E291: Catholics, Protestants, and Marrying Jesus w/John Bevere | Lila Rose Show

When she hit that back door with her dad and she had this gorgeous dress on, I was overwhelmed. I think that's the way Jesus looks at us, Lila. He's just looking forward to the day when the father looks at him and says, go get your bride. And see, I was raised Catholic and now I'm evangelical, but I love all believers. But you weren't raised with the real Catholic in terms of the teaching. I don't want any of my Catholic brothers and sisters thinking I think they're in error. I don't think that it's in error. It's just my conscience just isn't comfortable going to the full end of saying. I wasn't planning to go here in this interview. What would it take for you to be one again with the Catholic Church? Oh, that's interesting. Welcome back to The Lila Rose Show. Today, I'm sitting down with my friend, John Bevere. You may recognize him from the episode on marriage that we did with his lovely wife, Lisa Bevere. A lot of you love that. John is a best-selling author and the founder of Messenger International. John discusses his new book, The King is Coming, and we also get into a candid conversation about his upbringing and faith background and some of the differences and misunderstandings between Catholics and Protestants. I hope you enjoy. And please remember to hit the subscribe button. And if you enjoy this video, leave us a like as well. John Bevere, welcome back to the podcast. Lala, it's an honor and a privilege to be on this program with you. Thank you for all that you and Live Action are doing. Lisa and I so support you. And I'm gonna say this on air because it needs to be said, You carry this mission with such grace, such kindness, but yet you're as firm as nails. You've got grit like few people I know. And thank you for staying the course, not giving up, staying strong. I applaud you and your husband and your family for doing it. Thank you, John. Thank you. Well, I've got you and Lisa to look up to for that same tough as nails, but so full of love. And you guys are some of my favorite people I've ever had on the show. and thank you so much for supporting live action so much and the pro-life mission. We're just fellow warriors for Jesus. And we are warriors. Thank you. I was talking to you before you sat down and I was like, there's so many amazing books that you've written. And I, Catholics, Protestants, all different backgrounds because there's so much spiritual truth in your books that is just gives people a fire, fiery hearts for God. And I was saying, how many copies have you sold so far of all these books? I'm uncertain, but I think it's pushing 10 million. I don't know if I've had anyone on the show that sold that many books. It's just amazing to see the power of- I know Bait of Satan just passed 6 million a couple of years ago. I don't know where the rest of them are. There's 25 of them. I think the thing that I'm most excited about, Lila, is that they're in 146 languages now. And our mission for the last 16 years has been to give books to pastors who have nothing overseas. And we just passed 65.5 million courses and books that we've given to pastors overseas. So just Iran alone, we've done over 4 million. Our app is being used in 243 nations of the world. It's over 12,000 users in Saudi Arabia alone. North Korea people are using it. How this happens, I have no idea. But it's obviously a God thing. And as you know, as a leader of a ministry, God is the one that gives increase. We work hard. Paul planted, Apollos watered, but God is the one that gives the increase. Yes. Amen. And I was just listening to the scriptures this morning and the gospel reading was about the sower sowing the seed. And I was really moved and convicted again, where you can sow the seed and the seed can grow up and the weeds can choke it or the cares or the distractions of this world can choke it, but only God can actually give the fruit, you know, tenfold, twentyfold, whatever it is. Our job is to keep the ground right. Yes. Our heart needs to be teachable, needs to be humble, needs to walk. in the fear of God needs to be rooted in ground and love. If your soil is good, you're going to produce. And we are responsible for that. Are we going to allow the cares of this life and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things to choke out the word? Are we going to receive the word, but as soon as we're persecuted for it, walk away? So that's your ground, your rocky ground and your ground that has the weeds in it. And so we're responsible to keep our heart free, but God is the one that causes it to grow, as you just said. Amen. How did you first have an encounter with God? You've now been walking with God throughout your marriage, your ministry. Tell us the job of your origin story. As a Catholic boy, altar boy for eight years, Catholic school for seven years, my Catholic priest made a statement to me at catechism in third grade that I'll never forget. But I said, my friend Gordy Gibbs skipped Mass last week. Is he going to be okay? And the priest said, if he doesn't go to the confessional, he'll go to hell. Now, I'm not saying the priest was right. That put a fear in me, Lila. I don't care. You know, I play Junior Davis Cup tennis, the USTA circuit. I started on Purdue University's tennis team. All my coaches knew they had to bring me to Catholic Mass. Because that fear that got in me, when that Catholic priest said it, I was like, I'm never missing Mass. Well, there was a guy in my fraternity who saw that I had a lot of zeal, but he could see I had no relationship with Jesus. I was a complete party boy. You know, I would just, I didn't even like drinking, but I'd drink to get drunk just to be, to fit in. It was all about girls, everything like that. And I wouldn't listen to people unless they were really athletic. Well, this guy happened to be one of the best athletes in the state of Indiana in football and baseball. He came to my room and shared Campus Crusade for spiritual laws. He saw that it was getting nowhere with me. So he looks at me and says this lightly. He said, John, can you tell me about the president of the United States? I said, sure. Jimmy Carter's wife's rosaline. He was a peanut farmer from Georgia. He was governor of Georgia. He said, great. Can you tell me about Jesus? So I gave all my answers, right, that I got in catechism. Born of a virgin, had 12 apostles, died on a cross, right? He said, great. Do you know President Carter like you know your mother? And I went, no. He said, tell me the difference. I said, I've never met him. He said, so you have a relationship with your mother and you know about the present, but you've never, ever had a conversation or have a relationship with him. I said, exactly. He said, do you know Jesus like you know your mother? And my jaw dropped. And that is the very thing that God used to open up my eyes, that just being Catholic wasn't going to save me, just like being Methodist doesn't save us, just like being a Pentecostal doesn't save us. It is a relationship with Jesus. And the only way we can have a relationship with Jesus is if we do what a girl does when she walks down an aisle of a church with a white dress on. We're called the bride of Christ. So when a girl walks down an aisle with a white dress on, she's actually making a pretty bold statement. She's saying goodbye to about 3.9 billion guys. What is she saying? This is the one and only man I'm going to give the rest of my life to. I don't believe we talk about this enough in the American church, is that Jesus is our bridegroom. We're the bride. Just as no young man would ever strike a deal with his girlfriend when he proposed to her and she said, I dated this guy in high school for two years. I'd like just two nights a year in bed with him. And you'll be my favorite. I love you more than my high school boyfriend. But I just can't cut him out. No young man would ever accept that. And I look at Jesus, Lilo, what Jesus did for us. I mean, in writing this new book, The King is Coming, I did something that I haven't done in 46 years of being a believer. I intensely studied what he went through the night of his betrayal. He stood in front of four garrison of soldiers, three of which, Caiaphas, Herod's, and Pilate's, beat him till the soldiers were exhausted. Isaiah said that by the time they were done beating on him for about 10 hours, this is our creator. His face didn't even look like a human being. He knew he was going to go through it. He gave the words to Isaiah 600 years earlier. Then they do the scourging. His back is completely exposed. because they said the Romans, you know, the Jews only did it 39 times. The Romans didn't have a law like that. They said most often the man's spine was exposed and his hip bones were exposed because they would tie him up naked on a two-foot tall stone thing where his wrists were so locked in they couldn't move. And they would have a left-handed guy and a right-handed guy going wham, wham, wham, wham, wham, wham. with metal and bone fragments in the whip. And I look at our creator. He could have called for 12 legions of angels, but because of the joy of his bride set before him, he endured it. They then drive the nails into the median nerves, which is, according to doctors, is the most sensitive nerve in the entire human body. Every time he pulls up to keep from suffocating, the pain is absolutely excruciating for six hours. he knows he's going to do this because he's so in love with his bride, which is you and I and all the believers who truly follow him. Now, when I look at him giving his life to us that way, and we say, let me sleep with, let me flirt with the very things that drove the nails through your hands. No, thanks. That doesn't work. That's like the girl saying, let me just sleep with my old boyfriends when we're married. He's coming back for a bride that has given herself to him the way he gave himself. to her. This year, America is 250 years old. So let's celebrate by shopping for food that actually supports local American farmers and ranchers. Because the reality is, even if your grocery store says that the meat that you're buying is produced in America, over 80% of that meat is still from overseas. Goodranchers.com offers the highest quality meat and fish pre-trimmed, cut and packaged for incredibly easy freezing storing and meal prep. That's 100% American raised beef, chicken, pork or seafood all sourced from local farms and delivered right to your door. No antibiotics, no added hormones. My favorite are the chicken breasts. They are amazing. It's what we love to eat at our home. If you go to good ranchers.com and subscribe, you will save up to $500 a year. And if you use my code Lila, you'll get $25 off your first subscription order. That's goodranchers.com and use the code LILA. This Lent joins something truly life-changing, Hallow Apps Pray 40 The Return. Pray 40 is a 40-day journey of daily prayer leading up to Easter. At the heart of this challenge is one of the most powerful stories ever told, the parable of the prodigal son. This journey draws from the brothers Karamazov, one of my favorite books and one of the greatest novels ever written. Hallow's new challenge begins Ash Wednesday, February 18th and continues through Easter. You can join anytime. If you're ready to let go of what's weighing you down and get closer to God in your prayer life, get three months totally free today at hallow.com slash Lila. That's all of Lent for free at hallow.com slash Lila. We can never think about what the Lord did for us enough and to not remind ourselves of it every day and of our own mortality. What else is the life of a Christian to meditate on what our Lord did for us? So thank you for letting me meditate just now because I didn't do that yet today and there's many days I don't do it. Every single morning when I go out to pray, I usually spend anywhere from five to 10 minutes thanking him. And I walk through every step, the crown of thorns that lacerated his skull. I go through every bit of it, his beard being ripped out. And I say, thank you, my creator, you chose to do this for us. And this is part of this message on the king is coming because he was the lamb slain from the foundations of the world. god the father had a meeting with god the son and god the holy spirit before the world was ever created and said we're going to create man and they're going to mess up he didn't make us mess up he knows the end from the beginning he's not bound to time he just knows what we're going to do he said son would you go die for them and and jesus the son said yes and so um i asked myself a question was i'm sorry i feel like i've taken over this this podcast it's in your heart sure And I want to ask you about your encounter with God as a kid, but I want to hear what you're going to say here, because this is in your heart. This is what you put your heart into. So knowing he's the lamb slain from the foundation of the world, I asked a question in this book I didn't know the answer to. I said, you're God. Why couldn't you have devised a much less painful salvation for us? Why did you allow demonized men to do this? one of the things that he said to me is he said because I wanted to be as close to my bride as possible what I didn't realize is about in the last couple of decades psychologists scientists have discovered something it's been led by these group of scientists that are down in New South Wales Australia they did tons of research and they found out that people that experience mutual pain have a bond that's much closer than anyone else. I look at Lisa and I when she walked down the aisle 44 years ago this October, I was deeply in love with her, but we've gone through a lot of pain in our marriage, externally and internally, right? I love Lisa today so much more than the first day I married her. That pain brought us closer. Soldiers, they cite that soldiers that are wounded in war together have a bond that people just don't get. A mother, when she has her child, will go through the greatest discomfort she'll ever go through in nine months, and then she's going to go through the greatest pain she'll ever experience. You would think she would resent the child, but they actually said the bond between a mother and child is stronger than any other bond that child will ever have, even the father and the child. It's called, the scientific term is trauma bonding. So could it be that Jesus looked at his bride and said, I want to be as close to you as possible, therefore I'm willing to go through this. Now we have to reverse it. Paul said, to you it is granted not only to believe in Jesus, but to suffer for his sake. Wait a minute, grant? Can you imagine saying to a 16-year-old, to you it's granted for your 17th birthday, you get to get a root canal. That's twisted humor. Why would Paul say it? Because the early church understand the great privilege of suffering persecution. If you look at Peter and John, they were flogged, not quite as intense of what Jesus went through with the scourging. And yet they came out being flogged, which is getting your back whipped open, but not like Jesus. They came out rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame. Peter says, Christ suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourself. The Bible says we will be joint heirs with him if we suffer with him. Paul said that I might know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship. Listen to the word fellowship, the partnership of suffering. So here's what we got. Because I asked God this question. I said, I'm writing this book and I said, why will we never pull a mutiny, try to pull a mutiny against you like Lucifer and the third of the angels did. And the Lord said, Lucifer was never tested in the hostile environment. And I'm like, oh, I get it. But we do pull mutinies, right? I mean, what do you mean like the church? Why does the church not pull a mutiny? So Paul makes a statement, we will ever, forever be with the Lord. Jesus said, I will give you a throne like my father gave me a throne. And God said, your throne, Jesus, is forever and ever, right? In the ages to come, in the new heavens and earth, right? Why will we not do what Satan did? Once all the new, right? And the Lord said, because my bride was tested in hostile environment. And they chose me despite the test. Because the angel got a test, but you're right. The angel wasn't, it was a one moment test is I think what the theologians say. Like Satan had the one moment as an angel. Do you serve or not serve? He said, non-servium, I will not serve. But he was never in a hostile environment. We're in an environment in the world that hates God. The flow of this world is according to the prince of power of the air, the Bible says. So this world hates the things of God. It doesn't openly show it many times, but the course of this world is diametrically opposed. So when you look at Solomon's statement, who can find a virtuous wife? The word find actually means who can search out and literally discover her. And it says this, it's amazing. The heart of her husband does safely trust in her. So could it be, because if you look at Jesus at the beginning of his ministry, he did the miracle at Canaan. And that miracle, the Bible said, people began to trust in him. This is the New Living Translation I'm quoting. But he said, but then it says he didn't trust people because he knew it was in the heart of people. Three years later, he looks at the 11 and he said, you're the ones that stayed with me through my trials, right? I no longer call you servants. I now call you friends because now I trust you. You stayed with me all through my trials. Yeah, they had a hiccup that night. They proved it. The sanctification. I mean, that's the beauty of like this, the gift of this life. Unlike you're saying the angel, because the angel wasn't given a lifetime of choices. Yes. We were given, we are given a lifetime of choices and we can choose God or not. And we can suffer for God or we cannot. And that's the sanctification that is our journey to heaven. I mean, what a gift that we get to do it. But you're saying it makes that relationship with the Lord even closer because the angels are jealous. I mean, that's the thing that I've heard some theologians say, the early church fathers, that Satan was jealous of man and what God would do for man. Because he understood the salvation history, saw enough of the picture of salvation history. and he was jealous that God would, for a creature that he considered lower than the angels, that God would take on human flesh and that he would die for us. Ultimately, die and live for us, be resurrected for us. What manner of love God has bestowed upon us. That God Almighty, who made this entire universe, would call us his sons and daughters. And so when you look at Psalm 8 and says, what is man? When I look at the heavens that you created, the stars you put in the universe with your fingers, what is that? But I think it was one of the seraphim. Every time the throne of God moves, you'll see it in Ezekiel, the four seraphim move with the throne. I believe when God came down and formed man out of the dust of the earth, I believe one of those seraphim went, what is that? That you're so mindful of him. How mindful is he? Psalm 139, 16 says that his thoughts towards us outnumber every grain of sand that's on this planet. Wait, are you saying that maybe that Satan, that's when Satan fell when he saw what God was doing because he was angry and he said, I will not serve. I believe Satan fell before God created man. Okay. I believe that with all my heart. Yes. And I believe most theologians agree with that, but I think it's one of the godly angels that are right next to his throne, overwhelmed by how much attention he's given. Because remember, his thoughts about you, Lila, about my wife, about me, outnumber every grain of sand. In one cubic foot of sand, scientists tell us there is 500 million to a billion grains of sand. God can't exaggerate. So that angel is blown away by the affectionate love he had for human beings. And that's overwhelming. Now, to even call us his sons and daughters makes it that much more. But here's what I love about the second coming. It's about a groom being reunited with the bride he longs for. See, God not only wanted children, but he wanted a bride for his son. that he, the son and the bride could rule the cities, the countries, the continents, the universe together. I love doing ministry with Lisa together. I'm doing this because Lisa's in the studio. I love doing, I love doing life with her. I love doing ministry with her. It has challenges, but that's a fallen world. That's my fallen nature that may create the challenges. There will be no challenges. when Jesus and his bride rules the universe forever and ever and ever. So unfortunately, a lot of people in the Catholic Church, in the Protestant Church, have made the second coming into an event. I believe it's so much more than that. It is a heart longing groom that's coming back for his lovesick bride to be reunited forever and ever and ever. that's amazing it's beautiful well I think the official teaching of the Catholic Church of course individual Catholics may have their interpretations as they would but part of it is having to do with the personal judgment before our Lord upon our death because we don't know exactly eschatology wise how timelines will look with the new heaven and the new earth but we do know that we will all one day face Jesus face to face and have that judgment a personal and then a final judgment and that's really what this whole entire life is about is what are we preparing for? Well, there's two different judgments. When we see our Lord. There's two different judgments for human beings. One's gonna happen before the thousand year reign of Christ on earth. That's called the believer's judgment seat. I think our language we use is the personal judgment. Should look it up. But I think it the same thing we talking about That is more like an award ceremony If you applied yourself your award ceremony is going to be really cool If you were sloppy if you didn apply yourself you're going to have a little sense of regret because Jesus is going to judge us not based on our sins because our sins have been eradicated by his blood. He's going to judge us on how we served him, according to how he called us to serve him. So that is going to be rewarded by what the Bible calls eternal judgments. What does that mean? Because when you say judgment to the average Christian, where does their mind go? Condemnation. Well, but I think we can be condemned if we don't accept salvation. Well, that's the other judgment. That's for the people who didn't walk with Jesus because they didn't accept him as their Lord, Master, and Savior. And I think where I think their alignment to here is when you confess your sins, and I think confession is, you know, you can go before a priest and confess. You can also confess your sins any day, all day to our Lord. He's always waiting to hear you and always with you. When the Lord forgives a sin, like you said, it's gone. It's gone. The Lord has no— He said he buries it in the sea of forgetfulness. Exactly. Exactly. So it's interesting. The personal judgment is not so much a record of every sin, because if you've asked for forgiveness, you've been forgiven. There's nothing to record anymore. But it is about, yes, did I know you? I mean, I think about our Holy Scripture and the Lord saying, well, you did all these things in my name. Did you know me? And what was that? Did you live the life that the Lord had potentially there for you in terms of what you could do for the kingdom, how you could use your talents and, or what didn't you do? And it's all very mysterious because I, I would actually want to look that up. Like how much of it is sins of, what about sins of omission? Cause how maybe, how possibly can you confess endless sins of omission? I mean, I think that's what you're speaking to, right? We're using different language for it. It becomes really confusing if you lump the two together. The white throne judgment are the people that will not be saved. These are the people that tried to earn a relationship with God by their own works, their own merit, or didn't want a relationship with God. Or you've got people that said, confess Jesus, but really in works, they denied him, right? They're the ones that he says, depart from me. I never knew you. So there's no relationship. The believer's judgment is interesting. It's found in 2 Corinthians 5, verses 7, 8, 9, and 10, where Paul said, when we're absent from the body, we're present with the Lord, right? So he's only talking to real true believers. But then he said, for we, now who is we? the people that when they're absent from the body are going to be present with the Lord. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. The word judgment there is the Greek word bema. It's actually a platform where they would use, the judges would use to award the athletes in the Olympics back in the days of Greece. That's where that name came from. So Paul uses that name that it's like an award ceremony. So we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ that each one may receive the works done in the body, the body of Christ, whether good or bad. Now, bad's a terrible, terrible translation. The word should have been translated, and it is in some translations, worthless, whether good or worthless. What does the word worthless mean? It means it didn't have any eternal consequences, or they, here's what you just said, retreated from assignment. so in other words it's what we should have done what he we knew he was putting in our heart to do that we chose not to do that's retreating from assignment and paul makes it clear to the corinthian church that there's going to be people that actually get saved but they're going to come through like fire purgatory there you go that might be where they yeah where you guys have got That's where we guys, 2,000 years of it. But yeah, no, it's true. 2,000 years of it, right. But it's true because what you're saying exactly, let me, tell me if you think this is tracking with what you're explaining and how you wrote in your book. Believer's judgment, which you're speaking to, and this is from our friends over at Truthly. So they take the catechism, the church fathers and doctors and all this theology, and they have this beautiful program for, you know, you can dialogue with it. It's AI, but trusted, right? Through Truthly. And they say, A believer's judgment, or what is more commonly referred to in Catholic theology as particular judgment, I said personal, but particular, is the immediate encounter each soul has with God at the moment of death. This judgment determines the soul's eternal destiny, entrance into heaven, either directly or through purification, through the fire, purgatory, or damnation and hell, because that soul rejected God. At particular judgment, a person's actions, faith, and relationship with God throughout their earthly life are taken into account. This is a profound moment of truth where one's life is fully revealed and evaluated in the light of God's love and justice. This contrasts with general judgment, which occurs at the end of time when Christ returns in his glory. At that point, all souls are reunited with their bodies and all the final destinies of all will be publicly revealed as part of God's providence. Reflecting on this particular judgment, how do you change your life? How are you going to change your life? It's asking me, Lila. I'm going to pray more and do more, actually respond to the Holy Spirit more. Honestly, that's what convicts me because you get these inspirations of the Holy Spirit to do, to follow the Lord more closely, sacrifice for more, take more risks for him. And then you live your little routines and you don't listen. Lila. But anyways, I'm curious, is this in line with your... I totally agree, but I may not agree on the timing of what they're saying. But I will say this because I don't want people afraid on this podcast. I deeply love Lisa. I do things for Lisa. If she can't make dinner, I'll make it. Sometimes I may rub her feet while we're watching TV. I love doing those things because I love her. The same thing translates over to our bridegroom. Of course. We absolutely love him. We do it out of a heart filled with love for him. And he one day is going to say, I want to thank you for doing this. So when I do nice things for Lisa, I don't do it to get her rewards, but she rewards me. It may be affection. It may be, I'm going to make him a great meal tomorrow night. He covered for me tonight while I was doing that podcast. I don't do it to get those rewards, but she wants to express her gratitude to me. Jesus, I believe. Believe it or not. I mean, this is crazy. You think, we should do nothing but thank him for the rest of eternity for what I just shared briefly, what he went through, right? But he actually said, I'm going to serve them. I'm going to have them sit down, and I'm going to serve them. And you're like, what? And it's just like, he's going to give us a crown, a crown of righteousness to everyone that's eagerly looking forward to his return. You're like, I want you to share my throne. As my father gave me a throne, I want you to share a throne to you who obey me to the end. This is what he said to the church of Laodicea and to the church of Thyatira. It's remarkable when you think about it. I mean, it's like when I'm praying in the morning, Lila, I say, God, you could have made us slaves and we would have been so much better off than where we were. But you've actually called us sons and daughters and you actually want to reward us? It's the incredible goodness of God. It's just, yeah, it's the awe. We should have awe for God. That's another book of yours, the awe of God. But it's the incredible mercy and love of God. And it reminds me too of, you know, our role is to live in joy, peace, you know, the fruits of the Spirit and to be in joy. I mean, enjoyment of these spiritual realities of what the Lord has done for us. And I think a lot of the Christian life today is distracted, is dwelling on what is not, you know, the good and the true about our Lord, is not treating our Lord like the lover of our soul that he is. And instead, we just get caught up every day with whatever we're dealing with. And I think that's, you know, I do think that's the life of a lot of Christians today. We forget the goodness of the Lord. When I was engaged to Lisa, I was met up with a lot of daily responsibilities and pressures. but I was carrying her right here. Couldn't wait for that wedding day three months later. Couldn't wait for that wedding day a month later. I believe we're supposed to be that bride that our affections are set on that day because you'll find six times in the New Testament, Paul said, the crown of righteousness is for all those who are eagerly looking forward, eagerly looking forward to his appearing. I look at it as a kid at Christmas time, I hated Christmas Eve night when I was five years old because I couldn't sleep. I was so eagerly looking forward to opening up presents the next day. When my parents put up the tree, I was counting the days, sometimes the hours, until that big morning was going to arrive. Same thing when I'm engaged. Lisa went up to Indiana. I was in Dallas. I mean, it was the longest two months of my life, Lila. Every day seemed like a week. Every week seemed like a month. But I remember when we were reunited in Indianapolis Airport, I can still close my eyes and see it. I remember the dress she had on. It was a beige dress, kind of off-white dress. She was so gorgeous. I hadn't seen her in two months. And, you know, we didn't have cell phones, so we couldn't do the FaceTime and all that. But I looked so forward to that day. And then when she hit that back door with her dad and she had this gorgeous dress on, I was overwhelmed. I think that's the way Jesus looks at us, Lila. He's just looking forward to the day when the Father looks at him and says, go get your bride. I mean, when you really put that in your heart and you set your sights on that, you are eagerly looking forward to his appearing. It's really interesting. Paul writes in Philippians, he said, there are many, and I say this with tears, whose behavior shows that they have set their minds on things of the earth. Yeah. So then you look at John and John says that we will see him as he is when he's revealed. And all who have this eager expectation purify themselves even as he is pure. So the eagerness gives us the ability to purify ourselves from this life. Just like the eagerness for my wedding when Lisa was gone two months. I couldn't care how gorgeous the girl was in front of me. I couldn't care. I was so fixated. My sights were so set on this girl, this amazing girl I'm about to marry. Other girls lost. They weren't, I wasn't attracted to them is what I'm saying. So I was able to engage with them. I was able to do my everyday affairs, but my heart was so longing for that day. This is the way a believer is to live because this is what Colossians means when it says, if you're raised with Christ from the dead, then set your affections, set your sights, another translation says, on the things above. On the realities of heaven, another translation says, think about these things. Remember Jesus said, the one who says, my Lord delays his coming, begins to eat, drink, and beat fellow servants. So when you have this eager expectation, it gives you the power to walk in purity and holiness amidst a crooked world. But when you say the Lord delays is coming and you put it off and put it off, ah, it hasn't happened in 2000 years. It's not gonna happen in my lifetime. Now you're going to automatically gravitate to being more fleshly. Or when you don't consider your mortality. Because I think there's this, you know, remember your death, remember your death. If we don't remember that, you know, eternity is a second away. Eternity is here. It's a heartbeat. And instead we get distracted, like you're saying, and you know, well, the Lord's delayed. I'm going to be like, I'm not going to think about the fact that this is not all there is. Like this is all, I'm going to pretend like this is all there is. I should say, I'm not going to think about the fact that there's eternity. Then yeah. I mean, it's so easy to fall into the pit of just rejecting our Lord in the daily. Even if you're technically like, oh, I believe in God. I'm a Christian or whatever it is. And Catholics can fall into this. Like you said, Protestant, anybody can fall into this. On this show, we support moms and babies in everything that we do, including how we shop. Everylife.com has premium diapers, baby products, and women's products. We use their diapers in our household, and they're made from the highest quality materials, are supremely soft and breathable, and are leak-proof for up to 12 hours. 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Every show is vetted by real Christian parents, not only to screen out messages that are harmful, but to also avoid overstimulating video content that's linked to mental and behavioral issues. When you check it out, you'll find classics like Strawberry Shortcake, Babar, Paddington, as well as new shows like season two of Iggy and Mr. Kirk starring Kirk Cameron. And right now, just for my listeners, you can try Brave Plus free for seven days. Go to braveplus.com slash Lila. That's braveplus.com slash Lila for a free seven-day trial. I've got to ask you, though, about when you said you had this fear of God that was like planted in your tender heart. How old were you with this priest saying this thing about mass? How old was this? I remember having a fear of God as a young boy. Oh, in that third, I was third grade. Third grade. Yes. So it wasn't like awe of God, like he's so amazing. It was more like- He was being scared. I'm scared of hell. Yeah, it wasn't the healthy fear of God. It was the unhealthy fear of God. And I think I've heard other stories. I was talking with Perez Hilton. Yeah. He's the gossip columnist, was in the same sex marriage. I don't think he has any more. Or anyways, not walking with God, you know, in any public sense or any sense that I can see. I mean, he wasn't sharing like I'm a Christian or anything, but he went to a Jesuit school he was sharing. Okay. And they told him, oh, anybody who's not Catholic is going to hell. And he thought— That's the way I used to think when I was five years old. Right. But I think—I don't know if you guys are similar age. I think that that was a generation of Catholic practical teaching, especially in the United States. You know what I used to think when I was going to Catholic mass? I'd think, oh, I'd watch the people at the Methodist and the Presbyterian and all. I think, oh, they're wasting their time. They should have slept in because we're the only ones going. But that's so bad. That's terrible. Because that's not the Catholic Church's teaching. So I rebuke that. That is not the Catholic Church's teaching. It's not the Catholic. We don't know who's going to be in heaven or hell. We do not. We hope for heaven, obviously. And we want to help other people know the goodness of God and tell about Jesus Christ. We can be confident in ourselves. We can have confidence. Yes, we can have confidence. but to say someone is going to go to hell is completely ridiculous. And so, but I understand, I think the energy under that was they wanted you to take mass seriously, but instead of showing you the goodness of what this was, this is Jesus Christ, body, blood, soul, and divinity in the Eucharist, which is what we believe. He loves you, but you so beautifully described, John, that everybody should just replay and listen to about what the Lord did for us out of his love for us, because we were his bride. That was the message your heart was longing for. And you had it. So that just, I want to apologize on behalf of, you know, not that I am anybody to be able to do that, but I'm blessed with my generation for whatever it is that the priests, because I was raised evangelical, became Catholic. And the priests that I know, they are able to share what the church really teaches about salvation. And see, I was raised Catholic and now I'm evangelical, but I love all believers. The real Catholic in terms of the teaching. It's like, I look at you and I'm like, I'm looking at my sister in Christ. Of course. And you're my brother. Yes. So I think I was saying this before the program started. I believe all true believers really know each other. I'm genuinely in the presence of a Jesus follower, right? You know that. You know that here. We know this. And I think even John wrote about it, that we would recognized one another, right? Jesus said, you recognize each other by your loved one for another. What we're seeing right now in our society, there's so much offense. There's so much tribalism. That's not of Jesus. And hatred. Yeah, there's hatred. There's betrayals. It's so sad. And it's unfortunately done in the name of Christianity, under the banner of Christianity. And there is none of that. In the true kingdom of God, there's none of that. So just as you have things that happened in the past, like the crusaders and all that kind of stuff, you're going to have things done today that have the label of, oh yeah, I'm a Christian, but yet I'm slandering people. I'm dividing people. I'm against these people because they're not my tribe. That's not of God. I do think fear of God, the wonder and the beauty of God, but we should reject and fear sin. I mean, sin separates us from God. We don't want to be separated from our Lord Jesus Christ. So there is, in a sense, a healthy disgust or rejection of evil. That's a natural sense that we should have, that, oh, we don't want that. Get away from me. We don't want that. We want what is pure and good and true. We want our Lord. And I think about, you know, when St. Paul talks about in Corinthians, how you can go preach in the name of the Lord, you can prophesy in the name of the Lord. And if you don't have love, it's like a clanging symbol. It's the Lord really in you. And then what would the Lord say at your, when you meet him? And he says, here I was, Lord, I was this good crusader for you. But he's like, did you really know me? Did you really know love? and I think that's a real good word for us to remember every day to hold these things of yeah speak the truth know the truth know your theology you know stand up for what's right morally all of these things but are you doing it animated by that sacrificial humble I am the servant of all love that Jesus Christ literally gave and died for us with or is it animated with something something else God forbid pride which we're all you know tempted to yeah but that's the daily examination of conscience of saying, Lord, and like you said, your prayer time, talking to the Lord and like laying it all out, exposing our hearts to Him. You know, today love has been so perverted in our society. Love is just about, you know, giving me what I want and giving you what you want. Love is kind. Love is tender. Love is not parade itself. It's not boastful. It believes the best in every person, but this is the love of God that we keep his commandments. Yes. Because he doesn't have love, he is love. So therefore his commandments are rooted in his very essence. So Isaiah tells us, God speaks through the prophet Isaiah, that the day will come when they're going to call evil good and they're going to call good evil. So in other words, what is really good, what is really the true love of God is going to be called evil. And what is actually really evil and destroying people's lives is going to be called good. And we're living in that day. And the reason we're living in this day is we remove prayer. We remove the Bible from our schools in the 1960s. We've gone three 20-year generations since. And now we have a complete loss of a moral compass. And when I look at the garden, the garden had these two main trees, right, Lila? The tree of life. God is perfect love. He's my creator. He knows what makes me. He knows what breaks me. When I was building my kids toys when they were little toddlers, if I didn't follow the instruction book, the guy that created the toy, I often made a huge mistake, thought I was finished, but it didn't work. When I got the instruction manual and I deconstructed it, built it the way the creator said to create it, do it. Oh my gosh, it worked. That's the truth. I had my husband do that. I don't even try. But every man that's listening to us will relate to what I just said. but that's the tree of life. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil is interesting. When she saw it was good and it would make her wise. It doesn't say when she saw it was evil and it would make her wicked. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil is when I choose what is good for me outside of what God says. When we got a sin nature after falling in the garden, God gave us commands for two reasons. Number one, to show us that with this sin nature, we could never earn a relationship with him. It proved it's impossible. You can never be good enough to earn a relationship with God. It would have to be given as a gift. That's called grace. The other reason God gave us those commands is to protect us from ourselves because the human nature, because now it's the sin nature is going to gravitate if it not directed by the commandments of God It going to be directed to choosing things that are bad for it In other words I going to naturally gravitate to what will damage me. And that's what's happening in our society. We've pushed God's word, his statues, his commands, we've pushed it away. I know how to choose what's good for me. You know, you see this in Israel when they went utterly corrupt in the days of the judges. The Bible said every man did what was right in his own eyes, and he just did it. That's what we're doing today. We're doing whatever's right in our own eyes, not realizing we don't have the ability with a sin nature to know what is good for me. Only our creator who made us knows what's really good for us. And so those who love him and they are so aware of his love for them are able to choose this. I see you mentioned the Bible's being taken out of the schools in the 60s. And I don't know enough about that history to know exactly how much it was taught before that. I'm sure it was taught to some degree. You ready for this? Because American education system has always, it's changed so much in the last 100, 200 years. 1860. They memorized the whole thing. Supreme Court ruled unanimously, unanimously, that if a public high school in America didn't teach the Bible, they would not get government funding. Wow. 1960, we pull it out of the school and say it's separation of church and state. Well, and you go to the public library and they have yoga books. They're teaching about, you know, these rituals that are like pagan and indigenous. They're teaching about horoscopes and there's nothing, virtually nothing about true faith, about Christianity. It's a, it's, it's a huge issue. I think about though the history of like American history, but then also the understanding of who is God, what is Christianity? I do think that the last 400, you know, the postmodern world, the modern world of modern thought, the reject atheism, the rise of atheism, Nietzsche, all of this, because Christians weren't as united on theology, we were easy pickings for the culture. And I think when Christians unite on theology and moral theology as a core part of that, right? Then we can be stronger. But if we're not aligned, if there's some Christians that say, yeah, gay marriage is okay. Yeah, abortion's okay. You know, yeah, you know, sex outside of, these sorts of sexual activities are okay. This is fine. It all starts to split apart at the streams. Transgender, yeah, you can be born in the wrong body or you have to accept this, whatever. It's complete chaos. And you know, there's Christians that stand firm against that, of course. But then people say, I'm Christian and I believe this and that and this. And it's like, what do Christians actually believe? And how do you know you're right? And this guy over there isn't right. I can say I'm Russian. Are you? I'm a Russian citizen. I'm not Russian citizen. I'm not Russian. Italian, right? But yeah, I'm Italian. But what I'm saying is, but when you drill down and you find out and you start asking core questions, you're going to discover I'm really not a Russian citizen. I could say the same thing about a Spanish citizen. You're going to drill down. There's so many people that say I'm a Christian, but Jesus said, you'll know us, will know us. He who, let me just quote him directly. He who has my commandments and keeps them, it is he or she who really loves me and I will love him or her and I will come to them and I will manifest myself to him. So if you tell me you're a follower, because the Bible says in the last days, you're gonna have many people say, I'm a follower of Jesus, yet they're gonna deny him by the way they live. Or by what they preach, right? Or by what they preach. It's not the full truth, it's a compromise. Jude says in Jude 1, 4, he says that they're gonna slip into our churches unnoticed. This is really amazing. and they're going to say the grace of God allows us to live an immoral life. That is Jude 1.4. That is what we're living through. See, in the days of Jude who wrote that, you couldn't come into a church and say, hey, I am a Shintoist or whatever, right? The church would have gone, no, you're not in here. How do they creep in unnoticed? They profess to know God. This is Titus 1.15 and 16. They profess to know God. So they say with their mouths, I have a relationship with Jesus. But they deny him by the way they live and what they preach. So they subtly come in and they pervert, they twist the very word of God to their own fleshly desires and what they believe others will cause others to accept them. This is where, when you talk about the bride, we are the bride, but then also the church is the bride, and we are members of the church. We're part of the body of the church. Protecting the deposit of faith is so key, and that is the crisis, right? And I do see this. I see it within the Catholic Church in people trying to pervert, and thankfully, they can't change the doctrine, but they still try to do their little thing, but they can't change the doctrine. But then in practice, they're doing this. So it's scandalous for people. When people see this, they're like, what is this guy doing over there? He says he's Catholic. He's saying this stuff. Certainly outside of the Catholic church, you see it all over the place. People are, some people living what is true morally. They're speaking it. They're true blue. But then you have these weird things, you know, in the Methodist church or some of these other denominations, there's parts of the domination that split off that becomes, you know, pro-gay marriage or abortion's okay or whatever it is. I wasn't planning to go here in this interview. So if this is uncomfortable, we can cut this out. What would it take for you to be one again with the Catholic Church? Oh, that's interesting. What would it need to change? I feel like when God called me out, and it was very miraculous how he did, he didn't say you're to cut off the Catholic Church. He said, I've called you to my body, not just one section of it. So Lila, just as I would happily, happily said yes to come on, if an evangelical tomorrow calls me and I know they're walking with Jesus like you are, I'm going to say yes. Lisa and I both felt like God called us to the body, not to one stream of the body. And I look at the Catholics as it's a stream. It's a big stream. It's actually a river. Then you got the smaller streams, right? You've got streams of the Methodists and the Presbyterians and the Lutherans, the Evangelicals, the Pentecostals. To me, I'll give you an example. My Catholic priest was my drinking buddy in college. He could drink 16 beers and I'd be under the table after eight beers. And he loved me. I mean, just loved me. I was like his prized Catholic boy in the fraternity because I went to Mass every single Sunday. When I received Jesus Christ as my Lord, Master, and Savior, I was completely transformed. I was changed. I didn't want to drink and get drunk anymore. He's like, what's going on? Then I started a Bible study in our fraternity, and he was our house advisor. He was infuriated. Why? He got up because he actually got up in front of the entire—I'm going to tell you, He got up in front of the entire campus. And when I say entire campus, I'm talking about all the Catholics on campus. There was 5,000. Out of 34,000 students, 5,000 went to the church on the campus, the Catholic church, that he was one of the priests of. He got up and warned the whole campus about me. He said, there's a young man holding a Bible study. They're performing exorcisms, which we weren't. And he said, stay away. Well, that was the greatest advertisement. All these people started coming in. And I remember he really like started saying things, persecuting me, saying things about me. Was he? He actually, I'm going to go so far as to say this. Tell me, yeah. My wife's grandmother was the house mother for the sorority next door. And they were drinking buddies. Okay. The priest and the mother. The priest, because we were right next door to each other. Where is this, by the way? Is this in California or where? Oh, it was at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. Well, when he found out that I was engaged to Lisa, he looked at Lisa's grandmother and said, he's gay. He was just trying to do whatever he could, right? So it's okay. I'm so sorry. No, no, no, no. Hold on a minute. Hold on. This story is going to end well. Okay, so now I write a letter to my second grade teacher, Sister Madonna. She was the mother superior of the convent. So this is a lady who carried a lot of authority, and she happened to be my second grade teacher. I said, I'm just going to tell her. Sister Madonna, I found Jesus. My life has totally changed. I've been born again. I love the word of God. I have a hunger for it. Now I'm thinking, oh gosh, she's going to let me have it like he's let me have it, right? She writes me back. She goes, praise God. You found Jesus. I've been praying for you since you've been in second grade. This is like making my day. And it's just the most beautiful letter. So I'm like, okay, I got to go see her. So on my way up to Mary Lisa, Ozark Airlines, this is really going back, went through St. Louis. She was now way up in the Francescan order of the nuns in St. Louis. And I said, would you meet me? She said, yes. So she comes to the airport. And we reunite. We talked for like two hours. And I finally said, Sister Madonna, I said, I'm just so troubled. I said, Father Phil just loved me. We were so close. And when I got saved, he tried to destroy me. And she said, oh, you know. I said, I was, no, wait a minute. I said, I was so baffled by your response compared to his response. What's the difference? She said, oh, you know, John. She's smiling. And I said, I think I know, but I want to hear it out of your mouth. She goes, I know Jesus personally. He doesn't. She said, do you know why I'm still a nun in the Catholic church? because God called me to the Catholic church. He's called me to reach the nuns and the priests who don't have a relationship with Jesus. Now, do you know that she kept up with us for years? She came over to our house for dinner and, or she came to our ministry, excuse me. She used to come to our house for dinner before I got married. She came to our ministry. She read our books, shared our books with others and was so proud of me as her second grader. As you should be. I mean, because everything you're sharing, and this is, again, I appreciate you just, there's no agenda with this conversation. I know when we started, like, let's see where the Holy Spirit goes, and you've got this amazing book out on all of this. But when I became Catholic, it wasn't about, I'm Catholic now, I reject Protestants, you know, or whatever. Because Protestantism for me was never about protesting Catholic. It was just about Jesus, right? And then it wasn't about, well, now I'm here for the Catholics. I'm just going to go do a podcast for the Catholics. Life action is obviously ecumenical where every faith background is welcome. And our ministry, the pro-life ministry is for everyone, regardless of your faith background. But it's not, I don't see it as joining a club or a sect or a denomination. Instead, it's about fundamentals of how do we draw closer to our Lord and then go out and make disciples of all nations, right? And unfortunately, culturally, like you're describing with this priest, there's so much chaos, like people that are not really living the Holy Spirit. They're not in relationship with Jesus like you're describing, but the sacraments, baptism is still real. I know you, we both believe this. The Eucharist, I believe is still real. It's still Jesus. He's, he's, you know, not in a church far from here in the blessed sacrament. He can still feed us. He's still with us. He can be with us in the Holy Spirit everywhere we go. And so it's not so much about like what we're rejecting or how we're defining ourselves. I see it more of just, okay, we're getting to receive the Eucharist, getting to go to holy mass as this highest form of worship is the wedding feast. And we're getting to see it. hear, you know, on earth and be a part of this. It's incredible. It can go every day. And it's also about the deposit of theological, the theological foundations for Christians so that there is a, ultimately someone who calls the final shot in mother church, instead of everybody saying, oh, my interpretation versus yours on foundations around faith and morals, we know, okay, this is the, this is the right way instead of, oh, I have to figure it all out by myself every single day. have to wake up and figure it out again. You know, there's 2000 years of tradition saying, this is what the church teaches on sex, on life, on these theological realities. So I think, I think because of the way, I don't know, do you, it sounds to me because of these horrible experiences you had, not all of them, but some of them. I didn't leave the Catholic church because of the horrible experiences. I left it because it was a miraculous way God showed me. It was so I don't want to take the time to share it. But I will say that if I was in a community that all the Catholics in the community are like you and your team, and all the evangelicals were like hypocritical, who would be my real community? Be the ones that love Jesus. So you just rattled off things that I happen to probably not agree with if we went down there, but I don't need to go down that road because they're minor. You mean about the Eucharist? They're minor. What is major to me is that you love Jesus Christ and you see him as the risen son of God and your salvation comes through him who was 100% man and 100% God. His father was the Holy Spirit. His mother was a human being. We agree on that. We agree on doing his will and having a voice for those who can't speak for themselves. We agree that helping the people that are in need to hear the word of God, the majors were totally on. If we were to separate about every less major thing, we would be like the Ephesus church who like, if you're not just like me. I'm going to be violent against evil. I am going to be patient. I'm going to endure tribulation, but I've left the first love. And the first love is not only Jesus, but Jesus said, you've done it to the least of these, my brethren, you've done it unto me. And in the New Living, it says, you left your first love of me and your fellow believers. So to me, the more overarching thing is the majors. There are so many Catholics who love Jesus, who serve Him, who obey Him, and there's Catholics who don't. There are so many evangelicals who love Jesus, obey Jesus. Then there's those who have the name, but they're not. So... Well, I think you're talking about the heart's posture, which is really like at the end of the day because you can have all the knowledge, worldly knowledge, know things back inside out. I mean, Satan knows the Bible inside out. Satan knows the teachings of the church inside out. You can know everything and you can have your heart posture completely deformed. So in that sense, like that is the majors. It is the heart posture. And that's why we'll see people in heaven that were like, wow, you didn't even know. You might not have even heard the name of Jesus, but your heart posture was longing towards him. So the Lord miraculously allowed to reveal themselves exactly, which he does because he's so generous. So I'm not asking more of, again, like as a, the reason I believe it is a major thing, the heart posture, the most important, but what is a major thing is the sign, yes, of Christian unity to the world. We're not a bunch of denominations. We're not 50,000 denominations. We're not the Catholic, the Orthodox, the Protestant. We are meant to be one. So that gets me going because I want to be one. And it's not like a secret society, like, well, I know you know, Lord, you know the Lord, let's all get together. I want us to be publicly one. So that's what draws me to bring this up annoyingly, maybe. But it's also good. I think it's a good conversation. You're so generous. But it's also, I want, the Eucharist is really special. Right. I think that is another thing that it's protecting the teachings of the faith over 2,000 years against error. That's really important because there's all this error out there. You were just talking about it. But it's also, I just, I want the Eucharist. I mean, that was, that got me going when I, because I was given the experiences of the Spirit before I became Catholic and all of this, but getting to receive the Eucharist and to know that this is Jesus's Christ's body, blood, soul, and divinity, that is something that- You're part of the body of Christ too. The Bible says you are the temple of the Holy Spirit. My wife is the temple of the Holy Spirit. My team members are temple of the Holy Spirit because he lives in us and he dwells in us and he walks among us. And so that's where I thought in order to come in contact as a Catholic with Christ's body, I had to get that bread from that priest. Whereas I found out to get in contact really with Jesus, I need to find a genuine believer because they are the temple of the Holy Spirit, they are the part of the body of Christ. Paul says, you are the body of Christ and individual members thereof. So I'm sitting with a living tabernacle, a living tabernacle, part of the body of Christ right now. Yes. Okay. And I love your beautiful faith. This is when I receive that bread. I'm honoring the fact that I believe this is part of it. And I don't see that in scripture, but I'm okay with that because I see that your faith is in Jesus. Of course. So when the only reason I believe it's... I knew people in the Catholic church as, remember this, we were the guys that only Catholics are going to heaven. That was our way, only way of coming in contact with the body of Christ. And see, I remember being in church and the Eucharist, I was going to go pray at church just to be with our Lord in the blessed sacrament, because you can be with our Lord. I'm with our Lord when you're in the presence of a believer. Yes, you know, we are carrying his Holy Spirit. Like that is all. And like you said, we should not downplay that. But I think this is the generosity of God, because he didn't need to leave us the Eucharist. He didn't need to leave us his spirit. He didn't need to give us any of this. right? But I was in this church and, and the, and I was praying and I was like, I don't think the Eucharist is here. I had this sense spiritually. Um, then I, I looked over and like, yeah, it's not, the, the light's not on the tabernacle is not, you know, they, they were doing some sort of construction, but then I felt like our Lord said, I'm here. And I was like, what do you mean, Lord? And, and he's like, I'm here. You're there. He's talking about the workers and myself, of course, but he's talking about the workers. He was there in the workers. And I was like, thank you, Lord. And he was telling me exactly what you're saying, which I think is a good word for all of us, which is that he is always with us. He is with us in our brothers, and he is also with us in the least of these. He told us that. He's with us in the unborn child. He's with us in the person that is drug addicted on the street. That, of course, is the teaching of our faith too. So you see his face in every human person. That's our Lord's love. I have difficulty believing he's in every person because... Well, in that they're made in his image is what I mean by that. They're made in his image, but I don't believe that he's in every person. He's necessarily carrying him. I believe he's in those who have given their lives to him. Yes. Just as the day of Pentecost, he made it really clear, these are the people I'm in, and he literally covered them with the fire of his spirit. He's showing, and this is why the apostles write in the letter, you are the body of Christ and individual members thereof. Yes, that is an important distinction. Yeah, because I've met a lot of human beings that he's not in. Yeah. Well, the image is still there, even though it's very much. Yeah. There's a difference between image and his enduring presence. I see it all as just, I mean, abundance. That's the way I see it. And it's sort of like, well, the communion of saints, why pray to the saints when you can pray to Jesus? I do pray to Jesus. I ask you to pray for me, John. I talk to you, John, like I'm speaking to you now, right? Right. It's the abundance of God. The Eucharist is an abundance thing. You know, the Holy Spirit is abundant. The communion of saints is abundant. So when I think about these things from the Catholic church, I don't think about them in terms of, you know, some sort of a judgmental thing. What do you do with Paul putting rags that come from his body on people and they're getting healed and delivered? We do that now with relics of the saint. I've got four relics in the back right now. You know, that would blow a lot of evangelical minds right there. I mean, but... But also, it's also John 6. I'm curious your take on it. We're going there. John 6, when he says, you need to eat my flesh and chew my, you need to chew is really the interpretation of that word. But he goes on to say what? My words are flesh. My words are, excuse me, my words are spirit and they are life. And that's true too. That's true. Yeah. So I think he was talking about the fullness of his word because he is the word made flesh Yes but he left us So when the manna in the desert was left for the Israelites right It was this very concrete sign from heaven right Now Jesus is the bread of life right But he left God has always been a God of using you know, human beings. Like he uses us obviously, but he gives us something concrete because he works through nature in the natural order. He's always done this. It's very mysterious, but amazing. So he gave us something concrete. Like at the last supper, he gave concrete bread to his disciples that he broke. And then he said, I am this bread. And then his body's broken on the cross. But then the early church all believed and understood that to mean the believers break bread and receive it and that this is really Jesus that they're receiving miraculously. And this is a special way for him to remain with us. And you'll know the believers by the breaking of the bread. Very good point. Again, this is not a major to me. The major is, do we have a vibrant relationship with Jesus? Are we seeking with all of our heart to glorify him, to obey his words, his commands, and walking in his presence? To me, there's nothing more important. Yes. I'm with you, my brother. I'm with you. You know, my wife wears a wedding ring. I put it on her finger that day. The wedding ring is not the major. It's the covenant we made before God. So she could take that wedding ring off, and she does when she's cooking. that doesn't break the important thing, the covenant we made before Almighty God. It's just the same way with baptism. It's the same way with circumcision. Paul said, hey, this is an outward sign of the most important thing. You've given your heart to him. You've allowed him to circumcise your heart. So did I get baptized? Yes. Do I believe in that? Yes. but I wanna always go to the foundation of this was a covenant that Lisa and I made before Almighty God that stands whether she's got a wedding ring on or not. And we are aligned on that in that the most important thing, the foundation of all of this is Jesus Christ. In heaven, we're gonna have Jesus, not the Eucharist because he is the Eucharist, right? So there's not gonna see the bread in heaven. It's Jesus. It's all about Jesus in the end, all of this. these things of baptism, you use water to baptize, right? We don't baptize with the air. Like the Lord gave us water to baptize. Gave us instructions, yes. And so in that sense, major, minor, it depends how we're defining major, minor, right? But I think they're all gifts. That's the thing, they're all gifts. And it's not meant to be like, well, you didn't figure out the exact homework, so tough luck, right? It's not supposed to be that. And in the early church, it wasn't. And then I think we just kind of got confused the last few hundred years. Yeah. Because I wish Martin Luther had just kind of, the priest and the Martin Luther had figured it out together. We true believers were a lot more divided over this 40 years ago when I first got saved. Well, I've been saved 46 years. We were a lot more divided over this 40 years ago because I think we're actually growing in the knowledge of him and in love with him. And I think the more we do, the more we're going to come. And just like you said, it wasn't a dividing factor with you. I always look at the last thing lost was the first thing restored. And the first thing lost is the last thing restored. Do you understand what I mean by that? The last thing lost in the church was you're saved by grace. You think that meaning? That's when we went into the dark ages. And then the first thing restored is when Martin Luther, a Catholic priest, pounded his 99 thesis on the door and said the just shall live by faith. We went from buying indulgences and buying ourselves out of problems with God into back to faith, to where faith was the foundation, not our works of good works and not our indulgences. And see, I think I see when I look at Christian history, you see in every century, you're going to see that priest that, you know, didn't fully understand the truth. And so he made you fear hell without understanding the love of Christ. Right. And you're going to see that throughout history. You're going to see Martin Luther responding to excesses or a lack of representation of the fullness of the truth. And so he kind of says, I want to fight back with this other presentation of what I think this key truth that you're missing when you do this. And the church, the Catholic church reformed, had a counter-reformation to say, yeah, in these practices, we've forgotten the core, right? And that's always been a case throughout Christian history. The Holy Spirit's always reviving because we are mere mortals that are full of our temptation to sin, concupiscence. We're always tempted to sin. I don't know. There's still something here that I feel like if we prayed and asked the Holy Spirit to guide us, and I'm very open to what that looks like for me because I want the Lord to lead here. There's more to discover. It's truth. It's truth, Lila. I'm not a Lutheran. I've never been a Lutheran. But yet I just cited Martin Luther. Why? Why? Because Martin Luther received truth from the word of God, empowered by the Holy Spirit, that brought a change, a very good change, to where people were no longer trusting in their own works to earn their relationship with God. They were now receiving salvation by faith, the way it was intended right from the early church. But I think I'm saying, I think he misunderstood Martin Luther because the church- Martin Luther, if you go back, you're going to find out there were a lot of issues. I mean, but what I'm looking for is what is the truth that heaven is revealing? It's really interesting that somebody can carry a truth from heaven, but yet in their personal life, they may not be really walking it out in a lot of other areas. But still, they brought a truth that actually brought a revolution, a change. But what's so important, and I want to keep pointing us back to it, is what is your mind? What is your listeners? What is your relationship with Jesus? Are you pursuing him with all your heart, mind, soul, body, and strength? Are we truly his bride who loves him and lays our life down for him as our groom and our king? That, to me, trumps everything else by far. However, I feel like you and I in the past few minutes have dove into some of the less important matters, but we were doing it to try to find answers to what has created division. I'm okay with that. But I want to always keep pointing back to the fact that we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus. He's the one we set our affections on. I share it because when I was praying the prayers you're describing, Lord, how do I just follow you? That was the prayer of my heart. this is my testimony anyways right so i met the lord growing up evangelical bible-based church i knew jesus was real and i wanted to love him i figured out i had my doubts i was trying to figure out you know really rebuild my own face i didn't want to just believe it because my parents believed it so i went through a period of is this really true is jesus who he said he was is god real and i came to the belief that yes jesus is god you know the bible teaches the truth all of this. And then it was the hunger of, Lord, I want to get closer to you. Lord, I want to be united with you. I want to go deeper with you. How do I love you more? How do I pray more? How do I know your will for my life? And that's where enter in discovering 2000 years, church history, understanding more the depth of moral and faith teaching coming before the Eucharist and saying, wow, I get to receive you and be so united in this physical way with you. And that was the depth of it. So I don't bring this up as minors. And again, I'm so grateful for your patience with me because I'm not trying to like score a theological point because I have such respect. You're an incredibly- No one am I trying to do that with you. No, you're not. I know you're not. And it's truly an exploration of like, how do we get closer to Jesus? Because the only reason I'm Catholic is not because of some like team sport or, you know, sectarian thing. It's because I prayed, get me closer. And I discovered Eucharist. I discovered this mama church, like mama church in the body of believers, but also in the treasure trove of faith and morals teaching that wasn't going to change. It was going to withstand the test of time. I didn't have the baggage that you experienced. My poor mother was raised similarly to you, by the way, Italian, Catholic in Boston, the nuns. It was hard for her, similar timeframe, I think. And so she became born again at 20, left Catholicism. Probably right around 79, 78. Very similar to your story. Jesus revolution. Yes. But then met a lady in a bus who gave her the gospel. She heard it for the first time in the way that she could understand it. Born again experience. Then now she's back Catholic. But it's not like, oh, Catholic versus. It's more that, oh, the Lord allowed that because she wasn't with the formation she had received as a young Catholic. It wasn't real. Like she wasn't. It was real in that the Catholic Church's sacraments are real, but the connection wasn't happening. And so the Lord, I think, allowed this and gave her that born again experience. It was real. And now the Lord has brought her back to Eucharist and back to full communion. So I don't say it again as a minors for majors or trying to debate theology in more that, like, what is the deepest heart of getting as close as possible as we can to our Lord? And it's going to look different in different ways for each soul. but you know once it's like the eucharist is jesus and i get and i had this extra abundance of graces to receive him then it was well let's go for that do you understand that i love that about lila and the cat my catholic brothers and sisters and you understand that i love him so passionately but i can't i i have trouble with that one i see yeah yeah yeah but not a critical trouble. It's just, like I said, I believe we're members of the body of Christ, the individual, and boy, it's important. He said, until I return, do this in remembrance of me. This is my body. This is the blood of the covenant. And as long as, right, as long as I'm away, you continue to do this in remembrance of me. So it's very important communion to me. Very, very important. I think it's just how we view it. And I respect because I love how strong your faith is. And to be honest with you, I think that's what's the most important thing here is where's your faith and happy. It's kind of like when Paul wrote and he said, hey, you got a person who believes they can eat meat, sacrifice to idols, and you got a person that can't. And he said, happy is the man who's strong in his faith and approves what he believes. That's how he concludes that chapter. Because you've got a brother who can eat meat, sacrifice to idols, and it doesn't bother his conscience. You got the brother who can't do it. It bothers his conscience. He said, if he does that, it's a sin. If he makes him feel bad for not doing it, it's a sin. If he judges him for eating meat, it's a sin. And then he concludes the whole chapter was happy as he who has this conviction and walks in his own convictions of the truth of what he's received from the Lord. Well, and I think your point there is you have to be true to your conscience. Yeah. Because if your conscience is telling you there's error in this, right? There's error in this Catholic Eucharist, and it's not really what they're saying it is, then in good conscience, you cannot receive and you should not believe, you know what I'm saying? I don't want any of my Catholic brothers and sisters thinking, I think they're in error. It's okay, it's all right. I don't think that it's in error. It's just my conscience. Our love covers it. It's okay. Yeah. My conscience just isn't comfortable with going to the full end of saying, this is the body of Christ. Is that sit well? I respect that profoundly. I respect you saying it is. And I'm fine with that because I know you follow Jesus. Yes. Well, I don't know that many people have conversations like this on today's faith podcast, but I think they're beautiful. So thank you for being willing to. I've loved this. Talk about it with me. And I wish we did this more because I think when we do talk about these differences, but they're not so much differences as an understanding that, you know, it's the same thing because you were raised with this, right? You were raised with in the Catholic faith. Yes. But I don't know that the catechesis was the same that I experienced when I became Catholic. Yes. So your conscience, and I remember when my mother, when I became Catholic and my mother was like, you know, she kind of understood pieces of it. She's like, there were pieces of it that were like in her conscience didn't match up because she had become born again, happily gotten to know the Lord, you know, as a non-Catholian, now, you know, not in communion with the Catholic Church anymore. And so it's a process to understand what are these foundations that we share, certainly, but then something like the Eucharist, if you don't see it the way that I see it, then I can see it wouldn't make sense for you to go and want to receive. Right. Wow. Thank you, John. Thank you for talking about that with me. I've enjoyed it very much. Thank you. Thank you. Do you think that if more people opened their hearts sincerely and sought our Lord, how would things look differently, do you think, today? I think the early church experienced a lot of problems in the fact that the Jewish believers were still doing things that were prescribed under the law and the Gentile believers weren't. and I think Paul was kind of sent in to kind of bring a fact that hey look this is your brother that Christ died for this is your sister Christ died for look at this major on this I think the more we we talk these things through and that we allow different forms of emphasis in our walks to not be dividing factors but just to be okay I'm fine with that just like Paul was fine because I remember the time that Paul did get in trouble is when he went against his convictions and he did the purification sacrifice. That's when the whole place went into an uproar where he got arrested and eventually had to go to Rome. So, you know, that, if you look at Peter, Peter's got the Jewish brothers coming down and he all of a sudden pulls away from the Gentiles. That is the thing I think. And Paul called him out with the Galatian church. He said he played the hypocrite. so did Barnabas. And he should have been true to Peter because Peter knew that God accepted the Gentiles without circumcision, without all their rituals, and Peter should have stayed true to it. So I think the most important thing is we stay true to our convictions and also with an openness of heart to love and say, your convictions that you stay true to of what you see in the Word of God, I'm fine with, even though it's different for me. When we do that, I think that's the oneness that God is looking for. Do you think there's a vision when I think about heaven, and I hope one day we can be in heaven together, there's this vision of heaven of it's perfect unity, perfect unified love. I see a perfect unity before he returns, because he said, until we all come to the unity of faith and knowledge of the son of God. I believe that we're going to realize some of these things that are, we've placed high emphasis on are not the valuable things are not, are not worth dividing over. So that's where the, the, the process of hashing it out as maybe uncomfortable, it might make people, especially conflict of averse people feel like, why are you talking about your disagreements? You have so much you agree on, but that's where the hash out is so valuable. What do you think? I'm okay with it. I don't want to give all my time to it. Of course. I want to continue to preach the gospel, get the lost saved and discipled. 100%. But I think there is a value. That's why I've been delighted with us engaging right now because... Have you had a conversation like this before on a show? No. I haven't done it in this way on the show. No, I've never had a podcast conversation where I've gone this far. But you can... I pray to the Spirit of my Lord, I hope this is... Just that further. Please do. My wife's sitting right here. We've walked into cathedrals in Europe where I had to walk out. Really? Why? Because my sister died of cancer at 14 years of age. I took my allowance and I lit the candles to get her out of purgatory. And I realized. I'm so sorry. I realized after coming to know Jesus that the Bible says to be absent from the body is to be present from the Lord. And that's where my faith went. You were wounded, it sounds like. That's what my daughter-in-law said. I don't know that it's wounded. It upsets me and troubles me that there are still people who gave money for indulgences to build St. Peter's Basilica. And that's not at all the blood of Jesus that cleanses us from sin. And so wounding, I don't think is the right word. Seeing the damage, seeing the misleading that occurred, because I really believe I was getting her out. And that's why I would give my allowance money and I would light that candle. And I did it. And I did it believing, but I didn't have a relationship with Jesus. And I think what happened is when my fraternity brother shared with me the gospel, and he came into my heart and he filled a void that winning the state tennis tournament, playing junior Davis cup tennis, playing the USTA circuit, starting on the Purdue University tennis team, going to Catholic church didn't fill. Why didn't it fill it? Why didn't going to the Catholic church not fill that void? Because I didn't have a relationship with Jesus. and when he came in and I met him, he changed me from the inside out. And my Catholic mother was so mad. She wouldn't invite me to my dad's retirement party because she was concerned I was going to witness to people. But after that party, she looked at me one day, this is long before I know, Lisa. And she said, you've really changed. I said, mom, Jesus did this. What I couldn't do when I was going to Catholic mass every Sunday, mom, Jesus has done this. This is his gift, his grace. God put his divine nature on the inside of me. And what you saw before was a very very selfish, narcissistic young man. Now you're seeing a young man who's being transformed even as we speak. He's changing me. He's changed me and he's still changing me. And my mom, who wouldn't invite me to my dad's retirement party, was giving my books out to everybody that would listen to her by the time she left this earth. So... I don't know why the Lord in his providence allowed the errors and faults and stray actions of, yes many catholics including priests and nuns and lay people lila but but but but why that the lord then brought you to the fullness of experiencing the love of jesus and the relationship that you have with him and the fruit the real fruit that's come from your ministry there are pharisees that many of them were the enemies of jesus but there were pharisees who believed in jesus yes and they live by the letter of the law. But then in my experience, and I know so many more like this, experience now even a greater richness in receiving the sacraments and seeing mama church, you know, and understanding, yes, we're united in the body of believers. I see Protestants and non-Catholics who are baptized and believe and profess the name of our Lord and are seeking him. we're still part of the same body but I I just I I do have a vision I do have a vision that there will be a fullness of reunion of union this side of heaven you know I think it is the church united this side of heaven and I do think you have a special prophetic role to play so forgive me for that word, but forgive me. If you and I can get along like this, and the respect that I carry for you and the knowing I carry with me in me about you, knowing you are a servant of the Most High God, that you are one of Jesus's true children. And I think that same respect is mutual. Yes, then this can happen on a large scale, Lila. And it happens when people really fall in love with Jesus, not in their doctrine or their denomination. Yes. Yes, except when Jesus is the word, right? So in that, what is the doctrine then? I said their doctrine, not the doctrine. Not his doctrine, yes. The doctrine I'm all for. Yes. John Bevere, thank you. It's been an honor. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. What a blessing. A big thank you to our channel partner, EWTN. EWTN is the world's largest religious broadcast network. reaching millions of people every single day with the beautiful truth of the gospel. You can be the first to watch new Lila Rose Show episodes 24 hours before YouTube over at EWTN.com slash on demand and on the EWTN app.