Church and State - When the Pastor is the Problem with Reverend Riley Palmer

Spokane Valley could become a sanctuary city of a different kind. Councilman Caleb Collier says that this proposal. I'm proposing that the city of Spokane Valley issue a proclamation stating that our city is a Second Amendment sanctuary. Welcome to the fire. Welcome to the fire. Today on the Caleb Collier Show, when the pastor is the problem with Pastor Riley Palmer. Hello, Christian Patriots, and welcome to the Caleb Collier Show of Church and State Media, where we drive morality and religion over tolerance and apathy. And I'm your host, Caleb Collier. Once again, your favorite far-right shock jock and the show that talks about politics and religion. Jesus Christ is our referee, so it's always nice and clean. Real quick, you know the drill. Let's go to the website, churchandstate.media, fill out the form, get our newsletter, bypass the censorship. And of course, I personally call every single one of you who fills this out, As I always tell you, be a little patient. 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Lastly, if you want to get a hold of us, churchandstate1776 at proton.me. With that, and as you might have noticed... I do have somebody in studio with me. This is a very dear friend of mine, Pastor Riley Palmer. He's the pastor of the Adopted Church, one of the greatest churches. In Spokane County. I'll go ahead and throw that out there. I've been there a number of times. He's also part of a school. And your title with the school, Palmer? I'm the academic dean. Academic dean of THS. We'll be talking about that a little bit later. He's also on the board for We Believe We Vote. And also involved with another newer organization, right? Yeah. It's a campaign, really. It's a campaign. Okay. And we'll talk about that as well. But you're a father, you're a husband, and just all around a very pleasant person to be around. I should also mention an Army veteran. I'll tease him about that later. Thanks for joining us. Yeah. Great to be here. Of course it is. Yes. No, I knew. I mean, we've been having this conversation for a while. Hey, you should join me on the show. We should have a conversation. We kept talking about it. Finally, it has occurred. Yes, I'm here. You're here. And your family is going to be really excited to listen to this episode or even watch this episode, I should say. The question, right? When the pastor is the problem, what do you do about that? And that's the conversation that we're going to be having. I wanted to give an extreme example of when the pastor is a problem. You don't know about this yet. You haven't seen it yet. But I want to play this video, Chris, if you could get that one up and ready to go. I would say that in this video, the pastor is definitely part of the problem here. But let's go ahead and watch it. And then I'll get your take on this. Go ahead, Chris. And I want to share that, you know, Prophet and I, you know, we are living even right now in what we would call a polygynous marriage. My husband, our Prophet, he has a second wife. Y'all know her. Y'all love her. Y'all benefit from her ministry every week. And so I just want to take this time and just as a pleasure of mine to introduce to y'all Prophet's wife and my sister in marriage, Minister Shaquayla. Minister Shaquayla. Wow. Wow. This is so amazing. So we're going to have just a few. Words from Minister Shikala to see whatever she wants to say. Well, good afternoon, everyone. Go ahead and pause it right there, Chris. I think that's enough. We don't have to watch the whole video. Palmer, there are certain signs that I feel like if they occurred from the pulpit might readily identify that I should be moving on to a different congregation. Yeah. Yeah. I would say that's that's probably one of them. When you're when your pastor is polygamous, as she put it, I don't even know what that means. But she's mispronouncing it. Yeah. Having more than one wife is an obvious biblical no go. So, yeah, that's crazy. We're living in the days of crazy, I guess. There's a little bit of shock value that I had to throw into here, because this is so obvious. But typically, Palmer, they're not that obvious. Typically, you don't see it. You really have to examine the church. You have to examine the church through the Word of God, I would say. And I love your take on that, in order to identify if maybe the church is going down the wrong road. Yeah, I would say probably maybe the most pressing issue, spiritual issue of our day is that Christians and the world that I know is evangelical Christianity, the church is basically illiterate, biblically illiterate. They don't know the scripture. They don't read the scripture, study the scripture. And so when you have a people who is biblically illiterate, they can be led in any different direction and they don't know any better. And so, yeah, I would say that's a huge problem. I would agree. Chris, just real quick, is his microphone on? I'm... Making sure. Okay. We're good? Okay. I only see the one bar going up, and it gets me confused. I know. I get a little spastic here. I just want to make sure that it's a great production. I agree, Palmer, that we are illiterate. We don't read it. I mean, sadly enough, the vast majority of American households have, on average, three to four Bibles inside the home, and nobody picks them up. Nobody looks at them. And I know that you hear this message so frequently of, hey, are you reading your Bible? Are you getting up and spending time with the Lord? But it really is that essential to our faith to be giving some time daily to reading what he said and then entering into prayer. Yeah. And I think another part of that is that the way, so I was born in the 1980s. I really grew up in the 1990s. And I've been a part of the evangelical church here in Spokane for a very long time. And so I don't want anyone to think that I'm throwing stones here. But growing up in church, it was like the most important thing you could be doing in your spiritual life is praying and reading the Bible. But when we're reading the Bible, we were taught to read the Bible devotionally. So you're going to pick up a spot in the Bible and you're going to read three verses, eight verses, 10 verses, something like that. And then you're going to consider, so we were taught the SOAP method, S-O-A-P, scripture. Then you make observations on that scripture, applications, and then prayer or practice from that. The problem with that is that you're taking scripture in these little tiny bite-sized pieces. And what happens is you miss the forest because you're always studying the trees, right? That's good. Yeah. So I would say what's really important nowadays is like, hey, are you studying the Bible? So pick a book, pick a section. And rather than saying, hey, have I read it? It's like, do I understand what the content is? Just like just the basic content. Can you break down, say, the book of Genesis into its two main parts? Do you know like the main characters of the book of Genesis and the basic shape of their biblical story. And, and actually this is what is, makes it such a travesty. Never before in the history of mankind, never before has more biblical teaching and biblical availability been available to the average person. Like right now you can hear world-class teaching on any place in the Bible. You can I mean, it just makes it so easy. And yet, we are, or so the studies say, the most biblically illiterate Christians who have ever been. That like the medieval Christians in Germany knew their Bibles better than we do, and they couldn't read. That's true. But Palmer, watching a long format.... Sermon from a very good pastor gets in the way of me watching my cat videos on TikTok. Yeah, I guess. I mean, it's done intentionally. Okay, that's what it is. They have intentionally brought us to a point where our attention spans, you can't even watch the show. Honestly, because if it's not three seconds and it's not something funny, like a cat. Video or whatever it is, you're scrolling on to the next thing. Yeah, I mean, I would say there definitely are some systemic issues with the population at large. But for me, the real problem is the leadership of the church. It's pastors. And so I want to just be forthright with everybody. I'm a pastor. And so I'm not throwing stones at other people. I think we all need to get stoned together. Wow. I think that the real problem is, if I ask you, Caleb, what church do you go to? Then you tell me the church. And then if I asked you, is it a very successful church? That You have a math problem in your brain that you're subconsciously solving for. And what most people are going to go to, if I ask, is your church a successful church? Then what I'm really asking is how big of a church is it? That's not where my mind would go, but yes, you're right. That most people, and I can tell you as a pastor, you're trying to give yourself a grade. How am I doing? And like, hey, if you're a bricklayer, it's really easy to tell how well you're doing. It's like, do your brick walls fall down? That's not good. You know, how much production are you doing a day? You have to have a certain... When you're a pastor, it's like, how do I know that I'm doing a good job? So when you're assigning yourself a grade and trying to think through the issues of how well am I doing, unfortunately, way deep down inside, no matter what you say or think, you have the subconscious slant towards, is my church growing? And if your church isn't growing, even the people who reject the church growth sort of doctrines, growth at all costs, still at the end of the day, they'll say something like, well, I know we're doing the right thing because we're growing. Like healthy churches grow. And so as a pastor, you're like, is my influence growing? Is my preaching ministry growing? Is my church growing. And once you start going down that road, once that becomes the definition of success, and I'm just here to say, it has become the definition of success. 100% it has. I want to go into a lot of that seeker sensitive. I want to address some of the heresies, the more modern heresies that we're dealing with as a church. But I did want to return back to something you were saying about context, because that truly matters. Actually, my favorite Valentine's Day card. I love to give this out to people, it has Joel Osteen on it, and it says, you must be context because I want to take you out. Man, my wife loves that card. It makes her feel special. I'm sure it does. And Palmer actually grew up with my wife. But yes, when you're reading scripture, and people do this all the time, they take verses and they'll put them on their door or on a decorative pillow. Sometimes the context of it is like, I wouldn't put that as like a feel good message. Yeah. In fact, oftentimes it's that, but then you'll see people that are be like, what do you want to tell me today, God? And they'll just open up the Bible and put their finger down on something. Right. And like, oh, okay. Yeah. And then they'll take that and they'll apply it to their life when it could have literally nothing to do with what they're going through. That's why it's so important. As you pointed out, take a book, read through an entire book, And don't just stop at a chapter because there originally was no chapters. Correct. Right. And so oftentimes if you're just like, well, I read chapter five, I'll read chapter six, you know, next week, you're missing it because that actually continued on. Right. Yeah. Yeah. It used to be that books of the Bible were like self-contained. And so you'll have references in the New Testament to Jesus showing up in a synagogue and And they're like, oh, hey, rabbi, why don't you do some teaching and say, well, then he opened the scroll of Isaiah and began reading. And so without chapters and verses, you have a little bit more probability that you're going to read more than just a little tiny chunk. and that you're going to get clues from context when this section is over, rather than, well, gee, I read to the end of the chapter. Well, the chapters aren't like chapters in books that we have today. It's not like Isaiah sat down and went, well, chapter one. Introduce the hero. Right, exactly. It's more like, I think it was the Geneva Bible that first used chapters and verses in And so is more a reference tool for scholars so that when I'm making an argument from scripture and maybe that's something where you don't know exactly where to find it, then I could say, well, hey, that's Matthew chapter five, verse 13. Then you go, oh, okay. And now you have an address in your mind. And so, yeah, I think that's definitely like, yeah, read larger sections of scripture, get some help if you need it, but you need to... be able to understand the shape of the book of Jeremiah. Jeremiah 29, 11 is a great, amazing promise. You know the plans I have for you. Yes, this is one of the ones I was actually referencing. Yeah, I actually preached on it this last Sunday. And devoid of context, it's like, what that means, if you just read that verse, it's like this, God wants good things for you. And you are going to have good things in your life because that's what God wants for you. But if you read it in context, Jeremiah wrote that in a letter to the people who'd been exiled. And if you understand the shape of the book of Jeremiah, it's like, hey, you guys are doing terribly and you're not honoring God and you're not following him. And you have all these false priests and all of these false prophets, and you're listening to them instead. And disaster is coming. Judgment is coming. And they did everything but repent. And then Finally, God was like, cool, I'm going to divide the people of Judah into two groups. Those who are going to stay in Jerusalem and face my total wrath and those that I'm going to rescue out. Now, it's not because they're doing good, but what I'm going to do is I'm going to separate them from Jerusalem. They're going to go into exile. And then I am going to purge them from idolatry while they are in Babylon. And if you were one of the people who was living your life and then all of a sudden a foreign army rolls in and takes you captive and you used to be somebody and now you're a slave and you get drug off to a faraway land. Making people eunuchs. Yeah. And now you're struggling in a foreign place and it feels like your whole world has been turned upside down. Then Jeremiah writes this letter and it's like, hey, God has a plan for you. So it's not really a verse that was meant to be written to people who are drinking wine, having a picnic in their mansion. First world problems. Something like that. Yeah. And then they're like, oh no, what happens if the economy goes bad? I might lose my mansion. And then they whip out Jeremiah 29, 11. And it's like, no, no, no. God says good things for me. And so then what that means is whatever happens, I will like it. And then they get really angry when that's not what happens, right? So Jeremiah is writing to people who have no hope. And they aren't sure if God loves them anymore. And Jeremiah's like, no, God really loves you a lot. And he has a plan for you. And 70 years from now, your children and grandchildren will be brought back into the land and God's going to do good for them. And the best news is their problem, your problem with idolatry will have been solved. So it's more like a letter written to someone who's undergoing chemotherapy rather than someone who's... Just like got a splinter or winning the world strongman competition doesn't want to lose. If that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a phenomenal sermon. I mean, you just dropped a great sermon on the audience right there just by explaining the context of Jeremiah 29, 11. And I hope that that resonates with people and I hope they remember that and they don't just misquote it whenever they're experiencing some mild discomfort is really what it comes down to. So I want to throw some rapid fire things at you. Okay. And then just, I'll throw one out there. You explain why it's dangerous. And right off the bat, that seeker sensitive model. Yeah. Okay. So the seeker sensitive model, what the problem with it, and just that's kind of an inside baseball term. So let me just explain a little bit to the audience. That is church growth at all costs. That is where the pastor and the leadership of the church says, we will do whatever we have to get the church to grow. Now, they don't start out going, so, you know, we'll just have a sign that says free methamphetamine, you know, and man, our church will be huge. It's not like that. It's just like they, when they are grading, what, how are we doing? They grade everything by, is this causing our church to grow? So you could take any, like anything that a church does. Hey, what about our worship ministries? So at the end of the day, the pastor and the leaders of the church, when they're trying to grade how well is our worship team doing, they're going to be asking the question, are they causing our church to grow? And if the answer is yes, then they're doing great. And are they also going to be asking questions? Like, hopefully they will be about like, and how does that line up biblically? And so I, but even in, but in that model, they're secondary considerations. And so like, I'll just give you, a better model. This is what the ancient church used. So this was back in the first few hundred years of Christianity before Christianity was really a thing. When bishops of various areas were getting together and trying to compare notes, and I would say maybe in an uncharitable way, grade themselves against their peers. They had one question that was the gold standard for how well are you doing as a bishop? How well is your church doing as a church? And that is how many people, when the Romans came in and they gathered up all the Christians, brought them down to the Colosseum and said, you get to choose now. Will you choose life and deny Christ and spit on his image or stomp on it and then offer incense to the gods? Or will you choose death and not refuse to deny your savior? then the bishops were like, what kind of a ratio have you got? So how many martyrs are you producing? And so what if the church started saying, let's start grading our music on that. Is that helping us produce martyrs, like people who are going to be obedient to the Lord, follow him courageously no matter what comes? Or is it not doing that? And I would say, yeah, I think the worship genre that most... large churches and seeker-sensitive churches use, they're not thinking. About that at all. They're thinking about, yeah, do people come out of there feeling pumped up? Do they feel good? Do they feel like the Lord's with them? And so those aren't bad things. But when they become the thing by which we grade whether we're doing a good job or not, well, then you could ask the question is like, well, how many martyrs is the modern American church producing? And the answer is, I don't think that many. No, I would agree with that. Okay. The next one's probably going to go a little bit hand in hand with what you just said, but prosperity gospel. Yeah. So again, an explanation, a very brief explanation of the prosperity gospel is, and it came out of the seeker sensitive, is God wants pleasant things for you. So it redefines good, not from capital G good. But it changes the meaning of the word good. So they'll say God wants good things for you. But what they mean is God wants pleasant things for you. And then when they define it, they'll say health and wealth and abundance. And so then they say, like, that's what God wants for everybody. And if you're not experiencing that, the problem is you. And so what problems do you have? You have a lack of faith. And so here I want you to demonstrate your faith. by giving me money. And if you give me money, you'll be sowing a seed of faith into my ministry. And what God will do is he's going to take that exercise of faith and he's going to reward you with good, pleasant things. So you give me a hundred bucks, God's going to make sure you get a thousand bucks. You give me $ 10, 000, God's going to give you a hundred thousand dollars. You're going to have blessings. Your sicknesses are going to go away. You're Your children are going to do well. You're going to get that promotion at work. And so it takes the living God and turns him into an algebraic equation. Or a genie. Yeah, by which we get things, which is, I mean, it's antithetical to what the Bible says. Yeah. The rest of the Christians throughout the world are like, what? Come again? Like prosperity gospel could only take effect in America. Well, so just as someone who, so through the school, THS, we have students all across the world. And occasionally I get the opportunity to go and visit them. And so you can go into really, really poor places where, and I don't mean that the nation itself is poor, but that the average person, their experience is extreme poverty. So I was in Kenya and And we were doing a pastor's conference and we were asking the pastors who were there, what is the greatest need of the church today? And they said, we have got to exercise this prosperity demon from our churches. Okay. So it is taking effect. And I said... how? How did that happen? Well, it came from America. So the people whose voices get amplified are not the people who are really faithful. They're not the people who are just like preaching the true word of God, unvarnished and honestly. It's the people and the pastors who who have a really positive message, who are making lots of money, who are on TV, that's the stuff that's getting exported. And so if you are from a village in Kenya where you don't really know any American pastors, but you see them all the time on YouTube and on cable TV and what have you. And so a friend of mine who's a pastor there was like, it's really a travesty. So we had this guy come over from America who's who's a really important, like notable figure. He's not a rich man. He's not, and I forget the guy's name. And he said, we could not get people to show up to the conference, pastors to show up to the conference at this guy. But then Creflo Dollar put on a, and I don't mean to name drop, but that was the name he used, put on a thing here in Kenya and he charged money. If you're going to come, you have to pay this, you have to pay this. And he's like, which is really, really tough in Kenya. But you know what? they had, they filled up the stadium with pastors who wanted to pay the money so that they could go hear this amazing quote unquote, man of God speak. And they could get some kind of a blessing from him and the power of his ministry. It was like the power of those ministries is in fame and power and wealth. And in this world, those things go a long way. I wonder which private jet he used to fly over to Kenya. Um, Look, I don't mind name dropping at all. I've already dropped Joel Osteen. Creflo Dollars is not a pastor in my opinion. I'll throw that out there. You don't have to respond to that one. The next two, I would say, while the prosperity gospel and secret sensitive are dangerous, I would say that these two are perhaps even a little bit more dangerous. And so I'll throw two at you and you can address either one or both. But the word of faith movement and the new apostolic reformation. Okay. Now, if your average listener knows what those are, you've got incredible listeners. I talk about it a lot. On the show. Okay. So the first, you said the Word of Faith movement. Yeah. So if I were to try to give some kind of a precise definition, F.F. Bosworth wrote kind of the pinnacle of the, the, the kind of like really helps you understand what that, what the word of faith movement is about. I'm forgetting the title. Um, uh, but it's basically this, are you sick? Sickness is from the devil. Healing is from the Lord. If you have a relationship with the Lord at all, he doesn't want you to be sick. And he has invested us with the authority and the power to drive out demons and sicknesses. And in these examples in the New Testament, Jesus uses a phrase commonly when he heals someone. He says, your faith has made you well. And so. the logical conclusion from that. Let me pause you real quick. I apologize, Palmer, but we hit that hard break here real quick. We're going to come right back and we're going to do a lot more. In fact, we might go even beyond the 15 minutes that we typically do because. There's a lot to talk about. Hey, this is Caleb Collier with Church and State. I'm here to tell you about Hunter's Blend Coffee. I got to tell you, I absolutely love this stuff. I'm all about the dark roast. Hunter's Blend Coffee, black powder. Doesn't that just sound like deliciousness and rebellion? I got to tell you, in America... We don't drink tea. No, we drink coffee. It's the food of the gods, and I. Endorse and support Hunter's Blend Coffee. I've got to tell you, it tastes like freedom. So I need you to go over to churchandstate.media, scroll to Hunter's Blend Coffee, and use the promo code CHURCHANDSTATE to help support us. When you go to huntersblendcoffee.com, not only will you be getting a great cup of coffee. But you also, if you use the promo code CHURCHANDSTATE, be supporting Church and State in our dogged pursuit of truth. And we are back. Thank you for staying with us. You're over at churchandstate.media. We're going to go right back to our guests. But real quick, I do got to plug one of our awesome affiliates. And I'm going to go over to one that. I absolutely love. I take it daily. Well, at least Monday through Friday because... I love the effect on it. And it is methylene blue. And Palmer, I'm just going to insert you into here, because have you ever tried methylene blue? No, I can't. I got to get you on methylene blue, buddy. Best 365 Labs has the greatest stuff out there. Now, I know you've got a little bit of a... Twisted sense of humor, which is why we get along. Okay. So at the risk of offending perhaps the audience, one of the more fun things that it does is kind of a side effect. It's not actually what it's, why I take it, but it does make your urine blue. Ooh. Which is very fun, especially in wintertime. There's snow out there. Well, you don't even have to flush because your wife thinks you cleaned the toilet. Actually, it's a huge benefit. I got to tell you, it does do that. But it also. For if you're experiencing any type of mind fog, anything like that brain fog. it really clears it up for me and actually helped me sleep better as well. Really? So yeah, methylene blue. I love best three 65 labs. Use that promo code church and state. You're going to get a discount and you'll help support us as well, but go check it out. I already got a customer right next to me. Also remember to hit the donate button for us, please. Ladies and gentlemen, this is so important to keeping conversations like this alive. There really is a lot. Of work that goes into producing something like this with Chris, with myself, even with my guests. And if you like it, please. I mean, the Bible does say, at the risk of taking it out of context, that a worker is worth his wage, right? That he's due that. And I put in a lot of work for this. Chris puts in a lot of work for this. So please, ladies and gentlemen, hit the donate button. All right. With that, let's go back to the show. And we have Pastor Riley Palmer of the Adopted Church, which, by the way, I will just say this. If you're looking for a good church... That's a really good church. I've been there. Trust me on that. We'll talk about that in a little bit. But I had to cut you off on the Word of Faith movement. So please pick it up for the audience. Sure. Okay. So sickness and everything bad is from the devil. Faith makes you well. And therefore, faith healing comes from commanding in the name of the Lord Jesus the sickness to whatever to leave. And then it just leaves. And that's the way it works. If you have the faith, right? So that's the hidden thing. Even in his book, at the very end of the book, F.F. Bosworth has a chapter on if you didn't get healed, what could have gone wrong? And he lists things that are, to me, so ridiculous, it undermines the very claim in the beginning. Like if I say, like, Caleb, I promise you, You put me on the three-point line, and I will score every single time. And you say, why? And I say, because I'm that good. And then you say, are there any times when you can't? And I say, well, yeah, there are some conditions in which I can't. And you said, list them, please. And then I gave you a list, like a mile long, of all of the ways in which maybe I won't. Then you would think my original claim is just specious. Yes. And so that's the problem with the Word of Faith movement is that on the front end, it makes grand promises that are based entirely on your faith. And then on the back end has every excuse. for why it didn't happen. And the number one excuse is you just don't have the faith. Can you talk a little bit about the church hurt that a lot of people experience through this process? Because I have seen this myself. I've been involved in churches, thankfully no more, that have been word of faith. And it really, as I've explained it to the audience, it's really kind of establishing a caste system. Yeah. At its worst and in the most uncharitable, yes. Here's the deal. So I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis in 2011, I believe, maybe 2012. So I've had it for a hot minute and it wrecked my life, like really wrecked my life. And I had many well-meaning friends who were either in the word of faith or they were close enough to it that they thought, I need to go see Palmer and see if we can't get his healing. And so it gets really, when you're the person who's sick and also a person of faith, it can be like quite challenging. Here's my secret sauce. I want to give this to your listeners who, because you're talking about church hurt, as I discovered that the secret is when people you're sick, and someone's like, I want to pray for you because you will get well. What you have to do is you have to put that through an interpretation process. And here's how I interpret that. What they're really saying is, I love you and I care about you. Full stop. And then when I was feeling very gracious and had lots of patience, I would say, let's do that. And then they would ask questions, but do you have the faith to get well? And I would say, You know, I can't answer that except to say that I have every possible belief and confidence in my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And I know that I know he can do it. And they go, oh, OK, well, that's good enough for me. And then they pray and then be like, OK, now, like, test it out. Are you still sick? Yes, I'm still sick. So that's most charitable. When I wasn't feeling as charitable, I would say, I'll make you a deal. Yes. First, I want to ask, do I have to have the faith or you as the person who's praying, do you have to have the faith? And they would say, one or the other. And I would say, cool, maybe I don't have the faith, but do you have the faith? They'd be like, I think I do. Cool. Then let's make this arrangement. You're going to pray for me and I'm going to receive it. And if I don't get healed, you just have to listen to me talk for five minutes. I like this. Captive audience. They're like, yeah, sure. No problem. And at the end of the five minutes, I would say, hey, listen, I think your problem is that you think that sickness is bad. And like, it's not ideal. But to say that God can't redeem every negative, like Romans 8, 28, we know. that God works together all things to the good of those who love him and have been called according to his purpose. He doesn't say, we know that God gets rid of all of the unpleasant things and brings only pleasant things for the people who love him. So it's actually an act of faith to say, Lord, how are you using this sickness to do capital G good in my life? And you can't measure how bad it hurts. If you start measuring that, then it's like, it's not good. It's terrible. But if you start measuring, what are the good things that God is doing? How is he redeeming this in my life? Dude, I could list pages of ways. And my wife could list chapters of ways in which getting sick actually made me a much better person. And like, I thought God was calling me to be a preacher. And it kind of shocked me that my preaching ministry wasn't really going anywhere. But I was getting opportunity after opportunity after opportunity to visit people in their despair, in sickness, in the hospital. And I had this really crazy thing happen to me. I was visiting someone in the hospital. I was praying over them. And at the end, and they were crying. I was crying at the end. It was a very tender time. And they said, Reverend Palmer, thank you so much for coming. She said, I know that your prayers coming from you are going to do more than other people's prayers. And I'm not saying that's true. I'm just saying like, oh, because people know that I'm suffering a lot. It has actually given me a ministry that I otherwise would not have had. to care for people that I otherwise would not have cared about. I mean, not really. My heart would not have been moved for someone who's in the hospital. I'd be like, well, you're in the hospital. You'll get better and you'll get out. It's fine. But now I understand it. It's life-shaking to be a person who's totally helpless and you're at the mercy of your own body and your body hates you. But God can use it. He's done so many good things. So where did the faith move in? The problem is, is that what it does is it it makes everything good equate to everything that's pleasant. And that is so unbiblical that it's not even worth sort of going through all the many places in the Bible where that isn't the truth. Agreed. Yeah. So thank you for explaining that. And I think that's very, very good for the audience. I want to move over to the NAR, which is, honestly, it kind of incorporates the word of faith and prosperity into that. But in my opinion. and probably because I've experienced this the most coming out of a church that was NAR. Explain that, where your thoughts are with the dangers associated with the New Apostolic Reformation movement. Okay. Well, I'm going to take your word that your audience knows what that is. They should if they've watched the show, because I've done so many shows. Chris and I actually have done a series called NAR Wars instead of Star Wars. Yeah, so we've had a lot of guests on about the NAR. Okay, well, then I'll just cut right to the chase so that I'm not doing a ton of talking. I think the real problem with that sort of ideology or movement is that it places more authority in the quote unquote man of God than the word of God. So that you can have these apostles and prophets and stuff like that. And I don't get super bothered by the titles and the presumption. And I kind of get what they're trying to say. The problem is, is that it's asking the church community to place all of their faith in a person who's been touched by the Lord, who has an insight you don't have, an understanding you don't have. And so what it does is it makes the standard a personality rather than the word of God. And the book of Deuteronomy, when Moses is closing out, he's about to go and be with the Lord and hand over the keys to Joshua and And he says, don't say, you know, where is the law of God? Who can comprehend it? Is it up in heaven? Who can reach it? Is it down in the depths? He's like, no, it's really, it's right here. It's written down for you. Any person who can read can understand what God is like and what he requires of us. And that is, I think, the most powerful argument for the existence of God, the reality of the Lordship of Jesus Christ is the Bible itself. There is no other work. There's no other scripture that captures what is wrong with humans, what God is like, what the solution is, and how people can live with God and be acceptable to him by living in faith and obedience. And so, to me, the main problem with the NAR sort of movement is that it places way too much emphasis on personalities. I think that's very, very fair. I got one more for you, and it's not necessarily, it doesn't have like a label like the other ones that we've addressed, but I do think it's a very big issue within the church as a whole. And that's, The lack of reverence, specifically when it comes to communion or the Eucharist. Ah, okay. So you just want me to talk about that? I do. Okay. Gosh, how far back do I go? I'll just start with this, that Christianity has three sort of railroad tracks laid down by those, by the apostolic fathers, those who came after the Apostles but they were the guys who knew the apostles. They're the ones who were responsible for the canonization of scripture, for the implementation of the creedal formulation process. And so those guys were the guys who were like, hold on a second. We all thought that Jesus would come back before the last apostle died. That hasn't happened. And so we need to retain the apostolic witness. So- The three tracts are Scripture itself and the 66 books of the Bible, and that's, I would say, the most important. And then the second was the creeds. Of the creeds, I think the first four are the most important, the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed. And the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed are very similar to one another, and they are basically a definition of what the gospel is. So it is sort of a summarization of the entire Bible and how we are supposed to live. And address some of the heresies, what the Gnostics were teaching. Yes. So the first two are like, here's our story and our place in it. Then the next two, the Athanasian Creed and the Creed of Chalcedon, define the Trinity, that God is a Trinity. He is three. person's one God. And they sort of define that and lay that out for what that means. And that excludes a bunch of Christian-ish religions and has been since that time to the present day. That's why the Mormons cannot be considered Orthodox traditional Christians. They don't believe in the Trinity. But if churches recited these creeds, like some actually still do, then the Mormons wouldn't have that. I mean, a lot of Christians, you talk to them, they're like, yeah, Mormons are Christians. If you were reciting the creeds, you would know that they are not. Right. They don't believe in the Trinity. And then the Creed of Chalcedon is that Christ... It was fully God and fully man. And that was actually a huge battle in the church that we benefit from the fact that that has been resolved. And so the way that they would teach that, and I teach this to people in our catechism class, is they would, if you see old paintings of saints, they have their hands like this with the thumb, pinky and ring finger touched together. My Lutheran pastor actually still blesses people like that. Yeah, exactly. Okay, so this was all of the creedal information of the church put into one hand gesture that God is three in one and that Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man together in one person. Fascinating. Yeah. So you have scripture as a rail, the creeds as a rail, and then the third rail was about the practice of the church. And the word that they use was sacrament, the sacred mysteries of the church, the religious rites of the church. These are the things that we do, which have been blessed by the Lord Jesus Christ as a Christian practice. Christian lives are sort of defined by the use of the sacraments. So- I think the issue was during the Reformation, the reformers needed to be able to reject the trump card that the medieval Roman Catholic Church was laying down, which was we have the sacraments. And the sacraments are not valid unless we offer them because the church ecclesiology is what makes the sacraments sacred. And the reformers basically were trying to find a way to be logically consistent to revoke that. And so what Luther sort of decided was only the sacraments that are upheld by Scripture, the Word of God, are the ones that we should. But the problem with that, I think, is that it's sort of like when people say, well, Trinity is not found in the Bible. That's not in the Scripture. Well, yes, that word is not used. However, and that's why the church had to fight about it and come up with the Athanasian Creed and the Creed of Chalcedon. Those weren't in the scripture because those issues came after they closed the canon. So I think that the Eucharist, and so there were seven sacraments of the church, and Luther could only find two that he thought were really in scripture. And so that would be baptism and communion. And they were really, really sacred. Well, later on after the reformation, was what you might call the low church reformation. And this is more American Christianity, where the church is like, you don't want your pastor dressed up in a suit or wearing a robe and swinging a smoke pot, right? You want him sort of, you know, in a Hawaiian t-shirt wearing sandals and saying like, hey guys, that's low church reformation. And the low church does not know what to do with the sacraments. Because on the one hand, you want to say, well, yes, they're sacred. And yes, they're, but they're not really big on theology because we want the church to be super accessible. So what has happened is that churches still do baptisms, but they'll do it at a water park or something like that. And they rely on language. They're like, well, it's just a symbol. So the symbol, it's just symbolic that you're being reborn. And I would affirm it is a symbol, but it's not just a symbol. It's more than a symbol. Sure. So basically what I'm saying is that there's been kind of a theological slide, in my opinion, towards not knowing what to do with them. But interesting to me is I don't think there's been a church that is hungrier for the sacred things of God than the American evangelical church. They just don't have the language or the theology for it. So like, I'll give you a good example. Pilgrimages were a really important part of confession and absolution of sins. And it was like, hey, if you go to the Holy Land and see these holy sites and pray at these things, something will happen to you spiritually that isn't going to happen if you just hang out here in Britain or Germany or whatever. And like that almost perfectly describes how evangelical Christians talk about going to Israel today. They're like, hey, you got to go. It does something incredible for your soul. You go to these holy sites and you pray and you can actually see where Jesus walked. And it does something. lack any of the language. They wouldn't say, like, it's a sacred mystery. They don't have that language. And so it's more just like magic, sort of. It's like something magical happens to you when you're there and I'm going back. Harry Potter style. Yeah. So there you go. Okay. That's really, really fascinating. And I love and appreciate the sacraments. You know, and I differ on as far as Lutheranism goes. But I do. I found such a great reverence in baptism and the Eucharist for my part. I can appreciate those who on your side of things that are like, no, there's more. And we need reverence for all of those. And for the audience's sake, can you list the other sacraments? Sure. Yeah. Okay. Well, so the first would be baptism. And then the second half of baptism is confirmation. So baptism is like you belong to the church. Confirmation is sort of like a bar mitzvah. It's kind of like you are now old enough. to have a conscience informed by the Holy Spirit. So you don't need to have your parents. You can listen to the Lord. So right there, let me just pause you there. You're not against baptism of infants. No, I baptize babies. Yeah. Okay. And that's something that separates the church as well. Some people don't believe that you should be baptizing infants. Yeah, because it's a symbol of a choice. And so if it's a symbol of a choice, then that doesn't make any sense to baptize a baby. Sure. But if it is a sacred mystery that is about a covenant, then of course– so I say it this way because, of course, we're the adopted church. It's like baptism is our adoption ritual. And so like what idiot would say you can't adopt babies? Only when they're 19 or 20 years old, then you can adopt them. That doesn't make any sense. No. So that's the way I think about it. Okay. But then if you baptize babies, you have to have some way in which you can acknowledge someone as coming into being an adult in the church. And so that's confirmation. Okay. And with confirmation, it's like, you're not going to be confirmed in my church if you don't know the Apostles' Creed. You have to be able to say it from memory. You have to be able to say the Ten Commandments, the Two Commandments. Okay. You have to know the Lord's Prayer and Psalm 23. And if you could do all of those things and you attend some classes in which we talk about what it means to listen to the Holy Spirit and that kind of thing, then cool. You can be confirmed. You mean there's homework to join your church? There is homework. Yep. Wow. Not to join it to be confirmed. To be confirmed. I mean, I think we need that, honestly, Palmer. Like, I applaud that. We should expect to put in a little bit of work to be identified as a member of the church of the congregation, because far too often you just come as you are and, hey, I haven't seen you in like four months, but glad you're here today, you know? Yeah, so this is the issue that the American evangelical church has, is we don't have a function for allowing people to go all in. And so it's just like, hey, I'm really serious about loving the Lord and following Him, and I want to. There's nothing the modern evangelical church can do except for be like, Well, you could give more money or you could join one of our programs in which, so now instead of just sending your kids to children's church, now you can be a part of leading children's church or something like that. But we don't have ways to acknowledge. And okay, so you asked me to list the seven, baptism and confirmation. Then there's the Lord's Supper, which everybody knows. Okay, then there's marriage. So when I do a marriage ceremony, I will not marry anyone who does not allow me to go through the Christian formula for what it means, the commitment, the covenant that you're making. And one of the things that is like, this is classic sacramental language. It's not meant for your happiness. It's meant for your holiness. Like what you are doing is engaging in a covenant that's going to teach you about the Lord by firsthand experience. Hey, you want to learn about how the Lord loves you? Like try loving your spouse when they're having a bad day. You're learning about how God loves you, right? And giving grace, receiving grace. You also are going to have a really bad day and your spouse is going to have to not just tolerate you, but try to love you through that. And if you understand marriage as well, no, what marriage is, is it's just a relationship status. Well, then it can be changed. It can be And well, what's your, if I marry you, here's what you got to do for me. Otherwise this isn't going to work. And so, yeah, the American church has really poor view of what marriage actually is because they lost sight of the fact that it's a sacrament. Okay. Then there's ordination, which is when someone goes from being a lay person to clergy on some level. Um, so you can be ordained as a deacon, as an elder or as a pastor. Sure. And that again is an, um, uh, Getting into something, experiencing something where you're learning and growing spiritually that you couldn't accomplish otherwise. So, yeah, I think when we ordain pastors, I think we ought to be, you're not just hanging a shingle and saying, well, I'm going to preach now. You're actually entering into a covenant relationship with a group of people that you are going to be a good shepherd. And you're going to learn a lot about the good shepherd by trying to be one. Yeah. And you're going to learn a lot about sheep and how the Lord feels when I can't tell you how many times I've complained to the Lord. Oh, so-and-so is blah, blah, blah, and makes me feel, and the only response I feel to get from God is like, yeah, welcome to my world. That's the way it is, you know? Okay. And then there's the laying on of hands for the impartation of the Holy Spirit and for healing of sickness and stuff like that. And then there's the confession of sins. Okay. So there's just seven. Let me just address something real quick. And I know we've gone way over already. Laying on the hands, though, that doesn't mean that you're going to be slain in the spirit or immediately start speaking in tongues, correct? You're saying like definitionally from the sacrament of the church? Yeah, no, no, no. Those are I would say those are cultural expressions of what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit. It's entirely possible to be filled with the Holy Spirit. And to not speak in tongues, that's entirely possible, definitely, like biblically. And here's the thing about tongues. I teach my students about this all the time because there are many different traditions in which the sign gift of the filling of the Holy Spirit is speaking in tongues. Yes. I say, why? And then they talk about, you know, the book of Acts and some other places like that. And I say, okay, but also in the book of Acts, same chapter is like, these guys were speaking tongues and everybody gave all of their possessions to the church to take care of the poor. Why wouldn't people point to this if they're both like there contextually? So to me, the thing about tongues, I believe tongues is absolutely real. I also, I'll go out on a limb here. I also pray in tongues. from time to time, and so I'm totally comfortable in that world. The thing I'm not comfortable with is when people say it is the sign gift. It's a sign gift, not the. Why would you pick tongues? And to me, it's because tongues is the most fakeable gift of all. It's hard to fake hospitality or generosity or other things that are gifts of the Holy Spirit, right? Preaching, teaching, but anybody can babble. And when you're babbling and people say, well, what are you doing? You can say, I'm speaking in tongues. The only one who knows if you're really speaking in tongues is God. There are people themselves will claim, I don't know, I was just babbling. Someone else say, no, no, no, that was tongues. You see what I'm saying? It's a gift of faith, but it's eminently fakeable. Why would you make that the thing to look out for? All you're going to do is make, if your test about whether someone is on the same team as you is if they're wearing the same t-shirt... And I was like, well, anybody can buy that t-shirt. And so then a lot of snakes and charlatans get into the church and are in leadership in the church. And why? And people go like, well, gee, how did he get this far? Because you made a really stupid test about whether he's filled with the Holy Spirit or not. I think that's excellent. You know, I'm definitely more on the cessationist side of things. The audience knows that about me. That's okay. Nobody's perfect. I know. I'm close. But... But even on the cessationist side of things, we don't say that God doesn't do that anymore. Like all things are possible through Christ. And so if he's going to heal somebody, he's going to heal somebody. But on the cessationist side of things, we think those gifts have primarily stopped. That doesn't mean that he can't do it. It just means that primarily they're not occurring. And that's just for definitions for the audience here. To kind of put bookends on what we've been talking about, and really specifically with the title of the show, When the pastor is the problem, I threw a whole bunch of different heresies, errors in the church that are being taught. But I wanted for you in your own words to kind of bring that all together. When the pastor is the problem. What can people do? What should they be looking for? How should they address it within the church if they believe the pastor is speaking in error? The stage is yours. Okay. First, I want to give a really careful definition of what heresy is. Heresy is not just false belief. Like when we're talking about heresies, the church, if you read, say, like the Creed of Chalcedon, it ends by saying, and anyone who doesn't believe this does not belong to the Lord. They do not have salvation. So I would say like you would, when you're talking about heresy, it's not just a false belief. It's a false belief that someone knows is a false belief. And they persist in it anyway because of whatever benefits it gives to them. In other words, an actual heretic is someone who is an enemy of Jesus Christ. And they know it. They know it. So because people who are kind of in the reformed side of things throw that word around a lot. And I think for shock effect. But like heresy is something that's really, really serious. You're saying not only are you not saved. You are on the devil's team, and you know it. So I would say, like, I know tons and tons of really good people who are genuinely saved and think they're doing the right thing. They just don't know their Bible very well. And so they're easily influenced. And this is a reason why so many people are church hurt. Like, you think I haven't been through incredibly painful experiences? difficult, backstabbing, and I have been through it all. I think every Christian has really. Yeah. If you've been in the church for longer than say three to five years, you have had some like incredibly difficult, hard things happen to you. I would say like it has to be, the standard has to be the word of God. Why? Because we know that the canon is closed. We know what it is. It's a known quantity. Anyone and everyone can read it. And we can come to a conclusion on does the Bible say that or not? And so there are things that are like, so I would say you have to have a really hard center circle of what does it mean to be in the faith? And I would say the things that I listed as sort of the dogma of the church, scripture and the creeds. And then, I don't know, maybe sacraments fit in there. Maybe they don't. And there's sort of a level out from that, which is like doctrine. These are things like, you know, can women be pastors, speaking in tongues and those kind of things. It was like we can definitely have a conversation about whether or not the Bible actually recommends this course of action or not. I think it's entirely possible to be a woman and be a pastor and be like full of the Holy Spirit. And and like you're not wrong or bad for for me in my house. Would I attend a church that is that is executed like that that is run? by a female? No, I wouldn't, because I think that the Bible is really clear that the headship must be, should be male. Now, does that mean that if in some emergency or whatever, and the only person who knew how to do X, Y, and Z was one? No, that's not wrong. That's not heresy. That's not whatever, but just what are we considering normal? So for your audience, I would say one, make sure your pastor is preaching the word of God. And if they aren't, And it's fine to do topical sermons, but that shouldn't be your bread and butter. It should not be like seven ways to forgive and three ways to a more healthy marriage and two ways to serve. Those are fine sermons. And I preach those kind of sermons from time to time, but they aren't my bread and butter. And the reason is because they don't accurately teach the word of God and let the word of God set the agenda. That's the most important thing. Second thing to pay attention to is look at the leadership of the church. Is the leadership of the church quality people of deep character? Do you know who the leadership of your church is? Do you know who the elders are in your church? Do you know who the pastors are in your church? Do you know who the deacons are in your church? If you don't, you better find out. You need to know who's making those decisions. And are they people with a stellar reputation and who are really good and generous and that kind of thing? And if it's just a big question mark floating out there, I would say, man, find a place where you can actually know who the leaders are and actually have some kind of a relationship to them. I think if you're in a church where the pastor doesn't know who you are, isn't interested in getting to know who you are, and there are gatekeepers between you and the pastor or the staff, it's like that is not, in my opinion, that is not someone whose primary aim is to shepherd the sheep. You can't be a good and godly pastor if you don't know who your people are. Then what you're doing is you're running a corporation, you're running programs. And I'm not saying those things are bad, but I'm just saying if you're looking, you want to find a really good church, find a church where they preach the word of God, where the leaders aren't hidden, and you can be known and have relationships. I think that's fantastic. as well, which I think is very, very important. So I've really benefited from having a church aside for church and state, because I've been doing this on my own for a couple of years now. And while I like to study, and I certainly love theology, I'm nowhere near the scale that you are. And so I appreciate you coming on the show very much. I do got to say this though, as an Army veteran and as a Marine veteran, I think it would have been more appropriate if I would have been a little bit taller than you during the episode because that's just how Marines are. But no, man, it's been an honor, a blessing to have. You co-pilot with me. It's been awesome. Thank you, Caleb. Absolutely. We'll have to have you back again, honestly, and do it a little bit more in what people were used to with Caleb and Gabe and just addressing what's going on. culturally current events from a church perspective and from a state perspective. So we'll have to have you back and do that. Yeah. Can I just take 20 more seconds? Well, sure. I'm going to promote all your websites, but please, yeah. Yeah. I want to take 20 seconds here to talk to your audience directly. Hey, people. I just want you to know that you have a tremendous power. You have a tremendous power in what you choose to listen to, but also who you choose to financially support. So I I'm asking you, just as a pastor here in the local community, will you go on and will you donate to Caleb and to this show? Will you give them some resources so that they can not only keep doing this job, but do it better? I want to see this show. I live here in Spokane. I want to see this show do better. Would you do me a favor? You're not the kind of person who normally gives, but there's a pastor who's asking you. Will you go give just a little bit? Go give a little bit and help this show out. Thank you. That is so much better than when I asked for money. Like that came from the heart. And I thank you for that very much. I want to take the time to promote. We got four different websites that we're going to promote. Number one, if you live in the Spokane area, maybe you're doing a little bit of church shopping. And to be quite honest, church shopping sucks. You know, I'm blunt on this show. You know that I am. It sucks. You go, everybody gets there. You don't know anybody. You listen to the sermon, you're like, yeah, kind of, I like this. I didn't like this about it. Let's go try another one. And ultimately you get tired of the shopping and so you just settle. Okay. That's really honestly what church shopping looks like. If you're in that camp, go check out the adopted church. Riley, tell them a little bit about it. Our church is a small church. We meet in a barn out on the West Plains, out towards Airway Heights. And so it's like, it's a small crew of dedicated people. And, um, and, and we are totally like, it is not probably not a church like you've really experienced, uh, unless you grew up in a really traditional church. Uh, the worship, like we make a big deal out of everybody needs to be singing. Come on guys, let's sing to the Lord together. It's an incredible experience to be in a church where everybody is worshiping their heart out. Uh, the preaching is, you know, fair to middling, uh, whenever I'm preaching and, um, And we're a church. We don't really have any programs. We're just some people who love and care about each other. So that's what our church is like. It's a very masculine church. Let me tell you that. It truly is. Honestly, what you were talking about with the worship there, a lot of churches are geared more towards the women. And the women are up on the stage and they're leading the service. And they're singing in an octave that. I can't hit. Like, I sound like a bullfrog already, okay? But your church is a very masculine church. And the times that I visited, I have engaged in corporate worship and enjoyed myself. And that says a lot for me because I'm not a singer at all. Yeah, I played the drums in the band, not the lead vocalist. From there, let's go over to training pastors. Obviously, with what you were talking about on today's episode, you know your stuff, right? And so I'd like to see more pastors know their stuff. And so here's an opportunity for them. Talk about THS Academy. THS Academy is trying to solve the problem of getting young people into ministry. And so the school is relatively low cost. It is live online classrooms. So they're not videos, live online classrooms. And people like me teach. We have pastors, not academics, teaching. And our goal is simply to train pastors. At the end, we're authorized by the state of Washington to issue a bachelor's degree for pastoral leadership. And so it's just a really good, basic, it's sort of like a pre-seminary degree. So you'll learn a little bit of Greek, a little bit of Hebrew, church history, all that kind of thing. And then we also require that our students have an internship at a local church. And so you have the opportunity to learn on the job. It's a three-year program. And yeah, we've been around since I think 2018 or 2019, and we have graduates now and what have you. So It's a really good program. I really believe in it. I think more people need to be getting into the ministry. We need hardcore pastors with a spine who know the Bible and are ready for the challenges of today. That's how you bring about revival right there. I love that. Okay. From there, we've got We Believe We Vote. I've been involved with We Believe We Vote before. I was endorsed by We Believe We Vote before. In fact, I. Got 100% on the test that was given as a politician. But you are on the board for this. Tell people what We Believe We Vote is. Okay. We Believe We Vote is trying, it's all in the name. What we're trying to do is in Spokane County, give voter resources to Christians who want to put Christians and godly things. So we grade everything on biblical alignment, not conservative versus liberal. Though I'll be honest with you, liberals usually don't score very well because they don't have a very biblical worldview. And we're just trying to get good and godly leadership into our city, into our county, and to pass the ballot measures and the things that represent biblical values. So that's what that's about. And the voter guide is live right now for Spokane County. for this November's election. Yeah, it is a great resource. I go to you guys oftentimes. I know most of the people running for political office, but if I don't know one, We Believe We Vote is a great resource for me. And so if anybody's in Spokane County interested in the election, how they should vote, this is a great resource for you. Last one that we want to talk about is a newer one, and this is nomorehiddenchrist.com. You're wearing the sweatshirt right there. But tell people about this. Okay. So if you are a faithful person, one of our primary temptations is to feel all alone. That's very biblical. Elijah, you know, the apostles, they feel like I'm the only guy who's living like this. So what we imagine is what if Christians started putting out yard signs, wearing hats, sweatshirts that say, listen, I'm a Christian and I'm here. So no more hidden Christ is trying to get... our city, our county to recognize, and we'd like to go statewide and have, um, and have people know that like we have lots and lots and lots of Christians out there. So rather than like doing demonstrations and things like that, like this is a really simple, easy way where you can, um, Show the public who you're aligned with. I'm aligned with Jesus Christ. And and so, yeah, that is it's about that. I like that. And obviously there's some merch there as well. If you're wearing a sweatshirt, can you design a like a button up like what I wear? That looks like that, I would wear that. I will try. Okay. I will try. I would wear that. I'll put in a request. Okay, there we go. You won't see me in the killdozer. You'll see me with Christ on it. It'll look great. Okay. I would totally wear something like that. Well, once again, four great websites that I want all the audience to go and check out, get involved with. Like I said, if you're looking for a good church, the pastor's right over here. He's on my right. Yeah, because he's a good one, guys. Palmer, once again, Absolute pleasure having you on the show. I thank you for staying later than normal. Keep doing the Lord's work, Caleb. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. All right, ladies and gentlemen, there you go. Pastor Riley Palmer explaining what you should be looking for in a church. And I think we need a greater emphasis. In fact, I don't think, I know we need a greater emphasis on finding good, solid biblical churches. And he just gave you the rundown. So share it with friends, family, and neighbors. The Caleb Collier Show of Church and State Media is brought to you in part by Colonial Life Spokane Independent Agents, Finders. Insurance, and Mark37. com. I'm Caleb Collier. I was born for a storm. Welcome to the fire. Ladies and gentlemen, I want all of you to be a walking billboard. Some of us don't have platforms such as Church and State, but you know what? We can wear T-shirts and engage in great conversations with Christians and patriots all across the country. Stand Up Now apparel is the best T-shirts out there. These are American made, owned by a Christian and a patriot, and the material, it's like getting a warm hug from yours truly. One of the better things as well is there's no tags. I hate tags. I know you do as well. I don't know how many times I've cut off a tag and ended up with a hole in my shirt. You never have to worry about that with Stand Up Now apparel. These are the best shirts out there with the greatest messages. Let me give you a few examples. There's a t-shirt out there that says armed with Ephesians 6 on it. I gotta tell you, when I wear this in town, I get a lot of comments. And a lot of eyebrow raises. There's other shirts that include pure blood in Hebrew, obviously in reference to the vaccines. And also you can get Church and State merch there as well. We've got our flagship shirt. I was born for a storm with Church and State right on it. You got to order the shirt. Go to Stand Up Now Apparel for t-shirts and hats. 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