Thursday, October 5th | Technology and Innovation

Hello, everyone. Today is Thursday, October the 5th. I'm Ryan Hill.

I'm John Galantis. And you're listening to Clear View Today with Dr. Abbadon Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com. If you have any questions for Dr. Shah or suggestions for new topics, send us a text at 252-582-5028, or you can email us at contact at ClearViewTodayShow.com.

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We're going to leave a link in the description, so you can do just that. And the verse of the day today comes from Matthew chapter 13, verse 22. Now, he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.

This is the parable that led to my accepting Christ. Really? I didn't know that. Yeah.

The parable of the sower has a special place in my heart. 2007. That was the year. In October, actually.

Oh, you know what? It wasn't the 5th. I thought this was the anniversary, but I think it was October the 13th, or it might have been the 7th. It was early October 2007. I was looking at the run sheet. I was like, no way it's October 5th.

I think it might have been October 7th, 2007. That sounds right. I got saved. And it was because I heard the parable of the sower, and I knew that those three seeds, all three of them were true of me at one point, and the one that fell in the soil and sprouted, that wasn't me. And I was like, I don't want to go to hell, but there's got to be more.

Even at 15, I knew there's got to be more to being a Christian than that. And I talked to my youth pastor at the time, and I'm glad this is the first of the day, especially here in early October, because it was around this time in 2007 that that exact parable led me to Christ. That's awesome. Yeah, I love that.

I love that. And I love that parable, because, you know, Dr. Shaw said this before, and it's so true, parables are a mirror that you see yourself in the parable. So you have to look at the parable and ask yourself, where am I in this story? And just like you said, those first three seeds where they're trampled, or they're swept away, or they're choked out by thorns, they describe us at various points. And the ideal is to get to that fourth seed that falls in good ground, and it takes root, and it springs up. And that's possible because of our relationship with Christ. That's exactly right. And speaking of the deceitfulness of riches, someone wrote in million dollars question.

This is coming from a long-time fan of the show, Mike S. Million dollars, but your voice always sounds, 24-7, you can't get rid of it, voice always sounds like you've inhaled a bunch of helium. Yeah, I take that. Really? Mm-hmm. All right, I'm going to be you. And, David, if you want to pitch this up in post, that's fine. But here's you. Actually, I'll tell you what. Go ahead and open up Catalyst for me.

I'm one of your students. What's up, guys? Welcome to Catalyst Sunday Night. We're glad that you guys have decided to worship with us tonight. Go ahead and grab your Bibles.

I'd open them up to- Ryan. Yes. Why do your voice sound like that?

Because this is my voice. Also, is that a Rolex? It is. Sorry, is that a Bentley outside?

Yeah, that's one of the cars that I have. Okay, you just sound really weird. Oh, well, I'm sorry. I'm trying not to let that be a distraction. All right, go ahead, go ahead.

Release is chapter five, and we're going to start reading verse one. I can't get over this. I tell you what. Can you sing Alvin and the Chipmunks' Christmas Don't Be Late? Sure. Christmas, Christmas time is here. I can't abide.

What's wrong? I can't abide. I wouldn't take this money. Not for a million dollars. Really? Are you serious? I sing for a living. Are you serious? I sing for a living. So, you'll just sing differently.

If I did it, it'd be like, what do we do? Hallelujah. Thank you, Jesus. Why is everybody laughing? Why am I laughing?

I was a prisoner. People whispering to them. It is good, because I will say this. When you chipmunk your voice up, it does sound like it's typically more on... It's not actually on pitch, but it's harder to tell when you're off pitch. Well, I mean, it's kind of like severe auto-tune. You're controlling the pitch.

You could really do lots of runs. I was a prisoner, and now I'm not. Yeah, yeah. Exquisite. I would do it. Exquisite. I would do it.

Right? See? Okay. I changed my mind.

You just sound different. I would do it. Plus, you'd be the only worship leader with a voice of a chipmunk.

Yeah, that's true. Maybe there's a market for that. Million dollars. Would you do it, David? Your voice 24-7 sounds like you're on helium? No. What? I don't know. Because I like my voice.

I mean, don't you like a million dollars? I like my voice better. This is the voice guy, David. All right. That's what we're doing? We're going to do that? All right.

I don't know. Conversation over. Well, there you go. Go ahead and segue us in. Now, I'm curious as to what Dr. Joe's preaching would sound like on helium.

That's a forbidden trail that I should not explore, but I'm really curious. No, let's do it. Let's do it. Let's see what he would say. Text in and let us know what you would do. Would you take the million for a helium-pitched voice, or would you say, nah, I'd rather stick with my regular voice? Some people would be like, their contractors are big-time CEOs, so they need that deep, booming voice. Yeah.

I want those TPS reports on my desk by five o'clock, or you're out of here! It just doesn't have the same punch. It wouldn't have the same punch. You're right. I don't know. Let us know.

Let us know. We're going to get Dr. Shah and see what he thinks after this. Hey there, listeners. I'm Jon Galantis.

And I'm Ellie Galantis. And we just want to take a quick second and talk to you about Dr. Shah's and Nicole's book, 30 Days to a New Beginning, Daily Devotions to Help You Move Forward. You know, this is actually the second book in the 30 Days series. And the whole point of this devotional is to help us get unstuck from the ruts of life. You know, when it comes to running the race of life, it matters how you start, but a bad start doesn't ultimately determine how you finish the race. You can have a good finish, even with a bad start, and that's where this book comes in.

No matter who you are or where you are in life, you're going to get stuck. Instead of going out and buying some gadget or some planner, like I know I've done several times, 30 Days encourages you to find your fresh start in God's Word. Life doesn't have a reset button, but our God is a God who does new things. His mercies are new every day, which means every day is a new chance for you to start over. You can grab 30 Days to a New Beginning on Amazon.com. We're going to leave a link in the description box below, and if you already have the book, let us know what you think about it.

That's right. Send us a text, 252-582-5028. Share what God has done in your life through this devotional. Hey, maybe we'll even read your story on the air. Elly, you ready to get back to the show? Let's do it.

All right. Welcome back to Clearview Today with Dr. Abbadon Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at ClearviewTodayShow.com, or if you have any questions or suggestions for new topics, send us a text at 252-582-5028.

That's right. If today's your first time ever joining us here on the Clearview Today Show, we want to welcome you, let you know exactly who's talking to you today. Dr. Abbadon Shah is a PhD in New Testament textual criticism, professor at Carolina University, author, full-time pastor, and the host of today's show. You can find all of his work on his website.

That's AbbadonShah.com. Dr. Shah, we had someone write in today, a million dollars, but for the rest of your life. I'll even go kind of lighter on that. You just have to preach.

Only when you preach, your voice sounds as though you just inhaled a bunch of helium. For a million dollars? For a million dollars.

For a million dollars. I'll do it. You'll do it?

I'll do it. Can you give me, can you give me just right now, just like on, from, as you're, as though you're on the pulpit, can you give me just Colossians 1, maybe 15 through 18? Colossians 1, 15 through 18? It's like super theologically heavy about it.

That's one of the heaviest epistles out there. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him, all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth. Amen.

Visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through him and for him. I believe it. See, I think it could work.

I believe it. I think it could work. You could lean into it.

It could be like a trademark, like a signature thing. Nobody else sounds like you. I think you could lean into it. Finish strong, Dr. Shah. Finish strong. And he is before all things. And in him, all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead.

That in all things, he may have the preeminence. That's a pastor I could follow, dude. That is a pastor I could follow.

I would follow you to the gates of Mordor itself. That's awesome. Yeah. That's really fun.

That's really fun. I think you could do it. You made it a thing.

I think you could lean into it. Bro, technology, man. The fact that we're able to do that live is so cool. Well, it's funny that you mention that. Speaking of technology, today is actually the 12th anniversary of Steve Jobs' passing. When you think of technology, when you think of innovation, most of the time, you're going to think of Apple. You're going to think of the iPhone, latest and greatest. In fact, I don't know if you guys watched the Apple Summit that they had, the big reveal a couple weeks ago. The new iPhone. So many new features. I didn't even know phones were going to be capable of that. I saw a picture posted on social media that made me think about this. It was somebody with a stereo and a GPS system and a phone and a laptop computer and just all these different devices.

And they said, all of this is now in your pocket. Yeah. How many Apple devices are in this room? We each have a phone. I've got an iPad.

I've got my i15 Pro. You all both have iPhones. There's at least 10, just off the top of our head, 10 Apple products in this small studio. And that's just this room. I mean, you go outside to our campus.

I mean, there's tons. Dr. Shah, you're extraordinarily unique as a pastor in that you are very engaged with technology. I think a lot of people in your position sort of write that off and say, all I need is this Good Book and my staff or my kids get into all that.

But you are not that way at all. And in the 10 years that I've known you, you've always been passionate about being on the cutting edge of technology. But two people inspired me in that direction.

One was my dad. Growing up, I watched him how he would always try to be up on technology. Like our church back in the 70s had a projector. It was a slide projector. And he would use that to teach people biblical stories or geography of the Bible lands and all these things.

I mean, he would do that. There's so many other things. We had overhead projector back in the early 80s when overhead projectors were not even here in America in many parts of the country. We had it over there.

And he got it from Germany. And it was wonderful. So a lot of things my dad did and that impacted me. But here when I came, I sort of lost that edge. And I became kind of like, you know, I'm just a pad and paper guy. Give me the yellow notepad and a pen and I'm going to write my sermons and do my thing. And then when we began to change, change in the sense of become, kind of examine our mission, values, vision, all those kinds of things.

And we went through that time of transition where we kept our core doctrines the same. But how can we capture the culture? That's when I realized, what am I doing? I'm wasting time with the yellow notepad and a pen. And then if I mess up, I'm scratching it off or tearing up that page and throwing it away and then restarting that entire page because I want to just write.

But I could be on a computer and I'm using the computer every single day for my PhD work, for my articles, things like that. But I'm not doing it for sermon because I think it's more spiritual. And I think sometimes there are pastors, there are Sunday school teachers who feel godlier if they have pen and paper. Like it's only me and Jesus right now and that's all that matters. I don't know if it's me and Jesus, but they feel like there's something about the pen and paper that really makes me think and be authentic or just be heart to heart with God. Do you think that they see themselves as a Martin Luther somewhere sitting with a quill and a little ink bottle back in the good old days?

I guess so. It's one of those things where we feel like technology, because it's by its nature distracting, we feel like either we're so unself-controlled that we can't do it or it's just meant to be some sort of distraction or obstacle. Here's the thing, and you've taught me this Dr. Shah, technology works for us. We are the ones who make technology what it is. So technology is as distracting as we allow it to be. There are methods that you can use and there are things you can put in place to where your technology will help you focus.

It's not going to distract you. The person who helped me with that, of course you heard me talk about my dad growing up, how he was up on technology and all that, but the person who helped me here was Josh Town. Josh Town, he and his wife are wonderful members of our church. He owns a Chick-fil-A and all that. He's just a good friend. One day, when he first started coming here, he decided to take me out to eat. I said, okay, sure, let's do that. Then he began to ask me, what do you use for technology? At the time, I was just using a PC or a laptop. He said, you need to consider trying out Apple products, Mac. I said, this Apple and Mac, they're so controlling.

It's just their thing or nothing else. He said, don't worry about all that. You will see how much it'll make your life easier. So I'm like, okay. So we actually went to the Apple store and I ended up buying a Mac, a MacBook.

This is going back to, I want to say, 2013. I actually brought it and put it on top of our piano that's in the house. It sat there for the next three months. Wow. It just sat there closing the house.

It sat there, out of the box, but it was sitting there. While I kept using my PC, I was not ready to make the transition. I'm like, I don't want to mess up. I can't do that.

I have to really know everything about everything before I can use that Mac. Now I look back and think, oh, that was so dumb. Now if I have to go use a PC, I'm like, oh golly, I really don't want to use the PC.

I don't want to go back to it. So I sat there like that. Then when I finally opened it up, of course it was very intimidating. As much as he helped me, he also intimidated me because he was like, you can do this to this, and you can do that, you can swipe this.

It's like Tony Stark showing you stuff. I didn't want to swipe something and all my files are deleted forever. Hey, when you swiped that, you cleaned out the entire recycle bin.

Like, I needed that. So I kept saying like that, and then finally I began to use it. Then I got an iPhone, got an iPad, got them all synced, got on iCloud. Life is so much easier and better. So he helped me tremendously, and he will probably agree with me on that, but I know far more about Apple and Mac than he ever will. I bet.

Well, you dive into stuff like that and you make it your priority to learn this and, like you said, master this technology. I think it's something that's really cool because as communities change and as the world changes, I feel like a lot of times the church fails to change with it, maybe not change, but to build that connection as they change. I know that's something that's very near to your heart, is maintaining that connection to the culture. Absolutely.

Do you think there's fear involved in that? The church just doesn't want to change, or maybe they're scared to change? I don't think we know our own history.

So let me explain this way. The Bible, I'm talking about the New Testament. When we examine papyrus or manuscripts, they're all in a codex form. They're not in scrolls. They are in codex form. Codex means the book form.

Old Testament, a lot of scrolls. New Testament, codex. What is codex? Codex has, exactly, pick up your book. That's a codex form where you have pages that have been sewn together or stapled together so you can turn them and you can have a lot of information front, back, enclosed inside this codex. It's revolutionary. We call it book.

The debate is still out. The jury is still out whether Christians invented the codex. The idea of taking the parchments, the goatskins, and cutting them and making them into these rectangular shapes and then sticking one over the other and writing front and back on this as a book. Did Christians invent that, or was it already there? I tend to lean towards it was already there. Not necessarily that Christians invented the codex.

Having said that, why do you think they did that? They did it because when it came to referencing, it was so much easier and faster to turn to Isaiah 55 or Isaiah 9 or Psalm 23. It was so much faster to just turn rather than to open another scroll and open it, open, open, open. Okay, there it is. But I guarantee there was someone back there who said, you know, for me, it doesn't feel as godly as the scroll.

You lay the scroll down and you open it up. This is the way we've always done it, but think how much more work they were able to get done. Think how much more they were able to do for the kingdom of God because they became more productive because their work was easier. So it was just right for the New Testament people, the church, because their job was not just to say what has God said to the gospels or book of Acts or Paul's letters. Their job was also to go to the Old Testament and say everything is being fulfilled.

To cross reference like that, you needed a different tool. So I'm just giving an example of how Christians have always been people who innovated. I wonder if that has something to do with it too. People think it's more godly for the work to be difficult.

But rather than, let's make the work easier so we can do more. Just the idea of having screens in church, right? Ten years ago, some of the smaller churches, traditional churches, were like, no, I don't need any screen. Pick up the hymnal and that's how you feel. And now those same churches have screens.

So my question is, what happened? Did you become ungodly or did you realize, you know, we could do this? Well, you know, I remember in 20, I think it was like, let's say we moved into the new building in 2018. It was early, early 2019 or even maybe late 2018 where you were like, hey, let's get to live streaming our services. Let's make sure that people who can't be here can do it. And there were so many, I know one very notable Christian YouTuber who was very against live streaming. He'll probably even say it himself.

Really? That same individual, he'll tell you right now, I don't know if he'll ever watch this podcast, but now when 2020 happened, every church in America was trying to, okay, we need to scramble. We need to learn live.

Trying to figure it out. How do we do online church? We'd already been doing it for like a year and a half at that point. And it was one of those things where now everybody's like, that's the standard that they want to push to. And another thing I love about you is that when that happens culturally, when people catch up, we have to take it to the next level.

Absolutely. We are an open book church. There's nothing here that is hidden. There is no secret room where we come up with secret things. And then the rest of the world just kind of goes, I don't know how to do that, but they don't tell their secret.

It just comes Sunday morning and you'll take pictures, take a video. You'll see very quickly what we're doing. But my challenge to our team is always be a few steps ahead of everybody else. So just because people are catching up doesn't mean you go, I cannot believe they already, they stole our little technique.

We were doing this first and now they're doing it. No, just be 10 steps ahead. And this, I'm not even going to say the sky is the limit.

I believe there is no limit. Yeah, that's true. So while people are catching up with this, we're already thinking 10 steps down the road on what we're going to do.

Right. Continue to innovate. It makes me think that the people that we read about in scripture, like the Pauls or the Peters or those heroes of our faith, what would they do if they were in our shoes today? Would they say, oh, this is technology, so we're going to do things the old godly way? Or would they use every available opportunity to reach people?

They would use every available opportunity. Paul used parchments. He did not say, just give me the old papyrus. He was using parchments, which means he was already thinking differently. Of course, he was not from Jerusalem.

He was from Tarsus, so he was already in a different world, but he was willing to learn and adapt. And the church learned and adapt a lot of things. We don't have time to talk about the architecture of the church. You know, that's why people say, hey, you learn how to build your church from the Roman temples or the Greek temples.

My answer is, so what's your point? I'm not worshipping the Roman or Greek gods, but why can't we learn from them and build our basilicas? But I don't want to build a basilica today. Why do we need to build a basilica today? I don't have the Roman and Greek audience, so I'd rather build a building, which we are in the process of building our worship center, our sanctuary, which has stained glass windows, but at the same time it has the best technology you can imagine. We have LED walls, we have a big stained glass window in the middle behind the pulpit of a cross, but then we have LED walls on the sides, and it doesn't get flashy or like a performing arts center look. It still looks like a church, and yet we don't have to strain to see what's written. We don't have to open up your hymnals. The stained glass is completely backlit individually by nine different LED cannons that are designed to let people see it without having to, like you said, strain or look.

And those colors change and they match the rest of the lights on the stage. I mean, so we're doing whatever we can to be as innovative as possible. And if somebody has a problem with that, here's what I say. Number one, God is a creative God. You know, the Bible talks about that, if I can read this passage over here. Psalm 92, verse 5. O Lord, how great are Your works.

Your thoughts are very deep. So God's works are great. And of course, as you know, in Genesis, every time God did something, He said it was good.

It was very good. So God is creative, God is innovative, so we should be like Him. Secondly, our culture should be captured for the gospel. And this is one way that we can tell the world that we are not behind, we're not old fashioned. We have the gospel, which is the original truth of God, but we are not old fashioned.

This is the old wine, but it's in new wineskins, right? So we do have the truth, but the garb changes, the container changes. I think also another thing to bring out is that the technology, that you rise to the standard that you set for yourself and the technology we use requires precision.

You know what I mean? And I think that's something that churches often overlook. They think that you can bring blunt tools to the job and still have the same impact. But one thing that you always talk about, at least among the staff here, is that when you think about technology and when you go forward with your task, to do it in such a precise way that brings about optimal results. Because there's stakes to what we're doing. And that technological precision and innovation not only makes us sharper and makes us strive for more, but I'm thinking about Gen Z students that are coming.

I'm thinking about Generation Alpha, the kids that are coming up behind them. We want church to be a place where people walk in and they know they're in a church, certainly. But we also want church to be a place where young students and kids walk in and they're like, wow, this is cool. This is church?

This is really neat. Right. Why not? And if that's going to keep your grandson, your granddaughter, your son, your daughter, your nephew, your niece to come back to church and find Jesus Christ and be saved and their eternal life, their eternity is changed forever, why not?

If we have the resources, why not? I think it really reveals how we think as Christians. There's very little stakes in ministry for us, so we don't feel the need to push or to innovate. I look forward to the day when the world is going to look to us, to the church. And I think in some ways, some parts, it is doing that, especially in the music world. Christians have come a long ways in the past 20 years.

The past 20 years is amazing. Prior to that, it was sort of, hmm, we're always copying somebody else. Now it's like, well, maybe we have some things. That's true.

But I'm praying that in every way, the world will look to us as leaders, worthy of being copied rather than us making a cheap copy of what the world is doing. That's right. That's right. Absolutely. So Dr. Charl, let me ask you this as we close. If the sky was the limit and there were no restraints, what would be your biggest technological wish list item? Virtual reality. VR. Oh, yes.

Yeah. I want to be able to walk in the temple in Jerusalem on stage so people can walk with me or sit there and watch as we are going through elements. I want to be able to walk around the cross. I want to be able to walk through the Garden of Eden. Of course, Adam and Eve will always be behind some tree of bush. But walk around and people will be like, oh my goodness, see that lion, see this.

It's all happening on stage. I want to be able to walk through Noah's Ark. I want to be able to have some glimpse of the Book of Revelation, not everything, but some things on stage that people will go, whoa. Maybe that day is not that far away. With AI technology and some other stuff, that day might not be that far away.

Not that far away. I love that. It's so exciting to dream and just see where God has blessed you in pursuing technology and see what the future may hold for us. If you guys enjoyed today's episode, if you have questions or suggestions about what you heard today, send us a text at 252-582-5028. Of course, you can visit us online at cleary todayshow.com.

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That's right. So stay tuned. You might just hear your question on tomorrow's episode. We love you guys. We'll see you tomorrow on Cleary Today.