A God-Shaped Hole in the Lives of College Students ft. Cliffe and Stuart Knechtle

Hey everybody, my conversation with Cliff and Stuart Connectly in studio.

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Go to noblegoldinvestments.com. Hey, we are here with my friends, Cliff and Stuart Connectly. It's been a while, guys. Good to see you both. Good to see you, Charlie. Yeah, and the world is different, I think, in a little bit of a better place than when we were meeting back in. Why would that be, Charlie? I have no idea. The weather, that's why.

Christmas lights were brighter, yeah. But really enjoyed spending time with you guys. And you both go to college campuses in a similar fashion that I do.

And if the audience is not aware of it, you go and kind of hold court. And you sometimes go for multiple days in a row, is that right? You guys go for two, three, four days? Yeah. We're trying to shorten it now so we get to more schools. Is that right? But it used to always be four. And so just to remind the audience, how did you guys get into this, I mean, obviously started with you, going on these campuses, speaking to students. It's been multiple decades. Well, I think that was probably before you were born.

That's right. The first time I did open air was during an InterVarsity Beach Evangelism project in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, in 1980. And stood up on the beach there with the InterVarsity students and began to preach. And the people hopped off their towels, and I found out real quickly they didn't want to hear a sermon. But they wanted to show me what a fool I was for believing in Jesus. And so we developed the dialogue method.

They just would fire questions and I would answer. And then we started, I'll never forget the first campus, with SUNY Albany, up in upstate New York. And just haven't stopped since.

So this open air, I like that term. And how did you get drug into this? You were raised going to these? Raised going to these. Yeah, driving to school every morning in the car.

He would definitely put us on the hot seat, answer some of these tough questions, and then went to seminary and naturally just flowed. Doing this for the last couple of years, what trends are you seeing on these campuses? Good, bad, troubling, promising? Very good. Shockingly good. Tell us more.

I wish I could. I still can't figure it out. Honestly, because I get that question a lot, and I think there's a meaning crisis. A lot of these students don't know what their meaning and purpose in life is objectively. So when we ask them that, there's a lot of ooh, pauses. And so a lot of these students are coming out, and they also see that there's something wrong, there's been something wrong over the last however many years, whether it be political, whether it be their parents having divorce, whether it be a psychological health issue. I think they're just waking up to there's something wrong, there's been something wrong in our nation.

What is it? And we think that God could potentially offer some answers. The long period of time you've been seeing it, do you think things are more promising in the last couple of years, meaning more people are interested, more people are stopping, more people are asking questions? A bit.

It fluctuates. And over the past 44 years, I've seen a lot of ups and downs. The questions have remained consistently the same, but the emotions, I think, is really what are different.

I think there's a big difference between my dad, who at the age of 18 held a gun in the Alps in Switzerland, part of the Swiss Army, as he watched Hitler's Panzer divisions come up and stop right on the border of Switzerland. A lot of difference emotionally between that versus people who have to go to a crying room to work through who won the last election. That is a big shift emotionally. So I'm very grateful for Stuart and for his emotional sensitivity and his counseling background, because we have to be sharp in how we address people, not just intellectually, but emotionally as well. Do you see an increased amount of curiosity from these students trying to pursue truth and meaning?

I don't know. I debated Madeline Murray O'Hare years ago at the University of Texas, Austin, and there was a lot of intellectual curiosity and there was a lot of more intense back and forth. And that's what I miss a bit. I miss a bit of the post-Vietnam War, the hippie movement, the free speech movement in Berkeley, where there was a willingness to really go at it and to understand that even though we are going at it, we're not being disrespectful.

But we are strongly disagreeing. So I miss a little bit of that. That's why I was alluding to the emotional sensitivity and the need to be more careful emotionally. So that's been a bit of a change. And so you're pinpointing something promising. How do you quantify the promising or the uplifting elements that you're witnessing? Yeah.

A lot of these, you know, what is it? The suicide and depression rates have risen exponentially. You have divorce rates risen exponentially. And so I would say we live in a therapeutic age and we need to make America think again more clearly because there's been so much emotionalism and looking inward. And we know that the more you look inward, unfortunately, the more issues you have, the more you look outward and upward, the healthier you are. And so people are looking for a god, some type of god, and then they're looking outward to hopefully help community in some kind of way. And that's when they get the healthiest. And we know traditionally before this therapeutic age over the last five to 10 years, that's what our nation was all about. Our nation was all about God first, nation second. And that brought great psychological health and gave people meaning versus now.

They don't know who they are. It is without a doubt the sickest generation, both mentally, physically, emotionally, nutritionally sick. Has the church stepped up to try to offer, of course, the ultimate healing, which is in Jesus. Do you think the church has met the moment?

Yes, in many ways, no in other ways. I am very, very grateful for the church, for the emphasis on the intellect. Let's think through this stuff honestly, for the emphasis on emotions. Let's be thoughtful and careful the way we talk. And for the spiritual, obviously, that we need Christ to fill that God shaped vacuum at the center of our being. And for the physical, that we need to get off our backsides and start feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting those sick and in prison. And the growth in involvement with hurting people who are physically hurting, I think is a tremendous statement. Preach Christ every day. If necessary, use words.

And I think that there's a good, strong surge in that area. So it's fair to say you guys are apologists. Is that fair to say? How would you describe even what you do? To someone who doesn't know. Defenders of the faith. I try to steer clear of the word apologist because so many people don't know what it is. It's such a Christianese kind of term.

That's why I steer clear of it. I try and come at it from a psychologist as well as a pastor as well as some type of philosophical elements to my speakers. I try and bring it from different angles. So defender of the faith.

Doing this how you've done, what do you think, what have you learned to make you better at defending the faith that you wish you would have known a decade ago? Oh, I think people can become too myopic in just reading the scripture and having kind of carbon copy classical arguments on how to defend the faith. I think a worldview takes an emotional angle, a cultural angle, an intellectual angle, an experiential angle.

And you can get too myopic in just one of those. It's just my emotional experience and I believe in Christ. And this is how your needs can be met just from an emotional experience. Yes, that's part of it. We also have to answer the intellectual issues and you also have to say, does the gospel meet the biggest cultural issues? Sociologist Christian Smith, one of my favorite sociologists out of Notre Dame, talked about the more they're studying the doctrine of sin and how it's going away in a culture of relativism, the more you see the breakdown in so many of the greatest traditions, institutions, and the more that doctrine leaves, the more issues we're going to have at a cosmic, sociological, and psychological level. If you were to, you heard every argument under the sun, they just get repurposed and repackaged. But does every era and every age, I'm sure some arguments are surfaced more than others. During the free love movement, it's like, you know, don't tell me what to do.

And what age are we in? What is the common denominator, one, two, or three arguments you hear the most? For example, if I were to guess, it would be, who's to say that your religion is right?

Or why are you to tell me? Is that more deconstructionist, more questioning? What would you say is the common argument you're hearing in this era?

Either one of you. Moral relativism has a grip on people's thinking. Everything's relative. Explain that to someone who doesn't know what moral relativism is. There are no moral absolutes. Is that absolutely true? That's right. It's a self-defeating principle.

It sure is. I actually don't think moral relativism exists. I think the concept can exist, but in practice it's not possible. Exactly. I agree totally.

You're going to have to make decisions whether you're going to pay your taxes or not. Of course, by some standard, right? Exactly. Sorry to interrupt.

No, no problem. So moral relativism has a grip on people's thinking that's tragic, and I think you're right. It's self-contradictory.

Secondly, don't tell me what to do. That's being judgmental and bigoted. Instead, I'm going to do whatever I want to do and just back off. And yet, Charlie, that's exactly what you read about in the Bible. I mean, the end of the book of Judges, every man did what was right in his own eyes. I mean, that's moral relativism.

Just do whatever you think is right in your own eyes. Then there's the whole issue of science and faith contradict each other. That's baloney. But that one's so easy. I mean, that one— Sorry, I just like— There's no chemistry— It's the opposite, actually.

Exactly. It is the opposite. There's no chemistry, no physics, no geology anywhere in the Bible. So how can science contradict a book that doesn't have any science in it?

So it's ridiculous. Then there's the whole issue of hope. And I'm convinced that in America today we don't want to think about death.

We want to take an anesthesia called apathy or perform an acting job worthy of an Academy Award. That's the way we deal with death. Just don't think. And Jesus Christ, I find so refreshing in the way he says, Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you.

I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled. Do not be afraid. And I think fear comes from, I thought I was in control. Oh, no, I'm being confronted by my finiteness.

Now I'm beginning to be scared. Yeah, that's true. And that's why we need God who's bigger than death, who's bigger than any power or force of evil or injustice. So, yeah, people are really hurting and really need Christ in a desperate way. The trajectory, the trend is not good. The West is becoming less religious.

Europe is already done, unfortunately. I mean, that it's like a husk of its former self. The question is, when are we going to see revival?

My opinion, of which is not shared by everyone, is that there is the greatest opportunity for revival in front of us. The church is just not engaging. And so I'm far more critical of the church than, you're much nicer than I am. But, I mean, for example, we have millions of young men that we reach that are coming to conservatism and they say, Yeah, the church is irrelevant.

It is too open to the sins of the day. It doesn't speak for me. They have, you know, this feminine spirit. They are socially relativist.

And so there's this incredible harvest. I'm sure you see it, especially with young men. And the church seems rather scared or uninterested in actually engaging in that.

So the trend, we are seeing a slight uptick in religious curiosity to get young people interested in the faith and give their life to Christ. So what can we do better in that regard? And also to confront this malaise of moral relativism. Meet people where they're at in their suffering.

I really think we need to do that. In a culture that is more and more addicted to comfort every day, you see those that are addicted to comfort, those nations that are, you're going to have problems, tremendous breakdown. And so for a revival, you've got to talk about meeting a God-shaped hole. And I'm not one of these pastors who likes to talk about numbers at their church, but I will say we have kids driving five, six hours Saturday nights and sleeping in their cars and coming to our church Sunday morning. But that's a problem. Why don't they have a church near them? Well, we tell them that.

First of all, you're doing a great job, but... No, it could be way better, though. No, no, no, I'm saying that there should be 100 churches on the way to your church. Yes, that's exactly right. And so for us, we don't want to turn it into a social movement. You could throw a rock from our building and hit about 20 buildings near us, and it's just a social club. It's in Connecticut, right?

Yeah, in Connecticut. And they've got the rainbow flags, every single one of them. And so it's dedication to truth first and foremost, and we believe that ultimately it's how to save souls and then secondarily how to go about pushing for justice. But if you lose the moral absolutes that we're talking about from the perspective of Judeo-Christian worldview, well, then all these social justice movements, they're just going to peter out, break down, and what are they really after? The moral relativism, do you see alternatively any sort of other competing worldview that is finding it?

For example, we're not seeing, I don't think, Islam grow amongst young students on campus. Is it pagan? Is it Buddhist?

Is it New Age? Because I'm sure you've seen it all throughout the years, where students might have a more Buddhist perspective or whatever, or the power of now. But you're saying right now it is basically one of the darker ones, which is that there is no truth, don't tell me how to live. If you were to anticipate the next move, where does that lead them if not towards Christ?

What fills that void? Because eventually there will be a counterfeit worldview. Moral relativism is not there to stay. Eventually they're going to want to find a golden calf to worship at.

What is that? Well, let's be honest, the golden calf of moral relativism is me, narcissism, self-absorption. And when we live in a culture that so emphasizes comfort and feeling good, I mean, what's going to stop that? I mean, I'll never forget speaking at a Korean church down in Dallas, Texas, and afterwards I said to the elders who invited me out for a meal, how's the church in Korea doing?

I mean, I've always been so impressed with the amount of missionaries that come out of the Korean church. And they said, it's tragic. It's fallen apart.

And I said, why? He said, for the same reason that the church has fallen apart in the United States, money. You get a lot of money, buddy, and you only need God. And why be passionate about Christ, and why be passionate about reaching people for Christ? It's all about money. And that brings a lethargy and a spiritual apathy that is scary.

So how do we combat materialism in a country that is so wedded to materialism? That is a tremendous challenge. And you're right. I think Stuart put it well. Suffering often is what drives us. Our own mortality often drives us back to God, back to Christ.

But gosh, that's a challenge and a half. And it's an incredible situation where you have a generation that is the wealthiest ever. I mean, they need and want for nothing. You go to these campuses, they are Ritz-Carlton's, let's just be honest. I mean, from the fitness centers to the clubs, they've got saunas.

I mean, it is every food you could imagine. They've got cards, you know, and they're miserable. And so I think that's definitionally an indictment of materialism. I mean, they have everything materially that you could ever want, and they are the most likely to kill themselves, most likely to drug overdose, most likely. And they're just constantly pursuing the next dopamine hit.

And so, yeah, I mean, look, we're talking about very macro issues. I want to try to get down because I know you guys got to get back on campus here. The sequence, if you were to like train in five minutes or less somebody in the audience of how to present the gospel to a skeptic, how would you communicate that? What would you say if you were like, hey, I got five minutes to try to load you up before you go on campus, what would you tell that person? I would tell them, read Acts chapter 8. Three different ways to connect with three different people who are seeking, honestly. These people have to be seeking, honestly. There's way too many atheists who pretend to be seeking when they're truly just closed off cynics. Can you tell pretty quickly, I'm sure?

Yeah, Acts chapter 10. Do you think it's a waste of time? Oh, with an atheist?

If someone's not seeking, should you keep engaging? It depends if there's an audience. Because people always say that to these celebrity atheists who are so closed off and they're just going to say, F you. We're speaking over them to the hundreds of thousands of people. I totally agree, but keep going. Yeah, yeah, no, exactly. So it can't be a fool's errand if it's one on one. But for me, it's just right on Acts chapter 10.

Lydia, seller of purple, brilliant businesswoman. So what you have there is you have an encounter. A Christian comes and says, let's read the Bible together and actually ask some of these good questions on, did the resurrection occur? Then you have the jailer. And so the jailer needs actually a miracle. We know tough guys typically need something supernatural to even start to ask the question. And then you have the slave girl who needs justice done in order to actually come to even the point of saying, wow, there could be a God because finally I see some justice in my life. So you have to meet the person where they're at, figure out what are the cracks and how does God prevent the blue.

So if I could interrupt and I want to get back to your thought on this. When some pastors say, well, you've got to meet them where they're at, that means you have to use their lingo or dress like they do or... All things all people, yeah, yeah. Can you clarify that we should never ever compromise God's standards or rules for our life? I just think the Roman road or the evangelic cube are kind of cheesy, cookie cutter ways of doing it. And yet you do need to present the gospel.

Well, for example, I have to say an F word every other word, which I think is outrageous. You think things of that nature. Exactly. No, no, I do, by the way.

I'm glad. Yeah, I think it's not right. That's an issue. That's honestly an issue with a lot of Christian YouTubers right now.

They totally agree. Yeah. And so they got to steer away from that because I think there's a level of respect of a character of a person who doesn't need to curse to present it. Well, of course, you should never sin to try to evangelize. That's for sure. Right? I mean, it seems so self-defeating, right?

It sure is. I just think if you're going to sin to try to win someone for Jesus, I think that's by definition not correct. What would you say if you were to train somebody up? Do you guys do these kind of Defender of Faith academies where you train people on this?

Not really? No, we're asked too often, but we kind of back out. I think the best way to train someone to share their faith is come out to the open air, watch how we dialogue with people, junk what you don't like that we do, embrace what you do like that we do, and then develop your own style. What I get asked all the time, and I'd love your thoughts, is, Charlie, how do you remember all of this? How seriously do both of you take scholarship and learning and reading, I imagine very much so, to stay sharp and be able to engage on the infinite topics that can come your way? That's one of my greatest regrets that I haven't studied more. I like the preacher who said, when I preach, I'm first going to study as hard as I can, I'm going to pray as hard as I can, and then I'm going to preach as hard as I can. So, we've got to study hard, we've got to pray hard, and then we've got to preach hard.

What does that look like in practice for you guys? How many books a year, podcasts? I mean, do you take intentional time to pursue scholarship? Absolutely. You've got to read as broad as you possibly can.

My favorite mentors are my dead mentors, so they can't hold me accountable on anything. But one was in New York City, and he read 150 books a year, and he's written some national bestsellers, and he comes at it from every single angle, culturally speaking, in order to present the gospel, to make it relevant. Because I don't think it's enough anymore to just present the main doctrines. In the 1700s, when you had the Whitfields, when you had the Newtons and all these, or Edwards, they could just come in and talk about, hey, look at you. In the hands of an angry God, exactly.

And then you also have Whitfield down there. Right. So, you could just present the gospel, and it's the fire and brimstone. And people, there was revivals by the thousands who were just saying, oh, gosh, I'm going to hell, I better check this out.

So, it's out of fear that they considered God. Well, that's, you can't do that anymore for the average person. So, we have to read. We have to memorize. I try and, you know, he had us memorizing scriptures since we were two, and he's doing it with all my daughters right now. You know, they get a couple gummy bears every single time they're able to memorize a single verse.

And so, that memorization is huge, I think, when it comes to the intellect, and really being able to hone that skill is important. The question in front of a lot of other people, though, is also, and finally, I know this is a simple, but it is a very important one. How do you both find the confidence and the courage to go cold into a campus, you don't know anybody, and break that ice?

Are you both naturally introverted or extroverted? Well, the first bar that I preached in in inner-city Boston when I was in seminary, I picked out the bar, and I parked my car, and I walked towards the bar door, and I walked right past the bar door, and I walked around the block for about 15 minutes, trying to get up the courage to go in there and tell those men on vacation about Christ. Finally, I said, Cliff, you're defeated, so I went back to my car, was opening the car door to go back to the seminary, and the Holy Spirit brought to my mind the words of Hebrews chapter 11, 32 to 38. And what more shall I say? I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised, who shut the mouths of lions, quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword, whose weakness was turned into strength.

So, I began to realize, Cliff, you are the biggest wimp around. These guys, these great men and women of faith, lay their lives down for God, for Christ. And you can't even walk into a bar in inner city Boston and tell men on vacation who are doing the wrong thing about Christ. Convicted of my lack of faith, I turned around, walked into that bar, and stood up and said, Excuse me, guys.

John writes in 1 John 4, 10, This is love, not that we loved God, but that God loved us, and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. And the bartender came running down the bar, cursing his head off at me. I said, Excuse me, sir, all I want to do is talk with these guys about what means most in life, knowing God. He said, Buddy, you want to know what God is? God is the cash register, and all I care about these guys is their money.

And then he came around the bar, grabbed my arm, and escorted me out. So fear is the opposite of faith. And when I grow in faith and trust in God, understand what is true and right, then I will put a stake in the ground, and I don't care what happens, we're going to uncompromisingly stand for the truth of Jesus Christ. That's beautifully said. We have more time tonight.

I'm excited for that. Thank you guys so much. Good luck on campus, and God bless you both. Thank you, Charlie. God bless you. Keep going, brother. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Email us, as always, freedom at charliekirk.com. Thanks so much for listening, and God bless. For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to charliekirk.com.