#120: When Everything's on Fire (with Brian Zahnd)

This week, pastor and author Brian Zahnd returns to The Puddcast to discuss his new book, When Everything’s On Fire. This helpful and timely book is a sort of field guide to maintaining faith in a secular age, and so we unpacked deconstruction, modernism as a framework for secular society, Nietzsche’s predictions about the death of God, postmodernism and more. I asked Brian some very pointed questions about faith leaders espousing a faith we can’t support and why that’s led so many to deconstruction. It’s wonderful.

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Check out the B-Side!

Once you’ve listened to this, make sure to check out the raw and uncut B-Side interview where my friends and I unpack the conversation in even more detail. Available exclusively on Patreon.

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Transcription

 Brian Zahnd  00:00

The crisis of faith in late modernity is real. It's not just a fashion. It's not just something that was conjured up. It's not a fad. It is real. And being angry with people for losing their faith in our secular age is a little bit like being angry at medievals for dying of the plague. I don't think anybody wakes up one morning and says, "You know, just for the fun of it, I think I'll have a crisis of faith."

Jonathan Puddle  00:31

Hello, my friends, welcome back to The Puddcast with me, Jonathan Puddle. This is episode 120. My guest today is Brian Zahnd. We talk all about his brand new book, When Everything's On Fire: Faith Formed From The Ashes, which is sort of a field guide to maintaining and sustaining faith, in this divided, painful world we find ourselves living in. Today's discussion features Friedrich Nietzsche, Jacques Derrida, various other philosophers from the 18th 19th centuries, so we have a lot of fun with this. Brian is a fount of wisdom and kindness. So I hope you enjoy this. For the B-Side I sat down with my friend Jacob, who is a folksy, Gen-X pastor, one of my longest friends, and one of my tallest friends come to think of it. And we have a lot of fun reflecting on the things that Brian is sharing here. So if you enjoy this and want to go a little deeper, then make sure to listen to the B-Side. Afterwards, details will be included. For show notes and links to the book and everything else. You'll find that at JonathanPuddle.com/podcast. Let's get into the show.  I'm thrilled to welcome back to the show one of my favorite pastors and authors and prophetic voices for this hour, Pastor Brian Zahnd. Welcome back to The Puddcast.

Brian Zahnd  02:03

Thank you, Jonathan. Good to be back with you.

Jonathan Puddle  02:05

I've been flipping through your new book, I had every intention to like read it cover to cover before we did this chat. But then we became foster parents and our life got kind of topsy-turvy, which seems kind of ironic, given the subject matter. When Everything's on Fire, Faith Forged from the Ashes, is your your latest book. I've got questions and thoughts but I'd love just to hear from you straight, what's the genesis of this? And where did the spirit poke you?

Brian Zahnd  02:31

You know, just before we started recording, I was talking to you about the various Caminos that my wife and I have walked, the Camino de Santiago. The Francis route is 500 miles from Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port, France across the Pyrenees into Spain. And you walk all the way across northern Spain to Santiago de Compostela, Spain. In 2019, we were walking it for the third time. And I was at this I think was Castrojeriz. It's a lovely hilltop village, medieval, you know, pilgrims been walking through that town for 800 years. And I had been thinking about how difficult it seems to be to sustain faith in our intensely secular age. Very empiricist, it's just not been a friend of faith. And I was thinking about how, just how difficult it is. And I thought, well, if I could just... I kind of imagined if people that were struggling with possibly losing their faith or wondering if their faith, the Christian faith can be relevant? You know, in the 21st century world, what would I say to them? I mean, if we can walk together, you know, for a day or two on the Camino and I would have several hours just to listen and to talk and... Well, you know, I'm not gonna be able to do that with very many people. But I sat there on this little terrace after our probably 14-15 mile walk that day, and I outlined the chapters of what... I gave it the title When Everything's On Fire, right, then. I just thought, okay, everything's on fire... what do we do when everything's on fire? And I outlined the 11 chapters. And then I came back and that was an that would have been in either late September, early October of 2019. And I came back and I didn't start writing until actually writing on the book until early 2020. Like, maybe I started as early as January I don't quite remember...

Jonathan Puddle  02:34

January 6th?

Brian Zahnd  04:47

...but then everything was on fire. You know, okay, I thought everything was on fire. Now everything's on fire. And so I'm really addressing though, how to how to maintain and sustain faith. So that's, that's, that's where the book came from. I don't know, I love all my books like children. So. So it's hard to people ask me my favorite and I can't really say that I can tell you what I think about their various books. This one feels very pastoral and timely. And I don't know, maybe it sounds too egotistical, but I feel like it's a needed book. I think I think there are people that need this.

Jonathan Puddle  05:36

Yeah, certainly.

Brian Zahnd  05:37

Exicted for it to be coming out very soon.

Jonathan Puddle  05:39

Yeah, I agree. What I'm trying to figure out is if I need this book, and this is where I've been wrestling through the last few days, reading and thinking. And I love your writing, and I love what you do. And even just as I'm reading your prose, I can feel this, you know, the satisfaction of a well formed idea and a beautiful representation of the gospel, and I can feel it coming into my body, and I'm enjoying it. Now I went through a deconstruction, like 15 years ago.

Brian Zahnd  06:12

Yeah.

Jonathan Puddle  06:13

You know, I was in my early 20s, my wife and I had left Canada, we moved abroad. And it all kind of came tumbling down. And in the midst of sort of the wilderness that the Spirit led us out into, lo and behold, I fell in love with Jesus all over again.

Brian Zahnd  06:30

Yeah.

Jonathan Puddle  06:30

And suddenly everything was new, and beautiful once more. And ever since then, I can't identify really, with the statement that it's difficult to maintain faith in this current age, I find faith the only tenable answer to this current age. But no question that like deconstruction is suddenly mainstream, right? Like, it's like, it's the business. And it's I've watched with a certain bemusement, as I imagine, the prior generations have, you know, it was like, okay, yeah, some of us did this in the 60s, some of us did this in the 70s, we understand what you're going through. I guess, the part that I'm actually really struggling with, like Jonathan Puddle, is watching people I considered mentors in the faith, begin to espouse a kind of Christianity, that I cannot get behind anymore.

Brian Zahnd  07:28

Yeah.

Jonathan Puddle  07:29

And that's my big pain point. So I know that this book has, is going to have so much traction with so many people. And that's good, and we can come back to it. But sitting here in the chair today, I'm going: half of my mentors will not let go of their violent God images. They have bought deep into Christian nationalism, they seem to have more faith in the evilness of government and health care. And so, and I'm going if I'm cynical and disillusioned about anything, it's the people who raised me in faith. They're the ones challenging me, not the world.

Brian Zahnd  08:10

Yeah, I believe me, Jonathan, I feel your pain. And the people you are describing are probably my peers as far as age and you know, all that. And I have watched with absolute pained incredulity, as I have seen... You know, my roots are in the Jesus Movement. And so I have, you know, friends that that's when we met, as these radical or would-be radical followers of Jesus in the 1970s. And to see them just kind of turn into a petulant Republican Christian nationalist. I just, I don't understand it. And I, and I'm in a position to understand it, and I still don't. And I think this is the thing I think about every single day. I wish I didn't, but I do. And of course, I've written on this. I mean, I touched on this in a lot of books, but the book Postcards From Babylon is the book where I, where I've just, that's me actually, in one sense, I mean, I'm writing it for whoever will read it. But that's me speaking to my compatriots from the Jesus Movement that are now in their 60s and becoming just exactly what you're describing. That is me talking to them and trying to awaken them to the fact that really all they are doing is putting their faith in a in a modern version of the Roman Empire, a new Babylon and they need to they need to come out of her my people less to participate in her sins and receive of her plagues. I can go all Revelation on you! So yeah, I understand that. But but then the the other thing that happens that is, you know, these are people that are... we're talking about leaders.

Jonathan Puddle  10:08

Yeah. Yeah.

Brian Zahnd  10:09

That have significant platforms and voices they're speaking to, well, then they'll have in their congregations are whatever, younger people 20s 30s, whatever. And this is feeding that deconstruction frenzy...

Jonathan Puddle  10:28

Certainly

Brian Zahnd  10:29

Because there's the phenomenon that some people think there's only one narrow version of Christianity, some sort of American Evangelicalism... that there's nothing other outside of that. I mean, they theoretically would know better, I think, but they appear to think: if this narrow version of American Evangelicalism becomes untenable, which is what is occurring, then my only option is just to abandon the faith.

Jonathan Puddle  11:02

Right.

Brian Zahnd  11:03

Which is absurd!

Jonathan Puddle  11:05

Yes.

Brian Zahnd  11:07

And I will say this there, I don't know of any issue that is plaguing people's faith, that is suddenly new.

Jonathan Puddle  11:17

Sure.

Brian Zahnd  11:18

The church has been dealing with these sorts of problems and challenges and questions for centuries. And so yeah, but you're right, deconstruction has become I don't like that phrase, I deal with it. I think that I got my book here... it's the it's the title of the second chapter, is Deconstructing Deconstruction. And I mean, I understand deconstruction in the sense that I actually understand Derrida's philosophy, which is not really what people are talking about when they use the word they're not talking about Jacques Derrida's deconstruction of the literary text.

Jonathan Puddle  11:55

Most of them have...

Brian Zahnd  11:56

but there is a there is a little there is a relation, there is a kind of relation, ah, you know, people that are familiar with my story, and I'm not assuming everybody is. But you know, I've already mentioned I come from the Jesus Movement. I was leading a church by the time I was 22. By the way, first week for Sunday of November coming up, it'll be our 40th anniversary. So I've stayed at one church for 40 years, one congregation, it's been many churches, I think...

Jonathan Puddle  12:24

Sure, sure.

Brian Zahnd  12:25

...one congregation, or maybe it's one church in many congregations, that's maybe closer to the point. But so, you know, Jesus Movement that just sort of led me into, you know, just whatever came next kind of a charismatic renewal, Word of Faith, all of that. And then I went through a profound transition beginning in 2004. When I was 45, and and today, people, we weren't talking about deconstructing, then at least I didn't hear people talk about it. But I wouldn't have used that term anyway. Because it didn't feel like that to me. I... that my go to metaphor. I mean, I wrote a book under this title is Water to Wine.

Jonathan Puddle  13:10

That's right. Last time, you're on the show, you mentioned that.

Brian Zahnd  13:13

I don't need to revisit all of that. But I think they're better. It's like this. It's... the word deconstruction sounds a little too much like destruction.

Jonathan Puddle  13:26

Sure.

Brian Zahnd  13:27

And we ended up like, you know, the Taliban blown up the Buddhists there. And that isn't how we approach an adjustment, a critical rethinking of Christian faith. I would describe it possibly, there's a lot of ways to describe it. One way would be, imagine that in some monastery in, let's say, Russia, or somewhere, they discover a very old, maybe, you know, six or 700 year old icon. Maybe it's an icon of Christ, and it's it's, it's valuable, it's precious. But it's been covered by centuries of grime and dirt and soot and ash and smoke, and it's almost entirely obscured the icon image of Christ. And they said, but we want to restore it. Okay. Well, I'll tell you what, in the toolbox of the restoration artist you're not going to find dynamite, you're not going to find a sledgehammer. You're going to find you know, delicate brushes and solvents... As if I know how to do this I don't but I mean somebody does. And and it's a delicate task because you're dealing with something precious. Now, sometimes though, maybe the word deconstruction or even destruction is applicable. Let's let's take another run it this, another metaphor, because what these are all metaphors. We have our theological house. That's really just our theology. But let's go with a metaphor of this called our theological house. And this is how we think about God, and what we say about God. This is you know, how we relate to the world in terms of God. It's just our theology, but let's call it our theological house. And it comes together, it comes to exists through many ways. I mean, some of it was intentional, I suppose we adopted a certain idea about God, a certain theology in certain area. A lot of us just inherited a lot of it, we just pick up hodge podge one way or the other. And like me, possibly you can reach a point in your life where your theological house is no longer adequate. And you say, I, that's what happened to me, I would say, I was kind of embarrassed, I didn't want to have company over, my theology seemed unworthy of the Jesus who had captured my heart so long ago. And so I went on a remodeling project. Now, your theological house, though, isn't a little one room bungalow. It's like a sprawling mansion with all kinds of rooms and wings and all of that. For me, and I think I think this can be this way for a lot of people. Certain aspects ... let's stick with the metaphor, certain rooms can go largely untouched.

Jonathan Puddle  16:19

Yeah.

Brian Zahnd  16:20

You know, you don't maybe maybe add a coat of paint or something. I would say that my Christology, for example, really, I would say it's more robust today, it's more, more thought-out, more understood more and more in keeping with Orthodox tradition. But other rooms had a significant, you know, things dealing with eternal judgment, things dealing with soteriology and atonement theory. One whole wing of my theological house was my eschatology. And that, that, that did need deconstruction. We actually did bring in the sledgehammers and just took it right down to the foundation, because it was wrong. I'd inherited a, you know, goofball, dispensationalist, fantastical, end times war in the Middle East and all that nonsense. And at you know, and of course, I'm doing this as a pastor. So I'm not just some sort of, you know, private citizen off by himself rethinking his faith. I'm doing it publicly, because I preach—every Sunday. Right?

Jonathan Puddle  17:30

Yes.

Brian Zahnd  17:30

And so, this, again, we don't need to revisit the water to wine story. But this created some turmoil within the congregation because, you know, and people would come to me and they said, "Well Pastor, you're changing your theology." And most of the time, in whatever area they were bringing this up, I could say, "Well, I don't change that's, that's maybe a strong word, I am adjusting. You know, I am nuancing rethinking certain aspects, but I don't know if I'm changing it." But when it came to eschatology, I just had to say, "Yeah, yeah, I'm changing." And my only defense was, I had inherited something that was absolutely aberrant. And there was nothing there. There was nothing to salvage about it. It just needed to be torn down. So so that involved deconstruction, but but you don't want to tie your faith all up in one bundle. I mean, I've seen it I've seen people who, for example, have a, they have inherited or picked up or adopted an innerancy view of Scripture, that is that every aspect of the Bible must be factually true, even historically and scientifically. So that when they finally find one thing that doesn't pass that test, and they're just honest enough to say, well, that's not historically or scientifically true, their whole faith collapses.

Jonathan Puddle  18:54

Right.

Brian Zahnd  18:54

And they go, they make this giant fundamentalist leap to unbelief, a leap of faith to unbelief. Because one aspect, and it was all tied together so tightly around a certain understanding of biblical inerrancy, that once that one little thread came loose, the whole thing fell apart. And those are the kind of things that need not happen. For one thing, our foundation of Christian faith is not the Bible. It's not even the church. It's not any particular doctrine or system of theology. It is Jesus himself, and our own experience with him. I believe in Jesus, not because of an apologetic argument, not because I read a Josh McDowell book or I read the Case for Christ and it all added up in a while off, you're just smart enough to figure it out. You'd know that Jesus is Lord. No, it doesn't work that way. The foundation is Christ Himself in our own experience with him. Now what's happening though in the age of empiricism, following Descartes on, that has fallen out of favor. And somehow it has been deemed illegitimate to know something by your own subjective experience that is unverifiable in terms of empiricism. So I believe in Jesus because He has been revealed to me as the risen Son of God, I can't prove that and it can't be disproven either. I can just say, "This is what I know in my heart." Okay. So you you have, can we do a little philosophy here for just a moment?

Jonathan Puddle  20:41

Please!

Brian Zahnd  20:42

So we have, we have René Descartes, who was looking for a foundation that is indubitable, that cannot be doubted. Now, interestingly, you know, Descartes gonna create a lot of problems here. But Descartes was a believing Catholic. And in fact, part of his project, he says this in a note to his publisher, in writing his his famous book, that he's gonna, he's gonna try to prove the existence of God—which is a fool's errand—but that's part of what's motivated him. And he says, "Well, everything can be doubted, I can doubt everything, everything can be doubted, is there anything that cannot be doubted?" He keeps thinking and finally he realized, "Well, I am thinking. In in wondering what I can do, I can doubt everything. But in the process of doubting, I'm thinking, I think therefore, I am. Cogito ergo sum, I think, therefore I am." And then Descartes believes he has reached the, the the foundation that he can build on that. "Okay. I think therefore." But the problem with that does, there's a lot of problems. There's a dualism in it. That's, that's mistaken. But the big problem is, it kicks everybody upstairs inside their own head.

Jonathan Puddle  22:00

Right.

Brian Zahnd  22:01

And you have to be the sole arbiter of all things in the sense that you have to be able to give a coherent, empiricist base that is based on evidence from the five physical senses of for your faith in God.

Jonathan Puddle  22:17

Yes.

Brian Zahnd  22:18

And that actually is a rigged game. Once you start playing that game, you are going to lose. You have agreed to participate in a game that you are going to lose.

Jonathan Puddle  22:30

Yes.

Brian Zahnd  22:30

What should have happened is that Rene Descartes should have paid attention to his contemporary and intellectual equal Blaise Pascal, one of the greatest mathematicians in history, you can't accuse him of not, you know, respecting reason. The man that's known as the father of the modern computer. One of the great mathematical geniuses of any time, Blaise Pascal gives us the famous axiom, "The heart has its reasons of which reason those nothing."

Jonathan Puddle  23:02

Hmm, yeah.

Brian Zahnd  23:03

And so our foundation is our actual subjective experience with Christ himself—if we make it anything else, because I'll get... my foundation is the Bible. Look, the Bible cannot withstand that kind of pressure. The Bible is a faithful witness, a reliable witness that points us to Jesus. But if you make the Bible itself the object of faith, you're playing a dangerous game that could end in the collapse of everything.

Jonathan Puddle  23:33

Yes, yes. Okay, I want to pull a couple of these threads together, again, to selfishly ask for your input on a problem I'm facing. And this is all so good, Brian, I love this. Thank you. I'm pastoring, on a team, I'm not the lead pastor, but I'm part of the team and I've got good good friends who are lead pastors of a large church here in my town, folks going through this renovation process while pastoring, just what you described. And we're all in our 30s, and much of the congregation is older. And these are the questions, the accusations that we deal with every day, every week. "You're changing this, you're stepping away from the truth of the gospel on this." And what we are required by these voices, what we are demand, what is demanded of us is these kinds of empirical proofs. "Well prove that God is like you say he is! You say that you can no longer stomach this violent retributive, okay well, well what do you do with verse X?" You know, and it's this whole like, but it's this world, it's like this pivotal worldview shift.

Brian Zahnd  24:45

Yeah.

Jonathan Puddle  24:45

And it feels like we're talking past one another. What advice would you give to us and to other people in, you know, young... young is, young is lazy. Okay, they don't have to be young people, people who are pastoring through these kinds of transitions, but some of these people are refusing to leave our church. And it would be easier if they did.

Brian Zahnd  25:09

Yeah, well, God bless them. Well, there isn't any one, you know, panacea, do this and everything and we'll be fine. I think, again, I don't know exactly what kind of church you're leading, what tradition but in general, people in North America, Christians in North America that are in any kind of version of the vast mileau of evangelicalism are in desperate need of really knowing some church history. And knowing something outside of their narrow expression of the faith. They need to know about the great tradition, I think sometimes, again, I don't say this is gonna fix everything for everybody. But sometimes I think people can find it helpful, if you can say, you know, what I'm saying here is nothing new. I mean, I'm not saying that every Christian has always believed what I'm believing about, you know, how we understand eternal judgment, or is God angry, violent and retributive, etc. But I can take you to church fathers, and... who helped define what it means to be Orthodox, and show you saying them precisely what it is I'm saying. That's especially true about about, for example, the Church Fathers, this is just one example doesn't have to be our issue. But the church fathers were almost univocal in saying that the wrath of God is a metaphor. They did this primarily because they were so committed to the doctrine of impassibility: that God is not moved by external forces. Let's say, let's say it this way, God doesn't God is immutable, God doesn't change. God doesn't mutate. And for God to have wrath would be a change of mood. Alright, so God is changing. Rather, what they say is things like, look, the Bible speaks of God being asleep, and you know, he has to be awakened, or it speaks of God as a, as a mother hen, you know, I mean, there's all these, and they say, the wrath of God falls in that same category. Again, I don't have to unpack all that, you can read that in Sinners in the Hands of a Loving God, stuff like that. But I, to be more direct to your question: I think it just helps people to say, you know, we're not some we're not, we're not Johnny come lately. And we're not the only people saying this. That people have been saying the kinds of things about how we understand God revealed in Christ for, you know, over 1000 years, or whatever. I think I think that's one thing that helps. I think, more importantly, though, and this is what I've done, is I I'm this will sound like it sounds like a cliche, but I don't mean it as a cliche. I really mean it. You just keep talking about Jesus. You're just Jesus, Jesus. Yeah. But Jesus, he he, let's look at Jesus and you just keep the focus on Jesus. And this will sound bad, but but you "out Jesus" 'em. You say, I'm not backsliding, I'm being more Jesus centric, more Christocentric than what your theology at this moment's allowing you to be. And all I'm doing is calling you to, to let Jesus be the final definition of who God is. I think that kind of language helps but you know, if they don't want to be if they're if they're resolute in being unconvinced, then there's nothing you can do. But if they're if they're, if their hesitation is coming from an actual legitimate place, I think you can alleviate a lot of their anxiety by just saying, Look, I'm doing nothing more than saying let us be more Christ focused in the formation of our theology that, that that only Jesus is, is the only perfect theology, only Jesus is the perfect revelation of who God is.

Jonathan Puddle  29:16

Yes.

Brian Zahnd  29:16

So when people, when people deconstruct, we'll come back to that, usually it's a reaction to something in particular, about the church or some particular doctrine, it's usually not just Jesus. Now, sometimes what happens is, they get swept away in the landslide, and they end up... You know I talked to, I talked to a woman recently who had been in ministry for and her husband were in ministry, and she began listening to a particular podcast. I don't think it was yours...

Jonathan Puddle  29:59

That's where the trouble starts, man.

Brian Zahnd  29:59

Within 6 months she lost her faith is one of these, you know, ultra superduper deconstruction, you know, "We used to be Christians, and then boom, you know, now let's talk about it." And she started listening to this. And in six months, she was an atheist, of all things, an atheist. So I was having this conversation with her. And she said, "Well, why does Jesus have to be God?" And I said, well, you're asking me that question. But let me ask, let's, let's define some things. What Jesus are we talking about? She's gonna you know, Jesus. No, you tell me what Jesus you're talking about? Well, you know that Jesus of Nazareth, who was from Galilee, and preached in the first century and got crucified by the Romans. Okay. So how do you know about that? Jesus? What's What's your source for that? Just? Well, I guess the Gospels, okay. So you don't believe that Jesus is God? But the only thing you know about Jesus empirically, is from these four witnesses. Right? Well, did they believe Jesus was God? Or were they just deceiving people? Were they were they like, you know, let's, let's, because they clearly believed that Jesus was divine. Did they? Did they? Are they they write as if they did, were they being ingenuous? No, no, I believe that they believed. So. So let me get this straight. These four witnesses, writing in the first century, testify that Jesus is the risen Son of God, you accept much of what they say, but not that claim. Because you listened to a podcast? Because you're a modern person that listened to a podcast? I mean, I think sometimes we just need to see the arrogance of it. And, and that is that is a hallmark of modernity is there's just this inherent arrogance. Modernity as a philosophy really is a tradition of critiquing all other traditions. But it's a little bit un-selfaware. It's not it's not aware that it too, is just a tradition. And it's kind of shallow tradition. But it's a tradition of critiquing all other traditions. Once again, this is kind of a little bit of philosophical here today. But one of the things that I do like about post modernity, not everything is good about post modernity, there's kind of you reach a fork in the road with post modernity, and you either kind of go towards a tradition, you say, "Okay, I'm going to adopt something" or you I think the other I don't think there's anything other than nihilism left.

Jonathan Puddle  31:30

Right.

Brian Zahnd  32:04

But, but one things I like about post modernity is it punctures the pride of modernity. It is post modernity, that says, you know, you're just another addition of critiquing other traditions. And, alright, so we're a little bit off here, but, but when everything's on fire, not all has to be lost.

Jonathan Puddle  32:57

We'll take a quick break to say thank you to all of my Patreon supporters. Thank you, everybody who chips in monthly, annually on patreon.com. You are such a blessing to me. Thank you. Thank you. Big Love as well to everybody who follows me on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, thank you for the dialogue, the interactions, the private messages. Friends, if you ever want to reach me, just email Jonathan@JonathanPuddle.com or DM me, I'm just, I don't know, I find email easier to manage than DMs. But either way, reach out, drop me a line. Let me know what you're thinking. And if you have questions, feel free to ask, I love recording videos in direct answer to questions that people post. So reach out. If you want to become a supporter of the show, you can do so for as little as $3 a month at patreon.com/jonathanpuddle. Thanks friends back to the show.

Brian Zahnd  33:44

You know there was... You know I love Notre Dame. I love Paris. I think you know if you had to ask me was the most beautiful city in the world, I think I'd have to say Paris, you know, there's Vienna, there's others, but but there's something magical about the City of Lights, Paris. And every time I'm there, I visit Notre Dame. Sometimes every day that I'm there, I just would go every day, just every day. And I love the place and I love the history and just all you know, it is it is an act of worship in stone. And I remember Monday, I think it was of Holy Week. 2019 was it?

Jonathan Puddle  34:30

I think so.

Brian Zahnd  34:33

We were having multiple services a day during Holy Week and we'd had a noon prayer service and I came out I look at my phone, and Notre Dame is on fire. I was I was surprised at how hard that hit me.

Jonathan Puddle  34:50

Sure.

Brian Zahnd  34:50

How I wept. I mean I literally I just drove home. And I sat in front of my television for four hours. I didn't I didn't do anything else. I just sat there... prayed, grieved, wept, you know, because we all thought probably it was going to be entirely lost. It came quite close to that being the fate. But what I later found as interesting even as you know, as we move into night in in Paris, it was already becoming night you know, in Paris in a lot of ways that is the cradle of the Enlightenment, and it is sort of the epicenter of European secularism. And you think about all these Parisians that just walk every day with shoulder shrugging in difference past Notre Dom, Our Lady, let's say it in English, Our Lady, that's what it means. Well, first, Our Lady. Don't care... until she's on fire. And when our lady's on fire, even hardened secularists pause, and no's one shouting, you know, burn it all down, empty the pews. We don't need the church anymore. I get I'm getting I'm I know, I'm working with a metaphor here. But I think it's very easy to be cavalier about "I don't want the church" as long as you kind of secretly believe that it still will be there.

Jonathan Puddle  36:08

Sure.

Brian Zahnd  36:08

Do we really believe that the world would be a better place. Without that which keeps alive the Sermon on the Mount? And the story of the prodigal son, and the Jesus who touches the leper, and forgives the sinner? Do we really think the world would be better off without that, which maintains that message? So I think some people that are done with the church maybe aren't as done as they think they are. If they see it on fire, maybe they think I don't know that I really want to be in a world without this. The other thing that happens is sometimes I've seen this: people have kids. And they were done with the church at age 25. And then at 30, they had some kids, and they begin to rethink some things. You know, I as, as often as I speak against the church. I think maybe I want my church, my kids to have that in their life, and they need that. So I don't know, I don't know where we're going with this.

Jonathan Puddle  37:10

This is good. I love all this. I grew up in this secular world, right? Like I'm I'm 35 I have lived in New Zealand, Finland, France, Switzerland, and Canada. And so postmodern secularism is the cradle of most of my thought. And I've spent most of my career working with Christian churches and charities, older gentlemen, "Just remember, there's one absolute truth" and usually that means biblical literalism and so on and so forth. And so I've never, it's always felt so strange, because typically what gets attacked is post modernity, and the concept. And the nuance to say like, what you're saying that there are some maybe rooms in this house that need to be renovated, maybe one or two actually need to be sledge hammered. This seems lacking, certainly, from what I'm listening to, again, some of my mentors, some of my previous mentors, peers in ministry, who are very, very concerned about the deconstructionists and are very, very troubled. You know, and, and that's not what I hear you saying, you are saying, let's not throw the church out.. lets,

Brian Zahnd  38:20

You can't not have a crisis of faith by willpower. I mean, if a crisis of faith comes, it comes. And now you have to face it, and you have to deal with it. But you can't just ignore it.

Jonathan Puddle  38:33

What would you say to to your peers, not not in the Babylon conversation, but more even just more like philosophically like, like, I feel like you're reaching and wrapping your arms around another generation. I feel like you're doing that. Hmm, yes.

Brian Zahnd  38:50

Let's say it like this. Let's let's get I'm gonna have to do some philosophy here a little story. The crisis of faith in late modernity is real. It's not just a fashion. It's not just something that was conjured up. It's not a fad. It is real. And being angry with people for losing their faith in our secular age is a little bit like being angry at medievals for dying of the plague. I mean, something is just happening, you know, and that's the reality. And Nietzsche, foresaw it.  Good old Frederick Nietzsche. I like Nietzsche. And then sometimes I just, I just want to grab him and shake him. And I'm very well read on Nietzsche. So I'm not I'm not an arm, I'm not just someone that's like, you know, read a Wikipedia page on Nietzsche. I know my Nietzsche, okay? And Nietzsche in his book, The Gay Science which it throws people off that a better translation would be Joyful Wisdom. He gives us the parable of the madman. And he says that one morning, on a bright sunny day, a man walks into the village holding a lantern, crying out, "Wither is God, I cannot find God. Where is God?" Carrying a lantern on a bright sunny day, asking where is God? And the villagers gather around and they're laughing. They think this is very absurd and funny. And finally, the madman says, "Where is God? I'll tell you where God is: God is dead. And we have killed him." And they laugh at that too. And he says, "Ahh, I see, I've come too early, my time is not yet." And then he takes the lantern and smashes it and it goes into the churches and sings a requiem for God. Nietzsche writes this, I've forgotten... I think about 1888. He won't, he descended into insanity at age, in 1890 and then live 10 years. But that was towards the very end of his productive career. He writes this, and Nietzsche, it was not what he's not the equivalent of a modern angry atheist. The New Atheists they're sometimes called, you know, Christopher Hitchens and, and Dawkins and Daniel Dennett and Sam Harris... that bunch, he was not like that. When he says God is dead, he's not really making a case for atheism, he's actually pointing out that Western civilization has actually reached the point where they actually don't believe in God, they don't know it, yet. They're not quite aware of it. But God is no longer the organizing center of Western civilization, that's why he said, "I see, I've come too early." But he was he was a prophet in that sense. That, you know, 150 years ago, it would have, you know, atheism was some sort of like, you'd find it in a few salons in Paris among some intellectual elites. But it just wasn't a widespread phenomenon by any stretch of the imagination—that has all changed. That has all changed in Nietzsche foresaw it, and Nietzsche. But he wasn't glib about it. He wasn't even necessarily he, he thought it was time for, for humanity to move on without God. He did think that. But he wasn't cavalier that it was going to be a good... he hoped for the rise of the Übermensch, the Superman. He wanted men and and by the way, it would be men. You know, he wasn't.

Jonathan Puddle  42:39

Persons.

Brian Zahnd  42:41

 Yeah, it wasn't gonna be women. He wanted to he wanted men to be the become the Greek gods, to become heroic and courageous and have the wi... this is his line: the will to power, the will to dominate. And he felt that Christianity, he called it a slave morality, that the Christian ethic of love was what was how the weak manipulated the strong and it just pulls humanity down to a weak level. And he like is he thinks it's time to cast off the shackles of Christian slave morality, and rise up to the will of power. That was his hope. His fear was that instead of the Supermen, we would end up with the last men. And he describes the last men as these incurious couch potatoes that just sit around, and they're interested in nothing more than a little bit of prosaic happiness. He says, like this, he says, "The Last Man is in his most incurious, he's the last little insect upon the earth. He sits there and says, 'We have invented happiness,' and blinks." It's funny how he described them. Well, who did take Nietzsche seriously as far as trying to implement is that? Well it was the Nazis. And on the one hand, yes, it's true that that Nietzsche would not have endorsed anti semitism and what the Nazis ended up ultimately doing. But it's also true that they did take him at his word. And they were I mean, for the Nazis, the writings of Nietzsche, Antichrist, and Beyond Good And Evil, and Genesis and Morals, and all of those are their canonical texts. And they tried to live it and I, you know, I just that's what I want to say to Nietzsche, I want to say, "Did you really think your dark fascination with using violence to willpower wasn't going to end in death camps and a continent in ruin?" Because that's where it ended up. What I really wished it could have happened is that Nietzsche could have encountered Kierkegaard. They were rough contemporaries. Nietzsche may have heard of Kierkegaard. Kierkegaard would never have heard of Nietzsche, but he never read any Kierkegaard. They they're remarkably similar. I mean, people that study philosophy I speak of them as the Existentialists and put them in the same category. And they are similar in many ways. And Nietzsche, I mean, excuse me, Kierkegaard could be and was every bit as polemic against the state sponsored Lutheranism of Denmark, as, as Nietzsche was. And you have to know this about Nietzsche. Nietzsche was a PK, you know, when PKs go bad? Look out. And so yeah, he had he had grown up in a stern Lutheran pastor's home. Kierkegaard saw, he saw the morebund Christendom of the 19th century in Europe, and he railed against it with every bit as with all the ferocity of Nietzsche, and yet, he understood and he believed that at the center of this, there wasn't an empty husk, there was the kernel of the truth that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. So we've arrived at a time, I mean, I think of it like this, you know, the madman smashes the lantern, and I think of that, well, it's kind of like, it's kind of like Mrs. O'Leary's cow kicking over the lantern in the barn and starting the Chicago Fire. It's, I don't mean Nietzsche created it, but he did foresee it. And now we've reached the point where, where the wider society is no assistance to maintaining Christian faith. And so what do we do? Well, that's what the books about and there are ways to respond. But I don't think that, you know, I'm saying this all in response to, to your question about pastors who just sort of say, you know, like, get over it, what's, what's all this deconstruction thing? That's entirely unhelpful. I don't think most people just, I don't think anybody wakes up on morning sand says, you know, just for the fun of, but I think I'll have a crisis of faith. I think instead, what has happened is a faith that long ago, before any of us were born, or our grandparents were born, in the western world capitulated to the terms of empiricism as making anything and everything valid. That was a ticking time bomb, that was a trap. That was a rigged game that eventually was always going to lead where we are now. And Nietzsche saw it. And in that sense, he was right. When he says God is dead, it doesn't mean you know, God doesn't exist. What he really means is that God is no longer the presumed center of society. He knew that in 1888. And he says, Okay, I see my I've come a little too early. You guys don't know this yet. But you will.

Jonathan Puddle  47:44

Right.

Brian Zahnd  47:45

And now what Nietzsche foresaw is in full in full bloom, maybe I should say, is engulfing the Western world right now, and everything's on fire.

Jonathan Puddle  47:55

Yes.

Brian Zahnd  47:56

Um, but that doesn't have to, that doesn't have to be the end. You know, there are, you know, fires are actually part of the natural cycle of certain great forests, you know, some of these some of these great trees, these like redwoods and sequoias out in the west, they, first of all they their bark is such that it can withstand these things, but some of them have have certain kinds of cones and seeds that will not germinate or the resin won't melt, except in a fire. In other words, they cannot reproduce apart from fire. And so there's no stopping what's happening that the the the west, the fire of secularism is going to continue to burn, and a lot is going to be burned down. But it doesn't mean it's the end of the church, it means there's going to be a chastening, there's going to be a loss. In America, part of what part of what is fueling the very, very unhelpful culture wars is a sense of panic.

Jonathan Puddle  49:07

Yes!

Brian Zahnd  49:07

Among certain evangelicals that feel like they are losing their position of dominance in the wider society to which I want to say, "Yes, you are! And you're fighting a culture war that you are not going to win. You can win an individual skirmish and battle here and there but in the end you're going to lose this war and and you're fighting a battle you need not fight at all." Let's let's let's be chasing let's Be humble. We don't need the apparatus of state to help further Christian faith in fact, that is the problem not the solution. And America's funny I mean, you're you're from you from originally from Britain?

Jonathan Puddle  49:50

Born in New Zealand, but then lived all over Europe.

Brian Zahnd  49:52

I was you know it the whole time. I've been trying to place your accent. And I thought, he's all over the map with his accent.

Jonathan Puddle  49:58

Kiwi-nadian!

Brian Zahnd  50:00

Yeah, well, so I've been I've been all the places you've lived. I've always just lived here. But I've traveled the world quite widely. And so I don't, I'm not. I was in New Zealand as recently as February 2020, right before...

Jonathan Puddle  50:14

my uncle came, said he had a great time sitting there listening to you.

Brian Zahnd  50:17

Well, New Zealand, I don't know it as well, New Zealand, Australia, they're, they're kind of more like American in some ways. Let's talk about Western Europe. People, there's this there's kind of this general, Central Western Europe is just thoroughly secular, while Christianity remains a vibrant presence in North America. And I don't agree with that. Here's the way I really think, I think, when I'm in Europe, I've just got back in from three weeks in Scotland. When I'm in Europe, and I'm in Europe a lot, I mean, hasn't been lately because of you know what, but when I'm in Europe, I'm always aware of a historic Christian presence. I don't see it as secular. I see it as post-Christian, but at least the Christian you know, it was there, that Europe has very deep Christian roots. They're largely forgotten. They are there. They are buried, but they're there. I mean, Ivan Ilitch just says, "Europe is Christianity." Now it's not in its pure form, but it just simply is Christianity. He makes a case for it anyway. America is different. America, to me feels like a land that Christianity never really got to. Yes, yes, yes, I know, there are Christians. I don't... people that are listening don't... just give me a little slack here. Let me let me be playful with this. I mean, for example, again, you those of you that know me, you know, I'm not for, you know, trying to requisition the apparatus of state to further faith. I think that's the Constantinian catastrophe that we're still suffering from. But let's be honest about what America is, America is the first big nation state experiment in secular governance. Some people say to me, America was founded as a Christian nation. That was England, they have a state church, they call themselves Christian. And the whole bit. United States said, we're not going to do that. I think in 500 years, I think what will be most remembered perhaps, about America is that it pioneered the idea of secular governance, that there would be this radical separation between church and state, there wouldn't be a state church, which was completely novel. I mean, this was not how it was done. So I feel like the culture wars brings a a, it brings to the surface an aberrant form of Christianity that isn't really deeply truly Christian. It is really sort of a trying to preserve a certain ideal from about 50 years ago, or 75 years ago. That that that all can burn down and you won't have lost much. As I you know, Niels Bohr said, prediction is very difficult, especially about the future. But as I as I kind of look at the future, people say, What do you think the future of the church in North America is? I said, it's going to be diminished. It's going to be chastened. It's going to be humbled. If you're going to be a practicing Christian, 50 years from now, in North America, I think you're going to have to be willing to be viewed as weird. Sort of a relic, sort of strange, sort of out of step. In other words, you're going to have to be like the early church. No, not that we can go back to the early church. That's a fool's errand. You can't do that. But we're going to have to adopt some of that same mentality. That I mean, I promise you, the early Christians weren't trying to figure out how they could use the Roman senate to bring about Christian virtue and value to the Roman Empire because they knew that not gonna happen. And they were right. So they just went about the business of being the church.

Jonathan Puddle  54:11

Yes.

Brian Zahnd  54:12

I mean, I think I think one of the things that would be very, very welcome, very helpful is for the church to just let go of it's "Change the world" language. Quit talking about changing the world. It's not our job to change the world, changing the world is hard. We can't do it. We're not called to do it. We're called to be nothing more than the world already changed by Christ. That's enough, just just to enact a faithful presence and to live as the world as believing in Christ and not trying to use coercive methods to change the rest of world to act like Christians when they don't believe like Christians. And so I think I think the future looks something like that. It's it's interesting, I speak about it in bleak terms, in one sense, things being on fire, and diminished, but as I but in my heart, I don't feel sad, or I just I just know, okay, what we're really seeing what we're really seeing, Jonathan, is the end of Christendom. That is a project of trying to conflate Christian message, faith, church with the power of the empire. And that has been a 17th century mistake we need to let we needed to let go of that a long time ago. So if what is being deconstructed, what is falling apart, what is burning down... is Christendom as distinguished from actual Christian faith? Well, then, so be it. I mean, I know there'll be suffering, I know that we pain I know there'll be a sense of, you know, loss. But you know, the gospel is death, burial resurrection.

Jonathan Puddle  55:51

Yes, sir. Brian, that was That was beautiful. Thank you. I have thoroughly enjoyed this, this whole arc. And I'm glad for the philosophy because I think, again, if you're just in a deconstruction state, and you're looking for a guide, great pick up this book, and Brian's got great things to say. But I think for those of us who are on the other side of it or are pastoring, in the midst of it, trying to understand the societal shift, that the philosophy is so important. So I'm really, really thankful that you that you took us there, 30 seconds left, would you pray for us and anything else you want to leave us with.

Brian Zahnd  56:25

Sure. Lord, I pray for everyone who's hearing this. Wherever, whenever. There's something about this moment that we are connected. We're connected in this moment, and I'm thinking about them and they're aware of me praying, and Lord, I pray that your grace, the grace that comes by the name of Jesus, would flow into their life, I pray, they would know that they're loved, that they would know that somehow, despite it all everything's gonna be all right. Because God, you cause, you cause all things to work together for good. You don't cause all things. You cause all things to work out together for good. Because we love you. You've called us and we're drawing near to you. So Lord, I pray that in the midst of a time when there's a lot of anger, I pray that that we would have peace. I pray the prayer of St. Francis, Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there's hatred, let me sow love. Where there's fear let me sow faith. Lord, that that prayer is in our heart that that we wouldn't so much seek to be understood as the understand, to be loved as to love, for it's in giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we were pardoned. It is in dying, that we are born to eternal life, amen. It is in dying, that we are born again to eternal life. Lord, help us to trust you, in the whole process of the gospel being lived out in our own lives of death, burial and resurrection. In Jesus' name. Amen.

Jonathan Puddle  58:06

Amen. Thank you, Brian. I love Brian Zahnd. He's so much fun. And I just think that's so fascinating, that he's pastored the same church for 40 years. That's, honestly, it's kind of mind blowing. So there's a picture of faithful witness. I love it. What a blessing. Friends go and head to JonathanPuddle.com/podcast. You'll find the show notes for this episode, you'll find a transcript of all the audio into text on there as well. And you'll find links to purchase Brian's brand new book When Everything's on Fire: Faith Forged from the Ashes. I know, it sounds a little bit like me, like I'm downplaying the need to read this book. I'm so sorry. That is not my that was not my intention. I was in a pretty stressed out place, actually, when we recorded this interview, and I had, I had really wanted to read the entire book, as I said on air, but either way, I highly recommend the book, go and get it. Ignore anything that sounded like me saying I didn't need to read this book or that you don't need to read this book. It's a great book, whoever you are, wherever you are. Go and grab it. And you'll find Brian Zahnd of course on all the social medias if you're not following him already. You'll find me @JonathanPuddle, all the platforms. And don't forget the B-Side that's exclusive to my patrons. You can find that at patreon.com/jonathanpuddle. So glad you're here. Much love.