 The worldview of Rhett and Link, one year later. One year ago, famous YouTube comedians Rhett and Link opened up about their past. More specifically, their past is professing Christians. They shared about how they had later quit their engineering jobs to go full-time working for Campus Crusade for Christ. During this time, they coordinated and emceed an annual Christian Christmas event. For the Christians watching, you'd be interested to know that Albert Mohler, currently president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, actually spoke at one of these events. Just a little fun fact for you. From there, their creative career progressed into starring as the fabulous Bentley Brothers in this Christian Children's video. They were also in talks with Phil Vischer, the creator of VeggieTales, to form some kind of creative partnership. For those of you who are unfamiliar with VeggieTales, where have you been? No, like really, VeggieTales turned into an empire before its collapse. Though nothing ultimately came of those talks, Rhett and Link were rising stars within evangelical media. These two Christian guys with creativity to spare seemed bound to land something big. Their careers took a different path when they began posting their original comedy videos on their website, which got reposted on YouTube. Fast forward and Rhett and Link have been major creators on YouTube for over a decade, with their music videos, skits, and hit morning show Good Mythical Morning garnering millions of views and mainstream attention. Obtaining many celebrity guests on their show, it's evident that Rhett and Link have surely hit the big time. One of the first videos I ever watched on YouTube was one of their Rhett and Link music videos. From then on out, I was a fan. The one of Rhett and Link's staples was telling stories from the old days. They kept their former faith a secret. Two guys who had been in the public eye for a really long time, who had kept this most significant thing, secret, in off limits. We had kind of become experts at navigating interviews without talking about the elephant in the room, which is like, but weren't you guys like Christians, and not just Christians, but like big Christians, like professional Christians? And you guys write like some Christian songs for kids that were on like DVDs that were in constant rotation at Christian bookstores? Yes, yes, yes, and yes. I'm surprised that we're just as a, this is a side note that we were, that we've been as successful as we've been and gotten to the point in our careers we have without being vulnerable to that level. Because that's kind of a big part of being an internet personality. We wrote a whole book that was about us. I mean, let's be honest, we wrote the book of mythicality. That was full of stories about us. It was memoir-ish, but yet it didn't talk about any of this stuff. Last year, they had a series of podcasts in which they called the Lost Year series, where they had finally let people in on their past, their former beliefs, and the factors that drew them away from the faith. Being a fan of Rhett and Link for years, I listened to the podcast and was blown away by what I heard. In response, I made this video, responding to their objections to Christianity, as well as just trying to make sense of their story. It's simultaneously my most popular and most hated video. Funny how that works. However, just last week, they released two additional podcasts, catching people up on where their spiritual journey is at, responding to some criticism, and giving their take on some of the most controversial topics today. This is a doozy. Similar to the last video I did on these guys, there's absolutely no way I'm going to be able to respond to every one of their points, objections, or perspectives. The reason I'm making this video is not because I hate Rhett and Link. I still watch their videos, and it's not because I'm trying to prove I'm smarter than they are, because I'm not. I simply want to bring another perspective to the conversation, and maybe shed some light on the Christian worldview for people that may be confused after listening to their podcast. We'll see if this one gets as much hate as the last video, but without further ado, let's watch. But one of the things that I noticed was that it seems that the sort of general evangelical conclusion about us is that we were never Christians. That's where the majority of evangelicals have landed. It's like, okay, this is how I interpret this. And this has been pretty fascinating for me personally, because this is exactly what I would have said about us 15 years ago if I were to watch and hear the stories that we told. And actually, the way that it has been discussed in a couple of places, the way that we have been described is like, you know, you can kind of tell when you listen to them that they never really came to a saving faith. They never really repented. They never really understood grace. It seems like it was cultural. So here's the thing. I actually believe that they had the information necessary to become a Christian. Like, in terms of the actual nuts and bolts of the facts of the gospel and Christianity, it seems like they have a relatively good understanding of all those different information pieces. But the problem is, is that simply having that information doesn't make you a Christian. According to the Bible, what makes you a Christian is not just knowing all the things or having the information necessary to become a Christian. It's actually this inward transformation by the Holy Spirit that comes when we repent for our sins and trust in Christ. It's this idea of transformation, not information. The general sort of consensus of the churches that we came from and the sort of the part of the evangelical church that we came from is that once saved, always saved. And so I just find it interesting that, you know, you hear a couple of guys who talk about their experience with Christianity, how they were all in for Jesus. They recognize that they were sinners in desperate need of the grace of God that comes only through accepting the sacrifice of Jesus on our behalf. And we made a decision, in my case, multiple decisions just to make sure it had taken to accept Christ. And you say, those guys were never Christians. That is what you have to believe. I mean, that's right. I think they had an intellectual and emotional commitment to God, but that does not make you a Christian. Also, according to their worldview right now, right, they don't believe in the God of the Bible or Christianity. And so according to the Bible, what makes you a real Christian is a supernatural work of the Holy Spirit. That's what makes you a real Christian. So according to their worldview, that doesn't even happen. That can't happen because God, you know, the God of the Bible is not real. So that supernatural work of the Holy Spirit cannot take place for anybody. So according to the Bible and with their worldview, nobody can be a real Christian because God doesn't exist or at least the God of the Bible doesn't exist. So I don't understand why they're so like, I, well, we were real Christians. I'm like, dude, according to your worldview, nobody's a real Christian because God, that God doesn't exist. And that work of the Holy Spirit cannot take place in anybody. But honestly, Rhett, you're right. Yes, we need to believe that you weren't a Christian because otherwise, salvation is just a matter of believing a set of facts on Monday and being a Christian. And then on Tuesday, stop believing those facts and then you're not a Christian. I don't believe that's how it works and that's not how the Bible talks about it working. It is a work of the Holy Spirit within us. In John 6, 44, it says, No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day. It is God who draws us to himself. It's not about the information that we have. It's about his work in our lives only by the grace of God. But over the course of my adult life, I came to think that Christians might actually have it backwards. I, when the secular scientists, historians, archeologists, et cetera, question the truth of something in the Bible, they most likely were right. That was the process. It was a slow and steady shift. And then coming to that conclusion, which I finally got all the way on the other side of that, coming to that conclusion gave me permission to question what I kind of call the underlying cosmic principles of evangelical Christianity. Namely, people are born into a broken relationship with God and if they don't reconcile that relationship through Jesus, they will spend eternity in unthinkable torment in hell. And when I started thinking like, that's not even something that I want to believe. I had given myself the permission to not have to believe it because I didn't, I no longer believe the underlying sort of ideas that led to that, right? And at that point is when I was like, OK, no longer consider myself a Christian. You know, the Bible brings forward very challenging realities. And I don't, I don't pretend like these aren't difficult things to believe or difficult things to understand. Like when we talk about sin, hell, judgment, like there's a reason that a lot of modern trendy churches stay away from those things because they're not as palatable as the grace, the love, the mercy stuff, right? But we need to acknowledge, look, these are equally parts of God's character and reality. Because look, when we understand God's goodness, we need to understand his justice as well. A good judge can't let people that do wrong go, right? That wouldn't be just of him. That wouldn't be good of him. And when we understand that, we see God as he truly is. We see him as a good, loving father who has to judge those who are sinning, those who are breaking his law. But it is by his grace that he's provided a way that we can be out of that. We can get out of that. Our sins can be washed away. Our case can be dismissed by his grace through Jesus' work on the cross. So, yes, there are very difficult realities that we need to come to terms with, but there is also amazing grace available for those who trust in Jesus. A lot of people pointed out that it seemed like the two of us were not rejecting Christianity per se, but we were rejecting evangelical Christianity. And maybe more specifically, Southern evangelical Christianity. And I'll say I somewhat agree with that because that is what we had and that is what we experienced. That was our story and that is what we rejected. But I will also say that I don't think that Jesus rose from the dead. I don't think that God's ultimate true manifestation is in the person of Jesus. I would say that that puts me safely outside of the Christian camp. We've seen this before. When you no longer hold onto the Bible as your authority, as your truth, you kind of accept the Christianity that welcomes macroevolution, LGBT issues, critical race theory, and all sorts of stuff that makes it more palatable, makes it more accepting of the culture. But in turn, you've actually lost the heart of Christianity. You've twisted Christianity so much that it's no longer recognizable, but now at least you can still have the Christian label. Rhett and Link decided to reject Christianity on the whole and didn't bother twisting it in order to fit their worldview. White evangelical Protestants had the highest median score on the racism index. As Jones summarized, while most white Christians think of themselves as people who have warm feelings toward African Americans, holding racist views is nonetheless positively and independently associated with white Christian identity. Having spent most of my life in the white evangelical church, I don't need these stats, but you might need them in order to understand that racism has a very comfortable home in the white evangelical church. Calling the white evangelical church racist on the whole is quite an accusation. No, I don't live in southern United States. I live in Canada, so do I? Can I speak exactly to what's going on down there? Of course not, but what I want to appeal to a little bit more is the fact that Rhett sees these things. He has a strong kind of moral sense that this is wrong, right? He sees racism as wrong. And I agree with him, of course, right? But he sees, you know, this injustice. They're not paying attention to what's actually important, right? And I would just like to appeal to Rhett by what standard are you appealing to right now? Like, what morality are you clinging to that calls racism wrong? Because according to your worldview that you espoused a year ago and continue to espouse, we're all just pieces of stardust bumping into stardust. We are creatures that have evolved out of primordial ooze that have really no intrinsic purpose or meaning or value or anything like that or dignity. We have none of that. So why would you say that it's wrong for one other person to treat another person that looks differently in a harmful way or hurt them or be mean to them? Why would that be wrong according to your worldview? Because I can justify it according to my worldview. In the Bible it talks about how there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female. All are one in Christ Jesus. All are seen as equally valuable and worth protecting and have dignity and all that stuff. But according to your worldview, man, like, you don't have any of that. You're just appealing to your internal sense, your moral compass that you'll talk about a little bit later. But this internal sense that you're like, yeah, I know what's right and what's wrong. And what I would say to you is that that is the law of God written on your heart. That is your conscience appealing because you know, yeah, racism's wrong, right? And I agree with you. But I'm saying according to your worldview, you have no justification for that. Stardust treating other stardust in a certain way is neither right nor wrong if you have no moral foundation, no objective standard. And we find that true standard, the one that's written on our heart in the Bible. Have there been Christians that have committed racist atrocities that have done terrible things in the name of God? Absolutely. But we have the moral standard that can call those people out and say, yes, according to God's word, according to what God stands for, those things are wrong. We can say that. But according to you, you're just like, I wouldn't prefer that. According to my own opinion, that's not very nice. You have nothing to stand on. So in summary, White Evangelicals largely, not all, again, not all, but largely and more than anyone else, represent an intersection of science denialism and racist ideas that have made them an impediment in the fight against both COVID and racial injustice. And instead of worrying about the poor and the black and the brown who are more likely to suffer from both the pandemic and racial injustice, White Evangelicals have been preoccupied with their own personal freedoms spending more time and energy talking about their own persecution rather than those actually being persecuted. I can see this is emotional for Rhett, right? I believe he's genuine in this. He sees these things like racism. He wants people to seek racial justice and he wants people to be protected from COVID, which are good things, which are nice things. I understand that, right? But all I would say, Rhett, is that you feel these things so deeply. You want people to be protected. You want people to have justice and all these kind of things. And yet, where are you getting these terms? Where are you getting this sense of morality? Where are you getting this sense of right and wrong truth and falsehood? I think when we move away from the Bible, we are left with simply our own opinion, our own subjective opinion, where somebody can come along and say, you know what, I actually think it's good. It's nice for us to let the survival of the fittest happen. You know, other people may die, but that's okay, right? According to the Bible, that's not what it says at all. No, no, no. We have to be protecting the weakest among us, right? But that's according to the Bible and you've abandoned the Bible. Sure, people have said before, I don't need God to be moral, right? It's just about promoting human flourishing. But you just made that up. You just made that standard, that moral standard up for yourself. You're like, I think it's a good thing that humans flourish. Why is that good? Why? That's what they say, right? As long as I'm protected, as long as I'm taken care of, isn't that all that matters? But you're like, no, no, Isaac, that's not true, because there's something within me that's calling me out that's saying that that's wrong. And I would say, yes, that's God, friend. That is God's law written on your heart once again. One of the common responses to our story was a sense of fear and panic that the two of us were leading kids astray. That these YouTubers who have this big audience, that has a lot of kids in it, are causing these crises of faith to happen all over the place, right? Mm-hmm. And that in turn led to a lot of people talking about how churches and parents need to do a better job to train and educate young Christians to protect them from people like me and you. I have an alternative theory about why so many young people are leaving the church, because they are leaving the church like never before. I was gonna say, I'd like to take credit for it, but I'm not gonna say what I'm saying is, I don't think it's because of me and you and here's why. And I say this, I mean it, I say this out of love and respect because I do believe that there is hope for the church. Your kids are not leaving the church because you didn't train them enough. Your kids are leaving the church because you train them well enough to develop a sense for truth and justice. You let them read the words of Jesus and they've recognized that the church doesn't seem to be interested in those words. They're not leaving because they don't know the truth, they're leaving because they do. This isn't necessarily something that they would articulate. This is something that is happening on a soul level because me and you didn't give any, we didn't give people new information that they never considered. There wasn't anything revolutionary. There wasn't anything even particularly insightful about what we had to say on our podcast, honestly. Nothing that we said was never, it all been said before, but I think the thing that we did is we demonstrated that it is okay to question. It is okay to question at all. Your kids were already questioning it because it's pretty questionable, okay? It is. Now they're seeing that leaving the church might not ruin your life. In fact, you might find a new life. My take is a little bit different on why kids are leaving the church. Obviously, it's not just one thing that is happening. That would be too broad of a generalization. But I think one of the big factor that I've seen is that church no longer teaches what kids believe according to what they've been taught in school. When kids are taught a secular worldview within school for years and years and years and years, and then they grow up and then they find out the church teaches something very different. They're like, I don't want this anymore. And Rhett may see this as a good thing. He's like, oh, this is good. This means they're learning for themselves. They're making their own decision. Their eyes have been opened to science and all that kind of thing. But that's just straight up what's happening. A lot of times the church is teaching the Bible, teaching the Christian worldview, and the kid has been raised according to the secular worldview and those things do not mesh. Another thing is that it hampers their ability to live autonomously. Christianity, they hold people to a standard, right? And God holds us to a standard. And obviously that's where the gospel comes in and nobody can meet that standard, right? That's why we need Jesus and that's why we need his forgiveness. But it is an amount of responsibility and accountability before God that a lot of kids just don't want. I just want to live my life. I want to experience what the world has to offer. And so they leave. Another thing is that oftentimes churches haven't done a great job about addressing things and issues and topics that people are experiencing in their day-to-day life. They can get so high up in the tower of theology that application just isn't there. And the last reason I think people are leaving the church is that it is inconsistent with their perspective of what it means to be loving. And I'll get into that a little bit, but when we talk about what it means to be loving, what does it mean? Does it mean total and utter acceptance of every aspect of that person? Or does it mean something else? Link will help us here explore this topic. Watch this clip. You know, when Lando was nine years old, one of his favorite people on Earth was his teacher. She's a lesbian. She has a wife. They have two kids. We went to Legoland. And we happened to run into them. I got a kick out of Lando seeing his teacher, who he loved so much in a different environment. There's always that funny exchange between a student and their teacher out in the wild. And it feels weird. His love for her was so strong that it had the power to overcome that weirdness. And like, we got a picture together and we would see each other in line and we'd talk to each other and like, you know, it was amazing. Just that he has that type of relationship with his teacher. If I would have instilled in him what was instilled in me, he would have felt deep down within himself that he didn't have permission to love her. I know what the experience is like and I know how I looked at people who weren't straight. He knows what it's like to love somebody. That's not something that... It's inherent. That's not something that I had to teach him. The fact that he's free to love her is a beautiful thing that I... And to love her fully. To love her fully. Because when you love, because again, I'm not saying that Christians who, there are Christians who believe based on their commitment to the Bible and their interpretation of the Bible that being gay is ultimately wrong, but they say that our gay acts are wrong, but the person is lovable and can be redeemed, et cetera. But the thing that that mentality... It just doesn't work out that way in your heart. You're invalidating a huge part of that person's identity and existence and also in your teacher's case, the relationship in her family is not a valid or a legitimate family and therefore that's not full. It's just not full love. It's not full love. That's the idea, right? Before, Link and Brett were Christians. When they were Christians, they weren't able to love gay people fully because they weren't able to accept this major aspect of their lifestyle. I get it. But at the same time, when we talk about love, what are we talking about by... It's not fully loving. What standard are we appealing to here? Because according to the Bible, when we talk about love, love does not just stand by when your friend is heading off in a harmful direction. I think about... I'm not just trying to single out gay people here. That's not what I'm trying to do. You guys brought it up. But honestly, if my friend were sleeping with his girlfriend, and I were to be like... I would say nothing. And I'm just like, no, that's totally good, whatever. I think that would be a disservice to him that wouldn't be truly loving to him. But if I say, hey, man, I don't think this is right. I honestly think this is sinful and against what God would want for you. This is against what God has best for you. Because the best context for you is to have this sexual relationship between one man, one woman, within marriage. That's the key. And so, you know, I don't think this is best for you. And by me saying that, I believe that is a demonstration of loving somebody fully. It's not about accepting every aspect of the person because that's just not going to happen, right? People are going to do things we disagree with and that we think are wrong or harmful, all that kind of thing. But to be truly loving is to speak up when those things are happening and say, hey, man, I'll be here for you, right? Like, I don't hate you, but I'm doing this out of love because I think there's something better for you. So, if you want your kids to stay in the church, again, this is unsolicited advice. I don't know if anybody's taking it, but this is not a, hey, I want all your kids to leave the church. That's not what I'm saying at all. If you want your kids to stay in the church, you don't need to change your kids. You need to change your church. You know, people made assumptions about me and you and they're making the same assumptions about their kids. Let me explain. So, a lot of people assumed that we left the church because there was something out there, something outside of the church, whether that be fame, fortune, cultural, acceptance, whatever, that we ultimately wanted more than Jesus, right? Like, we fell to the temptation and we went after that thing instead of Jesus. And you also think that your kids might want something out there, something outside of the church, more than they want Jesus. I think it might be simpler than that. I think maybe your kids who left the church just wanted Jesus and they saw that you wanted something else. Don't change your kids. Change your church. Dang. That says it all. I mean, a lot of churches are falling into this, right? They're listening to Rhett's advice. They're saying, yeah, my kids leaving the church, can't we have more crazy music and light shows and can't we put on more trendy clothing on our pastors and try to get them to come back kind of thing. And a lot of people are doing it. They're changing their church in order to more accommodate to the culture. They're not touching on topics that are important. Like, real important issues that are fundamental to our life and instead they're kind of staying out in this self-help world. They're becoming self-help gurus because that's what attracts the masses. But I want to just encourage you, like, don't change your church to keep kids, right? Because the fact is, is when you do that, you actually lose the kids that are actually wanting to seek Jesus. And I know Rhett has this idea that kids are leaving the church because, you know, you haven't been preaching the true Jesus. And the true Jesus is about love and acceptance and, you know, he's a social justice warrior and all these kind of things. And don't. That's not who you want to be appealing to, okay? That's not who you want to be trying to come back because if you try to attract them with the Jesus that just isn't true, that isn't just the right Jesus, the actual Jesus. It's just going to be an absolute mess. And it's not doing a service to the people that are actually in the pews that actually want to hear about the true Jesus of the Bible. I don't feel like I'm in a sea of uncertainty. I feel like I'm free, right? I would mostly describe where I'm at right now as there is a sense of lightness and of freedom. Ironically, that is the way many Christians, especially people who have, you know, we didn't have the privilege of having like a hardcore testimony. But the way a lot of people describe the moment of coming to faith is a sense that a burden has been lifted off of them and there is a lightness and they feel free. For me, the leaving and also being vocal about my leaving has been the sense of freedom, the sense of lightness, the sense of not being burdened, the sense of being open. I get it, Rhett. Like he says he feels light. And I understand that, right? I really do actually because I think there is this sense that within Christianity that we have so much pressure on ourselves. We see these commandments that God has for us and all these things in the Bible that he wants us to do. And we're just looking at ourselves and we're like, I am so incapable and inadequate of holding up to any of this stuff. And even when we see the gospel, we're like, yeah, Jesus died for me and that's great and that means I can be, I can rest and all those kind of things. But a lot of us and certainly I think it has to do with our personality too, we just don't internalize that. We just feel like we're still in this place of working and trying to earn our way and throughout this podcast and these podcasts, Rhett and Link talk about how they feel like they have a lot of guilt and shame still lingering. And I feel that too. And I think some of the challenges is that when we see God and when we see the gospel, we feel like, okay, I trust in that then I should just feel free right away and I should feel good and I feel light. But I think feelings don't always correlate with reality. Just because we trust in the gospel, we're Christian, we're saved, all that kind of thing doesn't mean our feelings are going to necessarily change. And what I'm learning is actually like, God is inviting me and if you're experiencing this too, he's inviting you on a journey of healing, of letting the pressure be off because he's already taken the weight on himself. He's already taken all this stuff that we hold so tightly and we feel obligated, I gotta do more, I'm not doing enough, I gotta perform better. He's saying, come child, I can take that from you and it's gonna be a process. It's gonna be a healing process, but the key and the solution is not running away from God and saying, oh, I'm just gonna rid myself of all this stuff and just be free from it. But no, God wants to invite us into a place of healing where he can lift this stuff off our shoulders and it's gonna take time and I'm not even there. And the sense of not feeling threatened, I think one of the things that was so true of my experience as a Christian was that everything was a threat. Everything was a threat. You think this? No, that might be scary. You might be out to get me. You might be bad for me. That's real, right? If you've been on Twitter, you know what's up. But a lot of people feel that way. Anybody that has a worldview, they feel like other people with different worldviews are attacking them. I'm not saying that's good, but I'm saying that is the world of social media right now. It's just whenever somebody espouses a slightly different opinion, I am personally victimized and I'm being persecuted and all that kind of thing. Yeah, I'm learning. We can settle down. And even this dialogue here, me making this video and you making the video, I don't feel like you're attacking me and I hope you feel like I'm not attacking you because I don't think that's what's going on here. I think we can have a good productive dialogue about our different worldviews and find some place of understanding. That's what I would hope. Obviously I want you guys to come to repentance and faith. Of course. I want you to come over to my side. Of course. For Christians watching, I just want to reaffirm like other people aren't your enemy. They're not. They're really not. And whenever we feel like we're attacking somebody because they have a different argument than us and not really seeing them as a real person, then we're off base. We've lost what our true mission is, which our true mission is to love people. Yes, that means speaking the truth, but it doesn't mean seeing them as some thing we need to conquer. That's not the way to look at it. It's not like my moral compass was on the ship. I think a lot of people live with the understanding that well, no, the compass is on the ship. If you leave the ship, you don't have the compass anymore. It's like, no, you still, you got it. It's actually, unless you're just biologically predisposed to be a horrible person, most people have a pretty intact moral compass and that sense of truth and justice that your kids naturally have, that your kid that I know naturally has. He didn't lose his moral compass when he went away from Christianity. Yeah, I think that's honestly true, but he lost the foundation for it. He lost the justification for why it is actually valid or true because now it's just kind of his opinion. He's just like, yeah, it's good to do this. It's good to do this. It's nice that that's wrong, but that's just red. That's just Link talking. When we're actually grounded into a foundation, an objective sense of morality and truth, then we can say, you know what, this is actually wrong because this is how God has designed it all, not because, well, it's Tuesday and I don't like this and it's, you know, I'm not too happy with this. Yeah, of course, atheists can say, I don't murder people. I don't do the steal or whatever because I have a sense of morality. I'm not crazy. I would say, yes, that's right because you're taking from the Christian worldview. You're stealing from the Christian worldview. You don't actually have a justification for that morality. I don't have any more answers than I had a year ago, but I'll tell you, I do believe that my soul is richer because I've made some progress in knowing and loving myself more. That's through therapy, through introspection, through conversations and I'm beginning to experience how understanding and accepting myself has expanded my capacity to love other people. Let's talk about self-love because I've been thinking a lot about self-love and I think the key is is that when we understand that God has accepted us by His grace through Jesus' sacrifice in the cross, right? Not out of any of our doing, but simply by His grace when we repent and trust in Him. He has accepted us, right? We're fully loved and fully accepted in Him. When that happens, I believe that's when we can fully accept ourselves, right? When we can understand, hey, look, I've been created in the image of God. I am no longer guilty. I am a child of God. I think that is the ultimate place of just, I don't know, contentment in who we are because that doesn't mean we're not moving forward, right? The Bible talks about sanctification and moving more closely to Jesus every day, but it means that today I am loved and delighted by God through His grace. That is the ultimate form of not self-esteem, but that's what people are looking for when they want self-esteem, right? They're looking for this boost of their confidence and like, I'm a great person, but actually that only comes from when we see that Jesus has loved us despite us. That's why we can accept ourselves. That's why we don't need to feel this constant guilt or shame or just self-pity. No, no, no. We're delighted in and loved by God. Within the church, within the evangelical church, there is an expectation that the dad, the father is the spiritual leader of the household. And there's an expectation that not only would the dad be a leader, but the dad has the answers, right? Expectation that you'll have the answers and that there's very few things that you won't have answers to and there is a playbook for everything that your kids or your wife might encounter. First of all, a lot of pressure and being able to say, I don't know. I don't know if there's a satisfactory answer to this question that you have. I don't know if there's a satisfactory solution to this situation, but we can figure it out together. I kind of agree with Rhett. Fathers are seen as kind of this hub of needing to know everything sometimes and it can be tough. Like, I'm not a dad. I don't know. But actually, I actually wrote a book, surprisingly, a letter to my father what your son wants to tell you, but doesn't. And kind of like from a son's perspective, I wanted to share with fathers that sons, we don't need our dad to know everything. We don't need our dad to like have all of the answers. That's not what we're looking for, but we're looking for someone that can be present with us, that can help us find the answers and explore and yet have doubts and questions and all these things, but at least somebody that's with us to work through these things. So I don't think what Rhett's talking about is counter to, you know, the biblical perspective. I think there's a lot of learning that needs to take place for fathers, for sons, and you know, I think it's better if we do it together. I don't necessarily, I struggle with a lot of shame. I'm the king of shame, but guilt is not so much my thing. But for somebody who has, who struggles with guilt, being a part of a religious system, especially in our experience, evangelical Christianity, it's like steroids for the guilty, right? It's high octane. And of course, I understand that like, I remember being an evangelical and saying that like, listen, no, we're all about grace. It's the Catholics or the Jews. They're the ones who are all about works and they're the ones who are guilt-ridden, but we live in the freedom that comes with a grace-based relationship with Christ. And it's like, it's a fun thing to say, but in reality, there's still so much pressure and there's still so much expectation. My wife is an expert at talking about this, about what it's like to be somebody with OCD in the midst of a religious system. You know, I felt this pressure too. I'm sorry, like, it's not like, I feel like there are some people that really like thrive. You know, like they're just like, you know, doing a lot of different stuff and you know, within the church and maybe they're high up and leadership or something like that. And man, they're just killing it, right? And then there are other people that just feel bogged down by anxiety and just like, oh man, like pressure and shame and stuff like that. And then, you know, they try to do stuff but they become overwhelmed and burnt out and all this kind of thing and go through these cycles. Like I've been there, I've felt that. But what does that mean? Does that mean like I just leave Christianity? Like just give up? Like, I mean, I think there's a better answer than that. I think, and I believe that God is inviting us into this place of healing, of seeing these burdens that we're bearing, that we're continue to bear even though we trust in Him. We just continue to hold on to this baggage and this stuff. And I truly believe that God is inviting us into a journey of letting those things go. And I think that's a huge aspect of my channel is just like, you know, maybe you watch the conservative Christian channels on YouTube and you just feel like, this is what I gotta do. This is what I gotta do. Yeah, do this, do this. And I just feel like, I wanna invite you into this place where you can let go, where you can just say, God, I give it to you today. Like I'm not gonna be perfect. I'm not gonna be a perfect Christian. That's not what's gonna happen. I'm not gonna have all the arguments and all the stuff together. Like that's not possible. And I'm not gonna do enough to feel good about myself. Like that's not what I'm looking for either. I just wanna rest in you, God. And I truly believe that that's what God would want for us. It's not to just run away and shame and say, I'm done with it. But to say, God, can you help me in this? I'm stressed, I feel pressure, and I need you. And there's some people, depending on what tradition they're in, that live in debilitating mental illness. Yes. Because they cannot specifically get out of the system. Get out of the system. Especially mental illness. Because those type of things are the unseen problems and challenges are the ones that can be easily written off with a prayer or a proverb or some teaching. We've missed the mark on this. Like straight up, right? I think a lot of Christianity has adopted somewhat of a prosperity gospel in terms of mental health, right? When we look at the prosperity gospel, we see televangelists saying, just believe God more and you'll be healed. Just believe him truly and he will give you what you want. When we see people with mental health issues, right? And they just have like mental illness and we're saying, just believe God more and you'll be healed. Just believe God more and he will take it away from you. And we look down on those people that still have crippling anxiety, depression, different things like that. And we just say, you've got to believe God more. We're buying into the prosperity gospel of mental health because I don't believe that's how it works. Just like a physical ailment just doesn't... God just doesn't heal every physical ailment right away if we just trust in him more. I don't think that is how it works with every mental issue too. I think there's a path to healing that needs to take place just like there is for physical healing and we ought not look down on people that are struggling with this or say just believe God more because you know what it does? It shames people. It says that, you know what? You're not as good a Christian because you're still dealing with this and I know if you're still struggling with this that means you're not trusting God enough or you're not believing his word enough or you're not reading your Bible enough. I just don't think that's helpful and I don't think it's biblical because I think God wants us to approach it in a way where we can go after him for healing and not just quick fixes right away. There is no way I'm going to summarize this video but all I can say is that I'm praying for Rhett and Link and Rhett and Link if you're watching, I'm praying for you. I said that last year and I did and I will continue to. I still love you guys and even though I disagree with your conclusions I still really hope to see you in heaven one day. Thank you so much for watching. If you want to help support my channel, link in bio to join my Patreon. It is my passion to make this kind of content to help you follow Jesus daily. My name is Isaac David and you can follow me on Instagram, on TikTok. Keep up with me on the different socials. Thank you so much for watching and I will see you next time. God bless.