Seeing Good in the World (with Tim Muehlhoff)

Why is it that Christians tend to focus on the brokenness of creation rather than its goodness? What if we shifted our attention to highlighting that God made the world to be our home, and as a result, focused on loving the world? Sean and Tim Muehlhoff discuss the proper balance we can find between recognizing the sinfulness and goodness of the world and what this means for discipleship and evangelism. 

Tim Muehlhoff (PhD, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill) is senior director of Biola's Winsome Conviction Project that seeks to open lines of communication rather than close them. He is the author of multiple books, including "End the Stalemate," with Sean McDowell. He is a popular speaker at churches, conferences, and universities.

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Think Biblically: Conversations on Faith and Culture is a podcast from Talbot School of Theology at Biola University, which offers degrees both online and on campus in Southern California.

Find all episodes of Think Biblically at: https://www.biola.edu/think-biblically.

To submit comments, ask questions, or make suggestions on issues you'd like us to cover or guests you'd like us to have on the podcast, email us at thinkbiblically@biola.edu.

Transcript

Sean McDowell: 0:00

[upbeat music] Miroslav Volf is one of the leading public theologians today. He's a professor of theology at Yale Divinity School, and the founding director of the Yale Divinity School for Faith and Culture. But guess what? He's not our guest today. We've had him on previously. Our guest today is a name you will recognize, because he and I have sparred back and forth-

Tim Muehlhoff: 0:21

[laughs]

Sean McDowell: 0:21

... On pronouns, empathy, a beloved Biola professor by name of Tim Muehlhoff. Now, you're wondering, why did I introduce Tim Muehlhoff after Miroslav Volf? Because Tim and I took a class together-

Tim Muehlhoff: 0:33

Yes, yes

Sean McDowell: 0:34

... Where Volf came out for four days, and we sat through just some of the most brilliant- ... Insightful teaching-

Tim Muehlhoff: 0:41

Mm-hmm

Sean McDowell: 0:41

... And thought, "Let's do a podcast together." For both of our listeners here at the Think Biblically podcast at Winsome Convictions, just some lessons we took away, and I think they'll enjoy it. That's the hope.

Tim Muehlhoff: 0:52

This is the cool thing about Biola, Sean, is every year, to just keep faculty sharp, they bring in some of the top, theologians, thinkers, Christian thinkers, and then you can apply, get accepted-

Sean McDowell: 1:05

That's right

Tim Muehlhoff: 1:05

... And you sit in a class with your colleagues from all these different disciplines, and you do the reading ahead of time, and then they bring in a world-class, theologian, and we got to... It, it was like being back in grad school-

Sean McDowell: 1:17

Oh, man

Tim Muehlhoff: 1:18

... But all the cool ways of grad school.

Sean McDowell: 1:20

It was so much fun. I took a ton of notes.

Tim Muehlhoff: 1:22

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 1:23

It was personally enriching. I was the first one to turn in my application.

Tim Muehlhoff: 1:27

[laughs]

Sean McDowell: 1:27

I don't mean that as a sense of pride. I mean, like, I was so pumped-

Tim Muehlhoff: 1:31

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 1:31

... That Miroslav Volf-

Tim Muehlhoff: 1:32

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 1:32

... Was coming-

Tim Muehlhoff: 1:33

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 1:33

... That I was like, "I gotta get into this thing." So let's, let's jump into really what he's talking about, 'cause he's the head of kind of the Faith and Culture Center-

Tim Muehlhoff: 1:42

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 1:42

... Is how, as believers in God, do we interact with the world? And of course, the world can be Christians, it can be the wider world, it can be creation itself-

Tim Muehlhoff: 1:52

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 1:52

... And we need to think about all of those. So he wrote a piece on why did God create the world? I've got some thoughts, but jump in and tell us what you think, Tim.

Tim Muehlhoff: 2:02

Well, one of our good friends, Greg Ganssle, who's just a top-notch philosopher-

Sean McDowell: 2:06

Yep

Tim Muehlhoff: 2:07

... He made a comment that I wrote down. He said this- "You seldom hear Christians say, 'The world is good.'" And that really struck me when he said that. When I was in grad school, I didn't tell people right away I was on staff with Campus Crusade for Christ back in the day.

Sean McDowell: 2:24

Sure.

Tim Muehlhoff: 2:24

I just didn't want to lead with that. I didn't even lead that I was a believer. I was a grad student, so I was privy, Sean, to all these backdoor conversations.

Sean McDowell: 2:32

[laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 2:33

I mean, this is the Bible Belt, right? This is UNC Chapel Hill.

Sean McDowell: 2:36

Yeah, yeah.

Tim Muehlhoff: 2:36

And, I remember one comment somebody said, that we were really negative people, Christians. We think people are sinful, everything that's wrong with the world, everything that's wrong with everything, we love to point that out. And I thought,"Okay, that's an interesting critique." And some of it's warranted, because you don't often hear Christians, as Greg said, say, "The world is a really good place." Now, we have to be careful and unpack that-

Sean McDowell: 3:01

Of course

Tim Muehlhoff: 3:01

... But Volf really did a good job of unpacking that-

Sean McDowell: 3:04

He did

Tim Muehlhoff: 3:04

... Going back to Genesis.

Sean McDowell: 3:05

He does.

Tim Muehlhoff: 3:06

And when God made the world, he's the one who said, "It- this is good, very good." And I think even though it's fallen, and we'll get into what John later has to say about the world when he's talking about the fallen world, but we need to remember, God created the world to be a place, as Volf said, that we inhabited with each other and with God. I think that's a beautiful thing to think about, that God wanted to inhabit a physical space that we could enjoy together, and made it as creative as, science tells us. It's amazingly in-depth and creative.

Sean McDowell: 3:41

So Volf sent us these papers that he had written and had presented, and we got to kind of discuss them before he released them, so it was kind of fun insight. And he had one literally called Why Did God Create the World? [laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 3:52

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 3:52

And it's kind of a simple question that kids ask. I've thought about this a ton, Tim, but when I was reading this, I was like, "Why didn't I quite piece it together this way?" So he points out a couple things in here. He said, going back to, like, God calls Abraham, God delivers the children of Israel from slavery in Egypt, and all this to fulfill the one promise- "I will dwell among- ... The Israelites-

Tim Muehlhoff: 4:15

Mm-hmm

Sean McDowell: 4:15

... And I will be their God."

Tim Muehlhoff: 4:17

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 4:18

You come forward to John's gospel, of course, and very clearly, it's about God who's coming, what? To dwell with us.

Tim Muehlhoff: 4:27

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 4:28

God humbles himself in the person of Jesus, who is fully divine, takes on human flesh. You know, and even in John chapter 4, it's like he's tired, so he sits down by the well.

Tim Muehlhoff: 4:39

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 4:39

It's like he's God, but he's human, and he's dwelling with us. So Volf says, "Put simply, God created the world to dwell in it."

Tim Muehlhoff: 4:48

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 4:48

And then he asks a question. He goes, "Why did God create the first humans and place them in the Garden of Eden?" He said, "To help the garden flourish as their home." He says, "The Bible closes making the same point. At the very end of Revelation, you know, John of Patmos sees new Jerusalem coming from heaven and the renewed Earth. To make sure that John doesn't miss the meaning of what is happening before his eyes, a loud voice fr- you know, from God's throne says, 'See, the home of God is among mortals.' "

Tim Muehlhoff: 5:20

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 5:20

"He will dwell with them. They will be his people." He says, "God and the peoples of the Earth now have a home together."

Tim Muehlhoff: 5:27

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 5:28

That's so simple, and yet it's profound, and I don't know that I've thought about the world primarily through that lens for reasons that we will, we will get into.

Tim Muehlhoff: 5:40

Yeah, and we'll be there with- dwelling with him, interacting with him. That great passage in Genesis, in the cool of the day, God's walking. Certainly anthropomorphic, but you can see it. I mean, you- God is dwelling. So Sean, do you think when the, when the new heavens and the new Earth happen, and God is omnipresent- ... Do you think now in the new Earth-... That we will go about, interacting with each other, but we'll always have that presence, almost like elevator music in the background, that we'll see the presence of God as we interact and move around in this new Earth?

Sean McDowell: 6:18

I don't know how to answer that question.

Tim Muehlhoff: 6:21

Wouldn't that be wild?

Sean McDowell: 6:22

But [laughs] here's what I think. I think it's the new heavens and the new Earth, and it's physical. So sometimes we have this idea that God comes down and destroys this Earth-

Tim Muehlhoff: 6:33

Right. Yeah

Sean McDowell: 6:33

... Carts us off-

Tim Muehlhoff: 6:34

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 6:34

... Somewhere else. That creates a sense that this world is not our home. We don't have to care for this world.

Tim Muehlhoff: 6:42

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 6:42

I think when God comes down, it's like he's gonna restore the Garden of Eden. God placed Adam and Eve-

Tim Muehlhoff: 6:49

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 6:49

... Carefully. And if you look in Genesis 2, it's like you look in the original Hebrew, it's like God just gently placed them there with such care. That's what Prager argues in his commentary, like, this God who just places them there- ... Matters so much to them-

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:03

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 7:03

... That in the new heavens and new Earth, I mean, is Jesus physically walking around? I mean, I don't know the answer to that. I can't answer that, but it's physical.

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:12

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 7:12

And we're in God's-

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:13

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 7:13

... Presence relationally-

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:14

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 7:14

... And we see Him. But that metaphor of home-

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:19

I love it

Sean McDowell: 7:19

... I think is interesting.

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:20

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 7:20

So I've got some thoughts on how I think about creation differently as home from this seminar, but I'm curious, how does thinking about the world as our home shape the way you think about its goodness or its brokenness or how we should relate to it?

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:37

Well, I wrote down one quote when you, I, it-

Sean McDowell: 7:39

Yeah, do it

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:39

... It came to me when you were speaking, that God, Volf said, "God is intimately involved with each small part of the world." Right? Remember Jacques Cousteau?[laughs] Do you remember Jacques Cousteau?

Sean McDowell: 7:50

Okay. [laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:51

Okay, do you remember that name?

Sean McDowell: 7:52

I know the name, yeah, but like-

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:53

Yeah, a long time, long time ago, he was... He, he introduced the world to deep-sea everything.

Sean McDowell: 7:59

Okay.

Tim Muehlhoff: 7:59

I knew nothing about the deep sea. I'm from Detroit, right? But I remember this one episode where he goes deep as you possibly can in the ocean and sees some fish and makes the comment, "No one's ever seen these fish before, ever. This is the first time they've ever been recorded," and they were-

Sean McDowell: 8:16

That's cool

Tim Muehlhoff: 8:16

... Beautiful! So think about that. God creates these amazing, beautiful fish nobody will see, but they're still intimately beautiful because God delights in really beautiful fish that maybe people will never see until we got the technology to go actually record them.

Sean McDowell: 8:35

Mm-hmm.

Tim Muehlhoff: 8:35

That, to me, is the crazy thing about God, is he's decorating this home with all these elaborate gifts, like food just tasting amazing, and the more we learn about food, different combinations. He's, he's giving us visual sights, sounds that are just amazing, and God does it because He absolutely delights in it. I mean, He loves it, and then, you know, Trinitarian theology is the Trinity wants to share that love with human beings-

Sean McDowell: 9:05

That's right

Tim Muehlhoff: 9:05

... The love that exists. So here's God saying, "Ooh, ooh, let me show you this part of my home. Let me show you this part of your home." "Oh, wait until you see this. It's gonna blow your mind." Then when you create microscopes, you're gonna see how cells interact, and that's gonna blow your mind. So to me, this home is crazy elaborate, and that we need to receive it as a gift. We can talk about it in a second, but then it also breaks your heart when God looks at what's happened to His home.

Sean McDowell: 9:32

That's right.

Tim Muehlhoff: 9:33

Even the good gifts have been misused, right? Technology that could help us actually now hurts us because it's been weaponized. So I don't doubt that there's also a sense where God's heart breaks when He looks at a fallen world, and sees what we've done to it. But to me, it's every intimate part of the world. Art, I'm looking at your screensaver-

Sean McDowell: 9:55

[laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 9:55

... On your computer.

Sean McDowell: 9:56

The back of my computer.

Tim Muehlhoff: 9:57

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 9:57

Yep.

Tim Muehlhoff: 9:57

Which is what? It's, um-

Sean McDowell: 9:58

It's van Gogh, Starry Night.

Tim Muehlhoff: 9:59

Yeah. I mean, that's God. Right? I mean, we could talk about the stars the rest of this podcast-

Sean McDowell: 10:05

Sure

Tim Muehlhoff: 10:05

... How elaborate and beautiful and amazing it is. So I need to receive that as a gift. What I got from Volf is I need to stop and recognize, even within the fallen-ness of the world, there are basic pleasures I probably take for granted.

Sean McDowell: 10:20

Sure.

Tim Muehlhoff: 10:20

But I need to stop and say, "Hey, this is awesome. I need to say thank you to God."

Sean McDowell: 10:25

Now we'll come back to what it looks like, how we respond to it, but that whole metaphor is really pretty powerful. Like, you think about those fish that people didn't discover-

Tim Muehlhoff: 10:33

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 10:33

... Until Jacques Cousteau. God had been getting glory and joy out of those fish-

Tim Muehlhoff: 10:39

I love that

Sean McDowell: 10:39

... Before we came along.

Tim Muehlhoff: 10:41

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 10:41

There are some fish we'll never explore, certain galaxies in the depth of the universe.

Tim Muehlhoff: 10:46

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 10:47

So we're tempted to say, "Oh, God made all of this for us," and it's like, okay, time out. This is... The story is about God, not about us.

Tim Muehlhoff: 10:56

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 10:57

But He's inviting us-

Tim Muehlhoff: 10:59

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 10:59

... Into-

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:00

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 11:00

... His home-

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:01

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 11:01

... To share it with Him.

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:03

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 11:03

That's the important way to look at it. Now, when I think about home, I asked Volf this question. I said, "For me, home, like, when I'm tired, I'm like, 'I just want to go home.' My family-

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:15

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 11:15

... It brings... Like, if I'm on a trip, you and I are traveling-

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:17

Yep

Sean McDowell: 11:17

... And I'm like-

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:18

Mm-hmm

Sean McDowell: 11:18

... I just can't count the [laughs] minutes until this plane lands-

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:21

Especially if you're going through LAX

Sean McDowell: 11:23

... And I'm home. Oh, [laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:23

Especially if you're going through LAX.

Sean McDowell: 11:24

Yeah. That is a living hell-

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:27

Oh, come on

Sean McDowell: 11:27

... Sometimes.

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:28

Come on.

Sean McDowell: 11:28

I avoid that at all expense.

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:30

I know.

Sean McDowell: 11:30

But I'm just like, "I just want to get home."

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:31

I know. I want to get home.

Sean McDowell: 11:31

'Cause it has such a warm-

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:33

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 11:33

... Resonance with me-

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:35

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 11:35

... Relationally, growing up. My dad did not have that experience. You know my dad.

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:40

Yeah, yeah.

Sean McDowell: 11:40

There was abuse that was there.

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:41

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 11:41

There's alcoholism.

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:42

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 11:42

So I was like, "Why are we..." I asked, you know, Dr. Volf, "Why should we have this metaphor when for some people it's so painful?"

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:49

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 11:49

And he said, "But still there's a yearning for home. It's written inside of us."

Tim Muehlhoff: 11:55

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 11:55

So my father, out of that brokenness, built a good home for, you know, my mom. Obviously, they did it together, for my sisters, now for us grandkids. Like, there's something inside of us that yearns for that home, and I even think of, like, photos, interestingly enough.... And they show photos outside of Earth, it kind of feels like, oh, I have this feeling of like home for that.

Tim Muehlhoff: 12:20

Oh, yeah.

Sean McDowell: 12:20

So I wonder if we'd shift that metaphor a little bit, the way I treat my home, and obviously I respect somebody else's home [chuckles] I'm not gonna walk in-

Tim Muehlhoff: 12:28

Right

Sean McDowell: 12:28

... And wreck it-

Tim Muehlhoff: 12:29

Right

Sean McDowell: 12:29

... Out of care for them. But there's something about like, wow, this is my sacred space.

Tim Muehlhoff: 12:33

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 12:33

And I care for that, and I clean it up, and I fix it. What if we'd think about the world through the lens of the home?

Tim Muehlhoff: 12:42

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 12:42

I think it might shift the way it... Two things- It might shift the way we treat our home-

Tim Muehlhoff: 12:49

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 12:49

... But second, the way others would perceive us in light of the comment you made earlier about how non-Christians often view believers.

Tim Muehlhoff: 12:59

Yeah, I mean, you wouldn't trash your home.

Sean McDowell: 13:03

[chuckles]

Tim Muehlhoff: 13:03

Y- there's parts of your home that are even sacred. Like, there's cer-

Sean McDowell: 13:06

Or something's wrong with you, right?

Tim Muehlhoff: 13:07

Yeah, there's something wrong with you. Or you just watched the Detroit Lions get beat by the-

Sean McDowell: 13:11

Yeah

Tim Muehlhoff: 13:11

... Washington Commanders.

Sean McDowell: 13:12

By the Chargers.

Tim Muehlhoff: 13:13

Come on!

Sean McDowell: 13:13

But keep going.

Tim Muehlhoff: 13:14

Oh, that was... Okay.[clears throat] but there's certain things that kids have made that are irreplaceable. I mean, you can't go and- ... Buy them on Amazon Prime. I mean, these are things they made in second grade, and if a fire took them, they're, they're gone forever. So there's certain things in our home that are actually sacred to us, that we just treasure looking at those kind of things. Hey, I had one thought when you were talking about the home-

Sean McDowell: 13:36

Yeah, come back to it

Tim Muehlhoff: 13:36

... And God creating it, so and traveling. So we have a dog, Raleigh, after Raleigh, North Carolina-[laughing] ... 'cause all the kids who were born in Raleigh, North Carolina-

Sean McDowell: 13:45

So funny

Tim Muehlhoff: 13:45

... Were diehard, Tar Heels. [laughing] she's this crazy, COVID dog, that if you walk into the garage and just come back in, you've only been gone 30 seconds, she acts like you've been gone for a year, and she's so happy to see you.

Sean McDowell: 14:00

Right.

Tim Muehlhoff: 14:00

So coming home for me is, the tradition is, when Noreen hears me pull up in the car, she opens the door-

Sean McDowell: 14:06

Mm-hmm

Tim Muehlhoff: 14:06

... And out comes Raleigh, running like a mad person to greet you, and it just makes me laugh, Sean, every single time to see Raleigh just coming at you. Isn't it wild to think that could be God? That there's things in our world that literally just make God laugh. Like, He just looks at it and says, "I... That's great," to see how people interact with each other-... To see, to hear a joke, to see parts of His world that just delight Him and really make Him smile, and that He enjoys... It's not just for us. He enjoys the world as well, and it's kind of interesting for me to think He could look at a great piece of artwork and go, "Oh, that's really good." "I really think that's beautiful." So this idea of co-delighting in the world with God, I think, is also very important, that God loves, the way food tastes, the beauty of a sunset, that He would enjoy that, and it's not just us enjoying it, but He's enjoying it with us, I think is a cool thought.

Sean McDowell: 15:12

And it, you know, I think of like classic, often bring it back to The Matrix, when they discover what-

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:17

[chuckles]

Sean McDowell: 15:17

... Their real home is. It's like the food is like oatmeal. There's nothing aesthetically pleasing.

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:24

Right.

Sean McDowell: 15:24

It's just reality is painful.

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:27

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 15:27

Well, some of that can be the effects of sin, but God didn't have to make a world with taste buds.

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:32

No!

Sean McDowell: 15:32

God didn't have to-

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:33

Right

Sean McDowell: 15:33

... Make a world as beautiful as He did.

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:35

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 15:35

Well, what do we do in our home? We make our home beautiful-

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:39

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 15:39

... As much as we can, right? We put artwork up.

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:41

Yep.

Sean McDowell: 15:41

We put pictures up. We put things that mean something to create the aura.

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:46

Mm-hmm.

Sean McDowell: 15:46

Well, God has made a home that is beautiful and good, and I thought of, you know, Genesis 1, you mentioned this earlier, you know, what could God mean by calling creation very good? This is in Volf's piece.

Tim Muehlhoff: 15:59

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 15:59

He says, "Good in what sense?" So it could be aesthetically good, so it's beautiful. It could be functionally good. It could be morally good. But I don't know that I'd thought of it in the way he framed it here. He said,"There's another sense of good, call it existential." "A kind of goodness which cannot be lost and of which there cannot be more or less. When a wanted child is born, the immense joy of many parents often renders them mute, but their radiant faces speak of surprised delight- ... As if they were saying, 'Just look at you. It is so very good that you are here.'"

Tim Muehlhoff: 16:37

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 16:38

Like, as a-

Tim Muehlhoff: 16:39

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 16:39

... Parent, how many times do we look over a crib?

Tim Muehlhoff: 16:42

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 16:42

I remember when my wife was pregnant, a math teacher who's passed away, Mr. Nick, he goes, "You're gonna have this moment where you look over your crib, and you're in awe." And I remember going, "Okay, I don't know what you're talking about." [laughing]

Tim Muehlhoff: 16:51

Yeah. [laughing]

Sean McDowell: 16:51

And then you have a kid, and you're like-

Tim Muehlhoff: 16:52

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 16:53

... "Oh, my gosh."

Tim Muehlhoff: 16:54

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 16:54

"It's beautiful."

Tim Muehlhoff: 16:55

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 16:55

"It's amazing."

Tim Muehlhoff: 16:56

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 16:56

That's like a glimpse of God looking at creation saying, "It's good. It's very good." And then he says, one more thing, he says, "The delight precedes any judgment about the beauty, functionality, or moral rectitude of the child." by the way, I love the word moral rectitude. [laughing]

Tim Muehlhoff: 17:12

[laughing]

Sean McDowell: 17:12

By the way, I just gotta pause. He goes, "The child's sheer existence, the mere fact of it, is very good. That's what I propose God, too, exclaimed, looking at the newborn world. Some unconditional love grounds creation's existence." That's powerful. That's a take-home one to me.

Tim Muehlhoff: 17:34

So we need to receive this. We need to slow down long enough to receive it as a gift, and to savor it. So I took this one class, Sean. I for- man, I even forget what the class was. It was in my master's. It was a long time ago, but it was about play, human play, and she did this thing. She gave us three M&M's. The... It was a three-hour block class, like a lot of grad classes are, so three hours, you get three M&M's, and she goes, "I want you to savor these three M&M's. Like, make them last the three hours."

Sean McDowell: 18:04

[chuckles] Wow.

Tim Muehlhoff: 18:05

And I'm... You know, normally I'd take those three, pop them in, we're done, right? "But, Sean, put it in your mouth and just savor it."... Not like eat 15 of them, but just savor one, was a really interesting experience to get the full experience of an M&M.

Sean McDowell: 18:21

Yeah.

Tim Muehlhoff: 18:21

And David Turner, he helped run this Bold Seminar, he passed out these really little flowers one day, and we just sat there, all 15 of us- ... And he said,"I just want you to focus on this flower and enjoy the flower. Like, savor the flower." And then a friend of ours, Liz Hall, she said she has a Jewish friend, who would, when he would see a beautiful sunrise, would say, "I'm sorry, I just need to stop. I want to savor this and offer a prayer of thankfulness and praise to God for the sunset." And I thought, "Wow, I seldom do that!" Like, I might think that sunset is beautiful, but I don't think I stop to savor as much as I possibly could. That could be a really interesting practice in our lives, to savor the really good times. Because the bad times are there, it'd be ridiculous not to acknowledge the fallen-ness. But to savor the really good moments, I think, are, really important. Remember, James says, "Every good gift, every good gift is from God." So we need to receive these moments as gifts from God, and to savor them, and then express thanks.

Sean McDowell: 19:30

So we're shifting now from recognizing what does it mean that the creation is our home? God made it so he could dwell relationally with us.

Tim Muehlhoff: 19:40

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 19:41

Made the home with what we might call superfluous things-

Tim Muehlhoff: 19:44

[chuckles]

Sean McDowell: 19:44

... That are just not necessary.

Tim Muehlhoff: 19:46

Right, yeah.

Sean McDowell: 19:47

Like little, small, beautiful flowers.

Tim Muehlhoff: 19:49

Right.

Sean McDowell: 19:50

Savoring the taste of coffee or-

Tim Muehlhoff: 19:52

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 19:52

... Like swordfish, as random as that is.[laughing] I love swordfish-

Tim Muehlhoff: 19:55

[laughing] I love-

Sean McDowell: 19:55

... Or strawberries.

Tim Muehlhoff: 19:56

Swordfish is great.

Sean McDowell: 19:57

It's one of my favorites.

Tim Muehlhoff: 19:58

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 19:59

Like, those are superfluous things that we would consider blessings that God has given us, and the response is, how should we respond to that blessing?

Tim Muehlhoff: 20:10

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 20:10

And one way is to appreciate it.

Tim Muehlhoff: 20:13

Mm-hmm.

Sean McDowell: 20:13

I mean, if I give a gift to my kids... And it's interesting, back to something you said before, you talked about, like, in a home, there are certain things that are irreplaceable.

Tim Muehlhoff: 20:20

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 20:21

If I make something myself and give it to somebody, it means more than just buying something-

Tim Muehlhoff: 20:28

Yes, yes!

Sean McDowell: 20:29

... And giving it to them.

Tim Muehlhoff: 20:30

Yes, yes.

Sean McDowell: 20:30

Because our thoughtfulness goes into it. The time went into it. The personalization went into it, and it makes it that much more valuable and meaningful. And so this world has a lot of superfluous things in it-

Tim Muehlhoff: 20:46

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 20:47

... That are uniquely made. Now, I think there's certain joy that animals get. You described your dog, Riley, before.

Tim Muehlhoff: 20:52

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 20:52

Like, that's a part of God's blessing in creation.

Tim Muehlhoff: 20:55

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 20:56

But what should our response be-

Tim Muehlhoff: 20:58

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 20:58

... To these kinds of blessings you're describing? Well, one is not to abuse them. That's where sin comes in-

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:05

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 21:05

... Taking something good and-

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:07

Garbaging the world.

Sean McDowell: 21:09

Garbaging the world.

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:09

It's that, it's that phrase that was used. It was, You have the book right here.

Sean McDowell: 21:13

Is it the one-

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:13

Rosa. It was Rosa.

Sean McDowell: 21:15

The Uncon- she describes garbaging the world.

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:17

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 21:17

So-

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:17

Which is, I use, I use it. It's for me. I use it up. I take, I take, 50 M&M's-

Sean McDowell: 21:22

There you go

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:23

... And maybe I only eat 30.

Sean McDowell: 21:25

Which is overconsumption-

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:26

Over... Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 21:26

... Which we as Americans have down-

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:28

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 21:29

... Pat.

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:29

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 21:29

Right? So one, you know, one way is to just abuse something that's good, and that's what-

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:34

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 21:34

... All sin is.

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:35

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 21:35

That's what all ugliness-

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:36

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 21:36

... Is taking something good and turning it bad, or beautiful and making it ugly.

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:40

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 21:41

But we're also supposed to enjoy it.

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:44

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 21:44

Like, God gave us that flower to stop and enjoy. He gave us beautiful music-

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:50

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 21:51

... To stop and enjoy.

Tim Muehlhoff: 21:52

And made it for you. That's such a- that was an interesting comment you said, "Made it for you." So let me tell you a story. I'm like your dad. I came from an abusive home. It was horrible. It was really bad. Physical abuse, verbal abuse. And we didn't have any money. My parents hid it from us, Sean.

Sean McDowell: 22:09

Like, physically hid it from you? [laughing]

Tim Muehlhoff: 22:10

Yeah, we did not have money.

Sean McDowell: 22:11

[laughing] What's happening?

Tim Muehlhoff: 22:12

But they hid it from us, and you know how I found out eventually? I had two older brothers. We wrestled nonstop, and we all had glasses.

Sean McDowell: 22:19

[chuckles]

Tim Muehlhoff: 22:19

Very young, we all had glasses. So I looked at all my, like, you know, like, junior high pictures. It's duct tape-

Sean McDowell: 22:26

Oh, my goodness

Tim Muehlhoff: 22:26

... On one arm, and my glasses

Sean McDowell: 22:27

Are sideways [chuckles]

Tim Muehlhoff: 22:28

... Like, turned sideways. And I would say to my mom, "Mom, why do I have duct tape on my glasses?" My mom later said, " 'Cause we couldn't afford to get your glasses fixed." Okay, so a, well, embarrassing moment for my dad. We go to Kmart, and there's a sale on these toy guns, toy rifles. And it's a great price. So my dad, very uncharacteristically, says, "Each one of you get one." We're like, "Oh, this is awesome!" Right? So we got our guns. We go up to the cash register, and he's misread the price.

Sean McDowell: 23:00

Oh, no.

Tim Muehlhoff: 23:00

It was something above it.

Sean McDowell: 23:01

Oh, goodness.

Tim Muehlhoff: 23:01

It wasn't the actual guns. Well, he couldn't afford one, let alone three.

Sean McDowell: 23:06

Oh!

Tim Muehlhoff: 23:06

So he turns to us and he says, "Put 'em back." You can imagine our immature response. "Dad, you said! You said!"

Sean McDowell: 23:13

[chuckles]

Tim Muehlhoff: 23:13

And so he- but he said, "Put 'em back," and he got really upset, okay? Two days later, at his factory in Detroit, he took wood, and in his off hours, carved wooden rifles-

Sean McDowell: 23:26

Amazing

Tim Muehlhoff: 23:26

... And brought them home and gave it to us. Now, when I first got it, Sean, I was a little bit like, "What? A wooden rifle compared to the one at Kmart?"

Sean McDowell: 23:33

Yeah, like, "I want that one." Yeah.

Tim Muehlhoff: 23:35

But later, it became more precious. Like,"That's something my dad made for me," and my initials were on the, handle of the rifle.

Sean McDowell: 23:42

Oh, that's very cool.

Tim Muehlhoff: 23:43

That's, that's interesting to think-

Sean McDowell: 23:45

Do you still have that, or probably not?

Tim Muehlhoff: 23:47

I think it's at my mom's. I hope it's at my mom's.

Sean McDowell: 23:48

That'd be a cool thing to hang on to.

Tim Muehlhoff: 23:50

But that was... I mean, to me, that's like,"Hey, I made this. I didn't buy it at Kmart." Nothing wrong with that. "But I made this specifically for you in my off hours." and to think our bodies are that. I mean, we know that from Psalm 139, right? He- the-... The psalmist uses language like a master weaver crafting you, and I think we can say our bodies, even though falling and, you know, slowly degenerating, are a gift God gives to us, and we should enjoy our bodies, certainly, as we can.

Sean McDowell: 24:23

... You know, it's interesting to kinda, to, to shift towards asking the question how the church views brokenness-

Tim Muehlhoff: 24:31

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 24:31

-and views goodness. So, so far we've been talking about, like, God has made this creation for us. I love that story that your dad, like, personalized it.

Tim Muehlhoff: 24:40

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 24:40

So the flowers are for everybody, but they're for you, and they're for me-

Tim Muehlhoff: 24:46

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 24:47

... To enjoy. And yet, clearly the world is also broken.

Tim Muehlhoff: 24:51

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 24:52

Right? I've had two conversations in the past week that have just been running through my mind, and YouTube conversations, and with, like, Peter Singer-

Tim Muehlhoff: 25:02

Mm-hmm

Sean McDowell: 25:02

... Literally one of the leading ethicist-

Tim Muehlhoff: 25:04

Amazing, yeah

Sean McDowell: 25:04

... Ful, influential philosophers in the world.

Tim Muehlhoff: 25:07

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 25:08

Outspoken atheist.

Tim Muehlhoff: 25:09

Yep.

Sean McDowell: 25:10

And his issue was problem of evil.

Tim Muehlhoff: 25:12

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 25:13

Todd McFarlane, who is a comic creator. He co-created Venom. He was the creator of, Spawn. Really influential. The way he draws Spider-Man, I absolutely love it. I have so many of the comics. [chuckles] We met him in person. He signed some of the comics for me. But he leaned in and was like, "The problem of evil-

Tim Muehlhoff: 25:33

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 25:33

... I will never believe in God."

Tim Muehlhoff: 25:35

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 25:36

So clearly, we have a choice, just like you had a choice when your father gave you that gun. Am I going to receive this-

Tim Muehlhoff: 25:42

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 25:42

... As a gift or not?

Tim Muehlhoff: 25:44

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 25:44

Like, we have a choice if we see the goodness in creation or if we see the brokenness in creation, but the reality, there's both, and I think this is what we have to keep in balance, and we'll maybe come back to how to do this. But I'd just be curious from kind of a 30,000-foot view, and by the way, before I ask it, just Christian worldview is like creation, fall, redemption-

Tim Muehlhoff: 26:05

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 26:05

... And glorification. So we've been talking about creation. Of course, the fall, Genesis 3, messes everything up until Revelation, we get to the last two chapters.

Tim Muehlhoff: 26:13

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 26:14

Do you think the church errs on the side of emphasizing the goodness of creation or its brokenness?

Tim Muehlhoff: 26:22

Well, I... Well, and this is my experience, obviously, anecdotal. I think it's the brokenness. I think we're the brokenness people. The world's a mess. People are sinful. We're often seen as negative people. And I think we have to do better than that. I think within the brokenness, we have to point out the beauty that is still there, even within the brokenness. Now, ultimately, Jesus can only fix the brokenness, but He's given us really good gifts. So I was writing... I wrote this down, and you're probably gonna remember it, Sean. Remember during the pandemic, actor John Krasinski, he did this great, from his home, he did, he put on a show called Some Good News? Do you remember that from The Office? John-

Sean McDowell: 27:08

Probably missed that one. [laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 27:09

Oh, no!

Sean McDowell: 27:09

Sorry, man.[laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 27:11

Sean, it was our favorite!

Sean McDowell: 27:13

[laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 27:13

So here's what he did. D- when it was raging, and all of us were losing our minds-

Sean McDowell: 27:17

Yeah

Tim Muehlhoff: 27:17

... With the pandemic, like, seriously, how bad is this gonna get?

Sean McDowell: 27:20

Right.

Tim Muehlhoff: 27:21

People were missing their, proms. They were missing graduations. I had two kids miss graduations.

Sean McDowell: 27:27

Yeah.

Tim Muehlhoff: 27:28

He would share stories that were sent to him, and it was called Some Good News. In the midst of a pandemic-

Sean McDowell: 27:33

Oh, gotcha

Tim Muehlhoff: 27:34

... Some Good News.

Sean McDowell: 27:35

Okay.

Tim Muehlhoff: 27:35

And he would show a dad who converted his living room into a high school gym with... And then he w- he had a tux, and his daughter was dressed in her prom dress, and he would dance with her in the living room, right? Making the best of a really bad situation. I think the church should do that a little bit more. I think we should say, "Listen, in the midst of all the craziness you can watch 24/7 on social media, here are some good news." And the good news isn't just spiritual. The good news is, in the midst of all this, the sun is... A sunrise is still spectacular. Friendships are really important. God's common grace is real. Like, yeah, there's disease. There's also penicillin, and God gets blamed for all the bad. He never gets credit for all the good things. Like, we'd be in the Dark Ages without penicillin. And if you know the history of penicillin, it's fascinating. One medical history book called it, "The greatest serendipitous moment-

Sean McDowell: 28:35

Huh

Tim Muehlhoff: 28:35

... In the history of medicine," is the guy Fleming, who discovered penicillin totally by accident.

Sean McDowell: 28:42

Wasn't there, like, bacteria on-

Tim Muehlhoff: 28:44

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 28:44

... Some, like, dish?

Tim Muehlhoff: 28:44

He went on vacation.

Sean McDowell: 28:45

Yeah.

Tim Muehlhoff: 28:45

Oh, oh, yeah.

Sean McDowell: 28:46

Okay.

Tim Muehlhoff: 28:46

He went on vacation, came back, didn't clean all of his Petri dishes.

Sean McDowell: 28:49

[chuckles] Okay.

Tim Muehlhoff: 28:50

Some of them had fungus growing, some didn't, and some had half. He said, "Well, that's really weird. Like, why only half?" And he wrote a paper, presented it to, like, a handful of people, and then it was buried. It wasn't until World War II, when British soldiers were dying in the trenches-

Sean McDowell: 29:08

Huh

Tim Muehlhoff: 29:08

... Of disease, that this one British medical, researcher was tasked with, "Go find something to save our soldiers from dying from disease." He finds the paper, and he's g- he's like, "Oh, my goodness, this is... What?" And, within months, it's being mass-produced in the United States and in Britain, saving millions of lives. So even in the fallen-ness, God is saying, "Look, here are good gifts I give you," tol- all the time- ... All the time, all the time. I think that's really important for us to stop and say, "God, sometimes this world is really hard," but thank God, in the midst of cancer-... We ha- which my wife had a cancer scare, you know, we have oncology. We have people who have dedicated their entire lives to the study of cancer. We have radiation, chemotherapy. So God hasn't abandoned this world. He continues to give us good gifts.

Sean McDowell: 30:01

It really is interesting. I wish there were some study that was done, I don't know how they would do it, on, like, social media, books, pulpits, conversations, what Christians emphasize more so than others.

Tim Muehlhoff: 30:14

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 30:14

And maybe there's a different... Certain denominations might be different.

Tim Muehlhoff: 30:17

Yeah, yeah.

Sean McDowell: 30:17

Maybe areas in which you grow up. My parents were not this way. My dad's, like, the consummate optimist-

Tim Muehlhoff: 30:24

Always ready

Sean McDowell: 30:24

... So he's always seeing the positive, but very aware of the brokenness in the world.

Tim Muehlhoff: 30:29

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 30:30

And so I don't know, I-... My suspicion is, of the two, we lean probably more heavily into critical, calling out sin- judging, and there is a time and place for that-

Tim Muehlhoff: 30:45

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 30:46

... Than there is recognizing the good. And I might, I might get some more criticism just for this one, but I [chuckles] Taylor Swift, I didn't think that was gonna come up.

Tim Muehlhoff: 30:54

[laughs]

Sean McDowell: 30:54

I don't even know a lot of her music, but my son helps me with social media, and he goes, he goes, "Dad, at this point, she dropped a new album. Give your thoughts." You know, and they were celebrating it, and it's all scripted. And all I s- all I said was, I go, "It's incredible how much she gets done. I don't know how she does it." Like, she... And then she talks about loving what she did.

Tim Muehlhoff: 31:16

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 31:17

I said, "What an example of how much you can accomplish if you just find something that you love." Like, that was it. Like, that was, that was the point. That was my takeaway. Some people just lost their minds. I got emails, "How can you promote this?" And, "What's wrong with you?" And I'm just thinking, "We're so quick-

Tim Muehlhoff: 31:34

That is such a good point

Sean McDowell: 31:35

... To criticize."

Tim Muehlhoff: 31:36

It's such a good point.

Sean McDowell: 31:37

A few people reached out, and they're like,"You know what? We know your heart. We know what you're doing here. All you do is building common ground." She's a creator. She creates stuff and does it remarkably, even if I disagree strongly with a lot of the lyrics. [chuckles] And I don't even know how many songs I could mention, to be completely honest.

Tim Muehlhoff: 31:57

Right. Right.

Sean McDowell: 31:57

But I think we have this knee-jerk criticism,"Watch out for sin," more than we have a knee-jerk, "Let's find the good." That's just- ... My experience sometimes.

Tim Muehlhoff: 32:07

Psychologists call that splitting. Something's all good, all bad. It's all good, or it's all bad, and I think the church is guilty of splitting on many of these things. Like, we're not good at saying, "Hey, there's good and bad." In most things, I can think of good and bad. So I don't want to one-up your Taylor Swift thing.

Sean McDowell: 32:24

Do it! Do it.

Tim Muehlhoff: 32:25

I'm gonna one-up it.

Sean McDowell: 32:26

Go it.

Tim Muehlhoff: 32:26

Here we go.

Sean McDowell: 32:27

You can two-up it, man.

Tim Muehlhoff: 32:28

So, Rick Langer and I, we do the Winsome Conviction podcast.

Sean McDowell: 32:32

Wait, is this a story where you went on tour with her? Because that would... I'm just kidding. [chuckles]

Tim Muehlhoff: 32:35

Yeah, I did. I did. I was her-

Sean McDowell: 32:36

[laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 32:36

But I felt objectified. I finally stopped. Okay, so we decide in the midst of all this crazy political rancor, we're gonna do something kind of crazy. Here's what we decided to do. Listen, we can do the negatives of President Trump- ... And President Biden. We can do it all day long, but let's not do that. Let's take the next episode and do- ... The positives of both. We're only allowed to say positives. We flipped a coin. I got President Trump; he got President Biden. Next podcast, Sean, we researched the two, and all we did was positives. Like, give me... I'll give you a quick for both. President Trump, he doesn't drink. Why doesn't he drink?

Sean McDowell: 33:10

Yeah, that's interesting.

Tim Muehlhoff: 33:11

He watched his brother drink himself to death. So when it came to the opioid crisis, it is just fact of record, he poured in billions to address the opioid crisis, okay?

Sean McDowell: 33:22

Yep.

Tim Muehlhoff: 33:22

President Biden is, right about to do a Democratic debate, and, he's sitting next to Pete Buttigieg, and he's going through his rosary. Now, this is from people who were in the green room, and Pete Buttigieg leaned over and said, "Hey, what are you doing?" He goes, "I'm praying through my rosary. I just prayed for you." And for all accounts, he shared his Catholic faith with Pete Buttigieg. Okay, so that's what... All positives. I get my very first death threat.

Sean McDowell: 33:48

Legit death threat?

Tim Muehlhoff: 33:49

Legit. It was on my bucket list.

Sean McDowell: 33:51

[laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 33:51

My wife is like... My wife is like, "Who are you?"

Sean McDowell: 33:54

[laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 33:54

And I'm like, "Noreen, I have a black belt in kung fu." She goes, "Against bullets?" I was like, "Yeah, that's probably secondary." [laughs] You know what I mean?

Sean McDowell: 34:02

[laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 34:03

But, Sean, think about what splitting that was. And the comments were, "How dare you say anything positive about that person?"

Sean McDowell: 34:12

Yeah.

Tim Muehlhoff: 34:12

And I think that's splitting. So is the world all bad, or is it all good? Well, we know it's not that easy.

Sean McDowell: 34:19

It's neither.

Tim Muehlhoff: 34:19

It's n- it's much more nuanced than that. But I think we get the reputation of really pointing out the need for Jesus, which is... We absolutely have to do, but we do it by pointing out how bad people are, how bad the situation is, and we forget God's common grace. There are non-Christian EMS workers who are running into burning buildings to save people, and they're not Christians. They do it because of God's common grace. We need to call out the good and the parts that need redeeming, but I think we need to do both, and I don't think we're good at being known as, "Oh, you're the posit-," like-

Sean McDowell: 34:56

Right

Tim Muehlhoff: 34:56

... "Evangelicals, you're the positive guys." It's like, I don't think, I don't think that's our reputation.

Sean McDowell: 35:01

Well, I think that's, that's a fact.

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:03

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 35:03

You know, it is... It would be interesting to talk to or do a study of non-believers if we framed-

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:09

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 35:09

... Things like, "Christians view the world as their home. How well do you think they're caring for their home?"[chuckles] Like, it would-

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:18

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 35:18

I don't have a clue what they would say.

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:20

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 35:20

But I suspect they'd say, "Well, the environment." And I know there's a political angle for that-

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:24

I know, I know

Sean McDowell: 35:24

... That's not what I'm talking about.

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:25

Right. Yep.

Sean McDowell: 35:25

But I'm just saying, caring for the world that God has given us-

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:30

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 35:31

... I think is a part of-

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:32

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 35:32

... Stewardship.

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:33

Yep.

Sean McDowell: 35:33

Caring for animals, right? There's... I just yesterday, I was reading through some of the Old Testament passages-

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:40

Mm-hmm

Sean McDowell: 35:40

... And even in Proverbs 12-

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:41

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm

Sean McDowell: 35:41

... It's like a righteous man, the way he cares for animals.

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:46

Yeah. Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 35:46

You know, do we care for this world? I don't know that we're perceived that way of doing so.

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:52

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 35:53

And what this does is it causes us to lose credibility in the eyes of the world.

Tim Muehlhoff: 35:58

Mm-hmm.

Sean McDowell: 35:58

It's like, if I walk into your home, and you're telling me certain things, I'm looking around, I'm like- Bro, this is messy and messed up. And, you know, like, whatever's going on-

Tim Muehlhoff: 36:07

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 36:07

... You lose a certain level of, like, maybe respect, in a sense. I wonder if that's what's going on. So it matters... I guess it matters on two levels when we think about the world as our home. Number one, would just be so we can appreciate it and have spiritual practices as Christians to receive it as a gift in the way you described.

Tim Muehlhoff: 36:26

Mm-hmm.

Sean McDowell: 36:27

But there's also an evangelistic angle towards other people trying to find a home. I mean, I think about-

Tim Muehlhoff: 36:35

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 36:35

... How many movies are people who are lost?

Tim Muehlhoff: 36:37

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 36:37

The Martian, and they're just-

Tim Muehlhoff: 36:39

Yes

Sean McDowell: 36:40

... Trying to get home.

Tim Muehlhoff: 36:40

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 36:41

So there's an evangelistic piece to this as well. One question that, uh-... That Volf went into is some people are probably thinking, "Wait a minute, are we supposed to love the world, or are we not-

Tim Muehlhoff: 36:53

Right

Sean McDowell: 36:53

... Supposed to love the world?" Because there's calls to protect ourselves from the world, separate ourselves from the world, but love the world? How do we make sense of those seemingly conflicting biblical passages?

Tim Muehlhoff: 37:07

Well, let me just say one thing. Sean?[laughing]

Sean McDowell: 37:11

[laughing] What?

Tim Muehlhoff: 37:15

I did that to Clint Arnold one time at the emergent.

Sean McDowell: 37:18

You called him Sean? [laughing]

Tim Muehlhoff: 37:19

No, I called him Sean. [laughing] We were asked this crazy question about-

Sean McDowell: 37:23

So random

Tim Muehlhoff: 37:23

... About Colossae.

Sean McDowell: 37:24

[laughing]

Tim Muehlhoff: 37:24

It was like a really tactical... Clint is a friend of ours.

Sean McDowell: 37:29

He is, yeah.

Tim Muehlhoff: 37:29

He's an expert on Colossians.

Sean McDowell: 37:30

Brilliant.

Tim Muehlhoff: 37:31

He was asked a really hard question. We were on a panel, Sean, and I said-"Hey, real quick, let me just say one thing." I said, "Clint."[laughing]

Sean McDowell: 37:39

[laughing]

Tim Muehlhoff: 37:40

It brought down the house.

Sean McDowell: 37:42

I love that.

Tim Muehlhoff: 37:42

Now, let me say this, and we could e- we could even add to that John's observation that the entire world lies in the power of the evil one. So obviously, what I think the writers are trying to say is, do not love the fallen world. Do not love, the things that the world promotes, like, a, an unhinged sexuality. Do not love, raw power and ambition. Do not love money above people. You know, that kind of thing, I think the writers are saying, "When I'm using the world that way, I'm using a world that has been deeply influenced by the evil one," and we need- ... To recognize that and fight against it. So yeah, I think both things can be absolutely true. God created the world to be our home, but the home has been invaded. I mean, that's one message- ... Of the New Testament is- ... People have come through the back door, and they are invading our home, and we have got to take seriously that we're pushing these evil forces outside of our home and using spiritual weaponry to do that. I think, without a doubt, we can see the work of the evil one in God's home everywhere, as he wants to try to dominate it as long as he can before he's ultimately defeated. So we're in a war. I mean, this home is... M- it's kind of like having a home in Normandy invasion, right? [laughing]

Sean McDowell: 39:02

[laughing] Sure.

Tim Muehlhoff: 39:03

I mean, it'd be ridiculous to not look around you and say, "Hey, wait a minute, there's an invasion happening, and my home is now in the midst of a battlefield, not a, romantic balcony." I th- I think that's probably good to keep that in the back of our mind, is we can enjoy the world and be oblivious to the pain and the spiritual battle that's happening in the world.

Sean McDowell: 39:24

You mentioned Colossae, and Clinton, Clint Arnold's second edition of his commentary on Colossians, it might be in the first, but he mentions, like, three kind of, of enemies of us that can lead us to temptation. One is the flesh.

Tim Muehlhoff: 39:39

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 39:39

Second is Satan, demons, and third would be the world.

Tim Muehlhoff: 39:43

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 39:44

So it's like, wait a minute, the world leads us to temptation, and yet God so loved the world. Well, we have to distinguish what's-

Tim Muehlhoff: 39:50

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 39:50

... Meant by the world based on the context. So the world can mean all of God's creation, including the Earth, animals, and human beings, and I think based on Romans 8, that Jesus's death will redeem even creation.

Tim Muehlhoff: 40:05

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 40:05

You can mean the world in that sense. Sometimes the world might refer just towards, like, the church and believers. It might include unbelievers.

Tim Muehlhoff: 40:12

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 40:13

But a lot of times, it's the, it's the negative belief systems in the world-

Tim Muehlhoff: 40:19

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 40:19

... That are opposed-

Tim Muehlhoff: 40:21

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 40:21

... To Christ. That's what we resist. So we have to be careful when we take certain teachings, and we'll talk about, "Well, the world is evil. The world is bad." Well, that doesn't mean creation's bad.

Tim Muehlhoff: 40:31

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 40:32

That doesn't mean people are bad. It means there are systems invading them within them, so we've got to find a way to resist that, and yet love people and our creation. I think that's the balance, that we're looking for. Let me ask you this last question, unless there's anything else I missed. What... If we were really... At the end, this is one of the last questions we asked Volf, and you said, "All right, so creation, God just is thrilled that we're here," like looking at a baby going- ... "Whoa, it's arrived," like, beautiful.

Tim Muehlhoff: 41:01

Yeah, yeah.

Sean McDowell: 41:02

God has made this world for us to-

Tim Muehlhoff: 41:04

Mm-hmm

Sean McDowell: 41:04

... Enjoy, amongst other things, but to enjoy.

Tim Muehlhoff: 41:08

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 41:08

He wants us to receive this as a gift in the way that you described. What... But it's also been fallen. What holds us back as believers from properly loving the world?

Tim Muehlhoff: 41:24

So I wrestle with, and I think this is one of the negative impacts of social media, but, you know, you've been overseas just like I've been overseas, and, you know, we've gone some pretty nasty places- ... Like the Mathare Valley. The first time I ever went overseas with Campus Crusade for Christ was the Mathare Valley. It was the most intense poverty I've ever seen in my life. So for me to enjoy a really nice meal, right, and to take my wife out on a really nice date, i- sometimes in the back of my mind, I'm thinking about the Mathare Valley. That this money could... Remember Oscar Schindler? Schindler's List?

Sean McDowell: 42:04

Of course.

Tim Muehlhoff: 42:04

He takes off that watch. He goes, "This was two people I could've saved. This car was 20." And I think we can do that. And social media makes it so easy. I mean, we see- ... Sex trafficking, not just what's happening here in California. We're seeing it all across the world, and we're seeing children particularly. It's heartbreaking that they're eating gar- I mean, in Mathare Valley, they're eating garbage. So how do I enjoy a good meal when I know that's happening in the back? Man, I don't, I don't know. I don't know the answer to that question. I don't think I can't enjoy the meal, and go to Starbucks, and get my vanilla latte, Sean. [laughing] All my students know, vanilla latte and, banana bread. You want me grading your papers with banana bread.

Sean McDowell: 42:52

[laughing]

Tim Muehlhoff: 42:53

... So I think I need- I can do that, but at the same time, not to the exclusion, I don't think deeply about my finances. I don't think deeply about,"Okay, what can my wife and I and family do?" Like, like, when that come- remember when the tsunami hit, in Japan?

Sean McDowell: 43:14

You're talking about the 2004 tsunami?

Tim Muehlhoff: 43:16

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I remember, I remember [chuckles] this is so funny, and I hope my kids never listen to this, okay? [laughs] But you know how it comes on the bottom, it comes a number for the Red Cross-... You know, to help tsunami. [laughs] So I don't know about you, but I believe it's biblical calling that I control the remote control in the house.

Sean McDowell: 43:33

[laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 43:33

I think that's biblical. It's hard to nail down a particular verse, but I think it's heavily implied. I once got my wife, by the way, a Valentine's Day card.

Sean McDowell: 43:40

You're on, like, your third rabbit trail-

Tim Muehlhoff: 43:42

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 43:42

... On this one. [laughs]

Tim Muehlhoff: 43:43

I got my wife a Valentine's Day card that said,"I wanted to give you a symbol of my undying love," and so it's, "So I'm giving you the remote control for 24 unhindered hours."

Sean McDowell: 43:52

Oh, my goodness.

Tim Muehlhoff: 43:52

And then you open it, and a remote control pops up, and it says, "It started yesterday." [laughing]

Sean McDowell: 43:57

[laughing]

Tim Muehlhoff: 43:58

So when that thing came on, I literally paused the TV.

Sean McDowell: 44:01

Mm-hmm.

Tim Muehlhoff: 44:01

I did, I paused it. I said, "Okay, Muehlhoffs, what are we gonna do?"

Sean McDowell: 44:07

Wow!

Tim Muehlhoff: 44:08

Like, is that, is that, is that not us? As we sit and watch our flat screen t- you know what I mean? Not to guilt him, but to say, "Do we just get to turn a blind eye to that?" so I think that's the balance. I can enjoy a flat-screen TV, but when I learn through that flat-screen TV that there's people that are really suffering, I think I need to start to question, what's my role in helping with a fallen world? What's... For you, how do you balance this?

Sean McDowell: 44:37

You know, I li- I do live in a certain tension there. You know, interestingly enough, reading Peter Singer, you know, an atheist, he had a chapter in one of his books on poverty and was like, "You buy a new TV, you could have saved somebody's life."

Tim Muehlhoff: 44:51

Really?

Sean McDowell: 44:52

Like, this prophetic voice-

Tim Muehlhoff: 44:53

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 44:54

... Of calling people to sacrifice. I'm going,"Wow, here's an atheist who I disagree with profoundly about-[chuckles]

Tim Muehlhoff: 44:59

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 45:00

... Euthanasia, abortion, all these issues." Like, I think he's right about that. I live in that tension. I, I don't know how to fix that. I think it's a little bit of just living in a good world with brokenness-

Tim Muehlhoff: 45:14

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 45:14

... And the reality of that. I don't think we'll fully escape that until we get to heaven. So I think if we're just completely enjoying things, we've lost, we've lost the brokenness and the urgency to act.

Tim Muehlhoff: 45:27

Mm-hmm.

Sean McDowell: 45:28

If we're living in that brokenness and sinfulness, number one, it can become depressing, [chuckles] but number two, I wonder if we are receiving the goodness and beauty-

Tim Muehlhoff: 45:36

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 45:37

... That God has given us.

Tim Muehlhoff: 45:38

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 45:38

So I think, I think it's a dance between the two, and we probably have personalities and just experiences and rhythms-

Tim Muehlhoff: 45:44

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 45:44

... That lean us one way or the other. It's kind of like the truth and grace thing. Either people, you know, tend to be more truthful-

Tim Muehlhoff: 45:52

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 45:52

... Or more gracious, and you need to balance the two together. It's probably the same with this. You know, what keeps us back from properly loving the world, to kind of wrap up this conversation, I think it can be bad theology. That's why it's important to think about the world- ... As the home. I think it can be misguided priorities about what we're here for-

Tim Muehlhoff: 46:14

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 46:15

... And what our task is-

Tim Muehlhoff: 46:16

Yeah

Sean McDowell: 46:16

... To love God and to love other people.

Tim Muehlhoff: 46:19

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 46:20

And it can just be our own, our own sinfulness and our own falling short. But, this is challenging. It's been fun to revisit this, Tim-

Tim Muehlhoff: 46:28

It was great

Sean McDowell: 46:28

... 'cause that class was really meaningful to me.

Tim Muehlhoff: 46:30

It was really good.

Sean McDowell: 46:31

And I just forgot how deep that idea of thinking about all of creation as our home and our responsibility to it resonates with me, and I think the Scriptures, and to just ask the question- How do we better love God, love His home, and love people who are here? That's really the most important question.

Tim Muehlhoff: 46:48

And how cool that he would come to Biola and be super accessible.

Sean McDowell: 46:53

He was.

Tim Muehlhoff: 46:53

I found him to be very accessible. We had lunch with him.

Sean McDowell: 46:56

We did.

Tim Muehlhoff: 46:57

You, me, and a friend, and, I thought... Yeah, I thought he was very-

Sean McDowell: 47:00

And by the way, if you see him in public wearing some Jordans-

Tim Muehlhoff: 47:03

Yes!

Sean McDowell: 47:04

... That was from my son and I, which was just a gift-

Tim Muehlhoff: 47:07

Oh, cool. He loved them.

Sean McDowell: 47:08

Out of... He absolutely loved them.

Tim Muehlhoff: 47:09

Yeah.

Sean McDowell: 47:09

Out of appreciation-

Tim Muehlhoff: 47:11

Yeah, yeah

Sean McDowell: 47:11

... For how he blessed us, which brings us back to the power of gift.

Tim Muehlhoff: 47:15

And I can't wait, after this, podcast, to see the shoes that you're- you have for me. [laughing]

Sean McDowell: 47:20

[laughing]

Tim Muehlhoff: 47:21

I'm, I'm just... But I digress. Go ahead.

Sean McDowell: 47:24

Tim, this is fun. We'll do it again.

Tim Muehlhoff: 47:25

It'd be great. Thanks.

Sean McDowell: 47:26

Folks listening, make sure you subscribe to the Winsome Convictions podcast and to the Talbot Podcast- Think Biblically. We'll see you next time. [upbeat music]