The Deconstruction of Christianity | Ep. 83 w/ Alisa Childers & Tim Barnett

Tim Barnett: I wish I could say I was part of the Christian Backstreet Boys or something, but, no, I actually grew up in the church, and became a high school teacher. Taught science and math, for a number of years. And then kind of, started doing this apologetics thing. On the side was, speaking at churches and conferences. And then it kind of snowballed into something more. And now, for the last eight years, I’ve been working with Stan to Reason as one of their speakers and apologists. And, some of the audience might recognize me from social media as well, because the last few years, actually since 2020, we started something called Red Pen Logic with Mr. B. And, we just respond to, man, a lot of the nonsense that’s on social media. So TikToks and memes and Tweets and all that stuff, people see the red pen being applied to those things. So that’s what we’ve been doing, the last little while.

Clay Kraby: Wonderful.

Teaming Up to Write a Book

Clay Kraby: And now you’ve teamed up to write a book. Before we get into the actual content of the book, how was it that you ended up writing this together?

Tim Barnett: Well, it’s kind of a fun story. I was actually teaching a week long Bible study for a camp. And, the theme that I chose was deconstruction because it was something that was happening, like, in the moment. In fact, I remember that week, I think it was Marty Sampson or one of these well-known kind of Christian music artists that came out and was know, went to Instagram and know, this is my soapbox moment, so here I go and explain why they were deconstructing. And so the Timing was kind of perfect there. And, one evening I was sitting at the back of the chapel that they had looked more like a barn, to be honest. And, I sent Alisa a text message saying, you need to write a book on this topic. So I asked her, Are you writing a book on deconstruction? And she responded, I am way too busy. I’m currently writing a book. Live, your truth and other lies. she was in the nitty gritty of writing that book, and then I just responded by saying, well, do you want to write one together? And she said something like, let’s talk. And I thought, no way. Is this really, you know, she called me, maybe the next week, and we started chatting about it and we thought, man, this is going to be a good fit. Let’s do it, yeah.

Alisa Childers: And I responded so positively because I had noticed some of the things Tim was posting on social media, where he had all of the people that he had quotes from, all the people who are sort of influential in the deconstruction movement. And what really got me though, was he posted on Instagram what looked like a retweet or a copy and paste of somebody’s real deconstruction story. And I’m reading this going, oh, another one. Oh my gosh. And it’s Tim had made it up. It was about Demas in the Bible who walked away, and he had made this Instagram profile for Demas. But the wording was so well done and so mirroring what I was seeing in the deconstruction movement, I was like, Tim really gets this. He understands what’s going on. So we had know, getting the book together, and by the end, it was just a free for all.

Tim Barnett: Yeah.

Clay Kraby: So things were already starting to line up. So aspiring authors and apologetics authors don’t be texting Alisa after this and trying to write a just it just worked, right?

Alisa Childers: That’s right. I don’t want to write a book for like two years, so nobody talked to me about book writing for a long Time.

Clay Kraby: Well, the title of the book is The Deconstruction of Christianity. What it is, why it’s destructive and how to respond.

What is Deconstruction?

Clay Kraby: So let’s start with that question. What is it? Tim, could you give us a definition of what we are talking about when you say deconstruction?

Tim Barnett: Yeah, this is really, the heart of this issue, at least initially when we were researching what is deconstruction. and at least I can share more about this, but we actually kind of changed our minds about what this thing is the further along the research we went. And so it turns out everyone’s using the word to mean different things. If you ask ten different people for their definition of deconstruction, you’ll likely get ten different definitions. and it can mean everything from people are using it to mean everything from I’m asking questions, I’m experiencing some doubts. Maybe I’m moving from young Earth creation to old Earth creation. And so I’m deconstructing some secondary or tertiary doctrine, but it can also mean I’m leaving the church, I’m leaving the faith altogether. And that’s what we saw, man, especially when it came to Joshua Harris and many others, they equated it with falling away. And so as we kind of dug deep into the deconstruction hashtag online, what we found was, man, really, at the end of the day, deconstruction is a postmodern process of rethinking your faith. Now, here’s the key point. Without, requiring Scripture as a standard. And so we thought, man, this is going to be controversial because there’s some people that are trying to baptize the word deconstruction. They are trying to use it, they’re using it in a way that they would consider, like, healthy deconstruction using the Bible. But, man, as we spent more and more Time in that deconstruction world, in the hashtag on social media, what we found is no one is really using it that way, right?

Clay Kraby: Yeah. So it really involves this element of detaching from the truth of Scripture then?

Alisa Childers: I think so. That’s what we saw as we took in deconstruction stories and spent Time in the hashtag, which largely what people need to understand is that this is a phenomenon that’s largely happening online. People are disconnecting from their church communities, they’re finding communities online that really are an echo chamber filled with false information and propaganda. In fact, I just yesterday saw a deconstructionist post some of just the talking points that Bart Ehrman was saying, like 1520 years ago, as if it’s just brand new information about textual variance and things like this. And in that hashtag, he’s saying some true things about it, but the way he’s analyzing it is just meant to lead people away. And so the point that we’re trying to make is that if there’s a kid who comes home from summer camp and he’s like, mom and dad, I’m deconstructing, don’t panic. Ask him what he means, because he might just mean, I really want to make this my own. I want to make sure that the doctrines and the teachings that you taught me are biblical, that I line up with what I believe, with reality. But what we discovered is that and that’s why it’s important that we say it’s a postmodern process. In fact, I was doing another interview and the lady was like, deconstruction sounds like this kind of made up word. And I said, well, it kind of is in this context, but it actually has a foundation and that is postmodernism. So you have people like Jacques Derrida, who was referred to today as the father of deconstruction. Of course, he was deconstructing words and text where he didn’t think that words could be pinned down to a singular meaning. So what I’m communicating to you, I don’t have any more authority over the meaning of my words than you do, as the hearer or the interpreter. But then a guy named John Caputo applied Derida’s ideas to religion and Caputo’s all over the deconstruction podcasts. I mean, this is not something that’s happening in secret anywhere. This is very easy to observe when you spend Time in that hashtag. And so there are Christian voices trying to baptize the word and we’re just saying, look, we get it. We get that instinct to say, oh, deconstruct, but do it in a healthy way. But that’s just not how it’s manifesting online. So we wanted to kind of give a solid definition and maybe encourage people who are using it the other way to just use a different word, like reformation.

Clay Kraby: Sure.

What is an “Exvangelical”?

Clay Kraby: And another word that people are going to see, and in fact, a hashtag, that they may see is Exvangelical. Obviously a play on the word evangelical. Tim, what is meant by ex evangelical? Is this someone who has just completed, this deconstruction process?

Tim Barnett: Yeah, so that’s a great question. And actually, I don’t know if I could give you a definition. The problem is, that it’s hard to, define what an evangelical is because, again, everyone is using this word to mean different things. I think it’s Carl Truman who actually said the problem isn’t that there’s no evangelical mind. It’s that there is no evangelical. And what he was getting at was what are the doctrines? What does it mean to be an evangelical? in the book, we kind of walk through well, here’s some central kind of ideas or doctrines that are actually being attacked by the deconstruction movement. Things like biblical sexuality. One of the common threads we see, is that deconstructionists are leaving something. In fact, we describe it as an explosion. And just like an explosion kind of shoots it starts at a singular point and kind of goes, out, everywhere. This is what’s happening in deconstruction. People are going in all different directions. Some are landing in atheism or agnosticism or some kind of other progressive Christianity or whatever. But the central point is they’re leaving what they describe as evangelicalism. And the evangelical holds to a traditional view of sexuality one man with one woman becoming one flesh for one lifeTime. And because they’re pushing back against that that’s labeled as toxic, it’s harmful. And so they’re leaving that and going somewhere else to some kind of progressive view of sexuality. And that’s what we see in other doctrines like original sin or complementarianism a view of roles within, the genders, these kinds of things. And so what you’ll find is that every Time you see the hashtag deconstruction usually right along there is hashtag Exvangelical. And that’s pointing back to I’m leaving this particular thing. Although that thing is really hard to nail down.

Clay Kraby: Yeah. And a lot of Times, as they describe the thing they’re leaving often I don’t believe that either just as the definition for evangelical can be so squishy. And there’s a lot of caricatures of that, no doubt. there’s a lot of digging that happens if you’re having a conversation with someone that says they’re ex evangelical. But, if we were to take like a standard definition of that, if we could we’re talking about someone that leaves the faith leaves the Christian background that they were raised in maybe one that they even once professed. And they have different reasons. Alisa, could you give what are some of those common reasons that people give for, quote, unquote, leaving the faith?

Alisa Childers: Well, this was something we wrestled with for a while because there’s really no two deconstruction stories that are alike. Every single one is unique. In fact, you might even have two people who grew up in the same home in the same church went to the same summer camps the same youth group, the same mission trips, everything. And yet one deconstructs and one doesn’t. And so, to the best of our, ability to analyze what we see going on. There’s a sort of a cross section of whatever the foundation the person had to begin with, and then as that foundation interacts with some sort of crisis or series of crises. So you might have somebody who had a weak foundation. Maybe they never read the Bible for themselves, and they just sort of heard some things from parents and from church, and they never made it their own. Now, that’s not everybody’s story. And then they read the Bible as an adult and what their conception of what the nature and character of God was in their own minds was different than what they encountered in the whole of Scripture. And so they’re wrestling with that. That might be the crisis, is the Bible. You might have someone who experienced a very legiTimate experience of church abuse. I listened to stories where a young girl was molested by her youth pastor. And so for her, that was the crisis. And then that meets with whatever type of foundation she had and, caused a lot of confusion. So the whole thing gets thrown out, because of the behavior of the youth pastor. But it’s not just one thing. Usually, and I hate to even say church hurt, almost because it could sound like we’re being flippant about it, church hurt is real. Abuse is real. But the problem in the deconstruction hashtag is that anything that makes me feel uncomfortable or anything that, I feel oppressed by is also abuse. So telling someone they’re a sinner, or like Tim mentioned, biblical sexuality, these things are seen also as abusive. So there’s a lot of knots to untie. But there’s definitely deconstruction is something that is a result of a crisis, some sort of a crisis, whether it’s a moral crisis, maybe, sexual confusion, or maybe a good friend who has sexual confusion or gender confusion. And then there’s trying to make the faith work around that. so there can be all sorts of different crisis as they interact with the foundation.

Clay Kraby: Yeah, and so often it does seem to center around, lifestyle issues, behavior issues, desire issues that, they see being in conflict with Scripture. And all too often, the thing that, they see as needing to give is Scripture. And that might look like that they find themselves in a progressive church that is willing to accept and even celebrate, whatever it is that they are inclined towards, or they might walk away altogether.

A Faulty View of the Authority of Scripture is Central in Deconstruction

Clay Kraby: So what is the relationship here between deconstruction and let’s just say, a faulty view of the authority of Scripture? Tim, can you comment about how, a right understanding of Scripture is so crucial in these conversations?

Tim Barnett: Yeah, I think that understanding, that Scripture is truth, and I think this is the part we talked about this a little earlier, that truth is not central in the deconstruction movement. It’s really about personal happiness, or really the authority of self. And so you have this conflict between the authority of Scripture, which we think we call it reformation. We want people to correct their mistaken beliefs and make them align with Scripture. But that’s because Scripture is authoritative. But in deconstruction, that’s not the case. UlTimately, the final authority is the self. And that’s why it doesn’t matter where you land, it doesn’t matter how you do it. I mean, this is what they say, this is what the deconstructionists say. So, we want to encourage, Christians to hey, if you experience doubt, you just talked about hurt, questions, whatever it may be, don’t stuff them down. We want you to take them head on. But keep Scripture as the ulTimate authority. Why? Because it is the revelation of God. We believe that this is God’s very word, and so we ought to keep that first. And when my personal preferences and when my opinions are in conflict with Scripture, I bring myself under it m, that’s how it works, because it’s the ulTimate authority. the problem, what we’re seeing in the deconstruction world is they’re putting self as the ulTimate authority. And therefore, when Scripture seems to conflict with their own personal preferences, like we just talked about sexuality, but I mean, you could throw anything in there, then ulTimately Scripture has to take a backseat. It either needs to be reinterpreted or just outright rejected. And this is why, when you go through the deconstruction hashtag, it’s depressing. Because you see over and over and over again, Scripture is maligned, it is misrepresented, and ulTimately it is rejected. And that’s a fundamental difference. And we talk about this in the book, the fundamental difference between deconstruction and what we call reformation or reforming your faith.

Clay Kraby: Yeah.

Progressive Christianity Is Connected With Deconstruction, But They’re Not Exactly The Same Thing

Clay Kraby: Now Lisa, you and I have had a chance to talk about your, other recent books, Another Gospel and Then Live, Your Truth and Other Lies. No doubt in your work on those, you probably see a lot of overlap or at least a lot of indications, of causation between the work you did there and the study you put into that. And really so is deconstruction the kind of fruit of that kind of world, of more of like a squishy evangelical, not very well founded, not, playing a little fast and loose with Scripture because of a variety of reasons? What’s the connection you see in those things?

Alisa Childers: Yeah, I think that’s fair. So deconstruction is really more of a methodology. So progressive Christianity is connected with deconstruction, but they’re not exactly the same thing. So where progressive Christianity might be the destination that deconstruction takes certain people, deconstruction can take people anywhere. Like Tim mentioned, you can end up agnostic atheist, New Age, sort of your own new spirituality, whatever you want to cobble together. And progressive Christianity is one of those destinations. And I think that’s why deconstruction is so dangerous. Because the point of, like, for example, the point of progressive Christianity, to be fair to the progressive Christian, in their minds, they’re trying to reform Christianity. I think that they’re using faulty information and their authority is off. But in the mind of the progressive Christian, they are trying to reform Christianity. Whereas deconstruction just wants you to leave historic Christianity. In fact, they will tell you don’t have a goal. It doesn’t matter where you land. In fact, if you have a worldview you land on, you will have to just deconstruct. That it’s. Just like this perpetual agnosticism in the deconstruction hashtag. The whole point is to not land on something solid. And many deconstructionists say this openly, whereas the progressive Christian kind of lands on something. deconstruction can lead people to all sorts of different places. So, interestingly, in my first book, Another Gospel, I described my faith crisis as a deconstruction. That’s the word I used in the book. But after Tim and I did this research, I actually changed my position in our new book and basically said that wasn’t the right word. It was the best word I had at the Time because it was so monumental for me and it led me to almost becoming agnostic myself. But looking back, I always was in pursuit of truth, whether I liked it or not. And that’s not deconstruction. And so yeah. Was it a faith crisis? Yes. Did I almost lose my faith? Yes. Was it deconstruction? No. Because I wanted to know what was true with a capital T, not just go with what I was feeling was right or wrong. And so, in the new book, I’m saying that isn’t what happened. It was a truth quest, not deconstruction.

Clay Kraby: Yeah. If anything, it was a reconstruction, really, because you’re taking, kind of the rule of Scripture and probably doing a lot of renovating and rebuilding.

Alisa Childers: Yes, exactly. Things got broken down. But then you’re right. It was like along the way, I made a lot of course corrections. My theology looks different than it did before. I changed my position on a lot of, I would say several issues, major issues in Scripture that would be maybe tertiary or secondary. Important, but secondary. but really came to the conclusion that the gospel that my parents had given me is the true gospel. And I’m thankful to have my parents share that with me as a very young child.

Clay Kraby: Yeah. As we talk about these things, it brings to mind the German theologians from the 18 hundreds, 19 hundreds, who thought, well, we got to rescue Christianity. People are going to think it’s dated and dusty and outrageous. So they cut out the miracles and all these things.

Social Media And Deconstruction

Clay Kraby: So that leads me to ask Tim, this seems like a growing problem. Maybe that’s just a factor of social media and everybody’s got a microphone now, but it seems like a growing problem. But is this a new problem. I mean, you mentioned Demas earlier in the conversation.

Tim Barnett: Yeah, we don’t think it’s a new problem, actually. We argue that this goes back to the Garden of Eden, right? When Satan says, did God really say right? And this is the same thing that’s being echoed today on social media, on TikTok. We’re seeing the same thing. Now, what is new is, as you just pointed out, social media, everyone has a platform. And so now you’re hearing these deconstruction stories, more than we would have, say, 2030 years ago, because people are sharing those stories, expressing those stories on Instagram and TikTok and Twitter and everywhere else. So I don’t think it’s a new phenomenon in that way. but it’s certainly more in our face. And that’s why Alisa and I both thought, man, we need to respond to this because, there’s a lot of questions. I remember getting emails from concerned parents and youth pastors when Rhett McLaughlin, from Good Mythical Morning posted his spiritual deconstruction on YouTube. they have a podcast called Ear Biscuits. And for 2 hours he walks through his story from Christian to now, I’m not sure if he calls himself an agnostic or what, but, it was powerful. And that’s because stories are powerful. Jesus told stories, and, we use stories in our talks. Lee Strobel’s tesTimony I’ve seen people I’ve been there, when people give their life to Christ, hearing Lee Strobel’s journey from atheism to Christianity. And we’re seeing stories like this online at an increasing rate of Christian turned atheist, or Christian turned progressive, or whatever. so that’s kind of the new aspect. And so we want to make sure that people are familiar what is really going on. And as I give talks, and as Alisa gives talks on this issue, what I’m finding is people’s eyes are open to it. Deconstruction is not merely, rethinking your faith, as some have argued. No, there’s much more. There is an underbelly to this. In fact, when I get up to speak on this issue now, I say, I actually want to shock you with some tweets and TikTok videos and things like, you’re not going to believe what I’m about to show you. I want to expose you to what is going on here. And, at the end, audiences are like, whoa, the church needs to wake up, because this movement is really gaining some steam.

Clay Kraby: Yeah, and it’s often so sad when you do come across I mean, yeah, they’re strangers on the internet, you wouldn’t have known they even existed. But because of social media, you encounter their stories, and often it seems like they’ll point to something that Christianity just doesn’t have any good answers to. And then they list these questions to which there are wonderful answers to. They’re issues that people have brought up, that, critics and skeptics have brought up, that apologists have had solid responses to for decades. For generations. And it’s so sad that they’ve never encountered someone that can walk them through those things. And that on the flip side, because of the social media aspect, they can encounter lots of people who, will encourage them in their deconstruction process, whatever you want to call it. How big a factor is it that, they can find communities of like minded people that will really, take them by the hand and literally walk them out of the church, so to speak? Alyssa, could you talk about that a little bit? what factor does that have for us?

Alisa Childers: Well, this is an important point because, you mentioned just a second ago, it’s too bad there wasn’t somebody in their life who could provide them with these answers. And, I think the thing that people need to understand is it’s not because there aren’t answers. They make fun of the answers. They mock the answers. It’s moral and it’s emotional, largely speaking. And I know that, a, deconstructionist would not, agree with me saying that, but I’m just telling you what I see in the, spoke I haven’t told you about this yet, Tim, but I spoke with a woman who was deconstructing and she wanted to talk to me. And we actually sat down and had a meal, and she thought her doubt was purely intellectual and she was asking questions about certain things, and I was kind of giving her an answer. And then she’d reframe the question, and I’d give her the answer again and kind of try to say it a different way, and then she’d ask the same question. And finally I said to her, because these were all questions about the Bible and the morality of the Bible, the morality of the nature of God as revealed in the Bible. And I finally just said to her, I said, Just a quick question. Tell me about your Bible reading. And she goes, Well, I don’t read the Bible. And I said, okay. I actually think your doubt is emotional. And her mind was blown, but it actually got through to her. And she said, after the shock wore off because she thought it was intellectual, she was like, I think you might be right. I think I have trust issues with God. I was like, I think that might be it. Because because she she thought because of all these intellectual things she had heard that her doubt was intellectual. But I see this over and over and over again with deconstruction. I had never seen someone deconstruct purely for intellectual reasons. There’s always a moral reason underneath it or an emotional reason underneath it because the intellectual answers are out there. So I just wanted to say that it’s very interesting to me the way they talk about apologetics in the deconstruction hashtag almost as if it’s like the old picture of a human riding on the back of a dinosaur and. We’re just trying to convince people that it’s some kind of dumb thing, and they don’t realize that there are robust answers to these things, or they have to realize the answers are out there. They just don’t like the answers. And so in the book, we even talk about how, some answers are not given. That’s true. Some people did not have an environment where their questions were welcomed, but others just found the answers unacceptable. And that’s important to realize, too.

Tim Barnett: Yeah, that’s good. And, just to kind of piggyback on that, the answers are out there. I think the problem in the church is we’re not familiar, with the philosophers and apologists of present or the past. And so, man, you look at some of these, accounts on, say, TikTok, someone, named there’s a guy named Jagazis, okay? And he kind of parades himself as a gay Jesus. Okay? This is blasphemous stuff. He has 250,000 followers, and his account is just, either making fun of or criticizing, traditional classical Christianity. You have. I blame Bill. Half a million followers on TikTok. I could go down the list of these accounts, and I’m sure likely if you’re over 40 and you’re listening to this, you don’t know who I’m talking about. But I’m telling you, if you’re under 25 and you’re on TikTok in this kind of Christian space, you’ve seen these people. These are the people that we’re responding to with Red Pen logic. And what’s really sad is most of these criticisms of Christianity are straw men. They’re not actual people who understand Christianity are like, what is this person even thinking? That’s not what I actually believe. And, when it isn’t a legiTimate objection or criticism, well, there’s answers to these things, but most people aren’t familiar with even where to go to get the answers. And this is why red pen logic. Mr. B is on TikTok. I just post and ghost. I posted a video today, and I won’t be on TikTok until I post another video, that kind of thing. But it’s because and that account, by the way, grew to 200,000 people really quickly. And the reason it grew so quickly is because there was a vacuum there in that kind of space where people were responding to these challenges. So it wasn’t like, Mr. Beast, anything special. It’s just, wow, we want answers, and here’s a guy doing it.

The Tension Between Culture and Scripture

Tim Barnett: So I, think that this is where apologetics, I think, can help in this issue. Alisa’s right. There’s a whole lot of emotional and moral stuff going on. but when those questions arise, we want to make sure people see, hey, there is an answer to this stuff.

Clay Kraby: Yeah. And as you mentioned, there’s so many folks out there with these accounts that I get really, ah, like the Pied Piper of Hamlin vibes from these folks that are just trying to lead people away. So, just a short application point. Parents know what your kids are doing online. and just be aware that these things exist and are out there and can, not only, sow seeds of doubt, but can really put a lot of fertilizer on it too, and have some really destructive results. So much of this, seems to, as you say, there’s the personal history involved, there’s the emotions involved, there is logic and doubt involved. So much of this does seem to come about, or at least as a flashpoint, this tension between hot button cultural issues and biblical truth that seems to factor heavily in a lot of folks’ decision to walk away from Christianity or to reject what they once professed. Or perhaps that was just how they were raised. Alisa ah, what advice would you have for those struggling with those tensions?

Alisa Childers: Well, one of the most important chapters of the book, I think, is a chapter called Advice, where we actually walk through the different types of relationships and how those relationships can be affected when one of the people in the relationship is in deconstruction. And so I think dealing with the tensions, it can be a really tough thing to navigate this relationally. And so one of the things we tell people is that if you have somebody who’s in deconstruction, who’s in your life, you really have to understand the nature of it so that you can know how to interact. Of course God can do anything. So I’m not saying that this could never work to just preach the gospel and show them a Bible verse, of course, but we have to understand the nature of this thing. And the way it works is a methodology. It’s a particular approach to reality that really doesn’t acknowledge that objective truth can be known when it comes to religion and morality. So therefore, all of the exclusive claims of Christianity are seen as power plays. That’s why the Bible is so denigrated in the deconstruction movement, because it’s just the theological winners that got to write the Bible and tell you what to believe. And it’s how the church keeps you under its control. And the church just invented the doctrine of hell to control people with fear. I mean, these are the kinds of senTiments you see all over the deconstruction hashtag. So the Bible is just seen as this big, just lump of power that’s wielded by people because they don’t think you could actually know what’s true objectively about religion. So they’re not saying, like, is what you’re saying true? Is it false? How would we assess such a claim? That’s not even the way they’re thinking about it. When we say things like, we’re a sinner in need of a savior, all they hear is, why would the church say that? Well, they’re just trying to protect their institution of power. So you have to understand the way this thing works. Is it’s very postmodern in that sense. It’s rejected the idea that absolute truth can be known when it comes to religion and morality. So when you’re navigating the tension with people you’re in relationship with, we kind of take this approach that I don’t know if it’ll be controversial or not when people get to it, but I found a lot of people be comforted by it. And that is that it’s okay to back off in the beginning. If you suspect somebody’s in deconstruction, they’re probably not telling you about it if they are. But if you suspect it, it’s okay to back off. You don’t need to feel like you have to go fix their theology over coffee. It’s probably not going to work that way. So we are seeing people disconnect from their churches, but also their families sending no contact letters. I don’t think a night goes by when I speak at a conference where I don’t have at least one. Even up to five elderly parents tell me that their adult child deconstructed, they’ve cut off contact. Some got a letter, some it’s just tense. And they someTimes don’t let them see their grandkids. This is so common. Many people listening to us right now, you’re listening to me going, oh my gosh, that’s happened to me too. And so what we say in the book is that it’s okay to back off. It’s okay to just try to stay in their life. It’s kind of like triage. If there’s a big accident and the hospital is flooded with accident vicTims, the guy with the metal pole through his lung is going to get treated before the guy with the broken arm. And so it’s okay to do a little triage. And if it’s that desperate and that fragile, just take advantage of that fragile window of opportunity to try to stay in their life. And don’t underesTimate the power of prayer that you have. Fast and pray for your loved one. Show them what it looks like to be a real Christian, living out the beauty of the gospel. You do not have to compromise your convictions. Nobody should bully you into affirming something that you don’t affirm, but you can back off a little bit and just try to stay in their life, especially in that phase in the beginning when it might be really fragile.

Clay Kraby: Yeah, it’s really helpful. And it strikes me that so much of the good that can be done is relational. It’s inTimate, it’s one on one. And yet at the same Time, so much of what we see in deconstruction is this amplified social media, digital, short video type stuff.

The Importance of Relationships

Clay Kraby: So what element maybe, Tim, you could speak to this? Is there any element of reaching out of talking to someone online and maybe you don’t really know all that well? Is that completely fruitless? Obviously, again, God can use people with a well Timed question or response, but it seems as though the real work is going to be for those in relationship how can we if we encounter someone that we don’t really know all that well? Maybe it’s a, high school friend from Facebook. How might we maybe plant some seeds? Or as Greg Hochel likes to say, put some rocks in their shoe to help them think through these things.

Tim Barnett: Yeah, this is where, book, you know, really comes in handy. as Lisa just said, you’re going to have probably more, productivity if you have a relationship. If there’s no relationship, it’s really hard to speak truth into someone’s life, especially online. most people listening would agree that it can be tense when there’s disagreement. We often assume the worst, unfortunately, when it comes to debating something online, and so tone is hard to perceive as well. It’s really important that when it comes to these kinds of issues, if you can you want to be face to face and having that conversation, as Alisa pointed out, make sure that person knows that you love them. Right. It’s not I love you, but here’s what’s wrong with you. It’s. I love you. Period. And that’s not going to change, even if you disagree with me. I know if my, daughters, I have three girls when they are 20 years old, if my oldest comes to me and says, I don’t believe anymore, that’s going to hurt. but I want her to know right away that she is loved no matter what. And if, when she’s ready to have that conversation about our beliefs, I m am ready and willing, absolutely. But I’m not going to force that on her. There’s going to be boundaries that are set, but I don’t want to I mean, the Holy Spirit, as you just said, can use all kinds of means. And there are people that I have never met and they have written me, sent me messages over Facebook and YouTube saying, you have been encouragement to me. Or it was your video that kept me from deconstruction that just happened. Actually, I made a video on answering the question, can God make a rock so big that he can’t even lift it? And this young girl at a conference, she’s now 20, she came to me, her name is, Grace, I think. Grace or faith. I knew it was one of those biblical things. And, Grace said, I was really struggling with this question, and I honestly just wanted to stuff it. Thought I’ll just if I just push this thing down deep enough and it actually popped back up when she was in college, and, her mom had actually recommended Red, Pen Logic video, a different video. And she actually just went to YouTube and she was scrolling through and there’s my face in the thumbnail, holding a know and answering that question. And so there’s certainly a place for interacting with people, who may be deconstructing online, but, at the end of the day, we want to pray that God is the one kind of speaking through us. And as Lisa said, we’re modeling Jesus in those engagements.

Two-Tiered Truth

Clay Kraby: Yeah, as you said earlier, this really goes back to the garden. Indeed, has, you, know, questioning the authority of Scripture, the, truth of Scripture, truth itself, whether or not there even is truth. And in the book, you talk about this concept of a two tiered truth. Alisa, could you explain? What do you mean by a two tiered truth?

Alisa Childers: Right. Well, we’re just sort of standing on the shoulders of Frances Schaefer and Nancy Pearce with this one. But basically, the two tiered approach to truth is how our culture approaches truth today. So if we think about truth as a house, or how people think about truth as a house, there’s an upstairs and a downstairs. And things like facts, logic, science, objectively true things that most people would say, like, most people go to the bank, they expect their money to be there. They’re going to appeal to science on certain things. They don’t live as if truth is relative in all areas. But for them, those are the things that are downstairs. That’s for everybody. That’s true for everybody. But they’ve relegated things like morality and religion to the upstairs. And that’s more the private sphere that’s just kind of your own personal beliefs that you don’t really bring into the public sphere. And really, ulTimately, it’s because people have approached those two topics in particular as things that are more relative. Like, maybe your favorite flavor of ice cream goes in the upstairs, your favorite dessert, maybe if you feel hot or cold. that’s all the personal, private, lower t truths as our culture approaches them. And so what Nancy Pearsey and Francis Schaeffer are talking about with this is that really, we had this, thing we talked about, maybe I don’t think we put it in the book, but we’re like, we need to walk Jesus downstairs. Jesus goes downstairs. Right. Because what you believe about religion and morality is in the objective sphere. That’s really more in the math and science and logic category. That is publicly true for everyone, everywhere, of all Times, of all ethnic backgrounds, and every period of history. They’re true for everyone. Whereas the culturist this totally different approach to what you think about religion, morality, as if it’s just like your favorite flavor of ice cream.

Clay Kraby: Yeah. And you can see, just thinking through all the places that we’ve gone in this conversation, how much that is at the heart of the issue and trying to help people see no, there is true truth, whether you like, it or not and helping them see the truth of God’s word and the truth of the gospel and how that overrides and overrules anything else that really might be going on internally or externally.

Tim Barnett: And Clay, if your view of truth is that it’s in the upper story, as we say in the book. It’s in the upper story. That upper level. Then that means and, we say this, you’re the man upstairs. I mean, you’re the authority when it comes to those things. So you determine which flavor of ice cream you like. That’s your purview, that’s your authority. And so, if religion and morality are up there, it makes sense, of what we’re seeing right now in the culture. I determine what’s right and wrong when it comes to sexuality and when it comes to gender, and when it comes to which religious, belief, or if any, I’m going to follow, because they’re in the upstairs, the upper story, and I’m in charge of that. And so it’s not surprising. I mean, we’re able to make sense of what’s going on in the deconstruction world by using Francis Schaefer and Nancy Pearce’s idea of this. But it goes one step further, because if that’s where truth is pushed, it’s just personal preference in the upstairs. Then when Alisa Childers and Tim Barnett come along and they’re saying, well, Jesus is the only way, well, that’s a religious claim, but they’re seeing it in the upper story. And how could you possibly I mean, it’s like saying it’s like vanilla ice cream is the one true flavor of ice cream. They look at us and they say they don’t understand the claim we’re making. Or even worse, they think, oh, there’s Tim and there’s Alisa. And they’re trying to make a power move. They’re trying to force everybody to be fans, know, follow vanilla ice cream or something. And so that’s why, instead of saying, Jesus is the only way is false, that idea is false. They’ll say, no, it’s toxic. You guys are making a power move, and that’s wrong, that’s harmful, you guys are oppressors, you’re being abusive. And that’s the kind of rhetoric, that’s the kind of language that we’re seeing. Again, I’m hoping that our listeners can see. When you push truth into the upper story, then this is what follows from that. And so what we argue in the book is that, no, that’s not where religious and moral truth reside. It’s actually as true as one plus one equals two. It’s that kind of objective truth.

Clay Kraby: Yeah, that’s really helpful, just to picture it that way, and in your mind can start to even untangle some of the things you see online. And that might be someone, evangelize on the street. And they get into these conversations with a college student, let’s say. And it really does, it keeps moving away from whether this is true or not. Let’s have a conversation about that. It’s emotional responses, it’s trying to attack, motives or whatever else. And so often, it just is this question of who is the arbiter of what’s true? And we’ve all been steeped in it from our earliest days that we are. We determine what’s true. We weigh all the things and decide, is this true for me? And that dreaded phrase. But, you see how much that factors into this conversation about deconstruction.

Key Takeaways from ‘The Deconstruction of Christianity’

Clay Kraby: Now, I’d like to hear from both of you on what it is you hope readers are going to take away from reading the deconstruction of Christianity. Alisa, would you just share what your hopes are for this book?

Alisa Childers: Well, it’s really important that people understand who this book is written for. This is not the book you’re going to give to your loved one who’s in deconstruction. We did not write it to deconstructionists or even people in deconstruction. We wrote it for their moms and their dads and their children and their spouses and their pastors. It’s written for the church to understand the phenomenon and then help them to navigate relationships with their loved ones. And so that’s my hope. My hope is that every elderly couple that came to me after I spoke with tears in their eyes, saying, what happened to my kid? I can say, Take this book. You will understand what happened to your kid, and maybe get some wise advice on how to navigate your relationship with them now, and how you can pray and be reminded that we end the book on a high note of hope. We have hope. There’s a lot of bad news in the book, but we end with hope. And we want to give people hope. We want them to know they’re not alone, and we don’t know what God is doing. There’s something, God’s cooking up something, and we need to be hopeful for that and keep our eyes on him. And so I just hope that they will feel understood and that they will have a really good, practical resource to help them navigate those relationships.

Clay Kraby: How about you, Tim?

Tim Barnett: That’s really well said.

Hope in Christ

Tim Barnett: I don’t know if I can add to know, Alisa just alluded to our last chapter. We wanted to make sure that when our reader puts this book down, that there is hope. And so we talk about the experience Peter had the night, Jesus is betrayed, the night of the crucifixion. Peter goes from, I’ll never leave you, I’m willing to die with you, to denying the Lord three Times. His world is turned upside down. And I think a lot of our readers may feel like that, like their world has been completely turned upside down. And of course, we know Sunday brings this hope, this resurrection hope, where Jesus, appears. In fact, the angel says, Go tell his disciples. And Peter, like, Peter really needs to hear this. And so we talk about this idea of the know. The Scriptures don’t tell us much about what happened on the Saturday, so we really can only speculate and we know. Did Peter have a whole lot of questions? Did he start to really struggle with his faith? Did he start to question some of the teachings that he heard from Jesus. I mean, we just don’t know. Here’s what we do know. When all hope seemed lost on Saturday, there was hope just around the corner. Sunday brought this resurrection hope and actually a strengthened faith right on this rock, I’ll build my church. So here’s Peter with a strengthened faith. as one of the apostles, our hope is that when our readers get to that chapter, they’ll begin to see, hey, maybe that Saturday isn’t 24 hours for my loved one. Maybe it’s a couple of years, maybe it’s longer. but with Christianity, there is hope. And the Holy Spirit can work in even the darkest situation that we don’t think there’s a way. Well, he can make a way.

Clay Kraby: Amen.

Pre-Order Now

Clay Kraby: Well, the book will be out soon. Would you share a little bit about where folks can pick up a copy? And I understand you’ve got some pre order things available as well.

Alisa Childers: Yeah, so we’re real excited about the pre order bonuses. I’m really thankful Tyndale really went all out with these bonuses, so I’m feeling pretty good about it. But you can pre order the book anywhere. Books are sold. You can go to Amazon or Christian Book, wherever you want to go, and then just get your receipt information and then Tim, is it Thedeconstructionofchristianity.com? Is that the website? So you can go to TheDeconstructionOfChristianity.com it’s a long one. You can also just go to my website. It kind of goes to the same landing page, and then you can scroll down on that page and there’s a little form you can fill out where you put in your receipt information. And here’s what I just love that advice chapter that we talked about that I think is probably the highlight of the book. We’re going to give that to you immediately, so when you preorder the book, you’ll receive an email that will give you that chapter early. So you’ll get that like, today. And then, when the book comes out with your preorder, you’ll get 60 days of access to the audiobook for free, which Tim and I actually read. So, I really want to encourage you to preorder it and get your bonuses and you can get that advice chapter right away.

Clay Kraby: Wonderful. I’ll be sure to link to all of these things as well as other resources by Alisa and by Tim and their YouTube channels, their websites, and everything else. You can find that at the show notes for this episode at deconstruction. Alisa and Tim, thank you so much for joining me for this conversation.

Alisa Childers: Thanks so much, Clay. It was great.

Tim Barnett: Thanks for having us.