Shownotes
Dr. David Edgington, a biblical counselor and author of "The Abusive Wife," joins Will Spencer to discuss the often-overlooked issue of women's sin and the phenomenon of reviling wives, challenging the prevailing narrative that women are exempt from accountability.
The conversation delves into how cultural influences, particularly feminism, have contributed to a widespread reluctance to recognize women's failings in marriage and family dynamics. Edgington highlights the importance of acknowledging that both men and women are equally accountable for their actions, emphasizing that women's sin can manifest in destructive ways, including verbal and emotional abuse.
He encourages a return to biblical principles in counseling, advocating for a balanced approach that holds both spouses responsible for their behavior. The episode ultimately calls for humility, repentance, and the transformative power of Scripture in addressing these deep-rooted issues within relationships.
David Edgington is a pastor, biblical counselor, and the author of “The Abusive Wife.”
Takeaways:
- Dr. David Edgington, a biblical counselor and author, addresses the often-ignored issue of abusive wives in Christian marriages
- The podcast highlights how cultural narratives have led to the misconception that women are incapable of sinning
- Listeners are encouraged to seek biblical counseling and to recognize that true change comes from a humble submission to the word of God
- Edgington discusses the importance of accountability in relationships
- The conversation emphasizes that both genders have responsibilities in a marriage
- Finally, the episode encourages women who may feel they are reviling wives to seek help and accountability
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MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE
- "No Mere Mortals" - Toby Sumpter
- "Masculine Christianity" - Zach Garris
- "It's Good To Be a Man" - Michael Foster
- Jay Adams Nouthetic Counseling
- "Pornography is a Murderer" - David Edgington
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Transcripts
My name is Will Spencer, and you're listening to the Renaissance of Men podcast.
Will Spencer:My guest this week is a biblical counselor, plus a good friend, brother in Christ, and the author of the Abusive wife.
Will Spencer:Please welcome Dr.
Will Spencer:David Edgington.
David Edgington:You are the Renaissance.
Will Spencer:For the past several generations, evangelicalism has been infected with the idea that women don't sin.
Will Spencer:Part of this is due to feminism and what I call the feminist theology, which is the idea that women are cosmic victims of patriarchy and that in order to right historical wrongs, we can never hold them accountable again.
Will Spencer:Another part of this is due to the cultural disparagement of men.
Will Spencer:We see this in the Simpsons, Everybody Loves Raymond and more.
Will Spencer:Bumbling and buffoonish dads provide adorable comic relief while the capable wife dutifully cleans up behind the scenes.
Will Spencer:The husband does all the wrong and the wife does all the right.
Will Spencer:And that's just how it is and how it's always been.
Will Spencer:Both of these ideas and more combine to produce the idea that women are saintly, sinless angels under the oppressive thumb of men, either actively through mistreatment or passively through inaction.
Will Spencer:And so the notions that women sin, women sin against men, and that women sin against men who don't deserve it cannot be tolerated in the public square simply because they're obviously false, right?
Speaker C:Right.
Will Spencer:There's just one problem.
Will Spencer:Women do sin, including against men.
Will Spencer:Women have a sin nature, just like men do, and it expresses itself uniquely from men's.
Will Spencer:It also expresses itself in marriage.
Will Spencer:Yes, men can and do fail as husbands and as fathers.
Will Spencer: aying that since at least the: Will Spencer:But when you try to suggest that women have their share of failings as wives and as mothers, you're met immediately with shrill pushback.
Will Spencer:Clearly, it must be the husband's fault.
Will Spencer:Somehow, this false secular idea has also crept into evangelicalism and into the pastor's counseling office.
Will Spencer:It seems that in many cases around the country and also the world, the pastors cannot or perhaps will not see that there are situations where the abusive or abandoning partner isn't the husband.
Will Spencer:Rather, it's the wife.
Will Spencer:And there's a storm coming.
Will Spencer:Feminism has begun its long fall from its cultural and political heights.
Will Spencer:And with it is coming the realization that in our rush to point fingers and laugh at men, we've missed out on the shared responsibility for an entire sex, women.
Will Spencer:And that correction is going to be painful, difficult, and a lonely road to walk for all but the most faithful men and women courageous enough to walk it.
Will Spencer:Which brings me to my guest this week.
Will Spencer:His name is Dr.
Will Spencer:David Eddington, and he's a biblical counselor and the author of the Abusive Wife Ministering to the Contentious Woman.
Will Spencer:And there are a bunch of key words in that book title.
Will Spencer:First, the abusive wife.
Will Spencer:Yes, that is a real phenomenon.
Will Spencer:And since my podcast with David last year, which has become one of my top 10 most downloaded episodes ever, David has had men reach out to him from around the world, sharing their stories of being abused, often verbally and sometimes even physically, by their wives.
Will Spencer:These are cases that pastors often ignore in their rush to blame the husband.
Will Spencer:And in case you're tempted to wonder, David sees these couples in person or on zoom and witnesses this behavior firsthand.
Will Spencer:It is not speculation.
Will Spencer:The second keyword in David's book title is ministering.
Will Spencer:This isn't about shame or scorn.
Will Spencer:This is about ministering to a sinful woman's pain, calling her to repentance, and turning her heart towards Christ and her husband.
Will Spencer:This is key.
Will Spencer:We are not talking about a Christian version of red pill finger pointing, rather gentle but firm and loving calls to repentance in Christ for the good of her own soul, not just her marriage.
Will Spencer:And finally, the contentious woman.
Will Spencer:As we all know, women are less physically powerful than men.
Will Spencer:It's more difficult, though not impossible, for women to abuse their husband's bodies.
Will Spencer:Instead, women abuse men by being disagreeable, difficult, argumentative, accusatory, disobedient, vindictive, and cutting with their words.
Will Spencer:These women break men down verbally, and men, being more action oriented, have limited ways to respond and often can't respond at all.
Will Spencer:Not in time, anyway.
Will Spencer:These are the cases of men and women that Dr.
Will Spencer:Edgington counsels, perhaps one of the only counselors in the entire world who does so.
Will Spencer:And this is significant because this phenomenon is more widespread than most in the Christian church can imagine.
Will Spencer:But my sense is that very soon we're all going to hear much more about it.
Will Spencer:The pain, shame and hiding is real.
Will Spencer:No man wants to admit that he's the victim of abuse.
Will Spencer:And yet it's becoming time to talk about it.
Will Spencer:May we all do so with the wisdom, compassion, patience, and Christian heart exemplified by my friend David.
Will Spencer:In our conversation, we discussed the worldwide phenomenon of reviling wives, the infiltration of psychotherapy in the church, the need for men to stand up to women, the trait to look for in a godly wife, cultivating the gift of repentance, how your feelings will lead you astray, and finally, healing through biblical counseling.
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Will Spencer:If this is your first time here, welcome.
Will Spencer:I release new episodes about the Christian counterculture, masculine virtue and the family every week.
Will Spencer:Just a reminder that many things about this podcast will be changing very soon.
Will Spencer:As you heard me say a couple weeks ago, this podcast will soon become the Will Spencer Podcast.
Will Spencer:New brand, new topics, new guests, same format you love.
Will Spencer:This has been a long time coming and I'm incredibly excited.
Will Spencer:I hope you are too.
Will Spencer:And I hope you won't mind these regular reminders to make sure we all come along together.
Will Spencer:And so now I'm thrilled to announce the new podcast Substack that is our new community home.
Will Spencer:You can find that link in the show notes.
Will Spencer:There will be free content on the site, including a new article entitled no one Cares about Female Action Heroes and Were right not to, which is about the recent box office failure of the film Furiosa and what I think that has to say about the undeniable differences between men and women.
Will Spencer:So expect more of that.
Will Spencer:But the biggest benefits of the substack will go to paid subscribers who get a number of perks, including early access to ad, free audio and video interviews, previews of my new book, and the new brand of the podcast, lifetime access to my Christian Men's Discord server, and finally, access to a substack only podcast series called Will Spencer Uncensored, where I interview controversial figures that might get me canceled otherwise.
Will Spencer:Again, these interviews will only be available for paying subscribers.
Will Spencer:You won't find them anywhere else.
Will Spencer:I'd like you to be a part of all this and more.
Will Spencer:The new substack is available to subscribers for as low as $10 per month.
Will Spencer:Ladies and gentlemen, the next few months are going to be exciting.
Will Spencer:I hope you'll come along, visit willspencerpod.substack.com and be a part of it now.
Will Spencer:And please welcome this week's guest on the podcast, a pastor and biblical counselor, plus the author of the abusive wife, my friend, Dr.
Will Spencer:David Edgington.
Speaker C:Hey David, welcome back to the podcast.
David Edgington:Hey Will, great to see you again.
Speaker C:So in the time since you and I spoke on the show, I guess it was about a year ago, something like that.
Speaker C:I've been very blessed to form a friendship with you and so I think that'll probably that ongoing dialogue that's been happening since then will probably show up in the recording maybe once or twice.
David Edgington:I'm sure, I'm sure it will.
David Edgington:Very grateful for our friendship.
Speaker C:Me as well so maybe fill everybody in on what the past year has been like.
Speaker C:Because you wrote this book, the Abusive Wife, back in.
Speaker C: I think it was: Speaker C:And you were on five podcasts last year, including mine.
Speaker C:And so that was a.
Speaker C:That was a big shift.
Speaker C:So.
Speaker C:So catch the listeners up on what that's been like.
David Edgington: rote the Abusive wife back in: David Edgington:That's when it was published.
David Edgington:And so nine years ago now.
David Edgington:And after doing these podcasts last year, including yours, I could never have expected the response that I got.
David Edgington:I mean, it's been incredible.
David Edgington:The number of men that are struggling with the issues that you and I talked about in that first podcast is off the charts.
David Edgington:And I'm not one for hyperbole.
David Edgington:I'm not one for exaggerating.
David Edgington:This is.
David Edgington:I literally counseled hundreds of families last year on this issue alone.
David Edgington:And the reason that I think that's happening is that no one wants to talk about it.
David Edgington:No one wants to acknowledge it.
David Edgington:No one wants to even think that it's a thing.
David Edgington:And there are suffering and hurting men.
David Edgington:There are women that are bound in this reviling, in bitterness, and they're completely unrepentant about it.
David Edgington:And so, you know, so we struck a nerve when we did the podcast.
David Edgington:And what amazed me will, you know, I'm just a boomer, so I don't understand all the.
David Edgington:All this stuff.
David Edgington:You know, honestly, Honestly, I wasn't even sure what a podcast was when the first person invited me.
David Edgington:I'm like, what?
David Edgington:I think I know what that is.
Speaker C:Does it grow on trees?
David Edgington:Yeah.
David Edgington:What is that?
David Edgington:Is that the little pods things?
David Edgington:But the reach of the podcast, where it has gone literally worldwide.
David Edgington:I mean, I've counseled people in England, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore.
David Edgington:I'm just trying to think of Iceland, Turkey, Brazil.
David Edgington:All over the world.
David Edgington:People have contacted me because nobody wants to talk about this again.
David Edgington:Nobody wants to believe that this is really even an issue now.
David Edgington:Nobody is hyperbole, but it's very, very few people.
David Edgington:I would say that probably 90% of the pastors and counselors out there miserably fail with this exact issue.
David Edgington:And that's from talking to so many pastors, too.
David Edgington:I've talked to many pastors in the past year, many counselors, many no thetic counselors like myself that, you know, I know we've talked about this before, but they not only do not address the problem, they actually blame the man for the problem.
David Edgington:So it's a double pain.
David Edgington:First, the man getting all of this reviling in bitterness and hostility and control and rage from his wife.
David Edgington:And these are Christian families.
David Edgington:They're not liberal families.
David Edgington:They're not families that don't believe the Bible.
David Edgington:They're families that say that they believe the Bible.
David Edgington:So the men get all of that hostility from their wife and then they go to their church or their counselors, even, so called biblical counselors, new fetic counselors, and they get blamed.
David Edgington:Doesn't matter how wicked or bad the wife is, the man gets blamed.
David Edgington:Now the way I handle counseling is I listen to people and I say, okay, the man is in sin, I hold him accountable for the sin.
David Edgington:If the wife sends sin, I hold her accountable for the sin.
David Edgington:But with the reviling wife, she doesn't want to be held accountable.
David Edgington:She actually gets angry when you try to, just as gently as you could, hold her accountable for what?
David Edgington:For her behavior, for what she's doing.
David Edgington:Always gets blamed on the husband.
David Edgington:Well, he's abusive, he's toxic, he's, you know, we gotta destroy the patriarchy.
David Edgington:We gotta, you know, it's like, this is not what this is about.
David Edgington:These men are almost without fault.
David Edgington:They're gentle, they're kind, they're loving, they're forgiving.
David Edgington:They love their wives, they love their children.
David Edgington:They're not, you know, mean, cruel, you know, flexing and saying, you know, you must submit to me.
David Edgington:They're not that kind of guy at all.
David Edgington:And this is what's so mysterious about us.
David Edgington:Like, why, why is there not just that basic discernment to see what's going on?
David Edgington:Why aren't people even curious about it and say, it can't be that bad, can it?
Speaker C:Do the women who do this, I've got so many questions.
Speaker C:Do the women who do this, do they actually say, we have to smash the patriarchy?
Speaker C:Like, does that come up?
Speaker C:Do they bring that up?
David Edgington:Many of them do.
David Edgington:Many of the women do.
David Edgington:And again, we're talking about women that would present themselves as conservative, that they believe the Bible is the word of God.
David Edgington:They believe the Bible is what should be preached from the pulpit.
David Edgington:And, you know, they hate Doug Wilson.
David Edgington:They hate, you know, anybody that's trying to assert male headship and just simple men leading in their homes, men being the authority in their homes.
David Edgington:I think what happens will, is that when people hear authority, when they hear leadership, when they hear headship, what a lot of women hear is oppression, domination, cruelty, no freedom, doormat.
David Edgington:That's what they hear.
David Edgington:And it's like, that's not what that's not these men.
David Edgington:Now, there are men like that out there.
David Edgington:You and I know, sure, there are men like that out there.
David Edgington:There's probably a lot of men like that out there.
David Edgington:But there are so many women out there that have just given in to feminism and they don't even realize it.
David Edgington:I don't think they see it.
Speaker C:Yeah, they don't because they don't call it feminism.
Speaker C:Like that's the thing is I think feminism.
Speaker C:I've begun thinking that feminism is the wrong word because when you say the word feminism, people hear a socio political movement, right?
Speaker C:Oh, I'm not a feminist because I'm not part of the socio political movement.
Speaker C:But it's deeper, it's theological.
Speaker C:I mean, it's garden stuff.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:As my friends and I say.
Speaker C:But there's no word for what that is.
Speaker C:I mean, obviously it's just rebellion.
Speaker C:It's hatred of God that's expressed towards hating.
Speaker C:Your desire will be to usurp your husband and he will rule over you.
Speaker C:That's what it is.
Speaker C:But a lot of women are like, that's not me.
Speaker C:I'd never do that.
Speaker C:It's like you're doing it right now.
David Edgington:Yeah, no, it's the Genesis 3:16.
David Edgington:I like the way the ESV translates it, that your desire shall be contrary to your husband and he shall rule over you.
David Edgington:So it's contrary to the husband and now he has to rule over her.
David Edgington:And then you look at Genesis, chapter four, the very next chapter with Cain and Abel, and God tells Cain, you have to rule over your sin.
David Edgington:Sin's desire is for you.
David Edgington:It's crouching at the door, it's desire for you, but you have to rule over it.
David Edgington:So you have to take care of that and say, this is not going to happen.
David Edgington:I don't want sin to overwhelm me, and so I have to rule over my sin.
David Edgington:And yet the same picture is for the husband and wife, that the wife wants to control the husband.
David Edgington:And the husband says, no, God has given me the rule.
David Edgington:And that's not oppressive.
David Edgington:It does not have to be oppressive at all.
David Edgington:And a lot of these men are not as strong as they should be.
David Edgington:So I'll say that a lot of these men are more passive than strong leaders.
David Edgington:But with the reviling wife, this is such an important point and it's usually missed will.
David Edgington:With the reviling wife, it doesn't matter how strong the husband is.
David Edgington:It doesn't matter how masculine he is, how tough he is, how assertive he is.
David Edgington:She's still Going to rebel because the sin is in her hearts, not in him.
David Edgington:And the example I use with that, because people say, well, if a man will just be strong and masculine, then a woman will submit.
David Edgington:I know you and I roll our eyes at that a lot.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Yeah.
David Edgington:And so my response to that is, okay, let's say that that's true.
David Edgington:I guess Jesus is not masculine enough.
David Edgington:Right.
David Edgington:Because his bride, the church, rebels against him all the time.
David Edgington:Are we willing to say that.
David Edgington:That, you know, it's the man's fault when the wife sins?
David Edgington:I go, no, it's not.
David Edgington:Now, in the garden, obviously, Adam was responsible for Eve's sin.
David Edgington:He abdicated his leadership because the scripture says that he was with her when that happened.
David Edgington:But she carries the blame for the sin.
David Edgington:She's guilty of the sin herself.
Speaker C:Thank you.
Speaker C:Yes.
David Edgington:So that distinction is important and it has to be made because a lot of times it's just, nope, Sky's fault.
David Edgington:Sin entered through Adam.
David Edgington:So men are always to blame.
David Edgington:It's like, no, no one Timothy 2 talks about Eve was deceived and became a transgressor, so she fell into sin.
David Edgington:I mean, it's not saying, well, she was sinless.
Speaker C:Right.
David Edgington:Well, that's all we're trying to do.
David Edgington:We're just trying to hold men accountable for sin and women accountable for sin.
David Edgington:And I'm not looking for sin.
David Edgington:I'm not digging in and saying, I gotta find it in you.
David Edgington:It's like it's right out in the open.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:There's a book about it, I think.
Speaker C:It's not just your line either.
David Edgington:And a much better book than mine.
Speaker C:Much better.
Speaker C:Exactly.
Speaker C:Well, this is exactly what I run into, is I try and point out women sin, and then the response I get is, women sin.
Speaker C:My line is, women sin.
Speaker C:Women sin against men.
Speaker C:Women sin against men who don't deserve it.
Speaker C:All three of those things are true.
Speaker C:I think I did.
Speaker C:I think in my how to Find a Church.
Speaker C:Because last year I did an episode, how to Find a Church, and I talked to men who are seeking, probably women, too.
Speaker C:Like, you have to ask your pastor, do you agree with these three statements?
Speaker C:Do women sin?
Speaker C:Do women sin against men?
Speaker C:And do women sin against men who don't deserve it?
Speaker C:Because if a pastor isn't willing to say an immediate yes to all three of those, don't go to that church.
Speaker C:Because all three of those, and the.
David Edgington:Other part, too, will you, Pastor, hold that woman accountable for her sin?
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker C:That's a great.
Speaker C:That's a great part of it.
David Edgington:Women's sin.
David Edgington:But I'm not going to do anything about it.
David Edgington:It's like, no, you got to do something about it.
Speaker C:That's right.
Speaker C:There's so much here because I've been going around in DMs and on Twitter and stuff like this, about this, you know, about.
Speaker C:There are so many people who will say, I.
Speaker C:A woman who will say, like, my father or my pastor was.
Speaker C:Was really terrible to me, even.
Speaker C:Even assuming that it's true.
Speaker C:And so when you try and point out that you need to be accountable now, they get all mad.
Speaker C:Like, somehow it's that man's fault for your behavior today.
Speaker C:Like, it's.
Speaker C:That's not how it works.
Speaker C:Like when, when, like, women, when.
Speaker C:When you die and you face judgment, like, I don't think God's going to say, well, I see you did all these terrible things, but, you know, was your dad mean to you?
Speaker C:You know, asterisk.
Speaker C:Like, there's no asterisk.
Speaker C:You're.
Speaker C:You're morally responsible for your.
Speaker C:For your thoughts, words and actions, period.
Speaker C:Right?
David Edgington:Yeah.
David Edgington:And I don't.
David Edgington:I don't want to minimize.
David Edgington:This is a whole nother area.
David Edgington:I know we can go on a lot of tangents on this.
David Edgington:I don't want to minimize what women have been through, especially in their childhood.
Speaker C:Let's talk about this then, please.
David Edgington:So what I have found, and I just started seeing this pattern, I go, there's got to be something going on here.
David Edgington:As I'm counseling 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 of these husbands and wives.
Speaker C:Unbelievable.
David Edgington:I'm seeing a pattern in the reviling wives.
David Edgington:And of the hundreds of ones that I've counseled, about 80% of those reviling wives had some kind of traumatic experience in their childhood.
David Edgington:Now, when I say traumatic, I mean that they've been raped, okay?
David Edgington:They've been sexually molested, they got an abortion.
David Edgington:You know, there's all kinds of things.
David Edgington:Now, I realize she chose to get the abortion, but sometimes it's a young girl.
David Edgington:And I go, that.
David Edgington:That's horrible that she has to go through that.
David Edgington:Abortion is wicked sin anyway.
David Edgington:But, you know, a little girl having to go through it is just horrible.
David Edgington:So what happens is that trauma, it's exactly what you described.
David Edgington:Sometimes it doesn't kick in for five, 10, 20 years later, and she just gets full of rage over her husband, who didn't do anything like that to her, didn't have any.
David Edgington:Nothing even remotely like that, but she just gets gripped by this, and she's blinded with that rage.
David Edgington:Now, again, I have Sympathy and compassion for what she went through as a little girl.
David Edgington:I go, it's just wicked and horrible that men would do that to little girls.
David Edgington:But your point?
David Edgington:She has to be held accountable, compassionately held accountable as an adult grown woman who's 40, 50, 60 years old.
David Edgington:You can't treat your husband this way.
David Edgington:It's wicked.
David Edgington:It's godless.
David Edgington:You're blaming your husband for something that happened to you as a little girl.
David Edgington:Well, I'm not blaming him.
David Edgington:He's just like my uncle or my father or my brother.
David Edgington:I'm like, no, he's not.
David Edgington:But you're so blinded, you've just got this tunnel vision that that bitterness has set in to that woman's heart.
David Edgington:Started as a little girl, but again, it seems like it doesn't manifest until many times decades later, and then she's full on, just hostile and uncontrollable and unaccountable.
David Edgington:So, again, you know, we have to have compassion for what these women went through as little girls, but we still have to hold them accountable for what they're doing now and saying, you don't get a pass on this.
David Edgington:You really don't, any more than a man does.
David Edgington:And I'll say this, too.
David Edgington:I see the same thing with men.
David Edgington:Men that were molested and abused as little boys.
David Edgington:When they become adults, the same thing happens to them.
David Edgington:They become uncontrollable, full of rage.
David Edgington:And you go, what's going on?
David Edgington:Where did this come from?
David Edgington:So this is a big, deep topic, but we have to biblically and compassionately hold people accountable for their sin.
David Edgington:Nobody gets a pass over what they've been through from their past.
Speaker C:So I have a lot of thoughts about this because before I became a Christian, I spent a long time in the new age, which you and I have talked about.
Speaker C:And the new age world is big on huge.
Speaker C:This might be the most.
Speaker C:The number one draw of it is healing, quote, healing trauma.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And now there's all different categories of trauma in terms of the way the word gets used.
David Edgington:Right.
David Edgington:I think it's misused, too.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker C:Completely.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And if you want to go looking for various offenses that have been committed against you through your whole life, if you frame them that way, you'll find plenty.
Speaker C:Like, there's a video going around right now of the women's rage rituals where they're banging the sticks.
Speaker C:Apparently that retreat costs $4,000, which does not surprise me at all.
Speaker C:But if you tell men or women that there's something in their past to be angry about and to Let it out.
Speaker C:Then even if there really isn't a whole ton that we might objectively call terrible or sinful, they'll still find something to be angry about.
Speaker C:There's plenty to be angry.
Speaker C:Welcome to earth.
Speaker C:Angry sinners hearts, right?
Speaker C:So the heart will manufacture whatever it needs to.
David Edgington:You bet.
Speaker C:So, but here's the thing.
Speaker C:So having been in countless retreats and rooms where this is exactly what's going on, and I've been participating in them, so part of this, I look at these things and say, it's not as if these forms of quote unquote trauma are new.
Speaker C: It's not as if prior to the: Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:So I'm trying to figure out why and what has happened now, because I don't think that it was that way.
Speaker C: n't around in, let's say, the: Speaker C:Like I wasn't there.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:So like the boomers.
Speaker C:So I gotta believe that these things were happening.
Speaker C:And that doesn't make them right at all.
Speaker C:They're still morally wrong, they're still sinful, and in many cases still criminal.
Speaker C:But people managed, it seems to me, to live their whole lives without making what happened to them in their childhood their husband or their wife's problem.
Speaker C:Like, yes, of course, all sinners.
Speaker C:There's no papistry going on here.
Speaker C:The heart is not basically good.
Speaker C:That's not what.
Speaker C:That's not what's happening.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:So of course there were criminals.
Speaker C:Of course there were.
Speaker C:Of course there were terrible people who through being broken, became broken themselves and went on to pay that forward, let's say.
Speaker C:But it seems to me that terrible things would happen to men and women for centuries, and people understood that.
Speaker C:It's not like, well, this just means I have license now to go treat the man who loves me best like dirt, or the woman who loves me best like dirt.
Speaker C:Like, when did trauma become a license?
Speaker C:I mean, a license to kill?
Speaker C:I mean, in many ways, maybe not murder, but, you know, like, in a way that would, you know, truly be violation of a commandment.
David Edgington:You know, what it is, Will, is unbridled psychotherapy.
David Edgington:Yeah, that psycho.
David Edgington:And that's infiltrated the New Age movement and it's infiltrated the church as well, and big time, you know, huge.
David Edgington:That's one of the reasons I became a new fetic Counselor, you know, 30 years ago was because of the infiltration of psychotherapy into the church, where it's all about sympathy and feelings.
David Edgington:And now it's a.
David Edgington:Now it's about compassion on steroids, where you feel so bad for what people have been through that any expression that they give is legitimate.
David Edgington:And this is where.
David Edgington:Yeah, excellent book.
Speaker C:Joe Rigby, emotional.
Speaker C:I'm interviewing him for the podcast next.
David Edgington:Week, scheduled to read that.
David Edgington:Excellent.
David Edgington:Well done.
David Edgington:But you know, the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God.
David Edgington:You know, James, chapter one, right?
David Edgington:See, ritual anger, just, you know, just going full on with anger is going to make things worse.
David Edgington:It's going to harden the heart.
David Edgington:It's not going to somehow magically cause all this anger and bitterness to escape and leave the body.
David Edgington:It's actually encouraging it to stay in there.
David Edgington:You know Ephesians 4 that says, don't let the sun go down on your anger.
David Edgington:What does the very next verse say?
David Edgington:And give no opportunity to the devil, right?
David Edgington:Because what happens, you let that anger fester and stay in your heart even overnight.
David Edgington:The next morning, the enemy is able to take advantage of that and saying, you've got every right to be angry.
David Edgington:These men mistreated you.
David Edgington:These people did horrible things to you.
David Edgington:You should be angry.
David Edgington:You should be full of rage.
David Edgington:You should be breaking sticks on the ground, you know, screaming and yelling at your husband.
David Edgington:You should be reviling these men.
David Edgington:This is a whole nother area too.
David Edgington:I don't know which tangent you want to go on with this, but all of them, I.
David Edgington:But you know, this is another big, big problem is the so called conservative women that have a platform and they're counseling other women.
David Edgington:And yes, I mean, I'm thinking of a number of them.
David Edgington:I'll name their names.
David Edgington:Leslie Vernick, Darby Strickland, Sheila Gregor, Kaylee Triller.
David Edgington:I mean, these women, they actually urge the women into sin, not just divorcing their husbands.
David Edgington:But I had an interaction with Kaylee Triller on Twitter and she said, bad men deserve to be reviled.
David Edgington:She actually said that.
David Edgington:She used the word reviled.
Speaker C:She used the word reviled.
David Edgington:And I said, you're kidding me.
David Edgington:You're actually encouraging women to sin?
David Edgington:Oh, you're just twisting scripture.
David Edgington:I said, no, I'm not twisting scripture.
Speaker C:What?
David Edgington:How can you say that?
David Edgington:This is okay.
Speaker C:Oh my goodness.
David Edgington:Do I really need to point out Jesus was reviled and didn't revile in return?
David Edgington:I mean, 1 Corinthians 5 and 6, we do church discipline for reviling.
David Edgington:I mean, do I really have to point all that out?
David Edgington:Is that.
David Edgington:And you know, it's just the men are so Evil.
David Edgington:We have to hurt them verbally.
David Edgington:You know, we have to do this, and we gotta basically burn down the marriage.
David Edgington:And so, you know, you've got women like this, and there's a bunch of them.
David Edgington:These women have a huge following, and you've got a bunch of them.
David Edgington:And then you got pastors and counselors that have been so feminized and they don't even realize it.
David Edgington:So they're supporting these women.
David Edgington:It's a recipe for disaster.
David Edgington:It's a train wreck in the making.
David Edgington:And so you've got this momentum that is building and building.
David Edgington:And in the Meantime, it's Proverbs 14.
David Edgington:1 the wisest of women builds her house, but with her own hands, she tears it down.
David Edgington:That's what these women are, tearing it down.
David Edgington:I don't love you.
David Edgington:I don't care for you.
David Edgington:I don't want you in my life.
David Edgington:I've got one.
David Edgington:I counseling one right now.
David Edgington:And the wife said, I don't want to be married to this man anymore.
David Edgington:I just want a partnership to raise the children.
Speaker C:Wow.
David Edgington:And the man is not, you know, the man is like I described before.
David Edgington:He's gentle, he's kind, he's sweet, he's loving.
David Edgington:He's.
David Edgington:He's probably too passive.
David Edgington:He's not too aggressive.
David Edgington:He's not an angry man.
David Edgington:And you go, where is this coming from?
David Edgington:What's happening to the women of our society?
David Edgington:And why are the men not doing something about it?
David Edgington:That's what's so concerning to me.
David Edgington:I know that you're doing a lot about it.
David Edgington:You've been doing a lot about it.
David Edgington:But I know the average man that has any kind of a platform, it's just staying quiet.
David Edgington:Because once you speak out, you get a lot of hate, don't you?
David Edgington:You get a lot of attacking.
David Edgington:Oh, yeah.
Speaker C:I mean, it's not just that.
Speaker C:Yes, that is part of it.
Speaker C:But I mean, I think ultimately I have a thread of tweets that is finished and ready to post, but I don't know if I want to start this fire.
Speaker C:I try to be respectful of rooms that I come into and recognize that there are men in these rooms that have been spent a long time building them.
Speaker C:And, you know, it's like walking into.
Speaker C:And I think I've said this in my podcast with Jeff Wright maybe a month or two ago, that it's.
Speaker C:That coming into evangelicalism today is like walking into a big hotel conference room, you know, where the fluorescent lights are kind of hanging and things are flickering and there's stains on the carpet.
Speaker C:And there are a lot of people just sitting there.
Speaker C:And I'm like, guys, what's happened?
Speaker C:Like, does anybody see this?
Speaker C:And everyone's like, nope.
David Edgington:Do you see what's going on?
Speaker C:You see what's going on?
Speaker C:And it's like, well, they were here.
Speaker C:I want to be respectful to them.
Speaker C:And I think ultimately the reason why no one wants to say anything is that as soon as you start speaking into this, you're going to lose your church.
Speaker C:I mean, like, because the tentacles of feminism have reached so far into the church social structure.
Speaker C:Because this is.
Speaker C:This is how women use power.
Speaker C:Men use power physically, right?
Speaker C:If we want to exert power, it's with force of arms and force, force of rational will, like reason, you know, our minds and our bodies.
Speaker C:Women have power, which they do through social influence, through insinuation, through gossip and reputation destruction.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:So men will.
Speaker C:A man will just.
Speaker C:What's that?
David Edgington:And manipulation.
Will Spencer:Yes.
Speaker C:Men will destroy your bodies.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Women will destroy your social life.
Speaker C:This is our sin nature.
Speaker C:There's nothing wrong with saying either of these.
Speaker C:And neither is better or worse than the other.
Speaker C:It's still destruction.
Speaker C:And so I think a lot of pastors know, they see the seams of feminism like a coal seam running through their church.
Speaker C:And as soon as they start speaking about these issues about women's sin, you know, they start the Proverbs 14: Women.
Speaker C:There are all kinds of sinful, wicked women, all throughout scripture.
Speaker C:Of course, there are many virtuous women at all, but we don't talk about these sinful women.
Speaker C:We're happy to talk about men's sins, like David, but we forget that Bathsheba was an adulteress, right?
Speaker C:She knew her husband was out, like, so she participated in this.
Speaker C:But so we focus on the sin of the man and we leave out the sin of the woman.
Speaker C:Because when you start talking about these things, this entire feminist network will activate.
Speaker C:And they don't think of themselves like feminists, as you said.
Speaker C:They just know that, like, someone has spoken against the almighty woman.
Speaker C:And then things start to squeeze.
Speaker C:And I think that runs all the way up to many pastors wives.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:There's a book I've been working through with my men's group Disciplines of a Godly man by Kent Hughes.
Speaker C: this book, it was written in: Speaker C: And in: Speaker C:It didn't say what it was, whether it was adultery or inappropriate messaging or maybe even an emotional connection.
Speaker C:It didn't say whether they'd repented or not.
Speaker C:It just said 12%.
Speaker C:Now, the number is probably higher than that, right?
Speaker C: And this is in: Speaker C:So that number is probably way higher today.
Speaker C:In how many pastors, wives have overlooked various indiscretions of their husbands, so the husbands know that this is now off limits.
Speaker C:And so men have to overlook this whole section of life and can't speak into it because it not only will affect their church, it'll affect their marriage, their family, their reputations.
Speaker C:And this is what sin does.
Speaker C:It has to be covered up.
Speaker C:But a secret sin solves nothing.
David Edgington:And I think that there's certainly that.
David Edgington:The secret sin that I don't want people to know about, but I think in some ways, will.
David Edgington:It's even more basic than that.
David Edgington:Just people lacking the courage to speak the truth when it's unpopular to be a prophetic voice and saying, this is wrong.
David Edgington:This is sin.
David Edgington:And I think a lot of men, a lot of pastors are reluctant to do that because they'll get a lot of flack for it without realizing that.
David Edgington:I think a lot of pastors and a lot of counselors would be applauded for doing that.
David Edgington:If they do it with love.
David Edgington:They do it with boldness, but with love.
David Edgington:I think a lot of pastors would have a greater following with that.
David Edgington:You know, it was interesting that I was counseling husband and wife.
David Edgington:Wife that was reviling.
David Edgington:And she was.
David Edgington:She was going down the list of all the things that her husband was not doing, all the things that she was doing, and, you know, and totally unbiased, kind of glorifying herself.
Speaker C:No way.
David Edgington:And I just.
David Edgington:I don't know, I'm hoping it was just the spirit of God came over me.
David Edgington:And I said, you know, you are a poster child for why feminism destroys a marriage base.
David Edgington:And I said that to her.
David Edgington:And she, you know, she got this shocked look on her face.
David Edgington:No one had ever said that to her, obviously.
David Edgington:And she said, you're right.
David Edgington:I go, I mean, I think then I was more shocked than she was.
Speaker C:Yeah.
David Edgington:And, you know, she was repentance over what she had been saying and what she'd been doing.
Speaker C:Praise God.
David Edgington:So, you know, there is hope.
David Edgington:There is.
David Edgington:I don't want to look.
David Edgington:I don't want anyone to look at this and say, boy, you got a reviling wife.
David Edgington:There is absolutely no hope.
David Edgington:But I would say the Vast majority of them.
David Edgington:The vast majority of the reviling wives won't even talk to me.
David Edgington:They won't even participate in the counseling.
David Edgington:I would say maybe, you know, 5, 10% are even willing to talk in a counseling setting.
David Edgington:You know, they want the echo chamber.
David Edgington:They want somebody who's just going to agree with them.
David Edgington:And I go, oh, I'm not going to do that.
David Edgington:I'm not going to do that with your husband either.
David Edgington:I'm going to.
David Edgington:I'm going to hold him accountable, too.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:But I've been tracking this statistically and since last year, will my counseling.
David Edgington:40% of my counseling is in this issue.
David Edgington:This area alone.
David Edgington:40% is in the reviling wives and marriages.
David Edgington:And there are a lot of suffering men out there.
David Edgington:And again, as you and I have said many times before, we are not saying that men don't do the same thing to women.
David Edgington:I know they do it to women.
David Edgington:It's just as wicked, it is just as evil, is just as sinful.
David Edgington:Yet we have to talk about what women are doing.
David Edgington:It's dishonest not to.
David Edgington:It's leaving women in their misery if we don't talk to them about it.
David Edgington:It's leaving men in the misery if we don't help these men to say, you have to stand up to her.
David Edgington:Even if she leaves, you have to stand up to her.
David Edgington:Do it with grace.
David Edgington:Do it with forgiveness.
David Edgington:Don't start yelling and screaming and raging at her like she is at you.
David Edgington:Don't revile in return.
David Edgington:But you have to stand.
David Edgington:You must.
David Edgington:It's not.
David Edgington:You have to fear God more than you fear that woman, your wife.
David Edgington:And that's hard because, you know, these women are so fierce and so rigorous in their.
David Edgington:In their sin that it's hard for a man to stand up to that.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Especially because women are very adept verbally much.
David Edgington:Women much talk circles around a man before he even gets out of bed.
David Edgington:Like, you know, it's like, wait a minute, what happened?
David Edgington:What?
David Edgington:And she's got.
David Edgington:She's talked about 20 things already that he's done wrong.
David Edgington:It's like, what?
David Edgington:What?
David Edgington:Wait, wait, what happened?
David Edgington:What.
David Edgington:What did I do?
Speaker C:And that's right.
David Edgington:And then you just paid.
David Edgington:You just play defense rather than saying, no, let's.
David Edgington:Let's go on offense and say, you know, wife, I love you, I care for you.
David Edgington:I want to protect you.
David Edgington:I want to do what's best for you and the family.
David Edgington:God has called me to be the leader.
David Edgington:I am the leader.
David Edgington:Whether you want me to be or not.
David Edgington:I am the head of this family, whether you want me to be or not.
David Edgington:It's just going to be a matter of what kind of a leader am I?
David Edgington:Am I a good leader that stands where God stands, or am I a bad leader that just lets my wife lead?
David Edgington:And that's tragic.
David Edgington:We see the tragedy of that.
David Edgington:You know, one of the other things too, that I have just recently understood, probably the last year or so, is about the dangers of complementarianism.
Speaker C:Oh, boy, now you've done it.
David Edgington:I know, I know.
David Edgington:I'm just poking the bear everywhere.
David Edgington:All those bears you and I poke all these bears, poke all the bears.
David Edgington:And it's just the complementarian view just says that the husband and wife.
David Edgington:The wife completes the husband.
David Edgington:And I go, okay, that's good.
David Edgington:That's biblical.
David Edgington:Nothing wrong with that.
David Edgington:Completes him.
David Edgington:I can see that.
Speaker C:Yes, yes, okay, we can go there.
Speaker C:Yeah.
David Edgington:But what happens with that, in effect, is the husband becomes basically a tiebreaker.
David Edgington:So in other words, there's a disagreement, the husband, okay, the husband has the final say.
David Edgington:All right, but really, even in that, what happens is the husband is pressured and says, well, if you really love your wife, you'll just do what she wants.
David Edgington:Right.
David Edgington:And I go, wait a minute, that's not leadership at all now, is it?
David Edgington:That's just abdication, like what Adam did.
David Edgington:Far better to say, you know, the word patriarchy, very simple word, and yet, boy, that.
David Edgington:That makes feminists heads explode too, doesn't it?
David Edgington:Yeah, but patriarchy, it just basically means it's two words.
David Edgington:Father, rule.
David Edgington:That's all it is.
David Edgington:And we could look at scripture where Abraham was a patriarch, David was a patriarch, Jacob was the patriarch.
David Edgington:You know, I mean, it's a biblical word.
David Edgington:It's not something that masculine bros have invented.
David Edgington:It's something that's in the scriptures, and it does not at all imply oppression, toxic harshness, cruelty.
David Edgington:Making a wife a doormat doesn't imply that at all.
David Edgington:It's for protection, it's for help, it's for leading.
David Edgington:It's saying that's when the wife is safest.
David Edgington:So I've become someone that I embrace the patriarchy now rather than the complementarian view.
David Edgington:Because the complementarian view invariably has not only allowed this problem to arise, but it's actually furthered the problem of the reviling wife, because it basically nullifies the man trying to lead in any way, no matter what way the man wants to lead.
David Edgington:If the pastor or counselor says, oh, you know that you're asking too much of your Wife.
David Edgington:Okay, I'll just go along with her.
David Edgington:Well, then she's leading.
David Edgington:How can you not see that?
David Edgington:How do you not see that?
David Edgington:That's just abdication just looks a little differently.
David Edgington:And again, I'm not saying that men get everything they want every time they want.
David Edgington:You know, my wife and I, you know, we function perfectly with this.
David Edgington:And I ask her for input.
David Edgington:I say, what do you think of this?
David Edgington:And sometimes she'll say.
Speaker C:She says, well, she says, I think.
David Edgington:This might be the better way to go.
David Edgington:And I think about it, and I go, you know what?
David Edgington:Thank you.
David Edgington:You're right.
David Edgington:I appreciate your wisdom.
David Edgington:I'm a blessed man that you can think about things and you're right about some things.
David Edgington:And I'm not saying I'm right about everything.
David Edgington:And then I go, okay, let's do what you said.
David Edgington:But when we disagree, when it's something that I say, well, no, I really think this is the way we should go.
David Edgington:She says, I trust you, David.
David Edgington:I follow you, and I'll gladly follow you.
Speaker C:Yep.
David Edgington:How come that's so rare, Will?
David Edgington:How come that is so rare?
Speaker C:I can give you lots of reasons, by the way.
Speaker C:I can.
Speaker C:For everyone, you know, for everyone listening.
Speaker C:Like, you know, I've been to.
Speaker C:I've been to dinner at your house, David.
Speaker C:Yours and Diane's house, you know, what, two, three times at least, and spent a lot of time around you guys personally.
Speaker C:And I can validate, like, that's how.
Speaker C:That's how your marriage works and how happy Diane is and how.
Speaker C:How peaceful she is to be around.
David Edgington:Yes.
Speaker C:And what a.
Speaker C:And what a warm and loving presence she is.
David Edgington:Right.
Speaker C:And the way.
Speaker C:And the way that you guys communicate and that you.
Speaker C:It's very clear from being around both of you that you both have your roles and you're happy in them.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And that's such a beautiful thing to see, because I think a lot of women hear words like patriarchy or, like submission or obedience or respect or whatever, and these alarm bells go off, and they go straight to doormat.
Speaker C:Like, as soon as you say these, Yoshi.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And it's like, no, like, these are just two separate roles that both people can be equally happy in if they don't feel the need to lord it over the other person.
Speaker C:Right, exactly.
David Edgington:I don't.
David Edgington:I don't lord things over my wife.
David Edgington:I mean, I say, this is what we should do.
David Edgington:And.
David Edgington:And then she goes, well, you know, I think maybe this would be better.
David Edgington:And if she's right, I'm going, of course.
David Edgington:I've got to be humble enough to admit that.
David Edgington:But we do.
David Edgington:We value each other, we love each other, we support each other.
David Edgington:But you know, isn't it funny what you just said about a wife should obey her husband?
David Edgington:You know, 1 Peter 3 says that Sarah obeyed Abraham.
David Edgington:Sarah obeyed Abraham.
David Edgington:It says it right there in the passage.
David Edgington:He said, oh, that's terrible.
David Edgington:You should never ask a wife to obey her husband.
David Edgington:What?
David Edgington:Why not?
David Edgington:What is so wicked and evil about that?
David Edgington:Now again, I know there's bad men out there, and I go, that's harder.
David Edgington:But still, 1 Peter 3:1 talks about, even if a husband is disobedient to the Word, you submit to him, you follow him.
David Edgington:Now again, let's just qualify this will, because I know people will say, oh, so you're saying that if a man is beating his wife, just submit to that, don't do anything about it.
David Edgington:Course not.
David Edgington:Of course we're not saying that, right?
David Edgington:Oh, he's molesting the children.
David Edgington:Just let him.
David Edgington:Of course we're not saying that.
Speaker C:Immediately jump to the most extreme.
David Edgington:Stop making the hard cases the general principle.
David Edgington:That's not the way.
David Edgington:I mean, obviously then Peter was wrong.
David Edgington:Then Scripture is wrong.
David Edgington:Then God is wrong if we're saying that.
David Edgington:But there's three passages that I like to point to people about this issue of submission.
David Edgington:Ephesians 5:24 now, as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
David Edgington:In everything.
David Edgington:Not just the things that she agrees with him on, but in everything.
David Edgington:Not just the areas where she wants to submit to him, but in everything.
David Edgington:She doesn't get to pick and choose and say, well, I'll submit to you here, but I won't submit to you there.
David Edgington:I mean, Scripture is absolutely clear on that in everything.
David Edgington:The second one that I point to is 1 Peter 3:1, 1 we just talked about.
David Edgington:Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the Word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives when they see your respectful and pure conduct.
David Edgington:So the likewise is appealing back to first Peter, Chapter two, where here is Jesus was reviled and he suffered, and he did not revile in return.
David Edgington:1 Peter 2:23.
David Edgington:And remember, the Scriptures never once tell the husband to submit to the wife.
David Edgington:Not even once.
Speaker C:Nope.
David Edgington:And yet just the example that I was giving you about my wife and I that if she's right, she's got a better idea.
David Edgington:If she's right and I'm wrong, if she's Just wiser than I am.
David Edgington:I'm going to follow.
David Edgington:I'm going to say, yeah, that's good.
David Edgington:That's what a good leader does.
David Edgington:He listens to the counsel of other people and then he acts accordingly.
Speaker C:But that's not submission to them.
Speaker C:Yeah, that's still.
Speaker C:Ultimately, you're making the decision.
David Edgington:I'm still making the decision.
Speaker C:That's right.
Speaker C:I'm taking in your advice, I'm taking in your guidance and your perspective, and I am making the decision.
Speaker C:Like, if you're in the car, you know, it's not like you're driving is like, oh, honey, I think we should go left, because that's.
Speaker C:And you say, we should go right.
Speaker C:She says, no, left.
Speaker C:And you're like, okay, we'll go that way.
Speaker C:Why don't you drive?
Speaker C:That's not what happens.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:You still turn the wheel of the car.
David Edgington:We function this way all the time in a.
David Edgington:In society.
David Edgington:Right.
David Edgington:In a company, the CEO, you know, the CEO, he asks for input from his.
David Edgington:From his employees, and sometimes they have better ideas than he has.
David Edgington:And he says, okay, we'll go that way.
Speaker C:Yeah.
David Edgington:But the employee can't say, well, I'm not going to submit to you, CEO.
David Edgington:I'm going to do whatever I want.
David Edgington:You know what he's going to say, you're fired.
Speaker C:You can find another job, you know, work to somebody else.
David Edgington:The military.
David Edgington:How could the military function if there wasn't submission, if it wasn't leaders and submission.
David Edgington:And that's what the word hupataso is involved in.
David Edgington:It's in a military metaphor, a picture that, you know, there's rank, there's order, and if there's not, there's absolute chaos and there's bedlam and nothing is ever going to be accomplished.
David Edgington:Well, you have to have order, you have to have authority, and you have to have submission.
David Edgington:The soldiers must submit.
David Edgington:And yet sometimes the soldiers will tell the general, you know, this is a bad move.
David Edgington:I think we should go this way.
David Edgington:And a wise general will say, hmm, you're right.
David Edgington:Let's go that way.
David Edgington:Now, he's not submitting to them, but he's saying, I'm taking that wisdom in.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:Thank you.
David Edgington:Thank you for speaking up.
David Edgington:Thank you for having that.
David Edgington:And with a godly leader, with a godly man, that's going to happen.
David Edgington:Appropriate.
David Edgington:With a prideful, arrogant fool.
David Edgington:He's going to say, I don't care what a woman says.
David Edgington:I'm going to do whatever I want.
David Edgington:It's like, well, you're a fool.
David Edgington:So I mentioned there's three passages.
David Edgington:The third one I go to about submission is Titus 2.
David Edgington:5.
David Edgington:And it's about older women speaking to younger women and urging them to train the young women to be submissive to their own husbands.
David Edgington:And here's the key part, that the word of God may not be reviled.
David Edgington:And the word reviled, there is the word for blasphemy.
David Edgington:Same word for blasphemy, that the word of God would not be blasphemed.
David Edgington:So in other words, the unsubmissive wife is actually blaspheming the word of God by saying, I know better than God.
David Edgington:That's God's rule.
David Edgington:That's God's order.
David Edgington:I know better.
David Edgington:I'm going to do what I want.
David Edgington:I mean, that's basically blasphemy.
David Edgington:It's putting herself in the position of the authority of God.
David Edgington:And so those three passages, Ephesians 5, 24, 1 Peter 3, 1 Titus 2:5, submission is so important, and yet it's a dirty word.
David Edgington:Now, the S word, you know, not the other S word, but the S.
Speaker C:Word, the longer S word, right?
David Edgington:It's even a more deadly S word.
David Edgington:And we have to speak this because it's scripture, it's biblical.
David Edgington:It's what God says.
David Edgington:We didn't come up with the term.
David Edgington:God did.
David Edgington:And if we're not impressing that on wives and doing it in a godly, loving, gentle way, we're not teaching them well.
David Edgington:We're not teaching these young women well.
David Edgington:And this is the one trait that I always talk to when men ask me, say, what do I look for in a godly wife?
David Edgington:You know, I'm not married.
David Edgington:I want a godly wife.
David Edgington:How do I find that?
David Edgington:Say, you know, submission is really one of the most important points because our society has changed so dramatically, so dramatically from even when I was a young man.
David Edgington:Oh, yeah, I'm an old goat now.
David Edgington:But even when I was a young man, dinosaur riding.
David Edgington:Still going, still going.
David Edgington:I'm not done yet.
David Edgington:Right?
David Edgington:God's not done with me yet.
David Edgington:But find a wife that will willingly and gladly submit to you in your leadership.
David Edgington:Just be sure that you're a godly man.
David Edgington:Just be sure you're a man that loves the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.
David Edgington:Don't just love doctrine.
David Edgington:Don't just love all the doctrines of grace and things like that.
David Edgington:Make sure that you really love Christ with all your heart and be that kind of man.
David Edgington:Then you can look for the right kind of woman.
David Edgington:And it'll be a beautiful, a beautiful marriage.
David Edgington:But if she's not submissive, it's going to be agony, is going to be painful.
Speaker C:Well, then I want to, then I want to ask you about something because this is, this is something that is, it's on the minds of many men of all ages.
Speaker C:And it's something that, in a sense, that you helped me with and how will be apparent when I bring up the example.
Speaker C:There are a lot of women that spend their 20s and their 30s being unsubmissive, doing what they want, living the life that they want, you know, being feminists in practice, if not in ideology, although sometimes both.
Speaker C:And suddenly their mid-30s come around and they're realizing they're not so enthusiastic to be alone anymore.
Speaker C:And so now they want a husband.
Speaker C:Right, right, exactly.
Speaker C:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker C:As the clock begins to tick down and they say that they want a godly and biblical marriage, right?
Speaker C:And it's, yeah, of course, yeah, of course I want that, sure, whatever.
Speaker C:But ultimately, like, even if they get into that situation, that they don't really want it.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And so, and so a lot of men are dealing with this problem.
Speaker C:And this is the big thing that pastors, I think this is the real problem that pastors aren't dealing with, don't know how to deal with, would prefer not to deal with, is women flooding into the church in the second half of their 30s looking for a husband but bringing no actual godliness with them.
Speaker C:Like, where are all the men?
Speaker C:It's like, I didn't realize that this was a drive through marriage opportunity for you.
Speaker C:So, and so women come into the church and they, of course, men and women do this all the time.
Speaker C:But we live in a feminist context.
Speaker C:We live in a societal context that has failed to hold women accountable for sin for the past, I don't know, 60 or 80 years at least.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:That's the context we're in.
Speaker C:None of this makes men's sins go away.
Speaker C:I could talk to you all day about men's sins.
Speaker C:All day.
Speaker C:Men sin against men especially.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:So no one's pretending that doesn't happen.
Speaker C:But we've overlooked society wide, society wide, up to the highest level, the existence of women's sins.
Speaker C:And so now women are coming into the church seeking husbands.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:But they don't understand or care to understand what a truly submissive heart looks like.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:So knowing that pastors are probably going to abandon young men in this.
Speaker C:What do you mean?
Speaker C:She looks fine to me.
Speaker C:No problem.
Speaker C:Was she an Oldie fans model who made $9 million.
Speaker C:Well, she's baptized.
Speaker C:You saw this, right?
Speaker C:Nala, the onlyfans model.
Speaker C:It's like, yeah, she was a literal digital prostitute.
Speaker C:And I'm not going to use a more biblical word.
Speaker C:I'll use the word prostitute.
Speaker C:She made $9 million selling filth for years, and then she goes and gets baptized.
Speaker C:No problem.
Speaker C:She's good to go.
Speaker C:Everybody and pastors and women especially who support her are like, yeah, she's baptized.
Speaker C:What are you talking about?
Speaker C:There's no problem here anymore.
Speaker C:Like, she's washing the blood of the lamb.
Speaker C:You should be enthusiastic to get married to this woman.
Speaker C:It's like, this is preposterous, first of all, but I think there's going to be a lot of this.
Speaker C:So I really would like, if you, if you wouldn't mind a couple of different.
Speaker C:I have a couple different questions.
Speaker C:What can men do to make sure that the women that they're courting or dating are genuinely.
Speaker C:They are about that life.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:It's like repentant.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:And then also, what can you advise?
Speaker C:How can you advise women?
Speaker C:Like, this is serious.
Speaker C:This is not a larp.
Speaker C:This is not trad wifing.
Speaker C:This is not even Christian trad wifing.
Speaker C:This is the condition of your immortal soul and to take it seriously.
David Edgington:Right?
David Edgington:Yeah.
David Edgington:It's funny, a year ago, I would have no idea what you just said.
David Edgington:I'm like, what do all those words mean?
David Edgington:But now I'm like, oh, I get it.
David Edgington:I get it now.
Speaker C:I still don't know what I just said.
David Edgington:So I understand.
David Edgington:What larping and trad wife and all that.
David Edgington:Okay, I understand.
Speaker C:We're going to unbover you yet.
David Edgington:Yeah, you're going to.
David Edgington:You're going to make me into a millennial, I guess.
David Edgington:I don't know.
David Edgington:But, you know, white knighting and cucks and all that, I go, I know what all that means now.
David Edgington:It's like, amazing what the Internet does.
David Edgington:The education that you get.
David Edgington:Right.
Speaker C:Was this all literally all because you went on those podcasts a year ago?
David Edgington:Yeah, really, it is.
David Edgington:It's the podcast.
David Edgington:And then talking to all of these younger men too, because most of the men I'm counseling are younger than I am.
David Edgington:And, you know, they're talking about all stuff.
David Edgington:I'm like, okay, I gotta look that word up.
David Edgington:What does that mean?
David Edgington:Okay.
David Edgington:And so I've learned an incredible amount in the last year just from counseling so many of these men.
David Edgington:Again, hundreds of men that are going through this.
David Edgington:And I Go.
David Edgington:This is incredible.
David Edgington:So let's talk about that.
David Edgington:That's an excellent, excellent topic.
David Edgington:The.
David Edgington:The woman that's lived an immoral life, godless life, you know, porn star only fan star, you know, whatever it is, she's been a digital prostitute, or digital whore, whatever you want to call her.
Speaker C:Yeah, there you go.
David Edgington:I said the word.
David Edgington:Sorry, Will.
Speaker C:You said the thing.
David Edgington:I said the thing.
Speaker C:It's so over.
David Edgington:Yeah, that's it.
David Edgington:That's it.
David Edgington:But, okay, I think we have to look at this and say, all right, there is redemption for her.
Speaker C:Of course.
David Edgington:You know, there is redemption for her, and she comes to Christ.
David Edgington:Salvation in Christ.
David Edgington:She is regenerated.
David Edgington:She is born again.
David Edgington:I go, praise God.
David Edgington:I'm happy for her.
David Edgington:I love this.
David Edgington:This is wonderful.
David Edgington:But now, as Matthew 13 talks about, let's examine the fruit.
David Edgington:Let's see what comes of this.
David Edgington:And as you know, fruit, it takes time for fruit to grow, doesn't it?
David Edgington:Fruit doesn't just, boom, just appears on the tree.
David Edgington:We got a big fig tree in our backyard, and, you know, it takes months and months for that fruit to appear.
David Edgington:We go, okay, that's what we're going to have to do with these women that say, oh, I've lived this horrible, immoral, unsubmissive, godless life.
David Edgington:Now I'm 35 years old.
David Edgington:I want to have a good husband.
David Edgington:I want to have children.
David Edgington:And I go, okay, good, good.
David Edgington:That's a good desire.
David Edgington:But let's put the brakes on and let's examine the fruit.
David Edgington:Let's be fruit inspectors, right?
David Edgington:Let's not just assume you've made a profession of faith, you've been baptized or baptized, whatever you want to say, however you want to view that, that everything's fine now, everything's great.
David Edgington:Sanctification is complete.
David Edgington:It's like, no, it doesn't work that way.
David Edgington:It doesn't work that way with anybody.
David Edgington:There's a long road of sanctification.
David Edgington:In fact, it's your whole life.
David Edgington:It's progressive.
David Edgington:Sanctification is the biblical word for it.
David Edgington:You know, I've been.
David Edgington:I've been a believer for 41 years now.
David Edgington:You know, I became a believer when I was 23.
David Edgington:So the math is, I'm 64 now.
David Edgington:I'm almost a senior citizen.
David Edgington:But when I was 23 years old, I thought, yeah, I got it all together now.
David Edgington:And then five, 10, 15 years later, I'm like, boy, I need a lot of.
David Edgington:I got to grow an awful lot.
David Edgington:I'm not seeing a lot that I, you know, I'm seeing more than I did when I was an unbeliever.
David Edgington:But, boy, I've got a long ways to go.
David Edgington:And so now, even at 40, 41 years later, after I'm a believer, it's like I still have a ways to go, but I'm much better than I was, you know, 40 years ago.
Speaker C:Amen.
David Edgington:So I think we have to be patient with these women that are making these professions of faith.
David Edgington:Some of them are going to be false.
David Edgington:Some of them are not really going to be born again.
David Edgington:They're not going to be regenerated.
David Edgington:But how do you tell?
David Edgington:The only way you tell is through time.
David Edgington:That's the only.
David Edgington:I don't care how precise and perfect their theology and their doctrine is.
David Edgington:The fruit is what demonstrates whether it's genuine or not.
David Edgington:The fruit that evidences whether it's real, Holy Spirit work in the heart, or if it's fake or if it's just a profession of faith.
David Edgington:So the same thing for men, whether it's young men, middle aged men that are looking for a wife, you've got to take time, get to know this woman.
David Edgington:And I urge men right up front, talk about these issues right up front with this woman.
David Edgington:What is your view of submission to a husband?
David Edgington:I mean, you know, some husbands, some men say, I gotta ask that right in the first date.
David Edgington:I go, it's not a bad idea.
Speaker C:Not a bad idea.
David Edgington:Do it gently.
David Edgington:But see what, see what's out there.
David Edgington:See what?
David Edgington:The landscape.
David Edgington:If she balks at that and says, well, I don't, okay, it's probably not going to work unless she just really changes dramatically and follows you.
David Edgington:But if she says yes, I do believe the man is the head of the home.
David Edgington:He is supposed to be the leader.
David Edgington:I go, okay, that's a start.
David Edgington:That's not the whole thing, but at least you're in the ballpark.
David Edgington:And now you evaluate it.
David Edgington:You go out with this woman, you talk with her, you go on dates in different venues.
David Edgington:You might go to the movies, you might go shopping at Costco, you might go to some events.
David Edgington:All different situations.
David Edgington:Get her around your friends go around her friends, evaluate.
David Edgington:See what's happening in her.
David Edgington:Is she.
David Edgington:Does she look like a kind of woman that's willing to follow you?
David Edgington:Or is she all about a career?
David Edgington:Does she say, no, I'll submit to you, but I want my career?
David Edgington:I'm like, well, that's going to be really hard.
David Edgington:You know, you've got a career, I've got a career.
David Edgington:You have to be you know, woman, wife, you have to be willing to join me in my mission.
David Edgington:It's not me joining you in your mission.
David Edgington:I don't mean that in a mean way.
David Edgington:I mean that in a biblical way that she has to be willing to follow him.
David Edgington:This is the Proverbs 31, wife.
David Edgington:You know, we all glorify the Proverbs 31, wife.
David Edgington:We say, well, look, she worked and she had a job, and she went out and bought a field and all that.
David Edgington:And we go, yeah, but she was doing that to serve her family, to serve her husband.
Speaker C:Yep.
David Edgington:She wasn't just doing it independently and saying, well, I'm going to work for some other employer and.
David Edgington:And make him rich and make him prosperous.
David Edgington:It's like, no, I want to do these things for my family, for my husband.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:So.
David Edgington:So we're.
David Edgington:We're kind of touching on a lot of different issues here.
David Edgington:And, you know, the career woman is going to be hard for her to submit because she has invested a lot of money in her education, a lot of time in her vocation.
David Edgington:And, I mean, just.
David Edgington:Just look at what happened a few days ago with the football player, Harrison.
David Edgington:But, yeah, you know, I mean, what he said, I'm like, wonderful.
David Edgington:How nice.
David Edgington:I mean, he's a Catholic, so his theology is off.
David Edgington:But, you know, what he said was good.
David Edgington:And I go, praise God.
David Edgington:This is wonderful.
David Edgington:Oh, my.
David Edgington:You see what happened?
David Edgington:Blew up the woodwork, was it 250,000 people signed a petition to get him fired from the team.
Speaker C:Nice.
David Edgington:Like what?
Speaker C:Really?
Speaker C:Yeah, it shows.
Speaker C:It just demonstrates the size of this.
Speaker C:Yeah.
David Edgington:And then I saw this video of one of the.
David Edgington:I think it was one of the cheerleaders on the team, and she was just snarky, you know, arrogant young woman, and saying, well, we're both employees of the Kansas City Chiefs, and let me educate you.
David Edgington:And foul language.
David Edgington:And like, you're putting yourself on the same level as a football player, first of all.
Speaker C:I mean, come on, we're both on the field together.
David Edgington:Give me a break.
David Edgington:But I mean, just the things that she said.
David Edgington:I'm like, oh, this is just so painful to hear.
David Edgington:I just feel so bad.
David Edgington:I felt bad for her, but I felt bad for the man that she's either married to or the man she's going to marry.
David Edgington:I go, this is not going to go well.
David Edgington:This is going to be painful, painful, agonizing.
David Edgington:She's probably going to be a reviling wife if she's not already.
David Edgington:So this is kind of the whole landscape you know, I mean, I think, again, the scriptures give one basic command for wives.
David Edgington:There's really not.
David Edgington:I can't really think of other commands specifically for the wives other than she is to submit to her husband.
David Edgington:And if she fails in that one, game over, as far as I'm concerned, I go, just move along.
David Edgington:Don't pursue her.
David Edgington:I feel bad for her.
David Edgington:I hope other godly older women will help her, like the Titus 2 women.
David Edgington:You know, I hope they'll come alongside and help her to learn that.
David Edgington:But the man has to look at this and say, no, this is going to be torture for me if I marry the wrong woman.
David Edgington:I don't want that to happen to men because I counsel these men every day, Will every day.
David Edgington:They contact me every single day.
David Edgington:And it is painful and agonizing.
David Edgington:It's hard for me to endure what they're going through because it's like I'm just kind of living it over with them saying, oh, oh, this is painful.
David Edgington:Yeah, this sounds exactly like the other guy I talked to last week.
David Edgington:The story is the same over and over and over again.
David Edgington:It's almost like a carbon copy of the reviling wife.
Speaker C:Yeah.
David Edgington:And again, this is worldwide.
David Edgington:This is not just America.
David Edgington:This is not just Phoenix, Arizona, where you and I live.
David Edgington:This is all over the world.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:So it's.
David Edgington:I know I got off on a tangent there.
David Edgington:I don't know if I answered your question or not, but I don't remember.
Speaker C:What the question was.
David Edgington:Okay.
David Edgington:Maybe the listeners remember saying, you guys missed it, you know.
Speaker C:Well, there were two questions.
Speaker C:One is, you know, what men should do.
Speaker C:But I think there's also a question of what women should do, because we don't have those Titus 2 women anymore to disciple, you know, to disciple the younger women.
Speaker C:We just.
Speaker C:We have a whole generation where that's just been dynamited.
Speaker C:And so we have.
Speaker C:This is what the renaissance of men was is like.
Speaker C:You have a generation where fatherhood has been dynamited, whether by war or propaganda or both.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:So you had, beginning in the 80s and the 90s, a whole bunch of men basically being like, well, I guess we have to figure this out for ourselves.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Substituting older brothers for fathers.
Speaker C:And Andrew Tate is the best example of that.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:He's an older brother.
Speaker C:Older brothers are bullies, like, I love you.
Speaker C:I bully you because I love you.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:That's the classic older brother model.
Speaker C:That's the whole manosphere, essentially.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Okay.
Speaker C:So now a lot of men are exiting that world to Christianity, which is all about the father, right.
Speaker C:Brotherhood has a different framework.
Speaker C:It's all about the father.
Speaker C:So men are going in that direction and in the process, men are becoming more conservative.
Speaker C:This is actually young men are becoming more conservative as they enter various forms of Christianity.
Speaker C:But what we don't have is in the demolition of fatherhood.
Speaker C:We had a knock on effect of the demolition of motherhood down to the point of like, what is a woman?
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:But what we don't seem to really have yet, or what is taking shape much more slowly is women discipling women and how to be submissive.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:So you have.
Speaker C:I mean, there are examples of women that are doing this work.
Speaker C:I had a podcast, I've recorded it.
Speaker C:It's gonna come out Friday.
Speaker C:It'll be out by the time this one comes out with Annalise, formerly feminine, not feminist.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And she disciples by example.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:But she's a young girl herself.
Speaker C:I believe that she's in her 20s.
Speaker C:We don't have women in like, we have more Leslie Vernix that are discipling women in rebellion than we do.
Speaker C:And it's up to Pearl, who Pearl believe in her 30s, she's not a believer, but it took someone at that level and look, I'm not a huge fan of everything that she does, but she said a lot of really right things about calling out women's sins.
Speaker C:And we don't have a generation of women inside the church who have been doing that.
Speaker C:It's like a blind eye kind of thing.
Speaker C:Now we do have Rebecca Merkel and Rachel Jankovic, Doug Wilson's daughters, and Nancy Wilson, his wife, that have done a really good job.
Speaker C:And I'm a big fan of the things that they've talked about.
Speaker C:Yes, but it can't all be Moscow doing everything forever.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:And so.
Speaker C:And so in the same way that young men have had to find their way forward to men that can disciple them in masculinity, godly masculinity.
Speaker C:You have.
Speaker C:Because they've been abandoned, they're orphans.
Speaker C:You have women that have been orphaned as well, but are still made in the image of God and their heart is drawing them in that direction and they don't.
Speaker C:They have few resources that they can turn to.
Speaker C:So for women who are listening to this interview, knowing that they might not find a pastor or his wife to do a good job in discipling them in godly womanhood, what advice would you give for them in their own faith walk in their own sanctification so that they can become a non reviling wife?
Speaker C:Because I actually do get quite a lot of DMs from women on Instagram saying, I think I'm a reviling wife.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Like, I'm worried that this is me, which is.
Speaker C:And praise God for that.
Speaker C:I appreciate knowing.
Speaker C:And what I normally say is like, my, I don't know you, I've never met you, we've never talked.
Speaker C:This is just words on a screen.
Speaker C:But that you're worried about that means that you might not actually be right.
Speaker C:So, but there.
Speaker C:But there.
Speaker C:But there are young girls who might wonder, who have seen that in themselves, and even women and wives as well, who may see that in themselves.
Speaker C:What advice would you have for them to walk this out on their own, knowing they may not find support in the church or in the world.
David Edgington:Right.
David Edgington:So you're talking about women that they may see tendencies or traits in themselves that say, I may be this kind of a reviling wife.
David Edgington:You're not just talking about a woman in general?
Speaker C:No, I love how you take the long winded things that I say and you put them in like a loving and calm way.
Speaker C:I'll talk for five minutes, like, so Will, what you're really saying is, I.
David Edgington:Just want to be sure I'm getting your point.
David Edgington:That's all.
Speaker C:You do that all the time.
Speaker C:It's one of my favorite things.
David Edgington:Okay, thank you, Will.
Speaker C:I think it's a compliment.
Speaker C:It's definitely a compliment.
David Edgington:Yeah.
David Edgington:Because I get women like that, that contact me and say exactly the same thing.
David Edgington:They say, I think I might be a reviling wife.
David Edgington:Can you help me?
David Edgington:And I go, praise God.
David Edgington:You know, it's like, well, that's kind of strange saying, praise God, but praise God.
David Edgington:Because they're seeing some things, there's conviction in their heart, and often it's after they watch a podcast and maybe after they watch this one and they say, oh my, that sounds like me.
David Edgington:And I go, okay, so that is a woman that is at least to some degree humble enough to examine herself and not just blame her husband.
Speaker C:Yes.
David Edgington:So now that woman has a lot of hope.
David Edgington:And I've helped women like that.
David Edgington:I've got a pastor and his wife.
David Edgington:And the wife contacted me because she said, I think I'm a reviling wife.
David Edgington:Can you help me?
David Edgington:And I said, yes, let's get you and your husband, the pastor, together and let's meet altogether.
David Edgington:And I always do that.
David Edgington:This is another point that I want to re.
David Edgington:Emphasize, meet with the husband and the wife together.
David Edgington:I know.
David Edgington:I'm getting to your question because you're Asking about something different.
David Edgington:But meet together.
David Edgington:Do not meet separately.
David Edgington:Let the wife meet with the pastor or the counselor, and then the man meet with the pastor.
David Edgington:That's a recipe for disaster, because that just encourages gossip.
David Edgington:So meet together.
David Edgington:But my point is about this wife that she says, I think I'm a reviling wife.
David Edgington:And so they contacted me, we started counseling, and I said, you are a reviling wife, but there's hope for you because you're humble enough to recognize it, and you see these tendencies and these traits in yourself and you want to change.
David Edgington:And this is a couple in their, like, middle 30s, I'd say.
David Edgington:So they're a young couple, and through the process of counseling with them, just using the word of God and helping them, she has been repentant and changed.
David Edgington:And the last time I talked to them, the husband said, you know what?
David Edgington:It's so nice.
David Edgington:I love coming home.
David Edgington:Now, I don't dread coming home because my wife is sweet and kind and loving and all that.
David Edgington:I go, oh, great, that's what we need.
David Edgington:But it's going to take women to be humble enough to examine their own hearts.
David Edgington:So now I'm talking about specifically the ones you're asking about.
David Edgington:A single woman that's not married that says, I might be a reviling wife, okay?
David Edgington:Humble enough to acknowledge that maybe there's something in me that's wrong.
David Edgington:If you're bitter and angry and hostile at everything in the world, you're not going to get any help.
David Edgington:All you're going to find is an echo chamber of other people who say, oh, you have every right to be bitter and angry.
David Edgington:Go bang the sticks on the ground and scream in the forest.
David Edgington:That's not going to help you.
David Edgington:It's going to make it worse.
David Edgington:But you've got to put on humility.
David Edgington:Colossians 3 talks about that.
David Edgington:Putting on humility.
David Edgington:Put it on and listen and hear.
David Edgington:And now you have to have someone that's willing to help you and someone that can help you.
David Edgington:Two things, right?
David Edgington:Willing to and can do it.
David Edgington:Because some people are willing, but they don't know what to do.
David Edgington:Some people, you know, they can do it, but they're not willing to do it.
David Edgington:But it would be best if it was a godly older woman that would do that.
David Edgington:So I think this is a good call on this podcast to say, older godly women seek out these younger women in your churches, in your sphere of influence, and pursue them to help them to grow, just like Titus 2.
David Edgington:5 says, right?
David Edgington:To be submissive to their husbands.
David Edgington:So that the word of God is not blasphemed.
David Edgington:They need that.
David Edgington:But we need to have pastors and counselors rise up and say, I'm not going to be afraid to call women to account for their sin.
David Edgington:I have to.
David Edgington:It's part of my calling as a minister of the gospel, as a man.
David Edgington:That's a.
David Edgington:I mean, I look at myself as a physician of the soul.
David Edgington:That's what the Puritans used to call themselves, physicians of the soul.
David Edgington:They I can't set a broken bone, but I can help you with the problems of your soul.
David Edgington:That's what we should be.
David Edgington:And help these women.
David Edgington:You know, don't just ignore them if they're crying out for help.
David Edgington:Let's minister the Word to them.
David Edgington:Talk to them about humility, talk to them about grace, talk to them about their tongue.
David Edgington:You know, go through James, chapter three about the tongue, what the tongue does.
David Edgington:Because the reviling wife just tears her husband apart with her tongue.
David Edgington:A lot of things that it talks about there speak with respect.
David Edgington:First Peter 3 passage talks about when they observe your respectful behavior.
David Edgington:So here's even the man that is disobedient to the word of God, the wife still has to unconditionally respect him.
David Edgington:Because I've had wives that say, I don't respect my husband at all.
David Edgington:I said, well, you know, that's a problem.
David Edgington:It's not him, it's you.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:You are called to respect him whether he's a respectable man or not.
David Edgington:That's what scripture urges and teaches and commands.
David Edgington:So this is a.
David Edgington:It's a complicated problem, isn't it?
David Edgington:It's got a lot of tentacles to it.
David Edgington:It's got a deep web to it.
David Edgington:And it's going to take older women to rise up and seek out these other women, these young women that say, I think I'm a reviling woman, help me, or a reviling wife, help me.
David Edgington:It's going to take pastors to speak clearly, cogently and boldly about this.
David Edgington:And it's going to take counselors like myself, whether they're nosthetic counselors like I am, or whatever type they are, to say, I've got to hold women accountable just like I hold men accountable.
David Edgington:I can't wilt, I can't shrink from that.
David Edgington:That's the responsibility that we have.
David Edgington:And help these people, help them.
Speaker C:Well, you know how it seems to me.
Speaker C:I had this thought earlier when you mentioned it was Leslie Vernick and a bunch of others, a bunch of other names that you provided.
Speaker C:Now, I don't follow any of them, but I'm familiar with their names, and.
David Edgington:It all blocked me, so I don't follow them anymore.
Speaker C:Wow.
Speaker C:You, like, you have.
Speaker C:You don't have a whole ton of followers either.
Speaker C:So you're.
Speaker C:Yeah, they're gonna contact Sheila Gregor.
David Edgington:And I said, you know, I just said something very simple.
David Edgington:And I said on Twitter or X.
David Edgington:And I said, is it possible that women are bitter against men and that's causing a lot of problems?
David Edgington:She blocked me.
David Edgington:She didn't even interact, just blocked me.
David Edgington:That's it.
Speaker C:Thank you for proving my point.
David Edgington:Like, yeah.
David Edgington:Really?
David Edgington:Like, okay, you kind of did prove what I said.
David Edgington:I'm like, wow, okay.
Speaker C:But it's almost like there's two sets of rules, right?
Speaker C:This idea of patriarchy that's assigned to Christianity, that men.
Speaker C:Obviously, it's deeper than that, but it's not just assigned to Christianity.
Speaker C:It's the way that God made the world.
Speaker C:But there's this idea that men should be bound by the word of scripture.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:But women, they don't need to.
Speaker C:And this is within the Christian sphere.
Speaker C:It's like, well, all those things, it's just for men.
Speaker C:And so good men follow the word of God, and women are like, we get to do whatever we want, and we still get to call ourselves Christian.
Speaker C:It's like, where are you getting this second rule book?
Speaker C:What is the parallel source of authority to Scripture?
Speaker C:Well, I mean, it's.
Speaker C:What is it?
Speaker C:Trauma, My feelings, right?
Speaker C:Like the books, the key textbooks of feminism.
Speaker C:It's almost like there's this parallel authority that's set up.
David Edgington:It's a decoder rig.
David Edgington:Will, you didn't get one of those?
Speaker C:Well, I didn't, but I'm familiar with lots of different faith traditions that seem to have a decoder ring on the Bible that produces all kinds of terrible ideas.
Speaker C:But that's neither here nor there.
Speaker C:But it's like feminism is.
Speaker C:It's.
Speaker C:I don't even like the word because it's not the.
Speaker C:It's.
Speaker C:It's not a sociopolitical, economic thing.
Speaker C:It's deeper.
Speaker C:It's.
Speaker C:This is a parallel authority that is set up even in the Christian sphere, that we interpret the Bible through this lens of our own texts and our own authority that gives us this kind of parallel.
Speaker C:This sort of false religion.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:That.
Speaker C:That Christian women and faith leaders seem to think that they can do.
Speaker C:And it's a strange thing.
David Edgington:This is what I hear very often when I have the opportunity to talk to reviling wives A lot of times, again, as I said, they won't talk to me.
David Edgington:But when they do, and a lot of times they talk to me just to blast me and say, I'm done.
David Edgington:That's it.
David Edgington:Just wanted to get this out.
Speaker C:Thanks.
David Edgington:I want to help you.
David Edgington:I'm not trying to condemn you, but here's what they say, because I read Ephesians 5.
David Edgington:24.
David Edgington:The wife should submit in everything to her husband.
David Edgington:And she says, well, read the next verse.
David Edgington:Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church.
David Edgington:My husband is not loving me like Christ loves the church, so therefore I don't have to submit to him.
David Edgington:I said, that's not what it says.
Speaker C:That's not what it says.
David Edgington:It's a command for you, and it's a command for him.
David Edgington:Yeah, but he's not doing his part.
David Edgington:I said, don't worry about him doing his part.
David Edgington:You do your part.
David Edgington:Don't look at correcting him.
David Edgington:Let God work in you.
David Edgington:But that's what the reviling wife does.
David Edgington:She says, well, he's not loving me like Christ loves the church.
David Edgington:And I go, okay, probably in reality, no husband is loving his wife like Christ loves the church.
Speaker C:Probably.
Speaker C:Probably not.
David Edgington:Probably not exactly a completely doable thing.
David Edgington:But I know men that are striving to do that.
David Edgington:I go, yes, and when they don't love their wives, we rebuke them.
David Edgington:We say, you know, that wasn't very loving, the way you handled that with your wife.
David Edgington:You're kind of harsh.
David Edgington:You're kind of cruel.
David Edgington:I've called many men out like that.
David Edgington:And they go.
David Edgington:Usually the men go, you're right.
David Edgington:Thank you.
David Edgington:But when I call a woman out and I say, you know what?
David Edgington:That wasn't very submissive to your husband.
David Edgington:Well, how dare you?
David Edgington:Who do you think.
David Edgington:Wait, wait.
David Edgington:I just called your husband out on not being loving to you.
David Edgington:You're not being submissive to him.
David Edgington:Why is there a separate rule for you?
David Edgington:Why do you have this?
David Edgington:It's that mysterious book, Second Hesitations Will.
David Edgington:That's not in all Bibles, but in some Bibles, it explains all of these things.
David Edgington:Very feminist Bible, that we get a separate set of rules.
David Edgington:And I go, no, you don't.
David Edgington:We all get the same, we all sin.
David Edgington:We all sin and fall short of the glory of God.
David Edgington:Romans 3:23 does not say all men sin and fall short of the glory of God.
David Edgington:Says all of us do.
David Edgington:Not just men, but women do as well.
David Edgington:And we have to just keep on that point and say, look, I'm not trying to beat a dead horse here, but you have to be held accountable for your sin, too.
David Edgington:But like you said, a lot of wives, they just dismiss those.
David Edgington:You know, like Kaylee Triller saying that I'm going to tell women to.
David Edgington:She did.
David Edgington:She told women to revile men.
David Edgington:I go, how could you possibly say that?
David Edgington:Wow, that would be like me saying, okay, men just slap your wife whenever she's out of line.
David Edgington:You know, it's like, I mean, women would come unglued on that, and rightly so.
David Edgington:You know, that's just encouraging sin.
David Edgington:That's horrible.
Speaker C:It's harsh.
David Edgington:But why does she get a pass?
David Edgington:And then she blocks me.
David Edgington:And so it looks like everybody agrees with her because my comments are not there anymore.
David Edgington:And I go, oh, that's pretty effective.
David Edgington:That's one of the things I've learned about X and Twitter in the last year.
David Edgington:It's like, okay, you can kind of manage what you want people to see, what you want them to hear.
Speaker C:Well, if someone blocks you on X, your comments stay, but you just don't get to reply.
David Edgington:You don't get to rep.
David Edgington:Yeah, so.
Speaker C:When you comment under her post, when she blocks you, that doesn't mean that your comment goes away.
Speaker C:It's still there for everyone to view, including her, because she can click to unview that specific tweet.
Speaker C:I've had to learn this because I've gotten quite good at blocking people on X now because I used to give them a chance and now I just don't anymore.
Speaker C:But they're always annoying.
Speaker C:So, yeah, when you block somebody, their comment remains and other people can still interact with it.
Speaker C:So I've gotten notifications and stuff like that, but please, go ahead.
David Edgington:No, but you're right.
David Edgington:But what they do is they kind of manage it so that you can't comment on anything anymore.
Speaker C:That's right.
Speaker C:You can't defend yourself anymore.
David Edgington:You're prevented from interacting and talking about it and saying, wait a minute, this is not accurate.
David Edgington:I mean, I've been called a pedophile.
David Edgington:Been called.
David Edgington:I need an exorcism.
David Edgington:Done.
David Edgington:What?
David Edgington:Good.
David Edgington:This is interesting.
David Edgington:This is very fascinating.
David Edgington:I, you know, I feel sorry for all the people you counsel.
David Edgington:I'm like, really?
David Edgington:I don't think they would say the same thing.
David Edgington:You know, of course some of them would.
David Edgington:You know, some of them don't.
David Edgington:Don't like me.
David Edgington:But it's very, very small number.
David Edgington:I go, I.
David Edgington:I think like you, I'm a likable guy.
Speaker C:Not a.
Speaker C:I try to be.
David Edgington:I'm Not a mean guy.
David Edgington:I like you too.
David Edgington:And it's like, you know, it's just like, you know, I'm not, I'm not out to cause trouble.
David Edgington:I'm.
David Edgington:I'm here to help people grow in sanctification.
Speaker C:That's right.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:And you know, and they help me too.
David Edgington:When I see some things in them, I go, yeah, I do the same thing, don't I?
David Edgington:Interesting.
Speaker C:What's odd about this is I get that accusation a lot, you know, who say, oh, you just hate women.
Speaker C:It's like, well, if that were true.
Speaker C:Some of my most downloaded podcasts of all time on a show called the Renaissance of Men are interviews with women.
Speaker C:And you can go and you can watch those interviews and you can see me interact with women of all ages, inside and outside the faith.
Speaker C:I did a whole conference on the Proverbs, 31 woman with like eight women spoke that day.
Speaker C:So you get to like, how do you.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:So is this the behavior of someone who hates women to spend a ton of effort putting on an all day conference that I ran and did all like myself and just let women talk and like, I'm going to challenge.
Speaker C:I didn't challenge them, obviously, because why would I?
Speaker C:But this is the thing is it's very easy for people to say, oh, you're just a woman hater, because you made me uncomfortable with something that you said.
Speaker C:That means I'm now going to impute motive to you.
Speaker C:That because I'm uncomfortable by your words, that means something about you.
Speaker C:That's not how this works.
Speaker C:My inner reality is the metric that I go by to know other people's.
David Edgington:And this is the mind of the reviling wife.
David Edgington:It twists everything around.
David Edgington:So in other words, when the man is kind, is nice, is gentle, they say, oh, you're just manipulating me now.
David Edgington:I'm like, well, how can this man ever win then?
David Edgington:How can he ever do something good for you?
David Edgington:So the same thing with me.
David Edgington:I get accused of that by the reviling wives accused me of that.
David Edgington:Oh, you just want this woman to stay in an abusive marriage.
David Edgington:I'm like, no, I'm trying to save the marriage.
David Edgington:I'm trying to reconcile the husband and wife together.
David Edgington:I'm not trying to encourage abuse, which is a terrible word because it's so vague in general, almost nothing.
David Edgington:But I'm not trying to encourage that abuse.
David Edgington:I'm trying to get each of you to look at your hearts and examine your hearts and repent where it's needed so that you can have peace in your home.
David Edgington:But it's, you know, it's not going to happen if the wife just continues to insist.
David Edgington:No, he's hateful, he's abusive, and then when he's kind, he's manipulating me.
David Edgington:I had one.
David Edgington:Oh, I could tell you so many stories.
Speaker C:Let's go.
David Edgington:There's one that happened just last week.
David Edgington:Husband and wife.
David Edgington:I'm counseling, and I asked them, I said, how are things going?
David Edgington:And the husband said, you know, I've been really trying to be kinder and more gentle with my wife.
David Edgington:I go, good, good.
David Edgington:And I looked at her and I said, how's he been doing?
David Edgington:She said, yep, for the last three weeks, he's been really good.
David Edgington:He's been a good husband.
David Edgington:He's been gentle, he's been kind.
David Edgington:It's been wonderful.
David Edgington:Okay, how's it been going the other way?
David Edgington:You know?
David Edgington:Wife, how have you been doing towards him?
David Edgington:Well, I've been screaming at him and I've been hitting him and I, you know, scratched his back and 18 inch long scratch marks on his back and this and that.
David Edgington:And I go, why would you think that's okay?
David Edgington:Well, he's being kind to me now, so I can, you know, be any way I want to him.
David Edgington:I said, wait, what, what you're doing is just evil.
David Edgington:This is a sin.
David Edgington:This is wicked.
David Edgington:This is horrible.
David Edgington:How could you do that?
David Edgington:And then she started laughing about it.
Speaker C:Oh, very positive sign.
David Edgington:She started laughing about it.
David Edgington:And I said, why are you laughing?
David Edgington:This is not funny at all.
David Edgington:I'm not, I'm not joking about this.
David Edgington:And she just kept laughing and laughing.
Speaker C:I'm like, wow, David, did you come to trouble her before the time?
David Edgington:Is this some Star Trek parallel universe here where everything is the opposite and I don't know what have you to.
Speaker C:Do with me, David Edgington?
Speaker C:Have you come to trouble me before the time?
Speaker C:Head turns around, head spins around, vomit.
David Edgington:Comes out, you go, wow.
David Edgington:But that's how blind some of these women are.
David Edgington:Now, again, this man was not perfect.
David Edgington:He had plenty of flaws.
David Edgington:And I called him out on every one of them.
David Edgington:And I said, you know, you're doing some wicked things to your wife.
Speaker C:This is.
David Edgington:There's no excuse for this.
David Edgington:But, you know, he was somber and repentant and sorrowful and call her out.
David Edgington:She laughs.
David Edgington:It's funny.
Speaker C:I'm like, was this in person?
Speaker C:Was this in your office?
Speaker C:Or was it on zoom?
Speaker C:Or on.
David Edgington:It was on Zoom.
Speaker C:Okay.
Speaker C:Maybe best for your safety.
David Edgington:Yes, I think so.
Speaker C:I meet on Zoom for my safety.
David Edgington:And you know, about half of my counseling is on zoom now.
David Edgington:It's remote.
David Edgington:About half.
David Edgington:That's changed too, in the last year.
David Edgington:It's because of the reach of the podcast and the book that so many people are getting exposed to this and saying, oh, finally someone that's talking about this.
David Edgington:My pastor doesn't understand it, my counselor doesn't understand it.
David Edgington:So the online community, the remote counseling has just exploded in my ministry because of that.
David Edgington:It's a phenomenal thing that's happening.
Speaker C:I mean, praise God for that.
Speaker C:I'm glad that you're bringing awareness to this issue and just today, providentially, like Zach Garris, who wrote the book Masculine Christianity and who has a new book coming out, I guess in just a couple weeks at the New Christendom conference about, I think that I don't know the title of the book, I don't remember, but it's the Reformers Perspectives on Feminism.
Speaker C:And I'm sure that will be very.
Speaker C:Sure that will be very popular.
Speaker C:But he tweeted about your book and Zach Garris is not a huge account, but very well respected.
Speaker C:And so that was.
Speaker C:So maybe talk a little bit about that.
Speaker C:Like to go from a one year ago, we're like, is anyone going to pay attention to this thing that I wrote eight years ago and not knowing much about the Internet or podcasts or anything like that to a year later?
Speaker C:You know, again, Zach's a very well respected author and writer and leader of the faith.
David Edgington:Yes.
David Edgington:No, I was very grateful for that.
David Edgington:Like you said, it just happened this morning and I noticed that within 10 minutes there were a thousand views of that tweet that he put out about recommending my book.
David Edgington:I thought, wow, so this is, this is going to get a lot of, a lot of help for men.
Speaker C:Yeah.
David Edgington:And, and I admire Zach Garris.
David Edgington:I've had some interaction with him.
David Edgington:We've talked about things.
David Edgington:And, and his book Masculine Christianity is excellent.
Speaker C:It is.
Speaker C:It's back here on my shelf somewhere.
David Edgington:I have that probably right, right there.
David Edgington:Yep.
David Edgington:Yeah, there's.
David Edgington:That's one of the three books that I recommend the men in my online group to read.
David Edgington:Masculine Christianity.
Speaker C:What are the other two?
David Edgington:Real quick, while we're here, the other two are no Mere Mortals by Toby Sumter, which is excellent.
David Edgington:You recommended that one to me and I think, boy, that was just outstanding.
Speaker C:Yeah, love that.
David Edgington:And the other one is It's Good to Be a Man by Michael Foster.
Speaker C:Oh, great.
Speaker C:Okay.
David Edgington:Those three books I think are excellent.
David Edgington:They're outstanding.
Speaker C:These are recommended to my men's group as well.
David Edgington:Good, good.
David Edgington:And that's the other thing, too, for your listeners is that I have an online support group.
David Edgington:I've got dozens of men that their stories are almost identical, and they help each other with this.
David Edgington:Because I frankly can't help all these men with all of the details and the specifics of it.
David Edgington:So my requirement to be a part of that group is they have to talk to me personally, and I kind of vet them and make sure they're not, you know, they're not the problem.
David Edgington:And then I just turned these guys loose with each other on Discord, and they help each other tremendously.
David Edgington:Great.
David Edgington:Great bunch of guys.
David Edgington:And so one guy listened to the podcast that you and I did last year, and he couldn't believe that I gave out my phone number and my email address.
David Edgington:So he called me up, I think, a couple of weeks ago, and I said, hello, this is David.
David Edgington:He said, you really did give out your phone number, didn't you?
David Edgington:I said, yeah, I just want to help guys.
David Edgington:I mean, I'm not trying to hide.
David Edgington:I know that could easily backfire, but, you know, I just want to help people.
David Edgington:I'm not trying to hurt anyone.
David Edgington:I'm trying to, you know, bring about sanctification and.
David Edgington:And help Godly help for people.
David Edgington:So I would offer that again.
David Edgington: -: David Edgington:Call me if I can help you.
David Edgington:I live in Phoenix, Arizona, but I do remote counseling all the time and be glad to help anybody that needs that.
David Edgington:Help.
David Edgington:Men or women?
David Edgington:I prefer to counsel men and women together, husbands and wives together.
David Edgington:So there's no opportunity for gossip.
David Edgington:There's no opportunity for siding with one person over the other.
David Edgington:I hear the whole story that way, and I get the whole picture that way.
David Edgington:Because it's always going to be slanted if you only counsel with one person at a time.
David Edgington:And I can't tell you how many.
David Edgington:How many men have gone through this.
David Edgington:Well, my wife went to the pastor or the counselor and said, you know, I don't know what she said.
David Edgington:And then they brought me in the next month, and I was automatically guilty.
David Edgington:I didn't even get a chance to defend myself.
David Edgington:Sometimes they don't even talk to the man at all.
David Edgington:They just make the decision solely based on what?
David Edgington:The wife's testimony.
David Edgington:I go, that's unbiblical, too.
David Edgington:How could you do that?
David Edgington:And even churches that have supported not only spiritually, the wife burning down the marriage, but even financially helping her to end the marriage.
David Edgington:Oh, God, have mercy on these men and how horribly they're failing.
David Edgington:Please, if there's any pastors listening to this, please do not counsel husbands and wives separately.
David Edgington:Counsel them together with an issue like this.
David Edgington:Counsel them together at the same time right from the beginning.
David Edgington:Don't do this separate counseling because it's entertaining gossip and it is destroying marriages because you're going to go on assumptions, because the wife is going to be very convincing and yet she's going to leave out a lot of things.
David Edgington:I would say the other way, too.
David Edgington:Don't just meet with the man.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:Don't just meet with a man without the wife there.
David Edgington:But if one of the spouses refuses to go for counseling, then I'll still help you.
David Edgington:So in other words, a husband and wife are needing help and the husband approaches me.
David Edgington:And I always tell them, every time I say, let's get your wife involved in counseling before you tell me anything else, let's get your wife in here.
David Edgington:And vast majority of the time, nope, she doesn't want help.
David Edgington:She doesn't want any counseling.
David Edgington:She's done.
David Edgington:She's out of the marriage.
David Edgington:I say, okay, you, husband are going to need help.
David Edgington:I'll be glad to help you.
David Edgington:I wish your wife would so we could reconcile your marriage, But I don't want to leave you just helpless out there.
David Edgington:You're going to need a lot of help.
Speaker C:And let me just take this opportunity to endorse your counseling services because that's how you and I formed a friendship.
Speaker C:Yes, you appeared on the podcast.
Speaker C:I think it was probably about a year ago, right around this time.
Speaker C:And then I started having problems with insomnia, which is not something I've really spoken about on the pub on the podcast yet, but I will be speaking about it.
Speaker C:And so I recognized that this was not a physical issue.
Speaker C:I had tried all the different physical things like red lights and weighted blankets and humidifiers and like, I tried all the different physical things.
Speaker C:And then.
Speaker C:And then I was talking to a sleep psychiatrist about behavioral therapy, about, you know, sleep routines and all this different stuff.
Speaker C:And he's like, he said, I don't handle emotional issues, so if you want, if there's something else going on, you need to find a counselor.
Speaker C:And so that was like a light going off, like, well, I can't go to a psychotherapist like I used to anymore because I'm a Christian now.
Speaker C:And I had no idea how bad it was back then.
Speaker C:I know now, but I even knew Back then that I can't go be part of that.
Speaker C:And I recognized that I had your number and that.
Speaker C:Well, he's a.
Speaker C:He's a biblical counselor.
Speaker C:So let me start there.
Speaker C:And so we started.
Speaker C:We started in just biblical counseling together.
Speaker C:I guess that was probably like in August, something like that.
Speaker C:And it was over the.
Speaker C:Yeah, it was over the process of coming to see you in a professional capacity and then you helping me through some relationship stuff, et cetera, where it was like we built a friendship over time.
Speaker C:Over time as well.
Speaker C:So I got to know you as a counselor first.
Speaker C:And so I would say that you're one of the finest counselors I've ever met.
Speaker C:I mean, you're certainly the finest biblical counselor that I've ever met.
Speaker C:But I don't.
Speaker C:I say that not having met a whole bunch of them.
Speaker C:But you've shown me by example what it means to be a biblical counselor.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Because I, again, my intention was originally to be a psychotherapist.
Speaker C:That's what I thought I would be doing right now if Covid hadn't.
Speaker C:Well, you know, Covid did happen.
Speaker C:And so if is a silly question because.
Speaker C:Right, but that was.
Speaker C:My intention was to.
Speaker C:Was to be a psychotherapist.
Speaker C:That was.
David Edgington:Praise God.
David Edgington:You repented from that.
Speaker C:Yes, absolutely.
Speaker C:And for anyone who still thinks there's any virtue or merit to psychotherapy, definitely read the book the Other Worldview by Dr.
Speaker C:Peter Jones.
Speaker C:He does a whole chapter on just how wicked Carl Jung was.
Speaker C:We all know these days how wicked Freud was for the most part.
Speaker C:But like Carl Jung and Transpersonal Psychotherapy, Stanislav Grof, G R O F.
Speaker C:These are the guys behind that particular form, which is essentially the.
Speaker C:The spot.
Speaker C:The skeletal structure of the New Age.
Speaker C:So the New Age has a Jungian skeleton and it has a Buddhist heart or a Hindu heart and kind of Buddhist flesh, if you were to try and assemble that.
Speaker C:But I didn't really.
David Edgington:Demonic spirit.
Speaker C:And a demonic spirit.
Speaker C:That's exactly right.
Speaker C:That's exactly right.
Speaker C:And a wicked plan, for sure.
Speaker C:But I didn't understand how much Jungianism was built into that whole worldview.
Speaker C:And I know now, and Dr.
Speaker C:Peter Jones takes that apart.
Speaker C:So seeing you in a counseling capacity has shown me.
Speaker C:I haven't even read the J.
Speaker C:Adams book, but from listening to the way that you've counseled me and then our conversations as well, it helps me understand just how powerful biblical counseling is and also how unpopular it is.
Speaker C:The word of God is always unpopular.
Speaker C:But to really say, like, no, there is no Authority, inside psychology.
Speaker C:You've worked me through a bunch of different stuff, like the subconscious and all this different stuff ideas that I thought these are self evident, that might not be the case.
Speaker C:And so.
Speaker C:And so I offer this as an endorsement of your counseling services for men in reviling marriages, women who are reviling wives, you know, couples that are stuck in this cycle, men who are struggling with these, with their own issues independently related to that, and women as well.
Speaker C:Because the Bible is the only thing that offers true healing.
Speaker C:It is the truth, not some.
David Edgington:It is the truth, it is the authority, and it is effective.
David Edgington:The people that change the most are the ones that I can convince.
David Edgington:Meditate on the word of God, let it soak in, let it change you.
David Edgington:Let that be what addresses every problem in your heart, bring about conviction in the soul and grant you repentance.
David Edgington:Your life will never be the same.
David Edgington:It'll be so wonderful.
David Edgington:So the people I can convince of that, not just the people that will listen to me, but the people that will indulge their hearts and immerse themselves in scripture, those are the ones that change the best.
David Edgington:And it sounds so simple and yet it is so rare that people will do that.
David Edgington:You know, they'll say, well, no, I need, I need some medication, I need this, I need therapy.
David Edgington:And I go, you can do that, but it's not going to change your heart.
David Edgington:You know, medication has never changed anyone's heart.
David Edgington:Not.
David Edgington:Not even once.
Speaker C:Not even a little bit.
Speaker C:Well, maybe we can talk about this a little bit then.
Speaker C:Maybe we can talk about the psychologization of culture.
Speaker C:Like Abigail Schreier, I guess, wrote a book that everyone's speaking very highly about.
Speaker C:I wish I could remember the name of it off the top of my head, but we talked in the beginning about trauma being this overused word.
Speaker C:The word abuse is also kind of being overused.
Speaker C:And this idea that everything goes back to my own inner experience as the measure of all things, that's all an outgrowth of the psychologization of culture.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:Even weaponized empathy, as Joe Rigney talks about.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And that's an outgrowth of that.
Speaker C:And now it's set up as a parallel authority to the word of God.
Speaker C:But only by rooting yourself in the word of God as the sole infallible authority can you truly begin to find healing.
Speaker C:Because that generates repentance.
Speaker C:Repentance is not very popular, is it?
David Edgington:Yes, it's where people get a lot of pushback when you call someone to repentance.
David Edgington:But it's like that's part of the gospel.
David Edgington:If we don't have a call to repentance, we don't have the gospel because Jesus says, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:And John the Baptist said the same thing.
David Edgington:It's not a mystery.
David Edgington:But this is where we let the word of God, we turn it loose.
David Edgington:We say, God's word is going to change you.
David Edgington:Your feelings are going to deceive you, your feelings are going to lead you astray.
David Edgington:And what Joe Rigney and Doug Wilson talk about with empathy is sin.
David Edgington:I address that in my book and I say, your feelings are not sovereign.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:It's not just, okay, this is what I feel, therefore it's true and it's real.
David Edgington:And I go, no, not necessarily.
David Edgington:In fact, probably, definitely not.
David Edgington:Because your feelings are going to mislead you.
David Edgington:They're going to lead you astray.
David Edgington:It's the pure milk of the word.
David Edgington:As James talks about the word that's implanted, you know, the word that's implanted, that that's what transforms and changes a person.
David Edgington:Psychology might change the outer man, might change the behavior, but it doesn't change the soul, doesn't change the heart.
David Edgington:So that outward behavioral change that psychology can accomplish at times, it doesn't last, it doesn't endure, and it definitely does not glorify God.
David Edgington:But the change in the heart, where you turn away from anger, you turn away from anxieties and fears, you turn away from depression.
David Edgington:Instead, you trust, you have faith, you build your fear of God, not your fear of man, fear of circumstances.
David Edgington:You learn how to endure trials.
David Edgington:That's what glorifies God.
David Edgington:Because you go God without your grace.
David Edgington:My grace is sufficient for you is what the Lord said to Paul when he had the thorn in the flesh.
David Edgington:Right?
David Edgington:Thorn in the flesh.
David Edgington:What do I do?
David Edgington:Three times I asked the Lord, take it away, take it away, take it away.
David Edgington:And what did the Lord say to him?
David Edgington:My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect, perfect in weakness.
David Edgington:Grace and power are parallel words.
David Edgington:That's what God's grace is.
David Edgington:It's power that works in the soul.
David Edgington:It enables you to overcome sin.
David Edgington:It enables you to change.
David Edgington:Without that grace, it's just shuffling the chairs on the deck of the Titanic.
David Edgington:It's like, okay, we're just going to move everything around, but the ship is still going down.
David Edgington:Might look a little different today, but it's not going to help you.
David Edgington:So it's amazing to me will that, okay, I'm going To get more people mad with this one.
Speaker C:Let's go.
David Edgington:No, please, Lord, don't have this guy on the Will's podcast anymore.
Speaker C:That could be arranged.
David Edgington:That seminaries will train future pastors in Greek, in Hebrew, hermeneutics, homiletics, exegesis.
David Edgington:Go through all of this.
David Edgington:Oh, boy, we need to understand the Word of God better so we can preach it better.
David Edgington:Good.
David Edgington:My seminary did that.
David Edgington:But then we get to the counseling arena and we go, the Bible can't help there.
David Edgington:Yeah, we got to have psychology, we got to have psychotherapy, we got to have Freud, we got to have Jung.
David Edgington:We got to have.
David Edgington:Or something.
David Edgington:Or some integration.
David Edgington:That's the big word, integration, where we integrate scripture with psychotherapy.
David Edgington:And we think that somehow we're going to come out with something better.
David Edgington:And it is a tragedy, and it is a train wreck again.
David Edgington:And we look at this and say, boy, the same things that a pastor is taught about publicly preaching and teaching the Word of God, that same thinking, that same philosophy, those same principles should be in the counseling office as well.
David Edgington:Acts 6:4.
David Edgington:The disciples were devoted to prayer and the ministry of the Word.
David Edgington:And I talk with people often about that.
David Edgington:I say, okay, that means that your pastor should be ministering the Word publicly.
David Edgington:When he's preaching and teaching.
David Edgington:He's got a large group of people and he's talking to them all at once.
David Edgington:His authority for what he's saying is what the Word of God says.
David Edgington:It's not him.
David Edgington:It's not his training, it's not his education.
David Edgington:It's the Word of God.
David Edgington:He's ministering the Word publicly.
David Edgington:But now we want to minister the Word privately as well.
David Edgington:So there's public preaching and teaching, but there's private discipleship, counseling, helping someone one on one.
David Edgington:And now you can customize the application of the Word of God to help exactly that person.
David Edgington:You can't do that publicly in a sermon.
David Edgington:You can do it to a degree, but not specifically to an individual.
David Edgington:But you can do that in the counseling office.
David Edgington:In fact, you must do that in the counseling office.
David Edgington:You must help that person privately.
David Edgington:And you have to minister the Word of God.
David Edgington:Not your opinions, not your feelings, not even your education or your experience.
David Edgington:But you minister the Word of God because the Word of God is what changes people.
David Edgington:I don't.
David Edgington:I always tell people, I don't change anybody.
David Edgington:And if I changed you, then you need to repent from that because you shouldn't be doing it because I said so.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:You should be changing because this is what the word of God says.
David Edgington:And all I'm doing is bringing the word of God to you and saying, here's what it says.
David Edgington:What should we do about this?
David Edgington:So we've got a lot of work to do on this, too, Will.
David Edgington:This is another area now.
David Edgington:I've been a counselor for 20.
David Edgington:20 years now.
David Edgington:No, 30 years now.
David Edgington:They've been full time in it for 20 years.
David Edgington:And 30 years ago, when I first started, it was like, nobody wants to listen to this.
David Edgington:It's like, this is crazy.
David Edgington:And now I think that people are starting to wake up and they're saying, boy, all of this other stuff is bankrupt.
David Edgington:We need what the word of God says.
David Edgington:So I think there is a sense of people coming alive and saying, we need something more than just the Band Aids, you know, the cisterns that won't hold water.
David Edgington:Like Jeremiah talks about.
David Edgington:We need something real and substance.
David Edgington:And that changes the soul, changes you on the inside.
David Edgington:Because once the inside changes, the outside is going to change.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:The outside changes, but the inside doesn't.
David Edgington:It doesn't go the other way, but you have to.
Speaker C:I think that people are recognizing the wise people are recognizing that they need it.
Speaker C:But it's very clear that culture does not want it.
David Edgington:It's fighting, right?
Speaker C:Yeah, the culture is with everybody.
Speaker C:Now, when you try to explain to people, hey, that Netflix you're watching, that music you're listening to, it's the food you're eating, the things that you're choosing to do, you know, they.
Speaker C:You recognize the world is very much with you, and they don't want to.
Speaker C:They don't want to hear that.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:And that's the.
Speaker C:That's.
Speaker C:They don't recognize just the hooks that culture has in almost everybody.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:And so.
Speaker C:And so you try to say, like, hey, we need to.
Speaker C:We need to pull this hook out.
Speaker C:You know, it doesn't even have to be something that's egregiously, obviously, sin.
Speaker C:You know what I mean?
Speaker C:It has to be like, hey, this little bit of pleasure that you're getting from the world.
Speaker C:Let's say it's Netflix, right?
Speaker C:Which is almost totally degenerate now, or Amazon prime or whatever, like video.
Speaker C:We have to pull this out because you're getting poison pumped into your.
Speaker C:Into your mind, into your spirit through this.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker C:And you're not going to be able to live a godly life when you're having this whole other alternate set of values portrayed to you, whether it be through wokeness or misandry, like the Hatred of men.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:I just yesterday interviewed Jeremy Carl who wrote a book called the Unprotected Class about anti white hatred in American culture that's been going on for 50 years.
Speaker C:We talked for about an hour.
Speaker C:It was a fantastic conversation.
Speaker C:So it's like people have been plugged into these systems.
Speaker C:It's like we have to pull that out and minister to you using the word of God.
Speaker C:Oh, well, and then what do you get?
Speaker C:Oh, that's patriarchy.
Speaker C:That's outdated.
Speaker C:That has the two kingdoms.
Speaker C:My kingdom is out of this world.
Speaker C:All the standard lines start flying out like, okay, we've got something right there.
David Edgington:Yeah, yeah, no, it's true.
David Edgington:But I'm seeing more and more people that, including the ones that I'm counseling with the reviling wives that they've gone to, psychologists and psychiatrists and secular authorities and they go, they're not helping me.
David Edgington:You seem to be speaking about things and you have a lot of Bible references in your book.
David Edgington:Maybe you'll say something different.
David Edgington:I go, I guarantee you it's going to be something different.
David Edgington:There's going to be food for your soul.
David Edgington:It's going to change you.
David Edgington:It's going to transform you.
David Edgington:And I mean you commit your way to it and I guarantee you it will, it will be effective.
David Edgington:I won't always be effective.
David Edgington:But the word of God will never fail you.
David Edgington:His word will never return to him.
David Edgington:Void.
David Edgington:Right?
David Edgington:His word goes out.
David Edgington:Isaiah 55.
David Edgington:It never comes back empty.
David Edgington:It never comes back void.
David Edgington:It always occurs, accomplishes what God purposes for it.
David Edgington:God has a purpose in his word and it's going to be effective.
David Edgington:You know, another resource or set of resources that I would commend as well.
David Edgington:Not only Jay Adams books on noether counseling.
David Edgington:You know, those are, those were excellent.
David Edgington:Those were my training ground.
David Edgington:But the Puritans, just reading the Puritans, the banner of truth.
David Edgington:Paperback editions of all of these great men, Watson and Flavel and Owens, you're going to see exactly how you use the word of God in changing the soul, in addressing the problems and the agonies of the soul.
David Edgington:The reason that they're so effective is they were written before psychology was even a thing.
David Edgington: They were written in the: David Edgington:So it wasn't, you know, wasn't even around.
David Edgington:So that's why it's like all we have is the word of God.
David Edgington:Let's use it to help people.
David Edgington:And they did.
David Edgington:They were effective with it, tremendously effective.
David Edgington:So I would commend that to your listeners too.
David Edgington:Read the Puritans read them.
David Edgington:Read Jonathan Edwards.
David Edgington:You want somebody that's going to blow your mind, read Jonathan Edwards.
David Edgington:He's my favorite theologian.
David Edgington:He's the one that I think he taught me more than anybody ever has in my life.
David Edgington:And Religious Affections is my favorite book.
David Edgington:Nothing better than that in my mind.
Speaker C:This is how much for listeners, this is how much I love this guy.
Speaker C:I handed you my phone and like, here you go.
Speaker C:Sent you to Amazon to go find a copy of that of Religious Affections by Jonathan Edwards that you liked and just said, go ahead and order it.
Speaker C:I just let you order a book for me from my phone.
Speaker C:You go, just.
Speaker C:You do that.
David Edgington:You're sitting at the dinner table and you're like, what?
David Edgington:I remember that.
Speaker C:That's right.
David Edgington:Yeah.
Speaker C:I got it up on the shelf right there.
David Edgington:Good, good.
David Edgington:I think I've read Religious Affection seven times.
Speaker C:Oh, wow.
David Edgington:It's the only book I've ever read like that.
David Edgington:I mean, I've read the Bible more than seven times, but other than that, I've never read a book seven times.
David Edgington:And I go, wow, it is so deep and so rich, so incredibly thorough.
David Edgington:And what always amazed me.
David Edgington:Here's another tangent, Will.
David Edgington:What always amazed me as I'm reading and listening, you know, reading the sermons of Jonathan Edwards, and I go, wow, they are so deep and intricate and theologically robust.
David Edgington:And he's preaching to a bunch of unsophisticated farmers.
David Edgington:Does that tell you something about our education system?
David Edgington:Right?
Speaker C:It really does.
David Edgington:Here he's studying Latin and Greek at 10 years old and going to Yale, and you know what I mean?
David Edgington:It's like, okay, what are we doing?
David Edgington:Well, we got PhDs in gender studies.
David Edgington:That's right.
David Edgington:So, you know, just the fact that you and I could read that and go, man, I got to read this so slowly because it's so deep and rich and is so intricately woven.
David Edgington:His thought processes are incredible.
David Edgington:And we go, I can't think like that.
David Edgington:I want to, but I can't.
David Edgington:And it's because we've been dumbed down in our education system.
Speaker C:Everything.
David Edgington:God commends you people that will study and read for yourselves.
David Edgington:Study to be a workman approved.
David Edgington:Study the word of God that you're approved because you know what the word of God teaches you.
Speaker C:Amen.
David Edgington:Can't emphasize that enough.
Speaker C:And we just have a few minutes left.
Speaker C:I know you have some men to counsel, but maybe just to close things out, you can talk a little bit about, you know, some of the garden variety things that men deal with that are that it's not reviling wives, but that young men, older men that deal with completely independent of their interactions with women say that biblical counseling is also good for.
Speaker C:Because again, as we talked about, people will turn to psychology, self help, pop psychology, journaling, stoicism or whatever as a way to make these outer changes.
Speaker C:But maybe we can talk a little bit about how the Bible can minister to everyone's everyday challenges as well.
David Edgington:Absolutely.
David Edgington:Yeah.
David Edgington:No, I think another big area that I see a lot of activity in is pornography.
David Edgington:Men getting gripped by pornography, sexual sin, but specifically pornography.
David Edgington:And it is deadly.
David Edgington:It is devastating.
David Edgington:It destroys not only marriages, but it destroys souls as well.
David Edgington:And I've actually written a book on that.
David Edgington:It's called Pornography as a Murderer, the Suicide of the Soul.
David Edgington:And I address that because it's a murderer in the sense that the enemy uses pornography to murder your soul.
David Edgington:And yet it's the suicide of the soul.
David Edgington:You're doing it to yourself.
David Edgington:You are ruining your own life.
David Edgington:And this is a massive problem, not just with young men, but older men too.
David Edgington:Middle aged men, older men, absolutely destructive.
David Edgington:Men having the courage to lead in their families is another big area that I talk about.
David Edgington:You know, I see that very often as well, men that are too passive and they're too afraid to lead well in their homes.
David Edgington:And we need that, you know, 1 Corinthians 16, that, you know, being a man, being, you know, being strong in the Lord, in the strength of his might.
David Edgington:I see a lot of anxiety.
David Edgington:Since COVID anxiety has been off the charts.
David Edgington:A big problem.
David Edgington:Men and women, not just.
David Edgington:Not just men.
David Edgington:People are afraid.
David Edgington:Seeing what's happening with tyranny in the world.
David Edgington:Propaganda that is just pretty much in every fabric of society.
David Edgington:People are afraid.
David Edgington:People are fearful.
David Edgington:They're worried.
David Edgington:They're thinking, what's the future going to be like?
David Edgington:What's it going to be like for my kids and my grandkids?
David Edgington:We have to teach about faith, about trusting God, about trust the Lord with all your heart.
David Edgington:Don't lean on your own understanding.
David Edgington:In all your ways, acknowledge him and you'll make straight your paths.
David Edgington:Proverbs 3, 5 and 6.
David Edgington:So anxiety is another massive issue.
David Edgington:Anger, another big area.
David Edgington:We talked a little bit about anger and people just being bitter over what's happened in society and in their families.
David Edgington:People getting a pass, sorry, people getting a pass for their anger, not being held accountable for it.
David Edgington:That's a massive issue as well.
David Edgington:And again, the word of God addresses all of these things.
David Edgington:It addresses every single one of these in a beautiful and effective and God glorifying way.
David Edgington:So there's no problem of living that Scripture does not address.
David Edgington:None.
David Edgington:And that's an incredible encouragement.
David Edgington:I could not do what I do every day if it weren't for the breadth and the depth of the Word of God.
David Edgington:It covers everything.
David Edgington:Nothing new under the sun.
David Edgington:All of these things are addressed in Scripture.
David Edgington:And you let the Spirit of God bring the Word of God to convict you and say, I need help.
David Edgington:You're on the right path, but you keep your sin hidden.
David Edgington:You cover it and you don't want anybody to know about it.
David Edgington:You're not going to prosper.
David Edgington:You're not going to prosper.
Speaker C:Was one of the reasons, one of the many reasons I'm so grateful for our friendship is that in my entire faith walk, which really hasn't been that long, you know, coming to understand the power of the Word of God in a spiritual sense, yes, absolutely.
Speaker C:Coming to understand the reliability of the Word of God in a theological sense, yes, absolutely.
Speaker C:But to understand the healing power of the Word of God in a, we'll say, emotional, moral sense, you'd say, and life, life reform.
Speaker C:True life reform.
Speaker C:The way that you, you, you model that, the way that you embody that, the way that you communicate that, the way that you invite and have invited, even before we became friends, invited me to participate in that process.
Speaker C:And the things that that has shown me has been an enormous part of my sanctification over the past six to nine months since we started doing counseling together.
Speaker C:It feels like it's actually been quite a while that we've known each other, but it hasn't been all that long.
Speaker C:That's the magnitude of the impact that you've had on me.
Speaker C:And I'm grateful to hear you say all those things because it's true.
Speaker C:And so few pastors or influencers or content creators, whatever, inside, inside formal church structures, outside on social media, are willing to say these simple truths that the Word of God can and does do this.
Speaker C:And that's all you need.
Speaker C:Man, woman, married couple, that is.
Speaker C:That's all you need.
Speaker C:I need this other thing.
Speaker C:No, you actually don't.
Speaker C:If you submit to what the Word of God has to say, it's been an enormous blessing that you've shared with me in addition to all the ways you've blessed me with friendship and brotherhood as well.
David Edgington:Amen.
David Edgington:One final thing.
David Edgington:I would say Psalm 119, an incredible chapter.
David Edgington:You know where I'm going with this incredible chapter?
David Edgington:176 verses it's an acrostic, which means that it is poetry that is written in a very specific way.
David Edgington:So it's designed after the Hebrew Alphabet, 22 letters in the Hebrew Alphabet, eight verses for each of those letters.
David Edgington:And all of these verses talk about the different benefits of the Word of God.
David Edgington:And where I like to encourage people is Psalm 119, verse 24.
David Edgington:Your testimonies are my delight.
David Edgington:They are my counselors.
David Edgington:So first of all, what God says, I want to delight in that.
David Edgington:I want to look at that and say, whatever God says, even if it's rebuking me, I want to delight in that.
David Edgington:I say, that's good for me.
David Edgington:It's going to encourage me.
David Edgington:I love that, too.
David Edgington:Whatever God says through the scriptures, you want it to be your delight.
David Edgington:You want it to look at.
David Edgington:You want to look at it and say, this should have an internal effect on me where I'm drawn to this, and I love this, and I want this, and I want it more and more.
David Edgington:And then the second phrase, they are my counselors.
David Edgington:So then I remind people, I say, I'm not really the counselor.
David Edgington:The word of God is the counselor.
David Edgington:And that's what you want.
David Edgington:You want God's word to change you.
David Edgington:So if you delight in it and you're looking to it for the answers to all the troubles you have in your life, it's just turn it loose and let God work in you.
David Edgington:Delight in that.
David Edgington:And look for him to counsel you.
David Edgington:Look for him to correct you.
David Edgington:Look for him to encourage you.
David Edgington:Look for him to teach you the truth.
David Edgington:God listens.
David Edgington:God hears.
David Edgington:God is very eager to be involved in your life.
David Edgington:And some people, they just, you know, they block him and he won't work.
David Edgington:So.
Speaker C:Amen.
David Edgington:Nice way to end, Will.
Speaker C:Very nice.
Speaker C:Very nice.
Speaker C:Thank you, David.
Speaker C:Praise God.
Speaker C:Praise God for the wisdom.
David Edgington:Brother, thanks for having me on the show.
Speaker C:You're welcome.
Speaker C:We should talk more often.
Speaker C:Oh, wait.
David Edgington:Oh, wait.
David Edgington:We do.
Speaker C:All right.
Speaker C:Well, where would you like to send people to find out more about you and what you do?
David Edgington:Well, again, I'll repeat my phone number.
David Edgington: -: Speaker C:Bold.
David Edgington:I'm just a masochist.
David Edgington:Go ahead, it's okay.
David Edgington:Or email me.
David Edgington:Counselthewordm me.
David Edgington:So that's council.
David Edgington:C O U N S E L the word W O r d at PM as in PaulMichael me, Michael, Edward, contact me.
David Edgington:I'll be glad to help you.
Speaker C:Wonderful.
Speaker C:And God willing, when this comes out, should have a new website for people to visit as well.
David Edgington:Amen.
David Edgington:Amen.
David Edgington:And thank you for helping me on my website, too.
David Edgington:It needs a lot of work.
Speaker C:We'll get there.
Speaker C:It's less work than it seems, I think.
Speaker C:Well, praise God for you, brother.
Speaker C:So grateful.
David Edgington:So good seeing you again.
Speaker C:Amen.
David Edgington:Thanks for listening to this episode of the Renaissance of Men podcast.
David Edgington:Visit us on the web@renofmen.com or on your favorite social media platform at Ren of Men.
David Edgington:This is the Renaissance of men.
David Edgington:You are the renaissance.