[00:00:00] Speaker A: You know, you hear that kind of testimony all the time. It's like, nothing wrong with this religious experience. But don't build your faith on religious experience. Religious experiences are okay, but just test those. And when you test them, you find out, wait a minute. There is a firm foundation for all of my faith.
[00:00:23] Speaker B: Hello, and welcome to X Skeptic. I'm Jana Harmon, your host. And here we explore stories of unlikely belief, true accounts of people who journeyed from atheism or deep skepticism to a life of faith in Christ. Each episode, we delve into these incredible transformations. There are now over 100 stories on our website, x skeptic.org and on our YouTube channel. We love hearing from you, so feel free to connect with us on Facebook, YouTube, or by email at infoxsceptic.org Our guests not only recount their own journeys from doubt to belief, they also offer valuable insights. Towards the end of each episode, these former skeptics share their advice for those questioning faith, offering ways to seek the truth about God and suggest how believers can compassionately engage with those who have doubts. Life's struggles often shape our view of ourselves, others, and even God. Some of us carry scars from things done to us, while others grapple with their own choices that lead to dark places, places like addiction. For some, that journey may seem like a downward spiral, yet it can become a path to transformation. Today you'll hear from Bill Scott, a former atheist whose life was marked by the desire to live life his own way without God. But it was also marked by the pain of his own choices. But now he speaks from a place of hope and new life, sharing his deep love for Christ and his desires for others to find what he has found. I invite you to join us for Bill's powerful story. There's much wisdom here, so we're glad you're listening in.
Welcome, Bill, to Ex Skeptic. It's great to have you with me today.
[00:02:10] Speaker A: Thank you so much for having me, Jana. I'm glad to be here.
[00:02:13] Speaker B: Excellent, excellent. As we are getting started, I would love for you to introduce yourself, Bill. Talk to us about the kind of work you do, perhaps where you live, your education, those kinds of things.
[00:02:27] Speaker A: I live in Houston, Texas.
[00:02:29] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:02:30] Speaker A: Originally from Kentucky, though. That's where the accent comes from. And I work with Ratio Christie full time at Houston Christian University, formerly Houston Baptist University, and I work also in the international department. I'm the assistant director of Ratio Christi International, which means I have the distinct privilege of spending a lot of my time talking to people from around the world and visiting other countries, getting ministry started in other countries and just encouraging the, the world of apologetics across the globe. I guess it's really. So that's, that's what we do. It's really a blessing.
[00:03:07] Speaker B: You were once very far away from doing what you're doing now, right? Yeah. So let's, let's start back in your childhood and your home life where you grew up. You said you, you were raised in Kentucky. Talk with me about what your life was like in Kentucky and was religion or faith or God any part of your family or your friends cult, your friends lives or culture around you? Talk with me about that.
[00:03:36] Speaker A: Yeah, well, I can't say I wasn't raised in church because I did have a religious grandmother and she, she, you know, I wouldn't say that she was an extremely deep Christian, but she did love going, she loved going to church and she loved praying for people. And it's very typical eastern Kentucky home where you're raised with your grandmother. We lived in a, we lived in a, in like a large family homestead of a place that had five bedrooms. And my grandmother and my great aunt for the majority of my life shared one of those bedrooms. So around the kitchen table at night, you know, we had my grandmother, my great aunt, my sister, my mom, and my dad. My dad was more agnostic and kind of because of, I come from a very political family, so because of that, he was very antagonistic toward especially evangelical Christians and things. So, you know, he never went to church until I actually planted a church later in life. We can talk about that in a little bit. But yeah, Christianity was actually more discouraged in my home. There was actually a time where the Lord was really dealing with me. And I just realized this just in the last couple of years. I was thinking back in like third and fourth grade, there was a time where I just had this hunger to read the Bible like all of a sudden. And everybody in my Sunday school class at the church that my grandmother would take me to from time to time all of a sudden wanted to get baptized. It was like this little mini revival going on and I just wanted to get baptized. I wanted to know more about Christ. And since I was like in third grade, my dad just like put the halt to that and was like, no, you're probably going to this church a little bit too much. Sounds like they're brainwashing you. So I kind of came out of church from there and didn't really. I mean, I kind of came in and out, started getting into some really dark music Stuff when I was a teenager, and ironically when I was like 18, 19 as a musician, I actually played bass in a worship band for a little bit. But other than that, just really no church background. It was very, yeah, very.
My home, My house, My home was not like dark and horrible or anything. It was just religion just really was not that important.
[00:05:52] Speaker B: When you were third, fourth grade and you had a desire to be baptized or even you placed. Played in a worship band in high school, was there any. If someone would have asked you, do you believe in God or are you a Christian, what would your response have been?
[00:06:06] Speaker A: Well, I don't know. Nobody ever asked me that before I was a teenager. But at the time, probably around, I don't know, 13, 14 years old, I was really listening some very dark music at that time. Marilyn Manson and that kind of stuff. I got into drums and band and all this marching band and started playing drums a lot. And you know, of course you gravitate toward heavy metal, so a lot of that stuff is extremely dark.
And then I had. I had one of my very best friends became an atheist all of a sudden. And so that was cool, I guess, you know, in my mind back then. So I became an atheist too. So if you had asked me around 14 years old, like, what are you? I would say I'm an atheist. And these Christians, they're stupid. They're ruining our country. You know, it's just kind of repeating the stuff that I heard at home. And, you know, because it was such a political household, like msnbc, pretty much stayed on the TV at all times. So. So I was just repeating that I just. That just become part of my life, which actually, after I got out of high school and got into college and started. Started pursuing history and legal studies, wanted to be a lawyer. That's when my worldview really started to solidify. As an atheist leftist, I wouldn't have called myself a Marxist. But looking back at it, that was more what I was.
[00:07:25] Speaker B: You know, when you're advancing through your childhood, through high school, you're into dark heavy metal music, you start to call yourself an atheist. You became sounds like a bit contemptuous of who Christians were. The world and the worldview in which you entered, did you find it to be dark or disturbing in any way, or did you feel like it was giving you the life and, and the view of reality that you were seeking at that time?
[00:07:52] Speaker A: That's a great question, Jana, because you're absolutely onto something there. It was. I was getting the very. The life I deserved, but at the Same time. It was the life that I wanted, you know, I was very hedonistic. So, you know, eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we'll die. You know, I love to go to parties on the weekends and, and drink and be crazy and you know, playing music in bars and things like that and, and you know, just unrestricted sin. I just really didn't have a conscience for that. Like, it just really.
It really didn't matter to me what I was doing and thanks and, and that could have really destroyed me, but I mean, thankfully it didn't. I mean, when I was, when I was a kid, by kid I mean like 14 to 18 years old, my life was music. That was it. I poured everything into music. Like I was doing like, you know, getting awards for playing drums and stuff. That's all I did was play drums. So I was winning drum set solo competitions and all district jazz band and all this stuff and getting really involved in very technical music. So I would practice like five, six hours a day because I was trying to escape reality. That was kind of my approach to life. So to say that I even really thought. Thought about religion very much. I really didn't. And I mean I had friends that were in like Teens for Christ and things like that. And I even occasionally went to the meetings with them, especially when I found out they would do a field trip and get me out of class. So. And they would try to invite me along and everything, but just never. It's like I never really cared. I just, you know, it was just easy enough for me to sarcastically ridicule it and just dismiss it and, and this wasn't even a big deal to me. So I just really just identified as an atheist and moved on, you know, moved on to things I thought were more important.
[00:09:49] Speaker B: It wasn't as if you had done a lot of intellectual study. There was no rigor there to embrace this identity of atheism. It was just, it sounds like something, it was an identity that you wanted in a sense that it felt comfortable and compatible with your life and your lifestyle and you know, again, playing out in just spending your life in music and, and yeah, all that that had to offer your hedonism or whatever that it felt a lot more comfortable of, of an identity with that I would.
[00:10:21] Speaker A: Imagine, certainly started there.
The intellectual reasons for being, for remaining an atheist came when I got into the university and just seemed like in every single angle, but my worldview was being, was. Was being supplied with all the intellectual reasons to remain an atheist. So I mean, the seeds were Planted just because of, like you said, intellectual laziness really, you know, just being a kid, that wasn't really a priority. Maybe, or at least my mind was too caught up playing music than to think about it. But once I got into college and you know, got around a community of people that thought the same way I did, and then my professors were encouraging it, atheism more informed my political causes than it did anything else.
[00:11:14] Speaker B: So you found the intellectual justification for the lifestyle you were already living and the thoughts that you were already having in the midst of that.
What did you think? That belief in God and belief, any kind of religion, what was that?
[00:11:27] Speaker A: I looked at religious people, especially conservative religious people, as just idiots. I mean, it's like these people are idiots. They, they believe in a bunch of Jewish fairy tales. They believe in, in like they really basing their life off a book that men wrote, you know, all the typical Dawkins rhetoric. Cause the God delusion came out when I was in my first run at university and things like that. So the new atheist movement was just ramping up while that was going on. So it was cool to be that guy, not just to be an atheist, but to be an outspoken, foaming at the mouth, like, like ridicule them kind of atheist. And it's embarrassing to look back at now, but there was a time when there were preachers that would come on campus and do open air preaching and I was the one that was quick to stand up next to him and shout over top of them and yell them down and people cheering me and stuff. And he gave me this big dopamine rush to be up.
There's a time when I done that out of pure anger too. I can remember that, that probably been around. That was 2008. I can remember it pretty vividly because of all the other stuff that was going on during that time. And it was just out of anger. I mean, I was getting, it was getting to the point where I was getting not just dismissive of religion before I became a Christian, but I was getting angry at devout believers. And it didn't matter if they were Christian. Muslim didn't matter. People that believe in God were intellectually weak and should shut up because they don't have anything good to contribute to society. So yeah, I was very much an opiate of the masses.
[00:13:02] Speaker B: So in terms of, you said you were pursuing college and potential for law school and you had plans and of course the plans did not include God.
So how did your life, your life within atheism or naturalism work out for you, I mean, did, did it give you the kind of life you were looking for as you were pursuing life along that track?
[00:13:28] Speaker A: You know what's ironic, if you want to come full circle about something, is that back when I was living in that worldview, there's a time in my life and I wanted to be a chef. Now where did that come from? And why is that relevant? Because I, I still do actually love this guy, but he's very secular, humanist, atheist, agnostic at best.
But he was one of my heroes when I was younger and it was Anthony Bourdain, and I'd never made this connection. You know who he is?
[00:14:01] Speaker B: Yes, of course.
[00:14:03] Speaker A: Yeah. And so like, man, you know, I looked at that and said, well, what it would be to live a life like that, you know, to where you could just travel the world, check this food out, talk to people about their culture.
And that was a goal. And then I had another goal, which was to live within driving distance of an ocean somewhere. That was literally my whole life. Like, how, how selfish could that be? Like, that was my entire life goal. Let's make enough money to do those two things, you know, because that sounds interesting.
And so, ironically, today, as a Christian missionary with Ratio Christi, I live within an hour's drive of Galveston, Texas, which is where a beach is, and I travel the world and talk to people about their culture. When you're selfish, you're going to be greedy.
And so I was working real hard to get into politics. Like I really wanted to do that. So while all that's going on underneath the surface was this real, like, desire to just make as much money as possible and all this other stuff. And so all these things started coming together. Jana, in the political world, anybody that's worked there knows you have to have a lot of self control to stay away from the drugs and the drinking and the partying. So there's all the drugs, drinking and partying going on, and then a light bulb goes off and says, well, if I buy a lot of extra drugs, I could just sell those to my friends and make extra money and then I can get wild for free and party for free. And so, okay, let's do so. That was the world, like, no thought of consequences. None of that is just, let's do this. And so eventually the whole drug thing just kind of eclipsed the political thing and I had to drop out of school. I started this downward spiral. And which is what, this is what you do. I mean, that's when you pursue that kind of deep seated sin that's exactly what happens. So. So yeah, that pursuit, like, you. You asked if, like, how did the atheistic worldview work out? That's how it worked out. Like it, you know, because when you don't have God as a moral foundation, then you're just left to your own devices. And if your own devices are getting you ahead and you think you can see this visible thing coming where it's like, wow, this is all tangible. If I can just keep this up for a little while longer and just get into law school school, and then, man, I, I've already got all these political connections. Well, all those political connections tend to go away when you catch some charges for drug. Just catch some drug charges.
So, yeah, so it didn't work out very well for me, actually.
So.
[00:16:36] Speaker B: Goodness.
So you got in trouble with drugs and with the law. You. You had to drop out of your, Your course of education.
So did it land you behind bars somewhere?
[00:16:50] Speaker A: Yeah, it did. I only went to county jail. I never went to prison, but county jail was enough. You know, I did end up, you know, so fast forward a little bit. I was working in politics in 2008, and that's when I quit. 2009 is when I fell out. And then put Pretty quickly, in 2010, I was arrested on drug charges. I'd sold drugs to a confidential informant, caught three felonies, and was lodged in a county jail for only 17 days. Because God had a. He had a plan. And every bit of that I can even remember. Like, at that point, I'd become more of an agnostic Buddhist. I'd come out of my skepticism and honest, if I'm totally honest, I had some drug experiences with psychedelics that were like, maybe there is a God out there. Not to say they're not out there, but I've never met anybody yet that comes to Christianity that way. It's. They seem to find this new age kind of idea of God, which is where I gravitated, kind of like a. I started adopting Buddhism because I was really, you know, and this is the foundation of all this. I think looking back at it, it's like I really had wholeheartedly embraced subjective truth and subjective morality and all of that. So Buddhism just seemed to fit with my worldview. It really was like a religion without cost. Like, I could believe in God, live any way I want. As long as I'm a good person, karma is going to pay me back. It's not really. Like I've. I've said in front of enough audiences now, like, I went from Buddhist to Christianity. And then real Buddhists were sitting in there. They go, oh, yeah, what kind of Buddhism are you practicing? Like Nietzsche or Mahayana or. I'm like the new age American version that really doesn't matter. Like, it's just Buddhism in name only. And that's where I ended up due to the drugs. And then so I go to jail, and I'm actually trying to evangelize some of my fellow inmates in Buddhism. And it was my cellmate, Alonzo, that he finally just called me out. I mean, he wasn't really a Christian per se, but he was. He was like, bill, you know, every bit of that sounds so stupid. After I was trying to talk to him about it one night, and we just kind of laughed about it. But, you know, it's so cool to see God's prevenient grace when I was in that jail, because there are some weird things that happened while I was in there, you know, like, for instance, a friend of mine next door were making crosses out of, like, plastic bags that he would strip up and turn into thread and all this stuff. Anybody that's been incarcerated knows what that is. But, like, they'll thread it with my hand and thread these necklaces and stuff. And he made a cross necklace. And I really. There's something attractive about that. Matter of fact, I don't think you can see it, but it's hanging behind me. And I've always hung it in my offices so I can tell people about it. I've had it for 15 years now. But that cross was. There's something comfortable about that cross. Like, I would pray while I held that cross about my situation. I don't know.
[00:19:53] Speaker B: So who would you. You pray to?
[00:19:55] Speaker A: The God that could help me. The. The moral, therapeutic, deist God, you know, the. The. The God that can help me in my situation, help me get out of this God, you know, help my family, whatever. And then I started going to the church services for bad reasons, because, sadly, in a lot of jails, churches are the place for. It's like a marketplace, you know, people just trading paraphernalia and stuff on the back row. And then there's some people in there taking it seriously, too. But it's the one place once a week for one hour that everybody in every part of the jail can meet up at one spot. You know, so a lot of stuff's being traded around. So that's why I went there that night, was to protect my investment. Buying two cigarettes. Like, I hadn't read the Bible since I was in Third grade. And the only thing I'd read was like the first few chapters of Genesis or something. I mean, I hadn't, I didn't know anything about Christianity, but for some reason it was, if it was like when I was in this situation, it was always Jesus that I would be trying to, you know, lord, get me out of the, you know, not necessarily Jesus, but it was Christianity, I guess it was like, lord, get me out of this. God, get me out of this and I'll go to church. It's like, not God, get me out of this and I will go to temple or I will go to the, the mosque or I'll go. It was always. And that could have been my upbringing. I think that would be a fair criticism. I wasn't raised around a Buddhist temple or a Hindu temple or a mosque. I was raised around a church, in a church community.
But it was certainly Jesus the night that I was saved. I mean, the way I was saved was so Christian, it couldn't have been any other way. And I didn't know the Christian way of salvation.
[00:21:42] Speaker B: So what exactly happened? You said you're saved. That's a very Christian, Christian term.
So talk us through what that looks like and what that means.
[00:21:54] Speaker A: Well, what happened was when I showed up in church that night, this was the day before my arraignment. And if you've. And for those in our audience that's never been through the court process, an arraignment is the basically your pre trial hearing before you get sentenced, before they start talking. It's like this what do we do with you kind of hearing.
So you know, my lawyer had already, I already knew my fate. And I always try to tell people that it wasn't a rock bottom salvation at this point. I'd been in there three weeks.
I had no remorse for what I had done. I felt like I was a victim. I still had a victim mentality.
I wasn't at rock bottom. I really wasn't. I was, I was in there taking notes with my friends about how to be a better criminal. When I got out, I mean, my mind was just in a different space altogether and I had not learned my lesson, sad to say, and at least not until that night.
But yeah, as I'm sitting there, this was the day before my arraignment. I put in a prayer request because like I said, I knew my fate. I put in a prayer request for my mom and dad because I felt bad for them. Like they had no, I just had reconciled. Like, you know, the real victims here are my mom and dad. They don't deserve this. I'm putting them through stuff that they don't deserve.
And so I put in a prayer request for them.
Well, the funny thing about that was my mom was, was raised in a religious home, but it kind of moved away from that later in life. Like she was seeing the decline of her son and had actually started praying again, praying for me. And she prayed for the, for, you know, prayed to God that I'd get out of jail. So I'm putting in a prayer request for my mom. She's praying for me. And as soon, soon as I'm praying, as soon as I put in that prayer request, it was like the presence of God come upon me in such an intrinsic. I mean it was a real Christian way. It wasn't like, like, oh, this is how, like what I really need to do here is just give my life to Christ and like that'll solve. It wasn't that. It was like, it was a very powerful experience, if I'm allowed to use that word, to the sense, to the sense of like. I had never seen the chain reaction of my sins before. I'd never seen the depth of evil that was in my heart. You know, I'd never, I'd never been confronted with that. And that's all it was. There was a preacher preaching a sermon up there. I'm pretty sure he was Pentecostal just by how excited he was. But I don't even know what he said. I really don't. He was pacing back and forth and holding up his Bible. I can remember seeing that, but I can't remember anything he said at all.
I was having this very personal experience with God where the Holy Spirit came and opened up my need for salvation just clearly. I mean, it went all the way down to not. And this was, I don't hear many people say it like this, but it wasn't just like my sins, but it was also a full on confrontation of why I am what I am. And so it was like just the people. Like there were times where people had sinned against me too, that I needed to forgive right then and there. Like it was like, there's like. Remember when this happened when you were a kid, there was a chain reaction here that did this, it did this, it did, did this. And like the same person that did this to you is the person that introduced you to drugs. And this is why drugs meant no, you know, took your first drug when you're 11 years old. That's why you're desensitized to it. You know, it was just like my life playing back to me in reverse, seeing all these chain reactions. And it just logically deduced down to, my entire life has been godless. That's my problem. My entire life has been absolutely godless. And so the only thing that's going to fix this, the only chance I have, really, is to give my life to God.
And what I need right now is. What I need right now is forgiveness of my sins. Because my life is just one big lump pile of sins. And the only thing I really knew about Christianity, you know, you have to understand, I didn't know anything about Christianity. I didn't know the faith I'd rejected. I didn't know that Christianity claimed that Jesus was God in the flesh. I didn't know that. I just knew that Jesus died for my sins. And that somewhere I picked up along the way that when God forgives you of your sins, he casts them as far as east is to the west and remembers them no more. So there was some sort of peace that came to that where it was like, okay, well, I need a restart. And that's it. We need to start here. We need to start, like, if God has forgiven me of my sins as I was sitting there in my chair, waiting on my two cigarettes to come to me, if God has forgiven me of my sins, then it really doesn't matter what the court says tomorrow. It really doesn't matter how society sees me. It really does. None of this matters. Which in a way, kind of fed that worldview of nihilism that I'd already built anyway in some weird way. But at the same time, it was like, I've been trying to live my whole life as if I don't care, but at the same time, I have to care, like, because my entire life has just been a wicked bunch of sin that needs to go, and I need to start over now. And I have to. I have to go a different direction because this is going to kill my parents. It's going to kill me. It's like all of that hit me in, like, 45 minutes.
And so for the first time in that jail, while I was in the service there, the pastors that came and did our church service scooted together like three plastic chairs, you know, that you see in jails. And they were like, tonight, this is our altar. And if you want to give your life to Christ and be made new, then come and receive him. I'm like, be made new. That's exactly what I need.
But then I Tried to stand up and it's like I couldn't. Like all the power of hell was keeping me in my seat. Like, I mean, it was like, it was like a 2 ton brick was sitting in my lap. I was like, why can't I just stand up? Like, this is all I need.
And eventually I like clenched my fist and forced myself up out of the seat. And after that, it's like, it sounds very mystical, but it's almost as if I floated up to the. Like every step I took after that was so, so lot. All I know is that I think I was saved the moment I took that first step because it was just walking toward God. That's all it was. Like, it's a pretty simple salvation especially I think for, you know, somebody who's working in apologetics that works with all kinds of like really big ideas and hard, hard thoughts and stuff. It's like my faith is very simple. I gave my life to Christ on November 4, 7:45pm 2010. It's never been the same since, but that's when, you know. And I mean, I was free, man, I was free. Like, I was still tempted to do drugs after that, but I had no desire. It was so wild. I mean, I had other problems, I had other things that had to work out. But as far as the drug thing was concerned, that was completely. My mind was made up. Like, nope, not touching that. Don't need to, don't need to go there. Because as I was walking out of the church service, Jana back to my cell and oh man. Well, don't want to get ahead of myself. I was praying with these guys. I'd like to know what happened to these other four guys. There's five of us standing around in a circle and these guys were Gideons and they gave me one of those little Gideon's Bibles, which is great.
But I looked at that and I was like, you know, I was a history major. I love studying. I said, I don't want to sound ungrateful, but do you have a bigger Bible? Because I'm actually really going to read this and study it. Like, I really want to know about it. And they gave me a big Gideon's Bible. So here's the Bible. I still keep it around. It's still got all the original little letters and stuff in it that they gave me. And then here's that, the cross that I was talking about. Like, I, I mean this stuff is still like, you know, still very precious to me.
[00:30:18] Speaker B: Oh yes.
[00:30:19] Speaker A: And it's.
[00:30:19] Speaker B: Oh, that's Beautiful.
[00:30:21] Speaker A: Yeah. Can you believe that's made out of like garbage bags and potato chip bags and stuff? I mean, imagine redeemed and the cross said freedom on it. So what I thought was I would get, if I prayed to God I'd get free from jail.
But honestly, when I was walking out of there with this Bible under my arm, I remember the Holy Spirit whispering to me and said, bill, you don't have to do drugs anymore.
And that's still, it's still an overwhelming thought because I mean, looking back at that, my. I was. If that wouldn't have happened, I probably wouldn't be alive today. I was just going down a path of just utter destruction and it would have destroyed my whole family. Like, it's just how it works.
And it really saved every. It saved so much. I mean, if it wasn't for that, I mean, you know, my mom, my mom eventually gave her life to Christ at our church planning at our church plant like five years after that and got baptized and stuff. I mean, it was just such a. It's like now there's chain reaction happening in the opposite direction, you know, so, so I immediately go back to my cell and I call my dad on my last phone card and just. We'd never really talked about religion. I didn't know where he sit on it. But you know, I just was like, I'm a Christian now. And then I went back and I. I read the first 25 chapters of Genesis in this Bible and fell asleep in my bed. Woke up the next day for my arraignment and beyond everybody's. It shocked everybody. But I got released like my, it's on a $15,000 bond. It got dropped down to zero and I got released early, three months early. So. And I often wonder if I, if I wouldn't have made that decision that night. I don't, I don't know if I would have got out the next day, but my parents were shocked. They were like, so, so Bill is getting out? And I was shocked, like, I'm getting out, like, what's going on?
And then I ended up at a church and I prayed and asked the Lord like, what church I should go to. And I felt this impression on my heart that I should go to a church, that, that I should, that I can walk to. Which really paid a lot of dividends in my discipleship because the other two churches I was thinking about, I would have to drive to. And my car was stolen by one of my so called friends when I was in jail. So I Had no vehicle. So I ended up going to this church. And the pastor, to make a long story short, just said, after I told him, I. Quick story. I was too, you know, sheepish to say, like, I feel like the Holy Spirit told me to come down here and. Or like, I felt like God at that point. I didn't know what the Holy Spirit was really, so I felt like God told me to walk down here. He goes, well, you may have walked yourself into a ministry here, which really made me sit back. I'm like, this is way too weird. What's going on? He's like. He said, bill, we've been praying for a year for somebody like you to show up so we can start a drug recovery meeting here to try to meet the needs of some of our families in the church. He said, almost every family in this church has either a niece, nephew, son or daughter, granddaughter, grandson on drugs. And that's where it started. That's where my ministry started, was in that little church. There was a drug abuse counselor that helped me chair a meeting. I think we started a celebrate recovery meeting kind of thing. And we did. I did drug recovery ministry for almost 10 years. Seen a lot of Frida in that.
[00:33:57] Speaker B: So when you. When you left the jail, you were. You were given freedom, spiritually and physically. You were given freedom. And you said you had no desire for drugs anymore after that. That. That. That's almost like a supernatural.
[00:34:14] Speaker A: Well, let me clarify that. I don't want to say that I didn't.
The temptation can feel an awful lot like a desire, you know, And I think a lot of people get those two things confused.
A temptation is the want to do something. There's something like preying upon your carnal nature to go do something. But there's another side of me that was fighting so hard against that, which was the Holy Spirit. That was like, you know, is that Romans 7, man, just playing out? Like, it's like. It's like. Like, I really, really, really want to obey God here. But then there's this other thing that's drawing me back, and I wanted nothing to do with it except for when those temptations hit and that. And that drug abuse counselor was a very godly man. He still plays a big role in my life today. We've been best friends ever since, you know, I came. Came to cross. He's. His name is John. Shout out to John. He's played a big role in my life. And he. He said, bill, whenever those temptations come, it's just simple enough that you just pray that's the best defense you have. As I prayed and prayed and prayed, after about six months, that temptation just kind of left.
[00:35:22] Speaker B: Yeah, that temptation isn't there anymore.
[00:35:25] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:35:26] Speaker B: So you had this, this powerful going back to that moment of conviction where you almost had a life review and you could see how sin affected you, how it was preyed upon you, essentially P R E Y as well as the sin that you had committed. And you, you felt the guilt of that and the weight of that, but yet you were freed from that when you, when you. And you were made a new person, a new, a new person in Christ and you were given a new lease on life, which is pretty amazing. So it felt as if the way that you sent you explain it is. It was experiential. There's something powerful and palpable and real. And, and I think that for, for anybody who's experienced something really real, especially if it's, if it's supernatural or spiritual or godly, in a sense, there's no denying the experience, you know. Yeah, but, but, but yet you're sitting here and you are a proponent of giving a rational defense for the faith.
[00:36:33] Speaker A: Sure.
[00:36:34] Speaker B: Oftentimes people will say that's, you know, you had that good experience. Good for you, Bill. Yeah, I'm sure you think it's real, but yet how do you know it's true?
[00:36:46] Speaker A: I've been asked that a lot and I say pretty quickly, like, well, sure, my faith started subjective, became objective, became objective over time. When you have an encounter with the living God, it's going to be subjective. That's okay.
But that doesn't mean that the entirety of the faith is subjective. We test that by going into scripture and saying, well, what was the fruit of my religious experience? Jesus said you would know them by their fruits. How supernatural is it that even in the midst of all the cultural chaos that we're in right now in the west, that you can pray and ask the Lord to help you and he can impart to you love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self control.
Yeah. How in the world, like, how can, how can somebody who is a drug addict being parted with self control enough not to ever touch a drug again? Like that's supernatural, you know, that's very supernatural. So I had that going for me already, but that didn't mean that I didn't have questions. Right. Because I had all these years of college, all these years of public education, which is why I work with Rachel Christie today, is that I was the fruit of all of that. As A skeptic. I was listening to Ehrman, but then. And Dawkins and all these other people. But then I'd never heard the other side of this stuff. I'd never heard that there's actually validity to some of this stuff.
And so my pastor, he goes, he goes, you know, after, after about a month of dealing with all of my questions, he's like, bill, you have got to learn some apologetic stuff. You've got to be. You have this, this hunger to read here, read this book. And he gave me, Lee, please, Strobel's Case for Christ. I mean, it's a great introduction to apologetics kind of book. I started reading that and then, you know, I found a scientific apologetics series. And I was like, man, so there's scientific reasons, there are historical reasons, and, and even, you know, you talk about a full circle thing.
I didn't really, I didn't really pay much attention in my, in my philosophy class, really.
But, you know, one of the things that humbled me, the Lord spoke to me one day. I'm one of those weird Christians that actually thinks that God can talk to them. But I was walking down the hallway of the church one day and I felt the Lord lay on my heart. The beginning of all knowledge is knowing that you know nothing out of nowhere. Because I needed humbling at that point in my life because I was learning all these apologetics things and I was like becoming Mr. Know It All Christian and apologetics, and I didn't even know how to talk about the Trinity. And I'm sitting here talking about creation, evolution, column, cosmological, blah, blah, blah, you know, and when the, when the Lord laid that little truth on my heart. The beginning of all knowledge is knowing that you know nothing. I got out of apologetics for a while and actually studied theology. I went to back to school, did a biblical studies degree, really got grounded in the scripture word, theology, all that. And then I really felt this strong conviction to do apologetics full time, which is where I'm at today. I see the need for apologetics not just to reach, reach the lost and make a defense for the faith against the people that come against our faith and the ideas that come against our faith, but also man, just in discipleship. Where would I be today without that apologetics foundation, knowing that there are good reasons to build my faith on, you know, and this is not, this is not just about subjective religious experiences, but I don't discount those either, and I'm thankful for that. Nothing wrong with this religious experience, but don't build your faith on religious experience. Religious experiences are okay, but just test those. And when you test them, you find out, wait a minute, there is a firm foundation for all of my faith. And you know, when you study other world religions, there's not another religion in the world that has that where you can actually test your experience with scripture. And you start realizing this isn't anything new. This has been going on for centuries. This has been going on for a millennia. This is so awesome.
[00:41:03] Speaker B: Right? You know, it's interesting, Bill, I. More and more, the more stories that I hear of people who once rejected God and once rejected the faith of Christianity and Christ for very rational reasons or whatever, find themselves in the midst of a spiritual experience or a religious experience that is so surprising to them. You know, of course, if, but it's like you say, if we are spiritual beings, we are, we are souls with the body, not bodies with the soul. As C.S. lewis would say, that, that we live in an enchanted world, a spiritual world that oftentimes if we're too rational, right, if we're too left brain, if we're too, you know, just reason, logic. When I'm thinking about your story there, there are arcs in everyone's story, right? But you, you presented even as you were growing up, you had this degree of arrogance. You were really humbled in, in jail. And when you accepted Christ, but then after your, your acceptance of Christ, you were, you became a little bit self, admittedly, a little bit prideful and arrogant and you're puffed up in your own knowledge. But. And then you were reminded again that there has to be humility in order to really earnestly learn or look or seek. You have to be open to that, right? And so I'm the skeptic who might be listening and who really is curious. And they're open and they're humble enough to listen to you, to listen to your story, to listen to what you might have to recommend in terms of how might they might find this God.
[00:42:47] Speaker A: Whom you've found, really think it's just so personal.
I think, I think though, there's a principle if we want to be like Jordan Peterson. And look at this just simply as a metaphor, if you will, to the skeptic out there.
God gives grace to the humble but opposes the proud. Now, you know, even if you don't believe in God, let's think about this metaphorically. I mean, you're not going to learn anything if you know it all. I mean, that's maybe a life motto for me. Like, and if you're really wanting to learn something, you have to accept that they're like, you know, this is a crude analogy, but if you think of it like food, okay, like people with food aversions, I don't get that. I don't. I don't know. Like, I'm a foodie. I love, you know, cultural stuff. It's like every time that you say no to a dish, you could be saying no to your new favorite food. Like, why wouldn't you just, like, what's the risk here? Like, just give it a taste, you know, just taste it. Be open to where the evidence leads. Don't. Don't make up your mind, you know, and then just reject everything that sounds contrary to it. Really seek after truth. I mean, that ought to be our life's pursuit. If I could find a worldview that's more true, I would follow it. But I can't see any other explanation of reality that best fits what I see happening in the world every day of my life than Christianity. And this is coming from a person that was in the exact opposite camp. I was the guy advocating for everything anti Christian that I could. Not even trying to be anti Christian. That's just how it came out, you know, but in later in life, I was even explicitly anti Christian when I was working in politics and things. So it was, it was like, yeah, but at the same time, my pursuit was not truth. It was justifying my presuppositions. And, and I think you have to. I think it takes a lot of intellectual humility to admit perhaps I am wrong here. You know, Know what you know, but say, be willing to say, too, perhaps I am wrong and perhaps I need to give this dish a taste because, you know, there's probably good reason why millions of or billions of people on this world actually enjoy this dish.
So maybe I should give it a taste because maybe I am missing something here, you know, And I think that takes a little bit of. I think that takes, well, honestly, a commendable amount of intellectual humility. As a matter of fact, I absolutely love talking to intellectually humble Muslims, atheists, Buddhists, agnostics, people that come from a different perspective than me, because what a great conversation that is. If you can maintain that and still be friends at the end of the conversation. Just talk about something you're diametrically opposed to, but at the same time, you know, maintain that too. And, and, and I think one last thing. I think if you're a skeptic out there, try to find that kind of Christian, like an Intellectually curious, humble Christian, find a Christian friend, and I can be that guy if you need me to be.
[00:46:08] Speaker B: So thank you. Thank you for that openness and that availability. Honestly, Bill. And finally, as we're. You obviously engage a lot with people of other perspectives, and I think about your own journey. I think about the, the, the guy in jail who, who kind of gently challenged you. You a little bit to, to think more clearly. And then of course, your mom, who was prayerful. She, she, she didn't give up on you. She wanted the best for you. And she actually, admittedly, and, and according to your story, she wasn't even really a, a Christian at that time, but she knew that you needed prayer and, and she sought the best way that she knew at the time time to pray for you. And there's something very powerful about that as we are Christians and engaging with others. What it, what, what are some ways I, I love your, your, the way that you phrase being intellectually humble because I think especially in the world of apologetics, it's easy not to be humble.
[00:47:18] Speaker A: It's a temptation not to be, really.
[00:47:20] Speaker B: Right, right. So there are so many different directions you could go here, but how would you encourage us as Christians to engage in a way that's winsome and humble and prayerful? You're right.
[00:47:33] Speaker A: I'm glad you brought up the prayer thing, because the sake of time. I didn't go into a lot of detail on this, but my mom wasn't the only one that, like, I had friends at my workplace that were taking their lunch break. I didn't know this. Praying and fasting for me.
No, they, they knew that I was not open. But, you know, and there's another thing, too, that my resting officer knew, understood who I was better than me, honestly. And I can't mention his name on the air, but we're still friends today, actually. And he turned around and looked at me and he said, bill, he knew it was my first time going to jail. He said, bill, I'm going to tell you something. It's not what happens to you, it's how you react to it. And he told me after I was arrested and we talked about a year later, I was like, he was like, that was all the gospel I felt like I could give to you at that moment. We need to be there to love them, guide them and direct them, and be there to plant that seed when it needs to be planted. If it wasn't for my arresting officer planting that seed, I don't know where I would be today. But he couldn't just turn around in his seat and be like, you understand you need salvation for your sins. And I'd look at him and be like, I'm an agnostic Buddhist. That doesn't apply to me.
It's like. And the conversation's over. So, yeah, so I, I think, yeah, I think we just need, we need to have some tact.
We need to understand the people we're talking to and we need to listen. But not only listen, also be ready to respond when we see that there's a teachable moment there without being forceful about it. You know, be willing to give wisdom. Because I think good listening always results in good direction. So that's, that's my way of thinking about it anyway.
[00:49:23] Speaker B: That's wonderful wisdom, Bill. When I, when I just sitting here listening to your whole story, you're, you are really a beautiful example of a life that has been transformed, formed. I think that there is something in all of us. You know, at the beginning of your story, you, you thought you knew the way that you wanted to live. You, you, you lived according to your own desires and you found yourself in a really hard place. I think so many times we think we know best, right? We think we know better than God. We don't need God. But it was then in that place of humility and brokenness. And we all know that we're broken. But you've shown us that's forgiven and redeemed can look like. And I appreciate so much you, you coming forward, you, you demonstrating in such a beautiful way that brokenness can be become beautiful and that you can find a life that's so redemptive and so, so different than living in trying and striving for yourself. This story will be a blessing to so many people who can see what life in Christ is like. So thank you again for coming on.
[00:50:41] Speaker A: All right, thank you, Jana.
[00:50:44] Speaker B: Thank you for joining us on Ex Skeptic to hear Bill Scott's journey to learn more about his work with Ratio Christi and the resources he recommends. Don't forget to check out the episode notes. We'd love to hear your thoughts on today's episode. Whether you have questions, feedback, feedback, or you're joining us for the first time, reach out to
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