[00:00:00] Speaker A: And what I realized is that God took me in a state, that I rejected him. I've debated people when I was an atheist saying that there's no way he existed.
I, I really dirtied his name in front of anybody who would listen.
And then he still called me and he still accepts me. And I read this, I go, not only does he accept me, but he came down as a human and died a horrible, just brutal death for me.
Once you open your mind to that and your heart to that, it becomes a whole different world.
[00:00:44] Speaker B: Hi, I'm Jana Harmon from the Ex Skeptic podcast. Do you have intellectual doubts about God and Christianity?
This kind of skepticism can come after years of belief or prevent you from ever believing at all.
We've Talked with over 120 former skeptics and atheists who've shared similar doubts.
That's why we've created playlists on our YouTube channel organized by themes like Is it rational to believe in God? Can you believe in science and God?
There you can hear from many others who've wrestled with similar questions.
Find us on YouTube at xkeptic and explore these playlists. And others subscribe and share it. Because someone else might need to know that they're not the only ones with questions. Questions.
Hello and welcome to Ex Skeptic, the podcast where we explore the stories of those who once resisted or rejected belief in God, but who found themselves transformed by the very faith they once dismissed. I'm your host, Jana Harmon. In today's episode, we meet Dr. David Shapiro, a man whose journey takes us from Jewish atheist to Christian pastor.
David's story is a surprising one. He never guessed, after 30 years of disbelief, that he would find himself as a follower of Jesus and a passionate desire for others to know what he's found.
So wherever you are in your own journey, whether skeptical, curious, or quietly searching, I invite you to listen closely. Because sometimes the most unlikely stories are the ones that open the door to a deeper truth.
This is Ex Skeptic. Let's get started.
Welcome to X Skeptic. David, it's so great to have you with me today.
[00:02:31] Speaker A: Oh, thank you so much. It's a pleasure to be here.
[00:02:33] Speaker B: I'd love for the listeners to get to know who you are. David, can you introduce us to yourself the kind of work that you do, ministry you're involved in, and your recent educational achievement?
[00:02:45] Speaker A: Yes. So, my name is David Shapiro. I am a pastor and a chaplain for a local fire department.
I'm also a co host for the Boundless Bible podcast and I Am a new published author. It'll be coming out soon, take a few more months. But I actually have a published book coming out calling Jesus Christ A Lot of Evidence and educationally wise, I am really blessed. I just received my doctorate in religious education and kind of moving forward with whatever plan God has for me in the future. I don't really have a plan. It's just I'm enjoying sharing the gospel with people. I'm enjoying having these conversations, and we'll kind of see where God leads me, me down. I'm a father of three, husband of one, and I'm just really loving, loving life right now. God has me on an incredible journey.
[00:03:36] Speaker B: Yeah, that's fantastic. Just quickly, can you give us a.
Just a hint of what your book is about? Jesus and the evidence and also your podcast, Boundless Bible?
[00:03:49] Speaker A: Yes. So the book was. I fell in love with apologetics years ago, and this is my version of apologetics. And what it is, it's a blend of apologetics, I think that a lot of people who are familiar with the term have read, have heard about, but it's blended with my background, which is Jewish, is uniquely Jewish. So it comes from a different perspective, a different angle than maybe some people have heard before.
And the same thing with the Boundless Bible. It's me and two other gentlemen. We come from three very, very different walks of life who all came together in a Bible study.
And with all of our different opinions, it all leads to Christ. So the Boundless Bible, we come together and just have some really great conversations about stories in the Bible.
[00:04:34] Speaker B: That's fantastic. I hope our listeners will take advantage of listening to that podcast. We'll put a link in the show notes. Now, you mentioned that you're Jewish, so I presume that you grew up in a Jewish family.
[00:04:47] Speaker A: I grew up living out in an Orthodox household in Queens, New York. So the, the training that I had young was through the Torah.
But I, you know, having grown up in a Jewish neighborhood, I didn't have a lot of.
I didn't have a lot of dealings with the name Christ. I didn't even know who Jesus Christ was. And believe it or not, like most people actually thought Jesus Christ was his full name, first name Jesus, last name Christ.
I, I really didn't know a lot about him. It's not something that's taught in Yeshiva. It's not something taught in Hebrew school.
So it wasn't as if I was rejecting Jesus yet.
It was. I never really learned that there was anybody called Jesus.
And then when I got A little bit older.
What I knew about Jesus was people were upset because Jews kill him.
So I was almost felt like I was an outsider and people didn't like me because of something that happened thousands of years ago.
But my.
From very young, I just remember following the Jewish tradition, yes, studying, yes, going to temple, but more just celebrating the different traditions, different holidays, having a lot of respect and reverence for the Jewish tradition, more than even God. It was really more about the traditions and celebrating and those types of things. And I just remember my whole youth growing up having those moments.
I was a fairly well behaved youth. I wasn't somebody who's rebellious quite a bit.
Except for Hebrew school, I didn't love it. I didn't feel connected there.
I remember being probably 7 or 8 years old and I wrote a letter and on the note it said, school is closed. And I put it on the temple door.
So when I went home, my mother had said, hey, how come you're not a Hebrew school? I said, I don't know, the school's closed, there's a note on the door.
So although I wasn't very rebellious, there were moments like that that came here, there.
[00:06:48] Speaker B: Okay, okay. So through, through your training, your rigorous, it sounds like educational, religious training, did you see religion as more than a ritual or a rite?
Did you actually perceive that there was a real God out there somewhere and that the prophets and the, the history of Abraham and Moses and all of the stories, were they real people? Was this something that was significant to you or was it just something that you did?
[00:07:27] Speaker A: I think in the very beginning, I still hoped that this was all true, that there was a God.
And I felt like the rabbi and the really religious men of the temple were the ones who had access to him.
And that, you know, if I studied more and I got more mature, that I would, you know, finally be able to have a relationship with God. So, and, and even that relationship wasn't a relationship as I know it now. It was really, I will understand God more and what he wants and what he expects of me as I got older. And then what happened was actually the opposite. The older I got, the less connected I felt and the more I felt like this is just about a tradition. There really was no connection with God, that, yes, God existed. I wasn't quite an atheist just yet.
I felt as though God was still there, but just very, very distant.
Somebody who. We celebrate, we celebrate what he did.
Very past tense. He did this thousands of years ago.
Thanks so much.
You know, I appreciate the holidays. We get from it and the days off. But there really wasn't much connection to him.
And the same thing when I started going to temple, it became, you have the people who spoke Hebrew who daven inch in temple, they spoke so fast and it just seemed like they were trying to get through it. And it was. Davening is where you just kind of shake. It's called the, the name for it is shaking.
So when you shake, you're, you're saying the prayers and, and you're doing a posture. And for me it just seemed like that's what it was. It was just a posture. Let me just get through it quick as possible.
And then when there were holidays, you know, you'd have Passover where I'd go to my grandparents house, I'd be hungry, ready to eat. I was a growing boy and I just know, you know, hey, this great food.
And what ended up happening was they're praying and they're going through the Hagadah, the scripture for Passover and the prayers and blessings for Passover for hours.
And it was just all about the inconvenience of what tradition was doing.
And, and I couldn't understand where the connection was with God.
[00:09:50] Speaker B: I can see where that could happen, especially when you're going through a lot of motions and a lot of ritual and. Yeah.
And you may not be as invested obviously as some of those rabbis are and it would be a little bit hard to understand. But I appreciated the sentiment though, though that you wanted to be better to closer to God or understand more as you were moving along.
So. And you even went to Hebrew school and, and all of that learning as you were going.
So what happened? Did you start to get closer to God or was that something you became less and less interested in starting to question or doubt more? How did that look?
[00:10:36] Speaker A: It actually became guilt. So my grandfather, who again Orthodox Jewish man, very religious, saw me starting to stray from temple and Hebrew school and not being interested in my bar mitzvah. And believe it or not, when I was 13, I actually was not bar mitzvahed. I wasn't prepared and my grandfather was very disappointed.
At the same time, my brother was kind of going down the same path and he became an atheist way earlier than I did.
But we were both heading the same path. He completely dropped out of Hebrew school, wanted nothing to do with it.
And for me, I felt tremendous guilt. My grandfather came to me and this is after he had a stroke. And he said, I just want to see my grandson get bar mitzvahed.
And I went back and actually hired a cantor at that time to help prepare me to read from the Torah and be bar mitzvahed. And I went through lessons, private lessons with him for several months.
And I was bar mitzvahed and I was 15 at the time. And I remember my grandfather sitting there, ear to ear, grin, so proud, so happy for me. And I felt.
I felt good, I felt pride for doing that for him.
But again, there was zero connection for me. I didn't feel anything while I was up there. I didn't feel God.
And. And if anything, I think the guilt tore me further away where I didn't understand if he was feeling this way and he saw God in such a way and I did not, there had to have been something wrong with me.
So I felt more and more guilt towards that and kind of pulled away further and further. And at that point I was, you know, a young teenager, so other things took its place. I played sports, I hung around with friends again, I wasn't a bad kid. I didn't go running the streets, but I did occupy all of my time from studying to, hey, I'm just gonna have fun and, and play and do what teenagers do, and. And that was my life. And very happily moved there from Judaism.
School confused me even further. The lessons in school, you're hearing about everything that contradicts what, what Hebrew school was saying about creation and the Bible. And I'm going, well, this is. Science is saying the complete opposite. This is not what I'm going to believe if this is true and I don't feel God, but I can see science, that I'm going to trust the science, I'm going to trust the history, and I'm going to move further and further away from God and Judaism, the religion.
While always, I've never lost my appreciation for the Jewish people, I've never lost my appreciation, even today, for the traditions. It's beautiful, it's rich, it's loving. The music, all of it just makes me smile.
But there was no God there.
[00:13:30] Speaker B: Okay, that's pretty significant.
So you were dismissing the possibility of the reality of God and you didn't feel God. So it was like both head and heart.
You were stepping away. Now you said your brother had become an atheist. Probably by this time. Would you have labeled yourself an atheist? And when was that?
[00:13:53] Speaker A: No, I definitely wouldn't have labeled myself an atheist. I felt as though probably agnostic more than anything. There. There's something out there. It's just not. I can't put my finger on it. I don't know the name to it. I have no relationship with, with him or her. I just. There is an entity out there that controls some stuff, but not everything. It was this weird conglomerate of emotions of. I think science created the world and nature had something to do with it. But then there's a God who moved some people around and I couldn't quite put my finger on it. And to be honest, I didn't think about it that much. It wasn't something that consumed me to even study.
I, I was okay being a semi believer in some sort of entity out there and that was it.
And you know, many, many years later, I remember then I used to struggle with the fear of death.
And I remember years later meeting people who were faithful, one being my wife. And I said, man, it's, it's incredible for you to have such comfort around death that you know where you're going.
I just don't believe in that, so I don't have comfort in it.
So I think at that time there was a belief in some sort of God. Just I don't really know what he was in control of, what he wasn't in control of, if he was even around anymore. He just was, hey, you're up in the stars in the heavens and for all I know you're. You're Zeus on the mountaintop and you're not really doing anything anymore.
[00:15:19] Speaker B: As you were continuing on in your education, were you still at Hebrew school through high school and into college, or had you gone away from Hebrew school? I'm. I'm asking because I wondered if you had encountered. You said you'd never really heard about Jesus.
Wondered if you'd even even encountered any Christians or anything other than your Jewish religious heritage.
[00:15:43] Speaker A: I dropped out of Hebrew school. Not dropped out, but I had stopped Hebrew school after my bar mitzvah again. I, I wasn't prepared.
So I wasn't going to be the 14 year old going to Hebrew school with 9 and 10 year olds.
So I stopped going.
The public school that I went to did have Christians there. So I did learn about Christianity, about Christ, not, not in terms of what he did and the Bible, but more in terms of again, well, Jews are the ones that killed Christ. So all of a sudden I was now guilt and embarrassed that I was a Jew.
And what's interesting is that's actually, I think the first nudge.
Excuse me, that's the first nudge that Jesus ever gave me.
I remember wearing the Star of David around my neck for probably 10 years. And I remember seeing somebody Wearing the cross and almost being jealous, saying, I like that symbol better than mine. And it was a weird feeling and I feel like it was the first nudge of, hey, there's something else. There's something you don't know about.
And I remember that distinctly is, is watching that cross and going, man, I really, I kind of like that.
But again, not paying too much attention to it. Moving on.
I had this great ignorance, which was bliss, of I don't care, I don't know.
I wasn't labeling myself an atheist because I didn't care enough to evil even label that.
My brother did. My brother understood that. He's four years older, so he knew he was an atheist and was very, I think, proud of it. He was a scientist and that's what he did in his life.
And for me, I, I could care less. It didn't matter. There was no relationship with God. So I'm just going to be me. I'm going to be a good human, which I'm sure you hear all the time. I'm just a good person and that's good enough. And that was me. If there is a heaven, I am a good person and that will get me there. And that's it. I don't need to know anything else.
So let me go and enjoy the rest of my time.
As far as Christianity is concerned, you know, in Hebrew school, what a lot of people think is that they look and they go, hey, how can, how can you read the Old Testament, not see Jesus all the way through this? How can you look at Isaiah 53, which is one of my favorite, you know, chapters, and go, how do you not see Jesus all through this? And what I tell them is we don't study that. And, and it's not as if we have a physical Bible that we bring to temple with us. We have a prayer book called the Sidur. That's what we bring with us. It's blessings, it's prayers.
We don't actually have a hard copy Bible. What it is the Torah, which is owned by the synagogue that you're in, and it's read by the rabbi and they only read certain parts. And you don't get to Isaiah 53. And it's not something that's taught. So somebody who said, hey, what about Isaiah 53?
What are you talking about? What Isaiah 53, it's not something that's even taught.
So we're not taught not to believe. We're just not taught the information that would open our eyes.
[00:18:53] Speaker B: For those who are not familiar with the book of Isaiah as a prophet in the Old Testament and what you mean by Isaiah 53, can you just briefly explain that?
[00:19:06] Speaker A: So in Isaiah 53 it talks about the suffering servant pierced for our transgressions. This is the prophecy, the future prophecy of Jesus and even talking about him being pierced for our transgressions and everything that's in there.
This is a beautiful prophecy of the actual historical Jesus Christ that came.
Which Jewish people, especially Orthodox, I can't say all. I was not in a reformed temple, but Orthodox Judaism did not teach this. They did not show you this, this chapter, this verse.
So to say that I rejected Jesus, I didn't have a chance to, I didn't know who Jesus was to even reject him.
[00:19:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I can see where that would happen.
Yeah, that prophecy was written what, about 600 years prior to the time of Christ? Yes, and I believe at the time Roman crucifixion hadn't even been invented.
[00:20:01] Speaker A: No, it was not a thing yet.
[00:20:02] Speaker B: As a form of torture and death. But yeah, if anybody's interested in that, I, I encourage them to just google Isaiah 53 and read that chapter in its fullness. So you were just going on with your life essentially you were, you were fine on your own. You really didn't care about the things of God. You didn't dismiss it out of hand altogether, it sounds like, but it just wasn't something of interest to you in your life.
So what happened? You were. Did you continue on in the, in that road where you're leaving God just over there on the side or what happened?
[00:20:39] Speaker A: I, I think that it's anything else. Like perfect example, the road, when you drive away from something, it's smaller and smaller and smaller. And I think that you have years of him getting smaller and smaller until the point he was just non existent for me. And this was probably right around the time I was maybe 17 years old where if I was going to label it, I would have been an atheist. At that point I just, there was no thought of God. I don't believe that God really existed at that point.
I don't know if it was ever a full thing. There might be a little nudge still in me, but for the most part it was about as distant away as possible.
I driven down the road for miles. When I looked back, I couldn't see even a speck.
So from that point I had always struggled in school.
I was dyslexic, I struggled. So trying to get into college was very difficult. When I finally got into college, my grades were Some of the worst. I think I've ever heard any. How do you say. I mean, it was. I just really couldn't get my. Myself together in school and decided that that was no longer for me, and then went away to the military. And I said, I need to grow up. I just felt like this was a moment of immaturity and I needed to grow up quickly. And I felt like the military was that point to grow up in.
And I think that's the second time that Jesus nudged me a little bit.
Because when you're in the military and you go through stressful situations, a lot of people turn to God. There are a lot of very religious people in the military leaning on the hope and protection of God. And I went to Jewish studies there. I felt stressed, and I said, I'm going to go to Jewish studies. And I felt nothing, exactly as I was as a kid. There was zero there.
And I said, man, you know, I still need this, but I'm not getting this here. And I went to church and I went to a Sunday service in the. In the military.
And I remember actually saying, okay, I'm going to do all the things you're supposed to do. And I got down on my knees and I prayed, and I actually felt a little better there than I did at Jewish services.
And I think it was the second time that Jesus kind of nudged me and just said, hey, take note.
There's a little something here.
They hand you a Bible when you go into the military, and it's called a bulletproof Bible. It's only about that big, and you put it in your shirt pocket. And the reason it's called bulletproof are there stories of military personnel being shot and they live because the bullet goes into the Bible and not into their heart.
So they handed me this bulletproof Bible and I put it in my shirt lapel pocket, and that was my protection. And I. I felt all the things I thought you're supposed to feel.
And then the moment my military time was done, that was it. There was no God. It was right back to, no, I'm an atheist. There really wasn't any. It was just me trying to feel peace myself. And it was me all along.
And I tricked my brain into thinking something happened and I'm okay.
And I moved from military to actually professional fighting and open up a martial arts school.
I had learned combat in the military. I'd taken some martial arts growing up, and I became a professional fighter.
And if you're ever going to feel more pride and empowerment, it's Professional fighting. It was all me. There was no, I'm the one training, I'm the one fighting, I'm the one in the ring, I'm the one. It's all I, I, I, full of pride. And that's what I felt is just this overwhelming sense of me.
And then whatever speck was left on the road was completely gone.
There really was no God. I, I had moved so far away from believing in, in any type of entity that there wasn't even the God of the Jewish people. It was, There is nobody. There is, it's just the world and science and nature and me.
And look what I have accomplished and look what I've done. And I fought all of the guilt that I have felt my entire life in a ring. I took it out there. I said, I'm going to build myself as strong as I possibly can.
I had some rough parenting for my father growing up who was no longer in my life, and I was going to take that out on the ring and everything was, you know, an accident. It was happenstance. This is how I was born and raised. So I'm gonna take it in my own control. And I just happened to be able to take a punch in a ring. And that's because my father would hit me when I was growing up and kind of put everything in that perspective. And I, man, did I cover myself with a whole lot of pride and, and became bigger and bigger. And it's funny, my friends look at me, they go, your name is David, but you look like Goliath.
I, I am.
[00:25:38] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:25:39] Speaker A: I'm six three, I'm 275 pounds, I'm a big guy. So I had everything in the world to be prideful about and kind of moved my life along that way and then got into other careers and kept being a good person, really didn't get into trouble. I, I worked at non profits, I raised money for nonprofits. I was a quote unquote good person and as happy as can be being ignorant to God's voice.
[00:26:07] Speaker B: Yeah, just no need for God. It sounds like you were doing just fine on your own. Very, very independent, strong, obviously, as a man, able to conquer, able to win, able to work, it sounds like, very successfully on your own. So what interrupted that? What disrupted that?
[00:26:28] Speaker A: So I'll tell you the third time that Jesus came and knocked on my door. My mother had terminal cancer for 10 years. For 10 years they were saying, hey, in six months you might pass.
And she did that for 10 years. And so there was no way to understand when she was going to actually pass away.
And two weeks roughly before she passed away, she accepted Jesus Christ as her Lord and savior.
And it was. I mean, just out of the blue to me.
I didn't understand it. I couldn't. She was watching preachers on the tv. She just gave her life to Christ right at the end. And I thought it was bizarre. And then my brother married the daughter of a Baptist minister, gave his life to Christ.
[00:27:16] Speaker B: Wait, wait, your atheist brother?
[00:27:19] Speaker A: Yes, my atheist brother accepted Jesus, married the daughter of a Baptist minister, and. And went to church. And still to this day is all in for Jesus. Just on fire for Jesus.
It was the most bizarre series of events that to me, seemingly happened within a month worth of time.
And I couldn't understand it.
And to this day, I still. I don't know if I'll ever fully understand how God works and why he did all of that.
But still, at that time, I rejected God. I was like, well, my mom was dying, so she needed to hang on to something. And my brother, you know, he needed to hang on to something as well and fell in love with somebody that just happened to be the daughter of a Baptist minister. And I put it as very situational. And I still know. I'm still the one who knows. And you guys are crazy. And that's really how I lived for man. It probably was another six years. It was probably six years after that. I was still an atheist and they were nuts. And I was completely content in. My brother would have conversations about Christ with me. I'm going, you're, you're. You're crazy. And I shut him down. We can't talk about this anymore. I don't want to. This is not something I'm interested in. So he stopped talking to me about Jesus.
And that was it. I just kind of lived my life like I said, the way I always did. I am a good person and I'm happy and I'm doing well, and that's all there is to it. And then all of a sudden, I literally woke up one day and I don't know why. And I looked at my wife and I said, I think I want to go to church.
And she was like, what are you talking about?
And I said, I think I want to go to church. And you should know that my wife. And again, I wasn't religious. I didn't care who I married, but was an Irish Catholic.
And she goes, what do you mean you're gonna go to church? And I said, I just feel like I woke up and I feel like There's a tug. I need to go to church.
[00:29:21] Speaker B: Did your wife practice. Did your wife practice her Catholicism?
[00:29:24] Speaker A: She. No, she. So she doesn't go to Catholic mass. She was not a practicing. Yeah, Catholic. And so I. I looked up what local churches were by my house, and I found one that was a couple blocks away. I didn't even know where they were. Were. That was how far away I was from ever thinking about this.
And.
[00:29:44] Speaker B: And can I just interrupt you for a moment because I'm still, like, curious why the sudden desire to go? I mean, was there. Was it a dream? Was it just something you've been thinking about? I mean, what. What do you think? I know you were nudged. Sounds like you were nudged.
[00:30:01] Speaker A: It was. Yeah, it was. It was a nudge in a way that there was no dream of. Hey, you need to go here.
And there was no active searching before. Then I literally woke up and I. I have to imagine that, you know, obviously people get nudged in different ways. God just put it on my brain. You need to go to church.
And I didn't hear a voice. I didn't. It wasn't, you know, thunder outside. It was just.
I woke up out of the blue and said, I need to go to church. I just woke up and had this urge, and it wasn't one that I was willing to part with. It wasn't one where I was going, oh, maybe I'll think about it. Maybe I'll. It was. I woke up, I need to go to church. I need to look it up now and go right now.
I didn't know that there were multiple services. I didn't know how church even worked for a Jewish temple. You know, you typically have to go become a member. You have to, you know, pay for a seat for High Holy Days. There's a lot behind it. For church. I'm going. I don't even know if they want me there. I'm this old Jew who doesn't even believe in God. Like, am I even going to be accepted? All these things ran through my brain, but none of it was a red flag. All of it was like, no, I need to go.
And it was this just massive, urgent in me, as if you're taking a breath. I don't know why I breathe. I don't know why I need to inhale. There are moments I just inhale. And that was that moment. I need to go. I need to have this experience.
So I looked up a local place and I went and I entered in and they were wonderful. They greeted me. They had their Greeters. And they greeted me, and I didn't really know what I was doing. I told them I never been to church before for I don't know what to do.
And they had a pastor come up to me, and he kind of walked me through it and sat me in service and said, when we're done with service, we'll talk.
And I'm sure a lot of people had this experience, but God spoke to me and, man, through that pastor. Everything that pastor said on stage was towards me. And he talked about the heavenly Father that loves you. And I had struggled for years with the love of my father that didn't love me. And I'm going, what do you mean, there's a father that loves me? I didn't understand that. And he did this whole sermon on the love of the Father for his children and everything he said, I just needed to hear at that very moment.
And it was the most clear I had ever felt in my entire life. There had never been a moment where I felt more clear, more heard, more loved.
And when I stepped out, the. The pastor said, do you have a Bible? I. I'd never owned a Bible. I'd never owned one when I was, you know, reading the Torah. I said, no. And he handed me a Bible, and I. I didn't even know what to do with it. And he said, well, look, there are ways you can read the Bible. He said, you can do this, you can do that. He gave me all the different ways to study it and read it, and he prayed with me, and I left.
And that week, I read the entire Bible, the whole thing, cover to cover.
And it became.
It wasn't something where somebody looks at me and goes, wow, how are you able to do that? It was.
It was the greatest thing I think I ever experienced because I had known the Old Testament, I studied the Torah.
This was the sequel that I never knew was even there. This was like watching all of your, I don't know, favorite Harry Potter moments and going, wow, now I get to see the sequel of this. It was.
I can't believe.
There was this whole other part of. Of my faith that I knew nothing about, and I couldn't put it down. And I read and I read and I read.
And when I was done with it, I had read it almost three times in the first three months.
[00:34:06] Speaker B: Are you talking about the New Testament?
[00:34:09] Speaker A: Like, the entire Bible?
[00:34:11] Speaker B: The entire Bible. Okay, so you read part one and part two, I guess.
[00:34:15] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:34:17] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:34:18] Speaker A: Yeah. I need to see what the Word said I needed to read. Why the Old Testament pointed to the New Testament. I needed to read about the New Testament and who this Jesus was. And every time I picked it up, it was just lesson after lesson after lesson, touching me, going, this is all. All about God's testimony to us.
And this is all about God. The whole Bible is God and his story, but it's this beautiful testimony of his people and what he wants out of us. And all of a sudden, I went from this prideful guy and not guilt. I didn't go to guilt. I went from this prideful guide to I need to do better.
I need to do better and be better and.
And show God that it's not about being a good person, it's about being his person, the one that he created. And everything just came together.
[00:35:14] Speaker B: For me, that's powerful.
Just be. Before we get to what that meant for you, when you were reading the Old Testament, were you able to see how any of that pointed to the person of Christ, the need for Christ, all of those prophecies? I mean, we spoke of the 1 of Isaiah 53. But the old Testament is steeped with prophecy that actually points to a historical Jesus who will come and fulfill all of those things, all of it.
[00:35:49] Speaker A: And when I tell you I went through a whirlwind of beliefs and emotions in the beginning, every time I read it, I read something different in it. I read it over and over. And I read King David, who. I mean, if you talk about King David or Moses to a Jewish person, it is, you know, these are the most revered figures. And now I'm reading about all of his flaws. And I'm going, man, he wasn't perfect. I don't have to be perfect. And then I started reading about, you know, well, then why would God say he's after his own heart if he's not perfect? And I started reading about just the amount of love that poured out of him towards God and the amount of prayer and all of the emotion. And I'm saying, this is a God of emotion and love and not a distant God. This is a God who understands everything that this person's going through, which is why he's after his own heart. Because God is not unloving. It's the complete opposite. It is. He is so much love.
I don't know if I'll ever even understand how much emotion and how close God is to us.
It just opened up. I can go on and on, but when I read Job and we talk about he's the most righteous person ever, I'm going, actually, when you really start reading Job, you go, he didn't have a personal relationship with God in the beginning. He had a theological relationship. He knew of God. He said, God has the power to do this and that. But you start to see towards the end his now crying out to God and the relational God. And I said, man, I. I'm Job. I am the guy who theologically, I was like, well, this is the way it's supposed to be. And yeah, there's a God out there and he can take and he can give, but that's not for. For me to decide. That's for him to decide. And he's so distant to the Job at the end, who's just on my hands and knees crying out going, not God. Why have you taken this from me? But God.
Thank you for showing up. Thank you for seeking after me for so long, because we're talking now 30 years of rejection.
And for him to have the patience of 30 years to reach out for me, I can't ever be grateful enough.
[00:38:00] Speaker B: What I hear you saying is that you had, in some sense, as you were learning more, there was a sense of guilt that you may be.
Didn't know what to do with, but you sense the. The love of God even more.
Can you. For those who may not have read the Bible from front to back as many times as you have, who've really understood the Old Testament, how it fits in with the New and the coming of Christ and all of that, can you just, in a nutshell, describe the gospel?
[00:38:35] Speaker A: Oh, boy.
So I think that for me, having heard that, you know, we are imperfect, fallen people and we have caused all these things in the world. God's love for us is giving us the free will and knowing we're going to mess up anyway. And being a father of three, I know when my kids are going to mess up. It doesn't mean I take away their choice. It means that I teach them a lesson and try to get them the show that next time, hey, maybe you should choose something better. The gospel is God knowing all of that, knowing who we are, knowing us so intimately because he's our creator, to go. I'm still going to leave a place for you to be able to commune with me forever. And that's going to be through Jesus Christ. Because no Levitical law, no type of appearance he could have made would change who we are as humans.
He is helping the Israelites, and five minutes later, they're. They're groaning after he just saved them and, and split the Red Sea. And you're Going, how could you possibly be groaning? Because we're human, because that's what we do.
And we.
We are great loving people. We have the capacity for great love. That's how he created us. The reason we feel better when we do things for people is because that's how he created us. He created us with this just beautiful dynamic of, of loving and feeling better when we love people better.
But he also left the open door for us to reject other people and reject him.
And the gospel, to me is that chance of going, God, I'm human.
I'm human. You know, I'm human. You made me this way.
Thank you so much for still loving me so much to allow me to be holy in your eyes through Jesus. And there are people who say, this is such a narrow path. I'm going, are you kidding me? This is such a huge. This is a doorway that we get to walk into that God's arms is stretched out going, just give me a hug as you go through the doorway. And people have to go out of their ways to avoid him because he's everywhere. His love is everywhere. His proof is everywhere.
If you have not read the Bible, I would say first, you probably should look at it, open up and read it. But hear the testimony of people. Through all my education, through all the things that I have learned in science, history and archeology, the one thing that can't ever change is somebody's testimony.
What you're doing right now, hearing people's testimony and what they've been through and how they've turned from skeptic to believer, that's God's work every single day through everybody.
And it's all unique because he knows every individual uniquely. And my story will be different than somebody else's because of how he speaks to me.
And I can't ever be gracious enough for that. So for the gospel, he's got a testimony for you. If you open your eyes, if you open your heart, if you open your mind enough and allow that testimony to happen, you will have that testimony for the rest of your life and be on fire for the rest of your life for Jesus.
[00:41:50] Speaker B: That's beautiful.
I love in your story where you talk about these nudges, these nudges that would come along in your life at different times, you might be made aware of God or something. And then you put it aside and then. And then you receive another nudge, and then you put it aside and then another nudge, and then you say, well, that's not for me. It's for My brother, it's for my mother.
It's not for me.
But yet Jesus was persistent to the point where you had that compulsion really to go to church. And it was another nudge you couldn't ignore. And I think about people who are listening, who, you know, I think sometimes there has to be an openness to receive the nudge.
Maybe they'll. They'll receive it and then they'll dismiss it.
We all do that, right? We see something and you just don't want to see. You don't want to see it.
[00:43:03] Speaker A: No.
[00:43:03] Speaker B: Don't want to deal with it.
And it's easy to dismiss, but you're sitting here as someone who's saying, it's so much more than I ever thought it was.
That the love of God overcomes the. The lack of love that I received as a son from his Father.
That the love that I've been given and the life that I've been given is so much greater.
Like you say, it's worth. I'm so glad you turned in the direction of God that you got out of bed that morning and you started reading the Bible immersively. So obviously you came to a place where you, you believed in Christ, that he was for you as well. As a Jew.
Yes, as a Jew who believes in a Jewish man named Jesus. And I think sometimes people don't put those things together.
That even most of the apostles that surrounded Jesus were all Jewish. That he.
He. He went to synagogue, that he practiced the holy days, the high holy days.
How can you, can you first of all explain how someone can be Jewish and call themselves Christian at the same time?
[00:44:27] Speaker A: As far as a Jewish person believing in Jesus, it was such a foreign concept 30 plus years ago.
I can't imagine it not happening today. I look at everybody and I go, how are you not a Jewish person and a believer in Jesus?
Because this is.
Yes, he was Jewish. Yes, He. He taught from a Jewish perspective. He taught from the Old Testament. He, he did things correctly in the Jewish tradition. He followed Jewish law, he celebrated Jewish holidays.
All of these things happened.
You know, there's no coincidence that he was even crucified at the time of Passover. If you take a moment and you start to look at what's actually out there, all the information, you read the Bible, you see what these similarities are in, in the Old Testament and New Testament. There is no Old and New Testament. There's only one book. There is no God of the Old Testament, God of the New Testament. It's all one God. And I think that once Jewish people start to see that and go, wow, you know, here is an Orthodox Jew who kind of went through the exact same path that they go through.
How can I get here?
Because Jesus, Because God, and he willed it and he made it so that way. Somebody who wants to do some research and wants to read about it and wants to figure out where the connective tissues are, they're not hard to find. They're everywhere.
From the moment you read, you open up the book till the moment you close it, it's everywhere. If you just open the door a little bit, you're allowing that room for him to wake you up one day and go, I have to go to church.
And. And all the things have happened since are all God things.
There's no way I should be sitting here as a doctor growing up. There is no way that would have happened. Anybody who knows me and. And Jesus experienced this when he went back to his hometown. Anybody who would have known me said, there's no way that David would have. He was just an athlete. He was a jock, didn't do well in school. There's no way that he would have gone this direction. There's no way that this Jewish kid would have turned into a Christian pastor. There's just no way but God. And that's the answer. God has his own plans. And if you're open to it, he will just flood your world with an enormous.
When I say enormous amount of gifts, it doesn't mean the life becomes easy all of a sudden. Life is still life.
People are still people. There's still difficulties that go through it. But I have now a relationship with my heavenly Father who loves me, who's walking through all of it with me hand in hand.
And he's in the next room talking about me, preparing my next steps. And he's in the room after that, preparing that for me while he's preparing my house in heaven. I mean, if there's not a more loving God than that, I don't know what would be.
[00:47:35] Speaker B: That's beautiful.
Just. Just to clarify again, your own story, when you started reading the Bible immersively, it. I guess there came a point where you. You believed it was true, that Jesus was the one they were waiting for. The one that essentially you were waiting for.
Is that what happened, that you just. The more you read, the more you believed it was true, and that it was true not only intellectually, but true for your life.
[00:48:15] Speaker A: So it happened almost instantly for me where when I read the first time and everything was pointing towards a different King that I think the Jewish people were expecting. I realized that what we got out of Jesus was exactly the king that the Old Testament described.
So I think it was immediate that I knew that Jesus was the Messiah, that Jesus was God in the flesh. It then took a little bit more time to understand what the Trinity really was and what that meant. Again, one of the rejections that Jewish people have is, well, Jesus didn't come as the king that was expected.
But also, we don't say that God is. Comes out as a human. God is God. He is, you know, too reverent to be down here as a human.
So there's no way we can believe in Him. The Christians are wrong because they're not respecting who God is.
And then I realized that, no, God, you can't say that God is all powerful. It could be anything and then go, but he can't be a human.
No, God is all powerful and could be anything all at once. And he loved us enough to come down and live as a human, to impart knowledge, to live, to suffer, to be part of our world, to be part of our understanding. So that way, you know, aside from just the. The death and resurrection, which we understand was for our salvation, we also have this connection with Him. You know exactly what it's like to be here and be human.
You know what it's like to have friends die, to have people reject you. You know what it's like to feel all of the hostility in this world that we feel every day, and that becomes one of the most beautiful miracles that's unspoken. People want to talk about, you know, walking on water and turning water into wine and. And, you know, resurrecting Lazarus. And those are beautiful miracles, the miracles of God loving us enough to come down as a human and live this type of life, to live the way that he lived.
Wow.
So I think that some of it came immediately and others along the way.
I just look over and over and I still to this day, read the Bible over and over and over.
And every time I read it, I'm more and more just impressed and on fire that God would do this for us, for me, for. For what I've shown him the respect that I showed him for the majority of my life. And he's still going to call my name out and still going to go through what Jesus went through for me, man. I mean, it is.
I think that you have different levels of people. You have people that disbelieve in Christ because they're not ready yet, and they have something they're holding on to some belief, some, some form of system that they believed in.
And I know this because I fight with my wife at times where I refuse to give up a point. And I believe in that point so strongly, and I refuse to give it up. And then maybe a couple days or, or weeks later, I'll go, oh, you know what? You actually had a point. I thought about it after the argument and I realized that you had a point there.
And some people are so hesitant to open their, their minds and their hearts to that point that they hold onto it. And then there are others who I think they felt guilt and shame and they feel like they don't want to come to Christ in this state. I have to clean up my act. I can't come in this state. And what I realize is that God took me in a state that I rejected him.
I've debated people when I was an atheist saying that there's no way he existed.
I really dirtied his name in front of anybody who would listen.
And then he still called me and he still accepts me. And I read this, I go, not only does he accept me, but he came down as a human and died a horrible, just brutal death for me.
Once you open your mind to that and your heart to that, it, it becomes a whole different world. And then from there you jump into a rabbit hole of truth and logic and realizing that science and logic actually matches really, really well with the Bible and faith. And they're no longer enemies. They are actually compadres working together, going, no, this is actual proof of this. And this works really well together with that. And you start to realize that God made no mistakes when, when he gave us this Bible. 0. It is perfect. It's true. And I will shout it on the rooftops to anybody who'll listen.
[00:53:05] Speaker B: That's just amazing. Now, obviously you are sitting there as a pastor.
What was it that. That, was that another nudge from God?
Because, I mean, because some people will say, well, yeah, yeah, become a Christian, but become a pastor. That's a whole nother level.
[00:53:25] Speaker A: Yeah, I think this is.
I think this was God's joke. I think he's got a sense of humor. And he said, hey, I'm taking you from this atheist who doesn't believe me at all. And now your job is going to be to preaching my word to everybody.
No. And the same thing with an author. There's no way that somebody who was an illiterate growing up not being able to formulate a sentence is going to write a book. There was no way this was going to happen. I think God did have some humor in this and say, I'm. I'm gonna show off now. I showed up for you at this point, I'm gonna show off, and I'm gonna show you just what you're capable of with my help through me. And, yeah, there's. There's nothing in life that would have prepared me for the journey that he has me on.
Becoming a pastor was definitely not on my list. This was not on my bingo card in life.
But God said differently. And again, it wasn't this massive voice. It was another nudge. And he's been nudging me quietly through my entire career now.
[00:54:31] Speaker B: Yeah, I think that's the key, isn't it? Being open to it and being willing to go on this great adventure, honestly with God. I know my life has been very, very similar in that you find yourself in the most unexpected places, but in a life that's so much more abundant than you ever, ever dreamed.
So if somebody is sitting there, David, and they're listening to you, and they can see and hear the passion in your voice and know that what you're saying is true, that it has given you such a full life and that you're. You're just such a beautiful example and ambassador for Christ, and they're. They're thinking, he's got something I don't.
And they are open. They are willing. You've mentioned something about reading the Bible.
I know you went to church to kind of check it out.
What would you encourage someone who's, who's saying, okay, okay, what have you got for me today?
What would you say?
[00:55:31] Speaker A: I. I think that. Explore that part that you're interested in. If you're interested in what they say in church and all you hear is the negativity, go to church. Experience it first. See what you think. If you're hearing all these things, if you're there and you're watching social media and you go, well, the Bible sounds like it has a lot of, you know, contradictions in it. Okay, then read it. Read it for yourself and go, what does this book have in it? What am I missing?
If it's simply, hey, I want to learn from somebody who, who's been through it. I think this podcast is perfect. You have so many people have gone on who have been through different things and go, God does not speak to everybody the exact same way. You have story after story after story of different cultures and different people, and God reach out in different ways and go, this is a God who does not reach out in the same way. So what I experienced, you're not going to experience it that way. You're going to experience in your own very unique, different way that God has for, for you.
But the openness. And when I say be open to it, it's, don't shut your eyes to what you're feeling, thinking, but jump down a rabbit hole. What an amazing adventure that God can put you on and open your eyes to and show you things that are well beyond what you ever thought even imaginable is just this world of love and a gift of relational, a relationship with, with God. It's not distant. It's not, hey, he's somewhere in the heavens. He's right here with you, in you, around you all the time.
Why wouldn't you want that?
So I would say just, just start. That's the hardest part of anything.
[00:57:18] Speaker B: I think when anyone listens to you, they would, they.
They find that what you have is attractive. You know, Christ in you through you, leading you, guiding you, filling you with love. All of those things, obviously a meaningful life. And we want other people to experience that. Sometimes we're not the best ambassadors ourselves.
But I wondered how you would encourage us as Christians to, to be winsome or to be passionate or whatever it is, be informed by the Bible, to live in a way that is attractive. And in this embodiment of this Christ life that you seem to have, how can we best engage those who are skeptical perhaps of Christians and Christianity?
[00:58:10] Speaker A: Never stop being a child.
The faith of a child. And I always, when I compare God to things I say, I think God has a sense of humor because I think that deep down, the reason why children have such a magnificent imagination and story to tell is they're not afraid to just believe what they believe, love what they love, and they go forward with it. And, and for me, if you're a child, if you don't take this so seriously, if you don't try to just, well, let me, let me fight and debate and think about these things. Just start off being a child and open your eyes to possibilities and just have some fun with God.
He'll bring the other stuff, he'll bring the substance. He will definitely bring. When I started in apologetics, it was so I can defend my faith to others. And what it turned into is my defending the faith to myself and knowing, wow, this stuff all actually happened and there's logic behind it, and it was all for me.
And everything I find myself going through is something I start with the intention of somebody else. And it ends up strengthening my relationship with him. He'll take care of that part.
[00:59:22] Speaker B: I think that would be a beautiful, a beautiful embodied life in Christ. There's something very palpable about. About it. You can tell when someone's walking with God and that it is a relationship of something of enjoyment and incredible and deep love.
David, your story is amazing. I think of the way that we talked about it earlier, where you had, we had. You were walking. It was. If you were walking along the road, but you had kind of left God behind, kind where he wasn't even visible anymore. He was way off in the distance.
But today, and, and thinking about you and, and listening to you, you are walking.
It's almost like as in Genesis, you know, you're fellowshipping with God, he's walking with you in the garden. And I know the world is not a garden, it's not the Garden of Eden, but there, there's a.
There's a place, a maturity, a love, a fellowshipping that you've shown us. I think today that is possible even in this broken world, that you can have wholeness and love and fullness of life in God and by God and through him, in the person of Jesus Christ. And you've demonstrated that for us today. And I just want to thank you so much, so much for coming on and telling your. Your wonderful story.
[01:00:54] Speaker A: I am very thankful for you to have me on. I think that the podcast of, of Ex Skeptic is.
It's so necessary, I think, because people are looking for the singular way at which God speaks to them. And we know that God doesn't speak singularly to anybody. He's a multifaceted, talented God.
And I love the fact that people can come on here and learn different ways that he speaks to different people.
And, and I think that if they don't have their voice yet, or their testimony yet.
Wait, it's coming.
It took me 30 years, but it is coming because you're listening and you're interested and you're open.
[01:01:41] Speaker B: That's so true.
Well, thank you so much, David. You have enriched us all and I appreciate you coming on.
What a remarkable story. From a distant view of God shaped by strong independence, guilt and skepticism, to an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ shaped by grace, truth and love.
David didn't set out to become a pastor, a Bible teacher, or an apologist. He simply woke up one day with a nudge he couldn't ignore and followed it all the way into a new life. His story reminds us that God pursues each of us personally, patiently and powerfully, even when we're not looking.
If David's story sparked questions in your own heart, we invite you to take the next step.
Visit our Show Notes to find a link to the Boundless Bible Podcast where David explores Scripture and with wisdom and heart. And stay tuned for his upcoming book Jesus A Lot of Evidence.
Head over to xskeptic.org to sign up for our email updates, resources and curated story playlists that speak directly to your doubts and questions.
If you'd like to talk with one of our guests about your own journey, send us a
[email protected] and we'll get you connected it. And if you've been encouraged by today's conversation, please share this episode and leave a review.
It helps others discover these powerful stories.
Thanks again for listening to Ex Skeptic, a podcast of the C.S. lewis Podcast Network, and the help of our amazing producer Ashley Decker. I'm Jana Harmon, inviting you back next time for another unlikely story of belief.
