Heart of the Matter Broadcast: Guest Brian Diggs

Live from Salt Lake City Utah. This is Heart of the Matter, where we do all we can to worship God in Spirit and in truth.

And I am Shawn McCraney, your host.

A couple things before we get to our esteemed guest tonight – First of all regarding our work on the Transversional Apostolic Record – we thank those of you who have stepped up to assist us with your prayers and financial support. We need more – even if it’s a pray and a dollar a month. All of it counts. The task is Herculean but so worth it. Those of you who already support us will be grandfathered into the cause and campaign and all of you will, hopefully by the first of the year, will receive the Gospel of Mark to peruse and examine to see if you believe the work will bless the lives of others. So, know everything is in the works – including those initial gifts for signing up – give us a bit more time.

History and Background

Alright, well before I introduce our guest tonight let me give you a little history that is entertaining. Years ago I was in a gym and used to see this physical specimen working out in there like a wolverine and we sort of talked a bit. Year later, some good friends of ours – the Seims, Kelly and Allen – invited me to come watch this same man in a professional wrestling match – one where he wore a white speedo and called himself the Deacon of Death. We attended (the one time) and I never saw the Deacon again – and time passed.

Well last week I got on FB and, after searching and searching for a pastor to come on the show and defend objective Christianity and not finding one willing – so cowardly – a person named Brian Diggs on FB simply wrote, “I do it.” I was so excited I accepted his offer. I wrote him some emails and explained some things about the show, and then our mutual friend Kelly Seim reminded me, on Face Book, that this man was the one they took us to see wrestle years ago! I had looked at his profile and saw some wrestling references but they all looked like college or high school references at a glance and since his photos were so small to these fading eyes, I didn’t know that Brian was the same gym wolverine, and the same pro wrestler, as the guest we have on the show tonight!

So welcome brother Brian – I really appreciate your willingness to come on and explain the reason Objectively Delivered religion is as good or better that the subjective approach I maintain. We are each going to take 15 minutes to present our thoughts on it and then we are going to sit down together and talk.

Guest Introduction: Reverend Brian Diggs

A little about Brian first . . . Reverend Brian Diggs is the director of UMCOR (United Methodist Director of Relief) West office and Depot in SLC. UMCOR West is a disaster response center that utilizes volunteers across the country to build, shelve and send relief supplies to populations effected by natural disaster. Brian is responsible for the overall operations of UMCOR including the scheduling of volunteers, general office/admin responsibilities, and securing materials needed for volunteer work teams.

Rev. Diggs has over 20 years of experience in leading United Methodist congregations of North Carolina, Virginia, and Utah into deeper action around mission. He has been director at UMCOR West office since it opened in 2009. Prior to working with UMCOR, Brian served as Senior Pastor at First Methodist Church in SLC for 10 years. Rev. Diggs is an ordained clergy person in the Mountain Sky Annual Conference and received his MDIV from Duke Divinity School in Durham, North Carolina. His focus was on liturgy as ethical formation. Explain that focus to us, will you?

Objective vs. Subjective Faith

Okay, so I am going to present some thoughts first on the value of subjective faith and Brian will follow up, then we will watch a short promo and come back and talk. If he sneaks up on me and throws an arm-bar, throw a chair at him and tear off his speedos.

I want to start by saying that I do not begrudge organized religion their place in society. Nor people who enjoy them and their ways and demands. They fill a need. My purpose in challenging what we might call Objective Religion (which I think can be defined as a system or sect or denomination that mandates what others must do,

Subjective vs. Objective Faith

Believe, and practice in some structured fashion) as inferior to Subjective Faith (which I would describe as allowing all people to believe and practice however they are choosing to believe and practice and trusting that in their search for truth that God has the capacity to reach them and there is therefore no reason for demanding or policing doctrines or practices from an institutional platform.

I want to quickly present five reasons, in order of least import to the most, as some justifications for my stance:

Number 4 – Subjective faith is the reality in most cases even amidst sectarian demands. In other words, very few Catholics or Mormons or Pentecostals agree with EVERY official doctrine and stance taken by their respective church. And so at the end of the day, it's all between the individual and God anyway.

The Material Focus of Objective Faith

Number 3 – The focus of most Objectively defined approaches (even if they are non-denominational) is a focus on material religion – buildings, budgets, missional campaigns, pastors retreats, and on and on and on – all in the NAME of Jesus, but without a precedence FROM Jesus.

In our day these Objectified approaches often include POLITICAL leanings – again, not from Jesus. In the end the Objectified Religion, pushed out in Jesus name, represents far more to the watching world than Jesus ever did. To me that’s bad.

The Historical Impact of Objective Faith

Number 2 – And this is big – history proves – nearly two thousand years of it – that when what we call Objective Forms of Faith exist with men, then so do angers, judgments, divisions, spits, wars, hatred, bloodshed and even death. Doctrine divides – it always has and it always will – and we are talking about doctrine founded on a King of Love and forgiveness.

When we lay claim to possessing the right or correct doctrine, we are also laying claim to point a finger at the rest of the world and scream everything from “Wrong” to “Heretic” to “Unsaved” to “Evil” to “Going to Hell” to “you need to die, clown!” Get it?

And 1 . . .

Based on the Bible, especially the descriptions of the Kingdom once Jesus took His bride, there is not only no support at all for an objectively owned and delivered faith, but there are descriptions of the opposite – so much so that in the New Testament Age of the Kingdom God says that he would write His laws upon the hearts and minds of Man . . . so much so that Paul calls himself an apostle of the New Testament, not written with ink but by the Spirit, so much so that God says that in this Kingdom Age God would not let ANYTHING remain that was shakable as a means to let all things that do remain be unshakeable.

Let me ask you, do you participate in a kingdom of shakeable things or unshakable things?

To answer, if you base your faith on a denom, with rules, and orders, and doctrinal demand, and practical expectations; if you place any man or woman between you and God and allow them to dictate how you believe and live or think – you have continued to place your faith in something shakable – which was never the will of God.

The Challenge for Objective Religions

Let me wrap it all up with what we are facing now because people have allowed themselves to think that the faith once delivered ought to be Objectively administered. Two days ago a spokesperson for the LGBT community said that if a church will not marry all people, and another added, and will not all people to lead, in their brick and mortar, then they are NOT loving as Jesus loved nor are they LGBT friendly.

Objective religions of brick and mortar are going to more and more have to answer to such things – and therefore are going to have to be more politically driven, and are therefore going to have to have more money, and therefore are not going to be able to truly just reach and teach and serve like a loose-knit group of disparate believers could.

And the fruit of that poisonous tree called religion will continue to fail – where individual believers could never be touched.

Okay . . . Brother Brian.

Show 55
An Evening with Brian Diggs
To November 14th 2018