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You’re tired.
Not just physically; though yeah, that too.
You’re tired in your bones. In your soul.
Trying to be a steady husband, an intentional dad, a man of God… but deep down, you feel like you’re falling short. Like you’re carrying more than you know how to hold.
Dad Tired is a podcast for men who are ready to stop pretending and start healing.
Not with self-help tips or religious platitudes, but by anchoring their lives in something (and Someone) stronger.
Hosted by Jerrad Lopes, a husband, dad of four, and fellow struggler, this show is a weekly invitation to find rest for your soul, clarity for your calling, and the courage to lead your family well.
Through honest stories, biblical truth, and deep conversations you’ll be reminded:
You’re not alone. You’re not too far gone. And the man you want to be is only found in Jesus.
This isn’t about trying harder.
It’s about coming home.
welcome back to another episode of q and a with Chris. If you have a question that you would like Chris to tackle, go to dad tire.com/question and we will do our best to get that question answered on the show. Um, as always, Chris has, has not seen or heard any of these questions, so we are throwing them to, we are throwing these questions to him blind, um, which makes it kind of fun here.
Uh, we'll just dive right in. What's the bi, what's the biblical perspective on birth control or vasectomies? Whoa. Just something to kick us off. Yeah. Again, um, these are. Anachronistic questions. Again, we use that word a lot of times on this particular segment. Anachronistic means Cronos, so out of time, meaning, uh, people in Jesus' day and age weren't wondering whether or not you should be wearing condoms when you're having sex, nor were they thinking about any type of birth control, uh, or vasectomies.
These are all newer concepts, so. What we have to do is we have to take principles and try to apply them as, uh, mandates. You can't do that with this on, on what's mandatory and what's not. This is considered ra, it's what the Bible. Neither expressly commands or forbids here would be my best wisdom. My best wisdom is.
If you're married and you have a really good reason for not having kids at some point in your life, then I think there seems to be a permission to not over, uh, overlook wisdom for the sake of any level of pragmatism. Now, and this is controversial, okay, Jared. You're gonna get some email for this one. Um, I struggle a little bit with people who are, um, younger and they're married and they have this sense of wanderlust.
There's all these things they want to accomplish before they have kids. I think it fail to recognize that oftentimes the greatest adventure and calling of any human being is not gonna be in what they do, but in who they raise. And so I think there seems to be a sense that we get in culture even of an arrested development, um, a delayed maturity because we're having kids later and later on the altar of pragmatism.
Or I wanna get all of my fun out of the way ahead of time. So, uh. The Bible talks about children as a gift from God. It talks about a man's children are like arrows in his quiver that I'm able to, right? Like I've got five kids and I'm, I plan on unleashing them on the world someday to become disciples for Jesus, but then to raise their own families and, um.
To become people who spread the gospel. Right. And so it's not just what I want, it's what I'm called to do. And I think sometimes we fail in that department when we're talking about when and how we're gonna have kids. We don't really seek God's opinion or god's I. Thoughts on it. And I think God would say, um, one of the main reasons God has brought the union of people together is that they would procreate and that they would have children.
And so I, I, I would just caution anyone there is a sense in which he can get overly selfish to go, well, I. Almost like designer life, like at this point then we're gonna do this, and then nine months later we're gonna have kids and then we're gonna take two years off and then we're gonna do these things and whatever.
And it's, um, sometimes there's a control ethic. I think that we've gotta be really careful of that when God says that children are a blessing from the Lord, that they're arrows and a quiver, that, um, a man who is the father, a woman who has children, is blessed and should be, um, honored in the market. But these are all things that I think we've lost a little bit as we've been.
Able to control these things a lot better. So I think sometimes we would be better suited to go, you know what? We're gonna move in a, in a, we're gonna take a step of faith and we're gonna let the Lord do these things for us. And. I know what it means to, to be a dad of five kids. Everyone thinks you're a psycho.
But, um, I also think the idea of we're gonna have all our fun and then we're gonna do one of the most important things that we can do and mature and be sanctified in. And I don't know anything in my life that has grown me up as a man more than having kids. Totally. And so it's, it's really hard 'cause the longer.
You stay in that state of, uh, I'm not gonna get married. I'm not gonna have kids. It actually delays your desire to want to, because you then fall into those traps of like, well, my life's so great. Look at this money we've got, we're a couple of dinks, like dual income. No kids. We're able to travel whenever we want.
And so kids start to look like a burden and they should not look like a burden. They should look like the greatest blessing. And they have been, you know, the, the joy of my life has been being a dad. And I want people to experience that. And sometimes I think we delay that too long. You're in downtown San Diego.
So you are on the first, like you get the first breaking news of new terms. Yeah, and it doesn't make its way over to the East coast where I am for probably 10 to 30 years. So what's a dink dink? Yeah. You used the word think Dual income. Dual income. No kids.
Would've taken me through, I'd be 60 by the time I learned that. That's not a new term. Uh, you remember the old show on Nickelodeon, uh, Doug? Oh, yeah. Yeah. The dinks Live next door. Dual income. No kids. Oh my gosh. It's a, a commonly used phrase. I, I mean, or dad tired. Audience can tell me if I'm a psycho or not, but I think that's a commonly used thing.
I'm probably just. I'm way behind. If you ever go to, like Barnes and Noble, you'll see these things that have a whole bunch of pages. Mm-hmm. Those are called books. Mm-hmm. Okay. Then what do you do if you would commit to reading one of those? Every once in a while? You wouldn't be asking stupid questions.
Don't have time for kids. Yeah. No. Maybe doesn't those weird things where like, I know a dumb word that no one else ever uses, so that could very well be the case. So yeah. As if I'm acting like everyone knows this and no one knows this. No, you're probably right. I trust you more than I trust me. Doug was the duck.
Um, okay, I'm trying to, I'm trying not to give you too many in order with these, I'm trying to, um, balance the episode here a little bit, at least in rhythm. Um, did God and Satan continue to converse after the story of job? Yeah. I mean, it's extra biblical. I don't know. Um, uh, it seems like they do still have the ability to do so.
Um, we don't see a, a, right. There's no like textual variant that says, oh, and I. For more information on this conversation. C second hesitation is chapter three, so we don't really know. So I, again, I, I don't ever want to answer something. My speculation is that throughout time they have had different interactions, but we have no way of knowing that that conversation continued on after that.
So I don't wanna be able, well, I don't, go ahead. Well, what about, uh, Jesus being tempted in the wilderness? Could that, could we use that as a data point? As God, I mean, not specifically towards Job, but just that Satan and God are still having conversations. Y Yeah, no, for sure. I, I, I, um, the, the, the question about job, we don't know that they have other interactions.
We know for sure. Did that conversation persist after that particular one? I, I don't really know that, but we do know that they've had. At least one, right? Yeah. At least one conversation since then. So I would be compelled to believe that we don't have the only other instance and that that'd be more of those.
So yeah, I guess that's interesting. 'cause I, we, we both interpreted that question differently, but I think we answered both sides of the way that we interpreted it. Um. So Dink uh, chat, GBT dink, and then a dink wad is dual income. No kids with a dog. Oh dang, dude. Now you know, it's a 1980s term during yuppie culture.
Apparently that sounds eighties culture. 1980. That's how far behind I am. Yeah, apparently. Uh, were people who didn't know about Jesus's crucifixion saved through believing in God's plan before hearing the gospel. So before the disciples were sent out, this is what I'm guessing, before disciples were sent out and told, uh, and preached of the crucifixion of Jesus.
Um, but there's still. Believers, and we could probably, this question probably could be applied to modern day people who haven't heard the gospel, what is it that saved them? If, if at all they were saved? Yeah, so I, I think they, they have to stay separate because the question really could be asked of like, how is an old Testament J saved before the time of Jesus when we know that they were saved?
Um, which. What we recognize is in the Old Testament, we find in Genesis chapter 15, verse six, this application of redemption being applied to um, Abraham. Here's what it says, Genesis 15, verse six. But Abraham believed the Lord and God considered that righteousness. God credited to him as righteousness is what the text says.
So. The way that we are able to understand that, that the New Testament talks about in the book of Romans chapter three. Lemme just pull that up really quick. Um, Romans chapter three discusses the idea that an Old Testament Jew is saved by believing that the coming work of God in the world is taking, is going to take place.
So in that. How is someone during the time of Abraham saved? Well, told us that in the text you believe that what God said is true and you trust in that, and then you are considered righteous. So the really, the only difference is they're looking forward to the cross of Jesus. We're looking back at the cross of Jesus, but it's exactly the same faith.
We are saved by grace. God's unmerited favor through faith, trusting that God's gonna do what he says revealed by. The word of God and to God's glory alone, and it's through the person of Jesus alone. Now, they wouldn't have known that his name was Jesus or that he'd be a Jewish carpenter, but everything else in that is true.
That they would be applied by faith. That it was given only freely by God's grace that we trust in the word of God and everything is to God's glory. So it's the exact same pers, it's the exact same reality, just from a different perspective. So Romans chapter three talks about how. God in his forbearance and his mercy withheld punishment from the Jews until the time of Jesus.
Mm-hmm. So the Old Testament sacrificial system didn't save them. It, this is theologically crazy deep, but you, you were protected from the wrath of God by believing that the Messiah was coming and then. When it was time for you to be judged, it says that God withheld that judgment until the time of Jesus.
And that's when the Old Testament Jews were actually judged because Jesus would've then paid the price for their sins. So think about, um, you getting a, a letter from the IRS that you owe an infinite amount of money, or let's say a million dollars, and it's, um, April, and you file an extension because you know that in October.
You're gonna get a million dollars. So you tell the IRS, I know I'm guilty, I know I owe that, but would you forebear, would you be patient with me? And would you wait to come and judge and would you wait to call in my debt until October? And if the IRS said yes, but, uh, in the meantime to show that you really trust this or that, or that you are going to be faithful to this, I want you to, um, slaughter a goat.
The Old Testament sacrificial system, this is all it was. It was saying, I, I am leaning in to the forbearing mercy of God, that he's going to punish my sin at the right time. And the sacrificial system demonstrated that you were trusting that God was going to be sending a better sacrifice than the one that you had.
So that's what Romans three talks about when it says God in his forbearance and his love for us. And compassion did not. Punish people according to their sins, but enabled them to have their, their righteousness credited to them for a later time. So we now, when we come to faith, we are immediately the blood of Christ washes over us.
We are accepted as his children and we are when we die, are brought into his kingdom. An Old Testament Jew, they were considered as part of the body of faith, but their price for their sins hadn't been paid because Jesus hadn't come and died yet. So their sin was atoned for that means covered. Yeah, but it wasn't paid for.
It was just for bearing until it was time for it to get the debt to be paid when Jesus came to earth. So that's their salvation was on layaway. Yeah. Good. Um, I think the, and it talks about the, the Holy Spirit being the down payment for that, for the modern day believer, but in the Old Testament, the sacrificial system demonstrated that you were trusting into it.
'cause Romans chapter 10 or chapter four. Chapter 10 says that the, the blood of bulls and goats can't take away sin. So the sacrificial system wasn't forgiving us, it was just postponing our punishment by saying, we trust that you're gonna do what you said you're gonna do. Because Abraham was considered righteous and there was no sacrificial system yet.
So. It was all the same thing. Do you trust that God's going to send a sacrifice in your place? And now we go, do you trust that God has sent in Jesus the sacrifice to take your place? So it's the same story from different perspectives. So what happened then, to use your analogy in October when the bill came due for these, like what specifically happened?
I mean, they're dead. The wrath of God that they deserved was poured out on Jesus and they. The, and, and this is where you get into what is your, um, belief in soul sleep versus immediate resurrection versus whatever happens to someone when they die, which is a whole different field of study. Did everyone in the Old Testament go into like a state of neutrality, we call it soul sleep or Abraham's bosom, and then tell the time of Christ, and then there was the resurrection and then they were brought up into the kingdom.
Or did they go there immediately? Because heaven is outside of time and so they were able to be brought up immediately, even though in our Newtonian world it needed to be paid later on. There's a lot of deep thinking that goes into that. I'm, um, that's a whole different, I mean, geez, that's another three hour conversation, but it's kind of fun to talk about.
That is super fascinating. Um, yeah, I had like two other follow up questions, but I forgot what they were. Yeah. Okay. Uh, switching gears radically here as we like to do on the show. Uh, how should we talk to our kids, specifically our sons, about, well, I guess I answered in our, our sons, but they didn't ask that.
How should we talk to our kids about masturbation? Is it a sin? Uh, yes. Um, I am inclined to the, uh, old position that there's no such thing as sin outside of intent, which is another thing that's gonna bake your brain to think about. Is there any ontological behavior that is by itself, sinful, ontological means?
Like, um, is there anything that you can do that without? The intent behind it is innately sinful, right? So, um, is killing someone wrong? Well. It depends if they're coming for your family in the middle of the night in your home. No. Uh, if you're part of a war, a war that's justly fought and you're on the front line and right, like, think about the, um, old Testament Israelites who are called to fight against the Canaanites when God said, go and do this than actually not killing would've been wrong and killing would've been right because they were doing what God says.
So there's no, I believe there's no such thing as sin outside of intention. I think the scripture bears this out. Therefore, what is the, uh, sin of masturbation? The, the sin of masturbation is lust. The sin of masturbation is the idea that you're thinking about, um, someone who you're not in a marital context with.
And in doing so, you're practicing a lot of behaviors that are, um. That are atypical when it comes to the proper way that the New Testament talks about the word porneia. Porneia is the blanket word for sexual immorality. So while it doesn't lay out exactly what all sexual immorality is, it does that for a very specific reason.
Because if the Bible got into talking about what sexual immorality was and it started going like, uh, masturbation or incest or Right, what would we do? We would find the one new weird thing and start that. Mm-hmm. So Porneia just means it's outside of the Holiness Code of Leviticus 18 through 22 when it comes to the idea of what is appropriate sexual expression, I.
What is appropriate sexual expression? A heterosexual, monogamous, covenantal relationship between a man and a woman inside the co, inside the confines of marriage. That's when it's appropriate, which means any other eliciting of orgasm or any other lust or anything is inappropriate if it's not inside of that.
Porneia is a blanket term. It's kind of a catchall term that says anything not within the boundaries of what God considers honoring is porneia. So masturbation would fall into that. So that's why I think it'd be easy to say because it's not the way that God has built the human being inside of his, uh, system of.
What's appropriate to express themselves sexually. It then falls as porneia. And porneia is one of the things that God explicitly says to refrain from as a follower, avoid porneia. This is what the New Testament word uses when it, um, when, uh, the. Paul's vice list in one Corinthians chapter six. That's the word that Jesus uses, which we translate as adultery when he says, um, that is why when someone gets divorced, except for, and we always translate it adultery, but it should be sexual immorality.
That's porneia. So it's a blanket catchall term of which masturbation would fall inside of. Wow. Um. So can you take off your theologian hat and put on your just dad hat for your boys? Like how will you have that conversation with them as they get older? Because I think that's the heart of what the dad, the dad was asking.
You know, like, how do I have this conversation with my boys or my kids? Yeah. Yeah. Um. I think the earlier, the better. So they can start to understand that rather than figuring it out one day and going, what in the heck just took place? Uh, but I think as the more that they're aware of it, the more that you can use terminology.
And I'm of the, I'm of the opinion that the, the better thing to do when it comes to this sexual conversation is to teach them how to navigate Babylon rather than to avoiding it. And so I think a lot of that. What would be helpful is to sit them down and just say, let me tell you what sex is for. Let me tell you what it's about and then let me tell you how we in our broken state have misused it.
And then I would give 'em a couple of those different things on the list and just go, why does God confine this to this? I like to use the idea of fire with my kids in a couple of different areas, which is, um, when fire is in the fireplace, it does a lot of really good things. It can create warmth, it can heat up food.
It can create a sense of environment. It can be aesthetically pleasing. It can do a lot of things in its right context. Fire on the couch is really bad, right? Like it burns down houses. So sex is like fire. It's amoral. If I told you, is fire good or bad, you would say, well. I need context. Sex is the same way.
Is sex good or bad? It's context. Sex inside the confines of marriage can bring warmth and it can, it can be something that's connecting and healing. What about sex? Outside of it? Well, sex outside of, it's like sex is like fire on the wall or like fire on the ground. It's, it's not good. It burns things down and it can hurt things and so for them to understand.
God isn't trying to take away your sexual joy or sexual liberation. He wants you to lean into it bigger than you could ever understand. He wants you to have great sex, to be a great lover, and he doesn't want you to find impotence in your life or to find yourself being a bad lover or you having these mixed views of sexuality.
And so here's the confines he gives us. Everything else is kind of to start your living room on fire. And I think the more you can come from personal experience or look at. The world around you and just say, this is what happens when you don't, and kid, I just want what's best for you. So you're gonna hear me saying, I'm withholding joy from you, but I can give you a thousand examples of people who thought that doing whatever you want in this category was liberation.
And it's led them to deep bondage. So ask anyone who's listening to this, who has got a pornography addiction. Addiction, does it feel like liberation or bondage to you? Ask anyone who's having extramarital affairs, who now has. Um, you know, govern visits with their kids. Is this freedom for you or is this bondage?
Mm-hmm. God knows what he's doing and if we trust that, I think we can lean in and understand what he says about masturbation. That's a deviance from what he has asked us to do. And it's gonna be a na, it's gonna feel so natural. The world's gonna tell you it's natural, but what is natural to the world often comes unnatural to Christians.
And so that's what we have to lean into. Really good. Uh, I just wanna go back to real quick, if we could end our time on that last question where they were asking about. Um, salvation through before hearing about the gospel. Um, 'cause we had mentioned it and I just want to, to hit that with, with people currently who, who will die without ever hearing the gospel.
Um, where does that fit in? Yeah, I mean that, that needs its own podcast by itself. I think that the, the scripture makes it clear that one of the reasons that Jesus put such an emergency in Matthew chapter 28 of evangelizing the nations is because without those two parts of Romans Chapter 10, to confess to the mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart, God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
I'd be inclined to believe that. When you see people in the New Testament receiving Jesus as their Lord and Savior, you never see them doing it outside of recognizing and understanding the story and the gospel of redemption that takes place. So I, I wouldn't think that someone who hasn't heard the gospel of Jesus can be saved, because every time we see people, the, the scripture borne out simply about what it means.
To be saved or there in Romans chapter 10. Um, there's natural revelation, right? This is what Fred Hoyle talks about or other astronomers says, like you can recognize without, you could be on a deserted island all by yourself. And think to yourself, I have evil thoughts inside of me, and there must be a big force above me.
But that doesn't teach you the nature of sin. Or the gospel of Jesus, or the sacrifice of this Jewish carpenter on a cross who God became in and took away sin. So I, I think the, the most, and I'm super excited to be wrong about this if I am, but where we derive our theology is from the text. God's Revealed Word and the revealed Word seems to indicate.
That without hearing the gospel of Jesus Christ and his sacrifice on the cross, that mankind cannot be saved. So I would say the heathen debate is finalized in that if God has made a special provision for people who have never, hood, never heard, great. The problem with that is if he makes a special provision for everyone who's never hood hurt, I keep saying hood, like I don't, I've never, I don't.
If his special provision was to say, if no one's ever heard they're all saved, well then why would we go evangelize the nations? Right? Wouldn't we all just sit home and let a generation of people die off, burn all of our Bibles and then everyone goes to heaven? Mm. So that's problematic, which it leads me.
To the inclination that it's important that we go evangelize the nations because those who haven't heard, um, cannot be saved. Yeah. Now we do see from scripture that people who haven't heard are actually under lesser judgment than those who have heard and rejected. But what does that mean? That's another great question.
I don't even know what that means, but I just trust that God is just and fair, but he's also holy and pure. And so, um, that's why it's so important for us to tell those. Who don't know what about Jesus, about what he's like. And if you have a question that you'd like Chris to tackle on the show, dad tire.com/question.
Chris, thanks as always for spending some time with us.