Welcome to Speak The Truth, a podcast devoted to giving biblical truth for educating, equipping, and encouraging the individual and local church and counseling and discipleship.

Hello. Hello. Hello. We are continuing our episodes on the track leader episodes where we get to talk about a little bit of what's going on in each specific track at the Called Counsel Conference in 2026, again, happening April '20 in Fort Worth, Texas at Doxology Biblical Church. And I am excited about this episode.

I know I say that about every episode, but I really am excited about this episode because I get to talk about a track that I'm on as well as one of the coolest dudes I know with arguably a better beard than mine from Yeah. Yeah. So we've got Nathan Penny from Toronto. He's actually in what's the city?

Oakville.

Oakville. Oakville. Yeah. Hope Bible Church. Yeah.

Hope Bible Church. And, Nate, before we jump into this particular episode talking about practical theology and biblical counseling, you just wanna share a little bit about your context and ministry there in Oakville.

Yeah. Sure. So I serve as the pastor of Soul Care Ministries at Hope Bible Church in Oakville. Been there for almost twenty years, just coming up on, on that. So has my wife.

So she serves alongside as well. And she serves more in events, but yeah, it's been an incredible journey for us to be serving a ministry together at one church for almost two decades. So essentially my role is oversight of soul care and soul care would be essentially an umbrella term for whether that's one on one counseling whether that are discipleship classes, premarital ministry. So it's not all things discipleship, but that would be the emphasis is on discipleship. So we have a team, we've got a staff team of six.

We have a non vocational counseling ministry of about 20 or so, running ABC classes for the last decade. And it's a, and it's a joy. It's such a joy. I love everything. Almost everything about pastoral ministry.

Love it. Lots of challenges, but but again, I wouldn't have it any other way. I feel so privileged to be able to serve in this way. And yeah, we're seeing the Lord do some incredible things.

Yeah. To which some of those things I can attest to as I was able to go this year. Speaking of some places that I really enjoyed this year in my travels and getting to actually formally meet Nathan. Was it last year now? I just like time is slipping by, but it was earlier this year, right, at the Canadian Biblical Counseling Coalition?

Yeah. It's this year.

Conference year. Yeah. Yeah. Where we got to go, and I was able to meet with Nate and, man, just his team and just all these amazing people that are in Canada and other contexts that are just doing amazing things. I know you're excited because you're gonna be coming up on your sabbatical here coming into 2026.

Yeah. Looking forward to that. Our church graciously offers our pastors a sabbatical about every seven years or so, which I know is not normal, but we're very thankful for it. I'm personally very thankful for it. Looking forward to it.

Yes. And speaking of sabbaticals and practical theology, the personal ministry of the word in the church context, it's one thing to preach every Sunday and have sort of the pulpit part of the ministry, but the personal ministry of the word and engaging and meeting everyone one on one biblical counseling group context like what Nate was talking about requires a lot of work. Why we want to take some time and talk to talk about this track, just the practical theology of biblical counseling and what we're talking about as far as what this track is. And Nate's gonna share with us just the objective of what we're after, and then we'll we'll share a little bit about each one of our speakers. And then again, through each one of our lessons because again, there's for those of you who've been to the conference before, there's eight sessions, eight tracks, and eight sessions that we get to go in.

Typically, we've got individual sessions, and then we've got group panels and things like that. So, Nate, you wanna just talk a little bit about the objective of this track, practical theology and biblical counseling for a moment?

Yeah. I'd love to. So this really is my heart. I'm super passionate about this. So this is a brand new track.

It's just called practical theology, and the basic idea here is we're gonna be going through the first seven questions in the ABC level two Theology exam, but the idea isn't that we're just going to go through the questions and give answers to those who are going to go through the exam and then you kind of learn and then do the exam. That's not it at all. There's a spin and the spin is what I'm actually really excited about. So the idea here is the model we're thinking about is head, heart, hands. That's what we're thinking about.

As we're going through these topics, these massive theological concepts, the idea is, okay, so head, what are we talking about exactly? What is the doctrine? What is the theology we're talking about? Let's unpack that. Let's explain that.

Let's understand that as best we can. So that's the head component. The heart is how has the speaker, how has the person who's giving this session been personally impacted, transformed, had an encounter with Jesus through what they just talked about. And then lastly, hands is how can we then take all of that and seek to then communicate and counsel and point others to this life changing transformational truth that has been so important to us in our own lives. This is just what happens in counseling.

It's like, we don't want to be trying to communicate things and teach things that we ourselves have not been changed by that we ourselves are unfamiliar with because you can't teach what you don't know.

Yeah.

You can't lead others where you yourself have not gone. And so it's really the overflow of an individual who has been changed, impacted, and is therefore then passionate about this truth and and then seeking to communicate that truth to others that they might be changed as well.

Yeah. That's really good. With that objective in mind and trying to take those dense theological truths and basically make them street level. Right?

Yes.

Where compassion is front and center, truth, obviously speaking the truth in love, patience and compassionate hearts, and all of those things. All of those things collide in the in in the counseling room. And so that's why this track is necessary. And, Nate, could you just share a little bit about just our track team? And then, obviously, I can speak to myself, but just a little bit about Shanda and Jason, especially Jason being a part of the Canadian Biblical Counseling Coalition.

Yeah. So I'm looking forward to getting to know Shanda. I just met her online so far, but so thrilled that she's gonna be part of this track. She too seems very passionate about the topics that she's gonna be talking about and has experienced great heart and life change as a result of her own walk with the Lord. So excited that she's a part of this.

Jason, I've known for several years. Jason again is a Canadian. So some of us know that, some of us don't know that. I suspect he talks about it a lot, especially the Edmonton Oilers, his favorite hockey team. But Jason has been on the board of the Canadian Biblical Counseling Coalition with me for about a decade or so.

Love and respect Jason so much. And so again, really excited that he's going to be, he's going be part of this. And then Michael, you too are also going to be part of the track. So very thankful to get to know you a little bit and for your involvement also. Yeah.

Yeah. I think when we were at the the Canadian Biblical Counseling Coalition Conference earlier this year in Oakville, getting to meet Nate and just hearing more about his his context and ministry. But now in this context, we get to teach together. We get to be a part of the team. And I've been on other tracks over the last couple of years, and I gotta say this, I'm looking forward to this team and just being able to connect with each other and enjoy our time.

And I'm really looking forward to those of you that have signed up. And actually, I found out that as far as, like, early registrations right now, our track is getting a lot of traffic. Okay. Okay. So that's really exciting to know that this track is gonna be well attended as it should be.

Obviously, we have a lot of level two students, but then also too, we're also focusing a little bit on, and we'll talk about this here a little bit more before we wrap up this episode, but just the reality of having not just people that are going through level two certification, but then also you don't have to go through level two certification to benefit from this track. And, Nate, you wanna maybe speak to maybe outside of those that are gonna obviously participate in this track for level two help, but what would you say as far as to others where this would be beneficial as a pedestrian?

Just to your point, Mike, in our correspondence so far as a team, there has been just such a like mindedness and excitement and just such a sense that like the Lord is leading this. And if the Lord's going be leading this, that's exciting. Right? Let's show up and see what the Lord's going to do. But I would say for those who aren't necessarily going through level two, the exciting part about this track again for me is that we are seeking to take beautiful, glorious theology that we ourselves have been transformed by, and then seeking to communicate it in such a way that this is real.

This is how the Lord has worked in me. Yes, this is the truth, but then this is the transformation that he has brought about in me. And here's how he's done that. And here's specifically what that's looked like. And here's how this can play out in your life as well.

So sometimes there's a bit of a mindset of I'm not really a counselor. I'm going to this conference and I'm seeing what this is all about but I'm not really a counselor. I get that But at the same time, if the Lord has changed you through his word and you're talking about it, you're counseling on some level. So that's something that we all do as Christians. And if you are in a leadership role or you're in a teaching role, man, this is gonna be all about how to take the things that are beautiful and wonderful that you yourself have received and then seeking to pour those things out by the power of the holy spirit, by god's grace, into someone else's life that they would experience the same heart and life change that you've experienced.

So I'm very excited about that.

Yeah. That's really good. And just to even state it another way is depending on your church context for those of you who are listening considering this track, it's one thing to be a part of a church context that does like Sunday school or have has different teaching classes or whatever on Sunday. But it's another thing because the whole purpose of theology is to apply it relationally. Yep.

And that that really is going back to Nate's point about the our track and just the head, heart, and hands is that's what we're trying to do. So it's taking the formal study of God's word and applying it in those informal moments relationally. And so with that, though, as we're going through that, Nate, we wanna let's talk about a little bit of just how like each session, what we're gonna focus on because we mentioned that this is gonna be the first seven questions within the theology exam. So let's walk a little bit through that and what those are gonna look like, and then we can wrap up from there.

Yeah. So let's give just a brief overview. So session one, Jason's going to be teaching that and it's going to be focusing on the sufficiency of Scripture. So we think, okay, head, what does that mean? What is the sufficiency of Scripture?

This is an important hot button topic these days. Right? The sufficiency of scripture. How do we think about that? And then Jason gets the opportunity hard to talk about how the sufficiency of scripture has impacted his own heart and life believing that, how that's led to a transformational encounter in his own life with Jesus.

Again, not just once, but every day, every day. And then hands, how does he then communicate the beauty of the sufficiency of scripture to people that he's walking with? How does he point them to that, that they too can experience again, a transformational encounter with Jesus? That's what it's all about. So if you're picking up on passion here, that's because it's real Because I'm excited to sit under Jason's teaching and be like, yeah, that's it right there.

That's it right there. And for every single session, I'm excited about the same thing. Michael, you're up session two, and you're gonna be talking about God's revelation, Right? And general revelation and special revelation, you're gonna be focusing on that instead of me describing your session. Did you wanna

say that word for you? No. That was a good that was a good layup, man. I appreciate the assist on that. That was great.

But to yeah. To that point and again, it follows the rhythm of head, heart, and hands. And that, you know, what what we mean by that for example, my title is worship, the purpose of God's revelation is that God didn't just reveal himself so that we would just know that he exists. Right? The purpose of his revelation is worship.

Amen. And so I'm gonna be focusing on that. And and Nate mentioned general special revelation. And then we're gonna be introducing probably something that is gonna be probably newer to some people as far as this phrase applied revelation, and it really is the work of the Holy Spirit. And so I'm essentially gonna be working through Psalm 19 and just the movement of that text and demonstrating.

And what would be cool about that is even if you're not a counselor and you're just a ministry leader or you're just a believer who wants to grow theologically speaking, you're gonna be able to see like through Psalm 19 how you work through a text and see what you can draw out of that and literally be able to apply that in our relationships. But first and foremost, how it applies to your own heart, going back to that part about the heart. And so that's why we're excited about that that particular section as we move through these discussion questions. And then the third one, Shanda Anderson's gonna be focusing on our God who is not like us, the incommunicable attributes of God. And to that point, Nate, it's like, how do you take these deep dense theological truths of probably a term that most people haven't even heard about in the church.

We talk about incommunicable attributes. Right? So we're gonna be taking again, go back to the heady stuff. We're gonna try to distill that and draw and pull from those things to make these things street level. So you wanna continue on in the list?

Yeah. Yeah. So really excited to to sit under Shanda's teaching there. And, so she's been pointing, like, to the glory of God. Yes.

Right? So the incommunicable attributes of God, the things the ways that God is entirely different than us and that we will never be like him. All powerful, all knowing. These are things that we that's not us. That's not in our DNA.

It never will be. But how that has impacted her own heart, so that's heart. And then hands, how she then teaches that, communicates that, seeks to be a conduit for others to then also have a transformational encounter with Jesus. The next session number four, I'll be teaching and I'll be focusing on the communicable attributes of God. So, unpacking what's that?

Ways, ways that the spirit of god transforms us and our character to then be like Jesus, right? So, to be growing in love and patience and joy and peace. As we, in Corinthians three eighteen, as we behold his glory, right? As we behold the glory of the Lord, we're changed by degree and the change agent is the Holy Spirit himself who transforms us. So I'll get the privilege of being able to share a little bit of my journey and how the Lord is continuing to work in me as the as the outside is withering and getting old and all the pains and aches and all of that, the inner man is getting built up and that's so exciting.

But then and then how does that work out in the counseling room? I feel like that itself, every one of these questions could just be a track all in and of itself. Then how does that play out in the counseling room and the hands section of that? Shanda's up again after me and she's going be focusing on the names of God and again, head, what are the names of God? And obviously she's not gonna be able to focus on all the names of God, but she's take a few of the names of God and then heart, how that has impacted her as she has sat alone with the Lord and at the feet of Jesus, considering the names of God herself and how the spirit of God has used that in her own life and then how then that she communicates that to others so they might be changed as well.

Jason is up after that and again we're seeing some repetition here. Hands, heart, hands, head, heart, hands seeing that every session. Jason's up next talking about the will of God and be focusing on the sovereignty of God and the providence of God. Again, heavy, weighty topics to be unpacking. Every single session, there'll be heavy, weighty things because in theology there's there's an element of simplicity, there's an element of complexity, and an element of mystery, right?

And we'll be talking about all three of those in in in every head section, but then in his own life how the the the will of God, the sovereignty of God, the providence of God has been so impactful to his heart. And then how does that then influence the way that he counsels others again, that they might have a transformational encounter with Jesus. And again, it's I think it's so important to keep the focus of I can't lead where I don't go myself. And I think one of the threads through all of these sessions is man like I need to be pursuing the Lord. Right?

As as a Christian I need to be pursuing the Lord. As someone who's involved in ministry on any level I need to be pursuing the Lord. I need to be abiding because if this isn't real for me then it's not really an overflow into the lives of others, right? So again, it's just so important that that we ourselves are pursuing the Lord. Session seven, I get to wrap up with a again, a very weighty topic of the Trinity.

And so the actual question in the exam is explain the Trinity. This just in, I can't. I can't explain it as well. We're going to be talking about the Trinity for sure. And again, here's lots of mystery, but then I'll get the opportunity to talk about how the Trinity has impacted my own heart and life, specifically thinking about I've just been so blessed by this lately, being indwelt by the spirit, being united to Christ, being adopted by the father.

Each one of these just profound and then how does that play into my counseling in the pursuit of others having a transformational encounter with the Lord? And then session eight will be a panel, a Q and A panel, which I always really enjoy watching. I love participating in as well, and that will be a time for those who are coming to take their questions. There'll be questions in every single session, but this will be a time where we can spend a little bit more time interacting with those who are attending. So at the end of the day, everyone attending the conference should be exactly where the Lord wants them to be.

That's the important thing. But we're believing that the Lord wants many, to be at this track and that he's going to use it in our lives. I know he's gonna use it in my life. No, he's gonna use it in your life. And he's gonna use it in the lives of those who are coming.

So really excited to be a part of this.

To that point, Nate, I because oftentimes, there's there seems to be a sort of a stark contrast in the spectrum of the study of God's word. Like churches that high center on theology, but the perception is that they tend to be cold and not very relational. And then you've got the other side where it's all about fellowship and theology is lacking. And so, again, we were very intentional in trying to think through this track with a head, heart, and hands because, again, we know to to Nate's point, we've all been changed by the truth of scripture, the sufficiency of scripture, how God has revealed himself. And then in that study, realizing that we are not like him, and yet we are like him through who he is, how he's made us, how we're made in his image.

Like, why does it why is it even necessary to understand the Trinity? Because that's a relationship that we're literally made in the image of, And we get to see the work of that in our salvation and in our relationships and our sanctification, and then all of that transpiring in a counseling room and a conversation and an opportunity to show compassion to a hurting brother or sister who's suffering and struggling with the sovereignty of God in their suffering. And again, to Nate's point, we're trying to bring all of this to street level because practical theology is not only the interpretation, but it's the experiential reality of living out our theology. There's the the theology that we we say we ascribe to, maybe mentally, but then there's the attitudinal theology, the theology that we actually functionally live by. So we wanna just we wanna make that experiential and livable in condensing it in a way that is palatable for everyone in session.

Because again, these particular questions, and obviously for those of you who are going through the level two exam, know that there's 35 questions. But these first seven questions, just like the the law, the 10 commandments, those first four are all vertical. And so this is us understanding the vertical reality. And this is the cool part that I'm looking forward to, Nate, is when Jason talks about the the suffering and the sovereignty of God and how that sort of is layered upon our lives and the story of our lives. And all of us have our lives, our stories, and we're all part of God's story and the fact that it's not about us.

So it's yeah. I could babble about this forever. It's it's exciting, man.

Me too. Me too.

It's exciting. But any last encouraging words, Nate, before we wrap up this episode as far as and we already alluded to this, but maybe in closing, just an encouragement to those who are considering this track outside of, again, level two.

Yeah. This is truly a track that is for everybody. You know, this isn't a track for just like certain groups or certain populations. This is a track for everybody whether you're in level two, whether you're not. And, again, firmly believing that in in this context of this track, as we gather together, as we open up God's word, as the spirit of God is moving, as we're hearing personal testimony, I like our chances that not only will we walk away having learned something, but I like our chances that the spirit of God is gonna change us through this track, through the through being there in the room and the activity of the spirit.

Like, I just I like our chances. Come to this track, and I'm looking forward to seeing you there.

Yeah. Thank you, Nate. Guys, thank you for listening again. I want to encourage you. Go to calledtocounsel.com today, now.

There's a link in the show notes that you can go to it. For those of you who are gonna be coming in groups, divide and conquer. Right? So get somebody from your church or your group to go to a few other tracks, and then you be in this track, and you guys are able to come together. And what I'm really excited to just in closing with that is our track and arguably all of our tracks, and to me, this is a distinctive of ABC, is that we are a relational people.

We are approachable. So in between sessions, come talk with us. It's not just about answering questions. It's about getting to know us as brothers and sisters. Right?

It's not, oh, you're teaching, and so you you're, like, ahead of everything. No. Like, we're again, we have hearts, and we have hands, and we're trying to respond to this just like everyone else. And so we're approachable. It's all relational, and it's to that end.

And so, guys, thank you for listening, Nate. Thank you for your time, and, we look forward to seeing you guys at the conference. We'll see you then.

Amen.