welcome to real Christianity a weekly show designed to help Christians know their Bible defend their faith and truly understand what it means to follow Jesus the premise is simple the culture is getting louder the church is getting flash ear but few pastors are teaching on how to live a Biblical life my name is Dale Partridge along with my incredible wife Veronica join us as we start an important conversation about what it really means to be a Christian
 welcome guys to date we have a special show and it's titled Christianity episode number 103 haven't missed one episode
 for two years yeah which tell you what guys become very close recording like at 10 p.m. the night before it drops at 4 or 6 eastern time so we are just celebrating the fact that we actually have done two years of this I wanted to share a few stats about the show and give you guys an update about the future of the show we are going to change the format of the show and have a new structure and some things are going to be shifting that are good but we want to share that with you before I jump in and I just want to tell you what we've accomplished cuz it's really just the Lord's work and it's it's really beautiful so at the time of this recording we have 1847496 episode downloads
 and that just blows my mind there there might actually even be more because there was a a pruning of in cleaning of downloads through our host and so they might actually might actually be more than that but even still I just go out 1.8 million people have downloaded a real Christianity podcast episode I guess it's not actually that many people it's probably more like a couple hundred thousand have downloaded several but not to be about twenty-five to thirty thousand weekly individual listeners of the show and so I think about this with me for a second it's like a church of twenty-five to thirty thousand people every Wednesday and so that's that's how I think about it when I prepare my notes and
 when I pray about the show because it is a massive audience that the Lord has given us to Steward a couple other interesting stats Is that real Christianity has 5322 reviews which puts the show in the top 1% of most reviewed podcast and it isn't Fun stats that I have different apps that tell us these things so the largest podcast category on iTunes is the religion and spirituality podcast I think it's probably cuz every church and it's every every religion yes and so in that category of religion and spirituality 99390 shows exist and real Christianity regularly sits in the top 200 of those 99,000 shows we've actually appeared and the
 top 10 times and the top hundred about six out of ten weeks so we're regularly in the top hundred and that is just because the Lord and because you guys have been faithful and loyal listeners to the show we want to take you about that the show has listeners in 120 countries amazed if you look at this map here like wow there are people listening in countries that I forgot about in terms of just like well my geography so bad and we're on every single continent except Antarctica we just got to find one listener to like TuneIn whoever lives down there yeah I want to make sure if you guys are top five episodes the most-listened-to episodes that we've ever done in case you guys want to go back and listen to any of them episode 1
 the 8th the Bible's position on tattoos marijuana and alcohol practical obviously just think they're looking for practical information like how should we be view in these okay number two is episode 33 should Christian women wear head covering while praying or prophesying that one is very popular I remember where that one came out number 3 episode 65
 should Christians celebrate Halloween number for episode 81 the Bible on yoga the Enneagram and Progressive Christianity and then number five has two episode because they were two episodes guide episode 58 is your worship music teaching false Doctrine and episode 67 the self-love delusion the Enneagram Progressive Christianity episode would definitely be popular the Halloween episode and I think we did that even twice or different versions of that yours yeah yeah so when that time comes around again but yet is your worship music teaching Falls dr. That was that one's probably one of my favorite episodes cuz we are the more and more we've learned the richness of biblical hymns and we just we loved hymns now because the richness of the lyrics and at the the song writers have the same account of Bill
 to write biblically accurate song lyrics As pastors do and writing biblically accurate sermons and so that's just a fun episode yeah and then the false are the at the self delusion of self-love delusion that we live in a self Love Culture that's a good one to listen to episode 67 on this always talk about self-love so yeah but for those of you who have been with us since the very beginning you know that we start this podcast of the name ultimate marriage after the first 30 episodes or so we just covered marriage and family and then we shifted to the name real Christianity so we had a we have a program still at the six-week marriage program called ultimate marriage.com and the biblical marriage Mentor program and we we basically top tush
 on a handful of those topics of the program but then we decided you know what we want to talk about things outside of marriage and family that are named kind of limited us too so we changed it to real Christianity about 18 months ago and gave him some ability to cover a broader base of topics so we actually want to continue that journey of of growing and evolving real Christianity were going to keep the name the same so that's going to stay the same but we eat we really enjoyed searching the scriptures to discover the Bible's instruction and wisdom on to really made issues one is theology which covers a lot right we can just pay it almost everything in theology but getting down to understanding the Lord in a theological sense how does it work together in the Bible you know we think about the great commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart with all your soul and with all your mind and to really emphasize that last category of
 little understanding of the Lord because the heart can't rejoice in what the Mind does not understand and so it gives us a really beautiful chance to help explain to the deeper and more difficult topics of theology be at the second category that I want to focus on is church you guys know that our heart is we are at church planting the house church planting Ministry but really the ecclesiological doctrines of church how should Church be operating what should Church look like what did the Bible say about church those two categories of Theology and church are going to be the future focus of the show and we're also planning to make a handful of other shifts and there's about five of them and I'll let Veronica open up with the big one
 change shift shift number one yeah I will actually no longer be on the podcast as a pastor's wife and a mother to three young children and homeschooling and the stress and trials that come with local Ministry I've prayerfully decided that it's actually more fruitful for my first Ministry which is our family doctor separate myself a bit from the puppet Ministry online so much time and energy go into putting a podcast out researched taking notes studying things like that entails a type of Personality that he can just whip up his notes really quick and just kind of go off a fly type of thing or I am much more like I need to sit down and write out my nose and take write them all down and think about what I'm going to say I'm not very good on my feet
 and so it just takes a lot of time for me to be doing this every single week now this doesn't mean that I might not jump back in sometime in the future but right now in the midst of some very difficult times in our world we simply believe it's best to just allow me to focus my efforts on serving our family and our local church decision but you know Veronica is my support also in terms of as just being a wife and when she's out in the front in the public eye and in either getting critiqued as much as I get critique didn't and having to use the illogical study and you know it it really
 takes away from her ability to support our home and support me in a sense because she's got a burden on her of ministry that is a lot just a lot to do the online Ministry the podcast to do with all the home stuff we need on password to a local church as well and so there's all the relationships there in a house Church sure it's smaller but it's deeper and so there's there's deep relationships through through these communities and we just think that it's a wise investment for the time especially cuz our kids of young we're not going to get this time back and our kids are a little right now and we want to take care of them and and really pay attention to them in this time we don't want to create the kids that go mom and dad were always doing Ministry and forgot about us or put Ministry before us
 have it turn into any type of bitterness towards Ministry so this is just a wise decision I think second so Veronica is leaving his number one number two is we're going to actually see a brand new podcast cover in your podcast app and the next two weeks when we release our first episode under this new format so keep an eye out for new podcast cover a design it's going to be different colors and I probably won't even have my picture on the other just a real Christianity 3rd
 the show is going to be built on questions from listeners and so each week I'm going to answer one important question about Theology and the church and these are going to be important questions and vital questions and so I get lots and lots of questions if I ask four questions I'll get thousands of questions so the cool thing about this is that we get some really good question so we're going to have some good questions there's just no way you can answer all yeah I think about like the Ask Pastor John podcast from Desiring God that's what he does he doesn't answer the question and he's like I don't know episode 900 or something like that or 500 or something so the other thing which is still in the third Point here is that we plan to keep each other so shorter a lot of our episodes of gone to like 30-40 minutes we're going
 have these episodes aim to be 15 minutes long now some of them will be up to 20 but they will never be more than 20 minutes and we'll be never less than 10 and the reason is that's where most people stop in the statistics anyways because they have a 15 to 20-minute drive to work and then I finish it on the way back but it's really nice to go to finish an episode of one sitting and so we want to aim to help you guys hate here's a here's a 15 to 20-minute deep end of the pool theological you know encouragement for the day and those are going to continue to come out on Wednesdays number for we're not going to be doing video any longer and there's a variety of reasons for this but one of them just to be honest is that we live on a farm and it is a ton of work to get it uploaded here especially if we're filling in for K because
 and get out here and it's not yeah it's really really slow and so we have to like Drive the Cards into town and drop them off to like our editor and it's it's just been hard to do that and so but we will be uploading the video still to YouTube it just to be audio format and you can get that at our relearn. Org YouTube we've now changed our YouTube account to be relearned. Org instead of dealing Veronica partridge in this again it's not just speed up the process and uploading but speed up the process of filming like getting rid of that and it editing is way easier to the state of the ministry little bit of money and it also speeds up the process and makes it more
 and then lastly after this episode we're actually going to take two weeks off so for two Wednesdays after this you're not going to see a real Christianity podcast released we're going to between that time we're going to record try to do like 4 to 8 episodes back-to-back there we're going to record a new introduction in a shorter introduction to the know a lot of you who are regular listeners are going on my gosh I have to listen to the first minute of your introduction to every week I've heard it so many times
 everybody probably dies everybody has a really quick easy induction so those are the five things that are going to change so we also wanted to share a quick update on our ministry the new relearn Church. Org website is almost done which will be a wonderful resource of content for those interested in exploring the ostrich and Veronica just out of sheer memory but it's a real learn.org to change the the name to relearn. Org one is it we got that domain which is like a long process to get
 but to all I do. We were at church and so we don't get confused with the church for a church planting Warehouse you're planting ministry.org a couple weeks and so we hope that it'll kind of line up with when we release the podcast but that's big news and St Justin's. Org is it a part of our ministry it's a companion Ministry to relearn. Or if realtor.org is the website where you explore and learn and get introduced to the Little House Church then St Justin's is the application of that Journey oh no I've learned now I want to do something about it and so St Joseph St Justin's. Org that's our online church planting house church planting school and we would never are a limited number of spots available for the first year and we have several Men actually enrolled already in the program but if you're interested in exploring formal church and pastoral
 training we are putting together a really beautiful faculty of of men and a great group of advisers of theological advisors we have several of them locked in now and I were still have in discussions with a few more go ahead and visit st. Justin's. Org and just request more information and we would start the process of talking to you about that okay and lastly we just want to thank each and every single one of you guys who his Faithfully listen to the show the Lord his use this podcast to accomplish some of the most incredible amazing things that we've heard least testimonial eyes we've heard stories of people coming to Faith through the podcast which is a huge we've heard of men returning home from adultery because of something that they listen to during a particular episode we've also heard of couples who decided to have more kids or people who were set free from pronography hundreds of Christian
 you've decided to commit to reading the entire Bible divorces that were canceled in people who decided to be baptized relationships that were restored people who started Bible studies and just the stories just go on and on and on so down I just want to say thank you so much we're humbled by every time we hear one of these incredible testimonies it's very humbling but all glory to God we are grateful that he allowed us to do this for a season so I think we have all these stories from the reviews when you when you read the reviews it will make you cry I mean they're just incredible how the Lord has used
 a podcast of all things us sitting in our studio recording these things and
 he just uses them for his kingdom and so praise God and we just wanted to thank you guys for just being faithful and allowing us to disturb you guys in this ministry the last thing I want to say before we close out is that all of this everything that we've done everything that the Lord has done through this podcast all that is accomplished spiritually all that it's accomplished as it as a podcast itself it was only made possible because of people's faithful financial support if you don't know that the show is 100% listener-supported And so all of our expenses the camera equipment the microphones like I just had to buy a new microphones for the next show the way we're adjusting and getting better microphones and you know it was $700 yep and the editor paint you know paying the for just all the equipment in the lights in the study time that it takes for me ice
 General episode awesome time span
 2 to 10 hours studying for a particular episode and every single expense is covered by the donations of those who tuned in each week and so the Lord is using your donations and allowing us to produce more resources for the kingdom of God and so for those who are new and have not made a donation to support the ministry would you guys consider praying with the Lord would have you do we we promised that we will Stewart every single dollar with integrity and care and I it if the Lord leads you to do so you can make a donation relearn Church. Org forward slash donate still in that domain wheeler Church. Org donate so thank you guys for joining us for this important update and I will see you guys on the next episode in the new format on June 24th take care
 thank you for joining us on this episode of real Christianity real Christianity is an audio Ministry of relearn church.org if you'd like more information on how to live out a Biblical life relearn Church. Sobriety of Articles podcast sermons and videos to support your journey real Christianity is 100% listener-supported Ministry and if you'd like to support our efforts simply click to donate a pat relearn church.org you can also connect with both Veronica and I on Instagram Facebook and Twitter for daily lessons and Bible teaching thank you for being with us today we hope to see you next Wednesday for another episode of real Christianity