Revived Thoughts + Martyrs and Missionaries: Top 5 Episodes of 2023

[00:00:00] Revived Thoughts is a production of Revive Studios.

[00:00:09] This is Troy, Angel, and Elise, and you are listening to Revived Thoughts and

[00:00:14] Martyrs And Missionaries end of the year roundup top best episodes of the year. We are all online

[00:00:21] to share our, our, what our vision of the top five episodes of Revived Thoughts and Martyrs

[00:00:27] And Missionaries were this year with you. And we hope that you who are listening right now

[00:00:31] will, if you're maybe newer, this is a great way to catalog what episodes you should catch up on

[00:00:36] and which ones you haven't heard before. And if you have been listening, do you think that our

[00:00:40] top five episodes were your top five episodes? Find out. All right, guys say hi.

[00:00:46] Hey, how's it going?

[00:00:46] Hey, how are you doing, Elise?

[00:00:49] I'm good. How are you?

[00:00:51] I'm doing pretty good. Long time, no listen. No, no hear your voice.

[00:00:57] No, listen, no, listen. So you're admitting you don't listen to my show. I see how it is.

[00:01:01] That's oh man.

[00:01:02] Off to a fast start.

[00:01:04] It's a person thing. It's a, you know, interaction. Long time, no interaction, I should say.

[00:01:09] For sure.

[00:01:10] That's true. That's true.

[00:01:10] What's the temperature there guys?

[00:01:13] It's hot.

[00:01:13] It's hot.

[00:01:14] It feels hot.

[00:01:14] Needs to rain.

[00:01:15] Humid.

[00:01:16] Has it started raining yet?

[00:01:18] It for the rainy season?

[00:01:20] Sort of like there was like a good two weeks where it felt like the rainy season had started.

[00:01:24] And then this last week, it was kind of like the rainy season was like, well,

[00:01:28] I'm going to take a vacation. I've been working hard for a week and a half.

[00:01:31] It really doesn't feel like it's really started.

[00:01:34] Started when it when the rainy season is real.

[00:01:37] It goes on for six to 12 hours at a time.

[00:01:40] Just torrential down, just downpours like you can't even imagine.

[00:01:45] I mean, it's just unbelievable.

[00:01:47] And I feel like it really still, even though it should have started by now,

[00:01:50] it really still hasn't gotten to that that level quite yet.

[00:01:54] So I'm not complaining too hard, though.

[00:01:55] I am right now. It's hot in this room.

[00:01:57] What about you, Joel? Is it cold and snowy there in Kansas City?

[00:02:01] You know, it's actually been a pretty mild December so far.

[00:02:04] We've been like cruising in the 40s.

[00:02:07] The highs are in the 40s most days, which is which is honestly a pretty nice December.

[00:02:12] So I'm sure when January comes, we'll get slammed with,

[00:02:16] you know, it'll just be in the teens from then on.

[00:02:18] But I'm enjoying the 40s.

[00:02:20] The sun comes out. It's not too bad.

[00:02:22] You can go for a walk in it until until you get to that season of Kansas City weather

[00:02:27] where it's just all ice and snow and it's impossible to drive or do anything for like two months.

[00:02:33] Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if you enjoy seasons,

[00:02:35] if you want to experience what all four seasons have to offer,

[00:02:40] in the full list, move to the Kansas City area because we get we get all the spring,

[00:02:45] all of summer, all of fall, all of winter pretty equally, I feel like.

[00:02:49] Yeah. But I mean, you don't have all the seasons because you don't have rainy season.

[00:02:52] Of course, we don't right now either. So that's, you know, that's kind of.

[00:02:55] I don't think any of us are selling our geographic locations.

[00:02:59] People are listening, listening, going, all right, so don't move to Indonesia and don't

[00:03:02] move to Kansas City. That's what I'm here for.

[00:03:03] Florida, here I come.

[00:03:05] Here I come. That's right. All right. Well, hey, let's go ahead and get started.

[00:03:08] Every year we do this and we have done this with the least before.

[00:03:11] We didn't have at least on last year. I don't know why, but we didn't have you on last year,

[00:03:15] at least. But we do a top five best episodes. And like I said in the intro, the goal of this

[00:03:21] is just to kind of give a lot of new listeners. They wonder, where do I start with our show?

[00:03:25] We have hundreds of episodes with with at least a show that's like 60 or 70 episodes.

[00:03:29] Where do you start with these big, long shows?

[00:03:31] It helps maybe if you have a guide map to kind of be that that that where you get started.

[00:03:35] And for the people who have listened the whole year, you're dedicated. You know,

[00:03:39] every episode you're you're right there with us is just a chance for you to see

[00:03:43] where the five were your five favorites, the same five favorites that we had.

[00:03:47] Now, with that said, at least had this idea, and I think it's a good idea

[00:03:51] to throw in a little game. So throwing a little little something for everybody to listen to as

[00:03:56] we go. So during this episode, I'm going to be dropping some church history trivia questions

[00:04:01] and giving Joel and Elise opportunities to see if they can get the answers correct.

[00:04:07] And we will see who comes out on top at the end of this episode, I will say.

[00:04:13] If you're a gambling person, you know, I don't I don't want to say I don't want to I don't want

[00:04:17] to tip the scales here, but the odds might be more in one direction than the other.

[00:04:20] But we're going to see we're going to see.

[00:04:22] Joel, how do you feel? Feeling confident tonight that you got this game?

[00:04:25] I'm feeling about as unconfident as one person can possibly get.

[00:04:29] I feel like our listeners, our listeners have by this point come to understand our dynamic here.

[00:04:35] You're the the super brainy genius that remembers every church history detail and understands

[00:04:42] everything. And I'm kind of along for the ride. I enjoy I enjoy I really enjoy it, but I don't

[00:04:48] remember how I'm going to do my best, but we'll see here.

[00:04:54] Excellent. That's it. That is the attitude you want to have at the beginning of this church

[00:04:57] history trivia challenge is I don't know. We'll see.

[00:05:01] I mean, you say all that. He's probably going to smoke me.

[00:05:03] All right. Are you guys ready for your first question? Actually,

[00:05:06] I got one already locked and loaded right now. If you guys are in.

[00:05:09] Let's do it.

[00:05:10] All right. I'm going to throw this out there. Just make a buzzer sound. Let's see. Let's

[00:05:14] see a little like a beat or something. You can do your best here. And that'll be my cue

[00:05:18] to throw it to one of you. All right.

[00:05:19] OK. OK.

[00:05:20] All right. First question before we've even hit our sermons. Here we go. First question.

[00:05:24] Question number one on church history trivia challenge night is in what year was the Great

[00:05:31] London Fire?

[00:05:32] Oh goodness.

[00:05:33] What year was that fire?

[00:05:35] Oh, beep beep. Is that?

[00:05:36] Oh, hey, is that Joel coming in on the way? What do you got Joel?

[00:05:39] Apparently I have a toy car in this situation area.

[00:05:41] 1666.

[00:05:43] Oh, ding ding ding ding ding ding. That one does go to Joel.

[00:05:45] You know, I feel like that's that's unfair.

[00:05:48] It is not fair.

[00:05:50] Yeah. How many times I rambled about that fire to you, Elise?

[00:05:53] You certainly had as many opportunities as Joel did.

[00:05:56] Fair point.

[00:05:57] All right. Well, that was unexpected. Joel's taking an early lead with that

[00:06:00] unconfidence. He suddenly shook up the board. All right.

[00:06:04] With that said, let's go ahead and start. What is your number five sermon?

[00:06:08] Joel, since you took the lead, why don't you sermon or martyr and missionary?

[00:06:12] What is your number five episode for the year?

[00:06:15] Yeah, it's a it's a tough one. I don't know.

[00:06:18] I don't know if I would necessarily order my suggestions in a strict linear best to worst,

[00:06:25] but more of just like maybe top five ones that I liked this year type of thing.

[00:06:32] You know, I think that would be I wanted to say that, too, because I don't know that like any

[00:06:35] of these episodes for me, especially probably probably like the bottom four. Like there might

[00:06:40] be one that I'm really feeling tops about that. I think it was pretty good. But yeah,

[00:06:44] maybe there's a favorite and then four runner ups type.

[00:06:48] Yeah, that might be a good way to say it. Like they're all good. And it's like,

[00:06:50] how do you compare four and five? You know what I'm saying? Like,

[00:06:53] it's not like this one was fourth best. It's clear. I want to agree with you on that.

[00:06:57] Since it's fresh on the memory, because we just recorded it earlier this month,

[00:07:02] I really liked our moody episode this year titled What Do You Think of Christ?

[00:07:07] I had fun talking about it in the prologue section, and I like listening to Dustin

[00:07:13] read it. I thought it was pretty good. Yeah, he did a great job. And I and to it.

[00:07:19] It was fun for us to go back and do DL Moody. It's been a long time. I didn't realize until

[00:07:24] I was putting that episode together how much of deal Moody's story you know, you say I always

[00:07:27] have these church history trivia facts, but actually forgotten a lot of his story because

[00:07:31] it's just been I think it's been genuinely like two or three years since we've done an episode on him.

[00:07:36] It was really fun. It was fun to refresh on that, like just reading through how hard his life was

[00:07:42] and just the way God used him. He has an amazing story. So yeah, that's a really good one. And I

[00:07:48] agree. That was when we put out if you're listening to this with us in real time,

[00:07:51] that was when we put out most recently or one of my most recent episodes.

[00:07:55] And if you're listening later, hey, go check it out. It's a good one to check out. All right,

[00:07:59] Elise, number five in your martyrs and missionaries categories list, whatever you want to call it.

[00:08:04] All right. I think I'm going to have to go with Alan Gardner, not in vain,

[00:08:12] because I think his story was was one of those that it could have been really depressing

[00:08:19] because he kind of dies and seemingly as a failure. But then there's a lot of fruit from his

[00:08:27] from his ministry, not necessarily in the way that we would see it. I'm not going to spoil

[00:08:31] it for you, but it's just he goes all over the place. He doesn't he doesn't really he doesn't

[00:08:37] really see a lot of fruit in his ministry. And even after his death, there's questionable fruit.

[00:08:42] And then but it doesn't matter because it's still a great story and he has he has a great heart for

[00:08:47] people. So I like that. All right. That's a good one. I think Alan Gardner, Alan Gardner story,

[00:08:53] just piggybacking with me with Elise here. I was sitting here with my daughter's name

[00:08:58] is I it's just it's a depressing story. But I think at least had a really good job telling the

[00:09:04] full history of it in a way that I was I did. I had heard the story before. That was the one who

[00:09:08] is like telling at least for a year, like, oh, you got to do this story. And she was like, I starved

[00:09:12] in the jungle. I don't know how much I want to do that. It's kind of depressing. And she did a

[00:09:16] really good job filling in details I had not heard before myself. For me, number five, I think I got

[00:09:22] to go with this is kind of a weird one, but I feel like whenever we do these, mine always kind of are

[00:09:27] Ephraim the Syrian, the one that came out over the summer. It was this like 1600 year old sermon

[00:09:33] that the reason I liked it so much and I think it's just a cool one is I feel like it embodies

[00:09:37] the revived thoughts vibe of like finding some history that nobody's talked about or looked at

[00:09:42] in a long time, dusting it off and sending it out to the world. And I really enjoyed the sermon.

[00:09:47] It was, I mean, like a sermon on the end times told from the perspective of somebody who's like

[00:09:52] in the Syrian church 1500 years ago. And yet, despite how we should feel so extremely disconnected

[00:09:59] from something like that, I felt like it was a really good sermon convicting people were like,

[00:10:03] man, I was convicted by that sermon. It was good. And I think it was just really cool that we got

[00:10:07] to put that one out. So that's probably my number five. Awesome. All right. All right. All right.

[00:10:12] Wait, we got the ball rolling. Church history trivia number two. Light on me. You ready? Okay.

[00:10:18] This famous missionary happens to share the same name as a Marvel comic book character.

[00:10:31] Elise should not be looking surprised. That is what he does. He's got the same name.

[00:10:38] Oh, gosh. Peter Marvels. Oh, gosh. Okay. I know Joel has got to be working with Google that he

[00:10:45] figured that out so quickly. But he is correct. That's two points. Yeah, no, he's right. There's

[00:10:52] an episode called the least Peter Parker fan friendly neighborhood. I'm gonna call it. It's

[00:10:59] almost 10 o'clock. It's my it's not that is see, see? Uh huh. So literally, I hadn't I was just

[00:11:06] brainstorming. I was just thinking we heard that type. We heard that clattering of the keyboard

[00:11:11] Joel that that Google knows this is this is not looking good for I can't believe that that was not

[00:11:16] how I expected that to go at all. Zero to two. And that was straight from your show. You know,

[00:11:21] I'm not surprised. You know, I try to come off humble. But the truth is, I'm

[00:11:26] that's what I'm really thinking like, oh, there's not a there's not a Marvel hero named Hudson

[00:11:31] Taylor. Troy, you dummy. There's no David Livingston in the Marvel comic book. No,

[00:11:37] Peter Parker was okay. All right. Joel, you're on a roll here. Why don't you open us up with

[00:11:43] your number four episode of the year? All right. All right. All right. Number four.

[00:11:49] I think about it. You know, I really liked

[00:11:54] do you remember we did that revive conversation where we just talked about that article that that

[00:12:00] leaflet was that was a Spurgeon that Richard Baxter? It was Richard Baxter about how to spend

[00:12:06] our free time. And I found that shockingly fun and refreshing and interesting to talk about.

[00:12:15] Yeah. You know, we got I got we got good feedback from people who messaged me. I was like, that was

[00:12:19] a fun one. Like I liked it's weird that this 400 year old pamphlet that was like, quit spending your

[00:12:25] free time on useless stuff still made so many of us go scratch our heads and go, huh, that applies

[00:12:29] today and probably more so. I really like that one, too. Actually, I would say if I was having

[00:12:34] a separate category for a vibe conversations, I think that would have been my number one

[00:12:38] revived conversation for the year as well. And you know what, Joel, you've inspired me. I got

[00:12:42] to find another pamphlet for us to do. We should do another. Do it. Yeah, I think those would be

[00:12:46] fun to cover more. All right. Elise, I'm going to say you give us your number four martyr and

[00:12:51] missionary, although I'm starting to question who's really running your show after that last

[00:12:55] these last two questions. That's fair. OK, so it's kind of a toss up. And I think I think I'm

[00:13:03] going to have to go with the interview that I did with Jonathan Carswell about Pauline Hamilton,

[00:13:11] who was a missionary to postwar China and then also to Taiwan. She was she was a really cool

[00:13:22] woman and she did a ton of different ministries. And just her her autobiography is just filled.

[00:13:28] I guess her biography is not autobiography, but it's just filled with stories about about her

[00:13:34] her life, like and all these people that she impacted and all of these things. Actually,

[00:13:39] it is her autobiography. Yeah, it's just it's really cool. All right. Number four for me.

[00:13:48] Yeah, so we've had so many good episodes this year. I was like, I kind of forget as you go

[00:13:52] through the year, just focus on the week to week. And then when you get to the end, you're like,

[00:13:56] oh, yeah, we did that this year. We did that this year. We did that this year. But I think one of

[00:14:00] the ones that I enjoyed a lot was during the Revived conversation with Ben from Haunted Cosmos.

[00:14:05] He came on and we talked about like these weird supernatural things that happen in church history,

[00:14:09] just asking and talking about questions like, what do you do with people in church history?

[00:14:13] Say they heard a voice and it told them to do something or Joan of Arc who said she got a

[00:14:17] vision from God. This is kind of weird things. It was really fun conversation and a lot of

[00:14:21] listeners really enjoyed it, too. So I think that go for a solid number four. I would feel

[00:14:26] weird if I didn't mention that episode. And it was just fun to have a guy from that show on,

[00:14:29] too. He did. He was a great guy. It's really nice. Occasionally I'll send him something like,

[00:14:33] hey, did you see this? And he's like, of course. But he's a good guy. So that was fun.

[00:14:37] All right. Church history trivia number three. Now, at least I've really got to get this. At

[00:14:41] least as a zero. Joel has two and technically Joel is going to be a little more favored on

[00:14:47] this one because it's a little bit more in our court. However, I do think that I do think I

[00:14:52] would not be surprised if Elise gets this one. So here it is. Who gave the eulogy for George Whitfield?

[00:15:00] Oh, I know that Wesley. Ah, at least God. Yes. Bbb. But it was it was

[00:15:06] John Wesley. So I may or should challenge you and made you make sure it was which one it was,

[00:15:11] not Charles, but it was John Wesley. All right. At least on the board. One to two.

[00:15:16] The face she made was so like, I think I know this. Oh, wait, what if I get it wrong?

[00:15:21] That would be really embarrassing. No. All right. Good. At least is on the board.

[00:15:24] You gave me another thing. I want to get it. No, it's fine. Joel, thanks for giving at least

[00:15:28] one. I know you had it. Of course, you're an expert of these, but it was nice of you to throw

[00:15:31] at least one. All right, Elise. Well, no, actually, I won't start with you because I feel

[00:15:35] like I like this kind of revived thoughts, martyr and missionary revived thoughts like we have going.

[00:15:39] But I think I'll go first then to give Joel a chance to think about number three,

[00:15:44] my number three episode of the year. Oh, man, I shouldn't have gone first anymore.

[00:15:48] Trying to think about it. This one, it was definitely one of my favorites. I definitely

[00:15:52] could have even seen it sliding into number one. It is next three. Honestly, it's really hard to do

[00:15:57] a number one or number two here. But Peter Kierkegaard sermon against the Mormons,

[00:16:02] which just came out a couple of weeks ago. We've had lots of people like reaching out,

[00:16:06] being like, man, that was a really good one. And I even had somebody reach out and go,

[00:16:09] are you sure BYU posted that? Because why would they post it? It's such a damaging critique of

[00:16:14] the Mormon church. And it is. And I just think that was just a cool one. I love sermons that

[00:16:20] are off the cuff or the guy didn't have like two weeks or a month to plan it, but he just had to

[00:16:23] give it in the moment. And that one, I just think that was a really good one. So yeah,

[00:16:27] that's definitely one I'm really glad we got out this year.

[00:16:31] Yeah, it's definitely on my radar too as well. I'm glad you mentioned it.

[00:16:34] All right, Elise, number three.

[00:16:37] All right. My number three is serving in silence, the Armenian genocide.

[00:16:44] And I like this one because it's different from a lot of other episodes that I've done.

[00:16:51] And you don't really think about missionaries serving through genocide. I mean, we have a lot

[00:16:56] of like post-war China. We have a lot of like people who go to Japan and stuff like that. World

[00:17:03] War II, we have that. But there was a ton of missionaries. There were a ton of missionaries

[00:17:10] in Armenia and in like Turkey and those places like that. And they were pretty much helpless

[00:17:17] during the genocide. But they also are some of the most accurate and plentiful first-hand

[00:17:24] accounts that we have of the genocide. So I thought it was a really difficult episode to do

[00:17:30] because it was very sad, but I think it was incredibly important. So that's my number three.

[00:17:35] All right. Joel, number three.

[00:17:38] I'm going to throw in again more of a recent one, but I enjoyed you talking about Woodrow Wilson

[00:17:46] on your two-parter because I wasn't involved with that at all. So I just got to sit back and

[00:17:52] be a bystander, a mere civilian listening to Revive Thoughts and listen to you talk about

[00:17:58] Woodrow Wilson. Fascinating stuff. I appreciate that, Joel. That was a long

[00:18:04] ordeal that took... It was one of those many ideas that we have here where I just was like,

[00:18:09] this won't take too long. And before you know it, I'm a thousand tabs into a deep dive on

[00:18:14] Woodrow Wilson, asking questions like, what was the French's response to this and that? Just

[00:18:19] way in, way too deep. And I got to the end of that. And after recording it in this very hot room late

[00:18:24] at night, I was like, did that come across good? I don't know. But people have been saying it was

[00:18:30] good, that they liked it a lot, that it was really interesting. And a lot of people were telling me

[00:18:33] that they did not know any of that stuff about Woodrow Wilson and what a sleazebag he was,

[00:18:38] and also how much he claimed to be a Christian. And so I was really glad that we were able to

[00:18:43] get that out there to people. Thank you, Joel. I'm glad you mentioned that one.

[00:18:46] I didn't want to say it myself and be like, remember that time I talked for two hours

[00:18:50] about Woodrow? That was such a great time. Good me. So I'm glad someone else said that

[00:18:54] because that would have been a little bit weird. We've been telling you about a great podcast

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[00:20:01] Church history trivia round.

[00:20:05] Chance to tie.

[00:20:06] Two. Yeah, this is your chance to tie.

[00:20:09] All right.

[00:20:09] You know what? And now I think about it, I was going to say a revived thought style question,

[00:20:13] but I feel like to be fair, I kind of trying to pull from both shows here.

[00:20:16] So I got to be a little more balanced here and pull one for

[00:20:19] Elise. But you know what? This guy, it could be anybody. OK, so either one could get this. He

[00:20:25] does fall a little bit more in Elise's category, but that's OK. This guy is considered a proto

[00:20:30] reformer. Who was burned at the stake in the early 15th century.

[00:20:36] John Hess.

[00:20:36] Yep. At least that one. That was that was too easy. Maybe it's too easy.

[00:20:40] Sorry about that, Joel. Did you did the audio not come through? Maybe you're a little delayed.

[00:20:44] You know, I kind of broke up there for a second. Otherwise, it almost wasn't fair.

[00:20:49] I had three names until you said 15th century and then it cleared my slate of memory.

[00:20:56] Where did you know? I should have said 1400s because I don't know about you,

[00:20:59] but when I see 15th or 16th century, my brain goes 1500, 1600s. And I have to go and tell my

[00:21:05] finally at the age of 31, I feel like trained my brain enough to finally keep up with when people

[00:21:11] say century rather than hundreds. Right. It only takes you half a lifetime to get there.

[00:21:17] Pretty much. I don't know if other people have that problem, but I have to I teach history and

[00:21:21] there are moments where I'm like, what? 19th century. That's right, class. We're in the 19th

[00:21:25] century. All right. Number. People talk to me and they're like, it makes perfect sense,

[00:21:31] and I'm like, we don't say that we're like, yeah, 31. We don't live. We're not 31. We're

[00:21:43] living the year 30 or 30, 31st year. That'd be like saying, how old are you? I'm in my 31st year.

[00:21:50] Like that's, that's just not a conversation. You're not right. You're not wrong because we'll

[00:21:53] say, oh, the first century refers to the first hundred years, but a century hasn't technically

[00:21:57] passed yet. So, it shouldn't like should that even be called the first century because the

[00:22:01] first century starts after the first hundred. I mean, technically we're in the 21st century

[00:22:04] and it's not 2100. Yeah. And I know everyone is going, oh my gosh, our church history podcasters

[00:22:10] are such idiots. They can't do basic math. I understand the argument. I just your brain tells

[00:22:15] you 19th century. Conversationally, that's typically, we typically conversationally

[00:22:19] refer to the amount of time that has been completed first, not the amount of times that

[00:22:24] we're occupying within. Yes. And the only time I feel like we do that is with the centuries.

[00:22:29] And then you have to, yep, yep. We're on the same page. We're going to, we're a big, we're a big,

[00:22:33] everybody's already bounced out. But we're a big history group. We can, we can get this

[00:22:37] changed in history.com. All right. Joel, throwing it to you, even though you didn't get the point

[00:22:42] there, give us your number two episode of the year. Where would you go for number two?

[00:22:51] Sorry, just clarify. This is me.

[00:22:53] Yeah. You're up. You're up. Give us your second, your second, not your third, but your second,

[00:22:57] you know, episode. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, oh my goodness. This is a second to last,

[00:23:04] second to last. I know what I want to put in number one. I'm trying to think if it competes

[00:23:14] with number two. And if so, what I'm gonna, no, I'm going to do, I'm going to do increase

[00:23:21] Mather. Do yourself no harm. That one I thought was fascinating as well. I'll put that in my

[00:23:27] number two slot, increase Mather. For starters, like how many times do you, you don't get a lot

[00:23:31] of Mather love out there in general, right? Like people have a voice in Mather. He gets a lot of,

[00:23:35] he gets thrown under the bus a lot. He does. So I agree with you. That was a really, I'm glad we

[00:23:39] got that episode out. It was actually hard to get that episode recorded because I sent it to

[00:23:45] multiples of people and people were just kind of like, I feel uncomfortable recording this episode

[00:23:50] on why you shouldn't commit suicide. They were, they basically sent me back like, I feel like he's

[00:23:55] too hard on this and I don't agree with him. And it was, it actually took me quite a while to find

[00:24:00] somebody who agreed to do it. And yet I think it was a really good episode and I'm really glad that

[00:24:06] he did. I think, I think that it was definitely an uncomfortable and awkward episode, but I think

[00:24:11] that's part of the reasons that, I mean, from a like historical point of view, I found it fascinating

[00:24:17] was like, yeah, again, when we just look at what is a part of church history and what people went

[00:24:26] through, it's a unique addressment of that. That again, yeah, is not necessarily fun, but I did

[00:24:36] find it fascinating. Thank you. All right, Elise, Martyrs and Missionaries episode number two.

[00:24:42] Okay. This, my penultimate episode is Count Zinzendorf and the Moravians, which

[00:24:49] is the most recent episode on Martyrs and Missionaries. And I loved doing this episode

[00:24:58] because it was just the weirdest. It was so weird because you, I started out thinking like, oh,

[00:25:04] I'll just cover, you know, Count Zinzendorf. People quote him. That's great. And then you just,

[00:25:09] it just evolved into like cults, heresy, side holes, wound witnesses. And it was.

[00:25:17] That, that one of the grossest episodes of church history ever.

[00:25:20] It was, but I got so much feedback from it and I loved it because people were just like,

[00:25:24] what on earth is a side hole? And why did they say it so often?

[00:25:28] Yeah.

[00:25:29] But it's great because it's just so, so weird.

[00:25:32] If you're a Revived Thoughts Only listener and you don't know what Elise is talking about,

[00:25:36] I both encourage you and caution you to go listen to Elise's.

[00:25:40] I wholeheartedly encourage you.

[00:25:41] One of her most recent episodes on the Moravian church movement. And I think what I love about

[00:25:46] that episode was Elise went in with such innocence, and we all did, with this idea of like, oh,

[00:25:51] I'm going to study the Moravians. I've heard about them for a long time. They keep showing up as like,

[00:25:55] oh, there's a group of Moravians here and there. I wonder what they're really about.

[00:25:58] Who is this Count Zinzendorf guy? And I see, I mean, even last week I saw a pretty big Twitter

[00:26:03] account quoting Zinzendorf. He's a famous guy that people like to quote.

[00:26:08] We had no, you just, you had no idea what you were getting into. And by the end of that,

[00:26:12] I feel like everyone who's listening to that was like, by the end of that episode,

[00:26:14] my head was spinning. Like what happened and how did it go so horribly wrong?

[00:26:19] So that was really good. I enjoyed that a lot.

[00:26:21] All right. For me, number two, I'm going to give a tie. I do this. I think I do this every year

[00:26:25] with number two. And that's just, it's just, I shouldn't do it, but I do it anyway because I

[00:26:30] can't cut my babies in half here. I love them both and I got to put two episodes up here.

[00:26:34] So I'm going to do it. All right. Number two, first one is this really great sermon by Ambrose.

[00:26:40] He gave it while he was under siege. He was kind of under attack and he gives this sermon while

[00:26:46] these Roman guards are trying to break in basically into where he and the guys are.

[00:26:51] And he just talks about how it doesn't matter what happens to him. What matters most is that

[00:26:54] they fought for God. It's a great episode. We put it out as the first episode of the year,

[00:27:00] and I definitely think it would be wrong not to mention it on this list because I really,

[00:27:05] really love this episode. The other episode I'm going to say, this is kind of a weird one.

[00:27:10] Behind the scenes episode that Elise and I did back in May, we heard a lot of people say,

[00:27:16] we heard other, you know, we'll have a lot of people say basically like, we're really grateful

[00:27:20] you put that episode together. You did a really good job explaining like life overseas for people.

[00:27:24] And we also, it directly helped us. We didn't know it, but I mean, it directly helped us connect

[00:27:29] with a church when we were back in the States, which was awesome. And we got to go speak there

[00:27:33] up in Maine and they were just the nicest people that was just someone that, and it was just other

[00:27:37] things like that where we got to connect with people and network and just get to know people.

[00:27:41] And we would have never had that. Any of those things kind of come together,

[00:27:44] had that episode not gone out. So we were really grateful for just the positive feedback because

[00:27:49] we were really nervous. We were kind of telling our story and thoughts in a way that we weren't

[00:27:53] sure how other people would feel. And it was just great. So that was really, as a personal episode,

[00:27:59] that one meant a lot to us and meant a lot to me that we were, I remember Elise was very nervous,

[00:28:04] like, oh, should we even do this? And I was like, no, I really think we should. And yeah,

[00:28:07] it just, it worked out really well. So we're grateful for everyone who did reach out to us.

[00:28:11] And yeah, thank you. Thank you for that. It was, it was personally very enriching. All right.

[00:28:17] Church history trivia. Number five, this might be the last one just so we don't have a tie break

[00:28:23] here. Now that I've said that it's the last one, I just had a question in my head and it just

[00:28:28] totally blinked. Like where did it go? Shoot. Where did it go? My brain had a good, a good

[00:28:32] question for you guys. Oh, come back. No, this is really embarrassing. Where did it go? I totally,

[00:28:39] totally blanked on it. All right. Church history trivia number, number, number five,

[00:28:46] last question here. We're going to get ahead of it. Did I win? No, no. Actually, one of my

[00:28:52] questions was going to be which guy served in the YMCA as a, you did it Joel, you won! You pre,

[00:28:58] you pre-answered it. That's amazing. Okay. Church history trivia. Number one, which,

[00:29:07] ah, easy. Which two people, no, we'll go which one person was the first person to cross

[00:29:16] Central Africa alive and discovered Victoria Falls? Beep, beep, beep.

[00:29:24] There was no beeps there. Oh, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep. I'm not gonna let anybody out of this

[00:29:32] time. Okay. I kind of agree that that does feel like it was a tie because I do feel like Joel

[00:29:38] was trying to answer. We both knew it. We both knew it. That one, it was too easy. The listener

[00:29:43] is probably going, this is church. I had a better question. I literally had it saved in my brain.

[00:29:47] I was like, this is a good one. And I cannot, I do, I found it. Okay. You guys ready for the

[00:29:51] tiebreaker? This one you will not get. I remembered what it was now. Okay. All right.

[00:29:56] The listener is now going, so you didn't write these questions down beforehand. No, we did not.

[00:30:01] All right. Bernard of Clairvaux is responsible for causing which crusade? Oh my heavens.

[00:30:10] Bernard of Clairvaux is responsible for that. This is Joel typing it into the phone. It's the

[00:30:17] second crusade, right? How did, okay, Joel, I want to see your screen. What, how did,

[00:30:23] how could that have happened? Does Bernard of Clairvaux cause, a second one? No. That,

[00:30:27] this is so suspicious. He's asking serious. Yeah, that's what it sounds like. I genuinely

[00:30:31] remembered something from church history, so I'm pretty proud of myself. I got it, Joel. I mean,

[00:30:37] he answered it. I wasn't going to guess that. He is correct. It was the second crusade. It was by

[00:30:42] the way. Congratulations. Because they tried to do one before and it wasn't very good. Well,

[00:30:46] the first one was successful. We did a whole episode on that. It said, do you die for the

[00:30:50] listeners if they want to go find it by going to our Patreon and joining us on Patreon. But he was

[00:30:54] the one that rallied all the folk for the second one, right? Yeah. He rallied them for the second

[00:30:58] one. The second one was an utter and complete disaster, which was really bad because he

[00:31:02] basically sold it as like, God wouldn't let us lose. And then they lost really, really badly.

[00:31:06] So that was not the best thing. Probably why you shouldn't do that. All right. So we had a tie,

[00:31:10] tie three to three, but it looks like Joel is now the church history, uh, history,

[00:31:16] history, trivial winner. Four to three. 2023 crown. Yeah. The 2023 crown. Joel, wow. You went

[00:31:23] in so unconfident, but you came out on top. Way to go, my man. Well done. And with that,

[00:31:28] Joel, tell us what your, yeah, tell us what your number one episode of the year is. Oh,

[00:31:32] it's gotta be, it's gotta be London fire. What a fun, terrifying conversation about

[00:31:40] one of the most horrifying ways to die. The London fire of 1666.

[00:31:44] What a sell. The listener is going to just go download that right away. Now there you are,

[00:31:55] you're hearing that and you got to know, uh, I'm glad you picked that one. It was the one

[00:31:59] that I actually am not, it's not my number one. And I didn't, I felt weird. Cause I was like,

[00:32:03] how do I, like, it's another one where those are, I did a lot of the work. So I felt weird

[00:32:07] tooting my own horn here, but I also was like, it's really good episode, but it doesn't, it wasn't

[00:32:11] going to be my number one cause I did want to shout out a sermon that we had, but I love,

[00:32:15] I love doing that episode. It is one of the weirdest chapters of church history. I think

[00:32:20] that I have ever explored and recorded with you, Joel, that it was just like from start to finish,

[00:32:26] you would not, if you wrote that script down and handed it to Hollywood and you went and saw that

[00:32:30] movie, you would get to the end of that movie and go, that is the most ridiculous movie I've

[00:32:34] ever seen. There's no way all those things would happen. And then, but it is exactly true. It

[00:32:40] happened. And even probably it's probably, there's probably even more stuff to it that

[00:32:43] we didn't know about. And it's just an absolutely insane episode. All right,

[00:32:46] Elise, your number one episode of the year. My number one is a three in one because I did

[00:32:53] three episodes on this person. And if you are a faithful Martyrs Mysteries listener,

[00:32:59] and I didn't choose this person, you would be very upset. So it is, it is Hudson Taylor,

[00:33:05] of course. And that is, that is my, that's my top one. And I don't think I have to explain

[00:33:08] it because it's Hudson Taylor. But, but his, but his life is, is so cool. And I,

[00:33:15] I thought I knew everything there was to know about Hudson Taylor before I went in this episode

[00:33:19] or three episodes. And I found out that I knew next to nothing. And I was honestly incredibly

[00:33:25] blessed by doing the three part series on him. So that's my, that's my number one.

[00:33:28] Yeah. As somebody who has read Hudson Taylor's autobiography, like I thought,

[00:33:32] or his biography by his son, I can't remember what it is, but it's like, anyway, I didn't

[00:33:36] think I would be learning a lot of new stuff when I listened to that episode. You had so many

[00:33:40] stories and like really great stories that I had never heard before. And you also told flaws of his,

[00:33:46] but not in a way like sometimes they'll, they'll rewrite history and they'll just like, this guy

[00:33:50] was actually terrible. They try to do that with David Livingston a lot more like, oh, he was

[00:33:53] actually an evil. No, he was a great guy. But with Hudson Taylor, you didn't do that. You did

[00:33:58] a good job, I think talking about like real flaws of his and also giving a ton of story. If you like

[00:34:04] Hudson Taylor, if you like, you know, missionary stories and you haven't listened to anything,

[00:34:08] oh, I already know Hudson Taylor's nothing. Trust me. I would almost guarantee you there are lots

[00:34:12] of stories in there that you had not heard before, because again, they're not in the autobiography.

[00:34:16] You have to go to other sources to find them. My number one episode for the year,

[00:34:21] William Bacon Stevens, the anatomy praises God episode. It was so good. I really enjoyed that

[00:34:28] one. Just it was unexpected because it was this guy I'd never heard of. Well, he was William

[00:34:31] Bacon Stevens. He didn't ever do anything else that like would make the church history books or

[00:34:36] anything. But he had this really awesome sermon that I just kind of stumbled into by accident,

[00:34:41] where he just talks about how the human body glorifies God to a room of basically doctors

[00:34:46] who are graduating, going into the doctor degree. And he's like, you guys have learned to treat the

[00:34:49] physical body, but you don't know about treating the spiritual, the spiritual causes which cause

[00:34:54] so many of the issues that you're going to have. Don't forget God. And he just uses the human body

[00:34:58] with the science they had to explain how it's just amazingly created and how God is glorified

[00:35:04] in it. And what's really cool is that I feel like all of the things he said is even more true today,

[00:35:10] like the things that he was impressed by back then. There's even more evidence of how incredible

[00:35:14] the human body is now. And so it's just a really neat sermon that from one hundred and seventy

[00:35:18] years ago is echoing the same truths of God that I think are still real to this day. So I really

[00:35:23] enjoyed that sermon. And it was an unexpected treat. Like I did not I didn't get into that

[00:35:28] sermon. I did not see it being as awesome as it was. I think it's part of the reason I enjoyed it

[00:35:31] too. Neat. All right. Another another year in the bag of revived martyrs and missionaries.

[00:35:39] That's right. We have we've covered another year and we have our top five. We have our church

[00:35:44] history trivia crown winner, Joel. That's an upset for the ages. I don't think there's really

[00:35:52] anything else left to do other than to say I'm on the Revive Thought side. I would just like to say

[00:35:57] thank you to you who are listening. We could not do we certainly could not do our show without you

[00:36:02] because you read the sermons for us every week that we put up on our show. We are extremely

[00:36:06] grateful to all of you who have messaged us, commented on something, sent us a personal email

[00:36:13] who have read a sermon for us that all the different ways that you have many of you have

[00:36:16] reached out to us over this last year. And all the people who have signed up for Patreon as well or

[00:36:21] who bought some of our merch when we did the little merch thing. We learned a lot from that.

[00:36:25] Apparently you guys will buy merchandise from us, which is pretty cool. And yeah, we're just

[00:36:29] really grateful for all the different ways that you have come along and supported us this year.

[00:36:34] And we are looking forward to making on our end Revive Thoughts many more episodes for all of you

[00:36:38] to listen to in this next year. Elyse, what do you got for them? I would kind of echo your

[00:36:43] sentiments because I think that we have some of the most interactive audiences like that

[00:36:49] you could you could have for a podcast. I feel like we get several emails and they're so sweet

[00:36:55] or they're informative or their suggestions of like, hey, from my show, like, hey, would you

[00:36:59] like to cover this person or here's this obscure person I don't know more about. And like, can

[00:37:03] you figure this out? And I'm like, oh, that sounds really interesting. Let me add it to my list. And

[00:37:07] so if I haven't gotten to your person yet, it's because they're on my list and at some point

[00:37:11] they will they will be covered. But yeah, I think that we don't we feel if you're on a podcast,

[00:37:17] you're speaking to a microphone, you can sometimes feel like you're just speaking into the air and

[00:37:21] you're like, OK, I hope this does well. But our audiences are give such great feedback. So I think

[00:37:26] that it just it feels nice to feel like you're interacting with with you guys. Yeah, pretty

[00:37:32] consistently. I agree. All right, Joe, what do you got for the listeners? We're heading out here.

[00:37:37] I'm excited for twenty twenty four. It's crazy that we're still doing this. I don't like how

[00:37:44] long when did we start Revive Thoughts? I don't remember. I do remember it was in twenty nineteen

[00:37:50] and at the time I was living in Miami and we were putting this together in a laundry room.

[00:37:55] We then moved to Kansas City, did it for two years together at your house, which was when we had real

[00:38:00] church history trivia nights where we would have like live streamers and people come in. That was

[00:38:03] that was fun during those halcyon days of covid live streaming when that was really big. And then

[00:38:09] we went to Cambodia and Elise and I recorded our episodes in a literal wardrobe that didn't lead

[00:38:14] to Narnia. It just led to like cockroaches probably. And now here we are in the Indonesian studio with

[00:38:19] these really nice soundboards and this really nice roadcaster. And I don't want to say like it's

[00:38:23] been a journey, but it does feel like it's been it's been a journey come so far. So next year,

[00:38:28] next year in twenty twenty four, we'll be crossing into our sixth year of doing Revive Thoughts.

[00:38:35] Yes, Joel, we will have finished five years. But as you point out, that's such a weird way to say

[00:38:40] I feel like I feel like I raise my concern that we don't know how to count.

[00:38:44] It's neat and I love doing it and I look forward to doing it for years to come.

[00:38:50] I enjoy doing it too. And I will say, listener, you are listening right now. I mean,

[00:38:54] I Revive Thoughts still has five point zero stars out of one hundred and eighty

[00:39:00] Apple reviews. I don't I feel like we've got we're probably not breaking a record,

[00:39:04] but that's definitely like I've never seen a show just I mean, for especially because

[00:39:09] we're not exactly an uncontroversial show. We're covering theologians and we're covering like big

[00:39:13] topics like war. We've had to talk about slavery. We've had to talk about a lot of like not good

[00:39:18] stuff. The fact that we have not gotten one starred by anybody and the fact that you have

[00:39:22] all stayed with us for years and kept those ratings coming in and just have been so encouraging.

[00:39:27] It's just one of those many things that you have done that I am really appreciative of.

[00:39:31] And just it's just another way that you've all shown us that you care and that you enjoy

[00:39:34] this content. And yeah, we're just really grateful. All right.

[00:39:38] Oh, I had one more thing I wanted to add here. I want as as a Christmas present.

[00:39:43] We are four reviews away on Martyrs and Missionaries from having one hundred reviews.

[00:39:50] So if if you would like to give a review, you don't you don't write anything. I mean,

[00:39:54] I enjoy reading them, but you could just click that five star. That's that's what you want to

[00:39:58] do. And that would be that would be a huge Christmas present. I mean, I'm not going to

[00:40:01] what you want to do. And that would be that would be a huge Christmas present to me if you would

[00:40:05] like to do that. All right. So you heard that there at least is announcing that for Christmas.

[00:40:09] She's dear Santa in five star reviews on Apple. For our for Revive Thoughts, we don't we don't

[00:40:14] want anything. We don't need Christmas presents. We just like that you're listening. But if you

[00:40:18] want to join us on Patreon and continue supporting what we're doing here, it is the easier thing.

[00:40:23] We would be more than happy to have you because it does help every patron listener helps us a lot

[00:40:27] and continue to do all this. So, yeah, you're listening. And those of you who are on Patreon,

[00:40:31] we are really grateful for you and your support. I, I feel like we've hit all of our major

[00:40:36] important things. We thank you for listening to this rare crossover episode. We have not done

[00:40:40] one in two years or so where all three of us have been on together. So this is Troy,

[00:40:46] Angel and Elise. And you've been listening to Revive Thoughts and Learn Some Shades.