man Tim Stratton how you doing brother I'm doing good man how are you that's good man it's so good
to have you out here and just spend some time with you man well Atlanta is beautiful and this
trail is awesome and it's just awesome hanging out with you it's a little chilly this morning
cold yeah in the low 30s and yeah so um hey how long we known each other I think I first met you
in 2012 you were teaching a class at Biola at the time yeah so I definitely knew who you were
I think I started following you around 2010 so you know you're kind of a hero of mine before I went
Biola and it was just an honor to learn from you there and now we're like best friends so you know
yeah I enjoy our friendships it's fun it's you know friendships you can't force him there's just
the gut to be some common interests and passion of the personalities and it's cool yeah I think
one thing I like I like about you is your humility yeah pretty cool guy we need to look at you you're
pretty intimidating to look oh whatever you know man you're just buff I remember seeing it by all
the classes like it made me feel effeminate I'm not in the same shape as I was back then you know
just why I was never in the show I take physical fitness pretty seriously and you know it does get
harder as you get older but my goal is just always to do the best with what you've got you know and
if you're if you're injured you do the best you can around that injury and just always try to
keep moving forward so yeah so you let you lift obviously I mean what your workouts look like how
often and you work out what you do well not too detailed but yeah I'd like to work out and get
to the gym four to six times a week impossible Wow how long you there each time um at least an
hour sometimes more good I try to do at least 20 minutes a hard cardio and 40 minutes of lifting
you know then when I can I try to still do martial arts don't do it like I used to tell me about two
more shorts you used to be a what Nebraska state of Nebraska champion well I won the state corn
Husker games in 1994 and was runner-up in 95 and uh and karate and sparring so oh yeah those the
glory days you know but then I did MMA after that and learn jujitsu and actually had a little career
doing that for a while too and not a career but I made some money on the side I guess I should
say wow you did it for kicks huh that's right Wow well that's pretty cool what got you interested in
apologetics I was a youth pastor and you know I house the kind of youth pastor that was I wanted
to throw the party every week and you know maybe throw a few Bible verses at them and then go play
some video games with the kids and maybe have a little Bible study you know nothing too deep yeah
but then the students a couple years into it you know these young men that were in my Bible study
I started to ask a deep questions and one young man in particular I really was struggling and I
wasn't doing a good job of answering his questions well summer break hit and I didn't see him for a
few weeks he came back after being on my Bible study for two years and he came to tell me at
the beginning of this junior year that he wasn't going to come back to youth crew because he just
became an atheist over the summer Wow and I said but you know that's not true you've been in my
Bible study we read you've seen what Paul told Timothy that every word of the Bible is it's
inspired and you know cuz he says why should I believe this Bible I said well look it says look
what Paul tells Timothy here it's the inspired Word of God and he goes yeah but I don't believe
that and I said but it's the Word of God and he said well why should I think that I says because
he Paul says it and he goes 10 this is a 16 year old kid and goes Tim that's begging the question
that's a logical fallacy that's not a good reason for me to be to believe anything and I said what's
a logical fallacy I didn't even know at the time with that Wow a 16 year old kids schooling me and
giving me an education and then he said I'll tell you what if you can answer one of these
questions or objections I'll stick around and he gave me stuff from Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins
and Stephen Hawking and Christopher Hitchens and you know fill in the blank with your your
favorite atheist and I kind of answer any of them and it kind of rocked me I started even wondering
man it's Christianity really true or do I just believe it cuz my parents were Christians you
know and anyway I I did what any good aspiring theologian would do and went to Google and I
eventually found a guy named William Lane Craig and I started reading his stuff and that pointed
me to you and I found out about Michael okona and I started studying just devoting my life to this
study and it's transformed my life I had indeed been transformed by the renewing of my mind as
Paul says in Romans 12:2 so yeah that's what got me into it Wow well you becoming somewhat of a
rock star in the world of Christian apologetics and in recent years I mean you're just your your
profile is growing and man you're doing some some great stuff hey before we get into it you've got
a hobby now right so you've gone from martial arts you still do martial arts and you're highly active
and working out but you got a hobby yeah that's a serious hobby right now it's a it's a form of
martial arts yeah I look at it yeah well we'll call it gun play instead of kung fu maybe it's
gun foo you know as you get older you can't do everything you used to do well it's time to start
training with the pistols and you know another firearms I think it's a it's a martial art you can
do for your whole life so did you enjoy that oh I do it's my favorite hobby love to go down to the
range and shoot a bunch of paper and steel targets there's nothing better than then the sound of boom
man it's awesome but you do competition too right yeah I sure do I haven't won any competitions but
I'm getting better and you know that's my goal is to be safe and to know how to operate the weapon
so to be safe and to be accurate and then after that try to pick up some speed in the process
so yeah it's uh it's a great hobby it's you know when you're studying four hours a day and
doing all this research and writing sometimes you just have to go shoot some stuff decompress and
unwind so speaking of research and writing you are finishing up your doctor old were you have
finished your doctoral dissertation right and it's in the review process right now your dissertation
your research mm-hmm what is it on I'd say the big question that I try to answer is do we have free
will and by free will I mean the strong sense of free will what we call libertarian free will and
there's several different definitions of that but the one I'm different from Republican or Democrat
free will that's a whole other conversation but yeah libertarian freedom it can get into political
issues and Lee but but I'm were concerned about philosophical and theological issues right now
I do like to have the political conversation though but but the the the form of free will
that I typically like to defend or the definition I like to defend is the ability to choose between
a range of options each compatible with our nature and so there's been a debate about this for you
know probably ever since agustin if not before and and really in the last 500 years behind the
doors of the church the church has been split on this issue so I really mana I think I've I
think I've answered the question and finished the debate also in my dissertation I hope I have so
well that's that's wonderful it'd be great if you you have and we'll certainly be looking forward
to that being published so yeah so you're in that process now you've submitted that this
rotation you just have to see if they approve it maybe do some revisions if they require it
now and defended orally all right right you're in a fun position I remember when I was there
back in 2008 and it's just fun it's like you've done all the heavy lifting by now and you just
you just have a little bit left you're doing the cooldown hurried into workout no well I don't know
I've said the hardest parts over the scariest part remained haha that's true yeah yeah and
in what's interesting about it is the University were in that is a reformed University which many
reformers don't believe that you have free will and I'm arguing that we do so yeah if this passes
there I think that says something yeah you know doing a doctorate scary yeah I do you know Rob
Bowman yeah yeah it's great guy just brilliant mmm-hmm and he completed all his coursework at
Westminster Theological Seminary years ago and was writing his dissertation and toward the end
of it his doctoral supervisor retired they brought a new guy in Wow the ink on his PhD
diploma was still drying and he was such a strong presuppositionalist and because he didn't agree
with Rob no conclusion he wouldn't pass it oh man so that time you know was there you know he still
learned a lot but yeah he never got his degree from there you know getting and doing another
dissertation to work later on so I mean that can happen and yeah Christian University you're going
to a secular University where with a Reformed Theological apartment yeah so and where I went
the University of Pretoria secular University and probably a lot of the faculty at that time
didn't agree with my conclusion that historical investigation points to the resurrection of Jesus
but you know they to the credit they approved it because it's a matter of can you defend your
education that's right and you know I do that with my students they don't have to agree with me right
they just have to be able to defend their position and that's what's important I think that would be
what you find it at Northwest yeah so well great well that's cool so hey let's in our next video
I want to ask you about your dissertation more in your research and why you know those those
of you who are viewing this video right now why it's important for you how it translates
into a benefit for your life and applying itself that sounds great now looking forward to a bit
you