Conversation with a 12-year-old about Music, Apologetics, and His Generation

all right friends you are in for a treat i'm here with a new friend of mine a remarkable 12 year old and we're going to talk about his love for apologetics music and i have some questions for him about his generation which is called gen z now i first met in a whole life through a colleague of mine at biola fellow professor emailed me he said hey there's this young man he's 12 he has some questions for you about apologetics i thought well that's interesting then i read a little bit further and he said he read a part of your doctoral dissertation and has questions for you and i thought are you kidding me this 12 year old read my dissertation he wants to know truth that much that much the whole you and i zoomed last week you asked some great questions i thought you know what i bet my audience would be interested in hearing from a 12 year old who just loves apologetics and is trying to follow the lord today in different ways so nahua thanks so much for coming on the show yeah thank you so let me start by just asking you about yourself what would you want viewers to know about who you are um well i yeah my name is naha life i'm 12 years old i'm in middle school seventh grade and i you know i love apologetics i started doing apologetics about two years ago and and i love music i've been doing music for longer than i can remember literally so so yeah it's just uh an honor to be here well that's awesome your your parents sent me a an an email and mentioned that your love for music started early and we're going to get into some of that but let's talk about uh does does nahoa mean something i'm curious it's a unique name uh yeah uh my mom is from hawaii and uh nahuwa is a hawaiian name and it means bold and brave or you know courageous so so yeah i like my name i love that by the way do you know which apostle in the bible his name also means bold and courageous is andrew the brother of peter andrew means that my favorite verse is hebrews 10 39 which says for we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed but of those who believe and are saved so that is something you can live out and are named after what about life life is an interesting last name um well life is um well my life is my middle name and and you know like nahola life sounds really cool and i love again i love my name so i made that kind of my music name and what i go by on social media and all that stuff well it is a cool name and we're going to get into some of your social media following but let's start with a lot of my audience follows and is interested in apologetics and some have already said they want to know how you got into apologetics so you said this was two years ago so you must have been about 10 years old why would a 10 year old who's often playing maybe baseball or video games get into apologetics um well how i remember it was i was just kind of bored uh and and i was homeschooled like it was before the coronavirus and i was already homeschooled and and i was i was kind of bored and i had to read a book so you know my mom was interested in apologetics a while ago and she had a bunch of books on you know on the bookshelf so i just picked up one that looked interesting uh and it was called no god but one allah or jesus by nabil khrushchev wow and that i read that super intriguing first time i i realized there's actual there's evidence for christianity it's first time i ever you know learned anything about apologetics and from there i kind of decided to learn more learn more about jesus and learn more about god and yeah that's that's kind of what started it all so you're a christian before you saw that book obviously so that book by nabil qureshi who who was a friend of mine do you besides there being evidence for god was it his story was it his conversion what was it that captured you about that book in particular well i've always liked learning i've always been kind of kind of academic so you know i've always been a christian and and realizing that there's actual reasons to think that there's actual academic reasons to you know to believe in jesus and stuff like that that that itself intrigued me the the evidence the the just learning about um christianity from an objective standpoint you can't really be objective but you're trying to be as you know as objective as possible that itself is what interested me the most well it's a fascinating story being a former muslim coming to faith and what it cost him a remarkable book that's wonderful now since then tell me some of the other books that you have read in apologetics um so alright so one of my favorite books that i've read is how reason can lead to god by dr joshua rasmussen that you know that's a great book he talks he gives a super original argument for the existence of god and i really like that one um i read uh cold case christianity by jay warner wallace great and yeah that was a really good one too um i read uh outgrowing well i listened to it on audible outgrowing god by richard dawkins that was that was very that was very interesting okay let me stop you for a second did your parents have any concern of you reading a book by a leading atheist who's has stated in his books that he tries to talk people out of their faith were your parents like go for it were they concerned or did you just kind of sneak out apologies book and read it um i don't remember them you know ever telling me like oh don't do that or you know don't learn that the bible says this you so you can't read that they're always super supportive of you know me learning about apologetics and it was probably interesting for them to see their 11 year old reading a super atheist book but but yeah it was it was a good book um yeah so i want to come back if there's any other books that you've read but tell us what you thought about dawkins you kind of described it as interesting and being a good book what was interesting and what did you enjoy about it well first of all it was the only book i've read or no it was the first book or first just anything by an atheist like i've never seen other perspectives so that was you know the the first thing that was interesting about it was that it was the first book an atheist book i read okay also he he talked a lot about the gospels or he talked about so many things he talked about the gospels about evolution about the old testament and and i've i hadn't been doing apologetics for a long time so i didn't really know how to respond to anything he said now i can kind of i can kind of see through it i can kind of say no that's wrong look at this source but but at the time it really shook my faith i didn't i didn't i wasn't as confident i definitely wasn't as confident in christianity after reading that book but it kind of reading that book inspired me to learn even more about apologetics and and you know in that way i guess i'm kind of thankful that i read that book that's awesome would you recommend that other people read that book or would you have caution for other young people engaging somebody like dawkins book i would recommend to everyone that they would see different perspectives they would see the best you know the best people who agree with you and the best on the other other side and but yeah when you know you should always be cautious and you should always think about like don't just accept everything you hear because you could read a christian book or hear a christian message and and you know even then that it can be incorrect sometimes so you can't just absorb everything you hear and read like like a sponge but you do you it it is it is good to look at other perspectives i think that's why it's good for you now there's a question that popped through that says have you read c.s lewis uh if so which ones and you have a favorite by c s lewis i i have started reading uh the problem of pain by c.s lewis i'm reading it right now it's really cool really interesting i've learned some awesome stuff but and i know uh in our last conversation you recommended mere christianity by c.s lewis but honestly i haven't read you know anything from c.s lewis other than the beginning of one of his books well that's great he wrote the problem of pain i believe he was in his 40s and he's intellectually talking about why there's pain and suffering and then he wrote a grief observed about 20 years later after he lost his wife and personally experienced suffering so i'd encourage you to kind of read both of those together one is experiential one is intellectual you know kind of talk through with your parents about it um any other books you mentioned uh three or four books earlier there any that i missed that you have read that you found helpful about apologetics uh yeah so there's this one book another atheist book uh why evolution is true by dr jerry a coin he's an evolutionary biologist that that actually completely convinced me of evolution like i was i started off a young earth creationist then i became kind of agnostic about the age of the earth and then after reading that book i became full-on uh darwinist okay old earth yeah now looking back i'm like why but well you know why did i do that but and now i don't really know like looking into it more with more recent studies that have been found uh more recent discoveries which took place after he wrote the book that he couldn't even have known about they they kind of refute a lot of the evidence he gave so right now i don't know what on evolution yeah i i think that's smart and that's fair do you feel like if you believed evolution would that threaten your faith in the way when you read dawkins book and that was unsettling to you uh no because well it it depends on what you mean by evolution so if you mean i don't think the idea that species change over time and that every living thing on earth is related has a common ancestor i don't think that conflicts with the christian faith and i can explain why in just a second but but if you're talking about darwinism you know the evolution that's taught in schools and taught as a you know as a standard you have to learn about this in textbooks and the idea that random variation and natural selection produces the diversity of life that conflicts with the christian uh you know that conflicts with christianity because it's random it had you know god isn't and god isn't involved in the process in any way but if it's just evolution like species changing then that could be an intelligent uh you know a process which is intelligently designed intelligently that's not a word um but one reason i don't think the idea that evolution conflicts with uh genesis 1 and genesis 2 is because genesis seems to or those three first three chapters genesis 1 2 and 3 it seems to be metaphorical the author doesn't seem like he intended it all to be literal and uh dr william lane craig has a series of lectures on this topic and it's really good like that series is called life and biodiversity so that's a great series where he talks about genesis is more metaphoric mythical rather than a detailed historical account so your primary concern with believe in evolution is if it's a blind random unguided process that would conflict but if somehow god is guiding the process and involved then that could be reconciled with genesis and it wouldn't concern you right and i think like right now where i'm at with evolution is i think probably evolution is true that's what i think species do change over time and all living thing or most living things at least are related and share a common ancestor but i don't think darwinism is true i think there's really good evidence against darwinism very fair uh did i miss any other books that you that have been interested in you you mentioned jerry coyne dawkins were there any other atheist or skeptical or muslim writers that aren't christians that you read no i really i really want to read more atheist books muslim jewish books and agnostic books too um but i have so many books on the bookshelf that i haven't read yet but another book that i'm reading right now it's super awesome it's uh knowledge and christian belief by dr alvin planinga yeah it's a it's a i think an easier to read version of like another book he has and it's it's really awesome like i can relate to everything he says in the book super well written well thought out i love that book so so tell me one thing you like about plantiga who's clearly one of the leading christian philosophers in the world what's what's one thing you're reading that was like oh that makes sense i agree with that that was interesting to you well i love when he talks about faith like what is faith he has multiple chapters on this and he says faith faith is uh one part of faith is a knowledge of god's goodness and a knowledge a belief in the in the magnificent scheme of salvation that god has created but it also concerns your affections what you love and hate what you desire and and when you have faith when the holy spirit instills faith into you then you have a desire to love and please and worship god and you know you understand the great truths of the gospel and and i feel like ever since i've been doing apologetics i think the holy spirit really has instilled in me a very uh faith and i and i have found myself desiring to please and love god more and i'm just you know i'm so thankful for that well that that's awesome i'm glad you're reading some skeptics in other books but also people like plantiga that that's awesome sounds like you've read some of william lane craig or at least listen to his uh series tell us some of his works that you've read and what what you think about him he all right so i read uh most i think i've read most of his book reasonable faith uh probably you know his his most popular book and in there he talks about uh he well my favorite parts are when he talks about the existence of god arguments for the existence of god and the resurrection of jesus i love his case for the resurrection of jesus um and and yeah i think you know i really love pretty much all of his work there's some things that i would disagree with him on but but yeah i really respect the doctor william craig now now you've got me curious what would you disagree with uh dr craig on it's okay too he's the kind of person who would love somebody of your age or any age to have a disagreement with him and share why so what's maybe an issue or two you just see a little bit differently than he does well uh i would love to like understand more like really what he thinks about this but from what i've read and his his blogs and stuff it seems like he doesn't think abstract objects exist he doesn't think numbers or propositions actually exist and to me that's like and he says i can say the earth has one moon without saying the number one exists that that to me seems very very odd and but the most important thing is the propositions he doesn't think propositions objectively exist and and i think that's that's contradictory to say there are no propositions it's self-defeating so in the same way you can't say there is no truth well that's is that true like this statement there is no truth it you know assumes there is truth so a proposition is a statement that can either be true or false so if you say there are no propositions you are stating something that's either true or false so to say there are no propositions presupposes the existence of propositions i i mean that seems like the case to me so so yeah that's very fair now you mentioned you have read a lot of his book reasonable faith and you appreciate his case for the resurrection let's talk about jesus a little bit obviously he's one of the leading scholars on jesus today what is it about his case for the resurrection that kind of resonates with you so all right so i think the best way to answer that is to first kind of talk about my favorite case for the resurrection okay my favorite case is is in two parts and it goes like the first part talks about evidence just just evidence not drawing any conclusions and the second part is drawing the conclusion what does this evidence support what's the best explanation of it and the first part the evidence that you know i would love to give is the empty tomb right the fact that the uh his tomb was found empty and the fact that many people believed they jesus appeared to them alive after his death those two facts i think have so much evidence to support them i've really enjoyed actually reading the the documents from ancient history seeing what was actually written and and has just been super awesome but there's those two facts empty tomb and people believe jesus appeared to them then what's the best explanation well then you you would narrow it down to the resurrection hallucination can't explain it because hallucination can't explain the empty tomb and it wasn't some big lie because they believed it they actually were willing to die for this belief so so that's my favorite case and his case is very very similar his it's also in two parts first evidence then explanation and in the evidence he talks about the appearances they believed it he talks about the empty tomb and then he talks about the beliefs even more and and my favorite thing about his whole case is his argument for the empty tomb when he debates people on the resurrection of jesus he always blows them away with the empty tomb and it's just awesome so you've watched a lot of debates too haven't you yeah tell me tell me some of the debates that you've enjoyed watching um i liked his debate with uh dr richard carrier dr richard carrier seemed seemed very knowledgeable he is an atheist historian and he doesn't think that jesus rose from the dead clearly and he doesn't think jesus was a real person um i've seen his lectures on that too watch them on youtube he's pretty good then dr william lane cray comes and he gives the argument for the empty tomb and dr richard uh dr richard carrier responds to pretty much everything but he can't he can't take down the empty tomb argument and that's just yeah so so it sounds like have you have you read n.t wright's work in the resurrection yet no i really want to i've seen a lot lots of apologists citing his work but i haven't actually read it now that's about a 7 800 page book i use in my grad class on the resurrection but his basic approach is he argues for two facts the empty tomb and the appearances so craig will often give for habermas lacona sometimes three or four but it's nt right who uniquely approaches it the way that you do so when you get a chance i think you might enjoy his book the resurrection of of the son of god because he approaches it that way um have you seen any other debates how many other debates you watched that you found interesting um i saw oh dr william lane craig's debate with uh dr christopher hitchens he's a phd right dr christopher uh christopher hitchens was not a phd he was a journalist so dr william lane craig versus christopher hitchens that was a really interesting one i didn't really like um watching it because it kind of annoyed me a little bit um dr william lane craig would give arguments and arguments for the existence of the christian god specifically god in general but specifically the christian god and then and then dr christopher hitchens wouldn't respond to any of it he would talk about how religion is poisonous and terrible and then he would say i'm so glad there's no evidence for any of this thank you and he didn't respond to anything dr craig says so and you know there's lots of stuff that that was kind of like in in the debate i was actually at that debate because it was at biola where i teach and it was packed out there was energy and it's been seen millions of times online so it sounds like when you watch a debate you're paying attention to the arguments but also whether or not people respond and how they carry themselves in a debate is that true how you watch these debates yeah yeah and i definitely love how dr william lane craig debates he always you know he always has everything prepared his uh you know his opening statement his rebuttals his closing it's always very structured and he always responds to to the you know to the opposing side's views it's it's really really cool so what do you think are the best arguments for the existence of god you've talked about the resurrection but if a friend asked you or you were maybe an online debate or discussion someone said no why do you believe in god what is the arguments that you would give well first of all i don't really believe in god because i know of arguments for the existence of god i don't believe on the basis of this this evidence i think just the holy spirit has allowed me to know that it's true and that's also what you know that's what dr alvin planing was writing about so again i related to that because like you know christians don't don't always believe off of arguments they could know it but that's not why they believe so that's that's the case for me but if i was talking to just pretty much to anyone i would give the kalam cosmological argument you know probably most popular argument other than look at the trees um and i think oh and for those of you who don't who don't know it the on column cosmological argument is basically divided up into four parts it's one whatever begins to exist has a cause uh two the universe began to exist so three th this is the conclusion the universe has a cause and then the fourth part is kind of saying this cause is what we call god this is what we mean when we say god and i think each part of the argument has really good scientific and philosophical reasons for accepting each part of the argument and that you know i think that's a really successful sound argument that's awesome that that that makes sense again that's one of the ones that william lane craig has really developed do you have a follow-up like the moral argument or argument from beauty have you thought about that or there are other arguments which other ones resonate with you well probably my favorite argument i wouldn't give this to someone i wouldn't like if someone says why do you what's in our argument what's some evidence i wouldn't give this to them because it's it's really weird and kind of complicated but it's the modal ontological argument um and i think it's a really underrated argument i think you know first of all lots of people on youtube spend six minutes debunking a millennium of philosophical thought you know they're debunking it i guess and you know you know and then apologists themselves i think a lot don't you know they don't i don't know i just feel like it's kind of underrated and i really really like that one um but uh you know a follow-up to the column cosmological argument would be maybe the argument from the fine-tuning of the universe okay that that seems like a pretty pretty easy to understand and sound argument too um i like the moral argument a lot just it's kind of hard for people to separate the idea of you know like when you present it to them they often think so you're saying atheists can't be moral you're saying you need to believe in god to you know to be good that's not what it says um that's not what the argument says it's not what any apologist that i know say but but but yeah yeah that's great oh and and for the argument from beauty i really like that one and i know you have argued like probably the first video i saw from your channel was the argument from beauty and i think i think it's really good i i ordered uh some books on you know con beauty and i and i i'm really enjoying looking into that that's that is an area that could be developed much more in the world of apologetics so given that you love music and we're going to talk about that and love to think maybe maybe that's something you know that would interest you down down the road to develop let me go back to the what you described as the modal ontological argument since that's one of your favorite um if there's someone our audience that goes gosh i don't know what that is i realize this is a tough argument but could you explain how you understand just the best you can do essentially to someone who's like i'm not even sure what the ontological argument is okay so this one well my formulation of it the way i would present it it's different than you know dr william lane craig's version or even the original version um but it would go like this it won if it is possible that a perfect being exists then a perfect being does exist that's part one two it is possible that a perfect being exists so the conclusion follows a perfect being exists and that's that's kind of the structure of it and um most people can intuitively see that premise two is true it is possible maybe there is a perfect being uh being with perfect goodness power knowledge you know maybe it's possible i guess most people would would agree with that and then the first premise if it's possible that there's a perfect being then such a being exists that one is that one is the uh the premise that's the most complicated but i think there are really good reasons to think that and i think we could even give a like a logical proof like kind of like a mathematical proof of this first premise um uh yeah so i think that's good so i think the second one you're right the second premise would be easily accepted by most people with the first one give a give a simple defense that if it's give a civil defense of the first premise i know you could go into mathematical principles i don't want to get too lost on this but why would the possibility follow the actuality all right so in that case i think it's good to define some terms um so hmm okay so first i'll explain like what a possible world is okay so in philosophy there's something called a possible world it's basically a way that reality could be a way that reality might have been it's not you know a possible world doesn't refer to a planet or a universe or something it's just it's possible that the that reality could have been that way so you know there's not leprechauns in the real world but there could be i guess you know it's possible so there's leprechauns in some possible world okay that's what a possible world is um then uh here's a definition of possible if something is possible in philosophy that means it's true in some possible world so leprechauns are possible they could exist in some possible world if something is possible means at least one so it could exist in five possible worlds one seventy who knows necessary means true in every possible world no matter what hypothetical situation you give it's true and that is true in that world and and uh three means actual i mean yeah the the definition of actual if something actually is true then it's true in the real world okay in reality so a perfect being would be a being that has all good qualities it would have all great properties and necessity is a great property right it would be better if a perfect being had necessity rather than something else so if it's possible that a perfect being exists that means it's possible that a necessary being exists and pretty much every philosopher and logician people who study logic they agree that if it's possible for a necessary thing to exist then that necessary thing does exist and that's where the mathematics comes into play but but philosophers this is this is pretty widely accepted a perfect being is a necessary thing so if it's possible for a perfect being to exist then it really does exist and this is super uncontroversial in uh philosophical circles nahola that was a wonderful explanation i've got to give you full props for studying think about this there's a bunch there's one guy who goes i'm 39 years old and he understands the ontological argument better than i do so way to go there's i don't know if you can see it or not but there's a whole bunch of people just going wow good thinking way to go um this kid would win a debate with richard dawkins um so you're doing awesome you'll get a chance to see a lot of these uh later we come back to so uh for those of you listening we are here with future biola student noho life we'd love to have you at biola someday in any program apologetics theology talking about his love for apologetics i have a few more questions for you then we're going to jump into your generation talk about the music that you create as well now you shared earlier that your basis for belief in god is the holy spirit speaking to you and the arguments come after that so do you engage in discussions with skeptics and non-believers about the arguments or do you just say pray read the bible how would you interact with someone who doesn't believe well okay first of all i've been all right there's three main things first of all i've been doing apologetics like i kind of started around the time kovid got started like that's when i really started trying to understand so i haven't had the opportunity to talk to a lot of skeptics and stuff okay um yeah but but second when i say i believe because of the holy spirit and not really on the basis of of any uh arguments that's something that i'm learning about that's what this book i'm reading is talking about that's what dr william craig talks about i'm i'm not a hundred percent sure like that's really what's going on but i'm pretty sure you know it seems right to me like that okay so how how would i do that well i have conversed and you know i've had some conversations with people who don't believe and somehow we talked about evolution then we talked about jesus and and i kind of gave a resurrection argument um and it was a really good productive conversation i was happy to share um all the apologetic stuff i was learning about and i you know i would like to think that i've i spoke i gave a defense with gentleness and respect good uh like first peter 3 15 says so um so yeah but but you know i don't know if it's very effective to to talk to a non-believer and say oh you're broken and wicked you're sinful you should just believe in jesus then you'll go to heaven like you know no matter how theologically accurate that might be it's not very helpful it's not encouraging or inspiring in any way it doesn't demonstrate the love of god in any way so i think that's you know in some circumstances i guess that could be could be a loving way to share the gospel but i don't think that's very effective well that's great that you're distinguishing between theological truths and the method of doing this effectively i think that's a smart way to approach it uh nahola you do you have can you show us one or two or three books that you're reading right now is or are they in another room um i mean they're just in that room so i could get them or you know just tell us so you don't have to jump out and go to another room what's one or two you're reading right now um well i'm reading why does god allow evil by dr clay jones all right i'm reading like i said knowledge and christian belief by dr alvin planinga and i just finished reading a book about free will from dr sam harris so i'll probably read a book from a philosopher who thinks there is free will the last book i read was about how there's no free will so i have a book on the bookshelf um about it's called why free will exists by dr christian list and so again seeing both perspectives both sides of the argument um so yeah those are the three that i'm kind of reading and about to read at the moment so you believe you've experienced the holy spirit and you think the evidence points towards christianity do you have any questions that are just kind of like bothering you or you're wrestling through or you just kind of take it issue by issue like evil free will and just kind of grow as you go there's some that you know i mean i i don't even expect to have all the answers to all my questions but but there's always you know some of the main questions about salvation and about um about natural evil that kind of stay there but they don't really cause me to doubt or anything they don't they don't make me consider oh is everything i'm believing a lie it's not that powerful for me right now i that's good that's good you grow and you learn you ask questions and and keep moving forward i think that's uh that's really smart so do your friends have an interest in apologetics like you tell them about this excited they're like let's go play basketball or do they want to hear like what's this like with your other friends who are also in seventh grade well my friends are they're really nice really nice guys uh super supportive great listeners so you know i'm thankful for that and and somewhere in uh you know some way or another we always end up talking about some something like evolution or jesus or something like that and and i think if you don't like get crazy technical or use you know unfamiliar terminology or anything like that then then you could have a really you know fun conversation and that's kind of how my conversations with my friends have been about apologetics they're not super crazy into it like spending all the time on it but you know it's it's interesting to hear a scientific approach to faith do you want to be an apologist or are you just asking these questions because you love it it interests you and you'll figure that out in a decade well well i'm i did apologetics originally honestly because i was kind of bored and i had to read a book then i was like this is really cool so i did apologetics because it was interesting then i read the the richard dawkins book and i did apologetics to kind of save my faith i guess and then now i do it because it's just really really uh enjoyable learning about these these big questions i don't really plan to be an apologist um i think i'd i'd want to be a musician but you know i think i'll always love doing apologetics and uh keep a lot of these truths that i'm learning you know forever well the good news is you got a lot of time to figure this out and uh and balance it so you are exactly where you should be right now playing music hanging with your friends reading books asking questions i mean i can't even tell you how many comments there are just to people that want you to be encouraged that what you're doing is unique now when we were getting ready for this interview you mentioned a question to ask you and i was like of course i'll ask that and i didn't write it down and i forgot what it was i think it was a question about your generation you wanted to make sure that i asked you remind me what that question was oh it was about like how could we make apologetics more interesting to generation z exactly so that's that is such a good question how can we make apologetics more interesting to gen z to your generation so i think first of all everybody really learns differently at different paces and in school it kind of seems like it's kind of overlooked you have one curriculum forever for a class of 30 or more students it's you know it's it doesn't seem like the greatest uh greatest thing so you know it's kind of individual and personal but some of the best topics in apologetics you know first of all some of the best topics and apologetics to talk about with you know gen generation uh people around my age from my generation is i think stuff relating to evolution because they're learning about it you know they're constantly learning oh this is a fact no one disputes this in the scientific community this is definite and uh stuff relating to science and god so so first with evolution they go to school five days a week and they hear you're a product of blind random you know mutations and accidents and and evolution happened and the earth is 4 billion years old and then you go to sunday school and you hear the earth is 6 000 years old and and the pastors will joke around about how stupid evolution is and you get these two conflicting things and when really there doesn't have to be a conflict so i think shedding light on that that and we talked about this a little earlier that you can be a christian without accepting you know uh without uh like dismissing all of science you can do that and evolution and christianity don't have to conflict um so that's that's one thing second with science and god people my age and i think of every age are taught to respect and value science and it's i think maybe the one subject in school that isn't you know super lame because people every once in a while do a science experiment they watch videos they're learning about the world and that's kind of exciting so if you talk about how science scientific discoveries point to god how even evolutionary discoveries point to god an intelligent designer and that could be really uh really intriguing to a lot of people and the final thing about that is like reading stuff like you know i think one reason you shouldn't give people hmm how do i say this it's like you don't um i think a really practical and effective way to communicate the gospel and talk about apologetics in a fun way is to watch videos and do presentations and look at things for yourself instead of giving instead of being given you know a textbook like they are always in school that's smart i think that's not only really good teaching but it's also paying attention to the questions that this generation is asking one more for you then i'll jump to music do you look into like ethical issues that people debate today like say abortion or the environment or the lgbtq conversation is huge do you spend time thinking that or is it more like historical jesus and the science type topics well it's both it's my main focus is about um it's about you know the last thing he said about the historical jesus evidence for god philosophical arguments but i have i have thought about um abortion and i haven't really thought about climate change or anything but okay but but yeah but i i don't i don't i don't i think i don't think i have uh yeah that's great that's all you got to say so what advice would you give there's probably a lot of parents that are listening we have some pastors one 14 year old and a couple kids around but it's probably mostly adults that are that are watching this do you have any advice that comes to mind for them to kind of equip or train your generation i'd say one be open to learning new things i guess be open to to maybe changing some of the i think this is the right term preconceived notions that you have about reality um because you know in in church a lot and then stuff like in uh in i guess christian circles i hear a lot of like i said uh just you know sarcastic remarks about evolution dismissing it or something like that and i think evolution especially is super misunderstood uh not you know non-christians are often thought of by christians as oh you know not hopeful you know immoral and stuff like that that's that's that's not right um so yeah so i think you know be open to changing your mind about certain things i think that's wonderful wonderful advice i want to affirm that i love that you care about ideas but you care about the gospel and the way you talk about other people someone made a comment earlier when i asked you how you disagree with william lane craig which could feel like an intimidating idea someone with two phds leading floss from the world and you said you know i want to learn more but here's something i understand it doesn't make sense to me a very generous i think respectful way of doing that so i just want to affirm you're doing so awesome in there well let's talk about your music i have so many more apologetic questions that we can we can have you back if you want to and talk about some of these issues again maybe take a specific issue and go into a little bit more depth for your thoughts but tell us about your love for music your dad emailed me and said i think you were four or five when you really started engaging some of these so tell us about your love for music uh yeah it was about four or five when i started uh well now i sing i rap i write um and i play the piano and it's you know it's super fun right now i love uh creating music writing music then going into the studio this is our studio here uh we take you know adjust the microphone a little bit and open up the you know the program and then we just record music that we've made and and it it's super fun and it all kind of started about eight years ago uh seven to eight years ago when i was just you know i had a cheese stick in my hand and i was just freestyling and you know music has always been a part of the family my dad was a musician my mom was a poet and music is always playing on car rides in the background just yeah so tell us about the kind of music that you create or you love yeah i'll talk about what you create so uh i want to create music that i would enjoy listening to that's fun to make and that that's not just you know feels good but not lyrical at all like i wanted to have meaning i don't want it i want it to feel good too but to also you know have have uh impactful lyrics and and just you know dope lyrics too so and and i want to create music that uh that i would like to hear and that i think a lot of other people would like to hear would be inspired by and the music that that i like is uh r b pop soul gospel those are like the four you know the four main major genres of music and that's kind of that my music is a blend of that and hip-hop of course hip-hop do you have favorite band or two that you follow christian or not that you just think create good quality beautiful music yeah so well there's stevie wonder first of all he uh and tori kelly uh they're i think they're both christian and they're you know i just love their music um and then um well j cole he's not a christian uh i don't know actually i don't know what he what he believes but his music i just really love his music he's a rapper and and a producer um yeah that's awesome now do what is the creative process like for you because i don't know how to write books and blogs but i don't have a clue how to make music walk me through what this process looks like for you it changes kind of every time it changes from song to song but more or less what usually happens is first we have a beat um uh you know usually like a friend of the family uh you know my parent like dad my dad was involved in the music industry and stuff so he has some connections and his friends are musical and friends of the family give us beats they give us songs to work with and then we uh usually one of us will think of a concept first like what is a song about or maybe a title or we could even just be mumbling like melodies and gibberish and then a phrase will just pop out and that will be the title of the song and it changes at the beginning but once you have either the concept or the title or the first words of the song down then the rest is you know you just kind of write you listen to the beat and and yeah from there it kind of goes smoothly and it flows that that's awesome tell us some people have asked you have a youtube channel now what you sent me your dad sent me you have a website and you have an instagram that people can follow tell us first about the website um the website has um has a little bio about me and about some of the songs that i've released um and and you know uh instagram it's just instagram and i have a youtube channel too uh all of it the website there all of my social media stuff it's just no whole life so my youtube channel is called naho alive all of it um yeah in the description below we have a link to the website and to the instagram i don't think i included the youtube channel but those of you following me follow this young exceptional man and just like and support what he's doing uh no this is just absolutely fantastic i knew after our conversation that we were gonna have a good discussion but i gotta tell you even blew me away on a couple levels number one your thoughtfulness about these issues that you could explain the ontological argument actually i'm blown away that that even even one of your favorite arguments but then also that you're not threatened by ideas different that your own and you're just trying to think do you how do i take these ideas and communicate them to people who see the world differently i think that is great and awesome now did i miss anything you want to tell our audience about the music or about apologetics or just about you that that i should have asked or did that cover it oh no i think i think you did a good job oh my job was easy i threw softballs and you knocked him out of the park so again to our friends we are with future biola student nahoa apologist in the making doing music oh i did have a last question when you approach music is there a faith component to it is it just fun how do you think about that as a christian when you approach music hmm well uh first of all it's not you know my christian isn't gospel i mean my music isn't uh gospel music it's not like overtly uh christian i i mentioned god uh you know a few times but but it's just mainly music that that i would like to listen to and um and that's that's inspiring and encouraging too i do you know i don't want to do anything god wouldn't approve of and i don't you know do anything inappropriate or anything that's just just stupid so but but no there's not really a faith component when i'm making the music okay i think that's awesome well there was a comment that just said this was a great live video uh friend of mine dr jonathan mcclatchy you maybe have come across his work with intelligent design historical jesus he just said uh here's a great comment for you said this young man is very inspiring i look forward to seeing him contending for the faith in years to come uh there's just a whole bunch of people on here so hey noah you are awesome your family is awesome um i was looking forward to this and i could tell he's even better than i expected it was going to be so those of you watching this enjoyed it give us a thumbs up give nihoa a thumbs up for this and uh we will have you back assuming that you want to maybe we'll have you back you can play a song or something for the audience and we could talk about some of your apologetic questions you and i can explore that but keep me and then i can let our audience kind of know what you're up to um because you're god's god's got his hand on your life this is exciting stuff so don't take off yet i'm going to end this in a second but those who watch make sure you hit subscribe we've got some other really interesting interviews coming up people like wayne grudem nancy piercy lee strobel doing behind the scenes interview about the people and books and experiences that have shaped their lives and this tuesday a friend of mine i just met did his phd dissertation on transport policy how would opening up to trans athletes objectively affects sports so we'll be interviewing him tuesday that is a hot relevant topic so make sure you join us uh this week coming up all right thanks for everybody have an awesome weekend and i hope it don't take off yet thank you

Channel: Dr. Sean McDowell

Views: 138,402

Rating: 4.9377112 out of 5

Keywords: gen z, iGen, apologetics, students, teens, questions

Id: tC-bZUUiIAI

Length: 55min 15sec (3315 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 26 2021