Meet Deacon Tim Hopper 

00:00:39 David Nahkla  

My name is David Nahkla. 

00:00:41 David Nahkla 

I'm coming to you from the Philadelphia area. Today we have on our show, Tim Hopper. 

00:00:45 David Nahkla 

Tim serves as a local Deacon of Shiloh OPC in Raleigh, NC. Tim's been newly elected to serve on the OPC's committee on Diaconal Ministries. Tim has quite an interest in the office of Deacon. 

00:00:59 David Nahkla 

Apart from serving in this office in his local church, he has his own website on the topic called reformeddeacon.com and he has recently republished an out-of-print book called The Deaconship by John Lorimer, originally published in Scotland in 1840. You can find it on Amazon. We thought our audience would be interested to learn more about Tim and what drives this passion and interest in this office. 

00:01:23 David Nahkla 

Tim, welcome to the program. 

00:01:25 Tim Hopper 

Thank you for having me, David. 

00:01:26 David Nahkla 

Tim, tell us about yourself, your background. You know, what was young Tim like? Did you grow up in the church? How did you come to know the Lord? Just kind of fill it in for us.  

00:01:38 Tim Hopper 

Yeah. I grew up in southern West Virginia, which is not particularly a hotbed of Presbyterianism. I actually, on my dad's side of the family, come from Presbyterians going back at least to the beginning of the Church of Scotland and John Knox in the 1560s, but my dad had left the Southern Presbyterian Church. He grew up as a missionary kid, came back to the US in the 70s for college when the Southern Presbyterian Church was moving in the liberal direction, and he had left the Southern Presbyterian church from the 70s until I was 16 years old. But I have very godly parents and was raised in a faithful independent little church in southern West Virginia heard the gospel preached there at church and at home and I have 3 godly older sisters and by God's grace and I never knew a day when I didn't know Christ. You know, I don't remember that. I’m very blessed and fortunate for God’s covenant faithfulness to my family and to me. And my mother didn't grow up in a believing home, but was a very, very godly mother who taught us from a young age and that I’m thankful for. When I was 16, we started attending an EPC church after our church had kind of faded away and that that was something of the path to me becoming reformed. Then I was in a very good...I went to Grove City College and was in a very good PCA church during my time there. Ervin Hughes, who was it was my pastor—many people know that name—was a mentor to me and taught me a lot and really just the church it was founded out of a group that had left the United Presbyterian Church, but it was just a bunch of, you know, old farmers who were looking to be reformed and no glitz and glam, but just faithful Christians and looking for faithful Biblical worship and a church that loves the Lord and loves one another. So the teaching was good, but really there was so much instruction there for me just through the body there that I think set me off on a on a on a great path and so basically I was in a PCA church briefly I kind of bounced around after college and another PCA church and then I've been in the OPC now for 12 years. Briefly in Charlottesville, VA, and then now at Shiloh and Raleigh for 11 years. 

00:04:08 David Nahkla 

Excellent, Very exciting to hear how the Lord brought you to where you're at now. Did you have any diaconal exposure in those growing up years?  

00:04:16 Tim Hopper 

You know, I don't know that we had deacons in my church that I grew up in. Maybe we did, but I  don't actually specifically remember that. My dad was a I was a basically a ruling elder there. I guess...I mean I remember being exposed to the deacons at the EPC church I was at. Although there, you know, I don’t know that I actually really knew that they did much more than to kind of take care of the building. I guess this is kind of a gradual development of my own. Just serving at different churches. With the PCA church and college there were very, very godly and faithful deacons and I started to get involved with  church work days and opportunities to be around them. And again I don't know that I really thought a whole lot about their kind of behind the scenes, diaconal work, but they were godly men who I certainly wanted to imitate and who I admired. So it was a good example for me. Frankly, I don't know that I really thought tons about the office of Deacon until I was asked to be nominated later on. Yeah, I guess I don't actually remember thinking about it a whole lot prior to that point.  

00:05:20 David Nahkla 

And what is your current daytime work, you're calling? 

00:05:24 Tim Hopper 

I'm a computer programmer by day, and I’m actually fortunate to work out of my home even pre COVID. And I have a of a wife and two little boys and a third one on the way and I’m fortunate to get to be home and have my little boys interrupt my meetings all day. That’s one of my favorite things.  

00:05:47 David Nahkla 

And what do you... and when you're not declining or you're not computer programming or, you know, shooing the kids off your lap, what do you do for fun? 

00:05:55 Tim Hopper 

In that hour a week?  

00:05:57 David Nahkla 

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. 

00:05:59 Tim Hopper 

I'm interested in wildlife photography, which is something I don't have a lot of opportunity for. I like to sit on my deck and read a book and smoke a cigar and... I have an interest in church history and specifically Presbyterian history, so if I have that time, it might be found reading something obscure and probably seemingly boring to most people, but... 

00:06:24 David Nahkla 

So when you, you were approached about being a Deacon and that was, what would you say, about 8 years ago? 

00:06:31 Tim Hopper 

So I've been ordained now for eight 8 1/2 years, so it actually would have been about nine years ago, and I was just finishing up grad school, and I I was 25, I think and single, and I felt like I was kind of an unusual candidate actually, I didn't expect... we had nominations going on, and I didn't actually expect or anticipate doing that at that point. My brother asked me to and encouraged me to do that. 

00:07:00 David Nahkla 

When you agreed to that, and presumably went through some sort of training process, what surprised you about the office once you became a Deacon? Anything catch you off guard? 

00:07:12 Tim Hopper 

You know, a thing that was challenging for me and through my early adulthood, I really... by God's grace... this church in college and through some reading I was doing and just through study of Scripture really learned to love the church and the people in my church and learned to have a what I think is a God centered view of loving the people where He's put you, and at the same time becoming a Deacon and an officer and starting to learn more about some of the warts and trials in the church. That was an adjustment for me. You know, as a fairly young man I was not previously exposed to a whole lot of those things that were, you know, sometimes can be under the surface. Maybe, for example, you know, finding out someone in the church who you've admired for a long time has big financial needs, in part because they've been very foolish with their money. It’s an adjustment to learn how to think about that and to learn how to love the people that that the Lord has you with even in that time. And I think, you know, now, after eight years, I don't necessarily think about that explicitly as much, but it is challenging in ways and you know, I think causes deacons to... Writers have observed in the past that you know, deacons are able to really set a tone of peace and love and the congregation. And I think that that's a starting place where we can do that even when you see the warts and wrinkles in your congregation, you can have the love of Christ for those people even during that time. 

00:08:48 David Nahkla 

I love that. You've had your own podcast. You've... and a website, republished a book. Clearly you have a passion for the office. Can you tell us what led to this passion of yours? What events or means the Lord used in your life to grow in you this love for the work of the Deacon? 

00:09:16 Tim Hopper 

Sure, I think foremost, I guess foremost aside from Scripture, I don't want to minimize at all the, you know, the calling that Scripture gives- the importance of that and just the opportunity to show the love of Christ. But I guess second, after that I, as I mentioned, I have very godly parents who have served faithfully in the churches they've been at my entire life. And I mean, you know, I was one of those kids... I was probably in in church at six days old, I can't remember how early, but I've been in church morning and evening almost my entire life. And seeing parents who just would do whatever they need to serve the church. My dad's now...they moved to North Carolina as well, my dad’s a PCA elder, you know they've been, you know, faithful examples. You know, I actually have never asked the man who nominated me to be a Deacon why he did. They ended up leaving our church soon after, but I would... if I had to guess, it's because I came, you know, I had been at Shiloh for a couple of years... basically I've when I've moved and gotten to a new church, I show up and say what can I do to help because I don't really know any other way because that's the example that my parents have always set for me. So I think that's very much a, you know, a mindset and a spiritual discipline that I learned from them, motivating what would lead to me becoming a Deacon... as well as you know, I mentioned just reading Scripture and understanding Scripture, reading specifically about the Deacon, but just, you know, again the love of the church. And I remember reading D.A. Carson's book, A Call to Spiritual Reformation, which has been retitled but where he goes through the prayers of Paul in the in the epistles and kind of takes a practical and theological view of understanding those prayers and the depth and the love and extent of God's grace that you see through those prayers. It was a very transformative book for me, thinking about, you know, loving the body of Christ. Yeah, so I think those are not really deacon specific things, but I think those were a lot of the groundwork that would...you know, when I was asked if I would be nominated, that made me, I think, willing and able to do that. At the same time... this website I have it's reformeddeacon.com, it’s entirely devoid of any new content for me, so it's basically a fancy bibliography. And I remember someone several years ago it might have been Joel Beeke saying people described him as having the gift of bibliography, and I don’t know if I’m there yet, but I don't feel like I have tons and tons of unique things to offer, but I like to keep track of what other things have impressed me and share them with others. And I realized fairly early on in being a deacon that there didn't seem to be tons of resources focused on diaconal work and specifically...and you know, our reformed understanding of diaconal work. And for years I'd been exposed to a lot of the literature that's continually coming out on basically the work of the elder and the pastor and, you know, shepherding the flock and that kind of thing. But there seemed to be fairly little about deacons, and I realized that I needed to learn more and grow more. So I just started tracking down whatever things I could find  through, you know, mostly Google searches, but archives of Ordained Servant are probably half the content that I linked to. And there's some good stuff there that isn't immediately obvious how to find kind of by category for someone. And then, you know, gradually discovering more books that were out there and other articles. And then I also have the text of the Book of Church Order on the diaconate  and it for some of our NAPARC congregations. The scripture references with regard to, you know, I Timothy 3, Acts 6 and then I have them roughly categorized...things like Biblical foundations or practical, diaconal work. So I I found that...I started that really as a means for myself to keep track of things. I was trying to learn and understand as I was seeking to grow as a Deacon and at some point slapped those online as a real simple website. Then, a couple years later, I overhauled it to make it what it is now and I pretty infrequently add anything at this point that those materials aren't coming out terribly often. I do keep a little backlog of things I... there's some older articles, you know, like 19th century articles on the diaconate... some things I'd like to read and potentially post up there. For the most part, I post things that are what I would consider, you know, Orthodox and helpful and post them with my recommendation. It's not just, you know, anything that's out there and from whatever perspective. It's very intentionally trying to have a Orthodox, biblical, reformed view on Diaconal work. So I know that's been helpful to many and I'm thankful for that. And if there are ways, you know, things people see that could be helpful in other ways, I'm always happy to take feedback. I think there's a way on there to contact me. I'm looking forward to how my interest with that will can overlap with work on the CDM. I actually have some ideas of. Maybe in the future being able to pull together some of those resources into a single package that we could, you know, share with people. So hopefully that's helpful for people. 

00:15:13 David Nahkla 

Yeah, that's great. Looping back to one of the earlier things you mentioned with regards to your being nominated to serve as a Deacon. In my experience, the best deacons or those who are most adaptable to the work are those who are actually already serving in the church and serving actively. And it's just  natural for them to be ordained, to do what they're already doing, and that sounds like that was your experience. And it's a quite a jump start for you in your service and I think we end up with great deacons as a result.  

00:15:53 Tim Hopper  

And I you know, I encourage men to do that all the time. You know, it's not.. there's not some magic Deacon dust that gets sprinkled on your head that makes you suddenly start serving when you're ordained. If you're not doing it now, I don't know why you would imagine that you're suddenly going to be serving later so this is the opportunity right now to start serving and whatever ways you're able to. 

 00:16:17 David Nahkla 

To and along the along those lines I was just talking with a brother at church just on Sunday and oftentimes, you know, we will look to men maybe in their, you know, 40s or 50s for ordination and oftentimes they're men who are responsible and, you know, unfortunately have a full life and so now we ask them to add church service on top of that, whereas they'll be much better suited if they're already serving, stewarding their time well to serve in the church, ordained or not, such that...you know when it does come time to be in the Lord's timing if they're to be ordained, then it's just an easier transition to quote, unquote fit it into their life. 

00:17:06 Tim Hopper 

Absolutely. And I, you know... I was... I served for a couple of years, 2 1/2 years before I was married and it's certainly been an adjustment even now and after six years of marriage, learning how to balance those things. But you know, I'm grateful that... not that I would encourage anyone who wants to be, you know, a Deacon to need to do that before they're married. But I'm grateful that I had those years where I was really able to pour out 150%, and also set those patterns for my life that you know, in getting married, goes part of our life to serve that way even when it interferes with things that maybe you wish you could be doing as a family sometime. I completely agree with you that's it's a good thing for young men and women as well and not the goal of serving. But when you're young and have time to do those things, the church is a great place to use your time and energy. 

00:18:01 David Nahkla 

Yeah, totally. Your bibliography has been super helpful actually. Even as we were filling out our own website opccdm.org, we've very much greatly benefited from your work and even referenced your work. So I was going to ask you, along those lines... maybe there’s writers in our audience. Do you have any thoughts on any topics... or... that would be useful that are missing in the slate of books and articles that are out there? Where are the gaps that you think that we could use some writing? 

00:18:46 Tim Hopper 

Yeah...you know, I think in some ways that there's a good reason that there isn't tons and tons of stuff and that is in part, the scope of our work as deacons is more limited, potentially than what elders and pastors are called to. And I think the breadth of topics is actually pretty well covered. I think one of the things that... a difficult topic to write about, but is helpful is kind of the practical diaconal matters of things... like you know, somebody shows up to your church asking for money or saying they need to pay for a hotel or something. How do you sit down and talk with people like that? And those are difficult situations for experienced deacons, and they’re hard to write about universally. But I think that's an area that our... potentially is opportunity for more. And something that's available on the CDM website. It's from one of the earlier diaconal summits. 00:19:54 David Nahkla 

There were the case studies that were used and I wasn't at that that summit. But, you know, case studies to talk through different kind of scenarios and how would you deal with these scenarios? And I've commended that to people, and we've used those in our own church. That's a really good, really good resource along those lines. And it doesn't necessarily give you all the answers and I... you know, I don't know that it would be helpful for someone to pretend they could just give you all the answers to exactly what you do in those situations. But we...when we were doing training, we ordained 3 new deacons last year and when we were doing training, we got together 7:00 AM on Saturday morning for a month or two and talked through some of those, so I think that's a...those practical things are areas which are harder to come by... the timeless resources, and there's there are things out there for that, certainly. 00:20:53 David Nahkla 

But I think on the more on the theoretical and biblical foundation side, this topic has been hashed out repeatedly and maybe there's new things to say in new times, but the resources are out there, books and articles and Scripture only says so much about the diaconal work and it doesn't need reapeating forever. 

00:21:23 David Nahkla 

You're serving beyond the local. You've been a member of your Presbytery Diaconal committee. Actually, I understand that you're the chairman of your Presbyterian diaconal committee, and now you've been elected to serve denominationally. Tell us how these other service opportunities came about and what those opportunities are that you're involved in? 

00:21:48 Tim Hopper 

Sure. I also last year I became the chairman of our local diaconate as well, and it's really only because I'm good at sending emails and scheduling meetings and keeping to an agenda. I get frustrated if someone else doesn't keep me up to date on things, so I end up just taking over and doing it. So I...we not long, I guess a couple of years after I became a Deacon, we had a presbytery diaconal conference at Matthews OPC, now Resurrection OPC in Charlotte. That was really the first time I ever even thought about, kind of, diaconate beyond our own congregation, much less, you know, regional church or denominational wide diaconal efforts... like it just hadn’t really occurred to me much. So I was really encouraged and excited to see what our diagonal committee at the time was doing... then chaired by my now pastor, Matt Holst who stepped down from the committee after I joined, which is maybe not a coincidence, but.  It was very...just exciting to me to think about the connectional diaconal efforts throughout our Presbytery. The Presbytery of the Southeast is somewhat spread out. It's difficult, you know, we're not the presbytery in the Midwest, but we're pretty wide, and it's difficult to have those interactions, but it seemed like a good thing to me, and I left that just very energized thinking along those lines. That was in the late fall, and then I guess at our Spring Presbyterian meeting, Irvan Hughes, who had been my pastor in college, ended up...long story...serving at Shiloh as a kind of an assistant pastor for a few years, and he was at Presbytery. He texted me and said, Tim, they need someone on the presbytery diaconal committee, can I nominate you? And I said sure. And so he nominated me and I didn't realize Nathan Trice had had a candidate in mind that he was hoping for, and I...but I won the election, so I kind of got thrown into it, not...with very little warning and not totally knowing what to expect. And then we had pretty significant turnover on the committee and so that was in the spring, and then by December we had mostly new members and needed a new chairman, so we had a meeting and someone said, I think it'd be good for a Deacon to be a chairman, and I looked around and didn't see any other deacons. And you know, I said, if you, if y’all are willing to bear with me, I I've never done this before, but I'm willing to do it. So I guess I've served on that committee now for five years.I think it's just been a great blessing. You know, serving with, with wonderful brothers and an opportunity to serve our presbytery through, you know, meeting needs financially, through offering counsel at times and we've encouraged our churches every time at Presbytery, like if your deacons can call us and, you know, we're not super deacons or expert, but we know we'd be happy to chat with you. Through our disaster response work with with Mike Cloy. It's just growing and growing and we hosted our own conference a couple years ago and it's been a blessing to me to get to, to serve on that and meet deacons and hear about other churches. And I think and I hope, encourage our ministers and elders, and I've been asked few years ago if I would consider also taking a nomination for the CDM and timing was not right with family and other commitments at the time. And then you asked me again to consider that this time and at this past General Assembly and you know my love for the PDC, our presbytery committee, you know, extends to what's going on at our denominational level and just I'm very thankful for the initiative, the OPC's taken and that that you've taken in in your time as the Administrator, David. In thinking about the actual work in this bigger picture way, in a way that’s somewhat unique in our reformed churches and hopefully setting an example for our sister churches. So, I decided I was willing to take the risk of hopefully being able to serve both committees together. That's my my desire, my plan, and we'll see how that goes as my family is growing it and things, but I’m very thankful for the work going on and it’s a joy to get to serve the Lord in these ways.  

00:26:42 David Nahkla 

I'm glad we found you at a weak moment. 

00:26:45 Tim Hopper 

You know, I went to talk to my wife, and, you know, I imagined she would say, I don’t think we should do this. And I think we had just found out we were expecting #3, and she’s like yeah, this is the best time it’s ever been for you to do it. So I was very encouraged to hear her say that.  

00:27:02 David Nahkla 

Wow, what a good what a good help meet. What a wonderful deacon’s wife who joins in the labors of the deacons. A huge sacrifice, but a huge blessing too. Do you have any aspirations or interest in church service in which you’re not currently involved. I mean, you just you just expressed, you know that boy, we just filled up your plate a little bit more, but you know, as you, as you look towards the future and just even with the things that you've... the initiatives you take, is there anything you want to let us peek into in the heart and mind of Tim Hopper? 

00:27:41 David Nahkla 

My current goal is giving away areas of service as much as possible, so at Shiloh in particular, I've been trying as much as possible to hand off to hand off things which is a tough lesson to learn. It’s something I’m not terribly good at, but yeah, you know, I don’t have grand aspirations, and I wouldn’t encourage anyone to get into the diaconate or any kind of service in the OPC for fame and fortune, certainly. I love my work on these committees, but, you know, my desire is that those would never distract from the faithful service as a deacon at Shiloh... I can be on this podcast and ready to plunge a toilet on Sunday morning if the need arises, which it has. So I don’t have much other than, you know, with the website in particular, and the book which I didn’t mention is a reprint of a book from an early minister in the Free Church of Scotland That was available in like a scan facsimile copy on Google Books, but I read and was encouraged by. So I retype set it, and republished it first as a Kindle book and then as a paperback on Amazon. And you know those kinds of things in little ways, I would like to continue to make use of the technology to put things out there that can be of use to others. You know, I think particulary in the OPC and some of our sister denominations, we tend to have very small churches and a lot of churches with 0, 1, 2 deacons, and I imagine many of whom feel quite isolated and don’t have other deacons they can go and talk to. I think those interpersonal relationships are very good in those situations. But at the same time, there’s a lot that can be gained from reading and other resources, so you know this podcast is an example I think as a wonderful idea. Something I considered... this type of thing a few years back, and so yeah, I’d like to be able to encourage others.  

00:30:10 David Nahkla 

So I noticed that your book was on the top seller list. Is that correct? Was I seeing that right? 

00:30:17 Tim Hopper 

I haven't seen that, maybe so. It must be in a very obscure category, I can’t remember. 

00:30:24 David Nahkla 

How has the...how are people picking it up? I mean, are you able to get a sense of that? 

00:30:30 Tim Hopper 

Oh, it's sold, maybe, I don't know 50 or 100 in in two or three years. I bought a bunch that I hand out to people that's not included in the...yeah, I can buy them at a discount. Yeah, I tried to price it very modestly. I can’t remember it’s $8 or $10 or something. I think it's an excellent book and I...part of why I wanted to make that available is it just offers a perspective out of our own American context...and there's some things in there that just kind of don’t totally resonate you know, as in the American, you know situation as well as out of our own, you know, modern context and avoiding the chronological snobbery that C.S. Lewis talks about. And there aren't...there are some articles, you know, a lot of 19th century debates over diaconal work and various things, but I haven't come across a whole lot of other resources quite like that that are 150 plus years old, addressing the very same topics that we're thinking about today, but from a, you know, different time and place, and I think that’s good for us. I would encourage people to read that. I have no intentions or plans of getting rich off that, and if you can’t afford a copy, you can let me know. I’ll mail you one of the ones I bought at a discount, but I just... I would like brothers to read that, I think it’s a very helpful resource.  

00:32:00 David Nahkla 

It's a good, good plug for a good resource, that’s great. As we kind of circle in towards the close of our time together, if you had an opportunity to share three things with the prospective Deacon, what would those be, Tim? 

00:32:16 Tim Hopper 

Sure. I think we’ve largely hit these topics, but one is and don't wait to be ordained to serve, and we talked about that well, but right now is the time, and not only are you going to help directly through whatever ways you’re serving in your church, but serving is an encouragement to your officers and hopfully to your congregation as well. You know, I  try to encourage our congregation, you know, you can come and ask us ways to serve, but even more so just keep an eye out, look for ways that you can just hop in and start to offer a hand and ways in which you can use your gifts. Right now is a great time to start that. Secondly, you'll learn to love the Saints and to love the church. It’s not an abstract thing to be an officer. It’s a very concrete thing, and it’s a hard thing, and there’s a lot of times when you are going to have to persevere out of love, not out of it being just an easy joyful time. And so, learn to, you know, learn to love the Saints that Christ has put you with, right here are and now, before you, would ever would consider being ordained or installed into an office of serving them. And a final thing that’s really a difficult thing for me is to learn to sit at the Lord’s feet. And I think often about the story of Mary and Martha, and I as a deacon very often become Martha and think about Jesus saying to her, Martha, Martha, you were anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. And that was to sit at his feet like Mary did. And this is a weekly struggle for me to sit at church and think, does that microphone sound right? Is the temperature right? You know, should I be worried about this person who’s not here for the second week in a row? What’s going on out in the hall? Is the sanctuary clean enough? All these things that just kind of run through my head nonstop, and particularly, you know, as we have corporate worship, I have to remind myself, you know, you're anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. And that, you know, that comes both...it's kind of mental, psychological, but also something we as our diaconate and have been doing over the last few years is trying as much as possible for those kinds of needs that happen...just kind of logistical and physical needs that are happening on the Lords Day, to distribute that load beyond our diaconate, so those things aren’t just falling on us because we have, you know, a lot of other things on our minds. But you know that there's also just a very spiritual side. It's easy for me to be doing things and staying busy. I'm good at making my lists and and getting things done, but that's what Martha was doing, and our Lord told her she needed to sit down and sit at His feet and sometimes not worry about those other things. You know, so that was something that was a significant shift for me, you know, in becoming a deacon. Not that I was never aware of those kinds of needs, but as I started to feel responsible for so many of those other things. So you have to, you know, guard your own heart and not just be going through the motions. Well, there you can pray for me. That's a that's an ongoing thing I reflect on. And then my, you know, my wife tries to talk to me, about like, are you getting to hear the sermon? Are you getting to really take that in? You know, you were up there fixing the live stream yet again. Are you able to hear what’s happening. And we need to be doing that as deacons and all the officers.  

00:36:16 David Nahkla 

Don't wait to serve, love the Saints, and sit at our Lord’s feet. Those are good... 

00:36:23 Tim Hopper 

Those will be the three chapters of my book. 

00:36:24 David Nahkla 

Three chapters of your book, and a great way to end our time together. Tim, so great to talk with you, hear from your heart and your mind how the Lord has shaped you and raised you up to serve multiple capacities. And even beyond just with how you've been collecting resources and reprinting books trying to bring more helpful attention to the office of Deacon. So thank you for your service and thank you for your time. 

00:36:55 Tim Hopper 

Thank you, David. 

00:36:56 David Nahkla 

And with that, we'll thank our audience for joining us on this episode of the Reformed Deacon Podcast.