Whiskey and the Writings

What if everything you were taught about sin was designed to keep you afraid instead of free? In this episode of Whiskey and the Writings, I sit down with my longtime friend Andrew Miller (Impact Campus Ministries) to dig into atonement theory, the doctrine that's supposed to explain how Jesus's death and resurrection actually fix our relationship with God. Except once you start looking, you reali...

Revelation isn't about predicting the future or identifying the Antichrist in today's politics. It's about who's on the throne right now. And a literary device called a chiasm reveals exactly how John structured that message. In this episode, Joe walks through how the entire Book of Revelation is organized as one giant chiasm—a mirror-structure used throughout ancient Hebrew and Greek literature t...

Most people open the book of Revelation looking for the end of the world. That's not what they find. The Greek word behind "Revelation" means "uncovering." What John is uncovering isn't a future timeline, it's who's actually sitting on the throne while everything looks like it's falling apart. In this first video of our Revelation Bible study, we cover: - What "apocalypse" actually means (it's not...

If you've ever been called a heretic, or been afraid you might be one, this episode is for you. We're digging into where the word "heretic" actually comes from, what it meant in Josephus, how Paul used it, and how it morphed into the weapon a lot of evangelical leaders use today to shut down anyone who thinks differently. Turns out the original Greek word just means "a choice you made." That chang...

What if the problem isn't that you sin too much. What if the problem is that the conversation about sin has never gone deep enough? Most of us were handed a version of sin that was flat. A list of things you did wrong, a prayer to reset it, repeat. But the biblical authors were pointing at something way bigger than that. Something that, if left unchecked, slowly makes you into something less than...

Nate Hanson built one of the most listened-to deconstruction podcasts in the Christian space. Almost Heretical drew over a million downloads from people who were done with the faith they grew up in. Then something shifted. Not a dramatic moment. Not a crisis. Just honest investigation, a lot of rabbit holes, and a slow tipping of the scales. In this conversation, Nate talks about growing up so emb...

Most of us were handed one way to read the Bible. And honestly? It worked. For a while. But if you've hit a wall where the Bible feels stale, or your theology started cracking under the weight of real questions, you're probably not broken. You just might be stuck in stage one or two. In this video I'm walking through four stages I think we all move through when we engage Scripture. Stage one is de...

Here's something the history of the Bible doesn't get talked about honestly. You've probably heard the version where Constantine got a bunch of bishops in a room, picked his favorite books, and called it Scripture. Clean story. Wrong story. The real history of how the New Testament came together is messier, slower, and honestly? More compelling. It wasn't one meeting. It wasn't one man. It was com...

We grew up in it. The WOW compilations, the youth group pecking order, the "on fire" vs. "backslidden" scoreboard. The pressure to show up every Sunday, Sunday night, and Wednesday. The feeling that doubt was failure and the world outside the church was basically the enemy. In this conversation, Joe sits down with his friend Mario to take an honest look back at evangelical Christian culture in the...

Here's something nobody really says out loud in the pew: everybody around you looks like they've got it figured out. Same songs, same prayers, same language, same faces. And somewhere along the way you start wondering if your experience of God is supposed to look exactly like theirs. It's not. The spiritual journey is one of the most personal things a human being can go through. And the church, fo...

In this conversation with Pastor Josh Kramer, we talk honestly about church hurt, why the church still matters, and what it actually means to follow the way of Jesus. What happens when the church looks nothing like Jesus? Why do some people walk away from faith communities while others stay and try to build something better?

Forgiveness is one of those things you can know you're supposed to do and still not be able to make yourself do it. This week I'm sharing something pretty vulnerable. A year of holding on, a week that forced my hand, and what Jesus and Paul actually say about what forgiveness is and what it isn't. We dig into Matthew 6 and the Lord's Prayer, where Jesus ties our forgiveness directly to our willing...

Here's something nobody preaches on Easter Sunday: even after the resurrection, Jesus's disciples weren't sure. Thomas wasn't. The two on the road to Emmaus weren't. It took Jesus 40 days of showing up, teaching, and performing miracles to convince the people who were literally there. So if you walked out of Easter weekend with more questions than answers, you're not failing at faith. You're just...

What if the religious leaders who handed Jesus over to be killed weren't evil villains — they were just people protecting their power? In this Holy Week episode, we walk through John 18–19 and look at what's really happening beneath the surface of Jesus's trial. Because when you slow it down, you start to see a pattern that feels uncomfortably familiar: A religious system that had the answers. A l...

In this in studio conversation, I sit down with my friend Colby Stream to talk honestly about crisis, trauma, church community, and what it looks like to lead yourself through chaos without pretending it is fine. We talk about the difference between feeling out of control and actually being out of control, the “locus of control” idea, and why the story of Jesus calming the storm (Mark 4:35 to 41)...

Chapters, verses, punctuation, paragraph breaks. None of that is in the original manuscripts. That is not a problem. It becomes a problem when we forget it. Because the modern Bible layout quietly trains us to read Scripture like a quote database instead of a living story. In this episode of Whiskey and the Writings, I walk through why the Bible was read for over a thousand years without chapters...

Many Christians were taught apologetics as defense rather than understanding. This episode explores why that shift happened and how it shaped fragile faith and shallow answers.

The Bible has often been used to control, shame, and silence people. This episode explores how certainty about scripture became a tool of power and how reclaiming humility changes everything.

In this episode of Whiskey and the Writings, Joe Oliver sits down with longtime friend and theologian Mario Alejandre for an honest, thoughtful conversation about the state of the church, Christian nationalism, power, faith transitions, and what it means to remain hopeful when so many feel exhausted or disillusioned.

In this episode of Whiskey in the Writings, I walk through a big idea that has been sitting with me for a long time. The Bible did not drop out of the sky into a vacuum. Every stage of its formation and every major shift in Jewish and Christian belief happened in real places, with real people, inside real cultures, languages, conflicts, and power struggles.

Many people reach a point where they can no longer clearly define what they believe. This video explores whether that space is failure or formation and why uncertainty may actually be a faithful place to stand.

Genesis has caused many people to walk away from faith due to science conflicts and literalism. This episode explores how reading Genesis through the wrong lens creates unnecessary tension and how ancient context opens a better path forward.

Many people were taught to read the Bible as an answer book. But what if that was never its purpose. This episode explores a different way of reading scripture that invites wisdom, formation, and trust instead of certainty and control.

What happens when you feel finished with faith but cannot fully let go. This video explores why faith can still matter even after disappointment, doubt, or burnout. It is an honest look at staying open without forcing belief or certainty.

Why do so many churches feel unsafe today? Explore how leadership structures, power, and business models contribute to church hurt, and how healthy faith communities can still be found.