(upbeat music)

- [Narrator] When BrennanMcPherson was a young boy,

he was always intriguedby stories in the Bible.

Brennan now combines hisfascination with scripture

and powerful story tellingskills to inspire others

to read the Bible for themselves.

His popular Fall of Man series of novels

first featured Cain followed by Flood.

His latest Babel onceagain brings the pages

of Genesis to life.

- Brennan McPherson joins me now

and we welcome you to the program today.

Go back with me if youwill to when you wrote

your first book in The Fall of Man series,

what makes you decide which characters

you're gonna grab hold ofand continue to write about?

- I don't really know,it's a good question.

I think you just kind of become fascinated

with certain characters 'causethere's a lot of stories

that you could write and it's the ones

that take hold of you most emotionally

that you wanna spend that time with.

- And intriguing because like you wrote,

one of your books was Cain.- Yeah.

- And I have thoughtas I've read the Bible,

well then what, I mean, whathappened to him after that?

Well, the Tower of Babelis such a short story,

such a short telling againone of those scenarios

that you've decided to write more about.

What intrigued you about that?

- Well, I mean, partiallybecause it's the only event

in history like it.

God confused the languagesof all the people,

that's for all thelanguages that we have began

and it was an incrediblestory of God mercifully

stopping man from rebelling against him.

- And in this accountin Babel, you have Noah

as apart of that, how did the marrying

of the two of them come together?

- Well, when I was doingthe research for the story

because in the actual textof the Tower of Babel story,

it's a paragraph and there's no characters

really talked about, it'sjust all the people together

decided to build the tower.

But in the genealogies Ihave realized that Noah

was still alive during the events.

And so I wondered what inthe world was the prophet

of God doing while everyonewas building this tower

to engage in idolatry?- Still cleaning the ark

out right?- Right, yeah.

Gotta a lot of mold in there, yeah.

- Yeah, well, I mean, it's fascinating

how you weave the two of them together.

What kind of researchdo you have to put into

doing something like this.

I mean, I recognize thata good portion of it

is a fictional but it has

to be a very well thought out account

of what's going on.

- Some of it is researchingthe historical commentaries

by very trustworthytheologians of the past.

Some of it is also seeingwhat did the Jewish people

interpret it as?

'Cause a lot of times those are different

from our traditional- Traditional currents.

kind of evangelical views of things.

And it's interesting to see what views

are consistent across all of them.

- [Terry] Yeah.

- And to try and tease out,'cause a lot of the text

is very ambiguous, it'sreally hard to tell exactly

what happened.

- Which for you is kind of a good thing

because it gives youa free range. (laughs)

- It is, yeah.- To explore there.

Well, what do you in Babel, the subtitle,

The Story of the Towerand the Rebellion of Man,

what do you want the take awayfrom this to be for people?

- I guess I want peopleto really think hard

about our little rebellions in our lives.

Not just the big rebellions

but the ways that we ignorespending time with Christ,

being present with our families,

living up to our responsibilities,

all of those little things that add up,

add up to something big.

- We have all these figures in the Bible

that are bigger than lifeas we read the word of God

but a common issue that we see

and you surely show that in the book

is the flawed character in all of us

that needs a savior and a redeemer.

And you really emphasis and have

in all of your series, the relationship

between father and son,so significant isn't it?

- It is very significantand the Bible is unusual

as a major religious bookthat it shows it's prophets

and it's important peopleas being completely flawed.

What the Bible says about David,

you wouldn't find thatin other religious books

and as part of why we haveconfidence in his truthfulness

is that it shows us humanity as it is.

And it's important thatwe talk about fatherhood

because fatherhood is amirror of our relationship

with our father God.

- And what about your own life,

how has, I mean from thebeginning of the series

until now, what's changed in your life

as you've written these books?

- Well, I've become a father.- There you go. (laughs)

- Which was a huge humbling experience.

And I've grown in myrelationship with my father

and come to know a lot moreof the pressures he faced

when I was growing upthat I never knew about

and hopes and dreams that hehad, his past, everything.

It's been a wonderfulexperience to come to love

and know him more and morethan ever I'm so thankful

for the father that I haveand I see how his faithfulness

is what has allowed meto be stable in my life.

- How has writing all ofthis with the father, son

being so central to themessage changed you as a dad?

- It changed me a lot,it's given me a lot of time

to be self reflective aboutwhat it means to be a father,

what my calling is and I think we all need

to be very circumspect about our roles

as a leader of a family ina servant leadership role,

in the Bible the patriarch was responsible

for their children's mistakes.

It wasn't a role of domination,

it was a role of being thefirst to get on their knees

and saying I'm sorry, beingthe first to reconcile,

being the first to servethe other people around you.

- Big responsibility.- It is, yeah.

- So, Babel now and what's next?

- Next, is of courseanother book in the series

but what I'm most excitedabout is the short book

that I'm finishing upright now on the gospel,

it's called The SimpleGospel and How it Works in Us

and it's gonna be a freebook available to people.

- [Terry] Wow.

- And I'm excited aboutthat because the gospel,

I mean, fiction is great but the gospel

has the power to change our lives.

It's much more important.- Absolutely.

Well, we look forward to that. (laughs)

Very prolific writer, wellBrandon's latest novel

as I mentioned is called Babel,

The Story of the Towerand the Rebellion of Man,

it's available now.

You can order a copy on Amazon

so get ahold of yours becauseit's a fascinating read.

Thank you so much, it'sgreat to have you with us.

- [Brennan] Thank you, great to be here.