Tauren Wells' Dropping A Joy Bomb
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It's Live in the Bream with the host of Fox News Sunday, Shannon Bream. All right, this week on Live in the Bream, we have somebody that you may know from many different things. I first knew him as a singer, but he's also a pastor, a church planter. Let me tell you a little bit about his musical career. I mean, he's a celebrated multi-platinum selling recording artist. He's a songwriter. He's got 10 Grammy Award nominations. He's a singer.

But get this. On top of all of that, he is a husband. He's a father to four boys. And he's got a brand new book out called Joy Bomb.

Torn Wells, welcome to Live in the Bream. What's up? Thank you so much for having me, Shannon. I don't know how you have time for all of this, but we love the good things that you're putting into the world. And I'm so interested in this book and what brought it about because it gets at this question that I debate with my friends too. Does the Lord want us to be holy? Does he want us to be happy? Does he want both of those things for us? What did you find? Yeah.

I think one is connected to the other. And I think that Jesus chooses his words very carefully, very specifically. And in Matthew 5, we have this famous, probably the most famous sermon of all time. It's been called the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus teaches the Beatitudes initially.

And the very first word that Jesus uses is the word blessed. Now, you know, to us living in 2025, we might think hashtag blessed. You know, we just signed the contract. We just got the new house. We pulled the new car in the driveway. We just walked across the stage with that blessing.

that degree that we've been working so hard on, but that wasn't really the context that the first century believers would have had when Jesus said the word blessed. They would have actually heard the word happy, prosperous, glad, delight.

And so we would read Matthew 5, delighted are the poor in spirit, happy are those who mourn, glad are the meek. And so these words dance around each other interchangeably. And when I discovered that that word meant happy, that Jesus started his ministry with a how to be happy message,

I had to ask myself, how important must our happiness be to the heart of God if it was the first thing he chose to communicate about? And so that's what led into the exploration that became this book.

Well, and so much of that sermon seems counterintuitive to what culture does tell us. Like you shouldn't be happy if you're poor and you're sad and you're, you know, all of these different things that don't measure up in the same way as you said, you know, first century Christians would have viewed these things.

You write in the book, the Beatitudes have shown us a way of life in which God's joy flows freely, meeting us exactly where we are. You mentioned all those things that we think may bring us happiness, but we've all walked through terrible valleys or we're going to. But how do we be joyful there? Yeah, that's a great question. I think Jesus anticipated us being in lonely places.

isolated, desolate places. And that's why I think he even chose the location of where he shared this message very intentionally. Now, to me, if I'm going to share one of the most important messages in human history, I'm

I'm booking out the most magnificent convention center. I'm flying my people up to some luxury resort somewhere because I know that this moment is going to be echoed throughout history and

When Jesus chose the location, he didn't choose Mount Sinai, which, you know, is a prominent mountain in the history of these people. He didn't choose Mount Zion, which was a prominent mountain, a prominent location. He chose this little hill,

called Aramis. Aramis is a name that you want to know if I wouldn't have just told you right now because it's not even a footnote in the scripture. And yet this is the place that Jesus chooses to teach about joy. The interesting thing, Shannon, is that word Aramis means desolate, isolated, and strength.

So you have Jesus using the topography to illustrate the theology of joy, that in desolate, isolated places, we find the strength of true joy, that it's not out there somewhere waiting to happen, that happiness flows from the great beyond within. And that's what I'm hoping to remind people of today.

Yeah, because life is continually shifting and changing. And I think people feel so overwhelmed by world events too. I mean, in what I do, I'm covering wars and crimes and we can all get a little bit stressed out with that stuff and feel very much out of control. Like, well, I can't be happy until this is under control and this conflict in my own life is under control. But what you're saying is we can have joy from birth to death. I mean, through whatever life throws us, whether it's personal, whether it's the weight of what's happening in the world.

there are ways for us to be joyful. Yes. And it's more about, it's not that suffering and difficulty are absent from our lives. It's realizing that Jesus is present. And that's the most beautiful thing about the picture that we see in the Sermon on the Mount, is that although they're in a nothingness place,

Although these people have been under Roman rule, they have been caught up in a religious system that works against them and not for them.

That Jesus is saying, even in the midst of that. I know for me in my own life, when my family moved from Houston to Austin to plant our church, it was a desolate season, honestly. We were moving away from family. We were going into a city that we didn't know. We're having to create new relationships. Our kids are needing to create new relationships. There was a lot of unsettling and all of that. But

Just because it's a desolate place doesn't mean Jesus is there. He's actually showing us that when we're isolated, when we don't have the comforts we're used to, when we don't have the people that we're used to, when a season of life changes, Jesus is still present in the wars, in the conflicts, and future events that we really have no control over, that Jesus sees what we can't see.

that he's preparing us for things that are up ahead that we're even unaware of right now. And that's the promise of Jesus's joy. It's not that we won't go through hard, difficult things. It's that we will not have to walk through them alone.

Such a comforting thing. And if you are a person of faith and believe all of that about Christ, it takes a lot of weight off of our shoulders too. We are not running the universe. We have a constant companion to walk us through whatever is happening, but it's not all on our shoulders, which I find to be a joyful thought as well.

And you talk through this book, you talk through the chapters, each of them talking about portions of the Sermon on the Mount. And one of the chapters is happy are the intentionally humble. And you write, God did create each of us with his capacity for greatness by his definition. We're all unique. We don't need to strive to be anybody else or anything else because he's got a plan and a map for us. But certain things the world tells us make us great or not what you're talking about here. What are you talking about? Right.

Yes, I'm talking about greatness in God's eyes. And greatness in God's eyes is faithfulness to what he has called you to. And I think we get thrown off

of our unique calling, I know that this is true for me, when I start measuring what God's called me to do up against what God's called everybody around me to do, and I forget that God's actually invested in my unique greatness, in me becoming everything that He created me to be and nothing that He did not.

in me attaining everything he's called me to attain and nothing more. I love what Dr. Darius Daniels says. He says there's a difference between being hungry and being greedy. Being hungry is wanting everything God has for you. Being greedy is wanting more than what God has for you. But I think first we have to recalibrate our framework around our personal greatness and

I think a lot of us subtly believe that God actually does not want us to be great because we have made great people knowing our names, having a certain amount of money in the bank account, having people that follow us in a particular way. That's not how God defines greatness. But he is not opposed to you excelling greatly.

achieving, having a selfless ambition that is moved to operate within your capacity to affect the lives of others. I love what God told Abraham. He said, I will make you a great nation. So he's not opposed to you becoming great. There's no question here of whether or not your greatness is going to somehow rival God's greatness.

You can't even think on God's level. We can't even operate on God's level. There is such a great

chasm that's a universe wide between anything we will accomplish and everything that God is and what God has accomplished. And yet he gives us success. Now, here's what I learned early on in my music career. You have to determine what success is for you or someone else will define it. And here's how God defines success. Getting low, humbling yourself.

allowing your strength to be put under God's control, not thinking more highly of yourself than you should, but having God's viewpoint of you. I've found that God puts the greatest treasures of the world on the bottom shelf

Because it's only the people who are willing to get low that can reach them. And I hope that this liberates people to live in their greatness, but to walk in humility.

Yeah, because if we can view his definition of greatness and what he's equipped us for, we are just part of his building of the kingdom in whatever skills or gifts or things that he's given us. And we are all different in that. And I love your idea of not letting other people define the idea of success because you give away so much of your own talent.

personal contentment and your peace when you're having to chase what other people tell you you should be chasing instead of what you know God is calling you to, which as you said is esteeming others better than yourself, of humility, of just wanting everything that He has for you because of course that's what He's equipped you for. I've got to ask you about this chapter too, "Happy or the Unreasonably Forgiving" because man, people are so about vengeance

and setting the record straight and punching back and all of that. I mean, we just are in just a very heated kind of divisive place. Tell us about being unreasonably forgiving to others because Lord knows we all needed ourselves. Yes. Well, I think it's been said at this point, but if you haven't heard yet, those of you listening, Jesus canceled cancel culture.

So if you're not familiar with the story, there's a woman who was caught in a culturally shameful act. She's brought into the city square for judgment. And the judgment for this crime is to be stoned by people. And so the religious people all pick up stones and they go to stone this woman and they basically set Jesus up.

and say, this woman violated the law. Shouldn't we uphold the punishment? And he said, well, whoever has never sinned, throw the first stone. And one by one, the scripture says they drop their stones because the reality is the unreasonably forgiving person still jumps to conclusions, but jumps to a better one.

And the first thing that we consider is our own sin, our own ways that we have fallen short before we judge others so harshly. And if we're going to jump to a conclusion, why don't we jump to a better conclusion? What those people lacked that Jesus possessed was empathy.

He had a context around this woman that these people did not have. Jesus was all-knowing. He was omnipotent because he was both God and man. So there were things that he understood, even in just his wisdom, that other people could not understand. And so he saw the woman's brokenness. He saw the circumstances and the events that

that led her down this path to this place of brokenness and sin in her life. And he knew what the actual answer was. So many of us do not consider the brokenness of other people. We only judge the fruit of that brokenness, the sin. But most of us, when we sin,

It is not a discipline problem. It's a love deficit. Every sin that we commit is from a place that we have not received the love of Jesus Christ in. And so we as unreasonably forgiving people have to consider that there are

facts that we don't know. There are contributing factors to this situation that we're unaware of. And we jump to a better conclusion about people that we would be quick to judge. Had to do this in my own life. I had to do this with my dad. I love my dad. My dad is an amazing person. And there were some things that I was exposed to as a kid that I felt like he should have protected me from.

And he didn't. But that isn't necessarily his fault. I was sitting in a counseling session and my therapist, my counselor said, do you think you need to forgive your dad of this? And it had never crossed my mind. And I realized, yes, I actually do. Because he asked me, why do you think he missed this in your life? Why do you think this was allowed to happen?

And I said, well, probably because he was broken and because he had a love deficit in his life and he didn't know what to do. He was like, yes, perhaps he made a sin error because he was a sinner just like you.

And I had to forgive him and jump to a different conclusion and consider his path of brokenness that led him to the perspectives that he had. But you know what happened? I set my dad free. I set myself free. I set him free from unrealistic expectations. And now we're able to have an amazing, honest, vulnerable relationship with

Because I was willing to be unreasonably forgiving, realizing the only way I got there was because Jesus was unreasonably forgiving to me. So powerful. We'll have more Live in the Bream in a moment.

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And something that comes, I think, with maturity in life and spiritual maturity is recognizing that people are wounded. My goodness. In so many ways. And it gives you such a better understanding, realizing we are all wounded.

and have needed a binding up of those wounds. And as you said, just radical forgiveness that may not make sense to other people, but can end up healing you and the other people in your life, those that you feel wounded by. And it's all part of this Sermon on the Mount that you focus the book around. Again, the book is Joy Bomb. I love the title. It's going to get people's attention. What do you, as we wrap up, what exactly do you mean by that? Can we have joy bombs in our life? What do they look like? How did they happen?

Yes. Well, the initial thought was, you know, sometimes we read the Bible and we separate ourselves from it like it's just a historical document, which it is the most dependable historical document that we have. But it's more than that. These were real people. This was a real life. This isn't a fairy tale. These aren't characters. There's real context here. And so when I read the Bible, I

I've loved just putting myself in it. I love sitting in those scriptures. And one day I was just sitting there visualizing, like being on that desolate hillside when Jesus sits down and he starts talking about these things. And in my mind, I just started looking around that space, like who else would have been there? So the disciples would have been there.

And some of the religious teachers of the law would have been there. And when Jesus starts talking, he starts shattering people's cultural paradigm. He starts shattering their religious context.

They're familiar with the law, with Torah, with rules, with rituals, with religious and religious activity. And Jesus is saying, "Happy are those who are poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God. Happy are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Happy are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

I'll just pause on that real quick. Happy are the meek for they inherit the earth. The earth is always a symbol of status, prosperity, power. And he's saying you get status, prosperity, and power, the earth, from being meek?

from being humble, from being low. These two things don't make sense. They're under the iron fist of the Roman Empire, and he's talking about meek being the way that you overthrow earthly kingdoms. This was a bomb. This was a bomb on their religious system. Whore and spirit is

What do you mean poor in spirit, Jesus? I'm dressed in these fine religious clothes. I give my offerings to the temple. I keep every part of the law down to the finest detail. And you're telling me all of that is worthless. And how you actually get the kingdom of God is through expressing your spiritual poverty, the places that you are bankrupt in your life. This, this,

This idea was detonated in this cultural context so much so we are still feeling the reverberation of those words that Jesus spoke. And it brings down every disillusionment, every wrong idea, every false teaching, every worldly thought that we have about joy crumbling to the ground. And it only leaves the truth of what Jesus said standing.

And there's nothing more than we need in that. Tornwells, congrats on this book. Thank you for sharing it with the rest of the world. To those who have faith and those who don't yet, I think there's a ton of information and encouragement. If you need that, this is the book for you. It's called Joy Bomb, Unleash Jesus' Explosive Joy for an Extraordinary Life. Tornwells, thank you for joining us on Live in the Bream.

Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. Listen ad-free with the Fox News Podcast plus subscription on Apple Podcasts. And Amazon Prime members can listen to this show ad-free on the Amazon Music app. Listen to the all-new Bret Baier podcast featuring Common Ground. In-depth talks with lawmakers from opposite sides of the aisle, along with all your Bret Baier favorites like his all-star panel and much more. Available now at foxnewspodcasts.com or wherever you get your podcasts.