Deep Christian Strategic Philosophy & Warfare Theology Discussion

Date: September 9, 2025
Location: Trianon Coffee, Bee Cave, Austin, TX
Participants: Gary Sheng, Mike Ajouz, Santiago Montoya
Type: Extended philosophical and strategic discussion
Duration: Approximately 5+ hours (multiple transcript segments)

Meeting Context

This extensive conversation at Trianon Coffee represented a deep theological, philosophical, and strategic discussion between three Christian entrepreneurs. Gary arrived fresh from his transformative experiences in Liberty, Texas with Pastor Marcus Noel, while Mike and Santiago engaged in sophisticated analysis of Christian business strategy, cultural warfare, and spiritual formation. The conversation covered profound theological questions, practical ministry applications, and strategic approaches to Christian influence in secular systems.

Major Themes Discussed

I. Near-Death Experience (NDE) Theology & Truth as Ultimate Value

Mike's NDE Research Insights:

"That seems to be like the main interesting perspective, is that you will feel all the people you helped in a godly way, all the people you hurt. And that's truth. And that's very weird, because again, I don't want to overly put too much in his MBE research, but it is interesting that perhaps, around some of it, that in most of them, they didn't feel like he was passing judgment. He was just saying, you need to know the truth. And I find that so provocative, right? That knowing the truth is what we're talking about."

Truth as Good in Itself:

Gary: "It's a good in itself." Mike: "It may ultimately be the big idea."

Truth as Luxury Concept:

Gary: "I was just listening to God one day. And imagine being able to like... I wrote down luxury as well. Truth being luxury. How do you make that happen? Basically, how do you appeal to status? How do you make truth statusful?"

Mike's Response on Status vs. Truth:

"The truth is, if you have people that are chasing status, they don't care about truth. They care about status... So people who care about status, that is the point. So they will sacrifice. Remember the idea of sacrifice? They will kill truth to keep status. So the only thing they truly care about is status? Then you have to make the consequence of violating truth their status."

II. Theology of Recompense & Spiritual Warfare

Gary's Liberty, Texas Experience:

"Well, you just have to believe in the endgame, I guess. But also, the current game here, I've shifted my view on who can win in this earth as well... the guy I visited in Liberty, Texas, he's very much into the theology of recompense. Where if you suffered an injustice, which is always from the devil, you can demand sevenfold increase. But you have to know what that is and declare it. Demand it."

Thomas Massey Reference:

Gary: "That was Thomas Massey, by the way."

III. Justice, Punishment, and Vengeance - Theological Distinctions

Mike's Framework on Justice vs. Vengeance:

"Vengeance is pure retribution. It's the reciprocal of, it's basically, it's purely a reaction... Punishment is an interesting concept. Punishment can be thought of as rectifying... I view it as interesting, for example, in my theories of violence. There is a notion of punishment that is divorced from pure vengeance. And that is like, I can punish you as a, it's just feedback. Right? Like negative feedback."

Parenting Application:

"Like when I say, do I punish my kid? Yes. I don't hate my kids. I would never say vengeance against my children. But for me, punishment is like the natural order. It's like, you touch fire, you're hurt. It's not that fire is committing vengeance on you. But it is a reaction to an act. And I think it's useful."

Foreign Policy Analysis:

"When you look at foreign policy in this country, America is upset because it doesn't understand that punishment by itself is okay. So if someone does something wrong, you just hit them. You don't have to hate them. But clearly your words did not mean anything. And that event is simply an act of negative feedback stimuli."

Biblical Perspective on Vengeance:

"That's why Gina said vengeance is mine. Interesting... I think he said, I will be the ultimate arbitrator because you can't. And I think to some degree that's very interesting... can we, as priests, can we push out? There's some reasonable, yes. But if Moses was told, hey, push out some of the duties to the tribe. Pick some elders."

IV. Educational Philosophy & AI Integration Strategy

Mike's School Board Presentation Framework: Mike outlined a sophisticated approach to AI integration in education, distinguishing between:

1. Surface Level: "Which app should we use? That's the most superficial."
2. Methodology Level: "Do we change the in-class pedagogy to adapt to somebody who teaches that?"
3. Fundamental Level: "Do we change pedagogy? Do the actual metrics change where AI eventually takes over more and more of cognition?"

Core Educational Principles (AI-Resistant Skills):

"Number one is starting from like meaning making. Who am I? Why am I doing something? What ideas are mine? What ideas are yours? How do my actions align with my beliefs? The whole structure that is the precursor of action which is the why why why why each child will have to have or else they will be subsumed in other people's lives."

Critical Thinking Emphasis:

"AI will produce knowledge. Is it correct? Is it not correct? Is it mostly correct? Is it mostly incorrect? Where is it incorrect? Where is it correct? You cannot prosecute products of AI. You will simply be a conduit for knowledge of AI. Your value will be do you add value in the process of knowledge?"

Pattern Recognition & Tool Use:

"Being creative with patterns. Seeing patterns that exist or novel patterns... When diagnostically we see patterns, we see what's broken or creatively new patterns. These are fundamental. Next is tool use."

V. Parenting as Christian Formation Laboratory

Mike's Daughter's Political Campaign Victory: Detailed account of his daughter running for head girl at school, demonstrating practical application of Christian leadership principles:

"She told me, when I'm sitting in bed with her, she's like... The environmentals of, like, being victorious... She goes, all the other girls are reading from cards. I'm working in a crowd. I'm like, interesting. What does that mean? She goes, I've learned all their names. And I'm literally talking to each person. And they're just talking to a card."

Strategic Thinking Development:

"She goes, you know, like... She goes, the speeches are for the older kids. But for the younger kids, I'm having very cutesy, like, posters... she goes, I'm always trying to be last because people remember the last speaker. And also, there are kids that come in with it. And so can't keep up. And they miss..."

Mastery Moments in Development:

"Albert Bandura, I talked about the mastery moments in health advocacy. This is exactly what he's talking about, these mastery moments. And that's what you want in environmentals. So for me, a big part of personality development is not context-driven. It's these weird experiences."

VI. Risk Theory Applied to Education & Parenting

Individual vs. Ensemble Risk:

"Nobody experiences ensemble risk. We don't have, like, 100 instances all at once, and 60% of the time it works, and 40% of the time it doesn't... You experience an individual point outcome. So, risk of failure, risk of ruin is a real thing."

Educational Investment Framework:

"What does every parent really want? You want the best, but you want a controlled downside... You want the highest floor, and you want to have the most creative upside. But you want the highest floor. If you only try to solve for the highest upside, you also capture the rest of the bottom, which could be a lot worse than average."

Peter Boghossian's Son Example:

"He's a friend of mine. And I was texting back and forth. And his son just finished a Fulbright scholarship. He can't get a job. He can't get a job... He even said he goes AI. It's a good job job in AI. He just said it... it actually messed me up because I feel like this is the first person I've actually heard that I know that is now saying that their kid..."

VII. Gary's Spiritual Journey & Ministry Calling

Liberty, Texas Transformation:

Gary: "So I had a very positive experience in Liberty, Texas. With this pastor that has the gift of, I think he's quite anointed with the Holy Spirit... I asked for a baptism of the Holy Spirit. I've never felt anything like the feeling when he laid hands on me. Never ever. And it was like my pop culture reference to it is I now know how Goku felt. When he super I'm serious."

Theological Shift on Holy Spirit:

"All my conceptualization of it to that point was Holy Spirit is maybe something I feel when I listen to great gospel music. Or a technical thing that I was looking up the Theology of the Ridge when you get baptized when you give your life to Christ by saying I believe that Christ died for my sins or whatever. Holy Spirit automatically. No. That's not actually what happens. That's wrong theology. Based on now my experience."

Documentary Mission:

"I think a lot of people need signs, wonders and miracles. And that's because you're searching for your most powerful way to evangelize? Because that's your thing. That's my skill set... I can see one possible vector of this little town of 8,000 people being like a he already has the keys to the he's like an unofficial mayor of this little town. I think it can be a really interesting spiritual capital."

Book of Acts Continuation:

"Not just that though because the poetic one-liner that I see is the book of Acts is not finished. And he's been called to go to different places around the world. So I want to document that as it unfolds."

VIII. Advanced Theological Discussion - Universal Salvation Framework

Mike's Controversial Theology:

"I actually think that God doesn't care what you call yourself. God knows your heart. And so, I think there are Muslims out there that actually Jesus follows them and they know it. And I think they are."

Name vs. Substance Argument:

"I think that, my name is Michael. But if you said, if I wrote down my name legally, and I said, Miguel Ejus, legally, that would not be correct. Even though, Miguel is a translation of Michael. Jesus never heard the word Jesus. Jesus is a derivative of the Greek interpretation of death... when we read the Bible in English, we are, there are fundamental assumptions that we're making. And that is that, the concepts are what matter, not the words."

Jesus as Eternal Logos:

"So, God, everything is God's creation. And God is everywhere... when he says, nobody comes to the Father, but through me. You can either take that literally, and I think that's how we take it, is that we think of the man, Jesus, with a name, and we say, through him. But that's actually not just him. Like, Jesus represents the love of God... But, in the transfiguration, Moses, and Jesus was there, but Moses never met Jesus. Not the man. He never met Jesus, the man. But he was with Jesus."

Heart Posture vs. Semantics:

"God doesn't care about what's outside the cup. He cares about what's inside the cup. We know that. That's good theology. And if you call yourself Muslim, like fundamentally, you are communing in love, humility, your own brokenness to God, and you are manifesting that in sacrifice, in love, this way. You're Christian. And you may not know what to call that."

IX. Hypocrisy vs. Sin - Evil Distinctions

Mike's Definition of Hypocrisy:

"I think a working definition of hypocrisy is when I tell you, I express something to you that I deeply knowingly do not do... For gain."

Peter vs. Judas Analysis:

"I think Peter actually thought, I'm there for you, buddy. I'm never going to leave you. And when he was tested, he ran like a bitch. That was... Being a bitch isn't... I mean... Judas on the other hand, this is very interesting... He believes that Jesus should come and take over Judas when he took out the Romans... his problem was his will be done. His version of what should happen was what he believed in."

Evil vs. Sin Framework:

"Evil is a perversion of good for the sake of bad... Evil hates good. That's the difference. Evil hates good... Technically sinners aren't adversarial. They can be adversarial. But they can also just be removed from them. My will be done. Right. So evil hates good."

Pharisees vs. Sinners:

"Hypocrisy is when you pervert good. That's why I think Jesus said specifically woe to you Pharisees. Prostitutes and mind changers would go to heaven before you. That's why Jesus says that if you are a pastor and you fall from that position you will be dealt worse than if you never got there."

X. Truth as Warfare Strategy - Consequence Engineering

Mike's Core Strategic Philosophy:

"If you want to change the system, fundamentally, you create consequence for truth. They fundamentally do the opposite. In every scenario I've studied, the way they operate is they disconnect. It's basically how cancer destroys the immune system."

Fast Feedback, High Consequence Environments:

"For me, where I've studied what I call fast feedback, high consequence environments Live and die, and you know fast In those environments systems of truth emerge organically because you die or you blow up, or you lose all your money Areas that don't have high consequence are long cycles Lots of bad ideas live simultaneously with good ideas Why? Because there is no truth The mechanisms of truth creation or consequence are very poor"

Practical Applications:

"So what I say to you is if you want to change the system, fundamentally, you create consequence for truth... When the light, salt, and light descends upon your behavior, you freeze, right?"

XI. Cultural Warfare Analysis - Hijacking Systems

Paul's Strategic Use of Roman Infrastructure:

"Paul used Roman roads. I mean, he basically hijacked. There's that theory... Literally, Jesus used the Greeks and the Romans to transmit Christianity. He was a great conqueror."

John's Logos Appropriation:

"why does John start about Jesus being the Logos? And that partly is because it was a Hellenic world. So, he was able to map into... He just totally hijacked the idea. High-granded it and be like, It's over."

Christian Competitive Mandate:

"We are called to hijack the systems... We are not meant to be monks sitting around. We are constantly hijacking what he uses."

Austin as Battle Space:

"Austin works because it's this weird it's where the two types of energy slam into each other. You have very godly people and very ungodly people. And you have like it's the place where it's more neutral. And this is where there's the most dynamicism."

XII. Advanced Strategic Applications

Yale Name Change Campaign: Mike detailed his sophisticated campaign to force Yale University to confront their hypocrisy:

"I ran a I ran a project at Yale to get the to get the name of Yale the school changed to Harriet Tubman University because Yale was a human trafficker... Yale is a 30 billion dollar brand and would they they're hypocrites. Right? Yale is the biggest proponent of wokeism on the planet and yet their name is a 30 billion dollar brand that is an honorarium towards a human trafficker."

Redeem the Child Art Campaign:

"I took that child and I did an entire art fair around here called Redeem the Child. And I had artists from different parts of the United States do paintings depicting the girl and I dropped a thousand pictures of the girl everywhere with a few on credit that said who is the girl."

Strategic Choice Framework:

"Because if they would acknowledge their hypocrisy they would have to change the name or they would have to draw a line on the name changes. Right? This was when everything was American. So I was picking a fight. I was trying to put him in a crucifix for accountability."

XIII. Christian App Development - Force Multiplier Strategy

Mike's Vision for Christian Activism App:

"I thought about creating an app where basically it is a utility. So you take a cause... What we're asking for is either one action. And the action could be, please write a letter to a congressman or to the board. The app will literally draft the letter. It will already identify it. And all you have to do is docu-sign it, push. So it takes, it creates action as a widget."

Two-Click Engagement:

"And my UI rule is two clicks. Two clicks. Two clicks, I'm in the fight. The whole church descends on one prosecutor. I can send Venmo. I can send a letter. Whatever I need, boom. I can clip it to my best friend, boom, push it to them. Two, three clicks, no. I'm in the fight."

Feedback Loop Psychology:

"And there's a feedback loop. What happens is every time you win, you want to do more. That's the feedback loop. The reason the devil makes us horrible is we're like, we can't do anything. It's hopeless. That's what the devil does. It discourages you."

XIV. Israel Lobby & Church Corruption Analysis

Johnson Amendment Repeal:

Gary: "Do you... Are you aware that... The rules on Churches lobbying changed recently?... So they got rid of the Johnson amendment. Which... Blocked churches from lobbying. Publicly... The main reason why this was passed. Let's be honest. Is so churches can lobby for Israel. Without... With the dark money being church money. Which is not transparent at all."

Christians United for Israel:

Gary: "Do you know how many members there are? American evangelicals. 90 million. And do you know how many supposing members there are in the... Christians for something. 10 million. 10 million Christian members. For this lot. One group."

Parasitic Relationship Analysis:

Mike: "This is how they... This is their force multiplier. It's the same way that communists attach themselves to liberal democrats. It's when you have the parasite that takes over the body. It's because the body can't distinguish from the parasite itself."

Pastor Fellowship Programs:

Gary: "They're hosting... They're giving pastors fellowships... Hey, here's 20K, 50K, so easy, so cheap. That's life-changing for them. Hey, stay in my house."

XV. Processed Christianity Analogy

Gary's Insight:

"You know what you're making me... This analogy I've never thought about is processed food. Processed Christianity. We have heavily processed. It's been processed into a tool to do the exact opposite of what it's supposed to do."

Mike's Confirmation:

"It's like fruit-flavored candy. Exactly."

System vs. Individual Focus:

Mike: "And that's what Jesus did. So look. It wasn't sin. Isn't that funny? Like Christianity is all about sin. No beautiful love is sin. He wanted you, as long as you were able to come to him, he's like, okay. He's willing to forgive you as long as he wants. But when you became a hypocrite, when you used good against good..."

XVI. Parental Love as God-Understanding

Mike's Profound Realization:

"It's funny how it worked, at least for me... before having kids a lot of these ideas I would have been talking about kind of were very conceptual. I believed them but they were pretty conceptual. What a child has done is like instantiated in the most powerful way all of these ideas. Love is either a really hacky word or it's like a supernova."

Negotiating with the Divine:

"A child is like this magical thing that pops up. It just happens and you take it home... But then you realize you're in a relationship with it but it has its own thing. That's weird. No matter how smart you think you are it has its own thing. So you are really negotiating with the thing that you care about the most. And that's wild."

Theological Integration:

"A lot of my models of Christianity today come from this underlying truth that the truth rests not in my ideas. And they don't lie necessarily in my projection of my ideas. They have more to do with how clearly am I looking at the world and how am I negotiating with it and how am I projecting my big ideas to it."

XVII. Gary's Future Ministry Direction

Three-Year Success Metrics:

Gary: "I have my first kid. That's one of the methods. I have to find out what God does to connect me with her."

Heroic Fatherhood:

"I had a lot of thoughts about how heroic it could be the heroism required to be a father today. I think you have to be to be a responsible father that raises your kids to all those points that you're making about the point of a school. Ultimately this is formation, right?"

Attachment to Truth vs. Epic:

"So where I went from end of July and being rug-pulled at the beginning of August where I wanted to attach to myself I realized was something epic... I now want to attach myself to the truest thing that I can see. That I've experienced. Experienced... But the truth, the capital T truth is Christ."

Evangelistic Calling:

"In terms of what I think that he created me for is to be an evangelist in church. In a world where I've gone deep I've been in the synagogues of sin or at least not truth."

XVIII. Mike's Spiritual Humility & Terror

Profound Humility:

"I'm in the God conversation all the time. At night, in the morning. And I don't even pretend like I know exactly what he wants. I have such a profound level of humility. That in some ways it's very disorienting to me. Because my entire life has been like high conviction."

Gethsemane Identification:

"I know that when I say His will be done, I feel very much like Jesus on my knees in Gethsemane. Because some people, when they become Christian, they become like holy rollers. They're really evangelical. That becomes their identity, confidence. But for me, I'm like on my knees saying, God, you terrified me. Your will be done, but please be merciful. Don't hurt me."

Parental Vulnerability:

"Before you have kids, you're like, I hope something doesn't happen to me or maybe some of my parents. But if you have kids, and your entire life, you feel so exposed. You realize just how fragile you are, because the bottom of your life will fall out."

Father's Heart Understanding:

"And I just... It's just so horrible. And you understand, like, when God killed his son, and he saw Jesus, how much he must have hurt. It's not conceptual anymore. You know, like, it's just, you want to wretch. Like, I want to wretch."

Key Strategic Insights & Frameworks

1. Truth-Consequence Engineering

The conversation established that truth only has power when connected to consequences. Systems that divorce truth from consequences enable evil to flourish.

2. Hijacking vs. Building

Rather than building parallel institutions, Christians should strategically hijack existing systems for kingdom purposes, following Paul's model with Roman infrastructure.

3. Individual vs. Ensemble Risk

Educational and life decisions must account for individual outcome risk rather than statistical averages, requiring high-floor strategies with creative upside potential.

4. Hypocrisy as Evil's Weapon

Evil's primary strategy is perverting good for bad purposes, making hypocrisy (using good appearance for evil ends) more dangerous than simple sin.

5. Parental Love as Theological Laboratory

Fatherhood provides experiential understanding of God's nature that cannot be achieved through intellectual study alone.

6. Context Engineering Over Message

Changing environmental context is more powerful than changing messaging, as humans are highly context-dependent in their moral behavior.

7. Fast Feedback, High Consequence Systems

Truth emerges naturally in environments where consequences are immediate and severe, while low-consequence environments enable deception.

Personal Revelations & Growth

Gary's Transformation:

• Experienced genuine Holy Spirit baptism in Liberty, Texas
• Shifted from attachment to "epic" secular projects to attachment to truth itself
• Developed calling to document modern-day miracles and revival
• Wrestling with childlike faith requirements vs. intellectual sophistication

Mike's Ongoing Journey:

• Daily struggle with Christian walk not coming naturally
• Profound humility and fear of God replacing former high conviction
• Integration of parental love with understanding God's heart
• Tension between Christian passivity and need for strategic warfare

Santiago's Role:

• Continued facilitation of strategic Christian connections
• Observer and occasional contributor to theological discussions
• Bridge between business strategy and spiritual formation

Future Implications & Applications

Ministry Strategy:

• Gary's documentary work on miracles as evangelistic tool
• Development of "truth economy" through consequence engineering
• Creation of Christian business networks that compete effectively

Educational Reform:

• AI-resistant skill development focusing on meaning-making and critical thinking
• Parent-controlled educational environments with high standards
• Integration of spiritual formation with academic excellence

Cultural Influence:

• Strategic targeting of leverage points in cultural systems
• Use of business success as platform for Christian influence
• Development of Christian apps and tools for mass mobilization

Theological Development:

• Continued exploration of universal salvation frameworks
• Integration of spiritual warfare with practical strategy
• Balance between Christian humility and competitive engagement

Closing Dynamics

The conversation demonstrated extraordinary depth of theological sophistication combined with practical strategic thinking. All three participants showed integration of spiritual discernment with worldly wisdom, creating a framework for effective Christian cultural engagement that avoids both passive retreat and secular compromise.

The discussion concluded with mutual recognition of the profound challenges facing Christian parents and leaders in contemporary culture, while maintaining hope that strategic, truth-based action can create meaningful change in both individual lives and broader cultural systems.

Final Exchange on Truth Economy:

Mike: "And what's the highest leverage point to go after that?" Gary: "To create a fractal of that society of truth That box you can stand on That's where you can control the land"

This conversation represents one of the most sophisticated integrations of Christian theology, practical strategy, and cultural analysis documented in Gary's relationship network, establishing frameworks that will likely influence future ministry and business decisions for all participants.