Pulling The Thread Podcast: Tracing Jesus Before Christianity Emerged, Jesus the Jew within Judaism! · Jeramiah Giehl

From Christian Worship Leader to Torah Observant Jew (A Deep Dive into Pentecostalism, and Transitioning to Judaism): Episode 21

·1 hr 21 min·5 clips

John 14:6 becomes the passage that, in his words, “derailed my Christianity.”

The conversation starts plainly, with the host checking the pronunciation of Wagonmaker and joking about wagons. From there, Ben lays out a background that runs through several generations of Christian life, including a maternal grandfather who was a Baptist minister and a childhood spent in Baptist school from kindergarten through twelfth grade. He says he grew up inside a tradition that treated belief as something lived every day, not just discussed. That matters because the episode keeps circling back to how environment shapes conviction before people even know they are choosing anything. Music comes up early too. Ben describes how worship music and piano playing could move people emotionally and leave them open to what they understood as divine action. He is careful not to flatten that into mere performance. At the same time, the host keeps pressing on the question of whether those moments mean what the tradition says they mean. The discussion moves toward healing claims, including stories of people saying they were healed while Ben played piano or while his wife sang. Ben says he still does not doubt those experiences. For him, the point is not that the people had the right denomination or the perfect faith statement. He frames the miracle as mercy rather than reward. The host pushes back and widens the frame. Psychosomatic healing, emotional suggestion, and bodily response are not unique to Christianity, and the exchange acknowledges that similar patterns can show up in other religious settings too. That keeps the conversation from turning into a tidy testimony. Instead, it stays in the messier space where belief, stress, embodiment, and interpretation overlap. The tone stays conversational, with some repetition and side paths that give the story room to breathe. That looseness fits, because the topic itself is not neat. The episode is really about a person trying to tell the truth about where he came from, what no longer fits, and what still feels weighty. By the end, the conversation opens into practical curiosity, encouraging people with questions to talk with a rabbi, Jeremiah, or Ben without treating curiosity as a commitment.

As heard by us

A conversion story shaped by family history, worship music, and questions about healing.

Ben Wagonmaker's conversation traces a move out of a deeply Christian upbringing and into conversion, with the family history, Baptist schooling, worship music, and healing experiences that shaped it along the way.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

You want a candid conversion conversation that starts in a deeply Christian family and follows the thread into questions of faith, miracles, and what people call healing.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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