0:07

Welcome to the John Mark Koma Teachings

0:09

Podcast. I'm Strawn Coleman, your host and

0:11

part of the teaching team here at

0:13

Practising The Way. Each week

0:15

we share a teaching from John Mark

0:17

or other trusted voices in the formation

0:19

space. Today we're

0:21

bringing you something a little different. It's

0:24

a live recording from one of John

0:26

Mark's book events last month in Austin,

0:28

Texas, where he shares a little bit

0:31

more of the context for his new

0:33

book Practising The Way. Be with Jesus,

0:35

become like him, do as he

0:37

did. And at the end of

0:40

his teaching you'll hear him responding to questions

0:42

from the audience live that evening. So

0:45

without further ado, here's John Mark. Thank

0:50

you so very much. Okay, so

0:53

we don't say y'all where I'm from. So

0:57

this may go very

0:59

badly, but how you

1:01

all see I can't

1:03

hear you. How are you doing?

1:07

It's great to be with you.

1:09

Thank you so much to Peter

1:12

and Church of the Cross for

1:14

your hospitality tonight. After

1:16

20 years as a pastor, just

1:18

getting through Sunday is all-consuming. So

1:20

anything on top of that is

1:22

like too much. And so

1:25

I'm painfully aware of the sacrifice

1:27

behind a night like tonight. I

1:29

just get to walk in and chat, but thank you

1:31

so much to Peter and Sarah and the team

1:33

here. So it's great to be with you. I

1:36

love Austin. I'm born and raised in the West Coast,

1:39

y'all, and I

1:41

can't do it. I just

1:43

feel like an utter idiot, but you make

1:45

it sound so natural. I don't know. But

1:47

born and raised in West Coast, I've only

1:49

been to Texas a few times. My first

1:52

trip to Texas, you

1:54

know, Texas, Texans love

1:56

Texas, and nobody else

1:58

does. Just want to clarify that. But

2:00

you love it a lot, so that's all good. And

2:05

so, you know, all the shed on Texas. And

2:09

my first trip here was to Austin, and

2:11

I thought, this place is fantastic. Everybody looks

2:13

like they're from Portland, but they're nice.

2:19

And I remember walking in, it was like 8,000 degrees,

2:22

and there was this like super hipster dude

2:24

still wearing a beanie, even though it was

2:26

like 119 degrees outside. And

2:28

orange beanie, and like this cool spot, and he

2:30

said, Hello sir, can I offer you a bottle

2:32

of water? And I just said, you look like

2:34

you look, and you called me sir. I have

2:36

no category for you at all. But

2:40

I love Austin, and

2:42

but the problem is, every time I tell

2:44

a Texan, Oh, I've been to Austin, I

2:46

love Austin. They all say the exact same

2:48

thing immediately. Oh, and

2:50

there's this like disdain and contempt.

2:53

And they all say, oh, Austin's

2:55

not Texas. I

2:58

don't know what that means, but we

3:00

were in Dallas last night, and

3:03

I landed at the airport, and

3:05

Carolyn, who's here somewhere, who's from Waco,

3:08

picked me up and, okay,

3:10

Waco. Thank

3:12

you for your candles. And

3:18

I landed at the airport, and she

3:20

said, oh, okay, Dallas, here

3:22

we go. And she said,

3:24

oh, Dallas, Dallas is not

3:26

Texas. I meant, she

3:28

said, Austin is Texas. So

3:31

now I'm so thoroughly confused. And

3:33

I don't know what to say other than I really like Austin, and it's

3:36

great to be with you. Thank you for

3:38

having me. Let me

3:40

just offer a few thoughts. I know how

3:42

busy life is, and so I do want to

3:45

add value to your life, not

3:47

do a bad comedy sketch.

3:50

But I do want to

3:52

add value to your life. So let me offer just a

3:55

few thoughts that are at some level kind

3:57

of in tandem with the book, and then we'll

3:59

open it up. or not for a conversation and

4:01

something you can't get in a book or on

4:03

a podcast tonight. Every morning

4:05

I get up early and watch

4:08

the sunrise and make myself a

4:11

cup of very expensive coffee and

4:14

I sit like I'm sure many of you in

4:16

the room in a quiet corner of

4:18

my house and I pray to begin my day.

4:22

And unlike hopefully many of you, I do

4:24

it facing this object, I think we have

4:27

a picture of a skull.

4:31

Now just for the record, keep Austin weird, this

4:35

is not real, okay? So this

4:37

is from Etsy, not from my graveyard

4:39

by my house. I

4:42

did think, I actually, I was

4:44

riffing on the

4:46

Christian motif of the skull in

4:49

ancient Christian art and

4:51

this guy who I'm good friends with said, oh,

4:53

I go to Mexico on a regular basis for

4:55

work and I actually know of a market where

4:57

if you ask a guy at this one stall,

5:00

they take you behind this door and you can

5:02

buy a skull and you want me to get

5:04

one and you want me to get one for

5:06

you. And I just

5:08

thought, you know, in the day and age of

5:10

cancel culture, of all the things to go down

5:12

for, that would

5:14

be worth it, you know?

5:18

Like pastor found sneaking real

5:20

human skull across the border

5:22

from Mexico, I'm like, could it

5:24

be worth it? That's a good one.

5:26

If you're going to go out, that's a good

5:29

one. This is not real, all right? So this

5:31

is me in therapy, people. This

5:33

is not real. But I do this

5:35

and this is not unique to me. I

5:37

borrowed this from the monastic tradition where

5:40

for centuries, it

5:42

has been very common for a monk to

5:44

go into his cell and kneel

5:47

on a prayer bench with a Bible or

5:49

before the printing press with

5:51

a page from a scroll

5:53

and a candle and

5:55

pray facing a skull Because

5:57

of something that Saint Benedict said. The

6:00

country and his rule of

6:02

St. Benedict where he said

6:04

this day by day remind

6:06

yourself that you are going

6:08

to die. Good.

6:10

Evening y'all under serious say you

6:13

are now is like the Terrence

6:15

Malick of breaching right here like

6:17

beautiful and very depressing. So

6:20

that sounded like a critique. Is the

6:22

greatest film maker of our time? I

6:24

just wanna say that right? Or the

6:27

great christians and modern art. But some.

6:30

This sounds utterly a horrible

6:32

time modern sensibilities, but in

6:34

context it was not more

6:36

bed or black at all.

6:38

It was benedict way of

6:40

saying lies is leading. His

6:43

past seem like a or

6:46

through your chest cavity right

6:48

now as you speak. And.

6:51

It is a precious

6:54

gift. Do not waste

6:56

it on triviality. But.

6:59

Live for what matters in

7:01

the grand scheme of bitterness

7:03

and it has never been

7:05

easier than an hour day

7:08

and age to waste your

7:10

life. The. Social critic Neil

7:12

Postman called it amusing ourselves to

7:14

death said title of a very

7:17

same spoke He wrote in the

7:19

early eighties actually about the impact

7:21

of T and Entertainment culture on

7:23

American lives and is interesting this

7:26

as decades before a social media

7:28

or the I phone. His prediction

7:30

was of the two sectors. Of

7:32

American society that would be

7:35

utterly ravaged by television. And

7:37

and really be resonated from

7:40

the inside out where politics

7:42

and religion. and

7:44

he began to imagine the churches of

7:46

the future and the political discourse in

7:49

the future and how it would erode

7:51

the very foundations of both my point

7:53

is it's never been easier to disappear

7:55

into triviality you can disappear into black

7:58

hole of netflix or who or

8:00

your streaming platform of choice. You

8:03

can become a workaholic in pursuit

8:05

of wealth or fame or a

8:07

nicer house or a vacation home,

8:09

or you can just disappear into

8:12

the adult playground of a great

8:14

city like Austin and eat, drink,

8:16

and be merry for tomorrow we

8:18

die. Western culture is

8:20

arguably built around the denial of

8:22

death through the coping mechanism of

8:24

distraction, and our devices have turned

8:27

distraction into a way of

8:29

life or a better word there

8:31

would be death. As a social

8:33

kind of writer and Catholic priest, Ronald

8:36

Ruhleiser put it, we are

8:38

distracting ourselves into spiritual oblivion.

8:41

The trick is we often don't realize

8:43

it until it's too late. The

8:46

New York Times columnist David Brooks, you

8:48

know, famously distinguished between what

8:51

he called resume virtues and eulogy

8:53

virtues. Resume virtues are what

8:55

we talk about in our life, which in

8:57

particular if you're kind of upwardly mobile, it's

8:59

where you went to school or it's what

9:01

you've done or what you have or who

9:03

you are or what your identity is, whatever.

9:06

Eulogy virtues are what

9:08

other people talk about when we die,

9:12

and they are very different, namely

9:14

it's the person we become, the

9:17

fabric of our character, and our

9:19

most meaningful relationships. So day

9:21

by day remind yourself that you are going

9:23

to die is to refuse to be sucked

9:25

into the black hole of distraction.

9:28

It's to treat every fleeting

9:30

moment as a treasure and

9:33

to live for your eulogy, not

9:35

for your resume. I

9:37

had a very profound experience recently

9:40

where through

9:42

a just strange coincidence since I was a

9:45

baby or even before I was born, my

9:48

family has been family friends

9:50

with a very famous Christian

9:52

preacher, and

9:55

he recently died. And

9:57

there was a public memorial for many people, There

10:00

was a private memorial for about 80 people,

10:02

family and friends. And he

10:04

was much older than me. I was not personally close

10:06

to him. My dad was quite sad. I

10:09

was okay. And don't

10:11

tell anybody. But

10:13

I went still just to be a good

10:15

friend to his son that I love and

10:17

am in friendship with. And so I went

10:19

with low expectations just to be a good

10:21

friend. And it messed

10:23

me up. Because

10:26

I preach. And I went

10:28

to this memorial service for

10:31

this preacher two hours

10:33

long. And

10:35

not a word

10:38

was said about

10:40

his work, his

10:42

preaching, his book sales. I mean, this

10:45

man is a household name in most of

10:47

the world. Not

10:50

a word, not a stat, not

10:52

a shred of it. He

10:55

was just stories about

10:57

grandpa, stories

10:59

about dad, his

11:01

gay grandson getting up who doesn't even know

11:03

what he believes about all sorts of things

11:06

and saying, I don't know, but grandpa

11:08

used to take me out every summer we'd go on

11:10

vacation. And he'd take all of us

11:12

grandkids out every morning at 6 a.m. for

11:14

breakfast. And he would ask questions. And he

11:16

would love me. And I don't know what

11:18

I believe yet, but I miss grandpa. It's

11:20

just that kind of, it's just like grandpa

11:22

stuff. And I

11:24

was so messed up because walking

11:27

out of there, I realized I'm giving

11:29

the vast majority of my energies to

11:32

something that the moment I stop breathing, nobody

11:34

that I care about is going to care

11:36

about at all. And

11:39

that's eulogy, not

11:42

resume. Dallas Willard used

11:44

to say the main thing that God, he said

11:47

this actually at Baylor University. What

11:49

does sickum mean? What is sickum mean? What is sickum mean? What

11:52

is sickum mean? What is sickum mean? I'll

12:00

never mention Baylor again. At

12:05

Baylor University, he

12:08

once said the main—and he used to say this

12:10

all the time, but I have to proof text

12:12

everything for the book, and that's the proof text

12:14

we use, the source we use. But

12:16

at Baylor, he said, the main thing that

12:18

God gets out of our life is the

12:20

person we become. And

12:24

this process of becoming a person,

12:27

becoming a person for our eulogy,

12:30

not just for our resume, is

12:32

what in the Christian way is

12:34

called spiritual formation. All spiritual formation

12:36

is, is the process by

12:38

which our spirit or our

12:40

inner woman or man is formed into a

12:43

particular shape or what we would call a

12:45

character. And the first thing you

12:47

need to understand about spiritual formation is that

12:50

it is not a Christian thing. It

12:52

is a human thing. To

12:55

be human is to have a spirit,

12:57

to have a—that's just New Testament language

12:59

that we don't, you know, utilize

13:02

in the day and age of neuroscience, but it's the

13:04

same—to have a part of

13:06

you that does not show up

13:08

under a microscope in a laboratory

13:10

and does not fit into a

13:12

letter type or a number from

13:14

a personality theory, some part of

13:16

you that is utterly of value

13:18

and beauty and worth and wounding

13:20

and brokenness and virtue and all

13:22

of it put into

13:25

one. And to be

13:27

formed, we cannot help but

13:29

grow, evolve, mature. What do we say about

13:31

somebody when they move away from home to

13:33

the big city or whatever and then come

13:35

back or we run into somebody after 20

13:38

years? If we were

13:40

to say to them, oh, you've not changed

13:42

a bit, that is never a compliment. That

13:45

is always like co-passive-aggressive code for

13:47

something has gone wrong in your

13:50

development as a human being because

13:52

there's just this intuitive,

13:55

inchoate knowledge that we

13:57

are designed to grow

13:59

mature. involved to become

14:02

some person that is in their

14:04

inseed form. The question is not,

14:07

are we being formed? It's

14:09

who or what are we being formed into.

14:14

I occasionally have people say to

14:16

me that they are getting into

14:18

spiritual formation. And

14:21

what they normally mean is they

14:23

are reading books by introverts. Like,

14:27

Mr. Helle, thank you. And

14:31

beginning to practice more

14:33

kind of contemplative disciplines

14:35

of the Christian way that are kind

14:39

of countercultural to our day and age

14:41

of noise and distraction and busyness

14:44

and exhaustion like Sabbath or

14:46

solitude or like Dio Divina

14:48

or often in

14:50

therapy and kind of in

14:52

the work as millennials love to say of

14:55

kind of facing the shadow and kind of

14:57

below the line stuff. All this

14:59

is the stuff that I live for. I am for

15:02

all of that to the nth degree. But

15:04

there's a little like on real brother in

15:06

me that wants to say, listen, you have

15:08

been into spiritual formation since you were

15:10

in your mother's womb. You

15:13

have been being formed

15:16

by powerful forces inside you

15:19

and outside of you

15:21

inside of your under at some

15:23

level your control your habits your

15:25

attitudes your decisions the relationships you

15:27

foster or turn down and far

15:29

outside of your control your genetic

15:31

code and what lives in you

15:33

epigenetically through your family line and

15:35

the day and age you were

15:37

born into and your gender and

15:39

all of these things powerful forces

15:42

some malevolent and cruel others

15:44

beautiful have been at work

15:46

in you before you took

15:48

your first breath. All of

15:50

us are a product of

15:52

spiritual formation. Mother

15:55

Teresa was really into spiritual

15:57

formation Hitler was really into

15:59

spiritual formation. Mendela

16:01

was a product of spiritual formation.

16:05

All of us have been our

16:08

being and will be spiritually formed. Spiritual

16:12

formation is not optional. The

16:15

problem is that most of our

16:17

formation is unintentional.

16:21

So have you ever met anyone in your whole life

16:23

who, 21 years old, 18 years

16:25

old, upon graduation, my son is about to graduate

16:27

from high school. We

16:29

just took his senior photos. By that I mean we

16:32

had a friend take his senior photos at the moment

16:34

I found out how much it cost to take his

16:36

senior photos. And

16:38

have you ever met an 18 year old

16:40

who you said, what do you want to do with your life?

16:42

He's getting that question all the time right now. By the way,

16:44

never ask that to an 18 year old, unless

16:47

if they're really driven, just don't do that to

16:49

them, all right? But he's getting asked

16:51

that a lot. Have you ever met an 18 year old

16:53

who said, I just want to become

16:55

an addict? Or

16:57

I just want to become chronically

17:00

anxious. I want to become so anxious

17:02

that I begin to bend

17:04

my shoulders and by the time I'm old

17:06

I'm hunched over. Or I

17:08

just want to let resentment settle

17:11

so deeply in my body but by

17:13

the time I'm in my 50s you

17:15

see a permanent scowl etched into my

17:18

face. Or I want to get

17:20

married one day and then I want to have that

17:22

marriage end in disaster and then after that I'd like

17:24

to be estranged from my children. You've

17:27

never heard anybody say this, but

17:30

yet this happens and

17:32

it happens all the

17:35

time. Nobody

17:37

sets out to become anxious, bitter,

17:40

angry, a disaster, a hypocrite.

17:45

But it happens and it happens

17:47

all the time simply by

17:50

living a normal

17:52

life. The

17:54

truth of Jesus and the writers of the

17:56

New Testament and certainly of the great wisdom

17:58

traditions of the Christian way. is

18:01

that Christ likeness or whatever

18:03

you want to call it, Philokalia,

18:05

bro, you're probably the only other person in the room,

18:07

does anybody else even know what that is? Three

18:11

of my new favorite people, Peter you don't count,

18:13

you're an Anglican priest. You're

18:16

not even a pastor, all right, you're

18:18

like a whole other level of spiritual

18:20

leader. But, oh wow,

18:22

I mean Eastern Christians and ancient

18:24

Christians, they used a word we

18:26

don't have in English and Greek it's the word

18:29

theosis, which is

18:31

from theos, God. And

18:33

one of the reasons we don't

18:35

use it much is because the

18:37

best translation into English would be

18:39

deification or godification, which in

18:41

their view, that is the telos of the

18:43

spiritual journey. And they don't mean it in

18:45

a Hindu way or an Eastern kind of

18:48

way that far east of blurring the distinction

18:50

between creator and creation. They mean it very

18:52

similar to how evangelicals would use the word

18:54

godly. Think about the

18:56

word godly, we have no problem saying, oh she's

18:58

a godly woman, he's a godly man. That

19:01

is the noun God as

19:03

an adverb, godlike. That's

19:06

the telos of the spiritual journey, godlikeness,

19:09

godliness. Godliness

19:12

is possible, but

19:16

it is not natural.

19:20

It won't just happen if

19:23

you just go to church every third Sunday

19:25

and listen to like a reading

19:27

plan from you version every four days. And

19:31

hope for the best and listen

19:33

to John's record on repeat. That

19:36

will help a lot, but those

19:38

are all good things, beautiful things, you

19:40

could say essential things. But

19:43

it's not enough, in fact,

19:46

the powerful forces inside you

19:48

and certainly outside of you

19:51

and certainly in your front right pocket through your

19:53

purse and your phone, are

19:55

more than enough to

19:57

deform you more than they. even

20:01

if your heart's intention is

20:04

utterly sincere in your desire to

20:07

become godly or like God. Which

20:10

means the need for the hour, for not all of

20:12

us in the room, but the vast majority of us

20:14

in the room, is for

20:16

a greater level of intentionality in our spiritual

20:18

formation. My friend John

20:20

Tyson in New York City tells this great story

20:22

that he found in this kind of obscure journal

20:26

about Bonhoeffer right before World War II, at

20:28

the rise and the height of the Third Reich, where

20:31

Bonhoeffer goes out into the countryside

20:33

in what's now Poland, and he

20:36

starts Sinkenwald, which was kind of

20:38

one part clandestine seminary

20:41

outside of the auspices of the Gestapo

20:43

to kind of raise up spiritual leaders

20:45

to resist the Third Reich in what

20:47

they called the Confessing Church, basically the

20:50

true Orthodox faith, and to

20:52

kind of found this neo-monastic, intentional

20:54

community, 120 people living together by a

20:56

rule of life, it's beautiful. But

20:58

Bonhoeffer comes from money in

21:01

Berlin, professor, prestigious, old money,

21:04

and so at one point the story goes, I don't even know if the

21:06

story is true, but it pretty much is great. So

21:09

the story goes that the family sends out,

21:11

I can't remember if it was a brother, I think

21:13

it was a close family friend, sends

21:15

out to Bonhoeffer to basically say, what

21:17

are you doing with your life? Come

21:20

back to your senses, you're out living

21:22

in the middle of nowhere, hiding from

21:24

the Gestapo, praying the Psalms all

21:26

morning long, like come back to the city, come

21:28

back to your professorship, come back to your life,

21:30

get married, do all the things. And

21:33

the story goes that Bonhoeffer says, come with

21:35

me, and Sinkenwald was on a lake,

21:37

they get in this rowboat, they row across the

21:39

lake and kind of walk up this mound,

21:41

this rise, and on the other side

21:44

is a Nazi air base, and

21:46

they're a Hitler youth training there, and

21:49

young kind of teenagers marching. And

21:52

Bonhoeffer points back at Sinkenwald, which

21:54

was just a large house, and

21:56

says this, and then he points

21:59

at the Nazi camp. must be stronger

22:01

than that. And

22:03

I think the truth there

22:05

is that our life architecture of

22:08

spiritual formation, or what

22:10

ancient Christians called a rule of life, which is

22:12

just like an intentional

22:14

container to hold

22:17

our love for God and our apprenticeship

22:20

to Jesus. It must

22:22

be stronger than the

22:24

forces all around and within

22:27

that intentionally often

22:29

conspire and unintentionally

22:31

fall into place to deform our

22:33

soul and our society. From

22:36

the digital algorithms and political polarization to

22:38

the rising tide of secularism and

22:40

the black hole of the entertainment queue, this

22:43

must be stronger than that.

22:46

We have to build a rule of

22:48

life that is intentionally designed to offset

22:51

these powerful forces, which

22:53

is what, if you have a copy of the book and

22:55

if you don't, that's great. Well, it's not a great book.

22:57

I guess we're here for that. But whatever is

23:00

designed to come alongside you and

23:02

help you do. That

23:05

said, I'm guessing, I don't know why you're here tonight,

23:07

but I'm guessing that a number of you are

23:09

here at some level because a few years ago I wrote

23:11

a book, somebody found

23:13

it helpful about eliminating hurry. That

23:17

book was intentionally written as

23:19

a prequel for this one. We

23:22

all have our kind of sense of call and

23:24

part of what I have

23:27

a sense I'm meant to do with my life is I

23:29

just, like all of you, I want

23:31

to apprentice under Jesus. I want to follow

23:33

Jesus. I want to go on the spiritual

23:35

journey because I

23:37

desperately need it. And

23:39

I can't save myself and I want

23:41

to be saved. And

23:44

I want to go on this journey in a

23:46

way that is reflective. I

23:48

want to pay the best attention

23:50

I can, almost Like I Love novelists,

23:52

because the way they pay attention to their

23:55

own life, and then you read through a

23:57

really beautiful novel, and they somehow put language

23:59

to yours. Experience in they say it

24:01

in a way that all the

24:03

sudden the fuzz good star as to

24:06

give a little bit clearer how I

24:08

would love to pay attention the my

24:10

life, my inner journey with Jesus and

24:13

the movement of my heart in such

24:15

a way that I can help people

24:17

like you. pay attention to your heart

24:20

and your journey with Jesus and I

24:22

want to seek out the saints and

24:24

sages that have gone before us for

24:27

centuries now have left behind not on

24:29

a road map. But at least

24:31

wisdom for the journey, warnings and invitations for each

24:33

stage. and then I want to do my best

24:35

to distill it. Right in

24:38

or whatever and towards for. People

24:40

like me. All that to say

24:43

I am a learner before I

24:45

a teacher and but I do

24:47

wanna. Go. On the

24:49

spiritual journey and help other people

24:51

go on spurts, attorney and Hurry

24:53

is a non starter. In

24:56

my personal experience and my

24:58

pastoral experience. Most.

25:01

People are just. Too.

25:06

Busy, exhausted, and digitally distracted

25:08

to have much of a

25:10

meaningful spiritual life at all.

25:14

I wish that the solution was just write

25:16

a book about slowing down and then you'll

25:18

to slow. Down to be just. I've

25:23

I've I wish you could just write your

25:26

way into the life you want, but it

25:28

doesn't work that way. It's not that simple.

25:30

I need to go on this journey to

25:32

but it's not just send us. To.

25:34

Slow down. And

25:36

make space in your life. Force

25:39

comes. Would we make space

25:42

for. More

25:44

time to watch Netflix or to dominated

25:47

are career and in a retire young

25:49

or whatever it is or just to

25:51

like work on her abs. Clearly that's

25:53

not what I've chosen but others. The

25:56

whole social point in my view is

25:58

to slow down our lives. to

26:01

move apprenticeship from the margin to the

26:03

center, to slow down

26:05

to not just the pace of Jesus, but

26:08

the presence of the Father and the Son

26:10

and the Holy Spirit, and to

26:12

walk in Jesus' company and His

26:14

community's company, and to

26:16

find great joy in our

26:19

daily life with Him, and

26:21

to let Him form our inner

26:23

woman or man into people of love who

26:26

are like Him. You

26:28

see, to say that most of our formation

26:30

is unintentional, and we need to

26:32

be more intentional about our spiritual formation, is not

26:34

to say that formation is

26:37

just like the Christianized version of

26:39

habit stacking and self-actualization, and if

26:41

you just customize your rule of

26:43

life to the right shape for

26:45

your personality matrix and Enneagram number,

26:48

and then just do it for

26:50

a year or two, then out

26:52

will come sainthood or whatever. I

26:55

wish it was like that, but it is not. A

26:57

lot of people have asked me, you know,

26:59

it's this book, oh, it's about the practices,

27:02

and the answer is like, kind of, but

27:04

not really. Because of the work

27:06

that I'm involved in right now with practicing the

27:08

way the organization, which I believe

27:10

ends so deeply, most

27:12

people likely think that I think

27:14

the practices are more important than

27:16

I actually do, and

27:19

I believe in the practices.

27:21

I believe that the

27:23

disciplines of the Christian way, and

27:25

especially the practices and disciplines that

27:27

slow our busy lives down and

27:29

make space for what I

27:31

would call just a more contemplative Christian

27:33

spirituality, I believe they are utterly essential

27:35

to our spiritual formation. That's why we're

27:37

working so hard, we have all these

27:40

free resources, you're welcome to avail yourself

27:42

of. I'm all for

27:44

them. They are the next step

27:46

in the spiritual journey of most Christians

27:49

that I meet today. But

27:51

I also believe that they are just one

27:54

part of our spiritual formation. They

27:57

are the trellis to the vine, they are not

27:59

the vine itself. They are not the

28:01

spiritual life itself. They just posture and

28:04

place our mind and our body

28:08

where it can live in connection

28:10

to and communion with the

28:12

Trinity. All

28:15

of that to say, they are how we build

28:17

the scaffolding for

28:20

the temple of the Holy Spirit within.

28:23

And this is really what I hope if you

28:25

read the book, that's really what I hope you

28:27

take away from it. Not just to call, slow

28:29

your life down and be less stressed and a

28:31

more chillaxed Christian. That would, that'd be

28:33

great. I hope that for me and I hope that for

28:35

you. And not just

28:38

a call to practice spiritual disciplines

28:40

and design a rule of life

28:42

and live with greater intentionality. Beautiful,

28:44

that would thrill me. But

28:46

all of that is a means to an end. The

28:49

end is to slow down and

28:51

to make space, to be with

28:54

Jesus, to become like

28:56

him, to begin to play your small

28:58

part, my small part in the world.

29:00

And to love him,

29:02

but more importantly, to make space

29:04

for him to love you into

29:07

a person of love one

29:09

day at a time. Thanks for

29:12

listening. Sarah, are you up for a conversation?

29:15

Let's do it. I'm scared now, it's a

29:17

great, it's a great, it's

29:19

a great, it's a great, it's a great, Sarah

29:24

and I go way back. Like it's

29:26

a 10 minutes before this event, almost

29:29

an hour. Thank

29:34

you again, Sarah, for your hospitality

29:37

tonight. Love being here. As

29:39

a shorty, tools are a little tough, but I'll work

29:42

on it. You

29:44

ended with talking about the

29:47

trellis and the vine image. I

29:50

thought it was lovely in your book. I'd

29:53

love to hunt in on the vine part for

29:55

just a minute before we get into other questions.

29:58

What are you finding compelling? about

30:00

Jesus these days? Hmm.

30:07

I, uh... Do

30:09

you have parts of the Bible that, like, you cannot

30:11

for the life of you figure out what they mean?

30:15

So, that's great.

30:17

That's normal. Except

30:19

when you're a pastor and they're, like,

30:21

really well-known parts of the Bible. And

30:24

it's not as great. I have

30:26

long, um... had

30:29

a hard time getting my head around the Beatitudes,

30:32

which are the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. And,

30:35

um... I've been

30:37

thinking about them recently and just reading a

30:39

few books, and some new research has

30:41

come out on them just for my own. They're

30:45

at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. I

30:47

need to figure out something

30:49

of what Jesus is saying. I've

30:52

just been so deeply impacted by that first

30:55

line, Blessed are the poor in spirit. For

30:58

there is the kingdom of heaven. And,

31:00

um, I think, and I could be wildly offered, that

31:02

most people misread the

31:04

Beatitudes as, like, a

31:06

list of virtues. And

31:09

I think it's a little bit the opposite. It's

31:12

more about the blessing and the favor

31:14

and the loving kingdom of God coming

31:16

to us in our

31:18

absence of virtue and our brokenness. And,

31:21

you know, Willard translated that first one, the

31:23

poor in spirit as spiritual imbeciles, spiritual

31:26

idiots, people that have nothing. Jacques

31:29

Philippe is one of my favorite writers right now.

31:32

He... that's your name. One

31:35

person. There it is. If you don't

31:37

know Jacques Philippe, he's amazing. Um,

31:40

but, uh... He just

31:42

calls it spiritual poverty and

31:44

argues that spiritual poverty is the

31:46

foundation of Christian spiritual formation

31:48

in the life of discipleship. That if

31:50

you... you have to start from this

31:52

place of, I have

31:54

nothing. And I have no

31:57

spiritual wealth to bring to the table. why

32:00

so often I think Jesus would say the

32:02

poor or the broken get there ahead of

32:04

the rich and the put together. It's

32:07

why the poor have such a greater openness to

32:09

the gospel of Jesus, I think, one of the

32:11

reasons. And so all that to

32:13

say, I have just, sometimes the

32:16

older you get the more you

32:18

become aware of your spiritual poverty.

32:21

And that's not like code

32:23

for, I'm secretly having an

32:25

affair or something like that.

32:28

That's more code for, you know, you reach

32:30

a point in your

32:33

discipleship journey where you

32:35

become painfully aware of the

32:37

limitations of your willpower. And

32:40

once you become a husband or a mother,

32:43

and once you become a parent, you

32:45

begin to see that all the ways

32:48

that your wickedness has been causing woundedness

32:51

in others. And so

32:53

to see the way my

32:55

particular sin of chronic

32:59

perfectionism, controlling behavior based

33:01

on anxiety, shaming,

33:03

contempt and resentment that come out of me,

33:06

this is like the ugly part of

33:08

my underbelly, you know, to see

33:10

the way that comes out on my

33:12

teenage kids and knowing

33:14

that they're developing their image of God

33:16

the Father through their image of me.

33:18

And I'm just both mirroring

33:21

that image and distorting it every single

33:23

day, you know. So

33:25

I just feel like sometimes the more mature

33:27

you become, the more aware you become of

33:29

your spiritual poverty. I feel like

33:31

I'm rambling. All that to say, when I

33:35

slow down, and when

33:40

I sit in front of that skull, and

33:42

my brain is a thousand different directions, and

33:45

my life is stressful, and I have three

33:47

teenagers, and we just moved, and our brain

33:49

goes all over the place. But

33:52

in those moments where there's

33:54

something approximating stillness, what

33:57

I experience from the Trinity is

34:02

overwhelming love and compassion.

34:07

And I'm just so aware of

34:09

my spiritual poverty right now. And

34:15

so that's what I'm loving about abiding, is

34:19

I have been, many of you did

34:21

not experience the love

34:23

that God wants you to

34:25

experience from your parents or through

34:28

your spouse. And I

34:31

have been well loved and I'm very grateful for

34:33

that. And I'm

34:35

still sinful and not

34:38

all that loving at times. This

34:42

is me coming from a good family of origin.

34:45

And I'm just so profoundly grateful

34:49

for the love of God. Yeah. Thanks

34:52

John Mark. So

34:56

the words you just spoke really fit line with the way you

35:01

communicated about being a human

35:03

with a rule of life.

35:06

Your words are very kind and sober

35:08

about that in the book. And specifically

35:10

in keeping the rule, we fall down

35:12

and get up, fall down and get

35:14

up. How

35:17

did the Lord grow your tolerance for

35:20

falling down and your

35:22

courage to get back up? Hmm,

35:26

I don't know. I

35:30

don't know, I mean. Maybe

35:33

your resilience as an apprentice. How do you

35:35

feel like that's been grown? I

35:38

think, you know, I'm introverted and

35:43

I just naturally run everything for the lens

35:45

of radical Western individualism. And

35:48

you quickly realize you can't get very far

35:50

from a spiritual journey by yourself. And

35:54

you know, we often have

35:56

a capacity to experience the love of

35:58

God to the degree. that we have

36:01

been well loved by God's people. And

36:04

so I think, again, I

36:07

feel that I, like all of you, I'm

36:09

sure I have been hurt, I have been betrayed,

36:12

I have been rejected, and often

36:15

I have not deserved it and often I have

36:17

deserved it. But I have also been forgiven

36:19

and loved, and

36:23

I have been graced with

36:25

the chance to live in community

36:27

and in spiritual friendships where I did

36:30

not have to keep secrets. And

36:32

I have been loved through those failures.

36:35

And I think often it's their grasp

36:38

of the love of God that's

36:40

taught me how to say yes to

36:43

the love of God and get back up, you know?

36:46

So I think, I guess if there's a moral

36:48

in that, it would just be,

36:51

you know, sin and shame thrive in secret.

36:58

And you know, as I was saying, an AA,

37:00

I get drunk but we stay sober. That's

37:03

a great, which is actually not true. We want to be able to get

37:05

dragged together, but

37:08

I'm pretty sure that's how especially for young people.

37:10

But I think the

37:12

sentiment there is sin thrives in

37:14

isolation and secrets. It's no surprise

37:16

that, you know, the enemy got

37:19

Eve isolated and alone to

37:21

then create this million for her.

37:24

And so I think the

37:27

more that we can live with no secrets and

37:30

the more that we can live in

37:32

deep relationships and friendships and vulnerability, mutual

37:35

trust, and that beautiful,

37:37

you know, both end of

37:39

calling and conviction with also

37:41

compassion and forgiveness, the

37:44

more we can begin to fall and get

37:46

back up quicker and quicker and quicker. And

37:50

hopefully fall less too, you

37:52

know? Thanks.

37:56

Yeah, from that, I mean... you

38:00

speak to it in your book a

38:02

bit, but the role of community

38:05

in keeping a rule. You have a small community

38:08

that you keep a rule with. There's

38:10

a bit of a tension there for

38:12

keeping a rule that

38:15

probably you did not have sole authority

38:17

to craft. And

38:20

also the what's the rule that works. Can

38:23

you speak to that tension and why doing

38:25

it in community might be worth it? Yeah,

38:27

so again, some of you might not

38:29

even know what a rule of life is yet. So it's

38:31

a long conversation. No, but

38:34

this tiny little micro resurgence in rule of

38:36

life that this book's part of, that the

38:38

work we're doing is part of, is

38:41

beautiful and I'm so into

38:43

it. But it's sadly

38:45

kind of being pretty much all

38:47

run through the lens of Western

38:50

radical individualism with individual people writing

38:52

their rule of life. So John Marx is gonna write

38:54

a rule of life. Sarah's gonna write a rule of

38:56

life. You're gonna write a rule of life. And I'm

38:58

all for that. I do not think that's bad at all.

39:01

But historically, nobody ever

39:03

thought about rule of life that

39:05

way. Rules of life

39:07

were designed to hold a

39:09

community together. They were

39:11

written to kind of organize a

39:14

community around shared rhythms

39:16

of spiritual formation. And

39:18

of course, there's a tension there between what's good

39:20

for the group and what's good for the individual

39:22

and all different places. Especially in like a

39:24

church where it's not like a monastery where

39:27

everybody is a single male or

39:29

a single female. Where there's more diversity

39:31

in a modern church, diversity of all

39:33

sorts of things. And so it's gonna

39:35

be more elasticity there. But

39:37

the beauty of that is one, just

39:40

everything is more powerful when there's

39:42

a culture around you that's

39:44

doing it together. For example, Sabbath. I talked

39:46

to so many people that genuinely want a

39:49

Sabbath, but like, you

39:51

are literally going against the

39:53

entire grain of like the

39:56

modern economy and your phone and

39:58

kids sports. It's often

40:00

church culture against everything. And

40:03

if you're trying to do it all by yourself,

40:05

it can feel like standing against

40:07

the ocean or something like that. And

40:10

so, but Sabbath was never supposed to be

40:12

an individualized private spiritual discipline. It was supposed

40:14

to be in the Sabbath command is plural

40:16

to a nation. And it has to do

40:18

with what you do with your servants and

40:20

your house and your animals and your children.

40:23

And everybody was Sabbath-ing on the same

40:25

day. And there were beginning rituals and

40:27

ending rituals. It was designed to hold

40:29

a community together. And so

40:31

there's something powerful. We keep Sabbath-ing community.

40:33

When we start, you know, and it's

40:35

6 p.m. and we come around our

40:37

table, we literally have a black box,

40:39

and everybody puts their phone into the box

40:41

and powers it off, and we put it away

40:44

in a cupboard in the kitchen. And

40:46

we begin to enter in together. And even if there's only 15 of us,

40:49

we're like this little subversive

40:51

anti-Babylon rebellion. Like

40:54

15 of us against L.A., but hey, we'll take

40:56

it, you know? And there's

40:58

something powerful about that, you know?

41:01

So I think the

41:03

communal nature of a rule of

41:05

life is really powerful. And part

41:07

of what it does is like,

41:09

you know, accountability or encouragement and

41:11

keeps you going. But also

41:13

what it does is it helps round out

41:16

our spirituality so that it

41:18

doesn't accidentally devolve

41:21

into just a

41:23

preference-based spiritual wellness.

41:26

So I just wrote my rule of life. I'm

41:29

just gonna shoot straight with you. I just wrote

41:31

my rule of life for myself. I

41:33

would never spend time with the poor. I

41:37

would not do much with my

41:40

body outside of my

41:42

private times. And I probably

41:44

wouldn't go to church very often. Because

41:47

I am very happy with

41:49

me and Jesus by ourselves and

41:52

the touchpoints of one or two friends. But

41:55

thankfully, I have people around me

41:57

that push me outside of the preference.

42:00

of my personality to

42:02

spend time with the poor, to

42:04

do things, to give away my resources, to

42:06

worship with the people of God, to sing.

42:08

These are all things that I would not

42:10

do. I don't have a felt need for

42:13

them, but yet I need them. And

42:16

so there's something powerful, like in the

42:18

rule of life, there's

42:20

people like me advocating

42:22

for Sabbath and silence, and that's really

42:24

hard for some of my super extroverted,

42:26

action-oriented friends. And then they're arguing for

42:29

like an hour a week with the poor, and

42:31

I'm like, how about an hour a month? Is

42:33

that okay? Or is that like,

42:35

I gotta get there, and it's traffic, and it's

42:37

time, and you know, but that's

42:40

good for me, I need that. And

42:42

that's what keeps our rule of

42:45

life from becoming just another form

42:47

of consumerism or spiritual wellness, but

42:50

allows it to actually be a crucible

42:53

for formation. I

42:57

think, again, not to put everything to moral, but

42:59

your pastor, maybe part of

43:01

the invitation there would be start really,

43:03

really small, but begin to practice

43:05

a few of these things with a few

43:07

other people, whether it's your whole church or

43:09

two friends or roommates, and

43:11

tap into the power of that. Thanks,

43:15

John Mark. Okay,

43:18

I wanna give us an opportunity

43:20

to ask John Mark a question or

43:23

to you. Sam has

43:25

a mic, yes. So if you

43:27

would like to ask John Mark a question, go

43:29

ahead and raise your hand, and

43:32

I will point to you. I

43:35

see someone right here. Hello,

43:38

hi, I actually had a question on

43:40

this number nine here,

43:42

a community of hospitality in a

43:44

culture of hostility through the

43:46

practice of witness. I think it's the only one I

43:48

had a question on, I don't fully understand it. You're

43:54

asking for more backstory, but that's a statement off of

43:56

the rule of life I live by that we put

43:58

in the back of the books. of it. You're

44:03

just asking like more color on that or background

44:05

on that? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

44:08

So witness is

44:10

just, you know, one way of

44:12

saying the call upon all followers

44:15

of Jesus to reach out to

44:18

people that do not follow Jesus with the

44:20

good news. And, you know,

44:22

we live in this fascinating moment where many

44:24

of us, I'm guessing, I don't

44:27

know you, but I'm just guessing

44:29

that many of you in the

44:31

room would probably have some level

44:33

of emotional allergy to

44:35

what was called evangelism in

44:37

the culture I grew up in because of

44:39

an often unsophisticated or

44:43

manipulative or culturally

44:45

insensitive or at times

44:47

like low grade bigoted model

44:50

of quote preaching the gospel. But

44:52

yet bearing witness to the resurrection of

44:54

Jesus in the coming of the kingdom

44:56

of God is not like a side

44:59

issue. It's central to discipleship. You

45:01

know, Frank Laubach, who has a beautiful little book,

45:03

if you've ever read his letters to a modern

45:05

day mystic or buy from a modern day mystic,

45:08

has this beautiful insight about how the

45:11

secret law of the spiritual universe is to

45:13

possess God, you must give him away. And

45:16

if you want a sense of the resurrected Christ

45:18

in your life, in your body, you have to

45:21

give him away. You have to talk about it.

45:23

You have to tell people to reach out in

45:25

Henry Nown's language, you have to reach out to

45:27

people with good news. But

45:29

the question becomes, how do we do that in a

45:31

way that isn't like uber lame? And

45:36

not just, I don't know, just mean

45:38

in a way that is like, cool,

45:40

or like non-Christian progressive, like, I think

45:42

we're still legit, which they won't. But

45:45

how do we do that where, you know, and

45:48

I could be wrong, I think

45:50

I understand, Austin, I think what most

45:52

people mean, part of what they mean when they say

45:54

Austin's not Texas, is that, you

45:56

know, this is this little bubble out,

45:59

so the bubble out. where at least where I grew

46:01

up in Silicon Valley. I spent the last 20 years

46:03

in urban Portland, Oregon. I just moved to LA. So

46:06

LA, you know every city has like a nickname for itself. What

46:08

does Austin call itself? Does it have like a? Do

46:10

we have anything? We have our Keep Austin Weird, but. Yeah,

46:13

but do you have like a, you know, like it's not

46:15

music city or whatever. Do you have like some, you gotta

46:17

have something. Live music capital of the

46:20

world, but. That's

46:22

not very catchy. I know. We

46:25

don't need it to be. Whatever. Okay. That's

46:28

cool. So like Portland was Stumptown

46:31

or Bridge City or these are like, you know, whatever.

46:34

So LA is

46:36

self nickname is

46:38

Babylon. Like

46:41

that's why people like, like they

46:43

call it Babylon. Like the biblical

46:45

archetype of demonic fallen society

46:47

telling us it's God is

46:50

like the self identity. Not like fundamentals

46:52

Christians call it Babylon. Like LA

46:55

people call it Babylon. So I have to

46:57

say I've spent my whole life in places

47:00

where, you know, most people think

47:02

I'm crazy. I discovered, I don't know, this is, I don't

47:04

know. I can't figure out if I'm in the South or

47:06

not right now. I don't know what Texas is, but. There,

47:09

you know, this is podcast that I

47:11

had a friend of mine tell me about. I

47:13

listened to a couple episodes. I couldn't get any

47:15

farther, but called blurry creatures. And it's like a

47:17

Christian conspiracy theory podcast

47:20

about Bigfoot. Apparently

47:23

it's like huge. And

47:26

there's these two guys that went

47:29

to college. That,

47:31

well Jesus, and sound half the

47:34

time very smart and

47:38

normal who really believe that

47:41

in the woods behind the house I just

47:43

moved out of in the Pacific Northwest, like

47:45

Sasquatch or like, or I guess Sasquatch is

47:47

Northern California, Bigfoot. I don't know, there's different

47:49

names. Is like wandering around and

47:51

that we're just, the government and the CIA

47:53

is hiding it. Which maybe is totally true.

47:57

I don't know. Maybe not. They

48:00

went to college, apparently a lot of people deeply,

48:02

I thought it was like a joke, and apparently, there's

48:04

a lot of people that really believe, all of you

48:06

here tonight, well, people are leaving now, they're so offended.

48:11

They're offended, you confused that. Of

48:13

course, and how would I ever doubt the reality,

48:15

but my point is, most

48:18

people in the cities I've grown up in,

48:20

they probably have the same amount of

48:22

intellectual respect for my faith system as

48:24

I have people that think Bigfoot is

48:27

hiding in the backyard. And

48:29

I'm not equating those two things, I think there's

48:31

all sorts of good reasons for the resurrection

48:33

from that. My point is

48:36

that, that's the cultural

48:38

shame attached to it. And

48:41

so not only is there

48:43

a tiny little minority of probably 2%

48:45

or something in the city that is

48:47

following Jesus, but there's now a

48:49

rising hostility where I'm just at that right age.

48:52

I remember when I was in high school, and

48:54

people would find out that I'm a Christian, and people just

48:57

thought you were weird. But

48:59

kind of weird was kind of cool, keep Portland

49:01

weird, keep Austin weird, it's like, oh cool, you

49:03

just, you know. Don't have sex before

49:05

marriage, that's weird, but okay. Now

49:08

there has been a colossal change to

49:10

where there's a hostility, you are

49:12

dangerous. You're part of the problem,

49:14

not the solution. We need

49:17

to censor you, eradicate you, get you

49:19

out of the public sphere, and silence

49:21

your voice because you are a moral

49:23

blight and you're a danger. I don't

49:25

think that, but that is the perception

49:27

of many people. And

49:30

so how do you preach the

49:32

gospel? How do you bear

49:34

witness to Jesus? In a culture like

49:36

this, where not only do

49:38

most people think we're a bit nuts, but

49:40

many people have an actual hostility, and

49:43

there's no actual persecution, but there is

49:45

kind of emotional or social persecution. Many

49:48

people are experiencing a vocational hardship where you

49:50

can only, you know, I was chatting to

49:52

somebody at a giant corporation you would all

49:54

know the name of, who's a VP there,

49:56

and they said, oh yeah, nobody gets

49:58

past this level in the... company without

50:00

compromising their faith. Basically

50:03

said, you cannot get promoted past this

50:06

level and be a serious

50:08

Christian. Wow, this is

50:10

a household name kind of company. And

50:13

so in that kind of a cultural moment, when

50:16

you look at the life of Jesus, when

50:18

he was with religious conservatives, he'd get up in front

50:20

of a crowd and preach from the Bible and tell

50:23

them to repent. When he

50:25

was with tax collectors and publicans

50:27

and sex workers and Greeks

50:29

and Romans, he would

50:31

invite himself over to their house for dinner. And

50:34

he would sit down at a table and

50:36

he would eat with them through the

50:38

practice of hospitality. And I

50:41

think that, again, there's no silver bullet for any

50:43

of this stuff, but what

50:45

Rosari Vettafro calls radically ordinary

50:47

hospitality that turns, I

50:49

think in her language, it's strangers into

50:52

neighbors and neighbors into family of God.

50:55

I think that whatever the pathway forward is,

50:57

that's the yellow line at the center of

50:59

the road. It's opening up

51:01

our homes, our tables, our lives. It's having

51:03

hospitality, it's not just a practice, it's a

51:05

posture toward the world of welcomes, of modeling

51:07

the inner heart of the Trinity of love

51:10

and welcome compassion and community and

51:12

inviting people in. And so

51:14

I think what that value is trying

51:16

to say is we wanna be people that preach the gospel

51:19

of Jesus, but through

51:21

radically ordinary hospitality, no matter what the

51:23

cultural hostility or shame that we bear

51:26

is. I

51:35

am really working on reading more.

51:39

Well, how on earth do you get the reading that

51:43

you do, Dad? I'm

51:47

really serious, I would love to know.

51:51

Oh, I like how I read a lot? Yeah,

51:53

you get so much reading, Dad. I have

51:56

no friends. Oh,

52:00

I don't know. I don't have any secrets for that.

52:02

I have a daily discipline. I have, you know, like

52:04

all disciplines it never happens every day, but I have

52:06

an amount that I try to read every morning before

52:08

I look at my phone and go to work. And

52:11

then, you know, one thing that's been really

52:13

helpful for me is I love, I

52:16

read fiction all of the time at night, every

52:18

night before I go to bed and on the

52:20

Sabbath for like an ungodly amount of time. And

52:23

I rotate

52:25

through, I do read some literary fiction.

52:28

I also read stuff that you would

52:30

all judge me for because it's so unsophisticated.

52:33

And I have a little rotation where

52:35

it's like literary at night. I rotate

52:37

between literary fiction, fun

52:40

fiction that isn't depressing, and a

52:44

narrative nonfiction which I love reading kind

52:46

of historical true story stuff and memoir.

52:50

But it's probably disproportionate, unsophisticated

52:53

sci-fi. And I

52:55

do that because a lot of the stuff that

52:58

really grows my soul requires a lot of attention

53:00

and it feels more like a discipline to read

53:02

it. And so by reading just

53:04

stuff that is just fun, and

53:06

I have a lot of negative rumination

53:08

that I'm trying to partner with Jesus

53:10

to form my mind in his

53:13

direction, and I love reading because it's just really

53:16

good for negative rumination. It's a

53:18

way to focus my mind on

53:20

something else and often something beautiful and true. So

53:22

I don't know if that's helpful, but I

53:25

like to read stories every single night. I'll read

53:27

tonight before I go to bed, and

53:29

that fills me with the love of reading.

53:31

And then when I sit down to read scripture

53:34

or read books that require more

53:36

discipline, I have this kind of emotional memory

53:38

of I love to read. I love the

53:40

page. And it's a beautiful thing. Man,

53:50

thanks for just being here and for

53:52

the book. Our community has been able

53:54

to run a couple of the practices.

53:56

Oh, beautiful. Amazing. And when we did

53:58

the Sabbath one, conversations we

54:00

had was thinking

54:03

about our

54:05

neighbors in our city who might

54:08

be like low income working two jobs.

54:10

That's the type of household I grew

54:13

up in. And when thinking

54:15

about how to help them follow

54:17

Jesus and do

54:19

the practices of something like Sabbath, it's

54:22

just really hard. I

54:24

was wondering just as a pastor, if you've

54:27

walked with people from low income backgrounds

54:30

or people who have to work a

54:32

couple jobs, how do you help them

54:34

or what's the wisdom to help incorporate

54:36

some of those disciplines

54:39

into their lives? Yeah,

54:41

just opening the question like

54:43

that. Yeah, no, it's a beautiful question. I

54:46

just want to honor your heart for asking that

54:48

question. So there

54:50

are different answers based on who you're

54:52

talking to. So at a biblical theology

54:54

level, the Sabbath, which is the fourth commandment and the

54:56

10 commandments, is

54:58

intimately tied with social justice. So

55:01

again, this is not run through the lens

55:03

of radical individualism, Christian wellness.

55:06

It's run through the lens of a theocracy. And

55:09

so the Sabbath command is written

55:11

actually to often household owners. And

55:13

part of the command is you should

55:15

don't know where nor your servants or

55:18

even your animals in your house. So in a sense,

55:21

AJ Suvoda, a buddy of mine,

55:23

writes, Sabbath is scheduled social justice.

55:26

So can you imagine a world where, you

55:29

know, some of my friends at Praxis who

55:31

do redemptive entrepreneurship, part of their rule of

55:33

life is they create Sabbath

55:35

for anyone under their domain of leadership.

55:37

So as business owners and

55:39

business creators, like how do you actually

55:41

create Sabbath for people underneath you, whereas

55:43

many businesses or jobs make Sabbath impossible.

55:47

And so there is actually

55:49

an onus of responsibility upon

55:51

Christians, particular Christians, with privilege

55:53

to create Sabbath for any

55:55

within their realm of provision,

55:58

influence, leadership. at

56:00

a very pragmatic level, what

56:02

that would look like, you know, you get all

56:04

sorts of questions and there's a million different problems,

56:07

it's great for churches. But in

56:09

the optimal kind of ideal situation,

56:12

what that would look like is if you

56:14

know people in your life or community or

56:16

in your relational world that

56:18

want to practice Sabbath but don't have

56:20

the capacity to, what

56:22

I think the right impulse would be

56:24

is you and your community, that

56:27

it may be have a little bit of extra

56:29

resources, you create Sabbath for other people. So

56:31

that could be, hey, we're gonna give you a stipend of,

56:33

you know, $500 a month or

56:35

whatever we can pull together as a community

56:38

so that you can take Sundays off and

56:40

join us for Sabbath feast and we want

56:42

you to have this day. And

56:44

so, you know, obviously, how does this

56:46

work? We don't live in small villages

56:48

anymore where this is all, you know,

56:50

we live in these giant nation states,

56:52

cost of living is astronomical, it requires

56:54

government subsidy to just have a roof

56:56

overhead. Extraordinary complexity. I'm giving

56:59

you more of the biblical theology

57:01

and the aspirational ideal. And

57:03

that's where I think each of us work it out, you

57:05

know? And I think if we are not creating

57:08

Sabbath for others, then

57:10

we're missed, and if we're not practicing Sabbath with

57:13

others, it's still great to take a day of

57:15

rest and worship and delight, but we're missing the

57:17

full breadth of what God has for us. So

57:20

I would just challenge you, think creatively.

57:23

I'm certainly the right solution to what

57:25

about Sabbath for nonprivileged people is not,

57:27

so let's, none of us Sabbath.

57:30

And often, you know, especially if you do, like

57:32

part of the Sabbath command is not buying and

57:34

selling. So we refuse to buy

57:36

and sell. Can you imagine if every single

57:39

American said, we won't buy a single thing

57:41

on Sunday? Can

57:43

you imagine how for the service class, which

57:45

is gross language none of us like and

57:47

is very true, how much freedom

57:49

and new life that would breathe into them, but

57:52

the realities are constant consumption, deracinate

57:56

the impossibility of Sabbath for so many people.

57:58

So if we can... Again, Andre Prokme,

58:01

you know him who hid the

58:03

Jews during World War II, a

58:05

tiny little non-famous, non-celebrity pastor, a

58:07

little priestess from the village, said

58:09

make small moves against destructiveness.

58:13

And we can't change the grotesque inequality

58:15

in our cities and our nation, but

58:17

we can make small moves against destructiveness.

58:24

One more. Thank you. I've

58:28

been so blessed by all your work. You were

58:30

super grateful for y'all. And we also serve at a

58:32

church this time up here. We

58:34

try to decide the students were a church

58:36

student pastor. It's wild, our kids are so

58:38

anxious. Their struggles feel so

58:41

much more cute than any that

58:43

we both face. But there are gonna be a

58:45

thought, an idea of what it looks like to

58:47

implement kind of this idea of

58:49

practicing the way of following Jesus and in

58:51

this really traditional sense. Like, how did you

58:53

take that to a generation that is a

58:55

little bit younger and a more complex maybe

58:57

than those of us who are here that

58:59

are trying to work through this for themselves?

59:01

Yeah, the level of complexity, yeah. Are you following

59:04

Jonathan Haidt's work at all? His new book, Anxious

59:06

Generation, that I think might come out this week or

59:08

very soon. So Jonathan Haidt, social

59:10

scientist, he wrote that book, The Caudaline and

59:13

the American Nine. Absolutely, I had

59:15

all my kids, my teenagers, like you will read

59:17

this. There's a couple books that like, you will

59:19

not graduate from high school until you've read Skruite

59:21

Bladers. And then a couple, one

59:23

is his book, Caudaline and the American Nine.

59:25

So his new book's all on, it's called

59:27

The Anxious Generation and he's done the data

59:29

on basically how social media has utterly

59:32

corrupted the soul and

59:34

caused extreme mental health crisis across

59:36

the world. So

59:39

his work is helpful and there's some

59:41

pragmatic stuff in it well. So I'm

59:43

not a youth pastor, I'm

59:45

a dad. And all

59:47

I know is this, you

59:49

probably have to get upstream of your kids to the

59:51

parents. So I would think about your

59:53

ministry, not just to the kids, but to the parents. And

59:57

I really hope that... the

1:00:00

way that many

1:00:02

parents are not only allowing, providing,

1:00:05

often based on the parents' anxiety for

1:00:07

smartphones and social media for their kids, I hope

1:00:09

we look back at it the way

1:00:11

we look at movies from the 1940s

1:00:14

where it may just change smoking their way through

1:00:16

life. And like at like 12

1:00:18

years old, you know, I hope that is how

1:00:20

we look at it, and I don't know if

1:00:22

that's what will happen or not, it's a very

1:00:24

optimistic interpretation of the future. But

1:00:26

I know that there's only so much

1:00:28

you can do outside of the home.

1:00:30

So if I were you pastor, I

1:00:32

would be talking constantly with parents, a

1:00:35

lot of parents are scared to

1:00:37

do what needs to be done and

1:00:39

putting digital boundaries around their kids because

1:00:41

there's so much social pressure on the

1:00:43

kids and from their kids. So

1:00:46

like, you know, I'm not saying this

1:00:48

is right for what parents should do,

1:00:50

but in our house, like zero phone

1:00:52

before 16, and then you get a

1:00:54

like old school flip phone, and

1:00:57

then no smartphone until 18, and

1:00:59

then our encouragement is never ever, ever, ever,

1:01:01

ever, ever have social media unless you have

1:01:04

to for your work. And then if as

1:01:06

you pray for the mercy of God, and

1:01:08

they wait for the mercy of God, that's

1:01:12

just our opinion, I'm just saying, that's just our opinion. So,

1:01:16

and my kids have all sorts of issues, but they know how to talk

1:01:18

to you. And, and, they're

1:01:23

pretty great kids. So, but you know,

1:01:25

they pray face such painful

1:01:27

social stigma. Especially

1:01:30

now entering high school. Less on social media, most of

1:01:32

their friends like are like, oh my gosh, that's amazing.

1:01:34

But especially those like first year or two of high

1:01:36

school, they don't have a phone, it's really hard for

1:01:38

them. So it's really scary

1:01:40

for me, cause I'm having to stand

1:01:43

against like a whole generation as a

1:01:45

parent. So honestly, what was really helpful

1:01:47

for me was one of my best

1:01:49

non-Christian friends, who's like very secular, not

1:01:52

a Christian, but is kind of a cultural elite.

1:01:55

And just friends we've met through our kids, our kids became

1:01:57

best friends, we really hit it off. They,

1:02:00

whose kids are all in Stanford and all

1:02:02

the places. And they like

1:02:05

no phones till 18, no social

1:02:07

media in the house. I thought, these are

1:02:09

just like secular progressive elites who are just,

1:02:12

you know, I read this really terrifying article

1:02:14

about how the future of America is going

1:02:16

to be the 10, like elites is going

1:02:18

to be about attention, and how

1:02:20

the future elites will be the very few people that

1:02:23

actually cannot be controlled by their phones.

1:02:25

It'll probably be 10% of America, the

1:02:27

new ruling class, will be people

1:02:29

that can rise above their smartphones and manipulate the

1:02:31

other 90%. Now

1:02:33

it's like, oh my gosh. That

1:02:36

is so terrifying. Amazing.

1:02:40

All that to say, I try to get upstream,

1:02:43

and I try to create a digital rule of

1:02:45

life, like what the Crouches have done. Andy and his

1:02:47

daughter and the books they've written and the idea of

1:02:49

like, what if you had your youth group living by

1:02:52

a digital rule of life? What if you had them

1:02:54

all at least doing like, you know, Darren Whitehead in

1:02:56

Nashville just did the whole digital detox, kind of 40

1:02:58

day journey that churches can go on. I

1:03:01

would take my youth group on a 40 day digital thought

1:03:03

and you'd have it at least every year, you know, I

1:03:05

mean, do that for Lent, do it for

1:03:07

whatever. So I would be like actively working

1:03:09

to these issues and trying to bring parents

1:03:12

and kids and community together around,

1:03:14

I wouldn't just try to mitigate

1:03:16

against the symptoms, I'd try to actually get to

1:03:18

the root of the disease, you know. So I

1:03:20

can easily talk about it. You have to go

1:03:23

do the work. I'm just trying

1:03:25

to survive the next year without getting a phone from

1:03:27

us. It's all I'm trying to say. Thank

1:03:32

you, Sam, and thank you for your questions. Thank

1:03:34

you for being with us, Sam. From Waco,

1:03:36

thank you. Yeah, from Waco. That's it.

1:03:39

What was that? Yeah, that's okay. See

1:03:42

the grab right there.

1:03:47

Thank you for joining us tonight. It

1:03:49

has been a joy to share this time with you

1:03:51

and with you. Thank

1:03:53

you. That's an honor to be here with your community.

1:03:56

Looking forward to continuing to practice the way

1:03:59

of Jesus together. even

1:04:01

a wall turned. With that,

1:04:03

would you pray a blessing over us?

1:04:06

Let's all stand together. It would be my honor.

1:04:13

Can I? I'm not an Anglican. Can I pray a

1:04:15

blessing? Am I loud? I've

1:04:17

got to be breaking some... ...hole.

1:04:21

I'll let it fly, then we'll come in. I

1:04:30

invite you just to take a few deep slow

1:04:34

breaths into the goodness

1:04:36

and the love of the Trinity.

1:05:01

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, thank

1:05:06

you for every

1:05:08

precious Amago day in

1:05:10

this room. Now

1:05:15

you press deep into their hearts intuitive

1:05:19

sense by the Holy Spirit that

1:05:21

they are fearfully and wonderfully made

1:05:26

and more deeply loved than they can

1:05:28

possibly imagine. Come,

1:05:30

Holy Spirit. Thank

1:05:33

you for this time, one

1:05:35

night in the passing

1:05:38

train in the blur of life. Thank

1:05:42

you for the gift of this moment. The

1:05:45

gift of John's music, the

1:05:49

gift of Peter's leadership and

1:05:51

Sarah's hospitality. Thank

1:05:55

you that we're warm and dry and safe

1:05:57

tonight. Well

1:06:01

fed, well cared

1:06:03

for. We

1:06:05

bless you. Please

1:06:10

bless these peoples. And

1:06:13

I pray over them the words

1:06:15

of Colossians. Let

1:06:18

the peace of Christ rule

1:06:21

in your hearts, since

1:06:23

as members of one body, you

1:06:26

were called to peace. Amen.

1:06:32

Amen. We

1:06:38

hope you enjoyed that conversation with John Mark

1:06:40

about his new book, Practicing the Way. Be

1:06:43

with Jesus, become like him, do as he

1:06:45

did. If

1:06:47

you want to continue to explore these ideas,

1:06:50

you can pick up a copy wherever books

1:06:52

are sold. This

1:06:56

podcast is from Practicing the Way.

1:06:58

We develop resources to help churches

1:07:00

and small groups apprentice in the

1:07:02

way of Jesus. And

1:07:04

all that we make is completely free because

1:07:06

it's already been paid for by the Circle,

1:07:09

a community of monthly givers who partner

1:07:11

with us to see spiritual formation integrated

1:07:13

into the church at large. Special

1:07:18

thanks for today's episode goes

1:07:20

to Chaney from Vero Beach,

1:07:22

Florida, Christina from Burbank, California,

1:07:25

Gabrielle from Portland, Oregon, Scott

1:07:27

from Sadbury, Massachusetts, and Jennifer

1:07:29

from Spokane, Washington. Thank

1:07:31

you all very much. To

1:07:35

join the Circle or to learn more

1:07:37

about running a practice in your church

1:07:39

or community, visit practicingtheway.org. Until

1:07:43

next time, may the grace of the Lord

1:07:45

Jesus Christ and the love of God in

1:07:47

the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with

1:07:50

you now in Florida. you