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What is forming you? /// FOLLOW · FOLLOW

0:02
SPEAKER_01: Let your life speak.
0:03
SPEAKER_01: That's what vocation is, is letting you the entirety of your life say who you already and always have been.
0:11
SPEAKER_01: I think that's beautiful in the best sense, but also in the worst sense is you better know what's forming you.
0:17
SPEAKER_01: If there's work to be done, you're doing that work.
0:19
SPEAKER_01: But in the best places and the best guides and the best leaders or pastors or spiritual directors are are able to see that and like just kind of point that out or call that person in.
0:33
SPEAKER_00: Most Christians, I think, think, oh, formation is something that I choose to do.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: And if I don't choose to do it, then I'm just a I'm not being formed.
0:42
SPEAKER_00: That's not true at all.
0:43
SPEAKER_00: Actually, you are being formed and shaped all the time, whether or not you've surrendered and released control, whether you've made a plan or you have it.
0:56
SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the follow-up podcast, a podcast that believes at its core, the single most important oriented belief that if Jesus was right about God and life and the human soul, then it would make sense that we rearrange our lives around what he said is true.
1:13
SPEAKER_00: So that's what we're exploring.
1:15
SPEAKER_00: All that Jesus said was true and how to rearrange our lives around it.
1:24
SPEAKER_00: So here we are.
1:25
SPEAKER_00: We're actually doing this.
1:27
SPEAKER_00: How many months, years in the making?
1:30
SPEAKER_00: Well, I think back to the early days when I was 12.
1:35
SPEAKER_00: When I was dreaming of doing a podcast with Steve Carter.
1:38
SPEAKER_00: No, I mean, like, we started talking about this, uh, I don't know.
1:43
SPEAKER_00: It's been a couple years.
1:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:45
SPEAKER_00: Right?
1:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:46
SPEAKER_00: Couple years?
1:46
SPEAKER_00: Couple years.
1:47
SPEAKER_00: I mean, here we are.
1:49
SPEAKER_00: We've had this like circuitous.
1:51
SPEAKER_00: Is that how you say that word?
1:52
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter.
1:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's a smart word.
1:55
SPEAKER_00: If you if you just add a few more syllables to a normal word and then just pretend like it's the word, people are like, yeah, it's a biblical.
2:01
SPEAKER_00: Of course.
2:02
SPEAKER_00: Of course.
2:03
SPEAKER_00: So it's true, it's the Greek.
2:05
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
2:05
SPEAKER_01: So what circuitous?
2:07
SPEAKER_01: Circuitous.
2:08
SPEAKER_00: Our producer, our producer Luke, just uh confirmed there is a word.
2:12
SPEAKER_00: Sir Sir Charcuterie.
2:16
SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the charcutemus.
2:18
SPEAKER_00: Uh Greek for uh board of cheese and meat.
2:23
SPEAKER_00: So if anybody wonders where this podcast is going to be, um and if they should ever tune back in.
2:28
SPEAKER_00: Now they know they don't.
2:29
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, you were saying.
2:31
SPEAKER_01: Um, we so if you go back to Illinois, we get kind of like this opportunity to help a church out.
2:40
SPEAKER_01: That's right.
2:40
SPEAKER_01: And then we find ourselves in Colorado on a drive, and we like share just kind of like in a 45 minute to an hour long drive, I don't know if I've had as instant of a connection around just like life, but then formation and we didn't know each other.
3:01
SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
3:01
SPEAKER_00: You know, we had it was if you go back to to fill in even more blanks, yeah.
3:08
SPEAKER_00: I knew of you because we had we were both at two large churches, um, and so we sort of ran parallel, never intersected even at the church we were helping.
3:18
SPEAKER_00: Right.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: You were preaching and uh off weekends, and then I would come in and preach, and so it was our buddy Brad Lominik who said, Hey Parks, will you pick up this guy, Steve Carter, at the airport?
3:29
SPEAKER_00: And that's when yeah, I picked you up.
3:32
SPEAKER_01: And so I just I I just remember that drive, just kind of going, man, like I knew again, we you were there the off weekends and I wasn't there, so I knew the name, didn't know the the person, but just uh had that moment of kind of those next few days just going like this is this is someone that isn't just like a ministry friend, and I've got a bunch of those and they're awesome, and I'm grateful for their voice in my life.
3:57
SPEAKER_01: But I was like, this is someone who um is chasing down some of the same desires I have, whether formation, uh, whether our love for sports, whether uh just trying to get healed in the right ways, and and and and just there's just a bunch of similarities that um and then I'll never forget, I'll never forget, it's one of like the holiest moments is we we were with all of these pastors, and we end up um about six of us in a late night kind of cabin sharing like our experience of hurt um and experience like in pain and and struggle in the local church, and just how we were able to get through that and just the stories and the vulnerability and our love for Christ and our love for formation, our love for the local church, just all of that I feel like just like cemented um just this journey, and we've just been shopping regularly ever since let's let everybody know where you are in the world.
5:20
SPEAKER_00: I mean they've sort of picked up on it.
5:22
SPEAKER_01: So I live um in the northwest suburbs of Chicago, so 25 minutes northwest of Chicago.
5:29
SPEAKER_01: And then the church I um kind of am one of the pastors at is um historic church in Chicagoland.
5:37
SPEAKER_01: It's called Christ Church of Oak Brook, and I'm the third pastor um in 60 years.
5:43
SPEAKER_01: Uh first pastor was there 32 years, uh Dr.
5:46
SPEAKER_01: Art de Kreder, and then I followed um the Reverend Dr.
5:52
SPEAKER_01: Dan Meyer, and both of them huge, huge heart for formation.
5:56
SPEAKER_01: Um de Kreder actually um had this class called the um basics of Christianity, and it was like early spiritual formation in like 1965, 72.
6:11
SPEAKER_01: Oh wow, and then uh Dan Meyer really had just this heart.
6:14
SPEAKER_01: I mean, he he was the chair of the Fuller Seminary, and it's just like his longing and desire for formation, discipleship vision was the language of the church, and so I had always heard and respected Christchurch.
6:28
SPEAKER_01: I I actually referred to it as the Midwest Menlo um because it it just had that same Menlo Park.
6:34
SPEAKER_01: Menlo Park where John Robert was, yeah, you know, who's a mentor to both of us, like who who like it just had that kind of like presence and uh safety and trust in the community.
6:46
SPEAKER_01: And so um, so I've been there about 16 months and having the time of my life.
6:51
SPEAKER_01: Incredible, incredible team and congregation.
6:53
SPEAKER_00: So you you here's what's interesting about you you've kind of a um uh an eclectic sports uh loyalties, don't you?
7:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
7:02
SPEAKER_00: First and foremost, the University of Michigan.
7:04
SPEAKER_00: Uh I mean, come on, here's the thing.
7:05
SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about that for a second.
7:07
SPEAKER_00: First off, that is a grown man's basketball team.
7:10
SPEAKER_00: Grown man's.
7:11
SPEAKER_00: And then but that is what$21 million will get you.
7:15
SPEAKER_00: Huh?
7:16
SPEAKER_01: Well, that's the new world, you know, it's a wild wild west.
7:19
SPEAKER_00: It is the wild wild west.
7:20
SPEAKER_00: But that team is legit.
7:22
SPEAKER_00: So you you love Michigan, but you don't just love but you love the Cubs.
7:26
SPEAKER_00: I love the Cubs.
7:27
SPEAKER_00: Love the Cubs.
7:28
SPEAKER_00: Um, and and we you know, we're gonna we're gonna lock this into a time frame, which I'm fine with opening day.
7:33
SPEAKER_00: Is this open day?
7:34
SPEAKER_00: How do you feel about that?
7:35
SPEAKER_01: I feel great.
7:35
SPEAKER_01: Are you excited?
7:36
SPEAKER_00: You have butterflies.
7:37
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, it's kind of crazy.
7:39
SPEAKER_01: I I'm I want to sit down with PCA and ask them about six years, 115 million.
7:45
SPEAKER_01: Kyle Tucker got four for 225 or 240.
7:50
SPEAKER_01: So I'm like, why so little?
7:52
SPEAKER_01: I don't I don't understand it.
7:54
SPEAKER_00: Uh because that's another that's another thing.
7:56
SPEAKER_00: You and I could have a deep conversation on what's wrong with baseball.
7:59
SPEAKER_00: Yep, yep.
8:00
SPEAKER_00: Um and why the game of football is probably a better model.
8:04
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
8:05
SPEAKER_00: Uh, because think about it.
8:07
SPEAKER_00: Uh you're Bears fan.
8:08
SPEAKER_00: Yep.
8:09
SPEAKER_00: There, there's your other loyalty.
8:11
SPEAKER_00: Deeply love the Bears.
8:12
SPEAKER_00: Deeply love the Bears.
8:13
SPEAKER_00: Um, and they were complete uh garbage three years ago.
8:17
SPEAKER_00: And look what you can do in just a few short years.
8:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we could argue arguably say that we were complete garbage for three quarters this year, and then just the last four minutes just turned it on.
8:27
SPEAKER_01: So many like cardiac kids moments.
8:30
SPEAKER_00: So many cardiac kids moments.
8:32
SPEAKER_00: Uh I think some similarities now that so this is but uh the I'm pointing out a few differences between us.
8:39
SPEAKER_00: Yep.
8:39
SPEAKER_00: Um and I make it known.
8:41
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
8:41
SPEAKER_00: Um I I you know, I I'd like to think I don't really I don't really come after the bears so much, do I?
8:48
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no, no.
8:48
SPEAKER_00: Cubs, I don't really come after your loyalties.
8:50
SPEAKER_00: Um a little bit.
8:52
SPEAKER_00: Subtlety?
8:52
SPEAKER_01: Subtly.
8:53
SPEAKER_01: I would say not so much the bears, because you know, up until then this last year too, you and I were just weird terrible.
9:01
SPEAKER_01: We were on the island of irrelevancy.
9:03
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
9:03
SPEAKER_01: And then um the I mean, very brave, like you started out serving on a church in Chicago with a St.
9:12
SPEAKER_01: Louis Cardinals jersey.
9:13
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I didn't.
9:14
SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's a that's a bold move.
9:16
SPEAKER_01: That's a bold move.
9:16
SPEAKER_01: It's a very bold move.
9:18
SPEAKER_01: It's just like this guy's gonna get booed out.
9:21
SPEAKER_00: But I grew see, but I grew up in Granite City, Illinois.
9:25
SPEAKER_00: The the Illinois Illinois.
9:27
SPEAKER_00: But it was closer to yeah, you uh it was closer to St.
9:31
SPEAKER_00: Louis than most of the suburbs were.
9:34
SPEAKER_00: Like we were right across the river, still Mill Town, uh, it'd be like Gary, Indiana.
9:38
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know what I'm saying?
9:39
SPEAKER_00: With with WGN for the for us, you know.
9:41
SPEAKER_00: So you you had to make a choice.
9:45
SPEAKER_00: And and in our day, you did make a choice because I grew up in St.
9:50
SPEAKER_00: Louis.
9:50
SPEAKER_00: So I went to the World Series in 1982, 85, 87.
9:53
SPEAKER_00: Gosh, right?
9:54
SPEAKER_00: Whitey Herzog, yeah, Vince Coleman, Willie McGee, Jack Clark, Ozzy Smith, the Wizard of Oz, the greatest shortstop to ever play the game defensively.
10:04
SPEAKER_00: Um, unbelievable.
10:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah that's what I grew up in.
10:07
SPEAKER_00: Grew up with that, but we didn't have streaming services.
10:11
SPEAKER_00: There were two other teams that were constantly in front of you WGN, Chicago Cubs, TNT, yep, and the Atlanta Brace.
10:23
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um, and so I saw Chicago all the time.
10:27
SPEAKER_00: Now in the 80s, those are the Sandberg days, not particularly you had some moments.
10:32
SPEAKER_00: Cardinals sort of dominated.
10:34
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I mean I don't know.
10:36
SPEAKER_01: You know what's weird though for me is in fifth grade, remember those starter puffy jackets like the Parkas?
10:43
SPEAKER_01: So I live in Southern California, and all of our friends we wanted one, but I think it was my friend Andy.
10:49
SPEAKER_01: He was like, hey, we can't all buy the same jacket.
10:53
SPEAKER_01: So we have to right now pick our teams.
10:56
SPEAKER_01: And we had a draft.
10:58
SPEAKER_01: So fifth grade, like put our numbers in, and I got number two, and I think my friend Ken got number one, he chose the Lakers, and I just chose the Bulls.
11:07
SPEAKER_01: I chose and so if you chose the city, you had it like all their teams.
11:11
SPEAKER_01: So I went Blackhawks, Bears, Cubs, and then Jordan with the Bulls.
11:16
SPEAKER_01: Um, and so I like fifth grade, it was like called to a place of Chicagoland.
11:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it is, it is doesn't this speak to something about how we are wired as humans, the way in which so much of our past's uh experience finds its way into our current circumstances, like both good and bad.
11:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like those when we speak of like being formed, um being formed isn't just what's happened in this moment, right?
12:03
SPEAKER_00: It isn't just what we're doing.
12:05
SPEAKER_00: Being formed has all kinds of layers to it.
12:08
SPEAKER_00: Like, where did I come from?
12:10
SPEAKER_00: How did I grow up?
12:11
SPEAKER_00: Like reconciling some of these pieces through the process.
12:15
SPEAKER_01: Don't yeah, what think about it too, like in the sense of um was it Michelangelo, um, who's interviewed a long, long time ago, and he had like this um massive, massive like slab of marble, and they were asking him about the statues, like the Pieta or the David, like that he created, and he just said, Oh, the statue's right here.
12:39
SPEAKER_01: I should have to cut away the dead pieces.
12:41
SPEAKER_01: And sometimes the thing about formation is this um profound revealing.
12:50
SPEAKER_01: Like like because part of it is like almost cutting away to go, what is your Imago Day?
12:56
SPEAKER_01: Like I have a friend um when she was a kid, was writing letters to the president.
13:04
SPEAKER_01: She graduates from Westmont and she has an internship at the White House because her parents recognized that unique Imago Day and knew how to sift and sort and encourage, and could understand that revealing connected to purpose and calling, and that formation that wanted to already happen.
13:22
SPEAKER_01: That that that formation that was actually coming to the surface.
13:27
SPEAKER_01: And I think so much of that is like when you begin to recognize oh yeah, like it's like Parker Palmer, the great Quaker voice, just let your life speak.
13:38
SPEAKER_01: That's what vocation is, is letting you the entirety of your life say who you already and always have been.
13:46
SPEAKER_01: And and I think that I think that's beautiful in the best sense, but also in the worst sense is you better know what's forming you.
13:54
SPEAKER_01: And you better know what's like actually being revealed in you if so that you, if there's work to be done, you're doing that work.
14:00
SPEAKER_01: But in the best places, and the best guides and the best leaders or pastors or spiritual directors are are able to see that and like just kind of point that out or call that it out or call that person in.
14:15
SPEAKER_01: And um, that's been some of the moments I've had with you that have been so powerful.
14:18
SPEAKER_00: Hortberg said it this way.
14:20
SPEAKER_00: He said, returning back to the person, the one that God thought up when he thought you up.
14:26
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
14:26
SPEAKER_00: What is the profound misconception about being shaped, do you think, that most people carry?
14:34
SPEAKER_01: I think we've talked about this before, but I think it's the so much of life and formation that scares people is a surrendering of control.
14:46
SPEAKER_01: So, like, you know, you you got up this morning, you ran a mile and a half, you said, you know, like I did.
14:50
SPEAKER_00: I ran a mile and a half today.
14:52
SPEAKER_00: Huh?
14:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm proud.
14:55
SPEAKER_01: Hey, that's but that's great.
14:56
SPEAKER_01: It's great.
14:56
SPEAKER_01: And you you've got you've got a good coach, and the coach is gonna help you, you know, prepare for a marathon and and to run.
15:04
SPEAKER_01: Well, that's that's someone who's like shaping you towards something.
15:08
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
15:08
SPEAKER_01: Um I think it's but you you've gotta actually want that and surrender control to that coach's voice.
15:15
SPEAKER_01: Totally.
15:16
SPEAKER_01: You know, I I think I think oftentimes when you don't know how to do this, then all of a sudden you're like, how do I know that there's a promised benefit to my life?
15:25
SPEAKER_01: And and how do I know this is the person I should surrender control or trust to, that they're gonna actually help me be shaped for like my well-being and the well-being of those around me.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: Dude, that's so big.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: But here's here's I'll take that one step further because um we think about it as control and surrender, as if it's a conscious choice.
15:49
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not saying that it's not, but here's the reality.
15:53
SPEAKER_00: Most Christians, I think, think, oh, formation is something that I choose to do, and if I don't choose to do it, then I'm just a I'm not being formed.
16:02
SPEAKER_00: That's not true at all.
16:03
SPEAKER_00: Actually, you are being formed and shaped all the time, whether or not you've surrendered and released control, whether you've made a plan or you haven't.
16:14
SPEAKER_00: So today, yes, I am proud of this.
16:17
SPEAKER_00: Um, so I'm on this diet, I'm trying to lower my cholesterol, you know, like naturally, right?
16:25
SPEAKER_00: And so that means like I have to do certain things, um, of which most of them don't come naturally.
16:31
SPEAKER_00: I look like I'm a runner until you watch me run, and then you're like, wow, that guy is struggling.
16:36
SPEAKER_00: Uh so I'm I'm not particularly great at running, but I'm like, okay, there's things that I have to do, right?
16:41
SPEAKER_00: I I if I'm going to be shaped into someone with low cholesterol, we have to do these things.
16:48
SPEAKER_00: Now, in in our context, oftentimes we think, well, if I'm not doing those things, I'm just not being shaped.
16:55
SPEAKER_00: Not true at all.
16:56
SPEAKER_00: When I'm not doing those things, the other forces like eating like I'm 20 years old, um, and having hamburgers and French fries for lunch, um, and then pizza for dinner, and doing that over and over, is shaping me into a person who has high cholesterol.
17:13
SPEAKER_00: I think the thing that most of us uh that I want so desperately, people in our church, in our sphere to understand is, oh man, you whether you choose or not, you're being shaped into something.
17:26
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, right?
17:27
SPEAKER_00: Like you're being formed, and what's forming you is the thing that you relinquish control to.
17:34
SPEAKER_00: Um this phone.
17:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
17:37
SPEAKER_00: How much re how much control do we relinquish to this orb, this glowing orb?
17:44
SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
18:05
SPEAKER_01: I'll go back to um Tracy Bianchi.
18:08
SPEAKER_01: Uh she wrote this dissertation all on liturgy, and I got a hold of it and like read through it, and I was like, I was blown away by it.
18:14
SPEAKER_01: But something she said that was fascinating was after 9-11, um we as Americans needed something to make us feel okay.
18:27
SPEAKER_01: And you had a couple of moments that were um, and again, not not not not being politically here, but just a couple moments that like somehow rallied the country together.
18:42
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
18:42
SPEAKER_01: One of them was uh George W.
18:45
SPEAKER_01: Bush, President Bush.
18:46
SPEAKER_01: I know exactly what you're gonna say.
18:47
SPEAKER_01: Walking out the megaphone, and and but he walks out to the to the the mound and pitches a strike before the World Series.
18:57
SPEAKER_01: The next couple days later, the NFL.
19:00
SPEAKER_01: Oh and she she writes how the NFL is is its own liturgy, and in the subconscious, we look for something that just feels familiar.
19:15
SPEAKER_01: You know, that allows all of the cortisol just to kind of drop.
19:19
SPEAKER_01: And and again, like in your subconscious, you are going to it's like water, you're gonna you're gonna find the the the the the least path of resistance and and flow that way.
19:31
SPEAKER_01: And I think that's the the part of it is you just eat pizza, you get hamburgers, yeah.
19:36
SPEAKER_01: You just you just do what you want to do.
19:38
SPEAKER_01: What do you want to do?
19:39
SPEAKER_01: It's that in Dallas Wheeler language, the impulsive will.
19:41
SPEAKER_01: Like we just we just have that impulsive will.
19:46
SPEAKER_01: But I think for us the beauty of formation is recognizing oh, the decisions I'm making in my subconscious, bringing those to the conscious and asking myself to what you just asked, is that helping me become the person I want to be?
20:04
SPEAKER_00: The person I was made to be.
20:05
SPEAKER_00: The person that God thought up.
20:06
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
20:07
SPEAKER_00: But this is interesting.
20:08
SPEAKER_00: So tie it all together because uh when you think about this whole conversation of intentional formation, like, hey, we're being chiseled and formed into something, yeah, something all the time.
20:19
SPEAKER_00: Now you have to believe that, but I think there's an old uh old concept that uh the system in which you're running is perfectly equipped to get you the results that you're currently getting, right?
20:29
SPEAKER_00: That's right.
20:30
SPEAKER_00: So like um I think about that often is that everybody's running a play.
20:36
SPEAKER_00: Even if you say I'm not running a play, you are running and not running a play play, right?
20:41
SPEAKER_00: That's what you're doing.
20:42
SPEAKER_00: You're rehearsing something.
20:43
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're either rehearsing having high cholesterol, you're either rehearsing the a broken marriage, you're rehearsing, or you're rehearsing a different story.
20:55
SPEAKER_00: And that's why I think that that that quote and that concept is so important, because uh sometimes maybe some of these practices in and of themselves, you know, you're like, to what end?
21:07
SPEAKER_00: Right.
21:08
SPEAKER_00: You know, what is why am I doing this?
21:10
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's rehearsal for something bigger.
21:13
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's a that's an interesting part.
21:15
SPEAKER_01: It'd be like if I because we both like have you know storyboards and film and background and that kind of piece, but like it'd be almost like if I took um a movie, um my son and I just went and saw um Project Hail Mary.
21:30
SPEAKER_01: Let's say like the new Ryan Gosling movie, and let's just say I took one kind of scene from that and just handed it to you.
21:39
SPEAKER_01: You don't you don't know the whole story, you don't know where the story's going, you just have that one scene.
21:44
SPEAKER_01: And I think that's sometimes the way we approach formation is I just have this one random practice.
21:50
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I think that's so good, isn't that true?
21:52
SPEAKER_01: I don't necessarily have the entire arc of w what is the macro micro narrative of scripture going what What's my place in this story?
22:01
SPEAKER_01: What are the acts that make up the story?
22:04
SPEAKER_01: How does this actual practice helping me become who I'm supposed to be?
22:11
SPEAKER_01: I just feel like I've been handed a set of lines, but I have no idea what this whole play is about.
22:21
SPEAKER_01: Where's the story going?
22:22
SPEAKER_01: And I think for a lot of people, then they just I'm like, that's just that's for the academics, or that's just for the pastors, or that's just for that's that doesn't it doesn't help my life in Castle Rock or the Western suburbs of Chicago.
22:36
SPEAKER_01: Totally.
22:36
SPEAKER_01: And I think for us, if we if we can actually help, you know, people touch the bottom of the pool and just say, hey, this is where the the entire story goes.
22:45
SPEAKER_01: This is your unique place in it, and this is why it matters.
22:49
SPEAKER_01: I think more people will go, oh, that feels accessible.
22:53
SPEAKER_01: And that's that's what I think mentors have done for us, helped make that story, the shaping, the forming, the intention more accessible.
23:05
SPEAKER_01: That um I think you and I, whether through sports, whether through life, whether through faith, whether through leadership, have just constantly tried to bring that in.
23:14
SPEAKER_01: I'm curious for you, Eric, like what do you think is some of the biggest resistant barriers to formation in your current context in Colorado?
23:22
SPEAKER_01: I think a lot of times we can exegete a a verse of scripture, and most most pastors just jump to like, oh, what does this commentators think?
23:30
SPEAKER_01: Without recognizing, like, now our job is to exegete the place that we've been called to.
23:36
SPEAKER_00: I'll make a big broad brush stroke.
23:39
SPEAKER_00: Um, and again, evangelical context, that's what I've come up in, right?
23:45
SPEAKER_00: Um, been a part of large emerging churches.
23:49
SPEAKER_00: But even in that context, what I think is the biggest challenge to formation is that we've broken down all of Jesus' sayings, all of the New Testament, all of our teachings into just something I need to um uh learn.
24:08
SPEAKER_00: That's it.
24:10
SPEAKER_00: So if you think about what I was taught growing up, what is what is spiritual growth?
24:15
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I have a quiet time in the morning.
24:18
SPEAKER_00: And what does a quiet time consist of?
24:20
SPEAKER_00: A bunch of learning practices.
24:22
SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm not suggesting that you can't learn.
24:24
SPEAKER_00: Dallas makes it pretty clear like the way you and I think is the most determinative thing about us, right?
24:30
SPEAKER_00: Like what how the thoughts that run through our head, man, they do impact our action.
24:35
SPEAKER_00: So I'm not discounting thinking.
24:38
SPEAKER_00: What I would say makes this a challenge for people is there's a misunderstanding that this is not about learning lines so that you know the lines, it's learning the lines so that you can go and rehearse them with your body, like do something.
24:53
SPEAKER_00: And so what I love about the conversation is that yeah, there's a component of us learning.
25:00
SPEAKER_00: We gotta have new thoughts, right?
25:01
SPEAKER_00: We gotta think new thoughts and be introduced to new ideas.
25:05
SPEAKER_00: But the idea that you talked about rehearsal, that means like there's something I'm gonna do with my body, like I'm gonna go live this out in because here's the thing.
25:17
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna go to work after this podcast, you're you're gonna have dinner tonight with your family, you're gonna have uh your son is gonna wake up late for school this morning.
25:28
SPEAKER_00: And you if the words that you've learned have no impact on those moments, then the real question is, then what is all of this for?
25:39
SPEAKER_00: And so for me, it is like that's why I love when you when you said, you know, um, touching the bottom of the pool, words like rehearsal.
25:47
SPEAKER_00: Um, this podcast is certainly about rethinking what it looks like to be a slab of marble shaped into what God had in mind.
25:56
SPEAKER_00: But I am convinced that that slab of marble being shaped is to then go out and live in this world as a different kind of presence.
26:06
SPEAKER_00: Like we just show up differently, and wholeness and reconciliation follows us into all these spaces, right?
26:31
SPEAKER_01: I think is the the difference between Western way of thinking and eastern way of thinking when it comes to formation.
26:39
SPEAKER_01: Because we've been in a rehearsal um ever since we started going to school, which was to know facts.
26:46
SPEAKER_01: No facts, know the answers, all right?
26:47
SPEAKER_01: So pass the test.
26:48
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
26:49
SPEAKER_01: So I so how does that not play into our faith?
26:52
SPEAKER_01: And I can tell you this like um February 17th, 1963, there was a kid that was born in Brooklyn, New York.
26:58
SPEAKER_01: That kid at the age of two moved down to Wilmington, North Carolina with his family.
27:02
SPEAKER_01: He loved watching his cars with his his grandfather.
27:05
SPEAKER_01: Uh, he loved the game of baseball.
27:07
SPEAKER_01: He always tried keeping up with his older kids, uh, older brothers and siblings.
27:10
SPEAKER_01: And uh I could tell you about how he got cut from varsity as a sophomore at Laney High.
27:15
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you how he um grew um to 6'4 as a senior in high school, how he went to the University of North Carolina, had hit the game-winning shot as his freshman against Georgetown.
27:26
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you how he was drafted number three by the Chicago Bulls behind Sam Bowie and Hakima Lajwan.
27:31
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you about how he got his first shoe contract.
27:35
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you how many stats this man had.
27:38
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you how he met his wife at a Benning's restaurant, if you remember those, how they dated, broke up, dated, broke up.
27:43
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you about the drama on the dream team.
27:47
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you what really happened in the flu game.
27:49
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you about how there was this beautiful court built on the set of Space Jam where he got his runs.
27:54
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you what happened in the Birmington Barrens.
27:57
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you who his coach was, Tony uh Terry Francona, uh, in minor league baseball.
28:02
SPEAKER_01: I could tell you all of these facts about Michael Jeffrey Jordan, which you would then go, have you ever met him?
28:07
SPEAKER_01: And I would say, no.
28:09
SPEAKER_01: And you know, we call those people stalkers.
28:12
SPEAKER_01: And and I think that's that's that's the truth of how Western evangelical formation has been.
28:18
SPEAKER_01: Is we just have a whole bunch of people who are stalking Christ and the way of Jesus because we know facts.
28:26
SPEAKER_01: He fed 4,000, he fed 5,000, he walked and was baptized in the Jordan, he da-da-da-da.
28:31
SPEAKER_01: He overturned tables.
28:32
SPEAKER_01: But to what you're saying, the rehearsing, how it's showing up in my body, how it's leading to a life of reconciliation, a life of love, a life of forgiveness.
28:45
SPEAKER_01: My facts don't have the the chutzpah or the the wherewithal to transfer that.
28:54
SPEAKER_01: And I think that's where people feel stuck.
28:56
SPEAKER_01: They're like, I know the right stuff.
28:59
SPEAKER_01: I just don't know how to get it into my my being.
29:02
SPEAKER_00: Okay, it's the difference between um So uh you and I grew up playing sports.
29:07
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
29:08
SPEAKER_00: I played baseball, basketball, football.
29:11
SPEAKER_00: Um, and uh I think about the difference between playing football, uh playing basketball, um, and uh my math class.
29:21
SPEAKER_00: The math class, I was learning a bunch of facts in order for me to regurgitate those onto a test.
29:26
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not suggesting that math isn't important, that there was just a very specific way in which I was to learn these facts, spit these up on a test.
29:33
SPEAKER_00: That's what you were talking about.
29:35
SPEAKER_00: I had a bunch of stuff I had to learn in football.
29:37
SPEAKER_00: I had to learn on paper.
29:39
SPEAKER_00: I played, um I was a slot receiver and I was a uh free safety.
29:44
SPEAKER_00: There were plays, they were put on paper.
29:46
SPEAKER_00: Yep.
29:47
SPEAKER_00: They said there are certain things, when you see certain things, there this is what you're going to do.
29:51
SPEAKER_00: Tons and tons of facts.
29:53
SPEAKER_00: Tons.
29:53
SPEAKER_00: Yep.
29:54
SPEAKER_00: But all of those facts did me no good.
29:56
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
29:57
SPEAKER_00: If I didn't do anything with them, right?
29:59
SPEAKER_00: Like if I stood out there and I knew what was supposed to happen, but my body then didn't go and cover that, you know, uh tailback.
30:07
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the the coach would say, What are you doing?
30:10
SPEAKER_00: And the answer can't be, Well, I know what I'm supposed to do.
30:12
SPEAKER_00: Right.
30:13
SPEAKER_00: I know what I'm supposed to do.
30:14
SPEAKER_00: Right, right.
30:14
SPEAKER_00: But yeah.
30:15
SPEAKER_00: And I think if we can, I mean, honestly, as a pastor, I think about this all the time.
30:21
SPEAKER_00: I am not at all interested in discounting the facts.
30:25
SPEAKER_00: Yep.
30:25
SPEAKER_00: In fact, one of the phrases we use around here is uh, if Jesus was right about God, life, and the soul, then it wouldn't make sense that we rearrange our lives around him.
30:36
SPEAKER_00: But there's two pieces.
30:38
SPEAKER_00: You kind of have to know what Jesus said about God, life, and the soul.
30:42
SPEAKER_00: Like those facts are important.
30:43
SPEAKER_00: Like what he said in uh the Beatitudes, what um Matthew 5, 6, and 7 lead to when he talks about loving our enemy, what does that mean?
30:53
SPEAKER_00: Like you have to understand it.
30:55
SPEAKER_00: But there then has to be a transition into yeah, it's so that I can go out and play this game, live this life, do this stuff.
31:04
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's my my hope is that we can, you know, Barna did a did a study.
31:12
SPEAKER_00: This was like back in 2019 when um they asked a bunch of non-Christians what they thought about us.
31:18
SPEAKER_00: And the words they used weren't kind.
31:20
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean what they think about us and how we live out in this real world um did not reflect the words of Jesus.
31:29
SPEAKER_00: And so the goal is like, how do I take these things that I've learned?
31:32
SPEAKER_00: Yep.
31:33
SPEAKER_00: And run these plays in the real world.
31:35
SPEAKER_00: Totally.
31:35
SPEAKER_01: That's okay.
31:36
SPEAKER_01: And and taking even out of the sports, like for anyone who's like, okay, you're you're also a good cook.
31:43
SPEAKER_01: I do, I am a good cook.
31:44
SPEAKER_01: There are people, there are people, and I'm one of them.
31:47
SPEAKER_01: I need the instructions.
31:49
SPEAKER_01: You need a hello fresh.
31:50
SPEAKER_01: I will literally follow the instructions, but if like I don't know how to improvise, and that's what you're talking about with like the sports.
31:59
SPEAKER_01: Like, my wife doesn't need the instructions.
32:01
SPEAKER_01: She sees just give me the ingredients.
32:03
SPEAKER_01: I know how to make this, and she knows she knows how to take the ingredients and also improvise for what that meal or what that moment demands.
32:14
SPEAKER_01: That's that's what faith is what the kind of faith that is required for today.
32:20
SPEAKER_01: And I think that this isn't the podcast that's gonna help people really take what they've learned and and help them follow up in ways that are going to stretch them, but give them what they need to improvise to be attuned to God in the present and the spirit in the present.
32:37
SPEAKER_01: But actually do what that moment requires and demands.
32:41
SPEAKER_01: Um so that they're rehearsing in a way that feels true to who they've always been and who they were intended to be.
32:47
SPEAKER_00: I love that Orper quote to to to be more of who God thought say that again because I I think he said it um to become the person that uh God thought of when he thought you up.
33:02
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
33:02
SPEAKER_00: Become that person.
33:03
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I love that.
33:04
SPEAKER_00: A journey back to that person, and that does give us hope, right?
33:09
SPEAKER_00: And so I think that's the call is um how do we, you and me as pastors, you know, over the next few, however many, we'll bring some friends in and we'll have conversations, but it is about touching the bottom of the pool.
33:22
SPEAKER_00: That's a great phrase.
33:23
SPEAKER_00: Two phrases you introduced that maybe we'll adopt is like touching the bottom of the pool and rehearsing.
33:28
SPEAKER_00: Like, what are you rehearsing?
33:29
SPEAKER_00: So sweet, Carter, love you, dude.
33:31
SPEAKER_00: Love you too, bro.
33:32
SPEAKER_00: This is gonna be fun.
33:35
SPEAKER_00: So that's gonna do it for today.
33:36
SPEAKER_00: If something landed for you in this conversation, don't just let it sit.
33:41
SPEAKER_00: Take it with you.
33:42
SPEAKER_00: Carry it into your week.
33:44
SPEAKER_00: Talk about it with somebody, let it do something in you.
33:47
SPEAKER_00: And if you want to go deeper, click on the link in the show notes.
33:51
SPEAKER_00: We'll be back soon with more.
33:52
SPEAKER_00: So until then, keep following up.