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How to Find Yourself: Why Looking Inside is Not the Answer · Centrally Speaking

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Centrally Speaking is the Central Schwankfelder Church's podcast.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: It speaks about issues that would be of interest to our society.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: In particular, it addresses how a Christian worldview intersects with Western secular culture.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: In the spirit of the church's founder, we take the perspective of the middle way, which is in agreement with the historic Christian Church.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Dr.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: Drake Williams, Minister of Mission and Theology at the Church.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: Our website is www.cscfamily.org.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_02: We're very pleased to be able to have today uh Reverend Dr.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_02: Brian Rosner with us.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_02: I first met uh Brian and my time as uh a student at the University of Aberdeen, and it's a real pleasure, Brian, to connect with you on uh this podcast.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_02: Brian's uh now serving as the principal at Ridley College uh in Melbourne, Australia.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_02: He uh previously taught at the University of Aberdeen and as well as at Moore Theological College.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_02: His ministry experience is broad, uh, being involved with student work, local church work, and now theological education for the last uh 30 years.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_02: He's the author of uh more than 12 books, and we're gonna speak about one of them today: How to Find Yourself, Why Looking Inward Is Not the Answer.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_02: So, Brian, great to connect with you uh again, especially in this way on this podcast.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, thanks, Brian.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_03: Really happy to be here.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_02: Let's talk about your book, How to Find Yourself Why Looking Inward Is Not the Answer.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_02: You spend uh uh a number of chapters uh as you begin your book uh talking about something called expressive individualism.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_02: Uh what is that?
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_02: Uh can you explain that and summarize that for our listeners?
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so expressive individualism is a term, it wasn't invented by Carl Truman, it was probably popularized by him.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_03: So he's written a couple of books on the roots of a movement in Western culture, which really focuses on personal identity and questions of the self.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_03: Um one of them's called The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self, the other one's a strange new world.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_03: And it's it's this basic idea that you need to find yourself by looking inward.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_03: I quote Charles Taylor, the Canadian philosopher.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_03: He says, modern freedom and autonomy centers us on ourselves, and the ideal of authenticity requires that we discover and articulate our own identity.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_03: So in our world, you see it all over the place in popular culture.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_03: So the best advice you can give anyone these days is be true to yourself, uh, find yourself, be yourself, uh, you do you.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_03: It's this notion that you're to um reject all forms of external authority.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_03: We should celebrate everyone's quest for self-expression.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_03: And living authentically is really about living in accordance with what you find uh within yourself.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, it's it's actually quite a recent movement.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_03: Um, it's one of these things that people don't even notice because it's so pervasive.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_03: Uh culture's a bit like that.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_03: It's this invisible force that no one questions, a bit like asking a fish, like you say to a fish, let's talk about water, and the fish says, Well, what's water?
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_03: So it's another illustration is it's culture's like an iceberg.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_03: Certain things are conscious above the surface level, but but most things about how we think and behave, um, the the assumptions we have in all sorts of areas, including how we form ourselves, who we are, personal identity, are really deep down at the bottom of the iceberg.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_03: And exposing them uh is a bit of a challenge, actually.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_03: But but certainly it's um it's quite pervasive in Western culture in particular.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_03: So expressive individualism is how it's termed, and in in a nutshell, it's it's a focus on the self and uh finding the self, i articulate articulating your own identity, and then living in accordance with that self, being true to yourself.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_03: Those kind of ideas.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_02: I I like the way how you start with your introduction, uh you have several quotes uh from people uh such as uh this one, be true to yourself, and then who says that?
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_02: You have that uh listed as Oprah, Ellen DeGeneres, Beyonce, Michelle Obama, Steve Curry, Donald Trump, and every student body president.
• 4:25
  unknown: That's true.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_03: I guess we see this in a lot of different places, right?
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_03: Indeed.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_03: Uh the most recent quotes, not in the book, uh, was by another uh Dr.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_03: Taylor.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_03: So I've already quoted uh Charles Taylor.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_03: Uh I'll now quote uh uh Dr.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_03: Taylor Swift.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_03: So I don't know if you realize, but Taylor Swift got an honorary doctorate uh last year at New York University.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_03: And in her acceptance speech, she said this.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_03: I really love it.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_03: She said, We are so many things all the time.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_03: And I know it can be overwhelming figuring out who to be.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_03: So you see the focus on identity.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_03: I have some good news, it's totally up to you.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_03: I also have some terrifying news, it's totally up to you.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_03: And that really hits the nail on the head.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_03: I love it because yeah, expressive individualism says that your personal identity, who you're going to be, is totally up to you.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_03: But she also hints that look, there might actually be a problem with the movement, because it's also terrifying to focus exclusively on yourself to the rejection of all other factors.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_02: So we're seeing it not only in uh uh quotes uh from people, but are you seeing it uh, let's say in other places in society too, Brian?
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_02: Uh maybe in the way that uh universities uh encourage people to be uh whoever they want to be.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, look, it it's right from um popular culture through to high culture and tertiary education and high school as well.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_03: I suppose the pointy end of the movement is um the culture wars around sexuality and gender.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_03: And uh my my I've actually got two books on this topic.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_03: You probably know the first one was a more academic one called Known by God, a biblical theology of personal identity.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_03: Uh both books touch on but don't really focus on issues of sexuality and gender.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I think my books are relevant to those topics, but that but they're they're they're intensely personal things, and I don't have the expertise to really speak authoritatively into those areas.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_03: But the movement's much broader than those issues.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_03: I think that that's the thing that people don't realize.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_03: People just take for granted now that being yourself uh without any reservation or in a sense without any critique.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_03: So it's interesting, Francis Fukiyama, who's a famous American author, a political scientist, I love the way he puts this.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_03: He says that um most people don't have infinite depths of individuality that is theirs alone.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_03: What they believe to be their true inner self is actually constituted by relationships with other people.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_03: And I think there's a sense in which uh looking inward to find yourself has some benefits.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_03: So I think we should acknowledge that up front.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, uh, self-reflection is a good thing.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_03: And probably the movement is in part driven by a desire to include in society and give due acknowledgement and dignity to uh minority groups, so ethnicities and um uh all sorts of other groups who felt excluded.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_03: Expressive individualism is a way of saying, look, we want to acknowledge those groups and include them and give them full dignity.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_03: And obviously, living authentically is another positive thing.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_03: And psychologists talk about this.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_03: So um it's one of the basic needs of human nature.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_03: No one wants to be a phony, but but nonetheless, there's a sense in which looking only exclusively inwardly to find yourself, it is problematic in really uh significant ways, and uh it's not leading to good outcomes for individuals or societies.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_02: I'm wondering if you could uh uh speak about uh the history of this movement.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, surely people have been self-centered over the years, but expressive individualism, uh, whether so much of the focus on inventing yourself uh or defining who you are from what you feel like, uh, why hasn't that been seen earlier in history?
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's a good question, Drake.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_03: I I think um I've already mentioned Carl Truman's books, who traits traces in effect the intellectual history, the history of ideas.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_03: And the the notions we're talking about, the central notions of expressive individualism, do go back centuries.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_03: Other romantic poets like Rousseau and then uh Zygmunt Freud earlier in the early 20th century, um, and uh Friedrich Nietzsche, he mentions a number of major figures.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_03: But there something happened, the kind of tipping point uh in society where people no longer took for granted, and this is my own understanding, took for granted the Christian worldview.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_03: So the idea that self-sacrifice, uh, that forgiveness, those notions central to a Christian worldview and narrative, have really been abandoned.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_03: And there's much more of a focus now on the self.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_03: The fact that it's a recent phenomenon can be demonstrated quite easily, actually.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_03: So there's something called an N-gram search.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_03: Uh on Google, you can search all of extant English literature.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_03: Isn't it amazing?
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_03: And look how often terms have been used, and that gives you a little graph.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_03: And there's exponential growth in the last 30, 40 years in the West, uh, with English literature being the test case, for things like identity, personal identity, identity formation.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_03: Those terms were just not in use very much before uh the last 30, 40 years.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_03: So I think there is good evidence that it's a recent thing.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, if you look in popular culture, every Disney movie basically has this idea.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_03: Someone has to free themselves from external constraints and express who they really are.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_03: Think of Elsa's song in Frozen.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_03: It's kind of the anthem uh for recent generations.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_03: But but I don't want to sound like I'm sneering.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_03: As I said, I think there is uh real value in in many of the impulses.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_03: But unfortunately, which is so often with human nature, we we take something that's valuable and just it's taken too far, it turns out uh spoiling so many other things.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_02: Uh reading through your book, I I felt f found your uh discussion on expressive individualism uh really uh really valuable.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_02: You've list uh several things that you've already mentioned in this uh podcast uh about uh uh chucking off uh the uh authorities of the past, uh looking inward.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, but one of the things that I also felt very compelled by is uh the way that you uh sorted this uh through personally.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_02: Uh it's rather rare to have uh uh theologians uh speak personally about uh expressive individualism.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_02: It sounds like uh it's something that uh you sorted through uh yourself.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_02: Do you might you share anything about that uh for our listeners?
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, look, uh I agree entirely with you.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_03: It is unusual, and it's unusual for me too.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_03: I I had to I did it reluctantly, if you like.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_03: But basically, the publisher and some friends insisted.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, and the point was if you're going to talk about personal identity, you can't do it impersonally.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_03: And the truth is, I didn't come to this topic uh purely as an academic.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_03: I came to it for personal reasons.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_03: So back in the mid-90s, I had a kind of crisis of identity of my own and came back to those basic questions asking, who am I?
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_03: And uh I went back to the Bible as a Christian, and something that had always given me purpose and driven me in life was the notion of knowing God.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_03: Remember Packer's classic volume.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but for some reason it didn't really help.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_03: And um, I found a theme in the Bible, which I explore in How to Find Yourself in Part, uh, which is this notion that we're given our identity by God and we're known intimately and personally by him as his child.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_03: And I found that such a reassuring and beautiful thing, bringing comfort.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_03: And as it turns out, Packer admits this himself.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_03: In knowing God, he says that look, knowing God's great, but there's something actually more fundamental to human identity and discipleship, in fact.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_03: And it's this notion that God knows us.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_03: Some of the texts in the Bible, I'm sure people will know.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_03: So Galatians 4, Paul says to the Galatians, at one time you didn't know God, but now you do know God.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_03: But then he corrects himself and says, or rather, you're known by God.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_03: And in context, it's about being known by God as his child.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_03: It's not about God's omniscience, knowing everyone, everywhere, at all times.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_03: It's about God's personal knowledge of his children.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_03: And there's a sense in which we give our children their identity, at least in their early stages up to adolescence.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and uh that that informs their lives.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_03: And psychologists will tell you that uh that that attachment is is vital to well-being.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_03: And uh so the it has been a very personal journey for me.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_03: It's not one I've gone on alone, though, because I've spoken to dozens of friends and people in lectures and uh after giving talks over the years.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_03: And I found that people in the West are struggling with identity at all sorts of stages of life.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_03: So people, when their parents die, sometimes wonder who am I really?
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_03: You know, that that collective memory your parents have of you is just gone.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_03: Um, relationship breakdown.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, we live longer in retirement these days.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, you wonder who who am I if I'm no longer my occupation.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_03: And then uh quite amusingly, life stage uh experts talk not just about a midlife crisis, but uh something called a thrisis.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_03: You don't need ointment for it.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_03: It's something that happens in your 30s when you climb the ladder of success and uh you wonder if it's leaning against the wrong building.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_03: And then cuspiety, when you reach a cusp age, you you look back on your life and you wonder, well, you know, have I really fulfilled what I was hoping to do in my life?
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_03: What's my life really about?
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_03: So it was a very personal journey.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_03: I don't think I was impacted so much by expressive individualism in those days, although I I think I have been like everyone else since.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, but it but but certainly that uh difficult patch in my life in the mid-90s forced me to think about issues to do with identity in in a very personal way.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_02: It seems as you write on in the book Beyond Expressive Individualism, uh you come to uh something that uh we've been talking about in society a lot uh lately, social identity and how we're defined uh not just by being individuals, but also with group that we're with.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_02: And you tie that in also to your move back to Australia from Scotland, I guess connecting with um your Australian roots.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think um look, one of the problems, well, I think the biggest problem really with expressive individualism, there seems to be three.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_03: One, it tends to produce a very fragile sense of self.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_03: Um, people are destabilized and don't have a satisfying, stable sense of self throughout their lives, yeah, just by looking in wood.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_03: Um, the other problem is it's it's failing to lead to what anyone would call a good life, because things like um anxiety and depression and anger, all though and narcissism, all those kinds of things are on the rise in Western culture.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, but the most the the biggest problem is it's just not true to human nature.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_03: So the one you picked up on there is social identity.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_03: We don't actually know ourselves that well.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_03: We know ourselves by being known by other people and having that identity reflected back to us.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_03: Sociologists talk about this.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_03: They they they say the self is really a network of relationships.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_03: So you talked about my own um struggles.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_03: It uh it's true.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_03: I I reconnected with old friends and uh people who knew me best, and uh that was enormously comforting and helpful.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_03: If I'm wondering who am I, having people around me who can uh reinforce my identity is very helpful.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_03: Um, an illustration might be that um it uh it's kind of like expressive individualism is telling us we can be soaring eagles, eyeing our prey from a great height, you know, achieving our dreams, uh, our own life stories uh being uh one of triumph and success.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_03: But the reality is human beings are more like honking geese.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, you'll probably remember Drake from Scotland.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_03: In the right season, you could look up in the sky and you'd see this amazing V formation of geese.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_03: And they'd be honking to encourage each other.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_03: And uh the they actually fly much further by flying information because they've got these invisible ties, if you like, like a Peloton in a cycling race, you you travel much further uh by in connection with other people.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_03: So human beings are social beings.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_03: And uh there's a wonderful book by David Brooks, the New York Times columnist, which uh called The Social Animal, which explores some of these topics in a remarkable way, actually.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_03: I was thinking recently how accents in in America and in the UK in particular, both both countries, if you want to uh realize the impact of others on you, think about your accent.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, if you're if you're from uh Florida or California or Massachusetts or Texas, you're gonna talk differently, aren't you?
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_03: And why is that?
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_03: It's it's because we're so interconnected with others.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_03: So the the very heart of expressive individualism, thinking you can be a self-made self, it is is problematic in the least.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_03: It's and it's just not true to human nature.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_03: And as any goose will tell you, it uh that the only way to fly is information with with other geese.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_03: And that's and don't mishear me, I'm not suggesting we we should have a kind of blind conformity, but the reality is human beings are social beings, and we live best when we're in good connection with with others.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_02: Even if that uh social identity might be uh uh distressing at times.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_02: So maybe you've seen the the movie uh My Big Fat Greek Wedding, uh where a family has an identity and uh they leave uh the the main characters and they drive them up a tree uh several times during the movie, but uh the family comes back and takes them the next step forward when there's a problem.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_02: Uh that social uh aspect uh that drives them forward.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_02: Have you seen that film by any chance?
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, sure.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_03: And and look, uh Christmas is coming up.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not sure when the podcast will be put out, but um and for many people, Christmas is is a difficult time around the family table, and uh you get those embarrassing uncles and the like.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_03: And the the other problem with expressive individualism is its naivety in terms of its optimism.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_03: The idea that we're going to succeed if we just try hard enough.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_03: You hear this from um celebrities and very successful people.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_03: They just say, you know, I just follow my dreams and I I I work really hard.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_03: Look, the the truth is human existence under the sun, to use that uh amazing phrase from Ecclesiastes, it's a tough, it's tough.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_03: Everyone will experience things they're not prepared for and burdens which they're not ready to carry.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I'm in my coming up to my mid-60s, and none of my peers have escaped what I've just described.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_03: Life is very difficult for most people and for all people at different times.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_03: And uh the naive story that we're told uh via popular culture in particular, it's just so unhelpful and it sets people up for a terrible failure and disappointment.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_02: And the culture is giving a whole variety of stories.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um you talk about uh stories such as uh what uh uh secular materialism, secular humanism uh gives, um, a story of social justice.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_02: Uh might you be able to explain that to some of our listeners and then uh contrast it with the life story of Jesus Christ?
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so I think we talked about social identity.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_03: So in the book I talked about, I talk about three other places to look to find yourself.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_03: So around your relationships and ultimately up to God who gives us our identity as his children, um, being known by him.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_03: And you've raised another one, which is so important, and it's so obvious when you think about it.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_03: Our lives are stories.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_03: So what connects me as a baby to me now is it's not really anything physical.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, that there's a bit of an urban myth that all the cells in the body are replaced every seven years.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_03: Apparently, that's not entirely true, but but nonetheless, you can see the point.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_03: So, what connects me is my story.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_03: And um, everyone lives what Tim Keller calls a narrative identity.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_03: All of us have this relationship uh to the world around us um by the way we inhabit what we understand to be our story.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_03: But what people often miss is that we live in shared stories.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_03: So the stories we inhabit are often uh connected with other people.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_03: So you think about your family story, still affects you.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_03: So my family, my father's side, was um uh Jewish in Austria just before the Second World War.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_03: And uh they escaped after Hitler took over Austria in 1938, lived in China for 10 years, came to Australia.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_03: Now, what's Got to do with me.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_03: It's got nothing to do with me in the immediate physical sense, but somehow that has impacted me in all sorts of ways.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_03: National stories are the same.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_03: There's a national story that Americans inhabit, that Australians inhabit, has to do with the histories.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_03: So I think yes, the two big stories that people are being sold in our day, and sometimes they're mixed up, are what you describe secular materialism.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_03: It's the idea that the big problem with the world is ignorance.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_03: And all we need to do is through technology and education apply those things fully and pervasively, and society will continue to improve and will go on and on and on.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_03: And the problem with that life story is that it falls prey to the idols that will fail to bring security to our lives.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_03: They're gods that fail.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_03: So things like Enlightenment progress, the sexual revolution, consumerism are really idols.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_03: And the Bible's main critique about idolatry is that it's an idol.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_03: It's a god that fails.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_03: It will not ultimately bring us the security, significant satisfaction that all of us crave.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_03: But the other story I think you mentioned was social justice, which is huge, of course, in our day.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_03: And as a Christian, I come to that story uh um positively uh because the Bible clearly um enjoins Christians uh to look after the poor.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, just to quote one verse, Zechariah 9, 9 and 10.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_03: Administer true justice, show mercy and compassion to one another, do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_03: So social justice says that the world's the social justice story in our day, the narrative that people are living in, says that there are three groups in society.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_03: There's the oppressed, there's their loyal allies, sometimes called the woke.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_03: I don't like that term because it's it's part of the culture war narrative, which is I I find really um difficult and problematic.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_03: And then there's the oppressors.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_03: And and that's that's if if you get that framework, you understand the world.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_03: Because the problem with the world is discrimination and prejudice.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_03: And what we have to do is to rid the world of discrimination and prejudice, in other words, get the oppressors to either disappear, cancel them, or to change them, and then the world will become a better place.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_03: Now, the problem with that is that it can lead to an unhealthy sense of entitlement.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_03: It is divisive in the end because, and this is the real problem, its diagnosis with what's wrong with humanity is incorrect.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_03: Evil is not restricted just to the oppressors, and discrimination and prejudice are big problems, but they're not the only problems in the world.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_03: Every human being is capable of evil.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_03: And the Lord Jesus himself, of course, put it, you know, he didn't say follow your heart.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_03: He said, out of the heart come all sorts of evil, adultery, murder, theft, slander, and so on.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_03: So all of us are prone to those things.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_03: So the problem with the social justice narrative identity is that it has this wonderfully transformative future, vision of the future.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_03: It's inspiring, it's worthy, but it lacks the means to get there.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_03: We need an intervention from outside humanity, which is what Christians fundamentally believe.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_03: We need the kingdom of God.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_03: And it doesn't mean we don't do anything in the present, because the the future reign of the king, uh the Lord Jesus, is something that's meant to impact the way we live now.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_03: We should address questions of uh discrimination prejudice, but to think they're the only game in town is is really divisive and in the end doesn't help.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_03: Christians have a better story to live, which can address those things.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_02: So many in this part of the world uh are interested in social justice and trying to right the wrongs of the past, uh, but uh it seems like it's a dead end in some ways.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um you had a quote uh from Alexander Solzenitsyn that I think was uh was pretty pretty interesting uh on this about um I think it goes like this um if only there were evil people somewhere uh insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_02: But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_03: Indeed.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's exactly in rectifying justice, maybe new injustices are made.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_02: Is that where where you would go?
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_03: It feels like that, doesn't it?
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_03: We we want to get the fit rid of discrimination prejudice, so we invent new discriminations that uh um exclude certain people.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_02: But then you contrast those stories that cultures uh the Western culture is telling us uh with the story of Jesus Christ.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think many in uh the church would think of it as uh uh as a story.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe you could uh help uh explain what you mean by a story of Jesus Christ as you write it.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so I mean the word story, first up, it it it's got to be understood.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_03: We're not talking fiction.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, the story, story can be narrative is another word.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_03: So um you can have a true story, and that's that's my understanding of it.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_03: So the story of Jesus Christ is really the ultimate indictment of the heart of expressive individualism.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_03: It says you don't have it within yourself to define yourself or to live the good life.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_03: You need an intervention from the outside.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_03: So, in one sense, it's both the bleakest story, it says that we're beyond hope, but it's also the brightest story because it says God has actually decisively intervened.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_03: The odd thing about this story is that people live their life stories based on the template of some other one, of another person, namely Jesus.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_03: Now, it might sound odd even to Christians, but when you think about it, it it's fundamental to the Bible and to the gospel.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_03: So let me give you some uh evidence of that.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_03: So so so basically think of Colossians 3, 3 and 4, which which really has a lovely way of explaining this.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_03: Paul says, You died.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_03: That's a very odd thing to say, isn't it?
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_03: So he says to the Colossian believers, you died.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_03: And and what he means is that we died in union with Christ.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_03: So Christ didn't just die in in our place to secure our forgiveness, we died with him.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_03: So we die to self-interest and to sin.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_03: And we and Paul goes on to say, and I've translated this slightly differently to bring it out, your identity is now hidden with Christ in God.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_03: So we have the secret identity as God's children.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_03: And then he says, When Christ, who is your life story, again, I've I've tucked that in there, the usual translation, who is your life?
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_03: When Christ who is your life story appears, you will appear with him in glory.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_03: So the thing about stories and life stories is you've got defining moments, things in the past that really sum up your essence, that forge your personality, your identity.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_03: And for Christians, that happened 2,000 years ago.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_03: Paul says your defining moment is Christ dying and you dying with him, but you've also got a destiny in a story.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_03: Stories are heading somewhere, they have an ending in mind, and the destiny for Christians is the return of Christ.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_03: But it's not just a revelation of who he is, it's a revelation of who we are in him.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_03: Now, you might think, well, all of that sounds pretty peripheral to the Christian worldview.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_03: It's not, it's central.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_03: And think about it.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_03: At baptism, that's exactly what we do.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_03: We say, I die with Christ if you do baptism by emotion, which I recommend, um, and and then I rise with him uh to new life.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_03: And Paul talks about this in Romans 6 and all sorts of other places.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_03: And uh Christians then look forward to a time in the future that that will define them, but but that future destiny actually makes an impact on our lives now.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_03: So if you read on in Colossians 3, Paul says, look, this new identity is not automatic, it's a gift, but you've got to put it on.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_03: So he says, put on the new identity, and then there's a conduct that attaches to that identity, which reminds us of the cross.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_03: The cross is about God's self-giving love and sacrifice, living for others.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_03: And then Paul goes on in Colossians 3 to say, live in humility, gentleness, kindness, forgiving others, etc.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_03: The Lord's Supper is the same, the communion service.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_03: It's really a way of us identifying with the story of Christ.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_03: We look back to his death and resurrection, we we we uh partake of the bread and wine.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_03: Um we could talk about the details there and what different denominations think, but we all think the same thing on this matter.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_03: We all think that this is really us looking back to our defining moment and looking forward.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_03: We do this, what does it say?
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_03: Until he comes.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_03: So I think uh the Christian worldview is um very much a narrative which we inhabit.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_03: And uh the beautiful thing is that it's reinforced in all sorts of ways in the normal Christian service and in the Christian life.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, in effect, we're to live lives in keeping uh with that story.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_03: And we can go through the elements of uh the church service.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_03: All of them contribute to our don't I our identities.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, Paul says in that famous verse in Colot in Galatians 2.20, uh, I no longer live.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_03: It's Christ who lives in me.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_03: The life I now live in the flesh uh has to do with the crucified Son of God.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_03: Now, again, don't mishear me.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not saying that we, you know, my own life experiences, my own personality doesn't matter.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_03: But but the Christian story will impact the elements and dimensions of my life.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_03: So the kind of father, friend, worker, son I will be will be impacted by this story.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_03: And uh this story ends up um making all the difference uh to the way I live and the way I think about myself.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's a compelling story.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_02: But maybe most uh don't think of it like that, but uh to to consider uh that uh the story has an ending and our involvement, uh whether through the reading of the word, through prayer, uh sacraments, uh, and the like.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_02: But a lot of it starts with uh uh some of the words that Jesus says uh about being involved in that story, uh Matthew 10, 39.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_02: Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake uh will find it.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, might you say a word or two about uh that very crucial scripture text?
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_03: Well, the thing to say is that is just amazing, isn't it?
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_03: It it sounds like Jesus is addressing the 21st century issue of expressive individualism.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_03: Because what what we want what expressive individualism says in our world today is you need to find yourself.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_03: And Jesus has this quite alarming assertion: whoever finds themselves will lose themselves.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_03: And then he turns it around and gives us a promise.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_03: But whoever loses themselves for my sake will find themselves.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_03: So it's a beautiful promise as well as a warning.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_03: And I think um in the book I talk about it quite a bit, but the the basic idea is that when Jesus says whoever finds themselves, he's talking about the kind of self-assertion.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_03: Uh, whoever lives their own life for themselves, concentrating on their own achievements and uh um dreams, uh whoever's wanting to build their own kingdom, those kind of things, will eventually uh lose out.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_03: Um but then there's that beautiful promise.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_03: Whoever loses themselves for my sake will find themselves.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_03: I think personal identity and happiness, actually, it's kind of like trying to get a good night's sleep.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_03: You don't get a good night's sleep by trying really hard.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_03: Um, you get a good night's sleep by doing certain other things.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_03: And then a good night's sleep is a byproduct of those things.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_03: So having a secure and stable, satisfying sense of self, I think is a byproduct of other things.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_03: It's a byproduct of living for others, of having a secure attachment to God, those kind of things.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_03: It's quite understandable that people want to have that sense of self, but by focusing exclusively on the self, um, I uh ironically, it's a tragic irony, really.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_03: You you end up losing yourself.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I think that the great irony in our day is it's never been more important to know who you are, but it's never been more difficult to know who you are.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_03: And in my view, that that's in large measure to do with uh this um pervasive movement.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_02: I think your book adds in a very good way by uh calling people then to uh a lifestyle where one loses oneself uh um in another story, right?
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_02: In the person of Jesus.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_03: And in the service of others, yeah.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_02: And in the service of others, and then actually finding it uh at the end.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_02: Well, thank you so much for uh taking the time, Brian, to talk with us uh about your book, uh How to Find Yourself by uh Looking Inward is not the answer.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_02: And uh certainly wish you well in your uh ministry there in uh Australia and also with uh with your writing.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_03: Thanks so much, Drake.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_03: It's been a pleasure.