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Acedia and Faith That Lasts: God in the Desert (Noelle Forlini-Burt) · Thinking Christian: Bible, Theology, and Culture

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  Speaker 1: The world is becoming increasingly proficient at telling stories that
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  Speaker 1: deny God. As such, we need Thinking Christian to become
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  Speaker 1: as natural as breathing. Welcome to the Thinking Christian podcast.
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  Speaker 1: I'm doctor James Spencer. Through calm, thoughtful theological discussions, Thinking
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  Speaker 1: Christian highlights the ways God is working in the world
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  Speaker 1: and questions the underlying social, cultural, and political assumptions that
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  Speaker 1: hinder Christians from becoming more like Christ. Now on to
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  Speaker 1: today's episode of Thinking Christian. Hey, everyone, welcome to this
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  Speaker 1: episode of Thinking Christian. I'm doctor James Spencer and I'm
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  Speaker 1: joined today by doctor Noel for Leini Bert and she
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  Speaker 1: is the author of a book called God in the Desert,
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  Speaker 1: a spiritual theology of wilderness in the Old Testament. She's
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  Speaker 1: also a part time lecturer at Sanford University. And really
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  Speaker 1: enjoyed this book. You all know I'm kind of an
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  Speaker 1: Old Testament geek myself, and so I really appreciated this
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  Speaker 1: book and am happy to welcome Noel to the podcast.
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  Speaker 1: So welcome, Thank you.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Well, I usually like to start out and just ask authors,
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  Speaker 1: you know what prompted this book. This is a really
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  Speaker 1: interesting way of approaching the Old Testament. We emerge Old
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  Speaker 1: Testament with spiritual formation, spiritual direction, and so I'm just
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  Speaker 1: wondering if you can give us a little bit of
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  Speaker 1: an insight into what prompted you to go this direction
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  Speaker 1: and brought what drew your interest to the wilderness in
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  Speaker 1: the Old Testament.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been about twenty years in the making, to
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  Speaker 2: be honest, I mean I can go all the way
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  Speaker 2: back to my first semester spiritual formation class and seminary,
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  Speaker 2: and if you're familiar, our professor introduced us to a
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  Speaker 2: book called Devotional Classics, which is coming out of the
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  Speaker 2: Richard Foster Renovarri movement, and it's a compilation of excerpts
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  Speaker 2: from various spiritual writings throughout church history. And in that book,
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  Speaker 2: I met Saint John of the Cross for the first time,
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  Speaker 2: and Foster did sort of mash up with the Dark
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  Speaker 2: Knight of the Soul and Psalm forty two, which, of course,
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  Speaker 2: this is a psalm that is asking, you know, questions
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  Speaker 2: of where God is and longing to feel God's presence
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  Speaker 2: in the way that Psalmist once did. And I remember
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  Speaker 2: being in that class and being assigned to lead our
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  Speaker 2: class discussion that particular day and there was just something
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  Speaker 2: about the topic of darkness in God's absence and the
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  Speaker 2: questions that you have about God that are that are
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  Speaker 2: real and present and visceral even that felt really true,
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  Speaker 2: and that like, here are things that a lot of
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  Speaker 2: us feel but don't talk about. And I remember thinking,
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  Speaker 2: as a twenty three year old first semester seminarian that
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  Speaker 2: this text, this John the Cross and writings like that
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  Speaker 2: was a text for me and a topic for me.
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  Speaker 2: And I didn't know why. And I had a sense,
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  Speaker 2: this sort of intuitive sense, very early, that this is
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  Speaker 2: something that maybe not now, but somewhere down the line,
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  Speaker 2: that this sort of amalgamation of topics of suffering and
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  Speaker 2: darkness and confusion and God's absence would be important somehow
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  Speaker 2: in my life. And so fast forward a few years later,
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  Speaker 2: and I found myself doing a PhD in All Testament,
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  Speaker 2: and the story of Jacob wrestling with God the Javic
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  Speaker 2: River found me and it was the topic of my dissertation.
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  Speaker 2: And so once again it was darkness, and it was
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  Speaker 2: God's absence, and yet somehow God's hyper presence, the God
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  Speaker 2: that sometimes feels miles away and then sometimes it other
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  Speaker 2: times feels violently present, in ways that change your whole life,
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  Speaker 2: and how this particular care to encounter darkness literally and
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  Speaker 2: figuratively a lot in his story, and it feels and
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  Speaker 2: was a wilderness of sorts. And so I'm living with
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  Speaker 2: with that Old Testament text I'm living with at the
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  Speaker 2: time taking a doctoral seminar on the cloud of unknowing
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  Speaker 2: and learning about the mystics and desert fathers and desert
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  Speaker 2: mothers of the early Church and just seeing images that
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  Speaker 2: all related to wilderness in some way, like these sort
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  Speaker 2: of opposing ideas that all felt true in the life
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  Speaker 2: of faith, Like there's darkness, but you get enlightened in
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  Speaker 2: darkness too. Sometimes things are they're barren, they're stark, yet
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  Speaker 2: there's there's fecundity that is, there's abundance. Is also there's
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  Speaker 2: this idea that there's dislocation and exile, but there's homecoming
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  Speaker 2: true too, there's betrothal and divorce, and there's consolation, desolation, hunger, satiation,
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  Speaker 2: you know, abandonment and nurture and just all these things
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  Speaker 2: that wilderness became the image for me over time that
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  Speaker 2: represented all that and represented suffering and restlessness and confusion
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  Speaker 2: and malaise and stripping away of the things that we
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  Speaker 2: rely on usually and I think most provocatively encounter with God.
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  Speaker 2: And so I entered wilderness really through darkness, because I
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  Speaker 2: think that these are overlapping things and they feel they
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  Speaker 2: feel true in the actual lives people have, as opposed
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  Speaker 2: to the lives people say that they have. So yeah, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: I was just it's you know, what is it the
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  Speaker 2: most the most personal is the most universal, right, And
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  Speaker 2: that's really where I started.
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  Speaker 1: So very cool. I you know, as I was reading
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  Speaker 1: your book, one of the things that I think I've
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  Speaker 1: thought about for a long time is I was never
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  Speaker 1: much on preaching. I do it occasionally now, but even
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  Speaker 1: when I preach, I mostly just teach and then you
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  Speaker 1: draw some application. And as I was reading through your book,
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  Speaker 1: one of the things that struck me was this sort
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  Speaker 1: of I don't want to call it a hard line,
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  Speaker 1: but you talk about the intersection of liturgy and scholarship
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  Speaker 1: at one point, and how these two really do need
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  Speaker 1: to go together. And what I found myself asking was,
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  Speaker 1: you know, as I've done a little bit more I
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  Speaker 1: don't know, applicational work, right, trying to apply ex to Jesus,
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  Speaker 1: to the church, not just sort of siphoning it off
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  Speaker 1: and isolating it from real life. What I find is
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  Speaker 1: that merging it to real life, in other words, making
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  Speaker 1: the ex of Jesus fit the liturgy is actually the
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  Speaker 1: harder task. It's a much more difficult task, and they
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  Speaker 1: require each other. But I'm wondering how you think about this,
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  Speaker 1: the necessity of scholarship and it's relation to spiritual life.
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  Speaker 1: So in other words, and maybe I could just say
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  Speaker 1: like this, just so I kind of get my thought
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  Speaker 1: clear to you, is I see sometimes I see a
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  Speaker 1: lot of sort of pithy devotional content. Yeah, it has
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  Speaker 1: the ring of connecting to real life, but is very
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  Speaker 1: disconnected from the text. Yeah, and I'm wondering how you
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  Speaker 1: think about that relationship.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's tricky because I've seen it done as you
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  Speaker 2: have in different ways. So one way is the very
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  Speaker 2: low hanging, shallow fruit of application without exegesus, you know,
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  Speaker 2: to where I just said this in classed this morning.
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  Speaker 2: A text without a context is a pretext for it
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  Speaker 2: to mean anything you want it to me, And that's
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  Speaker 2: really dangerous. And so you know, these sort of pithy
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  Speaker 2: things that we put on greeting cards and on throw
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  Speaker 2: pillows divorced from truly dealing with the Biblical text as
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  Speaker 2: it needs to be dealt with is dangerous and shallow.
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  Speaker 2: And what is equally dangerous too, though, I think is
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  Speaker 2: I've said in church is that you know, I was
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  Speaker 2: trained as a seminarian, as a doctoral student to really
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  Speaker 2: do the opposite of what I just said, to really
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  Speaker 2: dig into the context, to really dig into the world
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  Speaker 2: underneath the text and to the exclusion of the soul,
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  Speaker 2: to the exclusion of the heart. And I have sat
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  Speaker 2: in church services well intentioned with people I love behind
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  Speaker 2: the pulpit and have walked away going I have no
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  Speaker 2: idea how this is relevant to my soul. I have
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  Speaker 2: no idea how this is forming me. This feels like
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  Speaker 2: a lecture and I don't And moreover, I don't even
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  Speaker 2: know who you are behind the pulpit, much less who
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  Speaker 2: God is. So I think that and who God is
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  Speaker 2: like pursuing me and wanting me to be So I
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  Speaker 2: think that there's a danger too that we hide behind
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  Speaker 2: our scholarship because we don't know how to go about
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  Speaker 2: the deep soul work, or we're afraid to or you know,
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  Speaker 2: I'm not a pastor, so I can say this. So
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  Speaker 2: somewhat judgmentally without any kind of repercussion for myself, but
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  Speaker 2: you know, without any vulnerability at all. And so I
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  Speaker 2: could understand only as a lay person, but I could
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  Speaker 2: understand that the perception of danger in letting you your
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  Speaker 2: congregants in too much. So I just feel that both
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  Speaker 2: of those postures, both of those opposites really have made
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  Speaker 2: me feel lonely. You know, I've walked away from church
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  Speaker 2: or Bible City or whatever it might be, feeling just malnourished.
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  Speaker 2: And so I think about, like, how might I pursue
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  Speaker 2: the discipline and it is an academic discipline of spiritual
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  Speaker 2: formation with the same degree of I hope, excellence and
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  Speaker 2: rigor in learning. Who are the seminal voices in this
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  Speaker 2: field and what were they about and what have they
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  Speaker 2: given to us? I'll say that Robert Mulholland's shape by
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  Speaker 2: the word using scripture or the power of scripture and
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  Speaker 2: spiritual formation has changed my life because he was a
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  Speaker 2: New Testament scholar that was his training, who was equally
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  Speaker 2: robust in this other discipline, and he brought them together.
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  Speaker 2: And so just how can we bring them together and
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  Speaker 2: also do it in the way that formation is intended
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  Speaker 2: as not just an academic discipline, although it is that,
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  Speaker 2: but to really let it do what it's supposed to do,
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  Speaker 2: which is to excavate the soul and draw us closer
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  Speaker 2: to God. So I think about just trying really deeply
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  Speaker 2: in my own life to bring as the Wesleyans would say,
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  Speaker 2: knowledge and vital piety together, and to be whether it's
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  Speaker 2: in class or in my writing or whatever it might be,
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  Speaker 2: as honest as I can. I share a little bit
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  Speaker 2: of my own story in the book, and also to
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  Speaker 2: say that, like, these are not perfect things, and I
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  Speaker 2: can offer a list of practices and have and do
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  Speaker 2: and will, but these are things, all of them that
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  Speaker 2: just position us before God, and we don't have really
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  Speaker 2: much control over what they do to us. We are
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  Speaker 2: dependent upon God for God to do that work. All
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  Speaker 2: we do is position ourselves before the God before whom
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  Speaker 2: we are laid there.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, So, I mean, I think, as I think back
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  Speaker 1: through your book, one of the things that I really
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  Speaker 1: appreciated was the tension you're able to sort of hold
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  Speaker 1: together without smoothing out the uncomfortable parts. So, I mean,
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  Speaker 1: I think about the chapter on Hagar and the way
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  Speaker 1: you deal with Abram and Sarah and the way they
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  Speaker 1: treat this woman. And you don't say, look, these people
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  Speaker 1: are now evil and we should frame we should demonize them, right,
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  Speaker 1: But you also, I think appropriately recognize these are not
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  Speaker 1: the people who are supposed to venerate. We can recognize
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  Speaker 1: their faith, and Hebrews eleven, as you mentioned, does that.
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  Speaker 1: But then we also have to really pay attention of
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  Speaker 1: the Old Testament record. We can't just take that little
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  Speaker 1: sliver of testimony, which the New Testament isn't giving a
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  Speaker 1: robust ex to Jesus of that narrative. They're pinpointing a
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  Speaker 1: very specific action, and so there's a narrowing that happens
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  Speaker 1: in the New Testament, especially in Hebrews eleven. And when
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  Speaker 1: we get to the Old Testament, we have to read
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  Speaker 1: this sort of broader stroke and recognize that there is
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  Speaker 1: a tension here, that there are things we need to
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  Speaker 1: wrestle with and recognize, and that this is in some
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  Speaker 1: way commensurate with the way that our lives look as
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  Speaker 1: opposed to being sort of a a pristine model that
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  Speaker 1: we're supposed to live up to. But I really appreciated
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  Speaker 1: the way you were able to deal with some of
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  Speaker 1: those really sentimental narratives in a way that respected some
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  Speaker 1: of that sentiment but also really challenged it and drew
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  Speaker 1: out some other aspects of those pieces.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you. The Hagar story is one that has followed
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  Speaker 2: me in a way that most stories have not. And
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  Speaker 2: I almost didn't put that into the book because I've
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  Speaker 2: I've written so much about Hagar already that I felt
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  Speaker 2: like I had nothing else to say. And it just
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  Speaker 2: came to me. And that's that I wrote that chapter
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  Speaker 2: in a in an afternoon. I mean, it just came.
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  Speaker 2: And you know, I think I look at biblical characters
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  Speaker 2: and in this case, Abraham and Sarah in the way
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  Speaker 2: that I look at myself and the people in my
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  Speaker 2: own life. And you know, when when I was younger,
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  Speaker 2: I was more apt to think in black and white
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  Speaker 2: ways about myself, and I so deeply wanted to be
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  Speaker 2: the good person in my own story. And you know, conversely,
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  Speaker 2: the people that have hurt me, I so deeply wanted
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  Speaker 2: to say, you're the bad guy in the story of
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  Speaker 2: my life. And because what does that do for me?
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  Speaker 2: It helps me to sleep at night self righteously and
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  Speaker 2: to still allow myself to be a good person. And
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  Speaker 2: the more that I've grown and aged. Really, the more
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  Speaker 2: that I've aged, I see that we're complex people. That
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  Speaker 2: I am I'm sure the mentor in someone's life and
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  Speaker 2: the person who has I hope been helpful to someone.
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  Speaker 2: And I'm probably the villain in someone else's story too,
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  Speaker 2: And we are mixtures of darkness and light, And so
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  Speaker 2: why would not the characters in the biblical text be
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  Speaker 2: that as well? And so I think just holding up
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  Speaker 2: a mirror and saying, here the places where Yeah, Abraham
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  Speaker 2: is the friend of God. He is, you know, he is,
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  Speaker 2: depending on how to read Genesis twenty two in particular,
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  Speaker 2: I mean, historically it's been read as this is the
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  Speaker 2: pinnacle of his faith. I mean there's there's certainly counter
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  Speaker 2: readings that complicate that, right sure, But to see that,
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  Speaker 2: like he he does things that are positive and faithful
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  Speaker 2: and things that are really really destructive, and so do
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  Speaker 2: I and you know, so do we all. And to
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  Speaker 2: look at that honestly and to say, God, please help
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  Speaker 2: me to see those places in myself and be willing
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  Speaker 2: to look at them and willing to deal with them.
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  Speaker 2: It is an aspect I think of grace and that
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  Speaker 2: I offer to myself and offer to characters in the
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  Speaker 2: text too, So.
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  Speaker 1: I don't want to get too far off on a tangent,
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  Speaker 1: but you brought up Genesis twenty two, and I had
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  Speaker 1: a question when I was reading your book or an idea,
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  Speaker 1: and so I hadn't really reflected on the Haggar story
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  Speaker 1: the way that you did. So obviously there's the connection
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  Speaker 1: with her going out into the wilderness, hearing from God,
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  Speaker 1: you know, almost being you know, we could say, exiled
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  Speaker 1: from her place, her normal home place, you know. Abraham
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  Speaker 1: and Sarah I push her out because they don't there's
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  Speaker 1: tension there and they don't want to deal with this tension,
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  Speaker 1: and then God sees her. What I found really fascinating
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  Speaker 1: was in reading your interpretation of the Hagar narrative was
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  Speaker 1: how I began to think differently about Genesis twenty two.
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  Speaker 1: I you know, you always catch that, okay, Ishmael's gone now, right,
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  Speaker 1: So this would have been the second time that Hagar
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  Speaker 1: and Ishmael are sent away, right, They sent her away twice,
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  Speaker 1: once when it's just her and then once when it's Ishmael.
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  Speaker 1: I'm correct about that. I think, yeah, it always gets
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  Speaker 1: mixed up and then so you always catch that, okay,
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  Speaker 1: Ishmael's gone, Isaac's the only one left. And now this
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  Speaker 1: is this act of sacrifice in Genesis twenty two that
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  Speaker 1: Abram's going to be tested. Is he going to give
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  Speaker 1: this his only son to the Lord? What I don't
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  Speaker 1: think I caught in all of that was the dynamics
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  Speaker 1: between those initial narratives where he's trying to push Hagar out,
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  Speaker 1: push Hagar in Ishmail out, and now himself being challenged
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  Speaker 1: to say, like, if you want to raise the tension,
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  Speaker 1: how do we raise it? How does this? How do
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  Speaker 1: how does Genesis twenty two function in light of those
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  Speaker 1: other two narratives. So I don't know whether you have
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  Speaker 1: any insights on that, but that was one of those
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  Speaker 1: things that it raised a question in my mind and
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  Speaker 1: I wanted to ask you about it.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's interesting. I mean, you're right that Hagar and
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  Speaker 2: Ishmael are are cast out. They are cast out twice.
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  Speaker 2: This is, you know, what we call on the ltestiamate doublets,
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  Speaker 2: the same story, same basic story, told twice in slightly
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  Speaker 2: different ways. Maybe it's different authors, who knows, and the
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  Speaker 2: sort of pathos of that. I mean, these are stories
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  Speaker 2: that raise the emotional bar higher and higher and you
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  Speaker 2: see that really what Abraham is left with is just
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  Speaker 2: the one son. And the text is very very clear
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  Speaker 2: as it piles adjectives onto take your son, take your
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  Speaker 2: only son, take the son that you love. Just in
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  Speaker 2: that very first verse, I think it is that just
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  Speaker 2: really describes the pathos of giving up this thing that
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  Speaker 2: you wanted so desperately and being willing to do that,
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  Speaker 2: and the sort of effect on potential effect on Sarah
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  Speaker 2: as well. I mean, that's the last that we really
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  Speaker 2: hear from her is the previous story. And the rabbis
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  Speaker 2: would say about Sarah that she dropped dead after this moment,
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  Speaker 2: that that's why we don't hear from hers is after
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  Speaker 2: this story, that it just killed her. So the emotion,
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  Speaker 2: So there's emotional on every side, even in the rabbinic
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  Speaker 2: literature that talks about this. And you know what we
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  Speaker 2: do with that story, whether we take it to be
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  Speaker 2: a story about critiquing human sacrifice and other religions, whether
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  Speaker 2: we take that as a story of different authors where
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  Speaker 2: Elahim requires one thing and y always requires another, and
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  Speaker 2: this is how this is getting worked out. There's a
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  Speaker 2: lot about the compositional history of that particular text. Yes,
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  Speaker 2: but the pathos is there, certainly, and just the requirement
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  Speaker 2: to give the very last thing that you want to give,
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  Speaker 2: the very last thing that you have to give, the
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  Speaker 2: dream that you've always wanted, and to be willing to
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  Speaker 2: see to that and submit that. You know, read in
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  Speaker 2: a positive light, I can empathize with dreams that you
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  Speaker 2: want to keep.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it's just I think what struck me
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  Speaker 1: and that again as I sort of read your purgation chapter,
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  Speaker 1: your purging chapter, which I kind of like we can
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  Speaker 1: turn to next. But I just think there's a beautiful
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  Speaker 1: symmetry in this idea that Abram and Sarah are consistently
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  Speaker 1: trying to push out Hagar and take away the things
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  Speaker 1: that mattered to her. And so the test that God
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: puts Abram through is the consequence of his actions in
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: relation to Hagar and Ishmael. Like, yes, God tells him
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: to send Ishmael away, and it's okay, but the reality
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: is that there they've already pushed them out. They've pushed
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: Hagar out, and there was no concern for her losing anything,
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: and now all of a sudden, Abram is put to
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: the test in this and I just it struck me
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: that those narratives are probably more closely tied together than
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: just the superficial Ishmael's gone and the only Isaac remains.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: So I definitely appreciate it about that chapter.
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Yeah.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: So let's talk about the purging chapter, because I thought
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: that was really Again, as I sort of read through
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: the Purging chapter, what started to come to my mind is,
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: so I look through the you know, you do the
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: wilderness peace as a place of testing. You reference Deuteronomy eight,
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: all those you know, sort of texts that many people
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: are familiar with that you know, man does not live
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: on bread alone, but not everywhere. That comes from the
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: mouth of the Lord. And you know, the Israelites are
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: sent out into the wilderness as a test so they
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: can learn to follow the commands of the Lord. But
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: then you get into Hoseiah and you have this much
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: harsher language in Hoseiah. It's very strong prophetic language where
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: God is going to send his people into the wilderness.
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: He's going to send them out, and you talk about
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: it in terms of purging, and so I'm just I'm
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: interested to hear you kind of walk through that a bit.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: And then I'll pepper in a few questions along the way.
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I should say the Hoseah chapter was the first
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: chapter I wrote for the book, and it was the hardest,
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: certainly for the reasons that you're naming the hardest to
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: get right, I don't know that I did the hardest.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: To Gosh, how many minefields can I can I step
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: over or step on potential lad So I offer that
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: with a great deal of fear and trepidation. I would say,
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: you know, Hoseah, the idea that God is bringing them
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: to the wilderness is not unique to Hoseah. I mean
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: Exodus thirteen talks about this, that God caused them. And
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: I won't geek out too much here, but the Hebrew
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: nuance there is in the verb is in fact causative.
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: It is God's agency that does this. It's not circumstances,
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: it's not happenstance. It is God's decision. And so it
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: makes sense to me then that Joseiah too might function
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: similarly in this way. And I think the thing that
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: helped me a little bit to soften some of the
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: Biblical language is to go to the Christian mystic mystical tradition,
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: so use the word purgation, and that is a part
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: of the mystical tradition of what we call the scholars
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: called the threefold way of purgation, illumination, and contemplation. And
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: it's kind of across the board. The mystics are weird
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: and wonderful, and I learned to love them, and seminary
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: and doctor work too, but they are all wanting to
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: have the end of union with God and a lover
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: and beloved meeting one another, and so speaking these really
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: impassioned and sometimes uncomfortable ways about the relationship between God
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: and the believer, and purgation is a part of that.
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: And in that tradition, purgation is this kind of stripping
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: way of all the things that a believer might normally
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: rely upon, all of the I forget who whose language
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: this is. It might be Henry Allen. The self made
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: props that we all, that we all hold on to.
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: Those those are different for all of us. You know,
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: we are not in Hoseiah's day and time. We are
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: not Israelites in the eighth century who are pursuing idols
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: or who are reliant on maybe political frenemies to help
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: them when times are hard. That's not who we are,
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: because it's not our context, But what are the the
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: self made props that I'm reliant upon? You know, I
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: just this is not Bible, but it's it's I think
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: it's somewhat relevant. I just read Gertu's Faust for the
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: first time a few months ago, and that has stayed
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: with me in such a sobering way. What is the thing?
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's it's it's on the face of its
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: particular story, it's, you know, a man who sells his
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: soul to the devil for infinite knowledge. But boy, I
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: read that and it sits on my shelf, and I
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: think to myself, I could see myself doing some version
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: of that, some form of that, whatever that looks like.
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: Of I really want to know all the things, and
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: so what is what is the idol in my life?
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: What are the things that I really need to relinquish?
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: And perhaps when I'm in some sort of stark situation,
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: when my dreams have been crushed, when you know, some
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: terrible thing has happened to me, and whatever that might be,
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: whatever it is that gets me to wake up and
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: to pay attention and to see that God is really
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: wanting me deeply, and he's wanting me in this beloved
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: way that this latter portion of Josea two is dealing with.
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: He's wanting to have that sort of romantic in the
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: sense of adventure and of closeness with me and I
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: have one foot in and one foot out often, and
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: the Israelites are a picture of that. So I think,
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: I think to answer your question going back to Christian
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: tradition and maybe not imposing on Hooseiah too, but using
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: it as a conversation partner with it, Yeah, helps me
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: a little bit. But to be honest, Yeah, Joseiah too
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: is really hard. And you know, I do fear. I
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: do fear the reader here and his or her vitriol
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: perhaps sense I don't know.
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: No, I mean I think as I read through it.
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: This has always been something. I think it's something that
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: Old Testament theologians always struggle with, is you know, what
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: is God doing here? And how do we think about
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: a punishing God? And sometimes I try to explain it,
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: and I think this softens the language way too much,
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: but sometimes it helps people get their head around it.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: It's like when my son was younger, he used to
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: have his iPhone or whatever, and he'd sit in the
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: tub and he'd have the iPhone on the side of
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: the tub, and I would tell him, I'm like, if
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: you continue to do that, at some point that phone
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: ends up in that water, right, But it didn't no
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: matter how much I warned, and he continued to do it,
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: and eventually the phone fell in the water.
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: So we get the rice out, we dried it out,
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: it's all good. But he learns a lesson. Right, Yeah, Well,
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: I didn't throw the phone in the water, but it
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: was the natural consequence of the behavior, like getting to
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: that line and working through it. And so when I
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: read that Hoseah too, my mind was going back to
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: and I don't think there's any formal relation between these
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: two texts, but the comments regarding the husband's responsibility within
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: a marriage in Exodus twenty one. Ye know that resonated
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: in my head as I was reading those passages and
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: Hoseah and your reflection on them, because it's like, look
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: what he's taking away. He's taking away the provision and
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: security that a husband is to provide a wife. But
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: in this case it's because the wife has been unfaithful
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: that these things she's no longer deserving of these things.
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: And even then, as God comes back and shows mercy.
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: We see the ongoing faithfulness of God despite his that purging. Yeah,
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: you know, he comes back and sort of is tender
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: and so he's long suffering with us. But no, I
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: thought it was a really effective chapter. And I think
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: that when I was reading it, one of the concepts
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: I really loved that you pulled out that I had
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: I was unfamiliar with. I'm not even sure I'm going
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: to pronounce it right, but the aciitia oh.
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, that concept, And I'd like you'd
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: explained a little bit.
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: But that concept I think made sense for me of
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: a lot of the tensions that we feel, and it
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: gets around to what you're talking about, the idols and
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: what we really depend on. I think, so maybe talk
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: a little bit about that if you don't mind.
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Asidia is a concept that comes out of the
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: desert tradition. So I'm linking that mostly with the desert
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: fathers mothers and potentially with the Hagar story, but it
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: absolutely applies here too. Yeah. So when Christianity gets legalized
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: under Constantine in the early three hundreds, it becomes you know,
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: church and states so to speak, come together, and it
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: becomes much easier to become a Christian, and Christianity becomes
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: cultural in many ways. And so there were those men
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: and women who felt Christians, who felt like the opulence
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: of the church is no longer representative of the Jesus
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: who suffered and died, and so they fled to the wilderness.
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: And when they fled to the wilderness, they encountered all
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: of these temptations what ancient desert fathers and mothers called
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: i guessimoy. That is, the thoughts that assail you, you know,
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: lust or the desire to go back to where you
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: came from, the desire to give up. Uh. And so
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: you know, there's all this advice in the desert tradition
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: about how to deal with that. But one thing that
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: that often happened, and the result of being in this
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: this desert space that was stark and it was remote,
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: was just the desire to kind of give up, the
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: desire to get just a kind of weariness at the
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: heat of the day. And it really is connected to
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: the noon. The noonday demon is is one way in
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: which it's referred to. It's that that demon that whatever
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: that demon is for you, for the individual that assails you,
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: and that says this life that you're leading that is austere, uh,
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: and it costs you something isn't worth it, and so
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: that that sets in. And sometimes it takes something significant
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: in your life to wake you up and to lead
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: you back to a place of impassioned love for God.
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: So I think, yeah, I think that's very very relevant.
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: I'm I just turned forty three, and I feel the
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: weariness of midlife very deeply and have been a Christian
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: for a long time and can and can understand that
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: in a very lived kind of way. Even though I'm
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: not a monk or desert mother, but I in my
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: own way, I can understand, Gosh, the world is not
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: what I thought it was, and I might just want
• 33:41
  Speaker 2: to give up and just do what everybody else does,
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: you know. So I think it's a clear and present
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: danger for a lot of us.
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: So I will say I mean, I think it resonated
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: with me in a few different ways. It was number one,
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: you know, I started thinking about my own life and saying,
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: I haven't had any major tragedies. I think my wife
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: and I have been really blessed in that way. We
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: just haven't had any major tragedies. But there is something
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: to be said for death by a thousand cuts. And
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: at this point, you know, at forty eight, we've you know,
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: we have three, three biological kids. We just adopted a
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: five year old. You know, careers are going different directions,
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. Like you just have the grind
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: of that day to day and sometimes you sit back
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: and you go, man, it'd be a lot easier not
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: to be faithful at this point, right, Just you could,
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: you know, I could make this work so much easier.
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: And I do think that that is the sort of
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: complacency that draws in because we don't see the immediate
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: effect or the effect that we want maybe of being faithful.
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: We want we want life to get better, and we
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: we we labor under the impression that being faithful should
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: being blessing. And I think more maybe more specifically, faithfulness
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: should bring the blessing that we expect, you know, yeah,
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: not the one that God surprises us with, but the
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: one that we actually want. And yeah, So I just
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: really resonated with that concept and felt like it fit
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: the tone that you were trying to strike in the book,
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: which I think is the world isn't quite right, yeah,
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: and this is where we live and we should not
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: ignore what's not right about it. Well, at the same time,
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: we can't surrender to what's not right about it either.
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, I think the implication with Asdia and with
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: the whole of the wilderness experience is the exact opposite
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: of what we kind of began talking about, which is
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: the shallow faith. And I think that the wilderness and
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: Assidia and all of these concepts inside of this book
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: and inside of the wilderness traditions plural implies a deep faith.
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: It implies a weathered faith, It implies a lived in
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: faith because these are questions that get raised because you're
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: living with God. So I would I would take some encouragement,
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: I think from that.
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: So I have another sort of curveball question. So this
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: is the danger of me liking the Old Testament. And
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: so as I was reading through the Wilderness work that
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: you're doing, and you know, seeing how the war the
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: wilderness is so formative, and how it sort of strips
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: you down to your bar essence. It takes away the
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: things that you would ordinarily depend on. And I think
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: Deuteronomy AD is really crucial to this. You know, when
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: God warns the Israelites that when they go into the
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: land and they have this prosperity and they're living there
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: that they not forget God and say it is my strength,
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: of my power that has gotten me all this wealth. Yeah, right,
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: that sort of temptation the wilderness pulls all that back.
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: My mind immediately went to the Garden of Eden, this
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: beautiful place of provision and abundance, is where it all
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: sort of begins to fall apart. And I'm wondering if
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: you have any thoughts on how those two sort of
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: fit together as almost mirror images where what we see,
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: you know how what we see in the garden is
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: sort of the opposite of what we're seeing in the wilderness.
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Gosh. Deuteronomy eight, I think, for me, is a
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: text that I really kind of hate because it really
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: forces me to look at grace.
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: Likewise, the Garden story forces me to look at grace,
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: what is given, what is provided. Yeah. I had this
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: moment not I'm to my shame, not long ago, where
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: I was driving around Birmingham where I live, and you know,
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: those those moments in the car are moments where you know,
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: what you really think about life kind of just comes
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: at you because there's no distraction, no one talking to you,
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: and I thought to myself, I really don't like grace.
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: I really like I really want to believe that my
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: hard work has paid off. Yeah, I really want to
• 38:44
  Speaker 2: think that kind of you. You were sort of talking earlier.
• 38:48
  Speaker 2: You didn't use this phrasing, but it's it's that it's
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: this retributive justice idea of if I pursue covenant, whatever
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: that looks like in a New Testament or in a
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: Christian sense, now, if I pursue God in the right ways,
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: then God will bless me. And that's a very shallow,
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: black and white way of looking at the world. In
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: the Book of job right pushes against that, our own
• 39:14
  Speaker 2: lives push against that. But there's something in me that
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: really wants that to be the case, because that allows
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: me to put a quarter in a machine and get
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: a candy bar out.
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: You know, that's right.
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think both the garden and the wilderness
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: shows us that whatever is, whatever is that is good,
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: is not what I have procured for myself. And it's
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: it's the moments that God has given me things that
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: I have not worked for, that have taught me that
• 39:48
  Speaker 2: and so that there can be, in this very strange way,
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: a kind of garden inside of the wilderness when when
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: you discover that it has been grace all along, you know,
• 40:04
  Speaker 2: And I think, and I think that you realize too,
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: like what is it that you really value? And what
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: are is hard work the idol in my life? Oh,
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: I think it's one of them. You know. I'm an
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: ang Ram three and I will absolutely outwork you. We
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: like I will, I will achieve the goals. And that's
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: one thing I've learned over the last few years especially,
• 40:27
  Speaker 2: is I had this moment I'll just share this in
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: my own personal life where I set out loud and
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: I'm so ashamed of this, but I set out loud
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: to someone, well, I'll be there because this is the
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: most important thing in my life. And as I said that,
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: I thought, what are you doing? Like that is so wrong?
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: That is and that that's such a shallow thing. And
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: so just really learning just like the the thing in me,
• 41:00
  Speaker 2: even that push against grace and that requires me, I think,
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: to live in wilderness so that I can see the
• 41:08
  Speaker 2: abundance of the garden. Yeah.
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: One of the just as you're talking there, one of
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: my one of my favorite texts for Samuel twelve, where
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: Samuel they've asked Samuel to give him a king, and
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: Samuel comes back, you know, God has told them, hey,
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: they're rejecting me, not you give him the king they're
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: asking for. And Samuel comes back, and he says, if
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: you will fear the Lord and keep your commandments, it
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: will go well with you. You you know, you have to
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: fear him, but your king also has to fear them.
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: And and it comes to mind because as you're as
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: you're talking about the grace necessary in the garden and
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: in the wilderness, there's a governing dynamic that God said
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: in place that doesn't change. It's this dependence on Him
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: that are our best strategy is always obedience. That the
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: fear of the Lord is what we are supposed to do,
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: regardless of our situation, and that that's what I think
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: we're supposed to see is missing in the garden, and
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: it's what we begin to learn in the wilderness.
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: And so I think that's just such a resonant theme
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: throughout scripture, but we often miss it because I like you,
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: I agree with you. Yeah, I don't like grace. I
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: want to earn it.
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And I.
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: Have this sort of misplaced understanding in my head that
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: I probably could you know, I'm yeah, I'm in any
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: of your gram eight. So it's like, no, that's a
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: good challenge, right, let me earn it all right, Yeah,
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: but that's not the way it works. And so yeah,
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: that's great. Well, we're getting close to the end of time.
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: And I usually ask guests like one kind of final
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: question just to get their take on it. So you
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: don't have to answer it from your book, you don't
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: have to answer it from anything we talked about. But
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: what do you think the church needs to do in
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: today's world in order to that maybe it's not doing
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: right now now to be and make more faithful disciples
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: for Christ.
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: I think one of the things of two things really,
• 43:13
  Speaker 2: I sort of joke that the most dangerous or the
• 43:17
  Speaker 2: most like self confident person in the world is a
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: twenty three year old seminarian and the second most self
• 43:27
  Speaker 2: confident person in the world is a twenty four year
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: old seminarian. And I think that like what we need,
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: at least in part, is a real willingness to be humble,
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: and with that humility comes not assuming that you have
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: the answers, and so underneath that I think is I'm
• 43:54
  Speaker 2: willing to ask questions. You know, this whole book about
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: wilderness supposes that, as you said, life is not exactly
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: what we thought it was going to be. It's maybe
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: not what we wanted it to be. And why is that?
• 44:10
  Speaker 2: And there are a lot of people, I think that
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: are afraid to ask the why questions of and about God,
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: And so I think, you know, one way that we
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: move from a shallow, self assured faith is to really
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: engage God with honesty. You know, we are we are
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: our proper selves and prayer often, and I think we
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: should come to God with honesty and trust that God
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: will will meet us there and alongside that, not hide
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: behind whatever talents tools exit Jesus that we want to
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: cling to, and realize that that spiritual formation and biblical
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: studies are fully important and needed, and we will do ourselves. Know,
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: there's a lot of harm if we don't allow God
• 45:07
  Speaker 2: to excavate our ideas of who God is and who
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: we are to.
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, we didn't get to your final chapter,
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: but I really appreciated your treatment of the psalm and
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: praying through it and the Olipha bait and gimmel, you know,
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: sort of structure of that it was really helpful, and
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: I agree with you. I love the most arrogant person
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: as a twenty three year old seminary, and I think
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: I was that most arrogant person at one point.
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And it's really funny, you know, when you think
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: back on it, I'm sure you've had this experience as well,
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: but it's like I'm a fraction of the arrogance I
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: was back then. Yeah, I think I know. Sometimes we
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: had this phenomenon. We give student surveys, you know, we
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: do a Bible knowledge exam, and you kind of get
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: their perception of how well they thought they knew their Bible,
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: and it almost always went down at the end of
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: their senior years. And I was like, yeah, that's absolutely
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: probably a good thing.
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: You know, you should feel like as you go on,
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: you understand this in some ways more deeply and more
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: richly than you ever have, But you should also have
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: a really deep sense that you have no idea what's
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: going on most of the time.
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: That's absolutely right. My husband and I have this conversation
• 46:26
  Speaker 2: all the time with each other. Absolutely yeah.
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And it just I think it speaks to the
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: humility that God cultivates in our lives, like as soon
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: as we think we have him down, you know, I've
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: got my systematic theology of daily living nailed down, and
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: then some you know, here's the here's the curve ball,
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: and you go, yeah, that's not right. I didn't right,
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: that's right.
• 46:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And it pre supposes being awake to life, right,
• 46:51
  Speaker 2: like having your eyes open to the world.
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: So yeah, well it's been fantastic. I really appreciate you
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: coming on and sharing your thoughts. I'd really encourage folks
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: to get the book. Again. The title is God in
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: the Desert, a Spiritual Theology of Wilderness in the Old Testament,
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: and we really just scratch the service, I think on
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: a lot of the topics that you address in the
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: book today. So I encourage folks to go get it.
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: This is an IVP title. IVP gives Thinking Christian listeners
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: a twenty percent discount, So if you link out and
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: buy it on the IVP Press site, that link will
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: be in the show notes, and you put in the
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: discount code that's also in the show notes, you'll get
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: this book for twenty percent off. So i'd encourage you
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: to do that. And yeah, Noell, just really appreciate you
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: being on and thanks so much for being here.
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much, James. It's been a pleasure, all.
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: Right, everybody, Thanks for sticking with us, Thanks for listening.
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: Go out get the book and learn a little bit
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: more about how to deal with God in the wilderness.
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: We'll take care everybody, and we'll see on the next
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: episode of Thinking Christian. I just want to take a
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: second to thank the team at Life Audio for their
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: partnership with us on the Thinking Christian podcast. If you
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: go to lifeaudio dot com, you'll find dozens of other
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: faith centered podcasts in their network. They've got shows about prayer,
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: Bible study, parenting, and more.