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Faith or Therapy? Navigating the Mental Health Crisis in the Church · 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, and through calm, thoughtful theological discussions,
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Speaker 1: Thinking Christian highlights the ways God is working in the
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Speaker 1: world and questions the underlying social, cultural, and political assumptions
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Speaker 1: that hinder Christians from becoming more like Christ. Now onto
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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 and doctor James Spencer and I
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Speaker 1: am joined today by Ashish Varma, but also.
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Speaker 2: Doctor Michael Moko.
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Speaker 1: Mike is a former professor of counseling at Moody Bible
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Speaker 1: Institute and he continues in private practice and today we're
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Speaker 1: going to have a conversation about the intersection of mental
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Speaker 1: health and faith and so excited to have you here.
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Speaker 1: Mike's great to see you.
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Speaker 2: Thanks, It's great to see both of you, and I
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Speaker 2: can't wait to just explore this topic that is coming
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Speaker 2: really popular. I just saw a conference where it's titled
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Speaker 2: the Convergence of Faith and Mental Health. Of churches are
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Speaker 2: doing things like they have a pastoral pastor of pastoral
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Speaker 2: care because it has become such a hot topic now,
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Speaker 2: even the relationship between faith and mental health. There's in
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Speaker 2: Chicago the Center for Religion and Psychotherapy. It is all
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Speaker 2: over the place, especially in the church world. I'll just say,
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Speaker 2: church world.
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Speaker 1: How do you see it? So I know a lot
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Speaker 1: of the counselors I've had on the podcast talk a
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Speaker 1: little bit about this idea that you're You know, they
1:42
Speaker 1: experience a lot of people coming in to have a
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Speaker 1: paid friend, like there's not you know, big psychological issues
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Speaker 1: that need to be dealt with, but they're really coming
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Speaker 1: in to deal with what would normally have been identified
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Speaker 1: as sort of the normal anxieties and stressors.
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Speaker 2: Of the day.
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Speaker 1: Are you finding a lot of that and how does
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Speaker 1: that sort of intersect with this trend within the church.
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Speaker 2: So when I first started my practice over thirty years ago,
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Speaker 2: i specialized in couples, couples who couldn't get along, But
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Speaker 2: then I also do individuals. So an answer to your question,
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Speaker 2: yes and no, there are therapists who they just are
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Speaker 2: okay with renting a friend. They don't want to probe deeper,
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Speaker 2: maybe because they don't have the skills or they don't
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Speaker 2: know about them maybe themselves enough to do it. So
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Speaker 2: there's that, but there's also depression, anxiety. This idea of
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Speaker 2: I need to look in myself has become so much
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Speaker 2: more relative or in my generation, it's going to sound terrible.
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Speaker 2: No one ever talked about how do I feel. No
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Speaker 2: one talked about maybe I should go see someone, you know.
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Speaker 2: I remember in my own life after I experienced some
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Speaker 2: really traumatic losses, and I'll just be vulnerable. I was
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Speaker 2: a pastor at the time. I got up to preach
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Speaker 2: and I knew something wasn't right, and I just said,
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Speaker 2: here it is packed. It's at church, about one hundred
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Speaker 2: and fifty people. I just started the ball I'm at
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Speaker 2: the bulpit, I'm ready to preach. I can't even I
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Speaker 2: am crying. One of the elgers comes up. He puts
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Speaker 2: his arm around me, and he says, the pastor spoke
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Speaker 2: a powerful message. They sang a hymn and they closed.
3:25
Speaker 2: I went home that day and I said, there are
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Speaker 2: a lot of barnacles in my life that I need
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Speaker 2: to scrape off. And I sought some help. And that's
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Speaker 2: when I started to When I first started too, I
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Speaker 2: also thought who pastors the pastor, so yes, they're a
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Speaker 2: rent a friend. But there are those people who, because
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Speaker 2: trauma has been very I use the word trendy since
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Speaker 2: the nineties, there's trauma informed therapist who really want to
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Speaker 2: help people who have pushed things down to bring him
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Speaker 2: to the surface. That's a whole other topic. Sometimes it's denial.
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Speaker 2: It should be your best friend, and other times it
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Speaker 2: shouldn't be. So I can go off, but I want
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Speaker 2: to stay on topic. Very good.
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Speaker 3: So you sort of alluded to a lot of different
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Speaker 3: cross sections of people here. You've been a pastor, you've
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Speaker 3: been a professor of undergraduates, you have retired from that,
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Speaker 3: but you continue to be to have a practice, So
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Speaker 3: you're seeing people in mental health settings. There are stigmas
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Speaker 3: for different generations. But how has each of those different
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Speaker 3: elements of your practice pastor, professor, actual therapist and formed
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Speaker 3: the way that you think about both the pros of
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Speaker 3: why therapy is an important thing and it's a good thing,
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Speaker 3: that it seems like it's here to stay, but also
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Speaker 3: perhaps ways in which we might rely upon it wrongly,
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Speaker 3: over rely upon it.
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Speaker 2: So historically, and you know, I've done a lot of
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Speaker 2: work in Angola, Africa, Historically, I would go to my pastor,
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Speaker 2: I would go to mentors, older mentors who would guide
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Speaker 2: me and walk me through this. In other cultures you
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Speaker 2: still find this. I think maybe in the West we've
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Speaker 2: gotten so preoccupied with the appearance that everything is okay
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Speaker 2: that we'll go into a back room to see someone,
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Speaker 2: but we won't just become you know, authentic and say, hey,
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Speaker 2: I struggle with a lot of different things. But as
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Speaker 2: I understand my transformation, the transformation process, God is still
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Speaker 2: working in me, and you can take these things and
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Speaker 2: what might be a label or a diagnosis might be
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Speaker 2: something that is a strength for me. So we used
6:02
Speaker 2: to be you went to your pastor, you went to
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Speaker 2: your grandma, you went to some leader. Nowadays, because it
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Speaker 2: was a trend, I want to say, in the eighties
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Speaker 2: or the nineties where everything turned into we handed over
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Speaker 2: to the professionals. And there is a book called Faithful Angels.
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Speaker 2: I think that's the name of it. But it was
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Speaker 2: tooth therapists in the nineties who wrote about how this
6:30
Speaker 2: idea of social workers have given up the field of
6:33
Speaker 2: helping the oppressed, the poor, the widows, and they have
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Speaker 2: gotten into it so that they can have a very
6:40
Speaker 2: nice income and live a good life, and they've sacrificed
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Speaker 2: the cause of social work for a cushy life, if
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Speaker 2: I can say that. And there's times when I've even
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Speaker 2: looked in the mirror and said mm. And I think
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Speaker 2: the passion that my wife and I had working in
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Speaker 2: Angola kind of mood. We were like, you know what
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Speaker 2: that kind of If I could say, it makes me
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Speaker 2: feel a little better. So I don't know if that
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Speaker 2: answers your question, but ask more and I'll open up
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Speaker 2: more for sure.
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Speaker 3: So you made the distinction of a distinctly Western sort
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Speaker 3: of setting. I have a couple of different contexts in mind.
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Speaker 3: One I think of a student that had years ago
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Speaker 3: from Puerto Rico. He was a middle aged man and
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Speaker 3: within the larger scope of class. In our discussion, he
7:29
Speaker 3: mentioned that growing up he was very poor. But if
7:32
Speaker 3: you asked him, are you poor, he would not have
7:35
Speaker 3: said yes, because he never thought in those categories. It
7:39
Speaker 3: wasn't until certain influences had begun to enter into to
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Speaker 3: try to show these people where the gaps were between
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Speaker 3: their way of life and what was perceived to be
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Speaker 3: the maturity of Western civilization that that idea entered into
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Speaker 3: his mind, and in retrospect he thought it actually impoverished
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Speaker 3: him to have that given to him. Now, I want
8:02
Speaker 3: to put that next to I have a cousin who
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Speaker 3: has spent years in the IT world, but for the
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Speaker 3: last a little over a decade he has gravitated towards
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Speaker 3: psychology and mental health and he's actually very soon going
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Speaker 3: to be setting up in India a mental health practice,
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Speaker 3: but in a place that has a lot of stigma
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Speaker 3: against mental health therapy, not least because it's seen as
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Speaker 3: a Western science that overrides the Indian mind, the Indian
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Speaker 3: ways of doing things. Now I want to put both
8:40
Speaker 3: of those together. You recommend it to me years ago
8:43
Speaker 3: book Crazy Like Us, which is sort of taking up
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Speaker 3: this issue. Do you want to talk quickly what you
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Speaker 3: see as the thesis of that book, why you saw
8:53
Speaker 3: it as important to recommend, and how would you speak
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Speaker 3: to these environments?
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Speaker 2: And I would beat you have normal psychology. First thing
9:00
Speaker 2: we did was a kind of like set the stage
9:03
Speaker 2: and begin to read this book. It's a globalization of
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Speaker 2: the American psyche and how we have the West is
9:11
Speaker 2: so powerful, So any diagnosis comes out of the DSM five.
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Speaker 2: When I was doing research on trauma. It was very
9:20
Speaker 2: difficult to find articles that were not connected to the DSM,
9:26
Speaker 2: so I had to find people who are in Australia,
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Speaker 2: the Netherlands, UK who are writing. The premise of the
9:32
Speaker 2: book is that we take our diagnosis because of this label.
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Speaker 2: In the DSM five just gives you criteria. So in
9:41
Speaker 2: the DSM four, if you met criteria six criteria, you
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Speaker 2: would be considered Let's say manic, I mean major depressive
9:50
Speaker 2: disorder when the DSM five or eight. When the DSM
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Speaker 2: five came at only six, so you could have not
9:56
Speaker 2: a major depressive disorder, but when the five came, now
9:59
Speaker 2: you have a major disressive disorder. So we take this
10:03
Speaker 2: and they put it over different The author puts it
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Speaker 2: over different places, and one of them is especially telling.
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Speaker 2: When the tsunami hit, there were a therapists in the
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Speaker 2: States who said, oh my gosh, there's gonna be a
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Speaker 2: tsunami of trauma, and so they gathered up all these
10:23
Speaker 2: therapists who went there and they couldn't get past the language,
10:27
Speaker 2: they couldn't get past the food, they couldn't get past
10:29
Speaker 2: anything else. And one person who goes really sick stayed
10:32
Speaker 2: and saw how this community had dealt with different tsunamis
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Speaker 2: on different basis and just were resilient. They worked together,
10:42
Speaker 2: they rebuilt, life went on for us it would be
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Speaker 2: like the end of the world. Then you know, you
10:48
Speaker 2: go to like the last chapter was a man who
10:52
Speaker 2: was eccentric or a unique in Madagascar. He comes here
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Speaker 2: and because of our society the way things are, he
11:00
Speaker 2: ends up in the hospital being labeled schizophrenic. So the
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Speaker 2: West has negated unique cultural peculiarities, community language, for all
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Speaker 2: that kind of stuff that moves people along instead of
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Speaker 2: pulling them out and putting them in a psych word,
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Speaker 2: labeling them, giving them every kind of medication that over
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Speaker 2: the long term, you know, it's like is it you're
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Speaker 2: going to be on this for life? Or as I
11:32
Speaker 2: like to say, sometimes you know, I'm not against it,
11:35
Speaker 2: but it's a cast. You put it on. When you're
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Speaker 2: done with it, you move on. And so when we
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Speaker 2: go to different cultures, it's ask questions and listen rather
11:47
Speaker 2: than imputing what we think is right in our culture
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Speaker 2: to another culture. It's like when I would teach on empathy,
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Speaker 2: I would tell my students, what is what utensils do
12:02
Speaker 2: you eat with? Forksmen in a life. How many people
12:05
Speaker 2: in this billion, how many multi billion world eat with that?
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Speaker 2: I don't know how many people either hands or how
12:10
Speaker 2: many people eat with chopsticks. I said, it looks different,
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Speaker 2: but that doesn't mean it's wrong or it's not good enough.
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Speaker 2: And we have an epidemic of not being good enough,
12:22
Speaker 2: always trying to be better. And even when it comes
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Speaker 2: to cultures though even the word developing culture as if
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Speaker 2: we are more developed than someone, in some ways we're
12:33
Speaker 2: less developed. When we'd go to Angola, I was I
12:36
Speaker 2: remember the first time we're in a tent in a
12:39
Speaker 2: refugee camp in Sub Saharan Africa, and I did a
12:43
Speaker 2: couple of weddings there and the couple were telling me
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Speaker 2: how the church assigns them to a couple who is
12:50
Speaker 2: not related to either family and they meet with them
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Speaker 2: once a week for a year. And I was saying
12:55
Speaker 2: to myself, Wow, that's developing. That's more developed than what
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Speaker 2: we have here, where the divorce rate is so high
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Speaker 2: and people are just you're on your own unless you
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Speaker 2: find a therapist or in a church where they have
13:10
Speaker 2: someone who comes alongside of you. So the premise is
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Speaker 2: don't don't take what we have and make it like
13:17
Speaker 2: something that fits every single culture around the world. They
13:21
Speaker 2: don't use a spork, a foon and a knife, we
13:24
Speaker 2: don't use chopsticks, we don't use their hands. Simply bese
13:27
Speaker 2: their hands. Let's just learn from each other. And what
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Speaker 2: we have lost in our culture today is a sense
13:35
Speaker 2: of family community, people bearing one another's burdens, because if
13:43
Speaker 2: you're a burden, you must be something must be wrong
13:46
Speaker 2: with you, or you must have a weak spiritual life,
13:49
Speaker 2: or you're in all of Job's friends when they mentioned
13:53
Speaker 2: talk to him that same concept, so.
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Speaker 1: So Michael, when when you think about that sort of
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Speaker 1: that cross cultural aspect of what you're talking about there,
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Speaker 1: what I think I'm hearing is we have more to learn,
14:08
Speaker 1: or we have something at least to learn. It's not
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Speaker 1: that we don't have anything to give. We definitely have
14:12
Speaker 1: something to learn from these other cultures. Because part of
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Speaker 1: the reason that may be unhelpful to export these sort
14:19
Speaker 1: of diagnoses from the West into these other areas is
14:23
Speaker 1: because they've already got structures that are dealing with many
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Speaker 1: of these matters in ways that we've forgotten our independence,
14:33
Speaker 1: our self reliance, are pull ourselves up by our bootstraps
14:36
Speaker 1: sort of vibe has created an independence that now virtually
14:41
Speaker 1: necessitates therapy. Right Whereas if you're in a culture that
14:46
Speaker 1: is much more communal, mutual dependence happening within a community,
14:52
Speaker 1: you have shared rituals, to shared symbolic structures, all those
14:55
Speaker 1: kind of things, therapy becomes at a little bit lower lighted,
15:02
Speaker 1: let's say, like less maybe not completely trivial, but certainly
15:07
Speaker 1: less prominent than it is in our culture. Is that,
15:10
Speaker 1: you know, sort of those all those different elements have
15:12
Speaker 1: to be taken into account as we understand why therapy
15:15
Speaker 1: is so crucial to us, why diagnosis is so crucial
15:18
Speaker 1: to us, versus why it might not work in another place.
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Speaker 2: I agree with you seriously, if I could have to
15:25
Speaker 2: boil it down. Yeah, it's all about relational connectedness. When
15:30
Speaker 2: I was a pastor at a church in Chicago for
15:32
Speaker 2: many years before I became a professor at Moody, I
15:36
Speaker 2: was the pastor of families and small groups, and I
15:39
Speaker 2: used to say, the more people are in small groups,
15:41
Speaker 2: the less my phone will ring. Because they had a
15:44
Speaker 2: net of people who would pray for you, who would
15:47
Speaker 2: help you move, who would bring you meals when you
15:50
Speaker 2: had a baby, and it was like, I want you
15:52
Speaker 2: to be a part maybe relational community. And then these
15:56
Speaker 2: communities would birth other communities, and then we would always
16:01
Speaker 2: have a group in birther group and birth, and we'd
16:03
Speaker 2: have grandfather groups and we have like seven or eighty
16:06
Speaker 2: people come together like at the church. Oh. Ever, since
16:10
Speaker 2: we started looking at we all came out of the
16:11
Speaker 2: same community. But it's when you lose this idea of
16:16
Speaker 2: relational connectedness, you've lost something that goes way back when
16:21
Speaker 2: you read scripture look at you know, it was like
16:24
Speaker 2: it was Israel and the tribes and all these different
16:27
Speaker 2: people had one another. And it's ironic that when you
16:31
Speaker 2: look at the New Testament you read all the one
16:33
Speaker 2: another passages, but we become no, it's not about one another.
16:38
Speaker 2: It's only me and not another. Yeah. Yeah, and even
16:44
Speaker 2: even it's interesting how there's always there's a book I
16:48
Speaker 2: used to say that my students always wanted to write
16:50
Speaker 2: called your check Engine Light on how when you drive
16:55
Speaker 2: your car and the check engine light goes on, most
16:58
Speaker 2: people don't park in the ground. They called up a
17:01
Speaker 2: service station. They go somewhere where someone else can help
17:05
Speaker 2: a group of people. Whatever they talk about. It okay
17:08
Speaker 2: in our in our own psyche, it's like we push
17:12
Speaker 2: things away rather than saying, do you struggle with this?
17:15
Speaker 2: I struggle with this? How'd you get over it? Well?
17:18
Speaker 2: I did A, B and C. And the problem with
17:22
Speaker 2: thinking Christian though, is as it's managing or walking through
17:30
Speaker 2: a jungle. Because there are some people who say your
17:33
Speaker 2: mental health are directly related to your spiritual health. Yes
17:37
Speaker 2: and no, okay, because we all come out of family systems.
17:42
Speaker 2: Moses had a problem with anger, and he kept having
17:44
Speaker 2: a problem with anger, and God didn't let him lead
17:48
Speaker 2: the people into the Promised Land because of his anger.
17:52
Speaker 2: Abrahm had a problem with lying. Isaac had a problem
17:55
Speaker 2: with lying. Jacob had a problem with lying. There are
17:57
Speaker 2: systemic things that need to be address that you could
18:01
Speaker 2: be a very spiritual person, have a walk with God,
18:04
Speaker 2: but the family system that you come out of still
18:08
Speaker 2: kind of gives you little dimples and wrinkles that are
18:12
Speaker 2: okay if they don't damage other people.
18:19
Speaker 1: Very helpful.
18:20
Speaker 2: Go ahead.
18:21
Speaker 3: Yeah, So this brings up an interesting subpoint to me.
18:30
Speaker 3: A lot of our lives are based upon the fragility
18:34
Speaker 3: of our memory.
18:35
Speaker 2: Right.
18:35
Speaker 3: A lot of studies have shown more recently we have
18:38
Speaker 3: prominent examples like the NBC News Brian Williams escapade that
18:44
Speaker 3: our memories are highly unreliable. They're open to suggestion, they're
18:49
Speaker 3: open to being nudged in directions subconsciously that we're not
18:56
Speaker 3: even necessarily trying to create. And so studies have shown
19:00
Speaker 3: in the last decade or so especially that therapy has
19:07
Speaker 3: has to shift and has made some shifts because suggestiveness
19:12
Speaker 3: within therapy sections has often resulted in the sudden creation
19:19
Speaker 3: of memories that there's no outside evidence ever existed, or
19:25
Speaker 3: there is no self understanding of such past traumas or
19:31
Speaker 3: abuses having happened. Now, in light of that, therapists have
19:40
Speaker 3: this odd position that's very different than what you describe, right,
19:45
Speaker 3: of a community in which you're going to people that
19:48
Speaker 3: their lives are intertwined with yours in a daily way.
19:52
Speaker 3: The therapists you see from maybe an hour a week
19:55
Speaker 3: or every other week doesn't really know you. There's a
19:59
Speaker 3: bare you're almost by intention right in order to try
20:04
Speaker 3: to be objective in a third party person. And now
20:09
Speaker 3: they make certain suggestions to try to delve and understand,
20:12
Speaker 3: and suddenly memories are created. Right, How does a therapist
20:20
Speaker 3: take this dynamic into play right, recognizing that there is
20:25
Speaker 3: a role for the therapist, There is an important work
20:28
Speaker 3: to be done with a client, and yet at the
20:31
Speaker 3: same time, the fact of this distance and the fragility
20:37
Speaker 3: of memory create an environment in which you honestly can't
20:43
Speaker 3: take everything at face value. How does the therapist work
20:48
Speaker 3: through this and why is that instructive for a person
20:50
Speaker 3: going in.
20:52
Speaker 2: When you therapist assumes client is telling the truth, but
20:57
Speaker 2: the truth that's relevant to the client. So you're if
21:01
Speaker 2: you're a therapist worth your salt. You listen well and
21:06
Speaker 2: you say, O, conneck the dots now in the last
21:09
Speaker 2: ten years, No, in the last two years. Here's I
21:12
Speaker 2: read an article three weeks ago, and then Wall Street Journal.
21:15
Speaker 2: Three point two million people seek AI as their therapist
21:18
Speaker 2: every day day, GPT chat, whatever it is they are
21:24
Speaker 2: on there. Dear AI, I have a problem with my child.
21:28
Speaker 2: What should I do? I have a problem with my boss.
21:31
Speaker 2: I'm struggling with this and AI doesn't okay, So answer
21:35
Speaker 2: your question. You have to stay relevant to what's happening,
21:39
Speaker 2: and when you sort out there. There are many people
21:43
Speaker 2: who narrative intertwines with everybody on Quora and Reddit, and
21:50
Speaker 2: maybe Facebook or whatever, because they want to be a
21:55
Speaker 2: part of something, and so they'll add something to it
21:59
Speaker 2: and they find all these invisible community groups. Oh man,
22:03
Speaker 2: that's me too. It's like, really, wasn't you. There's a
22:06
Speaker 2: kernel of truth and they spin a whole costume around it.
22:11
Speaker 2: And sometimes if you listen, well you'll hear inconsistencies or
22:18
Speaker 2: My approach to therapy is not sit back and I
22:24
Speaker 2: just say how do you feel? How do you feel?
22:27
Speaker 2: I'm a challenger. I ask questions. I say this doesn't
22:31
Speaker 2: make sense. I ask what if you were this? Or
22:34
Speaker 2: what about that? My therapy has moved to instead of
22:38
Speaker 2: just listening and saying how do you feel, to be
22:40
Speaker 2: more interactive. People don't want to go to therapists who
22:44
Speaker 2: just say okay and they answer your question. It's if
22:48
Speaker 2: you probe and you begin to untangle some of these things,
22:54
Speaker 2: maybe a client will say, well, I really wasn't truthful?
22:58
Speaker 2: Or what I will do as a a concept called leading,
23:02
Speaker 2: I'll say I might say something like I think you're
23:06
Speaker 2: not telling me everything, and they're like, what do you mean?
23:08
Speaker 2: I say, you know what I mean? Now, I have
23:10
Speaker 2: no idea, but what I'm doing is I'm throwing a
23:12
Speaker 2: hail Mary thinking that oh man, he or she must
23:17
Speaker 2: know something. Okay, this is what really the truth is,
23:21
Speaker 2: and so they'll do that. But in terms of, you know,
23:25
Speaker 2: working with clients, therapists need to really, like, like I said,
23:31
Speaker 2: stay present, stay up to date, and keep their tool sharp.
23:37
Speaker 2: If I'm dull, you know, they say, a dull knife
23:39
Speaker 2: does more damage in the sharp. If I am dull,
23:42
Speaker 2: the therapeutic process is going to go flat and people
23:45
Speaker 2: are going to have a bad experience. And if I
23:47
Speaker 2: don't know my own stuff, then the counter transference gets
23:51
Speaker 2: in the way or I fall into the web of
23:55
Speaker 2: the client's issues and they walk away disappointed. I like
24:01
Speaker 2: to say, we get lost in the forest together rather
24:04
Speaker 2: than helping them find a way out.
24:07
Speaker 1: Do you do you coach any of your clients as
24:09
Speaker 1: they come in on sort of what the best posture
24:13
Speaker 1: for them to adopt in a counseling setting actually is, Mike, So,
24:17
Speaker 1: I mean, it seems to me that it is a
24:18
Speaker 1: two way street, right. They have to they have you
24:22
Speaker 1: can only really react to what they're telling you to
24:24
Speaker 1: some degree, and so there needs to be some level
24:28
Speaker 1: of transparency from the client. But then they also have
24:31
Speaker 1: to recognize that you don't know the full picture. And
24:35
Speaker 1: so whatever advice you might give them, they still need
24:38
Speaker 1: to sort of contextualize that, think about it, reflect on it.
24:42
Speaker 1: Is that Is that something that you make clear with
24:44
Speaker 1: clients or is that something that just emerges from the relationship.
24:47
Speaker 2: Well, very clear. I tell my clients, I'm not Hudini. Okay,
24:51
Speaker 2: the more you inform me, the more I can inform you.
24:55
Speaker 2: But here's here's you know, there's a there's a concept
24:59
Speaker 2: they use it in corporate America called the Johari window.
25:01
Speaker 2: There's four quadrants. I see, you see, you don't see.
25:04
Speaker 2: I see, I see you don't see. No one sees.
25:07
Speaker 2: If you don't know how to ask the right questions
25:10
Speaker 2: to help them see what they don't want you to see,
25:15
Speaker 2: you'll never have that insight. And so I'll tell I'll
25:19
Speaker 2: ask clients, have you been a therapy before? What went right?
25:23
Speaker 2: What went wrong? I'm not about bashing of a therapist
25:26
Speaker 2: and saying oh yeah, now, it's just like, okay, I
25:29
Speaker 2: don't want to repeat something that you've already went around.
25:33
Speaker 2: What would make I'll ask them what would make this
25:35
Speaker 2: therapeutic relationship profitable for you? So that when it comes
25:39
Speaker 2: to termination, when we're down, you say that was worth it,
25:42
Speaker 2: it was worth my investment, my time, whatever. And sometimes
25:46
Speaker 2: they will say and basically I help them lead the
25:49
Speaker 2: treatment plan if you want to put it into like
25:52
Speaker 2: you know, assessment OLC. Come when it's a treatment plan,
25:54
Speaker 2: It's like, okay, so our goal and I'll go back.
25:57
Speaker 2: It's like, you know, if you're right, this is going
26:00
Speaker 2: back to what you're abstract is what what's the thesis
26:04
Speaker 2: of it? Now? Go back? Okay, you know you came
26:06
Speaker 2: in here for this. Where are we in? What mile
26:09
Speaker 2: marker are we in? I'm super big on metaphors, and
26:14
Speaker 2: I have clients who say, wow, I was never enlightened
26:18
Speaker 2: like that, and never, you know, no one ever gave
26:21
Speaker 2: me a picture of what it is that I'm struggling
26:24
Speaker 2: with or dealing with, or how I can best with
26:28
Speaker 2: other people.
26:33
Speaker 3: You you mention these practices for the therapist, How do
26:40
Speaker 3: you prepare the I guess you can't prepare them. But
26:44
Speaker 3: if you had a word of advice sort of to
26:45
Speaker 3: piggyback on James's question to those entering into therapy, into
26:49
Speaker 3: that setting, what should a what should a person expect
26:55
Speaker 3: out of therapy, and what do you see as a
26:58
Speaker 3: common thing they're coming in with that maybe they should
27:03
Speaker 3: set aside.
27:05
Speaker 2: So when you take a trip, you know your destination.
27:13
Speaker 2: You might not figure out how to get there because
27:15
Speaker 2: there might be detours, but you know what the destination is.
27:20
Speaker 2: Let's pretend that I got into therapy and I would
27:24
Speaker 2: the therapist, I would hope, would ask me, you know,
27:26
Speaker 2: what is it that you're coming what's the presenting problem?
27:29
Speaker 2: And then how do you know when you feel like
27:32
Speaker 2: you've gained enough insight that you can move on your way.
27:36
Speaker 2: My goal is to to get myself out of a job.
27:41
Speaker 2: As they say, there are there are therapists who in
27:45
Speaker 2: our field we call chronics. They love chronic people who
27:50
Speaker 2: will just go in because of insurance, just keep going
27:53
Speaker 2: in for years. They don't want to do any work,
27:56
Speaker 2: and the therapist loves this because they don't have to
27:58
Speaker 2: do work that make excuses whatever. So it's for the
28:03
Speaker 2: person coming in, it's where do you want to go?
28:07
Speaker 2: Or do you just want to be like the Israelites
28:08
Speaker 2: wandering for forty years thinking there's a promised land? But
28:12
Speaker 2: you know, where do you want to go? What do
28:14
Speaker 2: you want to get out? Of it. Again, I can
28:18
Speaker 2: only help you to the extent that you give me
28:21
Speaker 2: as much insight, but I also have to be a
28:24
Speaker 2: part of that process. And you know, when it comes
28:26
Speaker 2: to like, it's interesting this whole field of the church
28:32
Speaker 2: and mental health. It's the healthier people are, the more
28:37
Speaker 2: they can engage with other people in the church. People
28:42
Speaker 2: usually leave church because of relational differences something like that.
28:47
Speaker 2: But again, it all boils down to how do we
28:51
Speaker 2: view ourselves in relationship to others. And if we have
28:55
Speaker 2: a faulty view of self everywhere we go, we will
28:59
Speaker 2: think something's wrong with me. When we might go into
29:02
Speaker 2: a situation that stinks like a skunk and say, wow,
29:06
Speaker 2: I smell. No, your environment is toxic. It's the word
29:11
Speaker 2: or it smells or it's unhealthy, and it's like, no,
29:16
Speaker 2: that's not me because I know how I smell and
29:18
Speaker 2: I don't smell like that. And I'm not going to
29:21
Speaker 2: own someone else's issues because that's what people will do,
29:26
Speaker 2: especially when you see it in the church, at workplace wherever,
29:30
Speaker 2: they will dump their stuff on you. And if you
29:33
Speaker 2: don't say sorry, I'm gonna hose myself off with my
29:36
Speaker 2: raincoat and walk out because that's yours to carry and
29:39
Speaker 2: not mine. So again, when you go in knowing who
29:45
Speaker 2: do I bring into who's the person I bring into
29:48
Speaker 2: the therapeutic relationship? How do I view myself? And then
29:51
Speaker 2: if you want to talk about this from a Christian perspective,
29:54
Speaker 2: is how do I view God? And how do I
29:57
Speaker 2: think God views me? So much of life revolves around
30:02
Speaker 2: how I feel and if you think about myself when
30:06
Speaker 2: I'm in the context of others, because if others are
30:11
Speaker 2: constantly projecting and projecting and I don't interpret they're going
30:16
Speaker 2: through something, I'm gonna I'm gonna think that something is
30:21
Speaker 2: again the same words, not good enough, I'm in trouble,
30:24
Speaker 2: I don't belong you know, how come I misunderstood all
30:28
Speaker 2: the time. And so it all goes down to when
30:31
Speaker 2: you go into into a therapy or relationship, this is
30:34
Speaker 2: what I'm at, This is where I want to Where
30:36
Speaker 2: I'm at, this is where I want to be. It's
30:39
Speaker 2: never perfect or that this never comes to an end,
30:42
Speaker 2: but I know I'm on the journey towards someone who
30:45
Speaker 2: I feel really comfortable with that God has made me
30:51
Speaker 2: in my unique personality in the family system, that He
30:54
Speaker 2: has placed me in and in an environment where I
30:57
Speaker 2: feel like I can add something, you too. But if
31:01
Speaker 2: someone doesn't value themselves, they're not going to value you.
31:04
Speaker 2: Because in the church, the worst thing I see even
31:08
Speaker 2: you know, even in academia, jealousy, envy, all these things
31:12
Speaker 2: that because someone has a greater insight or has a
31:17
Speaker 2: personality that's more attractive or sees things differently, and that
31:21
Speaker 2: is threatening to people.
31:25
Speaker 3: So let's see an envy in academia.
31:26
Speaker 2: No, no, no, never, never never.
31:30
Speaker 1: You never saw any of that.
31:31
Speaker 2: And it's like, you know, and it all goes back
31:33
Speaker 2: to like, hey, this is how I with a fourkspeen
31:36
Speaker 2: of a knife. You're using chopsticks. Something's wrong with you.
31:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's really funny you say that, Mike, because I've
31:43
Speaker 1: just been going through this exercise. We're trying to figure out,
31:46
Speaker 1: you know, over the next five ten years, you know,
31:49
Speaker 1: where do I want to go professionally and that kind
31:51
Speaker 1: of thing. And part of the struggle has been this
31:54
Speaker 1: doesn't seem good enough, right, and so you start looking
31:58
Speaker 1: out at other people who are doing these other things.
32:00
Speaker 1: You're like, yeah, what I'm doing isn't good enough. I
32:02
Speaker 1: feel like I could do so much more or whatever.
32:04
Speaker 1: And I've had to sort of curb some of those. Obviously,
32:07
Speaker 1: part of that's good, you know, you want to be ambitious,
32:10
Speaker 1: But then you also have to recognize, like I also
32:13
Speaker 1: have very specific limitations and things that I don't want
32:18
Speaker 1: to give up in order to pursue this, And so
32:20
Speaker 1: you start to sort of situate all these different pieces together.
32:26
Speaker 1: But I would say, I, you know, I was fighting jealousy,
32:29
Speaker 1: I was fighting frustration. You know, I was fighting those feelings.
32:34
Speaker 1: So it's just kind of interesting to think through what
32:36
Speaker 1: is your desired state? It can't usually, at least in
32:39
Speaker 1: my experience, hasn't been a only vocationally. I just want
32:45
Speaker 1: to do this vocationally and nothing else matters. It's almost
32:48
Speaker 1: always within a system of relationships where you're sitting back
32:51
Speaker 1: and saying, well, what is my desired state at the
32:53
Speaker 1: end of five, ten, fifteen years. Who do I want
32:56
Speaker 1: to be as a family man, Who I want to
32:58
Speaker 1: be as a Christian?
32:59
Speaker 2: Who do I want to be?
33:00
Speaker 1: You know, all these different aspects have to kind of
33:02
Speaker 1: come together. My other question for you, which I find
33:07
Speaker 1: so your comments about you know, you have to kind
33:10
Speaker 1: of know what your destination is. So I've consulted with
33:14
Speaker 1: a number of different organizations over the years, and one
33:16
Speaker 1: of the things I've found is they almost always call
33:18
Speaker 1: me because they feel like they have a recruitment and
33:21
Speaker 1: a marketing problem. Right, that's always the issue, Right, we're
33:24
Speaker 1: short on enrollment, which means we're short on money, which
33:27
Speaker 1: means we need your help to help build our marketing
33:29
Speaker 1: and recruitment are And I'll get into the organization and
33:34
Speaker 1: it starts to become clear that they don't they don't
33:38
Speaker 1: know what that destination is. And so I've always found
33:41
Speaker 1: it to be interesting as a consultant. You kind of
33:44
Speaker 1: go in and you're talking with people and you're trying
33:46
Speaker 1: to help them understand that this one little pain point
33:49
Speaker 1: isn't quite what they're shooting for. Yes, they need to
33:52
Speaker 1: solve for it to some degree, but there's something bigger
33:55
Speaker 1: they need to develop. Do you find you do that
33:57
Speaker 1: in therapy as well, Like somebody comes in with almost
34:00
Speaker 1: a destination that's shorting where you think they need to
34:03
Speaker 1: go and sort of expanding their vision of who they
34:06
Speaker 1: desire to be long term in the future.
34:09
Speaker 2: Yes, So what you said in the James in the beginnings,
34:13
Speaker 2: some like with corporations or people or whatever, they feel
34:16
Speaker 2: like they're stuck. Yeah, here's the irony. And it's the
34:21
Speaker 2: strangest thing. People are more afraid of being successful, you know,
34:29
Speaker 2: than they are. Everyone knows they're going to experience failure.
34:32
Speaker 2: But it's like me be like write a book that
34:37
Speaker 2: people read. Me, has to be to speak at some
34:41
Speaker 2: whatever me. It's like no, no, no, And so it's
34:44
Speaker 2: like I'll challenge people. If not you, who or how come?
34:50
Speaker 2: Where does this mindset? And the especially Price followers, they
34:55
Speaker 2: confuse this with humility. I'm like, and maybe you should
34:59
Speaker 2: do a all said about himself? Okay, but it's like,
35:02
Speaker 2: if you're really good at something, then shine, shine and
35:08
Speaker 2: know that. You know. When you were talking, it was
35:11
Speaker 2: like it came to a place in life where I
35:12
Speaker 2: realized I needed to be the best person God made
35:15
Speaker 2: me to be. Are people you know. I don't listen
35:21
Speaker 2: to Taylor Swift, but she to sing a song called
35:25
Speaker 2: I Think It goes like people throw rocks at things
35:27
Speaker 2: that shine. I phrase something like that. I don't some
35:30
Speaker 2: young person would know it. Maybe not, but people I thought, wow,
35:34
Speaker 2: what a great title of our song. People throw rocks
35:36
Speaker 2: at things that shine, and some things maybe are generational
35:42
Speaker 2: it's like, no, that's not what you do. No, maybe,
35:45
Speaker 2: but that's maybe back then, but today, no, you need
35:48
Speaker 2: to do that. Otherwise what happens is you stay stuck
35:53
Speaker 2: and then then anger and resentment comes in. And you know,
35:59
Speaker 2: there's a book, right, I don't even know. We used
36:01
Speaker 2: to always bring in books in the classroom and tell
36:03
Speaker 2: students and they were too kind of like, oh, to
36:06
Speaker 2: know anything about reading it. But it's by a guy
36:10
Speaker 2: named James Hollis called Finding Meaning in the Second Half
36:14
Speaker 2: of Life, okay, and he looks at the second half
36:17
Speaker 2: of life after forty right. But the book is it's
36:21
Speaker 2: a fascinating book about when you get to a place
36:24
Speaker 2: in life you understand that so much of the interaction
36:28
Speaker 2: we have with other people is their own insecure projections
36:34
Speaker 2: on other people. And if you're in an environment and
36:39
Speaker 2: where there's a hierarchy, oh man, the projection is it
36:43
Speaker 2: is so blatant, and we have to understand that own
36:47
Speaker 2: what's yours and discard what isn't because these are people who,
36:53
Speaker 2: for whatever reason, well they cannot be wrong, they cannot
36:59
Speaker 2: handle correct, they cannot see anything different because it is
37:04
Speaker 2: affront to their own little world of whether it's control
37:08
Speaker 2: or power or whatever. But projection happens so often in life.
37:15
Speaker 2: When I work with couples, it's like they usually just
37:18
Speaker 2: respond this, don't respond in a negative way. Look at
37:22
Speaker 2: your spouse and say, it sounds like you're having a
37:24
Speaker 2: frustrating time in life, but you haven't really told me
37:28
Speaker 2: what you're frustrated about, and you're just slinging mud at me.
37:33
Speaker 2: And they're like, wow. But it's this idea of when
37:37
Speaker 2: you when you work, when you live long enough, you say,
37:41
Speaker 2: it's like all these books that were around in the New
37:43
Speaker 2: York Times bestseller about four or five years ago. You
37:46
Speaker 2: know what the aff do I care what people think
37:49
Speaker 2: about me? Or the same author who gives a sahi
37:52
Speaker 2: whatever about like, you know what people think? It doesn't matter.
37:56
Speaker 2: How come that matter so much? They don't they don't
38:00
Speaker 2: pay our bills, They don't live with the person I
38:02
Speaker 2: live with, or have the children I have, or have
38:05
Speaker 2: the hobbies or interests I do. So what do I care?
38:08
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, I mean I think Friedman's book Failure of
38:12
Speaker 1: Nerve it resonates with a lot of what he talks
38:16
Speaker 1: about in there, the non anxious presence, the self differentiated
38:19
Speaker 1: leadership concept. I think those ideas. I ran across those
38:23
Speaker 1: right at the right time toward my last few years
38:25
Speaker 1: at Moody, and they were really helpful because they do
38:31
Speaker 1: sort of if you can learn how to do it,
38:34
Speaker 1: like not take things personally, not be defensive, they really
38:37
Speaker 1: do sort of allow you to be calm in the
38:41
Speaker 1: midst of tumultuous situations where you're recognizing, yes, there's a
38:45
Speaker 1: lot of this that is my responsibility, there's also a
38:48
Speaker 1: lot of it that's not, and there's not a whole
38:51
Speaker 1: lot I can do about that. I can't solve all
38:53
Speaker 1: the problems. I can really be responsible for myself and
38:56
Speaker 1: what I can do, and then everybody else needs to
38:59
Speaker 1: sort of feel you're out not figure out their own
39:01
Speaker 1: lives in a bad way. But you do have a
39:04
Speaker 1: sense where it's like I can't be the solution to
39:07
Speaker 1: everyone's problems, and there is a calmness to that. It
39:15
Speaker 1: creates a piece I suppose, not a callousness, but a piece.
39:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, And the beginning of it is always say this
39:25
Speaker 2: to my students, because I get to say it to myself.
39:28
Speaker 2: What kind of people annoy you so for me? Ignorant people,
39:34
Speaker 2: people who are I'm just be stupid and think they
39:37
Speaker 2: know so much more, and I just shake my head
39:40
Speaker 2: and sometimes it's okay. I remember, sometimes it's okay just
39:44
Speaker 2: to shut your mouth and act like a fool, because
39:47
Speaker 2: there's a saying that that forgo. They used to tell us,
39:49
Speaker 2: the higher a monkey climbs, the more he exposes himself.
39:52
Speaker 2: And it's like that. It's like, let these people babble
39:55
Speaker 2: on for what because their ignorance is just so pathetic.
40:00
Speaker 2: And I used to say, Okay, you know what, they're
40:04
Speaker 2: gonna annoy you, but just let it go and walk away.
40:07
Speaker 2: They're not like back in the day in your classroom.
40:10
Speaker 2: But when they when they're ignorance, trive to control me.
40:13
Speaker 2: Oh man, I would be like, take that leash off
40:16
Speaker 2: of me. You know, microman and micromanaging people. You said,
40:20
Speaker 2: you just drive me crazy. Yeah, but again I had
40:25
Speaker 2: to be learned. Okay, you know what, what is it
40:27
Speaker 2: about this person? Interpret the person? Otherwise you will become
40:33
Speaker 2: the problem. Yeah, and you know it's hard to get
40:36
Speaker 2: out of that. Sometimes it definitely is. But all this
40:40
Speaker 2: relates to like how we again going back to what
40:43
Speaker 2: I said earlier, our relationship and relationship to other people
40:47
Speaker 2: and being okay with who you are and your emotional state,
40:54
Speaker 2: your physical state, your spiritual state, all those things because
40:57
Speaker 2: God has uniquely made each one of us, and he
40:59
Speaker 2: talked about it. The body of Christ is made up
41:01
Speaker 2: of different parts, you know. And if we're okay with
41:05
Speaker 2: how He's made us, what we're interested in, and and
41:09
Speaker 2: just how we impact other people in that world, we're okay.
41:17
Speaker 3: At the risk of opening up a larger can than
41:20
Speaker 3: we have time for, I'm gonna do it anyway, because
41:27
Speaker 3: it's what I do.
41:31
Speaker 2: That's the one thing I always appreciate about you. You know.
41:34
Speaker 2: I thought about you today because the church I go
41:38
Speaker 2: to has a pastor who's really passionate about the arts.
41:41
Speaker 2: And so my wife put this beautiful woodblock print in
41:44
Speaker 2: and she was talking to this guy, and he had
41:46
Speaker 2: never heard of the book Faith and Art or you know,
41:49
Speaker 2: the the and I forgot his name, the Japanese guy
41:56
Speaker 2: who has these incredible works of art let he puts around. Yeah, yeah,
42:03
Speaker 2: that's great.
42:05
Speaker 3: So as a theologian, I live in a world sometimes
42:09
Speaker 3: where there's understandably so much weight placed upon our relationship
42:15
Speaker 3: with God, and it's it's an odd thing for theologion
42:19
Speaker 3: to say, perhaps so skewed that we forget that our
42:24
Speaker 3: relationship with God is in the context of relationship with others.
42:29
Speaker 3: And you bring up the body of Christ's imagery right
42:31
Speaker 3: where there's there's two entailments from it that Christ is
42:36
Speaker 3: our head, but also there's a whole bunch of other
42:38
Speaker 3: people around us that are part of the body with
42:40
Speaker 3: this that we work together with. Right now. I bring
42:44
Speaker 3: this up because this podcast is thinking Christian. We want
42:50
Speaker 3: faith to be something that's not just on the back burner.
42:53
Speaker 3: And yet there has been a stigma that I think,
42:57
Speaker 3: even in the changing climate, still exists in some forms.
43:01
Speaker 3: And you know, we had a former president of Moody
43:03
Speaker 3: who we won't name, who got up in front of
43:05
Speaker 3: everyone and said, uh, we have all these mental health problems.
43:10
Speaker 3: All you need is to read your Bible more and
43:11
Speaker 3: have a better relationship with God. I think we're probably
43:19
Speaker 3: all on the same page here of so way too simplified.
43:22
Speaker 2: Opened so much cancer. I was on a comittee. I
43:26
Speaker 2: told you doesn't that wanted to get rid of that
43:31
Speaker 2: person to person counseling center And because of the bottom
43:36
Speaker 2: line and pay I'm not going to even say how
43:39
Speaker 2: much money it was every year to a phone service
43:42
Speaker 2: that a student could any time, And it was like,
43:45
Speaker 2: they don't even know our theology, they don't know the student.
43:48
Speaker 2: This is not relevant, This isn't even zoom, this is
43:51
Speaker 2: just a phone. It could be like some person in
43:55
Speaker 2: some country I won't even mention around the world who's
43:58
Speaker 2: up at it during the day when it's night. And
44:01
Speaker 2: I was like, what the heck? Yeah, so that's a
44:06
Speaker 2: whole can of worms that we have to go off camera.
44:08
Speaker 3: For for sure. For sure, so somebody on camera part
44:14
Speaker 3: of it. In light of that reality where I'm sure
44:16
Speaker 3: there's still a lot of people who are saying, I
44:19
Speaker 3: think mental health therapy might help me, but I know
44:23
Speaker 3: that if I do it, there's a whole group of
44:26
Speaker 3: people that will look down upon me because they'll say,
44:30
Speaker 3: your relationship with God isn't good enough. Why is it
44:34
Speaker 3: important in your in your thinking for someone to recognize
44:40
Speaker 3: that faith in God as fulfilled in the person of
44:44
Speaker 3: Christ and lived by the very breath of God given
44:47
Speaker 3: to us. Takes seriously that engaging in mental health therapy
44:54
Speaker 3: with another human being is not different from trusting God.
45:01
Speaker 2: We compartmentalize the emotional well being from anything else, so
45:09
Speaker 2: Let's say that I was eighty pounds overweight and I
45:15
Speaker 2: came to Jim and I said, Jim, you know, can
45:17
Speaker 2: you help me? And he would say, you know, you
45:21
Speaker 2: have to pray your weight away. You have to like
45:24
Speaker 2: just read the Bible or you'll become like Eli who
45:28
Speaker 2: fell over and whatever. But how come I could go
45:33
Speaker 2: to Jim and Jim isn't going to say to me
45:37
Speaker 2: or James, sorry, Ok'll good that. Hey, you know what,
45:42
Speaker 2: I can't help you. First, you have to get God's
45:44
Speaker 2: help and then maybe you know because but how can
45:47
Speaker 2: we compartmentalize so many things but yet the one area
45:53
Speaker 2: that is so relevant to our faith walk? If I
45:59
Speaker 2: see my self as less than how can I ever
46:02
Speaker 2: believe God can use me unless I'm so Unless I
46:06
Speaker 2: go to First Corinth and say He takes the foolish
46:09
Speaker 2: things me of this role to confound the wise. But
46:12
Speaker 2: how can I ever believe that I'm good enough to
46:17
Speaker 2: lead a Bible study, I'm good enough to be someone
46:20
Speaker 2: who engages in helping youth if I'm constantly struggling with
46:26
Speaker 2: you know what this as one pastor years ago said
46:31
Speaker 2: worm theology. And all I do is feel like I
46:35
Speaker 2: just crawl across the ground and I'm not good enough
46:38
Speaker 2: except be careful and I'm stepped on? How does that
46:42
Speaker 2: fit into how God wants to use me? And when
46:45
Speaker 2: you look at Scripture, it was like every you know,
46:48
Speaker 2: Moses was a great leader. Do he have his issues, yes,
46:52
Speaker 2: but he led the people out. Look at Paul, all
46:54
Speaker 2: of these people they had issues, okay, And yet in
46:58
Speaker 2: our world we can say no, no, no, forget this,
47:01
Speaker 2: just follow the boy. Scripture is good, it's it's relevant
47:06
Speaker 2: for everything. But yet all those people had something we
47:09
Speaker 2: never had. They had elders, they had families, they had
47:13
Speaker 2: other people who carried and guided them. When you're all alone,
47:20
Speaker 2: life becomes really scary. But when you're in real community,
47:24
Speaker 2: not fake community where you show up on Sunday morning
47:27
Speaker 2: for an hour and hour and half and then you leave,
47:29
Speaker 2: you know, like it's a baseball game or something. Real
47:32
Speaker 2: community where people are interested, they have you over, you know,
47:37
Speaker 2: their kids, their lives. That is all part of the
47:41
Speaker 2: growth process because you let them inside of your very fears,
47:47
Speaker 2: your insecurities, your struggles, and they're like, I'm gonna pray,
47:53
Speaker 2: not so my prayer can be a gossipline. I'm gonna
47:56
Speaker 2: pray so that you might be encouraged, And I'm gonna
47:59
Speaker 2: be here so you're couraged. What makes a a so
48:03
Speaker 2: effective any time of the day. I can call my
48:09
Speaker 2: sponsor anytime of day. I'm struggling anytime of the day. Okay,
48:14
Speaker 2: But he doesn't say, Hey, you know what did you
48:18
Speaker 2: talk to God before you called me? Now, it's an
48:21
Speaker 2: assumption of we are the body. I'm an extension. I'm
48:25
Speaker 2: his hands and feet. But our world says, don't inconvenience
48:30
Speaker 2: me only if I get a benefit from it? Was
48:34
Speaker 2: it now? When who talked about a disinterested love? He said,
48:39
Speaker 2: when we invest, we want interest, but when we liber
48:42
Speaker 2: oal lives of people, we should be with no expectation
48:45
Speaker 2: of interest back just give because of that's what we're
48:48
Speaker 2: supposed to do. Yeah, and we you know, when we
48:53
Speaker 2: I can only speak of like Angola. But I remember
48:57
Speaker 2: leaving when we said these. Now I under understand what
49:00
Speaker 2: it means when Scripture said that you have I have
49:05
Speaker 2: bred you know nothing about went there and it was
49:09
Speaker 2: like wow that they have back in the day, cell phones,
49:13
Speaker 2: no internet, no running still today many electricity no running
49:17
Speaker 2: one and no but they have bread. I know nothing
49:19
Speaker 2: about because they have each other and church was there.
49:25
Speaker 2: Even to this day, their lives revolve around church, not
49:29
Speaker 2: because it's a to do thing, but it's a people
49:32
Speaker 2: relational thing. Yeah, and I think you know we talk
49:37
Speaker 2: about our mental health Christian walk. It cannot be compartmentalized.
49:45
Speaker 2: It has to be intertwined because even the person who
49:49
Speaker 2: was quote unquote unique or eclectic finds his place or
49:54
Speaker 2: her place. HM. Very good.
50:00
Speaker 1: Well, Mike, thanks for being here. This has been an
50:03
Speaker 1: awesome conversation. Really appreciate you being on the show. And uh,
50:06
Speaker 1: and thanks for sharing your insights with us or call
50:10
Speaker 1: it a day there, but part two, we'd love to
50:15
Speaker 1: have you back. This would be it would be great.
50:18
Speaker 1: I know there's a lot of grounded didn't cover, so
50:19
Speaker 1: you're welcome back anytime. We'll get your scheduled. This was
50:23
Speaker 1: fantastic and I just really appreciate you being here. We'll
50:27
Speaker 1: close it out today and uh, we'll catch you on
50:30
Speaker 1: the next episode of Thinking Christian. Thanks everybody for being here.
50:32
Speaker 2: Take care.
50:33
Speaker 1: I just want to take a second to thank the
50:35
Speaker 1: team at Life Audio for their partnership with us on
50:37
Speaker 1: the Thinking Christian podcast. If you go to Lifeaudio dot
50:40
Speaker 1: com you'll find dozens of other faith centered podcasts in
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Speaker 1: their network. They've got shows about prayer, Bible study, parenting,
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Speaker 1: and more.