The Transformative Power of Life’s ‘Wasted’ Years | Joël Malm | Episode 5

Speaker 1: 0:01

Hi, this is Grant Lockridge and Jared Tafta on the Across the Counter podcast, where we create space for real people to have honest conversations. Today we have on the podcast Joel Malm. He's written a book called Connecting the Dots that just came out. So, joel, just give me a little bit about your personal journey and kind of how you got started.

Speaker 3: 0:28

Well, yeah, started is interesting because I would say probably what started. Things was a turning point when I was about 11 years old and my parents announced that they're going to be moving to Central America to be missionaries and we ended up moving to a country in the middle of a civil war Guatemala, central America and I grew up on the mission field down there, learned in Spanish, working right along with my dad, who to this day, is my best friend. We do a podcast together, if that tells you anything.

Speaker 1: 0:55

Yeah, I saw that one. Yeah, I've got over a hundred episodes.

Speaker 3: 0:59

Somebody told me when you start a podcast it's got to be sustainable. And I'm like the only thing that's sustainable is me talking to dad. So we started, I did that, came back from Guatemala, all my friends went to college and I had no desire. Well, I don't know, my school kind of tried to push me to go to college, but I just hated school. So I was like why would I want to do more of that? So I got a job working for Southwest Airlines, worked there for seven years, traveled all over the world, started climbing mountains. During that time I managed to go to college finally, kind of when I figured I wanted to do and thought I wanted to become a lawyer, got a degree in pre-law. And then a friend of mine is like oh man, I'm going to be real, honestly, you would, you would hate being a lawyer. And he was right, so right about my junior year of college I climbed a mountain in Russia called Mount Elbrus. It's the highest peak in Europe. I had this wild, hairy ambition to climb every highest of the seven peaks in each of the continents, you know. And oh man, yeah, I give up after two. But, but on the mountain had an experience where I felt like God told me to start taking people on outdoor ventures. So I started doing that. I didn't know what I was doing. I actually wrote a book about that, called vision map. People are like, how do you start something like leading people on outdoor ventures? I was like, well, I wrote a book about it and I basically I would take people at a group of 10. We would go for four months. We'd fly one of our trips. We flew into Hong Kong, smuggled Bibles into China, worked our way up through northern China, up into Mongolia, out into western China and Tibet, up to Mount Everest and then back home. And then we had another one where we flew one way to Central America and then worked our way back to the US Border by Ground over four months, did that for a few years, got married and kind of realized that the four month thing wasn't going to work anymore. So we my wife's very adventurous, but yeah, four months didn't work. Yeah, so uh, got a uh, let's see those are. Yeah, went back, got a master's degree and then I started doing shorter trips, these I started taking kind of prominent leaders. I had an idea to take prominent leaders on outdoor adventures around the world. Instead of them speaking to you know 12,000 people in an arena, I'd have them come speak to 12, um, on a, on a hike. So we hike Machu Picchu to Machu Picchu or climb Mount Kilimanjaro or raft the Grand Canyon. So I started doing that. Uh, right in the middle of that, we got sent to Mexico, which is what the book Connecting the Dots is about. It's an experience I leave off of my resume. If you see the gap in my resume, you're like, well, what happened in that year? Well, we don't, we don't talk about that. But uh, uh, the book is about this season in Mexico. That felt like the biggest waste of my young life, a year of my young life ever, but as I look back I see it was actually probably the most transformative experience up to this point. What? I learned that year in Mexico. So that's what the book Connecting the Dots is about. After that, we uh moved to Peru. I started a cafe in Peru and a church out of that. Uh, in Cusco, peru, you know, million people come through every year to go to Machu Picchu, a lot of spiritual seekers there. So we started actually an English fellowship right out of the cafe. Uh, did that for a while, moved back to the US, um, started writing books and speaking. And uh, here we are today or write books, I speak. Uh. We started a retreat center. We bought 16 acres. Uh, during COVID I kind of discovered I I don't actually like the city. Um, so we we moved out to the 16 acres and we built uh, four cabins my wife says to call them cottages because everybody comes out there like these aren't cabins, these are nice. So, uh, four cottages for pastors and missionaries to get away. So I'm also I guess I'm a real estate developer at this point. Uh, so I do that and I do leadership, coaching, write books, speak, and that's kind of how I got started and where I'm at now. So there's a brief history of the last 20 years of my life.

Speaker 1: 5:03

Yeah, but that's awesome. I want to hear more about that year in Mexico, cause I mean, I've had several years where I felt like in college I was wasting my life in my young life.

Speaker 3: 5:18

So the younger the younger you are, the more you feel like any gap in time feels like a waste of your life, right, yeah?

Speaker 2: 5:26

I just I'm really impressed that you just did a three minute uh review of 20 years of your life, really succinctly and well. Congratulations, man. I was just like man, he's doing it.

Speaker 3: 5:39

Well, one of the benefits of writing is what I tell people all the time is one of the benefits of writing is you learn to get really concise. Uh, because or, or you or you don't and nobody reads your stuff. But uh, it's you kind of learned like, what are the high points? Let's just go with the high points. So yeah, nice.

Speaker 2: 6:01

Nice yeah, tell us about that year.

Speaker 1: 6:03

That's really cool.

Speaker 3: 6:06

Oh, okay, you really, you really want to know about it. All right, I do. Yeah, so I had just gotten this idea to start taking the shorter trips and taking some prominent authors with me. I had just gotten a yes from a nationally known speaker. He said he was going to hike to Machu Picchu with me. And I got a phone call from a friend of mine uh, my friend, david Nicholson, lifelong mentor of mine from since we lived in Guatemala, and he said hey, I feel like, uh, my wife and I were supposed to move back to the U? S and we feel like you're, we're supposed to ask you to take over our ministry here in Mexico. And I was like, no way, that is not my call. He lived in a just a drug infested like narco trap. Not drug dealers had taken over the area, the cartels are taken over the area, open shootouts on the beach. And he was, he was tough, he's like six foot six. He was famous in the neighborhood because he got into a, uh, a scuffle with one of the toughest guys in the neighborhood who was beating up a girl and he like took him to the ground and had him in a chokehold. The missionary had this dangerous student of chokehold, the whole neighborhoods watching. I, I joke, he, he kicked butt, kicked butt and took names in Jesus name, um and uh, and so he's super famous. You know, and that's, that's not me, I'm a skinny little white guy. I did not a fight and uh, so he's like, I know you're the least likely person, but would you come down and like, david, I'm about to start this outdoor adventure thing. This is not what I'm called to do. And he's like no, I think you're supposed to pray about. Finally, so I, I, I joke that I used to the Christian Trump card and I said, all right, let me pray about it, brother. And uh, that that ends all conversation. You know, if you, if you don't want to be asked to do a certain thing, you just say, okay, let me, let me pray about that, brother. And everybody knows that means you don't get back to the person, right? Yeah, uh, two weeks later, dave calls me what'd you hear from? What'd you hear? And I was like, about what? He's like? You didn't even pray about it. And I was like, ah, it's like you never. That's, that's a party foul. You don't follow up when somebody says I'll pray about it, that means leave me alone, man. So, uh, so he's like what did Emily, my wife, say? And I had not even told her about it because I knew she would pray about it. So I was like, yeah, ironically or providentially, whatever it was, she was actually in Central America at the time. She had felt like she was supposed to go down there and improve her Spanish for something in our future. Of course I, and in my mind I'm like, ah, it's completely unrelated. But, uh, anyways, called her long story short. We ended up going to Mexico. It's the worst experience ever. Um, no, no, you know, nobody converted her. No, no, you know, nobody converted to Christ. There wasn't mass revival. We just left angry, bitter. Our life got threatened by the most dangerous dude in the neighborhood. We had an intern that him and her kind of hit it off and we had to take her and send her home immediately because the missionary dating thing wasn't working. Uh, and so he got mad, threatened us. We were holed up in our house for multiple days. Uh, we had our house broken into, stuff stolen, it was just chaos. And then after a year, they called us and there was some a scuffle with the board in the U? S and they basically decided the ministry needed to close down, and I was kind of like I agree, it either needs to completely reboot or close down. Crazy thing is we had raised support as missionaries to go down there. So all of a sudden we're missionaries who are fully funded without a mission. Uh, so it was a very awkward thing where we had told all these people, we're, we're called to Mexico and then a year later we're not called to Mexico. So so, uh, I called my dad. He runs a missions agency. Um, I'm actually in that office right now. I'm on the board of the mission. And you know, they got missionaries all over the world. And I was like dad, what do we do now? And he's like well, what do you want to do? I'm like, well, it doesn't matter what I want to do. What does the Lord want? I'm like, well, sometimes, sometimes, he just gives you free reign to do whatever you want. You know that. St Augustine quote love God and do as you please, for the heart trained and love to God will do nothing to offend the beloved. And I was like well, I've always wanted to go to South America. And he's like well, I got an opportunity on, there's a guy that wants to start a cafe in a church. I was like I could do that, called the guy to two Skype calls. Later we moved to South America site unseen, to Cusco, peru, and ended up starting a cafe. And then when we got down there, the guy that was starting the cafe, he bailed and left. So we started the cafe in the church by ourselves. But that was the Mexico experience. I always look back at that as a complete and utter failure and but now I see just so many things that God taught me through it, stuff he brought to the surface that you know, one of the things he brought to my surface was how much anger I had in me. I was just perpetually angry in Mexico. Yeah, and interestingly enough, I ended up writing, wrote a whole book about anger.

Speaker 1: 10:43

Slows down.

Speaker 3: 10:44

Yeah, I had to keep anger and anxiety from ruining life's relationships. So I learned a whole lot about myself through it and now I see it was a real transformational, foundational season in my life. But it literally felt like a waste of a good year of my life. There's a joke, I tell, of a guy that walked out, walked out his front door and saw a little snail on the ground and he picked it up and looked at it, tossed it across the yard and went on with his day. Well, a year later that same guy hears a knock on his door and he opens the door and there's nobody there. But he looks down and sees a snail and the snail looks up and goes what was that all about? And I Was that snail. Yeah, I felt like I took me a year to crawl back to where I'd started from before God tossed me across the yard. So that's what the book's about. It's about connecting dots, about like those seasons where you're like what was that all about? Typically, it's the thing we'd like to leave out of our story. That's what God uses to give us a message and a mission. We've all been given a message to share and a problem to solve, and that usually comes from those dark seasons that we, we we probably felt were a failure or we were a failure. They just did not turn out like we wanted, and that's when God comes in and makes all things work together for the good of those who love him, to those who are called according to his purpose.

Speaker 1: 11:57

So yeah, I'm super curious about that kind of church she started and how you feel about denominations and how you feel about, you know, starting a church in cusco. That's cool.

Speaker 3: 12:12

Yeah. So what I loved about that church? It was a church in english and, uh, there was no expectations. People were just happy to have somebody preaching the bible in english, in their native language. So nobody had expectations about children's program. I mean, a french guy came in and he offered to start a youth group that took off, but there was nobody wanting a children's program, nobody's saying we need a. You know why don't we have a small group for hairless chihuahua owners? You know, like there was an always like crazy, weird demands. It was just we get up, we sing songs, we get to know people. You know it's 20 countries represented in the church, uh, and we read the bible and and talk about the bible. And I absolutely Loved it. I think one of the greatest compliments I got one one night on the same night a lady came up to me and she goes hey, hey, I know you try and stay middle of the road, but I can tell you're from a charismatic background, right, I'm like I will not tell. And that literally that same night a guy came up to me. He's like hey, uh, you're, you're reformed, right, I can, I can tell you're from a reform background there, you go so we had to stay real middle of the road, um, because you just have people from all just all sorts of backgrounds, cultural backgrounds, um, you know, just it's it's. I really enjoyed it. It really challenged me too, because I, you know, sometimes I'd share something. And somebody came after me, a British guy, one time. He's like you know, he's like you know the way you presented this. I'm not so sure I agree with that and he gave his angle and I was like I hadn't even thought of that. But I was thinking from a very American mindset and the British see it very differently. So it was quite an education for me realizing how much, even though I grew up in Central America, how much of my paradigm is shaped by this kind of American idea of what the gospel is. But there's, uh, the gospel is multicultural, and again, that word has been hijacked, um, in so many ways, but it really is. It was, it was meant to be used across cultures in a way that speaks specifically to that culture. So I loved it. It was a great experience. I'd love to do it again someday. Um, I just have a real heart for, in fact, in two weeks I'm gonna be in switzerland with a group of international church pastors from europe and the middle east who run english-speaking churches in those countries. I love that group of people, I love what they do. Um, I love that it just requires staying central, centrally focused on the gospel, and because that that's you know it keeps it. What's that? I looted her the city, you know, in in non essentials. Whatever that famous quote is, you know, and all things unity, right, yeah, yeah. Yeah that great quote that I can't remember, but yes, I loved it. Um and uh, you know everyone's. Now we get some weirdos in there. There's a lot of uh, there's a lot of shamanistic religion in puru, so a lot of people go down there for these ayahuasca Uh experiences, where they sit there and take these hallucinogenic drugs and have this transcendental Psycho. What do you call that Psycho? No, um psychedelic psychedelic, that's word, psychedelic experience, yeah, so we'd have shamans wander in and then they're flowing white linen and stuff and kind of have to Handle them with a grain of salt. But uh, they'd say weird things sometimes, I think all right, well, let's talk about that afterwards, brother. So, and they were coming to church? Oh yeah, well, because they saw people that would, they could potentially get it to go to their ayahuasca sessions.

Speaker 1: 15:40

Oh Marketing should.

Speaker 3: 15:41

Hey, yeah, a bunch of a bunch of travelers all gathered together drinking coffee. Let's get them over here. So yeah, my wife, she regularly had to deal with them and she ran the cafe and they'd all come in the cafe trying to recruit people for their, for their ayahuasca sessions.

Speaker 1: 15:55

So it was interesting. That's gotta be a lot of interesting conversations, but yeah, yep, it was.

Speaker 3: 16:02

we had we met on sunday evenings at four or five, something like that, and then the rest of the week it was a cafe and yeah, so whenever you were describing Kind of that season of.

Speaker 2: 16:15

In my mind it's like a season of breaking, or you know that year of like, what was that about? Uh, I, I think I've come to to see a lot of those seasons as, um, it's almost like this season of renovation where, like, there's just a lot of gutting and putting things back together and you know, if you've ever renovated something, you never really know, like how far that's gonna go. So, like whenever you mentioned, like finding anger or those things like that, like, have you gone through more seasons like that, uh, since then, or is that kind of a one-time event?

Speaker 3: 16:59

Yeah. So when you write a book it's interesting because it takes about two years from the time, unless it's a really hot topic, right, you know, like a modern events thing. So you write a book, takes about two years to get it to the bookshelves. So at the time I wrote that I was like it was the hardest season of my life up to this point Until last year. So while we were waiting I had already sent the book in. Last year was probably the hardest season, a new hardest season. Um, building that retreat center was incredibly difficult. We sold everything like sold our house, and went all in on building this retreat center. We downsized from a very large house to a 1,000 square foot tiny home that we're living in now to get this ministry started. That was hard. The move was hard. Last year it was hotter than the ninth level of hell here in Texas by May. So we're out there building and I'm putting in plumbing under a house in 120 degree heat under the house. And then, on top of all that, I got a melanoma diagnosis. So they told me I had cancer and it was just literally one thing after another. Last year it nearly killed me on multiple fronts, thought I had my anger under control and then last year I saw there was a whole another level, that we knocked out some sheet rock and found, oh, there's more under there.

Speaker 1: 18:22

It's brought in wood oh yeah.

Speaker 3: 18:25

Does that go all the way down? Yeah, like what the heck man? We're gonna have to rip out all the plumbing here. So I'm very familiar with the building analogies. But yeah, so last year was incredibly hard Our marriage. It was really hard on our marriage. My wife is. She's a rock star. She was just telling me this week she's like I think I've been in panic mode for last year but I think I'm feeling peace finally. I'm like thank God. So she rolled with it. You know she's got the vision for it too and she's been working her tail off getting everything ready. And so last year was incredibly hard. In fact I've just now started kind of reflecting back on what I went through and got a nice big cut on my side here from where they cut out the melanoma. Funny thing is, when I went in to get it cut out, the doctor he's like hey, you know that last biopsy we did to kind of figure out the scale of it. We didn't find any, but I need to cut you anyways. And I was like wait, so it's healed and he goes. Well, it's the best possible scenario. You know, doctors they're not really hope dealers and I was like I'm like that's good news and he's like well, it's the best possible scenario. I'm like you, punk, but anyway I believe God healed me of it and because they were saying it was like stage four, bad like, and then is gone. So, which is crazy, because I've been hearing a ton of stories of that kind of healing all across the world. People saying like death sentences. They're coming in the doctor's, like go home and write your will, it's over, and then they come back for one last time and everything's gone, all the cancer's gone in their body. I'm hearing stories of like I think we're in the season of healing, but that's a whole nother topic we could talk about. But so last year was hard, very, very hard, and it was a horrible, terrible, very bad, no good year. But now I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. We're having missionaries and pastors come regularly getting a minister to them and it's really cool to see the vision kind of finally come into pass. It took twice as long as I thought it would take, but the retreat center's open now and we're gonna be starting doing small retreats, helping pastors write books, giving them a chance to get away. Had a pastor call me a couple of weeks ago and he said hey, I showed up at church and the elders met me in the parking lot and said you don't work here anymore, and so he's pretty devastated. So he's like I was like well, welcome to the club. And I was like now you're ready for God to use you? As the AW Tozier said, it's doubtful whether God can use a man greatly until he's first wounded him deeply. I'm like you're ready now? So yeah, so he came out and spent a few days getting a little bit of a break. So I love seeing that, and if all the suffering was for that, it was worth it. What's?

Speaker 2: 21:22

the retreat center called.

Speaker 3: 21:27

I think we've landed on calling it Madrona Hills. It's on a road called Madrona and it's on the top of a hill, so Madrona Hills. I'll send you a link to it you can see some pictures of. We just shot some aerial, had a person come out with a drone and shoot some stuff. We're in Curville, Texas, so Cool, well now.

Speaker 1: 21:47

So do you have a charismatic background or do you have a reform background? I'm curious now.

Speaker 2: 21:55

Yes, yes, I knew you were gonna say that that's awesome.

Speaker 1: 22:03

Well, are you involved in a church right now, or are you just kind of?

Speaker 3: 22:07

I am, yeah, I'm a teaching pastor. I'm a teaching pastor and then I speak at. I speak all over the place. Last week I was actually on the Catholic Faith Network, so Nice, that'll really throw you for a loop there, right.

Speaker 1: 22:19

Yeah, I've taught plenty of Catholics on this thing, so it's been.

Speaker 3: 22:23

Yeah, really. Yeah, yeah, I've. There's some really profound. There's one right here in town, a guy named Ronald Roheiser, here in San Antonio, one of the most profound Bible guys I've ever heard teach. But yeah, so I'm, yes, I mean that's the answer right, you could call me a charismatic reform Baptist costal with dispensationalist leanings, but I could go with Calvin Annalism. Yeah Sounds right up my alley.

Speaker 2: 22:58

Okay, grant and I have some things like I say I'm a nine point Calvinist with Armenian leanings, and then, and then I'm a pan millennial, like a pan millennial. It's all about pan out and like I'm joking and very serious, Like I don't, I don't know, Like you mentioned multicultural earlier and it's like if you can make a singular decision, like you probably haven't eaten enough foods, Like I don't know, Like it just yeah anyway.

Speaker 3: 23:28

Yeah, that's what. What's your favorite food? Well, Asian food, Mexican food, yeah, Middle Eastern food, yeah, yeah, yeah. So so, yeah, that's the bottom line. It was weird because I grew up in a pretty charismatic church but then when we moved to Guatemala, the English speaking church that we went to there we would go to two services on Sunday. So we'd go to the English speaking church, which was like liturgical, it was probably closer to a Presbyterian church, but then we'd leave that and we'd go to this wild, crazy Latino charismatic thing with, like praise hoops and dancers and you know people get knocked out on the ground and so you know, we get a little bit of both every Sunday morning. And then, on top of that, my dad was a pastor for a while and he took over an assembly of God church and then but then I also, I'd say my most formative Bible teaching was in a very heavily hyper Calvinist reform church. Probably the greatest Bible teacher, the guy that influenced me most in the view of my view of God, Keith Lam, a brilliant Bible teacher. I've never heard anybody like him. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, Maybe, maybe like AWPink, like level, if you know who he is, but he was hyper Calvinist. Like I can't. Even I can't drink the Kool-Aid that much, but he was. He's a brilliant dude. So yeah, and you know, one weekend I'll be speaking at a charismatic church. The next weekend I'm at an axe 29, you know, hyper Calvinist. The next weekend I'm at like a hyper Armenian church where it's like open, open theism, where they're like God knows all that can be known and the rest is up to us. So it's I'm not sure where I stand on all of it. And on the end times, eschatology stuff. I was listening. Are you familiar with Douglas Wilson?

Speaker 1: 25:28

I've heard of the name. I don't think so. No.

Speaker 3: 25:29

Okay, yeah, he's a famous post millennial guy, post mill, and it's got some pretty legit arguments. I was listening to him the other day and I'm like, all right, I've never considered this, but I'm starting to think maybe he might be on to something.

Speaker 1: 25:45

What is kind of one of those?

Speaker 3: 25:47

arguments. This is his great argument. I love the way he said this. He's like the world is not God's Vietnam or Afghanistan, where we're waiting for him to helicopter us out. Jesus either accomplished the work and it's being accomplished right now or he didn't accomplish the work. So if Jesus accomplished the work, we're just in the process of him bringing all things under submission to him, the gospel spreading around the world. And then the end comes right and he's like but you know, this rapture theology is like you know, it's God's Vietnam. Ah, man, we're not gonna win this battle. Pull them all out by helicopter and then we'll just destroy the place, fire, bomb the place. And I was like I can go with that. So yeah, I don't know. I don't know how to talk an end. I was doing a sermon the other day and everybody's like where do you stand on it?

Speaker 1: 26:33

I'm like I don't know, man, I don't know anymore, I'll tell you what it is incredibly refreshing to hear I don't know from people of churches and teaching passers and stuff like that, because not a lot of them will be like you know what? I just I don't know.

Speaker 3: 26:54

Well, I mean humility requires you say well, I mean Jordan Peterson says it's not what you know, that's most important, it's what you don't know, that's most important. And I'm like humility admits there's so much I don't know that to even you know like it's hard enough for me to live by what I do know, so I don't need a whole lot of other stuff in the mix. It's not even sure I'm gonna go with what I know for certain. You know God's love justification, those things like that. And there is that stuff. I guess we'll find out eventually.

Speaker 1: 27:29

Yeah, I like that a lot.

Speaker 2: 27:31

Yeah, I like the. It even makes me think, if you kind of go to like a food analogy, or as you expand your experiences, like a lot of times we think that if we expand our experiences and that comes to a place where you know nothing, it's like no, I still know what rotten food tastes like Like. I also still know what sweet and salty and umami and sour and bitter Like. There's some fundamentals. Now language itself starts to break down when we're trying to be understood, multicultural and with one another, but it's like there's I don't know. That's where I come to like the inherent God has placed his spirit within you. And so, yeah, there's some things that I know Like I know what's not good, like I don't know if you guys ever heard the lawyer in the state so I think it was Supreme Court where they were trying to define what pornography was Like to the letter, like at what point is something pornographic? And the Supreme Court judge was like look man, I can tell you when I know it, when I see it, and I don't know there's some kind of like of discernment of God in inherent. I think I don't know if that makes sense or carries on that thought.

Speaker 3: 28:48

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's just a steward. I think it was on the test for what it is. Yeah, yeah, two questions for you guys. How old are you both?

Speaker 1: 29:02

Well, I'm 20, 27.

Speaker 2: 29:05

Okay, I'm 34.

Speaker 1: 29:07

And Jared is some type of age.

Speaker 3: 29:09

Wow, that's a pretty wild realization to have come too early on. You guys must have like kind of an open field type. What are they in the big five personality types? They talk about openness to experience, and openness to experience means you're kind of open to a wider playing Field than most people would be open to. That's pretty impressive that you're already at that point. That's really cool Openness.

Speaker 1: 29:32

What is it? Since we're talking about Jordan Peterson, we both which we would cry if we ever got Jordan Peterson on this podcast, by the way like I would literally we tears of joy because that man's awesome. Oh yeah, that basically just that idea that one of his like incredible ideas is the idea of responsibility, of just like getting your life in order, of, you know, just adding responsibility so that you actually have something to wake up for. That was I actually just told one of my buddies that he's going through a rough time and that really helped me just to have things like a wife, a church, you know a couple of dogs, you know a young life leader. People need me here, like that kind of thing. So that's that's been super beneficial. So thanks, jordan Peterson.

Speaker 3: 30:29

Yeah, I think, when it all comes down, that guy's going to be kind of a CS Lewis type figure of this generation. If he's not already in the kingdom, he is very close, yeah, so yeah, cool.

Speaker 1: 30:47

Well, just going back to we kind of mentioned that thing if we know what's what's not good, and one of the things we kind of want to focus on in this podcast are things that things that you believe to be good. So what are a couple of those, couple of those things to you?

Speaker 3: 31:05

Like you said, the doctrine, you know, god's love, obviously fantastic, but yeah, well, so my two driving forces are this this is kind of the mission behind everything I do One is stop unnecessary suffering through using God's wisdom. So much of the stuff that we end up dealing with is just because we don't understand the principles God put into place, and I think that's one of the I'm. That's why I love the wisdom books, specifically Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, two of my favorite books. One of them, my dad, had us read the proverb of the day, start the day. You know, the one that matched up with the date. Proverbs, is how to stop unnecessary suffering. You know, it just talks about the principles, and and so I love principles and I think that's one of the gifts that that Christianity brings to the table is one of the things I talk about in the connecting the dots is the fact that there is no formula for life. There's only revelation from the Holy Spirit, and the longer you walk with God, you realize we all want a formula, which I'm. That's what religion is. You know. Religion's a formula. Like you know, do this, do that, do that and God will be happy. But there's really no, there's no formula. Now that Jesus is here, and right before Jesus left the earth, he said there's a lot more I want to show you, but basically you can't handle the truth. So I'm going to send the Holy Spirit and he'll guide you in truth as you need it and as you're able to handle it. Nietzsche, a guy we don't like to quote in the church much, but he said something pretty profound. He said the measure of a man's character can be can be gauged by how much truth he can handle without having to have it diluted. And I think the truth of the gospel, the beautiful thing about it is it's it shows us how to navigate the complexities of life. And usually that's through principles, which is where Jesus confused people so much they were going by the letter of law. And you know, a girl comes up that's caught in adultery and he lets her off the hook. And you're like dude, that was a pretty clear cut deal. Jesus like she was guilty there and he lets her off the hook. But then another guy comes up. He's like hey, I want to follow you, just let me go bury my father. And Jesus is like savage. Jesus comes out and he goes let the dead bury their dead. Anybody that puts their hand on the plow and looks back isn't worthy to follow me and you're like, dude Jesus, that guy was sincere, why you been so brutal with him. Yeah, there was something in there that. But that's the beautiful thing about principles that they navigate, they flex with each situation and you know, if you do this, you'll get this, if you do this you'll get this. So I love that. Stop, stop unnecessary suffering. And then my second kind of thing that I'm for is finding meaning in necessary suffering. Victor Frankel, he said in some way suffering ceases to be suffering the moment it finds meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice. And one of those are kind of my two driving forces and everything I write is use God's wisdom to stop the unnecessary suffering. But when you go through that suffering in Acts, one of those funny verses where Paul says he went around encouraging people that through much suffering we enter the kingdom of God I'm like that doesn't that's not very hallmark encouragement, but the idea that there's suffering that we just have to go through and then, through that, there's meaning on the other side of it. So how do you find that meaning? That's what connecting the dots the new book was specifically about is how do you find meaning in the middle of suffering Cause there's a pattern to his work. So those are the two things I would say that kind of are. My driving force is wisdom. I call it wisdom and perspective. But it's stopped by necessary suffering and then find meaning in necessary suffering, and I think that's the gift of it's the gift of an eternal perspective. When you keep everything in focus, you recognize that somewhere on the other side, maybe on the other side of the space time continuum, but you're going to look back and go true and just where your judgments, and then you'll drop your face to the ground and worship.

Speaker 1: 34:56

So Victor Frankel is a stud, by the way, that was one of the first books I ever read is man's search for meaning. And that was just man, because heavy book, I was not expecting the wisdom and philosophy you know through it, of just which I don't know where I land Like, did he become a Christian? Oh, there, you go Right there.

Speaker 3: 35:21

I literally have it on my desk, yeah.

Speaker 1: 35:24

Because it was written. The forward was written by I forget the version I have. It was written by a Christian dude, kushner, right. Kushner wrote the forward on this one. Okay, well, I don't know, I'm sure that there's so many different publications of that book just because it's old and they've just wrote it so many times. But it's just that is a killer book of just finding meaning and just unnecessary suffering. That's. I love that book Absolutely. But I feel like to be kind of that idea that you're bringing up of just like the wisdom via principles is huge, like it's almost like they're your guardrails, of just like how to live life, because there's so many I mean obviously there's so many different situations where the Bible just does not cover that, but it covers you in the way of like almost teaching you how to think. It doesn't necessarily like tell you exactly what to do with this. Because if it was a rule book with there are rules that I know that's not what I'm saying but if it was just like a legitimate rule book for every situation in your entire life one, it would be infinite amount of pages for all of humanity and two, it just would not be as beneficial as just like imparting the wisdom in the Bible to your brain and being able to make decisions based off of that, because anytime you go in and you say, hey, how can I love these people better? It's not like you know, here's my theology, you're doing it wrong, kind of thing. There is a place to call out sin too, but it's just having the wisdom of being able to read the entire Bible and figuring out what people did, where they went wrong, what God thought about it. That kind of thing is huge. So I definitely agree with both of those perspectives and how important they are.

Speaker 3: 37:34

Yeah, absolutely. I tell a lot of people at my church. We talk about principles a lot and I tell them you know, sometimes you're going to have to take out a loan, the transmission blows out, You're going to have to take out a loan to pay for that. Just know this. The Bible never says loan, getting a loan, as a sin. He just says you're going to be a slave to the guy that lent you the money. The borrower is the slave to the lender. So it's just saying if you do this, you'll get this. Now, sometimes you got to do that, but just know you'll get this. If he never gives the minimum standards on giving, he just says giving it will be given back to you. Basically, you get to decide how much people are generous with you by how generous you are with others, and that's a principle. So it kind of leaves the ball in your court.

Speaker 1: 38:13

Yeah, making decisions based off of that is huge. Go ahead, jay.

Speaker 2: 38:25

I think about God using principles as like his methodology for like, including our participation, cause, like, human beings are uniquely different, like I don't know. Like animals have instincts, right. Like there's fundamental codes written into the nature of most living beings and you know, if we're not here. Like there's a certain structure of which life is going to continue in animals and organic life. But human beings have this participatory motive and I almost view as like God having given us principles of like here's the means by which you should function in reality. But also, like you mentioned earlier, like you have the freedom to choose some things, like I almost think about it as like freedom to choose beauty, like how much art or what that art looks like in human beings. That's uniquely different, like the creative endeavor of human beings being different. But also like here's some pretty clear reference point of things that don't taste good and things that are bad and things that are decaying or rotting. So, when you were speaking earlier, I was processing the idea of a man that's just okay with mystery, like okay with discovering goodness, and then just the principles of you know these things are good and then these things are not good, they don't lead to life. So that's just where my brain goes thinking about principle.

Speaker 1: 40:07

I mean, that's just the kind of thing of I feel like which I'm still learning. I'm early Christian, baby Christian. I've been a Christian for like two, three years, so I'm still learning a whole whole bunch about how you know Christians or Jesus followers. I kind of prefer that of just Jesus followers, just kind of how they should look and how they should operate and how. A lot of times something that just really bugs me we've interviewed some you know deconstructionists and stuff like that that basically have left the faith or have really tried to just debate and dispute every kind of little thing and which is you know the heart behind. That might be correct, I don't know, nobody knows the heart of man, but just the kind of idea of keeping it, keeping it back to the basics of wisdom and loving your neighbor and loving God, is massive, which is kind of where I felt like your two huge you know principles kind of resonated on. Like Jesus said, the whole law of all the prophets is love God and love your neighbor and that sums it up and that is a massive amount of truth and that goes on endlessly.

Speaker 3: 41:43

Yeah, that's the thing about truth is I joke. Oftentimes I hear pastors say well, we preached the whole council of God here. And I was at a pastor's conference recently, talking to pastors and I said guys, let's be honest, you can't even figure out your wife. How are you gonna preach the whole council of God Like? have some humility, man, have some humility and admit you're preaching the gospel the best you understand it. And fortunately he left us enough to understand. That's enough to live off of it to do. But as you grow in faith, that's really impeter. It says add to your faith virtue you know that's right action. Add to your virtue knowledge, which is knowledge and understanding of the Bible. A lot of people get stuck there. Their faith is right action and knowledge. But then he also says add self control, which is where we go a little deeper and look at the motivations and you realize that no amount of willpower can help you overcome your pornography addiction or your alcoholism. There's something in your soul that needs to be addressed. And then he says add to your self control endurance. And I think that's a season where we all go through. We have to wrestle with God. It's the Jacob moment where Jacob he thinks he's in control and then God's like let me show you something. Pop, he breaks his hip. And then he's like and what's your name, by the way? And he goes that's Jacob. He's like nope, your new name is Israel. That's when we get our real identity is after you push through. And I think a lot of people they stop at the knowledge, or maybe they stop at the self control because they don't want to dig a little deeper, because what's below the surface scares them a little bit, and that's where, I think, a lot of times the deconstruction happens. They stop there Then as you move on to endurance, it says godliness, which I think godliness is simply all in reverence for who God is and you're not. And then it says and then add to that brotherly affection and then brotherly affection out of God and brotherly affection. I don't believe you can get to brotherly affection in a God. You can't love someone until you don't need them for something foundational. One of the things I talk about one of my books is that we all have a basic needs of security, connection and empowerment, and if you're looking for a person to give that to you, you cannot love them because they're always gonna be a source of meeting your need. So it's only when you find that need met in God's love that you're actually truly able to love. But that comes after a series of wrestling times with God and then we can hopefully walk into agape. I'm not sure we can get there until we get to heaven, but it's that progression where I think some people get hung up and for some people faith is about virtue. I do the right things and my grandma still died of cancer. Right, or that knowledge Like. I was at a men's conference a few weeks ago and these guys were on this hike and they were all preaching to me about the biblical order of what the Bible says about women in ministry. I mean, they had it down, they knew their theology. Everybody has that down.

Speaker 1: 44:37

Yeah, and they were in a small group and that same guy that had been ranting about it.

Speaker 3: 44:41

He's like, yeah, my wife said, if I don't come home, a changed man she's gonna leave me, but I'm gonna bring her before church discipline and show her. And I'm like, ha, ha, let me know how that works out, bro. Yeah, for real. So like you have all the knowledge but you have not love, you have not love. Like that's not it right.

Speaker 2: 44:59

Good luck to you sir.

Speaker 3: 45:01

Yeah, and he didn't want, and I think he didn't want to go to that self-control rate where you start to realize I got some hangups in me that are from deep soul wounds that need to be addressed. So it's just progression and I think at any point, well, if we stop growing, we end up falling short of that journey towards love that we're all called to. So it's that's huge.

Speaker 2: 45:22

What do you think about that? Like you mentioned something that's kind of even pivotable in a conversation I had right before this call. You mentioned like uncovering the motive, where there's something that needs to happen in your soul, and then like from there that step into endurance. Well, what you uncover is the inability to do anything and then the immediate next action required is endurance, like that transition progression. It almost leads me to obviously that next piece of governance and that, in my experience, is like one of the most brutal areas, because it's a recognition of weakness and need and an inability to have any type of address.

Speaker 3: 46:22

Do you?

Speaker 2: 46:23

does that track?

Speaker 3: 46:25

Yeah, I mean so in my book Connecting to Dots. I hate to keep pointing it out, but there's there. I talked about this sequence in the. There's a sequence of life, of faith, and you can't see it on the podcast, but it's a journey, right. And Every journey, I think, has nine stages, of every season of life has nine stages. There's a turning point, there's courage that's required to face the turning point. If you think about Luke's, you know Luke Skywalker having to decide whether he's gonna face the dark side, or Then there's the guide who shows up, and our guide is the Holy Spirit. You know. There's Gandalf, there's Obi-Wan Kenobi, there's the Holy Spirit, right. Then there's the decision we have to make to go all in. You burn the ships and go all in on the journey. And then there's a series of challenges JK Chester shouldn't set. An adventure is only an inconvenience, rightly considered. I call it the adventure in here. And then there's a dark cave and the dark cave is, I think, that endurance stage where God gets really silent and he. It's kind of where there's a. There's a, a time in Jesus's life where he starts talking about you. If you want to follow me, have to eat, be willing to eat my, my, my Flesh and drink my blood. And you know, the Jews think he's talking about cannibalism and they all start to leave. And so Jesus talks to Peter's like are you gonna leave too? and Peter's like I Got nowhere else to go, man, like I'm in too deep like so and I think that's what happens for a lot of us is we come to a place where it's like you do the soul work and you think you've gotten there and then all of a sudden God goes really silent. But one of the things I talk about connecting the dots is how and I've got a whole devotional about this on you version it on you version Bible app, if you want to look it up it's actually called the dark cave and my point and there is basically those dark seasons of when God just does not come through like you thought he would. There a test and if you think about it, when a teacher Is giving you a test, they sit over there quietly in the corner and you're like teacher, to now, show me you've internalized. They point and say show me you've internalized what I've been teaching you. They're not gonna feed you the answers because they have confidence you've internalized it and this is your chance to prove it. So I say oftentimes God's silence for us, if we're not in blatant sin, is Typically it's a sign of his confidence in us. He's saying no, you've got this, buddy. Now show me you've got this. It's not his disapproval, it's his confidence that the he doesn't have to give you the answer here, because you've internalized what he's been teaching you in the journey up to this point. And that's what the dark cave is about. And I think that's what endurance a lot of what endurance is is. Are you gonna push through when God seems silent, when he's not giving you the parking spot you prayed for at the mall, when he doesn't heal grandma of cancer or you have cancer? Are you willing to push through and say, not my will, but your will be done? Jesus had a dark cave, you know. If there's any other way to do this, lord, let it be, but not my will, but your will be done, and he goes to the cross and dies. That's what I think is one of the keys of that endurance stages, that endurance stage in every season. We have one of those in every season. That was my last year. I kind of saw it coming. Things were really hard and I was like there's gonna be some defining moment. And then I go to the doctor. He's like, by the way, you've got a cancer diagnosis and I was like, yeah, that makes of course. Of course that would happen. And the question is, are you gonna trust God in the dark cave and then on the other side of it, there's resurrection. Some way, somehow, you, you emerge a transformed person. The hero emerges after the dark cave battle with Darth Vader or in the in Mordor, trying to decide whether to keep the ring of power, use it for himself or destroy it. You emerge, changed, transform and you've got a mission and a message. As you go back to the Shire or go back to wherever you're coming, you know, go back home, and he's built something in you through that. But I think that's what that endurance phase is about. It's are you gonna trust God, even when he gets really silent and he seems like he may have abandoned you? Are you gonna be get choose to believe that it's his confidence, that you've internalized the lesson and this is your chance to prove it, and then you get promoted.

Speaker 1: 50:21

Yeah, that's a super refreshing point of view because I mean, I I've felt that before of just you know God being silent and me, you know, feeling like I'm doing all the right things, but I know, you know you're never doing all the right things. I mean that's, that's a fact. But like just that idea of him testing you, but less of like a Mad Adam and more of a this is my son and he's he's got this it's definitely a refreshing point of view. It's. It's crazy. He brought second Peter, second Peter, one, what is it? Five through seven or something. Um, and I have that tattooed on my leg because that's my away. Yeah, that's my favorite verse. I had to remember it because I was like but it's on my leg, so that's the one that I should Be able to remember, and I love the the part before that. That's basically like the reason it's to share in the dot divine nature of God and how to mm-hmm. Let me so.

Speaker 3: 51:29

I got it right here.

Speaker 1: 51:30

Okay, well then, there you go. I got it too, but read it away, re, go for it. So let's see that the heading which heading in ESV, who he really knows, but it says confirming your calling an election. And then, in three, it says his divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them, you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sender sinful desire. And this is what we were talking about. The five through seven, which is, for this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, virtue with knowledge, knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection and Brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours, and increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful. In the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is man, is that my favorite? You know Chonka versus, just because to me it's. It's basically a roadmap of one. You know a super thing of, like Knowing if you're being, like how to produce fruit, basically of you. You know it's a map and a gauge of you if these qualities are yours and increasing, you know, you know. You know that Fruit is being produced in in your life, which, and it's also a map of like, okay, I've got you know, and they're in the perfectly right order too, which I, which I love. You know, obviously, euy atmosphere, you know, just to make sure you have solid or hollow ression right, you got a game, a player that starts in the company you came in for you wanted to have something like Rennet, a good, reliable man who can help you make money. Have more info on the office補給, can you? You know, so virtue's gotta come first before you get that knowledge. And then you know, self-control is huge. Once you have virtue and knowledge, I mean that's massive. And then it keeps on going on and on till you hit that love bit, which is, you know, obviously the big one.

Speaker 3: 54:02

So yeah, which I think all of those are faces of love, but we want a completeness of love. So I mean, if you think about virtue, I think of that as figuring out the framework in which we're going to live, the framework of God's boundaries. That's the first step. As you say, this is what God, these are the boundaries in which he's called me to live, and they're for my own good. And so you bring your life in alignment with that. And then you come, and the next level of love would be so like when you commit to your spouse or your girlfriend. You're like by. You know, every Chica Chester talks about how every act of will is a decision to limit yourself. And so virtue is saying I'm going to limit myself to my and my options, to what God says is best for me. You get within the framework. Then the next thing, you come to love your spouse by learning more about them. You know them better. Then there's the self control, which is learning to open yourself, the deeper parts of yourself up. Then there's the endurance, the hard times you go through, and I think they're all elements of love that when they're combined, like you said, they build on each other, moving towards that agape.

Speaker 1: 55:08

Yeah, it's good Glad you brought that one up. That's just that's. That was one of the first verses I read when I went back through the New Testament. I just started in first and second Peter and it was just like that is huge, like that is like I say putting things in like your tool belt, like that is like I probably only have like two tools in my tool belt right now, but dad got me that's one of them and that one's awesome. So I just love those verses.

Speaker 2: 55:42

I love that. I love that one sentence in there as well that it says that you will not be ineffective in the knowledge of Jesus Christ. Like the whole point of all of those things being distilled down to your quote. Like you know, in a Western context we always want to be effective or productive, but toward what end? It's like to the end of your knowledge of Jesus Christ. And, like you know, using analogies, like not to go back to the analogy of what tastes good or what is good, but the Bible calls like true evil, calling what is good evil or what is evil good, and so it's almost like the whole point is even to distill down the recognition of your knowledge of goodness, like if that's inherently in the man, jesus Christ, or in God himself. It's like all of that practice and discernment is still in it, to just know like this is good and his name is Jesus yeah, you mentioned earlier like a severely limited Western context of the gospel. Like sometimes, I think, like each of those things you guys are describing in the dark cave, like they're this process of breaking off all of these un-gospel orientations, of just a pure knowledge of Jesus Christ.

Speaker 3: 57:08

Yeah, I mean, we've all got our framework that ties in. You just don't even realize you're surrounded by it. It's like you know a fish in water and you go, you know like, how's the water today, boys? And the two fish. The old guy goes, how's the water today? And the fish go what's water? So?

Speaker 1: 57:33

Thanks for listening to the Across the Counter podcast. If you enjoyed the show, please rate us five stars, wherever you got this podcast. Thanks, y'all.