Allen Arnold (Author of The Story of With)

Today's episode will begin in three minutes. But first I want to tell you about something crazy I'm doing for my new book, five Mere Christians. I've never seen an author do this before, but I'm giving a money back guarantee on this book. I'm so confident you're gonna love this book that if I'm wrong, if you pre order the book, you don't love it, I'm gonna send you a $20Amazon gift card as a money back guarantee. Why?

Two reasons.

One, this is a different book for me, right. I know this is a very different biography. What is Jordan Rayner doing? And I know it's risky, so I'm going to de risk it for you. Because listen, in my other books, Redeeming youg Time, the Sacredness of Secular Work, Master of One, etc, etc, I am telling you and me how we can glorify God in our work, but in five Mere Christians, I'm doing something very different. I'm showing you what that looks like practically through these unforgettable life stories of five Mere Christians from history. These are the top men and women that I would love to have on this podcast today if, you know, they weren't dead, right? So that's the first reason this is a risk and I'm gonna de risk.

This book for you.

Here's the second reason. I'm just confident you're gonna love this book. My friend Mark Batterson said, quote, five Mere Christians proves that biographies can be extremely entertaining, profoundly helpful, and mercifully short. If you're looking for a book that combines the punch of a great sermon with the pace of a great thriller, this is it. Highly recommended.

End quote.

But here's the thing. In order to qualify for this money back guarantee, you got to do two things. Step one, pre order five Mere Christians in any format, hardback, ebook, audiobook, whatever. And then step two, go to 5merechristians.com and fill out the form on that page and that's it. But you got to do it by midnight Eastern Time on May 9. By filling out that form, you'll also get all of the pre order bonuses listed on 5merechristians.com and be entered to win this crazy, epic trip for two to Europe. So visit 5meerchristians.com right now to sign up. Now, please enjoy today's episode. Hey everybody. Welcome to the Mere Christians podcast.

Hi, I'm Jordan Raynor.

How does the Gospel influence the work of mere Christians?

Those of us who aren't pastors or religious professionals, but who work as Chemists and gardeners and college professors. That's the question we explore every week.

And today I'm posing it to my friend Alan Arnold. He's the executive producer of content at Wild at Heart, a ministry founded by.

Former podcast guest John Eldredge.

Allen is also an author of some.

Extraordinary books for Christian professionals, including one I recently devoured and loved called the Story of With.

Before the work he's doing now, Alan served as the head of Thomas Nelson's fiction division, where he oversaw the launch of more than 500 novels. Alani sat down recently to talk about.

What does it look like practically day to day to do your work with God and not just for him.

We talked about the far better alternative to looking for open and closed doors.

As you make decisions.

And we talked about how to be crazy busy without yourself feeling crazy.

I think you guys are gonna love crazy. This conversation with my friend Alan Arnold. Alan Arnold, welcome to the podcast.

Thanks Jordan. Great to be with you.

So we connected for the first time a couple months ago and I got to hear a little bit of your story that I'd love for you to share with our listeners because it's fascinating to me. You spent a pretty long time running the fiction division at Thomas Nelson and I love the story about how you came into that role pretty suddenly. Can you share that?

Absolutely. So my background has been in story in various ways, from ad agencies and major ad campaigns, 30 second stories to the publishing world. And while I was at Thomas Nelson, which is one of the world's largest Christian publishing houses, it was founded in 1798, is in Nashville. I didn't know a lot of people didn't know that probably, but it was started over 200 years ago in Scotland area and it's in Nashville now. And so I spent about 20 years there and the last 10 I ended up shifting from marketing head overseeing all the marketing of the books to starting the fiction division. But the story of that is pretty cool. Michael Hyatt, who many people know who are listening, phenomenal, great thinker, creative ideation person. But the best thing about to me, Michael Hite, who was the group publisher at the time, was that he speaks life into people and he actually helps you believe that you can be who you were meant to be. Like nobody else I know. And so I was the head of marketing. I walked into his office one morning and was telling him all the things I thought the company could and should do better. You know how that goes where it's like, yeah, if the sales team would do this and if so, and so would do that. And you know, he's like, well, do you want to do this?

I've led a lot of those meetings.

Yeah, when you're not the person doing it, it's easy to have all the ideas. And so we were just kind of riffing back and forth and he was laughing, he was like, well, you want to do that? And I'm like, no, I don't want to do that. I just think somebody needs to do that. Right. And he said, well, I feel the same way on certain things. Like, Alan, I would love for there to be a fiction division in 200 years. We really haven't had one that was a dedicated full time story division. But I don't want to lead that. And I'm like, boy, Mike, if you did that, I would love to lead that, but I have no idea how to be a publisher. And he just smiled and he looked at me and he said, well, it's really easy. You walked into my office under the door arc as the head of marketing, and in a few minutes when you walk out, your new name is fiction publisher. And I said, well, yeah, but I don't. I'm not sure exactly how to do it. And he goes, that's okay. We'll surround you with the people that know. And so I did. I believed he. Through his belief in me, I believed. And I knew. I loved story. I just didn't know how that part worked, to be a publisher. And within, gosh, two months, three months, we were having our first sales conference event, we had our author list, and we were off and running. And over the next decade, I was the publisher of more than 500 novels. And it was one of my favorite parts of my entire life, all because of that conversation. That was the spark man.

Such a great reminder of the power that our words carry in random meetings like that. Right. I love that story. So you're there for 10 years, you have your dream job, you're having a ton of fun.

Yes.

Why'd you leave?

I left without even planning to leave. I really thought I would be there for another 20, 30 years. I had this idea that I would publish thousands of novels. And in the midst of all of this, I had gotten to know John Eldredge, who wrote the book Wild at Heart. And he has his history. Love, John.

One of our audience's favorite episodes of this show is John's.

Well, I believe it. He rocked my world in so many ways through his books and through some events. And so one day he called up and he Said, alan, I would love for you to join our team here in Colorado Springs. And at the time I'm in Nashville. And I said, hey, John, listen man, I'm flattered. Thank you, but no, thank you. I feel like I'm in a Camelot period here. Love what I'm doing. I'll keep supporting the ministry, but I'm good. And what he said, Jordan, I'll never forget. He was like, okay, okay. Hey, listen, buddy, before you hang up, I just want to tell you one last thing. We have already asked God about you being on the team, and he's already told us that you're coming and that you're going to be here. And so you might want to talk to him about it. And then when you do, just get back to us.

What a card to play.

Oh, well. And I knew enough about John to know he wouldn't say that if that wasn't 100% true. Which meant I was 100% disrupted because I had not. And I was exposed to. Right. Because I hadn't asked God. I just was comfortable. I loved what I was doing. And I assumed that then you just keep doing what you're doing. And I did go to God after that and spend some time with them and so did my wife. And we knew pretty quickly that was the destiny for what was ahead. And so I left the job that I never wanted to leave, that I completely loved. And we relocated to Colorado Springs. And that was a little over a decade ago now. I thought that I was making that cross country move with my family just because. And I say just, but because of a job that a calling that God had placed through John on my life. But what I realized a few years into it, it became very clear, no, actually this is a journey of sonship with God. And the role at Wild at Heart, as important as it was, was the catalyst or the gateway into a new story, a new chapter that was all about learning the art of sonship, which I had never understood, never lived, even though I had been a Christian most of my life.

Yeah, tell us more about that. What do you mean by this, the art of sonship? And how did this move cultivate the ground for which you to learn these things?

Yeah, well, I was a very driven, highly driven, highly productive, make it happen individual. And I know a lot of people say that, but to give you an example, Jordan, of the life I was living while I was in the publishing world a little bit before 9 11. And you'll see why I'm saying that this is the type of man I would be. I was on a business trip and I had a video crew. We were filming an author and doing some things with the authority. And so we're at the airport, I'm on some high level call. The plane boards, the crew gets on. I don't pay attention. I'm in the midst of this other call. I look up and everybody in the whole waiting area is gone. They're on the plane. So I run up to the counter and I asked the person working there, hey, can you open the door? I need to get on. Like I see the plane out the window still here. I just, I'm so sorry. And the person was like, yeah, no, we've given your ticket away and seat away and you know you're going to have to catch another flight. And I'm like, this is the only flight out today. And they just walked away. So I'm standing there by myself, you know, with the crew on, they don't know where they're going. And this is a massive video shoot, really important. So I just open the emergency exit door and walk out onto the tarmac and. And surprisingly, like again, this is right before 9 11.

This is unbelievable.

So security is not what it would be today. I would be shot today. But I walked out and stood in front of the plane. I just, I faced off the plane and I just stood there and I didn't know what was going to happen, but I knew I was going to get on that plane. And I lived at that time, Jordan, by this mantra of a fortune cookie saying I had taped to my desk, which was the one who says it can't be done, should get out of the way of the one already doing it. And that was, it's never a great idea to take your life saying from a fortune cookie, but that was what I really believed. So I stood there and about a minute later to the pilot gets out, walks over to me and says, what do you. This is a small flight. And he said, what are you doing? Stand in front of the plane. I said, well, I'm waiting for you to open the door so I can get my seat. He said, well, we gave your seat away. And I said, I know, I'm waiting for you to take that person off the plane so I can get on and we can go. And ultimately, Jordan, I talked my way onto the plane, got on it, made the flight and you know, it was delayed by 30, 40 minutes because of what I did. But that was just the type of the plane blinked instead of me and that was the type of man I was. And the people I worked with loved it because they were like, oh, you put him in a room, he'll get it done.

Right?

Right. But internally, I was doing more and more, and my heart was growing more and more empty because I was only as good as what I did next. And after you stop a plane, what do you do to top that? And what do you do to top the next thing? And so that's the kind of man I was now. After I'd gotten to know John in the ministry, I had been going through some spiritual heart surgery, and I was realizing I was living my life as an orphan. In other words, everything I did, it was all up to me. I believed in God, loved God to the capacity. I understood that. But really, God was an irrelevant part of my life. Really. I did most of life without God. And I evaluated my days by how much I got done on my to do list. And so that was the man I had become. And that's not an easy man to be married to. It's not an easy boss to work for, because I expected the crew to work 24 7, just like me, whoever I was working with on the team. And that was who I was until a few years before this point when John called me. And a few years before that, God had really started to break through that shell. And I started realizing I don't want to be the man that I had become. And that the way that came out real quick was I got invited by my boss to a lunch, and it was random. It wasn't on the calendar. We just went downstairs in the building I worked at, and we had a sandwich. And I honestly thought he was going to give me a promotion because our team had just done so many impossibly phenomenally wild good things for the bottom line of our company. What he did was he said, alan, I just want to start the conversation with this question. And I was like, sure. And he goes, do you know everybody on your team thinks you are a complete jerk? And he didn't use the word jerk I'm not going to use. He was a very salty individual, but he was very colorful in his language choice. And I just stared at him because I had no idea. And he said, yeah, nobody on the team enjoys being around you. They don't like your presence. They simply work for you and stay with you because you're productive, but they can't stand your presence. And it. Jordan was like a basketball, had just, you know, that feeling when it hits you in the gut when you're not ready, and you're just. You're gasping for air. I felt that way, and everything in me wanted to just push back and say, you know what? They're all fired. I'll rebuild the team with people who care because they're expendable. And that even revealed more of the man I had become. So that started my journey into God. I don't want to be that kind of man. I don't want to live my whole life the way I'm living it now. Even though I probably would be a multimillionaire by now if I had followed that path of just more, more, more. Work is everything. Get it done. And thankfully, that was my beginning. Moment of a rescue. And then as I moved out here again, I thought it was for the ministry, and I knew God was calling me. But he really started to dismantle the things I had built my life on, which was, you are what you do. So the more you do, the more you are. Outward performance versus internal life of the heart. And so sonship, the journey was from orphan to son. And by that I mean it was from a man who thought, everything in life is kind of all up to me. To nothing in life is primarily all up to me. I have a good father, and I want to live as a son who believes the father is for him and wants to father him in the art of life. And so it changed. I mean, I can't tell you the night and day difference in my life now, how I live it, how I wake up with an expectancy of God. Father, Papa, what do you have for us today versus me waking up, multitasking before I even get out of bed. And so that was the beginning of that sonship journey.

I devoured your book at the beach a couple weeks ago. Your book, the Story of With, which is really, and correct me if I'm wrong, but kind of the outpouring of this whole story, right? How you've learned to be a son, how you've learned to do your work not just for God, but with him. As a child, you've been describing what life looked like and what work looked like when you were doing it without God. At a functional level, even if you had intellectual knowledge, how would you describe.

What it looks like now to do.

Your work truly with your heavenly Father?

Yeah, great question. Well, the way it looks now is. And this is not. I'm going to give you, just not the Pollyanna version, but just the messiness of it.

Yeah, please.

It really looks.

Because this sounds messy.

Yeah.

You and I Talked about this on.

Zoom a couple weeks ago. Right. I've been really studying up on this. I've been really thinking deeply about this. Read Sky Jathani's great book with. I read your book, whatever.

But I don't know what this looks. I don't think our listeners know what.

This looks like to do their work with the father. So talk us through the messiness.

Well, the messiness is, I believe, and I've told you my background has always been story. Well, I believe our lives are stories and every day is a page in that story. But when we wake up, we don't know where that story is going to go. It could radically shift through a meeting, a conversation, an accident, a victory, a phone call, anything. And so it's waking up each day with a just a hunger and an expectancy for God. What do you have for us today? I try to see each day like a road trip with God where no longer the agenda is mine, where the epicenter is what it was supposed to have been in Eden, which is walking through the cool of the day, the garden, with God going at his pace, at his rhythm, trying to have eyes to see what's really going on here right now. What is the. You know, what used to, I would think would be the interruption of my day if somebody randomly came into my office and I would. I mean, used to when I would leave my office in the publishing world, I would have my cell phone. I wouldn't be talking to anybody. I just hold my cell phone up to my ear and talk to myself to have people not interrupt me.

I have no idea. I have no idea what you're talking about. Nobody's ever done this before.

Gosh, no. Yeah. I look back at that. Yeah. And so. And the worst is when you're doing that and all of a sudden the phone rings and you're like, I thought you were on the phone. Yeah. So now the interruptions I see as the God moments, which really aren't interruptions, but really which were the key moment perhaps of that entire day or week. And so it's walking in this sense of God. I'm holding things loosely. And today, if it's the project you want me to work on that's on my desk, I'll do that. If you have something totally different. And so what happens, Jordan, is like, for instance, if you're driving to work and all of a sudden your car breaks down. We're used to that would have derailed me so much because it meant the whole day was inefficient was a waste and a costly one at that. Well, now it's like, okay, God, we're on a road trip together through the day. What's going on here? Give me eyes. What's your interpretation of this moment? What do you have for me? Maybe it's an encounter with the tow truck driver. Maybe you're going to miraculously do something where what should have been $1,000 is $0, I don't know. But I'm walking into it with that awareness and expectancy of a son with a good dad. If I'm driving home and my wife and I have to have a hard conversation, it's talking to God on the way home, just saying, God, I don't know what I'm supposed to do in this situation. And so rather than me being the man with all the answers or pretending to be the man who will get it done, father me in this. What is it that my wife's heart needs? What is it that you're exposing in us or me? Should we have the conversation tonight or should I wait? It's that kind of step by step. God, we're in this together and you want to father me. And what I learned quickly, Jordan, is the best way to be the best husband I can be is to be the best son I can be. The best father starts by being the best son. And so that journey of with has really transformed. Just I can savor the days now more. I can see people by being fully present. I have made my phone as absolutely low tech as possible. I've taken every app, every email, the ability to email, anything that would be a distraction that the phone could provide so that when I have one second, I'm picking it up and looking at it. I've stripped away from the phone. So it basically is a phone. And I can text and get directions, but it's that way of trying to live life. How can I be fully present to the people around me and what matters most? By being present to God and aware of his presence first.

So this is really helpful to me, hopefully to our listeners. What I don't hear you saying is I no longer come to the office with a plan for the day. Right, Right. You have a plan for your day. The difference between New Allen and old Allen is any interruption to the plan, any phone call, any interaction. You're viewing through the lens of this is being delivered to me by my father. And he's using all things Romans 8, 28, 29 for my good, for my sanctification. So these aren't distractions, they are the work of being fathered, Is that what you're saying?

Absolutely. I mean, I had the busiest four months of the 10 years that I have been at Wild at Heart. That just wrapped up a couple of weeks ago. And so, I mean, it was non stop. John had a new book release called Resilient and I was managing a good bit of that and overseeing a lot of the content around it. And it was crazy busy. And yet I wasn't crazy in the busyness. And so, yeah, I had a plan for every day. I didn't just wing it, but I held onto it loosely. And I think the main thing is now I'll always come back to if I can get through this day in my own strength without God needing to show up, without looking to God with questions or asking his input on what I should do next, or with a person, or by myself, or how the flow of the rhythm should go, then that day is not going as it was originally planned. I'm not living in the realness of, of intimacy with God. And so it's not about whether the day has a plan. A calendar is super busy. It's am I going to go through this and see God actively and intimately in the choices that I'm making, not inviting him into it afterwards for a rescue, not at the end of the day laying down exhausted, going what in the heck happened? But to the best of my ability in the moment. It is that relational intimacy with our Creator. And I think it's living a life where the only guarantee is God. And I think we try everything in our flesh, everything in our humanity, wants, guarantees, wants the guarantee of a good life, wants the guarantee of upward mobility, wants the guarantee of the family that doesn't have problems. We're always looking for that. And the shift, I would call it, really story one living. And it's going back to the original story as it was designed. In Eden, which is the epicenter of our life, as it was in Eden is God. And if we live story one, then we live in abundance. We live in a mindset of hope. We live in a mindset of being comfortable with the messy mystery, the unknown. We really hold things loosely when we live in story two, which is everybody's story since Adam and Eve's tragic choice in the Garden, they exchanged story one for story two. They exchanged reality, meaning how we were made to really live, how God created reality for unreality, because any life away from God is an unreality. And so we have all, as humanity, been living and were born into story two, an imposter story that we think is how life works. We think this is just the way of the world. If you want to do this, you have to do that. And, yep, there's some trade offs, but that's just the way things work. And that's what I would call Jordan's story, too. And so really, the ability to go from being an orphan back to a son or daughter is returning. Putting our eyes on Eden, going back to story one, where the only guarantee in story one, when you get down to it is God is with me. I get to do this with God. When I moved to Wild at Heart and left the publishing world, the salary was fine, but it was about a 50% pay cut. It was a downward career in terms of title, in terms of salary, in terms of the way the world would define it. It was a radical downward shift in the things that most people value in a career. And yet it was the thing that really saved my soul in terms of how I was living and how I understood God. So it's story one is radically counterintuitive, but it's the best story of all.

Yeah, I'm so glad you brought it back to Eden. I loved this line in your book, the story of with you wrote, quote, God didn't primarily create us, so we would do things for him. Jordan, commentary. He did create us to do things for him, but not just for him. Right. And then you continue to say or.

Even learn lessons about him.

His primary reason for creating us is so we can be with him, end quote. And I think that's right. You know, I've been thinking a lot about this lately in the context of the first commission. Right. God could have fulfilled this first commission, the call to fill and subdue and create this world in line with his commands way more efficiently and effectively than we have, to state the obvious.

Right, Right.

And yet he invited us to do that work with him. Why?

Because he's our Father. And fathers take delight in being and.

Working with their children. Right?

That is so true. And that's really it. And so when a lot of believers, theologians, pastors, when they start trying to define God in these heavy, doctrinal religious terms, my heart now really just sinks. Not that what they're saying doesn't have truth in it, but if they miss God as father, I think they have missed God. Like, if they just start seeing God as this keeper of rules and their structure, and there's the history and there's this and there's that, and really it's like somebody describing if you or I had a really good earthly dad. And somebody goes, yeah, I knew your dad when he was in his 20s and 30s. And we're like, gosh, tell us about him. Well, you know, he came to work at 8am and he always punched the time card in. And he did not allow anybody who worked for him to be late without consequences. And he disciplined as well. You'd be like, okay, I'm not seeing my father in that, because you're leaving the heart out. And so the heart of God is his desire for relational intimacy with us. Not just to save us. I mean, to save us for what? Not just, you know, that when Jesus was asked, why did you come? He quotes from Isaiah and he says, well, I came to heal the brokenhearted and set the captives free. So set us free for what? Heal our hearts for what? It's not just to get our act together. It's not just, well, because we don't want to burn in hell. That you hear a lot of, I think, theology that just misses the whole point. He came to heal our hearts. Why? So our hearts could be alive with him. He came to set us free. Why? So that we could be with him in freedom. And if we miss that, we've missed the whole invitation. And so my life work really is inviting men and women into the larger story, into what I call story one, which is the Eden story. And it's returning back to how God made us to work, how God created us to become alive. And the rescue that he provides isn't so we'll get our act together or just, well, I didn't want to see you perish. It's so we can do life together. And Jordan, the best kind of picture I can give people. And this. I think about this almost every day. I have a really big truck, and when my youngest son was around five, six, seven, anytime I got in it, he'd want to go with me. And he would always want to lift up the console between the driver and passenger seat. He would slide next to me, leg against leg, arm against arm. And he didn't care where we were going. He didn't ask me where we were going. He just wanted to be with me. He didn't ask if I had enough gas to get us where we were going, if I had my wallet, if I had the directions. None of that. It wasn't even what was in it for him. It wasn't at that age. Can we go get ice cream? If I go with you? It was simply if you're going, I want to go. And I trust you to know the journey and I'm here with you in this road trip. And that right there is the picture that we should carry with us with God is I don't care where you're going, as long as you're doing it. I want to be with you. And. And that is really the story of with. I mean, that right there is the goal.

That's good. I think this has a lot of application to how we make decisions about our careers or specific decisions about which path to take within a particular job. I know this is an issue a lot of mere Christians are facing right now or will face in the future. And I love that you applied this with wisdom to the art of decisions. In the book, you talk about the difference between looking for open and closed doors that we love to talk about and looking for God himself, Right. As we face these big decisions, what's the difference? Help us draw the nuance between these two things.

Right. So to me, open and closed doors, the whole thought of, well, I am thinking about colleges for my child. And so resumes have gone out and we've solicited the four colleges we like most. And three said no and one said yes. And. And so that's what must be what God wants for us. I mean, it's really clear the problem is we're putting our eyes on the doors. And the enemy knows how to open doors and God knows how to pick the lock of closed doors. And so a lot of times what we miss is by not engaging with God on God, this door opened, these three didn't. What would you like me to do? Well, a lot of times a good father may say, well, I want to show you how to pick a lock on a closed door, or I want to show you how to persevere when odds are against it. When you face a red sea and there's no way through it, I'll show you how to part the sea. Perhaps. Or perhaps he says, right, none of those four were right. You didn't even ask me to begin with. You just went with the four you thought would be the best. And so we don't know what's the enemy up to here? What is God up to here? And so the answer is, take our eyes off the door and once again go back to relationship with God. And whatever the issue is we're facing, whether it's this job, I really feel my heart being pulled to it God, but it's half the salary. Or I really think if I move Here, this could be good in this way, but I don't know. Well, the answer isn't a pro and con list. A pro and con list, actually, honestly cons us more times than it helps us, because it consists into believing that the number of things that are good versus a number of things that are not good, that's our answer. And it's a godless way to make decisions. Any hero, think about any of your heroes in the Old Testament. If they had had an invitation from God and said, all right, well, hold on, I'm just going to put a pro and con list together here. So Abraham does that, or Daniel or, or David or Esther, like they never would have ended up with the destiny they did. Because God's way is so messy, so inefficient from a human perspective, so counterintuitive. Because God's goal is never just to get us somewhere quickly. It's to get us somewhere new, transformed. And so his goal is not the fastest way. His goal is the most transformative way for our heart and soul. And when we start to look at things like that, the whole concept of open and closed doors loses its ability to even be our compass anymore. A year ago, I lost my voice from speaking too much. And I had a whisper, kind of a raspy whisper. I saw a throat specialist and he said, yep, Alan, you've got nodules, a lot of speakers. Get this. The only way to get your voice back is to surgically remove the nodules. And until then, you can not talk for a week. You can do all these home remedies. Nothing will work. I've done this for 30 years. This is your answer. So I sign up for surgery. It's three days before the procedure, which was about a three month wait. Miserable if you're a speaker and you can't use your voice right. Three days before, God just said. I was out mowing the yard and doing yard work and I took a break. And I just. Since God say, within my spirit, Alan, do you want to do this the predictable way or do you want to ask me for a different way? In other words, story one or story two? And I said, God, I want your way. And he said, cancel the surgery. Well, I knew if I did that it was going to be at least three more months until I could get back on the books. And I had major events I was supposed to keynote at, but I was like, okay, God, the only way I'm going to know what this other story is like Alice in Wonderland, is to go down the rabbit hole. Is to step into it with you, so I'll do that. So I called the doctor and the doctor chuckled and he said, well, Alan, you know, that's fine. If you want to cancel it, it is fine. But when you get ready to have your voice back, call me because it's not going to happen otherwise. Well, three days later, after, at this point, five months, three days later, I wake up and my voice is 100% back. I didn't do anything to get it back. And I had already released God in that situation, Jordan, from the outcome. I mean, I let him know, God, I just want this story with you. If you tell me in a few weeks to reschedule the surgery, I'll do it. I'm not putting pressure for you to do something miraculous even, or come through. I just want to do all of life with you since you're inviting me into something new and different. I want to jump in your big truck and I want to go on that adventure with no strings attached. Maybe I don't get my voice back ever. Maybe it's a year later, maybe it's through the doctor in the surgery later, or maybe I'll just wake up and you'll have given me my voice back. Whatever it is, I'm all in. And that's really what I'm talking about, is the messiness of it without guarantees, but knowing at the end of the day, what I most want living as a son or those living as a daughter, is the intimacy and the wildness of God in whatever we're doing.

Yeah, and this is such a helpful distinction between this open, closed door approach to decisions and this just with God approach. Because I think when you make that shift, it actually takes all of the pressure, if I could be so bold to say that, out of the decision.

Itself, because here's the deal, even if.

You didn't get your voice back, it still would have been the quote, unquote, right decision. Because Romans 8, 28, 29 says, God's working all things for our good in our sanctification. Right. Proverbs, I think it's 1921, says, many are the plans in our hearts, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails every single time. Tim Keller commented on that verse when he said, for a Christian, there's no such thing as a plan B. Right.

I think you're getting at this.

In the book you said, quote, God rarely gives us upfront guarantees, which you said already on this show. He seems to prefer inviting us into adventures that include equal parts faith and Mystery, end quote. And that's hard to embrace. But once we do, it frees us from the pressure, the crippling pressure sometimes of decision making, right?

Absolutely, absolutely. And it also allows you, like your heart starts to beat at a less frantic pace, chaos can't get into you anymore. Fear isn't the prominent way to live your life. I think when we live, even as believers, if we live basically without God in the active intimacy of his presence, well then we live somewhat of a fear based life, a reactionary life where we're trying to control everything we can to the best of our ability, which is not very much. We can basically control what color socks we wear when we get up, or we can control the shampoo that we choose to buy for our morning shower. We can't really control the rest of the day or the people around us or the events around us, or on a micro or a macro level. And so what this does is it lets you just walk through the day going, okay, God, what now? What next? I don't need. John Eldridge just said, you know, the reason God doesn't give us a map ahead of time is because we would begin to worship or cling to the map and forget God, we would actually choose the map over choosing God because that's just human nature. And so instead he says, no, I give you myself and I am the way, and now let's find the way together with me in the lead. But you as the one saying, and that's what Jesus invitation right to the disciples, before they were his disciples, was follow me. He didn't say, here's where we're going. He didn't give the agenda for the day. And it's a beautiful dance we get with God. And as long as we don't think the goal is efficiency or a guaranteed betterment in our salary or in our career, or if anything we put our eyes on other than God as the guarantee the enemy can have a field day. Because if we're like, well, it's yeah, God, it's you, but it's you and this. And you know, there's that story in Isaiah about the woodsman who he's living in his gifting, right? He's planting trees, he's nurturing the trees, he's harvesting the trees. When it's time, he's chopping them down and he uses the wood. Isaiah tells us initially to warm himself, he makes a fire and to feed himself, he cooks a meal over the fire and he's using his God given gifting in a really good way. But then, same man, same piece of wood, same creativity, he takes the rest of that piece of wood and he carves an idol for himself and he bows down and worships it and he says, save me, deliver me. And I think what we do is we take our God given gifting, our calling, our talents, our creativity, and we use it oftentimes for good. But then we start thinking, but really that gifting, that skill, my talents are what's going to save me. And so I've got to really spend more time focusing on it, for it to save me, deliver me, than on God who created me. And we start worshiping it in terms of the way we spend our hours and our thoughts.

Yeah. Related to that, you said in the book, quote, when you find the creator of time, you find time, end quote. And this is hitting on a theme I touched on in my book, redeeming your time. And I know it's an issue that a lot of our listeners struggle with. We feel called to the work God has given us to do in this world. We feel called to, as Paul says in Ephesians 5, redeem our time because the days are evil and steward our time really well. But I argue in redeeming your time, and you're arguing here it is through time with the creator of time, which feels inefficient, that we find more time. Unpack that a little bit more. Al, what do you mean by this?

Right. So I used to believe there's never enough time. I mean, that was in great. It was tattooed probably into my brain at some point. That time is short and we're always in a race against time. And that honestly may be part of that was too. You know, as I told you, I was a publisher and every great story is this race against time. There's a limited amount of time and possibility for the hero to come through, but it was a toxic way to live and believe. And I love how in Ephesians 2:7, in the message translation, Eugene Peterson says, this way. Now God has us where he wants us with all the time in the world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us. In Christ Jesus, God has us where he wants us with all the time in this world and the next. And you think about time. You know, there's Kronos and there's Kairos, right? And so it's not just the ticking of a second hand or a minute hand on a clock. God can exponentially increase time for us, our productivity within time. The way he connects us to people, the way he. I mean if on that example of my voice in the surgery, if I'd gone through that surgery, I would have had about a 10 week period where I really couldn't talk very much and my voice was healing after the removal of the nodules and the scarring and all of that. Well, God healed it in my sleep and there was no build up to my full strength voice, it was just there. God can do things outside of time, as the Creator of time. And while we are time bound, we have to ask ourselves if our Father isn't bound by time. And he gives us a desire, he gives us a call, he gives us a passion to write a novel, to start a business, to begin a family. Even though maybe we're 40 years old and we think we really should have had kids when we were 30, you know, and it's this efficient because we start doing the math now I'm going to be when they're 20, I'm going to be in my 60s. And gosh, we start looking at it from a human understanding of what's possible, whether the thought that no, with God all things are possible and we just have to step into his stream, which is, you've got all the time in the world for what I've called you to do. Why would God call us to do something and then not give us the time to do it? Why would he set anybody on a mission of go into the city, start this thing, marry this person, begin this dream, but go. But yeah, you're never going to get it done like I've given you the desire. It's going to be really frustrating and you're going to have a lot of tears because I've given you something that's impossible for you to do, even if I'm involved. Like, does that sound like God? But to say it is impossible in your own strength and it is impossible in your own knowledge. But Jeremiah 33, 3, come with me and I will show you things beyond your wildest imaginations. I'll show you things that you've never known before. I'll show you how to do things that will blow your mind colors you've never seen. I'm paraphrasing if you will do it together with me. And that's where I think the excitement of this story one living comes in it's right. I can't do it in my own strength. I don't have enough time, if it's all up to me, to push it through in my human days. But with God, if it's his initiation. If it's his stirring that he knit in me before the beginning of time, than actually I do have all the time in the world.

Amen. So well said, Alan. I love to wrap up every episode with the same three questions. Really excited to get your take on the first one. Given your love of books, which books do you find yourself recommending or gifting most frequently to others?

That's a great question. And yes, I always have about 10 books going at one time. Wow. I've just gotten better.

I could not do that.

Well, to me, it's just the most stimulating thing. But I made a commitment in the last few years of I'm no longer buying books to collect them on my shelf. If I get a book, I want to read the book. I don't just want to have the book.

Yeah, I've stopped. I've stopped buying books. I read almost exclusively on Kindle, and for a long time I would see a book I liked and buy it in hopes of reading it later. I don't buy it until I am ready to start reading it right in that moment now.

Yeah, that's really good because otherwise you bought it. And we like to acquire and collect things.

Exactly.

But we bought it, but we haven't experienced it or lived it. And those are two very different things. So some of the books that I love to gift for creatives, I have really enjoyed the work by a guy named Austin Kleon.

Yeah, Austin Kleon's great.

Yeah. So still like an artist.

So good.

Show your work. Keep going. These are square six by six books. They're easy reading, but just the concepts of how to pursue your creativity. Now, he's not going into how do you pursue your creativity? With the creator, but he's going into very practical ways to pursue creativity that gets you to the finish line because.

So such great books.

Yeah, everybody can start. Not many people finish. So he shows you how to do that really well. I really recommend C.S. lewis to people, but he's written so many things that a lot of people are familiar with. What I find is most people have not read the Space Trilogy.

Yeah.

And I'm right now in the middle of rereading that trilogy. And I'm on the third book, which is just the most trippy. Wild. It is trippy, but it also is a mirror of our times because it takes place largely in a university. It just happens to have Merlin and a lot of surreal things going on at the same time. So if you haven't read that, to me, the Space Trilogy is A phenomenal.

How has the Space trilogy not been developed?

I know, film, right?

Like, I really don't get it.

Well, I'm really glad to this point that it hasn't yet, because I think now with the special effects and the way movies can really take you anywhere, it's going to be so much more if they stay true to the books they now have the technology to recreate because so much of the book takes place on different planets.

Right? Exactly.

And so, yeah, I hope it is one day.

Going to call Doug Gresham, my friend, is his stepson, head of the C.S. lewis Company. Let's get it done. Space Trilogy, here we go, man.

I'm all in. And I hope, I hope listeners will. If you have not read it, do yourself a favor and dive into that.

It's a good answer. Hey, Alan, who would you most like to hear on this podcast talking about how the gospel should shape the work that mere Christians do in the world?

Well, I'll give you my first answer, but it's who I'd like to hear. But. But he's already in the kingdom, so we can't get him. Is Rich Mullins.

Yeah, man, that's a good answer because.

I was just a huge fan of his songwriting and music while he was recording, and I saw him in concert tons of times, and then he died in a tragic car accident. But his music, it just feels like it gets to the heart and the essence of everything we're talking about. And he also was not chasing success. He refused to play the game of the Christian music industry or the music industry at large and had an integrity about his life and his way. So I would love if you could have interviewed him or if we could have had that somehow. I'm reading about his life right now, so he's top of mind.

Alan, what's one thing you from today's conversation you want to reiterate to our listeners before we sign off?

I think I want to reiterate that everything we're talking about, Jordan, can seem a little bit mystical or a little bit well with God. Okay, but how or what is that? So just to drive home the practical side of what we're talking about isn't something that is heavy lifting. It's not something that you have to get a degree to do or anything like that. It really just begins with a simple request from God, which is God, father, me, father me. I want to be your son or daughter. I want to do all of life with you. Will you in some way today show me your love for me as a father, maybe through a song on the radio, maybe through a connection with somebody I haven't talked to in a while, maybe through a sunset, maybe through a word of scripture, whatever it is, God, break through this story two illusion of life that I've been living in and show me the story you created me for Father Me. And I just want to reiterate that because oftentimes hearing something doesn't lead to breakthrough, it's actually experiencing the thing. And so they've heard us talk about this. But now I would say wherever you're at, whatever you've tried, try this. God, Father me. I love you. I want to do life with you. I want to live this adventure with you. And I give up the control that I have been trying to make life work with. And now I just want to walk through it with you son and daughter with a father who we love. And so that's the main thing. Try that. Say that today in your car. Say it as you're walking around the block, in your neighborhood, wherever you can. Just say that and watch what God does. He loves it when his sons and daughters come to him with that heart posture.

Well said. Alan, I want to commend you for the exceptional work you do every day for the glory of God and the good of others, for reminding us today that God doesn't need us, he wants us. And he wants us to do our work with him and not just for Him. Guys, I strongly recommend to you Alan's great book the Story of With Alan's got a bunch of other books I've yet to read, but we'll be reading@withalan.com Alan, thank you so much for hanging out with me today.

Hey, thank you Jordan. I really enjoyed the conversation. It's so life giving to talk about these things together.

There are episodes that I get so engrossed in the conversation that I just don't take notes. This was one of those conversations. I hope you guys enjoyed it as much as I did. Hey, if you've got a recommendation for a guest to come onto the Mere Christians podcast either in this life or on the new Earth as Alan and I talked about, I want you to let me know at jordanrayner.com/contact. Guys, thank you so much for tuning in this week. I'll see you next time.

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