Joon (J.S.) Park (Hospital Chaplain)

The episode you're about to listen to was released back when the Mere Christians podcast was called the Call to Mastery. Now, if you love Mere Christians, you're still going to love these older episodes because the majority of each conversation focuses on how the gospel influences the work of our guests. With that disclaimer out of the way, please enjoy the episode. Foreign. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Call to Mastery. I'm Jordan Raynor. This is a podcast for Christians who want to do their most masterful work for the glory of God and the good of others. Every week, I'm bringing you a conversation with somebody who's following Jesus Christ and also pursuing world class mastery of their vocation. We talk about each guest's path to mastery, their daily habits, and how their faith influences their work. Today, I am thrilled to introduce you to my friend, Jun Park. He's been a friend of mine for many years. He's a former devout atheist turned skeptical Christian. He's a hospital chaplain who has acquired well over 10,000 hours of purposeful practice of his craft. He's got his Masters of Divinity from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. He's a brilliant, wise, godly man. And we recorded this in the middle of the coronavirus crisis. So it was just a really special time together. I think you guys are going to get a ton from this episode of the podcast. Specifically, June and I talked about how the Lord moved him from being a devout atheist to a career as a hospital chaplain. We talked about June's three habits he employs with his phone that positively affect his mental health. And we talked a lot about how God's sovereignty and God's control of all things is in a lot of ways manifested through what June calls the miracle of our work. You guys are going to love this episode. Please enjoy this conversation with my friend, June Park. June, my friend, it's been so long. It's so good to talk to you. Thanks for being on the podcast, Jordan.

Thank you for having me. I am a big, big fan.

Longtime, longtime listener, first time caller. So, hey, before we spend an hour, you know, talking about death, let's talk about life. You and your wife are expecting your first child, a baby girl, right?

Yes. Today is 27 weeks. Baby girls coming due in July.

I love it, man. Congrats. I got three girls of my own. I love being a girl. Dad, what are you most looking forward to as a father?

Oh, my gosh. So, of course, the baby phase, being able to hold her, all of that. Just initial the bonding, the connection, the giggling, even the work. Even the work of it, the grit of it. I'm looking forward to all of it. Maybe three weeks in I'll change my. But definitely looking forward to that. But you know what I've been dreaming of the most and literally dreaming of this is like sharing the things that I love with, with my daughter. The movies that I like, the books that I like reading, the hobbies that I have. And whether she likes those things or not, just the fact that I can share that with her and like impart that upon her. That's what I'm like, really, really excited about.

Just in this last week had like a really great taste of this. So obviously I love books. I love to read. And it's hard when your kids are, you know, three, four, they don't like love reading yet. But Ellison, my five year old, I gave her a series of graphic novels which I never read comic books as a kid, but I gave her these because one of our future guests on the Call to Mastery wrote this amazing comic book series about. It's called Cleopatra in Space. And she loved them and she like wanted to read them nonstop. I think on, on Sunday we read it for like two hours. It was just such a joy to be able to enjoy something in common together. It's awesome. I'm really excited for you and your bride. And so you and your bride are both in the medical field. I mean you as a chaplain. She's on the front lines of this current coronavirus crisis. How's she doing?

That's correct. She is a nurse practitioner on the front lines. She is not in a hospital, but she's going from home to home doing patient visitations. And so of course I'm so proud of the work she's doing. She won't stop unless she's told otherwise. But you know, there's a little worry there because since she's pregnant, any type of flu can adversely affect a baby in utero. And so there is a concern there. But we're very blessed and fortunate in that Juliet, she has plenty of ppe. Her, her company has provided for her very well and there's something about she is going to stay honorable in her duty to take care of her patients. A lot of these patients, they're bedridden, they can't go anywhere. They need her and she's going to keep doing her work. So we're worried and at the same time we're hopeful and we're honored to be able to do the work that we're doing.

Work is heroic in times like this. Just going to work every day doing your job with excellence as a means of ministering to and serving others. It's a beautiful thing. Hey, June, you have a really interesting story. Can you talk us through your personal narrative and kind of the path that led you to the work you're doing today? As a hospital chaplain, I was maybe.

11 or 12 when I made a conscious decision, said out loud to my parents and everybody that I knew. I'm an atheist, don't believe in God, don't want anything to do with organized, institutionalized religion, all of it. Didn't believe in God, and also grew up with a lot of traumatic experiences. I didn't know until just a few years ago that I scored a nine out of 10 on the ace score.

What's the ace score?

Yeah. So for those who haven't heard the ace score, kind of heard of it. A score is the higher the number. Each number represents a different dose of trauma. Trauma is an experience that overwhelms our capacity to deal with it. It's any kind of negative or debilitating experience. And so if you have, for example, 4 out of 10, each question that they ask is something like, you know, did your parents divorce? Did one of your family members go to jail frequently? Did one of them ever use drugs? Did one of them ever abuse you? Pretty heavy questions. But if you're four or more, you are more likely to have a heart attack when you're older, more likely to have prison time, more likely to have mental health issues such as depression, anxiety. Every dose of trauma is a pretty accurate predictor of your actual physical and mental health. And so I scored a 9 out of 10, which means I was at a deficit going through life in some sense. And so having that traumatic experience, my constant like this was sort of underneath, like my consciousness, but then slowly started to rise to the surface was, I want to be the voice for people that I always needed growing up. I want to be the presence for those that I never had. And so that sort of led me down the path towards being called to pastoral ministry and now into hospital chaplaincy and doing chaplain work at the homeless nonprofit. And so I want to be careful, Jordan, in that I'm not saying do something that is against something else. Like I don't want to say I built my life on what I didn't want or got anti ground or something. But truly these traumatic experiences, when I went through that, my mind was, gosh, I want to be a voice in someone's life who's going through crisis, grief or trauma. And Find safety or comfort in the middle of that chaos.

And I know it's hard to answer a question like this succinctly, but you describe yourself as a former devout angel atheist turned skeptical Christian. How did that happen?

Yeah, so, you know, that wasn't really like an overnight epiphany. I can't think of one single moment where my brain just flipped and switched. I started going to college probably around senior year of high school, maybe around college. And I went more as a social club. Like, I just wanted to hang out with people, wanted to meet girls, wanted to date. I also played drums. And so there was that part. And very fortunately, I went to this church that was very kind to receive me and put me on their, what we call the praise team to play drums. But, Jordan, the way I found faith was hanging out with people who had a supernatural love, a love that I found impossible. It wasn't any one sermon. It wasn't even really any one conversation. It was hanging out with a group of people that. It was very, very authentic and genuine love for one another. And I thought, oh, maybe these people just need religion as a crutch. Or this is. At times I thought, this can't be real. They're just faking it. But as I heard each person's story, the difficulties that they went through, the same traumas that they experienced, they were still able to express and share love in the midst of such troubled upbringings. And so extrapolating backwards, I found what was the source of that love, what changed their lives so much that they wanted to love, and that. That I found was the Christian story. So really that began kind of the slow transformation and exploration into what is the source and reason for how they're loving so hard.

Man, what a. What a beautiful picture of the gospel in action and what an encouragement to all of us that we can make the gospel winsome. The aroma of Christ could be winced up through us, with our co workers within whatever communities we're in. Hey, one thing I read about in prep, I mean, you and I have known each other for years, but I didn't realize this until researching for this podcast. There's actually a pretty intense path to becoming a hospital chaplain. Right. So obviously you went to seminary, but you also went through what's called a clinical pastoral education. What is that? What all does that entail?

Yeah, yeah. So there is a six month internship, and then about, I would say a dozen people a year or so get accepted to that at this teaching hospital that I'm at the teaching hospital I'M at is a thousand plus bed hospital, probably one of the biggest in Florida, one of the best in Florida. So there's a six month internship and then if you get in, there's a year long residency and they accept about five or six people a year. So I was lucky to get into both. And like you said, Jordan, it's an intense, super intense program. There are classes, there are reflections. Each week there's a thing called ipr, Interpersonal Relations, where we give each other feedback face to face. I mean, very honest, sometimes tough to hear feedback. We process all the patient visits that we do. We're doing master's level courses on counseling grief, on different religions, on cultural sensitivity. And so we're doing hundreds of hours of this clinicals plus classes, the CPE program. I mean, it's no joke. It's a real, really, really tough intensive. It's not for everyone. In the last four and a half, five years I've been a chaplain, I'm still part of the hospital where they do the teaching there. People will leave the program just because it's too intense, it's too much. And whether that's the classes or the visitations and handling the secondhand grief, it's super difficult. So for someone to think, sometimes people will say, oh, I could do that. I could just sit down and listen to someone. It's absolutely not that simple. I wish it was, which would be great.

So let's talk about mastery. You listen to the podcast? You know, we talk about this a lot. I love that you're a 6 degree black belt in Taekwondo. Fun fact, I don't think we've ever talked about this. I also earned a black belt in taekwondo when I was a kid. Yeah, I never went beyond first degree, but in something like Taekwondo or really any sport. Right. The path to mastery is so clear cut. Right. You break the board this way, you practice. It's deliberate practice at its like finest. Not so with writing or pursuing mastery of your craft as a chaplain, how have you gone about deliberately practicing your craft of chaplaincy?

Oh my gosh, Jordan, I love this question. So chaplaincy is being present. What we call a chaplain is non anxious, non judgmental, comforting presence. I know that's quite a mouthful, but how is it that we can practice something like that? I think one thing that we're constantly training ourselves in and processing out together is how can I see through the eyes of the other person? We're constantly training ourselves in empathy, spiritual and emotional. And that, Jordan, believe it or not, that's not really easy to do to train in empathy. There's a lot about learning about other cultures. There's a lot about, how do people grieve differently? How do people experience pain differently? What does trauma cause? There's a lot of pausing and then asking the questions. For example, why is this person acting out this way? Is it because of this specific part of their story? So there's a lot of tuning in and paying attention. And that's a craft that needs to be honed in constantly. So every time I'm on a patient visit, not only am I visiting the patient, but I'm also constantly trying to tune in and pay attention to this person's story, that it would deepen my chaplaincy. So you get better with every single visit? Not only that, but I couldn't do this without my chaplain team. We are allowed to, after every single visitation, find another chaplain and process the visit that we just had. And we're allowed to spend time with that if we want to. And in doing that, we get to talk about what were the missed opportunities that I had. What could I have said differently? How could I have paused more to allow the patient to tell their story further? Maybe I jumped in too quickly. Oh, this part of the story that they told. Did I miss something there? Could I picked up on that thread and help them, that patient, to process that part of the story? And I just kind of jumped past it. So really, it's the feedback of other people. If we're open to that and explore that, man, we can get better not just at chaplaincy, but just at life.

Yeah. I talk about this in Master of One. Right. One of the keys to mastery is purposeful practice. And an element of purposeful practice is rapid feedback. I mean, putting yourself in a situation where you're getting rapid feedback from peers like that who are walking the same road and trying to master the same craft. I think that's really critical. So you're one of those, like, unique people that I would argue has mastered or is at least pursuing mastery of in a really rigorous way. Two things, right? You have way more than 10,000 hours of purposeful practice as a chaplain, but you also have a ton of purposeful practice as a writer. You get this book coming out with Moody, the Voices We Carry, which I've started to read and I'm loving, and I want to talk about the substance of the book in a minute, but for now, I want to talk about your pursuit of mastery as a writer. Because this book deal with a traditional publisher. It's been a dream of yours for a long time. But you've been writing and blogging for a long time, is that right? Can you talk about the discipline over time that is leading to mastery of that craft as a writer?

Oh, gosh, yeah. You know, I've always, always, always loved writing. In fact, the earliest experience I can remember writing, I was probably six. I had a notepad and I wrote a mystery story about the ducks that lived in our backyard. So that's something that I've just loved doing all the time. I carry probably four or five notepads with me constantly. And then blogging is something early on, even before the word blog existed, my friend created for me, like this HTML text website that I would just write on all the time.

That's amazing.

Yeah, so it's weird because, like, random people would find it and say, hey, I found your site. And it was kind of maybe more for me, but it was always a thrill when somebody found it. But one thing was that when I started my blog early on, I would say maybe 2008 or 2009. This was when WordPress was like the only thing you could find. I was writing probably every single day, just thoughts that I had, journaling out things, and I was getting zero clicks and zero views. But I just loved writing so much and putting thoughts to paper that I did it regardless of audience. It was almost like, whoever's reading, if it's three people, wonderful. It's for you three and it's for me. And so part of that discipline for me was writing regardless of audience. Of course, after that, I started off self published. I just kind of put a book out in the world and it did okay. It did way better than I thought. But when I published that, I first gave it to beta readers, like test readers, and I opened myself to feedback. So again, going back to that theme of feedback. Once your baby is out in the world, you know, your book, your creation, whether that's music or art or dance choreography, anything like that, it kind of belongs to this collective now. Group of people are taking part in it and it becomes open to enjoyment, criticism, feedback, all kinds of things. And so I thought, I'm going to do that early and I'm going to do that quick. And I want to hear what people think. Not only that, but get the specifics of where does this work? Where is this getting boring? Jordan, I think you do a great job of that, of asking those questions like, where did this lose your attention? Where is this not having clarity, things like that. So I did that early and it is always, always painful. But I feel with seeing through the eyes of another, or seeing if they can see what you're trying to convey, that's so, so important.

I think this is hard. I think this is like the discipline that all creatives need, whether you're a writer or an artist or whatever you're making in the world. And I heard a really good piece of advice recently about feedback, specifically for writers. It was basically like, listen, artists are really resistant to receiving critical feedback because it's your baby. It's art. Art is largely subjective. But while people who are giving you feedback probably aren't the right ones to propose the solution to the problem, you need to listen to the fact that there is problem. Right. So as a writer, if somebody tells me something's not clear, I need to pay attention to that. Not necessarily their suggestion for how to make it clearer. Right. But just the fact that there's a problem there. Would you agree with that?

Yeah, yeah. In fact, you know, I recently read Made the Stick by Chip Heath, and they talk about in there the curse of knowledge, which is you may know something and you're trying to convey it, but the other person doesn't have the foundational furniture to really understand everything you're saying. And unless you kind of key them into, here's the premise, here's the foundation here, kind of the beginning building blocks of the idea I'm trying to present to you. And they do this funny thing where they say if you know a tune in your head and you use your knuckles to tap the tune out the other person, it's very low likelihood of them understanding it because you know the tune in your head, but they're not going to know it just by tapping your knuckles. And that's the curse of knowledge. So if I were to do it right now, we can do this experiment. So I have a song in my head. I'm going to tap it out with my knuckles. Jordan, see if you can guess this tune. Are you ready?

Oh, man, I'm ready. Yeah. I have no idea.

Right. So they did this experiment, actually, they talk about that in the book. And I think there was something like 90% of people or even higher than that wouldn't get it. I just tapped the tune to Happy birthday to you. Right. So that's what they call the curse of knowledge. You may know something in your own mind, but to try to convey that if there's no building blocks to clearly express that idea, the other person won't get it. And that's. I think that's part of what feedback helps with feedback saying, like, hey, I don't get this. Can you help me to get what you're saying?

That's a terrific analogy. I've never heard that before. I love it. Hey, so you spent years blogging every day, just writing, writing, writing, kind of building this portfolio. Now you've done something I know a lot of people listening want to do. You got. You got a book deal with, like, a real publisher. I love the team at Moody. What have you learned through that process of how to get a book deal? Like, what advice would you give to people listening who want to do the same thing you did?

Yeah. So writing any kind of book, I had this very purist idea of writing in that this is my voice, these are my thoughts. I need to get out my ideas in a way that is exactly me and exactly my voice. But soon you start to learn things about marketing. You learn things about, hey, maybe this is too poetic, or there's a lot of purple prose when it could be said more clearly. You learn things like word count. Like, I tend to overwrite. My first draft was 100,000 words.

Wow, that's nuts.

They said, we gotta get this down to about 60,000. We ended up compromising at 70,000. As anyone starts writing a book as they find out there are a lot of moving pieces. And it's a collaborative effort of a team. It's a group effort. Writing is not a solo sport at all. I always thought it was. And there was a part of me that was maybe stubborn or prideful in that. No, I want my voice to be pure. Whatever I put on the page is what I want people to read. But then I had two wonderful, wonderful editors, Amy and Amanda, and they really, really helped to make clear what I was trying to say and crystallize my voice, really. So I think one thing that people will learn is now I've learned I was probably somewhat arrogant and snobby to think whatever I want to say is what should be said. I needed to have open ears to hear what this team effort, this collaborative effort of what can deliver this message the best.

Yeah, there's a ton of wisdom in there, and I can co sign that wisdom. Hey, so, you know, we talk about routines and habits on the podcast. I have one just very specific question to this end. Right. You write a lot about mental health. Right. And I'm a big believer that our habits with our phones and technology in general have a far greater impact on our mental health than most of us think. So are there habits you employ with your technology that you believe contributes positively to your mental health.

Yeah, man, I love these questions. So I think there are times when I feel like I'm way too attached to my phone, which I think I'm sure nobody's ever had that thought. Right. So there are times when I know I am just itching to check it. So there are times where there are entire seasons I will put my charger in the hallway outside of bedroom and just leave my phone out there. There are rules that we have. So, for example, at dinner time, Juliet and I, we are not allowed to look at our phones at all during dinner. So if we get a phone call, if we get a text, we can't answer those. We just have to wait till dinner is done. And this may seem maybe kind of strange because when we watch a movie, and I know movie is part of technology, but when we watch a movie together or a TV show, we also never check our phones.

I love that.

Yeah. Because if we're taking in someone's creat, someone's art, someone's vision, to interrupt that with a phone, or it like turning aside and just checking something else, I think rudely interrupts and does a disservice to that creator's vision. I know that sounds very kind of high minded and lofty, but I instituted that rule like first day of marriage. I told my wife, look, I love movies, I love art, I love music, I love all this kind of stuff. And she had barely watched like 10 movies maybe. So I said, when we're watching a movie, no phones whatsoever. And she thought that was kind of crazy at first, but now it's just. It's just become a part of our habit of our home. I don't know if that's strange. I don't know if anybody else does that.

So I've never thought about it. I'll be honest. I think about it much more selfishly. I don't think about it as disrespecting the art. Although I think you make a fair point. I think about it as like, it's just bad for my anxiety and just my ability to develop my muscles of concentration and focus. Right. I believe that concentration, there's a lot of science to back this up, has to be cultivated. You have to work out your muscles to focus. And watching TV is a great time to do that. I do the same thing. I don't check my phone ever or watching tv. And part of that is I just love television. I want to. I want to be all in on the Medium. Those are three like hyper practical tips with technology though, right? A physical space for your phone that's away from where you are. This idea of, of putting your phone away for dinner, which we also do, and not checking your phone during tv. I love that. So, June, you know, the heart of this podcast is this intersection of faith and work. We're recording this episode in the middle of this COVID 19 crisis. And I loved your Instagram post a few weeks back. You said, yes, Christians, God is in control, but that does not absolve us of our responsibility to roll up our sleeves and do the hard work of what you call healing and justice and grieving together. Can I invite you to get up on your soapbox for a minute and expound upon what you mean here and more importantly, like what the relation of this is to the work that we do every day?

Absolutely, yeah. You know, so that post, just so you know, came from somewhat clenched teeth and clenched fists. And so I want to be careful that my soapbox isn't too high. Right? No, but really, truly, when I see well meaning, well intentioned people of faith talk about the sovereignty and providence of God, of course I believe in the sovereignty and providence of God. And at the same time there needs to be wisdom that is practiced. So sometimes I'll hear people say, hey, I don't need to be careful with social distancing because God will protect me. God is in control. And for me, I say, okay. I want to say, yes. And I want to say, agree with the part that, okay, God is in control or God is good, or God will provide for us and we need to be careful and we need to be wise because there are consequences and there's sort of the natural unfolding of life that can happen. We need to practice caution. And in fact, I would say we answer to God. We answer to being accountable to Him. The best thing that we can do is be cautious. The best thing that we can do in partnering with God's sovereignty and providence is to practice wisdom, is to practice what scientists are telling us and what people who know about these things are telling us. And so I don't buy into this whole God is in control, therefore we don't need to do anything. That is a very, very passive type of faith that I think is very unfair and I think has caused a lot of trouble already in these last couple months.

Amen.

So we see that in all kinds of ways with racism, with bigotry, with prejudice, with the injustice that we're seeing in the world. We see that with the homelessness issue, we see that with mental health, where we just kind of. I'm just going to leave it to God. Leave it to God. Leaving it to God is a lot of times what I see. It's laziness. Yeah.

It's apathy. And it's rooted in a. In really bad theology about how God works and moves in the world. He works and moves through his image bearers. Right. Not exclusively, but he works through us. He works through our work. Right. He's given us Christians and non Christians, grace and wisdom to exercise his will in the world, to eradicate the coronavirus, to heal, to self distance, to govern. Right?

Yes. Yes. Yeah. I mean, I believe God works miracles still. And sometimes that miracle is the person that God will send to you to offer his help. Sometimes that miracle is a scientist that's staying up nights and nights and nights, coming up with a vaccine. Sometimes that miracle are the doctors and nurses who are working constantly for our health. And so, yes, God can protect us and God can work miracles, and there is providence, but there is work involved and there's partnership and there's cooperation with God in doing that. I believe that's God flexing and working through us for sure.

Amen. Our work is part of how God repairs this broken world. I. I think about this quote almost every day. Mr. Rogers did a PSA after 911 where he said, he reminded us that we are all, quote, repairers of creation. Right. So, yes, God is sovereign. Yes, God is in control. But he has invited us graciously to extend his will into the world and to help repair creation and be conduits for his miracles in the world. So, June, we spend a lot of time on the podcast talking about how the Christian faith influences the work of our guests every day. In your case, you're a hospital chaplain.

Right.

I think a lot of people would assume that you see the purpose of your work as largely saving souls at the 11th hour. But something tells me that's not what you see as the purpose of your work as a hospital chaplain. So tell us, how do you view the purpose of your work?

Yeah, you know, so one of the differences between a minister and a chaplain, a minister is going to impart information and theology, and we absolutely need that. We need ministers to be able to give theology, to give view of scripture and of God and talk about the person and work of Christ. Then you have chaplains. And a chaplain's role, rather than preaching, is to be a presence. And I'm not saying one is better than the other. But a chaplain's role is at the moment of ground zero, of grief and crisis. They enter in and in the midst of doctors or nurses or lots of things happening with authorities, lots of people swirling around. In the midst of that, the chaplain enters and is a center of peace and calmness, and in some ways reflects the goodness and the love of God in that moment. Very often without words, very often just listening and being. And so part of my role, though, you know, we can talk theology, though we can talk faith with the patient and things like that. A lot of my role is being able to sit with a patient and allowing them to process what just happened to them, to tell their story. I believe it was Zora Neale Hurston who said, there's no greater anguish than the untold story. And so, by extension, I would say that there's no greater freedom and joy than being able to tell our story, to process that out, to say, here's what happened to me, and it hurts. And then to have someone empathically listening with their face, with their. With their ears, with their presence. And so part of my role is to be that person that is there for them so that they're not alone and they recognize you are not alone.

Do you encounter invitations from patients for you to share the gospel?

Yeah, absolutely. That has happened before and the way that we frame that. So I'm an interfaith chaplain, meaning I work with many, many different kinds of faith traditions, whether that be Buddhism, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish. There's even an atheist and agnostic chaplains. But we are often requested to match faith. Not always, but we sometimes are. And then there are some patients that I go to who are lapsed Christians or they haven't gone to church in a while or because, of course, of their situation, they absolutely hate God, and they. They couldn't believe in a God who would allow their illness to happen to them. There have been plenty of opportunities for me to share the gospel, to talk about God's love. I can say in the last four and a half, five years, there were probably two or three instances where I got to share the gospel all the way. And this was, of course, with the permission of the patient. I never get ahead of the patient with their pace, and they wanted to know more. They were asking me, like, what is it that you believe? What is it that gives you hope? And I was able to share with them. And I would say those two or three encounters, those patients died shortly after even thinking about that. Gosh, it just makes me emotional to think about it. It was my honor to be able to be there for them, to share what I believe God is all about.

So let me ask you this. You're in the room. You have a patient that invites that conversation. Obviously, you're trying to be sensitive. You're trying to console them, but at the same time, you've got to adhere to the truths of the gospel and not water it down. How do you manage that tension?

Yeah, you know, I think this part of the job, maybe ironically, may be easier than other parts of the job. And the reason why, Jordan, is because when people have chronic illness or pain, injury, trauma, or they're at the end of their lives, they are so open to talking about faith. They're so open to talking about their regrets. You know, what Scripture calls sin. They're so open to talking about the ways that they've hurt people and asking for forgiveness. They want to get things right. They really do. And so that is a doorway that is kind of an entry point into being able to talk about love of God and the forgiveness that is offered and the grace that is offered in the work and person of Christ. And so really, the trauma stuff, the grief stuff, that's the real, real hard stuff that requires a lot of nuance and thoughtfulness and navigating carefully, and every person's different. But I would say when it comes to talking about faith, if a person is open to it, that part is pretty easy. And I would say, in a general sense, when people are hurting, they want to know, is this all there is or is there more? And I never want to use that entry point against someone. I never want them to feel like I'm doing this in a cheap way or exploiting or anything like that. Like I'm always moving with their permission, at their pace. But when patients are in that moment, they're so open to talking about faith, Jordan. I think those are always perfect opportunities to talk about God.

Is the cliche true that nobody lies on their deathbed wishing they had spent more time at the office?

Jordan, that cliche is a cliche for a reason. It is absolutely true. I have sat with. This is a heavy thing, but I have sat with many, many dying people on their deathbed. I've heard many, many last words, Jordan. And we have a policy in the hospital. We try as best as we can. Nobody dies alone. And if family members can't make it, if friends can't make it, then chaplains, we're the last one there. And I will hear tons and tons of regrets, lots of regrets. Regrets about. I should have done this, I should have done that. I should have done less of this. I wish I could have done that. And then the other regret almost is always about I wish I would have made things right with that person, that person that I. That there was unforgiveness there or disconnection or the relationship just got messed up. I wish that person was here right now and I could just tell them we're okay. So absolutely that cliche is right. In some sense. With the more time in the office, there's always something at the end that somebody wishes to get right. And really that's where the grace of God comes in. In that through fractured relationships, through opportunities that we miss in life, through the mess ups that we've created, that God still offers grace even, even in the very last moments.

So you know my work pretty well. One of my goals, like when I think about what do I want the church to look like with its relationship to its work, in a very practical sense, I want believers who are consuming this content to get to the end of their life to be on their deathbed and be able to say, you know, I wish I had spent more time doing my work in addition to spending more time with my family, more time with just more time in general, including work. Because I viewed my work in this life as a means of service, as a means of ministering to others through the ministry of excellence, as a means of glorifying God. I think we can get there. Tim Keller kind of gave me that vision in every good endeavor. Right. And I think if you, if you understand the eternal significance of our work, I don't know, I think, I think I can envision myself saying that on my deathbed. What do you think for you personally, do you think you can, on your deathbed, will you have wished you have served more patients?

Yes, I wish I would have served. I mean, I think there's always a sense in which, gosh, I could have done 10 more things that day or six more things that day, or in that year, I had more opportunity to write or to serve people or to visit people. But I think there's also the wishing for the quality to be better and things like that. But I think one thing that I want to encourage listeners right now is that wherever that they're working, wherever that they're serving, whatever their calling is, what I found that's so important in any calling is being able to establish great quality relationships and connections with people. I was talking with this person on his deathbed and I want to be careful and maintain his privacy. So I'm going to change a couple details, but he worked in a place that was not the best. I mean, he did not like where he was at all. His job was terrible, filled with smoke all the time. Just kind of a seedy, what he describes as a trashy place. But what he said was, is that his employees, they were all young and there was quick turnaround. They would all come into his office all the time and ask for advice. After months and months of just building trust, they would ask for advice. And what this man told me on his deathbed was that his favorite part of his work was those connections where people would come in and ask for advice. He said he hated his job, but he loved his job. And he loved his job because of the connections that he made. So I think what people will be wishing for more of in the end, I don't know if it's more of the product or if it's more numbers or if it's more hours. I think it's going to be the quality of those connections that we make.

Yeah, I think that's right. It's about people and service to them. Hey, can we talk about your new book for a minute? The Voices we Carry?

Yeah, my brother.

Yeah. So let's start here. Give us a quick summary of what this book is about.

Yeah. So the book is called the Voices we Carry. The subtitle is Finding your one true voice in a world of clamor and noise. And the book is about different voices that we wrestle with, such as self doubt, people pleasing, trauma, grief, family dynamics. Each chapter is a different voice that we wrestle with, and I talk about how those voices harm. But if we listen carefully to each voice, there are different ways in which they can also heal or we can find healing through them. And so the book is kind of half self help, but then there's also a memoir of it, a chronological journey through my hospital chaplaincy and also growing up Asian American here in the States.

What's the most common voice of those voices you listed that you think keeps Christ followers from just really engaging in their work? Not to get something from the work, but as a means to glorify God and serve other people?

Yeah, so you know, the first part of the book, there are four voices. There's self doubt, people pleasing, and then there's condemning others, and then there's elevating ourselves, which would be ego. So I would say what I'm hearing most common, at least in my circles, is that self doubt and people pleasing are extremely Pervasive. And this may be a millennial and also maybe a zoomer issue in which we want to make sure that we're pleasing everybody around us because we want to keep our jobs, because we want to keep our hours, because we want everybody to be happy or we want to look like we're doing a great job. And I think these two, the self doubt and the people pleasing, they maybe go hand in hand even I would say so the people pleasing is kind of creating a predictable world of security. Because if I can keep everybody happy, if everybody, everybody can approve of me, then I will have this very secure world and I will feel safe. When you start kind of going down that road, then there's the self doubt. Am I doing a good enough job? Am I enough for everybody? Can I really do this? Can I meet up to this ideal standard? So I'm seeing a lot more and more of now of, especially with people pleasing. The consequence of that being we're not taking care of ourselves very well. I mean, we are just spending ourselves dry. There's a lot of burnout and compassion fatigue, especially in my circles. And so I think people pleasing is a, is a super prevalent issue. And for me, that chapter was, was one of the most meaningful chapters for me.

I haven't gotten there yet in the book, but I got to imagine that's going to be the most meaningful one for me as well. Hey, June, you know the three questions we ask at the end of every conversation? Number one, which books do you find yourself recommending the most or giving away the most to others?

Yeah. You know, this is not a light read at all. This is a book that has a lot to do with my work. It's called Being Mortal by Atul Gawande. And it's about end of life care and palliative care. Atul Gawande is a doctor, he's a surgeon, and he went on this quest to explore what is end of life care like for many people, especially in the States. And I think we find it as a culture very difficult to talk about death, about loss, about losing someone. And he presents this dilemma of is chemo the way to go for cancer? For example, do you want to experience extreme pain for the very small chance of lengthening your life? And he talks about what does quality of life mean? Are these treatments really, really helping us? Or can we just have, even if it's only two months left, have a peaceful two months without the pain of chemo? He talks about these kinds of dilemmas. And so this book, I just Non stop, recommend it to people because we, all of us need to get ready, if not for our own funerals, those of others. I think talking about death in a healthy way, in a God centered way, that's going to help prepare us for what is to come.

If we had more time together. I really wanted to dig into the Christian perspective of death because you're right, we in the church don't talk about death enough or biblically enough. I think a lot of that's rooted in uncertainty and lack of clarity within the church of heaven. And. But yeah, maybe, maybe we can have you back sometime to dig into that topic. All right, June, who you've listened to a lot of episodes of this podcast. Who do you want to hear next on the show?

You know, I. Jordan, this might make you laugh. This is who I really want to hear from. I'm so curious to hear from Chris Pratt about his faith.

Somebody just said Chris Pratt the other day. Oh, my God.

Yeah, I'm sorry, that. That's so. I guess that's the second person who's saying that now. I would be so curious to hear about his, his faith. I've read his testimony and he's just such an interesting person to me.

That's a great answer. All right, one piece of advice. To leave this audience of people who, like you, are trying to do the best work they know how for the glory of God and the good of others. What do you want to leave them with?

You know, failure is going to happen in every task and every endeavor, in every effort and every goal. Passion, dream. There will be a lot of failure. There will be a lot of sticky, sweaty armpits standing around in line. The in between, frustration that nobody sees. There will be a lot of alone time, loneliness. It's going to be hard, very, very hard to pursue dreams. It's. We see romanticized highlights online all the time, but the in between stuff is difficult. But what I want to say is, as hard as it is and as much as you fail, your dream, your passion, your goal is what God has called you to do. And I pray that you persevere through it. Because as painful as it is, there's no greater joy than persevering and seeing it through to the end.

I love that you're reminding me of. I remember our first coffee meeting at Kawa Coffee, downtown Tampa. I was just like, blown away. I'm like, how old is this guy? How is he so wise? And you're just reminding me of why I became such a fan of yours in the first place. June, I want to commend you for the excellent and eternally significant work you do, even when you're not sharing the gospel, even when you're just there for somebody as they're dying in a faithful presence and loving them well. Thank you for loving people well in those times of peril and the times of greatest need, and holding firm to the truth of the Gospel. Thank you for reminding us of our call to mastery as we repair creation. Hey guys, June's new book is the Voices We Carry. It comes from Moody, which, by the way, Moody's becoming one of my favorite publishers, beyond of course, my own Penguin, Random House and Baker. I've started reading the book. I highly recommend it. You could also find June's blog@jsparkblog.com June, my friend, thank you again for being here.

Jordan, much love to you, you and your family. Thank you so much.

I love, love Jun Park. He's one of my favorite people. I know it's so rare that I see him, but every time I see him, I'm just reminded of how wise he is. And that was a real joy, being able to talk to June on the podcast. Hey, I hope you guys enjoyed the episode. If you're loving the show, make sure you subscribe. Make sure you rate the podcast so we can rise in the rankings and other people can find this content. Thank you guys so much for tuning in week after week. I'll see you next time.