Kaleigh Cox (Co-Author of Five Mere Christians)

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 5 mereChristians. Calm 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 friend. 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 Florists, speech therapists and cable installers. That's the question we explore every week. And today I'm posing it to my friend Kaylee Cox, the first person I have ever worked with to co write a book. The book that dropped yesterday, My brand new book, five Mere Christians. I Binge Worthy biographies that show you how to glorify God in your work. Kaylee and I sat down to talk about what my decision to work with a co author can teach you about your own work. Today I shared why I chose to make a collection of biographies, my next book. And Kaylee and I both shared a bunch of the stickiest stories from the lives of Fred Rogers, Fannie Lou Hamer, Hannah Moore, CS Lewis, the founder of Lego, ET Etc that have forever changed how we work. You're not going to want to miss this terrific episode with my friend, Kaylee Cox. Kaylee Cox, welcome back to the Mere Christians podcast.

Yay. It's so good to be back.

All right, it's confession time. We. We were not totally honest with our audience. We had you on the podcast back in January 2024, so I was interviewing you I about the job you had at the time. But we neglected to share with our listeners that you and I had been quietly working together for almost a year at that point writing five year Christians. And we were both giddy to talk about it but agreed it wasn't the right time. Right.

That's right. It was very sneaky of us. But I'm so glad I get to come back and talk about it now. I only didn't talk about it last time because you promised I could come back and talk about it later.

Yeah. And now now's the right time. Right. Because we are dropping this episode the day after we release our new book which we co wrote together called five Mere Christians Binge Worthy biographies that show you how to glorify God in your work. I won't talk about how hard I had to fight for Binge Worthy in that subtitle, but my word, did I fight for it.

Yeah, I was the one who thought it was not great. And then early reactions have proven you right. No big surprise there.

Vindication.

That's right.

Helped us sell 4000 units of this thing. All right. Yeah, listen, this is. I've been telling everybody and I can say this unashamedly because I am genuinely not responsible for the vast majority of the writing in this book concept. Sure. This is the best thing I've ever made. Ever made. I am obsessed with it. I love this book. I can't stop. I've been talking about it for almost three years, and so I figured, yeah, let's celebrate this launch by doing something a little bit different in this episode. So, listeners, bear with us. We're actually going to flip the mics a little bit. Kaylee's actually going to interview me for the first half or so of this episode about why I chose this as my next book, how this project came about, etc. Etc. I don't know, maybe some fun stories come up about the messy making of this book. And then we're gonna talk about how writing about how the gospel shaped the work of these five men and women changed how we personally work today. Does that sound like a plan, Kaylee?

I love it.

All right, take it away.

All right, Jordan, well, you know that before I even worked with you, I had read everything you'd ever written. And so I know that this was a very different type of book for you. So can you just tell us where the idea came from for. For publishing biographies?

Yeah, I get this question a lot with all my books, and honestly, for most books, it's hard for me to retrace the steps. Right. Like, it's. It's creativity is very messy. Like, I can't always see exactly how the concept came into being, but this one's actually pretty clear to me. And honestly, there were a bunch of different seeds dating back to probably like 2020 that kind of all grew together into this vision for biographies of mere Christians from history that were both extremely entertaining and extremely practical. I'll just share a few of those seeds here. I won't bore our listeners with every single one. So not comprehensive list, but a representative one. Number one, I just kept seeing a trend in my youversion devotionals in this podcast that case studies are stickier than commands. Right. So in books like the Sacredness of Secular Work or. Or my weekly devotional, like the Word Before Work, I am telling readers, telling myself, how we can glorify God in our work. But there's this quote from Tim Keller that I read years ago that I love. He said, quote, you never learn anything spiritually valuable by being told you have to be shown. End quote. By the way, that came from a sermon of his, right? Like strong words to come from a preacher. And I've just seen that in my own stuff. Yes, telling readers how to glorify God in their work, telling our listeners how to glorify God in their work is valuable. It has its place. And I'm going to continue to write more of that. Stuff. But I do think showing is even more powerful, which is why I think this podcast works. This podcast shows you listener how what it looks like practically to glorify God in your work by giving you flesh and bone three dimensional models of what that looks like in practice. So that was the first seed, right? Like, I just kept seeing this trend that case studies are stickier than commands. Number two. As you know, I kept dreaming out loud on this podcast about who I wanted to interview on the new Earth. And like, people laugh every time I say that. Like, I'm only half joking, right? Like, I can't wait to interview the founder of lego, to interview Mr. Rogers and Hannah Moore, et cetera, et cetera. And part of the reason is that they are dead. Like, I actually love that because we know that they were faithful to Christ to the end. They finished the race well. So that was the second seed. Third seed. I spent years wrestling with my love hate relationship with biographies, right? Like, I love biographies and memoirs because they're inspiring, because they baptize my imagination about what's possible for God to do through my work. Because again, show me and they show me what it looks like practically to glorify God today. If the biography is a hero of the faith. But most biographies suck. Like, they are absolutely terrible. They're way too long, they're way too boring, they're way too disconnected from the life of modern readers. There are just very few biographies that are short, binge worthy and extremely relevant. And selfishly, I wanted more of them. So that was the third scene. And then I would say the final scene. Seed, kind of the nail in the coffin was reading two books by James Patterson. So if you love this book, shoot James Patterson a tweet and thank him. One I read his autobiography where, which is extraordinary, by the way. If you are interested in ever writing anything, go read James Parson's autobiography. If you can get past the arrogance of the pride, it's great. He was basically saying the same thing I was saying about biographies. He's like, biographies are terrible and there's a way to make them read like fiction. And so I'm going all in on this genre. And then after reading that, I was like, all right, I want to read what James Patterson is doing with nonfiction. And so Kara and I were in London in the fall of 2022, and I think Patterson had just published his biography on Princess Diana and her boys. Now, I don't really care about Princess Diana that much. I'm a super fan of the Crown. But like, whatever Like, I don't. I'm not super passionate about the royal family. So, like, I didn't wake up in.

The middle of the night to watch a royal wedding.

Or I did not.

Not that level. It's no Taylor Swift.

It's not waking up at midnight to stream midnight. No, I didn't do that either. For the record. For the record, I'm not there. Crazy.

No.

So, like, I didn't care that much, but, like, I remember vividly. We were on a train. I remember where we were. We were. We were riding the train through Clapham, actually, I don't think I've told you that. Where Hannah Moore and William Wilberforce hung out. And I remember thinking, I don't care about this subject, but I cannot stop reading this book because of the length of the chapters, because of the cliffhangers after every chapter. And I was like, this is it. This is the format I've been looking for. I had this idea for a collection of biographies for a while, but I'm like, this is the style. This is the format I want to write this thing in. But I had no idea how to write it. Right. Like, I'm not James Patterson and that's okay. Which, as you know, was kind of the realization that eventually led me to work with you.

Yeah. Yeah. And I know you've gotten a lot of questions about that as well, because this is the first book you've written with a co author. Obviously, I know why you decided to do that, but can you flesh that out a bit more? Because I think even for someone who's not looking to write a book, there's real value in what your. Your kind of purpose and motivation was here.

There's a quote that's been rolling around my head for about seven years since I read it in Ryan Holiday's terrific book called Perennial Seller. Another book I'd strongly recommend anyone who ever wants to write or create anything. Honestly. Ryan says that the best books are either extremely entertaining or extremely practical. And I was arrogant enough, audacious enough, whatever you want to call it, to say. I think five mere Christians can be both, to be as helpful as anything I've ever written. See Redeeming your time, sacredness of second work, etc, but also as entertaining as anything Emily Henry or Laura Hillenbrand has written. Beach read crushable. You've probably heard me say that term a million times over the last year or two, right? Beach crushable biographies that could compete with Netflix and TikTok. But again, I knew I didn't know how to Write that. Right. Could I figured it out? Yeah, sure. And maybe on the new Earth I would love to figure out how to like write in that genre in that medium. But why would I try to figure that out now when there are plenty of other talented writers out there who can do it and are doing it? So yeah, for the first time my career, I decided to write with someone. People ask me all the time.

Oh, who?

Who helped you write redeeming your time? Who goes for. I wrote those. Okay, I wrote those books on my own. But this one I wanted to write with somebody who could achieve that vision of beach regressionable. Extremely entertaining. And get live up to the subtitle of this book of binge worthy biographies. And this is the beauty of the body of Christ. And I think there's a lesson in here for our listeners, regardless of their work. I'm good at one thing, creating content. And even more niche and specific than that, I'm really good at writing clear, compelling, linear, practical, non fiction, not extremely entertaining non fiction. But God has equipped many, many, many other people, believers and non believers alike, with that gift. Right. With that skill set. And so I was really, really pumped to go out and find somebody who got to give that gift to. You're one of them, one of 150 or so people that went through the process of applying to be my co author on this book. And that was really beautiful for me to step back and just appreciate the gifts that I don't have that God has given to others in abundance.

Yeah. And I think that right there is the lesson that applies to anyone. Because no matter what job you hold, and whether it's your company or you're just an employee or a contributor to a company, it can be so tempting to think that we are responsible for doing everything that our job demands. And when we take every responsibility on ourself, instead of reaching out and seeking help either from a co worker or hiring someone or whatever that might look like. For one thing, we're not going to do as excellent of what work as we would have done in partnership with other people. But we're also robbing people of the opportunity to do the work God has prepared in advance for them to do and has equipped them to do so, it's, it's a much broader application than just finding a co author. Right. It's, it's about partnering with people and recognizing that we're all part of a body and that different people have different giftings.

And yeah, it's so good. I can't remember where I read this. But I recently read somebody commenting on Genesis 1 and the first commission to fill the earth and to subdue it and the agency that God gave humanity and the freedom God gave humanity to figure out the how they were going to get the job done that God gave them to do. Right. And the point this author was making is when we fail to lean on others with different skill sets than our own, or worse, we hire them to do a job and then we dictate how that job is done and don't rely on their skill sets, we are robb them of the God given right and responsibility to lean into our particular God given skills and exercise those for his glory. In the good verse. Does that make any sense?

Yeah, absolutely. And it's one of those things where we can tell ourselves that we're doing it. Insert task here in the service of others and almost with this like martyr complex when in reality it's pride. Right? It's I'm going to do all of this on my own.

And by the way, I'm guilty of this nine times out of ten. The one time I got this right was hiring you to co write this book with me.

Well, I work, I'm jumping ahead here. Big reveal everyone. I now work with Jordan, we'll talk about that. But as a boss you are very mindful of this as well. So I would say in general you think about this well. So before we get into that, I do want to say really quickly, we won't spend time here on this podcast getting into the nitty gritty of how you found me and hired me because most of our listeners probably don't care. But there might be some who do, maybe who have always wanted to write a book and would love to work with a co author to do it. And you actually just finished yesterday, I think, or this weekend, creating a free course about this. Can you talk about that and just kind of where our listeners can find it?

Yeah, I record the course. I'm so pumped about it. I'm sharing everything for anyone who wants to write a book 10 times faster and better with an affordable co author. Including I'm sharing how I sourced candidates for this role, how I found you, how I found New York Times bestselling authors who are interested in working with me on this project. I share how I structure compensation. You're going to find out exactly what Kaylee made financially on this book. We did not hold back any secrets. I'm sharing how to delegate your vision for the book effectively. Yeah, so anyways, we're not selling this course, I do this almost for every book launch. I do a course like this where you can't buy it, you can't google it, you can't find it. You can only get it for free by ordering my new book. So if you order 5Mere Christians before 11:59pm Eastern on May 9th at 5Mere Christians.com go to 5meer Christians.com click the link to buy the book on Amazon, Barnes and Noble Christian book, wherever you want to. And then there's a form right there. Once you fill it out, you'll get free access to the course.

Yeah, that's great.

All right, can we flip the mic?

Let's do it.

I'm tired of bring it on. I don't like talking.

You're not used to being in the hot seat.

I am not. All right, so. All right, let me back up. I'll share a little bit of detail on how I source candidates for this book. So I did a couple different ways. I cold emailed about 12 authors who already published who I really like their stuff and got their interest. But I also sent out an email to a small segment of my email list. If you're listening, you may have gotten one of these emails. And these are basically my super, super, super fans, right? People who open everything, buy every book, et cetera. And it was a very simple email. I was like, hey, I think the subject line was like, want to co write a book with me? P.S. the open rate on that email was through the roof pro tip, right? And it linked to this very simple application that led to like this four stage interview process. Here's what's interesting to me though, Kaylee, you had never published, you had never written a full length book before and you were like, yeah, I could do that. Well, talk through your thought process and what led you to apply? Because this is a titch crazy.

Yeah. Well, I have to start with a confession, Jordan. I haven't told you this, but I didn't realize it was a full book until like the interview and.

Oh, that's right, because I didn't tell you.

Well, you were. You said it was like a short biography, maybe around 10,000 words. So first of all, I thought odds of me getting this were very slim. So I didn't really overthink it that much.

For the record, they were very slim.

Yeah. And so, you know, I just wasn't. But I thought, you know, like, best case scenario, if this were to work out, I'll spend a few Saturdays on this project. So by the time I understood, oh this is, this is a book. I was just way too excited to back out. But, but I will say, I think the whole process I would describe as a guided drift, which is a phrase I'm borrowing from our book. And it's how Fred Rogers thought about his career. And so to summarize the idea, and actually I have a bit of a quote here from one of his biographers, Max King, who is describing that guided drift concept. And he says that quote, the drift was allowing oneself the creative freedom to follow not just your interests, but where life would lead you, allowing the opportunities that come along to spark your creativity and allowing yourself the freedom to go after them. End quote. And so that really is how I have done my entire career is I'm all in where I'm, you know, where I am. And then if something interesting comes along, I'll knock on that door, I'll see what, I'll see if, you know, God might open it. And so it was just that, you know, I got this email, like I've said, I've been, I was a fan of yours for a long time before that email came. I mean, I was in the subset of people who opened all your emails and therefore got the email. And so I just thought, sure, whatever. I mean, I think I spent 15 minutes on the application. I was just like, I'll throw my hat in the ring. And every step of the way I was just giddy, like, man, if I got no farther, it would be so cool that I got to do this little test. Or if I got no farther, it'd be so cool that I got to do a one hour interview with him. And so it was just taking the step in front of me and, and being okay with any outcome and just enjoying the, the guided drift.

Yeah. In the words of Princess Anna, you just did the next right thing, you know, that's it. I remember very vividly. So round three of the interview process is a four step interview process. Round three was a live interview with me. I think of the initial 150 applicants, I think I did five live interviews. And I remember vividly your, just confidence in that call. I can't remember exactly what you said, but I remember asking you something along the lines of like, you've never done this, right? Like I'm talking to, you know, one of the other finalists was a New York Times best selling biographer who had like, you know, eight New York Times bestselling books under his belt. And I was just like, really direct. I was like, what makes you think you could do this? And I don't remember what you said, but I remember how you said it. And I remember it wasn't arrogance. And it wasn't. Do you.

I think so. I think I said, I mean, I could be totally wrong about this, Jordan, but I think God's calling me to write this book.

That's right. That's exactly what you said. And I'm like, oh my gosh, what a Jesus juke. But like, but no, I respected it wasn't delusion, it wasn't arrogance, it was audacity. And like I value holy audacity so much. In fact, I mean we, we talk about this in five mere Christians. So for the listener's sake, five biographies. And then at the end of each of these five biographies, I share three ways that you and I, modern mere Christians can glorify God in our work as seen in the life of insert person here. Fred Rogers, Fannie Lou Hamer. And in Hannah Moore's chapter, this poet who no big deal, abolished the slave trade in her lifetime, just randomly showed up at the biggest celebrities house in the world and like broke into his backyard, which I freaking love. I pointed this takeaway of like, I think mere Christians glorify God by living, living with that uncommon audacity. Right. We take big swings and it's not self confidence. This is the nuance that's really important. It's not I can do awesome things because I am awesome and I am enough. It is I can do awesome things because I have an awesome God living in me, dwelling in me and working through me to accomplish his purposes in the world. And that's what I saw in you in that interview. Again, not self confidence, but a holy God sourced confidence. I am curious though, like as you were writing Hannah Moore story, did that bolster your conviction around this theme and cultivate in you even more audacity for your future work?

Yeah. So I think first of all that that audacity stemmed from is just walking with Jesus a long time and seeing quote unquote failures or closed doors work out for the glory of God and my own good. And so I don't think I've shared, I don't think I shared the story in my first interview here, but when I was a freshman in college, I got this invitation to apply for a summer internship at this really big church that I attended, was a member of. And it would have been a really cool way to spend my summer. And it was like a personal invitation. Hey, so and so mentioned your name. We think you could be a good fit And I went and did the interview and thought like, oh, this is where God is leading me. You know, this is what I'm going to do this summer. And then they called me and I didn't get it. And I was so mad. Like, I was mad because the rejection stung and I was like, really just mad at God. Why would you even put this invitation in my inbox if you were just going to let me be rejected? And so as a result, I just said yes to the very next invitation that came without prayer. Just the very next thing that came in my inbox about that summer was leading this one week trip for incoming freshmen. And I was like, fine, God, like, you don't want me to work for the church, then I'm just going to do this trip. And that is where I met my husband. And so, you know, I can look back on that and see how God, I would have never even accepted the invitation to leave that trip if I hadn't been angry about the closed door. And then that's where I met Grant. And so ever since then, really I've been. I mean, it still stings to be rejected, but I'm always like, okay, even if this is a closed door, God is going to do something here. And it's made me more audacious. What I loved about Hannah more and the freedom I found in her was that she was audacious about that next right thing that you were saying a minute ago that she, she didn't have, I don't think this like overarching vision for all everything she wanted to accomplish in her life. I think that evolved over time. And so I can relate to that where by nature I'm, I guess audacious or ambitious. But I've never had a clear like 5 year, 10 year, 15 year plan. And Hannah Moore, her particular brand of aud audacity, gave me freedom that I don't have to string all of these steps together, you know, and try to orchestrate the bigger story. I can just be audacious about the thing right in front of me and trust that God's going to write the bigger story out of it and take me where, where I need to go. And another story I had not planned on telling. But when I was in my 20s, I started freelancing as a copywriter. That's kind of where my writing background sort of started, at least professionally. I had a sticky note, a digital sticky note of like, reasons I was going to freelance. And I would put it there so that I could remind myself in kind of the slower seasons, why I was freelancing. And the one I remember most was that I wanted to practice and develop the skill of writing so that if one day God might allow me to use that more explicitly in quote unquote, kingdom related work. Of course my understanding of that has changed, but. But that I would have the skill set to bring to it. And so I don't know, I'm kind of rambling here, Jordan, but just this idea that, you know, even then it was just, I'm going to be audacious about getting good at copywriting and getting good at writing persuasively and in an engaging way for all sorts of businesses and trust that if God wants me to take that skill set into a different, more kingdom specific field later, he will orchestrate that. Did somewhere in there. I answer your question.

No, you did. You did for sure. As you know, I'm already working on the next book, even though we just dropped 5 year Christians yesterday when, when this episode drops. And I've been thinking a lot about this idea audacity, because most, I don't think most Christians goals reflect a belief that the Creator God is working in and through him to accomplish his purposes in the world. There was this Annie Dillard quote. Let me see if I. Yeah, here it is. Andy Doerd said quote, on the whole, I do not find Christians outside of the catacombs sufficiently sensible of conditions. Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke? Or as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it? End quote. Right. And I think, and I've been thinking a lot practically about, okay, how do you baptize your imagination about what's possible for God to do in and through your work as a mere Christian? And this is a huge reason why I love biographies, right? Ones that don't suck and ones that are actually entertaining. Right? Because I think biographies are a silver bullet to that end. Yeah. And yes, these biographies are practical. They're super practical at the end. But maybe more valuable than that. I just think they're incredibly inspiring. Because here's the deal. The exact same Holy Spirit who empowered Hannah Moore to abolish slavery as a single woman in the 1700s is at work in you today. The same exact Holy Spirit who led Fannie Lou Hamer to basically pave the way for African Americans having the right to vote in the United States. Is it work in you believer? The same Holy Spirit that led Ole Kirk Christensen to get off the floor after his Lego factory Burnt down three times. He lost his wife and child and create the most impactful toy brand of all time is at work in you today, Believer. Right. And so I. I don't know. Like, that's why I love biography. It's one of the many reasons why I love biography. Did you feel that as you were writing this?

Yes. In fact, Fannie Lou Hamer, in particular, you know, I wrote her story in the middle of winter. And so I would get up. I worked full time while I was doing this, and so I would get up at 5 and write this before the workday and in the winter. First of all, I'm just not someone who hops out of bed at the first alarm, naturally. And so, you know, add that to. It's cold, it's dark, and my bed was really cozy. It was hard to get up at 5am and her story was heavy. You know, she's. This was not, like, a fun one to write. And so. But I would wake up and that alarm would go off, and I would regularly have just this mental image of her sitting on the couch in my office with, like, her arms crossed and her eyebrows raised, like, all right, well, whenever you're ready, get out of bed. Like, I'm. I'm in here waiting. You can come tell my story. And I would just. I'd feel this sense of, like, man, she. The stuff she did, you know, in her work and in her career, out of surrender to the Lord and the stuff she endured. And my job is just to help tell that story. Like, I'm gonna get my butt out of bed and go do what God's given me to do. And so, yeah, just. They became these real people who inspired me. Like, I wanted to be more like them. And I wanted, not just in telling their stories, but in my own work, to work the way they did and to glorify God the way they did.

That's good. You buried the lead, though. You see dead people. Is that what you just publicly shared on the. Okay.

Like, this is not, like, a supernatural thing. It was just, like, a thought in my head that got me to get.

Sure, sure, sure, sure.

In the corner, shadowy corner.

I love it.

All right.

Hey, you. You just. You just hit on this. And I want to. I want to dig deeper here. You said that writing these stories about how the gospel influenced the work of these five mere Christians influence how you work today. Be specific. How. Like, what's one or two ways that these stories have significantly influenced the way you work? As under the Lord?

Yeah. So this is actually A good example of what you said earlier when you were saying one of the reasons you wrote this was that case studies are stickier than commands. So not long before I started working with you, I had read your book Redeeming youg Time. And I had read John Mark Comer's book, the Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. And before those books, I was very. I very much had what John Mark Comer calls hurry sickness. Like, I was very stressed and spread thin. And so those books kind of were a launching pad for me to understand healthier principles and practices for really just working at a pace that glorified God. But we live in a culture that constantly pulls you back to that type of pace, right. And. And glorifies it, even. And so learning the story of Fred Rogers, someone who was in very high demand all of the time, and how he still lived at such a countercultural pace that people called it like Fred time and said time slowed down when you are with him. Those stories, those quotes that people said about him or the stories they relayed about the impact his presence had on their lives. That is what comes to mind when I feel that pull towards hurry, towards working after my family is in bed, you know, or, you know, pull towards over committing or whatever the case may, pull towards jumping into my workday without a quiet time. Like the principles I learned because you taught them and John Mark Comer taught them to me. But I stick with them because I have this picture in my head of Fred Rogers, the life he lived, the impact he lived because he lived out those principles. That's what motivates me to stay the course.

Yes. This is so good. This is so good. I didn't know you were going to say this. I love this. Do you find, and I will not take offense of this, that you remember the image and example of Fred's pace more than my or John Mark's exposition of how to live said pace?

Absolutely. Now, I've read both of those books at least twice each, and I would have to go back and flip through them to tell you line by line, like actual practices and principles. But I can tell you all sorts of stories where Fred Rogers lived them out. And that's.

And that's exactly right. And like that. That's why I love this genre. That's why I audaciously want to help reinvent the genre of biography. Because I too, I think in stories, we all think in stories, right? There's plenty of science that backs this up. Right. And stories are so much more memorable than just, frankly, sterile exposition. Even the best sterile exposition. By the way, I'm criticizing myself here. Like, I write fairly sterile exposition, but the stories. Yeah, just bring it to life in a new way. All right, I'm going to press you. Is there any. Is there anything else? So you mentioned Fred Rogers as a. You're hurrying less after writing this story. Is there any other way in which your work has changed after writing these stories?

I would say one of the takeaways we had from Oleg Christensen, the founder of Lego, about the value of doing excellent work and the ministry of doing excellent work. Again, something I've heard, read your writing on for years, and I've heard you talk about. But there's a story in the book where his son and I can so relate to this. His son is like, we could get these toy. It was toy ducks. This is back before they got into plastic. So we could get these toy ducks out a lot faster if we did two coats of varnish instead of three. And so he just does it and sends them out and then, like, brags about it, I guess his dad is like, you know, this is going to be.

Look at all this money I'm saving us.

Yeah, saving us all this money time. And Ole Kirk told him, like, you got to go get those ducks back and add the third coat. Like. And I think about those three coats all the time when I'm tempted to be like, good enough, get it out. Good enough. Get it out. Like, slow down. Read it out loud again. Ask someone else to proofread it. You know, just slow down. Do it with excellence. And I think of those. Those three ducks. That's what comes to mind.

No, I love. I think about that story all the time. And I love that he called him back, because he could have been like, hey, on the next batch, make sure you put three coats of our. No, no, no. We're gonna. We're gonna. We're gonna stop the trucks. We're gonna take it back.

I. Wait, I have another one. I want to bring up Hannah more because I wanted to talk about this earlier when we talked about her being audacious, and I just got focused on something else we were saying. But she was really audacious, right? And she went after these, like, big asks from famous people. But Jordan, when you look at the, like, arc of her life, she ended up becoming like family to these people. I mean, she was there when they were on their deathbed. She moved into, like, moved in and became like family to some of them. And so that's another one. I just wanted to Call out here, because we don't in the book. So you get this for free listeners. But you know that she did make these audacious asks of people, but she saw them as people.

Yeah, it's good.

And she pursued relationship with them. And when they stopped being useful to her, she was still committed to their good. I mean, you know, when the. When now, I wasn't prepared to tell the story, so I can't think of his name. But when the. When the actor, the famous actor, David Garrett. David died. Yeah. And it actually was no longer in her interest, really, to align herself with his. With his widow. That was her dear friend and she lived with her. And I don't know, it just. It was you. When you look at her life, this was not what we often see in our culture, which is like, how can I use successful people to get ahead? But it's, you know, God has given this person influence that can make my work more impactful. I hope I can, you know, connect with him about that. But also, this is a human being, and there's someone here that I can love and get to know and serve. And so anyway, that was a total side tangent. Not even a practical takeaway in the book, but something I think about a lot.

It's. That's really good. There were, as, you know, many quote unquote takeaways that we had to cut. I. We could have easily pointed to seven practical takeaways from each of these bios. We chose three. I can't remember exactly why, but we did. That's a really good one. And I, by the way, this guy, David Garrick was basically the Taylor Swift of his time. He's the most famous actor in the world. And Hannah Moore, who comes from a pretty poor family, just, like, goes to London and it's like, oh, this guy's not responding my letters. I'm gonna stalk him. Basically. I mean, not. Not in a creepy way. Kind of in a creepy way. She shows up at his house, like, knocks on the door, nobody's there. So she, like, lets herself in to his back garden at his house, and long story short, he reads her play. She was a playwright at the time and, like, loved it and introduced her to everybody in London. She moves in with him and his wife and become best friends, but yet serves them past the point at which they were helpful to her. I'll point to one more thing. This may be the most significant way that these stories have helped me apply the gospel more deeply to my work. Going back to Fred, Fred's example, I Think about constantly about how he. There's all these stories in Fred's life that are unbelievable, believable, unbelievable of the otherworldly kindness and compassion he shows to others, even at the height of his fame. Right? I'm thinking about the story. Fred is in his apartment in New York, looks across the street, sees a guy get mugged. He drops what he's doing, walks across the street, hands the victim a hundred dollar bill and says, I just want you to know that you are seen, that you are loved. Like, walks away. It's like other time. My kids still talk about the story all the time, where Fred took time out of his busy day of production on the set of Mr. Rogers Neighborhood to visit with a family who were big fans of his. And the kid had never spoken a word in his life. Fred starts just talking and visiting with this kid, and the kid starts talking in complete sentences. And like, the dad, like, can't keep the camera straight because he's, like, losing his mind with tears. But I remember reading, I get. I get really choked up reading these stories because it's so convicting to me. Fred was so much busier than I am, so much busier than I am, so much more in demand than I am. And yet he lived at a pace that allowed him to extend this extraordinary love to others. And I think it is because, and I point this out in the book, he took so much time to be filled up with the love that his heavenly father had for him. I think I may have mentioned this on the podcast before. I can't remember. So in case I haven't, I'll share it here. Fred, every day around lunch, when he was in production, would go to his office and sit there in quiet. And there was a sign hanging on his wall. It's Song of Solomon. I think it's 216. My beloved is mine and I am his. It was a Hebrew rendering of that verse. And I thought, I think about that picture so much as a reminder of how badly I need to experience the love of God if I have any hope of sharing the love of God with those that I encounter, my kids, my listeners of the show, whatever, that I actually had a replica of the sign made. I'm looking at it right now. It hangs above my door. And every 20 minutes or so, per my eye doctor's instructions, I look away from my screen, look 20ft away at that sign, and remind me, remind myself of the love I have in God. So anyways, listener, hopefully we're convincing you that these biographies, any biographies of Christ followers can give you stories that stick in your brain. Like probably stories you've heard in this podcast, right? Of what it looks like practically for the gospel to influence the work that you're doing as a mere Christian. Hey, before we go, Kaylee, I got to touch on this. You alluded to it earlier. Not only did this book change how you and I work, it also changed what you actually do for a living. You are no longer just my co author on 5 mere Christians. As of January 1, 2025, you are also my full time VP of Marketing. And I'd love to hear you riff on this for a minute about what role writing this book played in cultivating your excitement and energy about helping every mere Christian listening apply the gospel more deeply to their work.

Yeah, well, I mean, when you look at the impact of any one of these five people, it's wild what God was able to do through their work. I like to even just look at them as a whole. These are just five people who did not know each other, who didn't live in the same time or in the same place or do the same type of work. And through five different people that were surrendering their careers to God, he redeemed forms of media like television and what were basically magazines. With Hannah More, he ministered to people who were scared or grieving or sick. He made the world more just with Fannie Lou Hamer, he made the world more joyful. With Ole Kirk Christensen, basically, through these people, he made our world a little bit more like heaven effects that we still experience and feel to this day. And so my hope. I'm VP of Marketing, so my job is to help get not just this book, but anything you write, Jordan, out into the world, into more Christians. So my hope is that the work I do plays this small role in helping more Christians baptize their imaginations and understand what kind of potential their lives and their work hold. Because if just five more people caught this vision, I mean, how much, you know, could we bring the kingdom to earth? So that's my hope and my prayer.

It's really good we didn't touch on Lewis. How is this possible?

Yeah, that's a great point. And I have so much I could say about Lewis.

Let's just riff on one thing. What's your biggest takeaway from C.S. lewis, who's the. The fifth in our lineup of five? Is it the joy scene at Magdalene College?

No, but do you want to tell that? Because it's a great scene.

It's a great scene.

And I think that this comes out like a week before the, what is it, 100 and something anniversary of this ceremony.

Oh, really? That's exactly right.

Wow.

Oh my gosh, look at you remembering all the facts and figures of five mere Christians. So, yeah, I would argue that the search for joy was the dominant theme of Lewis's life. Right? And he for many years sought to depart from Christ in all the usual and some unusual places. Alcohol abuse, satom masochism, which we had to cut from the book. That's an interesting chapter in Lewis's life. This alleged.

I haven't said that on the podcast before.

I haven't said that on the podcast. This alleged affair that he had with his dead best friend's mom for most of his 20s and maybe most relatably, his career. I shared this in a devotional, the Word before work that came out Monday, but it bears replaced repeating here. So in 1925, Lewis actually had a really slow start to his career. He had a lot of professional disappointments, but eventually he landed his dream job. He wanted to be this fellow and tutor in English literature at Magdalene College in Oxford. And so he gets the job and they have this like super posh induction ceremony, exactly what you would imagine an induction ceremony would look like in this 500 year old college. And there's this great scene where Lewis kneels before the president of the college and the president of the college looks in the eye and says, I wish you joy. And then Lewis, the story goes, rises. He proceeds around the room. He stops in front of each of his new co workers who echoes the exact same refrain. I wish you joy. I wish you joy. I wish you joy, and I promise you because, oh, I could so relate to this. In that moment, C.S. lewis likely believed that he had found joy in the ultimate. He had achieved his vocational dreams, right? But by God's grace, he came to learn that what I think all of us eventually come to learn as Christ followers, which is that even a dream job will eventually turn into a nightmare if it is done without Christ. Right? It is only by remaining in Christ's love that our joy is made complete. See John 15. And so I think about that story a lot to remind me of the truth that, okay, great, we signed another big book deal. That's amazing. But I glorify God by looking to Christ and not the book deal, not the success of five mere Christians, not the success of this podcast for my ultimate joy. I think that's my biggest takeaway from his life.

It's so good and such a clear Scene of him going around that room and hearing that this word's echoing and what I'm sure was this hallowed hall.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

The scene for me that I love is when we open with where there's, like, a barman getting ready to hand a beer.

By the way, this is true. We didn't make up a single thing in this. That's right. This is a real scene. Yeah, Tell the scene.

Yeah. So it's, you know, World War II. There's this quiet pub. Someone had left the radio on, but it's moved on to, like, programming in another language. No one's really listening to it. It's just background noise. And this guy is sitting at the bar, some kind of army employee. And you sit at the bar. Everyone's kind of dejected. There's been the blitz. It's just not a good time in England. And so he goes to hand him a beer, and CS Lewis's voice comes on the radio and cuts through the. Just the din, the noise, and says something like, you know, you've heard it said. That's not fair. You know, give. And he starts to. To talk about where do we get the concept of fairness. He's kind of laying the. The foundation for an argument for. For God. Right. And it was so compelling that the. The bartender freezes with the beer in his hand. The whole group of soldiers who have been drinking. I mean, this scene is wild. Stop and listen to C.S. lewis, entire address.

It was like 20 minutes.

The beer is still in midair, suffering over the bar. And then when it ends, the guy puts the beer down and. And, you know, the. The night continues on. But it. From then, that was his first address on the radio. From then, the audience grew and grew and grew, week after week after week as word spread about this professor and author. Again, we think of C.S. lewis as, like, this apologist, but he was not. Yeah, he was a professor and a writer. And so just this idea that someone took the audacious opportunity in front of them, the invitation to come and sit down, and he prepared well. He gave a great address. And just that mental image of it interrupting that scene and capturing people's attention, it's just so powerful and such a reminder that we're all equipped and positioned because we are mere Christians, to share the gospel in a way that captures people's attention like that.

And that, I think, is the point. By the way, real quick note on the beer. I find this story extremely hard to believe that the soldier didn't reach across and grab the beer. But, like, we fact check this every which way. Our publisher fact checked this. We have a report of the story. But here's the beauty of it again. Louis today is remembered primarily as a Christian apologist. He was not. He was a mere Christian as an English professor. And I think that's why these soldiers were captivated, because they heard in him someone relatable, somebody who had a past. And while he didn't talk about his affair on the air, he didn't talk about blowing up and screaming at his father, this regret that he took to the grave that we talk about in the book, he didn't talk about these things. You just knew, listening to Lewis on air that this guy's not a religious professional. This guy's a mere Christian. And so I'm gonna lean in and hear what he has to say. And if that doesn't preach to this audience of mere Christians right now, I don't know what will. All right, Kaylee, it would not be an episode of the Mere Christians podcast if we didn't round this out with the same four questions we ask every guest. This first one we did not ask. We were not asking when you were on the show first. And I don't think I've ever asked you, what job do you want to do on the new Earth?

When you first posed this question, where I heard it, it was in the sacredness of secular workbook.

Where do you see yourself in 5 million years?

Yeah, yeah. And I wrote about. It was like, in a workbook. So I wrote about that. I would love to, like, interview people and tell their stories. And then it was maybe three, two months later that I got the email from you and got to write this book. So that's kind of wild. So I'm going to stick with that answer. But say, you know, one thing that you and I have lamented is that we can only feature people who have reached some level of acclaim because we have to have enough records to go off of to write a full, true story, detailed story. And so I want to get to the new Earth and do interviews of people whose names we have completely lost to history, but whose work was seen and valued by God and his kingdom, and tell those stories on the new Earth to the glory of God.

It's really good. I love it. Which books are you recommending and giving away to friends most frequently?

Okay. Also, I used to never give away books until I heard you ask this question every week. And then I thought, should. I mean, I read a lot, but should I be giving away? That's a that's a nice thought. So I made that a New Year's resolution to give away one book a year.

That's funny.

Yeah. And pretty much I've given away a bunch of your books, but to avoid being too Jordan Raynor promotional here, one more one I gave away very recently that wasn't yours was Scatter. So good, Scott, which I also learned about on this podcast. But I have talked about that one a lot, even beyond the one I gave away. I'm not even someone who feels called to move overseas, but reading about his vision for missions has really impacted how my husband and I have talked about even where in the United States we want to live and how we view our work and our purpose in the kingdom. And so highly, highly recommend Scatter.

It's really, it's a great book. Who do you want to hear in this podcast? Now, you have some influence over this, right? But if you had to pick one name, who is it?

Okay. Stacy Hill. I don't think I got her permission to say this, but she is a mentor of mine. She goes to my church. She and her husband, I mean, everyone adores Stacey Hill. She's got a teaching gift. She's full of wisdom and has just walked with Jesus Christ a long time. Very humble. And when she and her husband were younger, had young kids, they were in missions overseas. I can't remember what country, but they were overseas. But God kept like, just absurdly blessing the window washing business they had created back in Colombia that they had left behind. And over time, it became clear to them that God was calling them to come back and run this window washing business, which they still do to this day. And they are leaders in our church. Like I said, a lot of people respect them and look up to them. They've had the ability to mentor a lot of college age guys who come and work for this window washing business, you know, over the breaks and things like that. And so I would just love to hear her come on and talk about that whole story and how she glorifies God through a window washing business.

You've been holding on to me. You've never shared this name with me.

I. Okay, so, Jordan, you asked me this question last time I was on the show, and I thought, I've got to save one. But he's having me back.

All right, reach out to Stacy. I'd love to.

I will, I will.

All right, what's one final thing you want to say or reiterate to our listeners before we sign off?

Okay. In our takeaway chapter for Hannah Moore, who's clearly one of my favorites because we've talked about her a lot. We quote a biographer that said, you know, it's true that we can always use another William Wilberforce, who changed the world through politics, but what we need far more is another Hannah more. And I would add to that another Fred Rogers, another Fannie Lou Hamer, another Ole Kirk Christensen, another CS Lewis. And so I would plead with our listeners to wake up tomorrow morning, seek God in His word. Ask him, God, what would you have me to do with you today for the glory of God and the good of others? Keep that conversation going throughout the day as you face challenges or opportunities or decisions in your day, in your work. Then wake up the next day and do it again. And then the next day and the next day and the next day. Because if every believer who listens to this podcast or who reads this book would just do that, walk with God and surrender their lives and careers to him, as we've seen in the lives of these five mere Christians, it would change the world.

That's so good. So good. Kaylee, I could say this really genuinely more meaningfully because I've been in the trenches working alongside of you seriously now for, oh my gosh, almost two years. I want to commend you. You are an exceptionally talented person. You are a five talent servant and you're not bearing those talents. You are stewarding those talents exceptionally well for the glory of God and the good of others. Thank you for your phenomenal work on this book, for helping me show our listeners what it looks like practically to glorify God in their daily work, and for not just writing the book, but for doing it, for living out these principles personally as you do your work. Guys, Kaylee's exceptional. I hesitate to share her LinkedIn with you. Don't you dare poach her. But you can find Kaylee Cox on LinkedIn and of course you can pick up five mere Christians wherever books are sold. We got a ton of pre order bonuses actually now post order bonuses. Since we're dropping this the day after the book releases, they can pick up before May 9 at 5 mere Christians.com Kaylee, thanks for being here and thanks for making this great book with me.

Jordan, the honor is all mine. Thank you.

My friend Mark Ban, lead pastor at National Community Church, bestselling author, the Circle Maker, and a bunch of other books said this quote, if you're looking for a book that combines the punch of a great sermon with the pace of a great thriller, five mere Christians is it? End quote. And I could not have pulled that off without Kaylie Cox, as I shared in this episode. Hey, if you want to learn how you might leverage a co author to quickly publish your first book, I've created a new online course to walk you through exactly how I did it. So called how to write a book 10x faster and better with an Affordable Co Author. Yes, that's the longest title of a course of all time. But here's the kicker. You can't buy this course. The only way to get it is to get it for free. After you order five mere Christians before 11:59pm on May 9th. Okay, so here's what you do. Go to 5Mechristians.com you can get a link to the book right there from Amazon, Christian Book, Barnes and Noble, Whatever. So order the book, then come back to that link, fill out the form and you'll get free access to the course. Thank you guys so much for listening. I'll see you next week.

Foreign.

Hey friends, this is your last chance to claim all the amazing pre order bonuses for five mere Christians before they go away at 11:59pm Eastern Standard Time on May 9. I've never offered this many pre order bonuses on a book before. So when you fill out the form@5Mechristians.com Number one, you're going to be entered to win an incredible trip for you and a friend to tour CS Lewis's favorite spots in Oxford, explore Olay Kirk Christiansen's former stomping grounds at Lego headquarters in Denmark, and much more. Number two, you'll be invited to join my first ever interactive reading, culminating in a Zoom call with me and my co author on this book, Kaylee Cox. Number three, you're going to be getting a money back guarantee to try the book risk free. And number four, you'll also get access to a free course I'm not selling anywhere called how to write a book 10x faster and better with an Affordable co Author. You can claim all these bonuses in just two simple steps. Step 1 Pre order 5 mere Christians in any format you want. It can be hardback, ebook, audiobook, whatever and you can order it from wherever. Doesn't matter to Me.

Me.

Step 2 Go to 5Mechristians.com and fill out the form of that page and that's it. I'll send you all those bonuses. You'll be entered into the sweepstakes with one simple form submission. But hey, don't wait all of these off. All of these offers, all these bonuses, they're going away at 11:59pm Eastern Standard Time on May 9th. So visit 5Mere Christians.com right now to claim your bonuses.