WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.300 Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Church Digital Podcast. We got another bonus episode for you 00:00:04.300 --> 00:00:08.760 here. By the way, this is Jeff checking in with you. I hope things are good out wherever you are 00:00:08.760 --> 00:00:14.100 in the interwebs. We have a bonus episode with the Church Digital Podcast. We've been doing this 00:00:14.100 --> 00:00:20.560 for a while. We've been doing a podcast takeover where different episodes from our TCD Podcast 00:00:20.560 --> 00:00:25.960 Network, where they get highlighted here on the Church Digital Podcast. And so the hope is that 00:00:25.960 --> 00:00:30.620 you find some new podcasts that you might be interested in listening to and subscribing to. 00:00:30.820 --> 00:00:36.740 And so this week, we are highlighting an incredible show called Better on the Insight. John Powell 00:00:36.740 --> 00:00:45.980 is a digital pastor, but he's also soul care and pastoral care. And he really leads digitally 00:00:45.980 --> 00:00:53.100 with that pastoral heart. And so there's often fascinating conversations with Better on the 00:00:53.100 --> 00:00:59.560 Insight as he explores that scope and that space. And by the way, this conversation that we're 00:00:59.560 --> 00:01:06.940 highlighting today is maybe the best podcast that I've heard in a year. It's an incredible episode, 00:01:07.080 --> 00:01:13.740 an incredible interview with Dr. Josh Packard. You know, it's interesting. I'm pretty sure Dr. Josh 00:01:13.740 --> 00:01:21.680 Packard was quoted in my most recent book, Sharing Jesus Online, because Dr. John Harris loves some of 00:01:21.680 --> 00:01:26.240 the work that Josh Packard has done. And so I'm dropping a lot of doctor names and a lot of John 00:01:26.240 --> 00:01:31.400 names. Hopefully you guys are keeping it straight. But this episode with Dr. Josh Packard and John 00:01:31.400 --> 00:01:39.880 Pyle is incredible. Talking about Gen Z, talking about millennial, talking about the use of technology, 00:01:40.060 --> 00:01:45.340 engaging in social media, how we can use these tools to reach literally the next generations. 00:01:45.980 --> 00:01:50.540 Powerful stuff that you're going to want to get connected to and listen to. So here's what we're 00:01:50.540 --> 00:01:56.360 going to do. I'm going to include Better on the Inside, the link to their webpage to subscribe. 00:01:56.820 --> 00:02:00.980 If you like what you're hearing, go subscribe to their podcast. If you want more information on the 00:02:00.980 --> 00:02:05.640 TCD Podcast Network, go click on that link as well in the show notes or it's at the church.digital 00:02:05.640 --> 00:02:13.660 slash podcast. But at the end of the day, I want you to listen to this interview and maybe some of the 00:02:13.660 --> 00:02:21.360 best content that I've heard in a podcast in months. I'm hesitant to say a year, but I'm pretty close to 00:02:21.360 --> 00:02:25.720 saying that. Well, yeah, this is an incredible, incredible show. John, you did a great job with 00:02:25.720 --> 00:02:30.540 this. So, hey, I'm going to get out of the way. I'm going to hand it over to John and to Dr. Josh 00:02:30.540 --> 00:02:36.280 Packard for this incredible interview that was from Better on the Inside. Okay, everybody, here you go. 00:02:36.920 --> 00:02:43.340 What's up, y'all? Welcome to Better on the Inside, a podcast about how we can make the church and you 00:02:43.340 --> 00:02:49.740 better on the inside, because that's really what it should be. Now, our first season focused on how to 00:02:49.740 --> 00:02:54.260 work for a church without losing your soul, right? How to volunteer for a church, how to go to a church 00:02:54.260 --> 00:03:02.100 and how to really be a part of a church without losing that soul piece. And that was really great. 00:03:02.100 --> 00:03:06.620 But this season is going to be a little bit different. We're going to be focused on digital, 00:03:06.960 --> 00:03:12.200 all things digital. We're going to talk to a bunch of really awesome people still about the church 00:03:12.200 --> 00:03:18.420 in the digital age and how these resources can foster soul care and help you on your spiritual 00:03:18.420 --> 00:03:25.200 journey. Because if we're going to keep it 100, let's keep it 100, our digital experiences can often 00:03:25.200 --> 00:03:31.920 feel like poison to our souls. Being online sometimes feels detrimental to our attempts to follow Jesus. 00:03:31.920 --> 00:03:38.160 And that significant tension between spiritual health and digital interaction is what we're here 00:03:38.160 --> 00:03:43.920 to explore this season. So I'm really excited about jumping into it. My first guest this season, 00:03:43.920 --> 00:03:49.520 and I'm so excited about talking to this guy, is Dr. Josh Packard. Now, Dr. Josh Packard runs the 00:03:49.520 --> 00:03:54.340 Springtide Research Institute, and they are passionate about learning more about young people 00:03:54.340 --> 00:04:00.100 and how they're creating meaning and identity and community and all of those things. 13 to 25, 00:04:00.100 --> 00:04:07.380 they have some of the most data points, qualitative and quantitative data points for young people. 00:04:07.380 --> 00:04:11.940 And so it is absolutely critical that we understand how young people are engaging, 00:04:11.940 --> 00:04:17.380 not just life, but also engaging digitally. You can find them at SpringtideResearch.org. We talk a little 00:04:17.380 --> 00:04:24.260 bit about more in the episode, but you're not going to want to miss this chat with Dr. Josh Packard. 00:04:25.140 --> 00:04:30.660 Hey, all right. Better on the inside, friends. This is Jeff Reed from the Church Digital and Digital 00:04:30.660 --> 00:04:36.020 Church Network. And I've got an incredible opportunity to help churches like yours connect 00:04:36.020 --> 00:04:40.580 with spiritual explorers digitally. Maybe you've heard of this thing, He Gets Us. Maybe you've seen 00:04:40.580 --> 00:04:46.340 their ads on the NFL games or on social media or even on billboards around town. You see, 00:04:46.340 --> 00:04:52.660 He Gets Us is a US-based ad campaign that connects people seeking spiritual answers with pastors and 00:04:52.660 --> 00:04:59.300 volunteers who have answers to these questions with the end game, with the goal of connecting people 00:04:59.300 --> 00:05:05.140 to your physical or maybe even your digital expression of church. You see, this is a great opportunity, 00:05:05.140 --> 00:05:11.300 and this will only expand in the coming months as He Gets Us is actually running several Super Bowl ads. 00:05:11.300 --> 00:05:18.420 That's right. Two different Super Bowl ads are coming up in February 2023. Imagine the potential 00:05:18.420 --> 00:05:26.260 reach and your church can be a part of it completely for free. That's right. You will get 12 months of 00:05:26.260 --> 00:05:32.740 He Gets Us, 12 months of spiritual explorers, 12 months of the platform and the technology entirely for 00:05:32.740 --> 00:05:39.300 free. For more information on this, do me a favor. Visit thechurch.digital/hegetsus, 00:05:39.300 --> 00:05:46.660 thechurch.digital/hegetsus. You can get more information there. Or if you've got questions, 00:05:46.660 --> 00:05:55.540 go ahead and text me, 484-324-8724. I literally just gave you my cell phone number. It's #4thechurch as 00:05:55.540 --> 00:05:59.620 well. All right. Let's get you back here to the podcast. Hey, John, how you doing, man? All right. 00:05:59.620 --> 00:06:06.980 Have a good day, y'all. What's up, y'all? Welcome to Better on the Inside. I am here with Dr. Josh Packard. 00:06:06.980 --> 00:06:10.420 What's up, Josh? Hey, thanks so much for having me. This is really great. 00:06:10.420 --> 00:06:16.420 Yeah. Josh, this is our first time officially meeting, but I do feel like I know you a little 00:06:16.420 --> 00:06:21.780 bit because I've really been into the Springtide research. And Josh is the executive director of the 00:06:21.780 --> 00:06:27.380 Springtide Research Institute, right? That's right. Yeah. And I dug into your documents and 00:06:27.380 --> 00:06:30.900 what you were doing. You were doing some great research about young folks in the church and 00:06:30.900 --> 00:06:35.060 everything else. And so that's a big part of what I wanted to talk to you about today. So I'm excited 00:06:35.060 --> 00:06:40.660 to talk about that. Yeah, you bet. I think we have the largest data set of young people's religious and 00:06:40.660 --> 00:06:46.180 spiritual lives in the country now. We've been around for a few years now and have 30,000 surveys, 00:06:46.180 --> 00:06:51.780 closing in on 500 interviews here. It's been a real pleasure to get to hear from that many young 00:06:51.780 --> 00:06:56.740 people and to get to explore what they think of when they think of religion and spirituality and how it 00:06:56.740 --> 00:07:02.580 intersects with their lives. That is incredible. I love that you have that data set and it's so important. 00:07:02.580 --> 00:07:07.940 It's so important. So before we jump too quickly into that, how did you 00:07:08.900 --> 00:07:13.220 become the executive director of a research institute? Like, what is that career path? 00:07:13.220 --> 00:07:15.780 What does that look like? How did you get into the work that you were doing? 00:07:17.220 --> 00:07:24.180 Great question. So I was a professor, a professor of sociology, studying really new forms of 00:07:24.180 --> 00:07:29.940 Christianity and American religion, mostly interested in innovation, really, and about 00:07:29.940 --> 00:07:36.180 organizational structure and that kind of stuff. But maybe the thing that makes me a little bit weird 00:07:36.180 --> 00:07:40.820 in the academic world is that I was an applied sociologist. So as much as I really respect 00:07:40.820 --> 00:07:46.500 this, the big theoretical work that was going on with a lot of my colleagues, and we use a lot of 00:07:46.500 --> 00:07:50.100 that stuff. I mean, I love it. It's just, it was never really where I found my home. I always, 00:07:50.660 --> 00:07:55.220 first gen college student, definitely first gen PhD, you know, all the conversations in my home 00:07:55.220 --> 00:07:58.980 were very pragmatic. Like, what are we going to do with this? What's the point of learning that? 00:07:58.980 --> 00:08:04.660 How could anybody use it? And I just sort of carried that with me. And, and so even as a professor, 00:08:04.660 --> 00:08:08.100 I was trying to do that, and was doing some consulting work. And when the opportunity came 00:08:08.100 --> 00:08:13.380 around to help, you know, ideate what would ultimately become Springtide, I jumped at that, 00:08:13.380 --> 00:08:19.780 and never really expected that it would lead to a job offer to be the inaugural executive director. 00:08:19.780 --> 00:08:23.140 But when it came, it was really something I just couldn't turn down. It just felt like, 00:08:23.140 --> 00:08:27.460 I mean, here's a chance to get to do all that stuff that I've been trying to do by myself. 00:08:27.460 --> 00:08:30.580 And here's, but now we get a team of people who are a lot smarter than me. 00:08:32.260 --> 00:08:35.380 Um, and a chance to, you know, really, it was, it was a missional thing. You know, 00:08:35.380 --> 00:08:38.740 it's like, it's, here's a chance to make a real impact in the world because we just felt like 00:08:39.460 --> 00:08:44.260 a lot of what was, what passes for the story about religion and young people is just not, 00:08:44.820 --> 00:08:50.420 it's not the full story. This decline narrative that dominates, um, is not untrue, 00:08:50.420 --> 00:08:55.140 but it's, it's not as encompassing as people like to think it is. There's a lot more going on. And so, 00:08:55.780 --> 00:08:59.540 yeah, when that's, that's sort of how it all evolved. And I left the university a couple of 00:08:59.540 --> 00:09:04.260 years ago and do this full time. Oh, I love that. I, first of all, 00:09:04.260 --> 00:09:08.820 I love that it came from the passion. I also love the like application piece, 00:09:08.820 --> 00:09:13.380 because one of the things I struggled with in seminary was there's a lot of big ideas. 00:09:13.380 --> 00:09:17.060 Yeah. There's a lot of philosophy. There's a lot of this, but I, in my head, 00:09:17.060 --> 00:09:22.020 I just can't get rid of the, and I don't know if it's like just a generational thing, 00:09:22.020 --> 00:09:25.140 like, uh, the way you were raised, but it's like, what does this matter to real people? 00:09:25.860 --> 00:09:30.260 If it doesn't matter to real people, and if I can't figure out how it matters to real people, 00:09:30.260 --> 00:09:35.220 then why are we talking about it? What's the point? What's the point of it? And so I love 00:09:35.220 --> 00:09:39.540 that it was like this missional thing. And let's talk about that narrative because the narrative, 00:09:39.540 --> 00:09:45.700 since I've been working for churches, I started working at my church in 2011. And so more than 10 00:09:45.700 --> 00:09:50.500 years now, the narrative has been decline, decline, decline, decline, right? This generation is less 00:09:50.500 --> 00:09:56.740 about Jesus than the last generation and then the next generation. And then we hit, I love, you said 00:09:56.740 --> 00:10:04.420 innovation and sociology and Christianity, religion. I'm like, oh yeah, let's go. But the pandemic kind of 00:10:04.420 --> 00:10:12.020 seemed to, uh, speed up some of the transition piece, but let's talk, talk about the narrative of 00:10:12.020 --> 00:10:19.300 why it's not entirely accurate. Even if it is true, it doesn't seem to paint the full picture. And so 00:10:19.300 --> 00:10:26.260 what is the picture of people's religious affiliation and belief? Yeah. So this is a really important 00:10:26.260 --> 00:10:31.140 thing to understand is that, I mean, I think, you know, for about the last 50 years or so, we primarily 00:10:31.140 --> 00:10:36.580 focused on, and I say we collectively and like academics, you know, um, pastors, rabbis, like, 00:10:36.580 --> 00:10:42.980 you know, campus ministers on and on. Like, I think everybody really focused on just a couple of key 00:10:42.980 --> 00:10:47.460 measures primarily around affiliation. So, you know, when you check the box on a survey, do you check 00:10:47.460 --> 00:10:51.060 a box that says, you know, Christian Catholic, Christian Protestant, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, 00:10:51.060 --> 00:10:57.860 et cetera, or do you check the none box at the bottom? Right. And then, and then the other 00:10:57.860 --> 00:11:03.540 metric that we primarily have looked at and used is attendance. You know, how often you actually 00:11:03.540 --> 00:11:08.420 participate in a religious community or service or something like that. And the weird thing about 00:11:08.420 --> 00:11:14.180 these is that we got so, um, I think used to using those numbers that we sort of forgot that we don't 00:11:14.180 --> 00:11:19.700 really care about those numbers. Right. What we actually care about is like soul transformation or 00:11:19.700 --> 00:11:25.380 commitment to a higher power or, you know, um, some sort of durable sense of faith or, 00:11:25.940 --> 00:11:29.380 you know, what, depending on, you know, but when you're after something that's sort of ineffable, 00:11:29.380 --> 00:11:34.420 something that can't really be measured. And so we used those things as proxies to indicate the 00:11:34.420 --> 00:11:38.420 thing that we actually cared about. Yes. That's a great point though, because theoretically, 00:11:38.420 --> 00:11:43.540 we don't actually care about those things. I mean, yeah, that's like, and that's important, but, 00:11:43.540 --> 00:11:48.020 but the, the, you know, cause you always have to do the transitive thing of the numbers on the 00:11:48.020 --> 00:11:52.260 spreadsheet for attendance. Don't just represent numbers because they're not vanity metrics. 00:11:52.260 --> 00:11:56.020 They're actually souls and people. Right. And so that's okay. So I won't interrupt you. Sorry. 00:11:56.020 --> 00:12:02.900 That's exactly right. Um, and it's not saying those things don't matter at all. It's just that 00:12:02.900 --> 00:12:08.180 there's a bigger goal in mind and those are helping us to indicate that. And for about 40 or 50 years, 00:12:08.180 --> 00:12:11.620 you know, those are really good proxies. Um, 00:12:13.460 --> 00:12:18.340 what's happened though, I think in the last 20 or 25 years is that we're starting to see lots of, 00:12:18.340 --> 00:12:23.300 when we start looking in other places for religious, you know, flourishing and activity 00:12:23.300 --> 00:12:28.900 and spirituality and expression, we start seeing lots of other things percolating, 00:12:28.900 --> 00:12:33.620 even as these sort of traditional numbers are declining, but without, without knowledge of those 00:12:33.620 --> 00:12:36.900 other numbers, we, we can draw a straight line to say like, well, look, attendance is down. 00:12:36.900 --> 00:12:41.460 Affiliation is down. And therefore young people don't care about God. They're not 00:12:41.460 --> 00:12:45.860 interested in conversations about the divine or the transcendent. Um, you know, they just, 00:12:45.860 --> 00:12:49.460 this is just a, uh, you know, what some people have told me is a lost generation. 00:12:49.460 --> 00:12:56.420 I'm like, well, look, there's this researcher, Nancy Ammerman out of Boston, uh, university. She wrote 00:12:57.140 --> 00:13:00.980 about 10 years ago. She said, you know, so I'll paraphrase. She said, you know, if, if we keep 00:13:00.980 --> 00:13:07.220 looking in the predictable places in, uh, for, you know, in the, for religious activity, and we don't 00:13:07.220 --> 00:13:12.180 find as much of it as we used to, we can't assume that it's disappearing if the world around us is 00:13:12.180 --> 00:13:17.940 changing. And I thought like, that is such a good point. Like the world is crazy. Right. 00:13:17.940 --> 00:13:23.220 And so those measures don't indicate as much of the story as they used to. So yes, those numbers 00:13:23.220 --> 00:13:27.780 are on decline, but like we see like three fourths of young people tell us that they're religious or 00:13:27.780 --> 00:13:32.100 spiritual, something like half of young people tell us that they pray daily or more often about 00:13:32.100 --> 00:13:36.500 half of young people tell us that they are in nature as a religious or spiritual experience every 00:13:36.500 --> 00:13:40.660 week or more often. And so we see all these kinds of like, and on and on, and we could, 00:13:40.660 --> 00:13:46.900 you know, we can talk about more of them if you want. Um, we see all these signs, not to say that, 00:13:46.900 --> 00:13:50.660 like the decline narrative is a myth and young people are flourishing and they're actually going to be 00:13:50.660 --> 00:13:55.220 fine. They believe more in God than ever before. That's not true. But there are these things that 00:13:55.220 --> 00:13:59.220 are coming alongside that mostly just don't get much attention. And when they don't get much attention, 00:13:59.220 --> 00:14:05.300 you know, the old adage of like, you know, what, what we measure is, um, uh, is, is what we end up 00:14:05.300 --> 00:14:09.540 focusing on in terms of activities. And so when we don't measure those things, what gets measured 00:14:09.540 --> 00:14:14.020 matters, I guess is the phrase. Um, then we don't, we don't put any effort into those other places 00:14:14.020 --> 00:14:17.460 because we're not measuring them. So springtide wanted to come along and say like, okay, look here, 00:14:17.460 --> 00:14:21.460 there are some other things happening and we can put efforts in those things because the reality is 00:14:21.460 --> 00:14:25.780 for a variety of reasons, you know, we're not going to flip a switch and have young people show up, 00:14:26.420 --> 00:14:30.100 you know, back in pews on Sunday mornings or Friday nights or what have you. 00:14:30.100 --> 00:14:38.260 Yeah. Yeah. Well, because, oh my gosh, that's a whole word though, is the idea that if affiliation 00:14:38.260 --> 00:14:45.300 is what we're after, then the narrative is 100% correct and 100% true. But if you're trying to 00:14:45.300 --> 00:14:50.740 measure the flourishing, the spiritual lives of young people, you have to look in a different 00:14:50.740 --> 00:14:59.780 place than affiliation. And what I, I would say though, as somebody who's kind of inside the church 00:14:59.780 --> 00:15:05.620 machine, right. For the lack of better, you know, lack of a better term is that that is an indictment 00:15:05.620 --> 00:15:14.340 on affiliation wasn't producing the, the flourishing that I think young people were looking for. And so 00:15:15.140 --> 00:15:18.500 I do think the world has changed and I don't think we should throw that out. I don't like, 00:15:19.060 --> 00:15:23.220 we absolutely have to be working with the reality that the world is different, right? 00:15:23.860 --> 00:15:27.780 There's been a whole digital transition, like even before the pandemic, all this stuff. So 00:15:28.740 --> 00:15:36.020 100% with that, I do think as folks who have said, these are the numbers that we're going to measure 00:15:36.020 --> 00:15:43.540 ourselves by. I do think there's some accountability when the disconnect happens because affiliation for 00:15:43.540 --> 00:15:50.260 a while, uh, was a reliable connection to flourishing. Absolutely. I think about it, you know, 00:15:50.260 --> 00:15:54.340 similar to like, uh, you know, when we used to have movie rental places like Blockbuster, you know, 00:15:54.340 --> 00:15:59.540 if you wanted to take the temperature of Americans interest in movies, you could look at, you know, 00:15:59.540 --> 00:16:05.380 how many movies got rented from Blockbuster in a given year, how many DVDs were sold, right. And then 00:16:05.380 --> 00:16:09.380 the world changed. And now if you kept looking at that metric, you would come to the conclusion that 00:16:09.380 --> 00:16:13.620 like Americans don't care about movies anymore. Yeah. You weren't looking at streaming numbers and 00:16:13.620 --> 00:16:17.540 download numbers, right. You're just looking at, but of course, like the reality is that they just, 00:16:17.540 --> 00:16:21.620 they're consuming more media than ever before. It's just that we're doing it in a different way. 00:16:21.620 --> 00:16:26.260 Um, and I think that's a, you know, it's a similar analog to what I think that this really is. It's 00:16:26.260 --> 00:16:31.780 not, again, it's not that they're bad metric. It's not that the, the previous 50 years were flawed. 00:16:31.780 --> 00:16:37.060 It's just that like that measure doesn't tell us what it used to. Yeah, that's wonderful. It's a lot 00:16:37.060 --> 00:16:43.620 like TV ratings. Um, and this is a perfect, a perfect analogy and analog to this, because 00:16:43.620 --> 00:16:50.100 if we keep looking at ratings and expecting friends ratings, we're going to be sorely disappointed 00:16:50.100 --> 00:16:54.100 because people don't watch TV like that. This isn't going to be the finale of mash. 00:16:54.100 --> 00:16:59.620 Right. I mean, like this podcast, well, John, this episode, this is, this is going to be the record 00:16:59.620 --> 00:17:04.980 breaker. Yeah. This is going to be the record breaker. Uh, but, but people are doing it differently. 00:17:04.980 --> 00:17:09.300 And so you have to understand how much time people spend on YouTube or tick tock or others. And, 00:17:09.300 --> 00:17:15.140 and the media companies, these multi-billion dollar corporations are pouring money 00:17:15.140 --> 00:17:21.540 into figuring out what streaming data tells us, what does Facebook data tells us, what does YouTube 00:17:21.540 --> 00:17:25.860 time and tick tock time and, and getting the eyes on what they're doing. And so that's why it's a good 00:17:25.860 --> 00:17:33.460 analog. And so I'm so glad that you're encouraging the church to look at, to look more broadly at the 00:17:33.460 --> 00:17:40.820 spiritual lives and flourishing of young people so that we can meet people there and be there, not 00:17:40.820 --> 00:17:48.740 in a like tricky, like Jesus juke. Hey, we're on, you know, we're on Twitch and here's, here's, 00:17:48.740 --> 00:17:53.060 here's the pizza. But now I'm going to talk to you about Jesus, but more in a way of just like caring. 00:17:53.060 --> 00:17:58.340 And so something that the pandemic made really clear for me, Josh, is that people seem to be 00:17:58.340 --> 00:18:04.900 looking at the, the phrase that I use repetitively and will always is always, at least for a while, 00:18:04.900 --> 00:18:08.740 is that people are defining their church by where they get their care, not their content. 00:18:10.100 --> 00:18:16.740 And, um, one, is that accurate for young people? And two, is that consistent with what you guys have 00:18:16.740 --> 00:18:22.900 seen? Yeah, I think it's a hundred percent right. I mean, one of the, you know, we have this model of, 00:18:23.380 --> 00:18:28.340 church for young people that is, it's sort of like largely their faith formation experiences are 00:18:28.340 --> 00:18:32.900 largely built around knowledge transfer, right? I mean, that was my confirmation experience was like, 00:18:32.900 --> 00:18:37.460 let's get knowledge from the smart pastor in the room to the dumb kids who don't know anything about 00:18:37.460 --> 00:18:42.020 God. Um, and that was true back then, like, where else was I going to get that, you know? 00:18:43.620 --> 00:18:48.020 And you know, that's, we still are working with those models and higher ed is coming to the grips 00:18:48.020 --> 00:18:53.620 with the same thing, although very slowly, uh, with the, with the reality that knowledge is not 00:18:53.620 --> 00:18:57.700 the thing that's in short supply anymore. It's, you know, it's knowledge is actually ubiquitous. 00:18:57.700 --> 00:19:02.340 You can get more information. You can get better sermons. You know, you can, you can get better 00:19:02.340 --> 00:19:06.500 information about the Bible online than you can from your local church in most cases. 00:19:07.780 --> 00:19:11.940 But the thing that is, what is in short supply when knowledge is abundant? Well, the thing that's in 00:19:11.940 --> 00:19:17.220 short supply are actual encounters and experiences with how that knowledge lives in the daily world. 00:19:17.220 --> 00:19:21.540 It's the care, it's the relationships, you know, how does this mean for me? Somebody help me discern 00:19:21.540 --> 00:19:27.540 that. Those are the things that, you know, are, are where young people say that they find their 00:19:27.540 --> 00:19:32.740 most spiritual and sacred moments, but that we just don't, I mean, you know, the Lutheran church 00:19:32.740 --> 00:19:36.580 that I grew up in, I don't think has transformed their confirmation classes to be primarily centered 00:19:36.580 --> 00:19:41.220 around asking questions and exploring, you know, possible answers with young people. Like that's, 00:19:41.220 --> 00:19:46.260 it's not, you know, they're not bad people. They care a lot. We're not dealing with a deficit of care. 00:19:46.260 --> 00:19:50.420 It's just a deficit of sort of understanding how the world has changed. 00:19:50.420 --> 00:19:56.580 Yeah. Okay. Okay. I know that you're not, you know, because you're academic, right? In nature, 00:19:56.580 --> 00:20:03.860 you're not an expert in this area, but how does the church pivot to what young people are saying? 00:20:03.860 --> 00:20:08.500 And so maybe the first question is what are young people saying, right? Of like, what is helping them 00:20:08.500 --> 00:20:14.740 flourish in this season? And then maybe the second question is how do churches address that? And so you, 00:20:14.740 --> 00:20:19.220 you just created a good one in moving from confirmation classes in the traditional sense of knowledge 00:20:19.220 --> 00:20:26.580 transfer to, Hey, ask me anything AMA, like what? And so what are, what are you seeing with young 00:20:26.580 --> 00:20:31.860 people and all, all of that? Well, we actually do have some pretty good data for this. I mean, 00:20:31.860 --> 00:20:38.900 it's, it's, you know, young people are really looking for relationships, um, with trusted adults 00:20:38.900 --> 00:20:42.820 and relationships of a particular kind. We wrote about this in the state of religion, young people, 00:20:42.820 --> 00:20:47.860 2020, which I think you can find online for free at, um, Amazon or Apple books. Uh, 00:20:47.860 --> 00:20:52.020 uh, and we call it relational authority. And it's really this element that combines like, 00:20:52.020 --> 00:20:58.100 yes, being somebody who's very relational, you know, somebody who listens, somebody who is transparent 00:20:58.100 --> 00:21:03.780 and, and et cetera, et cetera. Um, but also being the expert. And what we found from young people is 00:21:03.780 --> 00:21:07.620 that if you just show up as the expert in their lives and tell them what to do based on all of your 00:21:07.620 --> 00:21:12.100 credentials or, you know, your knowledge or whatever, but you don't do any of that care work, 00:21:12.100 --> 00:21:18.100 then they won't listen to you. Um, because they think that you then they perceive experts alone 00:21:18.100 --> 00:21:23.780 as representing the institutions that they already don't trust. And if you just do the other one, 00:21:23.780 --> 00:21:27.460 like if you do all of this care work, but never bring any expertise, they feel like this is a waste 00:21:27.460 --> 00:21:32.180 of time. Like you're just a fun uncle. Like, you know, I don't need one more person to, you know, 00:21:32.180 --> 00:21:37.220 um, have a Nerf gun battle with, or, you know, whatever I used to do with Torchlockens. Um, 00:21:38.100 --> 00:21:43.300 and so it's, you know, combining those two elements and, and then what we've learned in 00:21:43.300 --> 00:21:47.060 the ensuing years is around some particular things. And you mentioned already, like the ability to ask 00:21:47.060 --> 00:21:52.180 questions and it's not just the ability to ask an expert a question. I mean, if we're doing question 00:21:52.180 --> 00:21:56.820 asking in this relational authority framework, let's think about what that means. It's, it's not so much 00:21:56.820 --> 00:22:01.700 that I get to ask you a question and you give me an answer. It's, can you leverage your expertise 00:22:01.700 --> 00:22:08.340 to help me ask the right questions for my life? And that's a, like, that's a much because young 00:22:08.340 --> 00:22:13.540 people are, you know, I would, you know, they don't ask like, this is not because they're bad 00:22:13.540 --> 00:22:16.980 people. It's just the nature of growing up. Like they don't always ask the right question. 00:22:16.980 --> 00:22:22.180 Yeah. Um, and then when they, so therefore, when they ask a question either to themselves or to 00:22:22.180 --> 00:22:26.020 others and they go looking for an answer, it sends them down a hole, like a rabbit hole to get 00:22:26.020 --> 00:22:30.580 the answer that is not always, you know, a full and good, accurate representation of what they 00:22:30.580 --> 00:22:35.300 should be. So as adults and religious leaders, I think we can come along in that relational authority 00:22:35.300 --> 00:22:42.020 model, help them to ask better and you know, the right questions and then, and then help them to 00:22:42.020 --> 00:22:49.780 explore the potential answers together. Yeah. That's like a mind blower because I just, I have a, 00:22:49.780 --> 00:22:55.220 I have a seven year old and an 11 year old and asking questions to Google or Alexa, 00:22:55.220 --> 00:23:01.140 or even type it in your search engine. Siri, it's a very common thing to do, but they often ask the 00:23:01.140 --> 00:23:08.500 wrong question for, for what they're looking for. And so the, and so I guess you can say that knowledge 00:23:08.500 --> 00:23:12.340 is asking the question. Wisdom is asking the right question. 00:23:13.780 --> 00:23:17.940 I mean, we asked young people a lot. And so just in this, just in 2022, we asked, you know, we were 00:23:17.940 --> 00:23:20.900 asking a lot of questions about purpose and we said, you know, what are the things that helped 00:23:20.900 --> 00:23:25.140 you discover purpose in your life? And at the bottom of the list were all the religious things, 00:23:25.140 --> 00:23:29.220 knowledge about God, you know, participating in a faith community. And a lot of that is just, 00:23:29.220 --> 00:23:34.100 you know, representing the fact that most young people are not engaged in a religious community. 00:23:34.100 --> 00:23:38.980 And so it's about opportunity rather than, you know, rather than inadequacy. But at the top of 00:23:38.980 --> 00:23:43.860 the list were the number one thing was being able to ask questions and explore answers. 00:23:44.660 --> 00:23:48.980 That's the number one thing that is helping young people to find their purpose in life. And so then 00:23:48.980 --> 00:23:54.660 when you say like, well, does the church help you to do that? And like, no, you start to understand, 00:23:54.660 --> 00:24:00.980 like, but the heartbreaking thing about that is that there's nobody better to help do that purpose 00:24:00.980 --> 00:24:06.180 finding work than religious leaders. Right. And so it's not like, I don't think that there's a massive 00:24:06.180 --> 00:24:09.860 shift that needs to happen in terms of ideology or belief or anything like that. I mean, this is 00:24:09.860 --> 00:24:17.300 really a lot about modality. Like, do you care so much about being seen as the sage on the stage that 00:24:17.300 --> 00:24:21.700 you're going to hold on to this, knowing that it doesn't work for young people? Or are you willing 00:24:21.700 --> 00:24:29.060 to compromise the modality to meet young people in those questions, but not, but not compromise your 00:24:29.060 --> 00:24:34.180 beliefs that you can use a Catholic term, accompany them in that, you know, in that journey. And to me, 00:24:34.180 --> 00:24:38.420 that's a really easy, it's a, you know, it's, it's not an easy shift. I understand organizational, 00:24:38.420 --> 00:24:42.420 you know, dynamics and, you know, stagnation and those kinds of things and how hard it is to make 00:24:42.420 --> 00:24:47.380 those shifts. But it's not like, you know, we're not asking for a revolution here. 00:24:49.060 --> 00:24:55.140 Because you're not, and I think when so many people hear terms like deconstruction or changing 00:24:55.140 --> 00:24:59.940 modality of church or any of these things, it gets a little scary because it starts to tap into what 00:24:59.940 --> 00:25:05.140 we know. But a big part of what you're saying is we're not overturning belief systems or changing 00:25:05.140 --> 00:25:10.580 theology. We're not changing the theology. We're not even changing the orthodoxy. That's not even what 00:25:10.580 --> 00:25:15.540 you're talking about. You're talking about the orthopraxy, I think is the term, right? Of how you 00:25:15.540 --> 00:25:24.260 practice the orthodox in everyday life. And that is so critical. And so, you know, the, I love the 00:25:24.260 --> 00:25:31.460 relational authority terminology of, you can't just be the fun uncle that's just like, Hey, come here. 00:25:31.460 --> 00:25:36.580 Because you know what, you know, what's better for that? Reddit. Like Reddit is better at being the 00:25:36.580 --> 00:25:41.780 fun uncle than you are. Because guess what? They'll get to blow stuff up and like, do whatever, like, 00:25:41.780 --> 00:25:46.500 whatever. And then you also can't just be the sage on the stage, which is an amazing turn of phrase. 00:25:48.020 --> 00:25:56.100 There's something where having the wisdom to be able to sit in relationship and help them ask. And 00:25:56.100 --> 00:26:01.940 so I think of my interactions with young people and a lot of times they are asking what they're 00:26:01.940 --> 00:26:08.820 trying to get to with purpose isn't a question that is answered through, Hey, here's the Bible verse. 00:26:08.820 --> 00:26:14.500 Here's how you find purpose. Here's what you might get there. Right. But that's not where we're 00:26:14.500 --> 00:26:21.380 starting. We're starting with the relational piece of let's walk through this together and help you 00:26:21.380 --> 00:26:28.740 develop the right questions. I love that so much. Yeah. One of the, um, one of my inspirations for, 00:26:28.740 --> 00:26:33.220 for a person, I just think that really does this kind of ministry really well as our local, 00:26:33.220 --> 00:26:36.180 the head of our local youth for Christ chapters, his name is Jeff Neal. And he said, 00:26:36.740 --> 00:26:41.860 you know, we want to shout love so we can whisper the gospel. And it just strikes me as like, 00:26:41.860 --> 00:26:46.420 you're not downplaying, you know, your beliefs there. You're, you're just getting to it in a 00:26:46.420 --> 00:26:51.220 different way that meets this generation who is really skeptical of institutional leaders. And if 00:26:51.220 --> 00:26:54.980 you, if you come charging right out of the gate with like, look how big our church is and look at 00:26:54.980 --> 00:26:59.540 all the credentials I have. And, you know, here's the authoritative voice on this issue in this 00:26:59.540 --> 00:27:03.700 chapter and verse of the newer old Testament, then like that, those are just, 00:27:04.260 --> 00:27:08.180 those are not ways to start relationships at all. 00:27:08.180 --> 00:27:13.860 Well, so how can the church be more curious? Because curiosity is kind of the term of, 00:27:13.860 --> 00:27:19.220 some of it is that there aren't answers. There aren't concrete answers of do this, 00:27:19.220 --> 00:27:24.660 this, this, you know, one, two, three, four, like the, the conference circuit for churches is huge, 00:27:24.660 --> 00:27:30.500 right? Of like, you go to a conference, you get the whatever, and then you execute items one through 00:27:30.500 --> 00:27:38.500 10, and then you're growing. And so it seems like there's a shift in just, just posture to a posture 00:27:38.500 --> 00:27:43.940 of curiosity. And so what are some of the ways you would encourage churches to do that wherever they 00:27:43.940 --> 00:27:45.380 are? Because you might have five people, you might have 5,000. 00:27:45.380 --> 00:27:48.020 Maybe this is why I haven't been invited to those, those big conference stages. 00:27:51.220 --> 00:27:55.940 That might be it. Because we don't have the three step process, because I think you're right. It is, 00:27:55.940 --> 00:28:00.260 it's a shift in posture. How do you be differently? Not, not how do you, you know, 00:28:00.260 --> 00:28:03.780 it's not about how you are differently. It's just, how do you be with young people differently? And I 00:28:03.780 --> 00:28:09.540 love that you use that term curiosity. In fact, right over my left here is a Ted Lasso poster that 00:28:09.540 --> 00:28:15.140 says, be curious, not judgmental, which is from, it's not his quote originally, but it's from that really 00:28:15.140 --> 00:28:17.300 famous dart scene. If you haven't seen it, you should definitely check it out. 00:28:17.300 --> 00:28:18.420 Oh, beautiful show. 00:28:18.420 --> 00:28:26.340 Yeah, it really is. Um, the, and I think that's a really, it's a good place to be with young people 00:28:26.340 --> 00:28:32.180 is look, I, I understand the fear. I mean, I sat as a professor across the desk from a lot of students 00:28:32.180 --> 00:28:35.940 who I knew were making terrible choices. You know, like they just, they were about to do something 00:28:35.940 --> 00:28:41.700 that they just really should not do. But what I learned over the years is that if I only ever saw 00:28:41.700 --> 00:28:45.700 them once or twice a year during advising time, and they just saw me as like the gatekeeper for 00:28:45.700 --> 00:28:49.700 registering for their classes, you know, I could tell, I could give them the best advice in the 00:28:49.700 --> 00:28:51.460 world and they weren't going to listen to it. Sure. 00:28:51.860 --> 00:28:56.260 And, and I don't think that the advice that I gave changed much in the 15 years that I was a 00:28:56.260 --> 00:29:00.500 professor, but by the end I was getting a lot more traction because I would make sure I would see 00:29:00.500 --> 00:29:04.660 them more than once or twice. The nature and tone of those conversations shifted. I started taking 00:29:04.660 --> 00:29:08.660 notes and asking them follow-up questions and saying things like, tell me more about that. 00:29:08.660 --> 00:29:15.780 Um, which I think is a really great phrase to keep in mind because it's the, the, it, it, that phrase, 00:29:15.780 --> 00:29:23.140 that question sort of delays our judgment. Uh, if, if our natural inclination is not to correct, 00:29:23.140 --> 00:29:29.540 but to ask more than that, that tendency to want to like, Oh my goodness. Cause young people tell 00:29:29.540 --> 00:29:33.140 you things that make you go like, Oh my gosh, I feel like I really need to correct this right away. 00:29:33.140 --> 00:29:38.660 Cause that's just such a bad choice. Like, please don't do that. Um, and then when we couple that 00:29:38.660 --> 00:29:42.500 with like, you know, I think the stakes are pretty high for the work that I was doing. We're talking 00:29:42.500 --> 00:29:47.540 about people's careers and you know, their vocation, et cetera, but the stakes are even higher in ministry 00:29:47.540 --> 00:29:52.260 settings, you know, because you're talking about people's eternal souls. And so I understand the 00:29:52.260 --> 00:29:56.180 pressure that we feel when young people tell us, you know, when they're like, I'm not so sure that 00:29:56.180 --> 00:30:01.220 God is real or like, you know, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, whatever I could, you know, 00:30:01.220 --> 00:30:04.340 we, something like 40% of young people tell us they could fit in with any religion and they're 00:30:04.340 --> 00:30:08.580 going to sit across the table and tell you that. Right. Yeah. And you want to step in and say, 00:30:08.580 --> 00:30:14.260 and what that does is that it helps you go to bed at night better because you can say like, 00:30:14.260 --> 00:30:22.980 I, I spoke truth into that situation. But if we are actually being honest with ourselves and we know 00:30:22.980 --> 00:30:28.260 we haven't done the sort of caring side of that relational authority work, it's not really going to 00:30:28.260 --> 00:30:31.540 matter. You haven't built belonging, right. You haven't built a relationship. You haven't been 00:30:31.540 --> 00:30:35.780 curious with them. And so you could tell them and they'll pretend to listen, but it won't have an 00:30:35.780 --> 00:30:40.580 impact. It'll be just like me giving advice to my students, you know, without fully investing in 00:30:40.580 --> 00:30:44.980 their lives. And so, you know, it'll be harder to go to bed because you'll wonder all the time, 00:30:44.980 --> 00:30:48.740 should I have said more there? Should I have said more? That's to me, like, I think that's, 00:30:48.740 --> 00:30:53.140 that's the deal of being the adult, right? It's like, you don't get to go to bed easy at night. 00:30:53.140 --> 00:30:58.740 It's yeah. And it's look when they, you know, because they're going to, they're going to say 00:30:58.740 --> 00:31:03.300 things and ask questions and float ideas that is going to make you like, Oh, you know, your eyes get 00:31:03.300 --> 00:31:07.140 wide, but young people told us some really incredible things. And here's, here's just a couple that I 00:31:07.140 --> 00:31:14.660 think helped me to understand the context. Um, what a young person about a year ago told me, 00:31:14.660 --> 00:31:23.380 um, I don't even really know what I think until I talk about it. Like I, my beliefs get formed in 00:31:23.380 --> 00:31:29.220 conversation. And then I understood the value is not in where that land, like where the conversation 00:31:29.220 --> 00:31:34.180 lands, the values and being the person they're having the conversation with. Right. You know, 00:31:34.180 --> 00:31:37.300 like, because they're going to have that conversation because they've got to figure it out. Right. 00:31:37.300 --> 00:31:43.460 It's friends, which is not usually great. Um, or it's going to be with you. And so the question 00:31:43.460 --> 00:31:47.860 isn't, can you correct them? The question is, can you, are you going to be the one in that 00:31:47.860 --> 00:31:52.740 conversation? Yeah. And then the second thing that happened was with the help of some young 00:31:52.740 --> 00:31:58.900 people, I remembered that, like, I don't have the same art on my walls that I had in middle 00:31:58.900 --> 00:32:04.340 school. Like the football posters are gone. Yeah. Uh, I might listen to some of that same music 00:32:04.340 --> 00:32:08.900 that I listened to in high school, you know, for nostalgia, but mostly that's not what's on repeat. 00:32:09.780 --> 00:32:14.260 And, you know, I, I don't, I'm, I'm not the center fielder for the Texas Rangers. So I didn't, 00:32:14.260 --> 00:32:20.580 I didn't become what I wanted to be, you know, the reality that like, we, we know that young 00:32:20.580 --> 00:32:24.740 people's lives are about change and exploration, but when it comes to their faith lives, it's like, 00:32:24.740 --> 00:32:28.660 we put all that aside, everything we know about teenagers gets puts aside and we think we want 00:32:28.660 --> 00:32:32.500 to get them to commit right now as strong as possible and forever. Yeah. 00:32:32.500 --> 00:32:36.660 And the reality is their faith lives are subject to those same transformations. You know, they're 00:32:36.660 --> 00:32:40.580 going to fluctuate, they're going to explore their, you know, they're unlikely to believe 00:32:40.580 --> 00:32:45.860 at 25 what they believed at 15, regardless of what it is. Right. And when we keep that in mind, 00:32:46.500 --> 00:32:50.660 then I think it helps us to lean into those conversations more, take, you know, ask that 00:32:50.660 --> 00:32:53.220 follow up, you know, tell me more about that. Right. 00:32:53.220 --> 00:32:56.900 You know, and, and subdue the part of you that says like, that's insane, you know? 00:32:56.900 --> 00:32:58.100 Yeah. Right. 00:32:58.100 --> 00:32:59.460 In that conversation. 00:33:00.020 --> 00:33:08.500 Well, and I, I do think, especially as young people are, they have more information as a teenager, 00:33:08.500 --> 00:33:12.340 like my 11 year old knows more than I did at 17. Oh yeah. 00:33:12.340 --> 00:33:18.180 But I mean, just like, he's just ingested so much more information, which also includes things 00:33:18.180 --> 00:33:24.980 like conspiracy theories. And like, and so they'll like, people will just tell you the, like, just, 00:33:24.980 --> 00:33:30.340 Hey dad at school, this kid said, blah, like the moon landing wasn't real. And you're like, 00:33:30.340 --> 00:33:39.860 what? Like, Oh geez, we're talking about flat earths. And you're like, truly your immediate response 00:33:40.900 --> 00:33:46.820 wants to be like, that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. This is reality. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. 00:33:46.820 --> 00:33:49.220 The earth is round period. Full stop. Go. Yeah. 00:33:50.100 --> 00:33:54.100 You know? And so, but part of what you're talking about is the idea is that you're going to be 00:33:54.100 --> 00:34:00.740 presented with absurd information and you're going to be presented with immature processing of how 00:34:00.740 --> 00:34:08.180 things are going and where COVID came from and how you form religious belief and what the universe 00:34:08.180 --> 00:34:13.860 actually is. And, Oh, I think it's actually a simulation and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it's like, 00:34:13.860 --> 00:34:21.860 okay, like you can, you can respond to that with, like you said, correction, or you can respond to it 00:34:21.860 --> 00:34:27.780 with connection. Right. Oh, I mean like, yeah. Oh, I'm a pastor, Josh. You gotta, you gotta be, 00:34:28.420 --> 00:34:29.140 yeah. You gotta make it. 00:34:29.140 --> 00:34:34.900 File the trademark right now. Yeah. You gotta make, but you, you want to stay in the conversation 00:34:34.900 --> 00:34:39.860 because staying in the conversation based on what you're talking about with your research, 00:34:39.860 --> 00:34:45.140 being the person they talk to is more important than having the right answer because they're going 00:34:45.140 --> 00:34:50.100 to process it out loud. They're going to be going through all sorts of stuff as every 15 year old 00:34:50.100 --> 00:34:56.420 does as every 13 year old does. You're figuring out your way in this world and faith isn't going to be 00:34:56.420 --> 00:35:02.900 different than like you said, you know, your career. Right. And I'm sorry that the Texas Rangers didn't 00:35:02.900 --> 00:35:10.100 work out. You know, we, I, you know what, I'm not the president and James Bond at the same time 00:35:10.100 --> 00:35:15.860 and, and starting NFL quarterback. Like it just, it didn't happen. Guess what? That's okay. Oh, 00:35:16.420 --> 00:35:21.780 but one of the things that I think drives people away from the faith is this sense of trying to 00:35:21.780 --> 00:35:32.900 solidify and make people make lifelong unchanging commitments to something that I was just, I was 00:35:32.900 --> 00:35:39.300 talking to a friend who was part of, of the SBC growing up and it was a very political church that 00:35:39.300 --> 00:35:46.020 he was a part of. And once he started to get rid of those political beliefs, all of a sudden the 00:35:46.020 --> 00:35:51.620 religious beliefs didn't make as much sense. Oh, and so because they were so closely coupled, 00:35:51.620 --> 00:35:57.620 they're so closely coupled. And so, and so you, you go, well, wait a minute. I'm, I'm supposed to be 00:35:57.620 --> 00:36:04.500 scared of all these people in public school that are trying to take my God away and the earth is 6,500 00:36:04.500 --> 00:36:09.300 years old. And, but I'm, I'm actually meeting these people and they, they seem kind of cool. 00:36:10.340 --> 00:36:14.820 Like the, the people that I'm supposed to be afraid of actually are like really nice and loving 00:36:14.820 --> 00:36:20.820 and caring. And they let me hang out with them at lunch. And I, maybe what I was taught, is it right? 00:36:20.820 --> 00:36:27.220 And then you, you connected. And so it, it's the deconstruction process of what was actually 00:36:27.220 --> 00:36:30.180 there and what was too closely linked. And so, 00:36:30.180 --> 00:36:33.620 So then who's in that conversation? Well, it's not you. Now they're sitting at lunch with those 00:36:33.620 --> 00:36:42.020 other people who are, yeah, because you can hold, you know, you can, you can hold a handful of sand 00:36:42.020 --> 00:36:46.260 from the beach, right? If you just scoop it up. And the second that you try to squeeze down on it, 00:36:46.260 --> 00:36:50.660 like you just start losing sand like crazy. And you know, you think you're building and I get the 00:36:50.660 --> 00:36:55.220 impulse. I have a 12 year old and you know, you think you want to build this impregnable fortress 00:36:55.220 --> 00:37:01.780 of certainty, um, for their faith lives. Cause it's so important. And, and you have to resist 00:37:01.780 --> 00:37:07.140 the impulse to, to, to try and make that fortress immune from outside. Instead of, 00:37:07.140 --> 00:37:10.020 instead we need to start teaching them. How do we engage with those things? Like, okay, 00:37:10.020 --> 00:37:15.540 you heard X, does that jive with all the other sources of information that you trust? Like, 00:37:15.540 --> 00:37:19.780 how do we make sense of that and guiding through those things? It's a, because those are the skills 00:37:19.780 --> 00:37:22.340 that they're ultimately going to cause the reality is like, at some point they're going to encounter 00:37:22.340 --> 00:37:26.740 information without you. And like, they need to know, like, they, you know, how to make sense of 00:37:26.740 --> 00:37:30.340 that. Did we come back to you or are they going to make sense of it on their own? Do they have the 00:37:30.340 --> 00:37:38.740 skills and tools to do that? Yeah. Oh boy. Okay. That's a, I mean, but this is a whole new look 00:37:38.740 --> 00:37:45.140 for what church looks like. This is a, this is a whole new thing and there's, there's gotta be a 00:37:45.140 --> 00:37:51.140 digital element to it because so many of you, so many young people are plugged in, um, to what that 00:37:51.140 --> 00:37:58.740 looks like. But I would be interested in hearing like, what does digital life do to, I mean, I have a 00:37:58.740 --> 00:38:02.660 million questions I want to ask you. So like, we're going to have to talk offline because I definitely 00:38:02.660 --> 00:38:07.460 wanted to get into inside baseball too, of like, okay, like, let's talk about what we should actually 00:38:07.460 --> 00:38:12.100 do. Like, like, let's, let's go through it and let's work through it. But, um, as you're seeing 00:38:12.100 --> 00:38:16.980 young people, they're more plugged in than ever. They have phones, they have all of these things. 00:38:16.980 --> 00:38:24.980 What is the, and I'll say that the narrative is generally, you know, a lot of parents freaking out 00:38:24.980 --> 00:38:30.500 of like devices are the problem, right? This is why kids are depressed. This is why this, 00:38:30.500 --> 00:38:38.980 and it's not to say that that is not true. Um, but what, what is that connection to the digital 00:38:38.980 --> 00:38:45.700 life? These young folks are living and like spiritual life. Yeah. Well, let's, okay. So 00:38:45.700 --> 00:38:49.460 let's break this open a little bit. Um, on the one hand, I want to be really clear. I think, you know, 00:38:49.460 --> 00:38:53.540 one of the things I don't think parents have largely failed young people. I think the parents 00:38:53.540 --> 00:38:58.900 are mostly still parents, but if there is a place where we have not adequately evolved our parenting 00:38:58.900 --> 00:39:03.860 skills, it's around devices. And mostly what I hear from parents is that it's either nothing 00:39:03.860 --> 00:39:09.380 or everything, you know, it's unfettered access or it's, you know, my, my kid's not getting a phone 00:39:09.380 --> 00:39:14.900 until they're 27. Yeah. Um, and we've gotta, we've gotta have some better parenting norms around that. 00:39:14.900 --> 00:39:19.940 The data are now in about social media. It's not good for you. Like it's not, it's not intended to 00:39:19.940 --> 00:39:25.300 be good for you. Like, yeah, it's just not built for that. That's not the aim of it. It is. It's 00:39:25.300 --> 00:39:31.860 armies of PhDs up against 15 year olds. It's an unfair fight. Their goal is not to help them flourish. 00:39:31.860 --> 00:39:37.060 The goal is to help. The goal is to keep them on the screen and stuff that gets us, you know, 00:39:37.060 --> 00:39:41.300 our brains fired the most are actually not necessarily always the things that are best for us in the long 00:39:41.300 --> 00:39:46.820 run. So we have to parent better about devices and teach our kids how to engage with things online. 00:39:46.820 --> 00:39:51.220 So let's start there and recognize that. And, and kids are starting to, so that's number one. Number 00:39:51.220 --> 00:39:55.620 two, kids are starting to see it. One of the things that the pandemic revealed to a lot of young people 00:39:55.620 --> 00:40:00.260 was that, oh, this digital life, you know, this life that I thought I could lead entirely online and 00:40:00.260 --> 00:40:05.140 on my phone, uh, is not, I didn't like that. I don't like this. I don't want to do this. They don't, 00:40:05.140 --> 00:40:10.660 but they don't know how to get out of it. Yeah. What, um, uh, a young person at an event, 00:40:10.660 --> 00:40:17.300 um, just as past spring told me is that when adults dismiss my online life, they disqualify 00:40:17.300 --> 00:40:23.940 themselves from the conversation of my life. Say that again. Say that again. That'll preach. 00:40:24.420 --> 00:40:30.020 When adults dismiss my online life, they disqualify from themselves from the conversation of my life. 00:40:30.020 --> 00:40:34.260 So it's not the, as we talked for what she was saying is like, it's not that everything we do 00:40:34.260 --> 00:40:40.020 there is important. Some of it's TikTok dances and challenges and things like that. Um, but some 00:40:40.020 --> 00:40:46.020 of it is really important, you know, like hashtag witch talk about witches in modern day has more 00:40:46.020 --> 00:40:51.140 followers than your church has attendees. And right. You know, like they're learning about that stuff. 00:40:51.140 --> 00:40:56.740 They're, they're, you know, they're searching for it. They're listening to it. And not because they, 00:40:56.740 --> 00:41:02.740 they, you know, just out of curiosity, just out of playing curiosity. So we have to, I think we have 00:41:02.740 --> 00:41:10.740 to recognize that that's present, but also young people are starting to see that that's not necessarily 00:41:11.300 --> 00:41:16.740 a pathway to a fulfilling life. They don't know how to disengage from it. It's, it's not the depth 00:41:16.740 --> 00:41:21.380 that they want. They recognize that something is missing, but I think we live in this really weird time 00:41:21.380 --> 00:41:28.340 where for the entire evolution of human history, separation from the group meant death. I mean, 00:41:28.340 --> 00:41:33.300 you know, you would, if you left the tribe, you would die. You couldn't survive. And now we're 00:41:33.300 --> 00:41:39.300 in this place where like the immediate thing that feels the most safe is to disengage. And you, 00:41:39.300 --> 00:41:45.940 you can actually survive alone for a while, right? You can, and for long enough to trick yourself into 00:41:45.940 --> 00:41:51.460 thinking that it's possible, but you're missing a certain level of depth that can't lead to flourishing. 00:41:51.460 --> 00:41:55.940 And so the pathway forward where I think we need to be engaging young people in, you know, 00:41:55.940 --> 00:42:03.060 spiritual matters to get here to this third part of this answer is that it is really around experiences. 00:42:04.420 --> 00:42:09.700 So, you know, how do we help to create spiritual experiences for them online? How do we, you know, 00:42:09.700 --> 00:42:13.700 what are the, what are the fundamental components of your religion that you care about? Maybe it's about 00:42:13.700 --> 00:42:18.580 service. Maybe it's about service and belief, or maybe it's about expression, devotion, faithfulness. 00:42:18.580 --> 00:42:23.540 You can do all of those things online. Um, but they probably need an in-person component as well. 00:42:23.540 --> 00:42:27.620 And so it's not this like dismissal of online, like the transcendent can never be encountered 00:42:27.620 --> 00:42:30.100 on TikTok. That's not, that's not true. Yeah. 00:42:30.100 --> 00:42:34.740 But it's also not this like giving over to like, well, we're going to move all of church 00:42:34.740 --> 00:42:38.580 onto the metaverse or something, which young people, by the way, are not necessarily interested 00:42:38.580 --> 00:42:43.620 in our data. Um, but it's like, how do we meld those two things together? 00:42:43.620 --> 00:42:47.300 Like, how do we, how do we experience grace and forgiveness in real life? And then how do we 00:42:47.300 --> 00:42:52.900 extend that to people online and practice it in those spaces? And I, like, that's where I think 00:42:52.900 --> 00:42:57.380 adults and parents have a lot to offer in our religious communities. Really like you can make 00:42:57.380 --> 00:43:01.780 their online and social media lives flourish to a much greater extent by using some of the religious 00:43:01.780 --> 00:43:08.580 tools that you have. Wow. Oh my gosh, that's so good. And you know what? You can do that for your 00:43:08.580 --> 00:43:14.260 life too. That's right. Like we, because I'd run this 13 to 25 year old, but a lot of this is 00:43:14.260 --> 00:43:20.820 right. I'm looking at, I'm looking at my phone and being like, my kids see how much I'm on my phone. 00:43:20.820 --> 00:43:26.580 Yeah. They're not, they're not dumb. Like we haven't, we as grownups haven't figured it out yet. 00:43:27.220 --> 00:43:33.300 And it can be a really good thing to do together. Right. This is something that we can do together 00:43:33.300 --> 00:43:40.020 is figuring out how to regulate this for both of us, because I'm not better when I'm on this phone 00:43:40.020 --> 00:43:46.100 all day. Even if I'm doing good things, right? Right. The things that I'm doing are just as 00:43:46.100 --> 00:43:50.420 valuable as what they're doing, even if it's silly or ridiculous, right? Sending memes to each other, 00:43:50.420 --> 00:43:58.260 texting, whatever. And so to your point of stepping up our parenting and creating, because what my wife 00:43:58.260 --> 00:44:06.820 and I have decided is they're not going to live in a device-less future. Right. So we might as well teach 00:44:06.820 --> 00:44:13.060 them how to try to use it responsibly because it's going to be a part of their lives. It's going to be 00:44:13.060 --> 00:44:20.500 a part of their lives. So let's figure out in the same way that we would do it with a stove or a bike 00:44:20.500 --> 00:44:28.180 or a gun or whatever. Let's teach responsible usage of what that is. Now, how can we teach it when we 00:44:28.180 --> 00:44:32.580 don't know what it is? That's hard because we're all learning for what that looks like. But I think 00:44:32.580 --> 00:44:40.660 that's a good family activity together is to figure out what is good, what is transcendent, and what 00:44:40.660 --> 00:44:47.300 just makes you feel like crap. Because there are some things that if you just stop scrolling the 00:44:47.300 --> 00:44:51.780 comments, don't read the comments, right? That's one of the things that my wife and I, when my wife 00:44:51.780 --> 00:44:56.580 and I... You make content like this, that's rule number one, right? Yeah. Well, when my wife and I 00:44:56.580 --> 00:45:00.980 are going down rabbit holes at night around watching videos or looking at certain things, I'm always 00:45:00.980 --> 00:45:04.900 like, don't read the comments on the news story. Don't read the comments are just going to make you mad. 00:45:06.180 --> 00:45:12.340 It's just going to upset you. Don't do it. And I have to tell myself that. And if I can teach kids 00:45:12.340 --> 00:45:17.540 certain things like, that's just an example of like, hey, you watch this SpongeBob conspiracy. 00:45:18.260 --> 00:45:25.060 This whole SpongeBob conspiracy theory thing is a thing that my 11 year old is into. But here's the 00:45:25.060 --> 00:45:30.740 cool part about it. He's into it with his best friend who moved away to Pennsylvania. And it's part 00:45:30.740 --> 00:45:36.180 of how they communicate. And guess what? That's part of it. But hey, let's not read the comments because 00:45:36.180 --> 00:45:44.660 this is starting to get weird. This isn't about SpongeBob anymore, right? And so part of what you're 00:45:44.660 --> 00:45:53.940 talking about is how can we regulate these anxiety machines that hold too much power over us. So I 00:45:53.940 --> 00:46:01.140 love the idea that we can do that together and figuring out where to separate the... How to find 00:46:01.140 --> 00:46:05.540 transcendence in both the physical space and the digital space because neither is going away. 00:46:05.540 --> 00:46:12.820 One of our Mormon friends used to say this thing to their kids. Maybe they still do. We don't live 00:46:12.820 --> 00:46:17.460 near them anymore. But they used to say, remind them on their way out the door to school. And we 00:46:17.460 --> 00:46:23.060 started doing this with our kid. Make yourself and someone else better today. And I just thought, 00:46:23.060 --> 00:46:27.620 that's such a lovely way to send somebody. It wasn't every day. It was just an occasional reminder. 00:46:27.620 --> 00:46:34.900 Make yourself and someone else better. And so we started doing that even for online. Is Twitter better for you 00:46:34.900 --> 00:46:38.580 and for someone else because you were on it? I mean, our 12 girls are on Twitter, but that's the... 00:46:40.180 --> 00:46:41.940 We're just stepping toes into 00:46:42.820 --> 00:46:47.860 social media in that way. He has a Discord chat with some of his friends, but we haven't thrown the 00:46:47.860 --> 00:46:53.700 doors open. But that's the question that I want him... That's a spiritual question, right? For us, 00:46:53.700 --> 00:46:58.420 it's a very faith-based question. And I don't care if he's operating in a physical world or a digital 00:46:58.420 --> 00:47:03.860 world, if he's playing Minecraft online with strangers or friends. Is the world of Minecraft 00:47:03.860 --> 00:47:08.660 better because you were there? And are you better because you were there? And if the answer to those 00:47:08.660 --> 00:47:14.820 questions is consistently no, then we might need to rethink. And then there's follow-up questions 00:47:14.820 --> 00:47:19.380 about, you know, you don't have to pound this every single time. But sometimes you get into like, 00:47:19.380 --> 00:47:25.060 oh, how? Like what happened then? You know, you made Minecraft better today in some way. What 00:47:25.060 --> 00:47:31.460 does that look like? But these are like, we're trying to mirror the grammar of faith in these new 00:47:31.460 --> 00:47:36.100 digital spaces. And it's, it seems, you know, it's at least we're having the conversations that we care 00:47:36.100 --> 00:47:41.220 about having. Yeah. Ooh, man. Okay. We could talk all day. At some point, we got to chat again, 00:47:41.220 --> 00:47:46.580 maybe offline, just like talk about some of what this looks like in application and, and all that, 00:47:46.580 --> 00:47:52.740 because dude, like this is so huge and people look up Springtide Research Institute. All of this is 00:47:52.740 --> 00:47:59.620 there. Springtideresearch.org. That's right. Yeah. Springtideresearch.org. This is so good. And 00:47:59.620 --> 00:48:05.220 whether you are a young person or know a young person, this is all really good to know because it also 00:48:05.220 --> 00:48:09.940 affects you too, right? Because everything he's talking about seems to translate really well. 00:48:10.980 --> 00:48:18.980 So Dr. Josh, we have one more question for you. Oh, it is the, it is the non judgment zone of joy. 00:48:18.980 --> 00:48:24.740 All right. And I make up a theme song every time that I sing and I've been customizing them a little 00:48:24.740 --> 00:48:29.700 bit lately. Like what kind of music genre are you like into these days? 00:48:31.380 --> 00:48:37.140 Okay. So my friends joke, like if there's a folk singer with a guitar, like a white dude with a guitar, 00:48:37.140 --> 00:48:40.260 I'm probably listening to it. Love it. Love it. Okay. 00:48:40.260 --> 00:48:45.140 No matter where they're from, like, you know, uh, Eastern European, Australian, American, 00:48:45.140 --> 00:48:50.100 like that's, that's sort of what I'm into. Okay. So I'll, I'll, uh, so think about your answer. 00:48:50.100 --> 00:48:53.620 What's bringing you joy right now and I'll sing the theme song. The unbelievable. 00:48:54.100 --> 00:48:58.100 Yeah. Oh, I wish I had a guitar because I feel like, Oh, no way. 00:48:59.540 --> 00:49:04.020 Is this really going to happen? This is like, uh, I was on a Holy soup and, um, 00:49:04.820 --> 00:49:10.500 the bill, Phil Vischer is saying the veggie tales song with my name in it. And that was like a 00:49:10.500 --> 00:49:12.740 highlight. This is going to eclipse that. Here we go. 00:49:12.740 --> 00:49:18.020 Okay. Well, that's, that's a hard one to live up to, but I found, Oh no, this is, this is a lot. This is, 00:49:18.020 --> 00:49:23.540 this is unbelievable. My seven year old's guitar. Uh, and those songs are always kind of broody, 00:49:23.540 --> 00:49:38.260 sad boy songs. And so it's always like, it's the non judgment zone of joy, non judgment zone of joy. 00:49:38.980 --> 00:49:47.300 We talking about the thing that bring you joy. There we go. 00:49:49.940 --> 00:49:55.060 That was fantastic. Thank you, John. So what is bringing you joy? 00:49:56.260 --> 00:50:02.180 It's a very repeatable, predictable thing. Um, it's, it's one, it's, it's hard to, it's, it's one of those 00:50:02.180 --> 00:50:05.940 things that, you know, like when you have this thing that matters so much to you, sometimes it's hard to 00:50:05.940 --> 00:50:10.100 talk about because you're worried that the people that you're telling it to won't care as much as 00:50:10.100 --> 00:50:14.740 you feel like they need to in order to, you know, like really get it, but we're going to take a stab 00:50:14.740 --> 00:50:23.540 here. Um, the, this time of year in Colorado, where I live north of Denver and Greeley, the geese migrate 00:50:24.340 --> 00:50:30.580 and the right outside of my living room window, there's a, there's a hot tub and, um, we have this 00:50:30.580 --> 00:50:34.340 big open field. So you get a full view of the mountains and the geese flying over. And there's 00:50:34.340 --> 00:50:40.900 something just so satisfying to me to this, this repetition of hearing them. Um, it's not the same 00:50:40.900 --> 00:50:46.020 just to see them. And it's, um, and then later here in about a month, we'll make the annual 00:50:46.020 --> 00:50:51.220 pilgrimage to Western Minnesota for Christmas and we'll see it. We'll see that bird migration happening. 00:50:52.020 --> 00:50:56.020 Um, you know, times 10 and man, I just love it. 00:50:56.020 --> 00:51:02.420 So that is, that's a gorgeous answer. I love it. And it's like tied into nature. 00:51:02.980 --> 00:51:06.900 And are you from Minnesota? Is your family from Minnesota? 00:51:06.900 --> 00:51:11.540 My wife is from Western Minnesota. My mom's side of the entire of my family is from Northern 00:51:11.540 --> 00:51:16.500 Minnesota. And, uh, and then my, and then I'm from Texas where, where I met my wife at college. 00:51:16.500 --> 00:51:20.500 Um, but we were there, you know, I've been in Minnesota probably every, 00:51:21.860 --> 00:51:25.540 every year of my life, almost certainly, and often two or three times a year. 00:51:25.540 --> 00:51:30.100 Oh man, that's going to be awesome. Well, I love, I'm going to think about the geese 00:51:30.100 --> 00:51:34.820 when I think about the research, like, and I'm just going to imagine you like, I don't know what 00:51:34.820 --> 00:51:41.780 noises the geese make, but I didn't get a geese sound right there, but just imagine them flying 00:51:41.780 --> 00:51:49.460 those beautiful creatures. I love it. Josh, thank you for joining us again, springtideresearch.org. 00:51:50.260 --> 00:51:54.020 Uh, is there something else that you want to point people to as well? 00:51:55.060 --> 00:51:58.900 I'll just say that we are right now in the, in the middle of a series about mental health. This 00:51:58.900 --> 00:52:02.260 is the biggest challenge facing young people coming out of the pandemic. But as you mentioned, 00:52:02.260 --> 00:52:06.660 the pandemic accelerated things, right? So this was the mental health crisis for young people was, 00:52:06.660 --> 00:52:14.260 um, unfolding even before COVID hit. And, uh, what we're doing in this series first with educators 00:52:14.260 --> 00:52:19.220 in the, in the past spring, and then with religious leaders this fall, and then coming, 00:52:19.220 --> 00:52:23.700 coming early next year for parents and employers is helping leaders to build mental health friendly 00:52:23.700 --> 00:52:29.620 organizations by centering faith and purpose as a conscious exploration, along with a couple of other 00:52:29.620 --> 00:52:35.060 elements, um, to really, you know, help mental health issues from becoming mental health crises. 00:52:35.060 --> 00:52:39.220 And so in this way, there's like this intersection, this really important intersection between faith 00:52:39.220 --> 00:52:43.540 and spirituality and mental health. And so if people are interested in that, I would just encourage you 00:52:43.540 --> 00:52:47.300 that we have one page or we're sort of one page on our website, we're sort of collecting all those 00:52:47.300 --> 00:52:51.220 resources and you can dig in and dive around or dive in and dig around if you're interested. 00:52:51.220 --> 00:52:56.580 That's awesome. I'll, I'll find it, put it in the show notes that way folks can, can check it out. Hey, 00:52:56.580 --> 00:53:00.580 thank you so much, Josh, for joining us. We will definitely have to talk later. Thank you everybody 00:53:00.580 --> 00:53:07.940 for listening. We love y'all. What an amazing chat with Dr. Josh Packer. He's just a good dude. 00:53:07.940 --> 00:53:13.060 That's full of so much wisdom and so much data, like the data, the quantitative and the qualitative 00:53:13.060 --> 00:53:18.660 data can really help us understand how to engage with young folks, because that is obviously a 00:53:18.660 --> 00:53:24.100 priority to many churches and to many people just in general. And so I love my chat with Dr. Josh, 00:53:24.100 --> 00:53:28.260 and I do think it's going to help us be better on the inside, especially as it relates to digital 00:53:28.260 --> 00:53:35.060 things. You can find them at springtideresearch.org and you can always subscribe to the podcast. We'd 00:53:35.060 --> 00:53:39.380 love to have you do that. Like it, rate it, recommend it to your friends. If you want to go 00:53:39.380 --> 00:53:45.860 a little bit deeper, you can dive in on our Facebook group. That is facebook.com/group/betterontheinside. 00:53:45.860 --> 00:53:49.460 that's a great place to do it. Well, I love you guys. Thank you for joining the conversation.