The Tim Ahlman Podcast
The Tim Ahlman Podcast is your go-to resource for inspiring conversations that equip leaders to thrive in every vocation, inside and outside the church. With three primary focuses, this podcast dives deep into:
Leadership: Learn from experts across diverse fields as we explore how their insights can shape and sustain a healthy culture in the local church and beyond. Over 60% of listeners expressed a desire for practical discussions on cultivating thriving environments—and that's exactly what these conversations will deliver.
Learn: Engage in deep theological discussions with scholars who illuminate how Christ is revealed on every page of Scripture. Together, we’ll bridge theology to the realities of a post-Christian America, ensuring practical application for today’s world. This segment aligns closely with the themes of the American Reformation Podcast and resonates with the 60% of you who crave more exploration in this area.
Live: Discover healthy habits that empower leaders in all vocations to become holistically healthy. As followers of Jesus, we’re called to lead not only with faith but also with physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being.
Join Tim Ahlman as we navigate leadership, learning, and living with purpose, so you can lead with strength, wisdom, and a Christ-centered vision.
The Tim Ahlman Podcast
Exploring the 17 Questions of God
Have you ever considered that God's questions might reveal more about you than your answers reveal about Him? When the Creator of the universe asks "Where are you?" or "Why do you doubt?" He's inviting us into something far deeper than a theological exercise.
Charessa Koontz joins the podcast to discuss her new book "The 17 Questions of God and the Impact on Your Life Today," exploring how divine questions transform our spiritual journey. The number 17 holds special significance for her family, connecting biblical narratives with personal experiences of loss and restoration.
• God's first question "Where are you?" invites honest confession rather than hiding in shame
• The question "Where have you come from and where are you going?" challenges us to examine our past and future with intentionality
• Theology of beauty connects to theology of place—creating spaces that orient us toward God
• Grief has become increasingly isolated in our culture, with fewer community rituals to process loss together
• Doubt isn't sinful but can lead to deeper faith when it creates curiosity that drives us toward truth
• Jesus asking Peter "Do you love me?" demonstrates how restoration follows failure through love
• The book features illustrations by Koontz's 12-year-old daughter Charity, making it truly a family project
Find "The 17 Questions of God" on Amazon or visit Charessa's website where you'll also discover her new sermon journals designed to help you engage with what God wants you to know, believe, and do each week.
Welcome to the Tim Allman Podcast. I pray. The joy of Jesus is your strength today, as I get to have, I think for the third time, as a guest on one of our ULC podcasts, teresa Kuntz. If you don't know her, you can go back and listen to some of our other conversations. We've talked about youth ministry.
Speaker 1:She has 25 years as a director of Christian education. As a director of Christian education, family life ministry we both are bulldogs. She has. She spent man some time in board of director positions in across the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod, and before that she worked in radio and TV. And the reason we're talking today is she has a brand new book out called the 17 Questions of God and the Impact on your Life Today and what you may find fascinating about this kind of book, which has a journal type format. If you're following on YouTube, you can see a number of these pictures, and then you see these illustrations on a lot of these pages, and I just found out that they were written by her 12, soon to be 13 year old daughter, charity. So the opening question Charissa, well before that, you doing all right, life is good Love and life.
Speaker 2:Life is good, life is good. Yeah, same. How about you?
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, yes, jesus is on the throne, he's good at Lent, and we're preparing ourselves for the upper room cross and empty tomb, so, so, so exciting. What was it like working, though, with your daughter on this project?
Speaker 2:Man, what a blessing. This was really a family, all-in family thing. My husband on website stuff, I mean, everybody was in on it. But Charity just has these incredible gifts with art and I was like I really would love for you to be a part of it. It's so funny because even as a young person, she has a very particular style, and so even in doing some of the illustrations I'd have to go back and be like, hey, can you fix that? And so it was kind of funny being like mom and boss and all these different things. But, man, it's been such a blessing, and what's been so cool as a parent is watching people bring the book to her and asking her to sign it and, just like you know, encouraging her to continue to use her gifts. And that's the beauty is like her getting to see the impact of her using her amazing gifts that God has given her to really shape and honor people with it, and so I just love that. It's been a really big blessing for us for sure.
Speaker 1:Cool to give kids at that age responsibility. So no child labor laws were broken in the writing of this book. What were you able to do to kind of incentivize? Was there an incentivizing plan? Or she just voluntarily say, hey, I just want to be a part of this mom.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's so funny because I just was like I would love for you to be a part of it and I have two younger daughters and so they want to illustrate the next books and they're like, do we get to do the next one? So I think they just see the impact of it and how exciting it is to be a part of that. And, tim, you know, when we went into ministry, we accepted these amazing calls that God placed on our lives. But our families, that's a different thing. Right, they have their own pieces of that and helping them love and value where they show up in the world too, and so it's just, like I said, it's been an incredible blessing and I'm just excited, and, like I said, who knows that in the next couple of books that you won't see Ellie or Bellamy drawing some art in there as well?
Speaker 1:Do they all have artistic gifts?
Speaker 2:They do. And it does not come from me, tim. I think that's Completely from my husband. My husband is very good at art. I am the worst. When I was in Mops and they always had the craft project, I literally would tell my best friend, like can you just make an extra one for me? Like I have no artistic gifts in drawing at all.
Speaker 1:So yeah, yeah, I mean, I think we're kind of similar in that, like our only skill is words. I do very little of worth with my hands. But yeah, it's crazy how God makes our kids different. Because my 16 year old son very artistic, he's been drawing, writing, animating, all that kind of stuff, loves rap. He wanted to be for a while Like Christian I was telling you a Christian rapper like NF, and that's dreams kind of gone to the wayside now.
Speaker 1:But but bringing about those artistic gifts, it's a theology of beauty, right? I think that's what it is, and I w I don't know who I was talking with. Well, yeah, dr Dean Natasty, reverend Natasty, and he, he has a lot of work on the. I think he's got a book called the Beautiful Sermon and he says we've struggled to develop a theology around beauty. Have you ever thought about that Kind of a first article like this whatever is lovely, whatever is beautiful. Paul says think on these, think on these things. And I think we do know God most especially through word, through sacrament, through the means of grace, through the love of people. But he also reveals himself first Romans, chapter one, in creation, in his order, in his beauty. Any thoughts, any thoughts there, teresa?
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, yeah, I think. I mean, I think art is such a powerful tool too. I think about that in my own background in media and just the way that those messages can convey and the way God can use that. But I mean, I think you nailed it on the head with the whole idea of just creation. God reveals Himself in so many incredible and impactful ways to His people. We are His creation and we are His beloved and so, like, yeah, to honor that, I think, is a really special thing that maybe we don't do enough of in many ways that we should.
Speaker 1:I see the theology of beauty intimately connected to the theology of place. Do you have a place in your home, a corner, a prayer spot, where, whenever you go there? I've got a prayer corner on my outdoor patio couch and we've lived in the same house for 12 years and so a lot of the plants that we planted super young are now a lot larger, and I just find the older I get, the more I'm like I'm becoming like a dad or a grandpa Now. I just like sitting there and but my mind goes to a different place when I'm writing there out in creation, Like it seems like I get in the zone, if you will, the sweet spot of almost beyond thought, beyond comprehension. There's no effort, there's no trying, it's just being and living in the gifts that God has given.
Speaker 1:And a theology of place, obviously centered in worship spaces like this is deep. This is deep for us as human beings. Rituals that orient us in a place to lift our heads up, lift our eyes up and see the beauty, awe and magnitude of a God who loved us so much. You think of our worship spaces. There's a reason why right in the center there's a cross. We lift up our eyes to the beauty of the cross for us. So any thoughts on theology of beauty connected to theology of place, Charissa.
Speaker 2:Well, you're sitting in mine right now because this is where I do my writing, and you can see behind me I've got crosses, I've got chalices, but the thing that's most important in this room to me is the pictures of all the generations that have come before me.
Speaker 2:You can kind of see behind me. It's just a great cloud of witnesses that have loved on me throughout my life, and so being in this space is where I do the majority of my writing. My husband, you know he, was very kind because I'm working on book number two, and he sent me away out of town to basically a retreat place so that I could just sit in nature and write, because the topic of a book to you is a little bit heavier. And so he was like I just, I want you to be able to go and write in. The topic of a book to you is a little bit heavier. And so he was like I just I want you to be able to go and write in that space. And so I 100% agree with you that space matters and like where we place ourselves matters, and I think it's a beautiful thing to kind of honor like do we recognize those places in our life?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's so good. Well, let's talk about the book. How'd you come up with 17? It's such kind of a for anybody thinking it's a random number, just to be quite honest, right, 17 questions. So tell us the why behind the book and help us understand why 17 is important.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so obviously God asked more than 17 questions, and so I really the 17 number is really important to our family. It comes from the book of Genesis and it's all centered in the story of Noah's ark and it starts with you know, the waters burst forth on the 17th day and then the ark comes to rest on the 17th day. All in that span of time, and the book is really about like, how do we sit in the midst between storms and blessings? Our family that number 17 is the day that our family changed dramatically. Those that have watched our podcast before know that my two older daughters came to live with us when their parents passed, and the 17th is the day that their dad died. And so some people would be like, wow, why would you revisit that number? But my daughter, that day was just really significant to her and she found the scripture verse and just found such peace in this. This is the day the rainbow appeared, like all these beautiful things, and she was like, you know the promises of God, even in the midst of incredible suffering, and to see where God is at with it now just really became this incredible place for me to write from, of a place of just honoring and loving our family and like what our family has been through, but using not only our story but God's story and connecting it and really trying to get to the heart of the questions that God asked.
Speaker 2:And the questions that we asked in that process, like some of the questions that I dive into in the book, are very much the questions I think a lot of people deal with in their day-to-day life. And what I love about this book is I think you could pick it up today and answer the questions and five years from now you could pick up the book and answer it differently. I mean, you really truly could, because God is constantly working. And what I love about this book is that God never asks a surface question. It's always deeper. And so in that time for us as a family, as we've grown in our relationship, we've circled back to some of these themes over and over again and I was like you know, if we're doing that, I guarantee if somebody else is dealing with that and so like let's use these beautiful gifts that God's given us to fully serve and hopefully, you know, impact people with the gospel and helping them, you know, pursue Jesus in a big way.
Speaker 1:I love that so much. The reason I love it is it's there's an honesty of vulnerability coupled with an intimacy and high dependency upon God to work in our story. I also love it because you're giving honor to generations that have come before and giving honor to the story of those who are saints now faithfully departed right and the hope of seeing them again. I think today we struggle with this grander story. I think one of the reasons maybe this is a little tangential, but one of the reasons some of our younger people may be struggling and I think liturgical church bodies have a strong future is because we ground them in the generations behind and the grand story of God's love and then locating him. This is your first question in the book when are you? You know, where are you, god, and then, in light of where you are, how present or distant it feels like you are. Where am I right now? What's my origin? What is my grounding, nature, right? So talk about that first question. Why did you start with that question? Where are you?
Speaker 2:So I started with that question because it's the first question that God asked in scripture, right. And so, again, it's all about the questions that he asked throughout scripture, and so it's the very first one. And it's such an interesting question because it comes right in the midst of sin, has broken forth, right, and so it's not like God doesn't know where they are. I mean, you know, but it's this God that continues to pursue us, even in the midst of our sin and brokenness. And even when I wrote it, I was thinking about like times that my kids have broken things and they try to hide it, and how we sometimes try to hide from God. And so I think it's a great question.
Speaker 2:To start with is, as you open this book in your pursuit of God, where are you like, be really honest about where you're at? And and because that's, in a sense, even a confession in itself, and confession, man, is freedom. If we could get people to understand that confession is freedom of just like God I'm coming to you and and the freedom that he gives, then we can move in some incredible spaces. Because Satan wants to hold us in that place of like you're not free, you're broken, you're like there's no rescue, there's none of those things, and so to hear God say where are you and provide a way through, I think is really important to start there for people.
Speaker 1:The Genesis 3 origin story, which is the foundation of that question. It's so fascinating, I think a lot of times we can look at it and see that God is all law. Right, you broke a command, but it's the kindness of God that leads us to repentance. Not only did he provide for their shame and nakedness making clothes, which is kind of wild to think about but he also gave them a promise that, in and through the suffering, there would come one who would crush the head of the serpent, even as his heel was bitten. You know that I am with you and I still have a plan and a purpose for your life. There's still going to be generations that flow in your family line.
Speaker 1:As broken and messed up as it happens to be, I'm not done with you yet, right, I think a lot of times people's posture toward God is he's angry, he's frowning, he's grumpy. That's not the primary disposition of God. His primary disposition toward us is love. And so the question is not where are you? You know it's. Where are you. I just want you, I want you to know that I know where you are and to come out. Come out from the guilt, come out from the shame, and let me heal you. Let me forgive and restore, restore you. So yeah, anything more there about the disposition of God toward us broken sinners.
Speaker 2:I just think it's such a loving response, right, like, because I think about when I hear something break my like.
Speaker 2:First thing is like, ah, like you know, he doesn't have that response, he really does.
Speaker 2:He truly pursues us and we see throughout Scripture His constant plan, his constant providence, his sovereignty, His love towards us, and so I think you're absolutely right. I think, unfortunately, there's so many people that see God as just this, you know, evil man on a throne just wanting to burn everybody, you know, and that is not the God that we follow and serve and love. And the reason that we understand love so much is because of the way that he loves us and even in the protection of them, as tough as it is for them to leave the garden, there's protection and love in that too. And so, like, there's just, we just again got to understand the bigger picture of the story, and that was one of the things that I really encouraged in the book is, like some of these stories you know, I can't assume that everybody knows these stories and so, like, I hope you dive in, I hope you read it, I hope you really understand the full story of God and that you get it from these readings for sure.
Speaker 1:I love it. Your second question is where have you come from and where are you going? Why is that question important?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the story of Hagar, right, and so it's such an interesting question because she's just in this, incredibly, you know, between a rock and a hard place, and she's sent away. You know she's a slave and she's gotten herself in this like horrible predicament, right. But I think it's such a beautiful question because she's actually the first person in scripture that gives God a name, like you know, and I think it's such an incredible thing because, if you know the full story, what a way that God could have changed the events of all of history and he didn't. Again, we see incredible mercy and incredible love. And he asked this question and she doesn't answer it.
Speaker 2:She actually is like I'm running away, and I think for a lot of us we tend to just want to run away or we don't want to think about it. We don't want to think about where we come from, we don't want to think about where we're going, we let life happen to us and, instead of just again, that honesty of confession of this is where I've been and do I recognize if I'm on the right road or not, and just the intentionality of giving that to God, and when he asked her to go back, and he ends up again, blessing her in ways that she could never imagine. But just to answer those questions really honestly of again, tell me about your past, how honest can we be about that? What are you bringing to the table in terms of your thoughts and your feelings about God and about yourself, and where do you want to go?
Speaker 2:And I think that's an incredible question for people to really bring to God in the midst of like this is where I'm at, especially in a place of suffering and confusion, which is where we find her. She's in such a place of suffering and confusion that sometimes, when we get in those places, we can't see even in front of our own faces. And so to have somebody ask us that question of like, hey, how's it going? Like, what's happening, I think it's an incredible question for us to sometimes pause and to reflect on, and I think it's important I really do. I think it's such a powerful question that God asked her in that moment.
Speaker 1:Well, what's behind the question? Amen. What's behind the question is story. Tell me your story, the beauty and the brokenness of your story, and then, what is your vision for your life? Where? Where are you going? Is there, is there any kind of vision? Is a vision just like you say, I'm just trying to make it today? Or is it this grand vision that obviously is going to need the God of the universe to step in, show up and show off so that that vision can become a reality?
Speaker 1:It's wild about humans, right, everybody has to have an aim. It's the death of the human soul If one. No one cares about our story and we don't have a vision for a preferred future, like God has put eternity into the hearts of men and women, right, and we're called to move and go and produce. And the frivolity of it all, if you break it down, apart from God, is like, why would we even care? I mean nihilism eat, drink, be merry. Tomorrow we die. Hedonism, like that's the end of the story. But no, we've got this upward aim to bring beauty, love and life into a dark and dying world. That's, I think, one of the main indicators. We're created in the image of God, isn't that right, teresa, that there's even a desire spirit in me. We'd call it the Holy Spirit. Who's, who's giving me purpose, meaning passion for a preferred future, which is the advancement of the kingdom of God that I get to be a part of. Any comments there about the necessity of vision?
Speaker 2:For sure. And I mean, like, look at what she calls him, the God who sees me, like into me. I say, like God sees me and he is calling me forth and he is telling me. Here's what you know what I mean. And so I think that's incredibly powerful to know that, even in the midst of our circumstances, that God individually sees each and every one of us. And, like you said, that is incredibly powerful to know that God knows us fully and you've heard me say this fully known, fully loved so many times that even in the midst of this he sees us. I think it's just incredible and it does. It is the deep why, holy Spirit, of why you know, you and I and so many others just pursue him with everything that we have and we seek him in the midst of that and it changes the course right, it changes the course it really does.
Speaker 1:Intimacy is a word I don't think we use enough just to piggyback. There's a way we can kind of understand it, even using the word. You're like in reference to God, you're into me, right? You actually see me, you know me, all of me, and yet you have a plan and purpose and a call upon my life. You forgive me and give me an upward aim. I mean, it's wild when we recognize the God of the universe who created everything we see and don't see, makes us his temple, his dwelling place, and moves us in community out into a life which is truly worth life. So I love that.
Speaker 1:Second question when have you come from? Where are you going? You have a number of questions. How long will you mourn? Why are you going? You have a number of questions. How long will you mourn? Why are you crying or why have you forsaken me?
Speaker 1:Let's get into the tough stuff here. I believe we have a lot of work to do culturally and maybe within the church as well, around the topic of grief. What makes this question profound? As you kind of look at our culture, as we connect to grief, I'm not gonna. I'm gonna set this up.
Speaker 1:As a pastor, I have seen a robust change I've and I don't think it's all good in how we handle grief and the rituals around grief. Early on, it was everybody's going to come out and we're going to do the funeral within a couple, three, like no longer than a week. Right now a lot of those rituals of grief extend out. Well, we're going to plan it two, three. I've had funerals that were up to a year later because it takes a while to get everybody here. And so the theology of a funeral we're crying, we're sitting in it and then we're going. We're going with the body. Now I'm not going to get into practices around the body. There's a lot that can be said there.
Speaker 1:I am a fan of I am not necessarily a fan of cremation. I'm just going to put that I like. I like the body, honoring the body in this life and and anticipating the new resurrected body. But early on this is 17 years ago, my first, probably 20 funerals I did. I immediately followed the body in a casket to a tomb and were with the family as they placed the body down and dirt was thrown on top of the body in the hope of resurrected reality coming on the last day, Like there's such a distance from death right now. That I don't think is culturally healthy. I think we're stuffing it and I don't think we're inviting the entire community, because it's more than just the family. It's the family and extended family and the friends. This is not as it should be. So talk to us about the culture of grief, or lack thereof, that is present, especially in the West and in the American context, Charissa.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so this is book number two, the 17 Questions of Grief, and it's a very incredibly personal book. So when I dive into book two, there was even a chapter that I wrote that I had to get permission. I had to go to somebody and say, is it okay if I share this story? Because grief is the loneliest emotion that a human will feel, because we can all lose the same person, but we experience it so incredibly different and we have experienced that even as our own family, and so I was writing.
Speaker 2:I started writing the book kind of right after Christmas and you know, 2025 starts and within 10 days I am not joking, within 10 days we lost five people. Five and I just remember going Lord, I don't need any more source material, I got plenty Like I mean, you know, in just this way, but you're absolutely right the way each of those five deaths was handled and because I was already in this spirit of like empathy and writing and understanding and just being really mindful of watching different people go through it, god was teaching me in all of those incredible stories of honoring people and you're absolutely right, some of them were like immediately and I saw the family of God come around people beautifully and the sad thing that I've seen beautifully and the sad thing that I've seen. I remember I grew up in such a smaller Lutheran church and if somebody passed in our family, the whole church came. It was such an honoring thing to know that the family of God was with you and cared for you and was there to sustain you, even if they didn't know the person, they knew you and they wanted to be there for you. And so I've seen some of that, like you said, I've seen. One of them is still we still have not had a service for one of those five, very much to the point that you made. And so, yeah, I think the culture around it has really shifted.
Speaker 2:And I think it really comes down to and I watch this a lot and I'm sure you can relate to this, ted there's just a very uncomfortability with the emotion of grief Because, again, it does feel very isolating. The way we will look at it is very different and even the question of can I feel this way? I've sat with people and I know you probably have too that grief, even at times maybe, has come as a relief. Man, that person has been suffering for a long time and so then that person's like I'm relieved, but is it okay for me to be relieved that they're with Jesus now? You see just this wave of not being able to deal with it, even in the second book.
Speaker 2:As I'm dealing with grief, we're talking about grieving all kinds of different losses, right, and I see a culture right now that I think is very I'll put it this way very angry, and I think the longer that they sit with it, they'll learn that it's not actually something that they're angry about. It's something that they're grieving because it's the loss of an idea, it's the loss of a future, it's the loss of all these things. But the core motion that's risen to the surface is anger. But the longer that they sit with it they'll start to understand. Actually I'm grieving something in the midst of this, but anger is an easier emotion, it's like we can understand. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:And grief, I think, is one that really shapes us to our core. One of the ones that Eric and I had to walk through in the midst of the beginning of the year was, you know, obviously within our own family. Honestly, right now, as we speak, I am waiting for my aunt to be received into the arms of Jesus, and I'm grateful and thankful for that, because she, I absolutely know that and she knows where she's going, and so there's a huge sense of hope and peace in the resurrection right. And so she has suffered for a long time and so we will grieve on this side of heaven for sure. But we are also going to rejoice for her that she's receiving her heavenly rest.
Speaker 2:And I think that's what's so hard for some people is depending also how the grief comes right If it's sudden, if you know if the person's a believer or not, all these different things that are wrapped up in it. And again, I think it always comes down to and I hear this from people so many more times if I knew it was the last time, if I knew it was going to be the last time I was going to get to talk to that person, or do you know what I mean? Because, again, that grief is shaped in. I don't get to have another one of those moments, I don't get to have another conversation, I don't get to have another hug, I don't get to fill in the blank, and I think we really struggle with that.
Speaker 2:But you and I's buddy, zach Zender, I think, does a beautiful job with this and he talks about it at the gathering, which is like death is a middle word, it's not the final word. Cancer is a middle word it's not the final word. But yet we so get caught up in our human nature and our day to day that we struggle with getting past that. God gets the final word, and so it's hard, and so we sit with it and we grow around it, or we deal with it, or people say things to us that is incredibly uncomfortable and they're trying to be well-meaning and it just doesn't come across. And so how do we also deal with that?
Speaker 2:I heard a friend say recently, as he was was dealing with grief, that people were telling him stories about the person and he was like I didn't know what to do with it, because it doesn't always even that's not the person I knew. But you're telling me the story about this person that I love and I'm thankful because I'm getting to hear a different side of a story, but I don't know that person and what am I supposed to do with that? How do I hold that? How do I honor that? And I do. I think it's. Again.
Speaker 2:Grief is an interesting emotion because it is that loss of that hope and that future that we have in our mind of what we want it to look like. And so we also struggle with that because, again in our own human condition we want to be a little G-God sometimes and say this is the way it was supposed to go and there's a real surrender to. There's a different plan, whether we understand it fully or not. And, like I said, we've walked this road a lot in our family and have talked about grief a lot in our family and I just always come back to that of meeting God in the midst of struggling and grief and those questions really kind of tie into that. When we look at each one of those individual questions that you kind of talked about, they're so different even in the midst of those.
Speaker 1:What's your favorite story of Jesus around grief? I'll give you mine and you can talk about it, or something I mean all of John 11, right, is the story of Jesus and Lazarus and his tearing coming. He could have, but he doesn't Questions about why. If you'd only been here, you know, and the different kind of responses to grief. Martha ends up going out, giving Jesus what for a little bit, and Mary stays behind, kind of despondent, and you see those different reactions. You see the confession of faith, um, of Martha, which we often throw Martha under the bus, but she, she talks about the resurrection life. Right, um, and there, there will come a day of resurrection. I believe it and I just am grieving it right now.
Speaker 1:And and then, and then, uh, I think one of the biggest metaphors for me is Lazarus comes out of the grave. He's got to die again, and in the next chapter they're trying to kill him, or maybe it's even at the end of that chapter. They're trying to put him to death because he's a signpost of the resurrection life that's found in Jesus. That's, that's a bummer, um, and then, and then he, but he comes out of the grave and Jesus says help, help him with his grave claws. You know it's awkward.
Speaker 1:He's naked underneath these clothes and stuff, and so there's some honor of the body and we all kind of come out of the tomb day by day. This is what repentance is, but we got these grave claws that. We need people to be kind to us, you know, to care for us, and so, yeah, I think the story of Lazarus is my favorite. There's tears, jesus weeps, there's a theology of deep grief and crying. Jesus weeps over death. This is not how it should be and that's why I've come Any comments on the story of Lazarus or other stories of Jesus handling grief.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's my favorite one, and it's not in this book, but it is in the grief book, right, the question of do you believe this? Right, Like, I am the resurrection of life, Do you believe this? I think that's an incredible question that he asked in the midst of this grief. And you're absolutely right, that's such a beautiful story of different people responding to grief and the different ways, and I love that. I love the take the grave clothes off, Like we have to remember that. That's that, that is our job. Like leave it behind, Right, you know, and and um it, yeah, that's what that? That really is one of the driving themes, uh, in book two is all around the as some of the story of Lazarus. I break it down, uh, quite a bit so.
Speaker 1:Love it. I think it's when's the story of Jesus healing the girl who died while he healed the woman on the way right who touched his garments and then don't come, now she's dead. She's not dead, she's just sleeping. And everybody laughs at Jesus. I love we're walking through Mark right now. Jesus doesn't care what other people think about him, like at all. His family's throwing him under the bus. He's a crazy man. The Pharisees are saying he's possessed by a demon. People are laughing at him when he says she's just sleeping and Jesus just goes about doing his thing, making all things new.
Speaker 1:Any take on kind of how Jesus is just like so on mission. It seems like such a trite thing to say because he's the son of God, but like Jesus is just. He knows what's in the hearts of men. He's connected in his identity to the father. He's asking amazing questions, he's connecting with people, but he's got a mission and his eyes are set, like Flint, to Jerusalem, to a cross and do an empty tomb. What is it about Jesus as the healthiest human that just gives you a lot of joy. I mean, it lights me up when I think of how Jesus is just so on mission. Teresa, what are your thoughts?
Speaker 2:Well, and, like you said, I think it's in his timing right, like it's always in his timing. And you see him go out of the way to meet the Samaritan woman at the well, like he would have not. Like you know what I mean, like he very is intentional in his walk and in his mission and making sure that the right quote, unquote. People see certain things right, like for the word to go out and, like you said, lazarus being like the very next, like, oh, we got to get rid Because, as that was building, as that was growing, as people were coming to belief in who Jesus was, that was such an incredible thing. Because, again, I think it's always amazing to me that God's plan was us.
Speaker 2:Because I'm like, imagine the disciples just standing there watching him ascend to heaven and be like that was a cool story Time to go back to. You know what I mean. And they just went back to their regular lives. The fact that they could have done that. And I wonder sometimes in our today society if people would have been like, all right, that was cool. I'm like, all right, let's just get back to like doing what we're doing, that they were so on, stay still, that he really modeled that for his people. And I know you and me like that's part of our mission, is like we want to be on mission, we want to, we want, we want 2000 years from now, there to be people here because of the impact of somebody hearing the gospel, because of maybe an interaction with us or somebody that we encouraged in the faith. You know, that's the beauty of seeing the generations throughout history just really capture the story and see themselves in that relationship with Jesus.
Speaker 1:Yeah, One of your questions is whom shall I send? Right, yeah, our God is a sending God From the Father, father sending the Son, father and the Son sending the Holy Spirit, trying God sending the church, the church moving out, saying here am I send me? And it's obviously connected to the Old Testament story. Why is that such an important question? Whom shall I send, teresa?
Speaker 2:Because the church can never lose sight of the priesthood of all believers.
Speaker 2:And I think sometimes we outsource faith and we think, oh, somebody else will do it, somebody else will figure it out.
Speaker 2:And it is so incredibly important that if we're going to pass on the faith to the next generation, that we all see ourselves as part of that.
Speaker 2:It is not just the job of the pastor, not just the job of the youth minister, not just the job of even parents. We all, as the body of Christ, have to see ourselves as part of that and I love that in our baptismal liturgy like that, we as a church get asked that question will you support and encourage and all these things? And we should boldly that should be the loudest resounding like we will, with the help of God, in our congregations in the midst of that, because it does take every single one of us God does not have grandchildren, he only has children and so we have got to be a part of that in the midst of like passing the faith on to those next generations. And it does take every single one of us using these incredible gifts that God has given us to love on the people around us. That's what he's given them to us to do is to love God and love others, and as you go out, will you have moments where you're fearful, doubting, questioning.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's just the way it is and that calls us constantly independence upon God and his work. If this is about me, this is one of my like pre-sermon prayers. If this is about me, I'm really going to mess this up. Come, holy Spirit, give me joy, help me to get out the way so that you can take center stage and people can know and follow and experience your word and your love for us. But one of your questions is why do you doubt? Why do you doubt? Is doubt sin? Talk about doubt a little bit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think this is so important for young people to know because they're going to doubt and doubt is not a sin. I think that's so incredibly important for people to hear, because sometimes, when we get around the Genesis story, it's this idea like well, they doubted. It's never about the doubt, it's what we do with our doubt, it's the next step. Right, it is always the next step. Do we not think that Jesus didn't see things that were not like godly things to see? But it's what you do with that next step.
Speaker 2:And so, in the garden, instead of saying, okay, I have a question, where do I go for truth? I go to God, like, instead of turning back to God and going God, is this that tree that you told us not to Like? You know what I mean? And it's where do we go for the source of truth and doubt? We're all going to have doubt at different times in our faith development, in our searching of God, like we are going to question. And what I actually think doubt is can be a really beautiful thing, because if it can create us to be curious where we seek after truth and after God, god can actually use our doubt to do beautiful things in our lives, to help us dig deeper, to pull up the roots, to pull up the weeds of the things that don't, that are not serving us. As we seek him, as long as, again in our doubt, we go to the source, and the source of our truth and life is him.
Speaker 1:I don't know that I've ever connected doubt to adventure, doubt to calling, and I like, I like that. I'm being called up and out. You're sending me, god. It's going to be interesting to see how this all concludes, right, I don't know the end of my story, like how many days I have, the people that are going to come and go, and uh.
Speaker 1:My only orientation toward life, though and I think this is being, this is being proven scientifically, philosophically and theologically is that there is this upward call toward adventure and I get to be a part of it. I'm not the hero of the story. Jesus is the hero of the story. The word of God is the hero of the story, but I get to be a part of it, and a small, small hero I'm not the big H here, but a small hero in my context, in my, in my community. I'm the hands and feet of Jesus and, as I'm moving out, I just don't know how all this is going to play out and I don't know why God, you allow these certain things. But I'm taking my why, I'm taking my questions, I'm taking my doubt, but I have a spirit of, and I like that. I just have a spirit of curiosity and humility we're just going to see.
Speaker 1:Honestly, for me and our work with the ULC, that's often how I feel, like we're asking different questions of the church and various systems and structures and leaders et cetera, like I don't exactly know. I know the end result is more people knowing and following Jesus. I know the end result is all things made new. But we live in a broken reality and I just sometimes think that leaders, we want certainty. Right, give me the exact I don't know. I think certain we want certainty and comfort.
Speaker 1:Exactly. We want certainty and comfort and I think the origin of that is pride. Certainty is around pride, comfort is around fear. Now I take all of that to the God of love who overwhelms my fear, and the God of humility who, little old you, you get to be a part of this big thing. Don't get the big head. You know, I see Jesus and the disciples coming back right. Don't get the big head. Rejoice that your names are written in the kingdom of heaven after they did spectacular things casting out demons, healing the sick, proclaiming the kingdom of God, right, and I don't. There's no room for pride or for or for fear. I mean the perfect love of God. It casts out fear. But yeah, I like that a lot. That doubt is connected to curiosity, adventure rather than shame. That's really good, charissa.
Speaker 2:Well, I think people struggle with it because I'm a very curious person. I ask a lot of questions and I have to be really mindful sometimes when I ask questions, because I know that it can come across as I'm being a challenger, right, or like I'm down, and it's like no, I'm just being. I'm trying to really be curious, I'm trying to lean in, I'm trying to understand more because I want to understand, and I do think people do get challenged by it. But if you can, if you can have that spirit of curiosity, leads to a deeper understanding.
Speaker 2:I, when we talk about doubt, I love looking at other people in scripture that had doubts that God completely honored in their questioning, right, like I mean even Moses himself. Like, like God, how's this going to be? Like, you know, mary, how can this be? I'm a virgin. Like we see these different questions of like, this curiosity of like how's this going to happen? And we see God do amazing things through them. Because again, they're like, well, you know, tell them I am who I am, you know what I mean. Like I am the great I am. And for Mary, like, well, let it be so, if that's what the Lord wants, I'm open, you know. And so we see these beautiful things where God also honors the curiosity. And so that's where I think it's really important that when we talk and we center some theology around doubt, that we don't make doubt this horrible sin, that doubt, what we do with our doubt, does matter right Like we need to talk about that, but at its core it can actually be a really beautiful thing.
Speaker 1:Intimately connected to a life of prayer, the more I think about it, bringing your care. Cast all your cares upon him, all your questions upon him, because he cares, he cares for you. Hey, last question, this is so fun. Why did Jesus need to ask Peter, do you love me? One of your questions, does he ask the same of us? If so, why so? Do you love me? Let's talk about that one.
Speaker 2:Man. That's such a personal question right that he gets to the heart of it. You know, like, do you love me? And when we think about what the definition of love is right and we really kind of break it down, that again him and Peter had this incredible relationship, this incredible closeness, this incredible intimacy, that we've used this word a couple times. And when we get to outside, where Jesus is inside and preparing and being brought before the Sanhedrin, all these different things that Peter is, this guy that's like God, I will never betray you, I'll fight to the death, like all these different things. And yet when he doesn't, is not standing with the power and the strength of the disciples and especially Jesus by his side. I don't know the man, I don't know him, I'm not with him. Right, and and I think so many of us can fall victim to that, especially some of our younger people right now Like, I don't know him. You know they're so fearful of being tied to labels or whatever else and at the root, it's not about the label of. You know, you're a Jew, all those different things. Right, like, as Peter was being asked, oh well, you're from that region, you have to be right, like you have to be oh well, you're from that region, you have to be right, like, you have to be one of his followers.
Speaker 2:And it comes down to like that relationship with Jesus alone. And when he expresses this, I do not know him that when this restoration happens in John, you know it's this. Do you love me? And loving somebody again, fully known, fully loved. Yes, lord, I love you. You know what I mean. Like that, there is that repair in the relationship of you know. Yes, I want this. And Jesus incredibly challenges him. And even at the end of that story, the very thing that Peter was trying to say, jesus tells him like you will lose your life for me, point blank. Suffering is coming and that's what you were trying to save and I understand that. But at the end of the day, do you love me? And I think it's an incredible question that he asked of us, because if we love him, how do we show up?
Speaker 2:It's one of the questions that I ask our kids a lot when sometimes they're maybe kind of like not exactly making the best decisions or on the right road. It's that question of like you know, how are you representing yourself, how are you representing us? How are you representing God in these places and like, if you want to be known you know, we hear it all the time If they will know we are Christians by our love. How are we loving the world and God completely? When Jesus himself gets asked what's the greatest commandment? Love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, soul, mind and understanding, and love your neighbor as yourselves. That question of do you love me is getting to the number one commandment. It's getting to that very question Do you love me and do you love others? And if you're going to say yes, then we got to show up that way. We got to show up that way.
Speaker 1:Isn't it interesting how I mean thou shalt have no other gods before, every sin is a breaking of the first. We're idol making factories, right, we have passions and desires that go after created things rather than the creator. That's very true. But it's interesting that Jesus goes to love because the commandment, I mean there's. There's love that's around the giving of the commandments in the old Testament, but that Jesus highlights the posture of love. Loving God, loving, loving others, that's, that's a life which is truly life. Listening and being dependent upon the God who's in love with me, and letting him know that he's number one, and then moving out as an image bearer to bring love and light into the world. That's the best thing ever.
Speaker 1:Peter's story is so fascinating. He's gone back to his former vocation. Whether he'd get around to the kingdom-expanding stuff, maybe in time, and the Holy Spirit hasn't come yet either. But I think it's the, the humanity of it all. They, they see him and they then the whole story of the catch a fish and Peter gets out. He's got to get to Jesus. He's not crippled by guilt or shame. He, he, he's kind of he uh, performs acts before he thinks, and I can relate. I can relate to that sometimes, whatever it takes yeah, whatever it takes to get to Jesus. And then there's this awkward nature around the breakfast and the beach scene, right, no one really says anything. They all knew it was the Lord.
Speaker 1:And Jesus then initiates a conversation with Peter. He's very, very kind. And then the final point, it can't just be about us. Then you know, go feed my sheep, feed my sheep. This is the higher calling that you have. You remember, right, we're? We're fishing for people here. Go, go feed them. I'm the good shepherd, you're an under shepherd. Get after it, son. And uh, and he did, I mean and acts. Two is is a perfect case in point. When the Spirit descended, everybody looks around. Bueller, bueller, who's going to talk? Peter, everybody's talking. But Peter gives the most epic sermon of all time, connecting Jesus as the promised Messiah for the Jews, who are then diaspora, who are the sent ones out from that place. And the world was never, never, the same again, because of the power of the love of Christ and then the love of the apostles who carried his love into the world. You're a gift, charissa. Thank you for writing this. I had so much fun talking to you. And if people want to get the book, the 17.
Speaker 2:Questions of God and the Impact on your Life Today. How can they do so? So, again, you can head over to the website or you can go to Amazon, and if you go to Amazon today, you'll also see that I have uploaded some additional books and some resources there. Again, I am always wanting you to be diving into God's Word, and so I created some weekly sermon note journals as well, so that hopefully you know. Again, one of my older daughters was just taking a spiral notebook and writing in her spiral notebook every Sunday and I was like we could do a little bit better than that. So I've created a lot of different covers.
Speaker 2:The insides are all the same and I love that. It's got a little piece of me in it, one of the things that I like to teach about us actively listening and worshiping with God and how we. Now we know we believe and now we do. So we have the head, heart and hands in there and so, like, as you go to worship and you are meeting God in that beautiful place we talked about that earlier and you're meeting God in this beautiful place, what is he calling us to know, believe and do each and every Sunday, and if we can come in that spirit of curiosity, every single time we come to worship, is God, I am here and I want to know you more, and by knowing and learning these things, I'm going to show up differently. I think that's a powerful thing if we can get into that space of really truly understanding what worship is all about.
Speaker 2:And so, and hopefully you know, before long book two will be out, and so it's a whole series. When the whole thing is done, you will have an entire rainbow. That's why there's different colors, and so all those spines, when you finally line them all up, will be a rainbow which goes back to again the whole point of the 17 and the promises of God. And so, again, I just hope that each and every one of them are going to be a blessing. We're going to be talking about purpose and identity, and all these different things will be in these different books, and so I just pray that it's a blessing to individuals and the church at large.
Speaker 1:Every time I talk to you, teresa, I'm left with a crazy amount of Jesus juice. I'm just like so on fire, in love with the God, who's in love with me, and he's in love with you too. And listener, please like, subscribe, comment, take this in wherever it is. You take it in. It, help gets the word out. And you know, sometimes in the ULC podcast and Lead Time my other one we have these kind of uncomfortable conversations and what I like about the podcast is by my name, like my whole life is not all these uncomfortable kind of goofy.
Speaker 1:The vast majority of my life is just locking arm in arm as a one leader among many, many leaders, trying to bring love and light out into the world, asking big questions, letting God, through his word, answer them and and being called up. You know, I think a lot of times you can't control what people think about like who you are and how you present yourself to the world, and that's okay. You only, you only need the approval of God. But I say all that to say conversations like this are way more fun than conversations around pastoral formation and prior approval, just saying it's a good day. Go, make it a great day, sharisa, you're a gift to me and the body of Christ. Thank you, sister, thank you.