Death Valley in California is famously one of the harshest environments in the world. Because of extreme heat and little rain, it’s exceptionally difficult for plants to live there.

But the seeds for certain types of flowers and other plants continue to lay dormant in the ground, waiting for rain and a chance to bloom. Thanks to a rare heavy rainfall in later 2025 and January 2026, Death Valley is experiencing a beautiful wildflower season this Spring.

This rare desert botanical phenomenon is called a “superbloom,” where an unusually high amount of wildflowers germinate and bloom around the same time. This is so rare and beautiful that people travel from across the world to see the superbloom when it happens.

Pastor and author Jeff Jenkins has a book that came out this spring under the same name — Superbloom. The idea is that believers experience a drought in their hearts — dreams lie dormant with little to no hope of resurgence. His book contends that God can produce a “superbloom” in our lives the same way one happens in the desert.

“The soil of your life is the seed for what God has already planted in you,” he writes. “The discovery of what you will find is the basis of this book.”

The idea for this book came to him through a prophetic dream, and we spend some time in this conversation exploring what such a dream looks like and how to discern a prophetic dream against a normal dream.

Jeff is the lead pastor at Anchor Church in McKinney, Texas, and also hosts the Anchor Deep Podcast. He’s a neat guy with an amazing testimony, and I’m excited to share this conversation with him on the podcast this week. Be sure to grab his book.

All episodes are now available in full on Substack and YouTube. On YouTube, Just search ⁠In No Hurry Podcast⁠ and subscribe to be notified when new episodes go live.

If you enjoyed this, consider sharing it with a friend or someone in your life who might need to hear it. And if you want to stay connected, follow In No Hurry Podcast on ⁠Instagram⁠ and the new ⁠TikTok⁠ page for clips, updates, and more from these conversations.

Theology is the study of the nature of God. By that definition, a theologian doesn’t have to take the shape of C.S. Lewis or Saint Augustine or Thomas Aquinas. Anyone can be theologian.

That’s the mindset that Phylicia Masonheimer had when she created her ministry, Every Woman a Theologian. “We at EWAT argue for a different kind of theologian: the theologian who drives to her corporate job every morning, who knows what it’s like to be single at thirty, or who juggles babies while her husband travels for work,” she writes. “Yes, we believe every woman should be a theologian. Every woman should be a student of the heart of God.”

Phylicia is such a gifted writer and thinker, it was a joy to welcome her on the podcast this week. I’ve followed her for a while, but we connected recently after I came across an essay of hers where she shared her experience with secondary infertility. That resonated deeply with me as Emily and I are in the midst of our own infertility journey.

Much of our conversation centers around that topic — how to navigate it as well as how to care for those in your life that are experiencing infertility or miscarriage. Phylicia also shares her testimony and how an addiction to erotica is what propelled her into writing in the first place. Her vulnerability has continued to resonate with readers for over two decades, and I’m grateful she was willing to share her story on the podcast this week.

She’s the author of several books, including Every Woman a Theologian and Every Home a Foundation. She also has tons of free resources centered around theology on her website, phyliciamasonheimer.com.

All episodes are now available in full on Substack and YouTube. On YouTube, Just search ⁠In No Hurry Podcast⁠ and subscribe to be notified when new episodes go live.

If you enjoyed this, consider sharing it with a friend or someone in your life who might need to hear it. And if you want to stay connected, follow In No Hurry Podcast on ⁠Instagram⁠ and the new ⁠TikTok⁠ page for clips, updates, and more from these conversations.

The hot topic of conversation right now in just about every field is AI. Everyone is trying to understand how to best use it and how to keep up with all the new capabilities each tool offers.

But one of the trickiest conversations is where the use of AI fits in ethically and morally in the Christian creative space. The debate has intensified in recent months, and I’ve even weighed in heavily on this topic on Substack.

Another person whose voice has been a valuable one in this larger conversation is Christopher Lind. He has a wealth of experience across numerous roles with a wide variety of companies. He has deep knowledge of the tech space, and specifically AI, and has worked as a consultant and business advisor for some of the largest companies.

He also has some sound opinions on how to approach AI use ethically and how to view it through the lens of Scripture. This is such an important conversation for Christians to be having, but it’s particularly important for Christian creatives to understand the implications of using generative AI for their work and the moral dilemma it presents.

Chris is particularly sharp on this topic, and I hope you find his perspective helpful. To connect with Chris and learn more about his work, visit christopherlind.co.

All episodes are now available in full on Substack and YouTube. On YouTube, Just search ⁠In No Hurry Podcast⁠ and subscribe to be notified when new episodes go live.

If you enjoyed this, consider sharing it with a friend or someone in your life who might need to hear it. And if you want to stay connected, follow In No Hurry Podcast on ⁠Instagram⁠ and the new ⁠TikTok⁠ page for clips, updates, and more from these conversations.

After 40 years in print journalism, Vince Vawter didn’t quite feel finished with writing. In 2013, he published his debut novel, Paperboy — a story about an 11-year-old boy named Victor Vollmer living in Memphis in 1959 who struggles to talk without stuttering. Blending fiction and memoir, the book draws heavily from Vince’s own childhood and the challenges he faced finding his voice.

Paperboy earned a prestigious Newberry Honor in 2014 and has now been published in 22 different languages. Years later, Vince began to imagine the story on stage, and at a friend’s suggestion, it evolved into a musical. In 2023, the Manhattan School of Music performed it in New York, and later this year it will debut professionally at the Weathervane Theatre in Whitefield, New Hampshire.

Following the success of Paperboy, readers wanted more of Victor’s story. Vince obliged, and in 2018 he released Copyboy, which follows Victor at 17, and in 2023 he completed the trilogy with Manboy, where Victor is 21 and still navigating life with a stutter as he becomes a young adult in the tumultuous late 1960s in the U.S.

I’ve known Vince for over two decades — his son and my brother my brother were college roommates and close friends. As I began carving out my own path in journalism, I remember early conversations with him, including our shared connection to the Evansville Courier & Press, though I’m not sure if our time there overlapped when I was working there in high school.

More recently, we reconnected on Substack and have interacted regularly. Now nearing 80, Vince remains as sharp as ever. In February, he released his latest book, The Stuttering Stoic: How an Ancient Philosophy Helped Me Find My Voice.

He joins me on the podcast this week to reflect on his long, accomplished journalism career and what he now calls his “second career” as an author. He also shares about living with a stutter and how writing — along with his study of Stoicism — has helped him find his voice.

Paperboy was originally published by Penguin Random House, one of the industry’s “Big Five” publishers. But along the way, Vince faced pressure to change elements of his story. Wanting to remain true to his voice and experience, he ultimately chose to self-publish rather than compromise, and in this conversation he talks about how he ultimately settled on that decision.

You can learn more about Vince and buy his books at vincevawter.com.

I’d also love to connect with you on Substack, where I write essays and share updates about future episodes. You can find that at ⁠The Road Ahead⁠.

You can also find me on Instagram and Twitter ⁠@ColeClaybourn⁠, and on Facebook under ⁠Cole Douglas Claybourn⁠.

All episodes are now available in full on Substack and YouTube. On YouTube, Just search ⁠In No Hurry Podcast⁠ and subscribe to be notified when new episodes go live.

If you enjoyed this, consider sharing it with a friend or someone in your life who might need to hear it. And if you want to stay connected, follow In No Hurry Podcast on ⁠Instagram⁠ and the new ⁠TikTok⁠ page for clips, updates, and more from these conversations.

For years I felt like I was on somewhat of an island with the very niche topics I tend to write about and follow. Then I met Eddie LaRow.

Rarely have I been able to talk with someone in the writing world who sees things so similarly, whether it’s how we approach the craft of writing, how we view the world and use the art of words to make sense of it, or how we handle the pressures of promoting our work without getting caught in the comparison trap. Perhaps more importantly, we share similar experiences growing up as Millennials (with the same taste in MySpace-era emo punk rock) and see the world through the same lens of the Christian faith.

We also share a heart for Millennials and Gen Z and the plight both generations have experienced into young adulthood. Thanks in part to a lot of shared interests, Eddie and I have gotten to be pretty good friends, especially over the last month or so, and I’m excited to have him on this week’s episode of the podcast.

In this conversation, we talk all things Millennials and Gen Z, especially navigating adolescence and early adulthood before and after the 2007-2008 housing crisis, which has shaped a lot of our adult lives. We talk about education, the rising cost of things promised to us, and how our view of the American Dream is being redefined.

As writers, we talk about where (and if) AI fits into the picture for Christian writing and art, how Gen Z is valuing authenticity more, how parasocial relationships have become the norm for a tech-obsessed culture, and much more.

By day, Eddie is an acquisitions editor for Baker Publishing. But you can also find him writing on Substack for his publication, After Progress. He also has a book coming out in 2028 called After Progress: How an Ancient Faith Roots a Restless Generation, which he shares more about in this conversation.

I highly recommend taking some time to peruse his work, especially if you’re a Millennials or Gen Z reader.

I’d also love to connect with you on Substack, where I write essays and share updates about future episodes. You can find that at ⁠The Road Ahead⁠.

You can also find me on Instagram and Twitter ⁠@ColeClaybourn⁠, and on Facebook under ⁠Cole Douglas Claybourn⁠.

All episodes are now available in full on YouTube. Just search ⁠In No Hurry Podcast⁠ and subscribe to be notified when new episodes go live.

If you enjoyed this, consider sharing it with a friend or someone in your life who might need to hear it. And if you want to stay connected, follow In No Hurry Podcast on ⁠Instagram⁠ and the new ⁠TikTok⁠ page for clips, updates, and more from these conversations.

Another week, another new friend to introduce you to! My guest this week is Stephen Glasser, author of Everyday Adventure: How to Live Your Ordinary Life to the Fullest — a book that helps us stop living on autopilot and instead find more meaning, purpose, and adventure in our lives.

In this conversation, Stephen shares where the heart for the book came from and he goes into details about the creative process he underwent to make it happen. We also talk a lot about the idea of slowing down, remaining present in a connected world, and how we can find more purpose in some of life’s mundane moments.

If you like authentic storytelling with some Biblical wisdom and a little humor, I think you’ll enjoy this conversation and his book. And the foreword is by NFL quarterback Carson Wentz, which I think is super cool.

I really enjoyed getting to know Stephen a little bit, and I hope you enjoy hearing him share about his book and the stories that led to it.

If you’d like to connect with Stephen, you can find him on Instagram (@stephenglasser) and on his website, stephenglasser.com. He also publishes a newsletter called the Tuesletter, which you can sign up for here: https://stephenglasser.com/tuesletter

I’d also love to connect with you on Substack, where I write essays and share updates about future episodes. You can find that at ⁠The Road Ahead⁠.

You can also find me on Instagram and Twitter ⁠@ColeClaybourn⁠, and on Facebook under ⁠Cole Douglas Claybourn⁠.

All episodes are now available in full on YouTube. Just search ⁠In No Hurry Podcast⁠ and subscribe to be notified when new episodes go live.

If you enjoyed this, consider sharing it with a friend or someone in your life who might need to hear it. And if you want to stay connected, follow In No Hurry Podcast on ⁠Instagram⁠ and the new ⁠TikTok⁠ page for clips, updates, and more from these conversations.

I’m excited to introduce you to a new friend this week on the podcast. Her name is Kim Patton, and she’s an author as well as a foster and adoptive mom living in North Carolina with her husband, Kevin, and their daughters, Eden and Shiloh.

Her journey into foster parenting and eventually adoption came after she and her husband endured years of infertility. That’s obviously something my wife Emily and I can relate to, and I’m so grateful Kim let us in on her experience. It’s an amazing example of dealing with deferred dreams and accepting that God’s will is different from our own. I love how she explains the ways in which she’s found beauty through it all.

A big part of our conversation centers around her latest project, the Foster Mama Journal, which was created specifically for foster moms and families. Foster care can be a rather difficult endeavor, and Kim designed this journal to help foster moms process what they’re experiencing and reflect on what God may be teaching them along the way.

Kim shares about the ups and downs of foster and adoptive parenting, the lessons God has taught her through those experiences, and how writing has helped her navigate difficult seasons. We also talk about her broader writing journey and some of the books she’s published over the years.

If you’ve ever been connected to foster care or adoption, or simply walked through a season that felt heavy and uncertain, I think you’ll find a lot to resonate with in Kim’s story.

You can learn more about Kim and her work, including Foster Mama Journal, online at kimpatton.com, on Instagram @fostermamafriend, and on Substack. She’s also the host of the Book Therapy Podcast.
I’d also love to connect with you on Substack, where I write essays and share updates about future episodes. You can find that at ⁠The Road Ahead⁠.

You can also find me on Instagram and Twitter ⁠@ColeClaybourn⁠, and on Facebook under ⁠Cole Douglas Claybourn⁠.

All episodes are now available in full on YouTube. Just search ⁠In No Hurry Podcast⁠ and subscribe to be notified when new episodes go live.

If you enjoyed this, consider sharing it with a friend or someone in your life who might need to hear it. And if you want to stay connected, follow In No Hurry Podcast on ⁠Instagram⁠ and the new ⁠TikTok⁠ page for clips, updates, and more from these conversations.

One of the best aspects about Substack is discovering and connecting with other writers whose words you resonate deeply with. Christina Book is one of those people for me, and I'm excited to introduce her as this week's guest.

I came across Christina’s writing sometime last year, and I quickly noticed how similarly we think and write. I think a big reason for that is the fact that, as Millennials, we share many of the same life experiences — and have walked through many of the same bumps along the way in our faith journeys.

We grew up with a vision of how life should look by a certain age. We were given a roadmap — and we trusted it. But for many of us, reality has turned out very differently. Now, we live with this pressure of feeling like we’re behind — not having checked off milestones like marriage, buying a house, or starting a family by the age we once assumed we would. At the same time, many are carrying the weight of student loan debt from degrees that haven’t delivered the return we were promised.

Now in her early 30s, Christina offers a thoughtful and honest perspective on all of this. I especially appreciate her insights on dating and singleness — what it looks like to desire marriage and a family while also learning to live with contentment in the waiting. We also talk about the lasting impact of the Church’s “purity culture” messaging from our teenage years, and how we’re both still untangling some of that as we navigate dating and marriage.

We also talk about the challenge of building friendships and meaningful relationships as adults — something that’s often harder than we expect and rarely talked about enough. From there, we get into the realities of navigating career changes and the pressure that comes with trying to make the “right” decisions in a season of life that can feel anything but clear.

If you’re a young adult, this conversation is especially for you. But even if you’re not, I hope it offers a window into the unique struggles many young adults are facing and helps you become a source of wisdom, empathy, and encouragement in their lives.

You can connect with Christina and read her work on Substack, where she runs Storystead Co. I’d also love to connect with you there — check out The Road Ahead to stay up to date on future podcast episodes and essays.

You can also find me on Instagram and Twitter @ColeClaybourn, and on Facebook under Cole Douglas Claybourn.

Starting this week, you can watch this episode — and all future episodes — in full on YouTube. Just search In No Hurry Podcast and subscribe to be notified when new episodes go live.

If you enjoyed this, consider sharing it with a friend or someone in your life who might need to hear it. And if you want to stay connected, follow In No Hurry Podcast on Instagram and the new TikTok page for clips, updates, and more from these conversations.

One of my favorite kinds of conversations is the kind where it feels like you’ve known someone for a long time — even if you just met them.

That’s exactly what this week’s episode felt like with author and poet Tanner Olson.

From the very beginning, it felt like we had a lot in common. What followed was a fun and insightful conversation about writing, creativity, faith, and his new book, Getting Through What You’re Going Through, which releases on Feb. 17, 2026.

Tanner shares how he got into poetry through a love of music, specifically punk rock, and a desire to put words to what he was feeling. That eventually led him into spoken word, traveling the country, and building a career out of something he never originally planned.

We also talk about what poetry actually is — or maybe more accurately, what it doesn’t have to be. Tanner explains how he approaches poetry as a way to communicate something deeper that helps people feel less alone.

A big part of our conversation centers around the heart behind his new book. Much of it was written during a difficult season in his life, including walking through unexplained infertility with his wife, and the general weight of living through uncertain times.

It’s a conversation that, if you're familiar with what Emily and I have endured the last few years, hit pretty close to home for me.

We talk about what it feels like to walk through seasons where you don’t know when or if things will change, the tension between hope and doubt, the questions you bring to God when the answers don’t come, and how sometimes, the goal isn’t to rush past what you’re going through, but to actually walk through it, one step at a time.

Tanner’s book is rooted in the idea that even in the middle of pain, confusion, and waiting, there are still words that can carry you forward.

If you’ve ever felt stuck in a season you didn’t choose, or wondered how to hold onto faith when life doesn’t look the way you expected, I think this conversation will resonate with you.

To connect with Tanner, you can find him on Substack under Tanner Olson, on Instagram @writtentospeak, and his website writtentospeak.com.

You can find Getting Through What You’re Going Through wherever books are sold.

—

I’d also love to connect with you.

You can find me on Substack at The Road Ahead:
coledouglasclaybourn.substack.com

You can also find more of my writing at:
coleclaybourn.com

And on social media:

Instagram: @coleclaybourn
Twitter: @ColeClaybourn
Facebook: facebook.com/ColeDouglasClaybourn

It's Valentine's Day, so what better time to talk about all things singleness, dating, and sex? My guest this week, Bridgett Blood, is here to provide some unique perspectives on all of these topics.

Bridgett lives in Nashville, Tennessee and is a certified Connection Codes coach, speaker, and host of the Recover Your Life Podcast. She helps Christian singles, dating, and engaged couples understand their sexual story, and build relationships that align with their core values. 

Through her coaching and group programs, Bridgett creates spaces for honest conversations about faith, sexuality, and emotional health — empowering her clients to move toward the life and relationships they truly desire.

With a background in pastoral leadership and a passion for trauma-informed discipleship, Bridgett understands the tension of holding both faith and desire. Her approach is rooted in curiosity and emotional safety, helping others reconnect with their wholeness.

You'll hear me talk on this episode about how much I appreciate her social media content, so I highly recommend giving her a follow on Instagram @bridgettblood.

You can links to all of her other resources, including her brand new free E-book on boundaries, right here: https://stan.store/bridgettblood

I'd also love for you to connect with me on Substack on "The Road Ahead": ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠coledouglasclaybourn.substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. You can also find more of my articles and content at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠coleclaybourn.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and on social media:

Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@coleclaybourn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@ColeClaybourn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

Also find me on Facebook at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠facebook.com/ColeDouglasClaybourn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠