This week's episode features audio from a lecture by Ben Keyes entitled, The True Object of Human Longing: Re-embracing Dominion and Trust.

Ben Keyes grew up in Massachusetts at the Southborough L’Abri with the impression that having crowds of strangers in his home was a normal thing. From an early age he loved to play music. When he was in high school his family joined an African American church and Ben became involved in the music ministry—learning how to play gospel piano and bass guitar. He attended Brown University where he studied ethnomusicology. In 2002 he spent 6 months studying at the English L’Abri.

Ben Keyes studied Theology and the Arts at Regent College in Vancouver and directed a large gospel choir as part of his final thesis project. While at Regent, Ben and two of his classmates started a folk trio called Ordinary Time which sings both original songs and arrangements of old hymns. Ordinary Time has recorded 5 albums to date.

In 2007 Ben and his wife, Nickaela began working at the Southborough L’Abri and have been there ever since. In 2016 Ben and Nickaela became co-directors of the Southborough branch. They have twin daughters and a son. Ben loves to cook, lead music at his church, give lectures, read to his children, carve wooden birds, play the banjo, and tie flies.

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This week's episode features audio from a workshop with Sarah Chestnut entitled, Reflecting on the Incarnation with the Help of Poets: Jesus’ Humanity and Ours. 

The incarnation is central both to the revealing of God to the world and the redemption and restoration of true humanness. How might poems by Christian Wiman, Andrew Hudgens, Mary Karr, and Tracy K. Smith give us imagination and hope for the restoration of our broken humanity?

Sarah Chestnut grew up in a small, rural community in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, outside Yosemite National Park. Her parents own a small furniture manufacturing business and she has fond childhood memories of days spent at the workshop making sawdust and woodchip pizzas with her younger sister. 

After college, Sarah taught English in the Czech Republic for two years, then went to Regent College in Vancouver, BC for her Master’s in Christianity and the Arts, where she met Joshua. The Chestnuts have been at Southborough L’Abri since 2013. They have two children, Jacob and Lily.  Sarah loves writing poetry, gardening, and making sourdough bread. She also loves the stone walls of New England, the walking trails near L’Abri, and Indian food. 

Autumn used to be her favorite season, but after five winters in Southborough, now it’s Spring. Sarah makes pizza for family pizza night every week—not with sawdust and woodchips.

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This week's episode features audio from a lecture with Dick Keyes called, "Early Peacemaking: Can Conflict be Outmaneuvered Before it Starts?"

Much has been well-said and well-written about conflict resolution. But it is, by definition, reactive to conflicts already burning. Christian peacemaking is more proactive, with strategies which can help to avoid conflict altogether.

Dick Keyes is the former director of Southborough L’Abri Fellowship, where he has worked with his wife and family since 1979. He holds a B.A. in History from Harvard University and an M.Div. from Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia.

Dick has also worked for L’Abri Fellowship in Switzerland and in England. He served as a pastor in the International Presbyterian Church in London for eight years. He has been an adjunct professor at Gordon Conwell Seminary and Westminster Theological Seminary.

Dick is the author of Beyond Identity and many other titles and is currently writing a book on the significance of Jesus’ questions. He has lectured widely in the U.S. and also in Europe and Korea.

Dick and his wife, Mardi, are minority members of an African American Church, which has enriched their lives and experience of worship enormously. Dick is a member of the Ministerial Team.

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This week's episode features audio from a workshop with Jock McGregor called, "T.S. Eliot’s Idea of a Christian Society".

In our Post-Christian society, as Evangelicals struggle to find their place, a growing number of ‘options’ are being considered – from “Benedict’ to ‘Wilberforce” and everything in between. One voice from the past may, somewhat surprisingly, offer perspective – the famous twentieth-20th Century British poet, T.S. Eliot.

Jock McGregor and his wife Alison have worked at the Rochester L’Abri for the past 16 years. They met at Swiss L’Abri in the early 80’s when Jock was on staff there. They also worked for ten years with L’Abri in England. Jock, who grew up in Africa, has a B.Sc undergraduate degree and an M.Div. from Regent College in Vancouver, Canada. Jock has lectured widely on many topics related to the relationship between Christianity and contemporary culture. Alison, who is Australian, worked in computing for 3M Australia before joining Jock in the ministry of L’Abri.

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This week's episode features audio from a workshop by Phillip Johnston entitled, The Perfect Lie of Liberty - Pursuing Freedom in a Culture of Choice.

An inescapable aspect of life today is a constant sense of FOMO (fear of missing out). We are awash in options, a condition that has led to increased anxiety rather than enduring peace. At the root of this anxiety is a commonplace misunderstanding of freedom. What if true freedom is more than simply the ability to choose what we want?

Phillip Johnston’s L’Abri journey began in 2008 when he walked through the big red door at Southborough L’Abri and quickly realized his abundant cynicism was a vice, not a virtue. Though a Christian from an early age, this dawning awareness opened his heart to the beauty of Christ and left him a changed person.

In the ensuing years, Phillip spent time as a helper at Southborough and at English L’Abri before enrolling at Covenant Theological Seminary in 2012. After completing a Master of Divinity in 2015, Phillip took up a post as a worker at English L’Abri for over two years. While in England, he met a Nashvillian named Christa and returned to the USA to marry her in 2018. He now lives and works in East Nashville.

Phillip is an avid student of the Bible and culture, and finds great joy in helping people navigate the many barriers to Christian belief that proliferate in our distracting, secular world. He geeks out on slow movies, Bach cantatas, liturgical theology, and all things food. He’s also the curator of Three Things, a newsletter digest of three resources to help readers better engage with God, neighbor, and culture.

To receive e-mail updates about the podcast including lecture handouts, articles, books referenced in the lectures and updates about future gatherings, please submit your e-mail address at nashvillelabriconference.com. 

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This week's episode features audio from a workshop by Joshua Chestnut entitled, Cultivating a Hopeful Imagination in a Pornified Culture.

In this workshop we will consider some of the fragmenting and dehumanizing consequences of pornography with the help of recent neurological and sociological research on the unseen costs of habitually viewing porn. We will then explore the importance of developing the virtues of patience, imagination and hope for ourselves and friends who are struggling to stay human in our pornified culture.

Joshua originally hails from Brooklyn, New York but has lived in the Deep South as well as on the West Coast.  He received his Master of Arts in Theology from Regent College in beautiful Vancouver, BC where he also met and married his wife Sarah. 

Prior to being at L’Abri, Joshua was employed as a house painter, a mental health worker and a pool-cleaner (but not all at the same time). Joshua’s teaching interests usually revolve around the Bible as well as the intersection of Christian faith with post-Christian culture. 

If he can’t be found doing a project around the house or with his nose in some book, he’s most likely either playing with his two young kids or attempting to fly fish. 

Joshua and his wife Sarah are workers at the Southborough branch of L'Abri.

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This week's episode features audio from a workshop by Dave Friedrich entitled, The Ark of Speech.

“How far does our hospitality go? How far can it go? What can we welcome and gather in, and how? Hospitality is, first and foremost, the hospitality that we give each other, exchanging words and silences, glances and voices. And yet…” These are the opening words of The Ark of Speech, by poet and theologian Jean-Louis Chretien, who is also one of France’s leading philosophers. In this workshop we will explore how to move beyond mere digital connection that leaves us alone together, and into a shelter for conversation, a safe place where we are heard, challenged and changed.

Dave Friedrich was born and raised in Canada. After attending Tyndale University for Biblical Studies he went on to study philosophy at York University in Toronto for his Bachelor’s, and then completed a Master’s with a concentration in Spiritual Theology at Regent College, Vancouver. 

After backpacking Europe, Dave ended up at the Swiss L’Abri where he met Anna, his lovely wife-to-be. Their two delightful sons were born in Ohio where Dave worked in a church as a Youth Director. He then had an itching to live bi-vocationally which led him to become a professional firefighter/paramedic, and an ordained Anglican minister. 

The Friedrichs then spent some time working at the Swiss L’Abri before landing at Southborough L’Abri. Dave was an on-call firefighter in Switzerland and continues to be one in Southborough, where he is discovering the joy of stand-up paddleboarding. 

To receive e-mail updates about the podcast including lecture handouts, articles, books referenced in the lectures and updates about future gatherings, please submit your e-mail address at nashvillelabriconference.com. 

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This week's episode features audio from a lecture with Dick Keyes called, "America’s Polarized Politics: Can Christians have a Redemptive Role?"

We live in a society which has created a level of political polarization almost to paralysis. The word “Evangelical” has come to signify a voting block more than a theological or spiritual designation for many people. What can thoughtful Christian people say and do to help in healing this disunity?

Dick Keyes is the former director of Southborough L’Abri Fellowship, where he has worked with his wife and family since 1979. He holds a B.A. in History from Harvard University and an M.Div. from Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia.

Dick has also worked for L’Abri Fellowship in Switzerland and in England. He served as a pastor in the International Presbyterian Church in London for eight years. He has been an adjunct professor at Gordon Conwell Seminary and Westminster Theological Seminary.

Dick is the author of Beyond Identity and many other titles and is currently writing a book on the significance of Jesus’ questions. He has lectured widely in the U.S. and also in Europe and Korea.

Dick and his wife, Mardi, are minority members of an African American Church, which has enriched their lives and experience of worship enormously. Dick is a member of the Ministerial Team.

To receive e-mail updates about the podcast including lecture handouts, articles, books referenced in the lectures and updates about future gatherings, please submit your e-mail address via this link or at nashvillelabriconference.com. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week's episode features audio from a lecture with Anna Friedrich entitled, Grief and Anger: Appropriate Responses at the Tomb of Lazarus, in Dylan Thomas’ poem “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night”, and in Our Own Lives.

It is easier for some of us to make room for sadness than for anger, especially in the wake of tragedy, or even in the plain old story of getting older. Dylan Thomas’s famous poem of imperatives for his dying father set alongside the reaction of Jesus at his friend’s tomb, can together spark helpful reflections on how grief and anger are often just the right responses to the brokenness we encounter in our world.

Anna Friedrich grew up in southern Virginia, playing guitar, frequenting thrift stores, and dreaming of being a missionary in Africa or in the Amazon someday. After a semester abroad in Nairobi, Kenya, and a brief stint studying music, she read one shining paragraph in a book by Steve Garber that mentioned a place in Switzerland called L’Abri, where questions were welcome, so she packed her bags and headed to Europe.

A two-month stay at L’Abri turned into two years, an engagement, a wedding, and a little later – a baby! She went on to work at several churches in the role of Worship Director, but has spent most of her adult life homeschooling her two sons, Cole and Adam (and she may have written one hit youtube song about the periodic table). Anna has been back in L’Abri work since 2013, when she and her family moved to Switzerland to serve there for four years. Since 2017, she has been a part of the Southborough L’Abri team, enjoying a new-found love of poetry, and a new-found ability to cope with winter in New England. She loves to teach the Bible most of all, but also enjoys leading discussions on spiritual disciplines and practices, poetry, creation care, and butterflies.

Anna is currently working towards a Graduate Diploma through Regent College in Canada.

To receive e-mail updates about the podcast including lecture handouts, articles, books referenced in the lectures and updates about future gatherings, please submit your e-mail address via this link or at nashvillelabriconference.com. 

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This week's episode features audio from a workshop with Mary Frances Giles called, "What Does the Bible Have to Tell us About Sexual Harassment and #MeToo?"

Over the course of the past two years, the #MeToo movement has catapulted sexual harassment and assault, primarily against women, to the forefront of our cultural awareness. There appears to be a shift occurring in our collective American consciousness. Acts of sexual harassment and assault that have been historically overlooked are now being publicly discussed and confronted. This workshop will explore the issues and questions brought forth by this cultural moment from both theological and sociological perspectives.

Mary Frances Giles has worked for L’Abri in Southborough since 2010. A native of Tennessee, she has lived in the greater Boston area for over 20 years and is a member of Park Street Church in Boston. She received a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Georgia and a Masters Degree from Boston University, both in the area of speech-language pathology.

She worked as a pediatric speech pathologist for over ten years in both schools and hospitals in the Boston area before moving into the non-profit sector. At L’Abri, Mary Frances’ interests lean toward the relationship between the Christian faith and practical daily life, and how our personal stories intersect with the larger story God is writing for the world.

When she’s not at L’Abri you are most likely to find her at the beach, kayaking, exploring new restaurants with friends, or searching for that ever-elusive perfect shade of lipstick.

To receive e-mail updates about the podcast including lecture handouts, articles, books referenced in the lectures and updates about future gatherings, please submit your e-mail address via this link or at nashvillelabriconference.com. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.