Stories Are Soul Food

Yes, these two topics are both related, but not in the way you're thinking. Brian asks Nate a vital parenting question for anyone with boys -- how do you deal with kids talking about gross things? Nate points out that it's God who made the world with poop, pee, and barf in it, but it's also God who forbid coarse jesting. So Nate's family had a no-tolerance approach to fart jokes, for example; or yuk-yukking it up about poop and pee. But Nate also has a keen eye for the gross parts of God's storytelling, so there's nothing wrong with noticing and being amused when your infant destroys her new Easter outfit. This is all related to Shrek; but the real damage of Shrek is not in the earwax or swamp farting but in the "princess to monster" character arc that Princess Fiona epitomized. The guys break down wish fulfillment of Fiona's sort and how it has perverted (technical word) most of our modern storylines.

Around election time people get addicted to bad stories, downing them cocktail after cocktail. And that's because presidential elections, which are the beauty pageants of babylon, usually turn on this simple storytelling question: Who can tell the most compelling tale about their opponents? Harris-Walz is trying with video games and guns and abortion; Trump-Vance is trying with filthy comedians and French fries and free speech. Analysis gets really entertaining when you get to watch how fringe elements on both side stand where their opponents tell them to stand and say what their opponents tell them to say (this is where AOC and groypers overlap in their hatred of Israel, and where fascists and communists sort everyone into categories based on sunburn-ability). In literary terms, we Americans in 2024 are living in a black comedy, which is a satire in which the main characters cannot see that the rules they live by are crazy. But the audience can. And unfortunately, black comedies usually end in destruction for everyone but the audience. Speaking of audiences: who is your audience? What matters for you, right now, on a Tuesday afternoon, isn't the centuries-long stories God is telling of the rise and fall of nations -- it's how you treat your wife, kids, boss, pastor; and how your actions are telling a story to everyone you live with. So, vote for Trump, but God is the only Storyteller who should have control of your emotions. Stories are soul food, after all.

Public perception of Christianity has soured in the past decade -- and so has most of the famous "Christian" nonfiction -- titles such as The Shack, Love Wins, Blue Like Jazz, Love Does, Wild at Heart have aged like milk. In contrast, Brian asks Nate why his own nonfiction seems so well suited for the negative world. Notes from the Tilt-a-Whirl is now a barrel-aged 15-year whiskey, the gospel of story. Death by Living is a bold declaration of your mortality in a time when "normal" dreams are shattering. The guys discuss why storytelling is kingdom work, and why the Gospel of Story is a key skill for every Christian living now to develop. Nate also addresses readers who don't like his writing, and that one secular reviewer who, days after publishing a positive review, accosted Nate with this realization of how Christianity had tiptoed into his books: "You pulled that C.S. Lewis s***." Find the matching hardcover sets of each book at ndwilson.com.

See if you can guess this author who has sold over 200 million copies: His comic work consists of nonstop adventure featuring a boy-faced hero and his little white dog. Yes, this Stories Are Soul Food episode is about Herge, Tintin, and Snowy (or Milou, if you're Belgian, and want the dog to be named after Herge's girlfriend). Nate and Brian discuss Herge's influence on their development, Spielberg's sorta unsatisfying adaptation, and the excellent Tintin cartoons now available on Canon+ (better than Spielberg?? yes!). Nate also challenges SASF listeners to show episodes of Tintin to their children (5th grade and under) and see what comes out of brains fed with this adventurous soul food. (Do let the SASF pod know what comes of it.) The guys also discuss Herge's blatantly bad spots (Tintin in the Congo) and their excitement at being able to share a childhood favorite with so many other families. If that sounds good, sign up for a free trial at joincanonplus.com.

The internet is still smoldering from the aftermath of a Tucker Carlson interview in which Darryl Cooper of the pop history podcast Martyr Made called Winston Churchill "a chief villain of World War 2." Brian asks Nate about historical heroes, the great wars, whether Winston Churchill is hero or villain, and why the explosion of boomer rage over the Churchill criticism in the first place. Nate returns these questions with extra helpings of spice, laying into historical revisionists of all sorts who think that THEY are the judge, and that a great man's legacy rises or falls after each new podcast claim. And, at the same time, he gives his answers to whether Winston had bigger flaws than we think (probably). Churchill is the last championship banner hanging in the gym -- why wouldn't we love him, even if he had flaws? To make sure everyone is angry, Nate also makes a case for the nuclear end to WW2, showing that historical revisionists, even when they've got a point, are always taking shots from the cheap seats.

Did you know that N.D. Wilson found a method that would have allowed a medieval to fake the Shroud using glass and paint, including photo negativity and all? This Stories Are Soul Food episode has the entire scoop -- including: Nate's impetus for the whole experiment (a professor discarded the Bible because the Shroud was "proof of the resurrection"); how the inspiration came to him (through a monstrous collection of G.K. Chesterton's Father Brown stories); and how his theory continues to be ignored by contemporary Roman Catholics (although the medieval Roman Catholics declared that the Shroud of Turin was fake because they'd found the craftsman who had faked it!). You'll also hear why, if you believe your Bible, you already should have known the Shroud was fake. But for the first time in the modern era, we've got a frontrunner for how the Shroud of Turin was made (and it wasn't made at the moment of Resurrection).

After a quick discussion of Brian's decision to shout more at Nate to please a few vocal liseners, the SASF guys discuss what it takes to sell more than 8 million copies of your books. Turns out, if you published in the 2010s, putting "Girl" in the title pretty much did it. If you follow publishing, you should be able to guess the books that sold the most copies in the 2010s: EL James's 50 Shades series (the trilogy sold 35 million copies). Nate and Brian discuss the crisis that publishing such successful smut caused Random House -- and how RH made it go away. They also introduce you to Doug Wilson's reviews of Twilight and 50 Shades. Then they move on to identifying the expertise required to sell what fills out the rest of the top 10 list for the previous decade in this books-focused episode of Stories Are Soul Food. Includes discussions of Hunger Games, The Help, Gone Girl on a Train with Tattoos, Divergent, and more, all of which sold about 8 million copies or more.

Will we tell stories in heaven? Nate says the answer is so obvious it's a dumb question. Brian tries to make him answer anyway. Instead, Nate talks about a sci-fi story he is working on in which nobody lives past age 18. Turns out storytelling is fundamental to humanity, and we should be living like it now. Then Brian brings up a related listener question about how to choose what you're doing with your life now: What happens if you're working a blue collar job but you want to go to seminary and you also want to write? Prepare for an episode of Life Advice with Nate , and you best believe he's not sympathetic to decision paralysis. Pick what you want to do, and do it. God doesn't steer a parked car. You'll often get Open Doors when you least expect it, because your life is a story, and you don't get to know what happens in the future. The conversation blasts off into a conversation about human nature and winning the lottery, and how we love to complain in the midst of richness. You'll also get to know Grandpa Kohl's slogan, "Better than I deserve," and how you should look for God's choicest wines in the cellar of affliction (Rutherford). You'll also notice we opened this week's SASF with a new song just for fun: Check out Aaron Rench's "Fences" streaming everywhere now.

Prepare for a very convicting episode of Stories Are Soul Food. Jesus warns of one kind of seed that springs up fast but quickly withers away. It's this kind of character the SASF guys discuss today, with Brian asking questions about Saul and Judas. Nate identifies one fundamental error such characters always make: They mistake their place in the story, making themselves the main character. Saul thinks the kingdom of Israel is about him. Judas thinks he can make the Messiah drive out the Romans. But the most common place Nate has seen this error? Parents. Moms who can't see past their own trials. Dads who sabotage their kids goals for their own. Turns out, mis-reading the story is the way we all make things easier on themselves.

Nate and Brian invite Forrest Dickison on to make sure he takes first place as SASF'S Most Invited Guest. But really they want to discuss Forrest's debut picture book, Crispin's Rainy Day, a story about a boy who wants to join a crew of pirate frogs -- but only if he can escape from his little sister first. The book is a perfect chocolate chip story with stunning illustrations -- meant to be enjoyed as a family -- but it has a contentious depiction of gender roles reflected in the relationship between Crispin and his sister Rose. "Contentious" means "traditional" in this case -- Rose wields delicious slices of cake and is completely uninterested in swords. The discussion of the heroic feminine leads naturally into a discussion of Miyazaki's latest feature film, The Boy and the Heron, with some amazing female characters of its own and bold narrative choices (man-eating parakeets, anyone?). Forrest calls it a masterpiece; Brian wanted it to be better. You'll have to listen to the episode to find out what Nate thought. If you're an NC Wyeth fan, you'll also get some recognition in this episode. Visit crispinsrainyday.com for more.