The podcast begins with an extensive report on Kenya, with all that's going on over there right now. Listeners to this podcast have given over two million dollars to help in a corner of the world where no one else is present to help people who are dying of starvation and disease. It's an incredible story! Then Brad and Wayne switch gears and talk about a recent New York Times article about how the destruction that comes from our social media platforms, is because their algorithms were designed simply for the bottom-line benefit of the company unchecked by any moral considerations. By pursuing the next dopamine hit, we are drawn deeper into captivity and away from the contemplative spaces that allow us to engage him.

Podcast Notes:

Big Tech's Original Sin in the NY Times

If You Can Help Us in Kenya

Wayne's daughter, Julie, joins him for this podcast that begins with some listener comments and questions about parenting. They also look at probably the most wicked words ever written about marriage and women, hoping to help women and the men who love them out of any residue of that kind of thinking. One theme kept cropping up in each of these that is central to a healthy and productive family life—respect. To get it you have to give it. Parenting from power will lead to rebellion as kids get older and to disconnection inside a marriage. Finding your way to mutual respect will be a well of life.

Podcast Notes:

If You Can Help Us in Kenya

James was arrested for murder, eventually convicted, and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. No one could have been more shocked at this unfolding tragedy than the mom who had watched her son grow up with faith in God, achieve as a straight-A student, and then be appointed to the U.S. Naval Academy. How she continued to embrace the love of the Father when her worst nightmare was coming true, is the story of Ralaine Cunningham's new book, Burden of Promise. Wayne has known her for over 50 years and joins Julie and him to tell her story and the lessons she learned along the way. (In the photo above: left to right: James, Anthony, Hannah, and Ralaine.)

Podcast Notes:

Dateline story on the murder

Buy Burden of Promise on Amazon

Connect with Ralaine by Facebook, or email

If You Can Help Us in Kenya

 

Wayne and Brad continue their exploration of a chart of 24 biases that affect the way we process life around us and how they can keep us from recognizing the truth, even while we're certain that we have it. If you haven't heard last week's podcast, you might want to go back and check it out because it sets the contest for this one.  Find out how the Curse of knowledge can keep you from responding freely, or how your in-group bias will only make you more unaware of what others are going through. And, don't get us started on the Fundamental Attribution Error. This chart provides some fun and insightful rabbit trails to help us live more freely.

Podcast Notes:

The Bias Chart at weforum.org

If You Can Help Us in Kenya

What if the thing you believe to be true with all of your heart and soul, turns out to be false?  Then, where are you?  Bias is everywhere! It can be eye-opening to realize how much bias we pick up going through life that allows some of our familiar interpretative patterns to keep us from seeing the truth. The School of Thought has published a chart of 24 biases that affect how we see life that affect our ability to actually see what's true. Wayne and Brad work through the chart exploring their own biases and how our awareness of them can help us avoid their pitfalls and live more freely in the world.

Podcast Notes:

The Bias Chart at weforum.org

The latest news from our project in Kenya

For one listener, our podcast on Seeing God as He Really Is filled him with thoughts of unbelief, or so he wrote to Wayne and Brad. They unpack his concerns as they once again encounter the question as to whether God always wants to heal sicknesses? And, what do we conclude if he doesn't? Living in God's ultimate purpose in a broken Creation, doesn't allow for easy answers to those questions. But he does offer to be our guide through anything life can throw at us. They end with a discussion about Job's journey and the insights it gives us to following God when our circumstances are not what we desire.

Podcast Notes:

The latest news from our project in Kenya

A gospel that only concerns itself with getting people saved and does not help them come alive in the kingdom where God reigns, is a truncated Gospel that will leave people bored and empty, adrift in the cares of the world. On Wayne's recent trip to Tulsa, he catches up with his dear friend Tom Mohn, for a conversation about the kingdom of God, and why it would be best for us to be more focused on his kingdom than we are on his church. Living in the ways of the kingdom is what brings depth and vitality to our walk in Christ. How do we let this kingdom live through us, as it shapes our lives and reveals his light and wonder to a world in desperate need of him, even if they don't know it yet?

Podcast Notes:

The Demand Project

Tom's Podcast: Good Morning Fellow Pilgrim

Tom's Book: Good Morning Brother Pilgrim

The Unshakeable Kingdom and the Unchanging Person by E. Stanley Jones

Previous Podcasts with Tom

The latest news from our project in Kenya

Do you as a parent have the power, or even the responsibility, to change your children? Thinking you do, misunderstands your role as a parent and will undermine the relationship God wants you to have with your children. That's the conclusion found in the Introduction to Parenting: 14 Gospel Principles that Can Radically Change Your Family by Paul David Tripp. This week Wayne and Julie begin their conversation about parenting using this book as a launching pad to talk about parenting from their experience and passions. This week's focus is on not taking ownership of your children, but to see yourself as God's vessel to expose them to him and to his grace.

Podcast Notes:

Parenting: 14 Gospel Principles that Can Radically Change Your Family by Paul David Tripp

Loving Our Kids on Purpose by Danny Silk

The latest news from our project in Kenya

A listener email starts a discussion about calling, especially as it relates to full-time ministry. Brad and Wayne try to parse out the genuine from the contrived as they talk about their own sense of calling and whether or not the pastor's role as it has emerged over the centuries fulfills what Jesus had in mind. Brad is becoming increasingly involved in a local congregation that has asked his help in exploring a more vibrant relationship with God, but it already encountering some of the dynamics that make that difficult. Exalting someone above others and investing them with an "anointing" others must follow, has probably done more to sidetrack the church, creating it in our image instead of his.

Podcast Notes:

The latest news from our project in Kenya

Wayne and Brad follow up last week's podcast by continuing to talk about the challenge of forsaking our own best-laid plans, to go on a more fulfilling adventure of following him even if we haven't the foggiest idea where he is leading us. Realizing almost all of us seem to prefer him giving us a strategic plan we can follow from start to finish, it is a constant vigil to stay true to his working. None of us can see far enough ahead, nor all the variables God does so we easily end up getting our plans and hopes confused with his. However, to be able to follow him that way, we have to be won into a depth of love and trust that will allow us to be comfortable with uncertainty and unresolved circumstances as he shows us the way through.

Podcast Notes:

The latest news from our project in Kenya