Why Our Friendships Matter In Relation To Our Career and Identity

In Part 2 of this conversation, B.Davis and Dr. Jason Barnhart turn to the topic of friendship and the challenge of being truly known. Drawing from Jason’s upcoming book, they explore why meaningful friendships can feel so difficult, especially for men, and how our tendency to fix rather than listen gets in the way of real connection.

Jason shares personal stories about vulnerability, emotional growth, and the role friendships play in shaping who we become. They also connect friendship back to calling, showing how deep relationships are essential to understanding ourselves and living with purpose.

This episode is an honest look at what it takes to build lasting, meaningful friendships and why it matters more than we often admit.

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:01

You're listening to episode two of my conversation with Reverend Dr. Jason Barnhart. If you missed part one, go back last week and you'll check that out. Jason talks about friendship, calling, charting your life, and how theology impacts what you think about your job and your career and your vocation. You don't want to miss episode one. If you're checking this one out, go on back and check it out.

SPEAKER_02 0:40

Hey everybody, this is CallerID. We're calling about your identity, your direction, and what you're doing with your life. Brandon David as well. Let's dig into what we're really doing here.

SPEAKER_05 0:57

And when I think of the legacy folks that I've had in my life, they often weren't the ones who are publishing like crazy.

SPEAKER_03 1:03

The Donhart Reinhardt and folks like Yes, you know.

SPEAKER_05 1:07

These are ones who said, I committed to a place and I went deep with students. But I tell you, the the cost of that is that I have to daily, you know, in Christian language, I would say crucify or allow to be crucified, daily have to go, Jason, that's not stop looking that way. That's not why you're here. And by the way, doesn't mean those who feel called that way are bad. It takes a village to be able to do this. This is this is your contribution that you bring here. And be reminded again of those values.

SPEAKER_00 1:46

Can I tell a quick story real quick?

SPEAKER_05 1:47

Yeah, yeah, please. So many years ago, we were living inside the city limits here. And Brandon, you know the Freer Field that we have. And at this time there was no walking path through Freer Field. Now there's a nice little paved path and everything. And every Christmas, the mayor thinks that we need to have lots of lights and fireworks, but you know, we won. Absolutely, yes. Uh, but uh it's lovely, it's it is lovely. I'm not trying to cast the spurs at it.

SPEAKER_03 2:15

Back in my day, uh, we we didn't have fireworks Christmas lights, and it took 40 minutes for the Appalachian to really, really rear its head. That's okay. That's a good run. We had a good run of academic into Appalachian Jason.

SPEAKER_05 2:29

That's back in my day, you go to Free Field, you walk uphill both ways in the snow. Snow with nothing but wonder wonder bread bags on your feet. But anyway, uh so we were driving by the the woods there one day, and I felt like this weird kind of like twinge. And and those who don't have faith listening to this, you're I get it. This is gonna sound weird, okay, and there's no other way I can describe it, okay. But there's also the apartment that's just deeply mystical as well. And so we drove by, and as we're driving home, I said, I told Allison, um, I need to go into the woods. She's like, Do you need to use the bathroom? I mean, we're we're so close to home. And so I'm like, No, I just I need I need to go in the woods. I had no idea. There was literally some deep voice within me saying, Come to the woods. And so she remembered, it's it's a spring morning. She drops me off and she goes, When do I pick you up? I don't know. Whenever, whenever I'm done. And I got out of the car and walked into the woods.

SPEAKER_03 3:35

I love this.

SPEAKER_05 3:36

And so I spent four hours. And by the way, for those Brandon knows this, for those who don't know, this is not a big patch of woods.

SPEAKER_02 3:45

No. Okay. No.

SPEAKER_05 3:46

Okay, so uh it's it's not a forest. This is not Sherwood Forest, right? Yeah, yeah, no. Okay, it's it's like you know, a small group of pine trees said, you know what, let's gather. Um, and so we're I'm I'm walking through this, and and and and I had all kinds of you know various experiences while I was in the woods that I won't go into detail about. I'm walking out and I'm just going, okay, Lord, I I I'm feeling kind of a pull towards teaching. And even in that moment, trying to go, my gosh, but what kind of teacher will I be? You know, Lord, give me a sign. I just need to see something here about what kind of teacher I'm to be. And no kidding, Brandon, you've already mentioned uh his name. As soon as I walked out of the woods, I looked over to the road passing by, a car beeped, and it was Don Reinhardt waving at me as he was driving by.

SPEAKER_02 4:40

Wow.

SPEAKER_05 4:42

You know, and you go, okay, there's something there for me to take.

SPEAKER_03 4:48

And for people who don't know, Don Reinhardt, Dr. Don Reinhardt was a legendary professor at Ashland University who impacted so many people's lives, him and his wife Jan. And Don was, I mean, he was at almost all of our weddings, and like he was very impactful on my wife's faith, and which then became impactful on my faith, like this this huge ripple effect on the community that has spread outside of Ashland, and that's a legacy.

SPEAKER_05 5:17

When I talk about calling, this is where I think, and yeah, I first I should I I should qualify what I said about Ashland's you know, life center, you know, career, whatever it's called, uh the center based on life centering, like life calling and career.

SPEAKER_03 5:32

Career center for life calling.

SPEAKER_05 5:34

Sure. There you go, thank you. Um is they're not alone in this, is that most colleges, if they talk about calling, it's so intimately tied to career. Career is the expression of a calling. Your calling should be something that takes up your entire life. You you you need the amount of time you have to be able to fulfill the calling. A lot of times what I find is people aren't thinking big enough when they think about their calling, they're thinking too narrow. Um, because calling is not just the job, calling is what kind of dad am I going to be? You know, what what kind of human being am I going to be? You know, all kinds of stuff. What kind of husband am I going to be? Listening to your life, want to add, is is not just navel gazing. Okay, you know, friendship kind of pulls out of that, but it's also a matter of thinking through what kind of people do you gravitate towards when you think of those you know who are older than you, who are people that you go, my goodness gracious, there's just something about them.

SPEAKER_03 6:34

This is a great question, right? This is a great comment because, for example, so this morning I'm driving to work to drop off my son at school. And out of the blue, I get a phone call from a former teacher of mine from high school, who I coached with briefly as well, who called me to say, Hey, I listened to your first podcast. It was great, it's so good. I just wanted to encourage you. I was like, whoa, makes me emotional now thinking that, right? Because this guy's so full of joy, and we're gonna have him on the on the show on the show at some point as well, Dave Piper, who uh just was so full of joy and constantly encouraging. And he's one of those people that like like you say about Dr. Reinhardt like that's the kind of person that I gravitate towards. Because I need that positivity, because I know that I will bend towards you know, doom and gloom Cleveland sports fan. Negative. So so I need those people in my life. Like, those are the people I gravitate towards.

SPEAKER_05 7:40

Which which I'm gonna say, by the way, I mean, if if you are a Cleveland sports fan, which Brandon and I are, I I do think there's a special dispensation of grace for us. Because talking about chaos and darkness.

SPEAKER_03 7:53

Oh, we've dealt with we've dealt with Dante's seven levels of hell for most of our lives. That it's pretty much what you know, there's purgatory.

SPEAKER_05 8:02

You know, a few years back, you know, I I I blog regularly. I have a blog, Brethren Contemplative, and I I took a journey where I went through my K through 12 experience. What I did is I I went year by year and identified uh a teacher that had an impact on me and what that was all about. It was easy when I was in elementary school because I only had one teacher. Uh you know, one room schoolhouse there in Virginia, right? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 8:29

Yep.

SPEAKER_05 8:29

So every day before lunch, go out and chop wood and then slide a hog. But uh, but it was fascinating to go back and just think through and start to go, oh my goodness. First off, listening to your life helps give you profound joy and appreciation and gratitude. Because I look, I was gonna look back. Here are here are you know elementary school teachers who I mean they were in Grottoes, Virginia. Okay, it's not like they're you know, okay, this this is not, you know, some big city school, you know, this is a podunk little town. Um, and you go, my goodness gracious, the impact that they had on me that this many years down the road, I can still recall that. And it was fascinating because um there were two teachers in particular, uh, my first grade teacher and my fifth grade teacher, that somehow got a hold of the blog. And when I went back down to Virginia, I mean, here I am. When I was a first grader, I had a teacher named Mr. Keeler, K-E-E-L-E-R. I couldn't say E. Yeah, I always said Mr. Killer, and he was always like Keeler, Keeler. I'm like, Killer, killer. Uh but and so this weird experience of little area to grab a beer in in Virginia. I'm sitting with my first grade teacher having a beer with him, and we're talking about life. I get called to my fifth grade teacher, Mrs. Robinson, and into her home. Yep.

unknown 10:09

Mrs. Robinson.

SPEAKER_03 10:10

He walked me right into it.

SPEAKER_05 10:12

I'm realizing that my I'm realizing my teacher names did not set me up well for Mr. Killer and Mrs.

SPEAKER_03 10:17

Robinson. Right, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 10:19

But you know, and we're talking about talking about life, and I'm going, so many years have passed since I've been in your presence. And yet I'm here. Not because you I really recall a lot of what you taught me. I'm here because I, you know, Mr. Keeler would always say, he's like, Jason, my job is trying to sand down some of the, you know, the sharp edges that you had. Oh, what a what a great phrase here. Yeah, you know, Mrs. Robinson going, you know, I, you know, introduced you to some books and you just love to kind of curl up and read in this kind of and you know, just instilling a love of reading there. Um, and it was just I'll use the word, it was magical uh to be there. Um and go, wow. And then I get to these moments and I go, what do I want to do as a teacher? What I want to be about. Well, freely I have received, freely I must give. I I would rather be known as, my goodness gracious, he wasn't a tough grader. Uh, you know, he always you know took you know late assignments and didn't take any points off. That's true.

SPEAKER_03 11:31

I passed I passed your class in seminary, so that's definitely true. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 11:35

He always tells you that he hates grading, uh, he always tells you that he rambles. You know, when my kid was sick, you know, he reached out and and and he prayed for me, you know. So I had a couple last, I had a student last semester. He and his wife have been trying to get you know get pregnant again and again and it continues to fail again and again. And they were so excited, he shared the news with me. She's pregnant. And then he missed a week, and then I get a message and he says, She miscarried. So I looked up and found the phone and my records here. I call him and I talk to him. And he's been like, I don't, he's like, I he spellbound it. You know, I would give him a call. I'm like, well, of course I'm gonna give you a call because I I care about you as the student. Um, and so I I think that I'm I'm in a place right now, I don't know how temporary it'll be, okay, where I'm learning to take those. I like to imagine the intersection using Beakner's language again, the intersection of you know my deep gladness and the world's great need. And what I think sometimes a helpful way to think about it is when they overlap, they form an overstuffed leather chair. And you just set in it and you sink in and just be. Because what happens is I think you know, for a lot of for a lot of people who are all about do, do, do, do, there's a lot to be done. We think about, oh, you overlap, here's what I'm gonna do. First and foremost, what you have to realize is that where that overlap occurs between great passion, great desire, great happiness, and great need is you become human yourself. You find out who you are, and then the rest of your days, all you have to give is yourself, and then you realize that there's not a lot of that to give. There just isn't. And one of the problems, you know, in an information technology social media age like we live in is that it continues to demand the impossible from us. That I can't fix all the problems, but I can sit down, people, or chat with people and go, that's messed up, that's wrong. And to be able to go, yeah, what are you gonna do about it? Okay, well, let's let's we can talk about it, but also to go, there's only so much that we can do, but it's nice to be able to say, Well, we affirm this, that's wrong, that's not, or you know, we sit down and talk, and somebody says, Yeah, I hear your processing, I see those golden threads. My goodness gracious, I that's been you all along. I think all of my writing, all of my my journey, I would phrase one of my favorite phrases, because calling goes by many words, you know, but one of my favorite phrases for calling, and I think speaking you, Brandon, you'll relate to this, is holy discontent. You know, it's it's just you know, there's just been a sense of, okay, there's been a restlessness in my spirit. Now, I've had to go and say, okay, is that restlessness necessarily of the Lord? Sometimes it's not. Right. But I've also, I don't want to so push it away that I act like restlessness means nothing. And I always go back to, you know, Saint Augustine. So here's a fourth century Christian theologian, and he says in his confessions, he says, You, you, meaning God, because he's writing this to God, you have prepared us for yourself. And our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you. For me as a Christian, an essential part of calling is listening to my life, but also through the power of community and the spirit, listening to what does God say about your life. And that is so very difficult because that is the journey of moving from silence. We think we want silence, you know, where there's no noise, you know, those kind of things. What we really want is we want solitude. We want to be in the quiet, maybe with a close friend, maybe with the voice of God. Beautiful if they're both. And we have just a singular voice talking to us, is what we what we long for. We rarely step into silence because even for Christians that I meet, they're functional atheists who believe if I step into silence, there's nobody on the other side that's going to talk to me. And so I avoid it and I stay busy. That's a tragedy that even marks my own life. The first step, yes, is to find silence. But the second step is if you truly want to listen to your life with a trusted colleague or friend, or or just go off on a walk in the woods, eventually you want to get from a place where it's not just silence, but you actually find that you are communing. That's a lot of waxing formationally there. But Alice and I have been watching a few films lately and have noticed a theme that continues to emerge in them. And I would recommend for all your listeners on Netflix is a new film called Train Dreams. Um, and I'm gonna tell you uh, make sure that you have Kleenexes nearby because this one is just it is tragically beautiful, you know. And I won't ruin the ending here, but the ending comes with okay, here, you know, here's a man who has experienced tragedy upon tragedy upon tragedy. And then it wraps up with an experience where he just says that he finally felt connected. I won't tell you what the experience is or anything, and I and I think that's what we are, that's what we're longing for, and that's what calling does is calling connects us with God for a Christian, God is reconciling the world through Christ. So our calling should be all about that too. It should lead to reconciliation, and that's the task is calling, you know. Everybody thinks you know that you know when that the spiritual life is about disconnection and you know this kind of stuff. No, the spiritual life is is about further, deeper, embodied human connection, and so that's the place where I go, you know, your calling should be pushing you towards the world, not pulling you away from it. And you have to learn how to be nimble and adapt. And so the language I use, and I borrowed this from Andy Crouch, who wrote a book called Culture Making, uh, and he differentiates between posture and gesture. We use gestures all the time, but the problem is, you know, if if your gesture is that you're always in tight spaces, you have to hunch down constantly, then what ends up happening is your posture ends up picking on that as well. Our posture should be one that has two feet firmly planted that can be nimble and can adapt to a number of gestures that we need. Calling is our posture in the world. We are open to the world, and we are open in the sense of this is how God has designed me and what God wants me to bring right now. Gesture could be the various jobs or career paths that we take with them. And so having to learn to go, okay, differentiate those two. And that's that's difficult because we we don't do well in America with language, period. We just lump all these words together and they become synonymous, and they're not. Calling and career are not synonymous, they're related intimately, but they're not synonymous.

SPEAKER_03 19:01

And I would say identity, yeah, synonym for calling there and career are not are not the same either.

SPEAKER_05 19:10

And actually, Brandon, I think that I think the identity thing is a is a key point. It's been implicit in what I've said, but let me I want to make it explicit uh because you you're absolutely right. Identity is intimately tied here, and and I think this is a part of the identity crisis, is that when you when you make calling and career synonymous and then you lose your job, you end up losing yourself in the process. Losing a job is already hard as it is. The time that I had to step away from a job that that I didn't know I was gonna go to. Literally, my head went to, well, if there's no other university chaplain job, I guess I'll flip burgers. And flipping burgers, you know, thank God for those who do it, you know. I there's nothing wrong with that. Okay. I used that point to get to say I hadn't really ever thought about how to translate skills differently, you know, and it was just kind of this moment of going, oh my goodness gracious, what it just seemed like there were no options available to me. You know, calling could be able to say, and this is where you know I give huge props to my wife in this season. She she has been a champ because she is actually listening to her life and going, okay, maybe I can kind of lean into something else right now. And she'll tell you that she's scared by it, she doesn't want to fail, you know, all these things. It's hard. But but yeah, yeah, and it's but she she's leaning in.

SPEAKER_03 20:40

Look, if you would take 10 seconds and just share, rate, subscribe, follow, I would really appreciate it. It's how this podcast continues to grow by word of mouth. What was your first job?

SPEAKER_05 20:54

You know, uh, I'm proud of this one. Um because it's and it's funny you say that because this past week I talked to my boss because her husband just died. My first job was I was a bag boy at Twitte's IGA in Grotto's Virginia. Uh and so the Twitty family owned this IGA. Uh, and so there was Ann Saylor. Um, and you know, my my thoughts go out to Ann and her family. Her husband Roger just passed away over the weekend. There was Mary Lou Twitty. Mary Lou passed away several years ago, and that one that was hard for me. Mary Lou was great because she actually closed the store uh the day after Jale Earnhardt died in that NASCAR accident, you know. So, I mean, you all you are in Virginia, and then the intimidator.

SPEAKER_03 21:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 21:40

The matriarch of the family was this lady named Mildred Twitty. And so Mildred looked like the white Diana Ross who came in every night to count money. But my gosh, I I love that job. And when I look back on it, I go, there was so much about what I'm looking for that was already there. I was with people. I was helping them. I was trying to be an encouragement to bring some joy to their life. You know, I love the people that I work for to the point that they still check in on me and I still check in on them, uh, which was absolutely incredible. It no longer exists, you know, because big chains like Foodline and all that stuff kind of pushed them out. But I easy Jason, easy, easy. But you know, you just got your badge back.

SPEAKER_02 22:27

But uh easy rod. Easy rod. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 22:33

But you know, but there was a sense of small town America, and it was a small mom and pop grocery store that you know ended up kind of partnering with a chain that was IGA, and then uh went on to another chain after that. But it was one of those jobs of, you know, hey, Tweet's doesn't have the best, you know, the best prices, but their service is great, and the meat is, you know, always is the best in town. And it's things you start to look back and go, as we become old men, and go, there has been something that we've lost there. And I don't know how to stop the the you know the the onward march of time, but I can look back and go, okay, uh, twities doesn't exist anymore. But what things did I learn, what things did I love that that are still relevant and applicable to me right now.

SPEAKER_03 23:21

So when you retire eventually, if you ever do, maybe you can go bag groceries at Hawkins.

SPEAKER_05 23:28

Yeah, I I I've thought about that. Um, and uh one thing that Grotto's was great about is that I didn't live in a context in which in wintertime the air literally hurts your skin. Uh so but I do see the old men there, you know, and they they pull those carts out and those kind of things.

SPEAKER_03 23:51

Uh last little section here with you is a word association. Success. Oh, oh uh is this one of those things where I have to be a like in theory, but you know, a phrase or or a word or something that comes to mind. I'll start over. Ready?

SPEAKER_05 24:12

Okay, okay. Okay, I'm gonna tell you you're okay with the fact that my answers are gonna reveal there's still a lot of work for Jason to do.

SPEAKER_03 24:19

Absolutely. And I've done this with other people, and some of their answers have not been a word or a phrase, they've been like a soliloquy or a monologue. So whatever happens. Success. Money.

SPEAKER_04 24:33

Failure. Oh wow. That's awesome. I struggle with this one too, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 24:47

And I want to get some feedback on my first one. Oh, we can go back to success. We can go back to success. Well, no, because I I I think that's part of growing up in in Appalachia, and this was the hope of college, is that you would you would find your way out of poverty. Money has always been something that's always present there. And then to step into a world in which, you know, with every year you seem to be losing money, uh, is has had to make me think through what success looks like. But that's still kind of this guiding thing there, uh, that I think for a lot of us means something.

SPEAKER_03 25:25

Context is always important when it comes to pretty much everything, especially when we talk about theology. But when it comes to success, you're coming from a context of poverty, and and that money does sort of equate with success for what those folks and what you you grew up thinking.

SPEAKER_05 25:42

Yeah. And failure in many ways has been not so much the loss of money, but the loss of influence. Because I I think one of the things that has been consistent about me is I never want to be the person in charge. But I like to have influence, you know, and that's tough at times because when you sometimes I've found that in seeking influence, I have not always been as honest about who I am with these people because I didn't want to be rejected. And and that's been been really hard. So not that influence is bad, but just trying to go, okay, Jason, rein in what influence actually looks like and think through a little more. And don't always be so knee-jerk in that.

SPEAKER_03 26:28

Last one ambition. As a three, any Enneagram three. Wow, okay, that's a great answer.

SPEAKER_05 26:38

I I wouldn't have told you that even a month ago. I for those who are listening, Brandon and I are part of the same tradition, and so the the the elders of our of our denomination are gathering for uh a symposium here in Ashland to talk about brethren identity, uh, which I'll say what a novel idea. But I've realized that I've been hurt by my denomination quite a bit, and and I've carried a lot of that. You know, one of the things that I've been praying has been a very basic prayer of Lord, fill me with joy, and Lord, let me share joy. And trying to go, this is who I am. And when I say love, it's it's it's love the Lord, obviously. But first and foremost, people would go, oh yeah, and then love your neighbor. I'm like, yeah, I this may this may sound selfish, but I I need to learn how to love myself a little bit. My self-talk is awful. And what I what I realized is that in my journey through the various jobs I've held, I have often interpreted things incorrectly. That the odd thing of all is that I blame something or somebody or someone or something else for hurting me when really it was my perception of that thing that hurt me. So in many ways, I was hurting myself uh through through the self-talk. And so trying to the best I can to be open, to be generous, to be hospitable. And and I think even my darkest days, I I want love to be there because number one, God is love. And number two, I've always been a person who's thought a lot about my death, which sounds like you know, so macabre. But at the same time, it's I've often thought about how do I want people to talk about me when I'm not alive anymore. And I've been at the the bedside of people who have been dying, and you know, we know this to be true. They they never talk about I wish I had more time to make more money or anything like this. They will always talk about wish I could have done this experience, or I wish that I could have spent more time with my kids or my grandkids or or whatever. And so it's been kind of haunting for me that okay, that's that's what I want. And so there is this kind of warring in me of, you know, I'd love to have more money. Who wouldn't?

SPEAKER_04 28:53

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 28:53

But, you know, at the same time going, I don't want to be so caught up in that that I'm absent to my kids, I'm absent to my wife. And some of this too is, you know, as as our kids, you know, get to the age where they're graduating and they're going, you know, and so it's like, okay, it's there's a new era coming. And so trying to figure out, okay, uh, what does it look like for me to be present to them um in those moments? I think love is is an ambition of mine. And I like the word ambition, aspiration. Doesn't mean I'm gonna succeed at it, but it's it's definitely on my mind a lot.

SPEAKER_03 29:32

Last question, and we're visiting with Jason Barnhart, the good Reverend Dr. Jason Barnhart. Well, before we get to the last question, when does the book come out?

SPEAKER_05 29:43

That's an excellent question, Brandon.

SPEAKER_03 29:45

Um I'm trying to give you a chance to promote your book, but if it's not coming anytime soon, the hope will be early next year.

SPEAKER_05 29:52

You know, we have to get through the the writing phase of it.

SPEAKER_03 29:55

And that means we can have you on the show next year when it comes out. We can talk even more about friendship and and identity.

SPEAKER_05 30:03

Well, and what the what the book does is it um it it looks at, I won't go into the theological side for this just to be more applicable to a to a larger kind of listening audience here. Thank you. Uh, but it examines historical friendships and and the virtues that that that those those signal towards what friendship really is, and that you know what physics is reminding us, which medieval thinkers seem to know well ahead of their time, is that there is a psychic spiritual mystical reality that occurs within a friendship. Because one of the one of the virtues I think of friendship is that friendship is unitive. And in the West, which tends to be very behavioristic and very much, you know, this world, we think, you know, that idea that that sort of like mingling can only occur through some sort of physical penetration. Sorry for the graphic language there. But what we realize is that psychically, what friendship is, meaningful relationships are, is that there is a spiritual psychic penetration that's occurring. Literally, it's you know, our spaces. If you want to go very technical, think about the idea that there are electrons swirling that all of a sudden are kind of overlapping with somebody else. In the medieval world, they would call that co-inherence. And this is why when when a friend dies, the other friendships seem to suffer. Because in many ways, that friend made something possible with the gathering of friends that's no longer there. Or when you know a spouse dies, we see that the surviving spouse will develop dementia-like symptoms. And what we realize from the psychology is that our closest relationships almost are like memory banks. We we store things in people, and when they're gone, we can't access it anymore. And so we're disoriented, we don't know who we are, where we are. And so this is why in this whole journey, why friends are so important. And it's it's that unit of quality there, because part of our calling, part of our passion, all this is that we look to our friends to, in a sense, kind of upload again of okay, I saved my calling statement in you.

SPEAKER_00 32:13

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 32:14

So I need to access it again. Remind me, you know, and and to be able to have that.

SPEAKER_03 32:21

It really reminds me of you know I've done a lot of coaching of athletic teams. I've been a musician in some bands. It reminds me of both of those, right? When somebody steps out of a team and all of a sudden that chemistry is different, whether it's on the basketball court, the football field, the baseball field, like all of a sudden that looks different, and everybody in those contexts is different. And it's the same thing as a musician in a band. The drummer leaves, the bass player, like somebody steps out, you got somebody filling in, and on all of a sudden it's like, well, this is different. I'm not the same person with this group as I was before.

SPEAKER_05 32:54

I think music is a great way to describe it. And you know, especially when you look at jazz, for example, that there just seems to be kind of this psychic connection that, especially when jazz starts to improvise a little bit, that you know, there's just kind of this connection that everybody seems to adapt accordingly. And jazz might be a good kind of language as we talk about calling, is just this sense of the music shifts, okay, life happens. It also carries you. It's you know, it it calls you to improvise. Uh, the set must go on. And and and I and I think there's just you know a sense of that calling makes for profound connection, I would say, with God, with ourselves, uh, with one another. And and I would also add to that the created order. Um, but you know, I'm going down a rambling path there.

SPEAKER_03 33:49

Well, thank you very much for joining us. I really appreciate it. Dr. Jason Barnhart, it's been a pleasure. Absolutely, Brandon. Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_02 34:00

Thanks for listening to the caller ID. Please don't forget the idea. Thanks again, it's coming up. Brandon David Well, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, the same thing.