Episode 369 - John Eldredge, "Experience Jesus. Really."

Welcome to another episode of Restoring the Soul with Michael John Cusick. In today’s conversation, Michael is joined by returning guest and renowned author John Eldredge, known to many as the author behind the bestselling book Wild at Heart. This time, John dives deep into the message of his latest book, Experience Jesus. Really. Together, Michael and John unravel the life-changing invitation to authentic, everyday communion with Jesus—beyond religious formulas, beyond inspiration, and into truly experiencing God’s presence in a way that’s both simple and profoundly transformative.

They discuss why many believers feel let down by empty promises of intimacy with God, how technology and today’s relentless pace are wounding the human soul, and why, now more than ever, we need ancient practices of deep attachment and interiority. John shares his heart for spiritual restoration—rooted in Isaiah 61 and a Gospel that offers not just rescue, but soul-deep wholeness and restoration for both men and women. The episode also explores the misunderstood beauty of Christian mysticism, the importance of “benevolent detachment,” and practical tools like the Pause app, which John’s team created to guide people into genuine encounters with Jesus—accessible to everyone, everywhere.

Transcript

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Welcome to the program. John Eldredge. John, it's great to see you again. Thanks for coming on. Oh, it's good to see you, Michael. So grateful for your life and for your work. This is wonderful. I think this is your third appearance on the Restoring the Soul podcast, which means that we've been around for a long time, but it also means that you've just been very gracious and especially now to talk about your new book, experience Jesus. Period. Really? Period. Let's start with why the two words with periods? You usually don't get two periods in a book title, but I know you, so it was very intentional. Yes. I had to catch the reader right at the beginning because so many promises have been made. Right. Through whatever liturgical tradition they've been in or not been in, so many promises have been made about intimacy and the presence of God and how to access him. I felt I needed to say no, no, no, no. Really, really. I want you to know that this is a genuine offer, not a sales pitch. I remember years ago our friend Dan, when we were sitting in classes with him, and I was a couple years, I think, ahead of you in 1992, when we studied under Dan and Dr. Larry Crabb. I remember Dan said something one day that I heretical, but my heart resonated and I wrote it down. He said, christians are sick and tired of being sold a bill of goods. And it sounds like you were having to prepare for and come against that bill of goods, that here's what the Christian life is going to look like. But here's what we really experience. What you've done over and over again is lead people to something real, something beyond religion, something beyond just getting inspired again or giving people kind of a new path of knowing more and doing better so that then somehow, you know, they'll get the grace of God. That's really been the heartbeat of what you're doing. Thank you. That's a lovely compliment. Well, so let me. Let me also just dig a little bit into that. You hear this all the time, but you're known as the guy who wrote Wild at Heart. That book is still impacting millions of people around the world. A couple times I've been down to your office. It's fun to walk in the front door, and there's a shelf of your books and there's all the different translations in different languages. And I know that that's gone far and wide and Wild at Heart. And your ministry is so much more than a book to men about how to get their soul free. So for listeners that are not familiar with John Eldredge or only know of him as the wild at heart guy, talk about this central message that I've heard you speak about and that we've had conversations before that really is around Isaiah 61 and God's passion to make us whole and set us free. Yes. Oh, thank you. Yeah. Because most people still either haven't heard, don't know, entertain some level of incredulity, that the offer of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is an offer of restoration. This is what you guys are all about. So your listeners will be tracking with us. It is a offer of two things that are

named in Isaiah 61: 3:31

3 that are very important to keep together. Part of it is the rescue of people from darkness and the evil powers of this world set against them that get inside us even. And then what goes with that is the healing of your humanity, the restoration of the heart, the wholeheartedness. Irenaeus famous quote. The glory of God is man fully alive. Because that's the gospel mission. That's why it would demonstrate the glory of God. It's because his mission is a full recovery of his sons and daughters. And therefore while that heart is at the epicenter of it, the book you know, we went after to heal the hearts of men. But very quickly we realize, well, that's only in many cases half a household. Like if we don't also bring that same kind of restorative work to the hearts of women, the relationships are not going to go well. And then it just led us into. It was very interesting. I was having a conversation with a Christian later that day I won't name. He was very surprised to find such a deep. We'll get into this mystic life, warrior life kind of warrior mystics here at the center of this organization. And I said man, so are we. We didn't know when we got into the fight for the human heart. We were just well intentioned people, you know. And we quickly discovered that if you do not personally have a very deep, deep communion with God and you don't have a skill set to deal with the wrath of the kingdom of darkness that will come against you, you're just not going to make it. And so yeah, here at the heart of an organization called Wild at Heart is were sort of warrior monks. Sounds like the Celtic Christians that I've been a part of the St. Cuthbert's Way pilgrimage for the last two years and oh lovely. Some of them that were true warriors in terms of they were having to fend off Vikings while preaching the gospel and live in, you know, very small caves and things like that because of their calling. So to your point, that part of the gospel is to free us from the darkness, and then the other side is about making us whole. And that's the message of Isaiah 61 that you talked about and in your newest book, Experience Jesus. Really, you speak of this communion. You said it just a minute ago. But that word deep, deep communion is something so much different than having a nice Christian life. It's about something that is qualitatively different. You know, it's like watching NBA basketball and being out on the court. It's like seeing pictures of Mount Everest and then being on Mount Everest. It's like hearing about falling in love and then being in love. So talk a little bit about. I hate the question. So what's behind this book? You know, why did you write this book? But here's an observation. Your last couple of books, I feel, have been different from what you've written in the past. And it feels like there's a greater urgency that you have to simply, with simplicity, to communicate the reality of life with God. That's possible. And I don't know about you, but as I've gotten older, fewer and fewer things seem central about faith. So I've enjoyed that urgency that's there. But there's also a deep conviction that feels like it's deepened from when you wrote Wild at Heart and when you were a younger man about folks. This is really possible, and you usher people into that. So talk a little bit about your journey to this book and what seems like urgency to get this message out. Yes, Michael, part of it has to do with the hour that we live in and what technology, pace of life, exposure to global trauma is doing to the human soul. That's part of the urgency. It's like this is a brutal hour on the human soul to just be a human being, to just be trying to live a human life. So part of the urgency comes out of that. We just conducted a women's retreat, and coming back out of it, I wasn't shocked. I will say I was confirmed, but also startled by the number of women that were living under a great deal of darkness, death. So the hour that we live in is part of the reason of the urgency. But I think also the church hour has been radically deconstructed. And, you know, some of the famous people and all that stuff. You know, a lot of the big things have kind of fallen apart, and people are looking for spiritual mothers and fathers who will guide them back into the simple. It needs to be very, very simple, ancient paths. I just want people to know how accessible it is. You were sharing in your book Sacred Attachment that you thought you could get it through a PhD. You took the intellectual route, but it didn't get you there as much as the attachment route did. Pursuing attachment. So I think it's a really rough hour. Okay, there's one more piece on this. So Nicholas Carr's book the Shallows, which he almost won the Pulitzer for, is one of the many, many voices that are demonstrating that, you know, the neuroscience of the, the Internet is destroying your concentration, your, your ability to focus, your attention span. We're living in a moment that is literally conditioning people against the one thing that will save their life. And that is, you would say, secure attachment to God. You know, we would call it the Simple Mysticism. I wanted to call my book, by the way, Experience Jesus really was the second title. I wanted to call it Ordinary Mystics. Ooh, I love it. But I just knew, oh, I just knew too many, too many good hearted people would freak out over that and not open it up and let me explain what I meant. But the urgency of the hour and the need men and women looking for fathers and mothers to guide them in the simple paths of attachment of union and communion. And so you call yourself, in the back of the book it said that you are often referred to at Wild at Heart in the Outpost as the abbot. And having grown up Catholic, an abbot is the father. And I love, I'm so attracted to, and my heart comes alive at age 61. And you're a couple years beyond that of this idea of being a spiritual father. So thank you for that. You have been a spiritual father to many, many, many. You know, even though you are a parachurch organization, you have been in every bit as much as the largest mega church pastor. You have been a shepherd to millions now through leading people into communion with Jesus and his restoring power. So let's talk about mysticism. Because in Sacred Attachment I had a chapter about mysticism. I believe that it's essential. It is not a freaky word. It's not woo woo, it's not new age. It's historically rooted in Christian spirituality and it is something I think that people are hungry for. So tell me what your definition of mysticism is and why it's important for people to have this. So first off, the Christian life was always meant to be deeply experiential. I mean, let's just go back to the garden that the Original design of beauty and intimacy and adventure and creativity is this unbroken, what I want to call very informal life with God. It wasn't meant to be complicated. Now we blew the whole thing up and the ship sank. And we're all, as Chesterton said, survivors of a great shipwreck. So what I mean, first off is that as you go through the Old Testament and the new, you find an invitation to an experience of God. And then, you know, if you do the Greek words yada, I mean, the Hebrew yada, and the Greek ginosko, you know, these are deep. To know God as the scriptures present, knowing God is deeply, deeply embodied. It's deeply experiential. And the age of reason and disciples of the Internet and all that has really shoved most of us up into our heads. We live most of our life out of our heads, and we're having a hard time getting back to that. So I used mystics. Yeah. To kind of shock people a little bit, to go, whoa, wait, what. What's so fascinating, Michael? And you would know this especially. You just did Cuthbert's pilgrimage. None of the Christian mystics down through the ages. And so let's just name some, you know, St. John of the Cross, Augustine would be called a mystic. Martin Luther would be called a mystic. If you actually read his spiritual life, he had deep, profound encounters with God. None of them, you know, Teresa of Avila and Julian of Norwich. Right. And. Yeah, okay, Brother Lawrence. Yeah. On and on we could get. None of them called themselves mystics. It was later biographers and historians that did. They would have simply called themselves friends of God. Friends of God. So this would be like a classic from Brother Lawrence. He wrote, I don't understand how religious persons can live satisfied without the regular experience of the presence of God. And then he goes on to say something that sounds mystical. So let's name it, but then let's explain it. He says, for myself, I keep myself retired in the center of my soul with him all day long. And he says, while I am thus with him, referring to Jesus, he says, I fear nothing. He closes with this. He says, but the slightest turning from him is insupportable. Okay, that's mysticism. Mysticism is the ontological, existential, experiential relationship of the human soul with the presence of God, who is a person who has a personality and a sense of human humor and a playfulness about him that is primarily experienced deep within the soul. So that. Yeah, and that's the one thing that I think people are drawn to. You talked about the hour that we live in and the need and truly the impoverishment of the inner life and the soul, that there's a conspiracy against the inner life in Christ. And therefore it's not just experiencing God, but it's a deep interiority. And back to your word communion, because there's a lot of substitutes for this. And I love worship contemporary Christian music I've had an ambivalent relationship with because sometimes that is the be all, end all. You know, that if we have a powerful experience and raise our hand and feel the presence of God there, but it's always. Let me restate that. It's often felt like God is up there and out there that we have to worship versus that there's this abiding presence within in which we are united and in which we live and move and have our being, to quote Paul. And so there's something about this that it's not inward oriented like we become more inward, but it's inwardly rooted. And I think people are starving for that and a little bit skeptical, but when they hear the simplicity of your message, it's like, oh, I don't have to go read St. John of the Cross, although that might be a good idea. Or to read the Interior Castle five times by Teresa of Avila. I can actually close my eyes and take a deep breath and become aware of his presence within. And then I want to talk during this conversation about. Or I can download the Pause app that you and your team have produced, which is how I actually, I was introduced to your book further back. But when I finally did the pause app for 20 days, and it's the 20 day version of experience Jesus, really, it was so powerful. Then I came back to the book and I. And I picked it up and I'm reading it. So something that simple. Normally apps I'm suspicious of if it's claiming to change your life, but this is one that really will change your life if you apply it. Yeah, that's a beautiful God story too. Yeah. This has to be accessible. It can't be another complicated series of routines that always make the experience just quite out of reach. Right. Like when you get your black belt, you get to experience God. It can't be that. And the interior communion is something that all of the saints down through the ages talk about. Because this is Colossians 1, this is Ephesians 3, this is John 15, this is Revelation 3. You know, Christ comes to dwell in the depths of our being if we want him to. Anyone, anywhere on the planet. You know, Michael, you know what Actually, I'm remembering something, something else you asked about the urgency, something else in this though. So I've done several trauma intensives for my own well being, you know, and they were, you know, as, you know, there's several thousand dollars, you know, up to a lot of. A lot of thousand dollars. And you know, you travel and hotel and, you know, find the right expert, et cetera. And I found myself saying, while I am grateful, grateful, grateful, we have fallen into a model in the developed world for the healing of the human soul that requires a lot of money and access to experts. And I mean, you and I do this for a living. So I mean, I believe in the profession, I believe in the mental health industry. But what I was realizing was, yeah, but what do you say to those teenage girls that are being sexually bought and sold, you know, in Calcutta? Like, they'll never get to a Western professional. They just want. And they can't afford it. Okay, here's the beautiful news, everyone. The soul is healed through union with Christ. The soul is healed through union with Christ. And so if we can teach people the simple practices of union and communion, wow, we could help a lot of people. So we built this thing called the Pause app. And it's very, very simple. I enjoy other apps, but apps like Hallow, they're almost too many options. It's like, just give me a few simple steps. The Pause app takes people through music, beautiful imagery and guided prayer in a very gentle experience of union and communion. And we built it for ourselves, to be honest. We built it for ourselves and our friends. And now there's, you know, a quarter million people have downloaded that app because they're finding it to be that. What the mystics would talk about, they was like, wow, I am experiencing the presence of God with me and within me. And that presence is very comforting. Or it's very healing or it's very orienting or grounding. That's what we're after. That's kind of all I care about. I love the fact that you wrote in the book and it was actually further on in the book about that idea that what about the girls being trafficked in Calcutta? What about the child in famine in Africa? What about the people in Jerusalem and Gaza on both sides, you know, that are they don't have a house to live in and they can't get food and Jesus has come for them as well. And so again, there's a simplicity to it that is absolutely profound. So here's my request, brother. Rather than go through chapter by chapter, kind of theoretically unpacking the book, would you? And could you take the modules from the Pause app? And I think there are five of them, and just walk us through. For someone who hasn't used the Pause app, I think you start out with Refuge and some of the beautiful quotes that you've already said, and you walk through talking about the veils that are there. And that was one of the things I struggled with because I've got this skeptic in my head where I'm like, really? I don't know if I need to do this. And I'll be honest with you, this morning, this morning, October 10th, I went back to day one of my second time around with that skepticism. And I said, jesus, I'm going to trust you, and I trust John and Stacy and his team, but I'm going to trust you. And I pray, Jesus, remove the veils, any blankets of oppression that are there. And I felt something lift literally instantaneously, and my heart softened from two weeks of being on the road and speaking at conferences and feeling beat up and little parts of me getting activated, literally instantly, my heart softened and I felt something. Listen, so I, in this conversation, have an urgency to be able to pass on what you've given the body of Christ and what I've experienced and say to my listeners, hey, I want you to know about this. And I think if you could walk through it, people would go, oh, if I just listen to the podcast and do that, that's great. But now I want to turn to the app. Yeah, great. Okay. So first off, within the Pause app are some very, very simple experiences. Literally a one minute pause, 60 seconds, and then there's a three minute and a five minute, because we're teaching people how to do this again in a very gentle way. And it begins with the practice of benevolent detachment. Learning to just let everything go. Your soul was never meant to know about the trauma in the world. The human soul was meant to live in small communities, and there's enough heartache right there for a lifetime. But you were never meant to be exposed to all that you've been exposed to. So benevolent detachment, it's a beautiful practice. I do this all the time. I walk out of an upsetting meeting, I'm anxious about my new home insurance policy, whatever it is. And I just go, Jesus, like I. I just give everyone and everything to you right now. And, and for 60 seconds, you can do that, right? Through a guided experience, you can do that. And. And then what we take people through. So in the, in the, in the module that's built around the mystical experiences of the book. We first take them into Psalm 91, which again, is supposed to be an existential, ontological, in other words, a real experience. The Psalms are not just poetry. These writers are describing to you a life in God. So Psalm 91, refuge. I think the anxiety rates in the world right now are showing people need refuge. So we take them into the experience of the refuge of God, the solace, the care of the refuge of God. And it's a morning and evening sort of meditation, if you will, slash devotion, guided experience into the refuge of God. And then we walk them gently deeper and deeper to the last module is inner healing and the ability of Christ to access memories and traumatized places within us. Because he sits outside time and so he knows your story, he's able to go back. He did this to me the other day, Michael. I had a career in Washington, D.C. as a very young man. And it was exciting and it was traumatizing. Exciting because I was in White House meetings, Supreme Court hearings. I mean, I was in the mix, traumatizing because it was so outside who I was designed to be. I had to pretend to be someone else to be there. And I lost my soul. Jesus took me back there through a very simple prayer the other day and released a part of my heart that was still trapped in that really difficult time in my life. So that's the last module in the app, and the pauses are longer and there's music and there's guided prayer. But we're leading people through a gentle process from the shallow end of the pool into the deep end of the pool where Christ comes. I got the most beautiful letter the other day, Michael, from a man. He says, look, I've been a pastor for 35 years. I'm retired now. I know Jesus, I know all this stuff. He said, I was on day 18 of the 20 day experience, which is the inner healing of fragmented parts. And he writes this long letter saying, it blew my mind. Jesus literally walked me back into major significant moments in my life and did a healing work that I can only describe as wonderful. He's like, I feel like a new person. And I had no idea this was coming. And this is just in a simple guided prayer exercise. But again, we've learned this from our own lives. Like everything we're sharing are things that we are experiencing ourselves. And it's kind of like, come and see, taste and see, you know? Yeah. What's wonderful about that story is I'm picturing that pastor sitting in A chair having that experience. And that's worth three or four really good counseling sessions or maybe 20 where something truly divine, truly supernatural happens. But it's not phantasmal. It's ordinary and it's mystical because, you know a little bit of my story. But, like, I can be really cynical and skeptical and what I've come to learn that those are not only parts of me that are younger and wounded and needing healing, but there's also an enemy. And that there's somebody whispering, saying, don't surrender to this foolish idea. But to have mysticism as a category both allows more of an understanding of evil that can be kind of childlike, not naive, but like, of course, but also open to. These kinds of experiences are ordinary. And we would. We think about, you know, heaven as extraordinary, but we don't think about heaven happening here in these ways as ordinary. That's right. Yes. And the good news is this. Every human being is wired for this. This isn't a skill set you have to go find. Every human being has an amphibious nature, is what I call it. You are an amphibian. You are meant to live in the seen and the unseen realm. And the unseen realm surrounds you all the time. You quoted Paul, in whom we live and move and have our being. The angels surround you all the time. The kingdom of heaven surrounds you. We just haven't been trained how to use our amphibious nature at the simplest level, to experience the love of God. It's not just a thought, it's an experience to hear the gentle voice of God. It's not wild visions and ecstatic experiences. Something as simple as saying, michael, well done. Just hearing your papa say, well done today, pal. I'm proud of you. These can be the richest experiences of our lives. Yes. That faculty is in every human being. What we're doing through the Pause app and through the book is showing you how to re engage it, tap into it. And so here's another delightful story. So at this woman's retreat, we did a little bit of these exercises. Very, very simple prayers. And then I did some question and answer afterwards. And a young woman raised her hand. She says, I was looking for Jesus, but I saw a lion. A lion came to me as I was praying. She's like, what am I supposed to do with that? And I said, talk to him. The next time it happens, talk to him. And her eyes got real big and she says, the lion talks. Well, yes, he does. He is the lion of Judah. He's immensely plain, playful. And here's the other Assuring thing. He will come to you in the way you are currently able to receive him. Okay? We grow and we move from the shallows down into the deeper ends. Because your being, by the way, your being has a shallows amid limbs and adepts, right? There's flitting crazy thoughts that go through your mind all day long about tacos and your mom and the bill you forgot to pay and the, you know, the, you know, crazy things happening in the world. And then you have a midlands to your soul, and the midlands are that your heartaches and your cares and your dreams and the people you love. You have a depth. Down in the depths of your being is face, hope and love. Down in the depths of your being is where God lives. Okay? So you. You can learn through your amphibious nature to just begin to enjoy the presence of God in simple ways. And then deeper ways. And then deeper ways. She encounters a lion. I ran into her later at the retreat. I said, well, and big smile on her face. She's like, yep, he talks. That's wonderful. I hope you introduced her to Narnia. Yeah, exactly right. So you address this through. Through one of the modules in the Pause app, and all of the material that's on the Pause app as it relates to the experiencing Jesus, really, which is one of the programs, for lack of a better term, on the Pause app. All of that material is in the book. And the Pause app is so succinct in that experiencing Jesus, really. But you talked about removing the veils that are there. And in Corinthians, Paul speaks of how that we are veiled and yet we as Christians are called to live and are living with unveiled faces. So specifically, talk about the veils. And then I'd like to have a little bit of a conversation because I know it's a seminary semester. To unpack this. What are the things that you've learned about why people don't experience God even though they're desperately wanting to have that? I know all the way back to Walking with God. When you wrote Walking with God, there was a lot of pushback. Like, no, people can't really hear God's voice like that. That's weird. So, yeah, first the veil, then experiencing that. No, no, no, let's start there and back into the veils. Because the answer to the second question is probably three basic reasons or three categories. One, they simply haven't been shown how they have the amphibious nature. They have the faculty. It's built in there. He has set eternity in the human heart. But they didn't have a spiritual mama or papa to guide them into. Well, here's how you do this. And, oh, yeah, that happens. That's bumpy. We get that. Someone to just mentor them. That's one. They just haven't been shown how, which is. Back to your worship thing. We go to these rallies and these big church services and kind of thing, but they're not teaching people how to do this, so that's not your fault. Secondly, it would be trauma, wounding, heartache, loss, unaddressed grief. All the things that you and I write about and talk about. Because while your. Your heart is the. Is the vehicle through which you experience God. That's Ephesians 3. But if your heart is mostly shut down, you're going to find it more difficult. Yes, that is a reality. Now, the good news is you still can and he still will. But then the third category was the other question you asked. The third category is the kingdom of darkness is a highly sophisticated universe of ancient beings of extraordinary intelligence. Okay? If we even entertain the reality of the unseen realm, we tend to think of it as, like, temptation, you know, or maybe accusation, you know, I just feel. He just keeps telling me I'm such an awful person. But they. When Paul says, put on the full armor of God that you may resist, raise the shield of faith through which you extinguish the flaming missiles of the evil one. So those flaming missiles, that was the leading military technology of the day. He just had to find an analogy. And he went, okay, look, we're all aware of these tools, these, you know, the flaming arrows that the enemies use when they get over the walls, into Jerusalem or into a besieged town. The kingdom of darkness has technology, okay? These are not dumb beings. And one of the technologies they use, one of the apparatus or whatever you want to call it, are veils. They literally put veils over the human heart. Now, sometimes we agree with them. Like, they'll come along and they'll suggest to you, God doesn't love you. And I was just talking to a guy yesterday, and he made the deep agreement. Yeah, I am not lovable. Not after the things I've done. Military guy. No, not after what I've done. Not after what I've seen. I'm not lovable. But if you make that agreement, a veil comes over your heart, a darkness, it's like a shroud. Think of it as just somebody turning out the kitchen lights. You're still in the kitchen. You can still kind of grope your way around, but the clarity isn't there anymore. And Paul describes these in 2 Corinthians, chapter 3 and 4. And he says, the enemy puts these veils over the human heart. To do what? To keep them from seeing the glory of God in the face of Jesus. To keep them from seeing Jesus. Well, apparently you get to see Jesus. Okay, so what we do with Paul, it's a very simple prayer of asking God to remove any veil that has come over my heart and soul. And we pray this right now together. Oh, Lord, please, would you remove any veil or shroud or darkness that has come over my ability to know you, experience, you hear your voice, feel your love, see your face. And as you experience, as God removes those veils. And sometimes it includes us breaking the agreements we've made with them. Right? I mean, if you make the agreement all your life, God doesn't speak to me, you're going to have a hard time hearing the voice of God. So you break the agreement. You say, no, that's not true. Scripture says I get to. Scripture says. I mean, Old Testament to New First Book to the last. Scripture says I get to hear the voice of God. So I break the agreement that I'm not good at it, or I break the agreement that this isn't for me, or I break the agreement that, yeah, it's for John and Michael, but I'm not spiritual. I break that agreement. I break that I want to hear your voice. A lot of times that's enough alone to have that shroud or that darkness removed. And then, Michael, your journey into becoming, returning to Catholicism, the power of the sacraments to cleanse the human soul of darkness and of vile things. I mean, I celebrate the sacraments almost every single day because of their. Because again, they're seen and unseen realm, the ordinary mystics. It's not just wine and a wafer, folks. It is deep mystery. But there is the power of God in it to heal the human soul. And so part of what I am also trying to help our dear, dear followers is that you live in a love story, but it is set in a world at war. The unseen realm, they don't care whether you believe in it or not. They're still going to mow your grass. They're going to do everything they can to steal, kill, and destroy, is how Jesus graphically described it. Once you begin to take that seriously, you can enter into levels of relief and clarity and freedom that you didn't even know were available. And so much of what has wounded people, as there's now new conversations and acknowledgment. About church abuse, spiritual abuse, trauma within the church, and from Christians. The finger gets pointed at God when the finger should be pointed at evil, not to take responsibility away from the perpetrators and the abusers. But when you understand that we are in a love story, in a world at war, it does change the framework for understanding your life. One of the greatest gifts of coming to accept the fact that spiritual warfare, which means fallen, angelic beings trying to mess with your life is a real thing. The lovely relief is you find out it's not all you. You're not just blowing it, you know, whatever it may be, you know, you can't. You can't finish the. You know, you can't finish your coursework. You constant struggles with your immune system, on and on you go, hey, you know what? You're an amphibian. That you live in a. In a. In a seen realm and an unseen realm. And this isn't just you. As you begin to practice some of the simple things of the scriptures, like just telling yourself the truth, breaking agreements with the lies, you begin to realize. Wait a second. You mean all those negative thoughts? That wasn't just me. Yeah, it wasn't just you. It's really actually very good news. You're not as big as a mess as you think you are, because I guess what I'm trying to say. Yes, let's wrap up with this, because I always try on interviews to try to. I learned this from Andy Crouch. He said, every time I speak, I take a risk. And my risk is I want to ask you to speak into my life about something. And that is the first a thank you. As I'm doing the pause app, and I forgot what day it was. And the experience. Jesus, really, you made the statement, it's not your fault. And it wasn't even about trauma. Where we might think, like from Goodwill hunting, Robin Williams says to Matt Damon, it's not your fault. This was something like the fact that your life is a mess or that you can't do xyz. It's not your fault. And I just teared up. It wasn't a new concept to me, but it was a surprise to hear it in that context. And I think in this world where there's this polarization between everybody's a victim or we all need to take responsibility and pull ourselves up from our bootstraps, there's a refreshing spiritual message that the father of Jesus is not looking down his nose at us saying, it's your fault. You better repair this. You better pull it together. So thank you for that, it was just beautiful. I think. I think a number of people might struggle with what I struggled with. And I alluded to this earlier. There was a part of me that felt scared and resistant to surrender to the veil, to say, oh God, take this away. And part of it indeed felt dark and demonic, as if to say, you know, don't do this, this is silly. But there's just something about our muscle memory and our neurology that basically says, don't trust love, don't surrender in that kind of vulnerable way. So, A, do you hear people saying that they struggle with these kinds of concepts that are really mystical and that are about pushing back the darkness? And B, what would you say to me about that? Is that normal? Yes, for almost every single human being, in some level, it's normal. I have a very, very deep life in God. But it's not Too many days go by where he either says something to me or asks something that I draw back and I'm like, whoa, I'm not sure. So, yeah, that's baked into human nature. That's okay, that's okay. Okay. Don't shame yourself for it. Let's just press in. Just be gentle with that and go, yeah, okay. I do feel the apprehension, I feel the unbelief. But I actually also really do want God. I really do want to experience Him. So we just be gentle with it, don't treat it harshly. One of the most important things about experiencing the presence of God, there's an author that I like very much. He has a book called Experiencing the Depths of of Jesus Christ. She was a 17th century Catholic mystic named it will look like Jean J E A N N E Y on G U Y O N and one of the best pieces of advice she gives in that book is she says, come gently, come gently as you come to prayer, as you come to experience the presence of God come to you, that will really help folks. But you asked me to speak to you, so your skepticism has a function to it. And the function is self protection. How's that going for you? And that's why that was. The moment of surrender was like, this isn't working for me. And in the saying yes and surrendering, there was instant relief and joy and softening and it was beautiful. It was a real learning moment for me. And I wanted to ask you that because you and I, we've walked for Jesus for 40, 40, 50 years. However many for you and I still get stuck. And there's still those moments like, oh, it's really helpful to hear, to come gently. It's really helpful to. Even though I know it to go. Not going to shame myself, but a deepening and a softening that takes me deeper into that life with God. Yes. Yeah, that's beautiful. And to be gentle with the younger parts and not force them because there's a 12 year old Michael that isn't sure what older Michael thinks of him. And if our younger parts feel like the older part of us is disappointed with them or frustrated, like, come on, get with the program. Quit embarrassing me. They won't come forward for healing. They'll stay back. But he's actually the 12 year old you is adorable. And he is very eager to come forward. If older, you will just tell him how much you love him, how proud you are of him. Thank you. I will and can do that. John, as always, I wrote in Surfing for God, I thanked you for always pointing me to Jesus. And I want to say that again today. You always point me to Jesus. You're pointing our listeners to Jesus. And thank you for your life and your ministry and how you're taking all that you've received and giving it back. The book is Experience Jesus. Period. Really, really, people, you can experience Jesus. So thank you to you and to all of the staff, to Stacy and everybody down at Wilder Heart for everything you're doing and for your time today on this Friday afternoon. Thank you, Michael. This has been delightful and it's gone too quickly. Indeed. Until next time.