My Reflections on Love in an Age of Violence · Plus Dr. Stephen Macchia on Intimacy with God in a Noisy World
Episode Notes
When the world feels on fire, how do our souls find rest in God alone?
This week’s two-part episode is close to my heart. In the wake of recent violence, I first pause to reflect on what it means to choose love in an age when outrage feels easier.
From there, I turn to a conversation with my friend and mentor, Dr. Stephen Macchia. Steve has spent decades guiding people into deeper intimacy with God through practices of silence, prayer, and community. Together we explore the barriers distraction creates, why being truly listened to is so healing, and how slowing down opens space for God’s presence in our lives.
This episode is an invitation to lay down outrage, pick up compassion, and step into the quiet spaces where God does His best work.
📚 Books you wont want to miss from Dr. Steven Macchia:
- Praying the Parables of Jesus by Dr. Steven Macchia
- Crafting a Rule of Life by Dr. Steven Macchia
📚 Also mentioned:
The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt
Here are some other episodes you might like :
Episode 75: Your Secret Weapon Against Stress & Anxiety - How to Transform Your Mind Through the Power of Prayer
Episode 88: What to Do When Change Stirs up Anxiety, Uncertainty, or Confusion
💬 Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.
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Transcript:
Hey everyone, and welcome back to this week's episode of The Best of You. I'm so glad you're here with me this week because this conversation is a really special one for me personally, and I also think it's one that's going to minister to you especially as we are dealing with so many hard things right now in our country.
Before we dive in, I do wanna pause and acknowledge the complicated emotions so many of us are carrying after the tragic killing of Charlie Kirk last week. We've seen far too many violent acts in recent years on school campuses, in public spaces, in universities, and it's absolutely tragic. Real people are hurting in your lives, in my life. Maybe people are hurting for different reasons, but people are hurting.
And moments like these remind me that our work, yours and mine, as soul menders really matters. Our work on the podcast here together and everything I do is to help you cultivate a healthy soul, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. And as we become healthy souls, you and me together in partnership with God Spirit, we become what this world needs. Changing our world out there starts with us.
It starts with our inner lives. It starts with every single one of us doing our part to bring more goodness, more kindness, more real love into the deepest corners of our souls so that we can spill that love out into our families, our neighborhoods, and our world. Part of why I've taken some time to gather my thoughts and figure out how I want to respond and why I almost shy away from political takes online is because I needed to have these conversations in my real life first.
There is absolutely no substitute for the hard conversations we need to have with each other in our embodied lives. And as I've had those conversations this past week, it's led me to two pieces of wisdom or insights that I'm trying to put into practice in my own life and I wanted to share them with you, especially as it relates to this work of soul mending. The first one is simple. We have to learn how to be people of love. We have to learn how to love people who see the world differently than we do. As followers of Jesus, we don't actually have a choice.
It's baseline. We have to be people of love. A healthy soul is a soul filled with love and it's hard to love Someone who's beliefs or viewpoints or lifestyler decisions or behaviors or actions feel like a threat. I get it That's real and I don't want to minimize what you're feeling what I'm feeling in any way But Jesus does it give us another option? We have to learn to become people of love this past Sunday Our pastor spoke on the parable of the Good Samaritan and it felt exactly Right to my soul when the man in that parable asks Jesus who is my
First, try this with me for just a moment. Think of someone who is hard for you to love. It might be that person with a yard sign that makes your blood boil or someone you just had an interaction with at work or at your kid's school or even in a friend group or even in your church community. Maybe picture them right now as you're listening and just notice what you notice inside your soul as you think of them. You might notice that some part of you bristles or feels resentment or that twinge of envy or anger or frustration or a feeling of injustice.
Maybe even a part of you feels hatred. I hate that person, they've hurt me. Listen, that feeling is most likely there for good reason and I don't want you to shame yourself for what you notice, but I do want you to pause for a moment and recognize this is where the love of God starts, is when you invite God's love into the places that are feeling that anger, that resentment, that frustration, that bristle, that even that hatred inside your own soul first.
You might even pray in that moment, "God, this part of me so angry, so threatened, so resentful, please hold even that part of me with your love. Because here's the thing, first John 419 says it perfectly. We love because God first loved us. It starts inside us. I'm not asking you to put yourself in harm's way, to debate or agree or to do something you don't feel in good conscience you can do, but we do have to cultivate a loving posture in our own souls.
And it starts by noticing those moments of hatred, of anger, of unforgiveness, of harboring resentments inside our own souls first. Secondly, and this one's more practical, but it's important to me and I want to speak to it. It's where I was the most rattled through these events. I want us to prioritize our real embodied lives over online outrage. And I want us to help our kids do this too. We used to be able to disagree without rage.
I remember a time before the internet, before social media, when we could have debates and disagreements and discussions without rage. I'm guessing if you're closer to my age listening to this, you remember those times too. I grew up in a very a very conservative state, what we think of now as a red state, a Christian family, and I went to a very liberal secular Ivy League college clear across the country in a different part of the country where most people thought very differently than I did. This was years ago. And guess what we did in those days, pre -social media, pre -internet? We had conversations. We had coffee together. We debated in classrooms and we could do that during that time without hating each other,
without labeling each other as the problem. I remember vividly in one class I held a very different perspective than almost everyone else in the class and you know what? None of us left the class hating each other. I think my perspective challenged some people.
They listened to me and I in turn gave them the courtesy of listening to them. We learned from each other and we stayed friends and neighbors all within one very small embodied community. We came together in a way that I rarely see happening in this day and age. What made me think of that memory is I was in all honesty looking forward to a debate that was scheduled to be held this week on my alma mater on the campus where I went to college back in the day before social media. It was between Charlie Kirk and Hassan Piker, two men who come from completely different worldviews, different sides of the political spectrum, different ideologies, different belief systems. And I was looking forward to it because I learned from listening to people with different worldviews, listening to people who think differently, almost always when I listen to someone whose viewpoint is different
from mine, somewhere inside my soul, I can say that's a good point. I may not agree with their conclusion, but I might understand where they're coming from. And you know what that does inside of me? It promotes compassion, a shared sense of humanity, humility. It makes me hold my own viewpoint with a softened grip, and that humility is good for my soul. I recognize that while I have certain convictions, I am not God. Ultimately, only God sees the whole picture, the full picture, who accounts for all of humanity. And I honestly believe with all of my heart that the internet, the deep recesses of the internet and social media are tearing us apart. They're preying upon the worst parts of our souls. I'm not saying there's no good online, there is. But there's a lot of darkness out there.
Rage gets rewarded online. It becomes addictive. I see it in myself. It lights up a part of our brain and I rebuke it on behalf of all of us in the name of Jesus. It's a lot harder to hate someone that you disagree within your real embodied life. You have elections. You vote against people. You debate vigorously in the town square. You might see that person in the grocery store line and greet them, or you might sit next to church with them, and you may not see the world exactly as they do, but you're part of the same embodied community.
That's where we're supposed to work this stuff out, not in comment sections. So my second challenge for you and for me today is to make sure we are processing these events, these very challenging topics and events with people in our real lives before turning to social media and most of all I want you to be working with your kids to do this too. Social media relationships are not real. They are not two -way. We are passively taking in data and not engaging with real embodied people. We know from the research what this is doing to our young kids. For resources on how to get your kids offline, check out The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Hyatt. We are trying to get him on the podcast because he has a new book coming out specifically for kids. But I believe the work that he is doing is profound and important to this present time. If you do use the internet or social media, as I do, make sure it's helping you grow compassion and humility, not to foster rage.
And then most importantly, we all have to ask ourselves, where are there people in my real embodied life that I disagree with? How can I take a step toward that person in love? Where am I gathering to talk with people who don't always think exactly like I do and who help hold me accountable to compassion, to justice, to mercy, and to love. We are called to love people in our embodied lives and not only people who are just like us. We are called to love people who are different from us, not only for their sakes, but also for our own souls.
Remember, 1 John 4 19 says it this way, "We love because he first loved us." I pray you receive God's love today in the deepest parts of your soul because it is my belief that it is out of that love you have received from God that you will be able to make a difference and become a person of love in this broken world. My hope is that this conversation you're about to hear will help us do just that.
***
My guest is Dr. Stephen Macchia, someone I consider a spiritual mentor and guide. Years ago, I went through a two-year program he designed called the Emmaus Experience, and I can honestly say it was one of the most profound vocational callings of my adult life. It shaped how I understand my own work as a therapist, writer, and follower of Jesus.
Steve is the founder and president of Leadership Transformations, a ministry that exists to cultivate vibrant spirituality and attentive discernment among Christian leaders and teams. He’s spent decades inviting people into the deep work of spiritual formation—away from hustle, distraction, and noise, and toward rhythms of prayer, community, silence, and rest.
In our conversation today, we talk about:
- Why distraction is one of the greatest barriers to intimacy with God and with one another.
- How silence and attentive listening can transform our relationships.
- The power of spiritual companionship and why every soul needs both solitude and community.
- And we’ll explore Steve’s newest book, Praying the Parables of Jesus, which invites us to engage scripture in a slower, more contemplative way.
If you’ve ever longed for a deeper intimacy with God, if you’ve felt the pull of hurry and noise and wondered how to create more space for your soul to breathe, this episode will meet you right there.
I cannot wait for you to hear from Steve. His words always leave me a little quieter, a little more grounded, and a lot more aware of God’s presence in my life.
So let’s dive into this conversation with my friend and mentor, Dr. Stephen Macchia.
***
- Well, I'm just so thrilled to have you here with this time with you today,
Steve, you've played such your work and your presence in your life has played such
an extremely important role in my own life. We'll get into that a little bit more
throughout our conversation. But I want to start just right where the listener is,
the person tuning in. We talk a lot about the intersection of faith and mental
health on the podcast. And one of your sayings that I always think of it,
always stuck with me is this idea that you, we emphasize different syllables.
Did I quote you? You say that so perfectly. - That's right, that's right. - Yeah,
and-- - That's right, this syllable has to be on the right. - Yes, and so we're not
working apart from one another. we're emphasizing different syllables and you're
emphasizing this spirit part, the soul formation,
which I love. And again, was game changing for me in terms of how I viewed my
work as a therapist. I'd love to just start right here and now with what are you
seeing as the biggest barrier that keeps us from experiencing this deep loving
intimacy that we so long to have with God?
- Yeah, I think it's summarized in one word. Then the one word would be distraction.
The biggest barrier to intimacy, whether it's a human relationship or a relationship
with God, is that our eyes are focused elsewhere, and that's what distraction does.
It holds our eyes elsewhere. My wife Ruth was a preschool teacher for many years,
and she would get down on her hands and knees and say to the children, "I need to
see your eyes, I need to see your eyes." And when she could see their eyes, then
she knew that she had their attention. She'll say that to me. Steve,
I need to see your eyes. And I know exactly what she's saying because I'm
distracted. I'm trying to do multiple things and I'm not paying attention to her.
And so I think when we're distracted, we're totally unable to focus on God or each
other. - That is so, such a great summary and there are so many distractions ever
increasing in our day -to -day lives. I sometimes look back with a sort of longing
on the pre -internet era, let alone the pre -social media era,
the pre -iPhone era, you know, it's, we weren't, it was sometimes a little bit
easier to keep some of that clutter of noise out of our lives, even though it's
always been hard, but that certainly is added to it.
Well, the promise of social media of all kinds is, and the internet and everything
that's available to us today is that the promise was that it would make our lives
simpler and slower, and it did the opposite. It made our lives complex and faster.
Yes. And both of those are against the work of the soul. Okay.
Okay. I love it. Against the work of the soul. So let's go back a little bit,
Steve, because your story's so interesting. You started out in ministry. You built
some pretty amazing things in New England, where, You know, the soil is a little
rockier in some ways for this work of spiritual formation of faith practices.
Although I tend to think of it also as incredibly rich. There's a little bit of
both and there, as you and I both know. But at some point, something shifted for
you. You were maybe following, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but maybe
a more traditional ministry leader path. Something drew you deeper into that work of
spiritual formation where you emphasize a whole different aspect of soul care than
most of us are familiar with. Can you take us back to that moment and what
prompted that change?
Well, after about 20 years of what I would call more traditional ministry, I was
working in a church for 11 years on a pastoral staff was great, great experience,
all of it was wonderful. And then I was in charge of a group called Vision New
England, which is a multi -denominational multi -administry network of folks around our
sixth state region. And it was all good. Everything was great. But I was really
trying to do so much, And I was pushing everyone around me to accomplish and you
know, live out that sort of that Protestant work ethic, you know, we'd rather burn
out than rust out. We'd rather be as busy as possible and accomplish great things
and set goals and go and accomplish. No matter who was in a way,
we can just sort of toss them to the side and get our goals accomplished. And I
realized that there was something going on inside of me that wasn't very healthy.
And I said to a friend who I trusted, I said, I'm looking to talk to someone that
doesn't want something from me. I need a neutral listening ear and voice.
And that's long story short, is when I started spiritual direction. I met this
Episcopal monk who came into my office with blue jean overalls and a t -shirt and
open -toe sandals and I was in this professional mode of dressing up and every hair
in the place kind of thing. And as soon as he opened his mouth, I knew he had
something that I desired. He had a slower pace.
He had a tentative countenance. He had a way of being with God and with me that
was profound. It was mysterious and beautiful. And that began a 35 + year
relationship in direction with the same person who I see on a regular basis as my
spiritual guide, my spiritual companion. So I would say single -handedly getting
engaged in spiritual direction with a trusted companion, trained and trusted companion
was the turning point for me. And everything about my life,
I would say, has changed as a result, some instantly and some more long term in
terms of a chipping away. But that experience of having a companion who was walking
with God and encouraging me to do likewise was definitely the catalyst for everything
since. And so you started this ministry called leadership transformations.
That was one of the things that flowed out of this pivot in your own life.
And it's marked, as I understand it, by some key components of the spiritual life
that go all the way back. They're not new, they're ancient, but in many ways have
gotten lost in our modern, as you're saying, kind of hustle culture that seeps into
the church, what are some of those key features? And I know from it,
I know from my own personal experience and we'll get into that. But from your
vantage point, this, you've, you've, you've talked about the word slow, attentiveness,
being with companionship. You know, it seems like from that came this ministry.
What are the key components, the key foundational pillars that you're trying to pull
lovers of Jesus into and away from this more kind of hustle,
trying to get things done, trying to do good things for God mentality.
It's a great question. And I would say that the number one spiritual practice that
we're all desperate it for, frankly, is what I would call spaciousness,
a spaciousness with God. In other words, finding the time and creating the space to
have unhurried, uncluttered, unhindered time for the sake of your soul,
which would be your walk with God, your relationship with God. So a prayer closet
experience is something that's very important that I strongly urge and encourage
everyone who is seeking to walk with God and in community to have.
It was Bonhoeffer who said, you know, the one who loves to be with others, be
careful because you need some time alone and be careful if you're only wanting to
be alone. You need time together. So it's with aloneness and a community and it's a
community and contemplation, another way to put it. So we learn how to pray, but we
learn how to relate to one another. And that's really where you excel is,
and that's where these two disciplines are combined, formation and healthy
relationships, because our experience with God is gonna be as deep as we can go
relationally. And if we're unable to go deep relationally with each other,
we're not going to go deep with God. But if we're able to go deep with God,
that'll help us to embrace the reality of who we are as individuals seeking to have
meaningful relationships with others. So it is hand in glove, Allison,
but if I were to put the emphasis on a particular syllable there, it would be soul
care, the care and nurture of one's soul. - Yeah. - And there is nothing more
important than that. And yet, because we live distracted lives, we put everything
else in front of that.
- So I wanna share a little bit here about how I experienced that, how our paths
crossed. And there's so much that came out of these two years. And we're going to
talk about this for your podcast. So I'll send my listeners over to hear more of
the story on your podcast. But just at that intersection of I love how you're
saying community and contemplation, the both and the aloneness and the togetherness,
neither of which we're very good at. So I came into your world,
this ministry that you're doing through a two -year retreat program. There were
quarterly retreats. And the rhythm that was just so life -changing for me,
there were silent portions of it where we would have silent meals. We would be with
each other sitting at the breakfast table, but not speaking.
- It is so powerful. If you've never done this, it is such a unique way to be
with other humans with the absence of all the noise and the words. We would have
time alone where we would literally be in our prayer closets or off on a walk.
So there was built -in time for that kind of aloneness. There was aloneness together.
And then there were structured times where we would share our stories.
And what I loved about that, Steve, is the structure. There was an order to it.
We would each get a certain amount of time, maybe 10 minutes, I don't remember
exactly, with themes. And over the course of four quarterly retreats,
you could get pretty deep in what you shared. And so for the first one, I think
we told our spiritual autobiography sort of in 10 minutes So you have to kind of
do the work of looking back and what was so powerful and I'm I'm saying this for
the benefit of the listener because I've never Experienced anything like this was
more powerful than therapy there dare I say I mean it was so powerful So I I just
that's that's the passion in my voice about this. I would share my story and at
the end of it, silence. We put a timer on and we would sit with my story or
whoever was sharing their story in silence, holding it. And Steve,
we don't do that. Usually we share our story and immediately everybody jumps in to
fix it, to give advice about it, to interpret it, to tell us we shouldn't feel
that way. All we did was sit and hold the story. At first it was very
uncomfortable for me. That first, I was like, what is happening? But over time,
the rhythms, and then there were more rhythms. You know, there was, we can get into
that, but because then we would take another round where people would reflect back
verbatim words that they heard you say without interpreting,
without giving advice, just saying I heard you say lonely four times.
And that is just an unbelievable, from a psychological perspective, an attachment
perspective to feel that secure holding was life changing for me.
And so I share that with you both to just honor and validate what you and
thousands of people already know about how the power in this work, but it was so
different than anything I'd ever encountered in a small group, even in discipleship
and mentorship. And I guess I want to ask you,
you know, how I'm not even sure what my question is other than to say, I think we
need this. I think what you're doing speaks to something so deeply inside of us
that need to be seen and held in a very slow,
methodical, kind of orderly way that we just often don't encounter. Well,
when you think about the most intimate moments of life, very few words are spoken.
Yes. It's presence. It's an embrace. It's eye to eye contact.
I mean, we fall in love through the eyes. We love another through the eyes.
And when we can't see each other's eyes or when we see each other's eyes as sad
or disappointed or tearful or turning away, all we need to do is just be present
with the other. And it's in that presence that the mysterious work of healing and
intimacy with God occurs. And we think it needs to be chock -full of words.
And it actually doesn't. And what your testimony is, is the testimony of many others
who have gone through our programs. People will say, "I've never been listened to
like that in my life. Now, think about the power of that statement. I've never been
listened to like that in my life. If we do one thing in this world to change the
trajectory of this craziness that we're in, it would be, I think, around
attentiveness, around listening. And so I talk about it and write about pure
listening and you've described it. It's, you don't fix a person,
you don't correct a person, you don't compare your story, you don't one -up the
other person's story. You're simply there. And if you're going to say anything,
say exactly what they said. Don't interpret. Because when we begin to interpret,
then the person who hasn't been properly listen to is saying to themselves, they
didn't listen to me. That's not what I said. And the bold and courageous will say
that. They'll give voice to that. But many will just smile and, you know, tolerate
it, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. So I think we should only speak when we're invited to
speak in those moments. The rhythm of that of that practice I took with me into
relationships,
even as my work as a therapist, because there was a time, I think the last round
was you can give encouragement. You know, the last round was maybe share a way in
which others touched something about me, or here's what it made me think about,
where we might get into some of that. But it's
after. We've given the fullness of our attention to the story. Yeah.
And to the person, the person's story, which is precious and it's unique and it's,
it may be difficult, it may be hard, it may be painful, but it still has,
you know, the work of God on it and he wants to heal every ounce of our pain.
Yes, if we let it and in those settings, that's where a lot of healing occurs So
Steve for the listener who's hearing this and maybe hasn't Been a part of such a
community and can't imagine You know, maybe they can't for whatever reason Take the
time to join one or their churches don't offer something so they're listening going
I want that how do I find it. What would you say might a couple of steps be
little both little tiny steps we can do just in our own lives and even bigger
steps that we can take to begin to bring this kind of listening and slowness into
our lives? It's a great question because experientially it's rare these days and what
we're trying to do is we're trying to push that rock up a hill, if you will, and
knowing that everything about the busyness and the noisiness and the confusion of our
world is distracting us and keeping us from these rich encounters with God and with
each other. But if we can at least be a catalyst for saying something like,
could we just pause for a moment and not dive into the conversation yet. Like
imagine if we were to just, let's take a minute of silence. - Yeah. - We want to
be together, but let's just have a minute of silence. I encourage teams and
individuals and couples and small groups tie the time that you're together in
silence. So if you're together for 60 minutes, that's an hour long session.
Take five or six minutes and just be together in silence. It will dramatically and
radically change the experience that you have when you start talking to each other
radically. I'll say the boards that are coming in. You're coming in from your busy
workdays and you're huffing and puffing to get here and you've just had a quick
meal and You had to deal with your kid's homework assignment, you know, whatever it
is that you're coming in with. Let's just settle together into a common space where
we can listen to God and each other and it comes through silence. It comes through
that crucible of transformation, which is silence and solitude. But it's dramatic for
both the alone space and my per closet and my communal space with others and we're
not doing either very well. Yes. I love it's the both and it's not just because
yes, it's not just spend more time alone. And I love that. I mean,
you could even do that with a friend or with your spouse or at the dinner table,
say we're going to sit in silence before we start dinner. You know,
we say the grace and then we all are, we sit, we practice sitting in silence for
a minute to just let our, let our bodies settle. Right. I bet that changes the
nature of the dinner conversation. It does. It does. I've seen it over and over
again. I've been on retreats with people I don't even know, never met. And for the
whole weekend, I'm not talking, saying a word to them. But by the time the thing
ends, I feel like hugging them because I've so enjoyed the time together.
And we haven't said a word. But that's how the Spirit of God works.
He works mysteriously. He works quietly,
secretively at times, you know, and then he makes some pops out makes himself known.
Yes. And yeah, I just I think we were too much of in a fix it mode for
everything, including our relationships. There's a form of humility in it,
right? We where we're kind of setting aside our left brain in our words,
our desire to kind of setting that aside and recognizing just the presence Read
g I love what you said there was another thing I wanted to grab on to you said
you might say to a friend I don't want to jump into conversation Can I share this
with you almost labeling it for someone? Yeah. Yeah, can I just share this with
you? And would you be willing to just hold it with me? Oh
Very good, that's a very simple thing you could do to just say it can we just
maybe even begin with silence and then kind of just share something with you.
I'm not looking to be fixed or corrected or changed. That Ruth will say to me,
"Steve, I just want you to listen to me. I don't want to. I'm not asking you to
fix me. I'm asking you to listen to me." Yeah. Yes.
Steve. I think we need to learn how to listen. Yes, all the way back to learn how
to listen, which means we can't be distracted. We have to have souls that can be
still with one another as someone who practices stillness and solitude.
I'm curious, what's one practice that you personally return to over and over when
your own soul feels dry or far from God or distracted. What one practice re -anchors
you time and again? Without a doubt, it would be simple breath prayers and probably
my favorite one is Psalm 62 verse 1. "My soul finds rest in God alone.
Seven words that have changed my life. My soul finds rest in God alone.
It doesn't find rest in this world. It doesn't find rest in even relationships as
good as they may be. It doesn't find my, I don't find rest in work. Everything
else is adrenaline, but when I can find a space to have Sabbath moments.
I'm just using a simple breath part to get me to that space, to get me out of
the distracted space and into the focused and attentive space that's uncluttered.
And, you know, that's hard to get to. So I'll just very simply just say,
"Oh, Lord, my soul, my soul, my soul. "Oh, find rest in God alone," and I kind of
speak to my soul in that regard or give voice. It's interesting in the various
translations, it'll go, "My soul finds rest in God alone," or "My soul,
comma, find rest in God alone," or "Truly,
my soul finds rest in God alone. It's nuanced ever so slightly,
but each has a power to it. Yeah. So I'm either commanding my soul,
just slow down and rest. Yeah. Or I'm reminding myself of the comfort of the
presence of God in the midst of crazy, full, full to overflowing lives.
I feel that when you say that in my body, there's something, when you say breath,
right? There's a whole body response to that, right? That we feel deep.
And again, I think for so many of us,
and I don't, I think doctrine is important. I think right thinking is really
important. And when we're so bent in this sort of thinking relationship with God,
it's new to experience that feeling of what you just said,
which is a lived, a holistic experience of my soul. You drop down into your body.
- Right. - Right, that's incredible. - And to use the breath prayer,
it's sort of like breathe in the breath of life and breathe out the anxieties and
the frustrations and then breathe in the joy of the Lord and breathe out everything
that's bothering you and consuming you. So it's very simple,
choose your own, but for me those little seven words in Psalm 62 have been,
they've been life changer for me in many - Yeah. - Very simple. And then I can get
into the word and then I can pray. That's the other thing that I learned from this
Episcopal monk friend of mine. He taught me how to pray. And basically,
don't do all the talking. Figure out a way to let God do the majority of the
talking in your prayer so that you're doing less of the talking. So much of the
time we're thinking about our prayers in terms of what we articulate, and oftentimes
it's not what we're articulating, it's how our soul is being prepared to receive the
gift from God, His Word, His love, His grace, His kindness, His forgiveness,
the very things that God loves to give to all of us as his beloved children.
It's a two -way conversation. Yeah, yeah.
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This leads us, Steve, right into this brand new book. It's beautiful. I was just
looking through my copy. It's called Praying the Parables of Jesus,
and it's an invitation, really for readers to engage scripture,
prayer in this more contemplative way. So tell us a little bit about what prompted
the book and how it leads people in this way of not just saying more words to
God, but really being with God in all of we are. Yeah,
it's that's a great summary. It's a it's a desire of our heart of our hearts as
Sue Skinner, my artist friend and I collaborate on this. She's she was the visual
person. I was the word person. And we have this dream together of bringing the
parables of Jesus to life. There are 40 plus or minus parables.
So we're featuring 40 that we think is the sort of the focal point of Jesus'
simple little stories that so often we think of in childhood, you know, we think
that all children would like these stories. But the more I spend time in each of
the parables, the more I realize, oh my goodness, God is so serious about his
kingdom that every single one of the 40 parables point to the kingdom.
It's all about the kingdom of heaven. And there's a picture, there's a simile for
every single one. The kingdom of heaven is like and fill in the blank and that's
where Jesus excelled. He was basically explaining the here and now and the future
kingdom that we're invited to participate with him. He was so serious about the
kingdom that that's all he referenced and all 40 if you were to look at in terms
of the main theme. It was all about being with him now and forever.
And he was really speaking against the religious leaders of the day who were putting
rules and regulations out that barely anyone could keep up with. And Jesus came to
set people free. He came to give them life and joy in their walk with God and
their delight with one another. So again, it's that vertical horizontal thing coming
together in each of the parables. These parables are amazing, absolutely incredible.
They stand alone, there's contrast, there's a simple story that goes with it,
but it really penetrates the heart. And so what we've done is we've taken two very
ancient spiritual practices called Lectio Divina and Visio Divina and brought them
into each of the parables by way of the message, by the way, it's Eugene Peterson's
rewrite of the entirety of the scriptures and how He wrote out the parables,
so we're pulling from that. We dedicated the book to him because he's one of our
spiritual heroes.
And then it's just an invitation to read the parable perfectly,
reflectively, and take a look at this visual that may help you pray the parable
when you see how an artist has conveyed a part of that parable for you.
- That's beautiful, I love it. It's-- - A deep dive. - Yes. - But it's,
yeah, invitation. - It's an invitation, again, to everything we're kind of talking
about to enter in with our whole selves.
Again, not just our thinking brains or not just our, our souls that are distressed,
you know, but to really, I remember as part of the Emmaus group that I did with
you, you, one of the assigned readings was, I think it's called Eat This Book by
Eugene Peterson. And that book itself is such a great book,
but it's, it does a lot of what you're, it invites you into a holistic experience
of scripture that again many of us haven't just when you when you taste it it's
like oh but it's hard to even describe because you're still just marinating in
scripture but it's it's kind of from this more um I don't even you know it's hard
to put words on it but from this more contemplative space where it dwells within
you, which again is maturity, you know, I think sometimes we think maturity ends at
the head as opposed to bringing us deeper into our whole bodies.
- Totally. And yeah, lektio and visio in its simplest form is the repetitive read of
the same passage of scripture. So you're looking at this parable and you're reading
it several times. You're not, you're not jumping ahead, you're not looking around the
parable, you're diving into that parable and seeing what God has for you.
And every time I've used electio with groups and we go out for an hour by
ourselves and we sit in a particular passage of scripture and come back into the
circle, there's never been a repeated store in that circle.
Everyone discovers something that's for them. That's amazing. That God gave to them.
That's amazing. And so that's what Lectio and Visio really provide for us as hungry
souls wanting to know more about the heart of God. And you can follow this Lectio
pattern anywhere in the biblical text, not just the parables. - One other resource,
before we close, that I want to shout out to my listeners, 'cause I just think
it's such a helpful resource. It's your book called "Crafting a Rule of Life,"
which came out, I don't know when, several years ago, but I know so many people
who've gone through it because it teaches, the book shows, it explains these
different practices like you're describing here that are new to some people. But then
the back part of the book takes you back creating your own rule of life, which has
nothing to do with sort of a rule. It's a way of leaning into,
I think, who's the quote, the unforced rhythms of grace? That's another one I
learned from Emmaus. Who said that? - Yep, that's a Willard. That's a Dallas Willard.
- Dallas Willard, the unforced rhythms of grace where we put ourselves in the path
of these encounters with God. Could you just tell us a little bit about crafting a
rule of life and how that is another way that we can scaffold these encounters with
God? - Yeah, first of all, we correct myself. Unforced Rhythms of Grace is Eugene
Peterson's interpretation of the passage in Matthew. Willard would say we need to
learn the sort of the unhurried way of eliminating hurry,
basically, from our lives. So anyway, just to correct for those who knew better and
are listening to my voice on Um, yeah, it's,
it's, um, the rule of life has nothing, as you said, has nothing to do with rules
and regulations. It is all about a way of life and a way of life is either going
to be something that's, that's toward God and his purposes for our life,
or it's going to be wandering on our own. And I like that imagery of the vine
and, um, a healthy vine needs a trellis from which it grows and blossoms and
flourishes. If a vine does not have a trellis, it ends up wandering on the ground
and it does not produce the fruit that it's supposed to. In fact, God called the
people of God in the Old Testament at one point, "Wandering vine." You're a
wandering vine and you basically need to come back home. And so I look at the rule
of life. I mean, yeah, crafting the rule of life as something that brings us home,
brings us home to the true person, the best of you. - Yes, yeah.
- The one person that God made you to be in all of your uniqueness and all of
your beauty and all of the gifts and the abilities and the storyline of your life.
and you begin to unpack that, understand that. And when you begin to live it, you
realize you don't have to keep looking over your shoulder wishing you were like
someone else. Instead, you look upward and straightforward to say, "God,
how do you want me to live my life fully for you?" So we have things in common.
It's like a thumb and a thumbprint. We all have thumbs and the thumb does what the
thumb's supposed to do. but your thumbprint is different than mine. And let's
accentuate the idea that your life is unique as mine is,
as everyone is listening to our voices is. If we can set people free to become
fully who they are and live more purposefully into that, then they're putting their
vine on a trellis And it's flourishing and blossoming, just like a healthy vine
should. I love this. And I think that, you know, this is probably overly simplified,
but from many of my listeners, I see a lot of this work of spiritual formation and
these, the rhythm of life, uh, I mean, the rule of life as sort of an expansion
of what so many of us got, which wasn't all bad, which is you have your quiet
time in the morning, read the Bible, pray, go about the business every day, go to
church on Sundays, say grace before meals. You know, these are not, these are, these
are beautiful rhythms, but they can so easily become wrote,
or if, let's say, um, my personal time, you know,
feels dry. And, and so then I set it aside, but I feel shame because I, you know,
I I don't know I and I have listeners right into me. They say, you know, I've
been growing. I've been learning about myself I've been growing in emotional health
and in some ways now my old rhythms my old rituals feel dry And I think to
myself, oh that that's because there's we're incorporating in new layers new meaning,
you know, we're Expanding all the different ways that we encounter God and those are
part of it. All of those different ways are part of how we encounter God. And I
found in that book, "The Crafting of the Rule of Life," it includes, you know, it's
reading the scripture, prayer, worship, all of those things, but there's just so much
more too. And again, this is ancient. This is not new. These are ancient rhythms.
There's just so many more ways that we can encounter God in our daily lives.
So I just found it incredibly helpful to me to just expand some of that myopic
viewpoint that parts of me had kind of thought, this is the way, you know, this is
the way, and if these ways aren't working, you know, there's something wrong with
me. - Right. Oh, that's good. It's expansive, but it's also deepening.
- Yes. - In one's self -awareness, and we're not very good at self -awareness either.
- Yes. - We've listened to lies and we've created lies.
And no, we need to listen to the truth and speak truth and lean into the truth of
who you really are, who you're meant to be. - Yeah. - And yeah, it's gonna take
some collaboration with the Holy Spirit and with people who know us best and love
us most. - Yes. - And And that I do think is very important. Turn to the people
who know you best and love you most and want the very best for you. They'll help
you figure this thing out and expand it as well as deepen that awareness.
It's interesting too that Saint Benedict, one of my other heroes, ancient heroes, he
was one who really formalized an understanding of a rule of life. And for him,
it was all about these two same things, contemplation and community. In fact, if you
look at his rule of life, it is all about that. But the opening word, the first
word is listen. Yeah, it's like, listen, listen to God,
listen to your personal life experience, pay close attention, and then lean into what
you hear what you're noticing from the word of God, from the voice of God,
from the voice of the community of God.
Yeah, listen, it goes back to listening again. That's right. And so essential,
so very important. I love that we bookended the conversation, the listening.
Where can my listeners find your work, find your resources, Find the new book,
all the things, Steve.
SteveMachia .com is my personal website for the books that I've written.
LeadershipTransformations .org is the ministry website. So, SteveMachia, M -A -C -C -H -I
-A, SteveMachia .com and LeadershipTransformations .org.
We'd love to welcome anyone that's your friend is our friend Allison. - I highly
recommend, I mean, you've been doing this for a long time. I know there are folks
coming along now. John Mark Comer is one who are kind of bringing these ideas well
into the mainstream, which I think is awesome. You have been working out these ideas
for years. These are such trusted resources and I cannot recommend your work enough.
- Well, thank you, Allison. You're very kind. I so appreciate your friendship, and
I'm so delighted with the ways that your ministry is expanding,
exploding really with your writing and your podcast and your speaking and just so
proud of you. Just delighting with you and for you. And And praise God,
awesome, well done, good and faithful one. Thank you, Steve likewise. Thank you for
joining me for this week's episode of The Best of You. It would mean so much if
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