It was January of 2001 and my mom had just died.  Unresolved family of origin issues were rolling inside of me like an afternoon storm in the Rockies. So perhaps it wasn’t the very best time to be reading a book on understanding the secret of  the masculine soul.  Or maybe it was the perfect time.

Either way, when I finished the last pages of  Wild at Heart I didn’t bother to close the book.  With contempt I just threw it on the floor.

“I’m not a real man,” I reasoned.  ”I don’t hunt, I don’t rock climb, and I don’t flyfish.  I don’t camp, canoe, or go with guys who do.  I guess I’m just screwed.”

Okay, so maybe I have some issues.

But when shame starts gurgling from somewhere deep in your soul it’s easier to hate the messenger than to deal with the message.  Fortunately, after nearly a decade I’ve found freedom from shame, and come to deeply appreciate both the message and the messenger who is John Eldredge.

It would not be a an overstatement, though, to say that Eldredge is a polarizing figure among American evangelicals.  For some his writings strike a deep chord, while for others they touch a raw nerve.  For the latter group I’ve often wondered whether it’s the man, the message, or a charicature of both that causes sparks to fly.

After all, what is one supposed to think when he makes the cover of Christianity Today (July 2004) with the words, “John Eldredge thinks too many Christians are weak, and churches are often insipid–and he’s not going to take it anymore.” ? What comes to mind is a Terminator-Iron Man-Jesus.  A Christian man lacking humility, depth, and intellect.

So, I sat down and had a conversation with the man himself.  Mostly because I wanted to hear his heart.  What I experienced was  a man with humility, depth, and  intellect.  A man whose intense spiritual focus is balanced with an almost childlike exuberance.  And nowhere during our time did I encounter the hyper-testosteroned man who is ‘not going to take it anymore.’

As a huge bonus, we were joined by  Craig McConnell, one of John”s colleauge’s at Ransomed Heart Ministries, who served over twenty years in two separate mega-churches and who offers much wisdom in relation to walking God.  As you will hear, our conversation was lively–full of scripture, and full of the idea that there is more to following Jesus than what most of us believe or expect for our own lives.

That indeed, this is not as good as it gets.To download this file to your hard drive,

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Dallas Willard is not in a rush.  In fact, spending an hour in conversation with him, it  becomes apparent that he moves to the rhythm of an altogether different drumbeat–an other-worldly drumbeat.   A rhythm which emanates from somewhere deep inside.

As we are introduced I immediately begin to wonder, “Where have I heard this voice before?” Suddenly I realize that this noted scholar’s voice is one part  William F. Buckley and one part Thurston Howell, III.   I try not to act too distracted.

What does one expect  when talking with an intellectual and spiritual giant?  Hubris?  Condescenion?  Distraction?  None of these are present though during our time together.   All said, Dallas is one of the most present, humble men I’ve ever met.

When the interview is over I thank him once more and we shake hands.  I release my hand shake at the socially appropriate moment.   But Dallas holds on.  I’m in a rush to move along, though I have nowhere in particular to be.  I’m caught off guard  by the power of his being.

After an uncomfortably long time he releases my hand.  He blesses me.   I feel unsettled–but in a good way.

I wonder to myself, “Could this be holiness I’ve just encountered?”

I think so.

Question:  What stood out to you in this conversation?

To learn more you can visit www.dwillard.org.

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Question: What do you get when you  take an exhausted, but relentlessly driven pastor in New York city,  add in his wife who tells him she’s quitting their church because she doesn’t respect his leadership, then put them together in a Trappist Monatery for four months?

Answer: Emotionally Healthy Spirituality.  And, one heck of a conversation with Peter Scazzero.

Peter serves as pastor of New Life Fellowship, a multi-ethnic church in Queens, New York City, and is an author and speaker whose books include, “The Emotionally Healthy Church,” and “Emotionally Healthy Spirituality.”

To learn more visit www.emotionallyhealthyspirituality.org.

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In a Christian publishing culture where marketing potential, charisma, and the latest recipe for self-improvement are often more valued than things substantial, Eugene Peterson cuts an ordinary figure at best. But in the world of spirit, integrity, art, and imagination, Peterson stands high above the crowd.

Known for years as a pastor to pastors, more recently he has become a pastor to the English-speaking world with the release of The Message : The New Testament in Contemporary English (NavPress). In this fresh paraphrase of Scripture, Peterson’s exegetical deftness meets headlong with poetic brilliance, forged in the fire of nearly thirty years of pastoring.

“The pastorate,” says Peterson, “is one of the few places in our society where you can live a truly creative life.”

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As a child I was told not to ask so many questions.  I never listened.

Apparently, neither did Philip Yancey.  The result has been a prolific career as a journalist, writer, and Christian essayist whose knack for wrestling with hard questions and offering outside the box slants has made him one of the most successful Christian writers of our time.

With over thirty books and countless articles, Philip has transcended being a writer and has emerged as a significant pastoral voice to those for whom faith has been difficult.  For the uninitiated, some of Yancey’s titles include “What’s So Amazing About Grace,”  ”Disappointment with God,”  ”Where Is God When It Hurts?” and “The Jesus I Never Knew.”

Philip lives in the mountains of Colorado with his wife Janet.

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At fifty-two, Mike Yaconelli is refreshingly unstable. Though he defies being easily categorized, at times his spiritual lexicon lists words more familiar to a Trappist monk or a Buddhist than an evangelical Christian. But Yaconelli is passionate about the gospel. And he is nothing if not a walking contradiction. A former student at Bob Jones University, but profoundly influenced by the spirituality of Henry Nouwen. An outspoken, often controversial, critic of the church, but a pastor with great affection for the church through which he ministers to the unchurched and irreligious. He calls himself an evangelist, but says he doesn’t do evangelism. Go figure.

As we talk over breakfast at the National Youth Workers Convention in San Diego, Yaconelli inconspicuously turns an invisible key, accelerates, and shifts into high gear. In a matter of minutes my interview questions have gone up in smoke. The words intense and passionate come to mind but are quickly dismissed for their obvious inadequacy to describe our time together. Clearly, this is a man who has broken the mold of evangelical leadership.

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It would strike some as odd that an ordained rabbi who served a chaplaincy in the Korean War, later earned a Ph.D. in philosophy from an Ivy League university, earned a reputation as a world-class Judaic scholar, and wrote several best-selling novels along the way, would be known for his mapmaking abilities. But Chaim Potok has spent the majority of his life doing just

that-mapping out the terrain of his Jewish past in novels which have transported both Jew and non-Jew into fictional worlds which transcend religious boundaries.

Perhaps best known as the author of The Chosen-which in 1981 was made into a movie starring Robby Benson and Rod Steiger, Potok is the author of eleven novels, two children’s books, and several works of nonfiction including the critically acclaimed Wanderings: Chaim Potok’s History of the Jews

“Long ago, in The Chosen,” he writes, “I set out to draw a map of the New York world through which I once journeyed. It was to be a map not only of broken streets, menacing alleys, concrete-surfaced backyards, neighborhood schools and stores . . . a map not only of the physical elements of my early life, but of the spiritual ones as well.”¹ The result of such mapmaking has been an insider’s look into opposing worldviews-conservative Jewish-American culture and twentieth- century secularism: clashing values, beliefs, ideas, and dreams. This has been the underlying tension in all of Potok’s writing. And it has also been the story of his life.

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