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00:00:01
With Nathan Rittenhouse
555 Plays1 year ago
One of the most effective methods for sharing the gospel is through personal conversations. But in our modern world, many of us struggle with 'personal' and 'conversation' for a variety of reasons. Today on PEP Talk we discuss the issues and struggles we have with conversation, personal connection and empathy in an age of digital distraction and polarised public discourse.
For further reading, books mentioned in this episode include Disruptive Witness by Alan Noble and Reclaiming Conversation by Sherry Turkle.
Our Guest
Nathan Rittenhouse is a speaker, preacher and podcaster. After double-majoring in Physics and Philosophy, Nathan studied theology and pastoral studies in several institutions and holds an M.Div from Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary. Nathan has been preaching and speaking in the field of Christian apologetics at churches, campuses, and conferences for the last 8 years. He is the Co-Founder of Thinking Out Loud. Nathan, his wife Erin, and their four children enjoy the great outdoors and are grateful for the wisdom, support, and opportunities to serve and grow in their local church.
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Transcript
Introduction and Setting the Scene
00:00:10
Speaker
Hello, and welcome to Pet Talk, the persuasive evangelism podcast. I'm Christi, and I'm joined with my wonderful co-host, Andy Bannister. Andy, how are you doing? I am doing well. Well, I'm freezing. It's minus two degrees, and it's the time of year when you ask yourself the question, why do I have my office in a wooden hut in the garden? Why do you have your office in a wooden hut in the garden, Andy? So I can scrape the ice off the windows in the morning, Christi. That's clearly the answer to that question.
Meet Nathan: A Multifaceted Life
00:00:38
Speaker
Well, we're also joined by someone who actually I'm Nathan. I'm not sure where about so you, you joining us from how cold is it where you are? Yes. Yeah. Below freezing here as well. So I'm in West Virginia in the States.
00:00:50
Speaker
Okay, well, Nathan, welcome to Pep Talk. Just by way of a short introduction, before we hit record, you mentioned introducing you as preacher, podcaster, farmer, and wannabe philosopher. Oh, as a wannabe also went with a farmer. Yeah, there's two wannabes that I am, so. Oh, the farmer was a wannabe as well. Oh, I don't know. You've already got pigs. What else have you got? Oh, yeah, chickens and bees and high tunnel vegetables abound.
00:01:17
Speaker
Fantastic. Well, that breaks the alliteration, doesn't it? Because I like Preacher, podcast, philosopher and farmer. Well, farmer doesn't begin with F, does it actually? Yeah, but it's near enough. It's near enough.
Evangelistic Conversations: Empathy and Approach
00:01:30
Speaker
Well, Nathan, we're really thrilled to have you on the podcast with us today. What I'd love to ask you a little bit about, so often we talk about, you know, different topics that we throw around together, but we were just talking a little bit about conversation, weren't we? And just some things that you've noticed yourself in terms of having conversations and having spiritual conversations. What have you noticed and why might be what we're going to talk about quite a big thing for us to consider?
00:01:58
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's a great question. And one of the strange things that I've noticed that when it comes to having evangelistic conversations is that the people that I know who are the best at this don't know they're evangelist.
00:02:11
Speaker
And so I think oftentimes we think of evangelism as a professional category or something that maybe you're trained in. And there is training for that. There are people who are professional evangelists, but I am blown away sometimes by just overhearing a conversation that's just so casual, somebody just genuinely being interested in somebody else's life and then the reciprocated empathy that goes back and forth there. And then before you know it, they're invited into a really meaningful conversation.
00:02:36
Speaker
And so I think that's the thing that encourages me is recognizing that really the vast majority of evangelism gets done in a very non-confrontational, conversational way with people who are passionate about what they believe and have a deep love for the people around them.
00:02:55
Speaker
And then it just kind of naturally flows out. And we live in a time in which I think we think of all disagreement as contentious or combative. We certainly see that modeled through our screens. But the best evangelism that's happening out there is simply through conversations that everyday people are having with their family, classmates, coworkers, neighbors, what have you.
00:03:19
Speaker
So yeah, I'm, I'm excited about that because, and I think it's good for us to take a moment to think about what's the way in which this usually happens and what was Christ ideal for this idea about going and making disciples and teaching them to obey the commandments. So, um, it's one of those things where sometimes I think we get more technical, uh, then, then we need be sometimes. And this is a good moment for us just to step back and say, okay, how does this actually work? And what are some of the unique challenges of our times, um, and go from there?
Technology's Impact on Conversation Skills
00:03:49
Speaker
Well, on that very note, Nathan, in terms of some of the challenges, particularly of our times, I'm very struck that an author that I know you admire and that I admire, I don't know about whether Christie's encountered her, there's a wonderful writer called Sherry Turkle.
00:04:04
Speaker
based in the States, who's written a lot on technology and its impact on us. But Sherry wrote a book a few years ago now, four or five years ago from memory, something like that called Reclaiming Conversation. And that book really looks at the fact that we live in an age where people are forgetting how to have conversations. Now, she's a sociologist focusing on technology. And so one of her theories is a lot of that is driven by tech.
00:04:28
Speaker
We're at an age where everyone's staring into the black mirror of their devices and has forgotten how to talk with one another. And I think that is this one of the stumbling blocks that we're coming up against as Christians? Well, whether by the way it's technology or other issues, that we're trying to have spiritual conversations, which is itself tough, but we're trying to have it at an age where people have forgotten how to have perhaps conversations in the first place.
00:04:51
Speaker
Yeah, the thing that I found interesting about her book is where she enters the conversation. And I think there's a reference early on. She said, you know, we had Rachel Carson in the Silent Spring and the look at pesticides and the impact on the environment. And there's this explosion of, you know, interest in, you know, the predators and the, you know, the birds and all of this. And she said, what we're going through right now is another Silent Spring moment of the die off and empathy.
00:05:19
Speaker
So she was studying bullying and came to the conclusion through her studies that kids aren't getting more mean or they aren't trying to be mean, they just don't have any empathy and they can't see the world from somebody else's perspective. Now, she's linking that directly into how technology forms the way that we think about reality.
00:05:39
Speaker
But if we pull that then back into more of a gospel issue and think about here, we have a sociologist out of the Massachusetts Institute for Technology talking about the collapse of empathy within our culture. I think there's a lot of room for the church to lean into that and and ask some good questions about what does it mean for me to legitimately be able to think about somebody's life for Christ's sake, not for what they can do for me or how I can manipulate them or
00:06:08
Speaker
So, yeah, I think empathy is a good introduction into this idea of what does it mean to have a legitimate conversation? Yeah, I think if I recall, one of the things that I really enjoyed about her book, it was Alone Together, which may have been before that one, is that she gives the example of how
00:06:25
Speaker
people at funerals rather than talking to one another will text one another instead. And again, that just picks up that lack of empathy. And it's not because they don't have it necessarily, but they don't know how to express it in person with a person that is next to them, because you can't erase, you can't edit, you can't take back what you've just said as you can curate who you are through text message or WhatsApp or social media or whatever it is.
00:06:52
Speaker
And I suspect that many of us feel like that as well in our own conversations with friends or family or people that we're just meeting on the street that, oh gosh, I better get this right because I can't take this back if what I say in some way actually undermines the goodness of the gospel that I'm trying to commend. What if you come across kind of Nathan that might help to develop? You mentioned just some of the
00:07:18
Speaker
you know, the naturalness of conversations and developing that love for kind of other people and the skill in order to actually be able to express our care for others in person, not just through text and technology. What would you recommend? How could it go about that? Yeah.
Practical Tips for Spiritual Conversations
00:07:35
Speaker
And before we go there, two or three things, but just one thing first that so I was talking to a young working professional and he said, I find myself being extremely guarded
00:07:45
Speaker
in any conversation that I have with anybody. So he said, take immigration, abortion, marriage, politics, climate. He said, you know, it's a landmine out there. So he said, if you're meeting somebody casually, you're not going to get into any deep type of conversation because
00:08:03
Speaker
You're trying to kind of walk around these landmines. You don't want to step on the thing that's going to explode, and then they're going to judge you through their preconceived notions. So he said, my professional interactions in the workplace are all extremely superficial.
00:08:16
Speaker
He's like, I don't talk about important things with anybody that I don't know really, really well. And so that leads me into where I wanted to go with this is just, this is obvious, but let's recognize the difficulty of having a good spiritual conversation with somebody who doesn't want to have a conversation at all.
00:08:34
Speaker
And so we're trying, I think oftentimes to jump in at like the deep end of the pool in something that needs to be eased into. And so in my recollection of thinking of times in which this has gone well, a good spiritual conversation always happens inside of another conversation.
00:08:51
Speaker
Now that's not to say there aren't times in which the Lord just sets you up and you're at the right place at the right time. And the person beside you on the plane is crying and wondering about the meaning of life. I mean, you can jump right in there, but by and large, you don't start at 60 miles an hour. You ease into it. And so that means that a rich conversation about somebody's life is going to happen inside the context of another conversation. So I kind of work through it practically like this. Um,
00:09:18
Speaker
Say you're you know, let's let's use the example of you're in a public space or you meet somebody for the first time you have half an hour together or whatever. First question, does this person want to talk to me at all? You know, earbuds and sit down. No, they don't. And if you try to force your way into that, that's not going to work. So here's the question. Does this person want to talk to me at all? Then here's my next sneaky move is to let them know in the conversation that I'm a Christian.
00:09:46
Speaker
Cause what I'm wanting to find out is, does this person want to talk to me? And then does this person knowing that I'm a Christian still want to continue talking to me? So it might go like this. I'm talking to somebody and they say, I run this small business. And I'll say, you know, a couple of the people that I go to church with who run small businesses have talked about how difficult it is to find workers who have a good work ethic, who can really carry on the ethos of the business. Is that something you found to be true?
00:10:11
Speaker
Okay. What are we talking about there? We're talking about finding good workers or somebody's a dentist and I'll say, Hey, you know, the dentist that I go to church with has noticed that. And so I'm just dropping this in there, right? So I'm just putting it in there. I'm a Christian. I'm interested, you know, I talk about spiritual things. And then at that point, if they want to continue talking to me,
00:10:32
Speaker
It's their fault. They know what they're getting themselves into, right? So I'm giving them an out. Do you want to talk to me about interesting things? Yes. Do you understand that I'm a Christian and a spiritual person and willing to talk about that and still want to talk to me? And then step three is to go for it a bit deeper. So I think that's the practical step is, okay, maybe you have a conversation with somebody. It's going to be hard to talk to them about Jesus if they don't know you're a Christian.
00:10:56
Speaker
So how do you start to kind of ease into that in a very, you know, not strategic way, be genuinely interested in what they're interested in life. But you need to, you need to mention that at some point to get the conversation going.
00:11:09
Speaker
One thing you said there, though, Nathan, that's phenomenally helpful advice, actually, and I always love my conversations with you because I always learn things. That's a really clever idea, actually, to find that way of just sewing those little things in early on and then seeing what happens. Is there also, though, an issue that we need to address in the church sometimes for us Christians that
00:11:30
Speaker
But can we be guilty of not taking enough of an interest in others? Because the very way that you model back there of reaching out and taking an interest, I think sometimes there's a disconnect that, you know, either we want to, as you say, go straight for the jugular. And the only thing we know how to do is let me give my testimony. I will not actually genuine interest in the other person.
00:11:49
Speaker
Or actually, we've bought into exactly the same world in which conversation has been forgotten. We've forgotten how to take that interest in people. And there might be some people listening to what you've described there and going, oh, it wouldn't have occurred to me to actually find that connection. How have you learned to be able to sort of think that way and go, oh, dentist, friend at work, church, these kind of conversations, and then target that towards genuinely taking an interest? Because certainly I found, I mean, it was interesting. I was on an airplane ride just the other day.
00:12:19
Speaker
I got chatting to the couple next to me who had an absolutely fascinating job and it was actually really easy just to go, wow, I've never met someone who does that. I can ask obvious questions, but sometimes it's harder. How do we learn how to be people who take an interest in others such that that is attractive and winsome in itself?
00:12:37
Speaker
Yeah, well, so I think part of it is the way in which we conceptualize what the gospel is. And if we're seeing it as a way of life, not a set of propositions to have somebody download, then it does get easier. I learned this from a campus minister one time where he said, we tend to do the things
00:12:56
Speaker
that are in keeping with the way in which we visualize ourselves. So he said, I think of myself as someone who, so what do you do for a hobby? He would say, I think of myself as someone who has spiritual conversations.
00:13:08
Speaker
And if that's a, if that's a real part of your life, then you're going to talk about your kids, uh, soccer, football team, your side. Um, you know, you're going to talk about, you know, camping, hiking in the, in Scotland, if you're Andy or whatever, but then it's going to come back around to it. Oh, also, you know, I do this on the weekends or Wednesday nights or whatever with my church. Um,
00:13:28
Speaker
So I think part of it is the way in which we're thinking about evangelism as inviting somebody into a way of life, which is richly in keeping with Jesus was teaching. And so it's going to make sense then that the gospel touches our lives and all of the categories. I was just recently on the Unbelievable podcast talking about animal rights. And the host said to me, why are you interested in this? And I said, well, because I'm a disciple of Jesus. And I'm curious about how everything that I do applies to my life.
00:13:55
Speaker
Um, you know, so if we're, if we're looking for that kind of integrity, we're going to find all the, all these little ways in which, um, are, are religious. And I think that's a good word or religious, um, connection to the church into Christ pop up in our everyday conversations.
00:14:12
Speaker
I think that was the word that jumped out at me before you said it, that Nathan was discipleship, thinking about this being a way of life. This is who we are in Jesus and who he's made us to be with particular passions and hobbies and things like that. What do you think it would look like to go from having that entry-level conversation of
00:14:33
Speaker
This is just what I do, you know with my church or I know someone in my church who does this da da da How how could you then like take the conversation on a little bit? So there's a point at which I think there's a there's an evangelist in the UK I think it's Rico ties. He talks about how we all cross this pain line There's a pain threshold where you go from talking about things, you know in your life and hobbies to actually talking about
00:14:57
Speaker
Jesus. And it's crossing that pain line that many of us can find really quite painful because suddenly the temperature kind of changes a little bit and you're not quite sure what the next thing is to say. And that's when that fear of, I can't edit, I can't change it. How do I still be a human being and have this conversation with a person in front of me?
00:15:19
Speaker
Well, I wonder if this is going to be changing a little bit. When I look at the proliferation of interest in the occult, crystals, astrology, this is just out there. It's everywhere. And so one of the things that I've tried to do that has worked well is, you know, kind of like Andy, you're sitting beside somebody genuinely fascinating. I loved you. Like, where did you move from there? And why did you end up there? And why did you go to university here? And that's great. And then at some point you can turn the corner and say,
00:15:46
Speaker
People love talking about themselves by and large. You say, that's, that's, that's a wild story. And they say, you know, it's interesting. Is there a spiritual journey that goes alongside that? And more often than not, there is, and that's very open-ended and people can bite on that as they want. But I think you're saying, look, here's the fullness of life and the things that we normally talk about. Where are you from? What do you do? Do you have a family? What are your hobbies?
00:16:12
Speaker
kind of surface level stuff. But we recognize as Christians in order to be fully human, that we are spiritual creatures made in the image of God and that the vast majority of humans have experiences that don't quite fit within a reductionistic, materialistic, naturalistic framework of reality. And so just sliding that in there alongside to say, as, as if it's another part of the story of saying, is there a spiritual journey that goes alongside that? Um,
00:16:39
Speaker
So anyway, that would be step one, I think, in that, or three or whatever step we're on. I don't know. Are we doing numbers, Nathan? By the way, one thing I came across the other day was that it's also interesting to learn from others to do this well. So that couple I mentioned I got checked on the airplane the other day was fascinating. It was a couple of colleagues. They weren't part, they weren't together. But the woman started the conversation with me because I've been reading for the entire flight, two or three books. And then as we landed, she's like,
00:17:08
Speaker
asking yourself, are you just someone who's interested in reading or is that for work? And I was like, that's a good question. I thought, by the way, that's really good. So actually, she initiated the conversation.
Creating Space for Spontaneity in Conversations
00:17:18
Speaker
Then I found out what they did, which was fascinating. So when you hear good questions from others, like you've just modeled, I like noting them down and going, that one you said there about the spiritual journey. That's a really great question. But Nathan, the other thing I wanted to ask about
00:17:32
Speaker
One of the other things, but back to our old friend Sherry Turkle, I think the other thing that comes out of that book on reclaiming conversation, and I think is also a stumbling block for some, is there also an issue that we live now in a culture that's so busy, that was so surrounded by digital devices, so much noise, like in the past, not wanting to hark back to the past, but
00:17:50
Speaker
When we were lining up for waiting for our coffee, you know, whatever coffee shop you frequent, I refuse to mention any brand names because they're not sponsoring us. You know, you wouldn't, we wouldn't have had our phones. We'd have kind of looked around and gone, there's a way I more likely get chatting to the person next to me. Now we have these down moments. What do we do? We whip our phones out. We do our social media. We try and get rid of three email messages. We're constantly busy, busy, busy. And that reduces the space for these kind of accidental conversations.
00:18:18
Speaker
Is that an issue and how as Christians do we try and sort of push back against that a bit and sort of try and create more space in which conversation might happen, right? Because, you know, if you want to, if you know, talking to a wannabe farmer, if you want to grow some vegetables, you might do some ground clearance first. If you just sort of throw your seed down among the weeds and hope it happens, you're going to be, it's going to be far less effective than if you actually do a bit of ground clearance first. Is there equivalent for conversation? Can we cultivate the ground a bit and make it more likely that conversations might happen?
00:18:48
Speaker
Well, there's a great book on that exact theme by Alan Noble called Disruptive Witness. Is it Witness in a Distracted Age? I think. So if any listeners are interested in that, it's a quick read. It draws largely on Charles Taylor's secular age and pulls out some of those themes. But it looks at disruptive personal, disruptive community and disruptive church practices.
00:19:09
Speaker
It's that exact idea. You don't just go out and throw seeds on the soil. There's some soil disturbance that happens in advance there, kind of a tilling if you were to get that seed bed ready. That would be a great resource for people who want to push into that.
00:19:26
Speaker
I guess in the past, we would professionally talk about that as pre evangelism. But right now, I would say that we're living in a tumultuous time in which the soil is being is already tilled. When I look at just, you know, even talking to pastors here in the last, I would say month or two, the harvest is plentiful and the workers are few.
Cultural Shifts: Rationalism and Spiritual Openness
00:19:45
Speaker
There are people who are fascinated, people coming to church for the first time.
00:19:51
Speaker
The people are at ill ease with how the world is going. I guess in a market term, a lot of the competitors of the church or a lot of the false messiahs, whether it be education, the medical system, science, politics, whatever's happening in government that have said, we're going to solve all your problems, are just not doing that.
00:20:12
Speaker
And all of a sudden, the gospel makes more sense in that context. So I think we're in a in a sweet spot here right now where a lot of that soil disturbance is happening and is ready to receive the seed.
00:20:26
Speaker
Yeah, very much so. And I'm just really quite intrigued to hear about what you think that has contributed to that shift. Or maybe it's not a shift, but maybe you're just kind of seeing more people who are more engaged and interested in spiritual conversations and then coming to church than usual. I mean, what are your reflections on that, Nathan? Well, I was listening to, so we have NPR in the States, National Public Radio, and there was a lady doing an interview with somebody who's a professional astrologist.
00:20:55
Speaker
And they said, you know, isn't this whole thing a little bit wonky, you know, astral projection, so forth. And she said an interesting phrase. She said, look.
00:21:03
Speaker
We've tried Western rationalism and look what it's left us with. Maybe it's time to try something a little bit wonky. Now, I would say that's an extremely dangerous thing to say, but what's in what's baked into that is actually, you see this in here, see Ali's conversion recently where we constructed a world that was just so cold, clinical and sterile that it was unlivable.
00:21:30
Speaker
Look what rationalism has gotten us. Maybe it's time to try something a little bit wonky is a scream for, I need to find some meaning in my life. And the last decade, the answers that have been told to me for where I will find meaning and fulfillment in life haven't turned out to have borne no fruit. And so I think that's where this is coming from. And people aren't rejecting Christianity because they don't think it's rational. They're rejecting Christianity because they don't think it's good.
00:22:00
Speaker
And people believe all kinds of goofy stuff. That's irrational. Rationality is not the issue. So part of what we're doing in those conversations about the gospel that we're having is not me saying, I know this and you need to know this. I'm right and you're wrong. It's for me to say, you know what I've been working on in my life? I find that we are living in a time when people aren't empathetic, when people aren't doing a good job of listening to others. And I'm trying to grow in this direction. This is what I'm up about.
00:22:26
Speaker
This is what we're up against and this is what I'm about. The conversation is more, will you come journey with me as we pursue this? And I've found that in the teachings of Jesus, he's one of the few people who tells truth for the actual sake of the other person, not because he's trying to get something out of them. And to me, that stands out as a very unique thing in all of history. And that's why I'm fascinated.
00:22:50
Speaker
So I think it's making that turn of capitalizing on the already, on the uneasiness with the answers that the world has given, and then saying, the gospel is good on all the categories, and I'm trying to grow in that direction. And hey, if you're interested, come along with me. Now, back to what the other thing I've found is that very few people, Andy, read books anymore.
Christians as Engaging Conversationalists
00:23:10
Speaker
So very few people have book level knowledge on a topic. Most people have a tweet, a meme. And so I'm increasingly finding that Christians have more to say in a robust way on most topics than anybody else that I run into. So I think, Christy, to your question, there's also that part of this is my father's world and I'm curious about how it works. And I'm going to be studying and pursuing and asking questions and turning over the rocks just for the sheer giggles and kicks of it.
00:23:38
Speaker
Because I think there's a lot of undiscovered beauty and joy there and so I'm increasingly finding Christians to be by far the most interesting people that I'm running into Anywhere, and I think that has to be contagious as well Well
00:23:52
Speaker
I think on that note, Nathan, that's a good place to bring it to an end because we've hit almost 24 minutes and we try and keep it under 25. But wow, there are so many things we could say off that. But I hope that folks have found this helpful and kind of stimulating. We're going to put a link to Alan Noble's book.
00:24:10
Speaker
into the show notes of people who want to pursue that. Nathan, thank you just so much for spending the time and sharing some wisdom and disrupting our pre-prepared questions with a direction that I hadn't quite expected to go in. This has been really, really helpful. So again, every blessing on all you're doing there in the USA, be it farming or philosophy or preaching or other things that begin with a purr or a fur.
00:24:32
Speaker
And thanks again for joining us. Podcasting, that's the thing. Meanwhile, from me, Andy Bannister and Christy, I hope you've enjoyed that. Wherever you're listening to pep talk in the car, in the bath, while milking your cow, wherever you are. We'll be back in two weeks time with another episode and another guest. So join us then, but goodbye for now.