Transcripts

00:00:00 Jeromy Johnson: What happens when you stop trying to deserve love? When you lay down your constant need to be right, to be pure, to be enough. What if God was never waiting for your belief to start loving you? That's the world. Chris Jorgensen lives in a world where grace isn't polite. It's powerful. Where perfection gives way to presence, and faith looks more like wonder than certainty. In this conversation, we talk about the holy risk of love that breaks rules, about the scarcity we inherit and the abundance that we're invited into. Because maybe the real miracle of faith isn't believing harder. It's daring to rest in a love that has already said yes, that you are beloved and worthy and deserving without question. So pull up a chair, unclench your theology, and let's wade into deeper waters. I'm your host, Jeremy Johnson, and you're listening to slutty Grace. From Drew Theological Seminary in New Jersey to Greenwich Village and eventually back home to Omaha. Chris has followed that call with honesty and courage. In twenty seventeen, she became the first female pastor in the one hundred and thirty year history of Hanscom Park United Methodist Church. Now at Saint Andrews, she works to break down barriers that keep people from encountering God's love, creating spaces where faith can be curious and grace can breathe. Chris, welcome to slutty Grace. I'm glad we finally get to sit down and talk.

00:01:35 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for making time for me tonight.

00:01:38 Jeromy Johnson: You know, it's funny, when I named it this, it was a risk. It was a decision for sure. Right? Because it's not the the most, uh, kosher, uh, title. You know what's funny, though? More women like it than men.

00:01:51 Chris Jorgensen: Oh, that's really interesting.

00:01:53 Jeromy Johnson: Isn't that interesting? I thought it would be the opposite. Yeah, but usually it's it's the men that have a bigger issue with it. Like, most women are like, oh my gosh, that's really cool, I like that.

00:02:03 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah yeah yeah. Don't don't make me get into the patriarchy right away. This is a very big temptation right now, Jeremy.

00:02:10 Jeromy Johnson: All right, well, we'll we'll slide into that once we get warmed up, but we'll, uh, you know, Chris, I have been looking forward to this conversation for some time. I know we we reschedule a few times. And I'm really excited to hear your story. And a bird told me you might have an opinion or two.

00:02:28 Chris Jorgensen: I am slightly opinionated. It's true. Yes.

00:02:33 Jeromy Johnson: Okay. I just picture us, like, at a at a bar or a coffee shop sitting down. We just met each other and we're having a conversation, and people are really nosy, and they're just eavesdropping on our conversation here tonight. And so I'm excited with that now. Last time we talked you had just announced something to your church and leadership, right? Yeah. And that was one of the reasons why we had to reschedule, because it was just pretty heavy. Would you mind sharing what that was and how that impacted you?

00:02:59 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, absolutely. So I have been the pastor at Saint Andrew's for about three and a half years, and I made the decision basically this summer when I was up visiting my parents in Wisconsin, that I just felt a very clear call, that it was time for me to go home and be near them and sort of move myself back to Wisconsin to be closer to my family. And so, yeah, it was just a couple weeks ago, about two weeks ago, I think that I announced that to my congregation. So, um, which is kind of a weird thing in the Methodist tradition, because we are under an appointment system. So usually they get a call from a district superintendent sometime in the spring saying, hey, we're moving your pastor. So to know about it this far out is is both unusual, but also, I think maybe a healthy opportunity to have a good transition. So. So yeah. So that's what's going on. So I'm in this weird transitional space of being a quasi self-appointed interim slash lame duck pastor at my church. And so we'll see which one of those manifests. But yeah.

00:03:58 Jeromy Johnson: And right now you don't have a place in, uh, Wisconsin that I noticed you're.

00:04:02 Chris Jorgensen: Wearing a.

00:04:03 Jeromy Johnson: Packer shirt.

00:04:03 Chris Jorgensen: By the way.

00:04:04 Jeromy Johnson: No, I don't.

00:04:05 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, so it is. Oh, no. Did you. Oh, don't even, um. So no, I don't yet. Um, so that is, that's the risk. I mean, I don't I don't have an appointment yet. There will be some conversations between the Methodists in my conference and the Methodist in Wisconsin about trying to find me a place there. And, um, if they can't find me a place, which is potentially potential because Wisconsin is a big state and I want to be closer to my parents. Um, there's a couple other denominations that I'm just chatting with about potential calls there, too.

00:04:34 Jeromy Johnson: So so you're like, look, not wanting to leave, like, but I will.

00:04:37 Chris Jorgensen: I mean.

00:04:38 Jeromy Johnson: I force my hand.

00:04:39 Chris Jorgensen: I am a free agent. So yeah. And it really could be the fact that the possibility that Wisconsin just doesn't have the right place within seventy five miles or whatever, my parents, whatever, my hope is about that. So, I mean, yeah, that's true.

00:04:50 Jeromy Johnson: They have to have an opening and.

00:04:51 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah.

00:04:52 Jeromy Johnson: And and the right fit too. Yeah.

00:04:54 Chris Jorgensen: Exactly, exactly.

00:04:55 Jeromy Johnson: So used to be a librarian. Yeah. So you're kind of like a book. Like you're on loan.

00:05:01 Chris Jorgensen: The on loan. I will be on loan. Yeah. So technically I'll be on loan from the from Great Plains Annual conference to Wisconsin if I go there, so. Yeah. Yeah.

00:05:10 Jeromy Johnson: Well, maybe there's someone to find if they don't return you fast enough, but we'll see.

00:05:15 Chris Jorgensen: I'll tell my bishop.

00:05:17 Jeromy Johnson: I mean, we don't know a whole lot about each other, so I am fascinated. What is your spiritual journey kind of been been so far? So, I mean, you were a librarian and a stay at home mom and then an academic person and then now a pastor. So what did that look like?

00:05:34 Chris Jorgensen: Well, at risk of starting with the words, I was baptized as an infant because I know you don't want to hear.

00:05:42 Jeromy Johnson: But you were right.

00:05:43 Chris Jorgensen: You were. I was.

00:05:44 Jeromy Johnson: I was a lot of people like that is. That's a weird thing, because baptism is for the repentance of sins and some traditions. And like, infant baptism is like, can be really radical.

00:05:55 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, yeah. So we can we can talk about baptismal theology more if you want to, but we'll start with I was baptized as an infant in the, in the Roman Catholic Church. So I was raised Catholic. I actually went to Catholic grade school through eighth grade, and I grew up in a very Catholic community. It was kind of interesting. I like it was very homogenously Catholic, with just a few Protestants kind of hanging around here and there. I was confirmed in the Catholic Church, though, had lots of questions, and and my parents confessed to me at one point they're like, we didn't think you'd ever get confirmed. And I was like, I didn't know I had a choice.

00:06:27 Jeromy Johnson: So like, you're like, wait, I can choose. No.

00:06:30 Chris Jorgensen: You're like, wait a minute. I was like, wait, you wouldn't have. Okay, well, we've done this now.

00:06:34 Jeromy Johnson: So even at a young age, you kind of asked some of those.

00:06:37 Chris Jorgensen: I really did, I really did, I, I, I've always been a sort of questioner and skeptic and. Yeah.

00:06:46 Jeromy Johnson: Dangerous.

00:06:47 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, yeah. One of those dangerous, um, unruly women. So, so I then I went to college and I, I pretty much decided to leave college. I went to a place called Central College in Pella, Iowa. Pella is where they have where they make windows. If you know Pella windows, I don't you don't know Pella windows. Well, I hear they're good windows.

00:07:08 Jeromy Johnson: Um, now I'll be looking for you.

00:07:10 Chris Jorgensen: Need to look for them anyway. So. Yeah. Pella, Iowa, a small town. Um, interestingly, I went to a Reformed Church of America school of the Dutch Reformed Church, and I grew up in a Dutch Catholic community, and I didn't quite understand that, like, those people were fighting with each other. They are not friends. Um, so that was kind of an interesting experience to to get there. And again, I was just so in this like, of course, everybody's Catholic mindset to get outside of that was like, oh, what is even happening here? So. So anyway, so I went there and I started doing, um, some exploration of, you know, as young people do what I believe. And I took a couple classes on eastern religions and got really interested in those, sort of did what I would describe.

00:07:53 Jeromy Johnson: Buddhist, Hindu.

00:07:54 Chris Jorgensen: Buddhism, Hinduism, a little Islam, which is not, which is more obviously Near Eastern religion. Okay. And did what I think I, I don't know, a lot of people do, but in my case I describe it as like I sort of left the church of my childhood or the understandings, my theological understanding of my childhood. And so, so I just kind of tossed the whole thing out.

00:08:12 Jeromy Johnson: And what age was this?

00:08:14 Chris Jorgensen: Nineteen, maybe. Okay. Yeah, yeah, it was first or second year of college.

00:08:18 Jeromy Johnson: Didn't take you long, did it?

00:08:19 Chris Jorgensen: It did not. I haven't.

00:08:21 Speaker 4: As my parents.

00:08:22 Chris Jorgensen: Maybe noticed I was one foot out the door. So yeah, so I left. And the reasons I left there, you know, there's sort of there's two branches. I think one is sort of theological. And one was basically I would just call political. Like there had been a literal front page I can remember, and I have a terrible memory, but I can remember walking into my lounge of the building I was living in, and it must have been sophomore year, because that's the building I lived in sophomore year, and there was a newspaper on the table, and it said something along the lines of Pope comes out with announcement against gay rights, abortion and something else I can't remember what. There were three things. I just was literally like, I literally stood there and said, I'm out. Like, it was like that was the moment.

00:09:05 Speaker 5: Where I was just like.

00:09:06 Chris Jorgensen: Okay, here's my sign I've been waiting for, apparently.

00:09:08 Speaker 4: So anyway, so.

00:09:10 Chris Jorgensen: So for that reason, I left it. Then the other reason was, was the theological stuff, again, the Catholic upbringing of my childhood. My understanding was if you weren't Catholic, you were going to hell. I don't know if anyone actually said that straight up to me or if I just like intuited it or what, but, um, and I and I know so many wonderful Catholic theologians.

00:09:28 Jeromy Johnson: That was just the water that.

00:09:29 Speaker 4: Was there was just the water. Yeah, just the water.

00:09:31 Chris Jorgensen: I swam in. So I started learning about, like, all these Hindus and all these Buddhists, and I'm like, so our God, who is love? Probably not sending all those people to hell. And again, so I'm like, I'm out. You know, I'm like, okay, there's the other reason I'm out. Yeah. So so I left, so I left the faith. And I was so interested in religion and thought about being a religion minor. And I'm like, well, what am I going to do with this? I don't I don't believe any of this. Like, I can't.

00:09:56 Speaker 4: Like.

00:09:57 Chris Jorgensen: It. Wouldn't it literally did not cross my mind that I might become a pastor if I was a religion major or minor, like it was so far out of the realm of anything I would have ever considered. So that was college. And then after college, I continued to be interested in religion. And so my first husband, Matt, and I started going to a Unitarian church, a Unitarian Universalist church, and really liked it. But but it and it was a great kind of like social, political community for us. But it just wasn't very spiritual for me. Like it was a lot about ideas, less about experience. And I and I love Unitarians to this day. But like, I just kind of by the time my daughter was born, I was just kind of disengaged because it wasn't like it didn't have that urgency of like, I don't know, it didn't have the spirit.

00:10:41 Jeromy Johnson: Felt like maybe they went too far in one direction and.

00:10:44 Speaker 4: Yeah, left a little bit of that spiritual experience.

00:10:47 Jeromy Johnson: Behind.

00:10:48 Chris Jorgensen: Just so people know, like every Unitarian Universalist church, I think has a very, very different personality.

00:10:53 Speaker 4: Correct? Yeah. This was just the congregation. You know.

00:10:56 Chris Jorgensen: This was just where where this was at for me. So, um, but they I mean, they do tend to be very educated and probably pretty intellectual in general. But again, there's there's a big variety, especially across the country. They have different sort of ways of expressing that faith or whatever. Anyway, so I left faith not in like leave. It wasn't traumatic. I was just like, we kind of just floated away as people do. And then when my daughter Ruby was four, it's just the only way I can tell time. She's she's twenty now, so. So this must have been sixteen years ago. We started going to First United Methodist Church here in Omaha. And the reason we went there is because we had some friends who we knew who, who we trusted, and who went there and had invited us to go. And eventually we just were like, yeah, you know, I think if we're going to check out a church, this might be the one for us. That friend of mine also had given me a book, um, by Marcus Borg called The God We Never Knew. And it just, like, blew my mind in terms of like, oh, this is a totally different way to look at Christianity from this sort of progressive perspective. And I was like, wow, I think I might be able to get behind this. So, um.

00:12:02 Jeromy Johnson: So books can be powerful, like it was a few books that, like, started reshaping like gave me another paradigm of like, these people are asking questions that I've always wrestled with. Yeah. And that's why they're like, they would burn books. Like they wouldn't let women read.

00:12:17 Speaker 4: For, right, so many years because they're like.

00:12:20 Jeromy Johnson: We can't let them get these ideas.

00:12:23 Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you have because they're powerful. Do you have a.

00:12:25 Chris Jorgensen: Certain book that you name as being pivotal?

00:12:29 Jeromy Johnson: It was Brian McLaren, a new kind of Christian.

00:12:32 Speaker 4: Okay, gotcha.

00:12:33 Jeromy Johnson: And he has a three book series of that. And I honor his ability to ask great.

00:12:40 Speaker 4: Questions.

00:12:41 Jeromy Johnson: And frame them in a way that's very approachable.

00:12:43 Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah. And I was just awesome. Yeah, it.

00:12:46 Jeromy Johnson: Was the right time, the right place. And then, um, so I was at that point I was in a Presbyterian USA church in Del Brunette, was was my pastor. And so just even that theology was quite a bit different than, than what I had been brought up with. And, and I've always been open to that. But that was a big part of.

00:13:03 Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's very cool.

00:13:04 Jeromy Johnson: Started all the.

00:13:05 Speaker 4: Dominoes to fall over. Yeah. So yeah. So this Marcus destroy myself. Yeah.

00:13:09 Jeromy Johnson: And claim me as a heretic.

00:13:12 Speaker 4: Well, you know, I.

00:13:14 Chris Jorgensen: I have a funny story about being called a heretic in social media. Um, I could I could share later.

00:13:20 Speaker 4: But anyway.

00:13:21 Chris Jorgensen: So we're in. So we're in my early, early life, right? And, um, Ruby's my daughter is around four. We start going to this church, and and I am squarely agnostic at this point. I'm like, I'm not sure what I'm doing here, but I'm interested because it's all like it's all like an anthropological exercise for me, right? Like, isn't this interesting that they're doing this kind of high church thing that they did when I was, you know, in my Catholic upbringing, but this is different. Whatever. Like I'm just fascinated by it all. But I also am like really guarded, like, okay, I'm just waiting. I'm just waiting for the pastor to say something in a sermon where I'm like, again, I'm out. Right? Yeah. And then I two pastors at the time were women Jane Florence, Reverend Doctor Jane Florence, and Reverend Deborah McKnight. They were phenomenal, phenomenal preachers, phenomenal leaders. Deborah ended up starting a coffee shop, bookstore, church, and she was a new church start pastor. And like one of the only successful new church, new church start pastors in Methodism in our conference that I know of, not just women pastors also very unusual.

00:14:23 Speaker 4: Wow. But, um, there's a stat. Anyway, it is a stat.

00:14:26 Chris Jorgensen: It's probably a very, very small percentage. Anyway, she's phenomenal. So I'm listening to these women preach, and I'm like, I'm waiting for them to say the thing that I'm just like, I just can't get behind this. And while they're keeping me in the pews long enough, there's some music and I can't remember what song it was during where I just really had, like a conversion experience, which is sort of embarrassing to say as a progressive, right? And so. So I had this experience of just being convinced, convicted of God's presence and God's grace, and also being given the the gift of seeing myself through God's eyes as a beloved child, as someone who needed and given forgiveness. Just this, as you might call it. Grace, right? Just this. Like like the forgiveness was just so free. And it it was so divorced from everything I had learned about which made me think, like, you might be forgiven if you might be accepted if you are okay, But, you know, just all the qualifiers, like, you know, just didn't exist. It's like it didn't exist. And and in that moment, too, I felt really freed of understanding, like, okay, so, so if this is true about myself, if I am loved without qualification, then there's a lot of things I've been striving toward that I don't need to be doing anymore. Striving toward perfection, striving toward like being a good person, striving toward, you know, earning my worth, you know, having to achieve something, to be worth something, whatever. And all I have to do is just love people. And how freeing is that?

00:16:07 Speaker 5: Like, it's like, oh, oh, that's.

00:16:09 Chris Jorgensen: That's all I have to do. Like to.

00:16:11 Speaker 4: All.

00:16:11 Jeromy Johnson: I hear, like you. You felt this weight just kind of.

00:16:14 Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:16:14 Jeromy Johnson: Lift from you. And you weren't even religious or.

00:16:17 Speaker 4: I was.

00:16:17 Jeromy Johnson: Spiritual up until this point. You were just kind of. I mean, you kind of were, but not. Maybe you saw that Catholic guilt sitting around.

00:16:23 Speaker 4: I don't know, I don't.

00:16:24 Chris Jorgensen: Know what it was. I mean, I always I've always been so just drawn towards spiritual, but again, in this kind of. Intellectual way or whatever.

00:16:31 Jeromy Johnson: But perfection, it sounds like that's something that. Doesn't matter who you are. Like people struggle with perfection.

00:16:37 Speaker 4: And like trying.

00:16:38 Jeromy Johnson: To trying to. Always make people happy around.

00:16:40 Speaker 4: You, right?

00:16:41 Jeromy Johnson: Trying to always say the right things. Whether you're in. Business or religion or in relationship. Walking on eggshells.

00:16:48 Speaker 4: Thinking that.

00:16:48 Jeromy Johnson: Everyone's judging you. And. God's judging.

00:16:51 Speaker 4: You.

00:16:51 Chris Jorgensen: Right? Right. And this, you know, the sort of self-judgment that that works its way into your brain, you know, as well. So. So, yeah.

00:16:57 Speaker 4: So good.

00:16:58 Jeromy Johnson: I'm glad you were freed from that.

00:16:59 Speaker 4: Yeah, I felt.

00:16:59 Chris Jorgensen: Really freed from all that. And then and then I started it just changed how I walked in. In the world, I will say. I do have to mention I just cried when this happened. Like, I, I cry as a response to spiritual experience. It's something I, I know about appropriate.

00:17:14 Speaker 4: So yeah, it's just.

00:17:15 Chris Jorgensen: It was so beautiful, you.

00:17:17 Speaker 4: Know, and just.

00:17:17 Chris Jorgensen: So moving to, to sort of finally I don't know how would I describe it like to finally feel like I was home.

00:17:24 Speaker 4: You know.

00:17:26 Chris Jorgensen: So so. Yeah. So so I.

00:17:28 Speaker 4: Have this.

00:17:28 Chris Jorgensen: Experience and then I start living my life in a little bit of a new way and like a freer way and taking more risks and not being as, as having, not having as much anxiety about like, oh, what if I make a mistake and what if I.

00:17:41 Speaker 4: Whatever.

00:17:42 Chris Jorgensen: And it's amazing. Like it's this amazing new way to walk in the world. And then because I'm not wise, I start asking questions like, how do I tell more people about this? And now, fifteen years later, I'm a pastor, you know, because.

00:17:58 Speaker 4: That's what happens, right? Like if you're.

00:18:00 Chris Jorgensen: Like, this amazing thing, I don't know. I know a lot of people have these experiences that don't become pastors. But for me, it was like, how do I tell more people about this? This has genuinely changed my life and made it so much better, and I want to share that with other people. How do I do that? So. So that's what got me into the ministry.

00:18:18 Speaker 4: Man.

00:18:19 Jeromy Johnson: And then obviously our growth doesn't doesn't stop there.

00:18:22 Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:18:22 Jeromy Johnson: Pastors and ministers.

00:18:24 Speaker 4: Yeah. You know, we.

00:18:25 Jeromy Johnson: You know, we are placed on a pedestal. It's just a weird place, right? Because you're like, I'm not deserving of this. But at the same time, this is my role. This is my position.

00:18:34 Speaker 4: Right, right. So it's just this weird dance. Jeremy.

00:18:37 Chris Jorgensen: I am deserving of this.

00:18:40 Speaker 4: Like.

00:18:40 Chris Jorgensen: As are you.

00:18:42 Speaker 4: Yes.

00:18:42 Chris Jorgensen: Every person. And let me tell you. Yeah. Every person who's a pastor I know is flawed is a flawed human. Yeah. And also totally deserving of sharing their their experience of God with people. I mean, I do think it's insane that I stand up every week and try to tell people about the mystery of God beyond all of our understanding.

00:19:03 Speaker 4: Like, I.

00:19:04 Chris Jorgensen: Continue to think that's a little nuts, that this is your job, Chris. And also, I think, if not me, then who?

00:19:12 Speaker 4: You know, like because everyone's.

00:19:14 Chris Jorgensen: Going to be a human who stands up there and preaches.

00:19:16 Speaker 4: You know.

00:19:17 Jeromy Johnson: Well, and here we are on a podcast, which is kind of a very similar thing, right? Where we're putting our voices out there for people to engage with and to, to learn from. But I've listened to a few of your sermons, and you deliver it with with humility and with a mystery, and I, I feel like that's the secret. I when people are just up there so dogmatic about this truth, and this is what the Bible says, and there's no arguing with this, there's this is just what it is. And this is what Judgment's going to be like. And this is what the day of God's going to be like, and this and that and this and that. And it's just so dogmatic and correct. I mean, a people are drawn to that because then they don't need to think they're just like, oh, this is what it is. But when you when you approach it with humility and mystery, it leaves room for their questions. It leaves room for them to think about things. It leaves I feel like it gives them permission to not have everything figured out.

00:20:07 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, I probably shouldn't say this out loud. I also don't have everything figured out. I know.

00:20:15 Jeromy Johnson: All right, well, we're done here. Thank you guys for listening. And we'll, uh.

00:20:19 Chris Jorgensen: We'll You're like, wait, I thought I had someone. And I'll figure it out.

00:20:25 Jeromy Johnson: I thought I finally got someone on that. Yeah. Had it all figured out. All right. Well, good.

00:20:30 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. The reason I say that I'm deserving is it's not. It's not an ego thing, for sure. It's because I think the greatest thing that I have ever brought to a congregation as a pastor is giving people the opportunity to see themselves in me and think there is a there. First of all, there's a woman up there who can be a pastor. And I know that's been really meaningful to a lot of people, especially people who have come from traditions where women can't be pastors. And in the last year, the idea that, like, there's a divorced woman up there as a pastor, and you know what I mean? I think I think they think I'm all right. And so then they look at themselves and they think I'm all right, too. I'm loved by God, too. I'm deserving too. I have something to say that matters, too. And I and people have told me that I have encouraged them in that way, and if there's anything that matters to me more, maybe than anything I've ever done, is to think that I might have given someone permission to see themselves as beloved and worthy and deserving without question. Like, if I've done that ever, I've done my job.

00:21:39 Jeromy Johnson: Mm. And even that's a mystery. How can God use such a vessel? Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. It's humbling. Yeah. As a methodist pastor, I'm sure that you've come across and have encountered all sorts of people in this journey. Can you share a story of grace that maybe you've experienced, or you've heard from someone that was a little bit different from you during this journey as a pastor?

00:22:12 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, yeah. Um, I was thinking about this, actually. It was really interesting. It took me way back to my time at my previous church at Hanscom Park United Methodist Church, and there was a man there who from the very beginning was very clear with me that our theology was not quite in alignment. He. He described himself as a.

00:22:34 Jeromy Johnson: We say, our theology. It's the Methodist theology.

00:22:37 Chris Jorgensen: My theology and his theology.

00:22:39 Jeromy Johnson: Gotcha, gotcha. Personal. Your personal theology?

00:22:41 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, yeah. We weren't quite coming from the same place. Thank you. Um, and he he described himself as a fundamentalist Methodist, which is probably the last thing I would call myself like. It is. So, like, I just, I would I at the time would have thought and perhaps still do think. I'm not sure there can be a fundamentalist Methodist like we have a particular way of reading scripture that I don't think really lends itself to fundamentalism. But he was very, very conservative and had a very literal reading of the Bible, very black and white kind of dogmatic, judgmental way of looking at at what salvation was about, you know, and that kind of thing. And he was open with me about that. And at the same time, I think like had such an appreciation for, for my faith and the way I talk about my faith and my experience of grace, even if he didn't agree with it. Like, I think he could see its earnestness and so treated me with just lots of kindness and respect in a way that that sometimes I mean, as a woman, if somebody doesn't agree with you, disrespect comes pretty quickly. Like, I think that feels like that can happen pretty quickly. But he did not.

00:23:46 Jeromy Johnson: I won't even pretend to say that I know or imagine. I will take your word for it.

00:23:50 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, yeah. But but he didn't. He didn't do it at all. And in fact, there were just some times like like he had a relative who was sick and he wanted someone to come there and be with her when she was dying. And he called me and I just thought, he knows how different our understanding of God is. And yet he called me to be there with that relative. And I just think that is so full of grace. Wow. Maybe also just so full of his trust in the fact that God can work through me. You know, like like maybe he thought I was an absolute freaking mess in my theology and whatever, but like, but like also, he had seen something of God in me, and so he had enough trust in God that I was the one he was supposed to call. You know, I just I think it's really amazing.

00:24:38 Jeromy Johnson: Or maybe your spirits and your energy align more than your your theology. I think so. Something that connected you beyond that, that theology there was, which is beautiful.

00:24:47 Chris Jorgensen: Honestly, it is incredible. Yeah. And it's why it's why I continue to talk about mystery and also, like, try to lean into, like this experiential dimension of, of the presence of God. Like, it's just as interested as I am in religion and the phenomenon of of religious practice and theology and whatever. Like there's something most real about it is beyond what we can explain. And so whenever you can connect, maybe that's where it happens when you connect with another human being. In that way, you experience that in kind of a beautiful way. I don't know. Anyway, I just think I had not I was appreciative of thinking about your question. You saw me earlier today because I hadn't thought about that person for a while and how much I appreciate him.

00:25:30 Jeromy Johnson: You keep mentioning the experiential ness of grace and spirituality. Can you open that up a little bit?

00:25:36 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. Um, since we started talking about baptism, let's, let's let's do this through baptismal theology, shall we?

00:25:43 Jeromy Johnson: Okay. Perfect.

00:25:43 Chris Jorgensen: Like when I meet with people to talk about baptism and. And also, this is how I think about the table to write the communion table, the sacrament of communion. Um, the Methodist Church believes that God is the first mover in both of those things. So that's why we baptize infants, is because we don't think that it's the person's initiative to say to God, I want to be baptized, but God's like, I'm claiming you as my beloved child. And so that's why we baptize infants and people of all ages. When I talk to the parents, I tell them, here's like, you know, the five or six things that baptism can symbolize. But what's more important is the actual engagement in the sacrament, the doing of the sacrament, and the experiencing the presence of God in the sacrament. And so one of my favorite things about the communion table to talk about that is when I was at church of the church of the Village in New York City, I was serving alongside a retired bishop named Bishop Alfred Johnson. And one time he was doing his invitation to the communion table. And he said to the congregation, we invite children to the communion table. We don't have an age at which a child can come to the communion table because he said, I, Alfred Johnson Johnson, a bishop of the church, have no better understanding than than any child of what the mystery is that happens at this table. And I have just never forgotten that and thought about like, like again, if you think you can explain it, you haven't quite gotten yet.

00:27:13 Speaker 6: You know, like, you haven't.

00:27:14 Chris Jorgensen: Quite gotten there yet. Yeah. So I think about him all the time. And you said that it wrecks me sometimes when I serve communion to our kids. Our kids.

00:27:22 Jeromy Johnson: That's so cool.

00:27:23 Chris Jorgensen: Aren't in the whole service. They, um, they they come in for communion when we have communion on the first Sunday of the month. And it just sometimes is like, I can hardly stay. Like I could hardly make it through, you know, because I just think about, like, my relation to God. I have no better understanding than these amazing little kids coming forward. To receive communion like that is the humility with which we come to receive the grace of God.

00:27:44 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. Like, who are we to say no and deny and.

00:27:48 Speaker 6: Right, right.

00:27:49 Jeromy Johnson: And see, I come from a tradition of close communion.

00:27:52 Chris Jorgensen: Mhm.

00:27:52 Jeromy Johnson: Where every week we would do communion. But it was very much, if you believe and accepted Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, you're free to come up and take and. But then just one day it just didn't sit right with me. Like I just could not picture Jesus at this party. Everything's going great until the meal comes, and then everybody goes into another room and half the people are just asked to sit on the couch while the other half feast and celebrate. Yeah, it just seemed so weird. And I thought, okay, so now Jesus is in this scenario. What would he do? I mean, you and I both know from what we understand of his life here on earth, there's no way he would be in that party. He would be with those on the couch that have been denied.

00:28:35 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, yeah, for sure.

00:28:36 Jeromy Johnson: And he would have made some great wine and got some great.

00:28:39 Speaker 6: Right.

00:28:40 Jeromy Johnson: Some great things. And he would have had communion at that point. So yeah, I've come full circle with that. And it breaks my heart to see people just deny that.

00:28:50 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah.

00:28:51 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah, here's this, this intimate meal. Yeah. With the Savior.

00:28:55 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah.

00:28:56 Jeromy Johnson: And even that we draw a line. We're like, no you're not. Yeah. And it sounds like maybe kids in your tradition were historically not not permitted.

00:29:03 Chris Jorgensen: Oh, in in the Roman Catholic tradition.

00:29:05 Jeromy Johnson: In the Roman Catholic.

00:29:06 Chris Jorgensen: Church, they have they have a sacrament of first communion that you have to prepare for. I think it was second or third grade that I think it was second grade that I had my First Communion.

00:29:17 Jeromy Johnson: And they definitely wouldn't let non-Catholics do it.

00:29:19 Chris Jorgensen: Correct. They wouldn't let non-Catholics do it. I mean, they also don't let women be priests. So, you know, there's a lot of things that I do differently now, you know.

00:29:26 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah, exactly.

00:29:28 Chris Jorgensen: But one of the things as as a United Methodist pastor, one of the greatest things I get to do is stand at that communion table and say, everyone is welcome here. Every person you don't even and this is I think this is kind of radical. You don't even have to be baptized in the United Methodist tradition to receive communion. And the reason that is, since you asked, is because, um, John Wesley believed that that communion could be what he called a converting ordinance, and it could be that someone who had never known an unfathomable grace of God might experience it for the first time in that in that sacrament in that and.

00:30:10 Jeromy Johnson: I just.

00:30:10 Chris Jorgensen: Man, I love it. And when somebody tells me I took communion in your church today, I haven't taken communion for x number of years. But because you said everybody could come, I came to the table. I mean, that is just a privilege and amazing thing to be able to do.

00:30:28 Jeromy Johnson: It's it's almost verbally giving them that permission, not just assuming, because like, you could not say something and people would assume like, can I can I? Yeah. But then if you say all are welcome, there's no question. Yeah. And then they can choose whether they want to or not. I mean, you're not going to point them out like, hey, why are you still sitting down? I said, everyone. I've never done that.

00:30:47 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah.

00:30:48 Jeromy Johnson: Reverse, reverse shame.

00:30:49 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. No, no I just it's awesome. It's so great. Yeah. So anyway, so I think so your question ultimately was about the experiential. I mean, I just think those are good examples of like again, I think we encounter God. We don't think about God. And so what does it mean to encounter God. And how do we do that in an experiential way, not just in a. I thought about God today, but like I actually sensed or experienced the presence of God in this day. And what does that look like? You know.

00:31:21 Jeromy Johnson: All right. Let's pivot a little bit. So I heard there's this person from history. It's on Jesus. It's not Moses, right. It's not even God that you would love to meet. I believe Julian was Julian.

00:31:35 Chris Jorgensen: Name Julian of.

00:31:36 Jeromy Johnson: Julian.

00:31:37 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:31:38 Jeromy Johnson: Tell us about Julian because I was I never heard about Julian.

00:31:42 Chris Jorgensen: She was an anchoress, uh, and an anchoress. And she's a medieval anchoress. And an anchoress was a person who would live in an Anchorage which was a walled in little.

00:31:55 Jeromy Johnson: Not Alaska.

00:31:56 Chris Jorgensen: Not Alaska, although I do every time I say that. Now, I do have questions about if there's a y y Anchorage, Alaska has that name, and maybe there was some. Yeah, it could be anyway. So anyway, so, so lives in this little cell on the side of a church is literally walled in there.

00:32:14 Jeromy Johnson: Okay, wait. So I'm picturing a church.

00:32:16 Chris Jorgensen: Like a cathedral. Imagine.

00:32:17 Jeromy Johnson: Like a cathedral, a castle. I'm gonna go a big castle. Cathedral, right. And on the side of this church, there's another little building that's plastered and walled to the side of that church.

00:32:30 Chris Jorgensen: It's like a little detached part of the church.

00:32:31 Jeromy Johnson: One little like window. There's a.

00:32:33 Chris Jorgensen: Window. My understanding is there's like one little window so that.

00:32:36 Jeromy Johnson: You. Okay? Not made in Ohio?

00:32:38 Chris Jorgensen: No, no. Not Iowa.

00:32:40 Jeromy Johnson: Um, Iowa.

00:32:41 Chris Jorgensen: So a window so that you can pass food in and pass waste out. Okay. And the anchoress lives in that room.

00:32:50 Jeromy Johnson: Wow.

00:32:51 Chris Jorgensen: And so, so as might happen, I suppose, if you're walled into a room on the side of the cathedral. Julian had some visions.

00:33:00 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. Oh, some crazy ones.

00:33:03 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, she did. She she had some. She had some visions.

00:33:06 Jeromy Johnson: Mushrooms may or may not have been involved.

00:33:08 Chris Jorgensen: I don't know if there were if if the villagers brought her mushrooms or not. Um, but she had these visions that she that are that. And there's a book called the there's the showings of Divine Love.

00:33:19 Jeromy Johnson: Mm.

00:33:20 Chris Jorgensen: And it's a record of these visions that she had about Christ. And she there's a bunch of fascinating stuff in this. The the saying all shall be well and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well. If you've ever heard that, that's Julian of Norwich. Okay, that's probably probably the most famous quote from the book is that one. But but in this, in this book she had, she just had these visions of like the, the reality of who Christ is with us and for us. And, and they were kind of radical for the time. There were some images of Christ, this mother that she that she experienced, that she talks about. Also, she has this, uh, vision of God's universal salvation for all people.

00:34:03 Jeromy Johnson: And do you remember what year this was about?

00:34:06 Chris Jorgensen: Ah I knew.

00:34:07 Jeromy Johnson: I'm really testing you now.

00:34:08 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, I would have checked if I. You did tell me this. I should have checked six hundred.

00:34:12 Jeromy Johnson: Okay. So pretty.

00:34:14 Chris Jorgensen: I don't know, I could be wrong. We should.

00:34:16 Jeromy Johnson: But within the first seven or eight centuries of the of the church.

00:34:20 Chris Jorgensen: Okay, I think so. Can I look? Sure. Can I look it up?

00:34:22 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. No, we can just pull it up right now and everyone can listen to us clicking and stuff. Because there's some people that say that universalism was not a belief in the early church. I find it fascinating. Oh no.

00:34:36 Chris Jorgensen: Wait, this is way later.

00:34:37 Jeromy Johnson: Thirteen forty two thirteen forty two.

00:34:39 Chris Jorgensen: I was I was only like eight hundred years.

00:34:42 Jeromy Johnson: Numbers.

00:34:43 Chris Jorgensen: I mean.

00:34:44 Jeromy Johnson: Numbers me.

00:34:47 Chris Jorgensen: Still a really long time ago.

00:34:49 Jeromy Johnson: Still a long time ago.

00:34:50 Chris Jorgensen: Protestant reformation.

00:34:52 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. And this is when so dark ages kind of people walling themselves in, uh, so Simeon Stylites. So same thing. He went up on a platform and.

00:35:00 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. Yeah. So like kind of with some wild religious things going on at this time anyway. So Julian. Yeah, a little later than I thought.

00:35:07 Jeromy Johnson: Um, but she got this revelation.

00:35:09 Chris Jorgensen: About universal salvation. Yeah. And she and it's interesting, one of my favorite parts of of what how she writes about it is she's like, so she's like, talking to herself right? In this, in this text. And she's like, so I understand that that Mother church tells me this is not so like she just lays it out. She's like, I get it. This is this is in conflict with what the church teaches. And she says, and even so, this is what Christ revealed to me. Wow. And Christ revealed that what is impossible for you is not impossible for me. And basically everyone will be saved.

00:35:49 Jeromy Johnson: Mm.

00:35:50 Chris Jorgensen: This vision was sure you humans don't get this how this is going to happen. But I'm telling you, yeah, everybody's going to be saved because God can do that. And I just. And then she's like, and I know the church doesn't really believe that. And she's a nun. She's a nun. So like, probably she should agree with what Mother Church says, but she's just gonna write this down anyway.

00:36:13 Jeromy Johnson: Wow. So I can see now, like hearing your story from earlier, how you resonate with her. Because it's like she was like this little, you know, not intentionally. Like she just asked questions, and she leaned into things, and, and she, she got this revelation that was different from the church that she was raised with. And that mirrors a lot of your experience.

00:36:33 Chris Jorgensen: Well, and and it was it was based in experience. Right? Like it was her saying like like I had this experience. I mean, she had these actual visions.

00:36:41 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah.

00:36:42 Chris Jorgensen: And this experience and encounter with God that yielded this insight. And she was like, you know what? Even though the church tells me this is wrong, this is this is what God told me. And and she like she trusts it, which I think is amazing. Like, imagine being, you know, a woman living in the fourteenth century and being like, you know what? Yeah, God showed me this, and I'm. I'm not messing around. I'm going to share this with people. You know, I think it's great.

00:37:11 Jeromy Johnson: I think it's great. That's cool.

00:37:13 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah.

00:37:14 Jeromy Johnson: I think there's a freedom when people finally have, um, an experience where they can start to trust and rely on their inner voice and their inner gut of just what's right. What makes sense.

00:37:28 Chris Jorgensen: Right? Right. Yeah. Instead of having to rely on some outside authority that you're like, you feel like it's it's you're being threatened somehow. Like, don't don't ask that question. Don't.

00:37:42 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. Well, you're being told or culturally coerced. I don't know if that's too strong of a word. Culturally, um, held to certain beliefs. Right. Because there is a cost. There is. There is a sacrifice that's made when you go against, you know, the beliefs of of a family and friends and and what you've been raised with.

00:38:01 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. For sure. Yeah, yeah. And certainly for some people, way more than me. Like my experience for sure.

00:38:06 Jeromy Johnson: Yes.

00:38:07 Chris Jorgensen: My parents have always been, you know, even though they're mostly Catholic, have not I mean, they've never had a problem with me being a methodist. They were even pretty cool with me being a Unitarian, you know, like like like like. So I've never I've never really had the experience that I've heard so many stories of, of people who literally are rejected by family and friends and community because they dare to ask questions that people aren't, you know, they're not supposed to ask, you know? So yeah.

00:38:36 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. Okay. I'm going to let you choose your own adventure here.

00:38:40 Chris Jorgensen: Okay?

00:38:41 Jeromy Johnson: Okay. So we can either go towards the space of like, shame and grace and courage and grace and like, what do those relationships look like? Or we can talk about masculine.

00:38:53 Chris Jorgensen: Or.

00:38:54 Jeromy Johnson: Feminine. Yeah. Of God and how that plays out with justice and everything else like that. So where where do you want to take us?

00:39:02 Chris Jorgensen: I don't know, those are both such. They're both such good topics. I think I let's do the masculine feminine stuff. Like I feel like, okay, I feel like I have more coherent thoughts around that. I feel like I need to explore the shame stuff a little bit more in my life. I'm in the world in my expression. So yeah, yeah, let's do that.

00:39:24 Jeromy Johnson: All right. Well, let's let's go there then. So masculine. Feminine I mean, so my belief is obviously if God created us, Adam and Eve, in God's likeness, and I tend not to use he or she even when referring to God, unless I'm making a point about those particular gender expressions. God therefore has both masculine and feminine qualities, because how can you make these things in your own image and not have both of those things in your image, right? So at times I feel like it's just as wrong to just solely call God he or solely call God she. Right? They actually would probably be a more, uh, Trinitarian expression.

00:40:10 Chris Jorgensen: With the Trinity that people get so skeezy about that.

00:40:14 Jeromy Johnson: I.

00:40:14 Chris Jorgensen: Know a.

00:40:16 Speaker 7: Lot. Yeah, yeah.

00:40:17 Jeromy Johnson: Um, but but just your experience, how does that play out? So I think of justice as more masculine. Um, maybe a universal grace can tend to be more feminine. And so maybe, maybe that's why we have a higher rejection of this more feminine, universal grace. If you would lean towards that because of the masculine charged culture and justice. Yeah, that could be an angle. Or you can just.

00:40:44 Speaker 7: Sure go chase a rabbit.

00:40:45 Jeromy Johnson: If you want to.

00:40:46 Chris Jorgensen: I mean.

00:40:47 Speaker 7: So I will.

00:40:48 Chris Jorgensen: Start by saying this. I think all of the qualities that we define as either masculine and feminine or feminine are in God. I one hundred percent agree with you. I don't believe it's the masculine is in God and the feminine is in God. I believe all of the qualities of humanity are in God. Yes. And the idea that we have to split them into masculine and feminine is, is just a product of the patriarchy. Right. And the.

00:41:12 Speaker 7: Patriarchy.

00:41:13 Jeromy Johnson: Of.

00:41:13 Speaker 7: Our.

00:41:13 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah.

00:41:14 Speaker 7: Patriarchy. Male. Female. Yeah.

00:41:16 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. In order to have power over, in this case, women. If we're talking about patriarchy. Right. Um, so I would say all of those qualities are in God. They're in every human being, and every human being expresses them in one percentage or another. Right? So I have a lot of qualities in me, and that's how we can loop this back to shame if we want to. I have a lot of qualities in me that I think would be traditionally considered masculine qualities. Like, I'm a I'm a strong leader. I'm very opinionated. You know, I have all of these things that you read. Books I read books. Yeah. Yeah. Right. I'm I'm, I'm I'm pretty intellectual. Like, I'm quite intellectual. And and that, like, those are things that like, like I've been taught by the patriarchy like that I'm supposed to kind of feel bad about, like.

00:42:06 Jeromy Johnson: So you felt some shame about that?

00:42:08 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. Yeah. Right. Of, like, don't be too much like this male thing I didn't know at the time, like, because that's threatening to people, you know, like at the time I just knew like, oh, don't be this thing. I just that's so anyway, that's my main point there is just to say, like, all the qualities that we define as masculine or feminine are in, in God, like, they're not they're not it's not a duality. It's not like it's these.

00:42:32 Jeromy Johnson: Oreo cookie sandwich together.

00:42:33 Chris Jorgensen: It's. Yeah. Right. Right, right. So, so so in terms of justice, like, I don't think you can separate justice and grace because God's justice has a very particular shape that does not look like human justice looks right. If we think about the parable of the, of the, uh, the tenants in the of the workers in the field. Everybody hates that story. Like they hate it. They're like, wait a minute. The people who who only worked for, like, the last hour are going to get paid as much as the people who work the whole day. That is not justice in the way we often think of justice. It is justice that is pushed through grace. The same thing with the story of the prodigal son that Brett left all of his inheritance, wasted it. The best that human justice would give us was, yes, you can come home once you show me that you have repented, and you are never going to do this again, and you need to sort of pay for this for a while.

00:43:38 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah, you'll repay your debt a little bit.

00:43:39 Chris Jorgensen: And you'll repay your debt. You're not going to throw a party. That is. It's the shape of God's justice. And I think that it's a great example of what we might think of as the masculine and the feminine coming together, right? God's justice is, in fact, just intertwined with grace. It's inseparable from grace. That's the only kind of justice there is, is the slutty grace, as you will. And it makes people who, like, are in the human kinds of justice. Like, so annoyed, like so very upset. Yeah, that like that. Somebody getting something they don't deserve. Because the point is not that none of us deserve it. The point is that all of us deserve it. Yeah. Like that's the point of the prodigal son. Like even that dude, he deserves it. And the older son, of course he deserves it. We all know he deserves it. Why is he so mad? Standing outside the party.

00:44:30 Jeromy Johnson: Father said all that I've ever had has always been yours. Older son. So.

00:44:33 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. Yeah.

00:44:35 Jeromy Johnson: So you're saying, like, we've probably projected our human justice onto onto God?

00:44:41 Chris Jorgensen: I mean, I think if you believe these stories that Jesus is telling us. Yeah, yeah, you know, that it's not about, you know, and certainly theologians through the ages have projected justice systems onto God that penal substitutionary atonement like that ledger is not in there, right? This is a this is a metaphor that humans were using. And they're like, oh, well, we think that maybe it's like this, like if this person, you know, goes to prison for long enough, then they'll be able to be okay. And it's like, oh no, that's not.

00:45:08 Jeromy Johnson: Metaphors are so lost on on some people that take everything so literally. Like even my title, slutty Grace, they just take it so literally. It's like it's a metaphor. It's not not saying God's a slut, okay? Like, that's not it's not what we're saying here, but it is metaphoric and it does stand up to truth.

00:45:26 Chris Jorgensen: And but also, I like it because it pisses people off in the same way. Like, like people want to control it. Yeah. Like I'm like, they're gonna tell you, Jeremy, you can't use that word because we need to control this.

00:45:39 Jeromy Johnson: I know well, and I was having a conversation because I was like, well, what? What word would be better? Promiscuous. Easy. Scandalous. And they're like, none of those. So it's the idea, it's not the actual word, right? It's cool because some of the freedom that I found in my life is not taking other people's thoughts or feelings or reactions, right? Right. As personally, oh yeah, I used to take it horrendously personal and I would be like, and so now I can just release them. And part of this grace that you were talking about with that freedom is like, I can let them have their own opinion. This radical slutty, as you would say, offensive. Yeah. Grace, if it wins, which I believe it will.

00:46:19 Chris Jorgensen: Right?

00:46:19 Jeromy Johnson: Right. And it doesn't matter.

00:46:21 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah.

00:46:21 Jeromy Johnson: It doesn't matter.

00:46:22 Chris Jorgensen: If I can share with you. I've been thinking about why people find this grace offensive. Think about, like, again, the parable of the workers in the field. And I and I've, you know, taken a very unscientific poll. When I preach this, I'll be like, how many of you like this story? And people are just like, you know, so that's my unscientific poll.

00:46:39 Jeromy Johnson: All the financial people are like, you're right.

00:46:42 Chris Jorgensen: Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think where that comes from is actually a scarcity problem that, like people don't trust in the abundance of God's grace.

00:46:54 Jeromy Johnson: Interesting.

00:46:55 Chris Jorgensen: And I think.

00:46:55 Jeromy Johnson: That's like, there's only so much.

00:46:56 Chris Jorgensen: There's only so much. And if someone else gets it, it means I'm not going to get it. Which again, I think also echoes the story of the prodigal son. Right? Like, we can't celebrate the prodigal son and also have the older, older child be celebrated, like, well, actually we could, but the the idea is that there's some kind of scarcity of God's grace. I might come right at capitalism for for helping our, our brains to do that, to think like, if this person gets this, it means I necessarily lost something.

00:47:25 Jeromy Johnson: It's a win loss, right?

00:47:26 Chris Jorgensen: Right. And I do think maybe the reason, even if it's the idea of universalism, if it's the idea of like, we should sort of radically forgive people, why that makes people so upset is because there is just a kind of scarcity mindset that doesn't, doesn't quite capture.

00:47:44 Jeromy Johnson: A great.

00:47:44 Chris Jorgensen: The abundance of God's.

00:47:46 Jeromy Johnson: Great.

00:47:46 Chris Jorgensen: Picture. Yeah.

00:47:47 Jeromy Johnson: No, that's really, that's that's really insightful. And so then it comes back to fear.

00:47:53 Chris Jorgensen: Right, right.

00:47:54 Jeromy Johnson: If we believe there's a scarcity of grace, then we're afraid that we won't get it. So therefore, you can't do communion. You can't do this. You're not in heaven. You're right. And then. And I don't think anyone's. Honestly, no one's intentionally doing this. I don't believe, I don't think that any theologians or any any pastors or any people that are in churches are like really intentionally being malicious with lines being drawn in the sand. If who's in, who's out, who gets grace, who doesn't get grace. It's just this thing that's just been handed down. And and our human nature is so powerful.

00:48:30 Chris Jorgensen: Right.

00:48:31 Jeromy Johnson: Again, there's there's a lot of that that that can happen.

00:48:33 Chris Jorgensen: So yeah.

00:48:34 Jeromy Johnson: You know, there's no judgment with that. But, um, yeah.

00:48:37 Speaker 8: I will I think I.

00:48:40 Chris Jorgensen: Will agree with you that I think the vast majority of people are not doing it from a cynical place.

00:48:47 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah.

00:48:48 Speaker 8: I will.

00:48:48 Chris Jorgensen: Tell you.

00:48:49 Jeromy Johnson: You think there still might be some?

00:48:51 Speaker 8: I do, I will tell.

00:48:52 Chris Jorgensen: You that even as grace centered and community centered, as I try to be, even even I have felt the pull of, wouldn't it be just a little bit easier to use fear here?

00:49:07 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. It works. It is very effective, as we're seeing in our country right now. It's fear is very effective.

00:49:13 Chris Jorgensen: And that's what I'm saying to you.

00:49:14 Speaker 8: Like I agree.

00:49:15 Chris Jorgensen: With you that I think there are lots and lots and lots of people who this is just this is the tradition they grew up with. This is what they earnestly believe. I think there are also people who are quite aware that fear is an incredibly good motivator.

00:49:29 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah.

00:49:29 Chris Jorgensen: And if you have no if you have no compunction about using it and you think you have some kind of end goal that you need to get people to without any concern for the way you get there? Use fear. That's the way.

00:49:41 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. No, that's fair enough. And I would argue that those people are probably some of the most afraid people out there because they're using the tool that they have and that they live with.

00:49:50 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah, yeah.

00:49:51 Jeromy Johnson: No, it's very true.

00:49:54 Chris Jorgensen: Sorry. That got dark.

00:49:55 Jeromy Johnson: No. It's good. When I was so, I was a middle school pastor, and I got done sharing a come to Jesus message on a Tuesday night, which is our youth group night. You would leverage it every now and then. Not, like, leverage it. But if you really felt like hell was a real place. And I feel like if people do believe that this eternal, fiery hell is a real place, and you should not shut up about it for your entire life, and there should be no other focus besides that. So the fact that that's not happening, I question how many people actually believe that it's real, because deep down, if we thought minimum two thirds of humanity was going to be separated and burning in hell, we just don't care or we don't believe that it's true, right? So I would I share this message and, you know, these are twelve, thirteen, fourteen year olds. And remember afterwards this in our youth group was growing and we were having, you know, non-Christians come to the youth group and kids were bringing their friends. And this one, uh, non-Christian friend came up afterwards and said, so Jeremy, my dad's Mormon, how do you do you think that he's gonna be in hell? And I just paused. But in my belief, yes, that's what the Bible clearly said. Through my understanding. And as a pastor, I need to speak that truth. And I said, yes, I do believe that the Bible says that that that's where he's he's headed unless he puts his faith in Jesus. And I just remember him turning. He didn't say another word. He just turned and just walked away. And I never saw him again. Come back to the youth group. Hmm. And I know, like, there's grace for me even in that moment. Right? Because we can only speak of and do the things that we know of at any given moment. But I look back at that and I just go, just be gracious on that. That soul, that boy's soul and that father's soul right now and just draw them to you. Because I didn't do any favors of bringing that kid.

00:52:02 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah.

00:52:03 Jeromy Johnson: Into the loving arms of grace. Um, however, I do believe that all these stories can be shaped and molded into bringing us towards grace.

00:52:13 Speaker 8: Can I tell you one.

00:52:14 Chris Jorgensen: Story that.

00:52:15 Speaker 8: It's it's it's it's a.

00:52:16 Chris Jorgensen: Child around that age. And so I feel like it might sort of resonate. So just because. Yeah, I just want you to hear this because I feel I feel pain from you when you tell me that story. Yeah.

00:52:29 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. No I don't. Like, I, I've, I've come to terms with it. But you know, I think there's things in life where you look back and you're like, man, I wish I could do that differently. You can't. And you know you can. And there's grace in that. But yeah.

00:52:40 Chris Jorgensen: Yeah. So when my daughter, when my daughter was about seventh or eighth grade and, you know, United Methodist Church has been in this like thing for a long time where we were trying to fully include LGBTQ people. And this was before the church had had made had made that something a person could do without getting their credentials yanked, you know? And she asked me, mom, if I if I ever decided I wanted to marry a girl, would you do my wedding? And I told her, I told her no. Even though I was actively working to try to change the church and and and from the very beginning of my ministry, like, was clear about, like, I'm here in this tradition and I'm trying to change this because I think it's wrong. I'd always kind of been there, you know, but I told her no. And it, you know, just like a year after that, like, and and I.

00:53:33 Jeromy Johnson: Why why did you say no?

00:53:35 Chris Jorgensen: Because I would get my credentials pulled. I mean, I would, I would, you know, have we get defrocked? Nobody wants to be defrocked, right? So I just remember, I don't know, just that moment of being like like. Yeah, that really that really convicted me. Like.

00:53:49 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah.

00:53:50 Chris Jorgensen: Like even though she knew. She knew what I thought about gay people that I thought it was fine to be gay, but that I was going to choose to follow this rule. And but she just looked so crushed, you know. Mhm. And it was not long after that that I decided, you know what if I, if someone asked me I'm going to do a wedding because I had that experience of like, gosh, what does it feel like to be told by your parent. No, I won't do that. And if God is like a loving parent. And recently I've been thinking about what a great metaphor that is. What an incredibly great metaphor God is a loving parent is because you know God can't control our lives and make it so nothing bad ever happens to us. Just like a parent, you know, we still experience, um, you know, the results of all kinds of human made and natural evil, and and God can't save us from that. But like, but what what we really need from our parents is to have have our parents be that that one person who is going to love and support us no matter what. And I know human parents don't do that perfectly all the time. No. And as you as you say, you forgive yourself for for that experience you had. And I forgive myself for this experience and for my daughter. And I have talked about it and stuff too. But but I just think about like if, if we can hope to embody that kind of love as much as we can for every person we encounter, like that's the and no, we're not going to do it perfectly and forgive ourselves when we don't. That's all we're being asked to do is to be able to reflect, be the be a kind of, you know, lens of that love of God as much as we can, knowing we're human and are never going to live up to it.

00:55:33 Jeromy Johnson: That's all we can do.

00:55:34 Chris Jorgensen: But that parent metaphor has. His. Yeah. Really really, really, really been resonating lately.

00:55:40 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. And those of us who are parents, it's hard to imagine God doing anything else than just always, always, always right. Embracing every single one of. Yeah, his kids, you know? Uh, okay. Some. Okay, we're gonna end with this. And because I want us to use our imagination a little bit, and then we'll. And then we'll end. And thank you so much for sitting at this, this bar table with me and having this conversation. This is. But let's use our imagination. What, Chris, would the world look like if the world embraced more slutty grace? If we believe that we were truly loved, not at war with God, and God was not at war with us or each other. And that love won. Would it look different than it does now?

00:56:33 Chris Jorgensen: Oh so different, So different.

00:56:36 Jeromy Johnson: Um.

00:56:37 Chris Jorgensen: I mean, again, I just go back to this image of abundance. If we could trust in God's abundance that in fact, there is enough for everyone. If we trust each other to act in generosity with one another. So, like, yeah, the world would be radically different because we wouldn't have war. We wouldn't have people fighting over resources. We wouldn't have people willing to try to take away someone else's benefits so that they can have more for themselves. I mean, it would be an entirely different world. We are we are very far away. We are. We are both very far away. And also the kingdom is at hand. Right? We are very far away from the fullness of the kingdom. But I do think.

00:57:23 Jeromy Johnson: And yet the kingdom.

00:57:23 Chris Jorgensen: Is is right here. And like as you even these stories you're asking me to tell, I mean, I think this is, is incredibly important for us as human beings to say in the midst of our horrendous news cycle. To be like, hey, tell me a story of grace. Tell me a story. When someone was generous with you in ways that the world would not tell them was a very good idea, because I think that gives us the hope that that we actually the world could be radically different if we can embrace risk taking that slutty grace requires to know you might you might treat someone with grace and not expect it back.

00:58:03 Jeromy Johnson: Yeah. And the risk is all the risk is, is letting go. That's all the risk is, is letting go and letting trusting God that grace and love is going to envelop. And I can let all that go. Like, that's really the biggest risk because there's as you've seen and I've seen, there's just so much freedom that comes when we do let that go. And we just kind of let that let that live in God's reign and God's kingdom as it should. Any last words you would like to say before we before we part.

00:58:35 Chris Jorgensen: Is it a really good conversation?

00:58:36 Jeromy Johnson: I think yes, absolutely.

00:58:38 Chris Jorgensen: I don't know. I'm thinking about how you asked me about experience being so important, and about the difference between preaching from a didactic place and I think lives lives are transformed through stories. And I just appreciate what you're doing, inviting people to share stories of grace. I think that's that's going to draw more people into Christ's love than than any reason or, you know, like, like those stories make openings for people to participate in God's grace in ways.

00:59:09 Jeromy Johnson: Well thank you.

00:59:10 Chris Jorgensen: I can't imagine.

00:59:11 Jeromy Johnson: Thank you. Yeah, that's that's the heart of this is to really look at how grace can or does intersect with everyday life. Yeah. Well, Chris. Thank you. Yeah.

00:59:21 Chris Jorgensen: Thank you.

00:59:22 Jeromy Johnson: Late where you're at. And I appreciate you taking the time and absolutely great. My heart is filled from talking.

00:59:30 Chris Jorgensen: Me too. Thank you. Thank you for the time.

00:59:34 Jeromy Johnson: Thank you for listening to Chris's and my conversation. If love really is this big, this wild, this unfair, then our job is not to control it. It's to join it. To let grace offend us. Just enough to change us. To live like Julian of Norwich believed that what is impossible for us is not impossible for God. Wherever this conversation finds you today, may you remember there is enough love for you, enough mercy, enough belonging, enough God. The kingdom isn't far away. It's already here in the act of breathing, forgiving and beginning again. So rest easy. The table is still set. Grace already saved you a seat. Remember, walk in Grace. And if you can, share that grace.