Spiritual, Not Religious

Hey, y'all. Welcome to spiritual not religious. This is a podcast for young adults that explores

the intricacies of God's kingdom and the modern world.

Welcome back to our seventh episode of Spiritual Not Religious with your host, James Henry, Molly June Miller, and me, Sean Winburn. And we are excited to be back and appreciate your tuning in as we try and navigate the complexities of belief and faith and just living out our life that has so many 18 to 30 year olds claiming to be spiritual and not religious. If you enjoy a good chat that includes a little bit of theology sprinkled in with some philosophy, stirred in with some questions about life, the church, and belief, well, then you're in the right place. And today, we are cooking up a topic to sink your teeth into. Sounds delicious.

I know. Now for everyone who feels the deep calling to deep feeling inside your soul, but you've struggled to make sense of that connection with what you see happening in the world, we welcome you. Now in this episode of Spiritual Not Religious, we're gonna take a look at a growing trend of young adults and emerging adults still trying to figure out their purpose and calling in life. Now are you thinking you should have figured things out by now but still don't have a clue? Are you asking yourself, what do I do with my life when I don't know what to do with my life?

This episode will take a look at how we can discern vocational next steps and push into questions like, does God really have a purpose and plan for my life? And if so, why hasn't God sent the memo yet? Now plenty of emerging adults have some legit fears going on due to these questions. Those with us at the end of this podcast. Now we've got a lot to talk about, and I'm really excited to be able to turn to some wizened and truly gifted and brilliant people to get into this conversation with.

So Molly and James, welcome back to the podcast. It's so good to be back with you both. We've had to postpone our usual schedule a bit, so it's so good to be back with you. James, kinda catch us up with what's going on in your life. You've been one really super busy guy.

Well, I appreciate your forbearance, and I am sorry for the delay on our every two week drop. And it comes down to my father, 96 years old, had a health crisis, went into the hospital, spent a week in ICU, spent a week incrementally getting better in a step down unit, needed a little bit of surgery to repair an issue. And he is finally, actually today, the day we're recording this, being released into a rehab center to redo some physical therapy and occupational therapy to get back into life. But that I am his medical power of attorney, which means I have needed to be attentive to him and what was going on. And I said to Molly and to Sean, go ahead without me.

Record you know, they'll love your ideas, just the two of you. I'm perfectly fine with that. And they were like, no, we're a team. And we're not you know, we're the trinity. And, you know, we maybe that was a little theological joke.

But, you know, there's three of us and we're not going without you. So we apologize for our delay. I appreciate your forbearance, all of our listeners as well as for Molly and Sean who have been praying for me and holding me up, and my father as well. So very thankful. And it's good to be back, and I'm looking forward to this topic.

And Molly, share with us how you're doing.

Yeah. Hello, everyone. I'm so happy to be back and be with you. It's felt like forever. I always look forward to being able to laugh with you and experience, just awesome things.

But I am preparing for my wedding of my fiance and I. We're really excited. It's in like a month and a half. And so we cannot wait for life to look a little bit different now that we actually get to be together because we're long distance. So we are sending good vibes for that.

It's crazy. There's so much planning and so many things to do, but, you know, at the heart of it, I believe that my first calling is to marry him and for him to marry me. And so that's what's important.

Sweet. That is beautiful. Wow. Well, I mean and, of course, you guys have such crazy and complex lives as most of us do, but still, we we never leave a podcaster behind. Where we go one, go all.

And so thank you out there for hanging there with us. And we would appreciate your warm thoughts and prayers coming our way because we we definitely could use them for moments like this, and but we appreciate you guys hanging in there with us. And so to get into this topic, which the title of it is failure to launch, and we re going to get into that title here a little bit later in the podcast because I think we need to maybe clarify that a little bit. But we know that the life of an emerging adult is not as simple as maybe it once was thought to be. There was an expectation, at least when I was growing up.

I'm 51 years old. I'm a Gen Xer. I'm a child of the eighties. Thank you very much. When I was growing up, I mean, it just seemed like things were a little more simpler and linear even.

And there was this expectation and accepted viewpoint at one time regarding the path of adulthood. As teenagers morphed into young adults, the idea was they would graduate high school, either go to college or get enrolled in the military, or go find a job working with your parents or a friend. Do that for a little while, and then you graduate or you leave the military or you work enough to then find that spouse. Molly, it sounds like you're doing a really good job with that. And then you would start a family and then you live happily ever after pursuing the great American dream.

But it's a bit more convoluted than that these days. I mean, young adult, young and emerging adults, they may experience a gap year before or after college, and they may travel or join an internship or live at home for a while. They may move in with a partner or take on several roommates before getting married. And I think it's important for us to name a certain expectation that is placed on some of these emerging adults that just might not be realistic anymore. The path of today's young and emerging adults just isn't this clean linear path.

What do you guys think about that?

Well, would jump in and say I also came up in a time when it seemed like there was a linear path, and there was a high sort of value placed on getting higher education or entrance into the military. Or you know, back when I was growing up, they still offered sort of some of the trades as part of you know vocational education in high school, and you could move on from there to finish off your you know, vocational training. Or sometimes you just you were a natural born. I had a good friend in high school, a good natural born salesperson. So he was selling things before he got out of high school, and then he became a manager at a you know, retail clothing store, etc.

And that was his path. So each one of us was kind of it did feel linear. It did feel like, you know, like a bird being pushed out of the nest, you needed to move on. And you know, there's a greater openness I think today for the nest to remain a nest for a long time. Generations ago, whole multi generation households, big houses with you know, several sets of grandparents sometimes, and adults, and children, and they were all part of an ongoing ecosystem looking out for each other.

And you know, it wasn't until the twentieth century that we invented the idea, and it really sort of invented the idea of a nuclear family that was just a parent and a child, and then we later on came and said, you know, that doesn't even, you know, every family looks different. Let's be happy with the different families, single parent, parents without children, adults without children, all those things make. So the expectations seem more open and free form, and yet sometimes those expectations from fifty years ago get put on young and emerging adults today. And so I do think that's where this we're going to come back to the idea of failure. I'm not sure it's a failure, but we're going to talk about that.

Right. So Molly, why don't you share your ideas before I just go off?

Y'all are good. I am a young and emerging adult, and so it's interesting to kinda see the perspective that other people have of what this looks like. For me, I did kinda follow a little bit of a linear path, but not a %. Mhmm. I graduated college, and I actually did a gap year with the Appalachia Service Project.

And I worked with them for fifteen months, where James was my chaplain. It was amazing. And then from there, I did a internship for two years as a ministry resident with MTSU Wesley Foundation. And then from there, kinda launched into being the director of a Wesley Foundation now. So I think for me, I remember when I told my parents, hey.

I wanna do this thing where I wanna graduate, and I don't wanna go and work yet. I wanna take this year and do service.

Mhmm.

And I wish that I could have taken a picture of their faces for all of you to see because they were like they're very supportive people, but they were like, what do you mean? Like, how is this gonna financially work? Like, you're not gonna just go and, you know, start working. Like, how are you gonna have money? How are you gonna have these things and that thing?

And what does this set up your life to look like later? And I remember just telling them that, you know, that's an expectation that they had put on them, and that doesn't need to continue to be put on me even though they didn't realize that they were just conditioned to believe this to be true. And so I kind of had to help them figure that out. And I remember over time, then eventually my my parents would be like, oh my gosh. Molly June's gonna go do this really cool thing and work for ASP.

And then they were, like, telling all their friends and, like, it became this really exciting cool thing. But it definitely took an adjustment for them to understand what I was doing and where I was going because it's such a different lifestyle. And I think lifestyle of ministry is just different in general and takes some getting used to when we talk about failure to launch.

Right. And and again, we're we're talking about these expectations that have been really ingrained, at least into our American society, where we want our our kids as a as a parent, we want our kids to thrive and be successful and do better than we did. It's it's again, it kinda harkens back to the great American dream, just doing and living better than our parents. And when we see our 18 to 30 year old still kind of trying to figure things out, we get nervous. We get scared.

And it's like you said, Molly, we we're not sure if they're gonna be able to find a job that makes enough money to feed into their four zero one k so that they can retire, you know, at 65 years old and go and enjoy their life. And so I think naming some of these expectations and breaking them down just a little bit will help because we need to be able to find ways to better support young adults and emerging adults who are they find themselves in this situation where they feel that pressure. I'm sure they do. And those expectations. I think I mentioned this earlier where maybe they see their some of their peers who kinda just figured things out real quick or they were able to move forward rapidly with their careers and they find themselves in a successful place.

And they're wondering, well, why can't I be like that? And I think it's important for us to name that actually we're we're all kind of on our own track here, and we can have a little more flexibility. We can offer a little more support. And what are ways that we can surround our friends here who are trying to figure things out and give them the kind of encouragement and mentorship or support, really, that they are looking for. Molly, I know you every day, you're working with with folks who are in the college setting.

Mhmm. And some of them may feel like, oh, I found I found my my passion and I'm excited about this. But we know that there's a lot of folks in college who are like, try this out, this is not what I wanna do. Now they're staying in college longer. The debts are starting to pile up.

Parents are like, oh, what are you? Just get the degree and get out and go. Are you seeing some of that play out with the Mhmm. Adults that you're working with?

Yeah. I I have seen that. I've seen some students who are, like, juniors in college, and they're still like, I took all these classes, and I don't even know if this is what I wanna do. Or I was going to be a teacher, which is what I did. I went for two years to be a teacher, and then one day was like, this is not actually for me at all, and then decided to switch to something totally different.

And so I've seen that also happen with the young adults that I come in contact with. And I think in those moments, I just remind them what is their definition of success, and what is the definition of success that comes from our society. Right? So for me, I think we often forget that if we go to college, we are in a very small statistic of people who are able to be educated well. That's already success.

And for those that can't go to college, if they're out working in something that they love, that's also a small statistic of people who are enjoying what they do and caring in a way that's important for our world. So I think success and the definition of it changes our outlook. And that's what I try to remind my students. What is your definition of success? And does it matter what society's is if you are fulfilling your own success in your heart?

Well, I think that that's why, you know, when we get this idea of success, that's where we get the idea of failure. Where we start throwing people, you know, you get an idea of success, and the success is you get out of the nest as quickly as possible, you become self sufficient, and

Right.

Whatever other things follow along after that. And so when we talk about the idea of failure to launch, we're talking about the expectation that launching looks like x. Yes. And unless you unless y equals x, then you have failed, and it just means you've gone a different path. I wish we would use a different failure to follow my expectations for you might be what is true, but it's not a failure.

It's that you're still discovering what the direction is, and wherever you are right now, it may not feel like a good place to be. And for some people, some of the places where they find themselves, it's not good. I'm not saying that every everything that could be happening to you is great because that would be a lot. But where you find yourself doesn't have to be perceived to be a failure, particularly if you begin to say what am I learning right now that will help me figure out what I am about? And can I be satisfied with where I am right now knowing that it is preparing me either through endurance or through what I'm learning about the things I do like or don't like or am willing to do or unwilling to do as I discover more about who I am, this is not a failure?

This is an opportunity to discover. And even if you perceive it as a failure, sometimes our greatest learning comes when we trip and fall, and then get ourselves back up or find that there are other people around us who love us and help us back up. Those are all opportunities. So I, you know, I think language is important, and the words that we use are important. So be careful.

I would caution, be careful how you define success, and be careful how you let other people define success for you, and then define you in some way as if failure is just a word. Nothing less than love can define you. So remember that nothing less than love and failure is just a word somebody else has decided to attach to you. And it's their word, not yours.

And so what we find ourselves is in a bit of a conundrum here because we get these characteristic or caricatures of folks who are afraid that they're gonna be like the 30 year old living in their parents' basement eating Cheetos on a grubby couch.

Hot Pockets. Hot Pockets.

I'm sorry. Yeah. Well, you start with the the Cheetos, and then you move to the Hot Pocket. Right?

You graduate to the Hot Pocket. Right.

And you're washing it all down with some, like, Mountain Dew. Right? Yep. Is that it? Is that the one?

Okay. So, yeah. You get these characters characters, it's just people are afraid of that. And parents are afraid that that's what their kids are gonna turn into. And then you get these parents who, again, they don't know how to define it a little bit better for their kid who s still living at home.

And so there are these expectations, and we mentioned this before, where that was something that was put onto them or that they kind of were living into. And not to say that we want success for all of our kids. That's a good thing to want, I think. But redefining what success looks like. And I think it's gonna be really crucial in moving forward with whatever it is we're gonna be moving forward in.

And I think young adults need to hear that. They need to know that, hey, you know what? It's okay if this is the way you go. I think maybe parents are gonna have more of an issue with this because they want to see that their kid is the one that was supposed to grow up to be the astronaut or the genius or whatever. And yet now their their kid is choosing to do this thing over here.

So how can we surround them in that love, in that support, and and and help them navigate some of these things that are going on in their life? And that can be it can be really tough. James, you and I are parents, and we want our kids to to be successful. But at the same time, we we want to make sure that they know deep down more than anything else that we love them and we're crazy about them. And I think sometimes that just that message isn't clarified very well.

Mhmm. And, I I mean, I've got a daughter. She's 25 years old, and she graduated from App State, and she's incredible. And I just I think the world of her, and I have so much pride in in who she is. And I think if we can start there as parents and defining, hey, you know what?

Who is my kid? Who did they turn out to be their character? Things like that. I think we start there. Because right now, she is still trying to figure out what her next steps are.

She's one of the reasons I thought of this pod this this topic for this podcast is, like, where where is she gonna get? What what are her next steps? And she's trying to figure that out. And so instead of slapping her with, hey. Here are the expectations.

The bar is up here. You need to do x, y, and z so that you can be successful and have the kind of life that you want. And when we need to understand that now there's more going on here. What do you what do you do you guys think of that?

I think there's a lot of different things that come to mind when we talk about that. I think too, like, I'm not a parent and so at this current time. And so for me, when my parents were like, oh, like, you're not gonna do the traditional thing, and you're gonna do this, and that seems so scary. I didn't understand, like, why they were so freaked out that I wanted to go do ministry and do this really thing that I thought was really cool. But it does come back to you know, we've been conditioned to believe that money is success.

And so if I'm going into this internship that I'm not getting a lot of money at, but I'm doing a lot of work in, or I'm taking this gap year where we're not getting a lot of money, but we're getting a lot of skills and love and support, those aren't computing in the same way to money is in our world. And so I think it really scared my parents that, well, where am I gonna go after this if I just have this gap year and then I'm done? What happens after that? And so Mhmm. Now that I'm out of it for a little while, I can kind of understand where they're coming from and why they felt that way.

And they eventually were super supportive and, like, totally understood. It just took a little while to get there. And I think that parents have to understand that you also will have a dream for your child. Right? Like, you're gonna dream that they're gonna do this thing or this person.

Mhmm.

And they're probably not gonna be that exact person or that thing that you dreamt of. And so that was hard, I think, for my family at first to understand. Right. But we got there. We got there, and I think that that will happen to everyone.

And just remembering that you're not a failure if you still live with your family. You're not a failure if you don't have the job that you love yet. You're not a failure if you don't have a partner that you're gonna be married to or in a long term relationship with. That doesn't define who we are as people. Our character does.

And who we are towards other people and how we act is, I think the way that we measure our success.

Yeah. I've got a statistic here from CNBC that they did last November in 2024. They found that approximately one in three US adults ages 18 to 34 live in their parents' home. The pandemic caused more young adults to return home or remain living with their parents into their late 20s and 30s, but aside from that spike from the pandemic, the numbers have remained fairly consistent in recent years. And so if you're the kind of person, this describes me perfectly, sometimes you just feel like you're the only one who's going through this thing.

And actually, that's a pretty huge statistic right there. One in three eighteen to 34 year olds are still living with their parents. And I think we need to stop shaming that. And again, we need to redirect our thoughts on that because it's quite normal for a 25 year old to live at home with their parents or guardians. And James, you brought this up because many cultures around the world, this is the norm.

It seems like, really, outside of all of that, we're the ones who are abnormal in America who place this high priority of getting our kids kicked out of the nest. And, you know, when in so many other places, family surrounds their kids and continues to support them in ways that enable them to figure some of these big life questions out. And I think that's beautiful.

Yeah. I'm completely with you on that. I think that, you know, the move towards the nuclear family, you know, whatever, You know, and that idea took away this sense that, you know, there is in a lot of those cultures, and even here prior to the twentieth century, there was a sense of mutual responsibility and accountability that they looked out for each other. And sometimes it was the 20 year old kid who had the job that made sure everybody ate in the family because dad was off of work or having to stay home to care for an aging relative, and they just made space. I don't want to idealize it like it was some romantic beautiful thing.

It was hard work, and it was the only way families made it in those days. And I think that today with the changing economy the way that it is, particularly, and this may be the first generation that cannot expect to do better than their parents' generation. At least I read that recently somewhere. And I think that this generation has actually many of them have already come to terms with that. I talked to young adults who are like,

understand

that what's most important is being fulfilled and being connected. I have my friends who walk with me. Yeah, my parents expect something or other adults or society does, but I find myself fitting with these other young adults, these other emerging adults, and they understand that what's most important. I don't live to work, I work to live. And so I make enough that I can afford to live where I live and make some time for travel and spend time with my friends.

I don't want to lose my emerging adulthood in eighty hour weeks at work if I don't have to. So I have to say I admire these young and emerging adults saying this is what I need. You may have expectations for me and they're fine. They're yours. They're not mine.

And I'm going to do I admire Molly so much because she chose that gap year, and she chose to do the ASP thing. And her parents didn't understand it, but rather than that be a daunting factor for Molly and or the other at the time, seven young adults, emerging adults who were doing the fellowship program, they engaged. You know, they just kept engaged. I think that's, I admire you Molly, just so you know.

To your point, James, you know, finding ways in which we can support our young adults in some of these decisions that they're making. And they're pushing back on some of these standards, and they see that a lot of these things didn't really work out so well. Working those eighty hour weeks and the stress and the misery that that may have caused in family dynamics. And they're saying, you know what? That's not for me.

You know, I'm not gonna, like, kill myself, and then come home and take it out on my my spouse and maybe my kids and then see that relationship fall apart. There's a lot of factors here that I think young adults are seeing and saying, you know what? That's not what I want to be a part of. I think we can do this a little bit differently. And that's just gonna rub up against some of these expectations that parents like me who grew up with, oh, this is the path you follow in order to attain success.

Not just model, it doesn't work very well anymore. And we're finding that maybe that wasn't the right model after all. And so and I I really appreciate how the young adults are kind of pushing back on that a little bit. I think as parents, we need to be in a position of, hey, we need to listen. Now, I know we want to encourage and sometimes it's good to be stretched and grown, at the same time, there isn't just one tried and true formula here that we all need to, you know, one size fits all kind of thing that we put onto ourselves.

We re going to take a break right here and come back and when we do, we have some more to talk about as far as just some statistics and some things that young adults are facing, but also let's create some possible solutions or let's reframe some of this wording like failure to launch. And so we look forward to getting into that, and we'll be right back. Alright. And welcome back, to our podcast. We are really excited about this topic.

We feel like it really touches a lot of folks out there who are trying to figure some things out in their life. And we're gonna try to redefine some of these terms we've been using like failure to launch and talk about a few more things that are just realities for a lot of our young and emerging adults, like the cost of living being a factor that kind of limits, I think, a lot of our young adults. My son and his partner, who are both 26, they want to get into a home. They're renting right now, but the the cost of this is is pretty astronomical. The prices have changed and the cost associated with things.

I think it's why a lot of folks kind of delay doing other things with their life, like starting a family. Things that have been relegated as typical paths of adulthood just aren't quite as as easy or as attainable maybe as they were when I was growing up at that time. And so I wanted to introduce a really strong voice in young and emerging adult study and research. His name is Doctor. Steve Argue, and he's a researcher a strategist at Fuller Theological University.

And he's primarily concerned with young and emerging adults and has relayed in his book called Young Adult Ministry Now that these emerging adults see financial independence as a goal towards becoming an adult, but this is a real struggle with student loan debt and high cost of living. He says that these emerging adults are more cautious to get married, saying that their own parents have failed marriages and things in the family were just really stressed and torn apart. And again, we can mention high costs associated with family life as putting another stressor on these relationships. He also said that young adults are staying in college longer, and we mentioned that. As they try to figure out who they are and what they want to do, or they're taking these gap years, not to goof off, but to legitimately try and figure out what these next steps are.

And so think we find some of these barriers, some of these hardships maybe for young adults and emerging adults to kind of like try to step through. Molly, how how much of the the financial hardship do you see playing out with young adults that you work with? How much of a concern is that with them? I mean, they're in college. They're they're probably racking up some debt here.

Do you see that playing out in their lives and their concerns and their fears?

Yeah. I think financial hardships are one of the biggest things that kinda set our young adults back in wanting to, you know, live out their dream or what they think that they wanna do. Student debt is crippling for sure. And as a young person who is now living on my own, thinking about all the things that my parents had paid for when I was young, I'm like, I would love to go back to that time when I didn't have to pay all of it myself.

Mhmm.

I think what we're also seeing is the gap between what we're being paid for what we do and then how much everything is worth to live. Mhmm. There's a huge gap there. And, like, health insurance, individual health insurance is, like, insanely expensive for an individual. Like, for me, I'm 26, and it's $400 a month for my health insurance.

Mhmm. So just things like that that my job is unable to pay for, and so I have to pay out of pocket for those things. So I think some individuals are realizing this kinda makes more sense for me to stay at home and to live with my family because then I don't have to pay for x y z things. I can save up that money while my student debt is going down and still work this job or do this thing that I love. Mhmm.

And I actually admire that. I think that that is really smart. As someone who took a gap year, I would never change what I did because I loved it so much, but I do see the benefit of when my students talk about those sorts of things for sure.

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, ahead, James.

I was just gonna say I agree. I mean and a lot of people are not, you know, a lot of young adults I know are not as focused on, you know, unless you have a STEM job where your entry level pay is going to be large, if you have a heart for teaching, We simply do not pay our teachers enough in The United States. There is no place that we pay them even half the value that they are currently worth. You know, and things like teachers. My son works for a nonprofit, and for a while, he lived with a couple of his friends.

And one of them was a computer programmer, happened to be for Apple, and the other one was in the private sector. And they were in a whole different financial space than my son. And so ultimately he said, hey, is it possible, because he lives in the same area, for me to come back home for a little while while I get paid off on these debts and get my feet under me because I feel strongly about working in the nonprofit sector, but the compensation means it is just a different way to be. And I'm very proud of him for that desire to change the world, to feed hungry people, which is what he does, and to be innovative about it in ways that he is. I see that.

It makes me very proud of him. And quite frankly, he makes a great roommate. I mean, he's my son, but he makes a great roommate. We come home from worship every Sunday morning, and he prepares us brunch. He prepares us brunch.

I'm talking about not something from a can or from I mean, from scratch. I am you know, okay. Well, you're getting off topic.

Toast and

Sorry, and I was starting to get hungry when I was thinking about some of the amazing meals he makes us,

but It's a tasty topic.

Yeah. So it is a tasty topic. So I think I in no way see him as a failure that he's come back home. In many ways, I see that his courage in coming back home when so many people he knows have found a way to live on their own, his courage in coming home says something about him as a person. And it has been really good to have him around.

We love having him around. So Okay, okay.

Yeah. And I'm going get into this a little bit with you, James, because I feel like we've got competing values going on here for our young and emerging adults. On the one hand, they probably have grown up and hearing, you can be whatever you want. You know, the world is your oyster and you are limitless potential. And and yet, when things don't quite work out that way, we run against those limitations and we're a little disillusioned.

And then they hear this like, hey, you just need to go work harder. You need to figure this out. And so, like, how how do we balance that out, James? I mean, do we need to just give more tough love to our young adults and emerging adults? I mean, should they just, you know, get in there and figure it out or do we just coddle them?

Like what how would you approach that? Because we've got these two different competing, you know, understandings here.

Well, it all depends on you know, for so many adults in our age that have adult children, definition of what it means to coddle somebody is something that came to us from generations before us. And I don't think it defines this generation. I don't and so I don't see myself first of all, you have to be honest with yourself as a and now I'm speaking to non young adults. They need to be honest with themselves too. But your parents or the people if you feel the need to move back home, they need to be honest about what their expectations are because oftentimes they've attached things to you that have nothing to do with you.

It's all about them. You know, they want to look good and see their child super successful and, you know, in five or six journals and being published and or whatever else their stuff is. And Right.

There's a social stigma attached to it.

Yeah. So I want you to know as a young adult, that's their stuff. It's not yours. It's it's you know, and I could say it's our stuff, suppose, but it's it's not my stuff. It's not my stuff.

I so you figure out what's good for you right now, where the space you're at, and if you can be in the same house with your parents and they can be supportive in that, that could be a good space for you. But if they're going to just be harping at you the whole time, you're going to have to ask your question, how do I get to that other side? Because it's hard enough to make it in society without feeling judged, shamed for who you are right now, where you are right now. You need to say this is who I am right now. It may not be who you anticipated I would be right now, but I'm okay with who I am, and I'd really like for you to be okay with me, but I'm going to keep being me whether you're okay with it or not.

And hopefully that will be received well, but depending on how much stuff they got invested in you from their perspective

Sure.

Is how you're going to receive that. So it's not coddling. It's a changing economic world. And unfortunately, in a capitalist society, which we are, we place value on STEM, we place value on you know high powered lawyers and kinds of things like that, And we don't put value on first responders. Look at how much we pay them.

We say a lot of lip service. We don't put value on teachers. We pay lip service to it but you know, we don't put the money on the line. And those there are people that we admire are military. We admire what they do, but we don't want to pay them anymore.

You know, and that says something about what the society values. You have to find the value you have because God values you. As I like to say, you are infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift you already are.

It's It's a great podcast. Go check that out. It's streaming everywhere. But let so that's a great segue for us to kinda begin to wheel in faith and let's let's bring in God here. Because I think we find in places of belief and in places like scripture, God does talk about this plan and purpose for our life.

And so how much of that gets kind of wheeled into this for young adults who are searching for identity? And we've talked about that before, but also just kind of figuring out what their purpose is in in life. And God's saying things like, yeah, you know, I do have a a plan and a purpose for you. I think that's Jeremiah 31. But in other places where God's hand wants to be very much on the steering wheel of our life.

So, Molly, what is your understanding of how how God's influence in any of that plays a part in the young adults that you work with? Do they do they do they value God's opinion? Do they seek it out? Is that sort of secondary, even tertiary in their in their life? How does and what does that even mean?

Do they do they Are they praying about these things? Are they seeking out God's guidance? Or are they just sort of like, well, if it happens, it happens.

Yeah, I talk with my students a lot about discernment and understanding like discerning this idea of where God's calling you and where your deepest hunger in the world is. And so where do you feel that your passions for the world line up with where God's passions for the world are for you to then contribute to society in that way? And I have a lot of students who are on that train trying to figure that out, have gotten involved in the campus ministry, and feel like this is cool. This is what we're doing, but I don't feel called to ministry. And I think people often think you can only hear God's call if it's being called to ministry.

That is not true. I did hear a call to ministry. That has been great for me and worked out well. But I think that my dad has a call to be an insurance agent. My mom had a call to be able to be a dental hygienist.

My sister has a call to work in sales with people. My younger sister is gonna be a social worker. She has a call for that. I think that there's a lot of different ways we understand what the word call means, and the church has made it something where it's this big profound god comes down from the sky and tells you, you are gonna be this, and it's gonna be amazing, and everything's gonna be bliss, and it's gonna be peaceful.

That would be nice.

Right? Let me just tell you that doesn't happen. But in our communication and in our prayers, we do hear God speaking to us in different ways. And I think if you feel a tug this is how I explain it to my students. If you feel a tug in a certain part of your soul, in a certain place in society, that may be a place that you want to push deeper to see if maybe that's where God's calling you to be.

And just because God has called you to a place and you've listened to the call and now you're doing the work, doesn't mean it's gonna be really easy. It's all gonna work out and things are gonna be blissful and happy. I often say that I'm called to chaos. And so when things feel comfortable is when I'm no longer called to those things anymore. And so for me, it's always hard in a beautiful way.

And that's what I try to explain to my students. And we're working through it together, trying to figure it out. Culture of call is something that is really important and really incredible in teaching people how to feel call in their lives, if that answers your question.

Yeah. Because I feel like God wants to equip us. God God wants to work through us. There's a lot of work to be done, and Jesus even talked about the work that has to be done, and there's a lot of it. And so how do we open ourselves up to that kind of work?

James, you're our resident theologian. I mean, when you hear these verses, is this a very kind of black and white kind of understanding? Or is there some more depth to maybe what some of these verses are alluding to when it talks about God's plan for our lives?

Well, I'll just say that I've come to terms with the sense that I don't think God has a plan for my life that is like a blow by blow. Every step, you know, I get up at I get God planned for me to be up at six fifteen and fifteen seconds this morning out of my bed when my wife reached over and touched my shoulder to waken me. And that I was going to make the coffee exactly a certain way and if the water was going to boil in a certain amount of I don't think God that's like micromanagement and then suddenly we become automatons or robots, not fully you know, free willed individuals. I think that God Mhmm. We're gifted, each one of us, and we bear a part of our gift is being the person we are.

You know, even if you have a profession. And Molly, for instance, for the moment, is called to campus ministry, and that's her form of ministry. But she is not just a campus minister Right. That fits into a box. You know, it's a title.

Mhmm. But Molly is Molly, the campus minister, not campus minister who happens to be Molly. She doesn't fit a box for that. I'm a pastor, United Methodist pastor, but I'm James. That's my primary identity, and that's what God wants to see come out.

So when I'm being a pastor or a son or a friend, I'm being James. I'm not being friend or pastor or husband. I am a unique husband to Linda. She will never if I die, she gets a new one, whatever. She will never have another husband that James, and she's probably thankful for that in many ways.

But you know, you bring you. Every one of us brings us to this. So Mhmm. I think God when God made us in the image of God, we bear a unique aspect of what the divine looks like. We reflect that into life.

So the most important thing is we learn to reflect that in life. It's less about which job you do. Right. You may find the job that's that is like perfect fit. You may not.

Mhmm. Yeah.

But the way you fit into what you do, the way you bring you to that thing, I think that's the biblical message of God's plan for you. I made you to be, in in Sean's case, I made you to be Sean. I want you to be bring your Sean ness to everything that you do. Molly, you know, bring your Mollyness to everything that you do. James, bring your Jamesness to everything that you do.

And when we bring that, we are reflecting the glory of God. It's less about a specific job or a specific

Mhmm.

But the purpose is that we be the self God made us to be. Get out of our own way and be the person God intended us to be because being that completes in a part, in a very small way, the mirror of what the ultimate looks like.

Yeah, yeah. I love that, James. And I just it reminded me of, you know, some of the the jobs that the apostle Paul talks about. He said, hey, some of you were gifted with this and doing that. Some of you have those gifts.

And this is kinda like this metaphor of the body, right? We all can't be the eye, we all can't be the foot, but maybe it's discerning, okay, so what is or what are my gifts and talents, and how do I use those to, as we say, intersect the needs of the world? And so how we better support young and emerging adults in finding out what are their gifts and talents? I mean, I know you can take surveys and kind of figure some of that out, but I think this is such a prime opportunity for the church to open themselves up and to surround young adults who are still trying to make sense of their life, make sense of the world. And what a great opportunity this is to invite them in and to love on them and to mentor them and to help them walk this journey a little bit instead of taking the more judgmental stance of of something that I've seen.

And that is, you you need to get your act together. You know? You need you need to get off your butt and you need to move forward. You can do this. Come on now.

And instead, it's taking more of that Jesus approach of, hey. I'm gonna sit here with you, and let's talk about this, and let's work through some of these questions, and let's kind of identify some of these places in your life where you can begin to use these gifts and talents that have been given to you, which I believe everyone has been imbued with, and and and how does that live into the glory of who God is and reflect who God is? And again, like you said, it could be teaching inner city kids, or it could be leading major law firm. But how does that leading a major law firm reflect the goodness of God? And so I think there's some questions there that we can ask.

Molly, what are some things that you've come across that have been helpful in helping your young adults to kind of gain a bit of introspective introspection into their own calling?

Yeah. I think for me, at least, when I originally was trying to figure out what my calling was, I took a piece of paper and I wrote down all these words of things that I couldn't live without. So, like, the state of Kentucky. I love Kentucky. Can't live without Kentucky.

Live

without It's because of ALA. Right?

Exactly. Exactly. I couldn't live without ASP. I couldn't live without campus ministry. Like, these all these things that I feel like if I didn't have all of them, I wouldn't be as Molly as I am.

Mhmm. And so then over those things, I kinda prayed into it of, like, what is specific on this list that I feel like is my call to the world? Mhmm. And for a while, I thought it was ASP. I thought I was gonna work there forever, and that was gonna be my thing.

But God kinda switched it up on me and was like, this is gonna be your thing. This is gonna be your call. And at this time, as James has said, I am a campus minister, and I absolutely love what I do. And I feel like every day now that I'm in the job and in that vocation, I can see why I'm called deeper to this. But I would ask, what are those things that you can't live without?

What are those things that set your soul on fire? What are those things that help you get out of bed in the morning? Write them all down and then prayerfully think through them. What is one of these things that maybe I could try to make as my vocation and see if I can live that out? And that's been helpful for me and what I tell my students.

That's great. That's great. And I've I've heard the stories where people are working very high paying successful, powerful jobs only to get bothered by god saying, hey. I want you to go do this. And it's not as glorious, and it's not gonna make near the money, but here's where I want you.

Mhmm. And that that can be a a very scary place, right, to turn to. But then, again, it's how are we building up trust and and faith in a god that truly is for us and and and wants to work wonders through us. They might not be as noticeable worldwide, right? But they're gonna make a difference in the people right around us, and how can we live into that?

And I think maybe another way of finding out what some of your gifts and talents are is just surrounding yourself with friends and mentors who can be objective. I think sometimes we're just kinda it's all right in front of us, and we can't really see very well. Mhmm. And so we need someone from the outside to look into our lives and sit with us and and and tell us what are the things that they see in our life that might help us make decisions about our future and next steps. James, what do you think about that?

I absolutely think that having if I were speaking to leaders in the life of faith, I would say that the most important thing you can do for a young adult, an emerging adult is to accept them right where they are right now without any expectations because being accepted and loved for who you are is the primary message of our faith. You know, God already loves you. You don't have to do anything to earn it. If you can be accepted and can then recognize you need to accept yourself, Limitations as well as gifts, and then moving out in that direction. I would say you need good friends too, not only who will help you see yourself, but occasionally you get stuck.

And it's not necessarily laziness but you get stuck. And you need somebody to I don't like to use violent imagery like kick you in the butt, but you know that needs to you know help you get yourself in gear. That you won't find out that you don't like something. You can think about 15 different things that you might be called to, and if you never try any of them, how will you even vaguely know? So sometimes you just have to say, I'm gonna pick one of these 15 things I feel called to, I'm gonna try it, and if it doesn't work, I'll try something else.

And the courage it takes to do that is knowing you may try something and it doesn't fit and you once again, back to that word

There it

is, Yep.

Yeah, there it is. You fail at it but it's one of the best learning experiences

Yes. You know

That is not you. I'm not gonna do that. That's a good failure is not a bad word. It's often the best teacher you will ever have is failing at something is like, oh, I thought I was supposed to do this with my life, but it's clear clearly not. So having the friends who will call you out and hold you accountable to what you want to be held accountable for.

You also have to be able to say, I need you to hold me accountable. Going to try this thing. Help me remember, it doesn't make me a label me a failure if I don't do this thing. So in six months, ask me how am I doing at this thing if I haven't already quit and see where we are then. I need someone to be accountable.

So being in partnerships will help us find but what you're doing right now is okay if you can accept yourself where you are doing the thing that you're doing. But try the things and see where, you know, where they lead you.

Yeah, that's great. Molly, you got anything to throw on there?

Yeah, I love when James speaks. I feel like it just like my soul. I just love it. I love how he reminds us always that we are perfect as we are, and so that's already enough. Right?

Like, we are perfect as we are. That's already enough. That's not something you have to change. If you find your vocation or if you find your partner, those are all added on things. Mhmm.

But you yourself are already enough just being there. And I think that that's not said enough to individuals, and I really appreciate that about you, James.

Nice. Well, Molly, I really appreciate you saying that.

Lot of love going on here in this podcast. And, man, yes. It it just it helps that we like each other.

Well, helps that we like each other but the truth is each one of us has found think part of what I love about being in this with you all is not only have each of us, you know, found the place that we need to be right now, But we're not afraid to also recognize that we've tripped a lot getting to where we are.

Oh, absolutely.

And we don't have all the answers. This is why it's a conversation and not a that we talk to each other. I learned so many things from both of you. You are brilliant. Sean, you are brilliant.

Molly June, you are brilliant. I'm pretty okay You're right. I love, I feel sharpened every time I have a conversation with you all. And so this is, young adults, if you can find some people who will say what they think, be honest with you, and help you figure out who you are, that is a gift greater than gold. No matter what we seem to think is most important, It is a gift greater than gold to have friends who will stand with you, who will encourage you when you need encouragement but also, you know, call you out when you need calling out and just sharpen you as a human being.

It's a real gift.

One resource I want to throw out there to our listeners is a book by Parker Palmer, and it's entitled Let Your Life Speak. And it's a great small book about listening for the voice of vocation. And so if you're looking for a resource, I highly recommend that one. James Molley, I don't know if you've got anything in addition to that that you wanna throw out there as a resource or an idea, but as listeners, you do have us, and there are ways to get in touch with us, to have conversations with us, to add to this conversation. Molly, in just a second, is going to let you know how you can get ahold of us, But we do want to be a support to where you are in this in this life.

Just know that you've got folks who are in your corner and would love to hear from you. And so Molly, take it away.

Yeah. Find us on Instagram at spiritual.not_religiouspodcast and send us a DM, follow what we're doing, and then we would love to hear from you in our email at spiritualnotreligiouspodcast@gmail.com.

Awesome. Any closing thoughts from either one of you guys? Well, you feel like you said it all then, didn't you? You're just that amazing that brilliant as James would say.

Yeah. Yeah.

Hey. Listen. Thank you so much for listening in. We really hope that this was meaningful for you. Again, we do wanna hear from you if you've got some thoughts.

And even if those are disagreements, we would love to hear from you. And your your your place in this world is so vitally important. Just know that we are in your corner. God is very much in your corner, believe it or not. And we hope to have you with us in our very next podcast.

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