Episode 11: A Guest in Someone Else’s Story with Eric Barreto
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Show Notes
Co-hosts
Jeff Chu
Find Jeff online: @byJeffChu on Instagram or @JeffChu on Twitter. You can also subscribe to Jeff’s newsletter, Notes of a Make-Believer Farmer on Substack.
Sarah Bessey
Find Sarah online: @SarahBessey on Instagram or @SarahBessey on Twitter. You can also subscribe to Sarah’s newsletter, Field Notes on Substack. Explore Sarah’s recent books on her website.
Featured guest
Eric Barreto
Eric Barreto is the Weyerhaeuser Associate Professor of New Testament at Princeton Theological Seminary. He's an alumnus of Oklahoma Baptist University, Princeton Seminary, and Emory University. Before he joined the faculty at Princeton, Eric taught New Testament at Luther Seminary and served as an adjunct professor at the Candler School of Theology and McAfee School of Theology. As an ordained American Baptist minister, he has pursued scholarship for the sake of the church, and he regularly writes for and teaches in faith communities around the country. Eric has also been a leader in the Hispanic Theological Initiative Consortium, a national ecumenical group comprising some of the top seminaries, theological schools, and religion departments in the country. He lives in Princeton with his wife, Holly, and their two kids.
Learn more about Katlin on EricBarreto.com, or follow @EricBarreto on Twitter, or @Eric.Barreto on Instagram.
“The wilderness is not a space of homogeneity, but a bit of luscious difference.”
Thanks to our producer, SueAnn Shiah, who also provided the music for this episode, you can listen to her album A Liturgy for the Perseverance of the Saints on Spotify, Apple Music, Youtube, or Bandcamp and find her at @sueannshiah on Instagram and @sueannshiah on Twitter.
Transcript
Part 1: Introduction
SARAH: If you’ve been listening to and loving this podcast, join us for Evolving Faith 2022, the live virtual conference. It’s on October 14th and 15th.
So many of us are engaging in good, hard, holy work right now to cultivate love, reimagine and build a faith that works not only for us but for the whole world, and to find our way in the wilderness together. We need to be reminded of what matters, who is alongside of us. We need connection, inspiration, good conversations, and laughter, and we need some hope, too. We are gathering not in spite of these turbulent times but because of them. So please join us.
We have set a big, rowdy table in the middle of the wilderness, and together, we will have a feast. We’re saving a spot for you.
Go to evolvingfaith.com and register today. You won’t want to miss this moment with this community. It’s pretty special. Okay, now back to the show.
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ERIC: But scripture keeps bringing us to the wilderness, to places of seeming isolation, to places of potential danger, places of hopelessness, places that seem to get us lost—but also places that teach us who and whose we are. Spaces that create space for us to realize that we are not alone in this world.
SARAH: Hi, friends. I'm Sarah Bessey.
JEFF: And I'm Jeff Chu. Welcome back to the Evolving Faith podcast.
SARAH: We are so glad that you are here with us today. Thank you for spending some of your time. So today, we're going to be hearing from Dr. Eric Barreto as he explores evolving faith and the wilderness. So, Jeff, I am looking forward to this one, because we will have a chance to talk about food a bit more. And any time I get to listen to you talk about food, it is a good day. So I am curious about what's happening in your kitchen.
JEFF: Nothing is happening in my kitchen. We are in the midst of a house renovation that is approaching one year. And after months with just a toaster and a microwave and an Asian version of an Instant Pot, my mom felt sad, and so she sent this electric wok. It's such a blessing, because at least I can fry an egg and make some stir fry, because cooking is such a big part of my life, and it's been a real education learning to do things differently. The most positive spin on this—because everybody knows that I'm the most positive person—is that I am learning different skills. I am trying to tell myself that there can be good that comes out of a shake-up of my routine.
SARAH: I am so impressed. Well, well done. We have lived through a few renos in our marriage and in our family, to which I say from this standpoint, never again. So, so much blessings to you and Tristan and Fozzie. It is incredibly disruptive. It is a whole new set of skills, a whole different level of patience, I think, not just in your home but like, those rhythms and those routines and the ways you usually, you know, kind of flourish or thrive or even just kind of keep the wheels on. So I don't know if it's- is it maybe because we are such homebodies and we are kind of like kitchen people and introverts? I don't know if maybe that's what makes it a little bit more disruptive or feel more disruptive, but it has- it can definitely be a long process. And so my empathy is off the chart for you.
JEFF: Look, I'm not going to I'm not going to complain too much. It feels a bit rich to do that, because I'm going to have this beautiful new kitchen at the end of it. And even given the equipment we have, we always eat well. The greens in our garden have been really great this summer, and I'm even doing something that is alien to my people, which is to make salad. It turns out that salad is not terrible if it has cheese and bacon and nuts in it, and I do a pretty good maple vinaigrette. Why are you laughing?
SARAH: That's my way of doing salad. I'm just impressed. It's nice to know that the ways of my people have arrived.
JEFF: Salad is still not my favorite thing. But I'm told it's healthy, especially if you don't put too much cheese and bacon and goodness in it. And Fozzie definitely has no grounds to complain. I genuinely believe that he sees me and Tristan as human treat dispensers.
SARAH: Well, being a treat dispenser is probably the ministry that we all need right now. That’s- that feels like holy work. So since we are talking about food, it does lead us pretty well towards today's episode. So I wanted to introduce Eric Barreto in case people maybe aren't aware of who he is yet. He is the Weyerhaeuser Associate Professor of New Testament, which is where Jeff's path actually crossed with his work. And he's an alumnus of Oklahoma Baptist University, Princeton Seminary, and Emory University. Before he joined the faculty at Princeton, he taught New Testament at Luther Seminary. And as an ordained American Baptist minister, Eric has pursued scholarship for the sake of the church, and he regularly writes for and teaches in faith communities around the country. He has also been a leader in the Hispanic Theological Initiative Consortium. Did I say that right? Consortium? How do you pronounce that, Jeff?
JEFF: I think that's right. Consortium.
SARAH: That's what I thought. But all of a sudden it came out of my mouth, and I was like, “Wait, that doesn't sound right.” He has also been a leader in the Hispanic Theological Initiative Consortium, a national ecumenical group comprised of some of the top seminaries, theological schools, and religion departments in the country. He lives in Princeton with his wife, Holly, who is a phenomenal baker, and their two kids. After Eric's talk, of course, Jeff and I will be back to chat a bit more. And so we will see you on the other side.
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Part 2: Eric’s Talk
ERIC: In Acts chapter 8, verse 26, an angel of the Lord calls for a bit player in the Book of Acts to do something really, really foolish. The angel calls Philip to go to the middle of nowhere to a wilderness road. And we know this is an awful idea if we've been paying attention to the Gospel of Luke in the Acts of the Apostles. Can anyone think of a story in the Gospel of Luke that might suggest that going to the middle of nowhere on a lonely road is a bad idea? The Good Samaritan had a chance to be good precisely because someone went on a lonely road by themselves.
But Philip surprises us, and maybe even an angel who heard about Mary's searing questions and prophetic song. In Luke chapter 2, Philip surprises us by getting up and going. No questions, no worries. Didn't even pack a snack, which is a bad idea. Philip is called to the wilderness, and he goes. He does not know why he is going. It is not prepared for what or who he will find. We do not know how Philip feels about this seemingly foolish call. He simply knows that he has been called to a place for not exactly why or who he might meet there.
Philip, of course, is not the only person called to the wilderness in the Bible. The Bible's full of images of wilderness story set in and around wilderness. My friends, if I'm honest, I tend not to be so optimistic and starry-eyed about the wilderness, about deserted roads. Wilderness evokes for me all kinds of complicated feelings and fears, because I've walked on those lonely roads, and I imagine some of you have to.
In my own life, such a wilderness became tangible in so many ways when my family moved from Puerto Rico to a town called Slidell, Louisiana. Anybody know Slidell? It’s the same as Puerto Rico, right? Nothing changes. And by wilderness, I don't mean wildlife and mountain views but that feeling of being far from home. That feeling of things are not what they once were. That, that knowledge that you understand the words you hear but not what's just below the surface. That incredible combination of fear of the unknown and the thrill of possibility.
I remember feeling so out of place, so lonely. I was nine years old, but that feeling of wandering in the wilderness lasted. I remember spending a whole summer praying for friends. I remember observing that one of my classmates drew the admiration of girls in my class I wish would even notice me. And I remember concluding that he must be drawing that attention because of his thin lips. And I remember practicing in front of a mirror, trying to talk like this.
I remember going to church and encountering a God of thunderous acceptance, reading a Bible pointing to a God whose love knows no depth, who would save me for my sins. It was a church that taught me the gospel, but it was also a faith that, a faith that wasn't enough. It was a faith that did not see my ethnic difference as something to celebrate, only something to erase for the sake of unity. This was a faith that told me that only men could be called by God to be preachers. That when you become a follower of Jesus, all our racial and ethnic differences simply fall off like the sin that previously entangled me. That I was just like everyone else, but what that really meant is that I could fully belong only under the guise of whiteness. It was a faith that taught me to fear the body.
And so eventually it felt like my faith was practiced in the wilderness for a long time. The faith that had sustained me seemed inadequate- inadequate to help a young Puerto Rican kid to figure out who I was. The faith that nurtured me was not up to the task to say something tangible, concrete, something meaningful about oppression and injustice. The faith that showed me the gift of God's love fell short when it came to loving and embracing my LGBTQ+ kin. The faith that taught me that God so loved the world is also a faith that allows too many Christians who, Christians to embrace a nihilist who wants to outline our borders with fences, electric- electrification and even alligators simply because we are so damn scared of our neighbors fleeing for their lives.
That faith gave me so much—it just wasn't enough. The faith that gave me so much dropped me off in the wilder- in the wilderness to figure it all out on my own. But scripture keeps bringing us to the wilderness, to places of seeming isolation, to places of potential danger, places of hopelessness, places that seem to get us lost—but also places that teach us who and whose we are. Spaces that create space for us to realize that we are not alone in this world. And so because I'm a deep Bible nerd, the first place my mind went to as I thought about today is one of my favorite stories in the Bible. And so we go back to Acts chapter 8. And if you want to follow along, please do, starting at verse 26. If you didn't bring your Bible, that's okay. Your phone has one inside. Just Google it.
In this passage, Philip meets an Ethiopian eunuch in the wilderness on this lonely road. The Ethiopian eunuch is an extraordinary person. They are wealthy, powerful, rich. They have taken a long, dangerous, expensive journey. They can read and have the financial means to acquire a scroll of Isaiah. They have a chariot and a driver. They are also a black person smack dab in the middle of a story, narrating the earliest days of the church. Irrefutable evidence of God's wide embrace that too many have missed. They are also a eunuch, an identity that places them in a complex space. That they are a eunuch gains them access to the halls of power. That they are eunuch also creates boundaries around their belonging in the ancient world. They can only draw so near to God according to one particular reading of the scriptures. And so the rich, powerful, educated Ethiopian eunuch also has something important. The Ethiopian eunuch has an existential question.
And so when Philip shows up alongside the chariot, the Ethiopian eunuch does something that people of power and means and education typically don't do. They ask for help. See, the Ethiopian eunuch was reading the scriptures, looking for an answer to a question that was gnawing at their soul. I, I think they were wondering, “Where am I in these stories? Does God welcome me? Does God seek me, an Ethiopian, a eunuch, a stranger, and sojourner in the wilderness?”
So Philip joins the Ethiopian eunuch in their fancy chariot and begins to share the gospel. They read Isaiah together, and then we hear the Ethiopian eunuch's question. And then they wonder, “Is this prophecy about the prophet or about someone else?” Behind that question, I hear an even more direct question: “Is this text, is this prophecy, is this faith about me and people like me? Is this text about, about those of us wandering in a wilderness of isolation and loss and worry, even if we are rich and powerful and educated? Is that me? Am I in this book? Or better yet, do I have a place in this faith that has drawn me from miles away to a place where I don't know if I will belong?” The answer in Acts is yes, a resounding yes, and it is God who answers it and so clearly, because in the middle of nowhere, there is water and the wilderness. Water to splash and the gift of baptism, the waters that teach us who we are, that we are beloved children of God.
There's one more little wrinkle in this story. If you look, the Ethiopian eunuch asks in verse 36 whether there is anything that prevents them from being baptized. The water in the wilderness makes the answer clear. Nothing. Nothing will prevent them from being baptized. Nothing. But there's a little wrinkle here. Of course, what number comes after 36? Everybody knows this—37, right? But not in this case. Most Bibles will go right from verse 36 to verse 38. And verse 37 is often found in a footnote explaining that most ma- most ancient manuscripts do not include it.
Verse 37, in some of these manuscripts, records that the Ethiopian eunuch responded that they believed in the good news, and they confessed their need for baptism. So what happened here? Someone in the church—a scribe, a leader—decided that there was one thing that prevented the Ethiopian eunuch from being baptized. They had to confess. They had to say the right words. They had to walk down the aisle and accept Jesus as their Lord and savior. And so someone added verse 37, added an extra boundering- boundary to belonging. Another sting in the wilderness.
And this is what too many of us have experienced in the church, isn't it? God's inclusive embrace has been met with boundaries to belonging. God has extended God's arms to us. But too many insist that if you are to come to God, you have to come to God in this particular way. But God's answer is clear. In the wilderness, all you need is a witness, a question, some water, and the gift of the presence of God. And with that presence, the wilderness transforms.
So I wonder what is on the other side of this wilderness that some of us have walked in? Perhaps it's not home anymore, because we can't go back to a place that shaped us. But it's not really home anymore. And perhaps it's not a civilized place, for we know too well that self-proclaimed civilized faces have to always call someone else uncivilized in order to nurture a myth of superiority.
What if the other side of wilderness is more wilderness? But a wilderness where we are not alone? A wilderness that does not assail us from every side but a wilderness of delightful surprise. Not a wilderness of worry but a wilderness of many roads and vistas that are made new every day. Not a wilderness of isolation but one that calls us to the stranger. Not a wilderness devoid of God's presence but a wilderness God has made God's very home.
Here's what I think I've learned. God is no stranger to the wilderness. God has made the wilderness God's home. Whether on a lonely road to Jericho, a new home in a strange place on a long walk to hope for the refugee, on the therapist's couch as someone struggles to embrace and love who God has made them to be, or in an arena as we wonder what faith looks like next.
I used to hope that I would leave the wilderness of faith, that I would find a faith of tended gardens, not brambles and weeds. Of paved sidewalks, rather than a path made by fellow travelers walking those roads over and over again. A place with clear signage to keep me from getting lost. But what if the faith of Jesus is trust and hope in the wilderness?
The wilderness is not a space of homogeneity but of luscious difference. The wilderness is a difficult space but blessed precisely in its challenges. The wilderness can often feel like a lonely place but only when we are deceived by others, by my insecurities, by the vicious lies of racism and misogyny and homophobia and ableism. When we are deceived that we are not enough, that we are not worthy of companionship on these treacherous but beautiful roads, that there's no one else who will choose to walk with us.
My friends, that's, that's a lie. A lie that has killed our neighbors. A lie that has fueled the worst of us. A lie that teaches us to fear and not love, protect ourselves rather than be vulnerable and available for deep and caring, loving relationship. Lies—all of them. But there is a truth that sends these lies running away.
The good news of Jesus is that this faith, faith, these biblical texts, these traditions are about us, that they address us and nurture us and affirm us and transform us. Why? Because God is in the business of drawing us together, tearing down the walls that have driven us apart, co- coaxing us away from fear to love our neighbors with curiosity and hope, helping us imagine not the world as it is but the world as it might be, and calling us to be builders of such a world of justice.
So look to your left and to your right. No, seriously. Look to your left. Look to your right. Look behind you. Look in front of you. Notice you're not alone in the wilderness. This road is not yours alone. And when you look in the eyes of your fellow travelers—your kin—in this pilgrimage, when you hear their stories and their questions and their doubts, when you share their joys and pains, when they help you see the good news of Jesus in an unexpected way, notice how you catch a vibrant glimpse of a God who has chosen to walk with us in this beautiful, scary, thrilling, wonderful wilderness.
For me, the wilderness has become far less lonely these days. It's the gift of family, of friends that are like family, a church that loves me, a faith that has something to say, not just about my soul but about the bodies of the migrants and the oppressed. All of it has taught me anew the depth and breadth of the good news of a God who has walked alongside us, who has brought life from death. This faith, these beloved people, have taught me what the gospel tastes like.
And so when I wrote these reflections, I thought about our house, the one my wife, my two children, and I have co-created. And I thought about the meals we ate. I understood something, finally, that my body and my heart had already felt- felt. My spouse, Holly, is an extraordinary cook and baker. My family of origin introduced her to the joys of Puerto Rican cooking. Platanos, mofongo, arrozo con gandules, pan sobao. Those of you who know, now you know, right?
And she being the extraordinary cook she is, learned how to make these dishes because, yes, she loves the food but also because she loves me and the land that made me, the food that nourished me. When she cooks in this way, she's a guest in someone else's story. Why? Because she loves me, along with her half-white, half-Puerto Rican children and the land that helped make us a family. And the love goes both ways. Holly's family includes a strong Italian heritage with the best of its traditions, including the tradition of Sunday gravy or as it was known, in Holly's family, just sauce. One word carrying so much. I love sauce. I love gravy. This is bad to do this when lunch is still so far away.
When I eat at that table, I'm a loving guest in someone else's story. And the world gets bigger. There's a colonial imagination out there that has fed us a lie. That lie tells us we own the table to which we invite others, that we are perpetual hosts. Others are perpetual guests. That hospitality is something we give and rarely something we receive. Simply put, a colonial imagination forgets what it means to love.
And Jesus, Jesus wants to free us from this colonial imagination. Liberate us from its narrow constraints, its binding chains. Jesus wants to set a new table before all of us. A table where the food never runs out. A table where there's always one more chair. A table where I am ever a guest to others, ever a host to the same.
And I wonder if Act chapter 8 teaches us one more thing. What if that table is not set in a fancy restaurant or even in a home? What if that table is set in the wilderness but a wilderness bereft of isolation and hopelessness and imbued with the beauty and diversity of God's wild creation? My friends, I want to meet you at this table that God has set before us. Because that table's for you. It's for me. It's for all people. And at that table set in the wilderness, there we meet a God whose grace is a constant, unending, delightful embrace.
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Part 3: Conversation
JEFF: I am a big Eric Barreto fan, but I became an even bigger one when I heard him talk about food. I love mofungo, which is a traditional Puerto Rican dish made with mashed plantains, and I love to plantanos. Mofungo first, plantanos second. But before I hijack this whole segment and it, and it becomes just me reading the menus of various cuisines, I want to talk about how Eric used the table to talk about love and about recognition and about seeing someone and about honoring someone. At least for me, coming from such a foodie culture, love and food are so often intertwined.
SARAH: I have seen that in you. And with you, you, you cook, and you also eat with a lot of love and thoughtfulness. I didn't, I didn't really grow up in a culture or home that made that connection quite as explicitly. And so I've. I’ve learned it over time and in relationship and, and through community. And so I think, my, I mean, I don't know, like, my, my version of comfort food is, like, grilled cheese and tomato soup. And not, like, the fancy kind but, like, the white bread, Kraft singles, tinned soup kind. So again, we're, we're revisiting the ways of my people, as I said earlier.
JEFF: So you know that five love languages book? I dislike it for so many reasons, but maybe the primary one is that it fails to recognize food as a love language. But I will meet you where you are. I do love a good grilled cheese and tomato soup, but I have to clarify, you really eat the canned soup? Is that a yes? Of laughter?
SARAH: So I've actually become a bit more of a scratch cooker over the past few years, and it's not just because of the price of groceries. But yeah, I do. I do still love the tinned tomato soup, and I probably always will. It's a connection. Isn’t that what comfort food usually is, right? I, I make all my soups usually from scratch, and I love to do so. It's, it's very worth it. It's one of those dishes where it's not- it's always worth it to make soup from scratch. But processed food—being a child of the eighties—does conjure really good memories for me. And so you do not even want to get me started at Kraft dinner.
JEFF: I just can't do that metallic flavor. And I don't know, I'm wondering if that's a flavor that your people appreciate. But my mother always said, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it. So I'm going to stop. And let's talk about something wonderful, which is how Eric just subtly weaves into his talk this moment that I think almost went unnoticed by many of us but in retrospect, was really important and made so much sense. This talk was the first time I had ever used- heard a speaker use they/them pronouns for the Ethiopian eunuch. And Eric did it without any fanfare.
SARAH: Yeah, I like that modeling a lot.
JEFF: I think, for me, what it did is that it was such a deft and teacherly way of opening up our imaginations, especially for those of us who had never heard pronouns deployed that way in the context of scripture. He did it so gently and invitationally, and it also underlined, again so deftly and subtly, that the experience of the eunuch has layers that often go unexamined and unaddressed, and the presence of the eunuch in such a pivotal story in scripture, it matters. And Eric inspired me to ask, “Why not?”
SARAH: Yeah, well, why not? Why not, indeed. Right? I remember the first time that I heard someone use they/them pronouns for God. And I remember feeling like, oh, that's, that's actually really beautiful. You know, it, it reflects the Trinitarian nature of God more accurately. And so that opened the door for me to start to use it interchangeably with he and she as well. Right? So Eric is a teacher—I think that really comes across. Gosh, he’s a good teacher. And so by modeling that usage and normalizing it, it invites us into the same language of hospitality for one another. And so Eric is one of the few people that I've heard who actually doesn't romanticize the wilderness. And I say that, of course, as someone who has, you know, a bit of a pathological need to romanticize pretty much everything. But he admitted that the notion of wilderness brings up a lot of complicated thoughts and feelings. And it's not just a metaphor, but it can be a real lived experience with those sorts of complications.
JEFF: And his specific experience of the wilderness was one that I really relate to, which is that of someone who's growing up with one culture in their home and a different one outside the doors of that home. It's a layered kind of wilderness, and his naming that gives texture and depth to something that I think we can sometimes make one-dimensional. It's not like the wilderness is monolithic. There are different kinds of terrain, different microclimates, different conditions that different people experience.
SARAH: Well, and he names that the wilderness also changes what home means. You know, he talked about not being able to return home, spiritually even. And I think that's experience, an experience that a lot of us within our community have had. We, we hear that often within even the Evolving Faith community, that the wilderness means that you have had to create a new home even while you know that you are shaped or, or being shaped still by what was home at first. And he says something really beautiful about how the wilderness is also God's home, that God isn't a stranger in the wilderness. And I found that to be true in a way that I, I don't know that I would have learned or imagined that otherwise.
JEFF: I think it's such a beautiful but difficult thing to recognize that a space is shared. For instance, Eric reframes even my understanding of a family home. And I’m wondering, Sarah, if you caught how he described his home as a place co-created by him, his wife, and their two children? It was such a quick disruption of the typical hierarchy that I, I bet a lot of people didn't even notice it happening. And it was such a tender and gorgeous act of empowerment and even honor for his kids, recognizing them as co-creators and not somehow less than or immature in the context of that household. And I also appreciate how he talks about how you might not even be able to claim ownership. Maybe that's one of the most subversive things that Eric did in a society that is so obsessed with home ownership. He asked what it might be like for us to be good guests, which, in a sense, means surrendering control and opening yourself up.
SARAH: Mm-hmm. Again, hospitality, right?
JEFF: Yeah. But I'll be honest, I typically like hosting a lot more than I do being hosted, because, again, control.
SARAH: That checks out.
JEFF: Okay. Rude. Rude.
SARAH: Love you. So this reminds me, as well, but Eric did talk about how he encountered the gospel or faith, but that it, it also left scars or even wounds still. And so things like saying that his ethnic difference wasn't something to celebrate. Like somehow the things that actually make you, you aren't celebrated or even acknowledged but just meant to be sort of, I don't know, like subsumed.
JEFF: One of the uncomfortable realities is that majority culture often doesn't recognize, because people don't need to recognize, that what they bring to a space is, in fact, that particular culture. To the majority, it's often just life. And there isn't a lot of self-reflection or critical thinking or empathy about those for whom it might not just be normal. From the beginning of time, the ways in which we've expressed our faith—and I mean faith generally here, not just Christian faith—the ways in which we express our faith have always been deeply interwoven with culture and societal mores. And that's from what we eat to how it's considered respectable to speak, to how we perceive goodness and beauty, to how we judge what's bad and ugly. This is all cultural, and there's a cost to the failure to recognize that, a cost that's often borne unequally. And whether you're the guest in a situation or the host, paying attention to this kind of dynamic is essential. It's a part of hospitality, and honestly, it's a reflection of love.
SARAH: That's so true. You know, the hospitality theme shows up again when Eric says that eating at someone else's table, eating their food, is being a loving guest in their story. So for so long, we've been, you know, greedy guests or obnoxious guests, you know, guests who try to make ourselves hosts by bluster. And so, taking the posture of a loving guest, which is a phrase now that I love, but taking that posture of a loving guest in each other's stories is a beautiful and, honestly, a radical posture in this world. And I do think the wilderness is part of that. It, it reminded me of back in the episode with Dr. Chanequa Walker-Barnes, which was this season. She talked about how being wilderness people means that we are people on the move but that we do find each other, even if it's just for a season or for a moment. And I think that that is something that I want to carry with me from this beautiful message, is that our paths do cross in the wilderness. And when someone invites you to sit at their table, whether it's real or online or whatever, and offers to feed you or be in relationship with you, what does it look like to be a loving guest in their story? To not impose our own story or try to explain away or negate theirs or make it fit into ours? I think that hospitality has kind of emerged as, as almost like this core value for us here, but that it's also something that will form our lives and our relationships and the communities that we belong to. And ultimately, it's something that is going to point us back to God.
[ Instrumental Music: It Is Well With My Soul by SueAnn Shiah ]
JEFF: You can find all of the links mentioned on today's show, as well as information about Eric Barreto, his writing and his teaching and his work in the world, as well as a full transcript of this episode in our show notes at EvolvingFaith.com/Podcast. Sign up for my newsletter at jeffchu.substack.com.
SARAH: And you can also find me, Sarah Bessey, @sarahbessey in all the places. The Evolving Faith Podcast is produced by us, Sarah Bessey and Jeff Chu, along with our phenomenal colleague SueAnn Shiah, who also wrote and recorded our music. Thank you for listening to this episode of The Evolving Faith Podcast, friends. And until next time, remember you are loved.
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JEFF: Throughout our time together at Evolving Faith, there is one thing we’ve heard over and over from you: We need community. Being in the wilderness can be really lonely. You can feel too isolated—even those of us who are profoundly shy introverts. We all need companions for the journey. And we need folks to accompany us and be alongside us.
So we are delighted to invite you to join the Evolving Faith Community online, a new space we’ve created—and we hope you will co-create with us—for better conversations, deeper connections, questions big and small, and content that we hope will be inspiring and meet you where you are.
It’s free to join the Evolving Faith Community. Our desire is that you might find some fellow travelers in this oasis with whom you can feel a renewed sense of belonging and maybe even some hope. So come, explore, and share. All you have to do is go to community.evolvingfaith.com and sign up. We can’t wait to greet you. See you there.
