Beeson Podcast, Episode #624 Reverend Dr. Carolyn Moore Oct. 18, 2022 >>Announcer: Welcome to the Beeson podcast, coming to you from Beeson Divinity School on the campus of Samford University. Now your hosts, Doug Sweeney and Kristen Padilla. >>Doug Sweeney: Welcome to the Beeson Podcast. I’m your host, Doug Sweeney, here with my co-host, Kristen Padilla. We are pleased to have you with us as we shine a light again on what the Lord is doing here at Beeson Divinity School. Today’s guest is here with us all the way from Evans, Georgia where she serves very faithfully and fruitfully as a pastor. It is an honor to have her with us on the podcast today. Two brief announcements before Kristen introduces her. First, if you’re listening to this episode, shortly after it airs on October 18th, then you still have time to register for our second and final Preview Day of the fall semester. This Preview Day is actually a Preview Weekend. For the first time ever we’re welcoming prospective students to campus on a Friday, October 21st. So, if they would like they can spend the weekend with us, getting to know our community and our city even better than is usually possible on one of these visits. Learn more and register at www.BeesonDivinity.com/previewday. Second, our annual Reformation Heritage Lectures will take place November 1-3, and will feature Dr. Ian McFarland. Dr. McFarland is a Robert W. Woodruff Professor of Theology at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology. Prior to coming to Candler in 2019, he spent four years serving as Regis Professor of Divinity at the University of Cambridge in England. His lectures are entitled, “Not By Bread Alone: Justification and the Christian Hope.” These lectures will take place every day at 11:00 AM and are open and free to the public. We hope you will join us. All right, Kristen, who do we have on the show with us today? >>Kristen Padilla: Thanks Doug. We have on the show the Reverend Dr. Carolyn Moore. Dr. Moore is founding pastor of Mosaic Church in Evans, Georgia. She has practiced as an ordained pastor in the United Methodist Church since 1998. For most of that time she has served as the founding and lead pastor of Mosaic Church, a missional community. She has a passion for creating conversations and communities that advance the Kingdom of God. She currently serves as Chairwoman of the Wesleyan Covenant Association’s Global Council, which was responsible for the formation and launch this year of the Global Methodist Church. The author of four bible studies and two books. Her most recent book, which we will discuss with her today, called “When Women Lead” will be released in September. Carolyn and her son-in-law co-host a podcast called, “The Art of Holiness,” bringing conversations about supernatural ministry, practical holiness, and intergenerational encouragement into the church. She holds degrees from Asbury Theological Seminary and has been happily married to her husband Steve for 36 years. Welcome, Carolyn, to the Beeson Podcast. >>Dr. Moore: Such a pleasure to be with both of you guys. Thank you very much for having me. And with everyone who is listening. So thankful for you taking the time to have this conversation with us. >>Kristen Padilla: Well, we are so grateful to have you on campus. As Doug has already said. And I know I read a bit of a bio about you, but we would love to hear you share about yourself, about your family, your upbringing and how the Lord brought you to faith in Jesus Christ. >>Dr. Moore: I appreciate the opportunity to share a little bit. I was born and raised in Augusta, Georgia which is Evans, Evans is a suburb of Augusta. So, I got thrown back into the briar patch when I ended up there to plant the church that I serve now. I was the last of six children. And born and raised in the birthplace of the Southern Baptist Convention and the birthplace of the Georgia Baptist Convention. Both of those were originated in Augusta. The Southern Baptist Convention in 1845 in August, Georgia. So, the idea of female leadership inside the church was really foreign in our context. And so I kind of grew up in the church. When I first came to Christ I was 12 years old. I say “first came to Christ,” ‘cause I’m a Methodist. We reserve the right to get saved more than once. (laughs) I came to Christ when I was 12 years old. I heard the call of God in a very mystical way. I heard the call of God when I was 13. But as I said back then in Augusta, Georgia that just wasn’t a thing. And so I tried to push that call into my adulthood, but I lost it somewhere along the way. I was 28 years old when I came back to Christ, 30 when I came back to the call. So, that’s kind of how I got here from there, I guess. That’s how I got here from there. Mm hmm. >>Doug Sweeney: Tell us more about that last part, Pastor Moore. A lot of our female listeners, a lot of our listeners all together will be interested in hearing from you about ... so, how did you sense that the Lord was leading you into pastoral ministry? >>Dr. Moore: Yeah, that’s a great question. So, go back to when I was 13 years old and first heard that call of God. I was standing in the pulpit. It was one of those Sunday night services. You remember when we used to have Sunday night worship? And every once in a while they would let the youth lead the whole service. And that was what it was. It was a youth led worship service that night. And they gave this little 13 year old skinny girl a chance to do the devotional. And I still have the paper. I still have the handwritten pages that I had put together for that little devotional. And while I was standing in the pulpit I heard the Lord say, “This is where you belong.” It was an audible voice for me. In the sense that supernatural voices can be audible to the person who hears them. I stopped because I thought somebody had spoken out loud in the room. And even asked people afterwards if they’d heard anything. Nobody heard it but me. So, I assumed that call was for me. But that was 46 years ago. And 46 years ago in Augusta, Georgia there just wasn’t such a thing as a female in pastoral leadership. So, I tried to hang onto it, as I said. But I eventually ... I kind of watered it down. By the time I got to college, I was going to do Children’s Ministry, Christian Education. Which would have been fine, except that I am a disaster in a room full of children. And it wasn’t my call. So, I ended up just getting a degree in religion, kind of wandering off into the wilderness. I mean, really wandered off into the wilderness. In God’s beautiful way of doing things, I met my husband in those wilderness years. And even on our first date he said to me he thought I would make a great pastor. He had no idea what he was talking about. I mean, he didn’t know I had a call on my life. And I was not in any way indicating that I had a call on my life in that season. But he had that word for me. And it kind of stuck with both of us for years. It’s kind of in the back of my mind, his mind, maybe. And then when I came back to Christ through Bible Study Fellowship, the Word started jumping off the page as I began to study the scripture. One night I just asked the Lord, is this all there is? I mean, I had a good job, I have two cars, I had a little girl, I had a house. Is this all there is to life? Is this what you’re supposed to do? And the Lord said to me when I asked that question, “Is this all there is?” I heard him say, “Just say ‘yes.’” And when I heard that, I really knew in my spirit, that was the Lord just kind of drumming his fingers, waiting for me to answer the call of the 13 year old. And so with a lot of fear and trembling, because I was far from the Kingdom, I said, “yes.” My husband immediately was supportive. He said that night, I’ve just been waiting years to win that argument. (laughs) He’s been that way ever since. He has been a tremendous supporter of my ministry and his kind of way of saying it is, when somebody in a marriage sees the open door, you’re supposed to hold it open so the other person can walk through. And that’s the way he has always been as we’ve made moves, as we’ve answered this call, as this call has evolved over the years – he has always been right there holding the door open so I can walk through. >>Kristen Padilla: Not only are you a pastor, but you are really a church planter. You planted your church in 2003. Can you tell us about that journey? What led you to plant a new church? And we’d love to hear about the history of your church and where it is today and its distinctives. >>Dr. Moore: Okay. I love these questions. I just love talking about how the Lord really inspired me towards church planting. I grew up in a mainline traditional denomination. I didn’t even know churches could be planted. I don’t know where I thought they came from. I just thought, you know, they just show up on every corner! In the South, the definitely just show up on every corner. I didn’t really think of myself as an entrepreneur or as a church planter at all when I went to seminary. But somewhere in seminary I began to get sort of obsessed by this question. If this Church that we have now (big “C” church), is this the Church Jesus meant when he ascended into heaven and handed it to us? Is this what he meant? And I became sort of obsessed with ... is that the answer? Is there a true church out there? Is there a more authentic expression of church? And I started calling all over the country. I would call people I know and ask, “Where have you seen the authentic Church at work? Where?” And over and over, as I began to call people and have them refer me to other people, I literally called from one coast to the other coast, just for my own personal edification. I was in seminary, but this was not for a class. Over and over I heard people refer me to the Church of the Savior in Washington, D.C. There’s this little church that was started just after World War II by a man named Gordon Cosby. It was meant to be an ecumenical expression. So, it wasn’t so much that they were ... it wasn’t really nondenominational so much as come and ... much like Beeson. Come and bring all of who you are into this community and let’s find the parts of us that agree. And let’s find community together. And then let’s begin to serve our city together. This was the Church of the Savior. It never got to be more than about 150 people strong. But their missions in the city were huge. They started a four story hospital for homeless people. Completely staffed by doctors and nurses. They would buy up tenement buildings that were condemned and they would refurbish them and then offer them at 40% of market value to widows and orphans. They started an afterschool program for children that attracted hundreds of children. They started a retreat center just outside the city for people who needed to get away for awhile, as Jesus would say. All these different missions, they started an evangelistic coffee house in one of the poorest sections of Washington. All of these little missions were like little churches in their own right. But then the people, the different missional communities, or different missional groups would come together for worship and celebrate what God was doing among them. You couldn’t be in the Church of the Savior without knowing your gifts and your call. Because you really connected through the groups. And I was just fascinated by that when I heard about it. Willow Creek, Saddleback, North Point ... Some of the huge mega churches, the names of which we know now, they can trace their small group system back to Gordon Cosby. He was just a tremendous influence. And as I said, his church was never more than about 150 people. But they had a tremendous footprint in Washington, D.C. and they have a tremendous footprint on the shape of American Christianity. So, as I went and studied the Church of the Savior, they had a resident writer; her name was Elizabeth O’Connor. I read all her books. My husband and I visited there once. We really thought we were going to be called to the Church of the Savior, because I was deeply moved by this idea of the true missional community. And within an hour of being there, literally within of an hour of being there, the two of us separately heard from the Lord that the Church of the Savior doesn’t need two more members. But the Methodist Church could use a Church of the Savior. So, with that sort of fire in my bones, and that model to look at, I became very interested in the idea of planting a missional community. After the spirit of the Church of the Savior. And I came back, after I graduated from seminary, to North Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church I fully expected to plant a church. And the folks who were leading the church development office in that day, it was just ... they just did not have examples ... They had not had successful examples of women planters. There are still precious few of us today. But because they just never had any successful examples, and you only have so much money to play with. They were very reluctant to let me plant. So, it took about five years for me to get permission to plant a church. In those five intervening years I was the Associate Pastor of a church. And that church had me plant a congregation across the street from their church. They wanted to have a contemporary service and we did it in a theater right across the street from the church. So, I got a little church planting on training wheels. And then when they finally agreed to let me plant, they sent me to the suburbs of Augusta, Georgia. Which is not the easiest place to plant, to be a female planter or to plant a missional community. But that was the opportunity I was given. And I was hungry. So, I took it. And I’ve been there ever since, for 19 years. And we have been slowly growing this missional community. And at some point I think it was probably four years ago, we began to see that our local missions are not nearly so well developed as what I’d seen at the Church of the Savior. They were beginning to be pretty well developed. We felt like the best way to support those local ministries was to separate them and put them under the umbrella of a separate nonprofit. It’s under the same roof. We have Mosaic Church and the Mosaic Center under one roof. But having a separate nonprofit allows people who might not volunteer for my church to volunteer for these ministries, because they’re volunteering for a nonprofit. And it also allows us to seek grant funding. There are grant funders who are very happy to fund Christian ministries, their bylaws won’t allow them to fund a church directly. So, that’s what we did. We started a separate nonprofit and when we did that and began to get both funding and attention from that direction, our ministries really began to mature. So, today we have six different ministries under that umbrella. We have a thing called Women of Worth for women who are coming out of incarceration or otherwise lived rough lives and somehow need to start over again. And we pair them with mentors from the community and help them to get their lives back on track. We have a thing called Exceptional Circles that is both applied behavioral analysis for children with disabilities, that goes on in our church all week long, and also twice a month social activities for young adults with disabilities. So, between those two we see about 100 people with disabilities every month. Some of them every single day of the week. And under that ministry we have an inclusive playground, we have a sensory room. We really developed that part of our outreach into the community. Because I think everybody deserves a church. Everybody. And sometimes it’s hard for the families of those with special needs to really feel themselves as welcome in a church when volunteers don’t exactly know how to handle special needs. So, we have that. We have Free Tuesdays, which is for recovery. We do all kinds of recovery through that. We do GED tutoring twice a week at our main campus. And we also have a person on staff now at a low and no income apartment complex for adults with disabilities. So, that person is there all day every day stirring up things like bible studies and recovery groups and other programs to help adults with disabilities to move forward with their lives. And we are just about, within weeks, of starting another GED tutoring program at that location. And we have a pantry, but it’s a closed pantry, which means we don’t just open it up to anybody walking off the street. It’s really there to help us open doors to ... there’s a veterans center in Augusta and also that low and no income apartment complex. We take food, we use that just as an invitational piece so we can pray with people and then begin to invite them into community; tell them about our groups and help them to get connected. Every single thing we do, we do for the sake of connecting folks to community. We say community is essential. And so we don’t do mercy ministry so well, the kind of drop in/drop out stuff – what we do is relational. All the way to its core and very much for the sake of getting people in community where they can hear about Jesus and begin to grow in their faith. We’re Methodists, so it’s all about sanctification for us. >>Doug Sweeney: That sounds wonderful. And that’s a great segue to the next question we want to ask you about. You sound like a fantastic leader. And you just so happen to have a new book called, “When Women Lead.” Embrace your authority, move beyond barriers, and find joy in leading others. We want our listeners to hear about it. What are you doing in that book? How are you praying that the Lord will use it to bless other people? >>Dr. Moore: Well, I wrote the book because I’m really not that great a leader, actually. But I was trying to figure out why is it that I can’t seem to do the same things as my male colleagues. For 19 years I’ve been about the work of planting a church, and mine was a parachute drop. There was no congregation waiting for me or splitting off for my sake. This was just me, my husband, and my daughter dropping into a city and starting from nothing. And I’d see my amazing, good, love them very much, male colleagues doing the same thing and they would just explode. My friends have what I call “big box rapid growth church plants.” They dropped in, they created a crowd, they built a big building, and they just began these ministries very quickly. And I couldn’t seem to make that happen. I assume part of it is because God called me to create a missional community, not a big box rapid growth church. But also there was just a sting, like, I’m doing all the stuff they’re doing, why can’t I make it work like they make it work? And I know I’m not the brightest bulb in the leadership box. But it did seem to me that they weren’t that much brighter. (laughs) So, I would ask – and maybe some of it is because I’m female. And people would say, “No, no, you’re great. You’re fine. It’s not that at all.” And people mean well when they say that, but that can be crazy making, too. Because, okay, well, if it’s not my gender, then it must be me. What is it about me? I can’t figure it out. And it was crazy making. So, somewhere along the way I began, I did that same sort of obsessive thing that I did with the Church of the Savior. I just started calling all over the country looking for female church planters. And I found that there really aren’t that many of us. I found a woman named Mary Kate Morse. She’s a professor at Fuller Seminary now. She’s an amazing woman. She is out of the Foursquare tradition, had planted two congregations. She just happened to be in Atlanta the week I found her. So, I rode to Atlanta and was sitting with her at a pizza joint and I said, “I just want to figure out what are the barriers women face and how do we help women lead past those barriers so they don’t burn out? So, they can be successful in ministry, whether it’s planting or otherwise.” And she said, “That’s sounds like a doctorate to me. That sounds like the burning question you have before you go get your doctorate.” And I went, “That can’t be it. I’m sure that’s not it.” (laughs) I just know God is not ... he knows my GPA. He’s not going to ask us to do that again. But I ended up going and getting my doctorate of ministry. On that question. I just wanted to answer that question. “What does it look like when women plant? What barriers do they face? And how do they lead past them so they can plant successfully?” And in the course of that study I discovered that the principles I was learning for planters, they work across the board. They actually work whether you’re in senior leadership in a church or if you’re just leading a ministry in a church, or if you’re just leading a nonprofit, or if you’re just leading in any way. These same principles work. I discovered that there were six barriers, or at least six that I focused on for women in spiritual leadership. And then I began to just dig around and find what are the strategies that can release women into successful ministry – as that subtitle says, “so they can find joy in leading others.” And so that’s what the book is. It’s a handbook of barriers and strategies that help women to become more educated about what it means to lead. Ed Stetzer and Warren Byrd did what was at the time the most extensive survey of church planters in the country, it wasn’t just women planters, it was just church planters in general. And they discovered in that study that when planters are made aware of the challenges, not the strategies, just the challenges, they become 400% more likely to succeed. Just knowing the size of the mountain helps you gauge how fast you can climb it and what energy you need to get to the top. I went and looked in the small business administration’s database and I discovered the exact same statistic. That when entrepreneurs, small business owners, are aware of the barriers or the challenges they face, they are far more likely to succeed than when they go in sort of blinded by dreams of grandiosity. They’re so much more likely to succeed over the long haul. And the critical years are years five through ten. Whether you’re a planter or just a pastor, or just a leader. Those are the years where you start to say, “You know what? Selling shoes in a department store starts to look really good about now. I think God has called me to say, ‘Would you like that in a brown?’” (laughs) So, it’s those years after you get started when the shine has worn off when we really need to know what we’re doing. So, this book is not just for the people just getting started, it’s for the people who are well along on their journey and need to hear, first of all, “You’re not crazy.” Second of all, “You can climb this mountain.” And some of the things that you sense, even intuitively, they’re real. There are studies that show these things are real. We’re not going to get over them today. So, your choice as a leader is to figure out what strategies work for you so that you can continue to welcome and advance the Kingdom of God. >>Kristen Padilla: I wonder if you can tell us what some of those obstacles are for women in church leadership? And what are some strategies that you have found to be helpful in overcoming those obstacles? >>Dr. Moore: Great question. And such an interesting question to answer in this context because one of the major barriers is theological. Half the Christian world does not have a place for women in senior leadership in their churches. And so that means that any woman who is, say, planting a church like I was, is fishing from half the pond. Right? And even just understanding that, that you’ll have a different group of people in your congregation, you’ll have folk that maybe have no scriptural knowledge and don’t even know what the bible says about women in scriptural leadership. You may have folks in your congregation who grew up in a tradition that didn’t accept women in leadership and now they’re in your congregation. They may not be saying anything about their upbringing, but something inside there is telling them, “Mom’s not going to like this very much.” Right? So, just understanding the theological barrier. I talk about that. I talk about kind of both sides of that debate or theological construct. And then I just talk about it. How do you live in that world without being angry? How do you live there peacefully? A second barrier is related. It’s the perception barrier. And this one really kind of broadens that theological question. Because we live in a fallen world. Genesis 1 & 2 made us a partnership. But Genesis 3 made us a hierarchy. And we all live on this side of Genesis 3, right? So, all of us, whether we’re Christian or not Christian, Americans or Iranian or wherever we live in the world, we’re all living on this side of the Fall. And we all have this internal sense of somebody’s supposed to be better than somebody else. We do it in all kinds of ways. I mean, your football teams ... somebody’s got to be better than somebody else. The ice cream flavors, somebody’s got to be better than somebody else. And we definitely do that with things like race and with gender. Somebody’s got to be better than somebody else. And even if we don’t think we carry that, we all carry the mark of the Fall. So, we’re all kind of walking around with this internal something inside us fighting against the notion that we were created to be partners on this journey. That internal perception that others have of me as a leader in the church can also have an impact on how I feel about myself. How I perceive myself. So, that perception barrier goes both ways. It’s how you see me, but it’s how your seeing me also affects how I see me. I find myself over time questioning whether I ... maybe I should not be doing this. Or, on my bad days, “Am I really called to this?” I had a denominational leader say to me that he noticed that women tended to apologize their way into rooms. I noticed that often, even when I’ve been invited to a table, I question whether I should be at the table. Even if I was invited to the table. Should I be at this table? It’s that kind of internal wrestling that we constantly have with ourselves that keeps us from being able to do what Jesus told us to do, which is to take authority, to take authority, to cast out demons, cure disease, proclaim the Kingdom, and heal the sick. So, perception is another barrier. That’s one of those things – the more you know, the better off you’ll be, because we’re not going to cure the Fall. Jesus is the only one who’s going to be ... Jesus has done the work. We’re waiting for his coming again. And when Jesus comes back, we will all be back on the created side again. But until then, we live in a fallen world. So, just understanding that, understanding how people come at this is going to be a big deal. And then there are other more practical things like the resource barrier. If there’s very few women in leadership then the resources to support them will be smaller. There are only so many dollars to go around. There’s only so many coaches. There’s only so many mentors. And so often those dollars, those coaches, those mentors will cater to the larger market, which is male. Another barrier has to do with our biology. Women have stages of life that are more obviously marked maybe than the stages that a man goes through. And that we do carry children and bear them and bring them up in the world. And we’re the ones who know what their vaccination records are more likely than not. Not all the time, but stereotypes do exist for a reason. We’re the ones who have a more nurturing style about ourselves often. And then there’s middle age when a whole other set of factors come to play in our lives. And we need to make decisions about exactly how we handle that. And what we can handle. I say to women all the time, you can have it all, but you can’t have it all at once. Right? So, those are just some of the barriers. And then some of the strategies to lead past them. I mean, it all begins ... and this doesn’t matter whether you’re male or female ... it begins with your identity. If you don’t know who you are in Christ, you’re sunk as a leader. (laughs) Until you know who you are in Jesus. So, I give some real practical exercises and ways for folks to really explore and better understand who they are in Christ. When I know who I am in Christ, I can do what Paul said. After I’ve done everything else, stand. And then also taking authority. In my tradition, when you lay hands on a person who is being ordained, you are told, “Take authority to do the work of the Church.” But so often we stand up from there and we leave the authority at the altar. And we go out and we live in self doubt and fear and a constant need for approval. Asking for that authority to come from the people in front of, instead of from the Lord himself. And so really understanding what it means to walk in the authority that’s been given you as a person who has been given specific gifts and a call. Whatever those gifts, whatever that call. And then the very practical resources that we need, if resources are an issue, then I need to go find the resources I need in order to do the work I’ve been given to do. I don’t need to whine about it. Whining is not a spiritual gift. (laughs) I need to go out and find those resources. So, learning how to negotiate for my salary. Learning how to budget. Learning how to go find mentors and ask for them to be a mentor, not waiting passively for somebody to come and find me. Being assertive and finding door openers. If my friend, Brian, knows where funding is for my ministry, I need to ask Brian to open that door for me so that I can get where I need to go. Once I’m in the room, it’s up to me. But Brian may be the person who opens that door for me so that I can find the resources that I need. So, those are some of the ways that we lead past both spiritually and practically so we can do the work God called us to do. >>Doug Sweeney: This has been a wonderful conversation. I’m sorry to say we’re about out of time. We want our listeners to know that Dr. Moore preached a marvelous chapel sermon this morning from 1 Samuel 17 called, “The God Who Fights For Us.” Kristen, I think, will have that posted in the next few days. We encourage you to go check it out online. I don’t want to conclude this conversation without asking you a question that Kristen and I ask of all of our guests. And that is, what is the Lord doing in your life these days? What is he teaching you right now? >>Dr. Moore: Boy, you guys ... I got an advance notice of that question and that sent me really thinking. Which one of the things do I want to talk about? (laughs) Because I’m at a seam right now in my life. I’m at this really interesting seam where I am waiting and watching with God for what’s next. And I have to tell you, when you’re in a seam – a little space between what’s come, what’s been before you and what’s in front of you – you could spend every waking second looking for God. Like, where is he? Where is he? I’m trying to figure this out. Where is he? Where is he? Oswald Chambers said something in one of his devotional things, “My Utmost For His Highest,” that just really stood out to me recently. And it was “rather than watching for God, watch with God.” And that’s become my thing. It’s given me a lot of peace and a better sense of settled purpose. My place in this seam is to watch with God. And whatever it is that’s in front of me, it’s going to unfold and I am going to know it when I see it. But while I’m waiting, I’m having a blast raising up a next generation of leaders in my own church and I’m just thrilled. We have two in seminary right now. While one has just graduated and he’ll take my spot one day at my church. I just am really excited to see the next generation get raised up. And I’m really, really excited about an opportunity to talk to more women about what it means, what happens when women lead? And I sit in the seam, and I wait with God and watch with God, and I’m so excited to see it when it shows up over the horizon. >>Doug Sweeney: Well, we sure are grateful that you are here with us today, helping us to raise up the next generation of pastors for the Lord’s Church. >>Dr. Moore: What a pleasure. Great privilege to be in that amazing room, sharing the Word of God. Thank you. >>Doug Sweeney: We are deeply grateful to you. And to you as well, our listeners. You have been listening to the Reverend Dr. Carolyn Moore. She is the Founding Pastor, the lead pastor, of Mosaic Church in Evans, Georgia. She preached a wonderful sermon for us today and has been spending time with us on campus. Please tune in to our website and listen to her sermon online. I’m sure it will be there in the next couple of days. Please remember we love you and we’re praying for you. We ask you to pray for us and we say goodbye for now. >>Kristen Padilla: You’ve been listening to the Beeson podcast. Our theme music is written and performed by Advent Birmingham of the Cathedral Church of the Advent in Birmingham, Alabama. Our engineer is Rob Willis. Our announcer is Mike Pasquarello. Our co-hosts are Doug Sweeney and, myself, Kristen Padilla. Please subscribe to the Beeson podcast at www.BeesonDivinity.com/podcast or on iTunes.