Today on the podcast, I got to talk to Rev. Jessica LaGrone, Asbury Seminary alum and dean of chapel at the Seminary. Jessica enjoys mentoring and multiplying as she serves as pastor to a vibrant seminary community. She is an acclaimed pastor, teacher, speaker, and writer whose engaging communication style endears her to groups throughout the United States. A native of Texas, Jessica previously pastored in churches in the Houston area, including nine years at The Woodlands Methodist Church. She is a member of the Transitional Leadership Council of the Global Methodist Church.
She’s written several books and studies, including Namesake: When God Rewrites Your Story, Under Wraps, and Broken and Blessed: How God Used One Imperfect Family to Change the World, Set Apart: Holy Habits of Prophets and Kings, and The Miracles of Jesus.
Jessica blogs at jessicalagrone.com. She and her husband, Jim, have two young children, Drew and Kate, and a dog named Bluebell, who is the color of Homemade Vanilla.
Jessica’s most recent book, which we talk about on today’s podcast is Out of Chaos: How God Makes New Things from the Broken Pieces of Life. It explores the beauty that God can bring out of the chaotic state of our lives and worlds. In this conversation we talk about Jessica’s new book and the relationship between calling, creativity and chaos.
Let’s listen!
*The views expressed in this podcast don’t necessarily reflect the views of Asbury Seminary.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone, Dean of Chapel, Asbury Seminary
Jessica LaGrone is the Dean of the Chapel at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky. She enjoys mentoring and multiplying as she serves as pastor to a vibrant seminary community. She is an acclaimed pastor, teacher, speaker, and writer whose engaging communication style endears her to groups throughout the United States. A native of Texas, Jessica previously pastored in churches in the Houston area, including nine years at The Woodlands Methodist Church. She is a member of the Transitional Leadership Council of the Global Methodist Church.
Jessica’s new book, Out of Chaos: How God Makes New Things from the Broken Pieces of Life, explores the beauty that God can bring out of the chaotic state of our lives and our world.
Jessica’s books and studies have been used in personal and group studies around the world, and include Namesake: When God Rewrites Your Story, Under Wraps, and Broken and Blessed: How God Used One Imperfect Family to Change the World, Set Apart: Holy Habits of Prophets and Kings, and The Miracles of Jesus.
Jessica blogs at jessicalagrone.com. She and her husband, Jim, have two young children, Drew and Kate, and a dog named Bluebell, who is the color of Homemade Vanilla.
Heidi Wilcox, host of the Thrive Podcast
Writer, podcaster, and social media manager, Heidi Wilcox shares stories of truth, justice, healing and hope. She is best known as the host of Spotlight, (especially her blooper reel) highlighting news, events, culturally relevant topics and stories of the ways alumni, current students and faculty are attempting something big for God. If you can’t find her, she’s probably cheering on her Kentucky Wildcats, enjoying a cup of coffee, reading or spending time with her husband, Wes.
Show Notes
Guest Links
Transcript
Heidi Wilcox:
Hey everyone. Thank you so much for joining me for today’s episode of The Thrive With Asbury Seminary Podcast. I’m your host, Heidi E. Wilcox, bringing you conversations with authors, thought leaders, and people just like you, who are looking to connect where your passion meets the world’s deep needs. Today on the podcast, I got to talk to Reverend Jessica, LaGrone. Asbury Seminary, alum, and Dean of chapel at Asbury Seminary. Jessica enjoys mentoring and multiplying as she serves as pastor to a vibrant seminary community. She’s an acclaim pastor, teacher, speaker, and writer with an engaging communication style that endears her to groups throughout the United States. As a native of Texas, Jessica’s previously pastored in churches in the Houston area, including nine years at the Woodlands United Methodist church.
Heidi Wilcox:
She’s written several books and studies, including Namesake, when God rewrites your story, Under Wraps and Broken & Blessed how God used one imperfect family to change the world also set apart holy habits of prophets and Kings and the miracles of Jesus. She blogs at jessicalagrone.com and she and her husband, Jim have two young children, Drew and Kate, and a dog named Bluebell, who is the color of homemade vanilla. Jessica’s most recent book, which we talk about on today’s podcast episode is Out of Chaos: How God Makes New Things from the Broken Pieces of Life. It explores the beauty that God can bring out of the chaotic state of our lives and worlds. In this conversation, we talk about Jessica’s new book and the relationship between calling, creativity, and chaos. Well, let’s listen. Jessica, thank you so much for coming back to be on The Thrive With Asbury Seminary Podcast. I’m so happy to get to talk to you today.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Thanks, Heidi. It’s wonderful to be back.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. So we want to talk about your new book, of course, Out of Chaos, which I read and absolutely loved. I read it in a weekend, and I’m a slow reader. So for me to finish a book in a weekend really speaks to the author of the book.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Thank you. That means a lot. Those of us who write always wonder if it has a life of its own out in the world. So it’s good to hear from someone who enjoyed it.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. Is it fun to see your book out in the wild?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
It is. It’s very surreal to see your name on a cover of something, but it’s also kind of like, well, this is what I did all that work for. So it’s also just very satisfying.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yes. Very powerful book. We’ll link to it in the show notes in case folks want to pick up a copy of their own, which I highly recommend.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Thanks.
Heidi Wilcox:
Before we jump into your book, I know we talked I think in the beginning of the podcast life about your calling and stuff, but it’s been a long time. So if you could just tell us how you came to Asbury and experienced your call to ministry.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Sure. So I did not grow up knowing that I was called to be a pastor, which is I would still define what I do here at Asbury as a pastor, I’m just pastoring. I call it the best congregation ever because I get to pastor emerging leaders for the church, which they’re just fantastic. But I grew up in the church, but also kind of feeling like I was called into medicine. I love, actually still love science, love understanding how our bodies work. And then I was about halfway through college getting a pre-med biology degree when God just knocked me over with I can count about 10 different messages that all pointed to the same thing, but they came from 10 different directions, many of them from people or even from my own gifts being recognized, but also just from scripture, things that were not connected to one another that I really felt like the Lord was trying to send me a message.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
And by the time towards the end of that year, I said out loud, I think I’m called to ministry. Everyone in my circle said to me, well, you’re the last one to know. We’ve all figured that out by now.
Heidi Wilcox:
Wow.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
So yeah. And then I just explored seminaries and really didn’t know much about seminary life, but there was an Asbury alum that I met and introduced me to what Asbury was and just said to me, promise me you won’t make a decision about a seminary until you’ve set foot on Asbury’s campus.
Heidi Wilcox:
Wow.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
And I thought, hey, a trip to Kentucky sounds fun.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
So I came for a visit and literally within five steps into the campus, I thought, this is it. This is the place for me.
Heidi Wilcox:
Wow.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Loved it. Had an incredible experience as a student. And I just really thought, Lord, I would love to help anyone else have this seminary experience. I would do anything for Asbury. It was kind of my parting word as I drove away. Drove away went back to Texas where I’m from, pastored for 13 years, doing what I could for Asbury. At the time, which was helping recruit students and send financial help to them. And at the end of 13 years, pastoring where I just really thought I would pastor in the local church forever and retire from that, I love the local church, Asbury called and said, there’s a role for Dean of chapel and we’d like you to apply. And that was eight years ago. So we have been back here for eight years and it has been incredible. This is an incredible place to minister and live and raise a family and that’s all been wonderful for us.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. That’s amazing. That’s amazing. I always find it amazing when people are students here and then come back to work in whatever capacity. Sometimes it’s faculty, sometimes it’s on staff, in your case, Dean of chapel. I just think that says a lot about the seminary.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
I call it a boomerang effect. Like yes, you can leave here, but something draws you back. That’s our experience anyway.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah, for sure. So jumping into your book, Out of Chaos, why was now the right time to write this book? Because we’ve just lived through a lot of chaos and it seems like it hasn’t left.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Right. No, no. There is no shortage of chaos right now, no matter what. I will say, I tell people I didn’t want to write a book on chaos. I did not set out thinking, gosh, that would be really fun to immerse myself in this topic. It was more like I felt I had to write a book on for chaos. I felt compelled, called is really a word, but compelled. And it started maybe 2017/18 is when I was really thinking daily about this topic just kept popping up. I was writing little bits of it in my writing time, I was finding scripture about it. I began book proposal process in 18/19 talking with the folks at Zondervan and Seedbed as they emerged in their partnership about it. But I will tell you this, the contract for this book came through in March 2020.
Heidi Wilcox:
No way.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
I mean, everyone knows what March 2020 means. We all remember those dates when everything in the world just shut down at once. And that is when, in my inbox, the final contract came through and I thought, well, yeah, of course, you want a book on chaos right now. We all need this book because we were navigating the beginnings of the pandemic felt so unknown. We had no idea. We knew the world was changing, but we did not know what the outcome would be, how long it would last. We knew the world would be different from now on, but we didn’t know how. So really the bones of the scaffolding of the book was in place, but a lot of it was put together during those first couple of years really making a lot of the impressions of a world in chaos came to be in this book during 2020.
Heidi Wilcox:
So you said the musings for the book, if you will, started a couple of years before, can I ask what prompted those musings?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Yeah, that’s great. So one thing, the book is really centered in Genesis one in a world, it’s out of chaos because God creates the world out of chaos and he continues to do so. That really started for me those, any listeners that are familiar with Asbury’s faculty, that started for me long ago, that love started sitting in a class with Dr. Joe Dongell talking about Genesis and just putting those pieces together. That inspiration in a single class or a single book can last for decades. So that was a piece of it, thinking about that early creation story. And then just looking at the world, Heidi, and thinking, why is it in such a mess? You know, if God made this good place, how did we get here and how do we get out of it? What is the Lord doing in all of this chaos? So it just seemed to me that there was chaos everywhere. There’s tiny chaos in all of our everyday lives. We all plan our week and then our plans don’t go the way we thought.
Heidi Wilcox:
Right.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Or we have relationships and so people make things messy in our lives and there’s chaos. There’re tiny things in all of our lives I talk about. There’s the breakdown of our appliances and the breakdown of our bodies. Right? All of us experience different things falling apart. But then there are these images that are so global and just moving to us of things like the war in Ukraine, a global pandemic, a school shooting, these are things that stop us in our tracks because we think, Lord, you made a good world, how did we get here? So really that question over and over again, made me think about why is the world in the chaos that it’s in.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. So as you were talking about the Genesis one creation story, it reminded me of what you talked about this word that you’ll have to say, it was the Greek word.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
It’s right. It’s from Genesis. So it’s the Hebrew phrase, Tohu vavohu.
Heidi Wilcox:
Okay. Tell me about that because I thought it was fascinating.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Tohu vavohu is when you read in Genesis 1:2 that the earth was formless and void and darkness was over the surface of the deep. Formless and void is Tohu vavohu. And so what we’re saying there is, it’s really almost a contradiction in terms because it’s a wilderness like a desert, it’s empty, but then it’s also a watery waste, right? It’s a wasteland that is chaotic water. So how can that be possible? But it’s this image of really before the earth existed, before the universe existed, God making something out of nothing. And we believe that God’s the only one who creates something out of nothing, but nothingness is chaos. Right? And I hate to connect everything back to the pandemic, but it’s so the world we’ve been living out of, I tend to think of chaos sometimes as like a [inaudible 00:10:56], chaos is too much, right?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
It’s when I have too much to do, too many problems, too many issues in the global news, things like that. But early pandemic for us was the chaos of absence, it’s when things stopped, all of the things that set schedules and boundaries and relationships and interactions in our lives were taken away for a time and that reminds me a lot of Tohu vavohu, right? Because it’s a chaotic absence. It’s thinking what is right in God’s good creation is when he makes spaces, these environments, and then he fills them with just incredible inhabitants of creatures and humans. But before all of that was nothing and really starting from chaos you think about what God does there and just the beauty and order that he brings gives you hope that he can do it again and again and again.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. What did you learn about God during the time that you were writing the book that you might not have known before or experienced in a new way? I mean, especially because you were writing in the midst of chaos, right? Unprecedented chaos, I mean.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
We all love that word now. Right? Greetings to you in these unprecedented times. What did I learn about God? That’s such a good question. I am continually surprised by chaos, whether I should be or not. When a news story comes up that is devastating. I’m shocked by it. Maybe I shouldn’t be, maybe I should expect the world to be in chaos. When we talked about the little almost like the drips of chaos, not the deluge, but the drips, when I plan out how a day is going to go and then it gets messed up along the way, I am surprised by that chaos. I did not anticipate it. And so sometimes to me it feels like chaos is an unknown that I cannot anticipate, that I cannot fix because it gets the best of me sometimes.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
I think what I’ve observed in reading scripture and then in my experience, and I think in the church’s lived experience is that God is not surprised by chaos. That God is not bested by it, if you want to use that kind of word. He is not overwhelmed. There is no sense in that creation story that God sees the Tohu vavohu as his equal or his enemy or he almost just takes it in stride as an ingredient. Here we are making something out of nothing. Just like you, I would take ingredients out of our refrigerator to make something, right?
Heidi Wilcox:
Right.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
And that model, it seems to be how God takes chaos and stride from then on. Even Joseph, that early character at the end of Genesis saying to his brothers, you meant this for evil, but God used it for good. So again and again that’s what we see. God can take anything and make beauty out of chaos. Right? That’s where the title came from.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. Yeah. You talked about that many times, the relationship between beauty and chaos, beauty and creativity, especially in the story of the Oyster And The Pearl, which I think we all know how that works, but when you told it, I was just like, oh wow. The irritant just stays there. I hadn’t really thought about the irritant staying there and then the oyster coating it.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Right.
Heidi Wilcox:
I think because I’m a fast paced person. I was just like, oh yeah, the little piece thing comes in and then like, boom, we have a pearl.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Right.
Heidi Wilcox:
But it was that over time. So why is it that… Because like the oyster, if the oyster thinks, I don’t think the oyster actually thinks, but why is it that we have to have a difficult thing? Or it seems like we have to have a difficult thing or chaos to make something beautiful. Why do we have to do that?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
That is probably the best question I’ve ever been asked, Heidi. You are a great interviewer. That is such a good question. Because if you think about it, if you think about it, when I think about, if I could make a little roadmap of my spiritual journey and just say, here’s when I’ve been closest to God, here’s when I’ve trusted God the most, here’s when I’ve really grown in my walk with the Lord. If I could map that out, I would tell you that most of those have been because of very hard things in life.
Heidi Wilcox:
Same.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
That I have learned to lean into Jesus because I was desperate, because I needed him and I couldn’t do it myself. Right? And in the times when things were pretty good and I became complacent, I really wasn’t looking to God as much as I could have been or should have been, my heart wasn’t as desperate when the times weren’t desperate. And I think there is an opportunity as a spiritual discipline for us to learn that dependence even when we don’t feel chaotic. The Lord certainly doesn’t want us to live in chaos continually. But just that question, why is it that beauty comes from chaos? Maybe that’s our choice, right? Maybe we’re the ones saying, God, now we really notice you, our eyes are open, we’re looking for you. But also, it just may be the way that the world works, that God is continually transforming chaos into beauty. And so it’s almost like a frame around the beauty in our lives, looking for the chaos, we can see the picture, the masterpiece in it.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. I like what you said about it maybe being our choice. Because I’ve experienced what you said too and I’ve been careful what I thought, because I don’t want to live in constant chaos, but wanted that connection to God that I’ve had when the chaos has happened. And then at times been angry when I saw some beauty come out of the chaos.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Right, right.
Heidi Wilcox:
But being careful to I don’t want to live in chaos all the time, but wanting that connection with the chaos all the time.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
There’re all kinds of diagnoses for people who seek to live in chaos. Right? I mean, that is a thing we do. Or some of us just have a habit of leaning into our pity party sometimes because things are hard and so we focus on what’s hard. That is certainly something that happens to us, but really we learn about gratitude as a discipline, how that makes us focus on different things, contentment as a discipline. Dr. Christine Poll teaches on contentment a lot. It’s such a beautiful spiritual discipline to lean into and really looking for the beauty. Chaos is not in short supply. Right? It is out there, it is in here. And so if we are going to live in a world where chaos is present with us, then we have to determine our response. So I think what you’re saying is maybe we build pearls, right?
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Maybe that’s our calling, there are definitely irritants in life and those little oysters, who knows what kind of brain they have? I could definitely use some research about that, but it’s just that concept of if they don’t coat that little piece of sand or sometimes it’s an irritant or even an illness of some kind, a little piece of bacteria that gets left that could damage them, then they’re going to be damaged. They’re going to be hurt. So they choose to make it beautiful. Right? Coat it with this substance that also coats the inside of their shells. And how is that something we can learn from?
Heidi Wilcox:
That’s amazing. I mean, I read it in your book, but in just talking about the oyster with you and choosing, because it’s a relationship with God, right? So it’s not just me choosing to cope, I want to be careful about that, but choosing to try to make pearls out of the irritants and then maybe having a better relationship with God all the time through that. Amazing Jessica.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Oh, thank you.
Heidi Wilcox:
So you mentioned calling a little bit, and that’s something that I wanted to talk about with you. What is the relationship that you see between chaos and creativity in our calling?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
That is something I love to talk about. I love to think and learn about creativity and because that’s also not in short supply. Right? I love living in community with other people and being able to see how God made each of us with our own kind of creativity and how we’re each using this gift that God gave us to make something. And then when we’re in community, we’re making something together. That’s some of my favorite stuff. So chaos and creativity are so linked, not just in Genesis one, but well, I’ll just tell you this. I have a 10 year old and a 12 year old at home. They are so into art supplies and painting and no, no, not just watercolor painting anymore, acrylic painting, the thing that when it gets on your furniture, it’s there forever.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
So I have a close eye on the chaos in my house because they want to paint everything and that we limit right to crafts. But that process of making something and making something beautiful is a messy process. Right? The mess is part of the creation. And I think that’s true in not just those who paint, but in those who create with words or music or those who are creating institutions or schools, or really even just making people in the church into new creations. These are messy things. When we get creative, we get messy. So there’s a lot to be thankful for about that messiness. If you try to tidy things up too much too early in creativity, you stifle it in a way, right? If you can’t make a little mess, you can’t make anything at all.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
So it’s a gift to have that chaos. Now, as you go, it’s a gift to bring that chaos into an ordered beauty. You don’t want the final picture to look the same as this build paint next too. But I do think there’s a close connection there and a connection in our creative minds as well to let things be a little messy in our thoughts in our creativity before we try to just clean everything up so the world can see it. Maybe a strange person to reference in a Christian podcast, but Stephen King, who wrote all the fantastic horror movies and novels, he talks about the first draft, he writes it with the door closed and the second draft, he writes it with door open. And what he means by that is the first thing you write down is not good enough for anybody to see, but you, right?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
You’re making something messy that is not for consumption of other people. But then you go back to it and you make it into something even more beautiful. Now, if you don’t do that first draft, if you don’t have a messy start, I don’t think you can have a beautiful finish sometimes. So maybe there’s some of that in life too, messy starts and beautiful finishes that we need a little bit of some good clutter as we move into things. Not super controlled. I think one of the things I was careful about in this book, I did not want to communicate that God wants order at the price of just that fun spontaneous life. God is not one that wants a sterile environment for us. That’s not what order means at all, but that there is spontaneity and fun and a little bit of mess in it within these beautiful frame for the picture, a place that God orders for us to play.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. It’s kind of like what CS Lewis, I think it was CS Lewis was talking about with the boundaries on the cliff side. And as long as you have that fence up there, you can go anywhere. But it makes you safe and it makes you ordered. Otherwise, you could just run right off the cliff.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
That’s right. Yeah. God loves our safety and our fun, you know? Those are both parts of who he’s made us to be.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. But as we’re talking about chaos, we’ve been talking about chaos on the outside, but you talked about chaos on the inside too, so that we can, as you put it, there’s chaos on the outside and chaos on the inside, but one of your challenges to us is to seek, it was from your director spiritual mentor to seek silence on the outside, silence on the inside, and then silence of the will. Can you tell us that story?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Sure. Yeah. Again, in a period of real struggle, I went to see a spiritual director saying I feel like I’ve forgotten how to pray. I’m not sure my life is so noisy. I’m not sure how to really be still before God. And she gave me that instruction of just be still, turn off all this noises around you, get in a quiet place. I think at the time I had an infant and a toddler. So the only quiet space I knew was my car in my garage turned off, not turned off, but I really had to go hide a little bit from my life, the kids had proper supervision, to get in a quiet place to silence the noises on the outside. And what happened when I did is that it was anything but peaceful.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
All of my disordered thoughts, all of the inner noise, everything chaotic within me really rose up and made for not a very peaceful time. I was trying to be silent, but my mind wouldn’t slow down. I think that’s what most of us experience when we try to find silence, meditation, prayer, is that our minds are so on the treadmill it’s hard to get them to stop. So I went back to the spiritual director and I said, well, I failed. I am a failure at silence and prayer. And so what’s the next assignment, because I am not capable of that. And she just laughed at me and said, this is what happens to all of us. And the point of a spiritual discipline is to try again. So to find silence on the outside and then eventually to find a place where you can quiet the thoughts of your mind.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
And then she said, the highest level is to find the silence of the will before the will of God. To be able to come to a place that you say before God, in that time of resting of not just making your laundry list of prayer requests, shouting out to God all the things you need to get through so quick, because prayer time is almost over, but really the silence of not just your mind, but the ability to say with Jesus’ prayer, not my will, but then be done and to rest in that. I am still not great at this. My mind goes a hundred miles an hour and so slowing it down, finding that time to rest in the Lord is hard, but I don’t think it’s one of those things that’s hard so we should stop doing it.
Heidi Wilcox:
Right.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
I think it’s hard and it’s a thing that is worth seeking again and again. Also, just to pay attention in our lives to how much we fill them with noise. Is there any quiet space in our lives? Do I even drive in my car without turning on a podcast or the radio? If I go for a walk or a run, do I put my earbuds in? Where are the spaces where I’m going to get quieter to listen for the voice of the Lord? It takes a little more listening. So we tend to fill up that space with noise, sometimes because we’re avoiding our own thoughts. We don’t want to hear what will come up when we get silent, which is I think something to pay attention to.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah, totally. That’s something that I’ve been paying attention to in my own life that I feel fail, fail, fail or do, do, do. Yeah. And don’t take time to just be you.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
I mean that’s another formative, is just the busyness that we put in our calendars that keeps us from finding space.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. What was the process like for you as you learn to be, or are still learning, I think we’re all still learning to be silent on the inside?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
It’s very revealing, right? Because the things that come up, the things your mind is saying on repeat are sometimes the things… Your anxious thoughts become idols almost. So that for me, has been very revealing is to pay attention to the repeated thoughts and noise that are there when I don’t want them to be. Or just say, when you lie down to sleep at night, that’s a time when things are silent. Right? And what we often say is like, I just can’t get my brain to turn off. So what I’m learning there is what are those things? There’s a wonderful Christian practice called the Prayer of Examine that you do at the end of the day that says let’s get these thoughts out. What are the things that are my highs and lows? Can I place those before the Lord and go to sleep in peace, knowing that he holds those in his hands?
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah, because it’s one thing to get away from the noise to go out in the woods or whatever is peaceful for you. But to have those voices be still, the storm on the inside be still too, because there’s so much chaos on the outside, in our families, communities, denominations, church leadership, as we’ve seen the rise and fall of leaders for whatever reason. And one thing that you mentioned is it could be said that we’ve lost our story and identity. So how does this spiritual dementia, if you will, throw us into chaos?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Yeah. It’s interesting how often the Bible says the word remember, isn’t it?
Heidi Wilcox:
Yes, it is.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Especially when God is really trying to form a people for himself in Israel. He continually tells them to remember and to place them within a story and they keep forgetting their story. You know, there’s a point where in the New Testament, the Pharisees say we can’t be slaves. We’ve never been slaves to anyone. You want to say, have you read Exodus? You have been slaves and it’s a huge part of your story, but we are the same way. We continue to forget the story that we’re part of. So I talk about in a chapter on memory and how God puts us back together again, I love the word remember because it literally means to be put back together again, how God takes that condition.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
We all have this spiritual amnesia, spiritual dementia, almost of we forget our role in God’s story. We forget what God has done for us because the other things going on in the world are so loud. It takes a lot of remembering in order to be part of God’s story. I was just teaching this week, talking to a group about the importance of the sacraments and holy communion in our repeated life. It’s literally participating, a repetition of a story that we enter into and participate in when we come to the table for communion. It’s one of those things that helps us rehearse and be part of and enter into a story. So that the story externally, the noises of the world, don’t become what we begin to think of as our story.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
We are not the people of chaos, but we have to be reminded of the story that God gives us of not just creating out of chaos, but bringing us out of chaos again and again, of how Jesus, how the cross is this really ultimate chaos, isn’t it? They killed God? I mean, how is this part of our story? But that story is so instrumental for us that Jesus could defeat death once and for all in that moment there is no other story like that in the world. So we have to be reminded that is our story. And that we’re part of that story in order to not live as if we want to be chaotic people.
Heidi Wilcox:
Right. Because in the remembering we find hope, right?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Yes.
Heidi Wilcox:
Because I don’t have all the details of the story that you told in your book, but you told this story about this woman who would see something chaotic happen in the world and respond with what the hell? And you said there’s more truth in that statement than we might think, because it can be just a flip of what the hell is happening right now?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Right, right.
Heidi Wilcox:
But really, chaos is a representation of that.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Right. I think that’s a very literal phrase to say that hell is coming to earth just as, in some ways we wish heaven on earth, right? We call for God’s kingdom to come.
Heidi Wilcox:
Right.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
There’s a whole other kingdom that is up against that kingdom. And I think that could be misunderstood is not meant flippantly at all. But this was a statement by a woman I knew who was a mother of five children and she literally said, hell just crept into their home again and again.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
So she would bring order and chaos would take over again.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
So to recognize that as a spiritual reality is one that I think is important too. Sure your house gets messy if you let it. On the other hand, what are the forces at work here? Not in your living room always, but if you’re not relying on the God of order, there’s a whole other kingdom coming up against that. And recognizing that is part of battling it too.
Heidi Wilcox:
So I guess my question is where can we find hope in a what the hell kind of world?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Yeah. Maybe there’s an opposite question to ask. Right? Maybe the question is not where is hell creeping into this world, but where is God’s beauty and order and life? Where do we see that showing up again and again? And in a world that should be so chaotic. One of my favorite characteristics in humans is resilience, right? And people who have faced so much such difficulty and yet they have not given up and they have a story and a testimony, I would say that’s heaven creeping in. That’s the kingdom of God creeping in. And I think part of being a people of that kingdom is to be able to look for it and find it and recognize it. To say no, hell is not winning in this place.
Heidi Wilcox:
Right. Right.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
God is about the business of his kingdom and it will not be stopped.
Heidi Wilcox:
How can we as the people of God be agents of hope in the world?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Yeah. That’s such a big question. And one, I think that’s what we’re all looking for right now. There’s so much hopelessness. There’s so many people saying to us in whatever way, things will never change. I think we have to be careful not to be flippant. We all know that there are Christianese sort of trite statements we could say that would take away from the reality of how hard things can be for people. We don’t want to be those people. Right? I don’t want to be the one going around spewing the cotton candy phrases at people that are sweet, but short lasting. I think we have to take very seriously the chaos that people have been in first of all, and listen well to their stories and acknowledge them. And then I think just living in a way that says my life, isn’t perfect.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
I’m not going to pretend anymore. That’s been an issue in the church too, that we have pretended, that never lasts for long, right? Things come out and creep up about that. But not that we’re going to pretend to be perfect, but that we’re going to know the one who is, and that’s going to change everything. Chaos comes to Christian lives, bad things happen to good people. That’s a scary but true reality. It’s who we know and how we are with him in those moments that I think are the real witness of hope. I’ve seen that again and again, the way people handle some of the hardest things in their lives are some of the greatest witness. That’s what testimony is, is being able to say what God has done, not diminishing the hard things, but really saying that God is bigger than all of that.
Heidi Wilcox:
For sure. One of the ways that as you said, that I was like one of the ways that you’re bringing hope into the world through your book, but then another way too is through preacher’s block. That is a space for preachers to come and work virtually, but in community. What was the Genesis for that creation?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Yeah. This is such an unusual concept to a lot of people. This actually helped me write the book, Heidi, there’s a whole thing out there called online co-working that people do. Where you’re using Zoom, you meet up with strangers, your Zoom is on, but the sound is off. And so it’s a way to make a commitment. It’s almost like a study hall, a virtual study hall where you get together and do your work. I will say that some of the hardest months of writing Out of Chaos were because there was very little structure, very little community, very little boundaries between work life and home life. And I found some online coworking groups that really helped me with that. And I just continually thought, goodness, pastors need this, preachers need this, Christians need this.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
So a group of us created, it’s called preachers block. And you can find it at preachersblock.com or share it with your favorite pastor ministry leader. It’s a group that meets, four or five days a week. I can’t remember how many, there are different sessions. People gather online and they get their sermon preparation done and they don’t chat at each other, which is hard for preachers to do. But there’s a period at the beginning where you make a commitment to what your work is going to do. There’s a period at the end where you celebrate what your work has been. And we have just heard again and again, I mean, it’s how I prepare sermons. It keeps you focused and it’s really a time blocking tool that helps you say now this is the time I will set apart for this work. And we all know that if we don’t set aside that time, it just gets eaten up with other things.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. Wow. Because out of your own chaos, you created something that helps other people.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
That’s great. I hadn’t thought about it that way.
Heidi Wilcox:
I just thought about it when you were saying that I was like, you felt this need in your own chaos and you filled that need with creativity.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Really out of necessity. Right. We say necessity is the mother of invention. It’s really chaos. I mean, chaos is necessity. Right? I need help here. Yeah. So things get invented because we find need. Yeah.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. For sure. Jessica, this conversation has been a delight. I have one question that I ask everyone who comes on the show, but before I do that, is there anything else you’d like to say that I didn’t know to ask you?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
That’s a great question. I would think that one thing that’s a misconception about chaos is just this idea that we could wish it all away and clean our lives up. And one of the things I really worked out in this book was to understand that there’s also chronic chaos in a lot of our lives.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yes.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
I interviewed some caregivers that really life is just a daily chaos for folks, but the lives that they were living in the midst of that were so beautiful. And really the leaning into the desperation for God’s help was so beautiful. So I think for a lot of people, we have this misconception that we’re just going to tell people to snap out of it somehow when we all know people whose daily lives have more chaos than ours. And so there is a word for those folks in this book that I would want to make sure people know that it’s not a snap out of it kind of book.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yes. Thanks for pointing that out. Because yeah, that’s really important because definitely want to acknowledge the both and rights.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Yes, yes.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yes. So the last question that we always ask anyone who comes on the show because it’s called The Thrive With Asbury Seminary Podcast, what is one practice that is helping you thrive in your life right now?
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
What is one practice that’s helping me thrive? Well, it is summer and our kids are out of school and the chaos has come home. And I think part of that for us is just some intentional rhythms as a family of when we play together there’s this temptation to try to get everybody to clean their room and make it all happen. And really, as a parent, one of my intentional practices is to play. I’ll just say that, to set aside time when we do crazy things like balloon volleyball in the living room or when we’re just chasing fireflies together to remind myself and that. And that’s such been such a gift in my life of the reminder that play is something that we have to pursue as well.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. I love that.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Yeah.
Heidi Wilcox:
That’s good. Thank you so much for being on the podcast today, it really has been a joy to have you here for this conversation.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
Thank you, Heidi. This has been such a gift. We appreciate Thrive so much and I’m thrilled to get a chance to be on it again.
Heidi Wilcox:
Yeah. You’re welcome back anytime.
Rev. Jessica LaGrone:
All right.
Heidi Wilcox:
Hey everyone. Thank you so much for joining me for today’s conversation with Reverend Jessica LaGrone. Isn’t she just the best you guys? I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed this conversation and how reading her book and this conversation really changed my perspective on the chaos that we all experience in our lives at varying levels. So if you haven’t already, be sure to pick up a copy of her new book Out of Chaos, we’ll link to it in the show notes. And of course, be sure to tell Jessica thank you so much for being part of today’s conversation. As always, you can follow Asbury Seminary in all the places on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram at @AsburySeminary. Until next time, I hope you’ll go do something that helps you thrive.
