Demotions, sueñitos, and excellence in little things
Why Jake voluntarily took a demotion for the good of his soul, the difference between hearing and listening to God’s voice, and the case for encouraging your team’s vocational dreams even if it leads them to leave your business.
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[00:00:04] JORDAN: Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Mere Christians Podcast. I'm Jordan Raynor. How does the gospel influence the work of Mere Christians, those of us who aren't pastors or religious professionals, but at work as urban planners and park rangers and interior designers? That's the question we explore every week.
Today, I'm posing it to my new friend Jake Reed. He's an Assistant Manager at a Trader Joe's store in Idaho. He's got no book. He's got no platform like many of you. He's just a regular guy working a regular job. He is a mere Christian in the truest sense of the term, which is why I was so excited to have him on the show.
Jake and I talked about why he voluntarily took a demotion, as a spiritual discipline. We talked about the difference between hearing and listening to God's voice and the case for encouraging your team's vocational dreams, even if it leads them to leave your business. You guys are going to love this episode with Jake Reed.
[INTERVIEW]
[00:01:16] JORDAN: Jake Reed, longtime listener, first time caller. Welcome to the podcast.
[00:01:20] JAKE: Thanks for having me. It's great to be here.
[00:01:23] JORDAN: I was shocked when I was looking back through old episodes. I don't think we've ever had anybody who works in retail on the podcast. I'm just super grateful that you're willing to chat, by the way. As a longtime listener, what are some of your favorite episodes, maybe from the last year of the show?
[00:01:40] JAKE: I've listened to all but 13 of them now.
[00:01:43] JORDAN: Oh, my goodness. Wow.
[00:01:44] JAKE: Yeah. So I would probably say Harris III was one of my favorite.
[00:01:48] JORDAN: Yeah. Harris III. That keeps coming up as a favorite.
[00:01:51] JAKE: It was a good one. I loved when you talk to your dad. That was just one of the best episodes.
[00:01:57] JORDAN: Nice.
[00:01:57] JAKE: Tim Keller, of course, the most recent one. Talking about forgiveness and just his journey with what he's dealing with right now. Yeah, that was a few my favorites. Yeah.
[00:02:07] JORDAN: Those are good ones. Those are good answers. Hey, I don't want to assume that everyone knows Trader Joe's, especially our international listeners of which we have many. Can you give us a real quick 30 second overview of the brand? What is Trader Joe's?
[00:02:20] JAKE: Trader Joe's is a specialty foods store. You're not going to go there and find just a wide variety of everything, just the best of everything from around the world. We just have fun. When you walk in, the experience that you have, there's just happy people and good food. So that's really what we say, is that the store is our brand. You can definitely tell when you walk through the doors.
[00:02:45] JORDAN: It's like people are cultish about Trader Joe's.
[00:02:49] JAKE: Oh, yeah.
[00:02:49] JORDAN: For those of you who don't have a Trader Joe's in your city.
[00:02:51] JAKE: Right.
[00:02:52] JORDAN: People lose their minds.
[00:02:53] JAKE: Yeah. Before I had ever worked there, I hadn't really shopped there that much because they were opening in Colorado. My first experience was just people lining up outside the door, hundreds of people, and it was crazy. Yeah, people definitely love it.
[00:03:07] JORDAN: Yeah. Anytime we drive past, because I think most of the items, all the items maybe, you can't get anywhere else. Is that right? Are they exclusive to the store?
[00:03:15] JAKE: That's true. Most everything that is carried on Trader Joe's is Trader Joe's brand.
[00:03:20] JORDAN: I'm outing my wife here. Anytime we drive past the Trader Joe's, she has to stop to get these dark chocolate peanut butter cups which are off the charts, like Justine doesn't know what's up, it's Trader’s Joe’s Chocolate. What's your favorite Trader Joe's exclusive item, Jake?
[00:03:36] JAKE: For me, I tend to be a little more healthy, but we have the sweet plantain chips.
[00:03:42] JORDAN: Oh, yeah. I've had these.
[00:03:43] JAKE: Okay, good. There's no sugar added. They're just sweet by hanging out in the sun and I love them.
[00:03:50] JORDAN: Hey, so I've never worked in retail. I've had a lot of work experience, a lot of different work experience, but never retail. I'm really curious what a typical day looks like for you as you manage this Trader Joe's store. What does that look like?
[00:04:03] JAKE: I'm an assistant manager there. Days can be a little bit different just depending on what shift I'm working. If I'm in charge of running the floor or being in front, where what we call the grand finale, where the customers are checking out, so things can look a little bit different there.
I would say that walking into retail, and anyone who's worked retail knows that It's a very repetitive job. Every day, you walk in, the truck comes in, the groceries go on the shelves, and then people start buying them. So it's that cycle that carries us through the day. However, everything's different every day as well, because the mix of people that are working is different every day.
Also, anyone can walk in the door, right? There's all kinds of different customers, people from every walk of life walk in. The days are very typical. You're walking in, working a certain shift, and doing fairly repetitive work. But also, it's always different, because we're just dealing with different situations and different people from moment to moment.
[00:05:13] JORDAN: Yeah. Yeah, it's super interesting. You sent me an email a while back, saying that you feel, “fortunate that God has placed” you in your current role. What do you think God's placed you in this role to do? Why are you at Trader Joe's? Why does God have you here? Why do you think?
[00:05:29] JAKE: He's really shown me so much mercy throughout my life. I feel like, wherever I go, whether it be at Trader Joe's or anywhere, that I'm there to just extend that mercy to people. One great thing about where I'm at is that I come into contact with hundreds of people every day. So I feel like he has his reasons for why it's exactly that store and exactly that company, but definitely my job is just to show up and show that same mercy that I've been given.
[00:06:00] JORDAN: What does that mercy, what does that look like, practically? Give us an example, maybe a couple of examples of how to extend mercy via retail. I love that you're pointing this out.
[00:06:09] JAKE: Well, I think it's really easy to look at customers, for one, and really stereotype people into just being cranky people. Because a lot of times, people do walk in and they're in a hurry and not everybody loves to go to the grocery store, even if it is Trader Joe's.
So it's really easy to pigeonhole them and just think that they're another nuisance, or when they say the same stereotypical things that every customer says that, I'm so tired of hearing that or whatever it is. It's really just looking at, hey, that's a person. That's a human being, and you have no idea what's going on in their lives. So just being able to connect with them, quick conversations, and really showing them some grace.
Then as far as showing mercy with co-workers, everybody has good days and bad days. We're all going to make mistakes. The first person that I want to extend some mercy to is myself, because I think that it's really easy to be hard on yourself when you make mistakes. Just knowing that God shows mercy to me, and I don't have to be defined when I do something wrong. I need to turn around and show that to the people that I work with and that work for me.
[00:07:25] JORDAN: Yeah. Amen. I can resonate with that, being really hard on myself. I think I always come back to man, if I really believe that Christ died for me when I was his enemy, pre-salvation. Surely, I can believe that as a child of God, when I mess up, when I make a mistake at work, when I sin, when I'm not as productive as I want to be for Kingdom things, man, there's mercy, all the more than as a child, as an adopted son of God. Amen. That flows out to your customers. That flows out to the team. That's how it should work. That's probably other worldly.
I would imagine in your world, most managers maybe many managers don't operate in that way. Have you found that by extending grace and mercy to your team, I don't know, it just made you winsome to them as you give them grace?
[00:08:14] JAKE: Yeah, absolutely. I think that when you do show that grace, people, for one, want to know where that comes from, so that's really opened up a lot of avenues to be able to really show that that mercy is coming from Christ Himself.
When people are in a culture like that, when they feel they can be themselves, they will turn around and show mercy to each other, even all the more. Yeah, it just changes the culture that you're in.
[00:08:39] JORDAN: Yeah. You said something else in your email that piqued my interest. You said, “The Gospel shapes my status at work far beyond the job titles I used to chase.” What's the story there? What do you mean by that?
[00:08:52] JAKE: Yeah. When I was I started with a different grocery store when I was 16, I always had it in my mind to be the store manager and beyond in the company. So I worked towards that. It was almost like a dopamine hit where I was getting promoted really fast. By the time I had made it to being a store manager there, I was one of the youngest store managers at the time that they had ever had.
But even then, I wanted a bigger store, more sales volume. So I did. I chased those things. I was still a Christian, but I think that what I failed to connect was just the way that God saw my work. So for me, maybe I thought I was bringing glory to Him, but it was really just to bring glory to myself to continue to chase the bigger store, the bigger sales volume, more employees, and that thing.
I'd loved being in charge of the store for reasons that I still loved all of the employees crew members that I worked with. But at the same time, there was a very self-serving, self-promoting part of that job where once I became a store manager, that wasn't enough. I wanted to move into the office. I think we can all relate to just wanting the next big thing, then never being enough.
I felt when Trader Joe's came to Colorado, I felt this tug. I know that God was definitely working on my heart to apply there. So I did, it wasn't something that I would normally do. I'm pretty loyal. I was at that other grocer for 19 years. I applied and became an assistant manager. Here, I wasn't running the store.
[00:10:42] JORDAN: You're taking a demotion.
[00:10:43] JAKE: Exactly, and a pay cut, and all of those things. It went to being the greatest thing that I did professionally, because what it gave me the opportunity to do was use a lot of the skills that I had learned in running the store, but do it in a way that I was now supporting, and we call our store managers captains at Trader Joe's.
My job then was to support their vision for the store and to really lay down my ambition to continue to get promoted and these sorts of things, and really look at what's the best way that I can steward, what I have right now, with the people that are around me in learning a new culture. Also, getting into a new company, I was able to learn from the people around me and that gave me a chance to really humble myself and learn from the people around me, and not have to be the one with all the answers.
[00:11:37] JORDAN: Yeah. It's almost, if I could put words in your mouth. It's like this voluntary demotion was almost a spiritual practice, right? It's like, hey this idol is growing out of control. I need to put it in check. This is one of the ways I put it in check. Am I reading that right?
[00:11:51] JAKE: Absolutely. I didn't see it at the time, but of course God knows what he's doing. He loves me enough that he did that for me. He opened the doors for me to be able to really lay that down. When I was running a store before, I did it obsessively, I took a lot of pride in the amount of hours that I could work, and just being there all the time, and that thing.
I saw that as being a good hard worker. Obviously, God wants us to have a pattern of rest and restoration as well. He loves me enough that he gave me the opportunity to do that when I couldn't see it.
[00:12:30] JORDAN: Man, what was the impetus? What did God use to reveal these idols in you, because I have a very similar story, right? Like, God blatantly revealed these idols in my heart about work. What was it for you?
[00:12:43] JAKE: For me, I never would have saw it or been able to hear Him if I hadn't established a good practice of being quiet before him. It was always something that we hear people talk about, spend time with God. I didn't have a really firm grasp of what it was, but the more that I did it, I wanted to do it more. I got to the point where every single morning, and it's been probably a good 13, 14 years now, being able to just get quiet, be in the scriptures, and just listen to His voice and the whispers of the Holy Spirit, telling me, “Hey, you should apply here.”
And those sorts of things, I never would have heard it had I not been quiet before him. It's also some correction as well with your story, where you had these idols, I definitely made an idol out of work and God, in a loving way, when we're receptive to His voice and the whispers of the Holy Spirit, he'll pull us out of those things.
[00:13:54] JORDAN: Yeah. Blessed be the name of the Lord for that, right. I mean, it can hurt. Yeah, it reminds me of that scene in, I think it's Voyage of the Dawn Treader, where Eustace rips the dragon skin off of the kid. He's like, “I'm going to have to go deeper than you think, but it's going to be worth it. It's going to be painful, but it's going to be worth it.” I'm butchering the scene and butchering the quote, but that's what that idol extraction looks like and can feel like.
[00:14:20] JAKE: Yeah.
[00:14:21] JORDAN: Yeah. Go ahead. Sorry. Go ahead, Jake.
[00:14:22] JAKE: I just think that going along with hearing God's voice and him working in our lives, in my experience, he's brought a lot of great things into my life through that quiet time where he said, “I'm going to do this,” or there's a promise. A lot of dreams that I've had are born out of that quiet time, in that relationship with Him. There have been times where I've taken those and turn them into idols as well.
[00:14:47] JORDAN: Yeah.
[00:14:48] JAKE: It's just one of those things that he showed me. There's a lot of good things that he's given us, but when we put it ahead of him and when we make those things are gone and chase after those things, even other good things., He'll definitely cause us to refocus on Him and just come sit with Him.
[00:15:11] JORDAN: You've read a lot of Keller, haven't you?
[00:15:13] JAKE: Not a ton. More and more –
[00:15:14] JORDAN: It’s like Keller 101. This is like Keller 101 or you've read a lot of Jordan Raynor. I don't know which one.
[00:15:20] JAKE: Probably the Jordan Raynor, but that’s the great thing is, I might not have to read a lot of Keller, because I’ve read a lot of Jordan –
[00:15:25] JORDAN: I want to draw out some nuance here that I think is really important. The way you're talking about your personal time with the Lord, your “quiet times”, leads me to believe that you're not only reading scripture, but you're actually sitting quietly in silence, trying to hear the Holy Spirit, am I right?
[00:15:47] JAKE: Absolutely. There's definitely a lot of great things that we can get out of Scripture and good teaching and all of those things. Also realizing that the Holy Spirit, God is a living person. And even with worship music, I know that in the early times of doing this, I loved listening to worship music, but there's times when that's even noise. We have to be able to turn that off a little bit and be able to just hear him when he's speaking.
[00:16:17] JORDAN: Yes. There was a practice in redeeming your time, where I talked about putting the quiet back in quiet time, right. I want to be crystal clear. We are to immerse ourselves in God's Word daily. If we don't know what God's Word says, we can't redeem our time well towards eternal purposes.
But reading the Word is still a form of in taking information. That's how we hear God's voice, but if we want to listen to God's voice and connect the word to what's going on in our lives and our work, we have to still our minds, we have to literally be quiet, right? I think a Psalm 46:10 “Be still and know that God is God.” The stillness makes way for the knowing, I think. for hearing the Spirit speak and connect the Word to what's going on in our daily lives. Does that resonate with you, Jake? Does that make sense?
[00:17:12] JAKE: Absolutely. There's a lot of times when in the quiet scriptures that I've read will come up as well. So, if you're not in the Word and knowing it, and letting it sink into your heart, a lot of those truths you'll miss in the quiet.
[00:17:29] JORDAN: Yeah. Hey, you interact with dozens of employees, maybe hundreds of customers in a given week. I'm curious how you think those people's interactions with you are different because you're a Christian? You've already talked about showing greater mercy, greater grace. How else are those interactions distinct because you're a Christ follower?
[00:17:46] JAKE: I think, at least when I interact with another Christian, I think it's evident that they've been with God. So I would hope that when people are around me, they find that I've been with God and can see the joy coming across in the way that I interact with them. I think I have a lot of fun, because I am content. I think I'm very comfortable with who I am. That's something that's come out of having a relationship with God is I know who I don't need to be as well.
In the early times of really trying to make a name for myself, I felt like I had to be everyone or be somebody that's not me, just to fill the role. But God has shown me what role I need to fill, and that's to be that encourager and to show his joy and His mercy wherever I go. I would hope that the people that I come into contact with would find that.
Another thing is taking a genuine interest in other people. So I think it's really easy to take a genuine interest in ourselves, but the more that we get to know God and His heart for other people and really see them through His eyes, we're going to take a genuine interest in them. And there's nothing I love more than listening to someone else's hopes and dreams. That's something that I've had the opportunity to do a lot of recently with the people that I work with. If I asked them, “What's your dream?” Everybody seems to have this little dream. I know that you're a big In the Heights fan, so we call it –
[00:19:29] JORDAN: I am. Oh, man.
[00:19:31] JAKE: Everybody has that, right? It's theirs. I think that is a great window into who that person is and knowing that about them, and encouraging them in - I know some people that knows a lady who wants to work with horses and people with disabilities. We have artists at our store, right? So everything you see around the store is done by hand, by artists, and one of the ladies at my store wants to write children's books.
[00:20:05] JORDAN: Send them my way.
[00:20:07] JAKE: I did. I told her all about The Creator in You. She read that. It was awesome. So there's another person at our store. He is a young man that wanted to start a marketing company. He's taking steps towards starting it. I was able to give him a copy of Called to Create. I've also gave another lady a copy of Redeeming Your Time, because I just happen to walk in the break room and see that she was reading the Ruthless Elimination of Hurry.
We were able to do a little book exchange there. I think that that's what's different, though. When I'm interacting with the people around me, none of that would ever happen if I didn't have that eternal perspective, that what I'm doing is not the sum of my efforts. It's my work is reverberating throughout eternity and the hopes and the dreams that I have, and that the people around me have will come to pass. But them knowing that I care about those things makes a huge difference. I think is what's different.
[00:21:10] JORDAN: Man, I want to dive deeper here. This is so good, Jake, because this is pretty countercultural. You're encouraging the dreams of those who work for you, even when those dreams are not to stay at Trader Joe's. It's replacing your dreams of, “I want to be more successful plus I want to hire and retain the best people and keep them here forever,” with their dreams. You're prioritizing their sueñitos.
By the way, you earned major points in my book, according In the Heights. Oh, my gosh. It’s a reference. Yeah, I know, like that's radical, right? Don't you fear that this is going to make you look bad, right, when all these great people leave and go follow their dreams?
[00:21:52] JAKE: Not at all now. The first time that I just happened upon that, because I love talking to people about that. It was in a performance review, actually, just what do you want to do? And to see the light come on in crew members when they're talking about their hopes and dreams, I could see the more and more that we've had these conversations that they're so much more engaged with the work that they're actually doing right now, knowing how it fits into the bigger picture of where they want to be.
That's one thing that, if I'm going to look bad I definitely want to be able to turn it back to the fact that what they're doing at Trader Joe's is going to help them in whatever they wind up doing, and seeing that the work that they have in their hands is valuable. I think it adds value to the company that I'm at. I think if more companies and more people in supervisory positions took the time to know this about the people that work for them, it does radically changes things.
[00:23:03] JORDAN: If you could underline and highlight podcast quotes. I would encourage everyone to go back and highlight what Jake Reed just said. I think this is really smart, two things. Number one, it's a terrific means of loving your neighbor as yourself in a really practical way, managers, by unearthing your team's dreams and encouraging those dreams, even if they're outside the four walls of your business.
Number two, it's good for business. It's good for your team and the productivity of your team. Jake, you probably know, I know a lot of our listeners know. I serve as executive chairman of this venture-backed tech startup called Threshold 360, that I ran a CEO for a number of years. There's a member of our team there. He's now our COO who's terrific at this, he was actually on the podcast way, way, way, way, way back when, one of the first episodes ever. His name is Will Barrett.
Will is exceptional at this. We have hundreds of photographers in the field going out and capturing content at Threshold. These are all really young people, they're in their early 20s, they all have dreams outside of this job. Will's really good, motivated by his faith, really good at understanding those dreams, encouraging those dreams. His team is the most engaged team at Threshold. They love the business. They serve the business incredibly well, because he's loved them really well and charted a course of, “Hey, here's how this job is going to help you get to that other thing.” Believe it, if he didn't do that, even if it didn't make them more engaged, it's still the Christ like thing to do, right Jake?
[00:24:29] JAKE: Absolutely. Absolutely.
[00:24:31] JORDAN: I love this. You mentioned to me before that you see a connection between your faith and your commitment to excellence at work. This is one of my favorite soap boxes. I'm going to invite you to hop up on the soapbox with me. Talk to us a little bit about how your faith informs your commitment to mastering your craft?
[00:24:47] JAKE: Well, as far as my faith, God's with me wherever I go. If I see trash on the floor and I walked past it, I know that God's going to deal with me in that I want to do little things well. Before, when I was chasing after different things and just trying to promote myself, it wasn't what I wanted to do. A lot of the little things, well, it's that I would just want the next big thing. So, my faith gives me the perspective that all of the little things matter, and that God's going to trust me with more if I'm doing the little things well and caring for the people around me well.
[00:25:37] JORDAN: Man, you're reminding me of David. This is David's story, right? When Saul tells David, “Hey, you're crazy for wanting to fight this Philistine Goliath.” David doesn't say, look at my muscles, or look at my killer slingshot strategy, right? He says, “Hey, look to my past history of faithfulness and liberal things. I killed the bear. I did all these things. I looked after the sheep well. I did the small things well, and thus, I can be trusted with this greater responsibility.” Right?
[00:26:05] JAKE: Yeah.
[00:26:06] JORDAN: That's exactly what you're saying.
[00:26:07] JAKE: Yes.
[00:26:08] JORDAN: You also said in your email, in this pre interview email I sent you, that “God gives me every opportunity to show his love to people who are different than me.” You mentioned before working in dark places, anywhere where there’s sin is a dark place, right?
Yeah, I'm interested within the context of the non-Christian co-workers you have a chance to build real long term relationships with. I'm curious, how do you show Christ's love to them, to the people who are different to you, and yet not condone lifestyles that are contrary to God's word? Have you ever had to wrestle with that tension?
[00:26:42] JAKE: Yeah, absolutely. I think that it's important to value that person for who they are. I mentioned a little bit earlier about being shown mercy, then turning around and showing that mercy to others. I think that's first and foremost in my mind, at least, is that God's going to be merciful to me, if I'm merciful to others. He's heaped mercy on me. So it really is my pleasure to turn around and show that mercy to other people.
So early on in my Christian life, when I was probably a teenager, I think it was a different story, where I would condemn people and even to their face. I know that nobody is walking with Christ now because I did that. If I can show Christ's love to somebody who's different than me, I know that I'm just planting seeds in their heart that could grow someday. So, that's the approach that I think it's important to take, is that I want to treat that person exactly like Jesus would.
[00:27:50] JORDAN: Yeah. But it's all rooted in that understanding at the mercy that we've been shown. One thing I've been asking myself lately is, I was challenged by my friend, Shaun Castillo, who was on this podcast recently. I was hanging out with Shaun in Texas and he's like, he was talking about just remembering what God has saved us from is the key to unlocking mercy towards others at work, in our homes, whatever. I thought that was a really astute.
How do you remind yourself of what God saved you from, Jake? Do you have a practice that you go to? Do you have a prayer that you regularly pray? How are you reminded of this?
[00:28:24] JAKE: I think it's important to examine your own life. In my time, I have really come up with the practice of journaling. But in a different way, I know that God puts me in different seasons of life. What I see as a season is a beginning and end in a lesson. So I do all of my journaling on my iPhone. It has to be in Do Not Disturb. A million texts don't pop-up while I'm doing it.
I go back and I write my story. That's the practice that I do. I think it's important to go back and look at my own journals. Since I have them in my iPhone, what I'll do is while I'm in the car on my commute, I just use the screen reader and Siri reads my journals back to me.
[00:29:10] JORDAN: Oh, that's good.
[00:29:11] JAKE: It's great to hear her tell me what I've been thinking. Sometimes I'm like, “Wow, I wrote that. That's pretty good.” To hear Siri speak scripture is an awesome thing as well. Yeah.
[00:29:22] JORDAN: That's amazing. I love that. Jake, you know what three questions we end every conversation with. Number one, which books do you find yourself recommending or gifting most frequently to others?
[00:29:33] JAKE: There's one called Images and Idols. It's by – Okay. Ryan Lister and Thomas J. Terry, a couple of guys out of Portland. It very much preaches the same message that a lot of Mere Christians is about. It's just that creativity is God's and creativity for His glory. Another one is The 6 Seasons of Calling by Brian Sanders.
[00:29:56] JORDAN: So good.
[00:29:56] JAKE: Yeah, it's great. I've gifted that to quite a few people in my life. It's something that I'll go back and revisit as I enter different stages in my life. Draw the Circle by Mark Batterson. Great book on prayer. I love that one. Then The Stranger in the Lifeboat by Mitch Albom. I took some time and read some fiction and that is a great fictional story.
[00:30:22] JORDAN: Huh. I don't read fiction, so I haven't read it. I read all those non-fiction, but no. That's interesting. It's good. Hey, who would you most like to hear on this podcast?
[00:30:30] JAKE: I would love to hear you have a conversation with Kevin Ogar. He's an unashamed Christian that does redemptive work as an entrepreneur, founder of a nonprofit, a coach, and an athlete. He's definitely a hero to me, even though I've never met him. He's the co-founder of the Reveille Project, which helps restore veteran’s life's post active duty. He's the founder of WheelWOD, which is a platform that provides coaching and competition opportunities for adaptive athletes. He's also the owner of CrossFit WatchTower in Denver, Colorado and just this last year, he won fittest on Earth in the CrossFit Games. He’s seated, no hip function Division. He became a paraplegic in 2014 in a competition in a weightlifting accident.
[00:31:19] JORDAN: Geez. Oh, my good.
[00:31:21] JAKE: He's done all of that since the accident.
[00:31:23] JORDAN: That's crazy.
[00:31:24] JAKE: Yeah.
[00:31:25] JORDAN: All right, I got to look this guy up. That's a great suggestion. Hey, Jake, you're talking to an audience of Mere Christians like you. What do you want to leave them with before we sign off?
[00:31:33] JAKE: Please, spend time with God. Study your own journey to know who you are, so he can send you out to play the role that you're meant to play. Be prepared to give an answer for your hope, and do it with gentleness and respect.
[00:31:48] JORDAN: Man, that's good. Straight from fourth period. Hey, how do you do that? How have you prepared to give a reason for your hope? What does that mean to you?
[00:31:56] JAKE: For me, there's nothing more powerful as a reason for my hope than my testimony. I could go to people and quote scriptures all day long. I think there's absolutely no denying when somebody talks about what Jesus has done for them. That's in going back to just studying my own life, and what God's done for me. I'm able to know who I am and be able to, at any moment, speak to somebody about that.
[00:32:26] JORDAN: Yeah. I've been thinking a lot lately about this passage in 1 Peter 3:15, where, I’m going to find it. 1Peter 3:15. “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.” Yeah, I think preparation here is on two levels. You've hit on the first one. It's like give a personal reason for your faith, right? Not just all the apologetic answers, although that's part of it. But personally, why are you following Jesus? What is the reason for your faith and your hope and your apprenticeship to Christ?
Then I think the second aspect of this is the universal reasons for our faith, the intellectual and historical case for our hope. But I agree with you, Jake. I think it's that personal reason that is the most compelling to people that you have a relationship with, because they can see the joy. They can see the peace. They could see the grace and the mercy oozing out of you, right?
[00:33:20] JAKE: Right.
[00:33:21] JORDAN: All right, bonus round, because you brought it up. I can't let you go without asking this. Favorite In the Heights?
[00:33:30] JAKE: The opening number.
[00:33:33] JORDAN: Oh, man.
[00:33:33] JAKE: Yeah. It's pretty good.
[00:33:35] JORDAN: I haven't met a whole lot of In the Heights fans. If you're listening, you guys know almost all my readers and listeners know, I'm a huge Hamilton fan. In the Heights is the first musical Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote way beforehand. It’s phenomenal. You could watch the movie adaptation on HBO Max, right now. That opening number is fire.
[00:33:54] JAKE: It's incredible. Yeah.
[00:33:56] JORDAN: It's so, so good. It's seven minutes. It introduces every character in the show in this genius way of everybody hopping into Usnavi’s bodega, like grabbing a cup of coffee. It's brilliant. It's brilliant. It’s musical theater gold.
Jake, man, I want to commend you, dude, for the exceptional work you do every day for the glory of God and the good of others. For reminding us of how we can show the love of Christ to those that we work with, show his mercy, show his grace.
As you were talking, one of my favorite verses came to mind Psalm 37:23, “The Lord directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives.” Dude, every time you stalk a shelf, every time you give feedback to a team member or answer a question from an angry customer in a way that honors the Lord, you are bringing God eternal pleasure. Keep going, brother. Thanks again for joining us today.
[00:34:51] JAKE: Absolutely. It was a pleasure to talk to you.
[OUTRO]
[00:34:56] JORDAN: Man, I love that episode. I hope you guys did, too. Hey, this episode came about because Jake nominated himself for the podcast, per my request. If you think you've got something very compelling to say about how the gospel shapes what you do, why you do it, and how you do your work, let me know at jordanraynor.com/contact. That's J-O-R-D-A-N-R-A-Y-N-O-R.com/contact. We'd love to consider having you on the show. Guys, thank you so much for tuning in this week to the Mere Christians podcast. I'll see you next time.
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