We live in a conversation-starved time when loneliness is at epidemic levels. One way we can love people in the midst of this difficult age is to develop good conversation skills. Heather Holleman’s book The Six Conversations shows us how and, perhaps more importantly, why.

Recommended Resource:

The Six Conversations: Pathways to Connecting in an Age of Isolation and Incivility by Heather Holleman

Transcript

Welcome to Questions that Matter. This is a podcast of the C.S. lewis Institute. I'm your host, Randy Newman. I get to serve at the institute as a senior fellow for apologetics and evangelism. And I'm delighted today to have as my guests return guests to Questions that Matter. Heather and Ashley Holleman with Seated and Sent Ministries. They've been here before talking about those two themes, but today we want to talk about the very important topic of conversation and how to be a better conversationalist. How to engage people in meaningful, respectful dialogue, promoting friendship building conversations. Heather has written a great book called the Six Pathways to Connecting in an Age of Isolation and Incivility. And Ashley uses this book quite a bit when they do their evangelism training at churches and other places. Heather and Ashley, welcome back to Questions that Matter.

Ashley Holleman: Thank you so much. We're so glad to be here.

Heather Holleman: Yes, this is always fun. I'm looking forward to a great conversation.

Well, let's talk about conversation.

Heather, what prompted you to write a book on conversation in our seemingly isolated and uncivil in civil days?

Heather Holleman: Well, really three things. The first was we had written this award winning book on evangelism called Scent, which we've talked about when we were doing the training, especially with graduate students. What we discovered is even if people are excited to share their faith, they were asking us to go back a few steps and remind them how to start conversations in general. So we thought, okay, that's important. The second reason is I was just becoming increasingly concerned about the health impacts of the epidemic of loneliness, especially on college campuses and research. I was reading in my home state of Pennsylvania and if, you know, you've read the Surgeon General's report about loneliness that came out a couple months ago, I mean, you're increasing your chance of premature death by % if you're lonely, it's the same as smoking  cigarettes a day. So I was just reading this stuff and really concerned about the college campus. And the third reason I wrote this book is I was showing my students the Harvard grant study, which is the longest research study ever conducted. It's like it's th year. And that research is trying to answer the question, what's the number one determining factor of a happy life? And I was showing my students that the research shows that the number one determining factor of a happy life is warm connections with other people. And my students would say, well, how do we get those? How do we get those warm connections? So that began my journey, really trying to survey all the social science Research I could to try to answer a very simple question. How do we have better conversations to foster the warm connection so vital for, you know, helping our mental health, our physical health, and most importantly, our spiritual health?

I should tell people. Heather is an associate professor at Penn State, and Heather and Ashley both have been involved in student ministry for many years, decades. We were together with crew.

 And so you've. You've sort of. You've lived in this student world long enough to see some trends, some disturbing trends. And there. There are quite a few books that are being written about this. It's almost like all sorts of people on the. From Christians, non Christians, totally secular people saying, wait a minute, we're in an epidemic. This is really a crisis.

 And lots of people are saying, we need to reclaim conversation. That's the title of Sherry Turkle's book on this.

 Ashley, how do you see this connecting with evangelism?

Ashley Holleman: Yeah, so Heather mentioned this a little bit earlier, but I'll expand on it. Really where we are today and just the whole realm of sharing our faith, at least in the US and probably Western culture, is we have to start a few steps back. You know, just in maybe several decades ago, it was helpful just to share a presentation of the gospel and ask people to make a response to it.

And. But nowadays that's certainly good to do, and we want to get there, but we have to take several steps back, several. Have to take the conversations several steps back to get to there first. And that just takes a series of ongoing conversations and the ability to converse well. And so we, as part of our evangelism training, we train people in the art of conversation itself.

And what that also does is it helps set the expectation that God can do anything. He can move in a moment, of course, but it helps set the expectation. This is probably going to be a series of ongoing conversations with your neighbor, with your family members, with your coworkers, with your friends. And so that's the other thing that. That we do in this area of conversation is help set the expectations of what evangelism even looks like.

And then we give them the skills, or at least we try to give them the skills of becoming better conversationalists so that they can really win in this area. And then the other thing that we stress is the idea that competence leads to confidence, that as they get better, as we all get better in the area of conversation, going to have greater confidence as we go into those conversations, whether they're about really weighty things and good things like God or maybe more surfacey Things or easier things for some to talk about. Competence always leads to confidence, and so we stress those aspects when we train others in evangelism and sharing.

Yeah, yeah. Good, good, good. You know, so the three of us have talked about this quite a bit.

 So I'm feeling like, oh, wait a minute. I need to remember that some of the people listening to this podcast haven't been involved in our coverage.

Ashley Holleman: Right, right, right, right.

So I do have to go back. But what I love about where we've landed a bunch of times is we want to have good conversations with people, not just manipulatively, because that's a better way to get to the gospel.

 It's so much bigger and better than that. Every single person we meet is a person created in the image of God. And God has called us to love our neighbors. And conversation is just one of the very, very best ways of recognizing that image of Godness in people and to show love to our neighbors. And in a time of, if I can call it conversational famine, just being a good listener and a good question asker will stand out for people is like, oh, people. People don't usually go there with me. Or they don't ask those kinds of things.

 So, yeah, absolutely.

Ashley Holleman: It's not just a means to a greater end. It is a great end in and of itself. And it reflects the heart of God that he would take interest and others. And he does take interest. And we can bear witness to that as we take interest in others and listen well and ask good questions and really demonstrate. No, we really care about you and your life. We want to know you and your life, and we want to. We want to seek that from you and engage in good conversations about that.

Now I feel the need to jump in and say, because I've shared these things when I do some training in evangelism. And I wouldn't say it's pushback that people give me, but honest people will raise their hand and raise the question of, well, what if I don't care about people?

 And we don't want to just assume that.

 When I wrote Questioning Evangelism, I included a chapter on what if I don't care that my neighbor is going to hell?

 Which raised a few eyebrows on the committee of accepting the book.

 But so I think we can pray and ask God to work in our hearts and give us a love for people. Some of us are just naturally drawn to people. We just love them. We just want to talk to them. That wouldn't be me.

 I have to regularly pray, Lord, remind me of the love you've shown to me, and then help me, transform me to be a person who cares more about the people around me. And I'm seeing the Lord do that.

 Not as rapidly as I would like, by the way.

 Well, Heather, you titled the book the Six Conversations. And I must tell you, you did a great job of holding off quite a long time before answering. What are those six conversations? I mean, it's a short book of, I don't know,  pages. But I don't think you get to. Well, what are these six? Until. Well after halfway through the book, which I thought was brilliant.

Heather Holleman:  Well, the reason I did that is because I read like you. I've read so many books giving all the best strategies, and here are questions and, you know, books of a hundred questions to ask. But what I learned is if you don't have the right mindsets, and it doesn't really matter if you give people a list of great conversational categories. And like what you were saying about even dealing with people that aren't curious about other people, I spent a lot of time really being honest about the Lord's work in my heart. In Philippians , Galatians , Romans , they're deeply convicting passages about valuing other people above yourselves, taking on their interests, you know, carrying their burdens. You're not alone. I'm like, do I really want to walk across the street and take on the burdens of my neighbor? So that's why I spent so much time. If you get those mindsets right, curiosity, believing the best, expressing concern, and then sharing your life. You're really prompted for these six conversational pathways, which really was actually Ashley's idea. He's really strategic in the way he helped me think about this. And so he thought of an easy way to never get stuck starting or continuing a loving conversation again. But he can tell you how he thought of the idea. This is the origin story, the flash of insight that came from Ash.

Ashley Holleman:  Yeah, I mean, basically, I just. I needed. I needed buckets to pull Converse, you know, questions from categories and.

Heather Holleman: Because it's more natural for me. Yeah, I'm the extrovert. This. I'm a national debater. I never have a problem thinking of a question to ask someone.

Ashley Holleman:   And I'm an organic chemist. And so what we do is we take a big molecule and break it down into its parts. And so I'm alone.

Alone in a laboratory.

Heather Holleman: Yeah.

Yeah.

Ashley Holleman: Yes. So I'm talking to, like, molecules, not people.

They're made up of a Lot of molecules. I can deal with, like, one molecule, but not like, you know, a whole body full of molecules. But anyway, I'm what Heather does naturally. I have to break down into its, like, constituent parts. That's just kind of how I think. And that kind of maybe served us here because I was looking for categories or buckets from which I could pull conversational questions from.

Heather Holleman:  You remember the textbook I was using?

Ashley Holleman: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember Heather, her first semester teaching at Penn State. She taught Use a reader called Being Human. And it basically talked about what does it mean to be human from a Western or a Judeo-Christian kind of viewpoint. And I said, yeah, that's ultimately what we all have in common. I couldn't think in categories like sports or hobbies, because maybe people don't like sports, but we are all human. And so I thought, well, what does it mean to be human? What are those categories? And the conversational pathways fell out of those. Look, we're all social, we're all spiritual, we're all emotional, we're all volitional or we make choices and so on. And so that's where.

Heather Holleman: and it all unfolded from that because I thought, wow, this is really easy. And even if there's no, like, mnemonic device or a graphic, at least in my head, and other people as they listen, it's not difficult to look at someone even. It only takes a few seconds for you to look at someone and think, okay, they're social, they have friends. I don't have to ask them, how are you doing? I can say, who have you been spending time with lately? Or they're physical. I can say, I haven't seen you in a while. How have you been sleeping? Or how was your knee surgery? So it was really exciting to just think, this is really easy. And then I began to think about questions that people normally aren't asked. They're hardly asked questions in the volitional category, which is human decision making agency, you have human volition. So asking people, hey, how did you decide to do whatever? They would really open up. It would really open up great conversations. Like, how did you decide to read that book? Instead of, hey, how's that book? You know, that's hard on the brain to have that weak verb. So I like the volitional category.

So. So wait, I'm. I. I'm. I'm not sure I'm catching.

So, Ashley, what. What are those categories? You said, you know, these buckets to pull from.

Ashley Holleman: Yeah, so there's. We're physical beings, okay? You know, we're emotional beings, we're spiritual beings, we're social beings. We're cognitive beings. We, we, we. We think and have thoughts. And finally, we're volitional beings. We have volition. We make choices, we make determinations, we make decisions.

There we go. Thank you.

Go ahead.

Heather Holleman:  Yeah, well, I ordered them in the book. What I thought was ease of asking questions. So they're increasingly more complicated as you go down the list. So I always go social, emotional, physical, and then cognitive. You're suddenly getting into, what have you been thinking about? Volitional. How did you decide that? In spiritual, which is my favorite category, conversation. But you kind of. It's easy to stay in the social, emotional, and physical categories.

Yeah, and I want to jump in. Something I've learned along the way is it doesn't always have to be a really, really great question. In fact, it could be a mediocre question, in fact, and it could even miss. So, like, I could say to someone, well, how did you decide to do that thing? And they may go, oh, well, I don't know. It wasn't. I didn't really think about it a whole lot. I just sort of kind of went into it. And then I could be thinking, oh, that was a bad question. But no, it got them talking and it moved the conversation along. And it's not like you're going to be graded on the quality of your questions.

It's more of, does this draw the person out? Does this get them talking about themselves?

Does this lead us further along in getting to know each other better and express good things? So I do.

Some people hear some of these kinds of things and they think, oh, I just. I can never think of those really great questions. Well, yeah, and I want to say, well, they don't have to be great questions.

Try them. Try an okay question and watch God, use them well.

Heather Holleman: And the funny thing is, what I've learned is, you're absolutely right. There's no bad questions. So in that example that you just gave, if I said, you know, how'd you decide to, you know, wear. Buy that dress or whatever? And they say, I don't know. I just. I found it, I liked it, I bought it. Well, my next question will be, have you always been that way? Have you always been? I'd go to the cognitive. Have you always been someone who can really make quick decisions? Is your mind just like that? I'm a terrible decision maker, so I'm already sharing my life. And if they go, yeah, like when the time I was little I never struggled with decision making. Well, then you're in the category of like talking about your childhood. You, there's no bad questions, even if it's about like the volleyball game or whatever, you're going to find great conversational pathways and you'll never, you'll never get stuck again. It's, it's just such an easy kind of toolbox. I think.

Early on in the book you talk about four, four mindsets. And you've already talked about this, but I just want to dig in a little further. You talk about be curious, believe the best, express concern, share your life. Just pick, pick any one of those four and explore it a little further for us. What, how do we pursue those?

Heather Holleman:  Well, the most important one is interpersonal curiosity. There are just incredible benefits to being a curious person. People who are curious have better marriages, they're more creative, they have better mental health outcomes. And so to challenge yourself to become a curious person is just very good for you, which I know is a selfish reason. But curiosity is a way of taking on the interests of other people, like it says in Philippians two, you know, bearing their burden. So being the kind of person that when you're with someone, you think to yourself, you know, I really want to know this person. They have a one-of-a-kind point of view on the universe. Every conversation can be a sacred space. I like to think too, if you survey a group of people and ask them how many of you have had a life-changing conversation?

You know, things happen in conversation, they can catalyze something. So always think of the immense opportunity of every conversation that you're in. So that's my favorite category. What about you?

Ashley Holleman: Well, just to add into that one some of the barriers I've experienced, I think others experience to being curious. One is like, you already mentioned it. Well, I just don't care, you know, I'm not curious. Well, that's probably a discipleship issue, you know, or growth issue. You know, this. Yeah, we, we talk about the six conversations isn't just for evangelism training. It's really good discipleship material because these mindsets really get to the heart level. But beyond that, I think sometimes I'm just stuck because questions to ask aren't coming to mind. Which again is where the pathways are helpful. It's like, oh, I can expand my kind of catalog of questions if I think in a different category. And then the third thing, that may be more of a barrier for me, I'm an introvert, I grew up in the south, where you shouldn't ask anyone any personal questions, is that barrier to, like, I've got the questions in my mind, but I'm holding back, like, should I really ask it? Would it be too much or would it be rude or would it. Is it too prying? And what we're learning, just not just experientially, but. And Heather can speak more to this, but in the research is take the risk. People actually like being asked personal questions more than we believe and understand. And actually the research shows you'll draw a stronger connection. Even if you do go too far and maybe ask a question that's too personal, the person will end up still liking you. They may not answer it, but they'll. They'll appreciate that you've moved towards them in the conversation. So that's, that's. Sometimes it's not. I've got the questions in my head. I just got to pull the trigger and trust God and ask it and not be so hesitant or conservative about that.

Yeah, well, I think I just have to keep kind of pushing on this until you answer.

So what are the six conversations?

Or have you already answered them and I missed. Not a good listener.

Ashley Holleman: No, that's the conversational. Yeah, those are the conversational pathways. So we. The title is the. The Six Conversations, but. But we're really referring to the conversational pathways so that we're physical.

Heather Holleman:  The conversations about your body, conversations about.

Ashley Holleman: Your social, conversation about emotions or the emotional category, conversations about decision making or being volitional, conversations about just what you're thinking about your cognitive side of your life. And then finally the conversations about God and meaning and purpose, the spiritual side of life. And so, yeah, we list them as six conversations, but really probably a tighter title of the book would be Six Conversational Pathways.

Yeah, but that wouldn't grab people the way the title the Six Conversations. So I like it. Good, good, good. Okay, well, so another thing that I'm thinking as I try to.

Well, so like you, Ashley, I'm an introvert and I have to push myself out to. To engage and ask people these questions. And I find that one of the things I need to somehow switch in my thinking is I. I need to get away from the efficiency quotient, or I'm not saying it right.

I don't have to be so efficient about everything. There's a big push, I think, on using our time well, every. Making the most of every moment and, you know, not wasting time. There's a whole lot of conversation that could feel like wasted time or it's not the most Efficient time. If you're just trying to get things done and I, I, I, I have to somehow switch of. Well, that's okay.

It doesn't have to be efficient. Efficiency isn't the highest goal. But I, but I think in our culture, for a long time that was, I don't think that's the case so much now, but for some people, at a certain point in time, it was, yes, you want to use your time well. You don't want to waste any time. Well, if that's your mindset, there's a whole lot of people who are going to waste your time.

Ashley Holleman:  Yeah, yeah. And that puts a lot of pressure on you. Right. And you and the, your conversation partner, like, man, this has got to be, like, the best conversation they've ever had. Or, you know, that's horrible. Like, no, what, what if we just. This is just one of many conversations that I'm going to have with this person. I don't want to take it for granted, but I'm also like, this is not the final one. This is not the only one. Let's just see where it goes. And there's a lot of fun and a lot of just adventure and, like, seeing where the conversation will go. Um, and maybe, I mean, we, I don't think we should grade ourselves in these things, but it's okay if it's a solid single. You know, it doesn't have to be a home run every time. Maybe it's a single, you know, maybe, maybe, maybe you got to walk. That's okay. Keep, you know, you'll, you'll have another conversation. Maybe the pitcher hit you, you know, maybe something bad happened. You'll, you'll, you'll have another conversation. So, yeah, just relax. I think that's what I'm trying to tell myself is just relax into the relationship, into the conversation, and just see where it goes. Beautiful things happen when I just let God kind of lead it. And I was like, how did we get here? I don't know, but I'm so glad we did. This is a great place.

All right, so let's help people, though, think through that. Could be awkward, could be difficult, but could be absolutely beautiful. How do we transition conversations toward the spiritual, toward the gospel about Jesus? How do we, what are, what are some skills about that transition?

Heather Holleman:  Well, what we've discovered is if the four mindsets are operating. So if you're curious about people, if you're believing the best about them, you're expressing concern and sharing your life, what's going to happen is you have what the research calls a warm connection. And so when it's time to talk about Jesus, it's not going to feel like a pivot in the conversation or a sales pitch. For example, if you're asking people, you know, what's been the most surprising thing about their week, which is a great question, and they say, oh, I was really struggling with this one thing, blah, blah, blah. They're going on and on. And then they say, what about you? Did anything surprise you about your week? And you say, yeah, actually, something really did surprise me, and it happened at church. Can I tell you what I was learning about Jesus? So many times I do that with my colleagues, and nobody freaks out because I have a warm connection with them. I'm just sharing my life. It never feels like a, okay, stop now I'm transitioning to a spiritual conversation. It's just part of the conversational flow. Sometimes you do, though, and Ash is much better at this than I am, and it's. It's part of my training in evangelism. At some point, when you're in the spiritual category, you do need to then say, you know, I've been talking a lot about what I'm experiencing about Jesus. What are you thinking about Jesus now? Or where are you, like, so keeping it in that category, and then having a moment where you actually talk about what it means to be a believer, you know, what it means to receive Christ into your life. So. But again, the beauty of the warm connection, it's a lot of people say, you know, Heather, how do you seem to get into these conversations and you still have friends, you haven't been fired? Well, there's a warm connection. And so you'll find that evangelism becomes really natural and easy and not awkward at all.

Ashley Holleman:   So, yeah, I think a convicting thing for me is Heather. Basically, Heather was describing sharing your life. That's one of the four mindsets that when we get. We get to talk to in a conversation. If it's just the first three mindsets and you're not sharing your life, that's an interview, not. Not a conversation. And so, A, I've got to share my life and be real about what's going on in my life. And then B, I guess two things. Are there things that God is doing in my life? Do I have something to share?

And do I genuinely think that they are precious to me? So that when someone says, well, what's really going on in your life?

I talk about what God is doing, A, because he is, and B, because it really is important to be. Not just like, well, as a Christian, I probably should say something about Jesus here as a way to get into a gospel conversation. No, I'm genuinely saying it because I'm as more excited about that than I am that Carolina won a basketball game two nights ago, which I'm, you know, always talking about with my friends. So I think that's, for me, is the challenge is just with that warm connection, having things to say about what God is doing in my life and wanting to say them to my friends. They really are precious to me. They aren't just a means to talk about God with them. That actually really is what I'm most excited to talk about.

So. Good. So I want to underline something you just said. You said, I want to talk about this, about what God is doing in my life, because you said two things. Because he is and that secondly, because that's important to me. And then I want to throw in a third of. And I've reflected on it. See, I think that that's what some of us don't take the time to just be still and, okay, what is God doing in my life? Where do I see him, or. Or where is he working? And I haven't seen him, but, oh, he is there. That is a blessing. What am I grateful for?

I forget where I just read this recently, but. But one of the enemies of gratitude is that we just become accustomed to what God. To all the good things that God is doing in our life. And so we just take that for granted, and then we complain about anything that's also taking place.

Ashley Holleman: So, yeah, yeah, we pray for, like, five months over something. It happens. And we take  seconds to say, thank you.

Heather Holleman: You're confirming my dream for my next book, which is my research on savoring and positive rumination and how bad we are at it. And this command to delight yourself in Lord, it's really. It's really a lot more complicated than just making a gratitude list. No, this is one of the most important things Ash and I have been learning when we do workshops all over is how convicting it is when we ask a group of people, even pastors, how is God at work? What story would you tell today of what he's doing in your life? And what theme does it connect to? So if your neighbor's really struggling with anxiety or fear, do you have a story ready of how God has worked in your heart in that way? And sometimes, you know, I sat at a table where people said, I've never thought about this. I don't think about God this way. I don't know how he's working in my life. So that is a great area of development. And it's exciting to be the type of person who's always thinking like, okay, God, how are you working? Even passages of scripture that he's using in your life. Because I love integrating God's Word into conversation because I feel like it has a special sacred. I don't know what the word is not. I don't know what the right word is. But when I use it in conversation, I feel like God's word is living and active, comes alive in a special way in someone's heart. And oftentimes they'll ask me about things I've read in the Bible. And, you know, but it's because I've thought a lot about it and think about the passages that he's using in my life. So, yeah.

I think it was on a podcast that I was listening to out called the Hidden Brain. I don't know if you know that podcast. It was with npr now it's kind of a standalone. And it was this whole thing about enemies of gratitude. I think they were doing it right before Thanksgiving. And it was this idea of taking things for granted. And the illustration that they used was we, we've gotten so used to air travel, we just take it for granted that we get on this big hunk of metal and it takes us often, we fly hundreds, thousands of miles. And so we've just taken that so for granted that now the only thing we're doing is complaining if they're two minutes late. Hey, they said we were taking off at . It's . I gotta be somewhere. And so the last time I flew, which was just recently, it was, this is really rather amazing hunk of metal. And in a few hours, I mean, if I was walking, it would take me. I could tell this. My phone tells me this would take me  days to walk.

And if I was driving, it would take me  hours, but it's going to take me three hours.

Heather Holleman: Boom.

How's, you know. So I think the more we can cultivate that mindset of seeing God's blessings and his greatness all around us, then you're right, it will spill over into these everyday conversations that we have.

Heather Holleman: Marveling. And then you're marveling, which the research shows is one of the most joyful and healthy brain states. When you're marveling with someone and in awe, you're closer and you're less Depressed, closer to people, less depressed.

So we need to bring this to a close. But I'm really hoping this is helpful for our listeners and viewers.

The idea of engaging in conversations. It's good for us, it's good for them.

It really helps us recognize and celebrate that God has created people in his image. It's a way for us to extend love and concern for people in a world and a culture that's really starving for that now.

Any last things you want to mention as we bring this to a close?

Ashley Holleman: I was just one, like, nd story. I was in the Bojangles. I was in a whole minute. Oh, good. I saw the long version. No, I was in Bojangles in Charlotte about two years ago, right after Covid was kind of coming out of COVID I was the only customer in there. So the manager comes up to talk to me, and I had been realizing that he has really had this dynamic, energetic, you know, in a good way, loud manager. I'm hearing him manage his team and he comes over just to check on me. And we're talking and. And I'm asking, just this stuff is fresh in my mind, and I'm asking these questions and these mindsets, and he starts sharing with me all the deep things that are happening with his management, with his. With his team at this Bojangles. And he just stops and says, wait a minute. Why am I telling you all this? I don't even know who you are.

And I said, well, I think what is happening is that God is creating a warm connection between the two of us.

Whoa.

Ashley Holleman: And he was like, yeah, I like that. And so anyway, I love that. That's what. That's what I think of when I think what could happen in this next conversation. I think of my friend in that restaurant and the moment that we had together simply because we were believing the best. We're being curious. We're sharing our life and going through the conversational pathways that we talk about in six conversations.

Nice. Heather, any. Any last thoughts there?

Heather Holleman: Well, when you were talking about pushback from the audience, when you were talking about how people were like, what if I don't care about people? The other pushback we get. The last thing I'll say is this idea of, is it biblical to believe the best about people? When you look at Romans , what if there are people that vote for the wrong political candidate or have views that you think are morally reprehensible? Like, you really think these people are evil? So I have Christians saying that to me, like, this isn't Biblical, where I'm going to hate these people. Well, two things. Number one, if you read Romans , there's no kind of constraints on what it means to bless those who persecute. You value others above yourselves, that kind of thing. Number two, it's clear that our battle is not against flesh and blood. People are not the enemy. Satan is the enemy. Those two principles have really helped me. And to think through. Your job is not to win an argument. When you're talking to someone, your job is to love them, learn from them, believe the best. So my neighbors who vote for a different political candidate or believe things I don't believe, instead of arguing with them, I'll say to them, I can tell you care so passionately about this issue. I would love to know the story about when you started to care about this. That is the realm of narrative. You're out of the realm of argument. That is what you want. You'll have a warm connection. And the research shows people are more likely to change their mind when there's a warm connection like that. So if you're interested in helping people believe different things politically, your best chance is the warm connection, not coming at people with hatred and an argument.

Boy, that's really important.

I'm sorry to hear that. That's the feedback you get, but I'm not the least bit surprised.

Heather Holleman: Right, right. It's not been a lot. Just a few. A few radio interviews and a couple of emails.

So, yeah, yeah.

And what a chance for us to incarnate or reflect or display the gospel. I mean, in a certain sense, we're all reprehensible. We're all terrible rebels against God, and still he chose to send his son to die for us. His love is not conditioned by how good we are. It's the exact opposite. He loves us in spite of our sin or while we were yet sinners. Christ died for us. So we are the people who can reflect that kind of. No, I disagree with pretty much everything you believe. You know what? I'm still going to care about you because I want to reflect a God who cares about me even when I have sinned against him. So that's applying the gospel to these interpersonal connections. And Amen.

Heather Holleman: I like that.

What a great opportunity we have to shine like lights in a dark and perverse generation, as it says in the New Testament. Well, Heather and Ashley, thank you for joining me again. Welcome. Welcome back to Questions that Matter to our listeners and viewers. We really hope this has been helpful for you as you connect with the people that God has sovereignly placed around you, even the difficult ones.

May he use this podcast, all our podcasts, all our materials at our website, to help you grow in your love for God and your love for others.

Brought to you by the C.S. Lewis Institute and the Questions That Matter Podcast with Randy Newman.