What is it Like Publishing Christian Books? | Justin Taylor

We are back with another episode of the room for nuance podcast. I'm Sean here with Justin Taylor, Justin. Will you open us in prayer brother? Sure.

Lord, thank you for this day. Your mercies are new this morning. We pray that you would be with us by your spirit. Pray that we would honor you in this conversation that we would edify anybody who listens.

We pray this in Jesus name.

Amen.

Amen, Justin. Can you start off just by giving us? Three to five minute version of your testimony how you came to know the Lord. Yeah.

Grew up in Sioux City, Iowa going to a Methodist Church. I Don't know that. I heard the gospel a lot from the pulpit, but my mom is the world's greatest evangelical Evangelist and she tried to like teach all my Sunday school classes.

So Heard the gospel a lot growing up. Prayed the sinner's prayer when I was six, I don't. Maybe the Lord made me born again at that point, but I think that I really understood the gospel at an FCA camp in ninth grade.

Between my ninth and tenth grade year and you know the classic questions of If you were to die tonight Where would you go? How sure are you that you would be in heaven on what basis would? The Lord let you enter in and you know I was like, I think I'd probably get in and I tried to do the right things and I believe in God.

So just understanding Grace understanding imputed righteousness. It was like the lights went on in the room. So Whether I was converted at 6 or 16 not a hundred percent. Sure. Yeah, just know that I love the Lord following him and I think he had his hand upon me.

Wow praise God brother.

What is an executive vice president of publishing? Yeah.

Publishing a book publishing. Yes crossway books. Okay, it's in Wheaton, Illinois. I actually live in Iowa. So I work remotely.

From there. Have you always done that?

No, I was there for a dozen years and I was home. Our families are there and we relocated back there after COVID during pre-COVID. Okay, so you were. You were ahead of the curve.

Yeah, and it was a little bit. It was a COVID pun by the way.

Right. Yeah trying to flatten the curve. Yeah, and it was a little bit more Dicey situation before COVID like can we actually do this? Can we make this work especially as a executive vice president. But yeah, the Lord's Lord's been kind to us.

So we have a number of executive vice presidents so there's an executive vice president of of sales and of Operations and of the Bible publishing side and so I Oversee the book publishing side.

You have managed to not exactly tell me what you do. You told me that there are other executive vice presidents and what they are over. Yeah.

I think the easiest way to say it is that that I am in charge of what books we are evaluating and bringing in and Oversee that the publishing committee. So the way it works in publishing is You know, you might write a great book and you did write a great book.

I should you're not paying me to say this but on the plane ride down here read Rival to your will and really appreciated what you wrote. So, you know that you didn't just write that book and send it to a publisher and they said yeah, we'll publish it.

Authors propose books and they say here's what I want to write. Here's who I'm writing it to here's how long it's going to be. Here's the argument. Here's how it's different from other books. And so we're fielding proposals bringing them in Evaluating them crunching the numbers kind of putting them through a theological grid so I do other things, but that's the the heart and soul of Evaluating which books Crossway is going to publish and then we decide as a as a team and there's a who's on the committee.

You want names?

Is it just like, you know a couple random people around the office?

Yeah, like the president of our company is on the committee and a guy's representing sales and editorial. So the kid it's it's kind of a mix of different folks that kind of look at it from different perspectives.

Do you funnel those to them? Do you do you kind of sift through?

The massive proposals and give them what you think are the best. Yeah, so roughly each month. We'll be looking at 10 to 15 different proposals that have kind of made it to that level. Sorry, 10 to 15 out of what like a hundred.

I don't even know. I mean, there's Submissions at crossway .org if anybody out there has an idea they can send it and you know, it gets funneled. Some of it happens through relationships. There's book literary agents who kind of our filters for certain projects, but Once we get it there.

We have a whole kind of evaluative system where we're scoring every project so that you know. It's there's always subjectivity when you're evaluating a book, but we're trying to bring some objectivity to it.

So we're we're scoring, you know. The the writing style the content how much the book can distribute so it might get low on One part and get really high on another part might be brilliant writing might not sell a ton of copies.

So we're trying to just think through it from a ministry standpoint. Crossways a nonprofit organization and I love working there as I get they've got just a heart for Global missions and seeing the glory of the Lord extend throughout the earth.

Yeah.

Man okay so many threads to chase there. Let's start with this. You when you get a book and You are excited about it. Yeah, can you push it through? Can you come in and be like guys? I'm Justin Taylor.

I'm the executive vice president of book publishing. I have a track record behind me. We should really do this and get behind this. Or do or you do kind of hands-off.

Trust the committee. Yeah. Yeah, it's a little bit of a balancing act. I I can pretty much turn down any book I want but I can never green light a book on my own. So there might be books that I'm really excited about and I don't always get my way and I'm glad in the way that everything's set up.

We evaluate as a team and Pool the collective wisdom would begin every single meeting with scripture and prayer and just ask the Lord like we know we could do this. In our flesh, we've got talented people in the room, but we want to be led by the Spirit.

We want to make God honoring decisions. And so yeah, there there are books that I think like I think the committee may have missed this one.

But.

Sometimes, uh, you know, I be outvoted. So it's not like my vote or the president of the company Josh Dennis like his vote is weighted more than anybody else. It feels like 98 of the time we reach a consensus and we're pretty happy with our Decisions, but you know at that point the whole books not written.

We usually don't ask we don't want. Authors usually write. Don't write a whole book and then send it to us write a couple chapters. Propose it send it to us and we can evaluate it. You know, we're not infallible and we don't know how books are going to do.

You know where you have to kind of put down a number of how many do we think this book is going to sell? So we're trying our best and we don't know everything but yeah, we're trying to serve people.

Yeah, like to read good books. Is there is there a book that you have passed on that you regret?

Paul Miller's the praying life. We. We looked at it and we just thought oh, I don't know if this quite works. We didn't have the whole book. Yeah. But looking back like man, that was a book we should have published.

So that was that was many years ago, but we I think we missed on that one. Yeah, and now we're publishing a lot of books with Paul and The praying church is his follow-up book that we had the opportunity to publish.

So we we got that one. Nice.

Is there a book that you've published that you look back and you go?

We probably should have done that if there was I probably wouldn't say.

Maybe like a distant.

Yeah, I'll say that we we published Mark Driscoll's books, oh, yeah.

And.

You know listening to Mike Cosper's podcast is Interesting podcast. Objectively, but also as somebody who published his books trying to think did we miss that? Were we part of the problem or? Was that a justifiable decision in the time at the time?

Those are hard things, I mean, I think clearly now with some of the things he did in terms of his Pastoral way of approaching people and handling things it was it was not the right fit. It was time to to move on so none of those books are in print anymore.

But.

As I think back like I'm not evaluating somebody else I'm evaluating my former self right. And I want to be gracious to my former self in the sense of like. Yeah in the future when you when things become clear things get revealed.

Hindsight's 2020. So there are things like that where we Publish an author there's a moral failing we have to move on. Not because we're trying to punish them because we feel like we have a stewardship to say to readers This is this is somebody who is qualified to to teach and we trust they may not be perfect.

We may not agree with every jot and tittle of what they're saying. But we're putting forward something that not as just good content, but somebody with godly Character is standing behind it. Is there a scenario where you will publish a book from someone that.

Later down the road. They might fail like like Mark did or they might move from the faith. But you think that the book itself is worth continuing to publish.

No.

It which is a distinct question from is the content still good, right? So, you know, there are Mark Driscoll chapters or you know, if we had published a book by Josh Harris I looked the other day at that, you know, he wrote a book called humble orthodoxy back in the day before he Apostatized and left the faith.

That's I mean you look at that book. It's very good content. If somebody didn't know who wrote it they would read it they could be edified by it. He's saying true things. He's saying encouraging things.

He's saying convicting things. He's saying insightful things. And so somebody Leaving the fold doesn't change good content and yet at the same time. We don't feel comfortable Continuing to put that forward You know because somebody could pick that up and think I'm just assuming that this is a trustworthy author.

This is somebody worth following. I want to follow them on Instagram and So the content can be good. It can be worthwhile even reading but as a publisher we don't feel like we should be continuing to stand behind it in that way because it's not just purely a Transactional thing for us, you know, we're not just in it to To make money.

We feel like we have some spiritual obligation to serve the church.

That seems super wise brother. You have been around the young restless and reformed movement for a while I guess. Even is it a movement anymore? But if it's not you were kind of there from beginning to end and you've seen a lot of that.

A lot of brothers fall away sisters to. Yeah, would you care to reflect on that. How's your heart. What does that do to. To your own faith, you know, yeah.

Yeah, it's been a sadness I Was gonna sound weird. I don't think I've ever actually told anybody this but I Keep like a Microsoft Word Timeline on my computer just because I don't have a great memory with dates.

Like if you said when did you start your blog? I don't know. 10 years ago 15 years ago. So I just started like I'm just gonna plug in dates personal life just even professional things, you know when did I come to Crossway and At the end of it I started keeping a little list of like there's people who wandered from the faith people who got disqualified from ministry for Adultery or for alcohol abuse and you know, I hope that list doesn't continue to crow but it's sad and it's just a reminder of Guys that I prayed with and hung out with and shared life with and who are no longer walking with Jesus or some of them are but you know our our divorce now or have Committed grievous sin and Is it doesn't it doesn't shake my faith.

It makes me sad and lament. I've tried in those situations here and there to to keep an open line of communication. You know, so somebody like Josh Harris We weren't best of friends, but we with a few other guys try to get together once a year or so and just hang out and talk about ministry and.

Greg told us that it was at one of those meetings with Tully and that the idea for what is the mission of the church.

Came on. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, right and totally and I think it was driving the car and talking with Kevin and. So yeah, we we get together. We talk about ministry stuff. We talk about what's happening. And so like with somebody like Josh, I I wouldn't want him to ever think like, yeah, we were friends.

When we were both Christians and now that I'm not a Christian. Never heard from these guys for the rest of my life. So, you know, I don't text him or write him regularly but it try to just drop a line here and there and just say, you know thinking of you would love to see you at Some point and you know, I've I've asked him before What do you think about Jesus these days and just see if there's you know, can we keep any any line of communication open?

So what kind of response do you get from that? I It's it's complicated question for me and you know, maybe maybe we can talk in person which I you know, that's that's fine by email, but. Yeah, I I look forward to any opportunity.

I could never have I I just don't want to be one of those guys that. That because somebody leaves the faith. I I write them off and and never tried to reach out. So there's definitely sadness. I mean the the movement I think it exists.

I think it had its heyday, but I don't think it's like that. You know the emergent church like that that just morphed into something different. I mean, it's still people who are progressives and Yeah, I think the the YRR thing still exists maybe just in a different form maybe hopefully in a in a more chastened humbled matured form to some degree but I think it was a force for good.

I think there was probably a lot of lessons.

Yeah, amen, brother, and maybe we'll come back and talk about that more. Back to crossway and publishing stuff. I have heard that most Christian books that are published are not profitable and That a lot of publishing houses kind of.

Like they are. The bills get paid when you get the big fish. So for crossway that might be something like gentle and lowly like a gentle like a bestseller like that. Kind of pays the bills for the next ten years.

Accurate inaccurate. I think that it's accurate. I don't know as if it's really as accurate with crossway, but I think that there's some Publishing houses where they have they might have more of that model.

Years ago I heard I think Donald Miller talking about he'd written blue like jazz and he was under contract to write a follow-up book and He was he just couldn't pull it together. He was late on it and he found out that his publisher like they had to lay people off because they were They were banking on that cash cow coming in and so crossway doesn't have that model.

There are books that that way outperform other books and they are super helpful for the rest of the company, but Yeah, we tried to evaluate with each book We've recognized saying a more academic book is not going to sell to the same degree there are some books where We're probably not going to make any money on it Long term, but we we feel you know for ministry reasons like this is a really Valuable project, of course, you can't do that with all projects or you don't have a job so it's great when you have that intersection of books that are genuinely edifying and Serve the church and a lot of people recognize it.

So, you know Kevin's book biggest story has done really well and Dean's book on gentle and lowly and So that's that's what excites us. I think I've never worked for another publisher. I I personally would hate to to work for a situation where There's books that make a lot of money in order to kind of fund books that I think are really edifying.

You're really helpful or I'm really discerning some. Hopefully what we're publishing the crossways all.

Gentle and lowly, I'm a contrarian a little bit. Yeah, and everyone was like Oh gentle and lowly and I was like, whatever I read it didn't know how much I needed it. It's so good. First chapter I was like, okay.

And and then I saw several months later that.

Free copies were being given away. How many were given away in total? Do you think? Yeah, I'm not sure there was a. Somebody who came along and funded a lot of just had a heart for that book and had a heart for God's people and said I'm gonna help you guys.

Distribute. Yeah, and who was thousands?

His name was Sean DeMar.

And but then you did the same thing with the Rediscovering Church. Mmm book with Lehman and Colin Hanson. Did someone come along and do that or is that just crossway?

Yeah, I can't remember with that one. I think that somebody may have said that we want to help there and it was a TGC nine marks crossway and just a huge desire post kovat. Yeah, like.

Guys remember.

Church, yeah, you don't just get to stay home and yeah and download it. Yeah, so that was a it was kind of a cool project for those guys to come together. Yeah, and say let's let's rediscover what church is and what God's plan is.

When you guys did that the first gentle and lowly which I know somebody else paid for but still I mean you guys probably Ate some a little bit on that too. If somebody's gonna pay for it. You guys probably were willing to accept Less profit as well.

And then the rediscovered church book. I just thought What a fantastic testimony to crossway because you guys say like this is ministry first. But a lot of people say it's ministry first. But when it comes time to like actually put your money where your mouth is.

That is not always the case. And so I was really encouraged by that. I know a lot of people were really encouraged by that and it had to be Encouraging for you to know like man this is the company that I work for it that I've given so many years of my life to and hopefully I will continue like Yeah, there just had to be a feeling of like deep Thanksgiving to the Lord for that.

Yeah, absolutely and I want to just publicly honor Lane and Ebeth Dennis who Lane's parents founded the company in the 1930s as a gospel track company and and their thought was The gospel needs to go out but tracks shouldn't just be Poorly designed that there should be beautiful design to go with beautiful content that was their heart back in the 1930s and then Lane and Ebeth in the 1970s started the crossway part of it with Publishing books eventually added the ESV Bible on to it, but they're just such humble godly people that Literally Lane has never led a meeting that I've ever seen without opening up the word praying and explicitly Just commending ourselves to the Lord asking for his help asking for his guidance for his Blessing upon the company and you know.

So all of the the money that comes in is is kind of being tied towards global projects. They've got this million Bible campaign. And so there's there's folks in the company who just get up in the morning thinking.

How can we? How can we do theological famine relief as Bill Walsh? Calls it at crossway, you know, like there's there's not just physical famine going on in other countries but there's theological famine and there's you know, prosperity gospel infiltrating and pastors who don't have.

You know, they they might not even have a physical Bible and they don't have copies of resources. And so it is really gratifying and humbling to work for a company that it just has that heart for ministry.

Okay, so on that note I can think of one two three. Probably keep going and you can probably think of them with me. Publishing companies that probably started off with the same mission and vision who have since Abandoned it or severely compromised it.

What keeps crossway on the narrow path. What will keep crossway? Yeah, I.

Think this is not just the the Sunday school answer, but the grace of God.

I.

I have said to my colleagues Let's just not ever assume just because the Lord has been faithful in the past or we have been faithful to him. That that's going to just continue Till kingdom come that we need to consciously not just assume but but put that forward before us that we We want to be faithful.

And we you know We are explicitly as it's part of our bylaws that we want to publish in kind of the historic reformed stream and that can include Lutheranism Anglicanism Baptist Presbyterian.

Reformed.

But we you know, we have kind of a confessional framework that we're seeking to operate in. But yeah, you can write a thousand bylaws and that's not going to keep you faithful. This can always be contravened, but we have a godly Board that that oversees we have, you know, godly leadership and.

Yeah, it's When you do good things you get encouragement and Then you have to decide how am I going to think about this encouragement this this praise these these accolades. Are we going to give the glory to the Lord and ask him for more?

Are we going to start to think like yeah, we're all pretty good at publishing. We win these awards and the Lord's really lucky to have us. Exactly and we can laugh about that. But that that can subtly infiltrate an organization mindset and so yeah, I think ultimately what is keeping us what is going to keep us as the grace of the Lord and Related to that is just a conscious Reliance on the Holy Spirit.

Lane would quote from I Think it's Francis shape Francis and he is Shaper. I think Eve Schaefer wrote the book tapestry. And she says in there kind of an anecdote about her and Francis Schaefer sitting there together at their kitchen table.

Wondering what would happen to ministries and organizations if somebody? Physically cut out all of the verses in the New Testament about relying on the Holy Spirit. Like would any decision-making Be different and I said wait, you know as we look around to organizations a lot of them would just operate in the same way and so I think.

Consciously relying upon the Spirit and asking the Lord for help and for wisdom and you know the book of James style. We lack wisdom. You're the only wise God you give it freely to those who ask and so we're asking.

Wow. Praise God.

I'm gonna have to go look look up that.

That's that it's from either Edith Schaefer. Yeah, okay, and my my blog is like my filing system.

So yeah, we're coming back to talk about the blog.

But yeah, I threw it, you know that quotes on there someplace. Just search my name and like a quote.

Okay.

Some time ago there was a Particular internet Presence person. I someone said their name. Who was like, yeah, I'm thankful for crossway. They've published my books in the past and without them Doing that my movement probably wouldn't have taken off but They're starting to go sideways.

They're starting to go a little.

Thoughts on that.

Yeah, do you know what I'm talking about? Yeah. Thoughts on how people go sideways or no thoughts on the idea that crossway is kind of shifting to the left. Yeah, okay.

Yeah, I think.

I.

Think whenever anybody says that Whether we're talking about crossway TGC T4g, I think the first question is always like oh, why do you think that? Because I think sometimes people can just say things and then things get repeated enough that somebody starts to think yeah, that's true.

Everybody's saying that. So that would be the first question. It's just like okay. What's the evidence? Where where do you see that and kind of putting the ball back in somebody's court and saying? Well, that's interesting thought like, you know.

Tell me why you think that versus just kind of repeating something that that somebody's said. Yeah, I think you would be hard-pressed to find a lot of evidence that that crossways going woke or drifting left.

I mean you're complementarian, you know, you don't publish any egalitarian stuff. You don't publish any weird side B. Sexuality stuff, right, right. Yeah, maybe maybe race stuff. Maybe that's the angle there.

Yeah, you know.

Yeah, I think I. Sometimes Anything or anyone who is a multi-directional puncher? And and isn't just only punching left is accused of. You know not being faithful to the team but I you know I think biblically like We we call it as we see it and we combat errors and there can be errors to the right and there can be errors to the left.

So, yeah, I I mean if you look at an issue like Abortion, I think we've published two of the best resources. There are Scott Klusendorf's book case for life and Marvin Alaski and leaves Leah Stavis new big book on the history of abortion.

I just finished it and it was fantastic. Long, right, you know homosexuality. We've got Kevin de Young's book on what does the Bible really teach on homosexuality and You know if somebody wants to say that John Piper's bloodlines.

You know, I don't think you have to agree with every jot and tittle but you go back to that book and it's faithful. It's seeking to go back to Scripture. It's not talking about CRT it's trying to say like what is what is Genesis and what does an Ephesians say about?

Book of Acts about race and about what the Lord's doing and trying to think through biblical principles.

So, yeah.

Crossway doesn't publish biographies. Not true. Okay. I was talking with Matthew Martins. Yeah about Raymond Johnson's book. Yeah, I said, well, have you gone to Justin with it? And he said, oh, they don't really publish biographies.

So there's a distinction between memoir. So you're calling a liar. Just checking.

No, I.

An autobiography or a memoir tells one's own story. So what you did with Christian focus. Christian focus, right? Yeah, that's rebel to your will by multiple copies for friends and family. Thanks brother.

Cuz I'll tell you what Christian focus ain't ever. It genuinely is a.

Searing.

Insightful book and praise God for your story. That's a John genre that we have historically shied away from. And we don't say that it's wrong to publish it. You know, we're glad for your book. I hope that Raymond's book gets published but a Personal experience story just tends not to fit what we're trying to do.

We have published biography. Which is a story of somebody else's life a little bit more historical. So so two recent examples. We don't publish a lot but Steve Nichols did R .C. Sproul's biography Lucy Austin did Elizabeth Elliott's biography and we're doing a Think this.

Yeah, we've talked about this a little bit publicly. But lives of faith and grace is a new series for and a middle school on up kids. Like on Martin Luther, you know What I'm Katie Luther short kind of biography series for kids and I think aunt Coughlin told me you guys are doing one on.

Lemuel Haynes. Yeah, yeah, he's written. I'm excited about that. So yeah, you do do biography. Look at that.

Yeah, but you just don't do much of it. We do biography but not kind of autobiography memoir, right?

Okay, 21 servants of sovereign joy. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, I can't. When I heard about that it blew my mind because I've listened to those John Piper. Yeah so many times. When I said I'm going to be interviewing Justin Taylor, what questions should I be sure to ask him?

I got a bunch of crazy questions, obviously. But one of the questions was will you do some kind of compilation for J. I Packers stuff in the same way that you've done it for for Piper stuff.

That's a good question probably not. For some somewhat complicated reasons of when we did it with Piper he really has only published with like three or four publishers mainly crossway a couple with Baker.

As it was easier to kind of corral all that Packer his career spanned 70 years and he's publishing with British publishers and American publishers. We have republished or kind of licensed a number of Packer books rediscovering holiness.

Keeping step with the Spirit knowing God. So if you go to crossway .org and type in Packer because he's some beautifully designed new books probably not Collected works. There is a collect and shorter writings of Packer it's four volumes if it's not widely available, but if you can get a hold of it, it's really worth its weight in gold.

It's kind of his his shorter writings and Nobody, nobody did it better than Packer packing stuff in. He used to say Packer by name Packer by nature.

Hey, do you do you want to hear a little factoid? Sure. I found out the other day that I said, no. Oh, well, I'll do it. Anyway, I Found out the other day that all answer females. Did you know that? No.

Yeah, if they were males, they'd be called uncles. Yeah.

Good, right. Okay, I heard that you. You had a dad joke contest with a little boy, is that true? Yeah, that is true. Did you hear that from Ed Moore?

Yeah, yeah, and I won. You won. In your face little Jimmy. Maybe if we have time at the end, I'll tell you Ed Moore's favorite joke. Okay, okay.

Let's talk about you. That's the way to get the listeners to keep us. Oh, yeah.

Yeah at the end if you can make it all the way. You and John Piper, yeah. So many threads to pull on here. Let's start with this. You were the editor and you were you were basically you did everything for a fetch fetch.

Fetchscript am I saying? Fetchscript is the German. Yeah, let's. Can we not come up with an English word? That's better than that.

I still don't know how to spell it. I need to read.

What does it mean?

Compilation. Yeah, I it's just basically a book to honor somebody.

Certain stage of their career. Okay. Here's my question. Yeah a little premature. No, yeah. Were you looking at him thinking? Ah, he's gonna go anytime soon. Now. We got to get this out. Yeah, what year was that?

I mean that was probably He's 70. You're bad with dates. No, I'm very major. You need your document. Yeah, I've got my laptop. Yeah, it feels like it was like 10 years ago. Yeah, but you know 10 years ago.

He was probably 65 years old. So kind of traditional retirement date and. You know, he was pastor for 33 years at Bethlehem.

But he's writing so much in like the the last stage of his life. I don't hope that doesn't sound bad. But I mean he is getting old. He's what. 70 78. Yeah the last stage of his life.

I mean, he's cranking it. Yeah, but he's always cited Jay Christie Wilson. I think he heard at a Conference who said like I wrote a book a year from age 70 to 90 and that's what I want to do.

Did you read his? Little blue book on lifelong learning.

Yeah, we've in conjunction with Bethlehem College and seminary where he basically is laying out like this is our philosophy of education of Learning and that's what the school. It's a small college and seminary is trying to say like learning is is really important for You know, why do you teach kids to to read so you can know the Bible and then You know one of the taglines of school is Reading the great books in light of the greatest book For the sake of the Great Commission.

Yeah, so I love that vision. I.

Read it. I was blown away. I was not expecting that. You know how it is with Piper books. You've read one you've read them all which is it. We say that we joke about that, but it's really not true. Christian hedonism is Infused and everything he does.

But when I read come Lord Jesus, even though I didn't agree with all of his eschatological conclusions I just thought oh man if I would have read this kind of eschatology book as a young Christian I would have cared more, right?

So anyways when I read his book on lifelong learning, I was blown away. I bought a bunch of copies. I'm gonna have our guys and in our elder training read it. I mean, it's just so good.

What did you like about it or what stood out to you? This is where we flip it. No, it's there.

Yes, you know, I don't know that I can succinctly and clearly put it into words. But I I am an intuitively curious person. I'm a bit of an auto autodidact. I don't have much of an education. I mean like I don't have any education.

And and a book like that Is like the Christian hedonism fuel. I need to keep doing what I'm already doing, right? Be inspired look at the word look at the word in the world and Be amazed by it and spend the rest of your life exploring the glory of God and in the place where he's put you.