Episode 2: Where Do You Feel The Tension?

In this conversation, Jo Hobbis and Christie Penner Worden explore the complexities of conversations between parents and children, particularly around identity, sexuality, and the unexpected nature of children's questions. They discuss the importance of being prepared for tough questions, the role of trust in these conversations, and the need for flexibility in beliefs. The dialogue also touches on the impact of technology on how children seek information about identity and the emotional aspects of navigating identity changes, including grief and hope. This is a deep dive into The Me I Was Made To Be: Helping Christian Parents Navigate The Identity Conversation by Christie Penner Worden.

Transcript

Jo Hobbis (00:02)
Well, here we are again, episode two. I'm very excited to see you again, Christie

Christie Penner Worden (00:06)
Great to be here, Jo. Looking forward to the conversation.

Jo Hobbis (00:09)
 So you and I have sat down very intentionally to have this conversation. And I'm imagining that people listening have probably done the same, especially if they're reading your book or they've read your book alongside their friends. But conversations with kids aren't usually like that. They're often far more spontaneous. Yeah, you're laughing because you know it's true. ⁓ And I feel like they usually actually happen in unexpected places at unexpected times.

Christie Penner Worden (00:26)
Yeah. Yeah.

Jo Hobbis (00:36)
I know that I often have the best conversations with my sons when we're in the car. Or sometimes a kid in my Sunday school group will suddenly just drop a massive bombshell about something that happened in their world that week. And then I've got to stop what I'm doing and help them unpack it a bit. And I also feel like those kind of chats don't always take as long as we would like them to. So I think this might.

Christie Penner Worden (01:01)
Hmm.

Jo Hobbis (01:04)
might be particularly where I live in the UK, but my car journey might only take 10 minutes. Or after five minutes of chat the kid in the group might just run off and join in the game that their friends are playing, having sort of thrown this massive thing at you. So given the sporadic and spontaneous nature of kid conversation, how do you think parents can be ready to talk when the child wants to?

Christie Penner Worden (01:31)
I think there's a few ways to come at this and a few ways to prepare yourself that don't include reading all the research, for example. That's one option. You can definitely arm yourself with as much knowledge  as possible, with as much scripture as possible. That won't necessarily be  how a child is hoping you'll answer. That might not be the way that is best for them for you to answer.  But I think what

we can expect is that the questions will come when we least expect them, like you said, or the  direction of the conversation,  you don't get to steer as much as you thought you would. So I think there's one thing that needs to be acknowledged first, if you get one of those questions that sort of catches you off guard, or you realize, ⁓ we're doing this now. Like this, I was, I didn't, I didn't think it would happen now. I didn't think it would happen at nine or I didn't think it would happen at 12.

And I think the first thing to acknowledge is that child trusts you enough to have brought something that even you think is hard and heavy. So if a child brings a question that you find hard or heavy, complicated, whatever it is, there's a moment where I think we need to take a deep breath and honor the trust that they're showing us in that moment to be able to say, thank you for trusting me with that question. That's a big question.

Maybe you didn't mean for it to be a big question, but that feels like a big question to me. The next thing you might need to say is, can I think about it? Just because a child has asked you a question doesn't mean you have to have all the answers, mostly because you don't. You don't have all the answers. But then more importantly, I think we can take our posture from Jesus in this, that Jesus often responded to  questions or conversations or

even almost riddles, it was almost like he was given a riddle by the Pharisees sometimes. And he had  three general, I'm generalizing, but three ways of responding to queries that would come his way. The most  popular way for him to respond was to first sit down. So I think  physically slowing down our bodies in that moment, and that might mean if you're in the minivan.

with a car full of kids and one blurts out that question that you didn't see coming, just take a deep breath. Even if you only have five minutes in your drive, there is enough you can say to honor, acknowledge, and build that trust. Like, woo, that's a big, I don't know if we can answer that question in five minutes, but here's what comes to mind first. But the first thing Jesus would do is sit down. Another thing Jesus would do was ask a question.

So it is okay to answer a question with a question. Like, can you tell me more of what you mean? Or I'm not sure I understand the question. Can you ask it another way? Or is this what you're asking? Or what makes you say that? There's all kinds of ways that we can ask for more clarity around what they're asking us and hoping we know than just assuming. So one of the other issues with  conversations around identity is that we assume identity means one thing. And it certainly does not.

It might be identity around someone's disabilities. It might be identity around sexuality or gender that does come up. It might be identity around a job or a vocation. It might be identity around words that have been spoken over a child or a bully has spoken to a child that we need to release them from. So identity, they might not be asking what you think you are just because you're feeling sensitive to the fact that an identity conversation around sexuality and gender is bound to come at some

So I would say  clarity is kindness in those conversations. So slow down, ask questions. And then when you get a bit more clarity around where  the conversation, where the child is expecting the conversation to go, the other thing you can do is tell a story. Jesus often told a story. And so you can even tell a personal story or say, can I give you an example of where I've seen this show up? Or can I give you an example of something I know is true in my life?

The last thing Jesus would do, and I would almost encourage us to let it be the last thing we do as well, and I'll qualify this, is the last thing Jesus would do, or the least frequent thing Jesus would do is quote scripture as an answer to a question. Now, the reason I say be careful around that is because Jesus only quoted scripture to those who had access to the scriptures. So was usually around the Sanhedrin or the Pharisees or...

The Sadducees, whoever he was talking to that had access to Torah, who had access to the scriptures, he would speak in scripture back to them because that was kindness. He was speaking their language. Using scripture as an answer to a question with a child who does not know scripture or would not necessarily understand that reference just isn't kind. It doesn't... 

help a child better understand or come to a conclusion about their question, if your answer is, well, the Bible says this, they didn't ask the Bible, they asked you. So I think being vulnerable and answering from a personal standpoint, or I don't know being your answer is a much kinder way to respond. And it can be, I don't know, but this is what I know Jesus said, or this is what I know Jesus has taught me.

Jo Hobbis (06:56)
Yeah.

Christie Penner Worden (07:14)
So introducing the person of Jesus rather than simply the words of scripture becomes really important in developing that relationship. They've already told you you have relationship. Why? Because they asked you the question. A child is not going to ask a tricky question to someone they don't trust. So you might need to digest that before you dive in. But the pace at which we take questions from kids really matters. And the amount of depth that we take in

Jo Hobbis (07:29)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (07:41)
also matters based on who the kid is, how well you know them, and if that child knows who Jesus is.

Jo Hobbis (07:48)
Mm, yeah, that's really good. Do you think that identity around sexuality and gender is inevitable to come up?

Christie Penner Worden (08:01)
That's a great question. I think  it's inevitable for a parent to want to bring it up in my very personal experience. I want to talk about it because I want to know what my kids understand. I know being part of the public school system, for example, which isn't everybody's experience, but being part of the public school system here in Canada, I know what's in the curriculum. So I know what's going to come up at what age.

Jo Hobbis (08:07)
Right, yeah.

Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (08:28)
 for each kid in which grade. And so I think it's important to know what's being addressed outside of the home and what is going to be talked about outside of the home. And I generally take those as opportunities to learn from my kids. What did you learn? What did they say? What did they teach? What did this, you know, they'll bring in guest speakers, they'll bring in organizations. How did they talk about this or this or this, or what did they talk about? I think a curiosity around how it's coming up.

at school or in social groups is inevitable. think parents hold a deep curiosity for what do they know, what do they not know, what can I get ahead of, know, especially when we think it's a dangerous conversation. I think curiosity is really important. It is not inevitable that your kid will bring it up. It is inevitable, I think, that you will want to have the conversation, especially when dating starts or crushes start or... 

One of your children has  a friend whose family member identifies differently than any of your family members. I think there will be a need to have the conversation, but not necessarily in a way that you expect or have prepared yourself for. So the inevitability of it may be, but the control you get to have over the conversation or the framework that you're hoping to have it in.

Jo Hobbis (09:35)
Mm-hmm.

Christie Penner Worden (09:55)
You might either need to go ahead of your kid or be really flexible and be a really humble listener when it does come up.

Jo Hobbis (10:03)
Okay, I'm going to address the elephant in the room because of course, is there any other? You have acknowledged there is a tension in this conversation and just thinking back to our previous conversation, episode one, you touched on

Christie Penner Worden (10:09)
Oh, is it a pink elephant? Tell me it's a pink elephant.

Jo Hobbis (10:30)
how for some people the book pinches, whereas for others it doesn't go far enough. And so that got me wondering if there are people who pick up your book, who hope it will be more like a handbook that is going to help them steer their child towards becoming the person they want them to be, or at least not the person they don't want them to be. How do you respond to that?

Christie Penner Worden (10:52)
Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, it's, well, it's, I've read reviews to that effect  by many people where  some will say the book is wordy, just get to your point. And I think that the point is, if I have a point, I have defied the conversation. I have.

made the conversation particularly uncomfortable for some, whereas for others it then becomes, well, Christie says, or I read this. And the truth is I don't qualify myself as an expert of anything other than figuring out how to have a better conversation. And a better conversation means not having all the answers all the time, not expecting to and having the humility to learn from someone

that might be your eight-year-old child that might be  an 11 year old on a Sunday morning at church and so the issue is does it go far enough or or does it does it not go far enough? The issue with that tension is that I think we need to live with it because where the identity where the identity conversation goes with one another and with a child is so

incredibly subjective and intimate, that there is a very deep caution I  would ask us to walk with. Meaning, some of us have had this conversation and have landed in places that have caused grief or caused sorrow or caused fear.

And so there is an intimacy to talking about identity and it pinches for us as well. I've been told who I am in ways that I do not agree with. I have had adjectives label my identity that aren't particularly flattering. We know what it feels like for identity to, I wish you would just ask me, I would tell you. I wish I had a chance to respond.

Jo Hobbis (13:07)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (13:12)
so many ways that a conversation around identity can pinch simply because we've made decisions about it before we've had it. One story I will tell and I won't betray this person's identity in telling it, but one family that I know who has walked with their eldest  through  gender identity change. So  this person is a transgender

female.  The one grief that they have struggled with in depth is that at one point in their parenting journey, they had a son and two daughters, and now they have three daughters. And so those preconceived notions around having a daughter or a son and what that might mean, one of those preconceived notions around son had to die.

and there is a deep grief in how that change impacts the whole family. And I will tell you, I'm not sure if that family is a God-fearing family or a Jesus-following family or even disciples of Jesus. I don't know if they know who Jesus is. And I say that intentionally because it's not the point. There isn't less grief if this is happening to a family outside of relationship with Jesus. And there's not

Jo Hobbis (14:38)
Yeah.

Christie Penner Worden (14:39)
necessarily more grief because you're walking it out with Jesus and you think there's a right way for this conversation to go. The things that come up in our identity shifts in parts of our story are always intimate and always very personal. And it doesn't matter whether it's gender or for example, I talk about one of my own kids losing her sight and how being visually impaired was the thing she really hoped

Jo Hobbis (14:46)
Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Christie Penner Worden (15:08)
I would get my head wrapped around rather than, she's been miraculously healed. That was the thing I needed more. And so I think we need to be really cautious around the pink elephant. And it might be our own pride. It might be our own bias or prejudice that is preventing us from having a loving conversation. It will inevitably be intimate for someone who's struggling with identity.

Jo Hobbis (15:31)
Mm-hmm.

Christie Penner Worden (15:37)
It will also inevitably be intimate when you show your hand as a parent and things aren't the way you hoped they would be. ⁓ There are, you know, dramatic car accidents that happen where a child who may have been a hopeful in professional sports can no longer play that sport. There's all kinds of ways that we have dreams and imagination for our kids in their future that come to an end for one reason or another.

Jo Hobbis (15:57)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (16:05)
sometimes by choice, sometimes not by choice. And it's just really important that we leave the space for the unknown. And in that space of the unknown is where we actually surrender to the power of the Holy Spirit to speak identity into that person  for the sake of the kingdom, rather than I had really hoped or I'm really sad.

Jo Hobbis (16:15)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (16:30)
or I don't know how to have this conversation and releases the I statements back to the person who gets to make them on their own about who they are. With or without Jesus, they get to have those conversations and come to those conclusions. And you have the opportunity, if you are so fortunate to be invited into the conversation, to walk through it with them. And so I think leaving space for the unknown is one of the most important gifts

Jo Hobbis (16:53)
Yeah.

Christie Penner Worden (17:00)
we can give when we finally acknowledge that there is an elephant and it is in the room and I might be the most uncomfortable one with it.

Jo Hobbis (17:09)
Yeah, yeah. I think that's really interesting what you say about, you know, potential for people not being able to do their sports or whatever. But there's loads of different ways that identity is shaped, that it means lots of things. And ⁓ it's not just a gender thing. And so when my son was diagnosed with ADHD, I know you know this, because you walked through it with me, that was

Christie Penner Worden (17:24)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

No.

Jo Hobbis (17:40)
bit of a grieving process for me as well a bit of a shock moment that he'd had that label put on him of you've got ADHD. But actually, in walking through that with him, it's helped me to understand better who he is and him to understand better who he is. So but as his mom, I grieved a bit because

Christie Penner Worden (18:01)
Yeah.

Sure.

Jo Hobbis (18:07)
I thought, nothing had changed actually, nothing had changed about him at all. He was still great and amazing and all the things that he had been before, he just had this sort of new thing that the world attached to him and says, this is your identity. And I didn't want that to be his identity. So.

Christie Penner Worden (18:11)
Right!

Yeah, right. But it's also

when we have these, you called it a label when we have it, whether it's a diagnosis or something else or something we've learned about our child, sometimes those things can make other pieces of who they are make better sense.

Jo Hobbis (18:40)
Yeah, that is true. Yeah, that definitely happened.

Christie Penner Worden (18:42)
Yeah, and I

so I think while there is grief and you we are entitled to experience those identity moments exactly how we do some of them we need to remember to do privately with Jesus and maybe not in front of the child  come to terms with it  privately whether with a friend or a partner or a spouse  before trying to unpack it with a kid but

Jo Hobbis (18:56)
Hmm

Christie Penner Worden (19:10)
making sure we recognize that that's that might be part of who you are, but that's actually helpful to know because now we get to learn how you learn. We get to figure out what you need in order to be your best self or to have fewer challenges as well. So there is an idea of of walking in that space like Jesus would making the burden easier and the yoke lighter because we have more information and knowledge is so powerful in that space.

Jo Hobbis (19:20)
Mm.

Mm.

Mm hmm. So acknowledging the tension and the pink elephant. Tell me what it was like for you as you were writing the book. You must have felt some tension yourself as you were unpicking some things. And I'm fairly certain that you knew it was going to open the way to some spicy conversations. So tell me how you navigated that.

Christie Penner Worden (19:45)
you

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, spicy conversations for sure, especially early on when when I was learning and learning how to do exactly what I hope the book encourages us to do, how to not  funnel people into a certain type of conversation, how to honor their disagreement, how to honor their fears ⁓ without necessarily giving their fears the loudest voice in the room.

 I felt the tension  mostly out of fear. My tension was was footed in fear and it was the fear of getting it wrong, the fear of offending someone and the fear of leaving someone out. Those were all things that led to a place where some people might feel I didn't go far enough. But if you think I could have gone further in in one area or another, please know that I wanted to.

in certain places, but Jesus gently reminded that there is a person that I would be cutting out of the kingdom quilt or the story of the kingdom if I did so, and that it wasn't, I was not called to name who is included in the kingdom and who is not, that that is entirely up to Jesus, the work of the Holy Spirit, and that person. And so my effort was to

clearly identify that all humans are made as image bearers. Being an image bearer is not what you receive at salvation. The Holy Spirit is what you receive at salvation. Being human and having breath is what makes you an image bearer. And so the inclusion of who gets to bear the image of God was  a great relief to me to come to that place of, wait a second.

talking about being image bearers isn't something that came after Jesus. It's something that comes very early in scripture. In fact, in the first and second chapters of Genesis. in the very beginning, God saw us as made in God's own image. And so...

Jo Hobbis (22:05)
Yeah.

Yeah, and

I love that. I love that. But it also really challenges me because ⁓ I'm running through all the people in my head that I think shouldn't be that. That's really awful, it? Sorry. But, ⁓ you know, there's definitely people that I know that I don't actually want them to be an image bearer because that doesn't fit who I see.

Christie Penner Worden (22:21)
Hmm.

Right.

you

Well...

Right. Yeah. And I think not everybody knows they're an image bearer. There's that piece of it. And then there's other aspects where I think people have rendered out the image of God far smaller than it actually is. And so the great imagination, the kaleidoscope of God's image, it created in me this profound longing

Jo Hobbis (22:50)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (23:14)
for all people to know that they are an image bearer because we miss out when they're not included. What do I not get to know about who God is if that person isn't invited into the kingdom? It's not that they don't already have the image bearing potential. It's the Holy Spirit who unlocks that potential. So they need Jesus. So absolutely in order to see that image bearing quality or that

Jo Hobbis (23:18)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (23:41)
prism of light that shines through because of the Holy Spirit, it might not be visible to us because of the absence of Jesus in that person's life in that moment. But that should compel us to a life of witness and compel us to a holy curiosity for the image of God in others. I think that's so important that we go after that. They have the image of God knit into who they are, according to Psalm 139.

Whether or not they have the capacity or the spirit to reflect it, that's what we need to be hungry for. That's what really gave me the courage to walk in this tension. Now, I think it would be remiss of me not to also mention what I believe the word tension means. And I go into quite a bit of detail in the book about it, but tension and hope go hand in hand.

Jo Hobbis (24:38)
Yeah.

Christie Penner Worden (24:38)
for me.

And I think just saying it like that, we can feel it. Like hope holds a tension. It's uncertain. There's a lack of certainty when we use the word hope. In that uncertainty is the power of Jesus Christ to resolve the tension, the power of the Holy Spirit to speak into that tension. But in Hebrew, actually, the word for hope is tikvah. Well, tikvah has a twin word and it also means the tension a cord can

Jo Hobbis (24:47)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (25:07)
hold when stretched to the full. So for the listener, if they want a bit of homework, go back and read the story of Rahab in the Old Testament and read about the Tikvah that she threw out the window so that she would not get missed in her family being saved from the invasion of Israel. That she threw out

a red rope, we know this, that she was to throw out a red rope and that was how they would know where Rahab and her family would be in order to save her. But she threw out a tikvah. It was also her last hope. It was her only hope of being spared from the demolition of the city where she lived. And so when we look at the word hope and tension being the tension a cord can hold when stretched to the full.

Just know that it's okay to hold tension in your hope. You have hopes and dreams for your kids. There is tension in that because at some point your child either gets to agree with you about who you see them to be or inform you about who they believe God made them to be. Or you might have to wait longer than you're comfortable with for them to come into that relationship with Jesus in order to see the flourishing technicolor

prism of light that we know as God's image in them. Hope is filled with tension. Hope is something that we all have for our own kids and for other people's kids and for those we know and love who clearly are not living by the Spirit. The ones we think, well, hope nobody thinks that's the image of God. You know, there's tension in that, but tension is  matched by hope.

Jo Hobbis (26:53)
Hahaha!

Christie Penner Worden (27:02)
And if you don't feel tension in your hope, I invite you to go further in that.

Jo Hobbis (27:08)
Mm.

That's really good. I feel like we got quite heavy quite quickly today. Shall we lighten the mood? I'd like to know what was the last question you googled? I'll tell you mine first. Let me tell you mine first. my... Look, the last question I googled was how many teeth do adults have? I mean, weird.

Christie Penner Worden (27:19)
Yes, please.

Well, please do.

Okay?

Jo Hobbis (27:38)
But

it was an argument that my husband and I were having and I needed to settle it and just to put it out there, I was right. Okay, so I can't remember the answer, but I was right.

Christie Penner Worden (27:48)
I do it all the time.

I'm not surprised you were right, but what was the answer?

Jo Hobbis (27:55)
I think it was 32. There's going to be a dentist listening to this who's going to correct me now. Anyway, that's that.

Christie Penner Worden (28:00)
I just know that

I, as hard as this is to believe, this is one of those things that people who know me love to know about me because it's ironic in every way, is that I have quite a small mouth, even though I'm quite a big mouth. And I to have adult teeth pulled in order to make room for all my teeth. So for all of you who think I have a big mouth or a loud mouth or any of the ways you would describe my mouth, I actually

Jo Hobbis (28:22)
wow.

Christie Penner Worden (28:28)
physiologically had to have a small mouth and had to have adult teeth removed in order to make space for the smiley ones at the front.  So I know I don't have the right number of teeth. That's why I was curious. But to answer your question, the last question  that I Googled was how late the Walmart near me stayed open. And there was a very important reason for this. Now, our pharmacy is at Walmart.

Walmart also has groceries.  So at my best, I would be Googling that because I was worried we wouldn't have milk for morning or coffee cream for my morning coffee, or perhaps I had forgotten to pick up a prescription and just needed to know I could still get it in time. No, that is not why I Googled the last hour that I could get through the doors of Walmart.

I was up late watching the first game of the World Series, as you do in Canada when the only Canadian team is in it. And I was rushing home. I, of course, missed the best inning of the game because I was rushing home, but I wanted to be on the road and back toward my village in time to get to Walmart before it closed because I had this spectacular idea to change out the laces in my shoes. Yes, and I had bought these shoes at a thrift store, but I didn't like the laces.

Jo Hobbis (29:44)
Of course you did!

Christie Penner Worden (29:51)
And so I wanted to know what was the latest hour I could pick up ribbon. wanted broad ribbon, satin ribbon instead of laces for these shoes that I was dying to wear the following day. And I needed to get those ribbons before  Walmart closed. And I indeed did make it in time. And my shoes are now ribbon clad instead of laces.

Jo Hobbis (30:13)
Amazing, amazing.

That is the most Christie answer you could give actually. So the reason I ask this random question is because I think it's in chapter eight that you talk about how kids Google everything. And they really do Google everything. In fact, I had a conversation with my son who's actually 18. So, you know, he's not that young. But he said to me,

Christie Penner Worden (30:17)
You're probably right.

Yes!

Jo Hobbis (30:43)
what did you do before you could Google the answer to everything? And I was like, sometimes you just didn't know. And you just had to live with that. We were okay with not knowing stuff. So the generation that we're dealing with now, they're not okay with not knowing stuff because they're used to being able to Google everything. And so you're absolutely right when you say that, how many times have they Googled identity? Like all the times.

Christie Penner Worden (30:51)
Yeah.

Yeah!

Mm-hmm.

Right.

Jo Hobbis (31:14)
And all sorts of interesting answers came up, didn't they, when you you googled that one. But the one that really resonated with me was the definition of identity is who you are, the way you think about yourself, the way you are viewed by the world and the characteristics that define you. So is that the heart of the identity conversation? Is that what we're talking about? Is that how kids would define identity, do you think?

Christie Penner Worden (31:18)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

I'm not sure that's how kids would define identity necessarily, but I think it is the most cerebral answer or  the most open-ended answer. And I think it's a great place to start as a grownup because that particular definition  means you get a voice into who you say you are. Those who know you get a voice into who they see you as, for better or worse, but you are projecting

something of your identity. I mean, you just said that's the most Christie answer I could give. That comes from the knowledge of who I am and how I show up and the colorful life that I choose to lead and that why wouldn't I find laces boring when you can have ribbon.  But it also includes virtues or characteristics or beliefs and ethics of a person. And I think all of those things do culminate into your identity. Now,

Jo Hobbis (32:14)
Haha

Christie Penner Worden (32:39)
There's a couple of things I want to address in having said that. There's something that since I've written and published the book since September of 2024. just over a year, within a year, we've got what's called a zero click search. So what that means is when you Google identity, Google itself will feed you with an AI overview and give you a definition

Jo Hobbis (33:04)
yeah.

Christie Penner Worden (33:08)
rather than only give you search engine results pages that give you other places to click. And so what we used to do is we would ask Google, and then it would give us websites to visit. And we would choose based on whether it was  Christianitytoday.com, whether it was Quora, whether it was Reddit, whether it was Wiki, whatever it was, we would then have to click through, we would have to choose who we wanted.

Jo Hobbis (33:13)
Mm-hmm.

Christie Penner Worden (33:37)
to get our information from. Now, when I was little, I would have to go to a shelf in my  family, in the basement of our house, where the Encyclopedia Britannica would give us an answer to everything. And if it wasn't in there, it didn't exist. And if it could exist, it wasn't for us, as you said. Now, with the zero-click  search result, the other thing we need to acknowledge, since the book has come out,

Jo Hobbis (33:40)
Mmm.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Right!

Hahaha!

Christie Penner Worden (34:05)
And since we've learned to search things differently, is that Google still remains 90 % of the search that people do today. However, 10 % and growing week by week, 10 % of search is happening in Chat GPT.

Jo Hobbis (34:24)
yeah, now I almost brought that up because I realized that I started searching in Chat GPT as well, but it doesn't always give me, it doesn't give me the answers I want.

Christie Penner Worden (34:33)
Well,

I mean, I think that's the whole point is we can ask Chat GPT anything, but we are actually training Chat GPT by the questions we ask. So Chat GPT is then going to the worldwide web, as we used to call it and gleaning. And it gives you a little bit of everything without necessarily anywhere to turn next. It is a little bit like encyclopedia Britannica in that way that it's going to give you an answer and then

feed you the opportunity to ask a next question, but what it's doing is  guessing where you want to go with this. So, Chat GPT will actually shape the conversation if you don't get ahead of it. It will ask you a follow-up question and you might decide, I didn't think I wanted to know that, but now I do. And so, what you'll end up doing is going down a rabbit hole where it's gleaning for you.

and it may not be where you want to end up. ChatGPT also doesn't necessarily point you to websites. It may just give you lots of answers. You might have to ask ChatGPT, what is an excellent website that is a Christian website that talks about this, this, or this, or what are the top five books? You may have to ask it different questions. But I say all of this as a caveat because even since I wrote the book, the way we search for answers and certainly the way

our kids search for answers have changed. Certainly the way they give answers in  a paper or how they research has changed. our education systems are having to learn how to comb information that kids are submitting for AI. And there are ways to do that. But just know, I don't think AI is something to be afraid of. It's something to be aware of.

And it's also something to understand. You need to understand the way AI works rather than be afraid that it's going to give the wrong answer. It's going to answer whatever question you ask and it's going to answer it with the information it has. Well, AI doesn't have robust knowledge yet. We are still training AI across the world. So I just, would caution against being afraid of that search.  But also maybe go looking that way yourself

to see what comes up, how answering the question has shifted for you. Like grownups are using ChatGPT to find answers to legal questions or to find answers to  theology, especially. Like where are they getting this information? Where are we getting this information? It's all over the place. Pastors, I dare say, are using ChatGPT to refine their sermons on Sunday mornings.

Jo Hobbis (37:28)
kind of hope they are.

Christie Penner Worden (37:30)
What? mean,

Jo Hobbis (37:31)
Sometimes. ⁓

Christie Penner Worden (37:32)
it depends. But the issue isn't AI. The issue is how are we using AI and how are we encouraging our children to be curious about AI? Curious not just in how they answer, but is this answer correct? Does this answer resolve itself in agreement with scripture? Does this answer lead us to truth?

Jo Hobbis (37:34)
haha

Christie Penner Worden (37:59)
or does it lead us to more curiosity? And  any of those can be good, they can be helpful, but we need to be mindful about it. Now, I think a less frustrating answer that I can give is we have to hold identity or the definition of identity equally in two parts. There's identity in... 

who I say I am uniquely or who God says I am uniquely, that I am my own person. We might hear this  as you do you, know, or, well, that's your truth. That longing to be unique and to be different is real in how  we ourselves choose to be identified or want to be identified. And I think that resonates with scripture.

Jo Hobbis (38:40)
Mm-hmm.

Christie Penner Worden (38:58)
You are uniquely and wonderfully made. You are fearfully and wonderfully made. You are delightfully made. You are made in the image of God, that you are a co-heir with Christ. You're now siblings with the Son of God. There are family resemblances in that that are incredibly exciting, but we are unique in how we portray it. To the flip side, the other part of identity is where we find our sense of belonging.

So for someone who identifies, I'll just go there, someone who identifies with the LGBTQIA plus community or the 2S community, or  identifies with  the disabled community, whatever it is they identify with that, it's a sense of belonging that I feel understood here. I feel known here. I feel like I don't have to explain myself here. Just allow yourself to sit in the tension of uniqueness and belonging.

and that those things are not necessarily resolved. The other thing that we need to keep in mind is what Gen Z and Gen Alpha,  they won't necessarily use this term, but those of us older than them, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, we might not use this term, but we sort of raise one eyebrow or go, really, when a kid tells you who they are or says, this is who I am now, I've decided to be this, or I'm going to be this, or I'm gonna...

Jo Hobbis (39:55)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (40:25)
this, please call me by this, or they're asking for neutral pronouns, gender neutral pronouns, and it might feel like it has seemingly come out of nowhere. What that is, what we can refer to that as is the sincerity dilemma that somehow, somewhere along the lines, those of us that are old,  might feel like if you're, that your identity is wishy washy.

or your identity is static and therefore we want you to have a less wishy-washy identity. But in fact, what we're learning from this generation who talks about identity quite liberally and openly and sincerely, I think they're a very vulnerable group, is that you get to believe who I say I am today and if I change my mind next week or next month,

Or if I realize maybe that's not who I want to be, or if I have an encounter that shows me I am different than I thought I was, you get to believe me when I change my mind. And so there has to be a flexibility in that tension between belonging and  uniqueness for us. And that flexibility, that's that rope that's, you know, when stretched to the full, there will be give and take to that tension.

Christie Penner Worden (41:52)
that allows the kids and youth and young adults that we walk with to grow and change. If we know that a prefrontal cortex is not fully developed until the age of 25, how then can we expect an identity to be truly formed before then? We should anticipate ebb and flow in how we talk about who we are. If I were to have been tenacious to even who I said I was at 25,

Jo Hobbis (42:09)
Mm-hmm.

Christie Penner Worden (42:21)
opera singer, I would not have been able to wrap my hands around all the things that God called me to be that don't include opera singer. As an adult, I am grateful for the way my identity has changed and been shaped by obedience. There was a time in my life where I didn't think I could have kids and I didn't allow myself to dream of having kids, mostly because I felt

Jo Hobbis (42:33)
Mm-hmm.

Christie Penner Worden (42:50)
that I wouldn't be a good enough mom. It came from a place of deeply sincere insecurity. And so the gentle work of the Holy Spirit to bring me around to a place of not only are you going to be a mom, but you're going to have three quite easily in fact that I've called you to motherhood and you get to be a mom. That happened well past 25, certainly past

my ages of development and the age of reason and all of that. And so the sincerity dilemma is, can I tell you who I think I am today? And will you hold enough space for me to change my mind tomorrow? I want the space to be able to grow and change my mind about who I say I am, because I certainly hope that God is doing a new thing in and through me all the time. We need to hold on to that flexibility

Jo Hobbis (43:32)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (43:47)
for others. That if they say, this is who I am, okay, that's who you are, I'm going to believe you, or I'm going to ask questions about that, or I'm going to allow this space for you to say that, even if I disagree with you, because none of us are finished yet. As long as we have breath, there is time and space for the Holy Spirit to do something new or different, whether we know it or not. And so I think

Jo Hobbis (44:06)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (44:15)
defining identity differently than my kids would definitely sit in that  sincerity dilemma where my kids might change who they say they are or who they want to be. That age-old question, what do you want to be when you grow up? I think a much more interesting question is who do you want to be when you grow up? And Charles Mackesy does it brilliantly.

Jo Hobbis (44:24)
Mm.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Christie Penner Worden (44:44)
the little boy in, what is it, the boy, the horse, the mole and the fox, whatever order they come from. All of those things, it's so beautiful. There's the film version and the book version and neither is more beautiful than the other. They're just a different experience. But the boy gets asked, who do you want to be? Some form of that iteration. And he says, I want to be kind. And so I think this space,

Jo Hobbis (44:49)
and the mole. ⁓ Yeah, all of those things all in one place. It's just beautiful.

Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (45:14)
to ask who do you want to be with the flexibility of knowing that's going to evolve over time leads us to a far more curious and far more beautiful answer of identity. And it's actually encouraged me to stop asking the question, what do you want to do or what do you want to be? Because we are who, not what's.

Jo Hobbis (45:37)
Yeah, I love that. I love that. So I, another thing I love, I love lots of things about you, Christie, you know that. But in chapter nine, you say that all of us have to be permitted to change our minds. And I really love that because I think I lived for a very long time feeling like, actually, I didn't,

find Jesus until I was like 16. And so I didn't really have a framework for how this thing works. And I think for a really long time, I felt like being a Christian meant that I didn't actually have permission to change my mind. And so like the thing that I decided when I was 16, probably because of something I've been taught and not something I bothered to research myself, just something I'd heard.

Christie Penner Worden (46:22)
Bye.

Jo Hobbis (46:34)
I felt like that was something that I had to stick with because I was afraid otherwise I'd be called a hypocrite. So that sentence just really helped me exhale. Thank you. And then I remembered the story in Acts about Peter's vision. And I realized that God can actually show us how to change our minds and ask us to change our minds and find a new way of seeing and understanding how far grace can reach. So

Christie Penner Worden (46:39)
Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Jo Hobbis (47:03)
Can you tell me about a time when you have found that to be true and how has God helped you to see things differently or change your mind on a long held belief?

Christie Penner Worden (47:13)
Yeah, I think, I mean, this is a very pastoral, very I work in ministry answer. So just bear with me. But I was raised, the church that we attended as a family held very legalistic theology. And so things were very black and white. And the bounded set nature of the theology meant that 

most things were either right or wrong.

When I asked a question at the age of 15 that  pressed on the bruise of that black and white, pressed on the line between those two things, I was chastised for questioning the theology and in fact kicked out of the church for questioning that theology. And I took three months. 

because I was so curious and so hurt and so sure of who I thought God was and is, and it wasn't what I was being shown in the church, I spent three months trying to figure out what it means to love like Jesus and who God is and who is welcome. So this conversation for me definitely started like 35 years ago where I all of a sudden didn't belong

that my sense of belonging, my identity as a Christian in that church was stripped of me and my uniqueness was challenged by the questions I was asking, that I didn't actually have permission to see things differently than they did. I would say any long-held beliefs that I've had have come into question every time

I've engaged with another denomination. So I've been credentialed as a pastor in two different denominations. I've worked for ecumenical organizations that try to serve the broader, the global church, shall we say,  some of which have served the underground church or  a church in poverty across the world. And so how do my beliefs

How are they tenderized? Let's say literally with like a meat tenderizer. How are they tenderized by my white privilege? By my theological blind spots? What do I have to let go of in order to feel that I can minister to a group of people that I may not agree with theologically in all aspects? I just want to remind people that we're not called to agreement so much as we're called to unity.

and the outcome of both is so very different. We are one body in Christ. It doesn't mean we will see things all the same way. If that was the goal, God wouldn't have been so creative in how he knit each one of us together. He gave us different  imaginations, different ideas, different ways of learning. He has permitted and allowed a myriad translations of

God's word. And so I think we need to be really careful around the beliefs, the long held beliefs that we were either raised with or the things that get in the way of us having a conversation about identity.  Spending time in the Church of England with all the time I spent going back and forth to the UK. I didn't know that a Church of England could have a charismatic prophetic prayer service.

or that they would install, I mean, these are centuries old cathedrals in some cases that have installed stage lighting and have electric guitars and they don't use the pipe organ anymore. And I just, in my classical training as a musician, I can't imagine wanting anything other than the hymns and the pipe organ. And yet here I was and not one person was wearing a frilly collar. I mean, I probably was wearing a frilly collar, but no one else in room was.

Christie Penner Worden (51:30)
in a choir growth.

Jo Hobbis (51:31)
I mean, I

can definitely find you somewhere they still are as well. And that's what's very weird about the Church of England is that actually you walk through the door, you don't know what you're going to get. It's like a box of chocolates and some of them are nutty.

Christie Penner Worden (51:35)
Yes!

That's right. It is like a box of chocolate and it isn't... So no!

Yes, we might be allergic to some of them. But the thing I learned was you can agree theologically and you can come together. For example, if you want to research one such body, New Wine is all of Churches of England's that come at Sunday morning.

Jo Hobbis (52:02)
Mm.

Yeah.

Christie Penner Worden (52:09)
very diversely. And when we can come together, that would be true of most kids ministry conferences, in fact, that the hope is to be ecumenical and to learn how to serve today's generation well, regardless of the denomination that sent you to the conference. And so holding beliefs loosely doesn't mean being wishy washy in our faith. It means that some people might be doing it right and differently than you.

Jo Hobbis (52:16)
Mm.

Mm. Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (52:39)
that

the truth can be more than one thing. Now Jesus, of course, is the Way, the Truth and the Life. I feel like I have to say that in that place. But some things aren't crystal clear in scripture. And what that leaves room for is two critical issues in this conversation. It leaves room for the mystery of who God is in Trinity, in the person of Jesus, and in the presence of the Holy Spirit.

and in the God we see of the Old Testament. It leaves room for God to be God. And that is a mysterious thing that is  not for us to answer. It's a thing for us to hold space for, to hold as much space as we can for God's presence to do what only God can do. But then the other thing it requires us to hold space for is questions. Is this a theological stake in the ground for me?

Jo Hobbis (53:32)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (53:32)
Or is this

a place I need to sit with Jesus and wonder longer? And so those long held beliefs can become  sources of discomfort if they've previously been stakes in the ground and we have to reconcile whether they remain stakes in the ground or whether we get to allow the Holy Spirit to pull up that stake and walk us into the space of mystery again in order to talk about Jesus with people we've been

Jo Hobbis (53:37)
Mm.

Christie Penner Worden (54:02)
invited to speak to about who he is and what he longs for and what living like Jesus actually looks like and who Jesus spent time with. Who did Jesus hang out with? Where did he spend most of his time? Was it inside the walls of the synagogue or was it out in the community? And what do I need to let go of as a long-held belief? Potentially in order to spend more time in my community.

Jo Hobbis (54:34)
Brilliant. Well, I think we should stop there. I mean, I could talk to you all day and listen to you all day, but we've got... Sometimes we do. Those are my favourite times. But we've got four more episodes. So, you know, we've got lots more to say. Let's keep them hanging on for the next one.

Christie Penner Worden (54:37)
haha

Sometimes we do, just for the record.

We do.

Yeah, I feel

like where we've left it, Jo, I want to pray for the listener today because it feels like it feels like  we've left them with more unanswered questions than than next steps potentially so  Jesus you are the one that we long to look like that when someone looks at me or Jo I know that  the more

Jo Hobbis (55:03)
⁓ yeah.

Yeah, yeah, go for it.

Christie Penner Worden (55:26)
we look like you, Jesus, the more we get to reflect the prism of who you made us to be and who you are in such a way that it invites others closer. And it helps people feel safer to have tough conversations, even the conversations they don't wanna have, or even the conversations that they don't understand are shifting or why they might be shifting. So God, I pray

for a covering of your Spirit, a protection of your Spirit over the listener today, that anything that was not for them, they would slough off or you would cause a holy amnesia to fall on the things that weren't for them. But the things that you planned in advance for them to hear and wonder about, I pray for a holy curiosity and a divine imagination to capture the spaces in their mind, soul, and body

so that they would go further with you and dive into these questions with you, knowing that you, God, hold all things together and work them together for the good of those who love you. In Jesus' name I pray, amen.

Jo Hobbis (56:34)
Amen.