Hello and welcome to the Matthias J. Barker podcast.

This is a podcast about mental health and moving towards what matters even despite hardship.

I got to have a conversation with John Mark Comer who is a personal hero of mine.

My favorite preacher in the United States, he's someone that, gosh, I just feel like we've

been on these similar journeys for like the past, I don't know, 10 years and I've been

following his work, reading his books, listening to his sermons at his church, Bridgetown

in Portland and have just felt this resonance with how he expresses Christian faith, his

walk with Jesus and my own walk and my own struggles and values and that.

And so what's cool is just getting to talk to someone so like minded and I think there's

multiple times in this podcast where I forgot that we were recording a podcast.

So I, and I just know we have so much common ground.

So I use a lot of references and theological words and maybe some referencing different

authors and stuff without maybe doing a good job of defining terms and I don't know,

pointing out who different people are.

So if there's some points along the way that feel, I don't know, like we kind of get

into the weeds, don't give up hope because we loop back around to a place that's maybe

a lot more approachable, especially kind of halfway through.

I think we get into spaces that are really relevant, you know, whether you're religious

or not, whether you're kind of Christian or not and I think, you know, in my email with

John Mark, I just told him, hey, you're someone I deeply trust and if I'm going to have

a conversation that's really overtly about my religious values, you're somebody that

I feel, I don't know, that I trust and that if people were getting an impression of what

...