Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the ROM. I guess today is an old friend, Dr. Ryan Peterson. We taught together at Cedarville University many years ago and have been friends ever since.

He's a really good dude, really down to earth guy. Super smart. Yes, PhD for Wheaton College in theology, a master's degree from University of Edinburgh and a master's degree from Biola University.

He is an associate professor of theology at Talbot School of theology and Ballet University and is also the author of the Amago Day as human identity, a theological interpretation, which is the subject of his PhD dissertation in this episode.

In this episode, I wanted to talk about Ryan about the whole concept of identity. I know this is something that Christians often talk about. Our identity is in Christ. What is identity? Who are we, why are we here? And Ryan brings a lot of knowledge from the interaction between theology, philosophy, and social sciences.

He sent me a few articles on human identity from a sociological perspective, which were really fascinating. So I said, hey, I would love to have you on the podcast to help me navigate this conversation from a sociological perspective as it interacts with questions around sexuality and gender. So please welcome to the show for the first time, the one room, a doctor, Ryan Peterson.

You know, every now and then I have on guests who are scholars, who are also friends of mine and Ryan is certainly of that number. We both entered into Cedarville University as brand new professors. What year was that, Ryan? 2007.

You would just, you would just finish your PhD at Wheaton, right?

I was actually still writing my dissertation. Yeah, so I think I finished that three years into my time at Cedarville.

I took you three years.

All those new classes. Oh my gosh. Well, that's the biggest fear is like when you're applying for a job in your ABD, all but dissertation.

Schools are like, we need this thing done. And the candidate's always like, I probably all I have to do is just edit the last time, because I'm just about done.

But it's people like you, they cost institutions to say, yeah, we've heard that song in dance before.

How long we at Cedarville? I'm sorry, I left in 2009. You were there another year. Yeah, I was there seven years and oh, seven years and went to Moody Bible Institute, Spokane campus for a year.

And then made my way down here to Talbot.

Wait, I guess I maybe knew that a year at the Spokane and that campus isn't there anymore, right?

Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that was crazy. But it was a really wonderful year actually. It was a great time.

It was like, you know, a small campus we met in a church and all of the students had to live in rented housing.

So they're just living in the community, you know, like not being able to go into a cafeteria and have someone wash their dishes for them.

We've had to do all their own work. And so there's like a different sense of like learning to live as Christian adults, you know, in that context.

It was a really wonderful year. And then it's been awesome being here.

How long when did you come to Talbot then? So 2015, 2015.

Now, okay, so you've been there. Yeah, seven, eight years. Are you a full professor yet?

...