No Sanity Required
No Sanity Required is a weekly podcast hosted by Brody Holloway and Snowbird Outfitters. Each week, we engage culture and personal stories with a Gospel-driven perspective. Our mission is to equip the Church to pierce the darkness with the light of Christ by sharing the vision, ideas, and passions God has used to carry us through 26 years of student ministry. Find more content at swoutfitters.com.
No Sanity Required
Follow Up With Brody on Insights from Students on Staying Faithful in College
In this episode, Brody follows up on last week’s interviews with college students.
He highlights key themes, especially the importance of reading Scripture daily, which was a common thread in every interview. Brody shares why making time for God’s Word is crucial for spiritual health and also talks about the need to stay connected to a local church, not just campus ministries, and how this helps keep you spiritually grounded.
College is a time of freedom, and Brody reminds students to use it wisely, stay faithful, and be willing to swim against the current when needed.
Insights from Students on Staying Faithful in College
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In this week's episode of no Sanity Required, I want to follow up last week's episode and in that episode JB interviewed several college students who have worked at SWO, who are currently working at SWO, and talked about the struggles, the challenges, the opportunities and the things that maybe need to be thought about, focused on as you prepare to head off to college, or if you're a college student, or if you're the parent of a high school student and you're preparing them to go. It's just really good stuff. I love that episode. I thought JB did a phenomenal job, so, thankful for her, proud of her, I want to say thank you to everyone who participated. It was just awesome listening to all those young men and women talk about the Lord and their focus and struggle and all that goes with being on mission on high school and college campuses.
Speaker 1:So this week we're going to follow that up. I'm going to give you some thoughts that I came away with after listening to that episode and, uh, I'm real excited to share this. This will be a followup but also, I think, give uh some things that that we can take away from from all of those interviews and conversations combined, some, some themes, some common things that we heard that kept coming up and then how, that those would apply even to those of us who are well beyond our college years. Or if you're not going to college, you're going to go in the military, you can go to trade school, you can go straight into the trades, whatever. Just some things that every believer can take away.
Speaker 1:So I'm excited to get into this. I'm recording from my truck and I'm recording with a stuffy nose because we just got done recording a couple of episodes that we're going to be rolling out in the next couple of weeks and I swept really good in the super coop in the area where we were recording and now I'm having a crazy allergic reaction or something. I've sneezed 100 times in the last 15 minutes trying to get this thing started. So hopefully I'm done sneezing, Hopefully we'll get through this episode. I'm excited to bring it to you.
Speaker 2:Welcome to no Sanity Required. Welcome to no Sanity Required from the Ministry of Snowbird Wilderness Outfitters. A podcast about the Bible culture and stories from around the globe.
Speaker 1:Well, we just came out of we had last weekend we had our not this past weekend, which was MLK, but the previous weekend, so weekend before last now I guess we had our annual college event, our college retreat. It's a conference where we had we actually had about 600 people that were going to be attending that, which is for SWO. That's a full-size conference. I know that for some people in some venues that's not big. For instance, if you go to the Passion event every year, that thing's massive. I think it's 20,000 people or maybe more, I don't know. It's huge. But for us it's a big conference but it's still small enough that we feel like we can really connect with people, enough that we feel like we can really connect with people. With all of our staff, you know 70 or so of us involved and then over 500 people attending you know we're able to really connect with folks, network with people. And then the teaching is. I always love I love teaching, but I also love sitting under the teaching at the college event because there's always some part apologetics to it, you know, just defending the faith, understanding the validity and strength of our faith and our belief system and our worldview. It's very helpful.
Speaker 1:I found the focus this year was idolatry and two things that stood out to me that I found extremely helpful. First off, everything was good. Spencer Davis kicked off the weekend with a talk on. He looked at some things that we can take away from the incident where the Israelites made the golden calf out of the jewelry that God had plundered from the Egyptians and then they said this is our God, but this is also Yahweh. It's a representation of Yahweh Crazy story. Spencer did a phenomenal job on that talk. He adapted that talk from a breakout session he had done several summers ago I think 2020 summer and it's one of my favorite topics and talks that I've ever heard him do and he's a phenomenal teacher.
Speaker 1:On Saturday morning, John Rouleau spoke. John looked at the idolatry that is more ideological, you know, the idolatry of ideas in our age, and that was phenomenal. That's right in his lane. That's John Rouleau wheelhouse stuff, you know, and it was so good. And then I really enjoyed all of the breakout sessions. Sessions, um, we had three breakout sessions Hank Parker, rob Conti and Jake Schwarting. All all talk breakout sessions. The all of those were exceptionally well done, um, and pretty well attended.
Speaker 1:We, you know, we had. We had about a hundred people, we had about 500 on the books and we had a little over a hundred no-show, so about 20 to 25% no-show because of the snow. We had a little over a hundred no-shows, so about 20 to 25% no-show because of the snow. We had a lot of snow that weekend and we just had people. I think people are scared to drive, you know, people from the South, if there's snow they kind of freak out and uh. But then it was funny because, I mean, people came anyway.
Speaker 1:We thought we were bracing for and we saw that it was going to be single digit temps at night and five or six inches of fresh snow falling on that Friday. Going into the event, we thought, okay, buckle up, this thing, we won't cancel. Just so you know, we won't cancel. It doesn't matter if it's the storm of the century, we're not going to cancel it. Whoever can get here and get here and we'll make the most of it. But because, for a couple of reasons but, and I guess the main one being it's very difficult to reschedule something here. You know our calendar is packed, it's not like we could, and then for everyone that's traveling if people aren't able to come. They can't. You know, a lot of people have planned for six months to be at this event, some for a year, and so it's locked into their calendar. So it's just, it doesn't make sense for us to cancel something and I'll be honest, and I'm not busting anybody's chops here, this is not critical. But when it comes to canceling anything, this goes.
Speaker 1:We were talking about this at church last weekend. I was talking actually with my, my son-in-law, greg. We were talking about how quickly people will cancel or bail out, and I understand there's liability issues. You know, if you're driving a bus with a bunch of kids, I get that, I really do, and so I understand why people cancel. But like we had a bunch of almost every church in our community that weekend canceled Sunday services and I'm like I don't want to. I'm not being judgmental and I know I'm very opinionated, like most people, but that's insane. That's just crazy to me.
Speaker 1:How are you going to face Christians in Siberia that sneak in sub-zero temperatures to meet in underground churches during the Soviet era? What about Christians in North Korea, where they're already you know? What about Christians in North Korea, where they're already freezing to death? What about Christians in Muslim strongholds. You know where there's fundamental Islamic strongholds where people will be persecuted. It's just.
Speaker 1:I would hate to face Christians and say, oh yeah, we don't go to church if it's chilly outside or if there's a little bit of snow on the road. The snow came in Friday. People canceled church. Two days later I can tell you the roads were fine. So my opinion on that is run it, have church. If you can get there, great. If you can't, then that's your deal. But we're going to have church. I don't care if it's me and six people, my family will be there and whatever other folks can get there.
Speaker 1:So that's my rant about canceling church. We don't cancel church. We won't cancel church. We ain't doing it over my dead body, it won't happen. So if you canceled church last Sunday, I don't know what to say other than come on, man, come on, that's that'll make sense. Shame on you, so I love you, but shame on you, okay.
Speaker 1:So we did not cancel, we ran it and by Friday night session we had over 300 attendees here. And then we had some that said you know what? We're not going to drive Friday because the roads won't be plowed yet, but once the road, because the only way to get to Andrews is through either the Nantahala Gorge or the Ocoee Gorge. Now, if you don't know what a gorge is, it's a two-lane road that goes through a deep ravine in the mountains and it's curvy and it's, you know, consequential, and so you want to let those roads get cleared. We don't have any interstates coming here, you know. So it's tough to travel here. So we had some folks waited. I know there's a church from Augusta, georgia, that waited and came in on Saturday morning and I say man, hats off to them.
Speaker 1:And then we had several groups come in on Thursday. They're like, let's go a day early, we'll get ahead of the storm. And Josh Dunn in our front office got a call Friday, I think, or I think Saturday morning. There was a group that had come and they were staying in an Airbnb. Not everyone stays on site at SWO, any of our adult conferences. We have a lot of people that stay in town and they'll rent Airbnbs or they'll rent cabins, you know. And these guys had come in on Thursday night. They went to a house way up in the Nantahala community above Nantahala Lake. It's a mile up a gravel road that's curvy and steep and they were legit snowed in. They couldn't get out and then they were able to. They had Wi-Fi up there at this Airbnb. So they got in touch with folks in our office on Saturday morning and Jeff Garner and Josh Dunn Jeff is our transportation director, josh Dunn runs our front office them boys went up there and they got them, dug them out and and uh got their vehicle out and brought them to camp. Those folks were so thankful and, um, they got to be here for the uh all the afternoon and evening stuff on Saturday and then on Sunday morning.
Speaker 1:So crazy weekend. We ended up with over 400 people attending. So I mean, maybe a hundred didn't show, it was. It was awesome, but uh, then then. Uh, then Saturday night I spoke a pretty intense, for me probably the least enjoyable message of the weekend for people, but I felt a strong sometimes you just get a strong feeling of urgency and I preached on idolatry and what that looks like in our culture. It's a worship issue, you know. And so I looked at Isaiah 44 and I read 90% of that sermon. It was pretty intense. And then Sunday morning, zach preached and did a phenomenal job and it was more. His sermon had a little bit more of an apologetics field defense of the faith, actually a whole lot of an apologetics feel. It was very good and just strong, but anyway it was awesome.
Speaker 1:And then Rob's breakout was a little bit shorter than I felt like it needed to be. I didn't feel like he had enough time. We didn't give him enough time. So we circled back. Rob and I just finished on yesterday, as I'm recording this Yesterday, rob and I just finished on yesterday, as I'm recording this. Yesterday Rob and I filmed and recorded uh, the, the, the film team, our production team, um set up the onstage, um set up for recording, for filming those interviews, and Rob and I had, uh, we talked for an hour and a half, probably worked through his breakout. We're going to bust that into two episodes and drop those next week, but, um, so what? Uh look for that. And it's his.
Speaker 1:His talk was about just the importance of studying scripture, how to read and study the Bible. Uh, you know, just a really clear, clean conversation about the importance of and sort of practical thoughts on how to study scripture. So it was awesome, loved it, loved every bit of it. It was an awesome event. And then this past weekend we had MLK weekend. We had a winter SWO that just wrapped up today and MLK is our third winter SWO weekend. We have one more of those and that'll be present to stay weekend next month. But we're doing, we're, we're working through the book of Philippians at our winter SWO and, uh, so anyway, awesome weekend.
Speaker 1:There got cold weather here in the mountains. I know it's cold everywhere. It's unseasonably cold in a lot of places. We're in single digits. So you, you know these old, these old houses that a lot of us live in, old mountain house that I live in, it's just a constant battle to not have your water freeze up. So, and my y'all know, my water's on a spring, I'm not on a well, I'm not on city water, I'm on a spring and it is very difficult to keep that sucker from freezing up. But we're we're surviving and um.
Speaker 1:So I want to go into in this episode. I just want to unpack and share with you some thoughts that I took away from that, uh, that episode last week. I thought I'm so proud of JB, so thankful for her, I'm so proud of all the folks that participated, and so I just want to look at some common things that popped up in those interviews and some things that I think we can learn from it, take away from it and be encouraged by. So this will be a part two to last week's episode. Now, before I totally dive into this, just a reminder that I'm sitting in my truck and I'm recording on my phone, so the audio is never great and it always picks up every little movement. So I'm going to try to sit super still so it's not distracting. But if y'all know me those of you that know me or you've been to SWO I'm pretty restless in ADD and move around a lot, so I'm going to try hard. But anyway, let's dive into this.
Speaker 1:Here was the first constant that I heard throughout all of the interviews and that was the importance of daily Scripture time in the Word. I want to give you a couple of thoughts on that. One is and Rob and I are going to really be unpacking this in the next couple of episodes but just some thoughts on the importance of Scripture in your daily life. First off, I appreciated how Marley and I think somebody else said this too talked about how it was good to learn not to freak out on days where she missed her morning devotion With work and some late-night finals or study and preparing for projects or whatever. Sometimes the schedule just got crazy and she didn't get it in in the morning that time in the Word, and she said it was good to learn that she could come back to that. The Lord's not angry with her. There's still the opportunity to grow and spend time with the Lord the next day or later that day, and it just it reminded me of a principle that I learned a long, long time ago, which is that the Lord, I think, showed me I think it was through a book that I read, maybe, and this was talked about but you know, if you miss a morning of time in the word, don't freak out.
Speaker 1:But at the same time, I think we need to have a sense of urgency where if I get up and don't get time in the Word, then I'm going to feel a sense of urgency to get back in the Word. I think of it this way If you get a short night of sleep, let's say that you work late, and then you've got to drive somewhere and you get home late and whatever, for whatever reason, your normal bedtime is 11 pm and you don't get in bed till one o'clock, and then your normal wake up time is 5 30 AM, but on this particular day you've got to get up a little bit earlier. Just one of those perfect storms where you only get about four hours of sleep. Now some people will say, well, that's all I ever get, that's all I need. I would say to you that is not true.
Speaker 1:It's medically and scientifically proven that no one is going to remain in good health with four hours of sleep, and so for most of my adult life in my 20s, 30s and then just into the beginning of my 40s I would go to bed between midnight and one and I would get up between 4.30 and five. So most nights I would sleep in four and a half hours. Anybody that knows me knows this is true. Anybody that knows me personally closely has stayed in my home. That's how I rolled. I can remember going to bed at midnight, getting up at 4.30. That was a consistent pattern and actually doing a morning workout and then getting time in the Word and being ready to work by 7.30, 7, 7.30. That was my pattern. That was the way I did things, and I would make fun of folks that needed more sleep.
Speaker 1:Well, the joke was on me, because what happened? Is it caught up with me medically and I had some health problems in my early and mid-40s that were directly connected to that lack of sleep. And so you got to sleep. You need six hours minimum. You really need seven to eight hours of sleep if you're an adult, if you're a teenager, you need more. If you're a kid or a teenager, you need more because you're growing. But let's say for this you know you're an adult, you need seven hours of sleep. If you have a night where you only get three or four hours of sleep, that next night you're going to be looking forward to getting a good night's rest and you're going to need it even more and it's going to be a good night of sleep. I find that some of my best sleep is when I have a crazy couple of days super busy, lots of work, and then a short night in between. That next night I just crash and sleep. So good. Take that same principle and now let's say you have a day where you don't get time in the Word, you're not really able to slow down and just focus and reflect on the Lord and His goodness and spend time meditating on His Word. That next morning you should be so much more excited about and in anticipation of that time in the Word it's so critical.
Speaker 1:The other analogy that we use a lot here is at least that I use personally in my life and we try to talk about it here is think of spiritual hydration. If you are dehydrated, you need water. Think of yourself spiritually being dehydrated and you need the water of the word Jesus. Well, paul says Jesus through Paul, the Holy Spirit through Paul, says in Galatians I'm sorry, in Ephesians 5, that the sanctification is the washing with the word. And so you picture your mind and your soul and your emotional makeup and health being affected by this irrigation of the word of God through your mind and your heart.
Speaker 1:And so people will say I can't read good, I don't focus good, I have a hard time focusing. First off, that's a lie that you've believed. If you think I can't read the word of God, I don't focus good on it, that's just not true. You're choosing not to be disciplined to get the scripture in front of you and reflect and meditate on it. It's like saying I just can't focus on my wife, so when she's there I just get distracted and ignore her. Well, what kind of marriage is that going to be. So. Your spiritual health, my spiritual health, depend on time spent letting my mind be hydrated with the word of God.
Speaker 1:When I get up in the morning, the first thing I do is I get in an ice cold shower. I jump in an ice cold tub thing on my porch out from my bedroom. This morning I didn't. This morning I got straight into an ice cold shower. The pipes are in the back of my house and that water is about 45 degrees and it is awesome this time of year. So I get out of bed, feet hit the floor, step in the shower, take about a minute or two long cold shower, get out, drink about 20 ounces of ice cold water and I say that to say I feel like it alive and awakens my body, my mind. It hydrates my brain physically. You know that you need water. Well, think of the word of God doing the same thing for you. So this is where I'm going to get into.
Speaker 1:One of the other things that was common was people in these interviews saying I'm not a morning person. It's harder in the morning, I do it at night. But then you heard a couple of people say I've learned that if I don't do it first thing, I'll get distracted and get sideways. Let me say this to people that say they're not readers distracted and get sideways. Let me say this to people that say they're night readers I would say, yes, go ahead and read at night, but you need to start your day with a reflection on God's Word, because your mind has laid dormant other than whatever dreams you had. You lay in bed. When you wake up in the morning, if nothing else, listen to some scripture while you drink your morning beverage If it's a glass of water, if it's a Coke, if it's a cup of coffee and imagine that, as your mind is coming alive and awake, the word of God is saturating and hydrating it. So I would just say that I did hear a couple people say I'm not a morning person, so I usually read at night, read at night, but also read in the morning. And then I appreciated there was a couple folks that said I've learned that if I don't make it a priority to start my day, then I'll get busy and it won't happen. I would just say, to summarize the importance of Scripture imagine that your mental, your spiritual, your emotional, your psychological health and being healthy in those areas is completely dependent on the scripture and your meditation on it. You need the word of God every day. Okay, now the rest of this will go kind of quick quick.
Speaker 1:Campus ministry and local church were two things that were talked about and reminded me of the importance of spending time in fellowship through community and ministry. So I want to separate the two, and we do this with our staff that come to work here in the summer. Don't let campus ministry serve as the local church for you. It is an addition to the local church. So when you go to college, get plugged into a local church. If you're not going off to college, you're already settled into a career or you're a young dad or mom, your life is just getting rolling. You need to get plugged into a local church, and it doesn't have to be a cool church with all the latest, greatest technology. It can be a church that's small and rural, as long as it's faithful in terms of teaching the Word of God and it's a community of people that love the Lord.
Speaker 1:You need the local church. That's biblical, and you will find that, even though you think I don't have time, when am I going to go to church? How's this going to work out? It's easy to believe the lie that you need, that you need. It's very easy to believe the lie that you don't have time to go to church or that you can spend that time better on Sundays. Go to the local church, hear the word of God, fellowship with God's people. This is why the writer of Hebrews says don't forsake assembling together with God's people.
Speaker 1:Now the reason I differentiate or make a distinction between that and campus ministry is because a lot of students will get to school and they'll go. You know what? I don't have a good local church here, but I really enjoy crew. Or I really enjoy BCM Baptist Collegiate Ministry, or I really enjoy RUF Reform United Fellowship I think it's called. I might not be getting all the names right.
Speaker 1:There's different campus ministries that are faithful and are solid and I would say get plugged into those solid. And I would say get plugged into those. But if it's either or yeah, if you only can do one or the other campus ministry or the local church, I would prioritize the local church. So there's that and I would prioritize getting involved in the local church. So you're attending on Sunday, you're going to whatever midweek stuff they have if it's discipleship groups and homes or some sort of community group, something like that. Or if it's a Wednesday night Bible study, or go to that church on Sunday morning, be a part of that and then get plugged into a campus ministry for your midweek. Just make sure you're plugging in.
Speaker 1:And what I found is, if you're spending daily time in the Word, you're plugging into a local church, you're involved in campus ministry, that you're going to stay fulfilled and active and accountable and have community and so, anyway, all of that came up in the interviews and I appreciated that. I also appreciated what Laylee said about, you know, growing up in a church that's so faithful, so solid, she loves it so much that it was. She had to really check herself to not be overly critical when she went and started exploring church options, and so I appreciated that you might not find a church that's just like your home church back home. It might not be exactly what you want, but if they love the Lord and they're spending time preaching and teaching His Word every week and praying together, then find a church that's faithful and it'll be good. I also heard multiple people talk about how getting to college all of a sudden you've got all this free time with nobody telling you how to spend it, and so it's important to be aware of that and develop a plan. And that's where I think, between daily time in the Word set aside meditating on God's Word, reading God's Word, listening to God's Word, weekly time at local church and campus ministry, don't overdo it where you're just busy all the time. Your job right now is to be a good student, so don't get overly involved. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1:There were a few people, I think Dylan talked about local ministry opportunities. I remember my oldest daughter, kilby, when she was in college she was plugged into a local after-school ministry that was similar to the Penwell program that we are involved with. That she was involved with that. Little my wife runs, but you can overdo it with it. Little my wife runs, but you can overdo it. And so don't just wear yourself out and become a bad student or create more stress, but be plugged in and be so with all this freedom and autonomy. Don't waste that.
Speaker 1:As a matter of fact, we tell people all the time, as stressful and hard as college seems, it is the most relaxed season of your life that you will ever have. That's crazy, I know, to some people to hear, but I mean there's not going to be a time in your life where you can, in the middle of the day, go take an hour and a half long nap. There's not going to be a time in your life where you're going to have an inconsistent schedule where some days you don't have class. You know like some college students will stack all their classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. There's there's people that that go Monday, wednesday, friday, all day. They have nothing, so they're doing homework, working on projects. You're never going to have that kind of flexibility again. So, while it is stressful, you do have a lot of freedom and autonomy with how you're going to spend your time. Understand this you have a lot more time right now than you're ever going to have, and I know that may say. If you're a college student listening to this, you may think that is not true, but it is true. It is true. Life is only going to get busier. I didn't want to have.
Speaker 1:I have a thought on fraternities and sororities, because that came up a couple of times. Somebody, I think, said I'm not throwing off on fraternities and sororities and they gave a clarifying statement. But I would say man, I'm not the best person to talk about this because I think they're dumb. I think they're just dumb and they're a waste of time. People are like, oh, you need to get into that because it's going to help you with jobs later. Let me tell you something you work your butt off In this generation. You don't need a fraternity to get a good job or to be in a sorority. Fraternities and sororities everyone that I've ever interacted with they're a bunch of dummies and I'm sure somebody's listening will get fired up and say no, not ours, it's different. Well, I don't know them all. I'm saying the ones that I've interacted with.
Speaker 1:The college I went to they didn't have them. But I had a cousin who's been on NSR and I love him and respect him greatly. But I remember he was in a fraternity and I'd never been around one and he would refer to his brothers my brothers and that's what they call each other in the fraternity and I remember at his wedding there was a bunch of idiots there, a bunch of dummies. One of them hit on my wife and I almost went to jail that day because those guys, they were just idiots. They were all boozed up and I realized, right quick, I got a bad taste in my mouth for what a fraternity is.
Speaker 1:My brother was a Division I football player and had been seeing a girl and they were on again, off again. This was 25 years ago, by the way, more than that, about 27, 28 years ago and they were on again, off again. Then they were off again for good, but they still had a good friendship, I think. And she called him one night and she was at a frat house, a fraternity house, where they're having a party, and she had run into some trouble with some guys and she's like I just want to go home. I don't know how I ended up here. I think she was with a friend who took her to this party and my brother goes over there and he's like I'll get her out of there and we'll take her home. So him and a couple of his buddies, two of them who played in the NFL. After this they go over there to get a couple of girls and escort them out of this frat house. And it turned into a brawl. My brother put a dude in the hospital and was fortunate that it didn't cost him like jail time because he whipped this guy. This dude got in his face, he was drunk and if you know my brother, it is not a good idea to want to fight Duke Holloway. He's a freaking wildcat and so, anyway, that whole ordeal was crazy because Duke ended up getting hit in the head with a ball bat from behind and split his skull and he had to have a bunch of stitches and go to the hospital. But between him and his three buddies they hurt a lot of guys. I think they whipped about eight guys. It was pretty impressive. I think they whipped about eight guys. It was pretty impressive. So that's my two fraternity.
Speaker 1:Oh, I have one other fraternity sorority story. Little and I were driving to a family funeral. We were going to the Williams. Our family that lives in middle Georgia. It's the little side of the family. It's where we spend Thanksgiving week every year. They're some of our dearest and closest friends and family in the world, and so there had been a death in the family. We're going down there. We messed up.
Speaker 1:It was at the end of summer camp one year and I had fallen asleep. Little was driving. We got about two hours down the road and I said I need you to drive, I'm just hurting. It was on a Saturday at the end of summer and she said, yeah, I'll drive. Well, I said stay on this road, and I meant stay on that highway. But to stay on that highway you had to exit, otherwise it turned into another road, if that makes sense, and I fell asleep. When I woke up, she hadn't exited and followed the road sign. She had just stayed straight on that road. And it took us straight into downtown, down into Athens, georgia.
Speaker 1:And it was UGA, what do they call it? Pledge Week, I think it's where all the sororities, which is for women, and fraternities, which is for guys, are doing their membership stuff. And it was just. It was like Sodom and Gomorrah. It was the funniest thing, though they were all wearing like fancy dresses and the dudes were all in sports coats. It was funny, but anyway, everybody's drunk and partying. It was crazy.
Speaker 1:And then my last fraternity story was I was at one of my brother's ballgames one time and these guys they were pledging I don't remember what university, but they came over and sat behind. We were in the visitor's section, which is a big football stadium, and you've just got. The only visitors at a game like that are like for the most part were the family members of players. And so we're sitting there and these frat guys come up here and started beef with us and I got into a little bit of an altercation. So, anyway, I just spent a lot of time talking about fraternities and sororities, but I'm saying that to say I've just not had good experiences. I know somebody's going to say oh no, I'm in a fraternity and here's why it's great. Here's what I would say. Me and all the people I respect most have made it through life without being in fraternities and sororities. So I think you'd be just fine without wasting your time and money doing that garbage. So that's my thought the time and energy you would spend being a fraternity or sorority person. Put that into Baptist collegiate ministry, baptist student union, campus Crusade for Christ, which is known as CRU, something like that, or the local church. Okay, there I'll get off that soapbox.
Speaker 1:One thought is in your college years you have an opportunity to redeem what Little calls redeeming. How does she say this? Basically, she describes redeeming the little moments. It's the idea that throughout your day you're going to have opportunities and time throughout the day to meditate on Scripture. Let's say you've got to drive eight minutes. Then spend that eight minutes listening to Scripture, rather than Joe, than you know, joe Rogan or um, or your favorite band or or maybe listening to worship music. Just, you've got a few minutes to wait for something right. This morning I had about a 10 minute window and I knew I wasn't gonna be able to get into anything work related. So I spent that 10 minutes just talking to the Lord and and working on a verse of Scripture that I'm trying to learn. So just redeem little moments. You don't have to block off a whole hour for a big, long quiet time and then you're done for the day. Maybe you spend 20, 30 minutes in the morning reading in God's Word and then throughout the day you've got moments that you just kind of practically reflect on Scripture and talk to the Lord. You've got moments that you just kind of practically reflect on scripture and talk to the Lord.
Speaker 1:We heard a lot of people talking about the disappointment of losing friends who drift away from the Lord. I don't know if you heard a lot of people, but I heard that come up a couple of times. So just a reminder that you can be faithful in your college years. And something that I thought about is and this kind of came up in the interview when JB was interviewing Stein and that was if you can ramp up and go into college walking with the Lord, with some momentum and you let that carry you through that first semester. That'll be real helpful.
Speaker 1:I think if you get there and you get disoriented, you get behind the curve and you start making some bad choices. It's a slippery slope. So prepare to go and then prepare, be faithful. When you get there, just remain faithful. That's important, just being faithful regardless of what everyone else is doing. It's okay to be different, it's okay to swim against the current. Let's see, we talked about serving, giving of yourself for others, ramping up before you go.
Speaker 1:Oh, with that, it's not just that your friends are going to turn away and some of you might go to school and you don't have any friends going there. You know there's nobody there that is a believer. You're kind of on your own. You might have to seek that out, and I heard a couple people say seek it out, try to find some Christian fellowship and community. And a couple people said, if you can't find it, then start it, and I thought that was good. You kind of create your own. I think it was. Somebody was talking about one of our girls here who was an interview. I think it was Alejandra they were talking about who's a SWO staffer that she got to school and started a campus ministry because there was nothing going on. So just know you're going to come under attack and sometimes that attack is going to come from professors.
Speaker 1:That was wild music, the music story that Stein told he said he had a professor, a music, he had a music class and they had to, like they had to do something where they had to choose a song and then critique it, or I don't remember the whole assignment. But Stein chose a Christian song and the guy failed him, he said because he hates Christian music. And what's crazy is professors can do stuff like that. They depending on the university. A lot of places professors have an incredible amount of autonomy, and so that was a crazy story. That just highlighted how difficult it might be when it comes to dealing with professors. I mean, that might be your biggest opposition. And then Marley, you know she her story about how a professor told her she needed to just experience college life go to a party, get drunk, have a good time with your friends. You're young, you can do that now, and he was encouraging her to that. That was kind of crazy.
Speaker 1:Appreciated the constant focus of being taking the opportunities to be a light and being an encouragement to others. That's a good word for us. Are you going to be an encouragement to somebody today? Are you going to be a light to somebody today? So so important, so helpful. And then it was interesting how people, a lot of people there were several people that did that are Christian college people. I think it was Andrew and maybe Cadence and they were talking about how, just how quickly you can end up falling away from the Lord and just becoming very lazy, that your Christian life because you're taking Bible classes or whatever. That was interesting, but I also appreciated.
Speaker 1:In that same vein, cadence said that the one thing that you get at a Christian university she's at Liberty University. She said it's like you're swimming downstream. So if you do want to follow the Lord, be faithful to Jesus. There's a strong current for that. So that's something to consider. Go to college. A Christian university might afford you the opportunity to really build momentum in your Christian walk and probably not have quite as much pushback. But I thought that was good insight. The danger is that you get lazy, but the positive is that you're sort of swimming downstream. So I thought that was very helpful and then I just had a couple of funny thoughts after listening to it.
Speaker 1:It just reminded me of things I saw at the college retreat, and some of this is funny, some of it's just a point of interest. One is and I'm going to rant for just a second about young men. I saw at least four young dudes these are college age guys, so we're talking 18 to 25 year old guys at our college retreat walking around in pajama pants. Pajama pants Don't like men. Do not go out in public in pajama pants. I don't give a rat's hairy butt crack what is in style or who where that's trending. That is not a thing for you. That is not a thing that men do. That's not a thing that men should do.
Speaker 1:I have a 14-year-old boy in my house who walked into my kitchen one day at seven o'clock in the morning about to go get in the car to go to school, and he's wearing pajama pants. And my wife said to him she said what are you doing with those? And he said oh, everybody's wearing pajamas today. And she said what is it Spirit Week? Is this like Spirit Week? Because you already had Spirit Week? She was on to him because he was trying to make it sound like this was something the school was endorsing. And he said no, it's not Spirit Week. She said, well, spirit Week y'all had Hat Day, team Day and you had Pajama Pants Day. And said, remember, we didn't let you wear pajama pants on spirit week. What is today? And he said, well, and come to find out like a group of boys just said, hey, let's wear pajama pants, cause a lot of kids are doing it. And she said you walk your rear end right back to your room. You put on a pair of real pants, a pair of real shoes. You're not leaving the house like that.
Speaker 1:And she said something I thought was very important. She said there is no self-respecting, hardworking, grown man anywhere that is in your life and your sphere of influence that you're going to see walking around in pajama pants. That's not what men do. Go change man. I loved it.
Speaker 1:I was like Little's a boss lady, but I realized there's this thing right now where dudes are doing it, because a couple days later I am after that conversation with Little. I'm driving, I'm pulling up outside of the grocery store. I dropped her off, she'd gone in and I stayed in the car. She just had to run in and get something and I just stayed in the car so I could pick her up right at the door because it was real cold and a guy about my age comes walking out of the grocery store wearing pajama pants and I thought now this guy looked like a dummy. You can't walk around looking like that and expect anybody to take you serious, so that's just dumb. So, dudes, don't wear pajama pants in public. Knock it off, quit that crap. I don't care who's doing it, what somebody's told you. Don't do that it's stupid. Don't do it Like, have a little bit of self-respect so that you can expect people to take you serious. And then. So there's that rant.
Speaker 1:The other thing that I thought was interesting and this is just an observation listening to all these kids. Most of the kids interviewed are Southern, but have you noticed how the Southern accent is going away? Like? Stein lives in North Georgia. He lives right just. Stein grew up 45 minutes south of here and I know how the people my age and older and a lot of kids still in North Georgia talk and he talks like he's from you know, like the West. He's got that contemporary accent and I heard several people with that, even like Marley and Dylan, have Southern accents, but when they start to articulate you can tell a lot of that accent is going away. That's not a criticism, by the way, it's just interesting. It made me wonder I wonder how many generations we might be, just one or two generations away from there, not really being many people with strong accents.
Speaker 1:We get to that point where there's like just that contemporary accent and it's interesting because you used to have a lot of regional accents. Even in the South they're different, they're varying accents. The mountain accent was different than the coastal accent. South Alabama folks from there talk different than people from Central Florida. People from Middle Georgia talk different than people from East Tennessee. It was all Southern accents but very much different variations. Same thing with the Northern accent or dialect. People from Pennsylvania and New Jersey talked a little different than people from the upper Midwest. It's interesting and I think a lot of that's going away because of the influence of social media how much of our language is learned through what we listen to and watch.
Speaker 1:That was interesting. That has nothing to do with anything, just an observation. And I see it with our staff. If somebody comes here and serves on staff and they've got a real strong Southern accent. Man, they really get heckled and picked at, which is always in good jest and good fun, but anyway, that's a real thing. Even JB. Jb doesn't have an accent. She's got that contemporary accent. Does not sound Southern at all and she's born and raised in Georgia by people that are born and raised in Georgia, by people that are born and raised in Georgia. I thought that was interesting and it's something I bring up because I've noticed it more and more with our staff. But again, neither here nor there. So just my thoughts on that episode from last week. Again, jb did a phenomenal job, so did all the folks that got interviewed and I appreciate it so much. I'm proud of all of them. I'm proud to be associated with such dynamic and amazing young adults who are the remnant in this generation that are going to take the gospel and impact their generation. I'm grateful, so grateful, to be a part of it.
Speaker 1:Next week we will have a couple of episodes coming out of Rob and I sitting down having conversation and then we've got some other stuff coming out. Be looking for some things that are coming out in connection to this college retreat stuff and the college interviews. As we look towards summer, we're going to have a little bit more content along these lines and we've also got some stuff coming in the next month or so we're going to be recording about doing ministry in small, like local ministry in small communities, if you're part of a smaller church, or even if you're part of a big church, but how do you minister in smaller communities, and just the importance of being faithful where you live and where you serve. So that's it for this week. I am going to come back and read some in a future episode.
Speaker 1:I want to read some what do you call it reviews from Spotify and Apple or from Apple Apple Podcasts that's where it's at. We were looking through reviews yesterday and just some encouraging stuff that people from Spotify and Apple or from Apple Apple Podcasts that's where it's at. We were looking through reviews yesterday and just some encouraging stuff that people have written, and so I want to read some of those and then give some shout out to people that have taken the time to leave a review. If you leave a review and you let us know who you are, we will send you swag. So just so you know we'll send you some SWO swag. Just just so you know, we'll send you some SWO swag, so that should motivate Surely. Anyway, thank you all for listening and just appreciate it so much, and we'll see you next time.
Speaker 2:Thanks for listening to no Sanity Required. Please take a moment to subscribe and leave a rating. It really helps. Visit us at SWOutfitterscom to see all of our programming and resources, and we'll see you next week on no Sanity Required.
