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
New Book, New Staff, Same Mission
In this episode, Brody shares some exciting news and updates about the No Sanity Required book, orientation, and responding to listener emails.
Brody gives a behind-the-scenes look at the recent SWO25 staff orientation, why it matters, and how it helps prepare the team for a strong summer. He unpacks key moments from the weekend, including a session on Colossians 1:28–29 and the mission statement that drives Snowbird.
He also answers a listener's question about women preaching, diving into what the Bible says and how those convictions are lived out at SWO.
Along the way, Brody shares some encouraging feedback, gives shoutouts, and reminds listeners about the upcoming Respond Conference—with limited spots left.
- Colossians 1:28-29
- 1 Timothy 2:12
- 1 Corinthians 14:34
Building the Team and Living the Mission | SWO25 Orientation
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listener emails. Responding to those, an update from this past weekend uh, two weekends ago, rather, we did our. We had our staff orientation weekend and some updates on what's going on here right now at SWO and the the sort of, as our energy and focus turns towards the summer, what that looks like. And then an exciting announcement that I'm looking forward to sharing with you on this episode of no Sanity Required, so welcome.
Speaker 2: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:So this week is going to be a little bit shorter episode. Just want to give you a few updates and read some emails. Update number one and this is an exciting announcement the no Sanity Required book, which is called no Sanity Required the Visionary Story of Snowbird Wilderness Outfit outfitters, is finally done. It's complete Final edit is done. Um, so grateful to Harry McSween and Susan Greenwood who have worked with me to get that content out. Um, they've done a phenomenal job of editing and helping me kind of stay going in the right direction. It's been a long process. This is a book that a normal person could have probably written in a couple of weeks and it's taken me a long time. And, uh, but we're, we're already. We're excited about book two, which we'll uh, talk about. Um, you know down the road, but book two is going to be a no sanity stories. We're going to look at different stories A lot of folks that have been on the podcast and others that maybe you've never met and we're going to see biblical principles come through from from the lives of people that have been impacted by a snowbird wilderness outfitters. Looking forward to that no sanity stories That'll come out, hopefully next year. So, um, the book is done, other than, uh, amy Davis is finishing up some of the design and graphic work. Amy is phenomenal. Most of what through the years, most of what you have seen. If you've been to an event at SWO, whether it's stage design, the thing that I think of that looks so cool that she did last year was the Gaga Pits. If you've ever been to SWO you know what a Gaga pit is. It's a game that kids love to play, a big, big round, um, it's like a. It's kind of like a Dodge, a contained Dodge ball game, and her graphic design on those is phenomenal. Anyway, amy's my favorite designer, um, because she just so much of the way SWO has done, the things we've put out through the years, so much of it has her thumbprint on it. But anyway, she's doing the book design. I'm excited about that. Harry has worked so hard over the last couple months to get the book organized, because the way I wrote it and put it together it wasn't real streamlined. It wasn't like a steady flow of thought, it was kind of up and down and all around. And then Susan Greenwood, who has been kind of the key editor, the primary editor for the book, and actually helped me get thoughts on paper kind of helped point me in the right direction early on when we're trying to get traction with the book. So, anyway, no sanity required. The visionary story of Snowbird Wilderness Outfitters that's coming, that's, that's going to be, lord willing, ready to roll. It goes to print in a week and, uh, it should take a month or two to get it out and we'll have it available, um, for you guys, and if you're coming to SWO this summer, we'll have it available this summer and then, um, we'll let you know how you can get your copy once we have the books in hand. So, um, excited about that.
Speaker 1:And the next thing just came through our orientation weekend. The reason we do orientation is because years ago we realized we do our staff selection in the winter. So we're, we're telling people in January hey, you've made it, you're on the team, after a lengthy application and then lengthy interview process. We're very it's pretty intense to apply to work here and then to go through that process. It's not casual. There's a lot of work to be done and in filling out an application and then, once you fill that application out, to work on our summer staff, there's a pretty involved interview process, not just a single interview, but there's going to be some conversations and then and then a really big interview with one of our um hiring team. So anyway, that all goes on in January.
Speaker 1:What I'm getting at, that all goes in on in January and then by the time staff training rolls around it's mid May. Well, I don't know, uh, if you realize it, but four or five, five months is a lot of time for a college-age student or a high school-age student to change their mind, and it could be that they just kind of lose interest and they don't understand the importance of sticking to your commitment. Or it could be far less serious than that. It could be. Something comes up, a school internship is all of a sudden presented and it makes more sense to do that to get that degree finished or whatever. Family dynamics, something happens at home. So we used to see a pretty high attrition rate from January to May. So we'd have, let's say we had 100 people that we had nailed down to be on the team in January. May rolls around and maybe we've only got 85 to 90. And so you know, 10, 12, 15% is a huge drop-off. So initially we started correcting that by over hiring. So if we needed a hundred, we'd we'd go with 110. And then, sure enough, that bit us because the you know, there was one year where we did 110 and needed 95, let's say, and nobody dropped. Nobody dropped, and so we ended up with 15 more people than we needed, whatever it was that year, and so we had to do some pruning and weeding out.
Speaker 1:Anyway, why we do, the reason we do the staff orientation weekend is because it gives uh, our staff a spring weekend in early April. That uh, you know, if they, if they and now the selection may be late January, early February, so within a within eight weeks of knowing that they've made the team, they're going to show up here for an orientation weekend and it just kind of gets them excited about the summer. It's a it's a really enjoyable weekend. We uh we have a few sessions where we're we're teaching sort of philosophical stuff, why we do things the way we do things. We're challenging them, we're, we're giving them a word of encouragement for how they finished their semester. And then, when the staff orientation weekend is over there, they're like five or six weeks until they're going to be back for staff training, which is a two week process, a two week training. So orientation kind of gives them a little spring bump. Um, it helps everybody to to meet face to face and and uh, it's a good weekend Started doing it several years ago quite a while now, probably 15 years ago and it's been real effective. We uh we didn't do it COVID year and we didn't do it the year following COVID and we thought about dropping it and not doing it anymore. But by popular demand, everyone just loves it, so we've continued to do it. So we just came through that I shared.
Speaker 1:On Friday night of staff orientation weekend we walked through the mission statement and the two verses Colossians 1, 28 and 29, that drive our mission statement and we looked at those three principles that you hear me talk on here about that. We hold a high view of the sovereignty of God, we hold a high view of Scripture and we hold a high view of the responsibility of man and a lot of people will use that phrase, responsibility of man. That's where they'll use the phrase free will. But we like to go a step further. It's not just that you have the will to choose this or that, it's that you have a responsibility before a sovereign God to to be obedient, to be on mission to fulfill the task of of building the church and growing the kingdom. So, um, we looked at those three things on Friday night and how the mission statement drives those.
Speaker 1:So what we're going to do is we're going to um in in this episode, we're going to include a link to that message so you can jump over there when you're done with this episode and listen to the message that we shared on, uh, friday night of staff orientation. Help you kind of wrap your head around the philosophy behind what we do, and I think you'll enjoy it and get a lot out of it. And this is a challenge that is not just for Snowbird Wilderness, outfitters, employees or team members, it's for the church, it's for the believer, it's for Christ followers. And, matter of fact, I took the main outline of that and shared in a Great Commission Sunday message at a church in Jacksonville Florida last Sunday, at a church in Jacksonville Florida last Sunday, just because I think it's such a clear blueprint for how we're to all live on mission. So I'm going to share that with you.
Speaker 1:But before we get there, I wanted to just tell you, coming out of orientation weekend, and so I did that Friday night and then on Saturday morning, um, we had some meetings. Um, john Rouleau gave a charge from Joshua three on leadership. Uh, saturday evening, zach um spoke to the staff. That and that's as far as we go. Sunday morning they eat breakfast and they get on the road. So we had three sessions, but then we had some meetings in there and then, uh, just a lot of free time, rec time, some small group, just just getting to know one another. So, anyway, it was a good weekend, very productive, and so all of our staff. You can be praying for them. They'll be showing back up here around May 11th, 12th, right right around in that weekend, that second weekend of May to start, on that Monday, our two-week staff training.
Speaker 1:Excited about that, okay, let's see what's next. What did I want to do next? I wanted to. So we got the book talked about. The book talked about staff orientation.
Speaker 1:I want to read some fun. Where's this one? There's one really fun book. Okay, this is from a pastor, friend, student, pastor James Mooney, in the Charlotte area, concord, north Carolina, to be exact. He said brother, I was listening to the Rudolph episode and filling up my truck at the gas station.
Speaker 1:The dude across from me just looked at me like I was nuts for listening to this podcast cranked up about the Olympic bomber. It was great, enjoyed this one man. So thanks, james. That's a hilarious scene that I can picture in my mind. First off, you need to know James Mooney is about 6'8". I think he's ginormous, he's a big man and so I'm just picturing I do this, y'all might do this. You open your door and you leave whatever you're listening to playing while you're pumping your gas, and so, yeah, uh podcast about the olympic bomber. I got a lot of funny um and and fun uh comments on that one, on that episode and jb her mom even sent. It was cool. Jb showed me this morning her mom sent a picture of uh jb. You know we talked about the recorder playing the little recorder in elementary school and uh and and doing such a terrible job of doing uh. I was so bad at it. But anyway, jb's mom sent a picture of hers. That was fun. So anyway, thanks for that, james Mooney.
Speaker 1:Look to see you soon at SWO. Thanks for leading well the student ministry there at Parkwood Baptist in Concord. If you're in that area, concord, north Carolina, looking for a solid church, parkwood is on the list. It's on the short list. We've got a list of churches in that area. That is definitely on the short list.
Speaker 1:So next up, let's see. This is just encouraging. This is from a guy named Dustin starts off my name is Dustin. I won't say his last name. Uh, he's from uh, we'll just say Alabama. We'll say where. I said my first time at SWO was 2007, 2008 ish, for summer camp with my youth group. Uh also attended a week of old school, which is old school was a program we did. It was like a back country program and he was here in oh eight or oh nine. He said um, and that was uh, like they would backpack for the week. It was a really cool program.
Speaker 1:My wife and I attended marriage conference last year, first time I'd been back to SWO since that week in oh nine. It was an amazing weekend. It truly has propelled my ministry within my family, to my kids and wife, to another level. We also plan on attending the marriage conference again this year. It falls pretty close to our anniversary. I cannot think of a better way for us to spend it. My wife will also be attending the Women's Respond Retreat here in a few weeks with a couple of friends. So if you're not signed up for Respond, let me give you an update. Before I continue reading Dustin's email, let me give you an update on what we've got in terms of availability. Okay, we've got about 50 spots available. We're approaching 400 attendees or people registered right now, so there's a few spots left. Make sure you're on the list and you get signed up to come to respond. So Dustin's wife's going to be attending, so that's exciting.
Speaker 1:Anyway, mainly wanted to type this email to say I'm highly thankful for you, your staff and ministry. In my early adult life I was not on fire or have my hand on the plow like I should have. A couple years ago I discovered the NSR podcast and the SWO teaching podcast, which is where I learned about the adult conferences, really found myself wanting to go back. So I told my wife about the marriage conference and since then she also has grown in her relationship with the Lord. We've both taken up different opportunities to serve within our local church the podcasts and sermons. My weekly meeting with my small group truly helps me to keep my hand on the plow. Me and my family are thankful for you and snowbird. I pray you and your staff have a wonderful summer and more lives are changed through your ministry. Thank you, dustin. I I just wanted to read that to say Dustin's a an NSR listener. I want to say thank you, dustin. This is encouraging. Share this in our staff meeting Love getting emails like this.
Speaker 1:Uh, sometimes get positive emails, sometimes get negative emails, but this was very encouraging and so, thank you, brother. Uh, thanks for being a blessing to us and that you've blessed a lot of people here and look forward to seeing you at the marriage retreat or the marriage conference this fall, and I look forward to seeing your wife, hopefully at respond. I'll obviously be not really on hand. Our, our, our gals will run that, but, um, I will, um, have an opportunity to interact with the lady Some little and I are going to be sharing something at the respond uh, respond retreat, respond conference conference, so I'm looking forward to that.
Speaker 1:Um, okay, two more. So I'm going to share this one by a brother named kyle. Let me read this uh, this is called marriage conference, is what he entitled this email. And let me read that to you. Hello, brody, hope you are well. Sir, my name is kyle and I'm a friend of. I'm not going to say who. Uh, I did not ask Kyle if I could share this, but I thought it would be. Kyle brings up a question in his email that I like to. When I can kill two birds with one stone and I can respond to an email on an NSR episode, I think it can be helpful. I think it'd be helpful for the person asking the question, but also for our listeners in general.
Speaker 1:I had the pleasure of meeting you, talking with you at be strong in the fall of 2024. I really appreciated how accessible you and the rest of your staff were. Such great blessing of a trip. Easy to see why your family and SWO means so much to uh. You name some other folks. I've been trying to get back ever since.
Speaker 1:I have a question. I'm hoping you can give me some clarification and feedback. I've invited my bride of 13 years to join me at the marriage conference because I want her to experience what I just described. Biblical manhood, womanhood and Christ-centered marriage are really important to us. Naturally, she wanted to get on the SWO site and look into the conference. When I started talking about it, she's troubled that you guys don't list any women as session teachers or otherwise for the conference. She says how can they expect me to learn about biblical marriage If only men are teaching the sessions? Are we overlooking something or would you advise me to how, or how would you advise me to answer at this point? I'd be truly grateful for any information or advice you provide, looking forward to worship with you and your guys at you and your staff again soon. Great questions. So I just want to, I want to unpack this and I'll. I will respond to Kyle personally as well, but I'm not reading that response here, but I do want to share a couple of thoughts. So he says that his wife was concerned. Uh, she's truly troubled that we don't list any women as session teachers otherwise for the conference. And so it's.
Speaker 1:It's a great question, um, and this is one of those questions that, if it, when it's asked with an open heart and mind, like, like, sincerely, um, then then it creates wonderful opportunity to share our thoughts, our position from Scripture. Sometimes people ask a question like this and they're trying to get like a gotcha moment, and I know that Kyle is not doing that, but I'm grateful to be able to answer the question. That's genuinely I'm. I'm grateful to be able to answer the question that's genuinely, I think, being asked, but sometimes just, this is more of a side note and, fyi, I've had people ask me a similar question where it becomes obvious they're just trying to. You know, they just want to have a gotcha moment and try to say, um, try to put words in your mouth, or so I'm rambling, let me. Let me answer the question we reserve.
Speaker 1:We believe that, biblically, there are certain responsibilities in the home and in the church that God has designated for men to do. One of those is the preaching and teaching of the word to men. Now, we do think that there's a place for women to teach and instruct women. We also believe that there's. Now I'm going to give you some. There's some nuance to this. I'm going to answer this question in layers and say that even within our team here, we don't all agree exactly how this should play out and what it looks like. What we do all agree on is that preaching the word of God in a room where there are men and women, that that is a job, a task and a calling that God has designated for men. And so the fact that we are talking about a conference where there's sermons preached and men are in the room, then yes, we're going to have men do those sermons are in the room, then yes, we're going to have men do those sermons. Now, that being said, at our marriage conferences we often have um panel discussions, q and a men and women. We also sometimes divide men and women where there's a breakout session for men and a breakout session for the women that's led by women. At our respond women's conference we have women that do the teaching at that conference. They do the main sessions. So we do have women teach and and I believe now I might be wrong, but I believe we have women listed. I know at least my wife is listed on the website as someone who teaches in in uh women's conference sessions. But, um, but anyway. So we don't have women teach or preach the word of God when there are men sitting in the room. And we take that from where? Where we get that is from uh.
Speaker 1:In the scripture in first Timothy, chapter two, first 12,. I want to read this in a few different translations. In the New Living Translation it says I do not let women teach men or have authority over them. Let them listen quietly. So in reference to the worship service and the preaching of the sermon, that's what we're talking about. In the NIV. It says I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man. She must be quiet, which that sounds very aggressive. But again, when we're, when we're reading a couple of things, when you're reading scripture, we don't ever want to try to make it sound softer or harder than it is. We just want to say what it says, and that's what it says, um, but also understand that the language that this was translated out of, um, the phraseology can can be different. You know, like when Jesus refers to his mother as woman from the cross. That sounds very abrasive, but it's not, and so there's some light, there's a little bit of language, not barrier, but like a context that's important to understand.
Speaker 1:Esv says 1 Timothy 2.12, I do not permit a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, rather she's to remain quiet. In those passages is that in the worship service, a woman is to not hold a position of preaching or teaching. 1 Corinthians 14.34 says it this way, and this is in the New International Version, the NIV women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says. And now what some people will do is they'll take um first the first Corinthians passage and they'll say well, that was specific to something that was going on in that church. And I would just say that is a slippery slope to get on. When you start that's what we call over contextualizing something you try to say well, there are things that that uh applied to those people in that church or in that era that don't apply to us. Sometimes, that's true, but we got to be careful with that, and I'll explain why in a minute. First Corinthians 14 and verse 34, the women should keep silent in the churches, for they are not for for they are not permitted to speak, but should be in submission, as the law also says. So reading those verses 1 Timothy 2.12, 1 Corinthians 14.34, we have biblical teaching that is clear that in a mixed worship service that women are not to preach or teach. Now are there times where we want to contextualize something and say, well, that mattered there, but it does, it doesn't really apply to us. Yeah, most of that's going to be more old Testament. There's some new Testament stuff. Um, you know, uh, first Corinthians is is the book that's just full of this type of stuff where you go, okay, what was it, what, how, what have this was applied to that church but not to us. Now, and there are some things in there. Um, you know, one Paul talks about food sacrifice to idols and he gives some instruction on that. Well, it's just not something that contextually we're going to face. We just go to the grocery store and buy food. So there are times where there's a context there, that sort of changes in our context.
Speaker 1:But when it comes to the biblical instruction on pastoral ministry, of preaching, teaching, being elders and overseers, the scripture is clear in the pastoral epistles of Timothy and Titus and also in passages in first Corinthians that the Lord reserves that for a man. Now one more thought on that, because somebody might say well, that's just for those people, that's just for again, that's just the context of those people. But the scripture also teaches where that comes from is in the order of creation. It's in the creation order. It goes back to um, when, when the Lord put Adam and Eve in the garden and gave instruction, adam was to lead, he was to be the head of his household, and when he fail, when he failed to do that, his authority was the word that's often used is usurped and Eve took authority over the man, and so the creation, the serpent, took authority over the woman, who took authority over the man. And so you have this inverted order. It's completely flipped upside down from how God designed it and instructed for it to work. So when we talk about the order of the church, the scripture will point it back to the order of creation, and so this goes back before the time of the Corinthians or Paul and Timothy. This goes back to the beginning of time. This is God's order, so we don't mess with that, we don't jack around with God's order.
Speaker 1:We do have opportunities for women to teach and to teach other women and to teach young women, and we've even had situations where women shared with teenagers. There have been a few situations through the years where we've had a woman share a thought would be Nikki Smith, who runs our element program, is often teaching and instruct, and instructing, um, the element students. Uh, some of those students are boys. Like when I say boys, they're, they're not adults, they're 16, 17 year old boys. So, um, there's that.
Speaker 1:Now the question. Then, um, from Kyle. She says how can they expect me to learn about biblical marriage if only men are teaching the sessions? I would say I want to be very respectful, I'm not being sarcastic, I don't want to come across as sharp, but the question of learning about biblical marriage should not matter who's teaching it. What we learn and teach about biblical marriage comes from the word of God. So it, if I'm hearing a biblical truth taught, it shouldn't matter who's teaching it. If it's a biblical truth. The way that I learn about biblical marriage is from the content of what's being taught. Biblical marriage is from the content of what's being taught. And so, to answer this sister's question, how can they expect me to learn about biblical marriage? Well, because we're going to teach the Bible, we're going to say here's what scripture teaches and here's the application, and there are going to be women speaking into it in different capacities at different times. And then also, I would encourage her to come to our respond um women's conference. I think you know that's going to be that's conference led by women for women.
Speaker 1:Um, I do uh speak on Sunday morning at the respond conference. I've never asked to do that. Our women have asked me to do that and each year I revisit and say y'all sure you want, do you want me to do this? Yeah, we want you to do it. So Sunday morning session, I step in, preach a message and then step right out. Um, but hopefully that answers those questions. Thank you, kyle, for the encouragement, for what you shared and for that question is really helpful. Um, we're going to. We're going to stop there. I do have.
Speaker 1:Uh, there's a listener named Katie and Katie uh has asked about a family dynamic situation. Um, she is married and her husband is uh having some struggle with her, her family. Uh, there's some, there's some tension there and we can a lot of us can relate to that and we're going to be tackling that. But that's going to be its own episode. It's going to be a bigger episode and I'm probably going to bring someone in, a couple of folks in, to make that more of a dialogue episode. So, um, be answering that question soon. So, hopefully, uh, those emails we responded to, some fun uh, and some that are hopefully practical and helpful for you. All right, that's it.
Speaker 1:So what I want to do is wrap this up by, oh, one more thing that I did want to say. So many of you have prayed for my granddaughter, alma. Her name is Alma. It's funny, a lot of people call her Alma. I've had so many people say how's Alma? So her name is Alma and I don't really care if you call her Alma. That's fine. The fact that you care means the world to me and to our family. So, anyway, just saying, I know when I call somebody the wrong name, I like to be told hey, that's not what it is, but her name's Alma doesn't really matter to me, cause I call her punky and punky is doing great. She really is doing good.
Speaker 1:She has, um, she has struggled with some illness. That's been, uh, man, she had a fever 105 and just where they're serving there is not a hospital and there's not a hospital. It's not like they can even jump in a plane and fly to a good hospital. It's, it's. It's very difficult. So pray for Greg and Kilby as they navigate, raising a family in a very difficult place, um, and with no real good hospital. So uh, but, but Alma's doing good, punky's doing great FaceTime with her yesterday, sweetest little thing, and uh, she calls me boo, I her boo, punky and boo. We thought about making a band or maybe like a club, maybe t-shirt tattoo, I don't know, punky and boo. But anyway, punky is doing awesome, she's the sweetest thing and I just love it that so many people prayed for her. So thank y'all, for that means the world, literally means the world to my family, to the SWO family. So thank y'all.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's it for this week. I'm just going to dip out and I want you to enjoy the message that I shared. Message, not really message, not like a sermon, just the charge. The word of. It's a word of put your hand to the plow, let's get after it.
Speaker 1:In the Christian life, we all have a job to do and we need to have a strategy, tactics, we need to know the why, we need to know the how. All of that matters. Don't just listen, don't be just lumbering through your Christian life as a consumer Christian, put your hand on the plow, put your pick up the trial. You know the the story of Nehemiah, where they're working building that wall. They got one hand on the trial, one hand on the sword.
Speaker 1:We are in hostile times because we live on planet Earth and everybody that's a part of the body of Christ needs to be on task, on mission together. So let's do it and hope you find encouragement in the message from, or the charge and challenge to our staff from Staff Orientation Weekend. The charge and challenge to our staff from staff orientation weekend. Um, and we're, uh, we're going to have some, some stuff that I'm excited to share with you. Um, next week we're going to start recording and video and some episodes and we're going to we're going to start having more of our content uh video available and I'm excited about that.
Speaker 1:So, books coming soon. Uh, summer's coming soon, it's springtime, it's Turkey season, it's mowing season. I love cutting the grass. It's just awesome and life is good. Thank y'all. Thank you for um listening to this thing every week. I can't believe you do it, but you do it, and there's thousands of you that do it, and I can't believe it, but I'm blessed by it and we as a ministry are blessed by your faithfulness. So thank you and hope you enjoy the charge to the staff.
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.
