100 – A Tribute to the last one hundred Episodes

Cody Johnston 2:08
Hey everyone, welcome to the reckless pursuit. My name is Cody and my name is Elaine and this is episode 100. We are in triple digits guys, we have been at this. Oh my gosh for 100 episodes actually just, it just is like a little secret here guys. We’ve actually been at this for 101 episodes Elaine just told me, but hey, who’s counting? Right? I mean 100 hundred one. We had a bonus episode 100 official episodes in to the reckless pursuit and I cannot be more excited to just sit behind a microphone and be able to say that because this all started, what almost two years ago now, right after I had just resigned from my position in ministry kind of on not the best terms Truth be told that whole year ended up being like the craziest year of our freaking lives. And yet here we are behind these microphones recording every single week. And oh my gosh, we’ve made it to Episode 100. So on this episode, we’re going to talk about where we came from what we’ve learned some of our favorite moments and where we’re going. But let’s start with an icebreaker. Elaine, what’s a random fact? It can be any fact about you that our listeners might not know after 100 episodes, I used

Elaine Johnston 3:32
to really be into skateboarding.

Unknown Speaker 3:35
They wouldn’t know that.

Elaine Johnston 3:36
I don’t think so. I don’t actively talk about it. It’s been like, I think the last time I actually skateboard was 2012. So

Cody Johnston 3:45
can we take that one step further. You wanted to be a skateboarding model?

Elaine Johnston 3:49
Yes. I wanted to be a professional skateboarder slash runway model, because I wanted the world to know that women can get down and dirty and have fun and they’re not afraid to get hurt but also that they can wear cute clothes and be pretty onstage and

Cody Johnston 4:07
didn’t you also skateboard with six inch heels one time?

Elaine Johnston 4:11
I would say I like rolled around a little bit. I don’t actually like to any flips or anything but yeah, whenever I had like homecoming and prom and stuff like that in high school, they all of my heels were like six inches. That was the thing like everyone wore like a big gaudy shoes and stuff. And I kind of like rode my skateboard a couple of times in the driveway with the shoes just if I were six inch heels I would just roll my ankle so congratulate

Cody Johnston 4:38
okay random fact about me. We have one guy in particular in nomads who learned this about me recently, but I’ll go ahead and make it public to the world if you don’t know this about me. Here you go. I am extremely into cryptozoology and anything like mythological creatures, I absolutely love all of that kind of stuff and the Mothman is my favorite of all of them. I’ve seen the movie we got to go to Point Pleasant is the big reason bring this up, we got to go to Point Pleasant West Virginia, which is where the initial Mothman sightings happened in the United States. And so that was super exciting on my picture with the statue and got to see the museum and all that. And I want to go back and spend more time there.

Elaine Johnston 5:15
I was gonna say we got there right after the museum had to close. It was so sad. We were five minutes too late. Yeah, five minutes too late. We didn’t get to go to the museum, but it was around Christmas. So there was like Christmas trees all lined up behind him from the city. So

Cody Johnston 5:29
the moss was adorned with

Elaine Johnston 5:31
him because it was the statue of the mafia, not math woman,

Cody Johnston 5:35
but we’re not assuming it’s gender. We don’t know. sure if he is a man or a woman or exist or if he has any. Maybe I don’t know what the malls creature thing. Yes. Anyway, so that is my random fact. Alright, let’s move on to something that’s a little more pressing. When we started this, like I had said I had just left my job as a youth worship pastor for seven years, we walked away, we had no idea what we were doing. And all we knew is I had some random audio equipment leftover from my band days. Hey, why don’t we just start a podcast? We knew we loved having conversations about spirituality. But let’s be 100% honest, we didn’t have our voice yet. If you go back and listen to some of those early episodes, we refused to take them down. But so many times I’ve wanted to because I was not bold. I was not brave, and I was definitely not reckless, at least in the, in the aspect that we talked about here on this show. I was scared to death to share my perspective, outside of what I had felt like I was allowed to share because for years, I mean, my whole life. I grew up in church. I had all these questions and so many times whenever I would step out of my box and mention them, I would kind of get reviewed for them and not just in one specific setting in multiple settings, multiple times I would share what was on my heart. I would share what I was thinking I would just be told I was different, or my opinions were extreme, or I was out there. And the more we have had these amazing conversations with you guys with our amazing guests, we’ve had just, you know, just some of the most amazing people on this show. The more we have these conversations, even with each other, the more I realized, wait, I’m not alone. Actually, there’s a whole lot of people. And they’ve all been through something very similar that I had been through where they had felt like they were the oddball out they had these thoughts, these opinions, and they didn’t get to share them. So with that being said, You mean how have you grown spiritually since we started this podcast?

Elaine Johnston 7:41
I feel like I’ve asked more questions. I feel like I’m exploring other ways of getting closer to God through like more meditative practices and stuff like that and just being more open. For me like I always grew up in a place where it was safe for me Ask questions. And I asked questions literally about everything and anything but faith and religion, spirituality just because I don’t know, like, I guess I had permission to do so. But I didn’t really have a whole lot of questions growing up about that specifically. But even the past two years of podcasting, I feel like I’m asking even more questions of like, well, well, why does the Bible say this? Or what does it actually mean? And just really discovering who God is who Jesus was, and all of that stuff for me, like specific to me the relationship that I have and how it may look differently than it did a few years ago. And then just since we started this podcast two years ago, and I just feel like one my relationship with God is deepened. My relationship with people has also deepened. And I’ve also felt like I’ve understood myself through the lens of God.

Cody Johnston 8:54
Yeah, that’s good. And I can attest that too. And the biggest thing I can say is just finding my voice. I’ve always Always wanted to be bold. I’ve always been the front man. I’ve always been the guy that everyone goes to when they have a problem, or they need a solution. I’ve always been the Yes man, the guy who didn’t know how to say no, that’s something I’ve learned a lot in the process of this podcast is knowing when to say no knowing when to stand up for myself. And that’s really in a large part of Judah, like so many of the people that we hear from and learning from other people’s experiences, and just realizing that I don’t have to try to please man, because all I’m trying to do is deepening my relationship with God. I’m not out to hurt anyone, but I don’t have to all these things that I thought I was weird or I was stranger had these opinions that were wrong. I realized there is not having a wrong opinion. It’s just sharing where you are in life. And that’s been one of the most beautiful things that I have come to realize, in 100 episodes of podcasting. So Elaine, looking back on where you were then two years ago, where are you now and what what areas of your life Have you seen The most growth from

Elaine Johnston 10:01
outside of just like my spiritual walk with God and my faith and everything. I feel like I’ve I’m a lot more vocal and more outspoken. Because I remember, whenever we first started podcasting, I got so frustrated, because I felt like I didn’t have anything to stay, I stumbled over my words, I didn’t really know what questions I was asking myself, much less other people. And I just feel like I mean, before we ever hit this episode, like two or three months ago, I started my own podcast and and so I just feel like I’m more confident in my voice and who I am in different aspects and different perspectives outside of just my faith. And I feel like I’m a lot more active online even with just some of those questions with some of my thoughts and being even more brave and bold in that and not really caring about the judgment or their criticism. If I have a crazy question or if I if I think differently and just being comfortable, not

Cody Johnston 10:58
and I know for me It’s some of that like being more brave and bold, like I was just talking about was a big thing that I feel like I have grown in spiritually or at least something that has like stood out to me that has changed is now whenever I hear other people’s perspectives, whether I agree with him or not, whether they’re hyper conservative or they’re more spiritually free, or whatever, you want to look at it however you want to, you know, slice it. I feel like I’ve been able to look at people and understand where they are a little bit more. And I don’t mean that is like, I want an ego. I mean, like for myself, I don’t feel as quick to judge when someone snaps at me. I don’t feel as quick to judge whenever someone calls me a name for believing the way I believe. I feel like I have really grown in the idea of learning about people, instead of just basing what I think they are off of my preconceived like notions of them are those first impressions. So with that, let’s just talk about A little bit about some of our favorite moments, these are completely spur of the moment, we’re just going to read these questions real quick, we’re going to say whatever comes to our mind. And then we may throw a, a nice little clip in there, or one of our favorite quotes from those episodes in these, as we say them and as we go, so like what episodes surprised you the most?

Elaine Johnston 12:19
So immediately, whenever you ask me that question, I have two things that came into mine. One is a specific episode, and one is actually a series that we did. So the specific episode that sticks out to me that really surprised me was an interview we did back with Tristan willeford. And it was about finding God and math, like finding God and man. Yeah, and all of that stuff. And that, like I just never ever thought when I hate math, like I don’t like math, I don’t get it. But like, I never would have thought like, Oh, I would see God in that. It was just a very cool conversation. Like I was just very intrigued with it and just his analogies of even Time. And like the timeline of the Bible in the timeline of, of God’s emotions,

Cody Johnston 13:05
why everything is for is a formula. Like it was a formula on creation, playing out the formula still playing out for this moment

Elaine Johnston 13:12
and being able to prove God mathematically and just all of that stuff, which is very fascinating.

Unknown Speaker 13:17
I think the thing that I relate most with math and God is that idea of design. In the first time that struck me I was in high school and teacher brought in this video on on something called fractals. And if you’re not familiar with the concept, fractals are basically like repeating patterns. Yeah, and they show up all the time in nature. So if you look at like a forest, there’s a pattern to where the trees are. And that same pattern kind of gives you how which trees are going to be thicker and which ones are going to be thinner. And that same pattern on an individual tree tells you kind of where the branches are going to be and where the leaves on each branch are going to be and where the veins in the leaf are going to be. It’s the same repeating pattern again and again and again. And I’m listening to these guys talk about how, you know, with all of our engineering knowledge, we just can’t create structures and systems that work as efficiently as these repeating patterns you see all the time in nature. And it’s just amazing that that, that random chance could come up with such a profound in an amazing system in place just like this is this is what it means to see God.

Elaine Johnston 14:24
And the series that kind of surprised me was our enneagram series and just learning about the different personalities, and how I could tie that into literally any aspect of my life, spiritually, or emotionally, mentally, physically, whatever. And just looking at the different people in my life, different relationships that I have myself, even you like just understanding like how people operate, and how God is in every Instagram number and in just what that looks like coming together as a Collective,

Cody Johnston 15:01
ya know, learning about the enneagram like shook me in a way that really sparked a lot of my curiosity about just learning God through people and just how that all plays together. The episode that stuck out to me is actually pretty recent episode. And it was the renewing of your mind with Todd Vic, you are in control. Your mind is not control you you are supposed to control

Unknown Speaker 15:22
it. And God gave us the ability to do that. To ask questions to to broaden our horizons. He wants us to do that he wants us to find the answers because he wants to give them to us.

Cody Johnston 15:32
And the reason it stuck out to me and Todd, if you listen to this later, like, I’m completely sorry for having assumptions. But Todd stood us up our very first conversation. He didn’t actually stand us up. It was a miscommunication. And like he got busy and like it was just this it was this funny thing, but like it was the first time anyone had ever like not got back with us immediately. And I was like, oh man, and so like I was working. I was not in the right minds. This is way before we record the episode. It was right in the middle of like a really busy season for us. And I was like, Oh man, I really hope because we get let’s be honest, we get people reaching out to us all the time. But a lot of them never follow through a lot of them we weed out beforehand, but I actually really liked what Todd was talking about. Whenever we first kind of met online and then whenever we went to have this call, and then I didn’t hear back from it, like, it got to me at first and I was like, oh man, but then I was like, No, I’m not going to base like one little instance like I’ve made mistakes. I’ve missed calls before I’m not going to base this and like base my relationship on this guy based on like a missed call. And so we picked the call back up a few days later, and we just had like this in depth conversation right there like sitting at a baseball stadium. Like we’re sitting there on facetiming this guy and come to find out like we have so much in common and like I just adored everything I loved. He sent us like his book I loved reading. His books are Your mind was great.

Elaine Johnston 17:01
I just have to say something. Whenever we got off that call, whenever we were at the ballpark, I literally almost cried.

Cody Johnston 17:07
It was just such a powerful conversation all of his takes on evangelism. And just how like we talked about what’s the renewing of we talk about renewing your mind, you know, but we don’t ever get into depth about what that means is just the power of thought in the Power of Habit and the power of what you put into your mind and the power of meditation, all of these beautiful things and the way it conceptualized God in a practical application. I just couldn’t believe the conversation we were having. And then it just carried right over into the actual podcast itself. And we still actively talk with Todd like on and like, I’m like, every single week, we’re online talking with Todd now and he’s become one of my favorite people, among a few others that we just talked to all the time online and so Todd, I’m so sorry that I almost judged you based on an accident. And guys, let them to learn from my Ignorance there. You don’t like first impressions are not always good, lasting or should be lasting impression,

Elaine Johnston 18:07
as Lemony Snicket has always, always said, once said in one of his books that first impressions are often entirely wrong. So

Cody Johnston 18:17
there you go.

Elaine Johnston 18:18
So Cody, I get to ask the next question. What episode currently stands out to you right now in this moment?

Cody Johnston 18:26
Alright, so right in this moment, I’m trying to scroll back in our log here to find it. And the reason it stands out to me is probably not like the best reason. It was a conversation we had with Robert Sullivan and Ben Valentine, who I used to lead worship with all the time is one of our earliest episodes such

Elaine Johnston 18:46
a fun and interesting, awkward conversation.

Cody Johnston 18:50
I love that conversation so much because when you get two three of us in a room, we go berserk. I just enjoy It was also like a catalyst conversation cuz it was about questioning faith, right? And the whole thing was about how it’s okay to have questions. It’s okay to have these doubts. It was really like a foundational episode in the podcast. Also, Robert may have said something that sounded really awkward by accident. And that may have also attributed your wise

Elaine Johnston 19:20
so had to cut out half of that.

Cody Johnston 19:22
Like there’s so many things that people think of in there like we were talking about with creation like, was it seven days? Was it several thousand years? And it’s like, you know the answer to that could be yes, it could write both. Yeah. And so like, there’s so many places in the Bible that that could actually be like, hey, if I take my ring and like pass it through a piece of paper and say that’s like a little world and then there’s a little stick people or something, and one person saying you know what, I think that as you pass that through you like see a line and another line another line because it’s two dimensional. And then like another little stick figures, like no, I think that’s Roberts ring. And so they’re seen in two different ways. This guy’s like, no, it’s it’s just a bunch of lines that are Passing through a different time, isn’t it? Like it’s like, no, it’s a ring. And well, they’re both right, because it is a ring and it is a bunch of lines. So I think there’s so many like false dichotomies that we set and say, hey, it’s either this or this when it’s like, you know, it could be both. It was a great conversation. And so that’s the one that stands out to me immediately. I don’t know you.

Elaine Johnston 20:20
Okay, so mines were serious. Of course it is. The episode that sticks out to me is one of the mental health episodes that we did, but specifically with Robert gear. That was a good one and him sharing his story about his family member that his entire childhood was always compared to everything and just the story at that was just very compelling to me.

Unknown Speaker 20:43
My family has a weird history with millennials, because back way before I was born, my uncle, my mom’s brother killed himself when he was 16. And he had been seeing some variation of a Christian counselor of something that had said he had depression but they said that he was okay. For whatever reason, because he had made several suicide attempts. And they were trying to monitor that. But eventually he did succeed. My grandparents, and my mom after the funeral, and after everything was over, and I was like, so how did you guys cope with this? Like, how did you guys go and talk to anyone? Did you guys ever worked through this or process it? And her answer was unfortunately, no. Like, they didn’t deal with it at all. They just, they didn’t ever talk about it at all. They just tried to let it go. Like they knew that it happened, but they weren’t going to, like work through as a family.

Cody Johnston 21:33
Yeah, and that was a great episode. Robert said some amazing stuff. And just Was this the different Robert not Robert, from my episode? Here. Yeah. He he was just very quick to say like, hey, the church needs to step up their game with mental health. We quit avoiding this and it’s just not something that we can just sweep under the rug. And there’s a big difference in a church pastor. And then there’s a big, big difference between a pastor and a counselor a license. Professional You know, one is for spiritual health one is for mental don’t cross those lines. Don’t confuse the two they

Elaine Johnston 22:05
are separate,

Cody Johnston 22:07
right? But you can have both right? Absolutely. You can have both and don’t it’s not fair to expect a pastor to have all those answers. And also if you’re in a place of leadership, it’s not fair to assume you have those right answers either that you’re capable of dealing with those things and that’s just I loved what he had to say there. So on a serious note, I couldn’t agree more. Alrighty line while we’re on a serious note here what a what episode shock you just like on a spiritual level.

Elaine Johnston 22:36
So the episode that comes to my mind, honestly, I wouldn’t even say shook me on a spiritual level. But it was the episode that you had recorded by yourself. Just what a day two days after I recorded it. And going back and listening to that it was just such an emotional impactful episode and why Not necessarily spiritually, but more like community based and family based. And all of that stuff is just how you were talking about forgiveness and how you were talking about loving people and loving people through hard situations and stuff like that. And it just really spoke to me, one being your wife and being in that situation, just all the craziness that was also going on at that time. But just going back and listening to just your raw honesty, transparency, I’m not even sure if you ever went back and listened to your own episode on that one if I ever not, because I don’t even think you edited it. That one I think you just pushed it out and said exactly what you did and then moved on to the next next episode the next week or whatever. And so that episode, it shook me just on an emotional level.

Cody Johnston 23:46
I don’t care if you feel it’s annoying to the point that you have to show them so much love that they’re sick of it, because I prefer them die sick of love, that sick full of death and regret and hatred and sorrow and loss. loneliness. How dare us not show that love? Yeah, and just a kind of a quick thing. If you’re new to the show, and this is the episode you happen across, I would, I would encourage you to go back and listen to some I’ve talked about quite a bit, but my mother was a very vibrant alcoholic. And that actually is what ended up taking her life through a long series of intense struggles. And I recorded that episode literally the day after my mom passed away at like, it’s officially recorded. It is like 12am on like the 13th. But it was actually like the, like nine or 10pm on the 12th. And so like, technically, it’s recorded as the 13th. But it was actually on the 12th or something like that. Anyway, so it was late at night and I literally got up that next morning after just like, I was preaching my mother’s funeral like I had a lot on my mind. I literally just walked into the office before, before any of the rest of this stuff I kind of came to I just turned the microphone on or recorded. Just my heart cry out at that moment. And I do Don’t listen to that episode, I think I may have went back and listened to it once, maybe maybe part of the way through I have, I probably should. But it was just, it was very emotional. And so that’s one of the beautiful things about podcasting is capturing some of the most raw and real and I’ll be extremely emotional and sad and hard and, and just trembling pain moments, but being able to encapsulate those for other people and I just, I knew I had to, and so on a on a different note, one of the episodes that just shook me spiritually was with Austin Fletcher and I gotta be honest, like anytime Austin is on the show, I feel like I get like spiritually challenged. I loved his perspectives over Halloween and just how like he actually used to not celebrate Halloween even though he’s one of the most not religious dudes I know. Like he was talking about some of his stuff with that and just how both of us learned mutually from each other, but specifically Episode 73 religious fear versus spiritual freedom. And I loved that episode, just because that is the epitome of so much of what my heart needed. I needed that Freedom from Religion, even though I haven’t been in a religious mindset in a while, I had still been ruled by so many of those religious dogmas and I had not experienced true spiritual freedom in such a long time. That episode was a huge breath of fresh air.

Austin Fletcher 26:27
There is freedom that Christ came to give you from law, freedom from law and rules, and regulatory righteousness. And there are plenty of ministers out there handing out rules and regulatory righteousness and conditional righteousness. And I would say sin management here’s how you know you get your accountability partner, you get your you know, make sure you do you read your Bible, you know, twice a day and you need to go to church every Sunday you need to give Oh, and soon By the way, isn’t just You know, a lack of morality. It’s also you know, not giving to the church and it’s, you know, not not, you know? Yeah, it’s such a broad subjective definition. You know why it’s so subjective, because all things are permissible.

Cody Johnston 27:16
And of course this could go on and on and on. Elaine, I know you absolutely adored Paul and Tony’s episode. I don’t know if you want

Elaine Johnston 27:22
to say favorite interview that we have done thus far in the last two years.

Cody Johnston 27:26
Great interview. That was great. Some of the other ones Carl forehands interview was great. Thomas J. Ward had an amazing time. We can’t forget David Hayward’s been on the show twice the naked pastor sharing amazing stuff every time there are so many interviews in death, marriage and youth was not too long ago.

Elaine Johnston 27:45
Tracy Winchell,

Cody Johnston 27:46
Christy burmeister, way back at the beginning right out of the gate, one of our first controversial subjects where she shared her story of sexual assault and church and then oh my gosh, Eric Nevins The list goes on and on. We’re missing so many things. But I mean, there’s just been so many amazing people. So for everyone who’s been on the show, we want to just reach out and say a huge thank you guys for taking the time to, to come on and share our last episode last literally last week. You know, Jason, you had an amazing episode, I was taking notes on that one as I was producing it, even though I was involved in the conversation. So guys, there’s just been some amazing conversations happen. And I just cannot be. I can’t express how grateful I am, that we have been able to do this thing and just that we’re going to get to continue to do this thing, because we are headed for another hundred episodes. We’re not slowing down. We’re just now pushing in. And we’re going to pivot and we’re going to shift but we’re going to keep pushing and keep asking harder and harder questions. We’re going to keep having more and more conversation. If you’re not in nomads, I can’t encourage you enough to go over there and ask to be a part of nomads, because that is where this conversation is going to keep going. And, you know, instead of all the usual closeout stuff, let’s just close out this way, Elaine, what has been your biggest takeaway since we’ve started podcasting? And while you’re thinking about it, I’m going to go ahead and share mine. Is that okay? You still thinking, Okay, cool. I’m going to go ahead and share mine. And this is something I’ve shared a lot lately. And that is just that if you want to see people, it’s not in a building. It’s not in a place. It’s in the eyes of your fellow man. I have learned that over and over and over, God keeps bringing it back up spirit, he’s bringing it back up into my, into my heart over and over and over. And it just came to be finally clear as day not that long ago to drop your anger, drop your burdens and just realize that, hey, when you look into the eyes of someone, even someone that is supposedly

accused of being the most godless person on the face of the earth, God is still in them somewhere. That person just doesn’t know it yet. And whenever you take a second to view them as God’s vessel, that person is a vessel that is king capable and able to carry the glory of God. All you have to do is pour something out. When you guys the whole analogy of would you toss out a car because it ran out of gas? No, you fill it up, you’d give it new gas, because that car is worth money. Well, how much more so is that true about people? And that’s been my biggest takeaway. I can’t express enough how much that has impacted my life.

Elaine Johnston 30:24
The biggest takeaway from me is that regardless of how confident people may sound, or pastors or leadership or really just any random person who thinks that they have all the answers, legit, nobody has all of the answers. Everyone has questions whether they voice them outwardly or not. We are all dealing with something we are all having things that we question and things that we are struggling with, and that we’re not alone and that if you are online for anything more than 10 minutes, you’re going to see people asking questions and asking some of the same questions that you’re dealing with. And that everyone is just trying to search for their specific relationship with God in the best way that they know how to. And because of that, we need to be more graceful with each other as well as ourselves.

Cody Johnston 31:26
Yeah, and that’s the epitome of the show. And that’s what we want even more if we want to keep asking those questions. And we just want to press deeper into that. Every single one of you who take the time to click and listen, guys, there’s a lot of you it’s amazing and it blows us away every single time. We look at download numbers, we look at responses that are started coming in even more so lately. And guys, you heard the reason that Elaine and I are brave that we are bold and then we are recklessly pursuing Christ without caring about the consequences. That we are open to these conversations and I just want you all to know that we want to keep having more. So here’s to another hundred, another hundred after that and another hundred after that. Thank you guys for sticking with us and being a part of this conversation. We look forward to the next one and as always be brave, be bold and be reckless.

We’ll talk soon.