Niki Hardy is a speaker, author, and host of The WildlyKnown Life Podcast. Her latest book, God, Can We Chat?, is a down-to-earth encouragement that if we let them, our questions can be our faith's superpower, not its kryptonite, and bring us closer to God.

Find Niki at The WildlyKnown Life, where she weaves science, faith, and wonder to help all the spiritually underwhelmed, grown-up humans of the world, say yes to the sacred tug within so they can be and do all they're created for.

Having left corporate life, been to seminary, moved continents, planted churches, started businesses and nonprofits, and navigated loss, cancer, church hurt and painful uncertainty, she's all about helping you put the spring back in your life and faith without having it all figured out first. She lives in North Carolina with her husband and ridiculous Doodle, Charlie, who is the main reason their three grown kids come home.

Welcome to 12 Minute Converse with Jesus Believers.

God chose first to have a conversation with us, his creation.

Our prayer is that this listening space brings growth and transforms your life forever.

Praise God for you, Nikki.

Thank you, and you.

Yeah, thanks for that.

What part of the world are you in today?

I'm in Charlotte, North Carolina, despite the accent, which is English.

How did Jesus meet you?

Well, I didn't actually come to faith until the first year that we were married, so we were in our mid-twenties.

I'd grown up believing I was Christian, but in hindsight, I would have said I was Christian with a lowercase c.

I believed in God, felt spiritual up mountains, and I wasn't Muslim or Hindu or Jewish like many of my friends, and so I thought, well, I'm a nice person, so I must be, you know, a Christian.

But then it wasn't until I came to faith that I was like, oh, this is what it is.

This is what it is to have a relationship with Jesus.

This is what it is to be filled with the Spirit, to move in the Spirit, hear God's voice, all those kind of things.

And it actually happened on an Alpha course, which is a course that's run all over the world to help people kind of talk about and question all the different questions of life.

So that was in London, yeah.

So the person that invited you to that event, is it because of your love for questioning, they asked you to attend at that point in time, or it was just because they cared?

Well, I think it was because they cared, but we have some dear friends, and we used to go camping with them.

And one weekend, she was like, oh, I won't be able to go.

And I said, why not?

And she told me that with her church, they were doing this course, and they were going to be meeting about it, and that's why she couldn't go camping.

And I said, oh, tell me more, tell me more about that course.

And it felt like an ideal place for me to be able to ask all my questions in a safe place, because you can't stand up in the middle of a church service and say, excuse me, what do you mean he died for me?

What does that mean?

And what about suffering and evolution and all these questions?

So she didn't actually invite me until I kind of probed and asked for a little bit more.

You talked about how you dressed in attending that particular event, right?

Why was that important?

Well, it wasn't me.

That was the vicar, the pastor who was giving the talks, and he was just a kind of trendy young guy who was dressed all in black.

He didn't kind of personify the English vicar in the clerical robes and the dog collar and speak with a kind of slow, pastoral voice.

He was just a regular guy, and I wanted to portray that and put across how normal everything was.

How important is that in terms of Christianity and your evolution into Christianity being normal?

I think it's incredibly important because we can go through life thinking that to be a Christian, we have to be a certain way.

And yes, we don't want to be too much like the world.

People need to be able to recognize that there's something different about us and be able to maybe see the light of God within us in the choices we make and how we conduct ourselves and the love that we share.

But also, if we're kind of too super spiritual or we use too much Christian language, then it's just a turn off.

And unfortunately, both here in America and other parts of the world, there is a sense that Christians are hypocritical and judgmental.

And as Gandhi said, you know, I like your Christ.

It's just your Christians that I have a problem with.

And so being normal, just a regular person, is just wonderful.

You talked about your dog.

Is it he or she?

It's he.

It's Charlie.

We used to have Charlie and Chester, but now it's just Charlie.

He's just part of my story.

He's part of the way I live life.

You know, I'm very outdoorsy.

I camp with him.

And it's just nice to bring him in to the stories that I tell and the way I portray my life.

And he's quite fun.

So that helps.

Being the questioning person, it'll only be fair to ask, do you have any questions?

For you or for God?

Well, that's a good one.

Yeah.

Do you have any questions for God?

Let's start there first.

Oh, I have so many questions for God.

Yes.

So many.

And I think it's unusual, if we're 100% honest with ourselves, to not have questions with God.

Big theological questions, but also personal questions.

You know, we often talk about, well, why did God allow suffering?

Well, I think when we go through something, and as if you read my book, you'll know I've been through cancer, lost my mum and sister to cancer, been through all sorts of things.

But so when the rubber hits the road and it's us that's suffering, or it's a loved one that's suffering, that question becomes so much more personal.

Why are you allowing this to happen to me, to us, to them?

They're such great people.

They've loved you all their lives, whatever the reason.

And I think it's healthy to have questions.

And I really believe that these questions that we hold do hold power, but not to distance us from God, but to draw us closer to him, that they're our faith's superpower, if you like, not its kryptonite, when we take them to God.

And I think he's not as fazed by our questions as we think he is.

And he, you know, when he says to us, come to us all you who are weary and heavy laden, and it's like, oh, yes, because carrying questions and pain and grief and worry is tiring.

It's exhausting.

So when we take that to God in conversation, he loves it.

And we might not get the answers that we think we need, but we get the intimacy and connection that is what sustains us and what we're really craving.

How does that affect your one-to-one relationships with friends or family, that ability to ask questions or even to understand that that is a space that you should create for others?

I think it helps people realize that I'm a safe space to come to with questions and that I'm not going to try and give them a locked and loaded theological answer to their questions, that I'm willing to sit in the space of mystery.

But also, every question is really shot from an arrow of pain, or there's a reason behind it, the momentum behind it, whether that's pain or grief, or sometimes it's pure curiosity.

But being willing to just sit in that and say, I'm so sorry, that is happening to you.

So what do you do to remain in that space?

To remain in that space with when I'm with someone, I work hard to think of how they are feeling and what they are needing, as opposed to my desire to answer the question to, you know, encourage them.

It's like, what is it that they are needing?

And what I need to feel myself in order to be that person for someone, it's all about spending time with God.

And for me, that happens outside in nature, where I can hear his voice most clearly, which is why I have the Wildly Known Life podcast, which is all those things.

So to help me and others do just that.

In closing, is there anything else you'd like to share with our amazing audience?

I really want to just encourage people to chat with God, to go to God with their questions, and their hurt and their pain, and know that there's nothing that will faze God, nothing that will turn him away, but that he loves you, because he loves you, because he loves you.

Links are in the show notes.

Amazing audience, a pleasure, a treasure.

Thank you for being on What is Inspired by 12 Minute Converse.