The discourse presented in this episode centers on the profound insights of Jason G. Green, the esteemed author of "Too Precious To Lose: A Memoir of Family, Community, and Possibility." Central to our conversation is the exploration of how Green's upbringing in a historically rich community informs his understanding of unity amidst diversity, particularly in the contemporary landscape marked by division. We delve into the transformative power of storytelling, as Green recounts the invaluable lessons imparted by his grandmother and the broader context of his community's resilience. His experiences, including his tenure as a Special Assistant to President Obama, illuminate the intersection of faith, service, and civic engagement. Together, we reflect on the importance of empathy and connection as essential elements in bridging divides within the church and society at large.

The discourse unfolds as Joshua Noel and TJ Blackwell engage with Jason G. Green, an eminent community builder and author of the memoir 'Too Precious to Lose: A Memoir of Family, Community, and Possibility'. The discussion delves into the profound themes of familial and communal ties, underscoring the importance of shared narratives in fostering understanding and unity within diverse societal frameworks. Green, whose career spans significant roles including serving as Special Assistant to the President under Obama, articulates the transformative power of storytelling in bridging divides, particularly in contemporary ecclesiastical contexts. He reflects on his upbringing in a Methodist household, where faith and community service intertwined, shaping his outlook on life and leadership. Throughout the dialogue, the speakers explore the intersections of economic opportunity, community trust-building, and democratic renewal, positing that the very essence of a united church lies in its ability to embrace plurality while fostering a sense of belonging among its members.

Takeaways:

• Jason G. Green emphasizes the importance of community building and trust in fostering economic opportunity and democratic renewal.
• The conversation reflects on how personal stories and family histories can profoundly shape one's understanding of identity and community.
• Green's experiences in the Obama administration provide insights into the complexities of domestic and economic policy during a challenging era.
• The podcast discusses the significance of church unity amid diversity and how different cultural backgrounds can enrich communal worship experiences.
• Jason shares lessons learned from his grandmother, highlighting the power of service and the importance of connecting with others through prayer and support.
• The episode illustrates how engaging with one’s heritage can inform contemporary social and political issues, fostering empathy and understanding.

.

You can leave a donation, buy podcast merchandise, check out previous series that we've done, or become an official member of The Whole Church Podcast on our website:

https://the-whole-church-podcast-shop.fourthwall.com/

.

Check out all of the other shows in the Anazao Podcast Network and find merch to support some of your favorite podcasts on the network's website:

https://anazao-podcasts-shop.fourthwall.com/

.

Hear more from Joshua on his other podcast, Be Living Water:

https://be-living-water.captivate.fm/listen

.

Check out TJ on Systematic Geekology:

https://player.captivate.fm/collection/f4c32709-d8ff-4cef-8dfd-5775275c3c5e

.

See more from Jason G Green on his website and get his book today:

https://jasongerardgreen.com/

.

Be sure to come out and meet Joshua at Theology Beer Camp 2026 in Kansas City:

https://theologybeer.camp/

Ephesians 2, 12, 16 in the Christian standard Bible says, at that time you were without Christ, excluded from citizenship of Israel and foreigners to the covenants of promise, without hope and without God in the world.

But now in Christ Jesus, you who are far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ, for he is our peace who made both groups one and tore down the dividing wall of hostility in his flesh.

He made of no effect the law consisting of commands and expressed in regulations, so that he might in himself one new man from the tomb, resulting in peace.

He did this so that he might reconcile both to God in one body through the cross, by which he put the hostility to death.

In this letter to Ephesians, St. Paul is helping to define to the local body and Ephesus what it means to be the church.

Here he is speaking to the Gentile believers about what Christ has accomplished in salvation for all who believe in himself.

Jason G. Green, how do you believe?

Do you like to learn from this idea that salvation reconciles Gentile and Hebrew believers in a way that might be applicable to some of the divides we see in our churches today?

You know that that piece of scripture makes me think of the.

The song.

I grew up Methodist denomination.

I am the church.

You are the church.

We are the church together.

All.

You follow Jesus all around the world.

Yes, we're the church together.

You can go on and say the church is not.

The church is not a steeple.

Right.

What it's saying is the church is a people.

And what's so beautiful about that verse is that it's.

It's saying that the.

To the uniting power of Christ.

The point there is manly divisions, our hostilities, our temporary borders, our tribalism, that through Christ we can be committed.

So it is the message of this court to precious times when we have the capacity to come together.

And that this is, you know, Christ in this example is what's lifting us up beyond our tribal differences.

Yeah, good stuff.

Good stuff.

Great song too.

Hey, guys, welcome to the Whole Church podcast.

Possibly your favorite church unity podcast.

Totally cool.

If it's not, though, we're not in competition with the other unity podcast because, like, that's self defeating.

I am Joshua Noel here with the one and only pot almighty, TJ Tyres, Juan Blackwell.

Welcome to your show.

Thanks.

Yeah.

And we're here with fantastic guest, really excited to talk to Jason G. Green about his upcoming book two or current book, Too Precious to Lose, a memoir of Family, Community, Impossibility.

It's going to be a good one, guys.

All right, Jason Green.

Is a former senior Obama White House official, the co founder of Skill Smart, CEO of Evergreen Labs.

His work focuses on how institutions build trust and legitimacy through practice across education, workforce, and civic life to achieve meaningful, durable outcomes.

So super excited to get to talk to him today.

But before that, you could go to our website, purchase one of our T shirts.

It helps promote the show.

It raises money for podcasting needs, gets others to know about the importance of our mission to educate and unite the modern church.

Josh, which one are you.

Is that a Systematic Ecology shirt?

I am wearing a Systematic Ecology shirt that the one day I'm not wearing a whole shirt while we record.

Yeah, right.

Yeah, of course.

My favorite is the one that is the TJ quote on the back, because there's nothing back there.

Super clean, super easy.

Yeah, I still like the.

It's classic.

It's called, like.

I think it's called the divided Church one that has, like, the building on the back.

Divided Church.

Yeah.

It's cool with the word Bubble church.

That one's good.

But you should check out the onslaught podcast network website for other shows like ours or that aren't like ours or shows that we like to like, like Kung Fu Pizza Party with Brandon Knight, Pixel, and Page.

There's a lot over there.

Theology on the rocks.

Yeah, Check it out.

Teacher's going to do a crossover episode with Kung Fu Pizza Party and Seismic Ecology soon about something I've been requesting over and over and true Kaizen.

Something I don't know a lot about.

I just know that TJ likes it a lot and it's Kung Fu related.

Yep.

Yeah.

And, you know, so if you're like me and you just like when TJ's excited about something, that'll probably be a good one.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So with that, we go ahead and start one of my favorite sacraments here on the show of Just Silliness, we like to start with a silly question before we do the serious stuff.

Because you can't be divided when you're being as silly as I like to be.

I still still stand on that, you know, community.

Sometimes it's formed in silliness.

And today's TJ and I answer first.

Give you time to think about it.

Jason, if you could have any one animated character in the White House, who would it be and what position would you place them in?

Tj, do you want to go first?

You want me to go first?

Yep.

Yeah, I'll go.

I'm going to go.

Willy from the Simpsons.

Groundskeeper Willy as the ground Creeper.

All right.

Perfect.

You know, something not super critical.

He's not gonna cause any huge problems, but it would be fun if he was.

He was involved.

Well, I'm just gonna do three to give Jason a little extra time, then Bugs Bunny.

Thank you.

Could be the help department.

Just because he's gonna say, what's up, Doc?

And that's literally all I want them to do, is just ask the doctors what they think.

That's fine.

Darth Maul for Department of Peace.

Mostly because he's pretty tactful.

He might be a little hot headed, but he's got some good tactics in that new mall series.

And my actual answer, King Mickey from Kingdom Hearts.

Sorry, Pastor.

Will you have a leader who's literally just gonna straight up leave, go into the realm of darkness to bring someone back?

Sounds a lot like Jesus to me, and I think we could use a little bit of that, so.

So as King Mickey is present.

King Mickey is president from Kingdom Hearts.

Yeah.

Specifically because Disney doesn't own enough.

Jason loves you, man.

Those are fascinating.

I went.

I went, winnie the Pooh.

And I'm gonna put Winnie the Pooh as press secretary.

Can you imagine Winnie the Pooh just, like, calming everyone down, offering some lessons, some perspective, you know, bringing everybody together?

It's such a hot mess right now.

I think Winnie the Pooh could be press secretary and do wonders for the country.

That'll solve a lot of those divides.

Just having someone who's like, what if we just stopped and had a small smack roll?

Well, you know.

Yeah, exactly.

What you need right now is some honey.

True.

Oh, bother.

Oh, Christopher Robin.

Yeah, I love it.

That's a good one.

That's a good one.

That's real change is what that is.

Sweet.

Very sweet change.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So usually we start the show by asking about your journey, coming to the faith and where you are now to help our audience get to know you better.

But that is largely what your book is about.

So would you mind maybe filling our listeners in on why you chose to tell such a personal story in the book and what you hoped this work would accomplish?

Yeah.

Thank you.

And I'm happy to get into that faith journey question too.

There's some components of that that actually aren't covered in the book.

And much of it sort of initiated the fact that I'm the product of a Methodist preacher and a public school teacher.

That's where my faith journey in many respects began.

But this book is a product.

You say, why did I choose to write it?

I don't know that I Chose to write it, in many respects, felt called.

I was definitely called to go spend some time with my grandmother.

So after I was four and a half years into serving as associate White House counsel to President Obama, I got both.

A call from my mother to tell me that my grandmother was sick and in the hospital.

But I felt a pull and a tug on my heart that I actually needed to go and be with her and sort of take up temporary residence.

Interviewing her and collecting her stories, that moved me.

And that kind of led me down this journey.

TJ that sort of compiled these stories and put this book together.

But I can't say that it was anything that I set out to do.

I'm very grateful that I had that experience and opportunity.

But to have been sort of following my feet in that calling sense.

Right.

Which is as good a reason as any.

Why'd I do it?

God just kind of.

It was.

I had to do it.

Had to follow my feet.

Right.

And who was guiding my feet?

Exactly.

You mentioned that part of your faith story isn't in the book.

And you've already mentioned some, that you grew up a Methodist.

Could you unpack some?

Like, what made the church you grew up in special?

What was the moment, like, where you first felt like you dedicated your life to the Lord and like, you know, if there's anything just peculiarities about the Methodist Church maybe not everyone's familiar with, that'd be cool to hear, too.

Yeah.

I grew up.

So I had sort of close proximate relations with three different Methodist churches growing up.

So the church that I was baptized in and sort of spent a lot of time in vacation Bible school in her early years growing up was Fairhaven United Methodist.

That's kind of the subject of the book.

It's the product of the merger of three racially segregated churches.

But then my father, when I was in first grade, my father graduated from seminary school, was ordained in the Methodist denomination and got appointed to a church.

And so then we started attending Metropolitan United Methodist Church.

So we grew up in Gaithersburg, was living in Gaithersburg, then moved closer to Baltimore, where my dad, dad became senior pastor at Metropolitan United Methodist.

And then about four years later, he was reassigned to Epworth United Methodist back in Gaithersburg, closer to where we had grown up.

And so it was interesting.

Fairhaven United Methodist was this Integrated congregation, product of three racially segregated churches, but both Metropolitan and Epworth were.

Metropolitan was historically a black congregation, and Epworth was historically a white congregation.

So it was very interesting to see.

Kind of my father sort of used God's call or worked to build community in each of those three different denominations.

Obviously, I felt at home in many respects in all of them, but they were all sort of working in different ways to try and heed God's call.

Yeah, that's really special.

See, the only time I ever really attended a Methodist church was so that I could be on their basketball team.

So not a ton of experience, but I did have to go for a few weeks.

You were recruited?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

They had an open gym, and after a few weeks, they're like, hey, do you want to be on the church's basketball team?

I got to hear Reverend Justin Coleman to come to church, his church, and, you know, friend of the show, Reverend Justin, just got to shout him out.

That was great, though.

That was a really cool experience.

Love him.

You know, I love Methodist church.

They have really big basketball trophies.

But the heart of your book, it was huge.

The heart of your book for us was, like, you mentioned, sharing stories from your grandmother, Ida Green.

Can you tell our listeners some about her and the impact she had on your life?

Oh, yeah.

So I was really fortunate in that I live very proximate to my grandparents.

So my grandparents lived at the top of my street that I grew up on.

Aunts and uncles were cascaded in between us, and my parents lived at the bottom.

So I got to spend time with my grandparents every day.

I got dropped off there before and after school.

You know, my grandfather, who passed away when he was 81, I was only 10 years old, but I still felt like I had a lifetime of memories with my.

With my grandfather, you know, so we were that close and had sort of that one relationship.

My grandmother grew up in the church.

She would say, you know, being at Pleasant View was felt like being at home in part, I think, because she was there so much.

They were there on Sundays, they were there on Wednesdays, they were there on Saturdays.

The church played this religious role, but it also was a community center.

It was a social center.

So much of activity, preparedness, planning, organizing, all happened in the church.

And it's where she was the Sunday school superintendent for 30 years, giving of herself to her community.

And she played the piano until her fingers gave out and she passed that on to her younger sister.

Sister.

But the church really was the center of community for my grandmother.

And you can imagine you're growing up in Jim Crow south, when a lot of the world was saying that she is a black woman with a second class citizen, it was in the church that truly provided the sanctuary.

It truly provided an opportunity to be with her God and to feel valued and loved and trusted and that she could be somebody.

And so she ended up being a part of the trustee board and really was able to accomplish and achieve some status and sort of that love of church, the love of people, and that appreciation of faith in God that she passed on.

TJ I would ask her, I'd be like, grandma, what's the hardest thing that you ever had to do?

Right.

She lived to be 107.

Like, what's the hardest thing you ever had to do?

And she'd be like, well, baby, if you just believe in God and work hard, what's hard?

And it was this sort of, with that frame that she approached everything.

Yeah.

I would have said turning 107.

Right.

I would just.

Yeah.

Or, you know, Jim Crow or World War II or.

She said the, the craziest thing she ever saw was the transition from the horse and buggy to the car.

I mean, just the woman saw quite a bit, but it was rooted in faith.

Right.

And she would have been like in her late 20s, early 30s.

You're like grown at the time and there's just no more horse that.

That have to be crazy.

Yeah.

Pretty wild.

But these stories with your grandmother serve as a close up look into a larger topic that you talk about with the historic black community of Quince Orchard, M.D.

What can you share with us about that community as a whole that has helped you in your career and faith throughout your life?

Yeah.

Well, one thing I think is the book starts to articulate how I didn't know of Quince Orchard as a place in that way.

Right.

I grew up with all of the love and community and connectedness.

Right.

That my father knew, that my grandmother knew.

I just didn't know that was called Quince Orchard.

And so part of this book and part of this journey is unpacking that, going into the stacks, having time with my grandmother to learn the story, and literally finding the article where Quince Orchard is written in print, and wanting to go back to my grandmother and understand what this place was and how it came to be, and frankly, how I could not know about it just in two short generations but when you talk about how it's helped me in my faith journey and how it's helped me in my career, all of this is really about understanding who you are and whose you are.

And so there's just a deep understanding of the resilience that it took to build a community like Quince Orchard.

And on that land, they built the church.

Right.

And they built the schoolhouse, and they built the social hall and the cemeterial plot.

They built this kind of life cycle of that community.

And that was an incredibly difficult time, a time that, I don't know that I would have been so communal or faith leaning, but they were.

And they sort of sewed those traditions into the foundation of that community.

And so I get to be the beneficiary of that today.

Right.

Which is an incredible legacy to, you know, take from Quince Orchard to the White House, you know.

Yeah, you want to, you know, I'm sure they're impressed now, but to mention your time in the White House and working for the Obama administration, how did that community that you grew up with shape how you interacted with others in that kind of environment you encountered in the White House?

Was that like fish out of water or you're just like, hey, here's what that's actually like?

Yeah, it's a good question.

I think that looking back on it now, I thought that everyone sort of came to that experience with kind of the upbringing that I did.

Turns out that's not entirely true.

There were some real political animals that viewed that experience through a political lens.

I view it from a lens of service.

I come from that lineage of a.

A Methodist preacher, a public school teacher, and a very activist grandmother who, I should say, you know that hospital room that I went to go stay with her in, late in life?

Well, it turns out that she introduced me to that early in life.

You know, at five years old, she would take me along with her to volunteer in the hospital.

And I remember going into one of those rooms and like, protesting, saying, grandma, I don't want to go in here because it smells funny.

Right?

Like, I don't.

And saying, I'm five years old, I can't help these people.

What do you really want from me?

And her saying, we're not here to save someone, we're here to serve someone.

And that orientation really stayed with me.

And taking yourself out of it, taking your ego out of it, that we're here to make somebody else's life better.

And it showed me the power of being in witness.

It showed me the power of showing up and the capacity to make someone else's life better just by being.

By being there.

And so that's kind of the orientation I had of service.

And so you can imagine me showing up to the White House with this belief that leadership is a manifestation of service and service is a manifestation of love.

And so we should be here because we want to love the American people.

We want to manifest that through our policy.

And dj, to your question.

Right.

That's not everyone's lens for how political work exactly gets done.

Yeah.

And, you know, I know.

I know a couple of people who have ended up at the White House.

And it's just the country that we live in, and the melting pot that it is results in so many different lives ending up in this same place, who grew up differently and generally just treat everyone differently and have such different perspectives.

And I.

You'd think it would end up better than it is currently, at least.

But.

How many people do you know that end up in The White House?

Four.

That's wild.

Here.

TJ's got a pipeline of folks that.

Yeah, yeah.

You know.

Well, you have a lot more friends than me, too.

Yeah.

I don't know.

Like, I feel like it's at least like, 80 because you're more likable and 20 because I. I'm less likely to like people.

Turns out most of the kids who want to be on town council in high school are pretty politically motivated.

Turns out when you choose to be homeschooled, stay in your home and then don't go try to meet people, you just don't have that many people.

It doesn't work out.

So anytime we bring up, you know, the Obama administration, the Bush administration, any political figure or administration, there's going to be people in the church who automatically want to deny your faith for working with them, for voting for them, whatever.

Have the lessons that you learned with that community you grew up with helped you when you interact with maybe people who would question your motives for working alongside one administration or another?

Because whatever they believe about it.

Oh, without a doubt.

So, I mean, it's worth just talking a little bit about kind of the community that I was born into.

So Fair Haven United Methodist Church was the product of this merger of three racially segregated churches.

We frame that in racial terms because Pleasant View was a historically black congregation.

McDonald Chapel was historically a A northern white congregation, and Hunting Hill was a southern white congregation.

So those two churches had split themselves over the issue of slavery.

So there was, you know, quite a bit of different perspectives.

So even beyond the racial lens, you know, you could talk about politics or just viewpoint, orientation.

And yet those three congregations came together in the grace of God and then had to figure out how to bind themselves together over time.

Right.

That meant what hymn book do we use?

What sanctuary are we going to use, what building are we using, what name?

How long are we going to.

Is our service going to go?

Who's going to preach?

Who's going to sing?

What are our songs going to look like?

And so their deep and great intention about figuring all those things out, but at the same time, not really muting a perspective.

Right.

So the goal in part was to stay together and then to represent different perspectives and how do you appreciate different histories and different cultures and.

And so you don't get into a lot of political conversation, but people have different politics.

Right.

But the idea here is, how do you build a beloved community?

How do you allow the things that bring us together, that unite us, be greater than the things that divide us?

And so, I mean, I think that that in display is an incredibly useful example and resource when trying to apply conversations in the White House or in the political lens.

Just to be able to understand and meet people as people where they are, talk about values and talk about orientation, rather than immediately dismissing someone just because of their political viewpoint.

Yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure.

Well, so along those lines, because it's political, but it's not just political.

Like our country as a whole, I feel like, just has become more divided in the last decade or so.

Especially you mentioned in your book, you mentioned the George Floyd and what it's done.

We probably all know people on both sides of debates that's like, oh, we don't like how whatever administration handled the COVID pandemic.

You know, whatever how churches handle the COVID pandemic.

I know people who left churches because of that.

How might the lessons that, like you're telling us now, how can they help not just you, but all of us kind of address just how divided and chaotic our country seems to be right now.

Yeah.

Too Precious to Lose is intended to be kind of a self.

It's kind of to be that balm and Gilead.

Right.

Like here is something that people can read and connect to.

It's lessons of my own interrogation of community.

It's my own interrogations of myself, my relationship with community, my relationship with my family, my relationship with these ideas, coming to the conclusion that pluralism, that the agency necessary to build community, is truly too precious to lose.

But it's sort of the lessons of me going on that journey that people can draw from.

Hearing you talk about the division just now, Josh, makes me think about kind of the story that I tell with Uncle Melvin in the book where Melvin, who I've known my entire life, but I only really knew one thing about him, and I knew that he didn't merge.

And in my mind, that was all I needed to know about him.

I kind of flattened him down to that single decision.

And so when I went to go interview him, he really wasn't interested in sitting down for my interview.

And it took me going to my grandmother and asking her to intervene.

And she called me out.

She was like, well, why do you want to talk to Cousin Melvin?

Why is that important to you?

And I said, well, because I think that I want someone to represent his viewpoint point in this merger conversation, because I want to tell a holistic story.

And she was like, do you want to talk to Cousin Melvin, or do you want to talk to somebody who represents a particular viewpoint of a.

You know, and it helped me realize that I wasn't.

That I was kind of dehumanizing him.

Right.

I wasn't looking at his humanity in total.

I was looking at the single decision that happened 50 years ago in attributing so much to it.

And so when I realized that, then we were able to begin to get a little bit more proximate.

Then we were able to begin to build a relationship.

And the book sort of articulates how that happens in this beautiful way where we go on this run.

But, like, that's a relationship now that I covet.

Right.

We don't agree on everything now.

You know, we have disagreements.

I understand is I understand him better, and I understand how he navigates in through the world and how he sees himself.

And I think that's really important.

It's one way it's hard to hate up close when we can be proximate with one another.

Yeah, hard to hate your cousins, too.

We frown upon that at the whole church podcast.

Yeah, you'd be surprised how often it happens.

Yeah, no, I.

There's something Learning in Wartime is a sermon C.S.

Lewis preached.

And of course, I have to mention C.S.

Lewis.

It's in my contract.

But one of the things that he said that really struck me.

And, you know, this is past World War II, all this other stuff.

And people are like, oh, what?

Well, actually, I think it's in the midst of World War II.

There a lot of people are asking, is there a point to going to college?

Is there a point to art?

Is there a point to, you know, this stuff?

The world's chaotic.

It's all ending now, you know, whatever, freaking out.

There's divisions in the country, all this stuff.

And he talks about it, he goes, yes, this is unprecedented times.

Every time is an unprecedented time.

And just like, the way that he said that.

And I'm like, man, this man, he had been around for both world wars through all kinds of, like, just crazy stuff happened in Europe.

And he's like, yeah, every time is an unprecedented time.

It's like, not to belittle your own time and what's going on.

Like, yeah, it's serious.

But when we look back at the example of, like, your grandparents or like, I think of like my grandmother, I found out, like, last year there was times where they were splitting a can of beans and who got to eat that day was like a whole question.

And I just never talked about it.

And you're like, yeah, the people before us have gone through stuff too.

We all want to, like, I don't know, overemphasize.

Like, our times are, like, it's so special.

And like, yeah, we're going through stuff.

Like, I'm not saying that the stuff we're going through isn't real, but looking through these stories from our grandparents, cousins, you know, whatever, we're like, oh, yeah, they've been through stuff too, and there's still a lot to learn.

Even if their stuff wasn't the COVID pandemic, they went through the Great Depression, and that was also pretty bad.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

I mean, Josh, one of the testaments here is just the opportunity, if we can.

If we can take it or if we can make it, to actually slow down and hear the stories that you're talking about.

Right.

One of the great blessings that I had in Too Precious to Lose is I got that wake up call.

I had the opportunity to go and sit with my grandparents, my grandmother, and just hear her stories and understand.

Exactly your point.

Oh, we've been here before.

And, oh, and by the way, the lessons of what our ancestors have done can actually be applied to this moment.

There are things that we can take from them that can help us move us forward.

And so I think Melvin's a good example where I get to slow down and sort of sit and understand we don't have that time very often.

And so everything's kind of hurried.

You know, I think about my own father, you know, the way that, for example, the integration of public schools was taught.

I learned about desegregation of schools in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Right.

The Little Rock Nine.

But I never learned, just never came up, that my own father integrated my elementary school, the school that I attended, that he was one of the.

He was the first integrated class.

And so, you know, having those times to sort of understand the context where we've been, the hard times that we've been through, and then extract.

Extract lessons that we can then apply to our time today is really the point.

I don't want folks to just sit in nostalgia and Too Precious to Lose.

I want them to read Too Precious to Lose because it gives us license to go back to our ancestors, understand that history, and take the lessons and apply it to where we are today.

And this might be a little weird, but I also think some of the lessons and stuff we've talked about before on this show about, like, hermeneutics can be important to understanding your ancestors stories because you do have to a little bit understand the context.

And that's where, like, there's stuff that me and my dad super disagree on.

But then I look at who my dad is and how that still inspired me, and I'm thinking, like, yeah, to me, my dad's a really rigid, conservative person who's never going to see things different.

When I look at my dad's story, he was a preacher in a church that didn't allow bowling, who just openly was out bowling, who convinced my grandparents it was his wedding bands weren't a sin.

Like, yeah, to me, that stuff is silly.

But when I look at the context of his story, I'm like, wow, my dad was actually kind of radical for some of this stuff.

He's like, oh, bullying's a sin.

All right, I'm gonna preach at your church, and then you can meet me at the bowling alley.

Hold up.

Wait a minute.

Yeah, you know, and your mom wears pants.

Yeah.

Crazy.

Yeah.

Not allowed.

Yeah.

So, like, to me, they're rigid of whatever.

They're still stuck in their old ways.

But, I mean, you gotta understand these stories in their context and then take that inspiration.

And, you know, to my dad's chagrin, I probably am doing much the similar thing of what he did and just looks different in our context.

Yeah, I think that's absolutely right.

And I love that understanding the whole person, right.

That who he was before he Was just your dad.

Right.

To sort of broaden out the title.

And same thing with my grandmother, to understand that in 68.

Oh, this woman was a radical.

Like, I just know her as Grandma Green.

Drives me to volunteer every day.

But she was out fighting for city names and high school names and merger of churches.

And so I think it's so important to understand the context around our loved ones.

Yeah.

Which is insanely difficult, at least for me.

Growing up.

It's like, oh, my.

My dad's a person.

Right.

But that's an actual person, like a human being.

Yeah.

So that was.

That's really hard.

Speaking of your dad, when you were young, when he transitioned from the historically white to the historically black church, was that for you?

Was that difficult?

I was gonna say teacher to your last point.

You know, it's hard for you to realize that your dad's a human and now think about, like, extrapolate that out.

Right.

So we just.

It gets harder and harder for us to see people as the human qualities that we can't.

The people that we live with under the same roofs.

Like, the more distant you get, the easier it is for us to forget.

To your question on.

On dad.

So dad became a pastor when I was in first grade.

And so the first church that he actually pastored at, he did his before he was ordained.

He pastored quite a bit at Fairhaven, sort of this integrated church.

Then we went to Metropolitan, which was a historically black congregation.

And then in my high school years, went to Epworth, which was a historically white congregation.

And, no, none of those transitions were difficult, other than the normal difficulties of leaving your friends and, of course, moving what I think thought was, you know, across the country, when in reality, it was an hour away from where we lived before.

But what was.

I think the beauty of being rooted in the church is that it gave you a community.

It gave us a community immediately.

And so I remember walking into that new congregation the first day, and a boy named Michael Sims said, you know, do you like basketball?

I said, yes.

He said, do you like baseball?

I said, yes.

He like soccer?

I said, yes.

And he said, you got a new friend.

And so I.

Day one, I had my new friend, Michael Sims, and, you know, got introduced into the rest of his church community.

And, you know, these.

These church communities, all of them were, as the preacher's kid, love looked a lot like accountability.

So I had a lot of people looking in on me.

I had a lot of people doting, and, you know, that felt a bit constrained at times, but.

But I Look back on that.

I knew that I had a lot of people who cared about me.

Yeah.

Now, a long, long time ago on our show we had a friend, you know, kind of like a sort of mother to me and Josh in some ways on the show who pastors black church in our denomination or my denomination now since Josh left us.

But she said that there is still value in a black church staying a black church.

Do you think that black that has a place in today's society?

I do, I do.

One of the journey of this book.

So one of the things that my recollections or as I wrestle with the world today for your listeners who are going to read the book, they'll see that I'm on this journey.

And that journey ends with me back at Pleasant View of all places.

Right.

And so part of what it's saying is that this church merger of three segregated churches, right, that produce Fairhaven, interestingly, the only one of the original three churches that still stands is Pleasant View.

And it still has its history.

It still has the cemeterial plot, it still has the floorboards that people got carved up with women's high heeled shoes as they were filled with the spirit.

It's still there physically even if the congregation doesn't worship there anymore.

And it still offers a place for kind of history and identity and legacy and sanctuary.

And so it's, I think it's really important to have those spaces where people can feel free and feel safe and can be restored and close to their God in a way that allows them to sort of then go forth and be engaged and productive in the world.

Yeah, people on the show.

No, I get weird when we talk about like if heaven exists and like some of the metaphysics of what it could be like and whatever.

And I'm like, I'm not sure how much I care.

But in general I really love those worships meetings where you have churches that stay true to what they were all coming together because you still get to hear like the black church music being awesome.

And then like some of my favorite actually worship songs on Spotify.

This is really weird.

I have some like Hindi Christian music and it's just so cool.

This is awesome.

And I like when we have all this stuff put together, but I think it is weird.

As much as I want us all to be united and all together all the time, then when you're together all the time, everything just sounds the same.

So I'm like, I kind of like this be.

Not that I want us separate, but I like that we have found a way to preserve these different cultures and music and stuff so that when we come together, we can have all the flavors.

I think that's incredibly well said.

For me, it's this matter of fact, preserving right and keeping a richness in.

When you get into the conversation of that dividing, then we have a problem.

Right.

If the.

If the intent of that preservation is to divide, then I have a problem.

What I.

What I think is beautiful is that where that preservation, that culture, that richness is actually a force for uniting, is a place that actually inspires people to be engaged in society, that allows them to have strong, informed foundations to go off and engage and be united, as you say.

I think if our institutions aren't advocating for us to be better and going forward, then we have a problem.

But where they are able to do that and have that richness and texture, then I think it's really, really important that they be able to be preserved and remain.

Yeah,.

The Orthodox Church does this really well.

They have a big Greek Orthodox church in Charlotte, Father Jonathan Shout Out.

Been on the show a few times, but their church has this big Greek festival.

People who even aren't Christian are gonna.

They go and they hope, because they're sharing these food and drinks and all this stuff.

And, like, something about preserving that culture does seem enticing to people.

It makes people want to see what's going on and, like, when it's done.

Well, you know, we've been to Father Jonathan's church.

I felt super welcome.

I've gone to Reverend Kino, the Ame Zion, been to that building.

So welcomed.

You mentioned our friend and mother, but we go to that church.

Super welcomed.

It's not like, hey, we're preserving this thing, and you guys stay out.

But it's more like, we're preserving this thing, and it ends up becoming this enticing thing of, like, we want to see what this is about.

We want to experience this culture and be a part.

Even that's a big part of State Assembly.

Yeah, I think that's perfectly well said.

And I should say that one of the things that's really interesting and beautiful so that we're exploring, Too precious to lose, is this merged congregation and the effort to still preserve these component pieces that we're talking about.

Right.

And it's a challenge.

It's a real challenge.

I mean, and I kind of equate it to the microcosm of America, which is like, how do you bind together around values and still preserve these elements of identity and culture and history?

And so small microcosm examples are like, when they're trying, when they're wrestling with what do they do with the gospel choir?

Right when they felt like the African American experience wasn't being fully, fully felt in the congregation, how are they going to bring that gospel choir theme?

And then what are you going to do with it?

Is it going to be integrated?

Is it not going to be integrated?

So really seeing a church wrestle with this idea of preserving its history and culture and richness at the same time that it's also trying to build a new pathway forward is one of the things that was really exciting for me to explore.

Yeah.

And it's funny because I'd like to go to any church.

I'll go to any church's service at least once.

I just don't really like to go to non denominational churches because where's the culture?

We can all worship here.

Sure, but what is it for?

It just feels it can be a good service, it can be a good worship, but it just doesn't feel like it's a lived service.

What's the.

I'm curious for both of you, like, on that first walk in, what would get you to come back?

Are you.

Is it the word?

Is it the music?

Is it the people?

Some combination of all three people.

And then, like, I'm a weirdo.

So, like sacrament, like, I love a good, like how it's put together.

One of the reasons I really love my church, beside Pastor Will being awesome, is when we come to partake of the sacrament of Eucharist, they actually.

We have some older ladies there who like, bake the bread by hand.

So this is like bread that I'm like, oh, People actually put this work into it.

Like, that makes me feel more part of the community.

So people in sacrament, I think probably.

Both, a lot of it is the music for me, very musical person.

That's fair.

Pentecostal.

You know, if it's.

If I'm clapping, I'll probably come back.

A beautiful sanctuary also helps a lot for the Greek Orthodox and Catholic churches.

You know, you walk in and your breaths literally taken away and no one's even saying anything.

Yeah, that doesn't hurt.

That doesn't hurt at all.

A nice greeter, a good greeter is important.

You know, it's not detrimental if you don't really have a good greeter, but a good greeter makes a big difference.

So mix of those things.

I'm with you, tj.

I think music sort of orientation.

But, Josh, you saying some of that community Piece that just reminds me of growing up.

I talked about some of the accountability.

It made me think about Miss Emma, who was this woman I write about in the book who was.

She didn't have any kids, but she was the.

She, like, would meet us all in fellowship hall and then stand, you know, dominion over the cookies and the treats.

And like, as all of us kids were leaving Sunday school, she would just like, like smack hands to make sure that no one got goodies before the adults did.

And it was so interesting because they would, you know, all of us would run to our parents and be like, miss Emma smacked my hand.

And they would all say, you better listen to Ms. Emma.

You know, and there was just this deep respect, you know, and understanding and shared values and doling of justice for Ms. Emma and, like, love for her looked like accountability and like trying to get us all to walk on the street and narrow.

And so seeing those sorts of people, you know, whoever the Ms. Emmas are, at these places that walk up to you and be like, this is my church, you know, grab your hand, welcome you and introduce you.

Like, I love those.

Finding those people when I.

When I show up at a new congregation.

Oh, yeah, right.

And you'll find them.

Yeah, yeah, they will make themselves for sure.

Yeah, they'll find you.

Is there anything else that you think our listeners may like to know about you or your book too Precious to A Memoir of Family, Community and Possibility?

I think we talked so much about the importance that the intent here is not to go back and stay in the past.

The intent is to go back and draw some lessons that we can apply to the future.

And excited that we've been able to engage communities in this work.

That historic site that I talked about.

When my grandmother passed away, she was 106 years, two months shy of 107, but she was still a trustee of that historic church.

And so when she passed, I actually took her seat.

And so I'm trying to carry her legacy forward.

And one of the things she wanted to see was sort of new life being breathed into that site.

We're doing that this month on June 20th.

That would be really Cool to see, actually.

That'd be fun to check out.

Come on down.

We have 11 days.

We can get to Maryland.

Yeah, that's fine.

Trip to dmv.

So is there something that you rarely get asked in interviews that you wish people would ask you more about?

Oh,.

There's nothing I wish that you had asked me.

No, I don't think.

Cartoon characters in the White House.

You wish you got asked more about that.

Yeah.

You guys got covered.

You guys got the animated animals covered.

You know, there is.

So you didn't ask me about, you know, when I was thinking about Bible verses, you know, the one Bible verse that might, that shows up in the book.

And my grandmother would talk a lot about James 1:22, be not hearers of the word only, but be doers.

That's her whole doers do orthodoxy that kind of shook me into activation.

I was a good government lawyer that could do a lot of paralysis by analysis and slow some systems down pretty well.

And so hearing that and understanding that there are people in the world that sort of get confidence and clarity in action and in doing it was a very powerful concept then to see it in scripture really touched me.

But no, I don't think that there are other things that we didn't get to chat about.

Good.

Good.

That's good for us.

Yeah.

Is there.

Where would you like to send our listeners to get a copy of your book?

What would help you the most?

Yeah, I'd love people to check out Jason greenbook.com they can see where my book's being sold.

It's being sold at Amazon Bookshop.

Wherever books are sold.

We encourage people, people to go and check it out.

But Jason Green, book.com people can stay in touch with me.

You can follow me on tour and they can also follow me on social media at Jason Gerard Green.

All right, cool.

We'll put those links in the show notes and.

Okay, great.

Wasn't sure if that was.

I'm saying that live.

And as always on the off chance that we have listeners who are just like, I can't afford to get another book.

I always have to recommend if you ask your public library, they will buy the book for you.

And then it's in the public library and even more people might see it.

So that's actually pretty cool.

It's helpful for everybody.

And you can do it for free.

Yes, please.

And it, it's in quite a few public libraries.

Yeah.

So check it out.

It's also, it's also I did the, the audio book version if you want to get that.

And listen, I love a good.

Put it on 1.5 speed and just get through a chipmunk, you know, That's.

That's all me.

Oh, yeah.

I think Josh listens on three times, actually.

But I'm.

I'm a crazy person.

I don't expect anybody else to do that.

It's just.

Do you really.

Oh, wow.

I just.

No, He's a freak.

I have too many books that I want to read and not enough time to read them.

You know, you do what you got to do.

Yeah.

You prop.

Solving problems.

I love it.

Yeah.

It just has to pay attention.

Yeah.

You just really can't afford to zone out.

It is true.

There was a.

There was a book I was reading last week.

I literally had to redo the whole chapter because I was, like, cutting onions and I stopped to, like, grab a bag and I'm like, I have no idea what's happening right now.

That's a talk for another day.

It was this book called Too Precious to Lose.

No, no, it was.

It was the.

The sequel to the space books with Chris Paolini's All Throat.

You know, I'm talking about D.J.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

The sequel.

To sleep Under Sky Stars or whatever.

To sleep in a seat.

Yeah, the seat.

The sequel.

I don't know what the sequel was, but anyway, one thing we do like to do before wrapping up, rather than talking about books that we aren't paying attention to, ask our guest to provide just a single tangible action, Something that you think would better help, better engender church unity.

What's one thing that you think our listeners could stop and do right now that would help better bring the church together in our own time?

Just something practical they could stop and do.

Oh, you know, my grandmother had this practice that was pretty special that I now do.

Whenever she would be awakened in the middle of the night, she would always say that, I think this is a good time for me to pray for somebody.

And so I started.

Started doing that.

You know, I don't sleep that well and realize it was a good time for me to think about someone else and hold them in prayer, whether they're going through a particular ailments that I know I'm sick and shut in, or just to, you know, hope that God's grace can embrace them.

And I think that it, you know, we can spend more time thinking about someone else, directing our energy in their direction and raising their needs up to God.

I think that that will bring the church a little bit closer.

Yeah.

And what changes in the world if we all do that.

You know, there's a song we started with, I Am the Church.

There's another song that says, somebody prayed for me.

Somebody prayed for me Got down on their knees, took the time to pray for me and I'm so glad they prayed and I'm so glad they pray.

I'm so glad they prayed for me.

You know, it.

It opens us up in both ways, and it builds a more empathetic heart and brings us closer together.

Right.

So that'd be great.

Everyone listen to Jason Green because we said so, and who doesn't want that?

Yeah, that's good stuff.

But before we wrap up, we'd like to ask everyone to share a moment they saw God recently in their lives, whether that be in a blessing or a challenge, a moment of worship.

We always make Josh go first to give the rest of us enough time to think about our God moment.

So, Josh, well, what's your God moment this week?

I had a very challenging day at work yesterday after a recent promotion.

And it's one of those where you're like, you're happy about the promotion, but then you're like, man, this is rough.

And it was like a 15, 16 hour something crazy.

I come out super late, and I'm like, oh, this stinks.

And barely got to see my wife.

Oh, my God, whatever.

And she had, like, a little goodie basket that my wife made me, like, on the counter with, like, balloons, like, congratulations and some of my favorite treats and drinks and stuff.

And I was like, ah, yeah.

You know, that whole, like, a good wife being, like, the best blessing or whatever, like the Bible thing is.

That was.

That was good yesterday.

Pretty sure it says good dog.

I needed that yesterday, though.

So that was a.

That was a blessing.

So it's gonna be mine.

She.

She's.

She's got.

She's got something there, you know, she's all right.

She's all right.

Now, I don't know if you're talking about my dog or my wife, Tiffany.

She's all right.

Sometimes.

She said, you need a cup cs Though she did say that recently.

I forgot to tell you.

So for me, my God moment, my little sister Just turned 25 years old, which, no, it's starting to make me feel older, which I never get to really say on the show.

Yeah, you know, I never get to feel older on the show.

But you know me in my life, I'm starting to get there.

I'm like, wow, about to be.

I'm gonna be 30 soon.

That's weird.

So, like, how is that?

Is this aligning with what I want to do?

Is, am I where I want to be?

And God has not laid it on my heart yet that I'm doing wrong.

So, yeah, mine's good.

Mine's good.

You know, I do feel like she.

Does not feel the same.

It's challenging for her.

I feel like I have the exact opposite reaction of everybody else on our podcast when you talk about your age, and they're all like, man, you're so young.

And like, my first thing is, holy Crap, when did TJ get that old?

Thought he was still, like, 14.

I don't know.

What do you mean?

He's in his 20s.

That's a little different for you.

Yeah, just Josh not knowing each other.

Since I was going to say that, that speaks volumes about your relationship.

For sure.

That's beautiful because it made me feel old.

Sorry.

I do that.

No, it's beautiful, man.

I love that you're talking about your family.

Mine feels somewhat similar to Josh's.

I was.

Feels a little petty, but last week, I was on tour in California, and I had an event in San Francisco, and I just didn't have any clue on how the event was going to go.

Just didn't, didn't.

I didn't have an RSVP count.

I had nothing.

And about an hour before the event, I started to get the flakes, you know, oh, man.

Traffic's bad.

Oh, man.

Kids basketball games going long.

Oh, man.

You know, work has got me going, so I got maybe three or four of those in a row.

I was already in my feelings that this was going to be an empty room.

And then I had four friends who I knew were going to be there who said, sorry, I can't be there.

And then my phone rings, and I look down and I see a name, and I know it's just going to be the fifth disappointment, and I don't think I can take a fifth disappointment.

And so I'm going to just let it go to voicemail, and I say, you know what?

The least I can do is just answer the call.

So I answer it, and it's a gentleman again.

This event was in San Francisco.

I answer the call.

I say, hello.

He says, hey, Jason, just want to let you know that I'll be there.

I'll be there in an hour.

Nice.

You know, I. I drove up from Los Angeles to San Francisco, so I'm not going to get a chance to change.

I'm going to come in the close.

I'm driving in, but Me and my family will be there.

And I couldn't help but say, like, look at God, right?

It was in that moment where I wanted to give up, in that moment where I was so, you know, uncertain.

And he said, you know, fear not, right?

Yeah, Yeah.

I love it.

Yeah, it's good.

Good moments.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And if you've got to be in San Francisco, it's tough to get disappointed four more times.

But also for those.

For those listeners who are, like, on the east coast, that's a long drive.

Just won't let them know San Francisco is a long haul.

A long haul.

I didn't realize that until I visited California, because in my mind, California, they're.

They're all right there.

No, that's what I love.

That's what I love about European vacation plans.

Not even just European.

I have an Australian friend who is coming to see us this year, later this year, and he wants to meet all of his American friends while he's here, right?

So, like, I'm talking to him and he's like, well, where are your other friends at?

Because we're going to meet him in Orlando.

You know, we're gonna go to Universal, Disney.

And he's like, well, there's a couple in Texas, there's a couple in Seattle, one in Pennsylvania.

I was like, dude, you have, like, two months.

Do you have, like, two months that you can spend in America?

Because that's not.

That's not from my house to Orlando, where we're going.

It's like 10 hours, man.

I'll super.

Like, not very relevant, but since you asked if they had two months, I just remember the one time we were doing, like, we.

I did an Orlando trip and we went to Discovery Cove, which is like a.

It's cool.

I only get into it.

I met at least two families that were from Europe that were like, oh, yeah, we're in our second month of our holiday.

I'm like, what do you mean, second month holiday?

What are you doing?

You're just like, bravo, bravo, my head to you.

Well, for the record, he does have the time to hang out with us for a while.

Week in Orlando and go to Seattle and Texas and Pennsylvania.

It kind of makes me mad a little bit.

Like, why don't I have two months?

A little annoying.

I want to muzzle a little annoying.

Yeah.

But if you like this episode, please consider sharing with a friend.

Share with an enemy.

Share with your cousins.

You always share with your cousins.

Especially you can go to our website.

Especially your cousins.

You can go to our website, purchase One of our T shirts helps promote the show.

It gets.

It gets us a little.

Little extra money for podcasting needs, and it lets others know about the importance of our mission to educate and unite the modern church.

Yeah, Josh, I mentioned my second favorite shirt earlier.

The the Broken Church or Divided Church.

Divided Church.

It's really the only other one I ever wear.

I just.

The graphic is really cool.

It's like the word bubble and our logo.

It's good.

Yeah.

That's really, really good.

Yeah.

Also check out some of the other shows on the UNO podcast network, like Kung Fu Pizza Party.

Be Living Water is one that I'm on.

TJ and I are both on systematic ecology.

We were talking about one piece earlier today, so if you like anime, check it out.

Yeah, yeah, we got it all.

We got something for most people.

Not everybody.

No one can please everybody.

But we do hope you enjoyed the show.

Coming up, we'll be taking a short break for a week or two and then we're going to begin begin our series on the behind the scenes of ministry.

From local church to publishing, organ building.

Yeah, who knows?

We know it's those things.

Plus a couple.

Oh, the shirt we were talking about.

Diverse shirt.

Turns out Diverse shirt, Sure.

I feel like we should rename it, but it's not.

I don't know.

We'll figure that out later.

We should rename it.

But at the end of season one.

Francis Chan going to be on the show?

Yeah, probably.

If someone tells him about it.

Maybe, you know, it's not maybe.

He definitely will be on at the end of season one.

Yeah.

Season one not ending season might last forever until.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Infinite season one.