Winsome Conviction
Winsome Conviction
Searching For A Better Way: Wisdom, Buddhism & Christianity
Susan Lim (Ph.D.) is a history scholar and writer who decided to follow Jesus in her teenage years after having grown up in a Buddhist family. Susan joins today’s episode to share her story from Buddha to Jesus, and it’s a powerful story that has reverberated through her family. She also speaks with Tim and Rick on the similarities and differences between Buddhism and Christianity. They discuss what Buddhists get right that Christians can learn from, differing views on suffering, and what happened when Susan told her mom she had become a Christian. If you’re interested in learning how to communicate with your Buddhist family and friends, you're sure to gain insight by listening to today's episode.
Rick Langer:
Welcome to the Winsome Conviction podcast. My name's Rick Langer and I'm a Professor at Biola University in the Biblical Studies and Theology department. I'm also the Director of the Office of Faith and Learning and the Co-Director of the Winsome Conviction Project with my good friend Tim.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Rick, it's great to be back with you again. For those of you who've been following us, you know that the Winsome Conviction Project actually has three different areas that we like to focus on. One, we take seriously the fact that we're God's ambassadors what Paul says, and so our first focus is really communicating outside the Christian community. We want to speak truth and love, and we kind of feel like the love part's been a little bit lacking. Second, we want to have conversations inside the church. You've been a pastor for nearly 20 years. And then the third one is, just the next generation kind of raising up new communicators.
Well, today we're going to get to take a look at the first two. Our guest is a friend. It's so good having friends on the podcast, and Susan Lim has her PhD in history from UCLA. She was a professor at Biola University for almost a decade, which is just awesome. She now is a conference speaker. She's a writer. We're going to talk about her book in the second segment. She is very active with her husband at Mariners Church here in Irvine, California, and we're so glad that you would join us, Susan.
Susan Lim:
Thank you for having me, guys. This is so fun.
Tim Muehlhoff:
And I forgot to mention that she's a taekwondo expert.
Rick Langer:
So don't mess with her. Got it.
Susan Lim:
Loosely.
Tim Muehlhoff:
We used to have some fun conversations in the hall about you and your whole family doing taekwondo.
Susan Lim:
That's right. Remind me to tell you how our master came to faith.
Tim Muehlhoff:
No, wait, your instructor came to faith?
Susan Lim:
Yeah, the grandmaster.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Oh, the grandmaster.
Susan Lim:
He did.
Tim Muehlhoff:
That's really cool. Oh, that's awesome. Well, let me just mention some quick facts and then we'd love to invite you into the conversation. In 1990, there were 30 mosques in the United States. Today there's over 3000. On average, one new mosque opens each week in the United States. From 1990 to 2001, Buddhism has grown in the United States by 170%, and today is the fourth most practiced religion in America. If you Google Buddhism, you get over 37 million sites. And I thought this was interesting. 67% of the world's population does not identify itself as Christian. So obviously a big part of our Winsome Conviction Project and Biola University is raising up a new generation to speak truth and love and winsomely engage people. We take very seriously the great commission. So although we're going to eventually get to your awesome book about the Bible, we wanted to explore just a little bit about your background because you have direct experience with Buddhism being raised in a Buddhist family. We just wanted to get a little bit of your perspective and then talk about maybe how to set up a religious conversation.
Susan Lim:
Sure. Wow. Those statistics are kind of mind-boggling, but as you're citing them, I'm not surprised because people are searching for a better way and there is this deep hunger for something better. But yeah, we'll talk about that in just a bit. But my own story is I was born into a Buddhist family. My mom was very, very devout and my dad was probably more nominal. And at that time it just seemed very normalized. We went to the temple and we had what we call [foreign language 00:03:43], which is yearly observances for our deceased ancestors.
Because my mom and my dad are both the oldest in their respective birth families, it falls on them to observe those. And so that means that my mom was cooking a lot. I'm talking about Thanksgiving four times a year, but more than that, because we had four grandparents who had been deceased, and then we had Lunar New Year and all of that. But it never struck me as odd to eat food that was dedicated to dead people. But yeah, it was just kind of party time for us is kind of what we thought. But yeah, it was a very rich tradition.
Tim Muehlhoff:
So when you say go to temple, is it kind of like the Christian family that you go on Sundays or are you going more weekly to the temple than just once a week?
Susan Lim:
We went once a week on Sundays, but then I think throughout the week if there were special services, it's very, I would say analogous to Christianity. Because it's a community and people are searching for belonging. And so you do the kind of cadence of once a week and then you would have other things throughout the week if you wanted to.
Rick Langer:
And you would have a message that a monk would preach or teach or whatever the language would be?
Susan Lim:
Yeah, I mean, I converted to Christianity when I was in high school. So a lot of my memory is obviously before that. But what I remember is that it's so similar to going to church, where you go, you have "fellowship", there are donuts, coffee.
Rick Langer:
Well, there's donuts.
Susan Lim:
Everywhere and people are mingling, talking about kids and life. And then you go in and then there's a song, kind of the worship part that we would do.
Tim Muehlhoff:
A worship leader leading the group in singing?
Susan Lim:
I don't ever remember instruments. It was mostly acapella, but there were people who would lead it and then you would sing, and then we would have people who would have... It's not a tambourine, but it was more like a thing that you would hit. I'm very musically challenged, you guys. I don't know what it is, but you would hit it and then you would do chants and then someone would share a word.
Tim Muehlhoff:
So I'm curious about the relatives who have deceased. Now, the reason this is of importance to me is my dissertation director, who I adore, is on the Mount Rushmore of people who have influenced my thinking about academics and about feminism and about a ton of different things. She was an adult convert to Buddhism. Then my kung fu instructor is also an adult convert to Buddhism. So for me, for the last, I don't know, 15, 16, 17 years, Buddhism has been part of our conversations as I try to enter into that world. So my understanding is as you remember these deceased people, isn't it true that based on the principle of rebirth, that they're continuing their spiritual journey through different rebirths?
Susan Lim:
Right. No, absolutely. So my mom told me that she always thought her mom would be a bird in the next life because her mom... They had such tragic stories. So my maternal grandmother had cancer when she was in her 40s, and she just lived a really hard life and she would often say, I want to be a bird so I can fly and be free. And my mom said that when she was maybe in her early 30s, she was in Incheon, which is far from Seoul, and she took a bus and she said there was a bird that followed her the entire way. And this is a long journey, and it was flying right by her bus, and she thought... And she was with her brothers, and they were like, that's mom. And so there's this total understanding of reincarnation that if you are good in this life, then you come back maybe as a better person. The worst is you come back as a snake.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Really?
Susan Lim:
Yeah, this crazy relative, like twice-removed cousin had this awful person in their family and they're like, if she dies, she's going to come back as a snake. They would say that. And soon after she had passed, they said they went into this rice jar and there was a snake that was right coiled into... Stories like that. And they're like, oh, she's come back. And that leads me into, there is such a spiritual element to everything we're talking about. And I believe that one of the things about our faith as Christians is that we believe in heaven and hell. We believe that there is the Holy Spirit, but there are real spiritual warrings that are going on. And I think that certainly the animal world or things that we think as odd... I think as Americans, we've forgotten that there are things that happen that look like light, that is darkness or that can woo people into thinking that, oh, that's the way. And so I don't think we can ever talk about other faiths without thinking about the spiritual element of it.
Tim Muehlhoff:
And it's become so popularized, Buddhism, in the fact that the whole meditation being mindful has kind of been co-opted a little bit by Buddhism. But not to say that mindfulness isn't a wonderful practice that we can use in Christianity to shut out all the outside noise, focus on a passage, have sometimes a prayer where our cell phone isn't out, the TV's not in the background, but there is like a sexy version of Buddhism that's out there. And when you start to dive deep into the law of karma, you start to realize there's a lot attached that can be a very heavy system in the fact that I'm always kind of looking over my shoulder of what's the accumulation of good and bad karma that I've been doing? Isn't there always that sense of keeping score of my karmic journey?
Susan Lim:
Sure. I'm going to answer that and then maybe go back to the idea of meditation. But yeah, I think in a way, as humans, we would like that because then we're in control. And also if I feel like I am the one ultimately keeping score, I can be forgetful that I messed up here. And I can also say, no, I did good here. So if you don't have a God who's going to be the real ledger keeper, who gets to keep that but yourself? And so you're ultimately in control as long as you're better than the next guy.
Tim Muehlhoff:
So my friends who are Buddhists bring up this objection and they say, okay, let's get rid of karma. Let's go your direction. Let's say it's grace. Well then you have anarchy, then you're free to do whatever you want to do. And that would be crazy. And in a way I say to him, I think Paul would give a nod to your objection because he kind of tackled that to say that is one way to go with grace. Another way to go to grace is to be thankful to God for the grace and to live a life that would be pleasing to God. But Paul recognized you could go both ways with grace, but interestingly, my Buddhist friends would bring up, at least karma gives a structure and things like that.
Susan Lim:
But you know what I would say to that is you're right, but you know why you're wrong is the fundamental difference between Christianity and Buddhism would be love. And so love seems like it's a free for all except for love is the greatest restraining power on the planet. So I love my kids, I love my husband, and I have the freedom to do whatever I want, but I would never do anything to hurt them purposefully anyway. And so I think in the same way, the love of God, which changes everything. Once you've experienced that and you've been loved by a perfect being like that, you feel like, oh, I can do whatever I want. But you couldn't. You wouldn't because love constrains us. As Paul says, love constrains me.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Constrains us.
Susan Lim:
But I think that the Buddhists have gotten some things right that Christians can learn from, which is meditation, which is suffering, which we sort of touched upon right before this is this understanding that when Buddhists come to faith, they are told up front, this life is suffering.
And the way that you get past that is that you are able to then do good deeds and also free yourself of want. You're going to free yourself of greed and you're going to release your mind and you're going to reach the state of Nirvana where you no longer are touched by all of these things that are broken in this world. And Christians are taught if you come to, largely I would say in the west, if you come to faith, you're going to be able to find your calling and you're going to be able to rock it in that place that God's gifted you. And not that those things aren't true, but they're the ultimate often for where we're going to land. And that's so dangerous. I feel that in my own soul. I have to daily fight against that, that is not the promised land and that there is suffering in this world and that the way out that we're supposed to be rejoicing in it because God gives us a greater power and the spirit.
Rick Langer:
Yeah, I think one of the things that has struck me about... Susan you could speak to this perhaps, you were mentioning this, resolving the problem of suffering by basically diminishing the role of your own emotions and passions and kind of detachment from the world. And I think one of the things that Christians have lost kind of a parallel to losing a place for suffering in our theology is with it a place for lament as a response to suffering. And in effect, it's a process I think, of finding meaning in suffering in spite of perhaps the chaos or whatever might be part of. But there's a way of processing this before God and before your fellow believers, that does not deny the suffering. It actually affirms the suffering, lament and some senses, it's first about the suffering. That's the core acknowledgement of it. You're doing something with it, but you're not denying it.
It seems to me the Buddhist technique is to kind of deny it or to maybe a better way to put it is to rise above it. So I think of the, I am a rock, I'm an island, and the rock feels no pain, and the island never cries or whatever that was, I realize I'm quoting Simon & Garfunkel now.
Tim Muehlhoff:
That was impressive. Rick.
Rick Langer:
But the concept of rising above those things and not being affected by it, I think really isn't a biblical notion. You read the Psalms, and these are written by people who are profoundly affected by their suffering.
Susan Lim:
Right. And I think for Buddhists too, there are different types of suffering. There's a suffering that comes from evil desires or from greed or from avarice. And then there are other kinds of sufferings that happen because people might hurt you or you're just kind of in that place. And how you would deal with those sufferings would be different. Versus for Christians, we believe that suffering is ordained by God, that He would allow it.
And one of the things that always has struck me as, chronologically Job is one of the oldest books in the Bible, and it's almost like God is saying, hey, let me bring up suffering from the gecko, right? He's like, let me tell you this narrative. I created the world and Genesis three, it's fallen, and this is what suffering looks like. Job who's on the same timetable as the patriarchs. And the answer to suffering, unlike for Buddhists who say, it's self-abnegation, it's just denial. It's not seeing, it's not engaging, it's being withdrawn from. God says suffering is going to be redeemed. And in the present, the answer is himself. He never gives an answer as to why Job suffered. And I think about when Brian, my husband was diagnosed with a brain tumor, and it was actually when I was at Biola.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Yeah, I remember this.
Susan Lim:
And I was just about to actually apply for tenure that year, and I had all this paperwork. I brought it home and I told Brian, hey, let's talk through some of the implications of this. And he couldn't keep his eyes open, which was just not like him. He was falling asleep mid-sentence. And I was like, that's so odd. And so I was like, I think you should go to bed. And it was pretty early. And that night he had a seizure.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Oh, wow.
Susan Lim:
And I remember though, when he had the seizure, I woke up and there was this peace in the room and a clarity, and I didn't know that I knew what to do except for I was being led by God. And the whole experience was, I think a gift from God to us. I know that all suffering is not going to be like this, but what He gave us during that time was the gift of himself, which unless you've experienced it, it sounds crazy.
And so for people who might be looking for answers out there who are saying, this life is hard. I don't know how to put food on the table. I tried all these things and I failed. I feel like a failure. I know because I know God, that He's already working in these people's lives. That there are traces of His fingerprints and grace that is everywhere. If there's a moment just to say, hey God, how do you want me to respond to what you're doing? I just know that He will answer and He will make himself known.
Tim Muehlhoff:
But you see how this goes against American Christianity. Can you imagine an ad campaign? Come to our church, we'll teach you to suffer well. Come to our Christian university, we're going to teach you how to be with God during the seasons of suffering you're going to experience. You'd be like, well, I'm not going there. I'd rather not think about that. Okay, so we're running out of time. There's two things we've got to talk about. One, your conversion experience, and then how do you share with a Buddhist mother?
Susan Lim:
Okay. Wow, Tim.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Hey mom, here's a fun thing that happened.
Susan Lim:
Guess what? I'm not a Buddhist anymore. But really quick, Tim. I think if we did say, hey, come to our church. We'll teach you how to suffer well, it might not be popular at first. I bet you it will be popular. I bet you people might try the fun churches late first, and when that runs dry, I bet you they'll say, hey, you know what? I think I might go try it. I don't know.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Enough said. I just gave her a fist pump. It was really good.
Susan Lim:
Yeah, I think try it. Try what the gospel says. And I think there are a lot of people who are doing it. But my conversion happened when I was a senior in high school. I was actually just super lost. Man, high school was hard for me. I just was a big, big mess. And I remember thinking, I just don't know how, even as a teenager, how I'm going to recover from this. I had made such bad decisions. House life was really rocky. My parents worked long hours and just their own marriage was not... It was really rough. And so I tried to find my place in community and parties and relationships. And one night I was at a party and the party got busted because the cops came and I just didn't have anywhere to go. And it was early enough where you're like, you don't want to go home. I called my friend and she's like, I'm going to church. Come with me.
Tim Muehlhoff:
A busted party.
Rick Langer:
Busted party. That's a good evangelistic strategy. I never thought of that.
Susan Lim:
I was like, oh, all right. She's like, just come. So I went and it kind of freaked me out because it was a little Pentecostal and there were people praying in tongues and people that were slain in the Spirit. It was really a little nuts. And I remember just sitting there thinking like, wow, are these people high or delusional or do you have to do this to get into the club?
Tim Muehlhoff:
Is this church service going to get busted?
Susan Lim:
Yeah. Later, much, much later I realized God uses all sorts of churches and He's so big. He does so many great things. But we broke out into small groups and my leader was very calm and he shared the gospel in a very clear way, that we're all sinners, that God came as a man to die for us. He rose again from the dead and He offers you new life. And at that moment, the Holy Spirit said, that's true. And I came to faith.
So backing up a little bit, when I was younger, I went through a really tough season of abuse at home, not from my parents, but from an adult who was living with us. And one night in particular, I just remember thinking, God, I don't know how to live anymore. I didn't know that... I went to Catholic school when I was little. So I knew that there was something out there. I never thought that Buddha was God. In my own heart it just didn't ring true. I just remember sitting in my bed crying one night saying like, God, if you're out there, come get me. And a spirit entered into the room that was so thick and loving and kind and real. It's almost like I could touch this being, just wrapped around my heart, my soul, and just reassured me. And then fast-forward to that night when I'm at church and this guy is preaching the gospel, God just spoke into my heart that night. That was me and my name is Jesus. And I never looked back after that.
Rick Langer:
And that was the process. You weren't in a process of searching per se, you were experiencing loss or hardship or I mean really, really difficult life. But it was just basically hearing the gospel and that's it.
Susan Lim:
And He's true. And I didn't come to faith because I wanted Him to make my life better. I came to faith because He is, and He exists and there's no denying it. And when He makes himself known, when He's so gracious enough to do that, you can't deny Him. He is the great I am. But I knew that because of that, He would make all things well, whether it's in this life or next, because that's just who He is. He doesn't owe that to anyone, but that when He reveals himself to be as He is. Yeah, man, He's great.
Rick Langer:
That's great.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Well one, so sorry to hear that as a little girl, you experienced that. That's very sad. But how powerful that God is meeting you and that feeling that He's there, He's reaching out to you even in the midst of that pain. Okay, so we're the Winsome Conviction Project. Now, I think a lot of people based on those statistics we mentioned in the beginning, we're now bumping into people of different faith traditions. So now you are going to try to have religious conversations with your mom. What would be some generalizable principles as you're having a conversation with a person of a different faith tradition, based on your own experience with your mom or friends, or there's even a monk that you deeply cared about and wanted to share with? What would be some general principles, do you think?
Susan Lim:
Well, from my experience, especially with my mom, I wasn't even trying to necessarily convert her. I just heard that night that if you don't accept Jesus as the Christ, that you're going to go to hell forever. Which is true. There's only one way to eternal life, which is the covering of salvation by Jesus. I was so scared that my mom was going to die early like her mom did. And my mom was sick a lot. In fact, she would be in bed a lot. And I bought this little mirror and I would carry it in my pocket a lot. And when she was taking a nap, I would put it right next to her nose to see if it would fog over.
Rick Langer:
Oh wow.
Susan Lim:
And when I would feel like, okay, she has another day. So my heart... I remember I've been an avid journaler my whole life. I've journaled since grade school. I still have it, thank God. And I remember that night I got saved because the next day I start doing my quiet times. And the first thing I start journaling I remember is from my mom's salvation because I'm just so scared that she's going to pass without this covering. And so I didn't have a game plan. My game plan was not hell for mom.
Rick Langer:
That's a good game plan..
Susan Lim:
That was my game plan. And so it wasn't even polished or anything. I just said like, hey, I'm so sorry. I know you told me to never to go to church. Because I was forbidden to go to church because it was going to be a warring spirit against the Buddhist gods. But I know what you're looking for. You're looking for peace and healing, and there's a guy named Jesus who can give it to you. But you know what I've found for my whole family who came to salvation after, and so many of my friends who have? That God sends multiple people to woo Him, to woo them to His love. And so even as my heart was burning from my mom's salvation, He was sending friends into her life in different ways that only He would know how to orchestrate to reach her heart.
So I would say if you have someone on your heart, number one, as we do, pray for them and ask God to help us to pray for them, because something is broken in the spirit, like spiritual strongholds. It can only be transacted on a spiritual level. No amount of human words can do it. It's only the words of the living God that God allows the power to come through. And I would say second is, I would pray the Ephesians prayer, open the eyes of our hearts to be able to see what you're doing in this person's life. What are the threads, God, the threads of grace that you're already weaving in their lives? Because He's doing that. And for us to come alongside, what's my part in that? And I would say third is love them genuinely. Not as a check off our list.
Rick Langer:
A technique.
Susan Lim:
A technique or a story that we're going to tell to someone. But God, give us a brokenness for this person. How do we love them well? And I think that love is true. People, no matter who you are... Reminds me of Forrest Gump where he says, Jenny, I might not be a smart man, but I know what love is. We're all made in God's image no matter what faith, tradition, because God has made us Imago Dei. When they see, experience love, they know that to be true and it's real and authentic. So I think we need to lead with love.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Boy, that neighbor love, right? People know it.
Susan Lim:
They know it.
Tim Muehlhoff:
We talk about Daniel Goldman all the time about this emotional contagion. We usually use it for the negative. If I have a bad attitude towards you, I don't like you. People pick up. And Goldman's really shown that in his research. But converse is true. People pick up the love.
Susan Lim:
For sure.
Tim Muehlhoff:
They get a good vibe from you and stuff like that. So I love the fact that you're saying lead with love and you already modeled one thing that we could add to the principle list. You didn't say Buddhism was bad A to Z. You actually mentioned some things about Buddhism that might be some good insights. We know via the Holy Spirit about suffering and hanging on to things too much and things like that. So I think that could be thrown into the mix as well.
Susan Lim:
Sure.
Rick Langer:
And so how'd that work with your mom? What was the story there?
Susan Lim:
For my mom and later to my dad too, I think... I was crying when I was sharing with them. And I think it's hard to be mad at your kid who's crying and saying, it's because I love you and I want you to come to this beautiful love that you're searching for. All the problems that you have can be solved because there's someone that great. And if I had time, I can tell you both of their stories on how God called them to be His very own. But just watching Him in action, He's such a great pursuer. I think we do our part and just watch Him do the grand thing.
But for my dad, for example, he drank a lot and he gambled a lot. And he... Okay, I'll just tell it really quick. My dad is a crazy soccer fan and he was watching a soccer game, a Korea game versus another team. And at this point, my mom had already come to faith and he was so angry about that. So he would drive her to church, but he wouldn't go inside and he would wait for her in the car and elders and pastors would come and knock on the window. And he would be like... I don't think he was profane, but he probably was, get out of here. And so they were praying for him. But one day he was watching the soccer game and he's like, oh, if Korea wins, I'll go to church. And Korea was down by three points and he turned off the TV. It was like 20 something minutes left in the game. He came back and they won in a penalty shot. And he got to church that Sunday. Because he's actually a man of his word. And he got saved that Sunday.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Are you kidding me?
Rick Langer:
That is so nice.
Susan Lim:
And now he's an elder. He's quit drinking and gambling. That's what God does. And that's His specialty, taking the dead, bringing them to life. Like a killer like Saul, to make them a pillar of the church. So I would say the person that you love, that you're wanting so much to come to faith, love them. I feel like one of the things that I have to work on in my own heart is God help me to walk it first.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Oh my.
Susan Lim:
I feel so convicted of that. I feel like on a daily basis, Lord, I just feel so unworthy to be a conduit of the gospel. My love is so weak, my knowledge is so small, but I bring you my fishes and loaves and you do with it. And I think it starts from there. And then watching God multiply that because He's so great. And the person that doesn't know Him today could be the next Billy Graham. Just watch Him do it. He can do it.
Tim Muehlhoff:
That is so great. Let me say this about our podcast. We've got Simon & Garfunkel, we've got Forrest Gump.
Rick Langer:
Covered a lot of territory, didn't we?
Tim Muehlhoff:
History of Buddhism. We cover a lot here, Susan. We're a fast-moving podcast.
Susan Lim:
Great.
Tim Muehlhoff:
But I love... I mean, can it really be as simple as lead with love?
Susan Lim:
I think so.
Tim Muehlhoff:
I kind of think American politics needs that. I think we've forgotten that as Americans. And thank goodness you did not forget that in dealing with your relatives, your parents. That's a powerful example.
Rick Langer:
Well, and I do think this issue of kind of finding, not finding a place for the sovereignty of God, but creating our own mental space for that, so to speak.
Susan Lim:
Yes.
Rick Langer:
Because we tend to fill up all of our mental horizon with what we control and what we can do. And then we act like that's all that matters. And like you were just hinting at Tim, I think that applies not just to what you were talking about with evangelism and everything, somehow we have to do it. And it's like we need to be faithful of the part we have. And God's going to have to be the guy who makes South Korea win the soccer game. Come on.
Susan Lim:
For sure.
Rick Langer:
And I do think the same thing has crept into our political discourse with that feeling of somehow, oh, this is the means to accomplish whatever ends we want for our society. We want to get rid of abortion or whatever the issues might be. And so we feel like we have to control all of that as opposed to say, look, there's a part you do have to do, be faithful to do that, but there's a bigger part for God's sovereignty. And when we push the sovereignty of God out of the equation, I think we end up trying to fill that gap by doing things that we just are not appointed to do.
Susan Lim:
That's right.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Okay, so Dr. Lim, we did not even get to her amazing book, Light of the Word: Knowing the History of the Bible can Really Energize Your Faith. So would you promise you're going to come back in a different segment? Because we honestly want to talk about your book because it's really... Being educators, this needs to be standard reading for our students as well as for people sitting in the pews. Would you come back?
Susan Lim:
I would love to.
Rick Langer:
Well, that has been so great to hear. And I would like to thank all of you for joining us for the Winsome Conviction podcast. Would love to have you become a regular listener by subscribing on Apple podcasts or Spotify or wherever it is that you get your podcasts from. And we'd also encourage you to check out the winsomeconviction.com website where you'll find a batch of resources that we have available for you, for doing things to help enhance the quality of your conversations about the important, compelling, challenging things that we face every day.
Tim Muehlhoff:
And when you're on the website, we have two new features. One, we want to hear from you. We've been doing this Rick, for almost four years, this podcast.
Rick Langer:
That's nuts.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Isn't that crazy? Well, we want to hear from you. So what questions you have about previous podcasts or just questions in general about the things that we've written.
Rick Langer:
Things you'd like us to talk about.
Tim Muehlhoff:
Yeah, things you'd like for us to talk about, and so many cool things are happening. We are going to do a quarterly newsletter, and if you would like that quarterly newsletter, then all you do is submit your email and we will get it out and just kind of let you know what God's been doing. So thank you so much for being faithful, and we just kind of want to get to know you and find out what's on your hearts and answer questions if we can.
Rick Langer:
And you'll find all that information at the winsomeconviction.com website. You can sign up there, and we're so grateful to have you part of our community. Thanks for joining us.
