The Good Life

Joshua Klein is a woodworker, furniture maker, author, church elder, and editor of Mortise and Tenon magazine. He has written a fascinating biography of  Jonathan Fisher, an eighteenth-century jack-of-all-trades pastor titled, Hands Employed Aright. He also works with the Greystone Theological Institute's mechanical arts program to mentor young men in intellectual, theological, and craftsmanship skills. 

We discuss what drew him to woodworking, the role of beauty in craftsmanship, and what makes a working with your hands so satisfying. 

 

• Mortise and Tenon Magazine
• Mortise and Tenon Podcast
• Hands Employed Aright
• Greystone Institute Mechanical Arts Program

 

Having just celebrated Valentine's Day, here are five good books of marriage that can help any married couple, no matter how long they've been married. 

The Christmas season is almost here and who better to talk about it than a man who hails from the capital of the white Christmas (Vermont) - Ryan Anderson. Ryan grew up in Vermont, moved to Washington state, and recently returned to the land of his fathers. I met him through Twitter (now "X") and have enjoyed his posts about moving home and delighting in the season. We talk about how many good things there are to celebrate in fall/winter, what a family needs from a father, and why slowing down is a good thing this time of year. 

Ryan's Substack page - Old Hollow Tree

Ryan's X (formerly Twitter) account

What is "the West"? What is the role of Christians today in preserving our Western heritage? How does liberalism fit into the decline of Christendom? What is leading to the rise of Anti-Semitism among some on the right? I am joined today by John Ehrett to discuss these and other topics relating to our cultural history. John is a writer and attorney in Washington, D.C. who has written for multiple publications. Some of his best articles are listed below:

• Postliberal Gods and Monsters
• Tradition and Anti-Semitism
• Augustine Against Vitalism
• The Impossible Bronze-Age Mindset
• The End of Viking Vitalism

John Klar is a jack of all trades. A lawyer, farmer, pastor, and public servant, he took on government bureaucracy and won, restoring the right of Vermont farmers to butcher their animals on their own farms. His most recent book, Small Farm Republic, describes the collusion of corporate farming with big government and provides hopeful options for people who want to resist that control. In this episode we talk about the Green (more like Red) New Deal, how conservatives must return to God's call as stewards of creation, and how cows restore the natural world. 

• Small Farm Republic
• John's Substack

How should Christians treat the world? Are we against it, for it, or something in between? In this episode, I discuss the two views and who from Scripture successfully achieves both. 

My guest today is Mr. John Waters, a journalist and Christian convert in Ireland. He has written several books, the most recent being Give Us Back the Bad Roads, which tells the story of how Ireland changed from being the most conservative country in Europe to one of the most liberal in a period of several decades. He wrote for a major newspaper until he was removed due to his stance against homosexual marriage and abortion. We talk about Irish history, economics, government, and literature.

Books

Give Us Back the Bad Roads

Was it For This? Why Ireland Lost the Plot 

Articles

The End of Pseudo-Liberalism

Broken Family, Broken Country

 

Most people approach the book of Ruth with simplicity, thinking they already know it. In my interview with Pastor Rich Lusk, we discuss the beauty, wisdom, and delight to be found in this little book. It is a folk tale, a love story, and a picture of the gospel spreading to the nations, all wrapped in four short chapters. His book, Ruth: Under His Wings, breaks through the normal things we think we know about Ruth and gets to the message at the heart of God's revelation: God never leaves His people. 

Today I had the privilege to speak with Dr. Hal Poe, a professor at Union University in Jackson, TN. Dr. Poe is a distant relation to Edgar Allan Poe, the poet and short story writer. Dr. Poe is the author of Evermore, a fascinating book about his older cousin. Today we discuss the wide-ranging talent of this often-misunderstood writer. There are so many interesting things about Poe that it's hard to know where to begin. For instance, did you know that:

• Edgar Allan Poe wrote more humorous stories than horror stories.
• Dorothy Sayers considered him the father of the mystery story.
• Poe's life closely parallels that of C.S. Lewis leading up to Lewis's conversion.
• He wrote a book about the cosmos where he explains a general theory of relativity, one hundred years before Einstein produced it.

If your view of Edgar Allan Poe was only formed by your public school literature class, after you listen to this interview you'll never see him the same way again. 

 

• Evermore: Edgar Allan Poe and the Mystery of the Universe
• Bonus Article: C.S. Lewis Was a Secret Government Agent

 

How did Evangelicalism become the cultural force that it is? How did it come to be associated with conservatism? What role does money play in the growth of religious consciousness in America? These are just some of the questions I discuss with today's guest, Jake Nelson. Jake has an M.A. from the University of Tennessee and has written on the rise of Evangelicalism in the early 1900s. If you're interested in the relationship between money, politics, and Christianity, this is a podcast for you. 

• One Nation Under God - Kevin Kruse
• Anointed with Oil - Darren Dochuk
• American Apocalypse - Matthew Avery Sutton
• God's Own Party - Daniel K. Williams