Why Jim Wilder Hasn't Given Up On The Soul If Speaking About the Brain (Ep. 93)

Interview with Jim Wilder

As a passion project, we keep the podcast ad-free. Please help us do it for just $8/mo. Shift your subscription here to help out. Thanks so much.

Photo by Greg Rakozy on Unsplash

Description (+ Transcript below)

Everyone is talking about slowing down, slow food, a slow life. I have friends who host the “Slow Theology” podcast.

But is going slow the best to understand the SOUL? (What does that even mean?)

Recently, people like Jim Wilder have been specifically accused to talking too much about the brain, and not even about the soul. So much so that some believe Jim doesn't even believe in the soul.

(And Jim is a speaker at the Attaching to God Summit, talking about "Empathy, Enemy Mode, and Engaging Gen Z"...so register for free).  

We have a long conversation, attempting to set the record straight about an overly philosophical-cognitivist view of the soul (the slow soul), and how that view needs to catch up to all the really fast things God has enabled us to do—brain, body, and soul. 

We also talk about how broad and wide the field of neuroscience is, the streams that we pull from (which aren't nearly as reductionistic as some), and how the Bible uses many terms to discuss the spiritual part of us.

Resources: Check Jim's New Growing a More Human Community (3-book series)

• Growing Me: Becoming a Child

• Growing Us: Becoming an Adult

• Growing We the People

Check Out the ATTACHING TO GOD Online Summit—with 12 hand-selected experts to help us build emotionally and spiritually amid our mental health crisis.

LISTEN or WATCH or READ:

WATCH: Below…

---

Transcript

[00:00:14] Geoff Holsclaw: Everyone is slowing down about getting slow food, having a slow life. I have friends who have the Slow Theology podcast, but is going slow. The best way to understand the soul, that's what we're gonna be talking about today. The Slow and Neuroscience Neurotheology. This is, uh, Geoff, uh, and Cyd's here today, but we're the podcast where we're trying to have a, a neuroscience spiritual.

Formation. And today we have on again, uh, Dr. Jim Wilder. He has extensive clinical counseling experience and is the chief neurotheologian where Life Model Works, which is a nonprofit working at the intersection of brain and theology, brain science and theology. He has been, uh, training leaders extensively, uh, for 35 years across five continents and author of multiple books, most recently coming out is Growing a More Human Community, which is a small three book series.

Um, which is really great, but Jim, thanks for being on the show today.

[00:01:19] Jim Wilder: That's great to be with you, Geoff,

[00:01:21] Geoff Holsclaw: So about two years ago, we had you on just to talk about like what it is to be called a neurotheologian. Uh, so we talked all about that and I'll put that link in the show notes, but more recently, um, maybe with the rising influence of you and, uh, someone like, uh, Kurt Thompson, as well as your work with life models, some people have grown concerned that all this talk about neuroscience and the nervous system and the.

Body is actually distracting from the main topic, which is, uh, the soul that the soul needs to be saved. The soul needs to be formed and transformed by God, by grace, by the gospel or something like that. And I've even heard, there's a whole book that's come out. We don't have to talk exactly about the book, but, uh, that, that basically says talking about neuroscience is a distraction to spiritual formation or to sanctification or to, So that's kind of the context for what we're talking about today.

I shot you an email. I was like, Hey, you want to jump on and we can, we can talk about this, maybe clear the air. And so the main concern basically is that you, I'll just kind of put it straight out there is that, uh, that the accusation has been that you and people like you, um, don't believe in the soul, have lost, The soul, um, and you talk about the body and the brain and the nervous system too much and that you kind of are maybe corrupting the spiritual formation process.

So that's kind of, uh, the introduction. Is there like another way that you've kind of heard it said that we could kind of throw out there to kind of give people a little context for, uh, what we're going to try to talk about today?

[00:02:55] Jim Wilder: Yeah, I think you hit it on the, the essence of it right there is that, uh, you know, we're, we're ignoring the soul and, uh, or doesn't, don't even believe in a soul. And, uh, you know, that, uh, we're falling into the trap of being, um, mechanistic, that, uh, everything is determined by the brain. And, uh, so the people who have been fighting that whole freedom of choice, and do people have agency, uh, fight for some time, um, you know, uh, have their concerns of, you know, are we feeding that, that, uh, wrong side of the argument?

[00:03:32] Geoff Holsclaw: Okay. So, uh, at worst, we're confused or mistaken about the soul or at best. Rather, we're confused or mistaken about the soul at worst. You know, we've implicitly or explicitly given up on the soul. And I think this comes from multiple different misunderstandings of Uh, so I'll kind of start with, with just the opening thing.

And then you have some really insightful thoughts, but one is I think some people don't understand just the, how broad the field of neuroscience is, uh, today. Uh, like it's exceptionally broad. Uh, so you do have neurologists who are studying exactly how individual neurons fire and the chemicals and electricity that.

Involves all that you do. Have a whole field of like brain scan people who are really into scanning the brain, uh, FMR eyes. Uh, and then trying to locate where in the brain do different activities happen. Although from what I could tell, that's kind of fading and importance, but you do, and there is, um, kind of.

A reductionistic bent in that view that you know, God, the God experience happens in this part of your brain when it's activated in a certain way and God doesn't really exist. Uh, it's just your brain firing or misfiring in certain predictable ways, right? Uh, so we can go on and on. So there are, I just wanted to acknowledge there are very reductionistic views of neuroscience.

Um, That we should be concerned about that do actively kind of dismiss spirituality and the soul. So I just want to acknowledge that, right. That happens. So

[00:05:05] Jim Wilder: Oh yeah,

[00:05:05] Geoff Holsclaw: I don't want to pretend that doesn't happen, but the field particularly, and we don't have to go super specifically, uh, is more in the inter, uh, interpersonal neurobiology, which you introduced me to and Kurt Thompson, uh, through and then through, and then, cause I'm a big research writer, like started reading Dan Siegel and Alan Shore, which is all the people that you studied, uh, also, uh, but they're in like a particular.

Area of the pool. Could you explain maybe like what they're focused on? Uh, that's not the same as scanning brains. Not that we're against that, but like they have a bigger picture in that one sense. So in

[00:05:42] Jim Wilder: actually looking at the formation of identity and what goes on with that based on attachment, it turns out. And so, the brain is a pretty busy duplication system, where it copies the people that it's engaged with, and out of that duplication, and uh, Interaction that forms, uh, basically a sense of who we are and how we're going to control our lives.

And, um, you know, you can see that growing and developing across life. And when it goes wrong, you have all kinds of, uh, particularly emotional regulation problems that, you know, my being upset, uh, messes up my relationships and the way I deal with others, which actually is a very old theological problem.

You know, the problem of the emotions. Taking us away from our relationship with God has long been, uh, bothersome. Uh, and so, you know, we've been trying to deal with that from the theological side. Um, but it's very specific in that, you know, uh, we're studying what happens when you're trying to be human, um, with a brain that has to learn some things, uh, about being human and how to deal with others.

And so that's what we've been looking at. And neurotheology is actually. Um, just takes that section of, you know, what goes on in the nervous system, um, when we relate to God and others as compared to what God tells us should go on in a nervous system, uh, or in a body or in a soul. Uh, and so neurotheology, actually rather narrow, it talks about what happens to human, the human soul when it is in a body.

It doesn't actually study what's happening to a human soul, but it's not in a body because we assume there's no nervous system there. So, uh, the first mistake people make is that, you know, Uh, because you don't talk about what's happening in the soul, uh, when it's not in a body that you don't believe in that, which is not the case at all.

It's just like, well, it's not in the field, you know, it's a very specific, focused field, uh, where we're trying to figure out how does the brain learn.

[00:08:03] Geoff Holsclaw: maybe the critique against your work that it doesn't, uh, Believe in the soul is kind of a category error, uh, in the sense that like systematic theology has many fields, uh, or theology in general, however you want to talk about it. Right. So there's, uh, you know, study ecclesiology while that studies, you know, uh, how the church works and there's theological anthropology, which is, you know, kind of the field that you're very connected to.

You have soteriology, how does God save us? Right. And those things ultimately all connect together to God's work in the world. Um, but You know, they're discreet, you know, and they don't always talk the same way. They don't always use the same language and they don't always focus on the same thing. So, uh, and you talked about, um, you know, just because neurotheology doesn't talk about the sun, uh, that doesn't mean that we don't believe in the sun.

Uh, it's just, that's not part of the topic. Um, so that'd be what,

[00:08:54] Jim Wilder: Yeah. We don't believe the sun has a nervous system, so it's not our field

[00:08:59] Geoff Holsclaw: But our nervous system interacts with the sun in various and different ways. Uh, so then you, you would talk about that.

[00:09:05] Jim Wilder: that would be Mm-Hmm.

[00:09:06] Geoff Holsclaw: Okay. So that'd be kind of one, uh, kind of thought is that it's a, kind of a category error, but then it also kind of, um, the critique that you don't believe in the soul, um, and I would say you, this kind of comes from a book at the, you're kind of grouped in with many, Is comes from the idea, um, while the soul is the center of the will of choosing and it's the center of kind of like knowing kind of things and that the brain, you know, doesn't do that or, or, you know, or, or whatever it's, it's not involved.

Uh, and so whenever it makes, whenever you make it sound like the brain is, is doing all these things that only the soul should be doing, uh, people have read that. Uncharitably, I think this to mean that you don't believe in the soul. You've just taken all soulless things and thrown it into the body and called it a day.

So, uh, and you talk about how there's this kind of slow you and I just, you sent me a document before, uh, We jumped on it and you call it like the slow soul. I love that. So can you kind of talk, talk about that, that they're kind of working within a certain world of thought that maybe is not as helpful as it at first sounds.

[00:10:16] Jim Wilder: Yeah. Well, the, let's go back to the fight that's forming here, uh, about the freedom and choice and will and all that sort of thing. Um, this fight has, uh, gotten focused on conscious thought, and so do we have a choice? When we have conscious thought, well, the, the more behavioral inclined and the reductionist psychologists will say, well, you know what?

You know, you're talking about the choice, but that happens after so many milliseconds. But before that, we can look in the brain and say, aha, here's the thing that determined it. So you're, you actually don't have a choice because earlier in the brain, something else happened that made that decision for you.

Um, Now, when you talk about it that way, you're already creating the impression that whatever happens before we become conscious, uh, can't have any human will or involved in it at all. Um, and that would mean the soul is slow. It can only go at conscious speed with conscious speed in the brain is maybe it updates itself at best, um, five times per second.

And most of the time it runs about a half a second or a second and a half. To get a conscious thought going and get it focused in your brain. That's really a very slow process that involves words. Most of our identity system in the brain is in the fast track, and it runs about 12 cycles per second. Much, much faster.

So you look in the fast system of the brain, we call the fast track, and go, you know, it's thinking. Much faster than the conscious track, but is that determinism, or could the soul actually keep up with the, with the fast track in the brain? And since I'm a neurotheologian, I say, okay, well, God designed the system and he, God created the soul.

Would he create a soul that was slower than the brain he created? I mean, is there any theoretical or biblical reason to think the slowest, The soul has to be as slow as conscious thought. Is it not just as equally possible that the brain, uh, when it's going fast, even so can't keep up with the soul? I mean, that could be the case.

But I think it's perfectly reasonable to believe the soul can think at least as fast as the fast track in the brain.

[00:12:39] Geoff Holsclaw: So as a practical example of the fast and slow track, so many people, this is a

[00:12:43] Jim Wilder: Mm hmm.

[00:12:44] Geoff Holsclaw: Uh, some people are listening to this as a podcast. I listened to a lot of podcasts while I work out some people while they drive on their commute, uh, or maybe while they're running. Right. So their slow track brain is listening to my words, describe the possible situations people might find them in, but their fast track brain is actually the ones keeping their legs moving and making little micro adjustments so that they stay balanced on the treadmill or out, you know, on the, on the track, uh, or The fast track brain is the one keeping them in the center of the lane as they drive in traffic and are aware of the surrounding cars, right?

They're, they're doing all sorts of things fast and slow. Uh, and so you're saying, well, isn't the soul involved in all those activities, the conscious ones that listened to this podcast, but also kind of the, uh, and you say not pre conscious, but you know, you know, faster than consciousness or however you might say it.

Uh, so isn't the soul involved in all those things? Is that kind of the point that you would want to make first off?

[00:13:40] Jim Wilder: Yeah, that would be exactly the point. I mean, the, uh, Uh, the fast track of the brain is making decisions like, what's my least harmful option here? What are the way, what are the outcomes that I would have? And out of that, the conscious brain thinks over the details a little bit more carefully. Uh, but you know, are we not, when, when we're thinking about who I want to be in this situation, isn't that also, uh, something the soul would do? It just does it so fast that we can't catch ourselves consciously thinking about it because it's already done by the time, you know, it gets served up on our conscious table, you know.

[00:14:21] Geoff Holsclaw: And so, so the,

[00:14:22] Jim Wilder: so the idea that the soul could be fast solves the problem of this, you know, the illusion that something is, uh, pre conscious.

It's no, just the system always runs faster than conscious thought. Uh, and why not? You know, what's to say the soul couldn't be involved in that? Now, it doesn't solve the problem of determinism Because you could say well, we don't have any choice at fast speeds and slow speeds But uh, you know that problem for me is solved scripturally not because no one knows how consciousness works anyway So it's a pretty wobbly Platform to stand on

[00:15:03] Geoff Holsclaw: yeah, all right. So that's the kind of the fast and slow soul and the criticisms has kind of come from kind of the older philosophical tradition, you know, that talks about immaterial soul and then it's different faculties and then it's kind of like the slow, those faculties are usually those slow speed kind of conscious things, which of course we still.

Affirm, but you're trying to say there's so much more, uh, that we should also be affirming, uh, you and you talk a little differently than, uh, so in the philosophical tradition, it just talks about like the rational soul or the rational spirit. Um, but you don't really don't talk about the soul that much in your writings.

Um, you use kind of a different biblical word most often. Uh, could you kind of talk about, uh, some of that and why, you know, like we shouldn't necessarily be locked into a one word and one way of speaking.

[00:15:54] Jim Wilder: Um, yeah, as it turns out, the words soul and spirit are used interchangeably at times when Peter's talking about the spirits of those who died in Noah's flood, and John talks about the souls of those who died during persecution. Uh, you know, the words are interchangeable in, in some context. I think there are some biblical distinctions, but they don't really matter to what we're talking about here.

But the word that we have talked about the most is the heart because, um, we're, it's very clear that God gives those who believe in him a new heart, uh, and a new living heart. And in fact, Paul makes it clear that Jesus lives in that heart. Now the heart and the brain are not the same thing.

[00:16:50] Geoff Holsclaw: Mm

[00:16:51] Jim Wilder: And so, whatever is going on in the heart, we have never connected with what's going on in the brain, except in one way, that the brain has to learn to live according to what happens and is seen in our heart.

Our heart in the Bible is always described as the eyes and the ears in the spiritual realm. It's where we see what God's doing. Unless our heart is focused on the wrong thing, like our treasures on Earth, then we're just looking at that, we don't see God. So, this perception of God is in the heart, not, not in the brain.

But, uh, when David says, why are you cast down all my soul? It's as though his, his heart was speaking to his soul saying, Hey, wait a minute, what's going on with you? What are you thinking? What's happening with you? And, uh, this, whatever has to be learned about spiritual realities has to be learned and put into practice.

Um, In the very, um,

uh, well, what'll I say, the brain was designed to learn, that's one thing that neurotheology insists on, you see. And, uh, the more mechanical view, the reductionist view of some theology is that because it's physical it can't learn anything. It just reacts to something. Someone has to drive it. It's sort of using a metaphor like, you know, this is like a bicycle.

No one on the bicycle, a bicycle doesn't do anything. And so you have to have the soul that's running the bicycle. We might say the, you know, the brain is maybe more like a horse. Might need somebody on there to run the horse, but the horse learns and does things on its own too. Sometimes not at all what you want it to do.

that can learn the wrong thing and has to be relearned. And part of the spiritual life and spiritual disciplines is to teach that brain what the heart sees is what's real and not necessarily what the world shows you is real.

[00:19:00] Geoff Holsclaw: Well, that, that idea of like learning, um, seems really important. You, you say something like the basics assumption of neurotheology is that we should teach the brain in the way the brain learns. Uh, and so to be able to teach the way to teach the brain, the way the brain learns means we know in which way the brain learns, so that's what neo, uh, neurotheology is trying to kind of get at.

So could you talk a little bit about like the way the brain learns? Uh, learns, uh, and then why, you know, talking about that might be, lead to better results than just talking about the slow soul and making decisions or learning more information or something like that.

[00:19:42] Jim Wilder: Uh, yeah. And again, we'll go back to the way the brain learns. It learns things at different speeds. And so, at, we've got a body speed that's very slow, the brain will learn, if you eat something that isn't good for you, because a few hours later, you'll have indigestion, or whatever else happens there that we don't want to describe, uh, and it learns slowly.

Uh, then there's conscious thought, where we exchange ideas with ourselves and others, and you learn that over time. faster speed. But the part of the brain that learns identity runs at this fast track speed, and it is based on the interactions with people that we're attached to. So this attachment love that we have is the speed at which the brain learns identity.

If we're trying to teach the brain the new identity, It has to function at an attachment speed which is faster than conscious thought. But, the brain does it easily when I'm interacting with somebody else. I mean, just as I'm talking to you, I have some sense about what you're thinking, what's going on in your mind, and all that stuff, that you haven't told me in words.

And if I tried to describe it consciously, I get it about half right, and you go, well that isn't, you know, but we still understand each other. And that speed is the one, this relational speed, this attachment speed with God and others, is where our, Identities are formed, and most of what we've done in, at least Protestant thought, goes at the idea of ideas and concepts, and so in the sermon, you will sit and run at your basic conscious speed, while someone's talking, um, Well, your brain may be off running, you know, rabbit trails every which way about, you know, how am I getting along with my wife and my kids and what's going to happen to this and all those, the, those thoughts are actually going much faster than the constant, uh, the concepts, but The concepts go so slowly and they go into the wrong parts of the brain that they don't really change our identities much.

Now spiritual formation is about changing our identities so that we begin to believe that we're the children of God and we act like a heavenly father. Then we have to teach that in the way that the brain learns. Not, not in contrast with the, the beliefs that we hold.

[00:22:11] Geoff Holsclaw: hmm.

[00:22:12] Jim Wilder: But it's just that beliefs need to be taught at conscious speed, and character has to be learned and taught at relational speeds.

[00:22:23] Geoff Holsclaw: hmm. And, uh, you cover that with a coauthor quite a bit in the other half of the church. So people who are interested in kind of those different speeds and how, uh, character formation happens. We're also, uh, Dr. Jim Wilder is part of our, uh, Attaching to God Summit, which will be, uh, in the show notes where he talks quite a bit more about, uh, some of that attachment, especially when it comes to enemies and empathy.

And so be sure to be on the lookout for that. So we have a little bit of time left here. Um, so, and there's a couple of different ways, uh, we could kind of keep going to kind of You know, looking at, we kind of covered that neurotheology is a really broad field. Uh, we covered kind of the slow and fast speeds, how, how the soul or the human brain and body complex learns.

Um, you also kind of talk about, um, Kind of the different speeds of value systems. So I don't know if we want to kind of cover that or if there's kind of another kind of burning issue that you think is helpful for people to kind of, um, grapple with. Oh, and we also covered how, you know, there's lots of terms to talk about kind of that deep connection with God and soul is one of them, but also heart.

So what are, are there some other kinds of things that you think is really helpful just to kind of people to keep track of in this conversation?

[00:23:41] Jim Wilder: yeah, I think we need to, uh, avoid a false dichotomy here just to say that, uh, there's plenty of evidence in scripture, although neuroscience can't, cannot tell you anything about it, that the soul still learns things after death. And so the ability of the soul to learn without a nervous system is clear from scripture and that the, the nervous system can learn, uh, on its own, uh, is the part that.

you know, we've discovered recently that the ancient philosophers didn't know anything about. But what makes a, a, a system, uh, a mechanical or, or an, an, uh, let's see, a physical system, probably the word to use, physical system learn is the existence of some kind of value system. And so, uh, actually very inanimate things like the internet learn by, and their value system, we call an algorithm.

And so it pays attention to what I click on. And so. If I happen to click on a particular singer, uh, it goes, Hey, that has value. Let's send him all of the other songs that were done by that singer. And he's not interested in those. It says, Oh, well, let's look at some other, uh, singers from that genre. And because there's more than one value system and these algorithms that go like, and let's look at what those people that were listening to that singer were buying, and we'll send them advertisements for that stuff.

And so the internet has changed itself. Not because it has a soul, but because it has this value system that says some things are more important than others. And the brain has five different, uh, known value systems inside the brain, as well as some other ones inside the body that says, you know, this raises my sugar levels, Uh, that's got value.

And if this, you know, makes me, uh, low on oxygen, that's got value. Those are some body value systems that we're all familiar with. But there's some other ones that are very fast. Like every time the brain senses something important is happening, it sends this one little value system. It's a cluster of about 200 nerves.

It sends out a little message to the brain going, Hey, everybody be quiet. Something important could be happening here. Pay attention. If you look at the brainwaves, there's a peak of, you know, a bunch of neurons fire together and then all of a sudden there's quiet after that. The value system runs on serotonin, and so most of us have heard of serotonin in the context of depression.

If you don't have enough serotonin, you get depressed. Well, what does that mean? It means you're not quieting enough. And so we know that when these value systems go wrong, our emotions start to run wrong, and other value systems associated with, it's low in Alzheimer's, it's the norepinephrine, um, no, the acetylcholine value system.

So, there, but there's just little bits of neurons that say something important is happening, and because they fire when something is happening, the system changes itself to pay more attention to that. Take, for instance, honeybees. When they are first hatched, they have one neuron that does dopamine, and it fires every time it hits sugar.

But within one day, it no longer fires in response to sugar, it now fires in response to whatever color it was looking at when it was getting sugar. And so now, it's acquired, its value system is shifted from sugar to colors, and it'll fly a long ways to find a color it likes. I got some flowers right back there.

You maybe see them, you know, so they might attract a bee by mistake. There's, I'll tell you there's no honey over there, but this is why you get bees flying around. So then these value systems are not in the soul, they're in the physical body, and so you can learn to be attracted to things that your soul might say, you know, you really shouldn't be eating so much sugar and fatty foods.

Where some of these other value systems are going, but yeah, I really want it.

[00:27:49] Geoff Holsclaw: Mm hmm.

[00:27:50] Jim Wilder: These are some of the struggles that we have inside. So to realize the picture is more complex. Then just the soul is learning or the brain is learning. The question is, does the brain have to learn what the soul, uh, sees through the heart when we look at what God is doing?

And neurotheology says, yeah, well, if it's going to learn that, you have to teach it in the way the brain learns. Can't do it with radio waves, the brain doesn't learn that way. You can't do it by conscious thought when it needs relationships. You can't do it by relationships when it needs conscious thoughts and so on.

It's just Straighten it out and teach more effectively.

[00:28:32] Geoff Holsclaw: Yeah. Well, I want to go back just to kind of end to that metaphor of like riding a horse and other people have kind of talked about, uh, you know, use these kind of, um, metaphors. And I think that's a good one because, uh, riding a horse where it's learning stuff, uh, and you're the writer and you're directing it, uh, and some, and the goal is to, uh, Is that you would be aligned in your work.

Uh, and I think God has created us so that our bodies and souls and spirits, however you want to talk about would be aligned. And sometimes I think the criticism from the soul champions kind of who feel like this work is reductionistic is they have actually a much more mechanical view of. What's happening.

So it's not so much that we're riding a horse and I know Jonathan, Hey, he talks about like, uh, riding an elephant or something, but they kind of have it like driving a car, which like there's no two way inputs, there's no independent learning. It's just, or more like riding a bike, right? Where it's just a mechanical contraption that we get into.

And then when we die, we leave. And that thing is just, you know, whatever it was, we'll just forget about it. And I think that that long term creates a lot of problems biblically. It does. Uh, but also practically as far as our spiritual formation goes and the story that God gives us is that, well, we are, we're made humans are made on the same day as the animals, you know, according to, uh, Genesis chapter one, right?

So there is something about us that. You know, we have a nervous system. We have physical needs that require nutrition, you know, uh, but then we also do have a spiritual reality that we've been given. Um, and you know, I love talking about all that stuff, but, uh, I, I think that that metaphor, um, Is good where we're not, the goal isn't then to discard the horse or to, you know, at the end of, but it's rather that we would be integrated, that the value systems would be aligned according to the way God has made us, not that we would just get rid of the horse eventually.

Uh, and sometimes people talk about the flesh, like you can kind of scripture talks in ways where you could start making that mistake where, Oh, God's really against the body or God is just waiting to get us out of our bodies. And some of us were raised with that kind of theology. And so. You know, we're not saying that, right?

That's not what you

[00:30:46] Jim Wilder: No. Um, yeah, it, it, it's not the case. Uh, I think part of that derived from the idea of the soul having the will, uh, just one, one will inside the soul, and the will was the only part that could respond to God to be saved. And so there was some theology that said, well, only the will will be saved and the body and everything else is.

sort of a waste product. You know, all we can do in life is to choose God and wait till we die so God can get on with things. And I believe there's a different way of reading scripture and that says God actually intends us to start our eternal lives now while we're on earth. And we're learning how to live the eternal life now in our bodies, which we eventually get back, or at least some version of them.

So the idea is, you know, there is this intermediate stage where we don't have them, but God's original plan was it would all work together. Then, because of the Fall, it stopped working together. Because of salvation, we're trying to guide it back towards working together, and it just turns out it's a hard thing to learn.

Um, because so many things have gone wrong, and yet with God's help and his spirit, uh, working in our lives, we're able to, uh, make progress along this way, you know, and so that's, that's what we're, we're looking for is this harmony, till all things work together, is, uh, you know, the way God meant them to.

[00:32:20] Geoff Holsclaw: So against some misc, mis, uh, misunderstanding or confusion, uh, life models, Jim Wilder is not against the soul, even though he might talk a little differently and emphasize different things, uh, There is not a sense in which the science is leading us to some sort of reductionistic view where the spiritual realities and soul, uh, don't exist, but we're just, you're just talking about it in somewhat different ways.

Is there any kind of last thoughts, uh, or ways of putting it that you think, uh, you just want to end with

[00:32:56] Jim Wilder: Um, well, what I would say is, uh, this, we, we want to avoid, uh, you know, the Gnostic, uh, mistake of thinking that there's a difference in, in value, that, uh, God didn't create value when he created the human body. Uh, we also want to avoid the, uh, the mistake of saying we're just thinking. Creatures with bodies and we're going to save our bodies and you know that that would be a way to lose our souls You know, so God meant for all this to work together And so that's the harmony that we should seek to find and just realize all of our explanations are going to be inadequate I'm quite sure that in a hundred years in neuro theology will have completely different views of how the brain is actually working With one exception, I do believe it's going to still be relational Then, uh, you know, and that's what theology says, is we were built for relationship with God and with others.

And when we keep that central, uh, we avoid a lot of, uh, you know, love covers a lot of other things, uh, that go wrong.

[00:34:07] Geoff Holsclaw: one, then just to kind of finish off the particular stream of You know, the, it's the big wordy interpersonal neuro biology, uh, is basically finding to be true. What scripture has always said, which is the most fundamental thing about us is our relationships. And we need to tend to our

[00:34:27] Jim Wilder: Mm hmm.

[00:34:28] Geoff Holsclaw: and relationships with bad things, do bad things in us and relationships or rather our attachments to God or to do good things, uh, cultivates goodness in us.

And so I think that is kind of, you know, the. The flag, you know that, yeah, I'm confident is not going to change. Uh, maybe they'll, they'll, they'll change, you know, which part of the brain does this and that, and how exactly do we understand that, you know, this, that functioning, yeah, but that deep kind of reality that, you know, our relationships uh, are so important is, is, is.

It's never going to change.

[00:35:01] Jim Wilder: That will always preach, Geoff.

[00:35:03] Geoff Holsclaw: Amen. All right. Well, then we'll just, we won't, we won't make the sermon extra long. Then we'll just end it right there. Could you say, uh, where people, uh, well, could you talk a little bit about this book that's coming out, growing a more human community, or it's a group of three books. Uh, could you just talk about that and then tell people, uh, how to keep track of the work you do?

[00:35:22] Jim Wilder: right. Basically, human communities are multi generational, and so building a good community starts with developing a self. That's the first book. That's what childhood is about. And it's the kind of self that'll be good for your grandchildren, not just the kind of self that, you know, is actualized for whatever I want to do without regard to what's going to be.

You know, the consequences. Then you have to grow a group identity, which is becoming us. That's the second book and that's the adult and parent stage. And then the third one is on seniors. And that's how do you actually go beyond your own identity as an individual in a group and form a community identity that looks like the people of God, because as far as I can tell God's goal throughout.

Scripture from the beginning to the end is to create a people of God, uh, that goes on from generation to generation. So, you know, how do we live into that and what do we need to learn and how do we need to train each other to be those kinds of people is what I'm discussing in that one. Talk about becoming a more human community.

I really think God thought being human was a good thing. We usually say, well, that's only human, you know, and we screw up, but no, this is what were we intended to be when we look at what God was creating in my life. So I'm, I'm telling the stories of what I've learned along the way by watching a lot of different cultures and situations, and maybe we can learn something from it.

[00:36:56] Geoff Holsclaw: Excellent. Well, that, uh, growing a more human community, we'll put that in the show notes, uh, and you're connected with, uh, life model work, uh, so that'll all be, uh, in the show notes also. Well, thanks for taking a little bit of time just to kind of continue this neuro theology conversation, uh, as well as clear the air about some of the misconceptions.

I really appreciate it.

[00:37:16] Jim Wilder: Great being with you, Geoff, and keep up the good work. 

Um,