Guest Bio:

Rich Villodas is the author of 4 books, including his latest The Narrow Path: How the Subversive Way of Jesus Satisfies Our Souls. He is the lead pastor of New Life Fellowship, a large multiracial church with more than 75 countries represented, in Elmhurst, Queens, and Long Island, New York. He is the co-host of the Resilient Pastor podcast. He’s been married to Rosie since 2006, and they have two beautiful children, Karis and Nathan.

Connect Online with Rich: Website | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter

On the Podcast:

• Matthew 5-7
• BibleProject Podcast: Sermon on the Mount series
• Hope Heals Camp
• Matthew: A Commentary, Volume 1 by Dale Bruner
• Pete Scazzero

YouTube Channel: video with closed captions

Let’s Reimagine the Good Life together.

Note: This transcript is autogenerated using speech recognition software and does contain errors. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print.

Amy Julia Becker (00:05)
season eight of Reimagining the Good Life. I’m Amy Julia Becker and this is a podcast about challenging the assumptions about what makes life good, proclaiming the inherent belovedness of every human being, and envisioning a world of belonging where everyone matters. I’m so grateful that my first conversation of this season is with Pastor Rich Viotas. Rich is the author of four books including his latest The Narrow Path.

how the subversive way of Jesus satisfies our souls. Rich Fiotis has written about reimagining the good life through the lens of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, and we get to talk all about that today. Before we get to that conversation, I also wanna remind you that I have an upcoming workshop called Reimagining Family Life with Disability. So this workshop is designed to help families affected by disability to envision and work toward a good future.

The next live online session begins September 18th, 2024. The workshop content is also available in a self -paced online course and a group curriculum. Here’s what one mom had to say about this workshop. This workshop has been so transformational for me and my family. I wish we had encountered this information so much earlier. It is truly reshaping how I think about disability and more importantly,

how I relate to and love my child. You are also invited to envision and work towards a good future for your family. I would love for you to register today and get 30 % off with the code family24. You can find out more at amyjuliabecker .com slash workshop. We will also include a link in the show notes and please tell a friend. And now for my conversation with Rich Viotis.

Amy Julia (01:53)
I’m here today with Pastor Rich Villodas. Rich, welcome back, we love having you here.

Rich Villodas (01:59)
Such a joy to be back, Amy Julia. Thank you so much

Amy Julia (02:02)
Absolutely. So I have read all of your books and I follow you on social media. I’m a big fan, but I might say that this new book of yours is my very favorite. So it is called The Narrow Path, How the Subversive Way of Jesus Satisfies Our Souls. And it’s really a deep dive into Jesus’s most well-known, perhaps least-well-understood, I don’t know if I just said that correctly, and longest sermon.

And that’s something we now call the Sermon on the Mount. So I wondered if we could maybe start just by with like Sermon on the Mount 101, because it might be like a phrase people are familiar with, but not like a body of work that people are familiar with. So like, who was it for, when Jesus preached it, what does he talk about, why might it matter for us today? If you could just, yeah, give us Bible teaching 101.

Rich Villodas (02:37)
Yeah.

Yeah, start from the very beginning. mean, Matthew chapter five through Matthew chapter seven, and there’s another place in the gospel of Luke, but I focus specifically on Matthew five through seven. That’s where Jesus really lays out what is regarded really as a manifesto of the kingdom of God. It is really, if you want to understand what the kingdom of God is and what life looks like to follow Jesus under his rule, this is really the place to start. And so as Matthew chapter five

Amy Julia (03:08)
Hmm.

Rich Villodas (03:20)
through seven. And if I can give, you know, I don’t talk about this in the book, but, you know, after I wrote the book, I was like, it would have been nice to include this into it there. But when I think about like thematically the structure of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus takes us through a very beautiful flow of what it means to follow Him. So it begins with kind of the language of authority. He sits down. The Sermon on the Mount is in many ways what the Ten Commandments was to the people of Israel in the

Amy Julia (03:49)
Hmm.

Rich Villodas (03:49)
Old Testament with Moses and the Hebrew Scriptures, Jesus is kind of deepening, not shying away from there so there’s continuity with the Ten Commandments, but he’s hoping to go deeper in the Ten Commandments with his followers. And so he begins with authority. He sits on the mountain and sits down, goes up to a mountain and sits down, much like Moses did. And then after he sits down, he offers blessing with the Beatitudes. And so there’s authority.

And then there’s blessing and I just love that blessing comes before he commands anything. He lets us know that you know before he commands he blesses We don’t he doesn’t bless after we have followed his commands. He blesses then he commands and so he he he blesses and then at that point there. There’s like the sense of Presence what what what are we called to be in the world or first of all, would say identity. Blessing. Authority, blessing,

Amy Julia (04:23)
Yeah.

This is…

Rich Villodas (04:45)
identity. He says, you’re salt and we’re salt, we’re light, this is who we are. Even before these disciples have done anything, Jesus is calling them out saying, this is who you are. You’re amazing. You’re salt, you’re light in me. And then he goes into presence, which is, what does it mean to be different in the world? You have heard it said, but I say unto you. And then he talks about practices and then promise.

Amy Julia (04:46)
Mm.

Rich Villodas (05:11)
And so it’s like, we’re trying to practice this way. So this is not just a believing thing, this is a practicing thing. And it leads to promises, the promise of a firm foundation in him. And so this is Jesus’s introduction to life in the kingdom of God, what it means to follow him. And it’s for followers of Jesus. And yet at the same time, I think it has application for people across the board in terms of what does it mean to live a good life, a life marked by fruitfulness and love.

Really, this is the way of Jesus.

Amy Julia (05:43)
And I think, don’t know if it was in your book or elsewhere that I learned that Gandhi read the Sermon on the Mount regularly. You know, that it was actually to your point that you do not have to be a follower of Jesus. Although I don’t know, maybe Gandhi would have called himself a follower of Jesus by some definition if he was reading the Sermon on the Mount every day, I don’t know. But regardless, that sense of there’s some…

Rich Villodas (05:52)
Yeah.

Sure.

Amy Julia (06:08)
wisdom here that certainly for people who call themselves followers of Jesus is really important to attend to. And yet there’s also some wisdom here that is speaking to our core humanity across many different potential dividing lines, including some religious ones, I would I think.

Rich Villodas (06:09)
Mmm.

across the world. I mean, Gandhi reading the Sermon on the Mount, I mean, he was so committed to nonviolent resistance work. And when you see Jesus talking about being peacemakers and turning the other cheek and what it means to live subversively in the world, to be subversive, that’s one of the words I use in the subtitle, is to undermine kind of the prevailing notions of what success is, what power is, how people culturally define

what the good life. And Jesus seems to undermine so much of that in his teachings, which is why I think Gandhi really connected, and why many connect with the words of Jesus, although it’s very difficult on the surface.

Amy Julia (07:09)
Yeah. So I want to dig into so much of what you just said, but I thought maybe I would start here. And I, this might be just something that is particular to me, but what I’ve noticed is that there’s been what seems to me like a lot of material coming out about the Sermon on the Mount in the past year. So I’m a regular listener to the Bible Project podcast, and they’ve been doing like a deep dive, like eight months so far on these three chapters from Matthew. So they’ve been doing the Sermon on the Mount. There was a book that came out last spring.

Rich Villodas (07:28)
Yeah.

They’re amazing. Yeah.

Amy Julia (07:38)
by someone who I had on this podcast called Blessed Are the Rest of Us by Micha Boyett. And it’s just about the Beatitudes. Actually, she has a son with a dual diagnosis of autism and Down syndrome and was using that as a way to reflect on the Beatitudes, which is a beautiful book. And then as I told you before we started recording, I just was down at Hope Heals Camp and was asked to teach from the Sermon on the Mount to the volunteers who were there. So for me, at least there’s been this kind of like

Rich Villodas (07:45)
Mm.

Mm.

Amy Julia (08:07)
congruence of or confluence of all these different people who I’m paying attention to and listening to who are paying attention to the sermon. So I’m wondering if you I think there is something about this particular cultural moment that has actually sparked a renewal of interest or attention to these teachings from Jesus.

Rich Villodas (08:08)
Mm.

Yeah, I do I think there’s much here. And in my own journey, one of the things I’ve wrestled with is, what does it look like to be faithful to Jesus? What does it look like to say, I am a legitimate follower of Jesus? And I think for me, when I look at it, it seems as if everyone across the board, and I’m looking at the church now, across the political social spectrum, claims faithfulness to Jesus. We’re just being faithful to Jesus.

Amy Julia (08:55)
Hmm.

Rich Villodas (08:57)
We believe this way, we vote this way, we lead this way because we’re just being faithful to Jesus. And when everyone is claiming faithfulness to Jesus, it becomes really hard to discern who’s actually really in step and in line with Jesus. And so I think the Sermon on the Mount gives in many ways, it offers an inventory and an invitation. Are we really following Jesus or are we following

the cultural ways that we have been taught to follow Jesus? Are we seeing Jesus? Are we seeing our politics through Jesus or are we seeing Jesus through our politics? So I think for me, at least as a pastor, trying to, I want to be faithful to Jesus. I want to walk in his will. I want to walk in communion with him. I want my life and the people that I shepherd to really embody the Christ life. And I think the Sermon on the Mount becomes

Amy Julia (09:35)
Mm.

Rich Villodas (09:55)
in many ways, a really clear litmus test about faithfulness. So in one way, I think the cultural moment is what does faithfulness to Jesus really require of us? And which is why I think one of the elements of faithfulness to Jesus is enemy love. Those who are really moving in that direction are those who are really the ones who are faithful to Jesus.

Amy Julia (10:15)
Hmm.

Rich Villodas (10:24)
So I think the cultural moment has, at least for me, brought up this idea What does faithfulness to Jesus look like in a moment where everyone is claiming faithfulness to Jesus?

Amy Julia (10:35)
Well, and you also just to pick up on the enemy love question, you asked the question, do we have the same kind of enemies that Jesus did? So especially in like this political moment and our yeah, our culture right now, like, could you explain what you mean by that question? Like, what are the what is what should we be asking ourselves when it comes to enemy love?

Rich Villodas (10:55)
Yeah, Jesus, one who’s never sinned, the Son of God, lots of people didn’t like Jesus. And I think the question becomes, why didn’t they like him? And I think if you strip it all down, lots of folks didn’t like him because of the ways he was questioning and subverting the ways that power was used to hurt people who were already on the margins,

Amy Julia (11:05)
Mm.

Mm.

Rich Villodas (11:25)
the ways that religion was used as a means of control and not transformation. And so Jesus had some very strong words to say about what is true spirituality, what is true religion, and consequently people didn’t like him. But ultimately he was governed by love. I find it to be the case that, and I say this with a personal testimony,

lots of people have not liked me over the years of me being a Christ follower, not because I was like reflecting Jesus, but because I was being a jerk really. And so they didn’t like me because I was maybe a bit too dogmatic. I wasn’t kind. I wanted to debate people and then they didn’t like me. And then what I do is I claim persecution. Very easy. know, look, they don’t like me.

Amy Julia (11:59)
Hahaha

Thank

Rich Villodas (12:17)
I’m receiving some negative words from these folks. That must mean I’m doing the will of God here as opposed to, my tactics have been really, really bad and I’ve been a jerk along the way. And so I think when our lives are marked by holding onto grace and truth, when our lives are marked by seeking to serve those who are culturally often overlooked and marginalized, I think we’re gonna bump up against some resistance and some enemies.

Amy Julia (12:21)
Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (12:45)
Those are the kind of enemies I think are consistent with what Jesus had, not the kind of enemies that emerge because, quite frankly, we’re not kind, we’re not exhibiting the fruit of the Spirit, we’re hard to be around. I think that’s a different quality of enemies that Jesus didn’t experience.

Amy Julia (12:57)
Yeah.

Well, in some ways that like kind of turning it on its head, I do I think and recognizing that so many things we do need to turn on their heads, right? Like just that we might have this reflexive reaction to the way we’re treated and assume one thing when Jesus might actually, and the way of Jesus might say, well, at least pause and ask some other questions here. And I think that gets back to this idea of re -imagining, which is a word that you use in the book a number of times and is the name of this podcast. So I thought that it would be good for us to like dig into

Rich Villodas (13:13)
Mmm.

Yeah.

Amy Julia (13:34)
that a little bit. I’d love to hear you talk a little bit about the imagination, like what is it, and then how do we reimagine things? Like what’s the role of the imagination in the spiritual life especially, and what does it mean, yeah, to reimagine? How does Jesus prompt us to do that?

Rich Villodas (13:46)
Mmm.

I love that. I mean, when I think about imagination, I think about possibility. I happen to be, I mean, I don’t know how people respond to this stuff, but I tend to be a crazy Disney follower these days. Part of it is because my wife is a travel agent with Disney. So we’ve been to Disney parks a lot. There’s one place I go to in one of the parks, Hollywood Studios, where it’s this whole big exhibit for Walt Disney about imagination.

Amy Julia (14:13)
Yeah.

Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (14:21)
And I usually just go there for my own inspiration around creativity, around innovation. But I think creativity and innovation is really about possibility. What is possible? And I think what Jesus is offering us is a different kind of imagination of What is possible in the world? What is possible from the perspective of love? What is possible from the perspective of peace and joy and satisfaction and wholeness? And so the…

Amy Julia (14:25)
Yeah.

Mm.

Rich Villodas (14:50)
I think the reimagination that’s needed is how do we get there? What’s the pathway to getting to the kind of life that we really want? Which is why I think so much of what Jesus does in the Sermon on the Mount is he’s trying to, in many ways, critique the prevailing notions of how we have understood what the good life is, and then helping us to reimagine what it could be. which is why there’s this refrain in the Sermon on the Mount.

He says about four or five times, you have heard it said, but I say unto you, you’ve heard it said, this is the way to a good life. This is a way to a life that pleases God. This is a way to a life that’s really marked by love. But I tell you, which is another way of saying, I want to give you a new, a fresh take, a new imagination to what is possible. And so I think that’s ultimately what Jesus is doing. I haven’t thought about it in that way. I love that your podcast is reimagining because

Amy Julia (15:38)
Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (15:48)
really what we’re talking about is what is possible in the kingdom of God, but it requires us to maybe critique the prevailing notions of what has governed and directed our lives up to this point.

Amy Julia (15:51)
Mm -hmm.

Yeah, and maybe this is a good time to ask about I really appreciated you said that there are kind of three ways of being in the world that Jesus is critiquing, I think to use this language, and that he’s inviting us to a different way and then you name that he rejects but moralism, successism, and individualism so maybe you could talk about what those three things are—moralism, successism, individualism—and then

Rich Villodas (16:09)
Mm.

Yeah.

Amy Julia (16:26)
what’s wrong with them and what Jesus is essentially calling us to reimagine around those.

Rich Villodas (16:30)
Yeah, yeah, you know, when I was thinking about writing the book, I was trying to at least trying to frame some of the problems that Jesus is trying to speak against. And it came to me with those three words, after some significant wrestling, looking at big kind of themes in the Sermon on the Mount. By moralism, I use that word because I think so much of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is addressing people who have lived good moral lives,

Amy Julia (16:59)
Hmm.

Rich Villodas (16:59)
and they have built a religion or spirituality or identity around living good moral lives. And so for example, When Jesus says, you have heard it said, don’t commit murder, let’s be honest, not committing murder is a pretty low bar for like spiritual maturity. Like at the end of the day, if I didn’t kill someone and I’m feeling really good about that, that’s a really low bar of, a spiritual maturity. so

Amy Julia (17:07)
Yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

Rich Villodas (17:28)
Jesus is trying to help his followers and those who are listening to him not live with the kind of surface spirituality that focuses on just our behavior, but he’s really getting at heart transformation. And so the moralism is really such an emphasis on the externals where there is no thought given to the internals that we’re carrying. Secondly, the successism and that term, really actually nuanced that from a New Testament the theologian named Dale Bruner.

Amy Julia (17:58)
Hmm.

Rich Villodas (17:58)
who wrote a remarkable commentary on the Gospel of Matthew. And successism is, it’s the ways that we define, describe, or try to live into what is the good life. And what Jesus does is he says, the ways that we have thought about success, the ways that we have thought about what makes for a good, happy, flourishing life is actually different in the kingdom of God.

Amy Julia (18:25)
Yeah.

Rich Villodas (18:27)
And so he begins with the Beatitudes, blessed are those who are poor in spirit, blessed are those who mourn, blessed are those who are pure in heart, which is, and that word blessed is some translations, happy, fortunate. He’s saying this is actually the kind of life that leads to the kind of fruitfulness that you want. And then individualism, it feels so on the nose to say it, but the kind of spirituality that Jesus is leading his disciples into,

is one that connects love of God for love of neighbor. And in some ways it feels like that’s just so Christianity 101. But When I look at the world and I see what’s happening in different parts of the world with those who are suffering and the ways that it’s very easy for Christians to separate love of God for love of neighbor, I think Jesus refuses to let us get off the hook there and says, no, you’re going to, proof of your love for God is love for neighbor.

Amy Julia (19:03)
Mm -hmm.

Yeah.

Rich Villodas (19:25)
And I think that’s what he’s trying to tease out in the Sermon on the Mount. So yeah, successism, moralism, individualism, I think are three important categories that Jesus is getting at here.

Amy Julia (19:36)
And do you have like an overarching word and you may have already given it to us, but for Jesus’s way of being? Like if it’s not moralism, successism, individualism, is there anything that kind of summarizes his way of being?

Rich Villodas (19:55)
You know, if I can take those categories, I mean, I think what Jesus is getting at, number one, is a beneath the surface spirituality that that connects love of God and love of neighbor, which leads to really the kind of true fruitfulness. So I think the successism, I think the better word for that is truthfulness.

Amy Julia (20:05)
Hmm.

Yeah.

Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (20:23)
like what is a life that bears fruit as opposed to what is a life that looks successful? And in the kingdom of God, in one word is really paradox or it doesn’t make sense. The kind of life that Jesus calls us into doesn’t make sense from the world’s perspective. so success looks like mourning and success looks like poor in spirit and success looks like purity of heart. That doesn’t seem successful. But I think it is this kind of paradoxical,

Amy Julia (20:26)
Yeah.

Mm -hmm.

Yeah.

Hmm.

Rich Villodas (20:50)
subterranean way of connecting love of God and love of neighbor. That’s the invitation I think that Jesus calls us to.

Amy Julia (20:56)
I remember, again, that word perfection, which comes up at the end of Matthew five, like be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect and learning for the first time that our, at least my American understanding of the word perfect as like conforming to an ideal is not what the Greek word means at all. It means becoming whole or complete or like, and that I think resonates with what you were just saying, like beneath the surface,

Rich Villodas (21:21)
Yeah.

Amy Julia (21:26)
integrated self, God, other, and all of those things, I guess, when we are pursuing from an individualistic, I just have to make sure that I’m right and good, whether that’s right and good being successful or right and good being moral. Ironically, paradoxically, maybe that is what can actually draw us away from that integrated life with

Rich Villodas (21:38)
Yeah.

Mm -hmm.

Amy Julia (21:49)
ourselves with God and with our neighbors. And Jesus is like calling us back. And it does seem kind of ironic. And you write about lament and you write about humility and you write about hiddenness, all of these and interior examination. This is a quote, behavior modification without interior examination leads to spiritual desolation. But just that sense of like, if we’re not going inward at all, then we can’t go outward in a way that is actually fruitful. And, and then and we end up

Rich Villodas (22:00)
Mm.

Yeah. Yeah.

Amy Julia (22:18)
in this empty desolate place as well.

Rich Villodas (22:21)
Yeah, it reminds me of, you know, Pete Scazzero, my predecessor at New Life, said, he has this one thing about a sign of unhealthy spirituality. And he says that’s we use God to run from God. And I add to that a little bit where we use God to run from ourselves. I think this is what Jesus is getting at as well, where in the name of religion, in the name of relationship with God, we remain far too easily content to say, I’m doing the right stuff.

Amy Julia (22:33)
Mmm.

Rich Villodas (22:50)
I’m believing the right things. I’m participating in the right stuff. But the question is, have I allowed God access to my interior? To what degree am I living, focusing on my motivations, focusing on my reactivity, focusing on my anxiety, focusing on the values that shape my life? I think that’s what Jesus is calling us into. A life that doesn’t use God to run from God, but works with God.

Amy Julia (22:51)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Rich Villodas (23:19)
to actually journey within so that the transformation, that’s behavior modification without interior examination leads to spiritual desolation. Jesus is, and which is so bizarre because like in Matthew 7, we have these people, which is one of the most frightening passages in the Sermon on the Mount, who are actually doing the God stuff. They’re casting out demons, they’re doing all the good, and Jesus says, I never knew you. Like your life has been so inconsistent with my teachings,

Amy Julia (23:39)
Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (23:46)
that even though you’re doing the right stuff and have power, there’s something that’s terribly missing from your life. And I think that’s part of the desolation that Jesus is talking about.

Amy Julia (23:58)
Yeah, I think I grew up in a Christian culture in which there was some suspicion of the interior work, and suspicion of therapy, suspicion of navel gazing was what it was often called. You’re just gonna only pay attention to yourself. Essentially seeing that as really self-centered. And so I would love to just dig in a little bit, but to what does interior examination actually look like? How do we practice that? And also how is that what actually frees us up

Rich Villodas (24:07)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Amy Julia (24:26)
to, as you just said, run towards God, run towards the love that is not only for us, but for the people in our community.

Rich Villodas (24:37)
Yeah. you know, by interior examination, I’m really getting at three words, first of all, so I’m, getting at, integrity, integration and love, integrity, integration, and love. For me, those are the three words that constitute, what interior examination is. And by, integrity, first of all, I’m not talking about, which is back to the perfection word you already mentioned. I’m not talking about living something perfectly, but wrestling with something faithfully.

Amy Julia (24:46)
Hmm.

Hmm.

Hmm.

Rich Villodas (25:06)
That for me is maturity. That for me is a life that pleases God because we’re not going to live something perfectly, but we can wrestle with something faithfully. By integration, I’m talking about the various ways that we are able to integrate what’s going on within us in worship before God. And so how do I pay attention to the various parts, the good parts, the parts I might not like, but

recognize that God doesn’t just want to transform some aspect of my life. He wants to transform every part of my life. And then the fruit of that is not navel gazing. The fruit of that is actually love. That’s the goal of interior examination. That’s the goal of emotional health in this way. And so again, if following Jesus is simply about following the rules,

and doing the stuff on the outside. I think we’re going to miss out on some significant areas of transformation that Jesus really longs for us to have. For me, interior examination is about integrity, integration, love. I mean, if I could offer just a clearer definition, interior examination is a commitment to navigating one’s interior world in the presence of God for the purpose of love.

Amy Julia (26:31)
Hmm.

Rich Villodas (26:33)
And it’s, it’s an act of really discerning God’s will through, through our feelings, through our emotions, through our personal histories. That’s interior examination. And I think, by and large, that’s the kind of life that Jesus invites us into.

Amy Julia (26:51)
I love that. And at least to me, that’s really attractive. I was thinking though about like the title of your book, because when we, I don’t know if this is an American thing or a contemporary thing, but the idea of like a narrowness, we don’t like, so your book is called The Narrow Path. And it comes from a section towards the end of the Sermon on the Mount when Jesus says like, the broad way is a bad way, right? You’re going to get in trouble on that one. So, you know,

Rich Villodas (27:08)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Amy Julia (27:18)
choose and find, like seek the narrow path and walk on it and it will bring you life. So A, it seems like that’s a hard teaching and there are other teachings in the Sermon on the Mount that are a little more like palatable. Like we’ve got the Lord’s Prayer, you’ve got the Golden Rule, the Beatitudes, like, you know, and so I’m curious why you chose that as your title, because you had some other things you could have, you know, worked from. And then also,

Rich Villodas (27:43)
Yeah.

Amy Julia (27:46)
you talk about it essentially being what I took away was a narrow path to a spacious place. And so could you talk about that? Like, so why did you choose that title and that kind of image as a guiding image for the book, but also in what way does that narrow path lead us to a spacious place?

Rich Villodas (27:52)
Yes, yes, yes.

Yeah, it’s, so initially it was actually the title of the book. And this is how it is, you know, with those who are writers, you start with one thing, you end up with something else. But the genesis of the idea was I was reading the Sermon on the Mount, studying it one season. I’ve been doing this for a long time. My grandfather, when I was 19, I became a Christ follower and was discipled by him for eight months.

Amy Julia (28:14)
Yeah.

Rich Villodas (28:31)
Four to five days a week, two to three hours each time. And one of the assignments he had me do was to live in the Sermon on the Mount over those eight months before he passed away and memorize Psalms. So I’ve been living in the Sermon on the Mount for a long time. It was a recent, a couple of years ago, I was reading Narrow Path or the Narrow Way. And the phrase that came to mind was, it’s narrow.

Amy Julia (28:34)
Wow.

Wow.

Mm.

Rich Villodas (28:56)
But it leads to a spacious life. So the original title was Narrow Path, Spacious Life. That was the original title of it because for me it harkens to the paradoxical nature of following Jesus. If you want to be first, you have to be last. If you want to be greatest, you have to be the least. If you want spaciousness, you have to go the narrow way. So for me, this is consistent with that kind of the paradoxical teaching of Jesus. And I chose narrow because, you know, well, it can come across as closed-minded

Amy Julia (29:00)
Okay.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (29:25)
in our American culture as in or out, this or that, very exclusive. But it hit me that when Jesus is talking about the narrow path, number one, he’s not talking about going to heaven when you die. The primary emphasis of it is life in the kingdom of God here and now. And when I discovered that, wait a minute, that might mean that there lots of Christians who are claiming

Amy Julia (29:25)
Right, right.

Yeah.

Rich Villodas (29:53)
to be followers of Jesus, but they’re not living according to what he teaches in the Sermon on the Mount. So the broad way is not simply bad sinners out there. The broad way is also Christians who are living in this way or Christians who might call themselves Christians, but not following Jesus. And then there was an image about two years ago. I mean, it was from Harry Potter. So I begin the book talking about Harry Potter and I’ve read all the books, I’ve listened to it. Depending on who you talk to today to mention Harry Potter,

Amy Julia (30:07)
Right.

Rich Villodas (30:22)
and the author of Harry Potter is, on all sorts of reasons. 10 years ago, I got in trouble for one sort of reason. Now I’m getting in trouble for other reasons now, but the image remains that in one of the, the Goblet of Fire, one of the novels there, the, one of the books, there’s this tent, narrow tent that, Harry, walks in through, but because the tent had been like charmed, when you go inside the tent.

Amy Julia (30:25)
Right, you might get in trouble for all sorts of reasons.

Rich Villodas (30:52)
It’s like a spacious, two -story loft and there’s like bedrooms and kitchen and everything. From the outside, it looks really narrow. When you get on the inside, it’s really spacious. And I remember reading that and then watching the movie and going, and because I was reading the Sermon on the Mount, it just connected for me. Like, yeah, that’s the life of Jesus. Like to follow Jesus on the outside looks restrictive and narrow, but when you get in, it leads to the kind of wholeness and spaciousness that our souls really long for. So that’s kind of the genesis of the

Amy Julia (30:54)
Mm -hmm.

Yeah.

Rich Villodas (31:20)
title and why I chose that word.

Amy Julia (31:23)
And what do you I think, I was thinking about this and I don’t know if this is a stretch, but I was wondering whether like narrowness and hiddenness are connected. You have a whole section on hiddenness that I thought was really beautiful and talking about, it’s not so much being hidden from other people as being almost hidden from ourselves, like not being so self -conscious or self -focused all the time. But I thought about how it is easy to miss

Rich Villodas (31:31)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Amy Julia (31:48)
like to literally not see the narrow way because it’s just not very big. And like, I was thinking about like a highway, you know, it’s like, you can’t miss an eight lane highway, but like,

Rich Villodas (31:56)
That’s a great point.

Amy Julia (32:00)
how often when I’m trying to like walk on a trail that I really wanna walk on, I have to like pay attention in a different way to find the marker for the trail. So I just wonder about the overlay between narrowness and hiddenness and why spiritual reality might work that way.

Rich Villodas (32:13)
Mmm. Mmm.

Mmm.

You know, it’s interesting. My, my, where my mind first goes is, I was in Florida a couple of weeks ago and saw a sign that said, path narrow slow down. And and you know, everything that every sign that says narrow, I’m taking pictures of it now. So it’s like, I’m telling my wife, Rosie, I’ve got to pull over. I got to take a picture of this or on a trail, whatever, like that. Let me take a picture of this thing here. And,

Amy Julia (32:34)
Hmm. Hmm.

Hahaha!

Yes.

Rich Villodas (32:50)
And I read that and remember my wife saying, you have to drive through a narrow path or walk. You have to actually slow your life down. So first of all, thought about, we often don’t see it because our lives are very just a fast paced and busy. So we don’t see the narrow path. But the hiddenness piece, you know, that part of the book is probably the hiddenness part and the words are the two chapters that personally for me,

Amy Julia (32:57)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Rich Villodas (33:20)
I think the Lord was really doing some great heart surgery as I wrote the book. I would like to say every chapter had equal weight, but no, I think it’s my words and the hiddenness piece, because the hiddenness piece, back to the paradoxical nature of it, true, know, my mind goes to the desert fathers with hiddenness. So they go into the desert to be hidden from the power of the city, the power of Rome. And it was in their hiddenness that led to the desert.

Amy Julia (33:23)
Hmm.

Rich Villodas (33:49)
St. Athanasius would say it became a city. It was like paradoxical. They leave to go to be hidden, but then there’s fruit that emerges. And I think that’s the narrow path as well. I think it’s the hiddenness that we are called to live, hidden is from ourselves primarily, is actually what leads to the kind of fruitfulness that Jesus calls us to. And yet, now that the book has been out already at the time of this recording for almost a month, I’m still realizing

Amy Julia (34:17)
Yeah.

Rich Villodas (34:19)
how I’m still paying attention to myself and need a fresh, you it’s like the book comes out and the day before it comes out, I’m journaling, saying, Lord, I just want to be caught up with you and be hidden from myself and hidden from the success of this book. And then like the next day I’m like refreshing Amazon to see, how’s the book doing? Is it doing okay? Are people buying it? Whatever like that. I’m thinking, Lord, I need to read that my own chapter again.

Amy Julia (34:24)
You

Yeah. Yeah.

Rich Villodas (34:50)
It’s this ongoing, ongoing journey for sure.

Amy Julia (34:52)
Well, and I do wonder, are, I mean, what I’m so struck by, whether it’s the Sermon on the Mount or other teachings of Jesus, is the ways in which there is just, like, again, wisdom and, like, statements of spiritual reality. I think there’s so much that we read as if he’s, pronouncing judgment as opposed to just telling us something that is true. Like,

Rich Villodas (35:07)
Yes.

Yeah.

Amy Julia (35:15)
Actually, if you walk on the broad way it’ll lead to destruction. And if you walk on this one, it’ll lead to life. Like that’s just a statement of truth as opposed to like, you bad person. I don’t I think he’s saying that. I think he’s just saying like, by the way, if you walk that way, it’s going to destroy you. And if you come over here, it’s gonna do this. Like it’s just a statement of reality. And there’s a lot of that in there. But I do I think that teaching what you were just saying about hiddenness, slowness, and…

Rich Villodas (35:18)
Yeah, yes. Yeah.

Yes.

Mmm.

Amy Julia (35:42)
again, the idea of going on the narrow path in a world where it seems to me that we used to have fewer choices and less money, like literally as a culture, like we, it was harder to avail ourselves of, and we didn’t have like these devices that literally were trained on us all the time, right? Like we used to use a map where we were not in the center of it.

Rich Villodas (36:03)
Yes, yes.

you

Amy Julia (36:07)
Whereas now it’s like our car, mean, literally, I don’t even know what way is north anymore because my maps tell me that where I’m going is the way to be going, right? Like everything is oriented around me. And so it just seems like practicing that hiddenness, slowness, stillness, smallness, all those things is both harder than it ever has been and more important for our souls.

Rich Villodas (36:14)
That’s a great point.

Mmm.

Absolutely right. I find the pace, and I live in New York City, I mean, there’s the city that never sleeps, and yet I have discovered increasingly through social media, I think through the vast technological advances that we find ourselves in, absolutely, it’s so hard to slow down our lives. to the, someone emailed me this morning, the,

Amy Julia (36:42)
Yeah.

Rich Villodas (37:00)
What is it, the choice fatigue or decision fatigue or long to like, there’s so many options before me. What does it mean to narrow down? Which is why in the Beatitudes, Jesus talks about, blessed are those who are pure in heart, which Søren Kierkegaard would say, he’s talking about singularity of heart there. He’s not talking about, you know, have your eyes watch something that’s inappropriate. He’s really talking about singularity of heart. And that’s what

Amy Julia (37:04)
yeah, decision fatigue.

Mm.

Rich Villodas (37:28)
purity of heart. And that’s what the narrow path is. To what degree is my life oriented around the presence of God and the teachings of Jesus? And in a world where we live in this, sociologists call in this continuous state of partial attention, it just makes it that much more difficult, which is why the contemplative life, the interior life, I think, I’m not sure how we follow Jesus

Amy Julia (37:47)
Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (37:57)
faithfully without committing ourselves to that kind of slow down singularity of focus because everything is pulling us in all kinds of directions.

Amy Julia (38:06)
So to that point, one of the things that I think is beautiful about this book is that you mentioned a lot of practices that help us to actually follow in this way. And I wonder if you could choose a few of those practices. What are some things we can do to reimagine the good life, to be reforming our own vision of possibility in the world and the way that we walk in it?

Rich Villodas (38:30)
Yeah, I think of a couple of things. I think, first of all, it might sound like pretty pastorally obvious for me to say this, but I wonder what it looks like for us to live in the words of Jesus, to really meditate slowly on the Sermon on the Mount. I do I think to live in Jesus’ words, to abide in His words, requires us to take His words very seriously. And so I think, one, meditation on Jesus’ teaching,

Amy Julia (38:48)
Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (39:01)
could go a long way, not just meditating and reading, but taking notes on ourselves. You when I read through the Lord, or when I pray the Lord’s Prayer, it’s usually the case that when I get to forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, that the Spirit of God is now doing something in my soul around who have I not forgiven, who am I still

regarding in a particular way, what have I not confessed to God? And I think that’s what the Sermon on the Mount do in reading on a regular basis. It’s really an invitation and inventory. And so would say, first of all, very, a simple invitation is to take time to slowly read the words of Jesus on a regular basis, meditating on his words. I also I think, you know, depending on the second sections on all the,

Amy Julia (39:49)
Mm

Rich Villodas (39:57)
categorizing with our words, our desires, our decisions, our enemies, things along those lines. I wonder what it looks like to surrender our angst before God on a regular basis, our worry before God, as in Matthew chapter six. We live in a world that’s so marked by worry, anxiety, and fear. I wonder if a good next step towards that is doing inventory

on what makes me most anxious, who’s making me most anxious, what areas have I been worrying about my life before God, what’s the story my anxiety is feeding me, what kind of space do I need to process with others? I think so, whether we’re talking about anxiety, whether we’re talking about generosity or praying for enemies, I think the entirety of the Sermon on the Mount as we read it offers some very simple invitations.

Amy Julia (40:35)
Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (40:56)
But I would primarily start with reading the words of Jesus. And if I can offer a second thing, I mean, I do I think the sermon, the Lord’s Prayer, I think is the most important prayer in the entire Bible. And I think as we live in that prayer, because it covers the gamut of spiritual reality, I think that could be a really great start for someone who is looking to follow in the way of Jesus.

So when we say, Hallow your name, to what degree am I aware of the sacredness of God’s presence? When I pray, your kingdom come, your will be done. Where do I need God’s will done in my life? How do I need to discern that? What’s my daily bread? Who do I need to forgive? What are the temptations that are before me that I’m feeling weak against? I think those might be a couple of ways to begin the practice of following Jesus.

Amy Julia (41:26)
Mm -hmm.

I love that. Well, I have one last question for you and you can take this whatever direction you want, but I’m just curious how, you know, obviously you’ve given us a very accessible way to understand and practice the Sermon on the Mount. So I really commend this book to anyone who’s kind of intrigued by any of these ideas. And I suspect, well, I can tell just because of the references you’ve made in this conversation and in the book itself,

there was a lot of backstory in terms of obviously what you described with your grandfather, but also like reading commentaries and finding out what other people have said. So I’m curious if it changed you to write this book, either in terms of practices, personal practices, or the way you understand Jesus. Again, however you wanna take it, I’m just curious how it changed you to work on this.

Rich Villodas (42:39)
Well, I think for me, writing is an act of prayer for me. And so the way I write, I’m writing as in conversation with God, asking God to do something in me. So number one, I think writing this book has been changing me over the last couple of years, specifically around a few of…

a few areas. I talk about the words piece. I talk about the hidden, righteousness piece, the money piece. I mean, if I can add a third, it’d be the money piece. Jesus, Jesus saying money is not simply this neutral tool, but a rival God, has really caused me and my wife, Rosie, to I think about how are we stewarding what God has entrusted to us? To what degree have we made idols out of things here? and so,

Amy Julia (43:12)
Hmm.

Yeah.

Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (43:36)
How has it changed me? I am aware of the ways that my yes is often no and my no is yes. I’m aware of the, I think more than anything, I have a heightened awareness of the gaps that I live with, which in many ways throws me at the grace of God. At the same time, I have to say that that’s not the goal of the Sermon on the Mount. The goal of the Sermon on the Mount is not simply

Amy Julia (43:58)
Mm -hmm.

Rich Villodas (44:07)
look how bad I am or look how I don’t measure up. Let me throw myself on the grace of God. I think it’s, I think it’s part of the journey, but I throw myself at the grace of God to actually receive something from God, to actually live this out. And so the emphasis is on the living it out, not on the, just need to receive the grace of God. And I think that’s probably the biggest shift in me. I’m not just here to wallow in my inability to live out Jesus’s teachings.

Amy Julia (44:09)
Right.

Right.

Yeah.

Rich Villodas (44:35)
I’m here to throw myself at the grace of God so that I could embody these teachings in the very real world I inhabit beginning with my relationship with my children, my wife, those nearest to me. And so I’m still living in these words after I’ve written on them. My grandfather gave me a really great foundation around abiding in the words of Jesus. And so that’s what I continue to try to do.

Amy Julia (44:57)
Mm.

Yeah, I so appreciate that because it’s a both and, right? Like we want to know that we getting it all right is by no means what God is requiring of us. And if we tried that, we will fail. And yet also, I think sometimes Protestants especially can get grace wrong in terms of thinking

Rich Villodas (45:16)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Mm -hmm.

Amy Julia (45:29)
that we’re never supposed to, our lives are never going to change because we’re always just these like terrible abject sinners instead of saying, well, we are sinners who are created in the image of God, invited to participate in God’s work in the world. And that does, and God is so patient with us to transform us very slowly and bumblingly, whatever word that is, over time. And I feel like

Rich Villodas (45:34)
Right. Yeah.

Yes.

Amy Julia (45:58)
for me, reading the sermon, I can easily go the moralistic route of just thinking, okay, I need to go do this and kind of going back to the Beatitudes. And then even the last image, I think, the, build your house on a rock. That’s the last. So it’s like the last images of someone who’s kind of beleaguered in a storm. And like, they make it through the storm because they’re built on the rock, but it doesn’t mean that like they were feeling like unbelievably secure as the wind blew, you know? So I’m kind of heartened by that.

Rich Villodas (46:05)
Yeah.

Yeah, exactly right.

Yeah.

Right. Right.

Amy Julia (46:28)
That there is a sense of, yes, keep following, keep walking, do the stuff. And sure, know, the bookends of all of this is God’s grace and God’s incredible embrace. And yet, I think that sense of God being for us, I want you to get to be a part of this spacious and fruitful experience, not just on the floor

Rich Villodas (46:30)
Mmm.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Amy Julia (46:53)
I’m aware of how imperfect you are, which of course is also a place where we end up sometimes. There’s a, again, a paradox or both and an invitation, as you’ve said so many times, to this fuller life that is really different than the way we live most of the time in our contemporary world, and yet also really beautiful.

Rich Villodas (47:00)
Yeah.

Mmm. Mmm.

Yeah, and back to that word imagination, because what you just said, I think is absolutely right and beautiful. The possibility that we can really change. I think that’s what Jesus offers us and lots, like you said, lots of Christians believe this is who I am. I’m not going to change. I just need to throw myself with the grace of God and receive God’s grace. And I think, Jesus is letting us know there is what does it look like to reimagine transformation that your life can actually look different. And I think it starts with

Amy Julia (47:19)
Mm.

Yeah.

Rich Villodas (47:46)
living in the words of Jesus.

Amy Julia (47:50)
Amen to that. We’re gonna call that the last word of this conversation. And thank you so much for being here with us.

Rich Villodas (47:52)
Ha ha ha.

Joy to be with you again. Thank you.