Virtues For Living Well with Dr. Alan Noble

Derek Rishmawy
00:00:00.160 - 00:00:47.230
This episode is brought to you by Lexham Press, who publishes books that love the word, love the faith, and love the church. Lexham Press was recently acquired by Baker Publishing Group, and there will be more news to follow.

Our May book of the month is Classical A Christian Introduction by Jordan Stefaniak. You can receive a 30% discount on this title and all previous books of the month by visiting bakerbookhouse.com pages mere fidelity.

You can find that link in our show notes and get 30% off of our book of the month from Lexham Press. Hello and welcome to another episode of Mere Fidelity, a podcast where we think about the word of God and the world we live in.

My name is Derek Richmou and I'll be your host for today. I'm joined by regular cast and crew members Alistair Roberts and James Wood. Good to see you guys.

Alastair Roberts
00:00:47.230 - 00:00:47.870
Good to be here.

Derek Rishmawy
00:00:48.350 - 00:01:23.270
And we are joined also by a guest today, a friend of the show, a friend in real life, the Orville Alan Noble, associate professor of English at Oklahoma Baptist University, a fellow at the Keller center of Cultural Apologetics. I'm just reading your little bio for the book, Alan, friend of the show. You've been on before.

We have hawked your books before because we love them and we love you. Alan's a good friend and you just came out with a new book, right? To Live well, Practical Wisdom.

So when did you decide to start writing finance books about living well?

Alan Noble
00:01:26.240 - 00:01:30.560
When I wanted to start making money, so I had to pivot.

Derek Rishmawy
00:01:30.960 - 00:01:32.600
Yeah. No, to live well.

James Wood
00:01:32.600 - 00:01:35.480
Practical Wisdom for this one doesn't have the.

Alan Noble
00:01:35.480 - 00:01:45.840
Oh, no, you know what? My publisher doesn't want me having the O Alan Noble. So I put it in all these other things. But they just want Alan Noble.

Derek Rishmawy
00:01:46.800 - 00:02:18.860
Okay, well, this one is. This book is not about extra names. This book is about practical wisdom for moving through chaotic times.

And we're really happy to have you on the show to talk about it. I will just upfront say I read it in a single sitting. I loved it. It was really helpful. I'm very much for this book. Buy this book.

But let's talk about it. Alan, why did you. What is your basic premise in the book? Give me the pitch on what your book is about for the listener.

Alan Noble
00:02:18.940 - 00:03:52.110
So it's not a sparklingly original argument. It's that we live in morally incoherent times. And I think the younger gener feels this particularly.

And they are getting conflicting messages from different directions, from TikTok gurus to voices on YouTube telling them how to live certain ways to people on Instagram, to self help books, to teachers telling them how to live certain ways that don't actually make a coherent whole. And this creates all kinds of anxiety and frustration and confusion about what it means to live a good life.

I wanted to offer something that was grounded and encouraging, a kind of mentorship, a kind of discipleship that would help people to make sense of the modern world, to make sense of their lives. And I didn't want to just offer them 10 steps to living well or Alan Noble's top five life hacks. I wanted to ground it in something.

So I wanted to ground it in biblical wisdom, and I wanted to ground it in the. These virtues which the churches long believed are valuable ways of living.

And with the help particularly of Josef Pieper, I advocated for these seven virtues as valuable ways of moving through the contemporary world.

Derek Rishmawy
00:03:54.430 - 00:04:21.320
That is the structure of the book. Right.

Just what you engage with here is you got some intro and then really these are meditations on, meditations on the four cardinal virtues and then the three theological virtues. Right. And. Okay. And just essentially in and fleshed in the contemporary moment. And that's, that's the structure of the whole. All right. Yeah.

James, you got a, you got a follow up?

James Wood
00:04:21.320 - 00:05:33.360
Yeah.

Before we jump into kind of your positive proposals and the wisdom you're trying to impart, can I stay just for a second on the diagnostic, like why you wrote it also, and one of the things, one of the names that didn't pop up that I was, that I had in the back of my mind as I was reading it a lot was Durkheim.

And like, one of the things I've talked about with my students, for instance, is, you know, Marx is always popular and cool, you know, among the angsty young.

And the thesis of alienation, that that's the primary analysis of where, why people are feeling the way they are, especially young folks, they're alienated from the means of product, products of their labor. They're being exploited at work. Class warfare.

But one of the things I've tried to talk about with my students is I wonder though, if that's the less helpful diagnostic than maybe Durkheim's, which is maybe alienation is less helpful analysis than nme that we, the normlessness, the guideliness, that we're awash with options and we don't have standard guidelines for the maps for meaning in our world.

Would you, is that, is that, would you say that it maps well onto the argument you're making and the diagnosis that you're making that you're trying to offer something to this moment.

Alan Noble
00:05:34.960 - 00:06:32.090
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. I didn't. For this book, I didn't want to dwell too much on diagnosis. Right. So this book is not too heavy on diagnosis because.

Largely because the diagnosis is found in you are not your own. The reality is that this book comes out of you are not your own. It comes out of a response to you are not your own.

When I wrote you are not your own, I wrote the diagnosis and I went around the country giving talks, and people said, I need some practical application. And this book is that practical application. So in earlier drafts, I actually called back to youo are not your own.

And the publisher said, please don't, Don't. Don't be too explicit about that, because what it does is it says to the reader, you need to go read the other book before you can read this book.

And that's not a really. That's not a really helpful thing to do to readers, is say, go read two books, actually. So. But.

James Wood
00:06:34.010 - 00:06:35.130
Alienating you from.

Derek Rishmawy
00:06:35.290 - 00:06:36.970
I was going to say it seems like your sales pitch.

Alan Noble
00:06:37.050 - 00:06:50.330
I thought it was a great idea, but my publisher was like, this notebook needs to stand on its own. So if. If I gave a fuller diagnosis, it would be in you are not your own. And Durkheim is a great. Is a great place to look. Yeah, that.

That normalness is absolutely there.

Alastair Roberts
00:06:51.540 - 00:07:09.620
You mentioned earlier the four cardinal virtues and the three theological virtues.

Could you say a bit about why the four cardinal virtues are what they are and what the three theological virtues are, and something of the background to those categories?

Alan Noble
00:07:10.420 - 00:08:34.530
Yeah. So the four cardinal virtues are prudence, justice, courage or fortitude, and temperance.

And then the three theological virtues are faith, hope and love that Paul talks about. And I think these are. I think, you know, people can come up with and have come up with very different lists of virtues.

It's my opinion that these cardinal virtues in particular, you can fold a lot of these other virtues into those four cardinal virtues. That's why they are the hinge, as it were, the cardinal virtues. So, for example, honesty, I think could be folded into justice.

And so I think these are useful ways of thinking about virtuous living. So I don't know if that answers your question, but those are the seven virtues that I'm working with, and I found them to be helpful.

Pieper writes these two books, the cardinal virtues and faith, hope and love, that are originally published as separate essays, and they're magnificent. And then he's pulling from Aquinas, and there are many others who have thought that these Seven fit together as a nice group. And I concur.

I think that they work together to make sense of how to live virtuously.

Alastair Roberts
00:08:35.330 - 00:08:45.490
Could you maybe say a bit more about what a virtue is and how it relates to maybe a more general biblical account of the moral life?

Alan Noble
00:08:46.190 - 00:10:05.200
Yeah. So I think of a virtue as a practice or a habit of living morally towards what God has created us to be.

And so this is where the Bible fits into our understanding of, of how to live rightly.

And where I would separate this from a strictly secular account of the virtues which would be, you know, that you can just live, live temperately in a sort of optimal way. You can sort of optimize yourself into living rightly. Instead.

My understanding of the virtues is that, that we're actually living toward what we were created to be by God. This is how we are created to be by God.

And so we're really walking in a manner worthy of the gospel by living in these virtues and living into the excellence that God created us for. As new creations. As new creations. And the Holy Spirit is working through us to do these things.

Derek Rishmawy
00:10:05.920 - 00:10:23.760
Throughout this book, I just sensed it coming from a lot of places. Obviously it's coming from Joseph Peeper. It's obviously it's coming from scripture and the contemporary world.

It seems like it's coming from a lot of office hours spent talking to college students.

Alan Noble
00:10:24.080 - 00:10:24.480
Yeah.

James Wood
00:10:24.480 - 00:10:27.360
Yeah. Can I jump in there? Because I was going to say the same thing is.

Derek Rishmawy
00:10:27.600 - 00:10:28.000
Yeah.

James Wood
00:10:28.000 - 00:10:36.040
I was a former college minister and Now I teach 18 to 22 year olds in the first couple chapters, especially on like choosing. Well, kind of your application of prudence.

Derek Rishmawy
00:10:36.040 - 00:10:36.480
Yes.

James Wood
00:10:36.790 - 00:10:59.670
To kind of the age of the paradox of choice. And, and like I remember, I'll just riff on this for a second is I remember one of the reasons I. Yeah.

I felt like I had to get out of college ministry just personally was because I was like, if I have to answer the discernment question of how do I know who I'm supposed to marry or what job I should take, I'm like, I'm going to lose my mind. I'm going to lose my mind. And then I come back. Now I teach college students.

Alan Noble
00:10:59.670 - 00:11:00.550
I'm still doomed.

Derek Rishmawy
00:11:01.030 - 00:11:02.870
Guess what I preached on two days ago, James?

James Wood
00:11:03.410 - 00:12:00.700
Vocational discernment. And.

But I was as I was reading that chapter which I thought was really helpful and I have thoughts about it, like one of a couple points that I loved and then I'll, you know, come is I loved, you know, just that you recognize the angst that people are Feeling about choosing, like we got all these choices, like the Barry Schwartz paradox of choice dilemma. Right. Like, but then like, I think you give really conquers, like what do you, what do you do?

And so maybe you can riff on your strategies of making those choices. But also I loved that, you know, like, look, we've got a lot of options and that's a good thing. And you kind of give guidance for how to do that.

But I also love that you kind of, you didn't use the term, but the BS jobs, you know, like, there are jobs that might not be worth your attention. Maybe you shouldn't consider these things. But yeah, so go back to Alex or Derek's point of.

Is this coming out of, you know, helping 18 to 22 year old kids a lot in a large way. And what is the guidance you give them for making those types of decisions?

Alan Noble
00:12:02.770 - 00:13:26.610
Yeah, it absolutely is.

You know, so when I, when I wrote this book, as I said, part of it is coming out of having conversations and Q&As with people when I, when I gave talks about you are not your own. But the other part of it is a lot of office hours with students who were wrestling with real questions about how to live well.

And they're asking questions about what is, what is social justice, what does justice look like. They're asking questions about what is love. Right. You know, how do I discern what love really means?

They're asking questions about how do I discern who to marry? Do I follow my fiance to grad school or do I stay close to my family? Do I pursue this career or that career?

And there's this existential angst that they're carrying. And so I tried to write this book pastorally, even though I'm not a pastor. I tried to write it pastorally, ruling elder. That's true.

Well, when I wrote it, I wasn't, but I am now. That's true. It does. It absolutely comes out of that. I had to choose examples to make these virtues tangible.

And I spoke to what I knew best and that was the struggles that a lot of young people are going through and what I assume to be very common struggles. And I hope that it will resonate with a lot of people and help them.

Derek Rishmawy
00:13:27.680 - 00:15:16.450
Yeah, I will say this is, this is true of 18 year olds. It's also true of 38 year olds, 39 year olds. I do feel like there's a, there's a chunk of folks in our generalized age cohort.

Leaving aside Alistair Roberts, who's elderly, but, but you get past the first wave of choices in your life, marriage, career, etc. And then. And then there's like this second wave that comes after the children or within the children.

And when you hit about 40 and you really start to ask yourself questions about, like, okay, but what does the back half look like? Am I. Am I. Am I still doing this? Is it something else or what? And so the choice paradox is they're still there.

And everything about the contemporary moment, you know, you're. Maybe you're making them for your children, maybe you're making them for your spouse. You're still. You're still stuck with some of these same loops.

And so I just found it very reassuring just in my own age stage, not just the fact that I'm going to absolutely use this as a book club book for my students next quarter. The chapter that was also really encouraging to me, and I wanted to hear you talk more about. And I think that there's.

I think maybe people are feeling this one in an anxious age. Fortitude. Fortitude and courage and suffering. I know you've walked through some things, and so I was just wondering.

I just wanted to hear you talk more about the chapter on fortitude and how that is, in a sense, maybe particularly needed in the contemporary moment.

Alan Noble
00:15:18.020 - 00:17:45.110
Yeah, that's a great question. Yeah.

I mean, I think, as I thought about the cardinal virtues and the ones that are most pressing for our moment, I think courage or fortitude and then temperance are the ones that. I mean, I think prudence is really important for that choice paralysis that is so crippling to so many young people.

But I increasingly think that there are two marks of our. Our culture. One is inhibition, this sense that we don't have agency in our lives.

You get a diagnosis and you feel like, I don't have agency over that. You feel like you're controlled over mass forces. I don't have choice, but I have to use AI whatever it is.

But you have this sense that I don't have agency. I can't ask someone out on a date. I can't do these things. So inhibition.

And then the other thing that relates to temperance is an addiction nation, right between pornography, sports, gambling, and other addictions. And so with courage or fortitude. Yeah, I think inhibition is a big problem. And I think courage is how we need to approach this.

And I've written about this before, written about this recently for the Gospel Coalition. I think that there's a call, and I think that particularly young people want to hear this. They want someone to invite them to be Courageous.

But somebody has to invite them.

If nobody's going to invite them to lean into courage and tell them how to be courageous and what courage even looks like, then they're not going to do it. And so the book tries to invite them into that and tell them what that is.

And unfortunately, courage means the risk of suffering and in many cases enduring suffering for the sake of the good. And that is something that I have.

And everyone has lived out at some point or another and will continue to live out at some point or another because life involves a great deal of suffering. And the only real question is how will you face that suffering? Will you face it courageously or not?

And so the invitation is to face it courageously, to endure, which is the better part of courage.

Derek Rishmawy
00:17:45.840 - 00:18:40.240
I think about this a lot with some of my students. The paralysis around a lot of choices comes from this fear of what they will endure on the other side or the amount of.

I mean there's so many jokes and reels about Gen Z bailing on stuff as soon as somebody corrects them or something like that. And some of that's fair, some that's not.

But I can see that in my own heart, in my own life and around the almost American tendency to think that if something's going wrong, I must be doing wrong. And I've got to switch tracks quickly to get out of the track that has me suffering.

If I'm suffering, something about this situation needs to change immediately. This can't just be the thing I'm called to for a while. I need to get the other job.

James Wood
00:18:40.240 - 00:18:50.560
Alan also adds there what I really appreciate, like you've mentioned Derek, like the. Even us 38 year olds, which I'm not 38 anymore but maybe I guess you are is. But people who.

Derek Rishmawy
00:18:50.640 - 00:18:52.080
39. 39.

Alastair Roberts
00:18:52.960 - 00:18:53.320
Yeah.

James Wood
00:18:53.320 - 00:19:50.990
You're holding on to youth. You know, you're trying claiming a former year but. But I really appreciate it as a former. Maybe a lot of people don't know this about me.

My major in undergrad was finance and I hated it. But there are only a few themes that I kept with me and I.

You brought up one of them, which is my favorite, the Sunk Cost fallacy, which I think you helpfully like for people who are making career choices or maybe they're in a career and they feel like I'm actually not using the best of my gifts. I'm not serving the best. This doesn't fit. So that's maybe not a suffering, but it's maybe not full service. But one of the things I Think some people.

One of the reasons why I think also so many of our choices are scary is because we feel like if we pivot later, either that is a failure of commitment or it's unwise because I've already invested so much in a prior decision I've made. Can you discuss that? Like, why did you bring that theme in?

Alan Noble
00:19:52.270 - 00:20:35.880
Yeah, my wife has a master's degree in economics, so that vocabulary was, you know, one flesh. So I got. It kind of got a little bit of that degree borrowed. And so that's where I get that from.

And I'm very grateful for it because that concept is really helpful.

And when I was writing this section on prudence, because that's where that sunk cost fallacy came in, I was writing this section on prudence and I was writing the section on making resolute decisions, and I was thinking about, you know, you're making these resolute decisions and you're following through. And this taps into this idea of courage, that all the virtues work together. You know, you make a resolute decision and you follow through with it.

Derek Rishmawy
00:20:35.880 - 00:20:36.070
Correct.

Alan Noble
00:20:36.140 - 00:21:37.070
Courageously. But the problem is, is that in real life, sometimes you don't, like you said, you need to pivot.

You follow through with a career, you make a career choice and then you realize, actually I need to pivot, this is a toxic work environment. Or I actually thought I had a skill in this and it's really just not working out for me.

And that's prudence too, because you're surveying reality, you're focusing on the good you're making. You know, you're bringing in wise counsel and you're realizing a new prudent decision is moving off of this career and moving to something else.

And so I realized I need to talk about the sunk cost fallacy, reassessing and moving on.

And so what I didn't want was someone thinking, man, the virtuous thing here is to grit my teeth in a, in a career that is, that is, you know, not fit for me and, and persevere. And so that's why I included that. Yeah.

Derek Rishmawy
00:21:37.950 - 00:22:38.980
And now for a quick word from one of our sponsors. Beeson Divinity School is an interdenominational evangelical seminary on the campus of Sanford University in Birmingham, Alabama. I've been there.

It is actually a lovely campus led by world renowned faculty. Beeson forms students in person in a kind of a community oriented model of theological education.

They have top ranked scholarship who engage their students at kind of very small class sizes. It's a warm environment. And now thanks to a generous gift.

Beeson is actually offering new full tuition scholarships for the 20252026 incoming class for their flagship degree, the Master of Divinity. So this kind of makes the whole thing more affordable than it's ever been.

Now these scholarships cover the cost of tuition and fees for three years, which is the average time it takes to finish the M. Div. And I'll be honest and say I wish I had known about this or had an opportunity to look at this one when I was heading to seminary.

So if you're interested, you can apply and learn more information@easendivinity.com the official Merriam.

Ian Harber
00:22:38.980 - 00:24:24.190
Webster Word of the Year in 2025 was slop, and I'm sure we can all feel why they chose that word. That's real.

You can go look it up In a world where everything feels like slop and brain rot, now is a perfect time to cultivate a rich intellectual life, to think clearly and carefully about church and culture, theology and technology, family and formation at Mere Orthodoxy it's our mission to create thoughtful, engaging content that aims to form Christian in the church to participate in the culture for the common good. Mere Fidelity is one of those media projects. Mere Orthodoxy and Mere Fidelity are reader and listener supported media projects.

Without our generous members, we wouldn't be able to produce essays and podcasts or cultivate the thriving community that exists among Mere Orthodoxy members.

Mere Orthodoxy members receive access to our full archive of content, the quarterly print journal with premiere essays, an invitation to the Mirror Orthodoxy online community, the monthly Miro mailbag newsletter from our editor in chief, Jake Meter, and you'll also be supporting a growing media organization that exists to form Christians in the church to participate in the culture for the common good. If you would like to support this mission, you can go to mirorthodoxy.com membership and become a member today.

That's mirrorthodoxy.com membership to join us and support our mission of renewing minds and restoring hope.

Alastair Roberts
00:24:24.990 - 00:25:32.300
At the beginning of the book you bring up T.S.

Eliot's the Wasteland and you mentioned this image of the heap of broken images, and that is a very helpful starting point for reflecting upon people. How how people approach the moral life, how they approach decisions, how they understand their navigation of the world. They don't understand it.

They have bits and pieces here and there. They have various voices that aren't really integrated. Well, that seems in many respects to be a characteristic of our very online age.

Just by the very nature of the media, what is there in a Christian vision to offer the sort of coherence and integrity and the ability to move beyond those broken, fragmented images to something that has wholeness and a sort of unity to it. How do we find a sort of unified life out of all these different decisions and virtues? How do they come together?

Alan Noble
00:25:33.020 - 00:26:41.490
Yeah, so there are a couple of things I would say. One of them is what I just mentioned a couple of minutes ago, which is that the virtues all work together. And so as you.

As you choose to lean into your new creation in Christ and act on these virtues, you're going to realize that these virtues work together and there is a unity. That you're not just.

You're not just picking up justice over here in abstract, that you're actually learning how to love people better, that you're actually learning how to act courageously, that you're actually learning how to think prudently. So there's a unity there. The other thing I would say is that this doesn't happen in an abstract.

It doesn't happen in alienation from community, or at least not properly. The virtues happen in community. And so there's a unity there because know, you're loving in community, you're acting justly in community.

And so part of the vision of the Christian life is a. A vision in community. And that community is the body of Christ.

Derek Rishmawy
00:26:41.810 - 00:26:42.170
Right?

Alan Noble
00:26:42.170 - 00:27:48.810
That's the community is the body of Christ. The other thing I would say is that in this side of paradise, we're never going to have this perfect.

You know, that the image I have that I imagine that. That Elliot had is the stained glass window.

I don't know if that's what he envisioned when he envisioned the heap of broken images, but that's what I imagine he had. We're not going to have this perfect, holistic, you know, image. You know, we're always piecing things together. It's always.

It's always going to be a little bit fragmentary because we're fallen. And there's always going to be a struggle to piece things together.

We're always going to have something a little bit off, and that's okay because there's grace for that. But our task is to.

To understand what the gospel is, to understand what God is calling us to, and to move toward that created order that God has called us to. And that's where I think, as we're moving toward that created order, we find that wholeness.

James Wood
00:27:51.930 - 00:29:24.400
I've got a question about when we were talking about the cardinal virtues, I think you said, and again, they all work together. So you can't like, you know, sift them out and separate them.

But I think you said courage or fortitude was maybe the premier cardinal virtue we need to focus or retrieve today, I wonder, on the theological virtue. The chapter that I thought resonated most with me and some of the problems of our moment was the chapter on hope.

And particularly your exposition of the theme, hope all things, and how that maps onto particular our political and ideological battles and how the thing I put in my margins was, I think a lot of us are Jonahs more than we want to admit about our prophetic speech to our political opponents. Because one of the things you said is we actually don't want to hope all things for our political opponents.

We want them to remain as bad as they are or as bad as they are in our mind, because if they change, we wouldn't know what to do with that. And then we wouldn't have a sort of kind of and against the enemy identity or something. And, and we also. You meant, you gave a concrete example, too.

We often don't like to celebrate when our political opponents break rank in ways that are more in line with our views. And again that you, you mentioned, that's a failure of hoping all things. Again, can you elaborate more on this?

Why, you know, what do you mean by this? And what's our, what's the antidote here? Do you see this as a major problem in our political discourse?

Alan Noble
00:29:26.640 - 00:32:02.360
Yeah, I think it's a major problem in our political discourse. I think it's a major problem in our interpersonal lives, too.

I mean, I think it's a heart problem, a posture of our hearts that we just have this tendency to not want to hope all things and really desire for people that we imagine to be our opponents or imagined to be people on the other side, whatever that might be, people that we have cast as the other, to, to, to make the right decision to turn from sin to, even if it's in small ways to turn to Christ. We just, we just have this desire in our hearts to not actually see that. And that is a failure to hope all things. And that is, I think, despair.

And it's, I think, sin. We should rejoice when our political opponents actually choose to side with us to make the moral decision and do the right thing.

We should rejoice because that's a good thing, but because of our polarized politics, instead, what we end up doing is saying there's at least a part of our hearts that says, gosh, now I have to. I don't want to Give them an attaboy because, you know, that would encourage them. I don't. I don't want to give them an attaboy. Right.

I don't want to admit that they did the right thing. And that's pride. That's. That's. That's failing to hope all things like. And that's a shame. And that. And that. And that incentivizes.

That incentivizes the polarization. Right. That incentivizes the polarization. That. That's just making things worse. So that was my. My intention there.

And as I said, I do think this happens on interpersonal levels as well. I think in personal relationships, we. We can find ourselves in situations where we.

We don't actually desire someone to turn from their sin and repent. We actually desire them to commit Morrison. And to wrong us more because we've decided we've written them off and that's a terrible place to be.

So we need to guard our hearts for that and choose to desire, to hope all things, to desire that they turn to Christ.

James Wood
00:32:04.600 - 00:32:18.040
Why I like that is because it's easy for me to conceptualize that antagonistic posture as a failure of love, which I think it is. But I think you're also high. Getting at something really true. Failure of hope. And I think that's really beautiful.

Derek Rishmawy
00:32:19.880 - 00:32:20.360
Yeah.

Alan Noble
00:32:20.680 - 00:32:21.160
Thank you.

Derek Rishmawy
00:32:21.160 - 00:32:26.000
Can I ask you a really dumb book? Not bum. The super book interview question. I almost never.

Alan Noble
00:32:26.000 - 00:32:28.320
Yeah, I want a dumb question. That's good.

Derek Rishmawy
00:32:28.320 - 00:32:33.800
Yeah. Yeah. That's what I'm here for. What was the hardest chapter to write.

Alan Noble
00:32:33.800 - 00:32:34.920
And really think about? That's a good question.

Derek Rishmawy
00:32:36.520 - 00:32:47.500
Think about living out. Think about. Not just at the conceptual defining level, but. But okay. Just getting into the mind space of kind of thinking this virtue through.

Alan Noble
00:32:48.780 - 00:32:53.180
That's easy. Justice was the hardest chapter. Justice was the hardest chapter to write.

Derek Rishmawy
00:32:53.260 - 00:32:53.660
Why?

Alan Noble
00:32:55.340 - 00:33:38.330
Justice is such a complex topic. It has so many ramifications. And I don't know why I'm saying that, because love is such a complex topic and has so many ramifications.

But I just think that thinking about our culture and how sensitive justice is and the realities of the implications of writing about justice, there was a lot of trepidation about writing about justice. So that's the chapter I'm least satisfied with. And I had the hardest hard. Excuse me. Hardest time writing.

Derek Rishmawy
00:33:39.840 - 00:33:48.160
Yeah, okay. Sorry. That was. I just had. I had to know when you're thinking about virtues, you're like, yeah, so you.

James Wood
00:33:48.160 - 00:34:21.920
Can't love that chapter. Speaking of love is how what. I love that.

My favorite Part of that chapter was we for a world to function, to actually have a society, we have to treat each other beyond formal justice. I love that point.

I thought that was really, really helpful because I think especially as we, we get in, as we lose social bonds in our society, we have lack of moral consensus and we just have lack of connection. We get increasingly into a litigious, technical approach to society. And I think you're right on that. That's not going to work.

Alan Noble
00:34:21.920 - 00:34:51.730
I'm taking that from people and elaborating on it. But yes. Yeah, that's.

I think that idea that to think that we can just have this legalistic, technocratic, you know, justice and live humanly is profoundly wrong. We need to be prodigal in our justice. We need to go beyond that. And so to make this world a human place.

Derek Rishmawy
00:34:52.850 - 00:34:53.410
Yeah.

Alastair Roberts
00:34:53.890 - 00:35:22.840
If you were going to speak to, let's say a pastor reads your book and is deeply persuaded by it and convicted by it and feels that they need to inculcate these virtues within their congregants.

What are some of the things that you think that churches could be doing that they maybe are not doing or not doing enough to actually move people in these sorts of directions and overcome some of the fragmented moral lives that people live?

Alan Noble
00:35:23.400 - 00:37:16.000
That's a great question. So one of the things I think that's really helpful is that the Bible is filled with language of virtue. Right. The Bible talks about justice a lot.

Right. The Bible talks about prudence. The Bible is not absent. It talks about self control. It's not absent this language of virtue.

So I think leaning into this language is helpful so that it's part of our shared vocabulary that we're not afraid.

I think that particularly for Protestants, there has been this fear of talking about living virtuously because we're afraid of sounding like it's works righteousness. And I understand that. I understand that.

But there's a way of preaching about living righteously that foregrounds the gospel and the importance of Christ's work of redemption and his righteousness and our role as our response as new creation, as new creatures that properly frames that, that I think allows space for us to live into who we are. And so I think that's important. The other thing I would say is it doesn't have to be from the pulpit, but maybe Sunday school classes.

Let's talk about things like temperance. Let's talk about how are we using social media? Should our kids be having SmartPH. Like, let's have these conversations.

Because if we're not having them in those spaces, then I think we're doing a disservice to our churches. But just having that shared vocabulary and having those conversations I think is important.

Alastair Roberts
00:37:17.520 - 00:38:07.890
Another thing I was wondering is you, when you're talking about virtue, you more generically will often find yourself drawing upon classical sources, various Greek and Roman philosophers. There's a sense of this as deep within the Western tradition. This is part of our shared vocabulary.

But when we're treating that tradition as Christians, we have this whole vocabulary and theology of grace, how does that relate to our understanding of virtue? Is there a way that we need to create space for a discourse of virtue within our theology of grace?

Or is there a way in which our theology of grace really propels a theology of virtue in ways that it is not within a non Christian framework?

Alan Noble
00:38:09.330 - 00:39:50.820
Yeah.

So if I think, I think if I'm understanding you correctly, this is how I would frame this is that because of the grace that we receive from Christ, we are propelled to act virtuously. Right.

Whereas under the, under a, a pagan understanding or even under certain Stoic understandings that you might see today, the idea of pursuing virtues might be just to optimize your life to live well in the imminent frame, as it were. And so the difference that I see is that there is a telos, which is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.

And that telos is, is framed under the umbrella of grace. So because of what Christ has done for us out of gratitude, we are compelled and excited as new creations to act righteously, to turn.

We are free to turn from sin and to walk in a manner worthy of the gospel. And that's the exciting thing, that's what I tried to get across in this, is that it's an exciting thing to be able to act virtuous, new creations.

Right. And because of grace. Right, because of grace. And you're.

And how I end the book is, is grace the fact, the reality that you are going to fall short of these virtues, you are going to make mistakes and there's grace for that. And that is an important message that I want to get across.

James Wood
00:39:50.820 - 00:39:51.300
You're.

Alan Noble
00:39:51.380 - 00:39:53.100
You're not going to get this perfectly right.

Derek Rishmawy
00:39:53.100 - 00:41:10.600
Yeah, this is really important. I remember early on in my preaching, it was, you know, hey, Christ has paid. You can't earn your salvation. You can't. The work's righteousness.

We're going to beat that to a pulp. And it was really a really Christocentric gospel, which is good.

Like he's done everything, he's done all but I remember, I can't remember what book or what event, whatever it is, but when the penny dropped for me on the way. Union with Christ and the double gift works in fact. He breaks the power of canceled sin and sets the captives free.

He cancels sin, he actually pays for it.

But he also starts to break the power of sin in our lives through the regeneration and through the power of the Holy Spirit and kind of preaching a two handed Son and spirit gospel there of the Son's work. And then what the Son gives you in the spirit, when the Spirit starts to work in your life, he starts to actually.

He actually starts to create the virtues within you. Right. The fruits of the spirit are powerfully. They start growing within us organically. Organically. James, I threw that one in there for you.

The Bavinck reference there.

James Wood
00:41:11.480 - 00:41:12.840
You also threw a Keller reference in.

Derek Rishmawy
00:41:12.840 - 00:41:13.080
There,.

James Wood
00:41:15.240 - 00:41:19.840
The penny drop, which nobody knows what those meaning. Nobody uses pennies. Pennies are obsolete, guys.

Derek Rishmawy
00:41:21.350 - 00:41:22.470
We do. We do.

James Wood
00:41:22.470 - 00:41:32.350
James, you use pennies. No. Can I, Can I ask. We use the references or did you have a question here, Derek? But I want to ask about another virtue.

Derek Rishmawy
00:41:32.350 - 00:42:19.290
Oh, I actually had one that I was going to ask you about.

I was wondering why when it came to love, I loved that on love you got to the virtue and the practice of friendship and you know, talking about marriage and chastity and some of the other ones. But friendship as this essential practice of learning the virtue of love.

I wanted to hear just more from you on that because that I think is again for myself and for my students, the capacity and the wisdom of being able to carry on and cultivate friendships is just so difficult and so timely and so essential. So Alan, I'd love to hear you more about that.

Alan Noble
00:42:19.610 - 00:44:02.950
Yeah, so I think as I. The older I get, the more I value friendships. I mean, I've always loved my friends, but the older I get, the more I realize that I just.

I depend on my friends. I need my friends to survive.

I've gone through some very difficult periods in my life where I've had to call up friends to just get through, to sit with me, to get through some very difficult moments. And. And I've also realized that it's harder and harder to make friends. And that makes me appreciate friendship even more because it's special.

And it's also made me realize how intentional you have to be to cultivate friendships and to carry friendships along. And so.

So a message that I, speaking of office hours that I like to preach to my students is that you need to care for Your friendships, like, you need to shepherd your friendships because they're not just going to happen. They might just happen now because you're in this special college bubble, but in the future, you're going to have to nurture them.

You're going to have to be intentional about them because they're not just going to fall into your lap. You're not just going to meet somebody in the cafeteria.

And your friendships, or lack of friendships, are going to determine how well you manage your way through life. We're in a loneliness epidemic, and it's not a coincidence. A lot of people don't have close friends. And so this comes from a very personal place.

I just think that friendships are incredibly important. And I wanted to talk about it under the virtue of love.

James Wood
00:44:04.300 - 00:45:11.510
Yeah. So I'll just have to say a couple things there that I wanted to pick your brain on is. I think that's totally right. I think all. You know.

And I love that you talked about friendships here, that it doesn't. I think one of the common assumptions about friendships that is that they're predicated on similarity and you really press that point.

Like, look, some of your best friends are really dissimilar to you and challenge you, and that's a good thing. And I think that's one of the myths of the day. But also we talk a lot about, like the.

You bring up the loneliness epidemic, but as related to friendship, we bring. We talk a lot about, like, the dating problem.

The, you know, a lot of young folks are really nervous and we need to give them some practical guidance to just like, date again. Like to talk to each other and to embrace rejection. Like, hey, it's not the end of the world. Like, I also think that applies to friendship too.

I think we probably need to give a lot more concrete. I think friendship is not coming naturally to people and I think we probably need. I think your book is a gesture towards this.

Do you have any more suggestions about kind of practical advice about actually how to live virtuously by. By taking steps towards friendship? Do you have any thoughts on that?

Alan Noble
00:45:13.750 - 00:46:17.700
Yeah, I mean, I think it goes back to the virtue of courage. I mean, I think I've been. I've been writing and thinking about this a lot. A lot of the same steps that apply to dating apply to friendship.

If you see someone who you think you would might be a possible friend, you need to recognize the good of friendship and take the risk of suffering and move towards that person. Invite them out to coffee, embodied presence and move towards them. Take the risk. You might get rejected.

They might say they're too busy or whatever, and that'll hurt and you'll move on with your life. But that's what it takes because you're exactly right.

There is this failure of knowing how to practically do this making of friends that is inhibiting people and keeping them in their shell. And instead they're turning to companion bots and things. And that's a shame.

Derek Rishmawy
00:46:19.140 - 00:46:22.290
Grim. Alan, your.

James Wood
00:46:30.530 - 00:47:00.200
Group is. Derek's really been an inspiration of. He's just practiced affirmation to a lot of us. And I think that's even like a courageous thing to do.

It's vulnerable to be like, hey, you're a new friend and I see these good things in you and I want to encourage you in that. So I'm actually trying to follow Derek's example here and say I'm inspired by him.

But I think stuff like that, just practical, courageous, like you said, stuff I think comes really hard to young folks and us, even our middle age. And so thank you for your push to us.

Alan Noble
00:47:02.760 - 00:47:04.840
Yeah, Derek is a good friend.

Derek Rishmawy
00:47:06.200 - 00:47:53.430
I was going to try and say something silly, but you guys got me feeling nice and like you're in your feelings. Yeah. Hey, Alan, you are my friend and you're a friend of the show, and I'm really glad that you wrote this book. It's going to help a lot of people.

I hope so if they open it up and read it. That's the hook, guys, is you have to buy the book and then read it, not just listen to the podcast about it.

But Alan, thanks for coming and joining us today and sharing this conversation. It was an encouragement, a blessing. Glad to see you.

For those of you who have listened thus far, if you have found this episode to be an encouragement, obviously, go buy the book, but then also maybe rate and review us the episode on itunes, share the show, get the word out. But for now, this has been another episode of Mere Fidelity.