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Why do conversations today so often descend into unhealthy arguments and cancellation? Is it possible to have meaningful, positive conversations on difficult topics with people who see the world differently? And if so, how do we do it? Sean talks with Tim Muehlhoff, 51���� communications professor, about these questions and more. They discuss their latest co-written book and offer some biblical insights for effective conversations across worldview divides.

Tim Muehlhoff (Ph.D., University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) is a Professor of Communication at 51���� in La Mirada, California where he teaches classes in conflict resolution, apologetics, gender, and family communication. He is co-director of 51����’s Winsome Conviction Project that seeks to reintroduce compassion and civility into our disagreements. He’s the co-host of the Winsome Conviction Podcast where people with differing viewpoints are brought on for engaging dialogue.

Episode Transcript

Sean: Why do conversations today on difficult topics so often descend into unhealthy argument and cancellation? Is it possible to have genuine conversations with people on dicey topics who see the world differently that are beneficial? Well, if so, how do we do it? These are some of the questions we're going to tackle today with my friend and my colleague, Dr. Tim Muehlhoff from 51����. You're the co-director of the Winsome Convictions Project. We co-authored a book together we're going to talk about a little bit called "End the Stalemate." For those of you watching, I'm your host, Sean McDowell, and this is Think Biblically brought to you by Talbot School of Theology, 51����. Tim, good to have you on, buddy.

Tim: It is great to be with you, Sean. What a blast doing the book together and just getting time together. We've known each other...

Sean: Twenty-five years, I think something like that. I think that's right.

Tim: I had hair.

Sean: No, actually you didn't, but we digress. All right, let's jump in.

Tim: Not a good start, Sean.

Sean: You brought it up!

Tim: All right, I did, yes.

Sean: All right, so nearly 20 years ago - you drew this to my attention - Georgetown linguist Deborah Tannen coined the term "argument culture" to describe how we approach cultural differences. What did she mean by that? And do you think we've gotten better, or worse, or stayed the same?

Tim: Well, it is amazing to think that 20 years ago she saw this on the horizon. She saw what was coming. The division, the rancor…social media was getting there.

Sean: Just starting.

Tim: Just starting. So think about all that can be added to that. What she meant by that, Sean, was we now treat each other as if we're in a verbal slugfest. We're not interested in listening. We're not interested in nuance. Common ground is being frowned upon. But two major things really came out of that. One is a psychological principle called “splitting” where I see you as all good, all bad.

Sean: Black and white.

Tim: Yup, black and white. But we call that “splitting.” So you either like this political candidate - he or she hung the moon - or they're the worst thing for this country and the country is going to be absolutely destroyed if we go...that's called splitting.

Sean: Okay.

Tim: Second, I purposely give the weakest version of your argument. I purposely do that. Like, I might know it, but for the sake of winning the debate, I give the weakest caricature of your position I can possibly think of. Now, people might say, well, why would you do that? Well, because then it's easy to defeat. I mean, if I give the weakest version that has obvious holes, inconsistencies…then I can just punch it and everybody goes, well, what a stupid belief. And second, it was so easily dismantled. And, you know, going to grad school, Sean, at UNC Chapel Hill, doing a master's and a PhD with mostly non-Christian profs who hold to postmodernism, hold to different beliefs socially, religiously, spiritually - they were heavyweights. So it was a great experience for me to meet the A-Team. This is the A-Team. And you do not minimize their arguments. Do not give a caricature, because they will come right back at you and say, nobody believes that. Who would believe that? And where are you getting that from, by the way? I mean, they would challenge you pretty hard and fast.

Sean: Which they should at that level.

Tim: Which they should. And they were mostly respectful towards conservative Christianity. I mean, they wrote some books going after it, but I felt like they were weighty books, which was actually a compliment. So that's what Tannen was saying, 20 years ago. Now add social media, which means we're perpetually perturbed with each other. Tribalism isn't something she coined, but social media easily puts us in these different tribes because I only go to my news source. I only go to places that really buttress my opinion. I very seldom go over to the other side and read articulate representations of views that just flat out disagree with me. I never even go to read. I don't even know where those websites are nor who those people are. So you get these crazy statements like, well, if you have a brain, there's no way you could believe in that position. You can't read your Bible and hold to that position. And I'm like, wow, there's a lot of really good people who hold to that position. But we can insulate ourselves very easily now with social media. It allows us to be in a cocoon.

Sean: We definitely can. I was just giving a talk on social media to students, and there were some adults there, and I said pull out your phones. Number one, look at screen time. That was interesting. But second, look at the podcasts you follow. Look at the people you follow on Twitter. Look at the people you follow on YouTube. And if they're telling you what you already want to hear, you're going to be tempted to demonize the other side and see things black and white. I'd show anybody my podcast feed. It's probably more Christians than non-Christians, but there's a lot of variety to try to challenge my thinking. Now, I haven't read Deborah Tannen's terms, so it might be nitpicking. But one thing I would say is, I don't know that we have an argument culture. I think we have an argumentative culture.

Tim: Oh, what's the difference?

Sean: Well, we are called to make arguments. Paul does in 2 Corinthians chapter 10. I don't see people laying out arguments and going, here's my reason, here's my evidence. What do you think? Let's pursue the truth. Now, I know that's not what she meant by it, but sometimes we lose that distinction. We are called to make a case for things. We're called to defend it. We're called to argue, but in a certain fashion. And sometimes we confuse making arguments with offending somebody - and there's reasons for that we won't go into - with arguing itself, which we're called to.

Tim: Well, being a rhetoric professor, I totally agree with what you're saying, because rhetoric has such a bad name. Like, empty rhetoric. Don't give me a rhetoric. Well, Aristotle's rolling over in his grave right now, having written the book called “On Rhetoric.” So rhetoric is a great way of thinking deeply about topics and how to persuade people. But you're right. Tannen is meaning it in the negative sense, the argumentativeness that you just talked about.

Sean: Right.

Tim: That's what she's critiquing. Not good, solid, reasoned debate. She would love that.

Sean: Of course.

Tim: Yeah. So that's a great point.

Sean: Fair enough. So there's few people who, I think, have affected the way I try to communicate as much or more than you have. In your books, watching you do this. I don’t know that I've told you that. And so I want to know why you think that conversations online and/or in person, and maybe these are different answers, so often descend from good empathy, care, healthy argument into canceling and divisiveness. Why does that happen?

Tim: I think we demonize the other side so much that the mere listening to your perspective is seen as compromise. Like, what are you doing reading that book? What are you doing listening to that person? And then I would add, Sean, what we've learned with the Winsome Conviction Project - we're in our fifth year. So we've been out there on Capitol Hill in churches, universities, taking com theory and seeing what works and what does not work.

Sean: These aren't just Christian universities. These are public universities across worldview divides.

Tim: Yeah, it's a mix of both. And let me just say, sadly, there's very little difference between the non-Christian community and the Christian community. We demonize just as much as non-Christians demonize, and it is really shocking. So what happens is, you get into your in-group, and your in-group dictates what you're allowed to consider as being reasonable. So let's say your in-group is of one political party, okay? And in that in-group, nothing is positive about the other person, nothing. And if you try to bring it up, and you say, well, you know, maybe we're being unfair to this person, just notice the response that you get from the in-group, right? Are you quickly chastised? Like, hey, remember that person believes this, this, this, this, this. And you're like, oh, okay, well, I don't want to rock the boat because my spouse is friends with your spouse or our kids play together. I'm not rocking this boat over something like a controversial theory, that I just want to say, maybe we're being overly negative towards this theory. So let me give you an instance. We, in the past, we've had these discussions, right? And we bring people together, have discussions. And so we did bring together two people who really disagreed. Super articulate. They came together. Man, Sean, it was a home run.

Sean: Good.

Tim: I'm sitting there with Rick Langer, the co-director, and I'm thinking, how do you get nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize?

Sean: [laughs]

Tim: You know what I mean? Is it an email? Do they call you? Right? Five days later, we get emails from the participants. This was unfair, what you did. I felt manipulated. I felt like you, as moderators, you did not do it right. X, Y, and Z. Now, what happened? They went back to their in-groups and the in-groups said, oh, you were mistreated that night. Oh, they were way more supportive. And you got deprogrammed. Today, Sean, we go back to electronic in-groups, church in-groups, small group in-groups. And in that in-group, we set the tone of how much we're really going to debate issues or we're just going to have the standard line. And I think many of us belong to an in-group where we have really landed the plane on some issues and other things do not get a fair hearing. We don't even think to say positive things about a particular person or political party or idea. And we’ve got to start challenging these in-groups, because any work that we do is going to get deprogrammed in a heartbeat. So we're going to have to have courageous people who stand up in an in-group and say, listen, I just don't think we can completely say negative things about this person, right? Can we try to do positives? So can I give you, for instance, the one that got us in trouble?

Sean: Sure.

Tim: So on the Winsome Conviction podcast, it was the election season. We literally flipped a coin. I got President Trump. Rick Langer got President Biden. This is what the podcast was. Only positives, only positive.

Sean: [laughs]

Tim: Like, we know the negatives, right? We know the negatives. We don't need to do a podcast on the negatives. Okay, so we just did positives. I had President Trump. Okay, it's no secret. I wrestle with this, right? But it was just positives. I was blown away by the positives. Do you know that he doesn't drink?

Sean: I did.

Tim: Because he watched his older brother drink himself to death. So when it came to the opioid crisis, he pumped billions into it. The veterans have often really struggled, you know, acclimating back. At the martial arts place that I train, there are vets there who aren't Republican. And I walked up to him and said, hey, I've heard this line a ton that President Trump really helped the VA. Is that true? And they go, look, I'm not a President Trump person. He really helped the VA. I was like, that is so good to hear. All positives. And then Rick did President Biden. So they're in the green room. They're about to have this debate among Democratic candidates. Pete Buttigieg is sitting right next to President Biden, who's going through his rosary. Pete Buttigieg says, what are you doing? He goes, I'm going through my rosary. I'm praying for everybody. I just prayed for you.

Sean: Wow.

Tim: And Buttigieg says, really? What did you pray for? And by all accounts in the green room, he sort of, kind of, shared Christ with Pete Buttigieg.

Sean: Interesting.

Tim: Now, Sean, imagine this. The podcast sure to get you hate mail. Because you're saying positives about one person, and people don't think there are any positives, and then flip that. I got my first death threat.

Sean: Oh my goodness.

Tim: No, no, it was on my bucket list.

Sean: Holy cow.

Tim: My wife is like, who are you? Like, what? Who are you? That you think that that…and yes, I have a black belt, but we never got to blocking bullets. We just never got to that part.

Sean: Yeah. Yeah.

Tim: But think about that, Sean. How dare you? How dare you say anything positive about that other person? There may even be listeners right now that are like, yeah, you can't do a whole podcast on that person with positives. There aren't any. That’s “splitting.” And I think we need to move away from that. We need to say, listen, I'm opposed to this person politically, socially, religiously. But I can see the positives in that person. I would argue if you can't, the issue is with you, not the other person. You are locked into what Tannen is intimating about “splitting.” We need to find the positives and really seek to find them. And that doesn't mean I'm condoning. It means I'm working really hard to see both the positives and the negatives and not just color a person black or white.

Sean: Now, one of the things you talk about is the importance of not, you know, strawmanning, but steelmanning. And so you could take different political positions and try to defend the other side as well as you can. That would be an exercise in not only seeing the positive, but at least minimally understanding that argument first. And I've asked a lot of people in different positions, why do you think I vote this way? And basically never is somebody able to explain sympathetically what the reason is, which tells me they're falling into a kind of “splitting,” but also makes me think, have I taken the time to step into this person's perspective and at least understand first? Now, we're going to get to that, because that's one of the things you brought to the book that I think is so powerful. But for me, I think, first chapter in the book, you asked me to write on how I think we got to this cultural moment.

Tim: Right. Right.

Sean: And I think there's a few things. I think there's a rise in, just, this argument culture. At the same time, we have a rise in mental health. Well, if you're not - and I'm not blaming somebody - I'm saying if we're not in a position where we're healthy relationally and there's conflict, we're not going to handle that conflict in a healthy fashion.

Tim: Right.

Sean: We just aren't. So we've heard it said, hurt people hurt people. So often when I see somebody canceling, and defensive, and angry in my mind, I think, where did that person learn how to communicate in that fashion? And in many ways, it's a failure of the ability to communicate well. That's what a lot of it is. I think we're also where…the other thing social media has done is brought to our fingertips countless issues that we all have to weigh in on and are all so, just, passionate about. But now our communication is, if you don't post on certain issues in a certain way, you'll still get piled onto.

Tim: Right. And you know that better than anybody. I mean, you know, you put yourself out there.

Sean: I guess I've had a couple of death threats, but I never thought about that being on my bucket list. That's a positive spin to put on it. And I appreciate that.

Tim: It's not on my resume.

Sean: So let's shift to this. You had this chapter that I love where you talk about the transmission view of communication and how it contrasts with the ritual view of communication. Yeah, I appreciate that you brought a balance and said there's space for both. In fact, this is a kind of transmission view of communication as we're depositing information. So you're not against it, but you want to move us towards a different kind of communication. Tell us about that.

Tim: So there's generally two different ways to view communication. One is called the transmission view. This is post-Enlightenment, right, where I think the best way to persuade you is to present my arguments. I'm going to present. We already talked about the fact that we want to retain this idea of robust arguing and rhetoric. I'm not opposed to that whatsoever. But the Enlightenment had this idea that you are all logic. You are not emotions. You're not your body. You're just your intellect. So we have been locked into that today. Hey, let me just one last time give you one more argument for my position. I know you've heard 50 arguments, but I'm just going to, like, reiterate it one more time to really hope this one you're going to go, oh my goodness. Why didn't you say that before? I'm now going to shift. So we're not opposed to the transmission view. My goodness. Think of Paul, right? When he's talking about, I passed on to you of first importance what I received. My goodness, that's transmission view. And we would always want to protect that. I was on the debate team in college. You are one of the top apologetic voices today. We're not getting away from the transmission view. We feel like we have really good arguments. But we need, now, to set up the arguments. Today in the argument culture, I don't think it works just to start with my arguments.

Sean: Okay.

Tim: So there's something called the ritual view that really predates the transmission view. Let me just put it this way. The ritual view focuses on connection - these bonds, social bonds, emotional bonds, intellectual bonds. But we're a community. That's even where the word communication comes from, this idea of community. And so what we need to do first is focus on these communal bonds with each other. How are you and I alike? Like, what brings us together? And I focus there in order to set up the coming end of the transmission view. So I love when you wrote in the book, hurt people hurt people. So in a ritual view, we immediately would go to, well, why are you hurt? Like, what caused this hurt, rather than the argument that's coming out of your hurtness? We eventually want to get to that and critique it and push back if we need to. But I want to camp out on what has hurt you. And are there people from my community that have hurt you? And that's where the ritual view…once we have this commonality, now, I think, what the Book of Proverbs says, a word spoken in the right circumstance. I think today in the argument culture, we have to create the circumstance. We don't have it anymore. So I'm a little bit fearful that we're just continuing presenting arguments. Let me tell you about an interesting study that was done. So you’re placed in an MRI machine and they're taking a look at the part of your brain.

Sean: By the way, this is triggering me because I have claustrophobia, but I'll go with it. You're good.

Tim: Oh my gosh, Sean, that must be horrible.

Sean: [laughs]

Tim: So it's the part of your brain that registers your beliefs. It's called the anterior insula. So they put you in an MRI and they read a political statement you agree with, and they register it. Now they give you five statements going against that deep political belief and they want to see how does that part of the brain register. Here's the shocking part. The same part of your brain that registers when you're physically attacked, registers when your beliefs are attacked. The same part of the brain. So one time I was mountain biking, Sean, and up in Carbon Canyon Pass.

Sean: Yeah.

Tim: I'm mountain biking and in front of me, it looked like a German shepherd, but it had cat-like features. So I immediately stopped my mountain bike and I go, was that a bobcat? Because I hope it's not a mountain lion. If it's a mountain lion, we got problems because that mountain lion is seeing me. You're not going to outrun a mountain lion.

Sean: Or outbike a mountain lion. [laughs]

Tim: Or outbike a mountain lion. I'm a little bit insulted that you thought I could not run.

Sean: [laughs]

Tim: So honestly, I didn't know. I'm trying to remember everything I ever learned about a bobcat. So I took my bike. I knew not to run away like a crazy person. That would invoke their chase instinct. So I took my bike, put it between me and walked where I saw it go into the deep grass. And I'm just ready to use it as a shield. But Sean, think of my heart rate. It probably tripled. That part of my brain is freaking out like, dude, if a bobcat jumps out and attacks me, I need to…right? Oh my goodness. Well, when you're presenting a view to a person and going against their deepest conviction, it is as if they're being physically attacked. And all I wanted to do with that bobcat was to get to safety. So it is impossible to have a conversation with a person when that part of the brain is firing like that. So we've got to find ways to convince that person, I'm not attacking you. And the only way to do that is to form these bonds and something we'll later call sympathetic awareness.

Sean: Right.

Tim: We have to lower those defenses. Remember the Book of Proverbs. “An offended brother is like a fortified city.” So we can go up against those fortifications, or we can say, I need to lower it. And let me just commend you, Sean, when I look at your YouTube channel. Man, you do this. Like, you have this unique ability to both hold the line, the Christian line or convictions, but in such a way that people do not feel attacked, because they agree to come back on your YouTube channel. So let me ask you what…oh my goodness. You're Josh McDowell's son, one of the best Christian apologists we've ever had. I can imagine people are coming on your show like, I don't know, this could go really bad. So what do you do to get them away from that feeling of being attacked? How do you set the stage with these people?

Sean: So what you're talking about with the ritual view is that there are certain barriers that keep from communication.

Tim: Right.

Sean: And they're emotional barriers, they’re fear barriers, they’re experiential barriers. There's a proverb that says, and you're the first person who I heard quote this, “the purposes in a man's heart are deep and a person of wisdom draws it out.” So I often think somebody's - not always - but somebody's objection is not purely intellectual and argument based. And this is not just towards God. This is towards gun control. Maybe some experience that somebody had. This might be towards an immigration experience they had, for or against whatever it is. And so I'm trying to think through, how do I create a communication climate in which we can discover what the heart of the issue is and then try to address it? So in the Gospel, Kingdom, & Culture class we teach here, I tell students, I want to find the question beneath the question. So we might be arguing about some intellectual topic, but really, at root the issue is, are you going to leave me and abandon me and attack me if I differ with you?

Tim: Yes.

Sean: That's a fear that clouds the entire issue. So the intellect is a part of it, and we're called to make arguments, but I just want to lean in, build common ground, understand, soften the temperature so we can get to the issues. Because when it's all said and done, we do have to make up our minds and also land on certain issues. But I also want to draw to the surface for people if I can: here's your argument, but here's really what's going on, right? And I'm not trying to read into something that's not there. It's just from listening. It's from understanding, saying, I hear you saying this, you had this experience. Are they connected? Does this shape your argument? And so to me, it's…I want to get to the argument, but there's so much stuff downstream from it, so to speak, that I want to deal with first so we can have it. That's it.

Tim: And let me just say very quickly about social media, online communication. There's no time for it. It is pure transaction.

Sean: That's right.

Tim: It's pure transmission view of communication in an environment where we never lower the temperature or we never do all that deep heart work that you're talking about. And so people say, well, what am I supposed to do? I don't know. Maybe not try to tackle the most difficult social, political, religious topics in an environment that does not allow you to go deeper. I'm not saying abandon it. I agree with Hillary Clinton, who said social media is the new public square.

Sean: It’s true.

Tim: I really agree with that. So we need to be in the public square and you're doing a great job. But let's realize the limitations of the medium in certain places. I just don't have the time, right? A word spoken in the right circumstance. Sometimes this isn't the best circumstance for us to jump in. We have an hour…YouTube channel, man, you can go for it. Don’t avoid [social media] or get rid of it, but maybe understand the limitations of that medium.

Sean: It's also disembodied and most communication, as you know, is eye contact and posture and dress and little reactions. That's where it gets difficult. So you mentioned this concept that I want you to unpack called sympathetic awareness. Explain what it is and then maybe how far you would extend it.

Tim: Okay, so sympathetic awareness is the heart of the ritual view, which means hurt people hurt people. So I want to know what has hurt you. Now, I can't just do that cognitively. If you tell me, okay, I've been hurt. When I think back in my life, there's three instances that have really hurt me. It is not sympathetic awareness for me just to repeat the three. And let's say I knew them…like you said, it was a parent. It was a former church member or it was a professor. Well, I literally say to you, well, yeah, your dad, X, Y and Z. Professor, X, Y and Z. That is not sympathetic awareness. Why? It was cognitive.

Sean: Got it.

Tim: There's value in that. I'm not dismissing that. But sympathetic awareness goes deeper to say, okay, what did it feel like to be betrayed? Like, how did that affect your body to be betrayed? So I try as much as possible to actually feel it, not just articulate it. I try to understand it, but I also want to feel what it was like to be betrayed by a family member like that and feel, as much as I can, the pain. This is what we call embodied perspective taking. I evoke my body, not just my intellect. So I actually want to sit with you and say, oh my goodness, I just have a pit in my stomach listening to you. I can't imagine what it's like to be betrayed by a family member. And I'm just…my hands are sweaty. Right? Now, we don't want to go too far with that, right? That I know exactly how it feels…I don't. But I do want to sit with a person and let my body start to feel it. And then let's add Carl Rogers into the mix. Whenever we talk about empathy or sympathetic awareness, we're really talking Carl Rogers, who did the seminal work. And he said this, though, Sean, about empathy that changed my whole understanding of empathy. I can do the really hard work of empathizing with you. But if I don't communicate it in a way that you receive, it doesn't work. Like, my goodness, I've tried to be empathetic 50 million ways and we just spent a half hour talking about you, but you did not feel it in a way that you appreciate it. So I'm going to have to learn what communicates to you sympathy, empathy, sympathetic awareness. Can I give an example from my master's program?

Sean: Do it.

Tim: I'm sorry, my undergrad is from Michigan University. I was a theater major, believe it or not. I was on a theater scholarship.

Sean: I didn't know you had a scholarship.

Tim: Yeah, yeah, I was on a scholarship.

Sean: That’s awesome, good for you.

Tim: So I'm there, and every one of my professors is gay, and militantly gay. Now, this was a lifetime ago. This isn't 20 years ago, Deborah Tannen. Yeah, this is me a lifetime ago. And I'm a leader with CRU. I'm a leader with Campus Crusade for Christ and a theater major. So, over time, they start to learn two things about Tim Milhoff. One, he's serious about the arts. He really does love the arts. And he's got some whacked out, crazy conservative views – like socially, politically and spiritually. Like, we like him, but he's kind of like the crazy uncle we don't talk about. And some tried to debate me relentlessly. Others just said, I'm not even going to talk to him anymore about that because we're not going to make any headway. So senior year, you have to do a performance and it's live. It's for the public. And I chose – as co-director of Campus Crusade, the student co-director – “Bent,” which is the classic gay play written about Hitler's horrible treatment of homosexuals in concentration camps. So in “Bent,” you have two major characters, Max and Horst, both gay. Max says, no way am I admitting to being gay because they'll give me a pink star and I'll be abused. I'm going to get a yellow star by denying my homosexuality. Horst says, I'm not denying who I am. I'm openly gay. He gets a pink star and is brutalized in the play. Eventually they force him to grab an electrified fence and kill himself. He chooses not to. Rather, he charges the guards and they shoot him. Max is standing right there and they say, take the coward Jew and bury him. So here's Max, who loves Horst. They have fallen in love during the course of the play. So, in a powerful scene, he takes off Horst's dirty uniform that has the pink star and he puts it on. And then he runs, and he grabs the fence, and is electrified and dies. On Broadway, when he grabbed it, they actually showed pictures of all documented homosexuals who had been brutalized in concentration camps.

Sean: Wow.

Tim: Right? So I did that. I did it. And Sean, the place was packed. And they were like, no way is this straight conservative Christian doing “Bent.” I mean, it's the sacred text. And when I finished, there was mild applause. I don't know – I was expecting a standing ovation.

Sean: [laughs]

Tim: You know what I mean? Captain, my captain. Right? It was mild at best.

Sean: Okay, okay.

Tim: And I honestly wondered, did that do anything? A week later, Danny, one of the most outspoken gay coaches on the speech team, called me. “I'd like to have you over for dinner.” I was like, oh my goodness. I said, yes, yes. And so I went, and he made an amazing dinner. And he said, “listen, when I came out in high school, my parents abandoned me. I've never talked to them since. You are really conservative in our theater department. I think you know what it's like to be an outcast.”

Sean: That's interesting.

Tim: “I think we have something in common.” And I'm sitting there going, I think we do, too. And we continued the rest of the semester. We'd go and do swimming in the morning, go out and grab breakfast. Eventually, I got a chance to share on multiple occasions, God's view of sexuality. I mean, it wasn't a mystery to him. He knew it.

Sean: Sure, sure.

Tim: But that's the ritual view, right? Imagine me going to dinner and saying, okay, Danny, come on, I just feel compelled one more time to tell you what I believe is the biblical view of homosexuality. That'd be the transmission view. I don't think Danny would have received it. But “Bent” was the ritual view, sympathetic awareness.

Sean: Yep.

Tim: Now, listen, that's a radical example of that.

Sean: Sure.

Tim: But I think the principle really holds. I need to show you that I'm trying emotionally, spiritually, and physically to experience your pain, your perspective, because I later want to talk into that perspective. But I do think we need to set the right circumstances – Book of Proverbs. I think the ritual view today when we're so siloed…we actually know from research and rhetoric, and I know this is weird saying this to an apologist, but we know from communication theory, the more times I present an argument to you and you reject it, like…I give you my A-game. I give you my best argument for God, whatever. And you reject it – every time you reject it, you become hardened in your position.

Sean: That makes sense.

Tim: You develop intellectual calluses. So my point is, I'm still going to try to persuade you with my best shot, but I'm not going to continually give it to you, because I'm actually creating calluses. I don't think I've created the right circumstances to give you the A-game. So I'm going to till that soil a little bit – empathize with you, sympathetic awareness – and then I'm going to present to you my argument with a better chance of you actually being in a place that you can receive it.

Sean: Now, this is obviously a controversial example. I'm anticipating some emails, and I hope they come. And if you have questions, send them to me, and you can tell us your thoughts and respond. In the back of the book, one of my favorite parts is that we press each other on different things. How far would you take this to white supremacy? Would you show some sympathetic awareness to one or not? You don't have to answer that now. But what does that practically look like for someone? Even if someone is sitting here going, I'm not sure I'm with Tim on that example, and has issues with it, I'd say, fine. At least think about it. Rest with it. Ask if there's any wisdom or takeaway from it before you just dismiss it. That's in part what I think you're asking people to do. Practically, how do people do that? Is this just good listening, and asking questions, and leaning in, and really trying to understand? Is that the root of it?

Tim: It's the root of it. But that sounded cognitive in essence. So once I get this information, what do I do with it? Once I learn your story, your narrative, what do I do with that? So my master's thesis at UNC Chapel Hill was taking three members of the gay community, self-identified, and three members of a really conservative Christian ministry on campus. They came together. Now, if we would have brought them together over dinner – have them do reflective listening, seek to find common ground, now, let's talk about the biblical view of homosexuality – we know what we would have got.

Sean: Sure.

Tim: So I said, okay, guys, let's not do that. Give me six weeks. Week seven, we're going to have the conversation, I promise. Give me six weeks to prepare. And they did exercises in perspective taking where they actually did each other's narratives in first-person. So I take the narrative of a gay member, and they tell me this is what it's like to be gay. And they get my narrative – this is what it's like to be a conservative Christian. We live with those narratives, and then we come back and present them to each other in first-person. So I don't say, Sean, this is what your narrative says. No, no, no. I do it as Sean. And I’ve got to tell you, the impact it had on the group was amazing. First woman up to do it was a woman, conservative Christian, and started to cry doing the narrative of this. This is before marriage was legalized in our country.

Sean: Same-sex marriage.

Tim: Yeah, gay marriage. She goes, I can't imagine somebody denying me to be with the person I love. I can't imagine. And she started crying. Now, let me tell you an interesting backstory. One of the participants in my study stopped the study halfway through. She stopped participating, which is a bummer when you’ve got six people doing a qualitative study. She said, yeah, I'm not doing…this narrative is like ingesting poison. A Christian narrative. I'm not doing it anymore. And I'm withholding my journal, which is my source material for the whole project. So she stopped halfway through it. I invited her to the final presentation to say, if you want to come, come. She shocked me by coming. So she's sitting right there. The Christian woman does it – starts to cry. When she finishes, this woman goes, well, all right, I'll do it. I was like, what? She goes, I'll do it. What changed? I think she saw that you allowed my narrative to move you. Make sense? Now, would we do that with a radical perspective? Listen, we're an educational institution, 51����.

Sean: Agree.

Tim: So, understand, I'm talking 400-level students. These are seniors, maybe a junior or two, who are in my engaging diverse perspectives class. Okay, so we're not doing this with freshmen. Freshmen are getting a biblical grounding, right? So they're being coached, guided. Hey, if this starts to go south, like, hey, maybe we need to back off a little bit, because I think you're starting to…right?

Sean: Yeah.

Tim: But now, listen, there's obviously limitations. I don't need to look at porn to understand a person addicted to porn, but I better understand what that addiction is doing to that person from the inside out. But I don't need to look at porn to do that. I think that's sin. I can't sin…

Sean: Yes, that makes sense.

Tim: …In the process of actually doing it. But listen, Jesus radically met with notorious sinners. I mean, his table fellowship…I read a book by Blomberg called Contagious Holiness about his table fellowships. They were mostly outside with notorious sinners. So I say to my students, who would be at that outdoor fellowship that would stop you dead in your tracks, that you would see Jesus sitting in La Mirada where 51���� is, and you would stop and say, Jesus, come here. You cannot be seen with that person publicly. The optics are horrible. Jesus's response, according to Blomberg, is are they sick? Do they need it? Good. Then what are we talking about? So I do think we need to radically move over, and I don't think anybody is beyond God's love and care. But let's not talk white supremacists. The neighbor who has a pro-fill-in-the-political-candidate in their front yard. To step over that fence boundary and say, dude, I can't vote for that person, is the transmission view. The ritual would be to say, what has led you to put that stick in your front yard? You know people aren't pleased with that sign. What has led you to this? Well, I believe our country is going downhill. I mean, live with that narrative for a second. The transmission view is, come on, let me give you five reasons our country is not going downhill. But no, I live with…if this candidate is elected, I believe our country is going to unravel? I need to live with that fear as though it's my fear – sympathetic awareness. And then we're going to have a conversation where I'm going to challenge some of his presuppositions.

Sean: In due time. So, some of the concerns…like, we used to take students to Berkeley and other campuses. We bring in atheists and agnostics, and we've had gay activists come in, and Unitarian reverends. And we would train our students,very carefully, to expose them to that. You're doing the same kind of thing with these upper-level students, because there obviously is a fear of protection that comes in. What if these are non-biblical ideas? So that's the kind of stuff we interact with towards the end of the book. This is what we call perspective-taking, in a sense. And I think this is what motivated me, in part, to write the book with you. It felt like a very incarnational way of entering into a relationship with somebody. I never thought of it in terms of that. You've got in Hebrews, we have a Savior who understands us in every way yet hasn't sinned. So clearly you can't take on sin to perspective-take. That's a part of it. But is there anything more on perspective taking that we need to unpack?

Tim: So perspective-taking is the concept that blew my mind when it came to communication.

Sean: So this isn't your idea.

Tim: No, no, no, no, no.

Sean: Just making sure.

Tim: This comes from both the field of psychology and communication theory. The two major psychologists who came up with this concept basically said it is the ability to temporarily set aside my perspective, my passions, my convictions, to experience your world from the inside out. And that word experience is really important – not just cognitively, but experience. Frederick Douglass said it's one thing to learn about the ills of slavery, to read about it. It's another thing to go into the deep pine woods and hear slaves walking to the owner's house singing songs of redemption.

Sean: Wow.

Tim: He said that passes through the chambers of your soul. Oh, that's a powerful moment I used in my dissertation. So what we want to do is to see the world through the perspective of other people. Now, in the book, I do a quick synopsis, Old Testament, New Testament, to show that I think it's there in some really powerful ways. So, very quickly, Book of Ecclesiastes.

Sean: Okay.

Tim: The word “under the sun,” I think is mentioned 28 times. So, let's say it's Solomon. Please do not send emails to Sean, saying it is not Solomon.

Sean: We’re saying, for discussion, good enough.

Tim: We're going to say it's Solomon. He says, listen, I want you to do a thought exercise. I want you to live under the sun. There is no God. There's no transcendent purpose. Life is chasing after the wind, is what he uses. It's life under the sun. Feel that experience – the hopelessness. But guess what? There is life above the sun. And he bops in and out really interestingly in Ecclesiastes. He'll give you the above the sun perspective every once in a while. But hey, that isn't all there is. There is God's judgment. There is God. Really interesting. I have my students actually do this, Sean. We take a week and live under the sun. So from morning till nine o'clock at night, there is no God. There is no prayer. There is no purpose. And then, I don't want to make them suffer, so after nine o'clock, you get to listen to Maverick City worship. You get to read your Bible. But know what it’s like to live in a world of existentialism - Camus art. All right, that's Ecclesiastes. Let's go to Song of Solomon for a second. 60 percent of the Song of Solomon is the female voice. If you add the chorus, 60 percent is the female perspective on things like sexuality. Women had no voice, let alone on sexuality. So you get the female perspective in the Song of Solomon. You're invited to see love, passion, and desire from the female perspective. Let's go to Hosea really quick. God wants to create a spokesperson to call Israel back to repentance. So I've got a wild idea: marry a woman who's going to be unfaithful to you. Marry Gomer. And what you feel every time she betrays you, prophet, is what I want you to say to the people. This is what God feels like when the nation strays. Now, that's radical perspective-taking. But I would say for sure he's preparing the prophet to not just articulate what it's like to leave Israel, but, hey, what does it feel like when your wife's unfaithful? Oh, it's horrible. Yeah, that's how God feels. Now, bop to the New Testament real quick. I think Hebrews is the best expression of this. When the writer of Hebrews says, I want you to pray for those in prison – this is Hebrews 13 – but I want you to imagine as if you were there. Isn't that an interesting move? I don't want you just to pray, but I want you to think about those who are imprisoned as if you were there and their pain being your pain. That's embodied perspective-taking. And my prayers, no doubt, for the persecuted would really improve if I imagine what it would be like to be in an ancient prison that was notoriously unsanitary. I mean, we could do the prodigal son narrative where we're invited into each perspective.

Sean: Yeah, that's interesting.

Tim: When we get Jesus – and you already mentioned – we do not have a high priest who is unsympathetic, but sympathizes with us. New Testament scholars say that word sympathy is “knowledge by way of common experience.” So he experienced the human condition. So I think perspective-taking today, if I summarize the argument culture…we don't value it anymore. Like, why do I need to do perspective taking with a position that is obviously false, obviously unbiblical, is going to ruin this country? Why would I give it the time of day? And that's why our book is called, hey, how do you end the stalemate? Like, what if you find you're in a stalemate with a family member, neighbor, person you work with? Do you just stay in the stalemate? We explore ways, how do you get out of the stalemate? And that's where I think we're trying to reshuffle the deck a little bit to say, maybe we need to rethink a little bit about communication and reorder things.

Sean: So one last question for you. We've gotten through like the first two or three chapters in the book.

Tim: I know, I know. We are speed reading.

Sean: Which is fine. At the end of the day, what I think to me is most helpful about this is, there's actually a plan people can walk through before the conversation, during the conversation, after the conversation. One of the reasons I think barriers people are going to have to doing this is they're going to say, Tim, Sean, this sounds like a lot of work and it's exhausting. I mean, I can't have that conversation for six weeks until we've spent all this time building a relationship? Come on, Tim, I just want to have a conversation. And now with social media online, there's all these people that, the bigger my platform goes, there's more people that have issues with me and are angry with me for whatever reason. I'm like, I don't have the energy to try to manage all of these. So maybe for like a last question, what are some practical things people could do, or what would it just look like to do this for people who want to translate it to their lives?

Tim: Okay, so in fairness to us, the name of the book is End the Stalemate. So if you feel like you're in a stalemate with a family member, and by the way, we mentioned some amazing statistics. I mean, disheartening 2016 election, 32 percent of respondents say I no longer talk to a family member based on the 2016 presidential election.

Sean: That's right.

Tim: So if you're in a stalemate, where you feel like, I don't know what to do with my teenage son; every time we talk, it makes it worse. I'd say, okay, that's a stalemate. Here are some ideas of how to get past the stalemate. Get past cancel culture. Second, the cool thing about the book is we hired a really talented web designer. So there's a website. See, the hard thing about these conversations, Sean – you can't practice them. Like, if I actually have the conversation with my roommate and it doesn't go well, well, we just had the conversation, right, and things got worse. So we created a website. You can go to it, called EndTheStalemate.com, where you actually get to practice in the privacy of your room. You get to get diverse perspectives and yell at the screen.

Sean: And no one's going to record it and send it online and hold it against you.

Tim: You can go to the screen and go, that was stupid. I totally disagree with that perspective. Oh, wait a minute. That won't be helpful. And then we actually guide you through perspective-taking, sympathetic awareness, how to prepare to have a conversation, and how to think about the conversation. But you're going to watch two different perspectives be presented to you. We're going to start with politics because the election is right around the corner.

Sean: That's such a hot issue.

Tim: And we're going to listen to people who are pro-candidate, pro-candidate, and you're going to go, well, listen, I really like this person. But that person's out to lunch. Oh, but let me answer these questions based on the book. All right. Okay. Right? And we’ve got to practice these things. So that website, EndTheStalemate.com, is a place that you get to go and say, okay, let me practice with the intention of eventually having these conversations. Are all conversations stalemate conversations? No. So you’ve got to read the communication climate a little bit. But if it is a stalemate, a true stalemate, which many of us feel with a lot of people, then I think it's going to take some time to prepare myself to have a conversation and create those right circumstances the book of Proverbs talks about.

Sean: That's good stuff. I've not been as excited about a book as this one in a long time, in part because in an earlier book that you wrote, you gave kind of a fore-plan for communication. Understand first, common ground, and then kind of disagreement, and maybe one step forward. And it's just such a practical plan that has literally, I've told you this, changed the way I speak sometimes, changed the way I engage people. And it's communication strategies…there might be some stalemates where people say, I will not be in conversation with you, and we can't fix it. But in many cases, if we look within and own some of the ways that maybe our communication is not being so effective…like I get emails weekly, sometimes many, about people whose kids have left the faith or they've shifted politically, and they've closed them out. And the parents are like, how do I get them to see the Bible says this? And I say, well, maybe let's take a few steps back, work on the sympathetic awareness. They know what you believe, and then we can build the relationship and get to that point. So I think in our age of just canceling in the church and outside of the church, we need some practical tools on how to do this. And I think we laid that out for folks.

Tim: And the reason I asked you to partner is, honestly, watching your YouTube channel, you do not shy away from the hardest issues. I mean, you talk about stalemates. You're running right into the stalemates saying, I'm not going to accept that it's a stalemate. I'm not going to accept that. I'm going to find ways to get the conversation going. And I'm an avid watcher of your YouTube channel, like most of you. And I admire the fact that you're not giving up.

Sean: Well, I appreciate that. There's a lot of conversations I wish I could have. Sometimes it's exhausting, but I try to do what I can do. Tell us the other 51���� podcast that you host. It's called the Winsome Convictions Project.

Tim: Right. So we host this podcast where we bring on people with differing perspectives and we try to find common ground to sympathetic awareness. We present the biblical perspective, but try to model what it's like. We also have a great segment called People Doing It Right. Sean, there are some amazing stories out there that never reach the level of headlines. I mean, there are local things that are happening. So we bring people on our podcast that are really doing amazing things, bringing whole neighborhoods together, to have conversations about race and sexuality. I mean, it's amazing what's going on. It's happening. But we never hear about it. So we love that segment. So if you want to check it out, it's called Winsome Conviction Podcast. You can go to winsomeconviction.com.

Sean: They can find it on Google or anywhere these days. But I'm an apologist, so I deliver a lot of content, try to model how to have these conversations. But you guys do that on the podcast as well. So it's a fun book. Thank you for coming on.

Tim: Oh, my pleasure.

Sean: Enjoyed it as always. So for those of you watching, this is actually a part of the Think Biblically podcast at 51����. This is a podcast that I co-host typically. My other co-host is out right now, but he'll be back soon. So make sure you hit subscribe. If you have questions from this episode or other questions or comments, please send them to thinkbiblically@biola.edu. That's thinkbiblically@biola.edu. We have programs fully online and here in theology, spiritual formation, apologetics. We'd love to have you join us. And remember when it's all said and done, think biblically about everything.