The Myth of Meritocracy? Moving beyond the Poles of Merit and Woke

The world is becoming increasingly proficient at telling stories that deny God. As such, we need Thinking Christian to become as natural as breathing. Welcome to the Thinking Christian podcast. I'm Dr. James Spencer. Through calm, thoughtful, theological discussions, Thinking Christian highlights the ways God is working in the world and questions the underlying social, cultural, and political assumptions that hinder Christians from becoming more like Christ. Now, on to today's episode of Thinking Christian. Hey, everyone. Welcome to this episode of Thinking Christian. I'm James Spencer, and I'm joined by Nate Giurtano. And we are going to be talking today about the topics of meritocracy, but also throwing in some systemic evil, systemic sin, structural evil, those kind of concepts into our conversation. And it's really in response to the president's speech that he gave before Congress where he talked a little bit about meritocracy. And so Nate and I are going to discuss this today and hopefully have a good talk. So Nate, welcome back to the program, man. It's always a pleasure to have you as a conversation partner. So how are you doing? Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. I'm doing good. Looking forward to talking about this. I think it's definitely, it hits everyone at some point in their current life. They've dealt with it at work and their social circles at church, wherever. So I think it's one of those things we definitely, I'm excited to dive into. So, you know, it's interesting. I mean, I started thinking about, I've done a lot of hiring over my career as an academic dean, we did an awful lot of hiring. But I, to illustrate, I think what I, what I see is the biggest challenge in with meritocracy, just as a concept. I'll tell a little bit about how I got hired in my first job. And so I, I was applying at a lot of different colleges. I hadn't finished my PhD yet, but I had my master of divinity and my MA in biblical exegesis done. I was finished up with my PhD coursework. So I was what they call all but dissertation ABD. And I was applying for teaching jobs. Just couldn't find one, you know, being ABD versus PhDs was very difficult. PhDs are completed. And it didn't matter, you know, whether, you know, the interviewers thought that I was as smart as the finished PhDs. The reality was I had an ABD behind my name. They had a PhD behind theirs. So very different. Right. So I finally decided I'd apply for an administrative job. I was going to apply for this assistant dean of, I think it was instruction and curriculum when I first applied for it. And it was with one of the schools that I'd already, I was with Moody Bible Institute where I'd done my MDiv. And so I knew some people there and my thinking was, you know, that I would, you know, I could probably move into this role. It was in distance education. And maybe once I finished my PhD, be able to move over to the faculty. Now that never happened, but to give sort of a context for this, I had no background in in higher education. I'd never taken an online course, never studied in an extension site. I had been a personal trainer for several years. That was about it. And so, you know, I, I had some sense about how to do things like client relationships and, you know, those kinds of, those kinds of processes. But yeah, I'd never done online education, never done higher education. I'd never worked with curriculum, been through it plenty of times, right? MDiv's 96 credit hours. MA was 42 credit hours. And then my PhD coursework was another, I don't know, 60, I think. Right. So I'd been through a lot of curriculum, but I'd never actually done a curriculum, never actually worked on a curriculum. I taught some, I'd started teaching in 2005. I got hired in 2007, but really I think I got hired for two reasons. Number one, I'd done my MDiv there. The distance education department was hoping I'd be able to bridge between distance education and the seminary. Right. And so since I had relationships with the faculty, they knew me, I'd graduated from there as an alumni. They'd hoped that I would have some goodwill coming in and be able to bridge some gaps. And number two, I knew people at the institution. I was a known quantity to some degree. And so there were people who trusted me who said, hey, he can do the job. Now, did I do the job? Yeah, I think I did the job pretty well. Like I was actually ended up being okay with it. I had a huge learning curve, right? But I ended up doing the job well. But if we think about that in terms of just meritocracy, I was way off. I did not have the experience behind me. I did not have the understanding walking in. I had ideas, but I didn't have any real hands-on experience with that job. Everybody had to trust that I'd figure it out versus I don't know what other candidates they hired or looked at, but it's hard to imagine that there wasn't somebody in there who had like an MED or who had, you know, experience doing online curriculum or managing extension sites or even, you know, running a small business or something like that would have been more qualified than me. Right. And so it wasn't that I was completely unqualified. I met the standards for the job as it was written, right? It's not uncommon for biblical and theological education to list things like an MDiv as, you know, a degree that they would take for this job. But the reality is I was pretty minimally qualified for that position, except that I was really well-networked for that position. Right. And so just as I think through meritocracy, when I hear that word thrown out there, that experience, that early experience comes back to me. While I think I ended up doing a good job and I knew I was going to be a hard worker and, you know, I know these things about myself, the people who were hiring me didn't necessarily know that. They were trusting other people that I knew to say, you know, to sort of vouch for me. But I think what we see in that story is two things. Number one, there's a difference between being qualified for a position and actually meriting that position. And so we've got this sort of issue of, yeah, I meet the minimum qualifications, but surely there were better candidates. And even though I met the qualifications for the position, then the next question is, but why would you pick me out of all the other candidates that you could have gotten? Let's say all of us were as well qualified as I was. Let's say the other applicants were basically in the same boat as me. Why pick me? Right. And so I think we, sometimes when we think about these issues of meritocracy, we like to boil it down as if it's just about having the qualifications to do a job or even having the best, which I kind of hate that adjective, the best qualifications to do that job because it never means what we really think it means, I think. Right. But we like to boil it down to that. And, and I don't think that gives, I don't think that's probably the best approach. I think it covers over a lot of things that we probably need to be thinking through when we talk about how do we go about finding the right person to fill a given position? What does that look like? And how do we make those choices? Let me ask you a serious question. If something triggered a major market drop in the coming months, would your retirement be ready or exposed? With inflation, market volatility, and ongoing global uncertainty, more families are taking a closer look at whether their retirement plan is truly built to hold up. And many are finding that adding a layer of protection makes a lot of sense. Sanctuary Metals is a Christian-owned company that helps families strengthen their retirement savings with physical gold and silver through a gold IRA. During uncertain times, many people look to precious metals as a way to add stability when other assets may be under pressure. If you'd like to explore whether a gold IRA is a good fit for your situation, Sanctuary Metals makes it easy to get started. Text GUIDE to 94878 to receive your free retirement defense guide or call 888-958-6579 to speak with one of their knowledgeable team members. Again, text GUIDE to 94878 or call 888-958-6579. Totally. Yeah, I haven't hired as many people as you have, but I've probably hired four or five people in my career, like to work under me, like when I worked in radio. And I think two examples right off the top of my head, like immediately I thought of in thinking about this, I kind of went off of experience on one and I expected a certain outcome and didn't get it because it was lacking like the heart and the motivation and like the passion. Then I hired another person in another season, you know, because people come and go sometimes. I lost one to going back into higher education and I was really bummed because I finally got to a good place there and like, you know, kind of worked with him. If someone's teachable and someone is moldable, like, you know, you said you're a fast learner and you kind of had a learning curve there, but you picked it up quick. But it was interesting to me looking back, I don't know which one I would have chosen because it's sometimes you have to take it case by case because the time I hired someone that had more of the passion but didn't have the experience. And then that kind of came back and bit me in a different way. And then I had to really work with them and kind of bring them alongside. And it just

almost like, you know, just kind of choose your poison, so to speak, or choose which way you want to go with that. But I don't know if there's always a right or wrong, especially when you're hiring for ministry. It can be challenging. And I tried both of those, and that was like really my first experience hiring somebody besides having a team of volunteers. So yeah, it was interesting. I think it's a case-by-case sometimes as well. I find it interesting, you know, when we think about meritocracy, it has been, at least in the last, what's called it, five, seven years, it's been contrasted with, I mean, President Trump even mentioned in his speech, wokeism, right? This idea of diversity, equity, and inclusion hires, and hiring people who really aren't qualified for the job simply because they have a certain ethnic or gender or, you know, ethnicity or gender or what have you. And, you know, maybe that has occurred over the last several years. I really am not in a position to even assess whether or not that has happened or the extent to which that has happened. Sure, you see people claim that there are examples all over the place. I just don't know that I buy it, right? I mean, I'd have to see a more robust study of that over the last six years for me to really buy into that. At least 100% because at the end of the day, it's people's opinions. Sure, and I mean, I think, again, having been a hiring manager for a very long time and having inherited hires from previous managers, right? Like when I switched positions from being academic dean over distance education and being academic dean over traditional undergraduate school, I inherited employees. And, you know, it's like, well, would I have hired all of these people? Probably not. You know, and so you sort of inherit what the last person gave you. And so I think there's, you know, these dynamics occur, right? There are friendships that happen. There are affiliations that happen. There's, oh, I graduated from this school and at this time, this school, you know, especially in higher ed, you know, this school was just, we hired from there almost exclusively. And so, you know, you begin to sort of pile up degrees from this one school or whatever have you. And so I think there's a number of different reasons why you end up with what you end up with. And it doesn't necessarily just have to be, I guess what I would say is, I think all of this is sort of the DEI hires, unless they're hiring people who are just absolutely not qualified for the position. Like you want to hire me to fly a plane? You're a crazy person. I mean, my wife and I talk about it every time we fly, and she's like, so you think if this plane crashed, you could land the plane? Like you think of this, you know, if the pilots were out, all the, you know, anybody you knew how to fly a plane is just knocked out on this plane, and you're the only person left. You think you could land this plane? And I always give her the same answer. I'm like, absolutely. I have no idea whether I could land a plane. But I've played a video game. Right. How hard could it be? Right. I'm betting it's pretty hard. Yeah. Right. But, you know, I mean, once I got up there and started sitting with the instruments and playing around with the joystick, I have a feeling my mind would change. Oh, I really can't fly. I really can't land this plane. Right. Right. So point is, like, unless you're hiring people who have complete no skill whatsoever, no qualifications whatsoever, I'm not sure you can actually call those DEI hires. And so what I think we're always working with is some mix of what has traditionally been called meritocracy within a system of other factors. I would call them network factors. Right. That draw one person to the front of the line and push other people toward the back of the line. Right. They're what they're what going to be. This is going to highlight this person as a well-qualified hire. And this is going to low light this person as a well-qualified hire. And I think we always have that. Sometimes it's a little more targeted. Right. We're looking for X, you know. You know, maybe, again, you know, sort of in my experience, we were looking to hire a couple of Bible faculty position. And one gentleman had published in an Oxford journal and one had published in Evangelical Theological Society journal. And so there was a big faction of people who just wanted the guy from the Oxford journal because he published in the Oxford journal. Well, the reality is that these are both peer-reviewed journals. It's just the reputation of the one is much stronger than the other. And so the people who really cared about that wanted that guy. And the people who didn't really care about that wanted the other guy. Right. And so it's like, well, why would that have really made that big of a difference? You're hiring for an undergraduate Bible position at a school that wasn't particularly known for its research and writing. And so why did that weight heavily with some people? It's just a characteristic that was highlighted for them. And it made them feel like this person would be better at the position than this other person. And so I think we're always, I guess that's my point. We're always dealing with this kind of jockeying of understanding what it is that would make a good hire in any given situation. And so when we talk about meritocracy, I think we just have to be careful not to assume that meritocracy is happening in a vacuum. So if I have, you know, if I got a 3.8 GPA and you've got a 3.7 GPA, I'm obviously the better choice. Right. Like this doesn't happen like that. Right. Right. Totally. So I think while I appreciate, I think what, if I'm gracious in the way I interpret President Trump's comments. Right. I think what he wants to drive back to is well-qualified hires in every position. But I think what we will never lose are these gaps. How is it that, you know, just like the story I told at the beginning, how, why is it that I got hired as a candidate who met those qualifications? Well, it wasn't because I just jumped off the page with my CV or you know, jumped off the page with my application for the position. It's because I had, I had people who would make calls for me. Yup. And I think we're always going to have that dynamic. Right. We're always going to have this interesting networked problem. And if you're in the network, you're going to have a higher potential to get a job. If you're not in the network, we can assume you're probably gonna have a lower potential to get the job. It's not zero. I'm not saying it always happens this way. So it's not, you know, it's not like you have to be in the network or you're never getting a job. But it's there. And I think that's what we need to struggle with a little bit, especially as Christians, when we're hearing this sort of political conversation about the difference between meritocracy and wokeism. I think we need to not be blind to the fact that there are all these different influences aside from just, is this person well qualified, that are always influencing, always influencing the hiring processes. Yeah. And when you don't, you know, when you don't get that job and you realize the reasons why, if you're able to ask and they give you some feedback, uh, it might be different in a couple of years' time. You might have more experience. That's right. You have that other degree, you know, you have maybe the next one you're a little bit more qualified for, or just simply maybe there's somebody in the next time in the pool that's not, uh, you know, edging you out. Like it might've been really close. So I know a lot of people, especially in radio, I just read a, one of my buddies was talking about, he wanted to be a program director, and he had applied for probably like a dozen or more times to be that in other stations. And he, it just wasn't his time. But, you know, that didn't discourage him from doing it. It made him want to rise up and, and challenge himself to go to the next level and to try to, you know, beef up his resume, beef up his experience. And, um, sometimes it's not always a bad thing. It brings the better part out of us. Yeah. So I think. As we think about all of this conversation, I just, I think that's the part I don't want to lose, is that there are these sort of, there's all these factors that go into getting hired. That's number one. Number two, when we say someone is qualified for a position, we're really saying something more than just they meet the minimum standards. Right. We'd like, that's why I would say we want well-qualified candidates. Right. Maybe somebody who exceeds the minimum standards would be just fantastic. Right. But then we're also talking about some of the intangibles you mentioned earlier, right? You hired the experienced guy, but the heart wasn't there. The passion wasn't there. You know, Lencioni's got a great model for this. He talks about, um, uh, humble, hungry, and I believe smart are his three categories. And so, you know, he wants somebody who's able to work within the team. That's the humble aspect. The hungry part is they want to go.

you better have somebody who's actually ready and willing to do the job and actually get out there and, you know, do some work and be pushing forward. And then they have to be smart. They have to be, you know, sort of able to do the job. There has to be some sort of mental capacity there that they understand how to handle their relationships. They understand how to do the job. And he sees the sort of minimum qualifications as what he, I think, if I'm recalling his model correctly, the sort of pay to play sort of idea. So you don't even get a shot at being humble, hungry, and smart until you've met the minimum qualifications. Gotcha. Right. No, that's good. And then when those things get canceled out just because we need to check some boxes in our DEI category, that's where I think people start to have issues with it, especially if it's someone at the end of the day that's not qualified when something happens. Like, for instance, that fire. I don't know when that was, like a month ago or so, that that was all over the news when the lady was like, you know, if your husband is in a fire and needs carried out, you know, he called the wrong person. Somebody should have done their due diligence when they put that person in that position because that's a part of the job. That's like a minimum. That's a requirement. Yeah, I mean, I think we definitely have had some of that, but I would also say, I remember my conversation with Caitlin Beatty. Maybe we'll link that episode here in the show description, but she wrote a set of articles called The Evangelical Bro Code. And part of which, I can't remember all the different parts of it, but basically, when you work in Christian organizations, or at least when I've worked in Christian organizations, sometimes what you do end up with is sort of this, I mean, I think she named it correctly. It's the evangelical bro code. And the evangelical bro code, as I reflected on it, and I, I wrote a piece for, I believe the Christian post on this. What I said was the evangelical bro code doesn't do anybody any favors, male or female. Because if you're female, it tends to hold you back. And I mean, I think Caitlin did an excellent job of expressing why that is. Uh, but what I wrote in the article was it isn't any good for men either, because it encourages complacency. It encourages laziness. There are some guys that I've met in evangelical organizations who know they're not getting fired. And even if they got fired, they'd just go on to the next place. And so it creates this sort of lackadaisical sort of non-movement. They're just occupying a position and taking home a paycheck and doing the minimum standard work that needs to be done. Mm-hmm . And so again, when we talk about these DEI hires, right, the, the idea of the DEI hires is really hot right now. But what I would say is, right, we've had this for a very long time. Right. It just wasn't being pinpointed as that. Right. But it's very much the same dynamic. Sure. Anybody that you hire into a position for a reason other than the work that they do, and I would say hire in and keep within a position other than the work that they do, is a species of this. It's just not coupled to gender, ethnicity, you know, those kinds of ideas. Right. But it's, it's this sort of, again, that network effect where someone can come in, have these different relationships and, you know, politically within an organization, be essentially untouchable. Totally. But they're not doing a good job. And, and I think that's sort of, that's where I think some of this conversation where we were hitting meritocracy against wokeism, I think we're losing the dynamic here. We're missing it. Right. Because meritocracy shouldn't just be a subject of conversation or topic of conversation on hiring. You earn your position day after day after day after day with the work that you do. Right. You know, you could think of it like basketball players, NBA players, NFL players, right? Mm-hmm . Yeah, they work hard. They work hard to get on that team. But when they don't perform, what happens? They get traded. They get cut. They get, these are more performance-based sort of positions. And, and I think honestly, most of the things that we do are performance-based positions. Not all, but many. And so if you're not doing the job that you were hired to do, why is it that you still have a job? And so it's not a, I'm not trying to be cutthroat about it, but I'm trying to point out this aspect of, I think there are a lot of people who get hired into positions, but don't have a real job to do, or they're not doing the job that they're hired in to do. And so we shouldn't just, I don't think this is about meritocracy versus wokeism personally. I think this is about a myth of meritocracy. Right. Where people who maybe want to sustain their positions uh, are, are calling on meritocracy to say, no, I should have, I should stay in the position I'm in. I should get these jobs. And once I get these jobs, either I'm going to, you know, I'm just going to sit back on my laurels. I think there's a lot of fear-based in this, whereas if we actually just look at the dynamics, the dynamics of both sides of this situation, they're very similar dynamics. Right. Nothing we do is ever based purely on merit. Right. Yeah, no, I totally agree, man. And it makes me wonder, like, how much more this was happening. Like you said, that's a great point. It was happening long before this. It just was under a different label. Uh, even in the Bible times, like, uh, I look at, you know, the Pharisees and the Sadducees and, and all the different scholars, like it was probably happening and, and you probably know examples in the Bible. I can't think of one off the top of my head, but, um, I think it's more of a human thing. It's just been called something different in the past. Yeah, I, I, I think that's probably the case. I mean, uh, one of the passages I would go to, and this is uh, this is very specifically about choosing elders, but first Timothy, uh, 19 through the end of that chapter, we have first, you know, sort of Paul giving Timothy some instruction. I think it's 19 and 20 about how to handle overseers who have sinned and who have persisted in sin and what to do about that. And then he goes on to warn Timothy and he says, um, listen, don't be hasty in laying on hands. In other words, don't be quick just to get an elder in the door, to have an elder in the door. And he goes on and he says, you know, good works are conspicuous, but so are bad works. Right? And the bad works may stay underground for a while, but they can't stay there forever. So what he's counseling Timothy to do is to be slow. If I were to make sort of a leap here, right? He's counseling Timothy to be slow in choosing elders for the church and saying that he will be complicit in the sins that are done if he is hasty about getting these elders, you know, if he gets the elders wrong and they, they turn out to be um, schmucks, right? Timothy's on the hook for that. And so I think, you know, there's a way for us to think about that and, and, and to recognize a pattern that is probably appropriate for us to think so through as we're hiring people. While the business world tends to move a little quicker and we say, well, you know, we don't have time to make this decision well, so let's just make it fast, right? You could see a situation like that, but we still need to recognize that, you know, we're really looking for people who are going to do good works. We're looking for that good work to be conspicuous. We're, we're looking for that, uh, you know, we're looking for that good work to sort of allow people to rise to the top. And I think so, I think there, that's one passage where I would go to and say, we need to be careful about who we're putting into positions, not just leadership positions, but positions all over the place. At this point, there's so many positions that influence others that we just need to be careful about it. Yep. And in past episodes, even recently, you know, when these scandals break and come out, it, it, it, there's no way around. You can kind of try to delicately say it and tiptoe around it, but it does leave a wake of destruction and it does come back and back on that ministry. And so, you know, like we talked about, I think a couple episodes ago, you have to really not just judge someone's experience and uh passion and like knowledge, all these things we're talking about. Those are all great. You have to look at someone's character. I think more so in ministry, you should be obviously everywhere, but in ministry is a little different. And then I think about X, this is a, maybe a side topic we can go on real quick. When Elon got in there, he kind of cleaned house and, you know, it made a lot of waves in the media and stuff, agree with it or not, he definitely had an agenda and he went in and, I mean, I, I forget how many people, but it was like a huge percentage of them,

Not really one. There's a lot of one-offs here where they can be totally different, but there is definitely a distinct difference between ministry and secular in this regard, especially when it comes to the issue of the heart and, you know, having that blowback when something breaks, something comes out. I mean, we just saw one today. And, you know, it just makes you feel bad, but I think it also makes you, like, realize, whoa, this is a big deal. Like when you hire someone, you really have to think it through and not just... So I would never want to subscribe to just picking somebody just to check a box. You know, you want to get the right person. You really want to. I don't know how people do that without praying and seeking God and having that peace or that confirmation this is the person I'm supposed to choose because ultimately, even if you feel good about something, you still don't know what you don't know. And, you know, you kind of have to just lean into God and His guidance and the Holy Spirit to guide you there. So that's always been a comfort to me because I've mostly worked in ministry in my life. But yeah, it's a dicey, it can be dicey situation for sure. Well, and I think that's a good word, man. I mean, you know, that process that you're describing, that sort of spirit-led, guided process where you're trying to find the right person. I think, you know, you're never going to be able to sift through the millions of applications there could be, right? You're always going to have to narrow the field somehow. And so there's an inherent sort of selection process that you're just not capable of going through when that happens. But I do think that, you know, we are far too quick to think that a position has to be filled no matter what versus sitting back and saying, no, just having a body there isn't actually going to help anybody. What we need is the right body there. And so, yeah, I think your idea of, hey, you know, I'm hiring to check a box, you know, don't just hire to fill the position. Don't just hire to placate someone within the congregation. Don't just hire to, you know, fill a quota of some sort. Don't just hire, you know, whatever. Don't just. Actually think it through, right? Decide who the right person is. It's not unlike the sort of teachings on partiality that we get in, let's say, the book of James where James talks about don't sit the rich person at the head of the table. In other words, don't cater to the influence that the rich people could have within the congregation. Don't look at them and say, this is what I really need to keep this going. Right. Because that subtle shift, that sort of placating of the rich within the congregation and the rich, we could, you know, sort of expand by analogy to people of influence or to, you know, whomever we depend on other than God to get this done. And I think that has a lot to do with sort of the dynamic we see when we think about, okay, we want a well-qualified candidate. That's good. Now, which well-qualified candidate do we pick? That's when we start to feel those other pressures. You know, that's when we start to get, you know, the walls start closing in on us a little bit, right? And that's what I think we need to avoid. That is, in essence, the way I would, one way to illustrate this sort of systemic sin that we're involved in, right? It's a way in which various members of the body of Christ, and I'll keep it within the body of Christ for the moment. I think it could expand out into the whole world, but basically it's the structuring of our relationships that tend to diminish certain people and elevate others. And we see this an awful lot. And so we've got to be careful of those factors as well. How is it that we're not, we're really missing the voice of God? How is it that we're missing the direction of the Holy Spirit because it's just not the way our systems and structures work? Let me ask you a serious question. If something triggered a major market drop in the coming months, would your retirement be ready or exposed? With inflation, market volatility, and ongoing global uncertainty, more families are taking a closer look at whether their retirement plan is truly built to hold up. And many are finding that adding a layer of protection makes a lot of sense. Sanctuary Metals is a Christian-owned company that helps families strengthen their retirement savings with physical gold and silver through a gold IRA. During uncertain times, many people look to precious metals as a way to add stability when other assets may be under pressure. If you'd like to explore whether a gold IRA is a good fit for your situation, Sanctuary Metals makes it easy to get started. Text GUIDE to 94878 to receive your free retirement defense guide or call 888-958-6579 to speak with one of their knowledgeable team members. Again, text GUIDE to 94878 or call 888-958-6579. You know, God doesn't work within our box. I often say it like, God doesn't live in our world, we live in His. And so He's capable of working outside our processes, outside our boxes, outside whatever it is that we want to do. And so we have to be really attentive to that. And when we're not, I think that's when that sort of structural or systemic evil comes in. Absolutely. And I think the moment you start trying to do things to appease people, it's like that door's open and it's not shutting again. And then you find yourself like you someone else saw it. So then now you're trying to appease this board member and this board member, this part of the executive council. And I've seen that too. And you have to, you have to consider that these are all human beings too. And everyone has motives and agendas, even if they're not going to come out and say it. And that's why it's most important. Those things are great and they're there for a reason. And we should definitely listen to that wise counsel and get, you know, guidance and leadership from our mentors, people we look up to or people that are there to help us make these decisions. But I think the biggest weight for us, like when, if we're still just talking about ministry is like going and taking it before God and making sure you have peace with that, the right thing, because I just, so many times in my life, I've tried to do it on my own. And, you know, it says lean not on your own understanding. If you are confused, sometimes it gets down. You narrow it down to two people. He's going to, you know, what's that quote? It says, uh, uh, good is the enemy of best or, or of great, uh, you know, you don't want to just check that box or just, uh, pick what feels good. Even, you know, it might be hard, but you have to do what you feel God is leading you to do. So. Yeah. And I think it's interesting. We don't often think of it like this, Nate, but, um, you know, we, we tend to interact with our environments more than we think. Right. We, again, this sort of idea of meritocracy tends to be thought of in the abstract, but whenever you hire someone and do an organization, whenever you put them in a position, they're interacting with a lot of environment. They're interacting with other people. They're interacting with, you know, um, different now systems, different data, different, whatever the aspects and parts of that, uh, economy or environment actually are. And so when we're doing this sort of thought process on who to hire, we're not just thinking and, and, you know, sort of weights and measures like who ends up the most well-qualified for this specific position. If I'm hiring a doctor, yes, I want them to be a really good doctor. Right. But maybe I don't need the best possible surgeon ever in the world who's doing these amazing experimental surgeries and pulling them off at a small critical access hospital in central Illinois. Right. Maybe what I need is something different than that. Maybe I need somebody who, you know, that situation is barely ever going to come up. Right. And so they need to fit the situation as well, I guess is my point. And sometimes we don't think that part through. Right. Who's going to really fit the situation well, who's not going to fit the situation well. I often talk about fit, but usually when we talk about fit, we, I think we talk about, well, will they get along? And that's not exactly what I'm talking about. When I'm talking about, will they fit? Are they fitted to, like, do they have the ability to operate and thrive within this environment? Not just will they, are they going to rock the boat or not? Right. Right. There's a difference. You know, you, uh, you throw me in the ocean and hold me underwater long enough. I'm not biologically fitted to that environment. I'll drown. Right. And, and I think there's a lot of that sort of mentality. We just don't think that through when we're throwing somebody into a different environment. And we sometimes only think of like our side of it. But the reality is, if it's beneath them, like that surgeon, for instance, if they did that, they're going to be doing things that's well below what they're capable of doing. And then someone else out there is going to suffer because they needed that one expertise from someone that maybe somebody else in another place couldn't do. And so, you know, you have to think about it like that. Sometimes we tend to just think of ourself and our needs and like our position that we're

We're thinking of if it would work here, we could miss, like, in taking away maybe God's best for them. And it's just kind of an interesting side of it that maybe we don't think about as often. Well, and I would say, too, I think, you know, we've talked about this from the employer or employee or side an awful lot, but I would say we need to think about this from the employee side as well. Um, when I was looking for new jobs as a in academics, my wife and I I remember we looked at a job out in Phoenix, out in the Phoenix area, and we've lived in Illinois our lives. We have family here, you know, in Chicago. We were about four hours away from family. Now we're about an hour away from family, and that's important to us. Yeah. And so when we flew out to Phoenix, the job was great, right? I thought the job would have been wonderful for me, right? It would have advanced my career. It was a promotion, you know, the salary was good, all those kind of things. But as we were driving around Phoenix, you know, we're looking at, you know, a completely different environment than we've ever lived in. We're thinking through, OK, what does Southwest flights home look like? You know, we're kind of talking about this. What we started to realize is that the grass wasn't greener. The brown patches were just in different places. That's right. Yeah. Right? And so there's a part of this that I think the employee has to sort of take on as well and recognize that even if you're well qualified for a position, you could do the job, maybe in the doing of the job, you're also not doing other things. Like in that scenario, I think we would have had a lot of stress as a family and I think that was a bigger job. I would had it been, you know, it wouldn't have been a 40 hour week job. It would have been a 50 or 60 hour week job. My wife would have been, you know, half a country away from our family. Less help. Yeah, I'm putting her in a position that, you know, we both need to agree on that this is the right thing for us. And I think at that point, we were really in the mindset to start thinking that way, which was good. It's very helpful. But I don't know that we always think that way. Right. And so, you know, even in my position as an academic dean, there was a point there where my wife was telling me I should leave because the pressure was just ramping up over and over and over again. And I was doing what I needed to do to handle the pressure of the job at work, but I wasn't doing a particularly good job at home. And so I think even, you know, when we think of ourselves, right, within the lens of meritocracy, there are many positions that I would be qualified to do that I shouldn't do. Right. And it's not just a choice of, well, I wouldn't make as much money there or I wouldn't, you know, whatever. It's a question of how am I uniquely fitted to that position. Yeah. Right. And so it's, you know, I've turned down jobs where there's a high travel component because I didn't want to be away from the kids. You know, I stopped consulting largely because of that. It was a lot of travel and just didn't feel like doing it anymore. It has nothing to do with my ability to do it, my qualifications to do it, and everything to do with how to shape of, you know, the whole shape of my life. Yeah. Looks. Mm-hmm. And so I think, you know, on both sides of this equation, employer or employee, we really don't want to think strictly in terms of meritocracy. Right. We just don't. No, you don't. Totally. And then if you couple it with my life verse, and I actually have it tattooed right across my heart here, it's Proverbs 16, 9, and it's always kind of been in the center of when I've made big decisions, advancing my career or moving my family, doing different things. And it says a man's heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps. And I always kind of ran it through, like if I had a situation or an opportunity, every increase or every new step that God's kind of brought me to and prepared me for, I've always walked it through that. Like, yes, my heart is taking me there, but is God directing my steps to get there? Or is there a lot of pushback at every turn? Is it, I'm dealing with something that doesn't sit right? Do I not have peace about this turn, this next step? And so I always kind of run it through that. And again, like I said earlier, I just mostly know from a spiritual perspective in ministry, but I don't know how people sometimes make these decisions without consulting God because I've always just leaned into him in those situations. A man's heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps. If God doesn't direct my steps to do it, I don't go. Yeah. I think that's a great place to end, Nate. I mean, I think that's the mentality we need to have. We need to be careful not to just get caught up in the rhetoric. And I know there are some corrections that need to happen, and I can appreciate what President Trump is talking about in his speech, but I do think there are corrections and not wholesale renovations. And I think that when we set these things, this idea of meritocracy over against this sort of boogeyman of wokeism, I think we do a bit of an injustice. We're covering over some of the less than pristine moments in a meritocratic system, right? That also need to be corrected. And I think what you're pointing to here is, look, the way we begin correcting these, particularly within the Christian community, is more dependence on God, not less dependence on God. Let's let Him guide our steps. And that, I think, is the main message I'd like to leave people with is, I know, and I'm happy that the whole woke thing is over to some degree. I didn't fully understand it. I wasn't opposed to it necessarily. I certainly wasn't friendly to it. I saw it as sort of an oddity, right? But I also am concerned that as we move away from woke, that we not move back into a conservatism that has its flaws covered over. We need to be walking in with eyes wide open and really recognizing that some of these things don't take God into account in the way we really believe that they should. Yep. And so questions in anybody that's listening, whether you're leadership on a Bible study or a group that you're mentoring somebody or you're doing something at the church in layman's terms, whatever you're doing, all these things we get better at by the transfer, by the what's the word I was going to say? Renovation of the Holy Spirit. Renovation of the Holy Spirit in us, but also like the renewing of our minds and that God is constantly helping us because the landscape's changing. It's changed in the last two years insanely. And just because we're moving away from that, it doesn't mean we're going to be immune to these other problems. It's going to be something else. So we always have the mind of Christ, the eyes of Christ, and that we're looking through that lens and not getting shuffled into this side or this side, whether that's meritocracy or wokeism or all the different things. Because truth is, five years from now, it might be a whole different thing and I'll be having to look up what does this mean? I bet you it's a big Google search. So many people, especially older generation, probably had to say, what is woke? Because it came out of nowhere and a lot of people didn't even know what it was. And that's how these things kind of happen. But what doesn't go away and what's always been here is renewing our mind with Christ. And I think that's a good way to walk into this. Awesome, man. I'll leave it there. Everybody, thanks. Thanks for the conversation, Nate. Really appreciate it. 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