I scraped off the cobwebs, blew out the dust, and set up the mic to converse with my friend Marty Duren. We have been friends and have shared our writing for almost twenty years. Sometimes, the projects were collaborative. We often wanted another set of eyes on something we were putting down on paper.

Today, we discuss a collection of essays Marty has put in book form. Inspired by a piece of art by Banksy and the discovery of an appropriate word in a Thesaurus, Marty draws out a more profound sense of the Christian adage, “in the world but not of the world.”

Maybe you grew up in the era where the exhortation of Christian piety came wrapped in the phrase we are to be in the world but not of the world. If so, you have likely also grown to understand that the expression entails something more important, a reality that cuts both directions.

What does it mean to be in? What does it mean to be not of? Indeed, it is more than an adult’s charge to avoid adolescent temptations. Yet, no one talked about what this might mean for the human pursuit of power. Take, for instance, Marty’s essay titled Evangelicals in the Room When It Happens. Too many have opted for a form of power in the world masked by a claim to be not of the world.

We hope that by the end of the conversation, you want one of these pocketbooks in your back pocket and on your mind as you assess the issues on the ground that may matter differently when the question arises from within the scope of Scripture. Put another way, if we claim that the Bible gives us the Story of God, what do we do within that story to reflect the character of God when we consider issues and ideas in our day?