Working the Road

David Eicher loves learning. In this episode, he discusses his lifelong passion for learning and a newer passion for literacy. He tells President Johnson how he got into college, then teaching and educational consulting. The journey included dinner conversations about grammar, a blue-collar boss who encouraged his pursuits, and a realization of his life calling. Experience David’s storytelling and learn as they discuss Pascal’s wager and how “new atheism” reflects the religious reactions of the enlightenment.

David has two roles at Sattler: Director of Student Services and Registrar. His job is to keep track of all the student records and documentation, oversee the work program, and develop class schedules that work for everyone. The most important part of his job is to support the success of every student by helping them get access to the resources that they need. David Eicher holds a BA in Pastoral ministries from Allegheny Wesleyan College and is pursuing an M.Ed. in Educational Leadership at the University of Mount Union.

Mentioned in this episode:

•         Working the road – song by Ellen and John Wright

•         Reading Between the Lines: A Christian Guide to Literature – book by Gene Edward Veith, Jr.

•         Montemayor – military history YouTube channel

•         Black Duck – novel by Janet Taylor Lisle

•         Paul Among the People – book by Sarah Ruden

Support the show

Episode Transcript

Zack Johnson (00:04):
It is 21 February 2024 and I'm joined by Mr David
Eicher, future doctor.
Maybe, hopefully, yeah,hopefully, hey.
Thanks for being here with ustoday.
So I'm going to quickly readyour bio and then we're going to
have a conversation.

David Eicher (00:22):
Okay, you ready for it?
Absolutely Thanks.
I look forward to it.

Zack Johnson (00:26):
The calling to Christian service has been a
part of David Eicher's life foras long as he can remember.
He graduated from AlleghenyWesleyan College in 2009 with a
BA in pastoral ministries.
After graduating, he taughtmiddle school for a total of
nine years, while also runningan educational consulting
business that helped smallprivate religious schools

(00:46):
throughout the United States andCanada develop intervention
programs to identify andremediate children with dyslexia
and other reading difficulties.
He's currently in a master'sprogram at the University of
Mount Union for an MED ineducational leadership.
Did you finish that?
Yeah, I did finish that.
You got it.
I'll take your bio.

(01:08):
All right.
Coming to Sattler has been along time dream for David and he
is thrilled to be part of theteam here.
Any addition subtractions fromthat part?

David Eicher (01:18):
No, it's not everything I hoped it would be.
So, yeah, I think I wrote thismy first week here something
like that and my feelings havechanged since then.
Being here has been everythingthat I hoped it would be.

Zack Johnson (01:30):
So you started like a year and change ago now.

David Eicher (01:32):
It's been close to two years.
June will be two years oh.

Zack Johnson (01:35):
I knew that David and his wife Triva and his son
Paschal is that how you say?
Yeah, paschal moved from ruralsoutheastern Ohio to urban
Boston and they absolutely loveit here in this busy,
fascinating, fun city.
They love sitting in the museumof fine arts, the Boston
Aquarium, riding the Charlestonferry and experiencing the

(01:55):
incredibly diverse culture here.
David's hobbies includecollecting and playing strategy
board games.
He has over 200 of them we haveto talk about this.

David Eicher (02:05):
Yeah, let me talk about this.

Zack Johnson (02:06):
He also loves singing theology and puns.
All right, there's a lot of me.
Any addition subtractionsbefore I move on?

David Eicher (02:14):
No, so far, so good.

Zack Johnson (02:15):
All right, so two roles here at Sattler director
of student services andregistrar.
His job is to keep track of allthe student records and
documentation, oversee the workprogram for the students and
develop class schedules thatwork for everyone.
That's a hard job, isn't it?
It really is.
Yeah, the most important partof his job is to support the
success of every student byhelping them get access to the

(02:38):
resources that they need.
Thanks for being here.

David Eicher (02:42):
Love being here.

Zack Johnson (02:43):
So I'm going to start with the juicy part of
your bio and maybe workbackwards.
But where did your love ofstrategy board games develop and
where do you keep 200 boardgames?

David Eicher (02:56):
Yeah, it's kind of difficult.
You know, 900 square footapartment we have.
I have a wall in the livingroom of bookshelves, so we have
those here.
I don't think people becomegamers.
I think people are born gamersand they just discover it.
Then we read a yard sale when Iwas a kid probably, I'm going to
say late I might have been inmy late preteens, 12, 13, I

(03:19):
might have been as old as 14,and there was this game there.
I didn't even know this kind ofgame existed.
It was called Frederick theGreat and it was about the
campaigns of Frederick duringthe War of Austrian Succession.
It had all these tiny cardboardsquares now I know they're
called counters with numbers andpictures on them and then a map

(03:40):
with hexagon-shaped spaces tomove these pieces around.
And as a you know, as a in myearly teens I didn't have
anybody knew how to play thesegames.
You know, I'm trying to figureout how to play it from the
rulebook.
I don't think I ever played.
I don't think I've everactually played the game and
played it according to thecorrect ones.
I can never get anybody to doit, but I discovered this whole
world existed and that has beena little world of interest.

(04:04):
The world of board games Likeniche board games.

Zack Johnson (04:06):
Yeah, niche board games.

David Eicher (04:07):
Yeah, you know, everybody knows about Monopoly
and RISC and so on, but like todiscover.
And then, as an adultdiscovering, there's conventions
.
I used to go every year or soto a convention that's called
Origins in Columbus and peoplewould come from Wednesday to
Sunday and like 15,000 peoplewould come.
There's a whole convention hallfull of people playing games

(04:27):
and so on, and it's a way ofexploring the world.
It's a way of understanding theworld that we live in, and
that's one of the reasons why Ienjoy it so much.
I usually have one of twodirections that I'll go.
I'll either discover a newtopic that I'm interested in and
then look at the Seacout Boardgames about that.
Like right now, one of thethings I'm super interested in
is the political upheaval inRussia in the early 1900s, and

(04:50):
for some reason, soviet Russiahas lately just really
fascinated me, and so I'vesought out some.
Are there games out there thatsimulate some of these political
things that happened, and thenthe flip side will also happen.
Are there?
There are, well, there's onecalled Kremlin, which is a
little bit of a social deductiongame.
Everybody secretly identifiesthe strengths of certain

(05:12):
political figures in this gameand then, as the game is played
out, you start revealing well,I'm actually the one that he's
loyal to, based on the numbersthat you've given him before.
And so there's this likeguessing am I actually going to
be able to do?
Are people going to be able tocome through for me?
No, but it's very much like asocial deduction game.
There's one called Descent intoChaos, which I just picked up,

(05:37):
and it's about the fault of theczar and how Russia goes from
being this relatively stablealthough there were a lot of
issues and protests and thingsinto this spinning out into a
chaotic state that eventuallyleads to the rise of Joseph
Stalin and the purges of the 20sand 30s.
And I find those kind of thingsinteresting to see simulated

(05:59):
because it can show us not onlywhat did happen but what could
have happened, other directionsthings could have taken.
There's one that I was actuallyreading about last night that
I'm being severely tempted.
Obviously, my budget doesn'tallow the continual procurement
of more games.
I already have 200, but youknow, somebody help me out with

(06:20):
it.
But it's called the white tribeand it's about Rhodesia, and I
didn't even know anything aboutRhodesia, like South Africa,
yeah, yeah, you know, and it wasan apartheid state back.
The only country that's alsoapartheid is South Africa, and

(06:41):
it dissolved into chaos as thewhite minority is trying to
suppress the black majority andeventually that's untenable and
the whole country collapses incivil war and violence.
And this game takes the placesyou, as a player, in the
position of a prime ministerwho's trying to move from this
apartheid state to a moreequitable state while also

(07:05):
maintaining the politicalstability, which means you're
having to make compromises overthe course.
So you can't be too progressive,because if you're too
progressive then you don't getreelected and everything you
know falls, the government fallsand so on.
And so like trying to threadthis needle of looking and see
how the world should be and howit is right now, and that
practical balance between thetwo and I find those kinds of

(07:26):
things just incrediblyfascinating to play and engage
with, because we all findourselves in those kind of
situations we see how thingsshould be and we have this
conversation.
We have this conversation aboutthe Sermon on the Mount.
You know Well, if everybody didthat well, what would happen.
And so we're all faced therealities of the world we live
in, that we always know.

(07:47):
Is this really the how do welive out and bring about the
world that we wish it was, thatwe know it should be, and still
deal with the practicalities ofwhere we are and what people are
able to receive, and so on.
And I think that's somethingGod, through his progressive
revelation did as well is takingpeople where they're at and

(08:10):
bringing us through, ultimately,the revelation Christ.

Zack Johnson (08:12):
All right.
So I'm going to ask some quickquestions and I'll change topic.

David Eicher (08:17):
Yeah sure.

Zack Johnson (08:18):
I know there are like probably categories of
games you recommend to people.
Oh yeah, this for this, thisfor that, oh for sure.
So any recommendations foranyone listening on some of the?
I want to ask you your top five, because I'm sure that would be
too hard for you.
Yeah, I could say like top five.
Or I was going to ask what's agame for community building?
What's a game for your family?

David Eicher (08:39):
Yeah, what's a game for A game?
One game that I think is greatfor and it's.
Every game is, on some level,group dependent, but concept is
a great game.
Concept is a.
It's almost more of an activitythan a game, but it almost
never fails.
If I start playing with a smallgroup of people, other people
come and get involved and it'sessentially a guessing game.

(08:59):
The player who's leading thegame, or whoever's turn it is,
is trying to get everyone elseto guess a word or, in some
cases, a phrase, and they're notallowed to say anything but the
word yes, and they have.
There's a board that's a grid,with all kinds of pictures and
symbols on it, and you'replacing cubes on these to help
guide people's thinking into howthese ideas.
You're creating groups of ideasand then everyone's trying to

(09:23):
guess what it is, and so that'sa really fun group activity.
Any number of people can playit, and you can just take terms
of drawing cards.
Sometimes people just like tothink up their own idea of what
they want people to guess, andit's that's a simple one to
learn.
It's, like I said, it's morealmost more of an activity than
a game, but it's that's a greatone.

(09:44):
That's one I recommend, one thatI've been playing a lot lately
that I really really like, iscalled BIOS Origins, and it's
about the development of humancivilization.
A lot of times, games like thatare about conflict, which
conflict happens, but this gameis a lot more based around the
ideas.
So you have cards that you canbuy that represent ideas that

(10:06):
are like major ideas in humandevelopment Everything from the
internet to petroleum-based cars, to singing and these ideas
basically form foundationalideas within your nation or your
culture, and then it enablesyou to do different actions, and
so it's not just about militaryconflict In fact, that happens

(10:28):
less.
There's also religious conflictthat you're able to send your
basically evangelize the othernations and bring them into your
culture, or there's other formsof conflict, and so I find that
really interesting to tell thehuman story, not for this idea
of conquerors and nations andmilitary power, but in this idea
of this ideas that culturesshare, or and it's a very

(10:53):
interesting story that the gametells every time I play it, okay
.

Zack Johnson (10:58):
I guess if I ask you that in a year, you probably
will change the answer yeah,yeah, for sure.
So let's try to jump back.
How does that relate to yourpastoral ministries passions?
I'm just kidding.
So you've gone through a littlebit of school and then you've
been in education too, somaster's degree.

(11:21):
You taught for nine years at amiddle school.
Why education?

David Eicher (11:27):
and yeah, so there's four boys in my family.
Okay, I've got two olderbrothers.
They're 11 months apart, andthen there's a nine-year gap and
there's me.
So it's like two differentfamilies.
And of our four the four boysin my family, I like to say I
got the double portion of myfather's spirit.
Okay, my father was an editorfor Rod and Staff.

(11:48):
My whole life he worked fromhome, which was kind of unusual
in our community and he cookedhis office every day and I
realized now as an adult thekind of discipline that that
took to treat going upstairs tohis office like a job.
Nobody's there checking on him,nobody's making sure he does it
.
He's in charge of his ownschedule and he's going and

(12:09):
working doing textbooks.
If you have a Rod and StaffEnglish series, you have the Rod
and Staff Mass series.
You can look in the front coverthere the acknowledgments of my
dad, marvin Eicher.
His name is there, and sothat's the kind of things we
talked about.
You talked shop.
Dads talk shop with their kids,and so we talked about things
like verb tenses and how wordswork and what sentences.

(12:31):
We'd read stories and we talkabout how this story could have
been better if the words hadbeen chosen differently, or what
about the plot?
And so this was just a big partof my family culture.
My oldest brother works as a Ithink he does accounting for a
business in southern Ohio, andthen my two, my second oldest
brother, chris, and my youngerbrother, ryan, worked together

(12:53):
in a tire shop and I'm involvedin education.
So I'm the one that I feel likereally took that and continued
kind of the life trajectory thatmy dad did.
So I was always interested ingoing to college and I didn't
know anything about going tocollege.
I didn't know even where youwould begin to start.

(13:14):
I was the first person in mychurch to go to college, the
first person in my family, and Iwill never forget one of the
really formative experiencesthat nudged me along that way.
I worked with a man named JasonWeaver and he was, I was doing
carpet.
I was just kind of his gopheron like 16 or 17, just trying to

(13:35):
figure out what I'm doing in mylife, and we were in this radio
bathroom in Newphilly, ohio andwe just chatting while we're
working, I'm running down,getting tools for him, holding
him home or whatever and helooks at me sitting there in a
tub, working on tile and helooks at me and he says
something along the lines ofyou've got a good brain, you
don't need to be doing this, youdon't need to be laying carpet.

(13:58):
If you're interested in goingto college, you need to pursue
that.
You need to make somethinghappen.
No-transcript For somebody who Ihad a lot of respect for.
To look at me and see that howold were you again, I was
probably 16 or 17 at the time Inlike encourage that, because
there was a lot ofdiscouragement of those ideas in

(14:18):
the community where I was.
You know it's like well, youknow that's not.
You know there's like three orfour one work options and that's
it.
And so to have somebody who whodid one of those work options
Look at me and say, no, there'sactually a bigger world for you,
there's actually something elseyou could be doing, that just
absolutely meant a lot.
So so I wasn't, I wasn't surewhat to do, where to go.
No, and then and this is awhole other, the whole other

(14:42):
long story take up the wholepodcast just to tell this little
piece of my story.
But I'll try to try tosummarize.
I came into, came into contactwith the conservative holiness
people, which is a what WestLane?
Basically it's the West Lanetradition, the conservative
holiness movement we had.
In 2000, which would have beenwhen I was 14, a family started

(15:05):
sending their kids to our schooland we had to be really good
friends with them.
We stayed in touch.
They Invited us to come totheir youth camp.
So I went to the youth campthat year and then they moved
away.
We kind of lost touch with thepeople there at the camp and the
year I was 17, on a whim, Idecided to go visit that church
that we used to go to once in awhile when my, when our friends

(15:28):
lived there and it happened tobe the Sunday before their youth
camp and they said well, comeback next Sunday, we'll take you
to youth camp again.
I love to do that.
So my brother and I went andthe president of the college
that I was that I would end upattending was the evangelist
there at the camp and he took aninterest in me and kind of did
what you do, going outrecruiting students, and he

(15:50):
stayed in touch with me and Iended up going to school then
then to college that fall andI've always felt a drawing as
long as I can remember I felt adrawing to ministry and I don't
like the word.
I don't like the word calling.
I think calling is is toostrong and ever felt like you
know, some people they knowexactly what they want to do.
I've never known exactly what Iwanted to do, but I didn't know
that there was some type ofservice to Christ that's that

(16:14):
went beyond just.
You know, we're all servants ofJesus, but I always felt like
there was, like there wassomething more, and it wasn't
sure exactly what it was, and soI was just trying to follow
that.
So I ended up going to collegePursuing a degree.
At the time I thought I'd be apastor in that denomination.
That was kind of the directionI wanted to go.
God made it clear that thatwasn't.
That wasn't really the coursehe wanted for me, but I felt

(16:35):
like he'd open the doors to togo to college there, and so I
did, and I was a senior my lastsemester and like not sure what
I'm gonna do now.
You know, I talked to seniorshere and I'm like I remember
being you.
You know, I remember all thosequestions that I don't know.
But I but I had a friend namedJimmy and and he had a little

(16:57):
bit of hard time with some ofhis classes and he was asking me
.
He said, could you, could youhelp me study for this test?
Could you help me, you know,get prep for this?
And I'm like, well, yeah, Iknow, here's what I would do in
that case.
Here's, here's how I wouldapproach that.
And he comes back to me later.
He's like I tried some of yourstuff at work.
It was great, you know, I feltreally good about the test.
I got a good grade on it,whatever, and I realized that's

(17:18):
what I want to do.
Hmm, that's like I love that,that sense of building a bridge
here's where somebody is andhere's where they want to be and
figuring out how to build abridge between here and there.
And and so that's become a Kindof a defining thing of what I
find in my life.
As a look back, and my firsttime in Boston I met Finney and

(17:39):
you know, kind of I'd heard is,I'd heard who Finney was and who
Finney was, but kind ofintimidated to actually meet him
.
And and he asked me you know,what's your life's passion?
And, like you know, I was likethe.
You know, if you on yourcomputer.
You know the little wheel thatspins, you know it's loading,
you know and, oh, it's your whatto say and I kind of I stumbled

(18:01):
something I don't know.
But I went home and I thoughtabout it and to to crystallize
that and I think the best waythat I can could describe it is
there's a song I'm working theroad.
I don't know if you know thesong working the road to make it
easy for those behind it.

Zack Johnson (18:16):
It's a it's a.

David Eicher (18:18):
It talks about how it's, you know, the path to
heaven.
We're all, we're all Seeking toenter into, into heaven, into
the ultimate rest, and so I'mdoing my best to reach the home
of the blast and make it easyfor those behind, and that, I
think that's, if I would sum up,what I want to be as a person,
who I want to be as a person.
I'll be the kind of person that, wherever I'm going, what I'm

(18:40):
doing is making it easier forpeople that follow me to follow
Jesus.
And it was for me, and I thinkthat's another Theme that runs
through my life, because my momwas a race in the Christian home
.
My mom was raised in a very mymom's family was wild mountain
people.
They I mean you read thestories of the stills up in a
mountain.
That explains why, as well as alift driver told me, he said

(19:06):
where you from and I told him hesaid all I could hear the
guitar in your voice.
That Happened a little after,but that's that's where you hear
a little southern accent.
That's where it comes from, asmy mom's family was was from the
, the Blue Ridge Mountains ofVirginia, and Some someone
sometime, and I don't know whoit was.
I won't know until I hopefullymeet him in the Holy City.

(19:26):
Somebody went up the hollowwhere my mom's family lived and
knocked on the door, invitedthem kiss, come church.
And mom started going to church.
Some others in her family didtoo, but she stuck it out.
She saw people that hadsomething she wanted and her
family opposed it.
Her mom would tell her shewasn't allowed to go to church.
Her mom would you know they?
She went to church into thewhere, the coverings, with that,

(19:46):
with the strings.
Her mom would take her Covering, cut the strings off, tell her
quick, quit, wearing a stringerpad on your head and all these,
all these things you know.
And mom's, as a, as a 16, 17, 18year old girl, is is sticking
with this and and Saying youknow, I want to go with God, no
matter, I doesn't matter ifanybody else is going, I want to
go with God.
And and Because of that,because of her desire and her

(20:08):
faithfulness, it's easier for meto serve Jesus than it was for
her.
And Now I have a son andhopefully it's easier for him to
make decisions because of thelife that I live.
So I feel like I have aresponsibility, not just for
myself, but for what's beengiving me to pass it on to other
people, and so I view my workhere at Sallar as as an
extension of that.

(20:28):
That.
Whatever I can do to look atthese young people that are that
are here and say, what can I doto help you To be faithful to
Jesus or whatever he's calledyou to do, I think is a is
another huge strand.
That that just has run throughmy life has one of my big
motivations.

Zack Johnson (20:44):
Yeah, your, your son has a unique name.
Mm-hmm, can you tell me alittle bit about how you and
your wife, yeah, yeah there's.

David Eicher (20:52):
There's two reasons, and we chose the, the
English pronunciation, pascalBecause it's a reference to
Easter, as opposed to the Pascal, which which is it's the French
pronunciation.
Yeah, and he's named afterblaze Pascal, but we chose the.
We chose the Englishpronunciation because I really
like the Easter connection, that, the pascal feast and so on.

(21:12):
But blaze Pascal is somebodywho I feel a lot of affinity for
because he's a.
He's.
He's incredibly gifted,incredibly talented, young, even
as a young man.
He, his dad's a tax collectorand he realized his dad's spent
all his time doing these youknow these figures, to add these

(21:33):
things up.
So he invents a physical,mechanical calculator as a, as
his teenager, the firstmechanical calculator and in in
the world, you know.
And so he's.
He's like, really gifted,really talented on that, on a
scientific, intellectual level,and he struggles with faith
because he likes stuff to makesense, he likes to figure things

(21:55):
out and At some point in hislife he has this epiphany where
God reveals himself to in, in,in some, some indescribable way,
and Pascal writes this down, hecalls it is, I think he calls
it the testimony or theconfession, and he Actually
keeps a copy of this testimonysewed in the lining of his

(22:18):
clothes for the rest of his life.
And he, he describes him thisexperience.
He says the God of Abraham, theGod of Isaac, the God of Jacob,
not the God of the philosophers.
And like he's, he has this,this intense Experience with God
, and he realizes this isn'tsomething about figuring it out,
and so that becomes a majorcomponent of his philosophy is

(22:39):
that, ultimately, we can reason,can take us so far and we can
try to figure it out.
When you try to cast, you know,cross all the dot across all
the T's and dot all the eyes andall these things, but
ultimately we have to look andsay I have to believe in
something, I must believe insomething, and so we place our
faith in something that we don'thave complete, like like head

(23:02):
knowledge or Confidence, in froma I can have it all figured out
from a to z Concept and I findthat really inspiring.
And if I that's something,that's where I've had to come
many times in my life it's Lord.
You know, I don't understand, Ican't do this all out, I don't,
I don't know, and there'sthere's questions that I have.
I'll probably, I'll probablydie with more questions
Unanswered than I have answered.

(23:22):
But I look at Jesus Christ andI and I have faith in him and I
believe in him, and I and I dothat knowing that, as someone
says, you know, I'm condemned tobe free and I must, and I must
make some choice.
Or Pascal says that in hisfamous Wager you must choose.
You must have some choice tobelieve, and so here's why you
should choose Christ, and sothat's my hope for my son.

(23:45):
I remember when he was a baby,rocking him and singing One of
my favorite songs.
Has come gracious spirit andthe second verse, the light of
truth to us display.
Make us know and choose thy way.
Plant holy fear in every heart.
We from God may depart, andremember singing that song again
and again to him.
Plant that God, and justbegging God that he would plant

(24:06):
that fear, because that's that'swhat I want for him is that God
would put something in him thatthat steers him toward God.
We can do so much, we can try todo all the things right and
ultimately it's a work of Godthat he does in our hearts that
we've got to respond to that,you know, in in faith.

(24:26):
And so I think I see Pascal asa, as a rebuke to the
rationalism at this time that wecan.
We can have everything figuredout.
I think it's so easy to do thatit's really easy to do that in
academic environment to think,you know, we like our data and
we like all these things, butultimately there's something
mysterious, something Magical,if you will, that that has to

(24:50):
happen.
That's above all of ourplanning and all of our thinking
, that that that underlies itall, and that to me, is, is what
Pascal was was Striking at, andthat's that's what I want for
my son.

Zack Johnson (25:03):
That's my prayer for my son is that he can find
that same thing when I was kindof up to follow up conversations
, when I Forget when I was whenI learned this.
Somebody also mentions thatPascal invented net present
value calculations.
Have you heard this?
I'm not sure if I have, sothere's.

(25:24):
There's this calculation youmake called NPV or net present
value, and when I was learningit, my teacher the teacher, it
was in a secular environmentsaid it was actually invented by
a religious man called BlaisePascal, where you multiply the
amount by the probability andthen you add up, add up all the,
you know the, the sum product,to get the net present value of

(25:48):
an investment.
It happens all the time.
Yeah, and so Pascal's wager.
I actually think we don't talkabout it enough, mm-hmm in
apologetics, do you not?
Do you know it well enough?

David Eicher (25:59):
Yeah, I'm familiar .

Zack Johnson (26:01):
You don't have to like Lay it out but what is his
famous wager?
And and then walk us through it.

David Eicher (26:08):
Yeah, so basically he's his.
The claim he's making is eitherthere's a God or there isn't,
right, and so you have twooptions you can believe that
there's a God or you cannot, andso that creates a matrix either
you believe in a God and Actaccordingly, and it turns out
there isn't one.
You believe in God and there isone.
You don't believe in there isone, or you don't believe in

(26:30):
there isn't one, and so then his, his calculation is so if you
believe in God and turns outthere isn't one, you'll be dead
and you won't know it.
So it's not that you know youmight be, you might be a little
bit.
You know you forego somepleasures, you forego some
things that you could have had,but in the end You'll be dead
and it won't matter like.

Zack Johnson (26:49):
So the worst case scenario is you believe in the
Bible and you, you follow it andyou miss out on some sort of
you, yeah, some sort of earlypleasure that the Bible I'll
just use the word prohibits, forlack of a better term.

David Eicher (27:07):
Yeah, you deny yourself and you follow Christ,
and it turns out that thatwasn't that.

Zack Johnson (27:11):
then your life is just not as fun.

David Eicher (27:14):
Right, not as great as it would have been, or
maybe you're martyred, you laydown your life, but at the end
of the time you're gone and sothere is no life to come.
You don't know it.
You've lost some type of finitevalue.
On the other hand, if youbelieve in God and it turns out
that your belief is well placed,there's infinite value because

(27:38):
you receive life and eternitywith Christ and so on, and you
have so.
So there's the proposition Onthe flip side.
If you fail to believe in Himand there's not, your outcome is
the same.
You have a small temporal gainbecause you had some things that
you know that, hey, you livefor yourself instead of living
for others or whatever.

(27:58):
You live for yourselves insteadof living for Him.
So that's great, you know yougained that.
But in the end, once again,you're dead and you know that's
it.
You had your experience and nowit's gone.
But ultimately, if you saythere isn't one and turns out
that there is, now, you've lostan infinite value because you
die and then you face thejudgment of what you should have

(28:19):
done and you chose not to.
So, ultimately, the wise thingto do with the you know, the net
present value is that youshould choose to believe in Him,
because that provides you thebest probability with the best
outcome.
So that's his logical rationalein walking through that.

Zack Johnson (28:38):
I heard my calculus teacher in high school
laid up Pascal's wager.
I think it was like a junior inhigh school and I remember
sitting there being verycompelled by that wager.
I was a little bit teetering onat that point in my life, I
think, as a whatever 17-year-oldthinking to myself interesting.

(28:59):
But you said somethinginteresting where there's
something mysterious about Godand it's not like data-based or
logic-based, but the butt that Ihave is I actually think the
belief in God is very, verylogical.
Well absolutely, absolutely andit's I'm probably my siblings
can tell you this.
I'm probably more on the we wishwe were more mysterious-like

(29:22):
and not so logic-driven and kindof thought more spiritually.
But I guess the question I havethe following up more about a
commentary on current society,on like someone like Blaise
Pascal and I've been talking toour sort of our biologists about
this question what has happenedthat the leaders of something

(29:47):
like Blaise Pascal, who inventsthe first calculator he's doing
all of this, he's doingmathematics sort of a leading
edge thinker comes up with astrong belief in God?
And that was like the leadthinkers were all finding God
through I'll just call it theAcademy right, not through the
Academy, but it supported thebelief in God, as is now.

(30:08):
It feels like I'm not ananthropologist, but it almost
seems like there's been areversal and the new priest the
new priest is the scientist.
Maybe the scientist or maybe apolitician, I'm not sure you
could argue that.
So why are we seeing thisreversal in academics and

(30:31):
generally in secular society,where it's like, oh, science
leads to not the belief in God,whereas what reversal has
happened?

David Eicher (30:38):
I think there's a couple things that have happened
and obviously it's anyconversation you have like this
is going to be oversimplified.
But you see this in two places,at least from my perspective.
Then you see this with the riseof the age of enlightenment and
this rejection of thesupernatural and this is a big

(30:59):
thing in America's founding Alot of the founding fathers are,
if they're Christian in alltheir deists, they believe in
the God that wound the clock andthen let things go.
There's some power that setthings in order, but then after
that they don't believe in anykind of supernatural
intervention.
Thomas Jefferson famously editsthe Bible and takes out all the

(31:22):
miracles and things he liked inteachings of Jesus and so on,
but he didn't like the miraclesof those pieces.
All these parts are cut out.
So his gospel ends with Jesusbeing taken to a hill and
crucified and that's the end ofthe story.
None of the other supernaturalstuff happens.
But this is all happening inenlightenment, in a reaction to

(31:44):
the events of the previouscentury, where Europe tears
itself apart and these gruesome,some of the worst, fighting
bloody wars, and it's all usingreligion as a pretext for their
political ambitions.
We have the ProtestantReformation that creates the

(32:04):
fractures in society because thechurch and the state are
working together.
And now, with this new form ofbelief, now it would be crass
for me to kill you because Iwant your stuff.
But if I want your stuff andyou believe in the wrong version
of God and you're leadingpeople to hell, then you should
be killed.
And so, like this whole theheretic hunting, the witch hunts

(32:26):
, all of these things that spillover into the 30 years of war
where Europe is just an agony ofpeople.
And so these Enlightenmentthinkers look and they're like
this is not making sense, thisreligion thing is going to kill
us all, because people aren'tbeing rational.
They're arguing over theirinterpretation of this
2000-year-old book.

(32:46):
What's that about?
And so, in response to that,they come up with other ways of
explaining the world.
They come up with.
It's very appealing, thealignment's very appealing.
We're going to rise above allthese base arguments and things.
The same thing then happens.
And if you listen to what thenew atheism, if you will and I

(33:07):
think that's actually the termsome of them use they'll tell
you the same thing that 9-11 wastheir moment of waking up and
saying atheism is the new gospel, because this religion thing is
going to kill us all.
This idea that suppose thatrational people, because you
have a different set of beliefsthan me, that makes it worth

(33:28):
killing you over that's.
We've got to stamp this out.
This is going to kill us all.
And I think it's the sameresponse.
Which is one of the reasons Ifind Kingdom Christianity so
compelling is because ourresponse to that is well, you're
reading the book wrong.
You need to.

(33:48):
The religion isn't supposed tohave those outcomes.
If your religious understandingis leading you to attack and
fight and kill other peoplebecause they understand God
differently than you, you'vemissed the very openings Jesus
teaching in Matthew 5, secretevidence and so on.
And so I feel like the.

(34:09):
I feel like the move fromPascal and his faith being so
closely connected to hisscientific pursuits was not was
due to a change in societybecause of the way Christians by
and large misused and missedthe boat, and I think that

(34:34):
that's one of the reasons that Ifind this idea of Jesus Christ
as the king of a peacefulkingdom I know it's your line no
blood, but our own is such acompelling response to that.

Zack Johnson (34:47):
I'm confused.
That line Too bad for him.
That's the problem.

David Eicher (34:49):
Oh yeah, so that's .
I think that's the responsethat the world needs, and I do
think the pendulum is swingingand people are realizing
materialism, the naturalexplanation, like there's
something missing.
Once again, we're getting backto the Right, we're getting back
to the technicalness behindthis.

(35:10):
We don't understand necessarilywhat it is, but it's not.
Pure mechanical knowledge isnot enough to explain what we
see in the universe.

Zack Johnson (35:20):
Yeah, and the other thing that I think is
really compelling to think aboutwith Pascal's wager is
something that actually ran intoteaching statistics here that
you know, byron, maybe I don'tknow if I'm allowed to share his
name, don't edit it out, but ifyou're listening, thanks for
this, byron.
He gives a talk about basicallycertainty versus confidence in

(35:44):
faith.
Yeah, and I think a lot of usare raised in this world where,
as soon as a doubt creeps intoyour faith, like it undoes it's
like an undoing.
But with Pascal, he's veryrational and he's saying hey,
there's actually somelikelihoods here that you,

(36:04):
anytime you hear someone say I'm100% certain, I would.
Just I challenge you to be likeyou can't be.
You can barely be 100% certainabout anything.
There's a little bit of room forwiggle room there but we
approaching faith in terms ofconfidence levels as opposed to
certainties is really.

(36:25):
I think it's really.
It opens the door for learningnew information and then
updating your belief system asyou progress through life.
And I'm not trying to be toolike, oh, tomorrow you could
wake up and learn that you're acat or whatever.
I'm not trying to get yeah.

David Eicher (36:43):
No, I completely agree and I think that's been
something that's been superhelpful for me in approaching
some of the theological issues,even some of the big thorny
issues that I grow up thinkingit is only one way to see this
in the Bible, whether it's thefate of the wicked or whatever
how exactly God brought theworld into existence.

(37:05):
And these are like major issuesin the world and to look and
say, well, we can be reasonablyconfident, like I'm confident
that God made the world.
I'm less confident that ithappened this way, and you can
have different layers ofconfidence rather than it's like
an all-or-nothing proposition.
I'm either 100% right oreverything is wrong.

Zack Johnson (37:28):
Yeah, and I just the line of thinking.
You're saying I'm going to talkabout this because I don't
think I can get in trouble on myown podcast.
No, I'm sure I can.
I got a letter in the mail thatbasically reviewed the current
events of the last year withIsrael and Hamas and basically

(37:48):
implored me to release astatement, a very binary
statement.
Whether you support this side oryou support this side, there's
nothing in the middle and withour worldview, the one that I
have fallen into, you kind ofdescribe it's.
You can't pitch binary choicesto people like that and just

(38:12):
have to say, hey, you have toside with this side, or you have
to side with this side, and ifyou don't, then you're basically
a no-good person who can'tthink, and this whole idea that
the world is in binary andthere's this third way with
Jesus, like, hey, well, maybethere's a way where I can still

(38:33):
describe the political world andhave rational thoughts about
what's right and wrong andspectrums of evil and spectrums
of good, while still saying thebest way is to bow down to the
Messiah and feel him, whichneither of those two sides are
doing.
Anyway, yeah, that was a change, that was a very I'm not trying
to be too detailed just in caseI don't want to lose my

(38:53):
presidency.
Right, I love their presidency.
Let's talk about something youmentioned earlier and you said
you're passionate about literacyand I'd love to hear you talk
about what that passion is andwhat it means to you.

David Eicher (39:14):
Yeah, yeah, no-transcript, basically, and
I'll tell you a little bit ofhow I got into it, and it's the
same way that Adam got into it.
Really, my wife got me into it,adam.
Yeah, you know, in the Bible,you know, adam.
Oh, so how you get into this?
And he's like, well, my wifegot me into it, got it, but I

(39:34):
thought so.
So we'd gotten married in 2010,and I was teaching school and so
I'm looking for something to do, as I like to say, to support
my teaching habit.
And so and Trey does like she'sbeen involved in literacy and

(39:54):
tutoring and things like that.
And she tells me she says thisthis Susan Barton that she
follows is she's a literacy guruand she's going to be in
Columbus, which is like twohours from us, and she said I
really, really want to go and betrained by her because she
knows how to, she can teach mehow to screen for dyslexia and

(40:17):
so on, and I've always beeninterested in and this is an
opportunity I don't want to miss.
So it's like I don't know.
We just got married.
We got married six months, youknow, and she's talking about
being gone a week and I was likeI don't know and it was a lot
of money and especially, youthink about the hotel, because
you're not going to drive twohours one way every day, so you

(40:37):
have to get a hotel for thosedays and everything.
And so we went back and forthabout it and she said she.
Then the idea came why don'tyou come too, you know, during
the summer?
So that's, you know it's not anissue with work schedule,
because you know I was doingsomething different in the
summer.

(40:57):
And so she's, she's like talkingto me to to convince me.
You know that's what we shoulddo.
And so I asked her.
I said do you think this?
She said I think this issomething big.
I think this is somethingpeople need to know.
No, I think if we learn this,there will be people out that we
can.
You know, we can use this as aside business, you know, like I

(41:19):
said, as support teaching.
And so I said do you reallybelieve in this?
Because if you believe in it,it's good enough for me.
And she said, yeah, you know,let's do it.
So we got the hotel for for aweek.
We paid for two tickets for usand you know it was a couple
thousand dollars, which is a lot.
You know, it's a lot of moneyfor us now Definitely a lot of
money for us, just having gottenmarried and we went and bought
the second day of this six dayseminar.

(41:42):
We went back to the hotel and Iwas just like everybody needs
to know this, because she taughtfor more years than I had at
that point.
Triva, yeah, no, no, no, no, no.
She taught, for I'm actually.
I actually have her beat now.
She taught for eight, I taughtfor nine, so my my first year
when I took a sabbatical, andthen we came back and taught

(42:02):
again and she taught the sameyear to keep us even, and then I
taught one more year.
So I guess I would be no,except she's homeschooling past
school.
So I guess that should count,shouldn't it?

Zack Johnson (42:11):
So I guess for still you.
The hand that rocks the cradlerules the world.

David Eicher (42:17):
So so we, we look at you know this.
This is describing studentsbehaviors, like, as she's
talking, students names andfaces are coming to mind.
I'm like, wow, that's why so,and so does that.
That's why I deal with thesummer classroom, because
there's these underlying issuesto this reading that they don't

(42:38):
understand and it's like it hasthis incredible explanatory
power and everybody needs toknow this.
Everybody needs to understandthis.
And so we, we started a businesswhere we would travel to
schools.
I would talk to the communityabout dyslexia, what it is, how
to recognize it, what you can doabout it, and the Barton system
, which is what we recommend.

(42:59):
That it's Susan Bartondeveloped.
It was designed for parents andtutors to be able to teach
themselves, so you didn't haveto go and get a lot of training.
You could buy this, this, thisprogram, and it would lay out
from the very beginning likepre-literacy skills, and a
student could go in a couple ofyears from being basically very,
very poor to no reading skillsat all to be able to read at

(43:21):
grade level, and we'd watch thisover the course of 10, it's
been over 10 years now thatwe've been doing it and we've
watched students do this.
We've watched children gothrough this process and so
seeing the difference thatliteracy makes a people's lives,
and then realizing theimportance of literacy
culturally and especiallyspending time in in grad school.

(43:42):
My initial stint in grad schoolwas a Malone University and I
was studying to be anintervention specialist.
So we're talking a lot aboutlearning disabilities and we're
talking about then also, becauseI was pursuing teacher
licensure just some of thefundamental things about
teaching, like post-literacy,and I hear a lot about this idea
of a post-literate societybecause we don't need to be able

(44:04):
to read books anymore becausewe have YouTube, we have TikTok
you can bleep that word out inthe post edit we have all these
other forms that we don't needto be able to read anymore, and
this is a really common idea.

Zack Johnson (44:21):
It's like culturally grown past the need
to read like actual reading,because you still need to be
able to read.
You still use those tools.
I've heard that you don't needto memorize anymore because you
have instant access to theinternet with the basis of
information, but I'm notfamiliar with the literacy part

(44:44):
of it.

David Eicher (44:45):
Yeah Well, it's not so much.
I don't think there's anybodyout there saying you don't need
to know how to read anymore, butit's like a functional
illiteracy to actually have themental space to pick up a book
and read it without all thevisual aids, without running
commentary and so on, like thiswhole thing is becoming a lost
art and the importance ofliteracy, however important you

(45:09):
think literacy is, it's moreimportant than that it used to
be.
That literacy means yourability to read a writer or a
name, and if you could do that,you were literate.
And now you know that there'slike.
The UN is obviously looking atliteracy as a way of raising the
standard of living in the world, and so they define between

(45:31):
strictly illiteracy andfunctional literacy, the ability
to read and write a couple ofsentences describing your
personal life, the events ofyour day and so on.
And what's interesting aboutilliteracy is, in many studies,
because of the strong linkbetween poverty, between
homelessness, between, all youknow, a whole variety of

(45:56):
societal ills, some of thesethings aren't measurable, and so
if they find that they're notmeasurable, illiteracy matches
it so closely that it can beused as a proxy number in
studies to assume these othernumbers.
Schools states what will usereading scores fourth grade
reading scores as part of theircalculation for how many prison

(46:19):
cells they're going to need asthey think about what's the
occupancy of our prison now, asopposed to, you know, are we
going to build a new prison, howmany cells should be in it?
And they have thesecalculations to how many can we
assume are going to be, you know, are based on literacy and
literacy is part of thatcalculation.
And so, for a lot of reasons,like the ability to pick up and

(46:41):
read or it's Augustine, you know, take up and read the ability
to do that is it's more thanjust you know, moving your eyes
across the words and more thanfiguring it out.
It's like a whole range ofskills that changes somebody's
life to be able to do and that,like that, jesus reveals himself

(47:03):
to us as the word in thebeginning was the word Vieth in
his book Reading Between theLines, which I highly recommend.
It was one of the few textbooksthat I read in my undergrad that
I could barely put down A lotof my read because I wanted the
reading grade, but this one I'veread multiple times since then.
That's my book recommendationReading Between the Lines and he
talks about.
He has a whole chapter calledthe word versus the image and

(47:26):
how God had prohibitions in theOld Testament.
He's like don't depict me.
You don't know what I look like.
Don't make pictures of me.
I've revealed myself to youthrough, as a voice, as words,
and he talks about how thisunderstanding of God is still
important, that we have thishumanly, we have this love for
images, we have, like, a desirefor what could be pictured, and

(47:49):
that there's something that's atodds between a picture and text
.
A picture is neither true orfalse, it just is.
And you know that's advertisingwouldn't work otherwise.
You think about all the adsthat you see and the implicit
messages that they send.
For instance, you have the well, they don't have them so much

(48:10):
anymore.
But when I was growing up hehad the moral board of cowboy,
you know, and he's going tocigarette and then he's riding
his horse in the sunset andwhatever.
And the message of the ad isyou know, if you want to be cool
and manly like this cowboy,then you should smoke our
cigarettes.
Now when you say it out loud itsounds silly, like of course.

(48:32):
That doesn't make any sense.
But they're not selling a truthclaim, they're selling a
feeling.
They're selling something thatit's an emotional claim.

Zack Johnson (48:41):
Maybe I should get you into marketing here.
I'm just kidding.

David Eicher (48:46):
No, I get where you're going with this and yeah,
and so literacy is the fightfor literacy is a fight for
clear thinking, if you will, the, you know, the sound mind, as
opposed to being ruled by ourpassions and ruled by our
emotional selves, and ruled bythings that we respond to this
early.
It's like reading slows us downand think about.

(49:08):
What claims are being made here, what argument is being made
here?
What am I being told to believein?
It's a different way ofthinking.
It's a different way of viewingthe world.
I think we're losing it.

Zack Johnson (49:18):
And so when you talk about literacy, it's I
don't want to put words in yourmouth it's sort of this ability
to sit down with a big idea, inthe form of a book usually, and
digest it and know what thatbook said, as opposed to the
sound bites.
Yeah, informing ourselves withsound bite here, sound bite here
, sound bite here, sound bitehere.

(49:38):
Yeah, yeah, I get it.

David Eicher (49:42):
And when you think that this is this is probably
the thing when I want to give atalk about literacy.
It, this is the thing thatblows my mind all the time.
Because if you believe ininspiration, which I do, I
believe that 2000 years ago andlonger, the Bible says in 1
Peter holy men of God spake asthey were moved by the Holy
Spirit and so that, if youimagine how it must have been,

(50:03):
paul's sitting down, peter'ssitting down, and they're going
to write a letter to theirfriends and this Peter or Paul
or whoever he's going to like,to them, they were writing a
letter, and yet the Holy Spiritsomehow comes and does something
like, imbues this letter withsomething more.
And so here's the apostle'sthoughts, and then the Holy
Spirit inspires those thoughts.

(50:24):
So they're more than just aman's thoughts, they're man and
God's thoughts, and he, he'swriting these ideas down and you
know the letter goes out andthey read him and they're now
thinking the same thoughts thatGod gave the apostle.
And then you know it getstranslated and it gets
re-translated.
And now, today, I pick up myBible and over 2000 years ago,
these thoughts that were givento Paul, I'm now thinking the

(50:46):
same thoughts that were inspiredby the Holy Ghost to Paul all
those years ago, and that's thepower of literacy.
That's what literacy does is itgives us that ability to
connect, over time and overplace and across the centuries,
to those times when God revealedhimself to his prophets through
his, through his inspiration,and ultimately, that's how Jesus

(51:06):
you know, one of the termsJesus used to reveal himself was
, in the beginning, was, was theword.
And so, to me, that's theultimate goal of literacy is to
provide that, that avenue thatconnects us with God's
revelation through Christ.

Zack Johnson (51:19):
Yeah, and I.
I just want to throw a pitchout for Sattler because I'm
allowed to, but in my collegeyears I didn't the number of
books that I consumed start tofinish to try to grasp an idea
that were assigned to me waspretty small.
Not I did have some professorsdo it, but our humanities
program really has people tryingto chew on some of these bigger

(51:42):
works and I I would justwholeheartedly agree that this,
this idea of being able to sitdown with a big idea, look at it
, spend time with it, consume it, understand its implications,
it's just a general skill thatwe need and if we can tie it to

(52:02):
it would actually helps usunderstand God, because we
understand God through beingtechnically, through a little
bit of literacy, especiallysomebody in our midst being
being literate.

David Eicher (52:13):
Yeah.

Zack Johnson (52:13):
I just threw that on, and I even say that when you
look at people in in history, Iread a big biography of Abraham
Lincoln and he was fromKentucky.
Have you ever read about him?

David Eicher (52:26):
Yeah, absolutely, and he was studying about
firelight and and walking milesfor a book.

Zack Johnson (52:32):
And he, he would, and he every book he got a hold
of he would, just, it wouldbecome his best friends and
their their stories of his room.
He would like scratch notes allover his room over and over
again because he could only getaccess to one book at a time.
And you think about that andthe implications it had for his.
I would just say his potentiallater was really high and then

(52:54):
later on in his presidency getthis for a hobby.
He once got a hold of theEuclid.
I don't know, have you heard ofthe Euclid?
It's like one of the originalworks of mathematics.
You just like sit there atnight and and solve some
problems in the Euclid, just forkissing giggles.

David Eicher (53:10):
Mm-hmm.

Zack Johnson (53:11):
Yeah right, isn't that wild?
And I'm like as a presidentthat's wild.
But it gets back to this ideaof just being able to spend time
with something.
And then I guess the onequestion I have to use I love
pushing that on people, but Ialso have people in my life the
thought of sitting down with.

(53:31):
I'll just say, if I were tohand them a book akin to
something like how to read abook have you read that book?
I think so, about how it's kindof like how to become literate
and really understand theAryan's text.
It's a hard book to get through.
Yeah, a lot of people, it seemslike.
Can we really prescribe thatacross humanity and Christianity

(53:55):
, like this idea of being purelyacademics, and how do you think
about the different levels ofpeople and their pursuit of big
ideas?

David Eicher (54:10):
Yeah, absolutely Well, I think, first of all,
it's important to remember thatfor the first 1500 years of
Christianity, the majority ofpeople were illiterate.
That's right, and so they cameto church, partly to hear the
word of God read, because thatwas the only access to it, and
so literacy is something that wecan all take part in.

(54:31):
But just the use of the wordand understanding words thinking
in terms of language as opposedto images, I think is important
, given, as you said, thedifferent levels.
Different people have differentpropensities.
Now, one of the things that I'veoften been frustrated by with
this topic is people.
You know, well, all I need isthe Bible.

(54:51):
You know I need to read allthese other books and you read
the Bible.
You know that's because if youcan't understand literature and
other books, how are you goingto understand the book of books?
I feel like all of our literarypursuits that are lesser.
It's like to me saying that isakin to somebody in medical
school saying, well, I don'twant to operate on cadavers.

(55:11):
I came to medical school tolearn how to operate on people.
Well, great, I mean, that'syour ultimate point, but
hopefully you can start withsomething that it doesn't hurt
if you cut the wrong thing.
And I think the same is truewith our literary pursuits.
You know, if I'm reading acomic book or I'm reading some
work of literature, if I'mreading something like Homer and
I misunderstand what Homer hadto say and I don't understand it

(55:34):
completely, or I understand theimplications incorrectly, it
doesn't make that big of adifference.
But if I can practice thoseskills on the less it works.
Hopefully I've honed my skills,so when I come to the word of
God I have a deeperunderstanding.
So I don't think, in answer toyour broader question, I don't
think it's something we have toprescribe to everybody, but I

(55:55):
think it's something we can callpeople to and to the level that
you're able.
We should be looking at thispursuit of the word as something
that is for all of us, isincumbent on us in some way, to
the level of our ability.

Zack Johnson (56:11):
Yeah, I guess what I was hoping to get at is that
there's some sort of danger ofbecoming a hyper-intellectual
people who can't relate to thepeople around us.
And I do think that there'ssomewhat of a danger where we're
like it's all about literacy,it's all about reading and these
things, but I don't.
I just want people to know that.

(56:32):
I don't think that you'regetting it.

David Eicher (56:33):
Yeah, it's definitely not what I'm getting
it and, like I said, the thingthat I often come back to when I
start being tempted to go thatway is, as I said, for 1500
years, most people couldn't.
If they could read it, theycouldn't afford to own it, and
so then the importance isfinding the word is still
important, but you can be a goodChristian and not know how to

(56:59):
read or not be of the propensityto be able to read the deep
book or so on.
Absolutely.

Zack Johnson (57:05):
Well, I'll wrap up with a couple of questions here
.
One I always talk about pearls.
We have this moment pearls ofwisdom.
Is there generally a pearl ofwisdom that you like to talk
about?
Is there a wisdom that you liketo talk about with people that
has shaped you?
I've heard a couple in thestories you've shared, but
anything else that you mighthave to talk about?

David Eicher (57:25):
I have three great truths, that I call them the
three great truths, and they'renot the only truths, but they're
ones that I need to be remindedof and they're kind of tied
together.
The first one is the prudentman foresees the evil and hides
himself, but the simple pass onare punished Most of the time.
The problems that you're goingto encounter in your life are

(57:49):
things you could have foreseenif you would have been paying
attention.
And the second is like underthe first, which is your success
in life is in direct proportionto the number of uncomfortable
conversations you're willing tohave.
And I've looked at myself andsaid that to myself different

(58:10):
times when I've been dreading aconversation.
Look, you talk about thisbecause if you can foresee
what's going to happen and yourealize, oh, this is a
conversation we didn't have withhim and it's not going to be
enjoyable, it's not going to behappy and fun times.
But the more you're willing topush yourself to have those
tough conversations, the moresuccessful you're going to be in
your relationships, whetherit's your relationships in the

(58:30):
workplace, whether it's yourrelationships in the brotherhood
of believers or with yourfamily, with your wife, wherever
, being willing to have theuncomfortable conversations is
going to dramatically improveyour success in life.
And then, something my fatherwould say all the time when I
was growing up.
Probably, if you would ask mewhat's the thing that you'll

(58:52):
learn from your dad, it would beyou don't have to condemn
everybody, but you don't have tojoin everybody, and I think
that's a really easy thing,especially as Christians.
You know, we're trying tofigure out what does God want
from me, and it can be easy.
Well, they're doing it, so itmust be okay.
Well, maybe they are and maybeit's okay for them.
But you don't have to look atthem and say well, they're
definitely.
What they're doing isdefinitely wrong, but that

(59:13):
doesn't mean it's right for you.
You have to look for yourselfat where you are, and so it's
been something that's been areally good guiding prism for my
life is looking and just sayingI need to decide what works for
me and where I am in life.
What is God trying to teach me?
Where has God placed me?
And I can do that and gaininsights from other people

(59:34):
without simply thinking oh, ifthey're doing it, then that must
be something I should do too,or that must be okay for me.

Zack Johnson (59:40):
Yeah, one of the when I teach a piece.
The third one there, when Iteach peacemaking.
One of the I write down at thebeginning of the class.
One of the skills and thenAnayman's skills for Jews is you
need to learn how to turnobservations into questions, not
judgments, because it's a verysimilar thing where you see
people and you can either judgeor you can ask a question which

(01:00:02):
actually bleeds into your.
Second Are you willing toactually understand people?
I love those.
You call them the three truths.
Yeah, three great truths.
All right, three great truths.
Maybe we need to do a separateepisode on that.
No, I'm just kidding.
And then the last question I'llask before, just like the final
, anything else is thereanything you consume on a

(01:00:24):
regular basis in terms of, maybe, content, recommendable content
to the audience, that you thinkis beneficial for people to
check out?

David Eicher (01:00:33):
If you're a history buff, there's a YouTube
channel called Montemire how doyou spell that?
M-o-n-t-e-m-a-y-o-r.
And it's not a very big channel.
It's not made 15 or 20 videoson it tops and it is some of the
most interesting historicalcontent I've ever seen.

(01:00:56):
He does really in-depthdescriptions and one of the
things that's really neat is hehas one of the battle midway and
he has animations to show whatthe different ships did in the
planes and so on.
And then at times he'll pausehis animations and fade in a
photo that was taken during thebattle and all the ships are
where they're supposed to be allplanes and everything.

(01:01:16):
But he just does it forapparently just for fun is
something he enjoys doing.
His channel's not monetized oranything, but his videos are
always an insta-watch for me.
I'm subscribed to his channeland I absolutely love his
in-depth coverage.
I think it's a perfect exampleof somebody that's just doing
something for the joy of doingit.

(01:01:37):
As far as other recommendations,everybody should read Black
Duck.
Black Duck is probably my mostrecommended book.
It's a young adult book and Ihad the privilege of meeting the
author last year.
She invited me to come down toher community and she showed me
around the setting of the book.
I get to visit most of theplaces where stuff happened in

(01:02:00):
the book and unfortunately shepassed away, actually in October
, so if I hadn't had the chanceto do it, did she interact with
some of the species?
Yeah, she came and did theguest lecture for her last year,
but it's such a like I could doa whole podcast of Black Duck.
I've read it.
I can tell you how many timesI've read it.
I cry almost every time I readit.
It's a really moving book aboutfriendship, about relationships

(01:02:21):
, about secrets, how our livesaffect one another.
By Jeanette Lyle.
Janet Tavile Lyle yeah, janetTavile Lyle.
So yeah, I highly recommend it.
It's been a really formativebook for me.
For a Christian read, Irecommend Paul Among the People
by Sarah Rudin One more timePaul Among the People.

(01:02:43):
She's a classical scholar.
She reads Greek and Latin as anacademic.
She got interested one day as aChristian.
What would it be like for theseGreek and Roman poets that I
read every day for my academicwork?
What if one of them had pickedup Paul's letters?
What would he have thought?
What would it have sounded liketo him?
What would it have meant in hisculture?

(01:03:04):
And she had a very, took a verydim view of Paul.
She said one of her professorsreferred to the apostle Paul as
Paul Grumpy Pants.
You know, in this view thatJesus had all the fun teachings
and it was all great andwonderful.
Then Paul came around along atruin at all Very progressive
kind of idea, and she saidthat's what I thought.
You know, I read Paul and Ilike some of the stuff he said
and he seemed kind of grumpy.
So you know, and she said Istarted reading it and I was

(01:03:26):
like wow, what this would havemeant.
This was like dynamite in firstcentury Rome, first century
Greek culture.
And so she lays that out and soshe hits all the hot button
topics.
She hits women's roles.
She has a whole chapter in thehead covering which is worth the
price of the whole book.
She has a chapter on slaveryand the Roman Empire and what it
meant and what the culturearound it was like, the
household of faith and howChristian community was this

(01:03:50):
alternative to the Romanhousehold system.
And this there was this desirein Roman culture to be part of a
household, like to matter, andthat the church offered an
opportunity to enter a householdthat wasn't a household that
you had to be born into or belucky enough.
It was something you couldenter by faith and how, or
shaking this idea of a communitybeliever.
Anyway, every one of thechapters worth the price of the

(01:04:10):
whole book and it's like, yeah,you can get it on Amazon for
like ten bucks, so at that priceit's bad stewardship not to
really All right.

Zack Johnson (01:04:19):
Good, and that's by Sarah Rudin, sarah Rudin,
sarah Rudin.
Yeah, somehow it's on my list,but I haven't read it yet.
But I'm sure it goes to.
We have talked about it before.
And then, lastly, is thereanything else that we didn't,
that you want to mention at theend of the conversation, before
we close out here?

David Eicher (01:04:36):
No, I think it's been a super enjoyable
conversation Me Tom, yeah,absolutely Glad to have.
Thanks for having me on.

Zack Johnson (01:04:42):
Yeah, well, at the end here, the date's coming up,
so we have an open up housecoming up and that is I should
have this memorized here March21st or something.
March 21st is an open house.
It's a Friday, saturday, and so, if you're interested in
Sattler, open house is awesome.
We come and spend a day oncampus and then we do some

(01:05:04):
Boston-based things, and that'swhat we didn't talk about.
Oh yeah, absolutely, but I'llshow you around Boston.
They will show you aroundBoston and his list of things
there.
I just heard you trying torecruit someone to the MFA.
That's right.
That's right.
That's right all the time.
And then March 15th is ourinternational student deadline,
which is really important.
We have students from fivecontinents here right now, which

(01:05:26):
is phenomenal.
You've been a huge part of thatand we're hoping I have a goal
to get every livable continentsomeday Right.
Actually, four continents Itake it back.
Yeah, four continents, we'remissing two Four, two livable
ones.
All right, thanks so much, davefor joining us.
Yeah, absolutely, thanks forhaving me.
Thanks for having me here,thank you.