Understanding Your Calling Through the Seasons of Life - Rich Wilson | Wake-Up Call Conversations

Summary

The Wake-Up Call: Understanding Your Calling Through the Seasons of Life

Guest: Rich Wilson
Host: JD Walt (Seedbed)
Date: January 21, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode features a heartfelt conversation between JD Walt and Rich Wilson, exploring the journey of understanding one's calling, particularly across different seasons of life. Rooted in Christian faith and practical experience, Rich draws from over 27 years of ministry to the collegiate generation in the UK. The discussion is meant to encourage college students, parents, pastors, and local church members to recognize purpose in every stage of life, build intergenerational connections, and embrace spiritual parenting for the rising generation.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Rich Wilson’s Story and Context ([00:11]–[02:56])

• Background: Rich shares how he came to Loughborough, UK, for university, fell in love, and has spent the past 30 years involved in the local church, Open Heaven. He and his wife have raised three children, two of whom have passed away.

• Experience: Rich celebrates passing the “10,000 days” mark in ministry (27.5 years) and reflects on the significance of each day in God’s plan.

  "All the days ordained for me are written in his book...they've been a mixed bag, but from his perspective they're all important."
  – Rich Wilson ([02:10])

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2. Encouragement and Guidance for College Students ([04:05]–[07:23])

• Unique Opportunity: College years (ages 18–25) are times of possibility, spiritual awakening, and the beginning of lifelong assignments from God.

• Practical Advice:

  • Trust God with your path, and don’t be afraid to “test” Him—pray boldly and expect God to respond.
  • Recognize your life is divinely crafted, not an accident.
  • Find a couple of friends hungry for God and journey with them.

  "Your life is not your idea. It's been crafted by a divine creator."
  – Rich Wilson ([05:20])

  "Carpe diem...More literally, it means pluck the day or harvest the day. There's fruit in each day because each day is ordained."
  – Rich Wilson ([06:32])

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3. Discerning Calling and Purpose ([07:23]–[10:25])

• Avoid Comparison: Don’t measure yourself by the apparent success of others, especially as seen on social media.

• Experiment and Observe: College years are for “experimentation”—try things, notice what resonates, see where your passions and strengths come alive.

• God in the Ordinary: Trust that God works through every experience, even the mundane or difficult ones.

  "Our deepest purpose is to know God and be known by him...But around that is this sense of we are made for more."
  – Rich Wilson ([08:36])

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4. The Power of Intergenerational Relationships ([12:26]–[16:23])

• Spiritual Parenting: The importance of older generations opening their homes and lives to younger adults, modeling faith, and giving encouragement.

• Mutual Blessings: Such relationships strengthen both parties—younger people find guidance, and elders discover new purpose.

  "This is where the magic happens. Something happens...where generations come together and particularly young adults are seen, valued and welcomed."
  – Rich Wilson ([14:16])

• Role for Churches: Not only campus ministries but local churches should recognize and act on the strategic opportunity to serve students in their midst.

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5. Fusion: Awakening Local Churches to Student Ministry ([20:30]–[23:32])

• Mission of Fusion: Helping students find hope in Jesus and home in the local church.

• Bridging Gaps: Fusion bridges the disconnect between churches and students, encouraging churches (near any college/university) to play an active role.

  "If you're within 5, 10 miles of a campus or a college, you've probably got a role to play. There's a whole generation coming through your town."
  – Rich Wilson ([22:09])

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6. Practical Steps for Local Churches ([23:32]–[25:25])

• Start Small: Identify those in your church with a heart for young adults and begin to engage—walk the campus, pray, have conversations.

• Support and Empower: Encourage young adults to lead and support them with resources.

• Invitation for All: Every church member can play a role; God is placing assignments on many hearts across generations.

  "It starts with a sense of conviction. We must do something...The good news is it's a conversation that God loves."
  – Rich Wilson ([24:07])

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7. Critical Life Choices in the College Years ([25:25]–[28:43])

• Three Core Decisions: Students will choose a mission, a master (who or what they serve), and often a mate for life during these years.

• Pitfall of Generational Isolation: Encourage intergenerational connection to avoid being “prisoners of their own generation.”

  "We're not trying to give you something to do. We're trying to say, would you ask the Lord to bring to you, open your heart to the young and be ready when they come."
  – JD Walt ([26:18])

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8. The Power of Simple Encouragement ([28:43]–[32:27])

• Small Acts, Big Impact: Handwritten letters, phone calls, and simple acts (like sending $5 to a student) can have a profound encouragement and lifelong impact.

  "We're not asking people to volunteer for this program or that program. We're asking them to talk to the Lord and say, I'm here. I don't know what I got, but what I got, I have treasure."
  – JD Walt ([29:25])

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9. Seasons of Calling: Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter ([33:19]–[36:36])

• Understanding Seasons: Calling is cyclical, not linear—there are seasons of growth, fruitfulness, challenge, and apparent dormancy (winter).

• Navigating Winter: Winter seasons are hard and involve loss, grief, or setbacks, but they are often where the deepest spiritual growth and richest treasures are found.

  "There’s opportunity for us to discover things in God in winter that we can’t possibly discover in any other season."
  – Rich Wilson ([38:35])

  "If there’s purpose and meaning in Christ’s suffering, then there’s purpose and meaning in our suffering. It’s only because of the cross we can make sense of our winters."
  – Rich Wilson ([39:44])

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10. Reframing Hope and Trust Through Winter ([40:34]–[44:29])

• Shifting Anchors: Realizing one’s hope may be anchored in outcomes; winter invites re-anchoring hope in Jesus Himself.

• Faith after Disappointment: Learning to trust God’s presence and larger purposes, even when outcomes are deeply painful.

  "My hope had to be rebuilt in Jesus himself."
  – JD Walt ([42:05])

  "Trust me...I knew I wasn’t trusting him for an outcome...I was trusting him."
  – Rich Wilson ([42:45])

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11. The Call and Joy of Spiritual Parenting ([46:07]–[50:19])

• Book on Spiritual Parenting: Rich is writing a book to encourage this calling, born out of personal experiences and conviction.

• Personal Example: Rich shares honoring a promise to his late brother, playing a role in his nieces’ lives, illustrating spiritual parenting in action.

• Second Chances: Even those who feel they have failed in parenting can find new purpose in investing in others’ children.

  "If anything, it means you’re qualified in a different way and there’s a new opportunity...He was a terrible father, but then he gets given Samuel."
  – Rich Wilson ([50:19])

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On Days Ordained:
  "None of them go by without purpose and meaning. And when we get a sense of that, we might want to shout Carpi Diem...more literally, it means pluck the day or harvest the day."
  – Rich Wilson ([06:12])

• On the Role of the Church:
  "Fusion is looking still to encourage local churches to think about the role that they must play with college students and to give them some tools and resources. But it starts with a heart."
  – Rich Wilson ([22:43])

• On Generational Impact:
  "You can plant seeds today that years after you’re in the balcony, you’re in the great cloud of witnesses, those seeds will have become trees."
  – JD Walt ([31:03])

• On Winter Seasons:
  "The winters are the hardest season, but they are also the season that have the most impact; it’s where the roots go down deepest."
  – Rich Wilson ([40:24])

• On Spiritual Parenting:
  "There's new opportunities, second chances, third chances."
  – Rich Wilson ([50:49])

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [01:07] – Rich’s background and family
• [04:05] – Encouragement to college students on calling and purpose
• [07:23] – How to discern calling and avoid comparison
• [12:26] – JD’s personal story of spiritual parents during college
• [14:02] – The profound value of intergenerational relationships
• [20:30] – History and mission of Fusion
• [23:32] – How local churches can start small in student ministry
• [28:43] – The impact of simple encouragement, like handwritten letters
• [33:19] – Introduction to the book “A Call Less Ordinary” and the metaphor of seasons
• [36:36] – Deep dive on winter seasons and calling
• [42:26] – Rebuilding hope and trust after disappointment
• [46:07] – Spiritual parenting: personal and theological reflections
• [47:54] – Story of Rich’s promise to his late brother

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Tone & Language

This episode is marked by warmth, vulnerability, and spiritual encouragement. Both JD and Rich are candid about joys and pain—drawing lessons from loss, disappointment, and healing. The language is faith-centered, conversational, and accessible, drawing on scripture and personal story to illustrate practical wisdom.

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Conclusion

Rich Wilson and JD Walt deliver a moving call to action: for students to seize their days with faith and curiosity, and for older generations, especially within the church, to show up as spiritual parents and encouragers. Through stories, practical steps, and scriptural perspective, the episode highlights that every season—sunny or wintry—has purpose in God’s unfolding story, and that building intergenerational relationships multiplies hope and awakening for everyone involved.

Transcript

[Rich Wilson]

Foreign.

[JD Walt]

JD Walt here with the wake up call and we've got another great conversation teed up for us today. So thankful you've joined us. We're going to be with Rich Wilson, a good friend of mine. I've known him three or four years now. And Rich is from across the ocean, the Atlantic. He's from the United Kingdom. He can tell us more specifically. But Rich's work for at least the past 10,000 days has been focused on the collegiate generation. And so I'm eager to get into it. Rich, thank you for joining us. Tell us where you're from. Tell us that.

[Rich Wilson]

Thanks, jd. I'm from a place that no one can pronounce or spell. It's called Loughborough and it's in one of the shires in central England, Leicestershire. And so, so, and just, you know.

[JD Walt]

Just give us a little about, you know, your family and how you got into doing what you're doing.

[Rich Wilson]

Well, I came to Loughborough to study. I fell in love with a girl who was involved in a church plant. That was 30 years ago and we've been involved in this church called Open Heaven ever since. It's a town with 20,000 college students and 60,000 people. It's got a belf boundary and lots of elite athletes and we've raised our family there and that's been a journey as well. So we've got three kids, two in Heaven, one who's now grown up and is actually in New Zealand at the moment.

[JD Walt]

Wow. And so was I right about that? 10,000 days? I've been reading about this.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we keep a record of, of the different people who've journeyed with Fusion for various lengths of time. And I crossed over the 10,000 day mark last Friday and yeah, I thought it was worth noting, being thankful for all the days ordained for me are written in his book and from my perspective, they've been a mixed bag, but from his perspective they are, are all important and something I'm trying to get my head around more for myself and the generation coming through.

[JD Walt]

Yeah. How many years is 10,000 days?

[Rich Wilson]

It's 27 and a half years.

[JD Walt]

Wow. Congratulations and thank you. And you know, I've invited, I'm hoping that I pastor a small church in a tiny town in rural Arkansas and someday you're going to come here, Rich. But in my church, we have 16 college students and they're across a range of colleges, universities, in state and out of state. And I've invited them to listen to at least the first part of this Podcast. And so, you know, we're going to have. There'll be parents of college students listening, there'll be grandparents, there'll be local churches, pastors, leaders, trying to say, you know what? How can we. How can we love college students better? But for. For starters, here, I want us to talk to these 16 and any of their sort of generation right now and just talk to them. Rich?

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah. Wow. Well, what a time to go to college. What a time to be alive between the age of 18 and 25, the time when God is moving. And he's always, for me, he seems to always have captured the hearts of this age group and dripped in assignments that it takes almost a lifetime to work out. And there's lots that goes on at this stage. It doesn't make sense when it comes to what are we about, where are we going? But what we can choose to do is we can begin to choose to trust God with our steps and our path, knowing that he will ultimately direct them. And my encouragement would be for any one of these 16 or anyone else who's listening, to begin to test God in a good way, begin to pray some prayers around your life and see if what he says is true or not. And this seems to be what a whole generation are beginning to do, because what they're getting given from the world isn't working for them. So a lot of them are looking back, a lot of them are opening scripture afresh. And I'd encourage them to start opening scripture afresh and say, God, speak to me. God surprise me. Maybe God help me and begin to dream, begin to dare that your life is not just an accident. I think that is a revelation. It's getting deeper in me. It wasn't my idea. My life was not my idea. Your life is not your idea. It's been crafted by a divine creator. And to enter into that space we mentioned before, those 10,000 days, and I said to you, all those days were ordained for me. And the question is, do you believe that? Do you believe that your days have been ordained for you? I believe that they have. Which means none of them go by without purpose and meaning. And when we get a sense of that, we might want to shout Carpi Deum, which means? Well, it's commonly it means seize the day. But more, more literally, it means pluck the day or harvest the day. There's fruit in each day because each day is ordained. And so each day is to be seized and harvested with what God has. And it might seem ordinary, but the reality is God is working through it all. And. Yeah, and alongside that, I'd find some friends who are deeply curious and hungry for God. Not all your friends, because you need to be around all kinds of other people, but one or two. Be praying for one or two friends who are deeply curious and hungry for God. I begin to journey with them, particularly through your college years. And who knows, they could end up being friends for life.

[JD Walt]

Yeah, that's so helpful and encouraging. Rich, let's. I want you to talk to them a little bit about, you know, everybody, or not everybody, but people. Like, how can people wake up to their purpose and their sense of, like, calling? And. And I don't. I don't mean like, just. I believe God has callings of all kinds. Right. Not just people. And I know you believe this, too. Not just people who work in the church or who talk about that and how to discern that and get at that.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah, well, we've got to get away from comparison, haven't we? And we've got to get away from these people who seem like they've made it when they're 23 and they're all over social media. And we've got to get in touch with ourselves, knowing that God takes his time over us and that God's put unique things in each one of us, and that can take a little bit of time to figure out. And so our deepest purpose is to know God and be known by him and actually to know others and be known by them. But around that is this sense of we are made for more. We're made to make a contribution. And that can take a little bit longer to work out. And that's why the college years, I think, are years of experimentation. They're years of trying new things, of hanging out with different people, of testing ourselves in all kinds of ways by what we read, by the places we go, by the people we hang out with. And in doing that, noticing where is there a resonance? What parts of me come alive and when, in which situations, around what topics? And then we begin to piece together, oh, hang on a minute. There might be something more here. There might be something here that actually is maybe not my idea, but the beginnings of good works that God has prepared for me. And so to begin to know ourselves, it doesn't all flood at once. Some people seem to stumble into this really early. But most people have to wrestle through this sense of, what am I about? What is my purpose, how do I find it? And the encouragement is to try some things and to trust that God's in it all. Particularly the hard stuff, particularly the stuff that doesn't necessarily make sense or the stuff that's a bit boring. That job that you just have to do in order to raise a bit more cash to get you through college, well, none of that's wasted. You're learning constantly about yourself, what else is happening. And it can take a bit of practice, but God will reframe our every day and begin to shed light on a little bit about more kind of who we are and how we're wired.

[JD Walt]

Yes. I mean, I've got two kids myself right now of my four who are in college in that season, and I so pray and. And we pray for our 16 students that. That they will awaken to the possibility of God in their life and all that God could do. And, yeah, that it could be. It could be in many different vocations, many different careers, but it's just so easy to just kind of go with a flow in those years. And college can be just. You just do it, right.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah, yeah.

[JD Walt]

But what an opportunity.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's to be seized because college is.

[JD Walt]

This season of time. You're not. You've left home for the most part, and you're not where you were anymore, nor are you where you're going to be. You're in a zone of where possibility and opportunity are just hovering over. Over your life. And I think that your counsel to students is to say, speak, Lord. Come, Holy Spirit, illuminate my heart and my mind and let me become. I don't want to miss anything. Right?

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah. Yeah. And it is that speak, Lord. But it speaks through everything.

[JD Walt]

Everything.

[Rich Wilson]

And you might get a still, small voice, so you might get an audible voice, but more likely he's going to speak through everything.

[JD Walt]

Yes.

[Rich Wilson]

That you engage in.

[JD Walt]

Yes. You know. You know, Rich, I don't know if I ever told you this story, but when I was in college, I went to this pretty traditional church in town, and I. I remember at the start of one of the school years, early on, I saw these little cards in the bulletin in the pews, and it said, would you like to be adopted by a family in. In the church? And I'm like, well, I don't know. But I filled it out anyway. And a couple of weeks later, I got a call from this man who said, you know, we. We put our name forward as interested in getting to know and maybe be a little bit of a home away from home for a college student. And the next thing you know, we're having lunch and they've invited me to their home. And Rich. That relationship changed my life. It absolutely changed my life. And these people became for me, you know, I had grown up in the church. I had grown up with very committed Christian parents. But these people became like in another category for me. They weren't like my home parents and they weren't just friends. They were kind of a, I think you may call it spiritual parents. Talk about that a little bit.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah. Well, J.D. that story is echoed all around the world and it is something we want to see increase at this time. So as well as those 16 college students going away, we need a whole host of elders who are prepared to open up their homes and make room just to hang out. And I know many people who've been profoundly impacted in the way that you describe, because that has been their experience. And it doesn't feel like it's a particularly significant time at the time, maybe for either party. But this is where the magic happens. Something happens in that space where generations come together and particularly young adults are seen and they're valued and they're welcomed. And then conversations begin to happen where things are called out of them and confidence grows and family is modeled to them. Not just nuclear family, but the family of God is modeled to them. And so if you have the opportunity and you're in the other end, end of the life stage or age group to be looking for people who are arriving at college or arriving into your church and neighborhood, and it doesn't just stop at college age. I think this is because of the way the world works at the moment. There's lots of people in their mid, late 20s, young, even early to mid-30s, who are craving this attention of spiritual parents just to hang out.

[JD Walt]

I know you're working on another book on spiritual parenting and just make talk about that. What does that mean? Because we're kind of in a moment where a lot of people are like, well, I never really had that in my life. How do I become that? How do I be a first generation spiritual parent? I don't know what that means. What is it?

[Rich Wilson]

Well, the picture I have is I do believe we are in times of awakening. And it's for the whole church. It's not just for the young. There's an awakening going on across the board. And the picture I have is that the church, the local church, is this storehouse of treasure. It's got this precious treasure in there. It's got gold, it's got gems, it's got precious stones, it's got seed, it's full to overflowing. But it doesn't understand the wealth it possesses. And so spiritual parenting is to begin to own what you carry and at times to excavate it. So some of the treasure in you and me is still a bit buried, and God wants to do a work to excavate it, that we haven't gone through the things we've gone through for nothing. Actually, again, God draws a bigger circle around all our circumstances, all our situations. And if we allow him, he will begin to reveal a whole load of things about who he is, his character, things that the next generation will surely go through. Through. And it's not that we share our wisdom verbally a lot of the time, but we inhabit that space of having journeyed through some things. So when these young adults come and hang out, they feel it, they feel a security, they feel a wisdom. They encounter something, and that's spiritual parenting. And then at times it comes out in our conversation. And a whole generation of elders, I believe, are waiting to be released into this ministry to give themselves away.

[JD Walt]

That's so right. It's. People think, well, I don't.

[Rich Wilson]

I don't.

[JD Walt]

I don't know the Bible. I don't know how to do this. I'm like, that's not even the question. You. You show up and the Lord moves in the. Like you said, it really is a lot of listening, and it's probably a lot more listening than it is even talking. Like that is so rare. I remember another relationship that I had in college with a man who. He had been a friend of my family's. I'd never met him before, but he just invited me out for coffee one day. And I mean, that's been 40 years ago. And do you know that still I call him or he calls me every week.

[Rich Wilson]

This man. Wow.

[JD Walt]

And. And this man is a doctor. He's been a surgeon. He's retired now. And we have just had a. We have walked through life together. I will. Will be up in his town at the end of this month, and I'll go stay in their home. And that this is where it started in college. And so college, that's what I want these students to hear, and I want parents to hear and grandparents to hear. Sometimes you can just go to college and just get sort of trapped in the college itself. And you're just with people all your age, which is fine. That's a good thing. But this is the beauty. And a campus ministry is a good thing. But again, you're just around people of your generation. This is why the church is so important, and that's what you've given your whole vocation to, is helping local churches. Fusion. Talk about Fusion, what it is.

[Rich Wilson]

Well, our mission is to help students find hope in Jesus and home in local church. And those two things are very, very much interconnected. I remember sitting in a student room, I just graduated, and I felt God speak to me about students. But before he spoke to me about students, he spoke to me about the church. I'd stumbled. I'd been in church my whole life, but I'd not always got on with it. And then I discovered this group of people in Loughborough, and I thought. I didn't know church could be like this. It was relational. We met in a home and we talked about things that mattered. And I thought, I can give my life to this. I can give my life to this. And so really, the calling to church came before the calling to students. I just thought, what's the most strategic way to build the church? Well, it's gotta be a whole load of young people. It's gotta be the universities. And so thinking, well, that would be potent. What if the church and the universities collided? What if something got awoken in both groups? Because like we said, campus ministries have served us really well, but the local church has been sleeping, and the very group that the students need have kind of delegated it to others. And so really, Fusion sought to bridge that gap a little bit or a lot, and to encourage leaders, anyone in local church, to think about, well, if you're within 5, 10 miles of a campus or a college, you've probably got a role to play. And you, well, we kind of need you to play it. There's a whole generation coming through your town and city by the thousands, and they're asking questions that you have some answers to. And so Fusion is looking still to encourage local churches to think about the role that they must play with college students and to give them some tools and resources. But it starts with a heart. It starts with a sense of, oh, hang on a minute, we actually have got a role to play. We can't just delegate this and then everybody wins.

[JD Walt]

No, this is an invitation to wake up to a church. And a lot of churches, they're doing what they do, and they don't really know what to do. What do they do? How can they connect with this? You're talking to pastors now, or you're talking about people in leadership, in big church, little church, all kinds of churches.

[Rich Wilson]

It starts small. It starts with what you've got. You know, who is there in the church who has a heart for young adults. And it might be one or two people, but those two people can begin something. We recommend that people start looking around, that they look around the campus. They spend some time walking and praying and asking God to open their eyes. They spend some time having conversations with young adults. If there's a bit more resource, if there's a cohort of young adults already, then it's encouraging them and actually creating some space for them to lead and to mandate them and to say, well, you know what, we'll back you, we'll support you, will provide some resources, some finance for you to reach out to your friends. But, yeah, the important thing is it starts with a sense of conviction. We must do something. And I've had that conversation hundreds of times. The good news is it's a conversation that God loves and I feel he's instigating a lot of the time. And so if you are close to a university college, there will be some next steps. There's probably some common ones in terms of opening our eyes, trying to mobilize those within our church to start something to open up homes. But there's always some next steps. And the team in the Fusion in the us, the Fusion in the UK are available, I want to say, night and day, to have that conversation specifically for your context.

[JD Walt]

Yeah, I remember when I was myself in college and I remember a pastor, he was speaking to us, just a small group, and he said, you're going to make the three most critical choices in your entire life over these next few years. He said, you're going to decide on a mission for your life. You're going to decide on a master, who will be your master, and you're going to decide or move toward deciding on a mate. And I've never, I, I was just riveted by that. Like these years of, you know, 18 to, as you say, can be 25, 6, up to 30, they're so critical and students can so easily get isolated and actually become prisoners of their own generation. And so it's, it's in the students. They don't know who to reach out to, that they don't know how to get beyond that. This is to the church. And I don't mean the church as an organization or an institution, but like all the people in the church, like, wake up and ask God, I'm. We're not trying to give you something to do. We're trying to say, would you ask the Lord to bring to you, open your heart to the young and be Ready when they come. Yeah.

[Rich Wilson]

When.

[JD Walt]

When you see them be. I don't know. Am I making sense?

[Rich Wilson]

You're making sense to me. And, and I think heaven has got all these invitations going out at the moment, and I think they're dropping on people's doorsteps. And it's not a, it's not a mail shot. These are specific. There's a whole load of assignments to, to get involved in this work of crossing generations and making yourself available. I'm, I'm convinced of it, JD I'm banking on the next 20 years, if I'm being really honest on this agenda of the generations coming together, and particularly those who've been around for a while, responding with everything they've got. And the good news is I'm beginning to see it. I'm beginning to see what happens. As you've described at an increasing level of some young adults who are either been around faith for a while or they're brand new to faith and they're connecting with someone who's maybe semi retired or just retired. And wow, what a blessing it is both ways.

[JD Walt]

Yeah. Do you know, Rich, I remember, I'm having all kind of remembering right now. When I was in college, this older lady who was from my hometown that I had known growing up, she had always tried to encourage my faith. When I went away to college, you know what she did? She started writing me. She would, she would have trouble getting to sleep and she would, she would write me letters like late in the night and mail them to me. I still have those letters. This, this is a, this is a person who said, here am I. And that's the thing. You know what? We're not asking people to, to volunteer for this program or that program. We're asking them to talk to the Lord and say, I'm here. I don't know what I got, but what I got, I have treasure. I know that. And I'm talking directly to you, Jesus. Would you open my eyes and ears and heart? And that's what she, she did that. And I have a trove of letters that I'm like, wow, that, that impacted me and I'll never forget it.

[Rich Wilson]

I mean, that is, that's huge. And for that lady, she was probably just being herself.

[JD Walt]

Yes, 100%.

[Rich Wilson]

And in many ways quite an ordinary lady, I'm guessing. Yes. But had an extraordinary impact. And I think this is part of the messaging at the moment is I do believe the enemy would want to say, just take it easy. You know, let the younger generation just do it, or you know, or you know, you're not quite as relevant as you used to be, so maybe just take a step back. And I do think there's a lot of obstacles and lies that we just need to dismantle or find a way round, because nothing could be further than from the truth. All the days ordained for you are written in my book. That means if you're still alive, your life is full of divine purpose. And some of that might just be beginning.

[JD Walt]

Now. You can plant seeds today that years after you're in the balcony, you're. You're in the great cloud of Witnesses. Those.

[Rich Wilson]

Those.

[JD Walt]

They will be. Those seeds will have become trees. You know, I was with my. My youngest son, Sam, where he lives, a few weeks ago, and he went out and got his mail. And he comes back in. He's opening his mail because I count Sam, even though he doesn't live. Where I live, of course, is one of our 16. And there was a letter from Ms. Thelma from our church. And she had written just a little note to him and put $5 in the envelope. And he's like, dad, and. And I'm sitting over there probably watching the news, and all of a sudden I hear Sam on the phone. He has called Ms. Thelma, and he's thanking her. So proud of him. And. And then I got back home and I talked to Ms. Thelma, and she said, oh, yeah, I wrote all 16 of them and sent them all $5. What a blessing. See, that's Ms. That's Ms. Betty Jane, the lady from my youth who.

[Rich Wilson]

Incredible.

[JD Walt]

I just think, what if our students just began to be salted and peppered.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah.

[JD Walt]

With this kind of encouragement.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah. And maybe just as people are listening, who is it that they maybe need to send a message to?

[JD Walt]

Yes, it matters.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah. Yeah.

[JD Walt]

It matters. Well, Rich, just a couple things here. I mean, I'd love just. You know, we're about to be releasing. You've written a book, and it's been widely released in the uk and our little company has picked it up and we're going to release it in the United States. Is. Tell us about a Call Less Ordinary.

[Rich Wilson]

Yes, indeed. Yeah. Call Less Ordinary. Why your purpose Matters. And it is a book about calling. The title is maybe a little bit cryptic, but it's designed to create some curiosity around your calling. And I always thought I wouldn't write a book before I turned 50. I didn't think I'd have enough to say, but this began to bubble up in me. Having work with students for 25 years I just felt I had something to say, particularly to them. But as it turns out, it's a bit of a rites of passage book because it kind of lays out some traps. You won't have faced all this, but you will certainly face it down the line. And so I found as young adults of Reddit, there's been a sense of I've touched some of these things, but it gives me a bit of a roadmap for how I might make decisions when I face some other things. And then as the older generation have read it, they've been like, oh, yeah, I've been down that road. Yeah, that's how you respond to God when you go down some of these harder, harder tracks. So I've tried to talk about what does it mean to pursue the call of God through life's ups and downs, when life is challenging, when life runs through its seasons. I start off early on talking about calling being a bit like seasons, you know, spring, summer, autumn, winter. We like spring because things begin to grow and bubble up and there's possibility. We love summer. We want to live in summer. That's where there's an abundance. There's all kinds of warmth and fruit beginning to budden the trees. We want to live in summer. But summer also has some jeopardy to it because we can sit back and take things a little bit easy. And we know it's not long before the seasons change and autumn might come along and some things begin to die and the trees put on a show and it looks good, but it can feel a bit threatening. We know things are going to go into the ground. And then winter, we don't like winter. Winter's hard. There's no sign of real life. Things are hidden and underground. But we're trusting. We're trusting that God is still working and moving and that's kind of calling. We go through these seasons and they don't follow on in our lives like they might do in nature, but we find ourselves cycling between seasons. So how do we pursue God? Well, how do we so. Well, both in summer and winter.

[JD Walt]

I wonder, Rich and this. I'm just gonna let you say what you want to say about this, but I was praying about this and I actually had this thought before you even. I didn't know you were going to go into those seasons right there. But no, did I Today I just had the thought. I'm like, Rich knows a lot about winter. Talk to us about winter. Anything you want to say about that? Because there are people listening to this who are living in winter.

[Rich Wilson]

Well, winter is not what we're made for. So it feels like it grates. Because the circumstances in our lives are often far from what we want them to be. And because the circumstances are not what we want them to be, the feelings are often not what we want them to be. Life as we imagined has not turned out as we wanted it to. And so we enter these winters where I think new questions emerge, difficult questions that test our faith. That means we have to revisit Scripture and go, what does this mean in the light of what I'm feeling and experiencing? Because I had an opinion, but now that opinion cost me something, so I'm having to dig a little bit deeper. And, yeah, I feel like I've been in a few hard, hard winters, particularly with grief, particularly with losing loved ones. They're not the only winters, but they have been the really, really difficult ones. When I imagined my future looking like this, and then suddenly it went like this. And how do we navigate that? And what does that do to calling? What does that do to our sense of purpose when our feelings change? And I do think this is the hardest, but also the richest time. I think it's the time where God is closest, even though he might feel like he's furthest, and he's actually doing the deepest work in our lives. And we think it's easy to think it's just about our lives now, but the work he's doing has this eternal resonance to it. And so there's opportunity for us to discover things in God in winter that we can't possibly discover in any other season. And sometimes we have to do it in reflection. Sometimes in the moment, it's just too difficult. And it's just, God, get me out of here. But in his grace and kindness, when we're in spring or summer, he'll gently help us revisit that winter and go, you know what? There's some treasure left in the ground there, and it's for you, and I want you to have it. Because nothing was wasted. Even though it seemed like everything was wasted at that moment, actually nothing was wasted. The divine hand was over your life, shaping you, molding you. And if we ourselves need to work on that perspective, because we need that healing for ourselves, we need to know that, well, if there's purpose and meaning in Christ's suffering, then there's purpose and meaning in our suffering, it's only because of the cross we can make sense of our winters. And therefore, as elders, as spiritual parents, we've got to do this work. We've got to do it for the sake of ourselves. We owe it to ourselves. We owe it to God. He's bled and died. That we don't just kind of skim over it and cope and medicate our way through the rest of life. We owe it to ourselves. We owe it to God. But we also owe it to the generation coming through. Because when we have that treasure, there's not a scarcity mentality with it. We get to give it away again and again and again to strengthen them for their journey. And so the winters are the hardest season, but they are also the season that have the most impact is where the roots go down deepest. And I think ultimately it causes the fruit to be most abundant.

[JD Walt]

Yeah, that's well put, Rich. You know, you and I, we've helped each other through winters that we have both been through that have been just devastating. And, you know, I think about, and I've written about this last fall when those guys are walking down the road to Emmaus and Jesus just comes up alongside them and he asks him, like, what. What are y' all talking about? And they say, well, where have you been? Do you not know? They didn't recognize him. And they were starting to tell Jesus about himself. And then these words that they said, they just. They just sit. They just sit with me and they sting me and then they comfort me. But the words are, we had hoped. We had hoped that he would do this or do that. And I think that's really what. What winter is, is coming to the place. And for me, it's almost like I just came to realize that I had hoped my hope was anchored in a particular outcome that didn't happen like I wanted it to happen. And so my hope in the outcome was crushed and. And my hope had to be rebuilt in Jesus himself. And I don't know, does that resonate with you?

[Rich Wilson]

Oh, yes. Yeah. And it's the same with trust as well. It's a similar thing, isn't it? I remember walking around this field that I've walked around hundreds of times. And it was when my daughter was basically being given a terminal diagnosis, my 13 year old. And I'm walking around this field having this conversation with God and he's not really saying very much, but I heard him say this. He said, trust me. And I knew I wasn't trusting him for an outcome. I desperately wanted a particular outcome. But he was saying, trust me. And then we have to zoom out because we know we're going to find ourselves with him very soon. It's not long. Now JD's very soon we're going to find ourselves with him because he's coming quickly, he's coming soon. And I knew the trust was in a much bigger agenda that I can barely comprehend. And in the short term, it was gonna be painful to trust. But it's like, Simon Peter, where else do you go?

[JD Walt]

It's. Yeah, I mean, my hope was in my hope. And he's like, no. I mean, yes, but no. Yeah, yes, but your hope. This. There's a re. Anchoring of hope beyond our hopes. Right. There's our hopes. I guess I'm saying we all have them.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah.

[JD Walt]

And then there is our hope. Sometimes those things coincide, but many times they don't.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah.

[JD Walt]

And that's winter.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah.

[JD Walt]

When they don't and it's almost like. And really what happened on that road, it's. He just starts opening up God's word to them. He rebuilt their faith. Jesus rebuilt their faith, didn't he?

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah.

[JD Walt]

He shows them himself in all of these situations throughout Scripture. And at the end of the day, they're like, man, did our. Did our hearts not burn? Has he opened the. The Bible to us? That's what an elder can do with a younger.

[Rich Wilson]

That's right.

[JD Walt]

You know, they can earn that place in their life and then they can begin to help open. And that's what Jesus does through elders with youngers. He and the younger's like, man, did our hearts not burn within us? That was something there. That was, that was Jesus. That was an. A person in an older generation just saying, you know what? I'm just going to show up here. I don't. I'm not the expert, I'm not the Bible teacher, I'm not the theologian, but I'm gonna show up here and be present to God and present to this student, to the, to these students, and trust God to see what happens.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah, man.

[JD Walt]

We need that, Rich. We need that so much. I want to be that man.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah. Yeah. I think you are that jd and I call more of it out of you. Come on.

[JD Walt]

Well, I'm looking forward to your next work. That's. That's going to be coming out. It's really on spiritual parenting.

[Rich Wilson]

It is proper.

[JD Walt]

Say a word about that. And.

[Rich Wilson]

Well, I'm looking forward to it coming out because it means it will be out. It's two and a half years of a God assignment. It was, it was provoked at New Room two and a half years ago. And I had a little word with you afterwards. And I said to you, I think I need to write on this. And you probably heard that a few times, but it went deep. And I feel like I've been living that message ever since. I've been living it in quite extreme ways ever since and trying to articulate something of what I believe is in God's heart for his family. And we start modeling his family this side of heaven in a way that maybe we. We shy away from because we're going to inherit something the other side of heaven that is going to be so glorious. And, yeah, it is about the generations coming together, and it is about an invitation from heaven at this time to mobilize and to encourage right across the generations.

[JD Walt]

I remember. I remember like you were. You tell the story. You told me the story about your brother who had a terminal diagnosis. And he knows he's. He's got. It's going to get him.

[Rich Wilson]

Yes.

[JD Walt]

And he comes and he has children.

[Rich Wilson]

Yes.

[JD Walt]

And what did he say to you?

[Rich Wilson]

He's got three children, three girls. They're five, seven, and nine. And it was at Christmas time, and I knew it was gonna be the last Christmas I was with him. And we had a number of deep conversations. And he shared about how he's committing his children into his father's hands. But he also said, and, Rich, I want you to play a role as well, if you can provide some fathering to them. And I said, I'll try. And the beautiful thing, JD is I have been trying. I'm not sure I've got it all right. But I took them to their first football game last Saturday. I took them to see Manchester City play, and it was just me and the three girls, and they're now 13, 12, and 9. And because Manchester City are a community club, they put on a little special thing for the girls. So they gave them a shirt each, and they had their photos taken with the players on the pitch before the game. And I was emotional because it was lots more going on for me than for them. They just had a great day. But it was. It was part of fulfilling that vow. And, you know, that's an ongoing.

[JD Walt]

Oh, Rich. Well, you know, I just think about, like. I mean, I think about my children, and I think, oh, my gosh, I failed my kids. I need help. I need other people to help me with my own children. And I'm praying for God. I mean, I'm praying for God to raise up spiritual parents.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah.

[JD Walt]

A bevy of them to just. And I've. It's so. It's hard to come by. We've got to wake up people. We've got to help other people with their kids. We've got to start showing up and taking risks and just going up. I mean, Gen Z, they're coming to church more than any generation right now and they need to be met there just by ordinary people who will step up and introduce themselves and say, you got lunch plans today? How about we treat you to lunch and bring some friends? And that's how it starts.

[Rich Wilson]

Absolutely, absolutely. And the message there is again, God uses it or we might not feel like we got it all right with our kids. They might not even be walking with God. But that doesn't mean you're disqualified. If anything, it means you're qualified in a different way and there's a new opportunity. You know, we have Eli in scripture, he was a terrible father, but then he gets given Samuel.

[JD Walt]

Samuel. That's a great story.

[Rich Wilson]

There's new opportunities, second chances, third chances.

[JD Walt]

Yeah, yeah. Okay. Well, I feel like this has been a God ordained conversation we've had and we have been able to just open up some windows and hopefully encourage a lot of different people from college students to grandparents. And I hope you'll take a look at Rich's book, A Call Less Ordinary. We'll put the link in this. I want you to take a look at Fusion. Fusion is, they were started in the UK, what, 25 years ago. Rich started it. Fusion is this ministry that is about helping local churches connect with college students. And Seedbed, we publish a number of those resources. I'd love you to take a look at that. You can go to seebed.com and find all that. You can go to Fusion and find it there. And then of course, Rich has got this book on spiritual parenting that'll be coming out that'll probably be months away. But this is, it's right on time. You know, there's, there's nothing so powerful as an idea whose time has come again. And, and that's a lot of what we're talking about today. So thank you for, for staying up a little bit later over there. You're, you're, I don't know, five, six hours later than.

[Rich Wilson]

Yeah, it's okay. And.

[JD Walt]

Yeah, we appreciate all that you're, that you've done and that you're doing and we thank you for just opening up with some of your story. That's going to be a deep encouragement to a lot of people. And I want to thank everybody for listening to this conversation, this wake up call conversation. I've been so encouraged by it. And, and we will see you on the field.