Weekly sermons from our Central Lutheran Church preaching team plus quick reflections from Pastor Ryan Braley.
Real talk, ancient wisdom, and honest questions — all designed to help you learn, grow, and find encouragement when you need it most.
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Two questions can expose how much of your life is choice and how much is drift: “Who are you?” and “What are you doing here?” We celebrate a milestone episode by telling a story about a rabbi who gets lost in thought, runs into a Roman garrison, and hears those questions shouted from above. What starts as a funny moment turns into a serious invitation to examine identity, purpose, and calling.
From there, we name the pressure many of us feel in modern Western culture to follow a pre written path: school, credentials, career, money, then happiness. It is easy to get swept into that current without ever asking if it fits who we really are. We slow down and challenge the assumption that success automatically produces meaning, and we talk honestly about how long it often takes to discover vocation, especially in your late teens and twenties. Sometimes you have to try on roles that are not you before you can recognize what is.
We close with a practical spiritual tool for discernment from Saint Ignatius: the Ignatian Examen. In five minutes before bed, you review your day and write down what was most life giving and what you were least grateful for. Do it over time and the patterns can point to what brings you alive, where you feel love and connection, and what consistently pulls you off center.
If this gave you something to think about, subscribe, share the show with a friend, and leave a review so more people can find it. What is one moment this week that made you come alive?
Hey everyone, it's Olivia here, self-appointed executive producer of the Reflections Podcast. And since Pastor Ryan is away on sabbatical this summer, I'm pretty sure I have the power to make that title official. So, until he gets back, we're re-releasing some of our most popular episodes so far. After all, an old message sometimes hits differently in a new season. I hope that is true for you today. Enjoy.
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What is up, everybody? Hey, this is Ryan, and welcome to uh uh episode 100.
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Woo-hoo!
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I'm in the house with Olivia. We're in the we're in Mike's Beats Laboratory. Mike isn't here, but Olivia and I are here. And this is episode 100. Let's celebrate. So I don't know if you're listening to this today, when you jumped onto the well, hopefully you're on the bandwagon. When you jumped onto the uh um awaken. Wait, what? No, reflections. Good grief. I do a weekly email to the congregation called Awaken, but this is Reflections. I don't know when you jumped on the bandwagon, but we're we're glad you're here. Welcome. And this is episode 100. So whatever you do to celebrate, celebrate today. Uh give yourself a high five, do it, dance a jig, have a drink, whatever you gotta do, do it. And I wanted to share this story. This is one of my favorite stories. Um I've taught at several places around, you know, uh, I guess Minnesota and Denver and the U.S. and and uh taught a couple of classes in theology at universities that teach at a seminary, and I often will open with this story. And here
it is. There is a story about this uh this rabbi who's walking home one night, and on his way home, he's deep in thought and he gets lost and he he takes a left when he should have gone right, doesn't realize that he's gone the wrong direction because he's so deep in thought. And this rabbi suddenly comes across this, comes upon this Roman garrison, this Roman uh fortress, and he hears somebody call down from the top of this Roman fortress and say, Hey, who are you and what are you doing here? And the rabbi looks up and he goes, What'd you say to me? And the guard up on top of the garrison says, I said, Who are you and what are you doing here? And the rabbi says, Oh, let me ask you a question. How much are they paying you to be up on top of that garrison and yell down those two questions? Who are you and what are you doing here? And the guard is sort of caught off. He's like, uh uh, two denarius a week a week, or whatever. And the rabbi's like, hey, I'll pay you double that to come over to my house every morning and ask me those two questions. Who are you and what are you doing here?
So I don't want to ask you, uh, listener, who are you and what are you doing here? You know, the culture that we live in, if you live, especially the the modern Western culture that I'm most familiar with, will generally uh work to push you in a certain direction. You probably feel it. Um if you're maybe super young, maybe not yet, but the older you get, you've got to recognize that there is this like a stream that's moving a million miles an hour that pushes us to go in a certain direction, to value certain things, to be and behave in certain ways that we just adopt without even asking why or what's going on. It's sort of like the matrix, you know what I mean. I remember when I was like when I was younger, I just remember thinking, you know, I get up and go to school every day. And why? Well, uh, to get good grades. I'm like, well, why am I doing that? Well, I'm like, okay, if to get into a good college. Well, why? Well, to get a good job eventually one day. Well, why would I why would I why would I care about that? Well, to make money. Well, why? Why don't I make more money? Well, so you can be happy. And then it's like, yeah, that was kind of the end of it. I'm like, okay, so every day I get up to go to school, do my homework, and so I can get good grades, so I can go to a good college, so I can get a good job, so I can make more money, and then ultimately, I guess that'll be what makes me happy. And uh now, of course, there's value in just doing the thing because you take pride in it. But when you're a kid, you almost I felt like I ingested this pathway, like this is where I'm going, and I'm going there no matter what. But then I'm asking, is that is that what will make me happy? And are are we as a culture, are we happy? Like, are we a bunch of happy people? Because we're all trying to chase this thing, or all in this stream that's moving a thousand miles an hour, and are we happy? And I don't know, the longer I live, the I know the culture will do its best to co-opt us and and and our well-being to fit into the certain mold and direction. And it's easier for us to just get in and go along. It's harder to fight against the stream, but who are you? Like, who are you? And what are you doing here? And maybe it's this very specific pathway that it seems like everybody's on, but maybe it's not. Maybe it's something different. I mean, it doesn't really matter at the end of the day what other people are doing. That's not you. There's this great saying that uh one of the rabbis said, Hey, when I go to heaven, God won't ask me, Hey, why weren't you Moses? Instead, God'll ask you, why weren't you you? So for me, it might God might be like, Oh, well, God won't ask me, Why weren't you such and such good, you know, preacher or good pastor? Why weren't you that guy? God'll ask me, Ryan, why weren't you Ryan? Yeah, why weren't you you? How can I be me unless I know who I am? Like, who who are you and what are you doing here? Now this takes time to figure out, of course. I I love talking to high school kids when they're graduating because they're right on the tipping point there of like having ingested this message of like, hey, go to school, work hard, so that you can then go to college, so that you can get a good job, so you can make money, so you can be happy, you know what I mean? And they're right, some of them are like right about to go into college and they realize that, well, maybe college isn't for me, or I don't want to go to the college my parents want me to go to, or I don't want that job that my parents want me to have, or that the culture tells me I should have. And and so I I say to them, listen, you you how could you know what you what you want and who you are and what you're doing here? You're only 18. Maybe you know, but a lot of them don't know because they're only 18, and that's okay. Because it takes time to figure out who you are and what you're doing here. And so if you know and have a sense, yeah, go to go to whatever your plan is. If you're like, I'm gonna go be an electrician, okay, great. Or I'm gonna go to this college and study law, great. Um, but don't be surprised either if you get in there and you're like, I don't think this is for me. That's hat that happens in many ways. I think it takes a long, a good decade for many of us in our 20s to like figure out what I'm doing, what I'm good at, where I want to go, what I feel like a sense of calling to, and who I am and what I'm doing here. And you might have to in that time, when you're younger, you might have to kind of enter into places that really aren't you, and you don't even know it yet. Or you have to try on clothes that aren't really yours, and so you can know what you're doing and what you want and where you're going and what you feel like you're called to do, and how you can make this world a better place and contribute and be a part of the mission of God of renewing the world.
Now, here's a practice though I want to give you, and I'm gonna get out of your hair and wish you all a happy hundredth episode. But there's this great practice, it goes back to this guy named Saint Ignatius. It's a form of the Ignation examine. And you can Google that. If it means nothing to you, then don't worry about it. But but it's a way of at the end of every day, and if you did this for like, I think three months and took notes, I think you would find some very fascinating things. But this is one of the ways you can find out who you are and what you're doing here. So here's the here's what you can do. Every night before bed, take about five minutes and you know, kind of enter into this time of reflection and and quiet, and you you can give thanks to God for all the things in your life that happened that day, good, you know, the the big and small gifts you received, and the moments of beauty and and wonder and awe and all that kind of thing. And then examine your day, like go over your day, like almost every moment from the time you woke up through to breakfast to lunch, and then who you met with. And did you go out for a coffee? Did you work out at the gym? Did you go play whatever disc golf? And then you came home and met with your kids, you know, go over all those things and ask yourself two questions. And the first one is hey, what did you do today that was life-giving? Um, what you could phrase it like this what did you do today that if you had to relive this day over, you'd do that moment again? Or you could say it like this, what in today's day, what are you the most grateful for? Like what made you come alive today? Not maybe it's like, oh, I got a free car. That'd be awesome. But but but write it down, whatever it is. It doesn't matter how shallow or deep it might seem, but just write it down. And like, I mean, like, what was the most life giving, or you felt like you were able to give and receive love, or you felt like you were living in tune with who you really are, and you just felt life-giving, it felt fun and incredibly connected, and all those kinds of things. The second question is what in your day are you the least grateful for? So just the converse question, like what what did you do today that felt you felt disconnected, or where did you feel like you couldn't give or receive love, or you felt like you you you weren't really yourself, or you just you're you weren't grateful for that moment. It felt like there was something just kind of off, you were off of center, and write that down as well. And then do this for three months, I would say, and then and what and you don't have to do it every single night, but I think I'd encourage you to do that and watch what happens. My guess is the things that bring you life, you'll start to see a trend. Like, oh, these are the same three, two, three things that keep bringing me life. You know, like for me, I did this for a long time, for about a year, and I noticed whenever I would hang out with people and when I would talk about God, and this is a true story, I'm like, those always brought me life. And like, here I am, I'm I'm a pastor. Like, there's something about my life. I'm sort of wired, I think, internally to like be with people and to encourage them and to talk about deep things about God and and uh and faith and life and meaning. And I I love doing that. And then, you know, on the flip side, the things that kind of drain life, you can address those as well. But do it over the course of a large chunk of time and see what it is and what those things are, and that might give you some clues about who you are and what you're doing
here. So, friends, for our 100th anniversary of Reflections Podcast, it's been a good ride, Olivia. It's been fun having you here the last month, a couple weeks. But uh, I want to ask you this question, uh these two again. Who are you and what are you doing here? All right, love you guys. Peace. Hey, if you enjoy this show, I'd love to have you share it with some friends. And don't forget you are always welcome to join us in person at Central in Elk River at 8 30, which is our liturgical gathering, or at 10 o'clock, our modern gathering. Or you can check us out online at clcelkriver.org. Peace.
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