Seminary Dropout 107: Deidra Riggs on Women of Color Writers, The Church, and More!

...Guest Hosted by Grace Sandra

DeidraRiggs

Deidra Riggs is an influential blogger at her own blog, JumpingTandem, as well as DaySpring’s (in)courage and TheHighCalling.org, for which she is managing editor. She has been a speaker for TEDx and has organized her own women’s retreat, hosting speakers like Lisa-Jo Baker, Holley Gerth, and many more. She and her husband have two adult children and live in Lincoln, Nebraska. Learn more at deidrariggs.com

Everyone has had that moment–we see a need in our church, our school, our neighborhood, our family, or our world and we think, Someone really should get to work on that, never imagining that we might be the answer to that need. We don’t have the time, the expertise, the money. We’ve got careers to manage, bills to pay, meals to prepare, and families to attend to. Besides, who are we to think we can change the world?

In this encouraging and empowering book, Deidra Riggs calls readers to accept God’s invitation to join him in making a difference right where they are, regardless of their current life stage. She shows readers that they were created with a purpose and with the capacities to fulfill that purpose. And she reminds them that it’s not up to us to fix the world, but it is up to us to join God–and the rest of his people–in his redemptive work. For when God calls and we look over our shoulder and answer, “Who, me?” God always emphatically answers, “Yes, you.” – From the Publisher


Interested in advertising on Seminary Dropout? For rates and information contact me at shane@shaneblackshear.com.


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If you liked this episode then you might also like…

Seminary Dropout 96: Jen Hatmaker, America’s BFF Talks about Aging, Raising Kids, & Jesus in Her New Book ‘For the Love’

Seminary Dropout 100: Jo Saxton on Post-Christiandom, Discipleship, and Being a Woman of Color in Church Leadership


 

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Seminary Dropout 106: Patricia Raybon & Alana Raybon

...Guest Hosted by Grace Sandra

This is the second episode guest hosted by Grace Sandraraybon

 

Patricia Raybon is the award-winning author of I Told the Mountain to Move, a 2006 Book of the Year finalist in Christianity Today magazine’s annual book awards competition; and My First White Friend, her racial forgiveness memoir that won the Christopher Award. She is also author of the One Year® devotional, God’s Great Blessings. A journalist by training, Patricia has written essays on family and faith, which have been published in the New York Times Sunday Magazine,Newsweek, Chicago Tribune, USA Today, USA Weekend, and In Touch of In Touch Ministries; and aired on National Public Radio. She is also a regular contributor to Today’s Christian Woman online magazine.

With degrees in journalism from Ohio State University and the University of Colorado at Boulder, Patricia worked a dozen years as a newspaper journalist for the Denver Post and the Rocky Mountain News. She later joined the journalism faculty at the University of Colorado at Boulder, where for fifteen years she taught print journalism. Patricia now writes full-time on “mountain-moving faith.”

Patricia and her husband, Dan, are longtime residents of Colorado and have two grown daughters and five grandchildren. Founder of the Writing Ministry at her Denver church, Patricia coaches and encourages aspiring authors around the country and is a member of the Colorado Authors League and the Authors Guild.

Alana Raybon is a seasoned elementary- and middle-school educator. During the past ten years, she has served as a third-to-seventh-grade lead teacher to a diverse population in Texas and more recently in Tennessee. She has been a mentor to new and student teachers, an advisor to a school’s accreditation process, a tutor, and a member of various school-related committees. Alana and her husband parent their three young children and a teenage stepson. She was featured with her mother in a May 2011 Mother’s Day reflection in Glamour magazine.

 

“Mom, I have something I need to tell you…”

They didn’t talk.  Not for ten years.  Not about faith anyway.  Instead, a mother and daughter tiptoed with pain around the deepest gulf in their lives – the daughter’s choice to leave the church, convert to Islam and become a practicing Muslim.  Undivided is a real-time story of healing and understanding with alternating narratives from each as they struggle to learn how to love each other in a whole new way.

Written with rare honesty and striking transparency, Undivided opens a door on the lives of an American Islamic convert, Alana Raybon, a dedicated educator, and her devout Christian mother, Patricia Raybon, an award-winning author, as they struggle to reconcile and heal their family divided by faith.

An important work for parents whose adult children have left the family’s belief system, it will help those same children as they wrestle to better understand their parents.

For anyone troubled by the broader tensions between Islam and the West, this personal story distills this friction into the context of a family relationship–a journey all the more fascinating.  While a conversation is desperately needed in America between Christians and Muslims, Undivided offers a real-time conversation to follow.

Undivided is a tremendously important book for our time.  Will Patricia be able to fully trust in the Christ who “holds all things together?”

Will Alana’s love for God cause her to become an outcast to her family–or provide a path that leads her back home?  And can they answer the question that both want desperately to experience: “Can we make our torn family whole again?” -From the Publisher

 


Interested in advertising on Seminary Dropout? For rates and information contact me at shane@shaneblackshear.com.


podcastingforeveryone

Want to start a podcast but don’t know how?! My e-course will teach you everything you need to know. To get a free lesson and register click here. Use promo code SEMINARYDROPOUT to get 25% off.


If you liked this episode then you might also like…

Seminary Dropout 61: Carl Medearis on Israel, Isis and Tea with Hezbollah

Seminary Dropout 71: Natasha Sistrunk Robinson on Jesus, Leadership, and Race


 

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Best of Seminary Dropout: Grace Sandra

 

grace

Back in 2013 I had the pleasure of meeting and interviewing writer, blogger, and speaker Grace Sandra.

In the interview we talk about the concept of privilege and racial reconciliation in light of the Gospel. Look to hear more from Grace on Seminary Dropout soon!

Mentioned on the podcast:

Grace’s Blog:
gracesandra.com

Books:
More Than Equals: Racial Healing for the Sake of the Gospel

Being White: Finding Our Place in a Multiethnic World

Outliers

 


Interested in advertising on Seminary Dropout? For rates and information contact me at shane@shaneblackshear.com


podcastingforeveryone

Want to start a podcast but don’t know how?! My e-course will teach you everything you need to know. To get a free lesson and register click here. Use promo code SEMINARYDROPOUT to get 25% off.


If you liked this episode then you might also like…

Seminary Dropout 98: Efrem Smith of World Impact Talks About A Diverse Church and #BLACKLIVESMATTER

Seminary Dropout 89: Carolyn Custis James, Author of Malestrom: Manhood Swept Into the Currents of a Changing World


 

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