MTP 42: Host Interview! Part 2, Shane & Spence, Why they love professors and believe God will use professors

A heartfelt conversation between Shane Hartley and Spence Hackney about their motivation to interview Christian professors, the importance of intergenerational influence, advice for college graduates and for parents, and encouragement to Christian professors to be open about their faith.

Takeaways:

• The importance of generational spiritual influence 
• How students can influence professors 
• Advice for young adults about adding value
• How parents maintain communication with straying college students 

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Transcript

Shane Hartley (00:00.28)
Hey everyone, my name is Shane and my friends Spence Hackney and I interview Christian professors with questions we get from college students. And our goal is to encourage Christ-centered conversations on the college campus. And we're so glad you're here. Welcome to Meet the Prof. And this is part two of our special episodes where Spence and I are interviewing each other. We wanted you to hear some of what God's been doing in our lives.

and how he's put on our hearts to even do this podcast. And so before we jump in, if you would please take a moment and click subscribe or follow or like wherever you're listening or following this, it doesn't cost anything. well, let's jump in. Here's part two of our interviews with each other. What's what's what's the Bible verse that means something to you? Let's talk about this. Yeah. So I know immediately the one it is Psalm 145.

verse four, and this is a verse that gives me confidence that God wants to use these professors to speak into students' lives about Jesus, have any kind of influence. And it says, one generation shall commend your works to another and shall declare your mighty acts. So there it is. I just think professor generation, one generation. Yeah.

And there's a twist on that too, like the immediate kind of applications like, Lord, you want to use these professors to speak into younger generations about your work in our lives. But I know that the students have a lot to offer for the professors too. when says one generation shall commend your works to another. I don't know if I said it wrong at first, but shall commend your works to another. That could be the younger generation to professors. And we've seen this some whenever

We'll invite some of the Christian professors to come to our student weekly meetings. They're on Thursday nights with crew and the professors are encouraged to hear what the students are talking about, how bold they are, whether they like in my meeting to hear prayer requests that they could share, share Christ with others. So, yeah, that's that verse gives me hope that we could keep seeing that happen. Have you seen like outcomes from that where professors are influenced by students and then they

Shane Hartley (02:17.13)
differently, behave differently. Has it gone that far? We have a friend who is a professor in the nursing school recently, Stephanie, who already had a heart to minister to her students. But she she took on a leadership role with one of the student groups. It's nurses Christian fellowships. It's student run, but they needed a professor. She shares that already this is an encouragement to her faith, being with these students. And you know, it goes the other way. She's encouraging these students to

You know, don't think this is not the same thing, but I've moved to a season where I'm coaching some younger business guys are doing this for kingdom purposes. Right. And I found a lot of joy in like seeing their idealism about things too, and kind of their excitement. So like getting to see the world through their eyes has been a lot of fun. Yeah. So at some point I'm going to talk more about this with the group, but I just, this is sort of a lightening around question that I didn't prepare for, but.

Could you see yourself moving overseas someday, you and Tara, to do missions? Because you such a heart that the coaching you're talking about is with foreign missionaries. It's funny. We've probably talked serious about this four or five times in our life. And we feel like every time we get on the road, the Lord sort of shuts the door. Remember when Paul said, I wanted to go into Asia and I was heading that direction and then got shut the door so I came over here. Right.

We feel like it's almost that. Like I went to a seminary that was focused on international stuff because I kind of thought that. Tara went and did international studies at Carolina and she kind of thought that. But it always gets turned around. And so I'll on record by saying, God, if you say to do it, we're open to it. But up to this point, we felt like he's does not fit our place. Yeah. And I've witnessed some of that too, where God has been, he's really made you fruitful where you're planted here. It is interesting to see like our

oldest son Nathan though. He's seen that as just kind of a natural thing now. And to watch what he's, what he's thinking about now is a lot of fun. End up in Papua New Guinea for like two, two months, think. A month and a half. I don't know what it was. And it's like, there was no way to contact it. And so, talking about cutting your apron strings. You got, cause he's like on some little island off the coast, you know, having to filter his own water. And if they want meat, like pluck the chicken.

Shane Hartley (04:36.386)
You know, that also gives him a certain confidence to live life where he knows he's going be okay. That need mom and dad. And now he wants to be around us, which is good. That's really good. He's in college at state NC state. Yeah. I'm going to do this on my Carolina people hate it, but go pack. I'm shocked that you would do that. You really love Nathan. I can, I can do the whole. Yeah. right. Well, this is pretty fun. Let's let's do lightning round with each other.

We've only done like that. I'm like other people so all right. I'm gonna get first. Okay. All right. What advice would you give your 18 year old self? The thing that comes to mind but where I was spiritually and all that I would give myself the advice of read Romans 8 and Consider the role the Holy Spirit should play in your life Shane. I would encourage myself at 18 Hey, just don't you read Romans 8 and contemplate because in there

The spirit in Romans 8, he bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God and I needed that kind of belonging to know that I belong to him. The love of the Father as adoption and to other great promises. Suspense, what advice would you give graduating seniors from college? I would say I came out of college trying to figure out what I could get out of the world. Right. And I think I would say that

for that is take value and I would say come out figuring out where I can add value to the world or I can get to the world and trust believe that you'll be well taken care of because of that because it took me a long time to have that mind shift, mindset shift and I think I would have been happier along the way if I thought more about giving and less about taking when I came out and that's not what they when you come out of college

Get everything you can out of the employer right now. Get the training and get the salary and get the whatever. And I see the people we're hiring at college. It's like, what vacation days do I get? what do I get? And it's just so much more enriching to say, what can I get? Job, family, community, kingdom, kind of everywhere. You can't go wrong with service, being of service to others.

Shane Hartley (06:57.154)
Factually like if you go into just a business organization and you you make yourself valuable because you give you become unfavorable Like and you become well compensated I mean just like the things you want to get you end up with Because you've been generous and give it back does that make sense? Yeah, the first thing that comes to mind is seek first his kingdom and his righteousness all the

What advice would you give to Christian professors? Yeah, this is slammed off. Well, so the first thing I want to express in this is just thinking about Christian professors warms my heart. I love them so much. And I see so many of them love the students. it's just there's a Bible verse of as for the saints who are in the land, they are the excellent ones in whom is all my delight. I think that's the song 16.

And I think of professors that way. Okay. So, if I think of advice for professors, I probably would rely more on some of the advice we've been hearing these professors give each other on the podcast, that they can be more bold about being a Christian than they realize. Okay. Our recent interview with Micah Green, Texas A he talked about bringing in legal counsel.

and the religious freedoms of today are greater than they ever have been. And so professors can say a lot more than they realize they can. They're not preaching from up front, but to even just tell students at the beginning that I'm a Christian, like my professor did my senior year in college. That would be my advice is it would be more of an exhortation. Like consider taking some kind of step of faith.

to let students know that you love Jesus. That's good. And there's a real there's a real risk there. A lot of professors promotion depends on their peers and yeah I don't mean to make light of that at all. Yeah that's true. Yeah all right so here's my last lightning round for you is what advice would you give parents of college students? I think I've got I've got two pieces one is don't try to manage their lives.

Shane Hartley (09:19.438)
because if you do that, they come out of college still not knowing how to your lives. So it seems like this is the time for you to say, learn how to manage money, learn how to manage your time, coach them like you're a coach now, but don't try to do it for them. I've watched some parents try to do that and it's maddening and it's not helpful to the kid. And then along with that, whatever you do, don't cut off communication. Like I've also seen some situations where kids did things the parents didn't like, whether it's a bad grade, parties,

girl and whatever the thing is and they just like get mad because they can't control the kid anymore they quit talking to him and I'm like the minute you cut off communication you cut off any ability influences situations so best thing you do is just love them where they're at that's hard like yeah like I've struggled a bit even Nathan if you're out to listen yes yeah I'm so proud of him he's done so well but there's things he's done where it's just I didn't agree with him

But I just got to keep my mouth shut and know he's going to deal with the consequences of the decision. I so appreciate getting to do this with you. Me too. Just opened my eyes to things. One thing is just that it is so much better to do stuff with a buddy. Yeah. And so it means a lot to be in this journey with you and have these incredible conversations with professors and knowing more and about your heart for college students. And you and I have so much in common. I love that too.

I've enjoyed this too. You've expanded my thought horizons too and my horizons about Christ. So that's a joy of our relationship is you see like different aspects of who Christ is. And the more I talk to Christian professors, the I talk to you, the more I from students, I'm like the body of Christ keeps teaching me more and more about who God is. We're talking about having Christ-centered conversations and that is because He is so infinitely great that we can continue.

learning about him. Yeah, you'll never get done. Yeah. Like no matter how often eight year olds listen to Elon Musk, they'll never fully understand a rocket. Yeah. And I think we just got to keep remembering we're the eight year olds listening to a brilliant... And we learn from each other. God. Trying to express himself to us. Yeah. Well, Spence, is there anything else that you would want to add? Anything else you'd want to say? It's been fun. Enjoyed this. I rarely talk about myself as much. It was a little awkward, but thanks for pushing me to do this.

Shane Hartley (11:45.89)
We probably didn't have an episode, which is all of our fails in one. It would take more than one episode. I was getting ready to say, you can do a lot. Well, thank you for listening in to our interview with each other. I am so grateful for Spence and it's really fun for he and I to get to even learn some new things about each other. And we're so grateful for this podcast and opportunities to meet great Christian professors. And so thank you for being a part of it.

and if you please remember to click on subscribe or like or follow and if you are a college student and you'd be interested in submitting a question to future Christian professors please find us on Instagram and send us a direct message for your question and you find us at meet the prof official on Instagram. If you're a Christian professor and you might be interested in sharing about God's work in your life

then we find this on meettheproff.com and you can create a profile pretty simply there and share about how you met Jesus and how he's worked in your life. And lastly, if you're interested in supporting this ministry, you can give online at give.crew.org that's CRU.org forward slash zero 42 43 44. And so until next time, we hope this encourages you to have a Christ centered conversation on your college campus.