Milyce Pipkin: 

Hi there, and thank you so much for joining us. Welcome to the Table Podcast where we discuss issues of God and culture to look and see the relevance of theology to everyday life. I'm Milyce. 

Bill Hendricks: 

And I'm Bill Hendricks, the executive director for Christian Leadership at the Hendricks Center, which produces the Table podcast. And I want to welcome you to our conversation today. And today we're going to talk about story. And Milyce can tell you when I heard that that was the topic, I begged to be part of this because the story is a huge part of the things that I do. The Italians have a wonderful saying that I can't know you unless I have dined with you and I feel that way about story. I can't really know a person until I know their story. And today we have a guest, Rebecca Jowers, whose work is all about story as well. And Rebecca is the founder and executive director for The Poiema Foundation, which she'll tell us about. Poiema is a Greek word, basically means good works from Ephesians 2:10 , but she is also the assistant dean and advisor for female students at Dallas Theological Seminary. Rebecca, welcome to the Table podcast. Thanks for being with us today. 

Rebecca Jowers: 

Thank you. I'm thrilled to be here and get to talk about something I'm very passionate about. So, thank you for the invitation. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Absolutely. As Bill mentioned, we're talking about the power of story and I love this. This is part of our passion. I mean, for me personally, professionally, everything I've always done has been listen to other people's stories and then tell the story as a news anchor and a reporter. And now I get to do it on this side of things from the secular world into the sacred world of the Lord and for his glory. Hear the stories, share the stories, and most of all, hear your research today. So, Bill, I don't know, you may want to kick us off if you don't, I will. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Well, why don't we start briefly, how did you get to the point where you are today, where was growing up and so forth? 

Rebecca Jowers: 

Yeah, that's great. So, start by telling you a little of my story. 

Bill Hendricks: 

There you go. 

Rebecca Jowers: 

And so it began, I was born in El Paso to a mom and dad. Both have trauma, stories of trauma, which of course I didn't know as a child. And my dad grew up in poverty, joined the army, became a doctor, served in Vietnam. I know he came home with post-traumatic stress was back then they didn't know what PTSD was, sedated in the hospital, so I never knew my parents' stories. My mom also, she grew up in Canada, came down here when she was to America all the way to Galveston. I felt like she went as far as she could until she hit the ocean, leaving things from her story that were traumatic and two traumatized people met walking to the bus stop. She was a nurse and he was a medical student. That's our story begins before we're even conceived and our parents' stories impact our story of course. 

And so that's how it began. They moved to El Paso, he got out of the military and that's where I was born and ended up spending most of my life there. I have two brothers and I got married and moved to the Dallas area. I used to teach math and science. I realized God has wired me to be a teacher. It's my passion. And I think around, we have four daughters, so I had four kids in six years. That's a big part of my story of how do you survive that? 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Yes. 

Rebecca Jowers: 

I have street cred with my daughters now because they're mothers and they have one and they're like, "Mom, how did you do this with four?" 

Bill Hendricks: 

How did you do it? 

Rebecca Jowers: 

So, it's- 

Bill Hendricks: 

That's good question. 

Rebecca Jowers: 

My husband says, "Your street cred went way up when they became parents." But it's been a joy to be a grandmother as well now. So, for me, this story work began when I was a student at Dallas Theological Seminary. I'd been teaching math and science. My husband and I started our family. I had four daughters in six years. And we realized childcare was going to be more than my teacher's salary. And so I stayed home. I had the privilege of being home for 13 years with my girls. And then my midlife crisis was I love teaching. 

My husband asked me the question, he's such a great cheerleader for me and for calling out what God has called me to do and supporting me in it. And so he knew that probably I wouldn't be satisfied just being at home. I was still in the throes of laundry, dishes, carpool, homework. But he asked me this question. He said, "When my youngest was going into first grade, it would be the first time in 13 years I didn't have a baby on the hip." And he said, "So, what are you going to do with all that time while the girls are in school?" Meaning from 8:00 AM to 3:00 PM. And frankly, it kind of annoyed me because I hadn't done any healing work in my story. 

And I thought, "What do you think I'm going to do? I'm going to do carpool and dishes." And I was so stuck in that mode. But thankfully I began processing the question that he posed to me. And I said, "I was working on a master's degree when I was teaching math at the University of Texas at El Paso. I never did get an opportunity to finish that. And so I'd really like to get my master's, but I'm not that passionate about math and science anymore. I want to have more of an impact on where people spend eternity." 

And he's the one that said, "You know, Rebecca, you love teaching bible studies." I'd been teaching a women's study in my home, which we ended up for 16 years meeting together, raising our kids together, teaching my daughter's discipleship groups Sunday school classes. So, I was always teaching and had a hunger to know the Lord even more deeply. And reading in 2 Timothy that we need to be equipped for what we're doing. My husband said, "Well, why don't you go to seminary? You love teaching the Bible. Why don't you go to Dallas Seminary and get your masters? It's a great school. It's right here in our backyard." And at the time, this was probably 2005, 2006, I thought seminary, that's for guide pastors. What am I going to do at seminary? And honestly, there weren't all the degrees that we have today. It was cross-cultural, THM, Christian education. And I thought, I'm just going to get the biblical studies master. 

Bill Hendricks: 

Master of Arts, biblical studies. 

Rebecca Jowers: 

All I have to do is study God's word. And Raymond goes, "No, you're an educator, you need to do", which is instead of 30 hours, it's like 65. He's like, "You need to do the MACE, the Master's in Christian Education. You're an educator." And I just remember being again, annoyed with him, why are you telling me what to do? But thankfully, I have learned when I step away to process and listen to the wisdom of my husband and I did end up doing the MACE, which was awesome. I enjoyed it, but it set me up later, which I'm now in my doctoral work. So, had I not done the MACE, I wouldn't have been able to step right into the doctorate. So, I look back humbly like, "I'm so sorry, God, so sorry husband, that I didn't just right away go, yeah, that sounds like a great idea." 

Milyce Pipkin: 

But that's the way it goes sometimes. And still, you were listening to the Voice of God in so many ways, even the wisdom of your husband because you did do those things, which is why I think you'll get a chance to see now why, and we have Rebecca on the table today and why we wanted to have this discussion with you has more to do, not just with your story and you sharing that, but also with the work that you're doing here to earn your doctorate. And so we can get into that as well. 

Rebecca Jowers: 

Yes, yes. And for me, I feel like the reason I had those responses or reactions to my husband is because I had trauma from my past that had never been processed. And one of the important things that I've learned is that trauma recovery really requires dealing with rage. And if you don't deal with your trauma, it's going to come out in different ways. And that's one of the things that I found. So, I grew up in a home. My mother struggled with rage and growing up was really, really challenging. But looking back, what I now know, just from the study that I've done, I've been able to look on it with compassion because I realize that's exactly true for her. She never was given an opportunity or able to deal with her trauma and it came out as rage. And so God began revealing that to me when I was in the spiritual formation department here and I had never told my story. 

I tried to hide my story. I felt like there was a lot of shame around it. I felt like I needed to protect my mom. I didn't want people to think bad of her. All of that was minimization, all these things that people who have suffered from trauma do. And so when I joined the spiritual formation curriculum, when I was forced fellowship is how I viewed it. In the beginning I was required to take this spiritual formation curriculum for two years, meeting weekly with people and getting zero credit for it. When I'm trying to chart the book of Leviticus in Excel. 

Milyce Pipkin: 

Well, you're not the only one who had to go through that. By the way. 

Rebecca Jowers: 

I've been in school for 25 years, but I ended up, actually, it was the first time I told my story and I ended up from that experience then leading a spiritual formation group, then becoming spiritual formation fellow. So, I went from 0%, not the best attitude to