Conversations on Writing, Reading, & the Christian Life

Host: Chase Replogle

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Join me as I interview pastors, authors, and writing experts in my journey to better understand the calling and the craft of writing, reading, and living the Christian life.

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Latest Episdoes:

Episode 239

Chase Replogle

My Favorite Books from 2025
A look back at my favorite reads and topics of interest from the past year.
00:00 20:49

Episode 238

Doug Basler

Finding Novels for the New Year
Doug Basler joins me to talk about his new book, All Swirling and Weaving: Reflections on Reading Fiction and Growing in Faith
00:00 44:44
More Episodes

I want to share something I’ve been quietly working on…

A More Physical Faith

Your theology might be making you weak, sick, and tired. While Christian men have been taught to cultivate their spiritual lives, most outsource their bodies to the gym, fitness trends, and online influencers. The soul is sacred, but for most, the body doesn’t really matter. The result is a church full of men who know...

Read More

Why Now Might be the Right Time to Try Logos

Logos Bible Software for Families, Writers, and Pastors

The Judeo-Christian faith has long been formed by books and reading. From synagogue scrolls to circulating letters, believers have been nurtured, disciplined, and matured through ongoing conversations in the form of written words. We are people of The Book, and alongside it is an ever-growing shelf of more books. I am a reader, in large...

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A Priesthood of Affirmation

When the Church Avoids Offense

When writing a book, you often have to cut material. This article is a section that didn’t make it into the final printing of A Sharp Compassion, but I think it still matters. It is taken from the chapter on affirmation and examines how the church has been tempted to avoid what offends. In 1957,...

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Featured On:

Barnabas Piper Karen Swallow Prior Dick Foth Tim Challies Peter Scazzero Abdu Murray Os Guinness Andrew Klavan
Scott Sauls Doug Wilson Andrew Peterson Philip Yancey HB Charles Max Lucado Jared Wilson Lee Strobel
Eugene Cho Derwin Gray Harold Senkbeil Jay Kim Mark Batterson J. K. Ramsey Gene Getz Eric Metaxas

Podcast Host:

Chase Replogle

Chase Replogle is the pastor of Bent Oak Church in Springfield, Missouri and author of The 5 Masculine Instincts. Chase’s work draws from history, psychology, literature, and a rich narrative approach to Scripture to help readers think more deeply about faith and life.

He has written for Christianity Today, The Gospel Coalition, Ekstasis, Bible Engagement Project, and Influence Magazine. In addition, he hosts the Pastor Writer Podcast (pastorwriter.com), where he interviews Christian authors on writing and publishing. A native of the Ozark woods, he enjoys being outdoors with his wife and two kids, sailing, playing the mandolin (badly), and quail hunting with his bird dog Millie.

  • Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
  • I want to share something I’ve been quietly working on… Your theology might be making you weak, sick, and tired. While Christian men have been taught to cultivate their spiritual lives, most outsource their bodies to the gym, fitness trends, and online influencers. The soul is sacred, but for most, the body doesn’t really matter. The result is a church full of men who know how to pray for their souls but quietly neglect or idolize their own bodies. Yet from the dust of Eden to the physical resurrection of Jesus, Scripture insists that your body is central—not peripheral—to discipleship. For the last couple of years, I’ve been working on a new book about faith and physicality. I’m excited to announce I’ve signed a contract to publish the book with NavPress. A More Physical Faith is set to release in 2027. In A More Physical Faith, I offer a Christian theology of the body and eight practical habits to better discipline your physical life. You’ll discover how the gospel transforms the way you eat, sleep, train, and live. You’ll learn how to: 1. Track what you want to ignore 2. Be honest about what you really want 3. Turn off the lights and pray 4. Eat what you can be grateful for 5. Lift progressively heavier things 6. Train your eyes on what is good 7. Take a little something when you need it 8. Think more often about death Whether you’re a lifelong gym-goer or just trying to get started, you’ll learn to recognize how the gospel is good news for your soul and your body. The book is an invitation to live a more physical faith for the sake of your body, soul, and witness to the world. I’m grateful to be partnering with NavPress to bring this conversation to a wider audience. Thanks to all of you who have purchased previous books and followed my work. Having an amazing audience like this makes publishing contracts like this possible.
  • The Cultivation of Christmas Trees T.S. Eliot There are several attitudes towards Christmas, Some of which we may disregard: The social, the torpid, the patently commercial, The rowdy (the pubs being open till midnight), And the childish – which is not that of the child For whom the candle is a star, and the gilded angel Spreading its wings at the summit of the tree Is not only a decoration, but an angel. The child wonders at the Christmas Tree: Let him continue in the spirit of wonder At the Feast as an event not accepted as a pretext; So that the glittering rapture, the amazement Of the first-remembered Christmas Tree, So that the surprises, delight in new possessions (Each one with its peculiar and exciting smell), The expectation of the goose or turkey And the expected awe on its appearance, So that the reverence and the gaiety May not be forgotten in later experience, In the bored habituation, the fatigue, the tedium, The awareness of death, the consciousness of failure, Or in the piety of the convert Which may be tainted with a self-conceit Displeasing to God and disrespectful to children (And here I remember also with gratitude St.Lucy, her carol, and her crown of fire): So that before the end, the eightieth Christmas (By “eightieth” meaning whichever is last) The accumulated memories of annual emotion May be concentrated into a great joy Which shall be also a great fear, as on the occasion When fear came upon every soul: Because the beginning shall remind us of the end And the first coming of the second coming.
  • Will’s first South Dakota pheasant trip.
  • Lemu Emu and Doug. Their idea for trick or treating… @libertymutual
  • Another successful tournament for Will. This kid trains five nights a week at Jiu Jitsu. His work ethic, discipline, and toughness amaze me. And a special things to @treycarterjj at @dynastyjiujitsu . Best coach and best gym there is.
  • Horse fieldtrip today. Ashley getting to nerd out on horses.
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2 weeks ago
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1/9
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
@thepastorwriter
@thepastorwriter
•
Follow
Tonight we lost my bird dog, Millie. For thirteen years I followed her through woods and fields chasing pheasant and quail. She was there to welcome both of our kids home from the hospital. When I set up my writing LLC, I named it A Desk and A Dog because my dream was to write with her lying on the chair in my office. She did just that for years, resting beside me as I worked and helping me write several books. There’s a reason so many country songs mention the bird dog they lost. She was the best.
2 weeks ago
View on Instagram |
2/9
I want to share something I’ve been quietly working on… Your theology might be making you weak, sick, and tired. While Christian men have been taught to cultivate their spiritual lives, most outsource their bodies to the gym, fitness trends, and online influencers. The soul is sacred, but for most, the body doesn’t really matter. The result is a church full of men who know how to pray for their souls but quietly neglect or idolize their own bodies. Yet from the dust of Eden to the physical resurrection of Jesus, Scripture insists that your body is central—not peripheral—to discipleship. For the last couple of years, I’ve been working on a new book about faith and physicality. I’m excited to announce I’ve signed a contract to publish the book with NavPress. A More Physical Faith is set to release in 2027. In A More Physical Faith, I offer a Christian theology of the body and eight practical habits to better discipline your physical life. You’ll discover how the gospel transforms the way you eat, sleep, train, and live. You’ll learn how to: 1. Track what you want to ignore 2. Be honest about what you really want 3. Turn off the lights and pray 4. Eat what you can be grateful for 5. Lift progressively heavier things 6. Train your eyes on what is good 7. Take a little something when you need it 8. Think more often about death Whether you’re a lifelong gym-goer or just trying to get started, you’ll learn to recognize how the gospel is good news for your soul and your body. The book is an invitation to live a more physical faith for the sake of your body, soul, and witness to the world. I’m grateful to be partnering with NavPress to bring this conversation to a wider audience. Thanks to all of you who have purchased previous books and followed my work. Having an amazing audience like this makes publishing contracts like this possible.
@thepastorwriter
@thepastorwriter
•
Follow
I want to share something I’ve been quietly working on… Your theology might be making you weak, sick, and tired. While Christian men have been taught to cultivate their spiritual lives, most outsource their bodies to the gym, fitness trends, and online influencers. The soul is sacred, but for most, the body doesn’t really matter. The result is a church full of men who know how to pray for their souls but quietly neglect or idolize their own bodies. Yet from the dust of Eden to the physical resurrection of Jesus, Scripture insists that your body is central—not peripheral—to discipleship. For the last couple of years, I’ve been working on a new book about faith and physicality. I’m excited to announce I’ve signed a contract to publish the book with NavPress. A More Physical Faith is set to release in 2027. In A More Physical Faith, I offer a Christian theology of the body and eight practical habits to better discipline your physical life. You’ll discover how the gospel transforms the way you eat, sleep, train, and live. You’ll learn how to: 1. Track what you want to ignore 2. Be honest about what you really want 3. Turn off the lights and pray 4. Eat what you can be grateful for 5. Lift progressively heavier things 6. Train your eyes on what is good 7. Take a little something when you need it 8. Think more often about death Whether you’re a lifelong gym-goer or just trying to get started, you’ll learn to recognize how the gospel is good news for your soul and your body. The book is an invitation to live a more physical faith for the sake of your body, soul, and witness to the world. I’m grateful to be partnering with NavPress to bring this conversation to a wider audience. Thanks to all of you who have purchased previous books and followed my work. Having an amazing audience like this makes publishing contracts like this possible.
3 weeks ago
View on Instagram |
3/9
The Cultivation of Christmas Trees T.S. Eliot There are several attitudes towards Christmas, Some of which we may disregard: The social, the torpid, the patently commercial, The rowdy (the pubs being open till midnight), And the childish – which is not that of the child For whom the candle is a star, and the gilded angel Spreading its wings at the summit of the tree Is not only a decoration, but an angel. The child wonders at the Christmas Tree: Let him continue in the spirit of wonder At the Feast as an event not accepted as a pretext; So that the glittering rapture, the amazement Of the first-remembered Christmas Tree, So that the surprises, delight in new possessions (Each one with its peculiar and exciting smell), The expectation of the goose or turkey And the expected awe on its appearance, So that the reverence and the gaiety May not be forgotten in later experience, In the bored habituation, the fatigue, the tedium, The awareness of death, the consciousness of failure, Or in the piety of the convert Which may be tainted with a self-conceit Displeasing to God and disrespectful to children (And here I remember also with gratitude St.Lucy, her carol, and her crown of fire): So that before the end, the eightieth Christmas (By “eightieth” meaning whichever is last) The accumulated memories of annual emotion May be concentrated into a great joy Which shall be also a great fear, as on the occasion When fear came upon every soul: Because the beginning shall remind us of the end And the first coming of the second coming.
@thepastorwriter
@thepastorwriter
•
Follow
The Cultivation of Christmas Trees T.S. Eliot There are several attitudes towards Christmas, Some of which we may disregard: The social, the torpid, the patently commercial, The rowdy (the pubs being open till midnight), And the childish – which is not that of the child For whom the candle is a star, and the gilded angel Spreading its wings at the summit of the tree Is not only a decoration, but an angel. The child wonders at the Christmas Tree: Let him continue in the spirit of wonder At the Feast as an event not accepted as a pretext; So that the glittering rapture, the amazement Of the first-remembered Christmas Tree, So that the surprises, delight in new possessions (Each one with its peculiar and exciting smell), The expectation of the goose or turkey And the expected awe on its appearance, So that the reverence and the gaiety May not be forgotten in later experience, In the bored habituation, the fatigue, the tedium, The awareness of death, the consciousness of failure, Or in the piety of the convert Which may be tainted with a self-conceit Displeasing to God and disrespectful to children (And here I remember also with gratitude St.Lucy, her carol, and her crown of fire): So that before the end, the eightieth Christmas (By “eightieth” meaning whichever is last) The accumulated memories of annual emotion May be concentrated into a great joy Which shall be also a great fear, as on the occasion When fear came upon every soul: Because the beginning shall remind us of the end And the first coming of the second coming.
3 months ago
View on Instagram |
4/9
Will’s first South Dakota pheasant trip.
Will’s first South Dakota pheasant trip.
Will’s first South Dakota pheasant trip.
Will’s first South Dakota pheasant trip.
@thepastorwriter
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•
Follow
Will’s first South Dakota pheasant trip.
4 months ago
View on Instagram |
5/9
Lemu Emu and Doug. Their idea for trick or treating… @libertymutual
@thepastorwriter
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•
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Lemu Emu and Doug. Their idea for trick or treating… @libertymutual
4 months ago
View on Instagram |
6/9
Another successful tournament for Will. This kid trains five nights a week at Jiu Jitsu. His work ethic, discipline, and toughness amaze me. And a special things to @treycarterjj at @dynastyjiujitsu . Best coach and best gym there is.
Another successful tournament for Will. This kid trains five nights a week at Jiu Jitsu. His work ethic, discipline, and toughness amaze me. And a special things to @treycarterjj at @dynastyjiujitsu . Best coach and best gym there is.
@thepastorwriter
@thepastorwriter
•
Follow
Another successful tournament for Will. This kid trains five nights a week at Jiu Jitsu. His work ethic, discipline, and toughness amaze me. And a special things to @treycarterjj at @dynastyjiujitsu . Best coach and best gym there is.
5 months ago
View on Instagram |
7/9
Horse fieldtrip today. Ashley getting to nerd out on horses.
@thepastorwriter
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•
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Horse fieldtrip today. Ashley getting to nerd out on horses.
6 months ago
View on Instagram |
8/9
@thepastorwriter
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6 months ago
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