Introduction to Aging and Spiritual Preparation
Tom Shrader returns after six months of serious health issues to begin a new teaching series on aging and finishing strong spiritually. Drawing from extensive survey data showing that many people enter retirement spiritually unprepared, he argues that spiritual disciplines developed early in life become crucial for navigating the challenges of aging. He emphasizes that just as financial retirement planning requires early preparation, spiritual preparation for later life must begin decades before retirement.
“People are turning 55, and spiritually, they got nothing in their account.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Tools for Finishing Strong
Recorded: September 12, 2018
Duration: 47 min
Themes: aging, preparation, discipline, finishing, retirement, strength, endurance, perseverance, approaching retirement, elderly believer, senior adult, dealing with illness, facing mortality, long-term planning, mature Christian, preparing for old age
Theological Themes: spiritual disciplines, spiritual maturity, sanctification, godly living, biblical preparation, stewardship, faithfulness, spiritual formation
Full Transcript
Well, good morning. It is really good to see you. I think I say that probably every week, but I've never meant it more than I do today. So I'm very glad to see you.
I'm not sure what you expect today, and I'm not sure what I expect today. So we're on the same wavelength at this point. If you're here for the first time, I kind of start from a position of weakness. I start with I'm sorry, because you're going to have to endure a little bit of family business, inside baseball, what's gone on. The last time I saw you was six months ago, and I was taken out of the game pretty quickly.
I always struggle in these situations on how much to tell you and how much to leave out. There's no right answer, because some of you at the end of this are going to say, "Gee, that wasn't enough," and others are going to say, "Hang on, you lost me at hello." I know that and I live with that. But I want to take you through what I've been through, and then kind of establish and remind you where we were, and go from there.
My Health Journey
About six months ago—I can't remember why I ended up in the hospital—but something happened and I spent six days there, six nights there. In the course of that, my cardiologist and I would literally sit and talk for three hours a day, which is pretty incredible because when you're in his office, you get about five minutes.
After the third day, he said, "You're not good." I said, "Well, I assume that's why I'm here." And he said, "No, this is bad. You're not thinking well, you're not speaking well, you're not well." I said, "Okay, what should we do?" He said, "It's your heart, and your valve is not working." I said, "Okay, so we do a replacement."
He said, "The problem here is—and it seems like I heard that a lot, sentences that start with 'the problem here is'—you can't survive the surgery because of your previous heart stuff." I was going to say I can live with that, but the reality is, I can't. So I mean, I have all these people say, "Oh, you're here. This is so good you're here. It's better than the alternative." And I'm thinking, not exactly. The alternative is looking pretty good.
A New Procedure
Long story longer, they have a new, relatively new procedure for a valve thing. Rather than—and I don't want to be too graphic here—but rather than cut you open, they do it like they would a stent. Now, if you say stent to these guys, they're insulted by it, because it's much more complicated than that. I said, "Well, this thing's been around. Why didn't we do it in December?" He said, "I didn't realize how bad you were."
In comes a doctor Brady. So I'm thinking Tom Brady—I'm in good shape here. I drafted him. This guy explains what's going to happen. They're going to go in and replace it—they do a bovine replacement. I said, "Okay," and all the ASU gear is out again. I like that. All the fresh stuff is out. I'm excited. So congratulations.
He said, "It's a relatively simple surgery for you. It's complex for us." I said, "You know, whatever." He said, "Do you have any questions?" I said, "Well, no. How long does it take?" He said, "Oh, take an hour or so. The thing that's going to surprise you is we go in the operating room, there's a lot of people, because I have a team, and it takes two doctors to do this. But we have to have a complete surgical team there for if your heart stops—they take over right away. So you have two teams." But he says, "You're the perfect candidate for this," which I take to mean my insurance covers it.
The Surgery and Recovery
I'll give you the initials of this surgery: T.A.R.V. The only reason I give it to you is I can look around the room, and I see candidates all over this place. This thing is life-changing, literally, for people who couldn't absorb it otherwise.
So I go through this thing. The procedure took 30 minutes. Within four hours, I'm walking around. And the next day I go home. So that's perfect.
I go to see the doctors, and I had two doctors tell me, "You're not going to get better." Here's what one doctor said to me: "This is good. Eat whatever you want, as much as you want, as often as you want, and don't exercise because nothing's going to make a difference." Well, that seems a little—I said, "I've been on that diet all my life, so that's pretty good."
But then he said this: "No more teaching." I said, "Okay, I can handle the eating, but no teaching? Seriously?" He said, "No." I'm not one of these guys that when they say something, I'm going to fight. I'm not a fighter. I'm a quitter. I'm lazy. I tend to give up. But I said, "Let's wait 45 days, and then we'll decide no more teaching."
So I went back in 45 days and he said, "You're getting better." I said, "Really?" He said, "Yeah." I said, "You think I can teach?" He said, "I don't think you can do your schedule, but I think you could do one. Maybe." I said, "Okay."
Another Challenge
I'm sorry for this being so self-indulgent and so long, but it feels therapeutic. So the day that you got the letter that said we were going to start the study, I got a biopsy back saying I have a cancer in my head. I went to the dermatologist and he said, "What's the problem?" I said, "This thing's growing out of my head. I'm going to be a unicorn in a week. You got to do something."
So he looked at it. And here's what you never want to hear from the doctor: "This doesn't look good." He said, "I'm going to take this, but I'm sure it's a cancer. It's not basal, it's not melanoma. It's like the third tenor—it's that cancer you can't remember. But it's not as bad as this, worse than this." And he said, "You—"
Two weeks ago, my doctor said I needed surgery and referred me to a surgeon. I went to see her - and I hope saying "lady" isn't insulting these days, but she was absolutely incredible. She was born in Russia and ended up at the University of Arizona. I asked how she liked Tucson, and she said, "It is very desolate." No kidding - even if you're from Russia, Tucson looks bad.
When I met with her, she asked why we were there. I said it seemed like she ought to know that. She replied, "I do. I want you to know." After we went through everything, she asked if I had any questions. I was wearing a Florida t-shirt - this was during my Tim Tebow stage - and she asked if I was a Florida Gator. I said no, I just wear it, then asked if she had a school she rooted for. She said, "I went to Mayo Medical School. We don't have a football team."
I told her she had an accent and asked if she was from Alabama. She said, "That's a good one." This lady was absolutely incredible, and the whole team was incredible. When I asked how many stitches it would take to close the incision, she said, "As many as it takes to do it right." She'd be a rough first date, I think, but she didn't mess around. So that was two weeks ago - they shaved and cut, and now I'm pulling stitches. I could not wait to get back to this.
Gratitude and Uncertainty
I made a note to thank you for your cards, emails, visits, and prayers. For those of you who aren't on that list, let there be a curse on you and your house - something's wrong with you at that point. But I'm a little unsure about what I've got today, mentally and physically. I'm like Eli Manning - I still have good receivers, but I don't know if I can hit them.
I appreciate you being here. I've had six people tell me, "We're going to be so happy to have you back. We don't expect much." How perfect is this? There's a sense in which I can't lose.
I've had six months to prepare for today, and I started writing last night. The reason is, everything is changing, and I've been pretty isolated. I'm almost exclusively at home - there are 168 hours in a week, and I'm at home 160 of them. So I have these thoughts, but I have them in isolation. I can't bounce them off people. When I do share them, they're clear in my mind, but I don't know how they come out. So I just ask your patience to bear with me.
Returning to Our Study on Aging
I want to rewind to where we were six months ago. We were attacking, ironically, the topic of aging. I've seen a radical change in my mind once we got into that topic, based on two things: statistics you can find anywhere, and data that Glenn Awada gathered from people like you - some of you and another group of maybe 300. What we got back changed my perspective on not just the topic, but on our approach to the topic.
Let me remind you of these statistics. Every day - today is September 12, 2018 - 10,000 people will celebrate their 65th birthday. That's seven people every minute, 417 people every hour. If you're in government, you have to deal with this. Government has 10,000 people a day turning 65 and 7,000 kids a day dropping out of high school. When you put those numbers together, this is unsustainable.
That's the good thing about being sick - I'm going to die way before all this stuff hits. But it has to hit. There has to be a collision.
The Scale of the Challenge
To put this in perspective, Kinnick Stadium - where Iowa plays their home games and they're 2-0 at this point - has a seating capacity of 70,584. You could fill Kinnick Stadium every week with the number of people turning 65 in this country. It's huge. If you're in business, I don't know what you need for a market, but there's a big one. If you're in government, it's a huge challenge. If you're a church like this, there's an opportunity there.
Now there's the medical side of it - the reality. Every 20 seconds in this country, a senior falls over. Every 29 minutes, a senior dies as a result of a fall. I'm in the doctor's waiting room the other day with five of us - four of them are asleep. I'm with old people all day, and it affects your psyche. You used to say, "How are you doing?" "Fine." Now I go, "How are you doing?" "My PSA's 11." That's the entire thing.
So I started thinking about how we're going to talk about aging. Then Glenn jumped in, and that changed everything for the better.
Survey Results on Aging Concerns
Glenn started to survey people, and here's what we got back. We asked what your top concerns were, and you could guess this: 39% said money. Money was the number one concern. Next was health, then family, then ironically, job - "Am I going to be able to work?"
When we talked to people who were about to retire, they said their number one concern was money and health. When we talked to people who were already retired, they said money - and they related it to health costs - and then health. Twenty percent said they had no challenges. Congratulations to one in five of you. I don't believe you, but congratulations.
We asked what people are currently doing or planning to do to prepare for retirement. My favorite response: "I have no choice but to die early. No one can afford to live like this very long." Then Glenn began to question people about...
They looked at retirement. What do you plan to do? The number one answer, huge answer, was travel. That's why when you turn on the television and you see Viking cruise ads, they're going to be Viking cruise down the Salt River within a year or two, because you've got all these older people with money who want to travel. But after a while, I had a friend that just took a cruise down one of the rivers in Europe. I said, "How was it?" He said, "If you've seen one cathedral, you've seen them all." Now, I know that's not true. I know there's difference and there's beauty. But travel was number one.
Number two, and 27% said, "I have no idea." That's the most dangerous position you can be in. I have no plan. 11% said, "I want to spend more time with my family." Now, this was in anticipation. What do you anticipate? When we asked people the best part of being retired, 43% said, "I get to do whatever I want to do. I get to make my own schedule. I don't answer to anybody. I do whatever I want to do." 24% said, "Not working." Now these are people who are now retired. Remember what they wanted to do was travel and everything. 6% said the best part of being retired was travel. So like anything in life, there's anticipation and expectation, and there's a reality.
The Wake-Up Call: Retirement's Hidden Challenges
I want to read you some of these, and this is what started to shape my thinking. And unfortunately, it's going to have to shape yours too, because I'm going down a journey and I want to take you with me. So we asked people, "What's the biggest challenge since retiring?" Here's the stuff that started to wake me up. These are all direct quotes from surveys from people like you.
Quote: "I have more worries about health in the future. I struggle to trust them to God and have faith that He's in control." Another one, quote: "Spending more time with my spouse is not always a good thing. Men and women need their space." I didn't need to retire to figure that one out. Biggest challenge, surprise. Quote: "When planning for retirement, the question is how much is enough? The answer seems to be just a little more." Quote: "Not knowing where I fit in a society that embraces youth and aging is something to be feared."
Becoming Invisible in a Youth-Obsessed Culture
Now, I know heads are going to nod, and if not physically, they're going to mentally. As you age, you become invisible. I go to the mall, and I'm telling you, these people look right through me. They got one thing they care about. All of a sudden, I'm a commodity. Don't come at me as a person. And it feels like that everywhere I go.
Sandy and I are trying to be spontaneous. We're planning to be spontaneous. It's really hard. And so we're doing things. We went to the Gilbert Museum, that thing that's in Gilbert. And we said, we've driven by this forever, let's go in. And it was a thing, and we're doing stuff, so we're planning all this.
We're talking about invisible. And all that they care about, everywhere I go, is not my generation or ours. So Sandy the other day said, "Surprise date, we're going to a movie." Not going to tell you the movie, because I wouldn't want you to go to it. I said, "What is it?" She said, "It's a surprise." So we're walking in, and there's the title of the movie. I've never heard of it. And there was a barrage of previews.
All I can say is, who goes to these things? I mean, these previews were insulting to me. And I don't mean I'm easily offended, I'm not a prude. But there were all these gothic blowing people up, and there were all these different things. And Sandy said, "I don't think you're the target market." And that's what we learned.
The Only Marketing That Finds Us
So as you go, there's a huge opportunity here. Because you've got people with time, some level of energy, some level of effort and money, and nobody's... the only email I get is from scripts, drugs, doctors. And I didn't bring it in, but I must be on a list. I'm getting these ads. I will bring it next week. Wait a minute. I may have it. Because it's so frequent that I'm getting them now, regularly.
Yeah, here it is. It's an innocent looking envelope. No return address, but no name. Are you getting these? I mean, it's unbelievable. And so I'm thinking, oh, wow, it's cool. And it says on the front, "Time waits for no one." This will fit in my aging thing. It said, "Time stands still for no one." "Dear Thomas, time passes so quickly. Before you know it, a year has passed. Then two. You start to think about all those things you should do, but you haven't. Take the time now to make affordable, sensible choice. Cremation is dignified." So they want me to commit my ashes to them. That's the only marketing I get.
If you go to the mall and you start to get sensitive to this, and you can grow tired and bitter and cynical, but there is nothing in that mall for me except the restroom and Cinnabon. But you begin to sense that, and that starts to creep in this thinking. So I don't know where I fit.
From Relevance to Irrelevance
Here's the next one. Thirty years ago, I was, or at least felt relevant to the mainstream business church. You go from who's who to who's he. You go from the guy or the gal to, "Can I help you with something?" And this is not a complaint. It's wholehearted. I think part of the reason people don't attack this subject is because you sound so whiny.
For those of you that may not know, I played a role in the pulpit here for a long time. I had been out of that job about six months. And I came in one Sunday and I was looking for Justin Marshall. And there was a person at the door passing out bulletins. And I said, "Have you seen Justin Marshall?" And she said, "I think he's here somewhere, but who are you?"
The Reality of Being Forgotten
I was in the lobby somewhere and a lady asked me, "Do you know where something is?" I said no, and she said to me, "Is this your first Sunday here?" I said, "No, it's not my first Sunday here." My point is very simple. You can be John McCain a week ago, and I guarantee you that you are about a year from anybody remembering who he is. And I got a tip for you: you're not John McCain.
Let me read you more of these responses from people: "In my head, I'm not done, but I seem to be superfluous to the body of Christ. I once had a purpose. Now I'm searching it out." Here's another one: "I'm not being discipled and I'm not disciplined to stay in the word. When I'm busy, I get disconnected from church, Bible study, etc. I get spiritually lazy."
These quotes started to shape my thinking: "I have more worries about health and the future. I struggle to trust in God. I struggle to have faith He's in control. I'm thinking about the challenge of eventual death, facing this reality, and thinking about eternal life."
Real Struggles from Real People
These are real people with real questions about what the challenge is. "Faithful Bible study, staying thankful for all life's ups and downs, sickness and health." I've got this new answer I've had for a week now when people say, "How do you feel?" I say, "Like Nike stock: I'm dropping, I'm rising, I'm dropping, I'm rising."
I did a version of this talk months ago at Tempe. When I got up the next day or two, a guy who was not there had listened to the tape of it. Apparently they taped it and posted it. He wrote me this email: "Hey Tom, listened to your first Wednesday talk in the middle of the night because that's when old people don't sleep. Would love to chat with you about the subject if we can. All your observations ring true for me. It's easily the most difficult period of my life at every level."
I think I'm pretty sharp and pretty reasonable, and I should have seen this, but I didn't see it coming—the financial part.
The Financial Reality
Think with me for a minute. I just sent myself an article the other day with the latest statistics. These are always changing drastically depending upon the source, but this seems to be the general rule: families where the head of the household is 55 or older have zero dollars saved for retirement. Let me tell you how long you'll last on zero dollars: not very long.
The stats get weird, but somewhere among people who have saved, the average savings for retirement is $10,000. It's not going to take you traveling very far.
Here was my big moment, and since it's a big moment for me, I want it to be a big moment for you: That's a physical picture of where people are spiritually. People are turning 55, and spiritually, they got nothing in their account.
The Target Audience Revelation
When Glenn and I started talking about aging, we thought the target market for this talk and discussion series were people 65 and older. But it took about one piece of data to tell us that this is really a message that I need to hear at 35 or 45. People are doing with their spiritual life what they did with their financial life: "I'll take care of it when I get there." Here's what I know: you won't. It's not going to happen that way.
I wanted to get this quote in your hands, and I always feel like the quality of the lesson upticks if you quote a Russian author. Dostoevsky said this: "The second half of a man's life is made up of nothing but the habits he acquired during the first half."
If you're a thoughtful person, you're going to say, "Well, that's not totally true." The point he's making is the habits you develop early are typically going to dictate how you end. If you don't eat well at 35, you're not going to eat well at 55. And if you do change, it's not until you have something catastrophic.
A Stark Illustration
The cardio rehab at Chandler Regional Hospital is on the northwest corner of the campus. Or just follow where you see the smoke, because that's where all the people from the hospital go out and smoke. So you're in there watching your heart laying out on the table, and then you go out and have a burger and fries and a smoke. It's just who we are. I do the same thing.
Here's what I wrote down: it's like financial planning. It's never too late to start, but it's never too early to start. The easiest time to save for retirement is when you're 25, and you have this amazing thing called compound interest. You put away $100 a month, which doesn't sound like much, but by the time you retire, it's hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The Lost Spiritual Disciplines
You develop a habit of a quiet time and the spiritual disciplines. Those things—and this sounds preachy, and I guess it is—but those things that we did... I got saved in 1980. In 1980, half the guys I knew had a little packet in their pocket with Bible verses on it. Everybody was memorizing scripture. Everybody—I mean, it was like a Costco card. If you didn't have one, you were the oddball out.
You had this packet, and you memorized verses, and you prayed, and you didn't hit it solid every day, but it was something you did. Over a period of time, you don't have that anymore. You sang songs—and I'm sounding older by the minute—you sang songs that had real depth to them, like "In Christ Alone." Now every song I sing goes, "I'm in the darkness, I got light, hallelujah." I don't know what it's telling me anything, and I'm not being critical.
Everything was driven toward that spiritual depth, and that moved out of vogue. When it did, you paid a price. That's what you hear from these people over and over again.
The Surprise of Decline
"What's your biggest surprise? How my skills, my memory, my strength has subsided. The lack of need that my church has for me. I'm irrelevant." You hear these words over and over again.
Responding to Uncertainty
You have some ways to respond to that. You can sit and say, "This is it," and you'll start to feel sorry for yourself. You can find three other guys, or three other gals, and have coffee together and whine about how bad things are. Or you can fix it.
The number one place to fix it is with yourself. If you're home all day and you watch TV, and you watch Fox News and listen to Sean Hannity, or you flip over the other way and watch Chris Matthews, or you just follow the leader of the free world on Twitter, it doesn't take long to become convinced this thing is really screwed up. When people come and see me, we have the same conversations, and it takes us about five minutes to say, "This is a mess." But then, every conversation ends this way: "But it'll all work out, it'll all work out."
The Problem with Optimistic Bias
I've found myself asking—I've gotten better at this—asking questions. I'll say, "Why do you think it'll work out?" And here's the answer: "Because it always does." It's called optimistic bias. I've had a lot of diseases; I've never had this one. Optimistic bias. "It'll all work out, because it always does."
I don't think that's a very good answer anymore. I think you're in uncharted territory, where the world around you is shaking badly. The answer to what's going on in the world is the church, and when I say church, I mean Christians. I don't mean the local church. I'm not looking for redemption to change the world. I'm looking for believers to change the world. You're the answer.
I had breakfast, obviously a while ago now, with a highly placed senior official in the Arizona state government. I sound like the New York Times. I like the feeling. This guy said to me, and this was so good: "Government cannot replace the family. Government is not equipped to replace the family in the culture. The closest thing you have to assisting the family is the body of believers."
The Heart of the Matter: Finishing Strong
I've retooled. When I talk to people, they all want to talk about, "You're sick, and I'm sick, and we're doing this." Here's what I hear over and over again. Here's what I want to hear: "Well done, good and faithful servant."
What's your goal? Number one answer: "I want to finish strong." So I've asked, "What does that mean?" And it's amazing. It's like, "Well, you know, I want to finish strong." Like saying it is going to make it happen.
Here's the mistake I made. I thought finishing strong meant doing everything I'm doing until I die. That's not finishing strong. It's loving God, and knowing God, and following God. And our hope is in God. It's the second quote I put on the sheet. Those are two familiar quotes to you. In a world, in a stage of life that feels so filled with fear, that has hope that's missing, our hope is in God. His promises, His character, His faithfulness, His sovereignty. That's what's going to stabilize all of this.
Victory in Death vs. Victory in Aging
As I began to read, and even search the scripture, the scripture promises victory in death. But it doesn't say a ton about victory in aging. They're two very different things that need to be separated. Then I read an amazingly simple sentence. The author said this: "Jesus did not grow old." And I never really thought about it. Jesus is our model, but we never saw how He grows old.
This whole thing on aging, I've given a working title called "How to Finish Strong." There's so much wrapped up in that. I did a series five or six years ago called "How to Stay Straight in a Crooked World," and it essentially becomes that.
What's Coming Next
What we're going to do over the next 10 or 12 weeks—I'm not sure—is look at these components that we need in our life. For many of you, especially this group, most of you are church people. Most of you are believers. Some of you have been believers for decades, some not as long. These are all things that you need to go back to again and again and again. This is your checkup. When somebody says, "How are you doing?" these become the measurements.
The same is true of the person that's 35. Now the difference is, and you know this, when you're 35, you're not worried about being 55. You're worried about whether you can get into Postinos or not. That's your biggest problem. I can't help you there. Call ahead. That's all I can tell you. But your kids and your grandkids and you and me and all of us need to make our way through this.
Next week, we're going to start with the first step in how to finish strong. Because that seems to be the one thing that we're all connecting with: "Well done, finish strong. How do I do it?" Here's what I've learned about Christians. We've got our own language. And somebody gets out of that, and that's the end of the conversation. You go, "Yeah, what do you want to do?" "I want to finish strong." "Me too." And that's the end of the conversation. What does that mean? That's where we're going to start next week.
A Personal Note
Thank you so much for being here. I got a text from my brother. My brother Dan, every year, he and his wife—this time of year, they don't have any kids, they let school get in—they go on a trip. They are headed Friday to Charleston, South Carolina. He sent me a text. Let me read it to you, because it's a sweet exchange. He's worried about me, which is good.
He sent me a text that said, "Are you going to start teaching again?" I said, "Start Wednesday." This was Monday. "I start Wednesday. I just went into the office to study and fell asleep at my desk. I'm rested, but not ready." He said, "Good luck. I think that's great. I wasn't sure that would ever happen again." I said, "Have a good trip. Take an umbrella." So we're on the same page.
Father, thank You for this. I pray that You take all of whatever I just said and somehow make it make sense to people, and most of all, work in our life and in my life. Help us finish strong by being strong today.
God, thank You for this. Thank You for the people who are here. It's so cool to see it, and it's a testimony to Your grace and mercy. We praise You and thank You. In Jesus' name, amen.
Have a great week. I'll see you next week.