How To Deepen Your Friendship with Jesus w/ Amy Boucher-Pye

Discover the transformative power of Jesus's love with Amy Boucher-Pye, acclaimed author of "Transforming Love," as she joins us to delve into the depths of His profound relationships with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus.

Imagine a bond with Christ as tangible as the friendship shared by these Biblical siblings. Throughout our conversation, Amy imparts how we can cultivate this intimate connection in our own spiritual walks, highlighting the role of the Holy Spirit and daily spiritual practices. Her insights offer a path to experiencing Jesus's presence in a way that strengthens our relationship with Him.

Join us as we navigate the delicate interplay between service and contemplation, inspired by Mary and Martha's distinct expressions of devotion. Learn to personalize Psalm 23 to mirror the nuances of your spiritual life, and find solace and inspiration in the prayer exercises Amy shares. This episode promises to guide you toward a more profound and personal connection with Jesus, transforming your prayer life and daily walk with Him.

Amy's Book &  Favorites:
Book: Transforming Love
Bible: NIV Bible Speaks Today
Coloring Sheets
David Suchet Audio Bible Reading
Website: amyboucherpye.com

Transcript

Ellen Krause: 0:04

At the Coffee and Bible Time podcast. Our goal is to help you delight in God's Word and thrive in Christian living. Each week we talk to subject matter experts who broaden your biblical understanding, encourage you in hard times and provide life-building tips to enhance your Christian walk. We are so glad you have joined us. Welcome back to the Coffee and Bible Time podcast. I'm Ellen, your host, and today we are going to be talking about a topic that I think everybody can relate to in one way or another. So let's start with.

Ellen Krause: 0:40

Have you ever studied relationships in the Bible and come across this precious friendship that existed between Jesus and his siblings, mary Martha and Lazarus I shouldn't say Jesus' siblings, but the sibling group of Mary, martha and Lazarus. And we have so much to learn from Jesus' perfect example of friendship by how he demonstrated his love to them, his compassion and acceptance of his friends, and because of Jesus's remarkable friendship with them. They were actually willing to sort of lay down their societal expectations and unhealthy patterns in exchange for a healthy relationship that Jesus offered. And the good news of that relationship is that we too can experience that kind of friendship with Jesus. And I'm joined today by Amy Boucher-Pai, who wrote in her book Transforming Love how Friendship with Jesus Changes Us, that studying Jesus's friendships is a great place to start in our goal of experiencing him on an intimate level.

Ellen Krause: 1:55

Amy Boucher-Pye is an author, speaker, retreat leader and spiritual director. She's the author of seven books and resources, and her first book, finding Myself in Britain, won the Christian Living Book of the Year in the United Kingdom. She also writes for publications such as Our Daily Bread. She has an MA in Christian spirituality from the University of London and enjoys leading retreats. Please welcome Amy.

Amy Boucher Pye: 2:27

Hi, I'm so glad to be here with you, Ellen, thank you for having me.

Ellen Krause: 2:32

Oh, what a delight. You know, Amy, when I was sort of getting myself familiar with your book and I learned about your experience here in Minnesota and you're living in the UK. Maybe just greet our listeners here in America with just a little bit about your growing up here in Minnesota.

Amy Boucher Pye: 2:57

Sure, yes, well, I had 20 wonderful years in Minnesota and then, when I was at university, I went to Washington DC and spent 10 years there, and then now I've been in England for a long time.

Ellen Krause: 3:42

Why don't you share with us when Jesus lived here on earth, he was not only friends with his disciples, which I think is what's more commonly talked about a lot, but he also developed this close relationship with this group of siblings. So tell us about what was special about this friendship and what you've learned through that.

Amy Boucher Pye: 4:04

Yes, definitely. Well, Mary, Martha and Lazarus. Their home in Bethany was about two miles from Jerusalem and it was really Jesus's home away from home. It was the place where he went to relax, to put his hair down, as it were, and Martha was noted as the head of the household, which would be countercultural, and maybe because she was the eldest, maybe Lazarus had a chronic condition. We don't know, but it's really fascinating how she is the one who welcomes Jesus and his friends to be there together where he could relax. He knew them the sisters are. It says in John's gospel that they are those whom Jesus loved. So there was clearly this really wonderful, deep, intimate friendship between the three of them, where, God, you know, Jesus takes them on a journey. We see that through the three stories of the gospels and we'll probably get into that. But it's amazing how he takes them on this wonderful journey, just like he takes us on a journey of transforming us, changing us from within.

Ellen Krause: 5:18

That's so beautiful In this perspective of Jesus in his relationship with the siblings, tell us about how it can sometimes feel elusive, you know, for us here on earth not having that one-on-one. You know him sitting down with us at our table. For the person, maybe that's listening, that's like, but I don't know how to do that for me. How do I make that happen? What would you say to that?

Amy Boucher Pye: 5:51

Well, Jesus, when he was preparing his disciples, his male friends, for when he was going to die, after they'd had their last supper together. In John's Gospel we see him saying I'm going away, but I'm sending the advocate, the spirit, and you'll be better off. He's like you'll be better off because you've got the spirit living within you which came at Pentecost. When we accept Jesus, he comes and lives within us. So he was like it's okay, you won't have me face to face, but I'll be there inside of you. So you know, we just need to cry out and God will give us a sense of peace, or we can put our hand on our heart and remind ourselves that Christ lives within us Every time we wash our hands.

Amy Boucher Pye: 6:37

We can make it a habit to go. Lord Jesus, I love you and you live within me. Give me peace, give me hope, give me patience. Give me hope, give me patience, love me, help me, love others. You know we can build these practices in to our lives. And as tempting as it is to think, oh, I really am jealous of Mary and Martha to listen to Jesus in John's Gospel and go, but he's right there with me all the time. I didn't have to wait for him to rock up at my house in Bethany. He's with me always. I mean, it's just life changing, isn't it?

Ellen Krause: 7:11

Yes, it sure is, and I think that that's something we need to remind ourselves on a continual basis and tap into the Holy Spirit and being attentive to the spiritual nudgings. If you will, I'd like to step into things that you use to describe this friendship with Jesus, like you talk about sort of three different aspects of being and doing as one, and how grieving and rejoicing is part, and then loving and serving. So those three different aspects. Why don't we take just a little bit of a tour through what you learned in these different gospel stories? That sort of helped you bring out those particular aspects.

Amy Boucher Pye: 8:11

Well, the first one is the one that we, especially as Christian women, we perhaps know the best the Luke 10 story, which and, as you said, I look at being and doing with that. And that's the story where Martha's in the kitchen, she's getting ready because Jesus and his friends have landed on them and Bethany and they didn't text ahead. So she's trying to get everything sorted. And Mary is there at Jesus's feet, being massively countercultural, because a woman just did not sit at the feet of a teacher. That was not acceptable. Women couldn't even read the Torah, they couldn't read the scriptures. Their husband or their father had to read it to them. So Jesus is there welcoming Mary to sit at his feet and Martha's all getting all upset in the kitchen like tell her to help me. And then Jesus does that wonderful thing of Martha Martha saying her name twice Come, she's chosen the better thing, come and be.

Amy Boucher Pye: 9:15

So it's that being and doing. And he's not saying doing is a bad thing, you know. He's not saying Martha, you just should be sitting here at my feet. He's inviting her to release what's weighing her down so that he can transform her. So, you know, we can have this wonderful relationship between being and doing and I learned so much. I read up on a lot of the church fathers, the ancient church fathers from way back. So a bunch of men looking at Mary and Martha and going. This is a wonderful look at contemplation and action, of being and doing, and it was just marvelous to learn and to see that we can be and we can do.

Ellen Krause: 9:58

Yes, it sure is. How about for you, amy? Do you see yourself as sort of the be present in the moment or the doer? Do you have a natural tendency, one way or the other? Cause? I know what mine is, but I'll let you go first.

Amy Boucher Pye: 10:15

Well, I think I do like to do a lot and that's part of um, I think that's, yeah, that's part of how I've been made. But I also increasingly love to be and to sit at Jesus's feet and and I hope that my being fuels my doing. In my best moments, my being fuels my doing. I mean, I don't always get it right, but yeah, let's hope that. The being and the doing. How about you? Which way do you tend to go?

Ellen Krause: 10:45

I find myself definitely more tending towards the doing aspect and I need to be very intentional about and I find the greatest joy when I'm actually spending time at Jesus's feet. So I think for me it's a it's, it's a struggle, it's this. You know, I feel like I should be doing all these things and sometimes guilty that I'm taking time out, but I think that's such a great reminder in this story of Mary and Martha, uh, of recalling what truly is, um, that Jesus is asking, and if we want to grow this friendship with Christ right, we need to spend time learning and reading and praying. Well, how about the grieving and rejoicing part in the John 11 story?

Amy Boucher Pye: 11:43

Yeah, John 11 is an amazing story. It's the second longest narrative in John's Gospel outside of his passion, and so the space that John gives it means that it's really important. And so we see, I love this story because I think Martha gets a bad rap so often, this story, because I think Martha gets a bad rap so often. But Martha is the one there who goes out to Jesus and who says you're the Messiah. She proclaims him as the Messiah. She's one of three people pre-resurrection who says you are the Messiah, and I think that gets overlooked, doesn't it? She and Mary say exactly the same thing to him. Lord, if you'd been here, my brother wouldn't have died.

Amy Boucher Pye: 12:30

But the way Martha says it is kind of matter of fact and you're the Messiah, you could have dealt with this, whereas Mary, who is so often lauded in contemporary Christian culture, goes and slams herself at the feet of Jesus, weeping inconsolably. She's basically having a crisis of faith, and Jesus, it doesn't say anything to her, but acts. He goes and he resurrects Lazarus. He calls Lazarus back to life, and this story is kind of a precursor to show what's going to happen in the resurrection. You know, we have the grieving and we have the rejoicing. He's showing it's kind of a worked out example that he is indeed the Messiah, he's the Lord of life.

Amy Boucher Pye: 13:24

So I mean Lazarus we never hear anything from him in the Gospels, but he changes the most in one way, doesn't he? Because he dies and he's brought back to life. So, grieving and rejoicing we'll all have grieving in our lives. Grieving and rejoicing we'll all have grieving in our lives and I pray and hope that we'll all have rejoicing and welcoming Jesus into those experiences is how he can change us, to make us more like him and to be there and to comfort us, to give us hope and to pick us up when we're at his feet, saying, Jesus, I've lost hope, I've lost the will to love and to hope.

Ellen Krause: 14:06

Yes, I feel like when you see that Jesus did grieve, it helps bring out the humanity side of him. Yet we also see the divine power of god in this act of resurrection, and how would you say? The two of those you know. Combining those two together can just help us trust him more well, I think you've said it beautifully.

Amy Boucher Pye: 14:39

You've brought out that we do really see how he is fully man and he's fully God. And we have that famous shortest verse in the Bible in John 11, John 11, 35, Jesus wept, but I read Bible scholars. The original language shows that he's like, he has this anger against death that is shown in him weeping, and so to know that God is fully human, we can relate to him. And then we see him bringing back Lazarus from the dead, so we can believe that he's fully God, so he has the power to change us. He has the power to change and he's stronger than evil, isn't he?

Ellen Krause: 15:27

Yes, Praise God for that.

Amy Boucher Pye: 15:30

Yeah, we feel like we need to stop and say thank you Jesus, thank you Lord.

Ellen Krause: 15:36

Yeah, yeah, absolutely All right. So we've touched on sort of the being and doing aspect and grieving and rejoicing. Let's talk about loving and serving and how that can help us in our friendship with Jesus.

Amy Boucher Pye: 16:51

Sure. Well, John 12 is the story of this big meal that they were having to celebrate, and Mary and Martha were there. It wasn't actually in their home in Bethany, but it was in a different home, Simon of Cyrene and I love that. All we see of Martha is this two little words. Martha served and it's just so beautiful that she was doing what she loved to do. You know Jesus had changed her, but she was still fully Martha. She was happy, but she's not. Like you know, she's not stewing in the kitchen anymore. She's there serving and fulfilling who she is.

Amy Boucher Pye: 17:32

And this is the beautiful story where Mary takes what probably could have been her dowry, this very expensive bottle of perfume which would have been worth a year's wages of a working man, you know, like I don't know today's equivalent, $30,000 or pounds or whatever and she breaks the opening. So there's no going back, there's no putting it back in, and she anoints Jesus with love. She's so grateful for the way that he's changed her and that he's brought her brother back to life that she just pours out her love onto Jesus, onto his feet, anointing him for his death a week later. So he would have probably still had that lovely wafting smell on the cross. And that's what he invites us to do. He invites us to serve, like Martha, and to anoint him with our precious gifts, which, you know, go up to heaven in beautiful ways that we don't even, we won't know. We don't know how God uses the ways that we anoint him, but he receives them as a precious gift, amy, if you could ask Mary and Martha a question.

Ellen Krause: 18:50

Amy, if you could ask Mary and Martha a question, what would you want to know?

Amy Boucher Pye: 18:57

Well, I would want to know from Mary what did you learn when you were sitting at Jesus' feet? What was he teaching? I mean, wouldn't that be the most amazing Bible study? We talk about coffee in the Bible, but I want to have that Bible study with Jesus and Mary and with Martha. Ooh, I think I want to ask her about that experience of her naming Jesus as the Messiah, how that felt, how he affirmed her. What happened after that? What was her life like after these three episodes that we see in Scripture? It would be so fun, wouldn't it.

Ellen Krause: 19:41

You know, I think one of the things that really stands out to me is the fact that she used this expensive perfume to pour this on Jesus' feet because of such an overwhelming deep sense of loving, believing that Jesus is who he says he is and I feel like that's something that all of us are striving for is just to have this incredible faith. What do you think we can learn from that act and how it ties into our own faith journey, our own faith journey?

Amy Boucher Pye: 20:32

Well, I think, as we stop and stop some of our busyness and receive, receive God's love, receive God's love through Jesus and the Holy Spirit, receive, like Mary did. She received so much from God that she wanted to pour it out on Jesus, to anoint Jesus's feet. And so, as we find out who we are in Christ, as we've become so, so certain of our identity as God's beloved, then what we do is we'll just be bursting forth with thanks and praise and adoration and anointing God just simply in our daily lives, because we'll be so overflowing with love and thankfulness. So I think it's about receiving and knowing who we are and knowing how much that we're loved, and then it's. You know, it's no hardship to love somebody and to pour out your love on somebody, is it?

Ellen Krause: 21:37

No, it really. You find such great joy in doing that. Amy, one of the beautiful things about your book is how you tie in prayer. How you tie in prayer. Tell us a little bit about the process you used in setting up this time of prayer for each of these sections and what people can expect to be able to take away from that.

Amy Boucher Pye: 22:09

Yes, I love prayer and one of my recent books is called Seven Ways to Pray. It came out of the work that I did with my masters of just exploring ancient ways to pray, not because they're ancient, but because they're time tested and because God loves to pour out his love on us. So whenever I lead retreats in any of my books I always want to leave space for people to encounter God. So at the end of each of the chapters in Transforming Love I have a prayer exercise, two prayer exercises. They're either based on prayerful reading or imagining yourself in the gospel story or these other wonderful ways to pray, and then also personalizing Psalm 23.

Amy Boucher Pye: 23:00

How are we viewing God? Is he a distant father? Is he an uncaring judge? Is he a dictator? Or is he our shepherd? Is he our friend? For me as a writer, sometimes I say the Lord is my publisher, the Lord is my reviewer, the Lord is my, you know, teacher. There's so many different ways that we can put in different things of. It's just an exercise to go. How am I viewing God? Am I really viewing him? Is he really meeting all my needs Like he promises he will him? Is he really meeting all my needs Like he promises he will. So that's my biggest pleasure is to hear how people, how people, encounter God through prayer, and so I love making available those kinds of prayer exercises.

Ellen Krause: 23:47

Okay, I absolutely love this idea of personalizing Psalm 23. For me, that is, you know, something that I memorized as a young child and even to this day I use it. Probably every other day. I think of it in some circumstance or another where I'm saying it to myself. But I love how you make it so personal and I'm just looking at one of the examples you have in the book here where you said the Lord is my colleague. I lack nothing. He makes me a hot drink, he leads me to a quiet space for a break, he refreshes my soul, and I won't tell everything, but I just found that so encouraging and just the personalization of that particular psalm to be so meaningful, and I think it would be something great. For if you're listening to this, that would be such a great journaling exercise. Yes, totally.

Amy Boucher Pye: 24:58

Yes, I have instructions on my website just my name, amyboucherpye. com of how to do this, and it's just very simple. Just ask God what aspect of my life can you meet my needs in at this point? Where's my point of need right now? And then name the Lord is my so-and-so, and you just model it on Psalm 23, which is one of the most amazing set of verses out there, isn't it? I was reading it today and going oh, surely your love and mercy will follow me all the days of my life, even though I walk through the valley of death, or even though I walk through the valley of bad reviews, or even though I walk through the valley of sagging flesh or I don't know whatever sagging flasher, I don't know Whatever.

Amy Boucher Pye: 25:52

Seriously, yeah, you could write something different every day.

Ellen Krause: 25:54

Yes, yes, which, which I really love. I think I'm really going to remember that when I'm in my workout class, the Lord is my hero.

Amy Boucher Pye: 26:06

I can the lord is my instructor, my aerobics instructor yes, yes I love that.

Ellen Krause: 26:16

Well, amy, as we start to kind of wrap things up with this part of the discussion, tell our listeners like something that they can do right now to cultivate their friendship with god do right now to cultivate their friendship with God?

Amy Boucher Pye: 26:33

Well, turn to God, that's just the number one thing. Turn to God with your heart and express your desires, and God will come rushing towards you with open arms, just as he did with the prodigal son, and I'm not saying that we're prodigal daughters and sons, but God rushes towards us. So, yeah, and try out the Psalm 23. Exercise, that would be another great thing.

Ellen Krause: 26:57

Yeah, yeah, absolutely All right. Well, how can people find out more information about you and the book? I know? You mentioned your website, but why don't you? Do you need to maybe spell that?

Amy Boucher Pye: 27:09

Yes, I'm sure I do. So it's Amy Boucher Pie. It's Amy, and then B-O-U-C-H-E-R-P-Y-Ecom. And then I'm on, you know, instagram and Facebook and X, formerly known as Twitter. So yeah, and I have a YouTube channel with prayer exercises. So if you want to check those out and do some prayer exercises, I was recently on the island of Iona on the western part of Scotland and I'm going soon to the south coast of England all these amazing places where I lead retreats. So if you want a taste of some beauty, I love sharing prayer exercises from these places. I get to go.

Ellen Krause: 27:50

So it's, yeah, it's, I love to help Tell us a little bit about one of these retreats.

Amy Boucher Pye: 27:55

Yeah, well, I just went to Iona. We all met in Glasgow, so we all had a journey to Glasgow, and then the next day we took two buses and two ferries to get to the inner Hebrides. This is the western part of Scotland where St Columba in ooh was it in the 300s brought the Christian faith to the British Isles with its Celtic Christianity. And so it was this amazing, rugged, gorgeous place, and we had to leave the island with an hour to spare before the storm Kathleen came in. So we had a taste of being a pilgrim, but God was with us.

Ellen Krause: 28:37

So, yeah, it's amazing, god is God, pours himself out when we turn toward him that sounds incredible, especially just combining the aspect of nature and the beauty of God's creation into that whole process. It must be pretty, pretty incredible.

Amy Boucher Pye: 28:57

Yeah, yes, it is. Yes. I'm very grateful to get to do these fun things and to share them with others.

Ellen Krause: 29:10

Okay, well, we will make sure we put links to all of that in our show notes Before we go. Amy, I want to ask you about some of our favorite Bible study tool questions. What Bible is your go-to Bible and what translation is it?

Amy Boucher Pye: 29:21

Yes, I have with me the NIV Bible Speaks Today Bible, which I just love. I love it because it has the wonderful commentary of the Bible Speaks Today series and it's all condensed down so you can just get into the text, get the context, get this wonderful, lovely commentary from the Bible Speaks Today NIV. I highly recommend it.

Ellen Krause: 29:52

Okay, excellent recommendation. Do you have any favorite journaling supplies or anything that you like to use to enhance your Bible study experience?

Amy Boucher Pye: 30:01

I do. I like to use coloring pages from the Lindisfarne Scriptorium, this wonderful group of people up on Lindisfarne which is known as Holy Island Again, that Kelton Christianity. They have lots of wonderful resources, especially coloring in Bible passages, just as a way to slow ourselves down. And that's just so much of the beauty of encountering God. And, like when Seven Ways to Pray, a lot of my practices are how can we slow ourselves down and really interact with God so that we can stop and hear God and hear all the wonderful things that he has for us and that he likes to share with us?

Ellen Krause: 30:45

That's so neat? Is there a special website that people can go to to get those? Yes, yes you certainly don't have to go all the way there.

Amy Boucher Pye: 30:54

No, you don't. Yes, it's lindisfarnscriptoriumcouk, so lindisfarn, l-i-n-d-i-s-f-a-r-n-e, and then a little dash and then scriptorium E, and then a little dash and then scriptorium S-C-R-I-P-T-O-R-I-U-Mcouk, and they're all available for purchase for not too much money. Definitely recommend them, okay awesome.

Ellen Krause: 31:22

That's really cool. I'm going to check that out and we will also put the link to that in our show notes. Lastly, what is your favorite app or website for Bible study tools?

Amy Boucher Pye: 31:32

Well, one thing that I use a lot is the NIV Audio Bible, narrated by David Suchet, who you might recognize as Inspector Poirot, the Agatha Christie. I just love hearing him narrate it. Sometimes, if I can't fall asleep, I have these like little, these little headphones that are like a headband, you know, so you can sleep. I have those too. They're amazing. Yes, so you can put For sleeping. Yes, exactly yes, so you just put on the NIV, you put on the timer and you hear scripture and you get to just, and I love how it comes alive in a different way than reading. I tend to be more visual, so I love all the things that you all do with Bible journaling and colors and sticky notes, but I also love hearing the Bible too, and it's like God speaks it over us. It's like it almost, you know, singing over us in love. So I recommend that the NIV audio, the Bible, app.

Ellen Krause: 32:36

Okay, excellent. Well, we will make sure we have links for all of those things in our show notes. Amy, thank you so much for joining us today. I just think it's been such a great reminder for us to think of Jesus in terms of being our friend too, as well as our savior. So, and just like any friendship, we need to tend to it, and Jesus is the greatest example of how to do relationships well.

Amy Boucher Pye: 33:05

So Amy thank you. Oh well, thank you. It's been an absolute pleasure. So thank you so much.

Ellen Krause: 33:11

I'm very grateful all right, you are welcome and for our listeners, be sure and get a copy of Amy's book, Transforming Love, today. We will have the link in our show notes. Thank you so much for listening. We appreciate you all. Have a blessed day.