Storytelling has been central to my life and to the lives of the students, young adults, and mentors I’ve walked alongside. As someone navigating faith and life with a marginalized identity, I’ve seen firsthand how sharing our stories can reclaim dignity, foster connection, and reveal the beauty of resilience. The stories of my students and colleagues—often shaped in the crucible of adversity—have shown me that our narratives are not just personal; they are communal treasures that shape how we see God, ourselves, and the world. What is the R.E.S.T. Mixtape? The R.E.S.T. Mixtape is a theological construct, a rule of life, and a new wineskin for deep, resonant faith in a post-digital, post-Christian, multi-faith, and no-faith world. It remixes Radical Ethical Spirituality with embodied wisdom, offering a framework for those seeking liberation, integrity, and belonging beyond the diseased imagination that distorts our ways of knowing and being. It's inspired by hip-hop, hush harbors, and womanist theology, R.E.S.T. is a framework that weaves together cultural traditions, spirituality, storytelling, and philosophical inquiry, offering a new wineskin for a post-Christian age. R.E.S.T. is both the acronym for this new way of being and knowing and the desired byproduct of engaging theologically with it.  I hope it empowers individuals and communities to encounter the divine in themselves and one another in fugitive spaces. What’s the Vision? The goal of the R.E.S.T. Mixtape is to excavate, remix, and preserve liberatory wisdom by integrating familiar biblical texts with cultural texts—music, TV, and film—to reveal the truth that belongs to all of us. It serves as a new wineskin, a container for what is worth keeping from a collapsing theological and cultural construct. Instead of discarding everything, it curates and holds the best, most liberative elements of inherited traditions while creating space for new ethical, spiritual, and communal possibilities.