Esau’s Key to a Grounded Life

Holy Post
Jul 2
4 min read

Esau McCaulley didn’t set out to become a “public Christian,” and that’s precisely what makes him a good one. In this spotlight article, he unpacks his multifaceted vocation and his tools for healthy boundaries, defining priorities, & staying grounded.

Family Man

Esau rose to public acclaim through his 2020 book Reading While Black and subsequent memoir How Far to the Promised Land. He earned high accolades like “the brightest theological mind of this generation,” but notoriety was never his goal.

“When I say I don’t care about any kind of public platform stuff, I'm speaking as honestly as I can. I do not care.”

Esau wants to use his gifts to do good in the world, but never at the expense of his life at home and in the church. He rarely travels for work, which makes space to create content while still availing himself to the people he’s committed to. He says, “having dinner with my children is the best part of my day…I feel called to do good in a particular place with particular people. While people were running away from the local church, I felt God calling me to run towards it.”

Pastor & Church Planter

Esau dreamed about planting a church for years, and in late 2024, All Saints Naperville was born. With Esau leading as Rector, the church integrates traditional Anglican sacraments & liturgy with a commitment to the diverse, justice-oriented, compassionate church described in Scripture.

A unique feature of All Saints Naperville is its variety of worship styles. Gospel music is woven throughout the service and treasured by the multiethnic congregation — “being in monocultural settings is soul-crushing…you want to be in a space where you feel like your culture is honored and valued.” Alongside the music, “the mystery and beauty of the liturgy brings people together, and you can do it without being stuffy.” In many ways, All Saints Naperville holds together things that many would seek to pull apart.

"You don’t have to draw lines between biblical faithfulness, concern for justice, and a personal relationship with Christ. You can have all of these things together."

It’s easy to say something like that on social media, but leading All Saints Naperville requires Esau to literally practice what he preaches week after week, which is a grounding force in his life and work.

Podcast Host

While his first priority is “particular people in a particular place,” Esau enjoys connecting with a broader community through The Esau McCaulley Podcast. His desire behind this show is “to explore sports, music, and pop culture from a Christian perspective to the end of helping us to follow Jesus more faithfully.”

Esau’s show also expands the public conversation of the American church, which has been broadly limited to white evangelicalism. “I want to say that concerns happening in a Black Christian context can also be relevant.”

Contemporary, accessible, and eclectic, The Esau McCaulley Podcast deftly covers topics as wide-ranging as Squid Game, the Nicene Creed, liberation theology, and the Kendrick-Drake beef. If you’ve ever wondered what it actually looks like to bridge the sacred-secular divide, Esau and his guests model it for us in every episode. Join the conversation every Thursday wherever you get your podcasts!

Professor & Scholar

Esau’s cultural commentary is so rich because his theology is so sound. Much of his week is spent “just teaching students the Bible” as Associate Professor of New Testament & Public Theology at Wheaton College. Through courses on Luke, Romans, the Epistles, and Paul, he strives to “help students see that the Bible is not just a book that they study — it's a book that studies them."

He says, "I have an unapologetic agenda when it comes to my students: I want them to see this book, and the New Testament in particular, as a reliable means of encountering, discerning, and obeying the will of God, through reading and interpreting those texts well.” Esau believes that questioning our understanding is essential to the life of faith, not threatening to it. “By probing and challenging, I don't want the student to trust God's word any less, but I want them to understand the questions that are posed to Christianity so they may answer them better. They still come out orthodox — they believe what Christians always believe — but they understand why. And the only way to get to the why is to ask the question.”

So he's a pastor, a professor, a podcaster, a parent, not to mention a New York Times opinion writer AND author...how does he do it all? What keeps him from burning out? The key is the local church.

“I have a podcast that I really, really love. I really enjoy teaching at Wheaton College. I really enjoy writing. But I also think that serving in my church makes the rest of it possible. I don't think I could actually do the podcast or teach at Wheaton or write the stuff that I do if I didn't have a local church where I was trying to embody it. What people saw in Reading While Black, the Lent book, How Far To the Promised Land, all of that was from a life of ministry - I spoke about what I gleaned from my life of ministry. I've said basically all I have to say about what I gleaned from that period of my life. Now I need to have another set of experiences so I can have more to give to the world.”

Continue getting to know Esau every Thursday on The Esau McCaulley Podcast! Make sure to follow or subscribe so you never miss an episode.

Also, sign up for Holy Post Plus to gain access to exclusive content from Esau like his new series 66 Verses to Explain the Bible! Striking the perfect chord between pastoral and scholarly, Esau breaks down each book of the Bible into small enough chunks to recognize, understand, and use in our lives.