Speaker 1: We've all had that experience in life where either from
Speaker 1: us or from a friend, where you got you get
Speaker 1: into a relationship, usually when you're younger, sometimes when you're older,
Speaker 1: and the relationship starts taking over your life or your
Speaker 1: buddy's life, and then they slowly start fading away from
Speaker 1: you as a friend, and then you see them slowly
Speaker 1: start fading away from their family and they become more
Speaker 1: and more isolated in that relationship to the to the
Speaker 1: worst extent, they break up, and then that person or
Speaker 1: you starts turning to some kind of supplement like alcohol
Speaker 1: to make them forget about it. And then they convince
Speaker 1: themselves that there's never going to be a relationship after that,
Speaker 1: and that was the only one that was worth anything.
Speaker 1: For the rest of their life, they're gonna be just
Speaker 1: trying to get recreate that perfect relationship back when on
Speaker 1: the reality from the outside looking in, you just think
Speaker 1: this is a terrible situation. This was never gonna be good.
Speaker 1: There's so many people left in the world, there's so
Speaker 1: many other opportunities for another relationship, and you're stuck on
Speaker 1: this one. Like I said, I keep I'm speaking in
Speaker 1: third person because it could be you. It could be me.
Speaker 1: It could be it was me at one time, and
Speaker 1: I've known many friends that have done this and you
Speaker 1: just get completely blinded. That was one of the questions
Speaker 1: on the podcast today. And so we're gonna dig through that.
Speaker 1: We're gonna dig through people seeing God and the clouds,
Speaker 1: which I don't know how I feel about that. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna talk about that. I'm gonna kind of dig into
Speaker 1: all different kinds of questions. If you have anything for me,
Speaker 1: anything at all, music related, relationship related, God in the
Speaker 1: Clouds related, email Granger Smith Podcast at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1: I have my good friend Chad Warren. It's going to
Speaker 1: help me answer some of these questions today. Really smart dude.
Speaker 1: I've met him recently because of a crazy I storm
Speaker 1: in Texas and we became friends in a strange way,
Speaker 1: which I'll talk about it. Chad is a cancer survivor
Speaker 1: that has gone through unbelievable experience with that. He is
Speaker 1: a CrossFit addict. I won't hold that against him. And
Speaker 1: he's also the connections pastor at First Baptist Church in Georgetown, Texas.
Speaker 1: He's a really good candidate to He's also from Montana
Speaker 1: and Colorado and currently lives in Texas. So he's a
Speaker 1: well rounded speaker for this podcast, and he's going to
Speaker 1: have a good opinion on a lot of these questions
Speaker 1: and you guys are going to like him a lot.
Speaker 1: So I'm excited. Welcome to the podcast. Ye yee did
Speaker 1: Muir's longline five? Fool of Husband down? Going Back's Rangy Coage. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you'reation chat. I was talking just before we started this podcast.
Speaker 1: You asked me if I'm a cross fitter. Yeah, I said, no,
Speaker 1: I do strength training. I mean, you look like you
Speaker 1: can handle yourself so well, so do you. It's like
Speaker 1: and sometimes you think of maybe it's the strength training guys,
Speaker 1: think of the crossfitting guys as like have a series
Speaker 1: like those those guys they do all kinds of crazy stuff.
Speaker 1: It is definitely a subculture. It is. Yeah, there's words
Speaker 1: and acronyms and like right now we're in the open season,
Speaker 1: so the CrossFit Open so everyone's kind of tuned in.
Speaker 1: So you've got this. It's they claim it's the largest
Speaker 1: fitness competition globally. So you can do it in your garage.
Speaker 1: You can go to a CrossFit affiliate and you compete
Speaker 1: against everybody in the world and then they'll take, so
Speaker 1: you do. They'll post one workout a week, so this
Speaker 1: morning or last night was the first workout, and they'll
Speaker 1: do three over the next three weeks. And you just
Speaker 1: get after it and you see how you rank against
Speaker 1: everybody in your age, demographic, all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1: So comment below if you're a crossfitter and you and
Speaker 1: you're participating in CrossFit open season right now? What you
Speaker 1: said open season? It's open, but it's the season of
Speaker 1: the open. It's not like I mean, some people might
Speaker 1: think it's like hunting. Yeah, if you see a crossfitter
Speaker 1: taking yeah, tikes. So the closest connection I have to
Speaker 1: CrossFit is my my drummer, Dusty, and I don't think
Speaker 1: I think he actually is a little bit into it.
Speaker 1: But he was all into it at one point. This
Speaker 1: is about two years ago. Yeah, and he got rabdo myialysis.
Speaker 1: I've heard of that. It was crazy, so bad. It
Speaker 1: was a day of a show and he was going
Speaker 1: to try to make the show and his his muscles
Speaker 1: were swelling. I mean he looked like he was he
Speaker 1: got bitten by the most deadliest scorpion in South Africa.
Speaker 1: I mean it was crazy. His face was puffy. His
Speaker 1: arm was all puffed up and he had to go
Speaker 1: into I mean pretty much an emergency situation at the
Speaker 1: hospital where they had to fix him up and do whatever.
Speaker 1: It's like overhydration or what. I don't even, I can't even. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's something blood, blood and muscle tissue and breakdown. It's
Speaker 1: actually pretty rare, but it's it's gruesome enough that when
Speaker 1: when it happens, lots of people take notice and they're like, Okay,
Speaker 1: that's it. I'm out. Yeah, So, yeah, it's rare. I've
Speaker 1: been coaching for over two years. I coach CrossFit, and
Speaker 1: I've never seen it, So, okay, well that's something. And
Speaker 1: then my personal connection with it is and you probably
Speaker 1: know David Goggins as you're you used to actually really
Speaker 1: want to be a Navy seal. Yeah, and we could
Speaker 1: talk about that. But but David Goggins cray absolute crazy
Speaker 1: ex Navy seal now author and speaker. But I was
Speaker 1: reading his book and he was talking about this pull
Speaker 1: up challenge and how many pull ups can you do?
Speaker 1: And he was like, yeah, he was walking it through
Speaker 1: like mathematically, like I could do so many pull ups
Speaker 1: in a minute, and then if I could just keep
Speaker 1: going and have thirty seconds of rest and then do
Speaker 1: twenty more and then rest for ten seconds. Then I
Speaker 1: could pretty much do pull ups all day long. So
Speaker 1: I was reading the book and I was like, man,
Speaker 1: I could do a lot of pull ups. I can
Speaker 1: pretty good at pull ups. I wonder if I could
Speaker 1: follow this pattern and do you know, do ten and
Speaker 1: then rest for twenty seconds and then do ten, do
Speaker 1: rest for twenty seconds, And how long could I go?
Speaker 1: And how many pullups could I do? So I started
Speaker 1: it on day one. I got tennis elbow from it,
Speaker 1: and it was dude, it was so painful. It was
Speaker 1: so painful to have that ten to nineus that I
Speaker 1: couldn't even close the car door and just in the
Speaker 1: one arm, Yeah, just in one arm. And I learned
Speaker 1: later that what happens is and David Goggins he just
Speaker 1: tore up his hands during pull ups. But what happens
Speaker 1: is when you start getting tired, you lose, you start
Speaker 1: losing your grip yep, and your your hands starts kind
Speaker 1: of rolling on the bar exactly, and it's rolling back
Speaker 1: and forth. That's where you tear things. Yeah, So now
Speaker 1: anytime I do a pull up, now I make sure
Speaker 1: that bar is all the way into the bed of
Speaker 1: my thumb, you know, as tired as it can go
Speaker 1: inside there, and my my wrists are straight down. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's good. We should do some pull ups sometimes, all right,
Speaker 1: all right, I mean I yeah, See, that's my problem
Speaker 1: is my brain will always keep going. It's like I
Speaker 1: just keep going, just keep going, keep going, and then
Speaker 1: I hurting myself. Well we can't. Yeah, we're at an
Speaker 1: age now where things don't recover quite as fast. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: but we think we're still like in our twenties and
Speaker 1: we're good to go, I know anyway, And I remember
Speaker 1: our dads, you know, or at least my dad's saying that,
Speaker 1: and I just thought, here's such an old man, yeah,
Speaker 1: saying the same thing. So Chad, you're Montana native. Yeah,
Speaker 1: born and raised northwestern Montana. Yeah, it's your mountain guy.
Speaker 1: You've also spent time in Colorado. Yeah, we did a
Speaker 1: little stint in the east, but yeah, the Pacific Northwest,
Speaker 1: basically the Rocky Mountains. Somehow you ended up in Texas. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: I my wife is from here. So some argue that
Speaker 1: I got wise, and I I realized I need to
Speaker 1: go find a good woman so go to Texas. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and she's an Aggie too. Yeah, so there you go.
Speaker 1: I'm married into all that. I love it. But you're
Speaker 1: an aggie too, now, okay, try to say that is
Speaker 1: you know, people say, oh, I wasn't you know, I
Speaker 1: don't have the opportunity to become an aggie. And I
Speaker 1: was like, well, and aggie technically is the parent of
Speaker 1: someone that goes there. They're technically the spouse of someone
Speaker 1: that went there. And then there's a lot of people
Speaker 1: that could just they could claim it through some other
Speaker 1: one degree of separation from the school itself. And there's
Speaker 1: a lot of noises you got to learn, and yeah,
Speaker 1: there's things that happen when when you join that noises.
Speaker 1: I like it whooping and it's good. Yeah, although I
Speaker 1: get I get pretty into it. My wife says I'm
Speaker 1: more eggy than she is sometimes because I get pretty
Speaker 1: fired up. Good. Yeah, So how long have you been married? Fifteen?
Speaker 1: Well we're in our fifteenth year marriage, so you know,
Speaker 1: you know you know about that, yeah, fifteen years. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So Chad, we met just a little bit more backstory
Speaker 1: before we get into some questions here, but we met
Speaker 1: a very unique way. It was the what people are
Speaker 1: calling the snow apocalypse now in Texas. And we have
Speaker 1: a mutual friend and it was they there was a
Speaker 1: day in Texas, midweek, mid storm when the ice finally
Speaker 1: subsided enough for people to actually get on the roads.
Speaker 1: And the day that that happened, kind of everyone in
Speaker 1: central Texas knew that there's going to be people in
Speaker 1: need of food and water, and so me and my
Speaker 1: brothers here we decided to go and the first step was,
Speaker 1: let's go get a bunch of pizzas and then through
Speaker 1: and I put it on Instagram that were going to
Speaker 1: get a bunch of pizzas and give them out to
Speaker 1: people that are hungry that day, need a hot meal.
Speaker 1: And then that mutual friend connected you who was actually
Speaker 1: you were doing the same thing and you didn't need
Speaker 1: so much the pizzas as the able bodies to turn
Speaker 1: the pizzas out. Yep, and people willing to drive yes
Speaker 1: in conditions that were unfavorable. Yeah. So yeah, in my
Speaker 1: role at the church, I got a call from somebody
Speaker 1: at the county and they said, hey, now that the
Speaker 1: roads are becoming driveable, is there a way that you
Speaker 1: would be willing to open your doors at the church
Speaker 1: and start to receive donations and then find a way
Speaker 1: to distribute those. So that's what we did. We just
Speaker 1: opened up. And then just as things were developing, that
Speaker 1: mutual friend of ours said, Hey, I have a buddy
Speaker 1: who's wanting to hand out pizzas. Can he sync up
Speaker 1: with you guys? And what you're doing? I'm like sure.
Speaker 1: So there were we had been learning about several neighborhoods
Speaker 1: where there were quite a few people that were in need,
Speaker 1: and so yeah, you and I linked up at the
Speaker 1: corner and grabbed our pizzas and we just started handing
Speaker 1: him out and groceries and Sonic Burgers and all kinds
Speaker 1: of stuff. So we spent a couple hours that day
Speaker 1: together doing that, and then later we texted and I
Speaker 1: don't know who said it first, but it's like, man,
Speaker 1: let's grab some lunch, you know, let's grab some tacos tacos.
Speaker 1: So we did that and then I was like, Hey,
Speaker 1: you're a cool guy, and I hope that you maybe
Speaker 1: thought that. Well, I just thought you were a dude.
Speaker 1: I just thought you were a really cool guy, and
Speaker 1: you are a really cool guy. But then I thought
Speaker 1: you were the yeee guy. Uh huh, I didn't know that.
Speaker 1: That's actually what your text said. The first text was
Speaker 1: are you the YEEE guy? Like yes, because I've seen
Speaker 1: hats and shirts, I'm like, oh, those are cool. And
Speaker 1: then I didn't know like you're a thing, and I
Speaker 1: didn't know that. Well. Then we had lunch again, had
Speaker 1: tacos again, had some deep conversations, and I was like, man,
Speaker 1: I have this podcast. I answered these questions people, all
Speaker 1: kinds of questions, they'll send them in, and you want
Speaker 1: to help me out on it. Well, you said, so
Speaker 1: it's gonna be it would be like us sitting around
Speaker 1: a campfire and Colorado. And I thought we were gonna
Speaker 1: be sitting around a campfire in Colorado. So when you
Speaker 1: were like, hey, it's just about fifteen minutes outside of town,
Speaker 1: I thought, that's that's interesting. Maybe we're gonna, you know,
Speaker 1: road trip or something here we are, Yeah, we're not.
Speaker 1: We're not at all in Colorado with the EU Farm.
Speaker 1: And I do have some cause you're the ee guy.
Speaker 1: I'm the EEG guy at the EU Farm answered some
Speaker 1: eue questions. That's right, And if anyone listening has a
Speaker 1: question of any kind, email Granger Smith podcast at gmail
Speaker 1: dot com. Could be about in It could be about music,
Speaker 1: It could be about life, could be about relationship, could
Speaker 1: be about job, could be advice, could be anything that
Speaker 1: you would talk about sitting around a campfire. And so
Speaker 1: neither one of us have notes. Chad has no idea
Speaker 1: what I'm about to say. And I looked at these
Speaker 1: just a little bit just to make sure we were
Speaker 1: kind of in the ballpark at what I wanted to do.
Speaker 1: And I'm gonna start out. I'm gonna start up with
Speaker 1: you kind of light chat here, but then I have
Speaker 1: to remember which ones. Oh, here we go. Have you
Speaker 1: ever driven a combined? And I have not driven a combined.
Speaker 1: I have not driven a combine. And I have droned
Speaker 1: many combines for YouTube. And I have some family and
Speaker 1: plain View, so I used to grow up and go
Speaker 1: to their farm out in plain View, Texas and see
Speaker 1: them run the combine. But I've and I've played plenty
Speaker 1: of shows where they're you know, they're prayer, they're the
Speaker 1: backdrop of the stage, but I've never actually been in
Speaker 1: the seat and driven one. You I've driven a combine.
Speaker 1: So I have family in North Dakota, and so we
Speaker 1: went and visited them one time, and as a kid,
Speaker 1: I don't know that you could call it driving it
Speaker 1: or piloting it or whatever. But then in high school
Speaker 1: I worked for a farmer in Colorado and I ran
Speaker 1: the swather, which is similar to a combine. Combine is
Speaker 1: taking you know, corn and stuff, but a swather is
Speaker 1: cutting hay. And it wasn't. I mean, it was a
Speaker 1: pretty sweet gig air conditioned cab and had a CD
Speaker 1: player and I would put in every morning when I
Speaker 1: go out there, I put in the soundtrack to top Gun, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and act like I was firing up the jet. Love it.
Speaker 1: Just get things rolling and just dial it in. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Me and Chattah say mate. So top Gun is like,
Speaker 1: you know, right down a ra alley, which there's another
Speaker 1: one coming out. I know. It was actually supposed to
Speaker 1: be twenty twenty, and then the pandemic pushed it back.
Speaker 1: Which on YouTube, now I could say coronavirus. Now, there
Speaker 1: was a time and they just released that. But there
Speaker 1: was a time when YouTube was demonetizing anything and hiding
Speaker 1: the analytics or the algorithm of anything that said coronavirus.
Speaker 1: So what would you call it? The rona? I was
Speaker 1: just say the virus or virus. You know what we're
Speaker 1: talking about. Virus. So yeah, shout out to Braiden. Doesn't
Speaker 1: say where you're from, Braiden, but I have not, Chad has.
Speaker 1: I'm assuming you have, and I hope that you listen
Speaker 1: to the podcast in your combine. I know it's not
Speaker 1: season right now, but I hope you listen to it
Speaker 1: in your tractor. That'd be really cool. Hey Granger, I'm
Speaker 1: from Garnet, Kansas. This is this guy's name is Trevor,
Speaker 1: and I was wondering what is your favorite kind of
Speaker 1: rifle to use when you deer hunt? And what is
Speaker 1: your choice? God bless Thanks Trevor. Shout out to Kansas
Speaker 1: everyone in Kansas another combine state. I I'm not a
Speaker 1: big I'm not a big fancy rifle guy, and that's
Speaker 1: because my dad never was. It was never all about
Speaker 1: the best rifle in town. I've shot a lot of
Speaker 1: seven milimeter eight and two seventy, and then lately I've
Speaker 1: gotten into the six fight creed More and I have
Speaker 1: a Recently I got a Savage Arms six y five
Speaker 1: creed More, which is an ultra light rifle which is awesome,
Speaker 1: which would work great in Montana if you're in the
Speaker 1: mountains and I don't even have a hunt planned where
Speaker 1: I would actually need an ultra ultra light rifle, but
Speaker 1: I love it. And it's on the bottom end, like
Speaker 1: the Savage Arms. This one is on the bottom end
Speaker 1: money wise of the ultra light world. And I think
Speaker 1: it's awesome. It feels great. And how about you, Chevvy.
Speaker 1: That's a big deal ultra light rifles and collar out
Speaker 1: of Montana because you are trekking, you are stalking animals.
Speaker 1: You are putting in miles and miles a day just
Speaker 1: to see traces of something. When I came to Texas
Speaker 1: and a buddy asked me to go deer hunting, I
Speaker 1: wasn't sure what that would entail, like if we'd be
Speaker 1: walking across wide open planes and or army crawling or something.
Speaker 1: But then he puts me in what he calls the
Speaker 1: executive blind. I'm like, okay, what's that mean. It literally
Speaker 1: had like a swivel leather reclining chair and we were
Speaker 1: just going to wait, And I was like, well, what
Speaker 1: are we waiting for? Is there a certain time of
Speaker 1: day where they come out? And he goes, yeah, when
Speaker 1: the feeder goes off, I was like, so basically, we're
Speaker 1: shopping today, and so yeah, when I shopping, I like it.
Speaker 1: When I shop in Texas for deer, I use a
Speaker 1: my grandpa's I inherited a lever Action thirty thirty kind
Speaker 1: of an old cowboy gun. And then I use a
Speaker 1: three hundred wind mag it's a Model seventy Winchester for
Speaker 1: elk hunting is which I primarily do, or a mule
Speaker 1: deer yeh. In Colorado or Montana, Dude, people are losing
Speaker 1: their mind agreeing with you when you're talking about shopping
Speaker 1: for deer and and it. You know, I love I
Speaker 1: love deer hunting and I always have. And in Texas
Speaker 1: it's typically sitting in a blind and you're you're hunting
Speaker 1: a food plot, could be hunting a feeder. And when
Speaker 1: I started touring and getting outside of Texas and noticed
Speaker 1: that that's like really bad to talk about that for
Speaker 1: people outside of Texas, they're like, what, that's not hunting,
Speaker 1: that's not hunting as as Chad from Montana would say,
Speaker 1: that's shopping actually, And I thought, man, I agree, I
Speaker 1: do like to. You know, I love to go and
Speaker 1: shoot a dough and put a bunch of meat in
Speaker 1: the freezing. Yeah, if you're for me, it's great because
Speaker 1: it's a it's a given you're gonna walk away that day.
Speaker 1: And I was in a situation where he I think
Speaker 1: he calls him cold. He needed me to kind of
Speaker 1: take out some of the bad genetics or something like that.
Speaker 1: He's like, yeah, come here, you know, shoot. So then
Speaker 1: he said, before you shoot, send me a picture of
Speaker 1: what you're about to shoot, and then I'll let you
Speaker 1: know if it's okay. So, I mean, such a different
Speaker 1: world where you would sit there, I'd have cell coverage,
Speaker 1: I would be able to snap a photo. He's in
Speaker 1: a blind somewhere else and he goes, yeah, take the
Speaker 1: one on the right. It's like, okay, we're hunting in Texas.
Speaker 1: This is awesome. Yeah, yeah, cool buck. It's yeah, that's
Speaker 1: that's and and the idea behind it is good management.
Speaker 1: Hunting is good because you are you know, the the
Speaker 1: number one way to get big antlers out of a
Speaker 1: buck is refining the genetics. So and people look past
Speaker 1: that a lot and they think, oh, it's all about feed,
Speaker 1: and which is feed is the second, But but genetics
Speaker 1: is number one and the only way to really get
Speaker 1: thoseics is to cull out the inferior genetics, take out
Speaker 1: the other suitors. Yeah for sure. Yeah, so well, cool,
Speaker 1: you got another. I'm gonna spread this out. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: spread out the easy ones because I have another one.
Speaker 1: We'll see time eighteen. Cool. So let's get into some
Speaker 1: meat here, Chad. Let's start with this one that the
Speaker 1: subject is wavering faith question. Dear Grangeer, I just want
Speaker 1: to say I'm a huge fan of the show and
Speaker 1: I've listened to every episode. Dude, Thank you, Michael. It
Speaker 1: says it gets me through my long shifts at patrolling.
Speaker 1: I'm a police officer here here in Arkansas, shout out
Speaker 1: to Arkansas, and I've seen the worst that life has
Speaker 1: to offer through my job and also in my personal life.
Speaker 1: In twenty sixteen, I lost my father to cancer. He
Speaker 1: was one of the nicest guys you could ever meet.
Speaker 1: In July of this year, I lost my mother. She
Speaker 1: was shot in her home. My mother was a recovered
Speaker 1: drug addict who had gone to prison and got out
Speaker 1: and it changed her completely changed her life. She tried
Speaker 1: to help anyone in need that she could and do
Speaker 1: to this, I've found my faith wavering. I'm a believer
Speaker 1: in Christ. But due to the things I've seen at
Speaker 1: work and the tragedies I've faced in my life, I've
Speaker 1: found my relationship to God is getting more distant. I
Speaker 1: don't go to church as much anymore or talk to
Speaker 1: God as much as I used to. My wife has
Speaker 1: noticed this and it kind of put a strain on
Speaker 1: our marriage. My wife loves going to church and it's
Speaker 1: a chore for her to get me to go. Did
Speaker 1: you go through anything like that with what happened with River?
Speaker 1: And what advice could you give someone to try and
Speaker 1: get the relationship back with God? And that's from Michael.
Speaker 1: First of all, thank you for your service. Michael, you're
Speaker 1: out there protecting the community in Arkansas. Thank you for
Speaker 1: your service, and thank you for being able to endure
Speaker 1: what you see for the sake of protecting so many
Speaker 1: lives and keeping so many people safe. And I'm not
Speaker 1: going to pretend like I even know what you have
Speaker 1: seen or what you've gone through. And I know that
Speaker 1: there's a lot of law enforcement that listen to this podcast,
Speaker 1: So thank you for everyone, and I'm sure a lot
Speaker 1: of people can relate. Other than that. That being said,
Speaker 1: it is still a common question that you're asking that
Speaker 1: you don't have to see what you see, or be
Speaker 1: in your line of duty to have your faith wavering,
Speaker 1: or to do to loss in the family, strain in
Speaker 1: the marriage. Your wife wants to go to church, you don't.
Speaker 1: I would think this is pretty common. It was a
Speaker 1: pretty common American man wavering. That could be just as
Speaker 1: equally women. Well, the danger here, first of all, is
Speaker 1: being angry and blaming God for any of this. And
Speaker 1: what has happened is when these events, these events have
Speaker 1: changed you in some way, and your first reaction was
Speaker 1: to move away from God and to talk less to God.
Speaker 1: And these are your words. God's getting more distant. I
Speaker 1: don't go to church, I don't talk to God as
Speaker 1: much as I used to. And in fact, you're almost
Speaker 1: answering your own question when you say, how do I
Speaker 1: get closer to God? I'm not talking to him as much. Right.
Speaker 1: The first kind of thing that I think of this, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean we can certainly distance ourselves from Him as
Speaker 1: we pull away. And I think you're right, it is.
Speaker 1: It is one the most common things that people will
Speaker 1: wrestle with within the faith and outside of the faith
Speaker 1: is if there is a good and all powerful God
Speaker 1: that created everything, and why is there Why did bad
Speaker 1: things happen? Why is there evil? Why is there so
Speaker 1: much brokenness in a world that he created? And if
Speaker 1: he's all powerful and all good and all loving and
Speaker 1: has the power to make that all go away, why
Speaker 1: doesn't he do that? I mean that that's the probably
Speaker 1: the most common question I could think of. And those
Speaker 1: that do have a faith in Christ, that's going to
Speaker 1: be one of those things when they encounter situations where
Speaker 1: they are up, you know, right in the midst of
Speaker 1: pain and personal tragedy, evil, They're gonna that's what's gonna
Speaker 1: start to shake things because they're going to go why
Speaker 1: would he let this happen? Why is this going to happen?
Speaker 1: And you know, there's a couple of things that I
Speaker 1: think about that. First of all, one of the main
Speaker 1: parts of the question is, well, who's responsible for the
Speaker 1: bad thing that happened? Who's responsible for the evil that
Speaker 1: we experience in this world? And we know the Bible
Speaker 1: isn't it's not a mystery in the Bible, it's we
Speaker 1: first apart of God designed this whole thing, and he
Speaker 1: said it's good, it's perfect, it's going to run absolutely beautifully,
Speaker 1: and he's the author of truth, of goodness, of beauty.
Speaker 1: It's humanity that said, you know what, I think, I'd
Speaker 1: like to give it a shot on my own. I'd
Speaker 1: like to try things my way. So as soon as
Speaker 1: we depart from God's design of the family, of the
Speaker 1: way that we interact with other people in our community,
Speaker 1: the way that we interact with money, the way that
Speaker 1: we use technology. Anytime we say I'm going to try
Speaker 1: it my way as opposed to God's way, it's always
Speaker 1: going to lead to brokenness. And then we experience that
Speaker 1: brokenness and we go, man, things aren't right, things don't work.
Speaker 1: Why don't they work? And then we these man made
Speaker 1: attempts to try to fix the brokenness only lead to
Speaker 1: more brokenness. So God's solution is he shows up on
Speaker 1: the scene and he demonstrates through the ministry the life
Speaker 1: of Jesus Christ, that this is the way out. We're
Speaker 1: going to return to God's design and so rather than
Speaker 1: human efforts that lead to more brokenness. So good, such
Speaker 1: a good word. And it's what's awesome, Michael, is that
Speaker 1: you say in here, I'm a believer in Christ. Christ
Speaker 1: was a suffering Christ. He demonstrated coming to this earth,
Speaker 1: being in the flesh and suffering, suffering just like your suffering.
Speaker 1: And then he says, follow me, do what I do
Speaker 1: through that suffering. So if I could up what I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say to you, I'm gonna say, dude, you're not alone.
Speaker 1: Your question is valid. Here's how I can answer it
Speaker 1: for you, because you did bring me involved in this question.
Speaker 1: Let's say God is distant, you don't talk to him, Moore,
Speaker 1: fix that. Talk to him, Get on your knees, crawl
Speaker 1: to him. Then secondly, open your Bible. Open your Bible.
Speaker 1: You're gonna find your story on every page. It's really
Speaker 1: hard to not find your story in the pages right there.
Speaker 1: In every page, You're gonna find stories of suffering and
Speaker 1: glory and grace and redemption and restoration and love and wrath.
Speaker 1: You're gonna find it all on almost every single page.
Speaker 1: And you're gonna The Bible is one of these books
Speaker 1: where you open most books and you think, what can
Speaker 1: I what can I find out? What could I what
Speaker 1: could I know? And what can I learn from this book?
Speaker 1: The Bible. You open it up and you go, actually,
Speaker 1: I think this book already knows me it's really weird, right,
Speaker 1: it's really weird. This book knows me, Like, dude, Michael,
Speaker 1: you're going to open this up and go, that's me,
Speaker 1: that's me. That's that's what I That's the question of
Speaker 1: the podcast, And there's my answer. Now, is it going
Speaker 1: to talk about what you've seen on duty? Is it
Speaker 1: going to talk about your dad in twenty sixteen? No,
Speaker 1: it's going to have very similar stories for you and
Speaker 1: an example on how to live and where to go
Speaker 1: from here and the reality that in God's economy, as
Speaker 1: we follow Christ, it's not going to be absent from suffering,
Speaker 1: from trial, from struggle. It's promised. It's promised that when
Speaker 1: this happens, consider it pure joy because it's testing the
Speaker 1: genuineness of your faith. Do you really believe? And I
Speaker 1: think of your story and even in the recent announcement
Speaker 1: and the new adventure that you guy have, that there's
Speaker 1: absolute pain and at the same time there's joy. And
Speaker 1: I was thinking about that when you guys made that announcement,
Speaker 1: and I was like, there is a word that we
Speaker 1: can't capture in the English but exists in the Greek.
Speaker 1: And so there's no mutual Look, there's no like equal
Speaker 1: or equivalent word, so it takes two English words to
Speaker 1: translate this. But there is this term in the Greek
Speaker 1: called karma lupe and it means simultaneous deep sorrow and
Speaker 1: at the same time happiness dude mutually like at the
Speaker 1: same time. And in God's economy. What he says is
Speaker 1: the things that you face in this life that are absolutely,
Speaker 1: unquestionably painful, and you go, I would never want to
Speaker 1: do that again, but I'm glad it happened. It's because
Speaker 1: of God's economy. That's how he prunes, That's how he
Speaker 1: gives us strength, That's how our roots go deeper and deeper.
Speaker 1: Just I mean an agricultural analogy. We have these plum
Speaker 1: trees in our backyard. We inherited them when we bought
Speaker 1: the house, these trees, and they were not producing plums
Speaker 1: and they were just growing everywhere. So my wife starts
Speaker 1: reading and she's like, you know, I think we're supposed
Speaker 1: to put uh, you know, mulch down and some other
Speaker 1: stuff like that. We need to trim these things, prune them,
Speaker 1: and apparently that's gonna And I'm thinking, so, you mean,
Speaker 1: we're gonna cut the trees and we're gonna throw chewed
Speaker 1: up dead trees, as in mulch around the base of them,
Speaker 1: and somehow that's gonna work. And absolutely so she got
Speaker 1: to half of them. So the next season came around
Speaker 1: and the ones that she pruned and she put down
Speaker 1: the mulch, they were vibrant, they were producing plums. The
Speaker 1: other ones were overgrown, still not producing. So there's even
Speaker 1: within the creation the way that he's wired this whole thing,
Speaker 1: that we're going to face adversity and that's going to
Speaker 1: test the genuiness of our faith and it's going to
Speaker 1: produce more life to come. Dude, so good. I love
Speaker 1: tree analogies, right be right back. This podcast is free
Speaker 1: for anyone that wants to watch it or listen to
Speaker 1: it on whatever app or whatever platform you want. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: it's not free for me to make. I'm very blessed
Speaker 1: to have sponsors for this today's episode, and the first
Speaker 1: one is features. You guys have probably heard me talk
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Speaker 1: like this all right. This question comes from Connor. It says,
Speaker 1: take Granger, I want some advice about something. I want
Speaker 1: to be a vet and air but that costs a
Speaker 1: lot and it takes a lot of time, and at
Speaker 1: the same time, it's my dream job. Can you help
Speaker 1: me decide if I should become a veterinarian or not?
Speaker 1: Connor shout out, buddy. You don't say where you're from,
Speaker 1: but I do know that your email comes from a
Speaker 1: school district website, so you're still in school. And I'm
Speaker 1: assuming that you want to be a vet. Let me
Speaker 1: just assume you don't say, but I'm assuming you want
Speaker 1: to be a vet because you love animals, you love
Speaker 1: helping animals, and it's your dreamed of because you genuinely
Speaker 1: want to go into that field and make a difference.
Speaker 1: And I want to tell you that you don't have
Speaker 1: to be a vet to do that. So it's not
Speaker 1: just so you know, it's not just about helping animals.
Speaker 1: There's a lot more to be in a vet. I've
Speaker 1: actually talked to friends that went into vet school and
Speaker 1: then realized later how difficult it is when they went
Speaker 1: in with the mentality if they just want to help animals,
Speaker 1: they find out that you go, say you're a small
Speaker 1: animal vet. Someone brings their dog in and it has
Speaker 1: really bad hip displays and you say, Okay, well we're
Speaker 1: gonna have to perform surgery. It's gonna be about fifteen
Speaker 1: hundred bucks. And the person goes, I just put them down.
Speaker 1: It happens, and the vet goes, well, No, I could
Speaker 1: do the surgery. I could make this flawless. I could
Speaker 1: make this dog great. I just can't afford fifteen hundred bucks.
Speaker 1: Just go ahead, And what's the next step. Put them down?
Speaker 1: And guess what you have to do? Put them down?
Speaker 1: And that's hard. If you love animals, yeah, and you
Speaker 1: know you can help them. You have the tools. Yes,
Speaker 1: So Connor, are you aware of that that's a little
Speaker 1: wrinkle in this dream. Maybe that's maybe you're totally fine.
Speaker 1: Maybe you know exactly what you're getting into. This is
Speaker 1: what you want to do. So first step, coming from
Speaker 1: a student email, dude, I would work on your grades.
Speaker 1: I would concentrate on your biology and your math. And
Speaker 1: if that's truly your dream, then study harder and longer
Speaker 1: than your friends, and you could offset that cost of
Speaker 1: a VET school with forms of scholarships. But none of
Speaker 1: that's going to happen unless you make that effort right
Speaker 1: now in your grades. And it's a sacrifice. So much
Speaker 1: of life as a sacrifice, and it sounds like working
Speaker 1: on math biology grades. And your why, right, we're assuming
Speaker 1: it's because you love animals. What's your why? And that's
Speaker 1: going to help you figure out is it worth it?
Speaker 1: The cost benefit of Okay, my why is pretty strong.
Speaker 1: I'm dialed in, and then maybe you need help figuring
Speaker 1: out your why. So maybe a part time job is
Speaker 1: you go to the local vet and say, hey, I'll
Speaker 1: empty the trash cans. I'll do it whatever it takes,
Speaker 1: just to be a round it and you can learn
Speaker 1: within that field maybe being a vet isn't the thing.
Speaker 1: Maybe there's something else within veterinary medicine that is a
Speaker 1: better fit for your personality is similar to medicine. So
Speaker 1: I've learned of people that they thought they wanted to
Speaker 1: be doctors, but then they realized, no, nursing is where
Speaker 1: because I want to be doing direct patient care. Seek
Speaker 1: wise counsel. That's that's great, So go to go. I
Speaker 1: mean there's plenty of vents. Go to the go to
Speaker 1: the local vet, and go till till someone tells you, yes,
Speaker 1: you want to empty the trash until someone goes, yeah,
Speaker 1: we need a guy to empty the trash and soak
Speaker 1: up one or two hours every weekday, watching learning, talking
Speaker 1: to the actual vet that's there, and and part of
Speaker 1: that discussion will be how do you how do you
Speaker 1: afford for school? How do you what? What do I
Speaker 1: need to be working on right now where I am
Speaker 1: in my life in high school? And you're going to
Speaker 1: get a lot of those answers. So good question, Connor,
Speaker 1: and good luck to you. That's a good one. Yeah. Okay,
Speaker 1: this question comes from Justin. He says, Hey, my name
Speaker 1: is Justin Taylor, and I saw your last podcast. I
Speaker 1: have so many questions. I've been wanting to ask you
Speaker 1: for a long time and just never got the courage
Speaker 1: to ask anybody. But let me give you a little
Speaker 1: short story my life. I live in Cliff, New Mexico.
Speaker 1: I'm nineteen years old. I live on a cattle ranch.
Speaker 1: I'm hurting over a broken up relationship. It lasted for
Speaker 1: eight years. I can't stop thinking about her. It's a
Speaker 1: constant pain. She's moved on, but I guess I haven't.
Speaker 1: And since this has been since June of twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: I'm still in feeling like I'm about to have a
Speaker 1: heart attack. Basically every day. The only time I don't
Speaker 1: feel anything is when I'm in a twelve pack of
Speaker 1: beer or whiskey or whatever other alcohol I can get
Speaker 1: my hands on. And because of that, I've lost my
Speaker 1: best friend and some other really good friends. I've lost
Speaker 1: family and using important people in my life. And it's
Speaker 1: all over the alcohol. And the thing is it's making
Speaker 1: me worse and I don't know how to handle that anymore.
Speaker 1: And his signature on his email says Fire and Rescue,
Speaker 1: Silver City, New Mexico. So shout out to Justin and
Speaker 1: New Mexico and Silver City Fire and Rescue. Thank you
Speaker 1: for your service once again. And I'm gonna say this again,
Speaker 1: Like I said earlier, this is a common question. It's
Speaker 1: not to diminish at all what you're going through. It's
Speaker 1: it's very very heavy what you're going through. But I
Speaker 1: would say the good news is it's common. This is
Speaker 1: this is something that a lot of people are dealing
Speaker 1: with or have dealt with, or have a friend or
Speaker 1: have a family member or a neighbor. You mentioned one
Speaker 1: today you're barbered that is dealing with this or has
Speaker 1: dealt with it, or it's very human of you, And
Speaker 1: thank you for trusting us with the question. Nineteen is young.
Speaker 1: It's young. My first question is, dude, eight years a
Speaker 1: relationship eight years old and you're nineteen, but started when
Speaker 1: you're eleven. I mean that's the formative years, man, that's
Speaker 1: your entire teenage life was with this girl. Yeah and
Speaker 1: so yeah, understandable how you're you're really broken up about it,
Speaker 1: and I wish, man, it's so hard. It's so hard
Speaker 1: to listen to someone else tell you that this too
Speaker 1: shall pass. It's so hard to hear that. And I'm
Speaker 1: just speaking about the relationship part of it, not the
Speaker 1: alcohol part, just the relationship part. Man as a as
Speaker 1: a as a brother is sitting around a campfire, I
Speaker 1: would I would say, dude, you're going to find another girl.
Speaker 1: There's going to be another another love of your life,
Speaker 1: and one that's a lot better. There's three billion women
Speaker 1: on this planet. Yeah, three billion. With a bee, there's
Speaker 1: another one out there. And I know in your mind
Speaker 1: you hear that your first thought is not like her,
Speaker 1: Not like her, Dude, she's one and three billion. Brother. Well,
Speaker 1: I can tell you, and everyone can tell you if
Speaker 1: you listen to any country music song this you're going
Speaker 1: to find another one. But but you have to you
Speaker 1: have to have the self discipline first of all, to
Speaker 1: to continue your life and move take the next step forward,
Speaker 1: and that has really hung you up, and you're you
Speaker 1: fell into the the best sinister snare, and that's that
Speaker 1: alcohol could numb you from your current reality. So you're
Speaker 1: escaping reality. You're escaping the fact that all you really
Speaker 1: need to do is take the next step forward in
Speaker 1: your life, in your job, in your front with your friends,
Speaker 1: and you're escaping that responsibility and retreating into something that's
Speaker 1: numbing you and only prolonging the pain. That's a good point.
Speaker 1: It doesn't it doesn't. It mutes pain, but it doesn't
Speaker 1: dissolve or resolve the pain. And so when that mute stops,
Speaker 1: then you're still left right there where you were, and
Speaker 1: sometimes in an even worse position. And I think sometimes
Speaker 1: I can remember heartbreak in high school. And one of
Speaker 1: the challenges in moving forward was coming to grips with
Speaker 1: the fact that I had identified as a as a
Speaker 1: person in a relationship. I was the boyfriend of so
Speaker 1: and so. We had history, we had memories, we had experiences,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden coming to grips with the
Speaker 1: fact that although that was the case, that that identity
Speaker 1: no longer exists, and so the path forward is realizing
Speaker 1: your identity apart from anybody, who are you, and starting
Speaker 1: to create some experiences and recognize what you like, what
Speaker 1: you want to do, who you are apart from anybody,
Speaker 1: so that when the next relationship comes, because there is
Speaker 1: a win, there is another, there is a next one,
Speaker 1: and when you get there, you're going to have a
Speaker 1: better understanding of what makes you tick and you're probably
Speaker 1: going to have a better opportunity to identify who do
Speaker 1: you pay you know, who's the right? Yeah. What's awesome, man,
Speaker 1: is that what this girl has done for you is
Speaker 1: narrow down your scope of who is right for you.
Speaker 1: And as soon as you realize that that, it wasn't
Speaker 1: a wasted eight years, which is really long, by the way,
Speaker 1: it's a long time, but it wasn't a wasted eight years.
Speaker 1: It was a learning experience to get you that much
Speaker 1: closer to the right one. If any of your friends,
Speaker 1: your best friends sat down and told you your story
Speaker 1: back to you, that that was their story, what advice
Speaker 1: would you give them, Because it's like I said, it's
Speaker 1: so much easier to give that advice. But what would
Speaker 1: you tell them? You'd say you're ruining your friendships, you're
Speaker 1: ruining your family that you do have. You're walking on
Speaker 1: a dangerous tightrope right now with alcohol that could lead
Speaker 1: to alcoholism, and then you could never touch the stuff
Speaker 1: ever again. And that's a whole different story to ruin
Speaker 1: your your opportunity to ever have a cold beer with
Speaker 1: one of your friends with it without it being a problem.
Speaker 1: And that could start now. If you continue this numbing,
Speaker 1: you could always keep digging down. If you think it's bad,
Speaker 1: it could always get worse. Yeah, And yet, like you said,
Speaker 1: you're you're messing with the now and the future as
Speaker 1: you dwell in the past, in the past eight years,
Speaker 1: and you're hanging on to stuff that man, you want
Speaker 1: to learn from that, and maybe you need to identify
Speaker 1: some things you could have done differently, or the way
Speaker 1: you interacted or treated or things you said. And there's
Speaker 1: there's a role that that should play. But it's not
Speaker 1: where you live. You don't camp out there, you don't
Speaker 1: hang out there. You learn from the lesson and then
Speaker 1: you move and you keep going because there is a
Speaker 1: next day and the sun will come up tomorrow and
Speaker 1: you got to be you got to be ready to
Speaker 1: face that day when the sun does come up. Dude,
Speaker 1: I would I would encourage you man to There's nothing
Speaker 1: in your email that mentions God. I would encourage you
Speaker 1: explore that. What do I mean? I mean, Hey, God,
Speaker 1: it's justin. I've never really talked to you before. I'm
Speaker 1: really hurting. I've hurt some people on this podcast that
Speaker 1: talk about you. I don't really know what to think.
Speaker 1: I don't really know if I believe it. But right
Speaker 1: now I need you because I can't fix this myself.
Speaker 1: I'm going down a dark tunnel. God, can you fix this?
Speaker 1: Can you show me what to do, where to put
Speaker 1: the one foot after the other? Can you show me that?
Speaker 1: If you say that with sincerity, I would be really
Speaker 1: curious for you to email back to this podcast if
Speaker 1: you give that kind of true sincerity. I'm talking about
Speaker 1: in your bathroom, on your knees. What else do you
Speaker 1: have right now? Justin what do you have to lose? Then?
Speaker 1: Dropping straight down to your knees, and that is not
Speaker 1: a bad place to be. It's not a bad place
Speaker 1: to be. Nothing else to lose. All I got is this, God,
Speaker 1: what do I have here? That's that's a common story,
Speaker 1: and I'm I'll just be curious to see what would happen.
Speaker 1: And I'm not talking about some weird writing in the
Speaker 1: sky or something. I would be interested to see if
Speaker 1: you feel peace from that, and what that would lead to,
Speaker 1: what the next step would be with you and losing
Speaker 1: your friends, losing your family. Like you said in this email,
Speaker 1: that's all you got. Your support network is gone. And yeah,
Speaker 1: the pain and loneliness you feel now is probably minimal
Speaker 1: compared to what it will feel like in a couple
Speaker 1: of months if you keep going this way. Yep, yep, dude,
Speaker 1: you are. I know you're a good guy. I know
Speaker 1: that you're you're you work for fire and rescue. Do
Speaker 1: you understand self discipline? You understand priorities? And I would,
Speaker 1: I would. I would wake up tomorrow morning and go today.
Speaker 1: I'm starting fresh. I'm starting fresh. I'm gonna brush my teeth,
Speaker 1: comb my hair, put on my shoes, I'm gonna go
Speaker 1: to work and I'm not gonna feel sorry for myself.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna move forward. I'm gonna I'm gonna take that
Speaker 1: relationship and I'm gonna say this is this is what
Speaker 1: I learned, and I'm going I'm going on I'm moving
Speaker 1: forward with what I've learned. I'm a wiser, smarter man.
Speaker 1: And I would get underneath in the in the bathroom
Speaker 1: and say that prayer too. That's me, that's my camp
Speaker 1: fire thought. And it's interesting that in fire and rescue
Speaker 1: you you exist to help other people. Yep. And a
Speaker 1: lot of times when we're and pain, we focus on
Speaker 1: ourself and we just hang out there. It's amazing when
Speaker 1: you turn your focus away from self in the midst
Speaker 1: of your pain and just look for that, who's the
Speaker 1: next person I can help? Who can I serve? Who
Speaker 1: can I engage with? And all of a sudden we
Speaker 1: start to forget about our pain or our situation and
Speaker 1: we start to invest in other people. So man cut
Speaker 1: with the grain on this one. He's clearly wired to
Speaker 1: help and serve people. Do that. Just do the next
Speaker 1: right thing. Right as you wake up, email back, email back,
Speaker 1: go through a twenty four hour day like this and
Speaker 1: email back and I want to see what you say. Amen, Yeah, thanks,
Speaker 1: thanks for the email, and do another one. Chet sure,
Speaker 1: let me see was that one of the softball questions? No,
Speaker 1: they get heavier than that. But I'm going to go
Speaker 1: this is not this is not too heavy. But I
Speaker 1: did find the question interesting, and I do. I think
Speaker 1: if I address it the way I want to address it,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make a lot of people mad. Oh right, okay,
Speaker 1: all right, here we go. Sorry, yeah, there we go.
Speaker 1: They actually don't know how you feel about it either,
Speaker 1: but I kind of know. I feel like I know you,
Speaker 1: all right. So the subject godly advice says, Hey, Grangeream,
Speaker 1: writing you from North Carolina. My husband and I are
Speaker 1: at a crossroads and need some Godly perspective. We are
Speaker 1: both born and raised in North Carolina, and all of
Speaker 1: our family is here. However, we don't have the closest
Speaker 1: relationships with our families. We visited Texas twice this year.
Speaker 1: Long story short. It's been my dream to move out west,
Speaker 1: and since actually visiting in June, the desire has become stronger.
Speaker 1: I always pray for God's will to lead us in
Speaker 1: the right direction in all things, and specifically ask for
Speaker 1: his confirmation on this move. And shortly after our visit
Speaker 1: in June, I began to see cowboy hats in the clouds.
Speaker 1: A few days after that, my husband saw what looked
Speaker 1: like a hand holding the state of Texas. We have
Speaker 1: our jobs sorted. We have two kids, eight and four,
Speaker 1: and we would like to make a concrete decision before
Speaker 1: our four year old begins kindergarten, which will be in
Speaker 1: the fall. My question is what do we do? How
Speaker 1: do I explain that if this is God's call, which
Speaker 1: I strongly believe it is, then how do we obey.
Speaker 1: I appreciate the time, love you guys. And they make
Speaker 1: bumper stickers that say I wasn't born here, but I
Speaker 1: got here as soon as I could, right. I mean,
Speaker 1: maybe that's the situation here. You you came to Texas,
Speaker 1: as we said, from another state. Yeah, And I will say,
Speaker 1: if you end up making this transition, you probably won't
Speaker 1: regret it in regard to the people receiving you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and the friendships that will welcome you, and the way
Speaker 1: that Texans man, they're just warm, welcoming people and yeah,
Speaker 1: good people. The challenge, I think, and it sounds like
Speaker 1: you don't necessarily talk about the tension, but it sounds
Speaker 1: like the tension is you've got a huge family, or
Speaker 1: you've got family in North Carolina that that you feel
Speaker 1: this obligation or this kind of this tie like I
Speaker 1: need to we need to stay here and do this,
Speaker 1: but at the same time, you feel this poll to Texas,
Speaker 1: and so you know, the thought is, make sure you're
Speaker 1: not you're not running from something, but you're you're going
Speaker 1: to something. I think is an important component when you're
Speaker 1: making a transition. And also make decisions that are the
Speaker 1: best for your immediate family, Think about your kiddos, think
Speaker 1: about you and your husband and your marriage, Like, ultimately,
Speaker 1: is this what is best for that immediate family and anything.
Speaker 1: It would be a blessing for your family in North
Speaker 1: Carolina to have someplace cool like Texas to visit. So yeah,
Speaker 1: so yeah, to answer your question, and let me say,
Speaker 1: I haven't said your name yet because it's Cecily. Is
Speaker 1: that how you say that? Cecily, Cali, Cecily, Cecily. That
Speaker 1: sounds better Cecily. So I'm so sorry for saying that. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: the reasons to move to Texas are strong. You got
Speaker 1: good reasons. Your your job is flexible, the schools in
Speaker 1: Texas are great. North Carolina is awesome too, So you're
Speaker 1: actually going there tomorrow today this afternoon, leaving there today.
Speaker 1: But the reasons for moving seems strong. We've talked about
Speaker 1: moving many times on this podcast. You are asking for
Speaker 1: godly advice, and that's the title of your email, and
Speaker 1: that you're wanting godly perspective from us. You ask for it,
Speaker 1: you're going to get it, and and so all the
Speaker 1: all the other things, you know, if we're just going
Speaker 1: to talk about the material reasons, uh components. To me,
Speaker 1: I think it's great, you're you're good. This is where
Speaker 1: I have a problem, and this is where people are
Speaker 1: going to get mad at me. But when you start
Speaker 1: seeing cowboy hats in the clouds, it becomes pagan wishes,
Speaker 1: that becomes fortune telling in a way. Well, I think
Speaker 1: what it is is you're you're seeing what you want. Yeah, right,
Speaker 1: you're the longings of your heart. You're looking for something
Speaker 1: external that that will fulfill that desire. And then rat like, okay,
Speaker 1: we've got reason to do it. Oh we're getting that.
Speaker 1: We're getting the good typically do this, but you you
Speaker 1: I don't typically do this. But you can't always take
Speaker 1: my word for it. You have to take the word
Speaker 1: for it. And so what I think of when I
Speaker 1: think of because you're asking here, where did you say it?
Speaker 1: If this is God's call? How do I explain? If
Speaker 1: this is God's call. In other words, God's will. And
Speaker 1: I think you did say will another point in this
Speaker 1: this email. So let's go to Romans twelfth two hor
Speaker 1: It says, do not be conformed to this world, but
Speaker 1: be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by
Speaker 1: testing you may discern what is the will of God,
Speaker 1: what is good and acceptable and perfect. So the danger
Speaker 1: here is following your heart. Follow your heart. A world
Speaker 1: always wants to say follow your heart, but the Bible
Speaker 1: says the heart is evil, and you need to conform
Speaker 1: your mind the renewal of your mind. Don't conform to
Speaker 1: this world, excuse me, but be transformed by the renewal
Speaker 1: of your mind. And so I wouldn't follow like symbols
Speaker 1: in the clouds and you and your husband seeing the
Speaker 1: state of Texas in their hands. I could go out
Speaker 1: here right now, Chad, and look at the clouds and
Speaker 1: find enough shapes to make me feel like whatever I'm
Speaker 1: thinking is reality. People have done that since the beginning
Speaker 1: of the time. They have found constellations in the sky
Speaker 1: to pretty much match any symbol or shape that they
Speaker 1: want it to be. And that is paganism. It's a
Speaker 1: different question. That's fortune telling that's looking to the stars,
Speaker 1: that's astrology, instead of when you're looking for God's will.
Speaker 1: He says, transform the renewal of your mind. So that's
Speaker 1: very different than should I just lay here on the
Speaker 1: screen grass and look at the sky long enough for
Speaker 1: God to just tell me that Texas is the right place?
Speaker 1: I say it when I think I don't want people
Speaker 1: to get mad at me, because because can God do that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Of course he could shape a cloud. He could absolutely
Speaker 1: do that. Right. Yeah. When I interact with people in
Speaker 1: a pastoral role, they this is a very frequent question, right,
Speaker 1: I want to know God's desire for me? Is God
Speaker 1: calling me to this or that? Is this a sign?
Speaker 1: Or is that a sign? And there oftentimes we're waiting
Speaker 1: for something that is external to the word of God
Speaker 1: and what He's clearly prescribed for us to do, and
Speaker 1: we want to find some external thing that's going to
Speaker 1: kind of give that affirmation. But you know, you talk
Speaker 1: about the heart is one of those things that man,
Speaker 1: we have to renew our mind. In Psal I'm thirty seven,
Speaker 1: it says, delight yourself in the Lord, and He will
Speaker 1: give you the desires of your heart. And we oftentimes
Speaker 1: read that and go Okay, So if I just kind
Speaker 1: of do it God wants me to do, then I
Speaker 1: can get that brand new Ford f one whatever where
Speaker 1: I can get the thing that I really want. What
Speaker 1: that Saull means is if I delight myself in the Lord, well,
Speaker 1: the seed of delight is in the heart. So if
Speaker 1: I'm actually delighting in the Lord, then he is the
Speaker 1: desire of my heart, and I've aligned myself with him
Speaker 1: because he is what is good, true and beautiful, and
Speaker 1: so as I seek him, as I press into him,
Speaker 1: and he is my delight, then man, it doesn't matter
Speaker 1: where I go or what I do, because he's my delight.
Speaker 1: And so my encouragement is always, are you delighting in
Speaker 1: the Lord? Are you truly seeking the Lord in this decision?
Speaker 1: And the doors will open, the doors will close, opportunities
Speaker 1: will present themselves, and as long as it's not just
Speaker 1: overtly sinful or contrary to God, you can probably go
Speaker 1: do it. Yeah, absolutely, And to that I would say
Speaker 1: your point of action would be exactly what Chad said.
Speaker 1: If there's nothing constricting you in any kind of way,
Speaker 1: then say, all right, God, it feels like the doors
Speaker 1: are opening to Texas. So we're gonna go ahead. We're
Speaker 1: gonna put the house on the market. We're gonna start
Speaker 1: looking at real estate. Like, just take one step. You
Speaker 1: don't have to think should we or should we not?
Speaker 1: Just start with a house, start with a city, take
Speaker 1: a town, and go okay, all right, God, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: start looking at real estate in Houston, Texas. And if
Speaker 1: you're not supposed to, if that's not part of God's will,
Speaker 1: He's not going to open anything up to you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: He's gonna make that very difficult for you. So instead
Speaker 1: of looking at the clouds, use your brain, use your brain,
Speaker 1: use your mind, and go all right, here we go.
Speaker 1: I'm sober minded. I'm looking at the world. I'm looking
Speaker 1: at real estate apps, and I'm gonna go all right,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna move forward, and God continue to
Speaker 1: open the doors that I need to walk through and
Speaker 1: close the ones that I don't. And before you know it,
Speaker 1: you're gonna get your answer. And I have done this thing.
Speaker 1: I have done this. I have said all right, God,
Speaker 1: I feel like this, this house, this happened a year ago.
Speaker 1: Guys got this house. It feels like this is right.
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna go ahead and start getting the loan
Speaker 1: together and start moving on this house and get the
Speaker 1: contract on the house. Okay, we're contingent on selling our house.
Speaker 1: All right, we're you know, God, I'm not looking at
Speaker 1: the clouds. I'm not looking at tarot cards. I'm saying,
Speaker 1: all right, we're gonna go ahead and move forward. And
Speaker 1: then coronavirus hit. Our house wasn't gonna sell. We fell
Speaker 1: out of contingency, I fell out of the contract. And
Speaker 1: it's like, okay, there it is. There's the closed door. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, it's not as hard as tarot cards. That's easy.
Speaker 1: There it is. And sometimes the door remains open. We
Speaker 1: walk through it and we fall on our face and
Speaker 1: it doesn't work out, and we go, oh, man, I
Speaker 1: blew it? Am I outside of God's will because we
Speaker 1: decided to do this? But realize, no, we as we
Speaker 1: walk with the Lord, even if it doesn't work out
Speaker 1: in human standards, God uses everything for his glory, for
Speaker 1: his good and to shape us into the image of
Speaker 1: his son. So it's gonna work. If you move to
Speaker 1: Texas and man, it's not what you thought it was.
Speaker 1: It's exactly what God knew was gonna happen, and he's
Speaker 1: going to use that in your life. And guess what,
Speaker 1: North Carolina's not going anywhere, right, it's not going anywhere.
Speaker 1: You go right back to North Carolina and don't worry
Speaker 1: about kindergarten. Right. I don't think like it's a legitimate
Speaker 1: concern on your part, emailing and saying you're you want
Speaker 1: to do this before you're four. Man, kids are so resilient.
Speaker 1: You could start your kid, your kids could go to
Speaker 1: could go to school. And my kids have done this.
Speaker 1: We've we've changed schools twice and you could move to
Speaker 1: another one. They might your four your eight year old
Speaker 1: might kick and stream a little bit, but they're gonna
Speaker 1: make new friends and they're gonna be resilient and they're
Speaker 1: gonna fall into a new place. Sometimes as parents, you
Speaker 1: just have to be flexible. And although we want to
Speaker 1: be concrete before the four year old starts kinder that's
Speaker 1: a good that's a good map, But you don't have
Speaker 1: to hold that as gospel. You don't have to hold
Speaker 1: that as what's best is the long jevity of your
Speaker 1: family and where you're going to be for a long time.
Speaker 1: And there's kindergartens and there's great teachers everywhere. Great question. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thank you for emailing and dude, Chad, it's been it's
Speaker 1: been fun. This is a blast. Yeah, we're gonna go
Speaker 1: get tacos again one of these days and then we're
Speaker 1: gonna go on this podcast again. If you want to
Speaker 1: see more Chad, say more Chad. And if anybody has
Speaker 1: any any more questions or if you have a Chad
Speaker 1: specific question that could happen. Maybe you're from Montana, I
Speaker 1: have a Chad specific Montana question. Maybe you're mad at
Speaker 1: him for calling hunting shopping in Texas. Email Grangersmith Podcast
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com and tell me what Chad and
Speaker 1: we'll definitely have you back. Cool. This has been fun. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a blast. See your brother. Yeah, thanks for joining
Speaker 1: me on the granger Smith Podcast. I appreciate all of
Speaker 1: you guys. You could help me out by rating this
Speaker 1: podcast on iTunes. If you're on YouTube, subscribe to this channel,
Speaker 1: hit that little like button and notification spell so that
Speaker 1: you never miss any time I upload a video. If
Speaker 1: you have a question for me that you would like
Speaker 1: me to answer, email Grangersmith Podcast at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1: Ye