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Speaker 1: One never knows when you wake up in the morning

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Speaker 1: what the day will bring. You can wake up in

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Speaker 1: the morning feeling fine and by lunchtime be definitely ill.

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Speaker 1: You don't know what the evening is going to bring,

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Speaker 1: but you know it will bring something. One never knows

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Speaker 1: how thin the line is between life and death. My

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Speaker 1: brother and I were used to race down in the

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Speaker 1: Stay sixty four in Charleston, West Virginia, and he had

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Speaker 1: a Corvette and I had a transam, and we were

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Speaker 1: going way faster than we needed to go, by one

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Speaker 1: hundred and forty one hundred and sixty miles an hour,

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Speaker 1: and he had the pedal to the medal and I

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Speaker 1: had it too, and he decided to break off because

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Speaker 1: he said he knew I wasn't going to quit, and

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Speaker 1: if I hit that turn that fast, I wouldn't have

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Speaker 1: made it. So he backed off because sometime it's better

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Speaker 1: to be alive than to win the race and the

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Speaker 1: other person be dead. That quick thinking, that momentary decision,

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Speaker 1: has a lot to do in our lives, but there

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Speaker 1: are times that it's not a matter of decision or

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Speaker 1: choices happenstance. It's fanciful. It's almost like a fairy tale.

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Speaker 1: It's almost like a spell by the wicked witch, and

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Speaker 1: you find yourself in a situation and you can't find

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Speaker 1: anything in what you did that made it happen. It

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Speaker 1: just simply happened. Every year, every year in this country.

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Speaker 1: Emergency departments in the United States treat over two hundred

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Speaker 1: thousand injuries unexpected injuries related to trampolines as simple as that,

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Speaker 1: with a significant portion involving severe spinal chord traumas, fractures, dislocations,

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Speaker 1: and yes, sometimes even death. A toy, a tool that

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Speaker 1: was made for family enjoyment and exercise and movement and

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Speaker 1: vitality and laughter and bouncing the ball back and forth

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Speaker 1: and leaping up in the air and telling jokes and

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Speaker 1: having fun, can turn into an instrument, an instrument of

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Speaker 1: cruelty in a moment's notice, if you're not careful for

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Speaker 1: families navigating these sudden crisis. The psychological toll of near

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Speaker 1: miss tragedies often trigger acute stress and a profound reevaluation

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Speaker 1: of mortality and faith. I don't really realize how close

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Speaker 1: you live every day to death until it comes near you,

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Speaker 1: around you, or around someone you love, and then you

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Speaker 1: stop complaining about the rain outside, or the skies are gloomy,

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Speaker 1: or I don't feel like getting out in all this traffic,

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Speaker 1: when you recognize that you are blessed to be alive,

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Speaker 1: to be here. I want to share a story that

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Speaker 1: happened to my youngest daughter. She and her husband are

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Speaker 1: succeeding me in pastoring the church and liberating me to

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Speaker 1: be able to do some of the things I'm doing

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Speaker 1: with you, and some of the things that I'm doing

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Speaker 1: to build our communities, and some of the things that

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Speaker 1: we're doing in other areas to start more businesses, to

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Speaker 1: prepare us for the days ahead, because there is a

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Speaker 1: thin line in the days ahead between life and death.

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Speaker 1: There's a thin line between the people hear the warning

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Speaker 1: bell and keep on doing what they're doing, and the

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Speaker 1: group of people who hear the warning bells and make

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Speaker 1: the changes that are necessary to escape. In New Orleans,

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Speaker 1: there was a thin line between the people who left

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Speaker 1: and got away and the people who couldn't leave, and

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Speaker 1: the people who just didn't leave because they thought they'd

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Speaker 1: seen it before and it would happen like it happened before.

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Speaker 1: But none of us knows that once the thing is started,

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Speaker 1: how it's going to finish is an uncertainty that only

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Speaker 1: Heaven knows for sure. This particular day, I was going

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Speaker 1: in one direction, my wife was going in another. The

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Speaker 1: kids are all grown, they all live their own lives

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Speaker 1: and have their children, and they're enjoying their lives just

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Speaker 1: the way they're supposed to at their age. And we

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Speaker 1: got that dreadful phone call that no parent wants to get. That.

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Speaker 1: My youngest daughter, Pastor Sarah Jakes Roberts, was out there

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Speaker 1: on a trampoline, playing with her kids, trying to make

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Speaker 1: sure that she balances her life, her work life and

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Speaker 1: her rest life and her family life, and trying to

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Speaker 1: be everything and cover everything and have a good time

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Speaker 1: so that the kids don't grow up and resent a

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Speaker 1: parent who's a worker hoolig or preach a holig or

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Speaker 1: a business a holic or whatever it is. It's so

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Speaker 1: easy to get the parenting quotient wrong. She works so

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Speaker 1: hard to balance all of that out so that they

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Speaker 1: get mommy time and not just past her time, so

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Speaker 1: that they get daddy time and not just preach your time.

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Speaker 1: And she was busy doing that, and I don't know

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Speaker 1: how she slipped. I don't know what happened. But when

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Speaker 1: she came down out of the air, she slipped and

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Speaker 1: fell in such a dangerous, diabolical, frightening, horrifying way that

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Speaker 1: when I heard it, my heart almost stopped beating. They said,

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Speaker 1: she fell on the trampoline, and we're sorry to tell

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Speaker 1: you that she broke her neck. We don't know if

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Speaker 1: she's gonna make it. I was stunned, I was terrified.

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Speaker 1: I'd love to tell you that. I dropped down on

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Speaker 1: my knees and immediately went into prayer. I went into panic.

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Speaker 1: That's my baby, that's my child. And we drove. They

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Speaker 1: were at one hospital where they weren't getting the tree

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Speaker 1: that they needed and they didn't have all the equipment

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Speaker 1: that was needed or whatever, and they had to take

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Speaker 1: her to another hospital, and they were slow with the

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Speaker 1: ambulance to the point that the new hospital said, just

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Speaker 1: put her in the back of the car, keep her

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Speaker 1: neck and head as straight as you can, and drive

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Speaker 1: her over here. We're waiting at the emergency room. So

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Speaker 1: we tore out, broke all speed limits running trying to

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Speaker 1: get there to be there, which was dangerous, but we

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Speaker 1: were panicked, and we got there before she did, and

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Speaker 1: by the time she got there, we were already there,

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Speaker 1: and the first thing that came to my mind is

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Speaker 1: I want to see her. But the second thing that

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Speaker 1: came to my mind said, are you sure you're ready

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Speaker 1: to see her? What I pictured in my mind was

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Speaker 1: so disfigured and broken and disjoined and bleeding and swollen

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Speaker 1: that I didn't want to see her that way. Nevertheless,

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Speaker 1: I thought my need, her need to see me there

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Speaker 1: supporting her was more important than my fear of what

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Speaker 1: I might see. I had all kinds of pictures in

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Speaker 1: my head. My imagination is extremely fertile, and I pictured

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Speaker 1: the most horrendous sights you could ever imagine. And when

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Speaker 1: I walked into that room, her neck wasn't bent like

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Speaker 1: I thought it would be bent. It was broken. It

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Speaker 1: was actually a crush, but it wasn't bent into a

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Speaker 1: grotesque configuration of who she used to be. And she

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Speaker 1: could talk and she said hi, Daddy, And I went

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Speaker 1: over there to her, and ever so gently, Because I

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Speaker 1: had spent years this year celebrating fifty years of ministry,

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Speaker 1: I had been at the deathbed and critical scenes with

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Speaker 1: so many people down through the years. There were several

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Speaker 1: years that we were doing four hundred funerals a year.

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Speaker 1: So I have been with many people when they took

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Speaker 1: their last breath, or I said last rites over them,

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Speaker 1: or prayed with families who had just lost their loved ones.

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Speaker 1: I know what it is to be in a room

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Speaker 1: where it is so thick with pain, raw fresh pain,

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Speaker 1: that you can't hardly breathe. But this was not quite

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Speaker 1: like that. There was hope in her eyes. There was

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Speaker 1: a little smile on her face, and I asked her,

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Speaker 1: from one to ten, well, it was your pain level like,

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Speaker 1: and I can't remember the number she gave, but I

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Speaker 1: think it was twelve. And I knew her She's not

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Speaker 1: a crab baby. If she said she was hurting, she

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Speaker 1: was really really hurting. The doctor said that her neck

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Speaker 1: was broken in such a unique place that had it

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Speaker 1: been an inch lower, she would be paralyzed for light

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Speaker 1: from the neck down, and an inch higher she would

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Speaker 1: have been dead. But God, in his infinite mercy and wisdom,

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Speaker 1: so designed it that he knew exactly where to break

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Speaker 1: her and not to kill her. And whether the enemy

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Speaker 1: sent it, God still controlled it that she hit that

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Speaker 1: one area in her neck that would not be an

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Speaker 1: immediate fatality. She's not out of the woods. Yet she

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Speaker 1: still got some surgeries to do and some more to

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Speaker 1: be done before she's out of the woods. But I

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Speaker 1: am so grateful. I can't tell you how grateful I

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Speaker 1: am that she is still here and still smiling, and

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Speaker 1: still moving and still going to and fro and her

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Speaker 1: mother and I took turns going up to her house

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Speaker 1: and cooking and sitting and entertaining her and trying to

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Speaker 1: get her to stay sitting down, laying down and not

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Speaker 1: move while they were trying to get the neck bones

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Speaker 1: in her neck to connect again with her headbones and

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Speaker 1: all the nerves to come to the rightful place and

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Speaker 1: their technical names for it. But I don't know that

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Speaker 1: I thought starters and provocative prompt questions would lead us

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Speaker 1: down the road of knowing every time you get in

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Speaker 1: the car and get out the car, or get on

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Speaker 1: the trampoline, or go on the basketball court, or play

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Speaker 1: hockey or play football, there is no guarantee that you

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Speaker 1: would come back the way you can. And it really

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Speaker 1: makes you really rethink what really matters in life when

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Speaker 1: you face your own mortality, and especially the mortality of

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Speaker 1: your child. Job said the Lord giveth and the Lord

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Speaker 1: taketh away. Bless it be the name of the Lord.

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Speaker 1: I know who did the giving. I don't know who

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Speaker 1: was trying to do the taking away, but I was

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Speaker 1: so glad that it was not that day. And for

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Speaker 1: many days thereafter, we sat by the hospital bed and

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Speaker 1: we're not out of the woods. She had specialist after specialist,

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Speaker 1: treatment after treatment, test after test, just trying to see

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Speaker 1: if she was getting enough blood to her brain to

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Speaker 1: survive inches just an inch away from paralysis. Suddenly she's

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Speaker 1: lying on a stretcher. They've gotten her out of the

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Speaker 1: emergency vehicle, and well, really it wasn't the emergency vehicle.

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Speaker 1: They'd gotten her out of her husband's car and brought

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Speaker 1: her into the emergency room. And she is in the

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Speaker 1: room and I'm trying to look calm and look positive,

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Speaker 1: and she looked better than I imagined her. But she

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Speaker 1: was not out of the world. You know. It made

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Speaker 1: me think how many times we look at somebody and

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Speaker 1: they don't look like what they've been through. We have

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Speaker 1: an idea in our mind of how bad something is

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Speaker 1: going to be, and some kind of way, when we

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Speaker 1: get there and we face it, it is not as

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Speaker 1: perilous as we thought. Sometimes it's words, sometimes we lose them.

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Speaker 1: It's such a fragile place. One inch can be the

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Speaker 1: difference between life and death. So people ask me, how

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Speaker 1: do you reach faith to millions when you're your own

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Speaker 1: child almost dies and the phone rings in the middle

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Speaker 1: of the night. With the crisis you cannot fix with

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Speaker 1: your hands or your resources. That's all the more reason

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Speaker 1: to pray, because a man's extremity is God's opportunity, and

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Speaker 1: if God doesn't do it, it can't be done. And

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Speaker 1: whatever he decides is sovereign and it's final. But I

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Speaker 1: did not want to go through that pain, and I

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Speaker 1: did not want her to go through that pain, and

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Speaker 1: I did not want her siblings and her mother to

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Speaker 1: go through that kind of pain, nor her husband, nor

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Speaker 1: her children, and everybody in our family was distraught, just

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Speaker 1: completely distraught. And I want to jump in and say

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Speaker 1: something to you. I don't care how they're acting or

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Speaker 1: what they're doing. If you got a child, love them, kiss,

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Speaker 1: challenge them, but don't be stubborn forgive them. If you

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Speaker 1: got a parent and you haven't worked everything out, reach

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Speaker 1: over the breach and talk to them while they can

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Speaker 1: hear you, because tombstones don't listen and coffins don't answer.

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Speaker 1: It is very important that you recognize that you don't

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Speaker 1: let your pettiness, your ego, your arrogance, your stubbornness leads

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Speaker 1: you down a trail from which you cannot return and

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Speaker 1: find yourself in a situation that you can't get out of.

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Speaker 1: She's scheduled to have an yet another surgery to further

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Speaker 1: repair the fracturing, the crushing that happened in her esophagus

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Speaker 1: on my birthday. During the ninth I'll be sixty nine

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Speaker 1: and will have been preaching almost fifty nine years. Come

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Speaker 1: that September, almost fifty years, not fifty nine, And I

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Speaker 1: wondered to myself. You never outgrow the need to pray,

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Speaker 1: and you never outgrow the helplessness you feel. There is

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Speaker 1: no safe place that you can build or develop, or

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Speaker 1: work hard, or invest in or grow in or get

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Speaker 1: capital in that takes you out of danger. All of

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Speaker 1: us are subject to danger and tests and trials and fear.

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Speaker 1: And your ability to grieve is commensurate with your ability

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Speaker 1: to love. He who loves little grieves little. He who

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Speaker 1: loves a lot grieves a lot. And you worry a lot,

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Speaker 1: and you pray a lot, And I can't explain to

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Speaker 1: you how worry and faith can cohabitate within the same

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Speaker 1: orbit and not crash into each other. But they can

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Speaker 1: coexist at the same time. You can say, I believe,

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Speaker 1: but help my unbelief. I'm praying and believing, but I'm

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Speaker 1: worried and scared all at the same time. Man is

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Speaker 1: a complex species, and his mind and his soul is

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Speaker 1: able to comprehend conflicting ideas simultaneously, because life doesn't wait

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Speaker 1: till one feeling is over before it brings another, and

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Speaker 1: it all comes at the same time. And I held

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Speaker 1: her little hand in my big hand and swallowed it

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Speaker 1: up and felt it tremble, and wondered, how in the

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Speaker 1: world are we going to get out of this? How

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Speaker 1: does the family transition from one stage to the next

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Speaker 1: from terror or what it could have been terror, to

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Speaker 1: the gratitude of what God prevented. It takes a little while.

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Speaker 1: You don't make a quick turn because you're not out

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Speaker 1: of the woods yet. Anything could yet happen on the

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Speaker 1: operating table, anything could yet happen in the process of

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Speaker 1: getting better. What I'm trying to say to you is,

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Speaker 1: don't take grace for granted. Don't consume mercy like it's

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Speaker 1: candy and like it's no big deal that you're still here.

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Speaker 1: It is by his mercy that we are not consumed.

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Speaker 1: And if you can understand that, can begin to understand

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Speaker 1: the theology of time and the grace of longevity. The

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Speaker 1: grace of longevity to get to be here long enough,

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Speaker 1: to get old, enough to get stiff enough to fell

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Speaker 1: aches and pains from time to time is a great blessing.

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Speaker 1: The theology of time is to know that all of

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Speaker 1: us are subject to time. Nobody that you've read about

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Speaker 1: in your history books is still walking around here today.

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Speaker 1: Sooner or later they all pass away. Life is like

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Speaker 1: a fleeting vapor. It's like a flower. It rises in

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Speaker 1: the morning and soon it withers away. It's like a

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Speaker 1: rock thrown into a pond and then quickly disappears out

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Speaker 1: of sight. We don't know what the next moment is

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Speaker 1: going to bring. In a contemporary American society, aging is

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Speaker 1: often met with deep cultural anxiety. We're afraid of it.

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Speaker 1: It's not looked upon with grandeur. Age is not celebrated

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Speaker 1: in our culture. We celebrate youth, and we make age

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Speaker 1: look like a disaster. But it takes something to live

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Speaker 1: to get old. It takes something. It's it's it's a

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Speaker 1: crown involved in it. It's a precision involved in it.

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Speaker 1: It's a miracle involved in it. Experience. I have to

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Speaker 1: experience close call after close call, almost this and almost that,

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Speaker 1: and still somehow I made it. To God be the glory.

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Speaker 1: Research indicates that approximately eighty seven percent of American adults

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Speaker 1: harbor fears about getting older, not really realizing that it's

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Speaker 1: a blessing to get older. That you didn't get on

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Speaker 1: a trampoline and break your neck, that you didn't step

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Speaker 1: on some ice and slip it and bring and bust

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Speaker 1: the blood vessels in your head, that you didn't have

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Speaker 1: an aneurysm, That you live to watch your hair change colors,

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Speaker 1: and you live to see your grandchildren. It's a great blessing.

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Speaker 1: Not everybody gets to see that. Not every child gets

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Speaker 1: to bury the parent. Sometimes the parent has to bury

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Speaker 1: the child. It's a grace and it's something that you

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Speaker 1: should be thankful for. Oh age brings its problems and

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Speaker 1: its issues, and you're not as strong, and your body

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Speaker 1: doesn't perform as well, it doesn't digest as well, it

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Speaker 1: doesn't sleep as well, it doesn't do a lot of

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Speaker 1: things as well. But housoever you are here, you made it,

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Speaker 1: you survived, and just like my daughter Sarah, you are

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Speaker 1: still pressing your way, not knowing what's going to happen next,

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Speaker 1: but being totally persuaded of this one thing that He

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Speaker 1: that has begun a good work in you shall perform it.

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Speaker 1: You keep your mind on going forward and let God

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Speaker 1: handle the rest. Understand that death is a river. We

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Speaker 1: all cross. Losses come just like wins. What makes winnings

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Speaker 1: so great, it's so many losses that comes before it.

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Speaker 1: I was in a sales meeting and they said to me,

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Speaker 1: what makes a sell so powerful is all the customers

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Speaker 1: who said no to get to that one years. But

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Speaker 1: all you need is one yes from the right person,

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Speaker 1: and everything about it suddenly changes just one yes. The

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Speaker 1: salmons David said it like this, and I loved the

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Speaker 1: way he said it. He said, teach us to number

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Speaker 1: our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

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Speaker 1: To number every day and be grateful for something every day.

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Speaker 1: Don't be so affixated on what would wrong that you

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Speaker 1: are not grateful for what went right. I hate what

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Speaker 1: went wrong that day. I hate the trampoline. I want

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Speaker 1: him to burn it, throw it away, bury it, throw

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Speaker 1: it over the hill, forget it. I'm through with it.

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Speaker 1: But I am also equally as grateful for the fact

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Speaker 1: that God controlled the fall. Have you ever had a

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Speaker 1: fall that God controlled and it wasn't as bad as

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Speaker 1: you imagined it? That is a great thing. That is

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Speaker 1: a powerful thing. That is the thing I went through myself.

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Speaker 1: When I survived my heart attack in November of twenty

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Speaker 1: twenty four, my relationship with the calendar changed to a

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Speaker 1: great way. I learned You're not invincible. You can't just

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Speaker 1: keep saying yes and please everybody. You cannot please the planet.

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Speaker 1: You cannot please the planet. Somebody's going to criticize you.

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Speaker 1: Somebody's not gonna like you. Somebody doesn't believe in you,

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Speaker 1: somebody doesn't accept you. Somebody hopes you choke. That's okay.

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Speaker 1: There's steal a lot, a lot a lot of people

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Speaker 1: who love for you and appreciate you and appreciate what

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Speaker 1: you have to offer, and you got to take what

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Speaker 1: you got and keep it moving because life is just

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Speaker 1: that fragile. Maybe there's somebody listening at me and you're thinking,

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Speaker 1: why is American culture so obsessed with you, and how

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Speaker 1: does that obsession rob us of the wisdom that only

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Speaker 1: comes with gray hair. I'll tell you why we don't

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Speaker 1: advertise gray hair. We advertise beautiful, bouncing, shining locks of

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Speaker 1: hair cascading down our back, blowing in the wind. We

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Speaker 1: make youth the most wonderful, beautiful experience you will have,

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Speaker 1: But it's not always. Not everybody's childhood was wonderful. Not

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Speaker 1: everybody's college years were fine. Sometimes you have to live

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Speaker 1: a while to get to the best part of your life.

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Speaker 1: So don't buy into the trap, the mistake of thinking

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Speaker 1: that all your good days are behind you just because

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Speaker 1: you had another birthday. Every time you float around the sun,

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Speaker 1: you come into a deeper and deeper awareness that it

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Speaker 1: is simply and absolutely grace. I have lived longer than

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Speaker 1: my father. My father died when he was forty eight.

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Speaker 1: I have lived longer than his father, who died when

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Speaker 1: he was twenty one. I have lived longer than many

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Speaker 1: people that I baptized, I also buried, and I am

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Speaker 1: still here, and I still believe I've got years in

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Speaker 1: front of me and hope to have a long time

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Speaker 1: to be able to serve in a smaller way. But

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Speaker 1: I did learn to take the time to care about myself,

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Speaker 1: because some of us are so driven to take care

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Speaker 1: of everybody else that we simply do not take time

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Speaker 1: to take care of ourselves. But when you feel that urge,

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Speaker 1: that proclivity that may be born out of a wound

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Speaker 1: in your heart, or it may be born out of

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Speaker 1: a good place in your heart, remember that the ice

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Speaker 1: is thin and the line is frail, and when all

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Speaker 1: is said and done, there is a thin line between

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Speaker 1: life and death. Be careful how you walk that line,

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Speaker 1: because it is oh so very thin. Indeed, I hope

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Speaker 1: you got something out of the podcast today. I am Tdjkes,

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Speaker 1: and you are listening at the next chapter, and I

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Speaker 1: decree and declare you will have a next chapter, and

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Speaker 1: every chapter will make you wiser and stronger and more

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Speaker 1: stable than you were before. And I prayed to God

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Speaker 1: that when you get to your next chapter, you will

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Speaker 1: seize it and breathe it in like oxygen, and enjoy

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Speaker 1: it and savor it and appreciate it and rejoice in it.

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Speaker 1: Because somebody just died in the hospital short of this

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Speaker 1: next moment that you're breathing air in your lungs, so

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Speaker 1: to the best of your ability, be grateful you're listening

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Speaker 1: to the next chapter. It's available almost everywhere you podcast

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Speaker 1: or so from Amazon to our heart, so many places

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Speaker 1: you can go and pick up the material and listen

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Speaker 1: at the podcast while you exercise, it while you drive.

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Speaker 1: You can listen at the podcast through many, many different

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Speaker 1: devices and be inspired to go on a little further.

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Speaker 1: Most of them are placed on Amazon, so you can

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Speaker 1: watch an listen whatever you need to do to connect

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Speaker 1: yourself back to the gratitude and the sweet taste of honey,

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Speaker 1: of being a survivor and living again. Do it now.

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Speaker 1: Don't waste it. Somebody just lost it just a second

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Speaker 1: ago and you got to have it. Don't waste it.

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Speaker 1: It's a gift from God and it's given to you. Now.

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Speaker 1: Take care of yourself, take care of your family. And

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Speaker 1: if you don't like the way your chapter has been

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Speaker 1: written so far, get up the strength and the courage

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Speaker 1: to lift the paper and turn the page and start

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Speaker 1: writing next chapter. Thank you,