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S2 Ep4 Coffee, Ministry and Apostolic Calling · Called BEYOND

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Following Jesus was crucial every step of the way.
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And the one thing we agreed on in the beginning of marriage is we would do anything
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the Lord said so long as it wasn't being missionaries.
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So we were all in for anything except missionary work until one Sunday.
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One of the things that was really clear in God's call was that instability or
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even I I would say more specifically insecurity that we felt was we weren't
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fully stepping into what the Lord had for us.
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And so there was like this holy discontent. And in that, it was like when the
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call came, it was energy and excitement and vision and all those things came with it.
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It wasn't like, okay, that's crazy.
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Now what, Lord? It was more like, okay, I'm going to start moving.
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I'm going to start moving in that direction.
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Music.
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Welcome to Called Beyond, a Novo Mission podcast.
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We love sharing stories about how we can hear God speaking to us,
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as well as what happens when we say yes to His calling in our lives.
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During this second season of the podcast, we're highlighting three spiritual
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rhythms reflected in the life of Christ.
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Cave, the place of encounter with God's Word and presence.
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Table, the place of belonging with supportive family and friends.
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And Road, the place of spiritual engagement in the world.
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Well, welcome back, everybody, to another exciting episode of the Called Beyond
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podcast. I'm your host, Tim Shuck.
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Today, I'm joined by two amazing Novo missionaries, Stu and Sarah Sutherland,
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who are with us from Northern California.
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Together, they run nonprofit coffeehouses as a vehicle for connecting with people who are far from God.
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And they happen to live in the fifth most unchurched city in the U.S.
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So all of you Googlers out there, I'm sure you're trying to figure out where
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that is. but it's not exactly the most exciting statistic, but it has everything
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to do with the need for them being where they are.
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And we want to tell the stories about people coming closer and closer to God.
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So will you guys join me in welcoming Stu and Sarah to the call? Welcome you guys.
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Thanks. Hey, Tim. Thanks for having us.
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Absolutely. Well, man, I've gotten to know these guys just a little bit through
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the last couple of years. And I'm excited for you guys to get to hear some of their story.
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As we unpack, what does it look like for them to be called beyond?
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Like, what's it look like to say yes to Jesus? And so, I think maybe the first
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question, maybe for Sarah, because I want the honest truth from you.
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Like, what has this like following Jesus, being married to this guy, Stu, been like?
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How did you guys get, I guess, connected and on this journey of living missionally together? Heather?
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So, I mean, our story is crazy. We started super young, had babies,
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our first baby before we were married.
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And so, it was just like following Jesus was crucial every step of the way.
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And I realized after time that I'm also apostolic, but I definitely married
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an apostolic dude who's just, he has a heart for God.
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And he's like, whatever the Lord says, that's what we're going to do.
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The one thing we agreed on in the beginning of marriage is we would do anything
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the Lord said, so long as it wasn't being missionaries.
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So, we were all in for anything except missionary work until one Sunday.
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And it was just like, I mean, there were things building up to it.
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And then the Lord was like, nailed Stu with a call to overseas missions.
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And, you know, Stu was unpacking that to me later that afternoon.
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And Sarah, by the way, already knew. I was like, yeah, I know.
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But that's what we're doing.
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Wow. Yeah. And then kind of over the journey of becoming missionaries,
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thinking we were going overseas, the Lord really kindly redirected us to our backyard.
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But I think that that initial for us, that initial overseas call helped us solidify
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in our minds that we were missionaries, that we weren't church planters.
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And it's really different to be a missionary than to be a church planter. That's amazing.
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Okay, so I love this story already because I feel like I've lived this story a little bit.
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Like, I'm okay with anything except for this.
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And like, it's almost like by saying this, it's like that becomes the thing.
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And so I just, I find that amazing. That's so scriptural, right?
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It's just sort of like Jesus very gently meets us in our longing and he actually
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knows what's best for us.
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And he wants to qualify us out of the areas where we maybe don't feel qualified
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or maybe it feels too big or too crazy or too stressful.
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Stu, what did that feel like to receive this, I would say, calling that wanted
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to be a no, but it needed to be a yes?
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You know, I think, like Sarah said, there were a lot of events leading up to that.
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One of the events was we did a short-term missions trip.
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The missionaries pulled us aside, said, you guys have whatever,
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you have everything it takes to be missionaries.
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But then they're like, don't go unless God calls you. We were so relieved to
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hear that last sentence because we're like, God did not call us for good.
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So I think that was kind of the cliffhanger.
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And when it was on a Sunday, I was on the worship team, I was getting ready
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to play bass, and then I felt really sick. And I was like, this is weird.
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Ended up going home. I'm on the couch. Sarah's next to me.
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I just lose it. I'm crying, whatever. I can't figure out what internally is
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wrong with me. And that's when it was like the clouds parted.
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And it was like, Oh, no, God's calling us. It was clear.
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And it was like, I had to, I had to say yes, I had no choice.
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It was it was so powerful.
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And so it really, I think the Lord was gentle and wooing us through that process.
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But when the call came, it was crystal clear.
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Wow, that's amazing. Well, congratulations on saying yes.
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Because I feel like, you know, there's so many opportunities we have to ignore.
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And you probably would say this, like, I know that I could have said no.
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But I knew that I had to say yes. You know, it's that, it's kind of that,
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like, it is a moment of clarity and reality where it's very clear.
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But you also know that you had a decision to make as well. I really love that.
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I'm just curious how far into like y'all's relationship, did you feel this cementing
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call to become missionaries and move in this direction?
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We were in Paraguay five years after like our fifth anniversary.
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So I think it was about, we'd been married for about eight years and homeschooling
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our kids. Stu's working in architecture.
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He had just finished college, graduated.
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Like I said, we were babies when we got married. So we're pretty young,
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but had been together for a little while. Yeah.
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Well, I find that exciting. So it's just like, essentially, what you're describing
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is like everybody's chaos.
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Everybody's sort of normal, chaotic life, kind of within Chris and Dama's short
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term mission trip here and life and work and babies and homeschooling and mortgages
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or rent to pay or, you know, all of the chaos of life.
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And you guys are sifting through these kind of big, altering,
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what feel like big life-altering decisions amidst just the normalcy,
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which is often chaotic, of life.
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Yeah, 100%. For sure. I kind of think, you know, in the upheaval of it all,
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you know, we did, we were homeowners at that point and, you know,
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raising our kids and looking for some semblance of normalcy.
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I remember kind of in that season, hanging out with some friends going,
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man, I just want to have some friends that don't move away after 18 months,
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just looking for something.
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But I think what was beautiful in the Lord's call in that time of our lives,
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and Tim, I think you're digging this up, which is a really good point.
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It's that we were already in motion.
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There wasn't a lot that we, you know, our lives already felt kind of nomadic,
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even though we longed for something more stable.
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But I think one of the things that was really clear in God's call was that instability,
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or even I would say more specifically insecurity that we felt was we weren't
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fully stepping into what the Lord had for us.
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And so there was like this holy discontent. And in that, it was like when the call came.
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It was energy and excitement and, you know, vision and all those things came with it.
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It wasn't like, okay, that's crazy. Now what, Lord?
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It was more like, okay, I'm going to start moving.
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I'm going to start moving in that direction. And because we were stuck in a
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place of comfort and regularity, I don't know.
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It just, again, it's part of God's beautiful design. He invites us into things.
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The timing was right. And yeah, and it's so amazing because,
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you know, something that Sarah said when she was just talking about how God
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has wired the both of you together, and you use the word apostolic,
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just to kind of define that term in case that feels like an outlier for anyone
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listening to this is, I like to think of that as being like a,
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almost like a spiritual entrepreneur.
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Like someone who takes risks, who is maybe a fire starter or someone who's like
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looking for ways to engage and create something that's never been there before
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with the heart of seeing, you know,
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spirit filled experiences come out of it.
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And so that idea of being apostolic, I mean, it really matches with what you're saying right now.
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It's like once we had the yes to get out of the way, it's like the excitement
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and the building and the vision for what could happen next started to come to you guys.
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Does that feel fair to say it that way? Yeah, and it really took key leaders
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in our lives to unlock or even give us permission to operate in that apostolic
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wiring and calling, I would say.
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I grew up being told that I was interested in too many things at once,
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you know, pick a thing, you know, but I was always learning.
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I was always building. I was always creating.
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And, you know, even culturally or in your family, that could be,
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you could be unusual and people would try it. You know, people would tell me you need to focus.
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For me, that was pursuit. That was the joy. It was the new thing.
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What's the next thing? What's the next thing?
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And so when I had a leader call that out, it's like, no, that's apostolic.
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Like that's the entrepreneur for the kingdom.
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Things started to make sense. But again, without those people to give us language
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and permission and even being able to identify what it's unto,
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I don't know that we would have been able to fully embrace what that call meant.
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That's awesome. This whole idea of creating these nonprofit coffee houses,
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like as places where people can engage, I find it so beautiful as we're unpacking
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this like entrepreneur for the kingdom in this idea of knowing where this is kind of going.
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Will you kind of bring us into this story a little bit as far as like,
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how did the boxes start to align for you to move into what you're actually doing even today?
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I mean, a lot of it was connecting with leaders, people that was part of our journey.
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We were with the Christian Missionary Alliance and in that got,
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you know, had other schooling we needed to do, other education,
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which led to connection with the Randalls who are actually now Novo missionaries.
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And it was in that relationship with them that the Lord used them to reshape
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our heart and vision for overseas missions,
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where we thought we would be doing like a coffee house community center type
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thing because we're living room people, we're not stage people.
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So we knew that would always be like our trajectory.
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But God used other people to speak into our lives and then help reshape our
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focus from overseas to local.
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So like Sarah was sharing, we really thought we were going to go overseas to
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France and work with postmodern, post-church culture.
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We knew small groups and discipleship was our jam.
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And we love coffee. I've been in coffee.
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It was my first job when I was 13 and just was always experimenting with it.
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And as we became, like, as the Lord put that call on us,
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coffee was there, small group and discipleship was there, and we thought France,
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but as we were in relationship with the local church, and that was with Bill
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and Jill Randall, who were those leaders, by the way, that called out the apostolic in us.
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And it was that life-on-life relationship time. it was the Lord moving where
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Risen King, the local church in Reading, was really investing in a small community
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about 11 minutes north called City of Shasta Lake.
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They had vision, they knew God wanted to move in that city, but they didn't have leadership.
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And when we came into the scene, it became really clear that the Lord was inviting
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us to think like missionaries, to live like missionaries, to be missionaries,
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but to do that locally, to do that in City of Shasta Lake.
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And it came with that vision of coffee. It came with that vision of small groups
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in discipleship because we saw a community that was post-prunter,
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post-church, just like we thought we were going to be in France.
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And so, it was this perfect alignment with what we knew about us and what we
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knew about our call. It was just where was unclear.
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And so, Shasta Lake ended up being that thing. We walked the streets.
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We prayer walked the streets.
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Shasta Lake, we did video interviews with locals who had led us.
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We created this whole montage and shared it with the church community that we
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were part of to build vision.
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And with that came funding, with that came the business plan.
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Again, we didn't want to be missionaries.
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And we sure as heck didn't want to be business owners or entrepreneurs.
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Like these are all things were so outside of our vision that we have for ourselves
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that I had for myself like that.
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If you were to ask me, you know, what do you want to be when you grow up?
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I'd always say, well, I just want to do what Jesus wants me to do.
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But underlying in that expectation would probably be something like,
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I don't know, probably nothing too great.
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I mean, growing up looking at missionaries, they were like, you know,
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like these amazing people that were so otherworldly that you could never be like one.
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And so, it just felt really out of reach.
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But again, the simple obedience step-by-step as the Lord wooed us and led us,
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He led us to a place. He led us with the vision of small groups and discipleship and all the things.
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And then He led us with provision to buy a building and to build these businesses
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that ultimately has now allowed us to build teams that are groups of people
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who are everyday missionaries engaging our city of Shaftes Lake and now the city of Reading.
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I would be remiss if I didn't at least ask you guys, I'm going to use kind of
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a metaphor because I just love them and just invite you into this metaphor and
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just a chance to describe kind of what you guys see as you kind of reflect on it.
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So let's just assume the Lord is painting a masterpiece through the brushes
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of Stu and Sarah, and he's been working on it for decades and he's been writing
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it for writing it or drawing it for a really long time.
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And you've gotten to see some, only some of the beautiful things that he's doing
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through your guys' obedience and your yes to him.
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If you kind of zoom out of your own story and look back at what he's doing,
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what are the things that you feel like he's highlighting as like his wonderful
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works of art that only he could do?
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And I get that this is kind of an elaborate question and maybe a little bit
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out there, but like, as you look at the things, what are the things that you're
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seeing actually bring you guys the most joy where you know that only by partnering
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with God does this happen.
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And you get to actually be a part of it. And you're part of this painting that he's making.
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Well, let me tell you a story about that. We had a guy on our team. He was amazing.
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He was 1000% in everything that he did. He was the biggest personality.
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Everybody loved to him. He was this amazing networker. We still love this guy.
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But it turned out that something more interesting caught his eye.
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And so he had a long conversation with us and said, I know I committed to being
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on the team, but something else came up. I'm going to go do that. And we said, okay.
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And had a little bit of a conversation, but it didn't go too deep.
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So we blasted him, released him, and he went and did the thing that he was really
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excited about. Well, fast forward about a year and a half or so.
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He comes back to us after working in this other field that was really difficult,
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found out that working for us wasn't as hard as he thought or bad as he thought. I don't know. But...
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Realize I want to still invest time here. I feel like there's more for me to
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learn and more for me to do.
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And we're like, yeah, we would love that too. We've got this leadership opening,
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but we always invite our people into a one-year commitment.
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And part of that is it takes us a year to properly what we call ruin you and
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give you the DNA, give you the stuff that we know that helps you live sustainable
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rhythms of being a disciple who makes disciples.
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And so he's like, Like, yeah, I'm all in for that again, because this is Mr.
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1000%. So he was all in, gung-ho, super excited.
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And just a few months in, we had the talk again.
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And he's like, yeah, turns out I can't really do this. And it's not working
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out for me. And it's not what I expected.
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And I said, hey, we had a commitment. I thought we were doing this. He's like, no, I can't.
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And I said, well, can we pull back? He's like, I'm all in or I'm all out.
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And I'm going to be all out. okay and that
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conversation ended but things in me were not good
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like and it wasn't frustration or anger it was just
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it was like man this feels weird this feels off and so i i called him up and
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said hey this is not settling well with me are you okay if we meet up again
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and talk and he said yeah i'd love to and we have a great relationship and so
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we were able to sit down have a beer.
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And have a conversation around some patterns.
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And I said, you know, this isn't about me, but I just wanted to make an observation
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of what I'm experiencing with you.
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And it seems like there's this cycle that you're going through over and over again.
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I've seen it two or three times with you. And he's like, yeah,
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people have been saying that to me most of my life.
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And so I stopped and said, well, what are you doing about it?
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He's like, I don't know. I'm like, does this feel like maybe a family pattern?
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You know, do you see this happen with your folks or anything like that?
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And he's like, well, yeah, actually, this happened with my, you know,
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with my parents, my grandparents.
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I'm like, hey, have you ever thought about this being like a family sin pattern
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or, you know, something that maybe we need to break off in the spirit?
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Maybe this is impacting how you live your life right now. He's like,
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oh, I haven't really thought about it.
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And so it was amazing. We had a chance just to hang out with Jesus and go after
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that and to break off that cycle that was really something learned in how he grew up,
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but also probably something very spiritual bound up in his family and in his family of origin.
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And at the end of it, he's crying and he's just like, this is,
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I didn't realize this was in my way. And so we've been kind of keeping up with him.
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But I would say to answer your question, like, that's the stuff,
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you know, that's the stuff when we just do the daily grind with people and we
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have the hard breakup conversations or we get to be, oftentimes we get to be the bad guys,
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you know, not really, but in their perspective, kind of a hard person in our
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life because we're authentic.
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We're not mean, but we're just true. And we're not going to sweep things under the carpet.
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We do conflict well because we believe that it's
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for healing and i think those
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are the things that god continues to work out in in
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the opportunities and the time that we get to have with people is it's formational
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it's it's you know your moment with us is a moment but we are also in faith
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trusting that god's multiplying that he's taking that as a as a milestone in somebody's story wow.
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I love it. I love the idea that stories really are the brushstrokes of what
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God is doing in painting.
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And so, I love that you went straight to story out of that question because it really is.
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I mean, that really is what God paints with.
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It's testimony after testimony. It's glory. It's the opportunities we have to say, God's way works.
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And He's so ever-present in our lives and in here right now.
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And we can do this together. And I'm with you.
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And I love this idea of being authentic truth to people.
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Truth leads to healing. Isn't that amazing? What a cool, I mean,
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seems like a revolutionary concept, you know?
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And it's something our world needs, you know?
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And so, as we kind of wrap up this episode,
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you know, one of my favorite things of this season is getting to ask guests,
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you know, what's one thing that a listener could try that you've seen be really
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effective maybe in your own life?
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It could be something you've just started, you know, or it could be something
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you've done for a long time, but just something to lead them with,
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whether it's a personal prayer pursuit or a fun question to ask while you're
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gathering with your friends,
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even a way to engage someone that's right across from you that you don't know
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that maybe needs to experience the love of God, you know?
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And so, I'm sitting now before you guys just to ask you, you know,
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is there something that you would leave for the listener?
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It's just something to try, something to take a small risk, just try this out
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and see if there's fruit there for you.
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Mm-hmm. Something that I have recently learned and am enjoying practicing,
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it's something I read in the book, Living Like Monks, Praying Like Fools.
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I can't remember the author, but he talks about- Tyler Stanton, I believe.
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Practicing, yeah, practicing gratitude and just like impiling gratitude on top of gratitude.
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So it's like, oh, Lord, thank you for this food, but not just thank you for
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this food, but thank you that I got to buy these tomatoes from the farmer's market.
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And thank you so much for those farmers and what a gift they are to me and in my life.
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And thank you that I get to share it with these friends.
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And thank you for the depth of relationship that I have with these friends that
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I get to share this food with.
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And just building on the simple little thing that's right in front of us and
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just layering gratitude.
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It for me has really... I tend to be optimistic, but I also tend to be really critical.
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And so practicing, especially layering gratitude has been really helpful for
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me in recognizing just the goodness of God, especially when I'm struggling.
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Wow, that's great. Stu, what is it for you?
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Being apostolic. And if you guys are into Enneagram, Enneagram 8, Wing 9.
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So challenger with some peace maker. That's the excuse for this one.
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You ready? What's the Lord saying to you and what are you doing about it?
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You know, the small, simple obedience is, you know, God's a high invitation.
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He invites us into big things. He's also a high challenge. He invites us to
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orient ourselves to him and nowhere else.
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And so again, when we have our eyes fixed on him, when we're inviting in him,
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and we make space to hear his voice, he invites us to partner with him and his plan for redemption.
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So what's he saying to you? What are you doing about it?
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Music.
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Well, guys, thanks so much for gathering around the table here just to talk
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about what we learned from Stu and Sarah's story. Man, so many good takeaways.
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Some of the things that I heard that really pulled out, especially when thinking
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about kind of our organizing principle for this season being cave, table and road.
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You can really see how those practices or areas have influenced their life.
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I think of that amazing sort of meeting with the Randalls where they were kind
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of really discipled, really sort of able to be fully open and honest.
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And around that table, they kind of came to some amount of unity and then moved
25:11
out from that kind of into the road, which is kind of where they're living their life now.
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So, I hope that hearing that thing blessed you. There was a number of other
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things that came up in the episode too.
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One of the things I love is just this idea of what being a disciple really looks
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like, what being a follower of Jesus really looks like, what doing as Jesus
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did and said, like following him.
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Like what that actually looks like practically for each of us.
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It's taking time to listen. It's spending time.
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It's managing conflict well, because you know that healing comes as a result of doing that well.
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And it's all of these little bits and pieces that there's an invitation for
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each of us to move into being a disciple, not just for the benefit of others,
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but also for the benefit of ourselves too, in being who Jesus is calling into us.
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As we're all kind of works in progress a little bit, as we all need to be following
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and yoked and abiding with him.
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And so, I hope that that caught you up as well, as you see multiple times in
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the moments where they are actually discipling other people as well.
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They are being disciples to other people in their story. And God is using that
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to paint this beautiful picture in the Mount Shasta area of Northern California
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through just two humble, obedient servants named Sarah and Stu.
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And for the multiple others that are coming out of that as well.
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I hope that today's episode was a blessing to you.
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And I just want to challenge you to try those two things. Try just...
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Gratitude layering, just following that air thing that you're grateful for all
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the way back to its origin, as well as answering that question,
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what is God telling you and what are you doing about it?
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So bless you guys today as you listen.
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So as we wrap up this episode, we want you to know that you too are called beyond.
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We believe there is more that God desires for your life than you could possibly ask or imagine.
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Are you eager to cultivate a healthy, fruitful, and holistic walk with God?
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We bless you in Jesus' name to experience spiritually rich times in the cave,
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around the table, and on the road.
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We pray and believe for transformation in your personal relationship with Jesus,
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your community with other believers, and in the missional spaces the Spirit
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of God is inviting you into.
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Music.
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Let your hope rise up, let your kingdom come Let your will be done,
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he's here and now Let your hope rise up, let your kingdom come
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Thank you for listening to today's episode.
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Call Beyond is a production of Novo Mission, Inc.
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To learn more about Novo's commitment to multiplied movements of the gospel
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and mobilize the church for that mission, we invite you to check us out on our
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website at Novo.org or follow us at Novo Mission on Facebook or Instagram.
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The music in today's episode was written by the band Wild Earth and use with
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permission from the artist.
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Thank you again for giving our podcast a listen. We hope you'll join us for more called Beyond.