Latest / The Father's Business Podcast / Embracing Life's Journey in 2024 with Intention and Spiritual Resilence

Transcript

Embracing Life's Journey in 2024 with Intention and Spiritual Resilence · The Father's Business Podcast

• 0:04
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: The Father's Business was founded by Sylvia Gunter to encourage people to a deeper relationship with God.
• 0:09
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I'm Elizabeth.
• 0:10
  Kimberly Roddy: Gunter-Powell, and I am Kimberly Roddy.
• 0:13
  Kimberly Roddy: Welcome to the Father's Business podcast.
• 0:15
  Kimberly Roddy: We are so glad that you've joined us.
• 0:18
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Well, welcome everybody back to the Father's Business podcast and happy new year.
• 0:23
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: We have returned from our holiday break and we are eager just to talk with you today a little bit about how we leave 2023 behind and enter into 2024.
• 0:36
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: So, first off, kimberly, do you have a good holiday.
• 0:38
  Kimberly Roddy: I did have a good holiday and I figure around January 15th is when we really officially are ready to say goodbye to last year and hello to this year, because it feels like Christmas and New Year's there's just so much that runs on together it takes a little while to settle in and process and decompress what's been going on.
• 0:56
  Kimberly Roddy: So it was a good holiday.
• 0:57
  Kimberly Roddy: It was busy and I'm ready for a new year, new conversation.
• 1:00
  Kimberly Roddy: How about you?
• 1:01
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Yeah, I'm the same.
• 1:02
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: We had a great time and I feel the same way.
• 1:04
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: When people look at me at January 1st and say, have you made any resolutions, I'm like whoa, whoa, whoa, like we don't have to rush into this kind of stuff.
• 1:12
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I'm still trying to get over everything we did over the holiday.
• 1:17
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: So, yeah, it was good.
• 1:20
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: It was a little different for us, just being the first year without my dad, but a really sweet time and I really felt God speaking to me in some ways in December about 2024, which is exciting and part of what we want to share today.
• 1:33
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: But I'm like you.
• 1:35
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: It just now feels about normal and now I'm ready to get back into the normal routine of things.
• 1:40
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: As I look back over 2023, I just kind of made it through.
• 1:45
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: It wasn't really a year that was very strategic because, I mean, it was just we didn't know what was happening, and then my dad dies in March and then all the things that go along with that.
• 1:56
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I just kind of felt like I was on a roller coaster that I couldn't really get off of and had no control over how fast it was going to go or whether it was going up or down, so I was just kind of holding on through 2023 and grateful that I felt God's presence with me.
• 2:12
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: But as I came to the end of the year in December, I really started saying, okay, we just kind of had to hold on for dear life this year, but stepping into this next year, things need to be different.
• 2:26
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I mean, I know a little of your story, kimberly, and the number of things that you had to face in the last year, but how do you kind of feel you're leaving 2023?
• 2:34
  Kimberly Roddy: I was doing an exercise a couple of weeks ago well, I guess only a week or two ago, because we're just at the 15th but I was looking back, using a tool to look back at the past year, and one of the prompts that they gave you was choose three words to define your past year.
• 2:50
  Kimberly Roddy: And I thought about that for a while and it had a lot of other leading questions to get up to that one, but the three words that I came up with were exhaustion, freedom and diligence.
• 3:02
  Kimberly Roddy: And it was like if you had to title a book for your year, what would it be titled?
• 3:07
  Kimberly Roddy: And I wrote Forced to Keep Going, which I'm not sure anyone would want to read.
• 3:10
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Oh, that's a brilliant.
• 3:11
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Can I borrow your title, because that's what I'm talking about?
• 3:14
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Being on the roller coaster, you just can't get off.
• 3:16
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Yeah, yeah.
• 3:18
  Kimberly Roddy: It was a year of just being really tired, having to push through, not for bad reasons necessarily, just it was just the nature of the beast, yeah.
• 3:26
  Kimberly Roddy: It was just reality, but there was also diligence in my persevering I had, you know, I felt like I pushed through diligently, and then I also had a sense of freedom, because there were some things that I, decisions that I made this year and things that I experienced this year that all brought about a sense of freedom in the midst of being forced to keep going.
• 3:47
  Kimberly Roddy: Yeah, I think that's kind of reflecting back on 2023, some of the ideas that came to my mind, yeah, I mean.
• 3:55
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I really resonate with all of that because in a lot of ways it was, you know, off the top of my head.
• 4:00
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I might like steal your three words because it was in some ways it was very hard to lose my dad, and other ways there was a level of freedom that came as I'm no longer one of the primary caregivers for someone living with Alzheimer's, and so it was a sweet sadness for him to go, and also knowing he's healed and whole and he's no longer dealing with this disease, and so I did feel like I could take some deeper breaths.
• 4:27
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I did feel like I could sleep through the night, not worried what's going to happen next.
• 4:31
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: So, yeah, I might steal your three words and your book title.
• 4:34
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Maybe we'll write a book together about last year.
• 4:37
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: There you go Buy our book next year.
• 4:38
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: That's right.
• 4:39
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: But as for me, as I kind of came to the end of 2023, I don't like making resolutions.
• 4:46
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I don't like it when people say, well, what are your resolutions for the new year?
• 4:51
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Because it always just feels like I'm setting myself up to fail and it's like you're setting unrealistic goals for yourself to exercise more, eat better, read this many chapters of the Bible every day, whatever it is that people come up with their resolutions, and so I've really just resisted over the last several years even making them, because I just don't like them.
• 5:13
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And I was actually at my desk struggling with a computer that Kimberly you know, you've heard me write for most of 2023 that my computer just was not functioning the way it should function and I kept saying, maybe I just need a new computer or whatever.
• 5:27
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: But I spent a lot of time wondering if it was the internet speed was causing the problem, because now so much of what we do is online, and so I spent a lot of time trying to upgrade the speed, change the router, and then fiber came into our, into our place, and so got file.
• 5:46
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Okay, now that we got fiber, now my computer is going to just be great and everything I tried didn't work.
• 5:53
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: So I finally broke down and said okay, maybe we need a new computer.
• 5:58
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And it was towards the end of this year that I got a chance to do that.
• 6:03
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And as I was trying to research and figure out what computer to buy and that is one time when I really do miss my dad, because he speaks Klingon and understands computers and he would just say buy that one.
• 6:13
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: So I'm trying to research it all and I realized I was like well, let's look and see what I've got so I can compare it to what I can get.
• 6:20
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And I realized that the computer I have now, the receiver inside of it, it can't, it can't receive any faster.
• 6:30
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: So it didn't matter how much faster I made the internet, my computer was never going to move any faster than that.
• 6:37
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And I was just like, wow.
• 6:39
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I spent a lot of time between 2023 trying to make the internet speed faster, but the problem was not the speed of what was trying to be downloaded, it was the receiver couldn't take it anymore.
• 6:52
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And in a way that I can't even fully describe and I'm trying to get the words around it it was just this very deep thing spoken into my spirit that for 2024, like all of God, all of who he is, all of his power, all of his abundance, everything he can't get any fat like bigger, faster.
• 7:12
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I mean he is who he is, but what can change is I can upgrade my receiver.
• 7:19
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I can look at areas of my life, whether that be physical, emotional, spiritual, relational.
• 7:27
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: What are things I can do to have myself in a better place, to receive more of who he is?
• 7:35
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Instead of wondering why isn't God doing more, why am I not hearing him better?
• 7:40
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Why am I not?
• 7:41
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Why does it feel like he's so far away?
• 7:44
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: It's more about okay, what can I do in my daily routines and my habits, and the focus of how I schedule my life this year to be more strategic, instead of just holding onto the roller coaster and trying to make it through so that my receiver is upgraded to receive more of him.
• 8:01
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And it reminded me of back to the RUWAC journey study that we just finished, where we use the example of the thing that looks like a plastic test tube but it really is a shrunken down two liter bottle.
• 8:12
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And are you going to allow your spirit to expand to its full capacity and receive all of who God is and live from that two liter bottle place?
• 8:20
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Are you going to live like, think of a crumpled down two liter bottle and live from a small place?
• 8:25
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And the verse that kind of came to me was out of Psalms 81, where he says I, the Lord, am your God who brought you up from the land of Egypt.
• 8:34
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Open your mouth wide and I will fill it.
• 8:39
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And I've just been kind of sitting with that and I don't have all the answers yet and I can't rattle off.
• 8:44
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Here's the four things I need to do differently, but kind of the question I'm walking into 2024 with is how do I open my mouth wider, how do I put myself in a position, how do I maintain that intimacy with him, that abiding with him, so that I can receive more of who he is?
• 9:03
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And that feels much more inviting to me, that feels much more obtainable to me than setting a list of resolutions.
• 9:13
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Does that make sense?
• 9:14
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: So, just in any way I can, how can I be more available to whatever it is that God wants to do in me and through me for other people in 2024?
• 9:25
  Kimberly Roddy: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense.
• 9:26
  Kimberly Roddy: I was thinking, as you were sharing some of that earlier this year, I was doing some work and some struggling and some praying and someone encouraged me, based on my personality type and some other things, that I should slow down and take a look at the serenity prayer, and I had not really done that in the past because it felt like a rote prayer, I guess to me.
• 9:50
  Kimberly Roddy: But I sat with it for some time and it says "'God, grant me the serenity to accept the things "'I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can.
• 9:59
  Kimberly Roddy: "'and the wisdom to know the difference'".
• 10:01
  Kimberly Roddy: And it goes on if you read the full version and says "'Living one day at a time, "'enjoying one moment at a time, "'accepting hardship as a pathway to peace, "'taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, "'not as I would have it, "'trusting that you will make all things right "'if I surrender to your will, "'so that I may be reasonably happy in this life "'and supremely happy with you, forever and the next'".
• 10:23
  Kimberly Roddy: But I think there's some key points in there.
• 10:25
  Kimberly Roddy: To elaborate a little bit on what you were saying too, and a different angle for me personally, it was about trying to, I think, to connect what you were just saying like in order to be able to receive what God has for me and how he wants to use me and how he wants to work in me and through me and all those things.
• 10:46
  Kimberly Roddy: For me some of that comes down to I have to be willing to be at peace and not intense and uptight all the time.
• 10:55
  Kimberly Roddy: And so from a practical angle, it comes down to like this I mean living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time, and that was some of what I reflected on when I looked back at last year.
• 11:07
  Kimberly Roddy: I thought the times I don't always love the word happy either, it's circumstantial but the times that I felt more at peace and full of more life and joy were the times this last year that I slowed down and chose to not get uptight, chose to not get my feathers all ruffled, and so some of that is choosing to.
• 11:29
  Kimberly Roddy: It's a choice.
• 11:31
  Kimberly Roddy: It's an active choice, it's a discipline choosing to walk by the spirit in the spirit and just be okay and not feel like I have to make everything okay and not feel like I can't be okay if things aren't the way I want them to be or perfect.
• 11:46
  Kimberly Roddy: Accepting hardship as a pathway to peace is what the words were here, but it really is accepting the things I can't change and the courage to change the things I can.
• 11:55
  Kimberly Roddy: We have some friends who love resolutions and I have a good friend who's driven and loves setting goals, and I am very aware, the last two years in particular, that the reason, like you said, I don't love setting goals or resolutions.
• 12:10
  Kimberly Roddy: Is that fear of failure?
• 12:12
  Kimberly Roddy: it's that fear of getting stuck in that perfectionistic mindset and then just going I'll never do it, I'll never do it, and then just feeling horrible about myself and having a horrible outlook, and so reframing that towards the perspective of in order to receive.
• 12:28
  Kimberly Roddy: I mean, god has unlimited power, he has unlimited.
• 12:32
  Kimberly Roddy: Everything right, we can have the opportunity to live in His fullness, but so much of that is being able to be at peace and not caught up in stuff, not caught up in the things that in a lot of ways, are trivial, they feel big in the moment and sometimes they are, but they don't have to be.
• 12:55
  Kimberly Roddy: So does that?
• 12:57
  Kimberly Roddy: Do you see how that can connect with some of what you were saying?
• 13:00
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Oh, absolutely.
• 13:00
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And for one thing, I didn't know there was more to this really rare.
• 13:03
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I thought it just.
• 13:06
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I mean, the first three lines are awesome and I was like you know those three things great, but I love that second half and, like now, I want to go back and spend some time meditating on that and understanding that, because, yes, it's, and it all ties back to what you're saying.
• 13:19
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: You know, living in the moment connects back to Jesus saying don't worry about tomorrow, tomorrow's got enough worries of its own.
• 13:25
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And it's that idea of remaining present with him, of being in the moment, and it is, I mean.
• 13:32
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: You know, when I get stressed out, I get mean.
• 13:34
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: That's what my family says and it's true, and it's because I'm thinking of all the things that have to happen versus okay, in this moment, right now, I just have to do this, not the list.
• 13:47
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Yes, there is a list of 20 things that have to get done.
• 13:50
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And I also, I get that overwhelmed feeling when I don't take the time to make sure my day started the right way with aligning myself, spirit, soul, embodied with all of who he is.
• 14:02
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And so, and in knowing Jesus, you're going to go into this day with me and there's nothing I'm going to face, that you're not going to be there with me, and so you and I can choose to have a laugh about it when things don't go the way that I thought they were supposed to go, instead of getting stressed out.
• 14:18
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Super easy to say out loud, harder to live.
• 14:21
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: But that is kind of the thing that I want to focus on, and I think also with the resolutions, not only do I don't want to fail, it's just it feels like resolutions have to start on January 1.
• 14:33
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I'm not ready on January 1 to start a new year, and so this idea of okay, how in this year am I going to choose to intentionally approach my days differently, feels more friendly.
• 14:46
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: But yeah, he is the God of abundance, and when I was looking back at the verse where it says open my mouth and I'll fill it, I was like what does that word really mean in the Hebrew?
• 14:55
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: And that word really does talk not just about you know, kind of get it up to the top, but it's this overflow, this abundance.
• 15:03
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: They use the same word to talk about a woman who's really, really, really pregnant, and so it's having that expectation that God wants to do abundantly more than what we think he wants to do in us and through us, and whether it be relationships that we think can never get better, or financial situations that we always feel like we're behind, or whatever it is.
• 15:25
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I want to enter 2024 and invite all of us to enter 24, expectant that he's going to do more than we could ask for, imagine, and I think that then helps me slow down and enjoy the moment like you're talking about.
• 15:40
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: If I'm walking through life with that mindset versus I've got to get it done, here's all the things that are on me.
• 15:47
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: This is, you know, and feeling like you're living out of scarcity.
• 15:51
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Now, that verse everyone quotes is great, but the next verse is not.
• 15:57
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: It's so great because it goes on to say but my people did not listen to my voice and didn't obey me, and so I'm like well, shoot.
• 16:06
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: That's not really encouraging if you read past the fill-up part.
• 16:11
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: So it is a partnership.
• 16:13
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: It is me having to choose to put myself in positions where I can experience that more, and I do.
• 16:20
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I want to be like that baby bird of the nest that has his mouth wide open because mama's coming with something good to eat and trusting that, whatever God is going to bring this year.
• 16:29
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: It is going to be good.
• 16:31
  Kimberly Roddy: Yeah, and defining what good means Right.
• 16:33
  Kimberly Roddy: You know, like you talk about, like last year, a lot of last year was defined by losing your dad.
• 16:38
  Kimberly Roddy: Picking up the pieces from that taking care of all that.
• 16:42
  Kimberly Roddy: And I've had a friend last year that was diagnosed with some hard medical stuff and then another friend at the beginning of this year was diagnosed with some hard medical stuff.
• 16:50
  Kimberly Roddy: And you think about what is the goodness of God look like in the middle of your year, starting with January 3, getting a diagnosis?
• 16:58
  Kimberly Roddy: That's painful, right, and people listening have that experience.
• 17:03
  Kimberly Roddy: They have that and I think that's where we have to pause and recognize all of these things.
• 17:10
  Kimberly Roddy: I believe, from a scriptural Jesus centered viewpoint, it's about being whole W-H-O-L-E right.
• 17:18
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Yes.
• 17:19
  Kimberly Roddy: It's about looking at the wholeness of who we are, and I think a lot of times people get into the new year and they're like oh, I'm going to, you know, january 1st, the gym is full right, yes.
• 17:28
  Kimberly Roddy: Your local gym and it's full, and your fast food restaurants are not as full anymore and all that kind of stuff.
• 17:34
  Kimberly Roddy: The grocery store, the outer aisles are full.
• 17:36
  Kimberly Roddy: Right, shopping, yeah, and that's awesome.
• 17:40
  Kimberly Roddy: But to me, the last year or two has also been about how can I holistically be whole?
• 17:47
  Kimberly Roddy: and healthy, well-rounded.
• 17:50
  Kimberly Roddy: It's a phrase, it's often used, but the abundance that wants to come to me is from walking with God, is a holistic abundance.
• 18:00
  Kimberly Roddy: It is taking care and I don't mean prosperity, gospel kind of stuff at all Right, right, like not no, but it is paying attention to.
• 18:09
  Kimberly Roddy: God created my body, he created my spirit, he created my mind, he created my emotions.
• 18:13
  Kimberly Roddy: He created all of that and he's blessed me to live in the kingdom world that I live in.
• 18:21
  Kimberly Roddy: We all have these microcosm kingdoms that we live in, where he wants to use the resources he's blessed us with, and that is our body, our finances, our home, our jobs, our cars, our everything right and so how we like being more intentional and again it's what we talk about in January.
• 18:40
  Kimberly Roddy: But the encouragement, the challenge, is to daily live that way, aware that God longs to fill us, to overflowing, relationally, financially, emotionally, spiritually, mentally and I mean that in its proper context.
• 18:58
  Kimberly Roddy: Sure, right, but it is being aware of how do I walk with Jesus, all in an intentional way, in all aspects.
• 19:07
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: So, kim, as we come to a close, I am thinking about we just had our Father's Business Board meeting this past week and one of our board members prayed over us and the Father's Business and everyone connected with the Father's Business a prayer out of one of mom's resources, and it was just really impactful and he didn't know what God had been saying to me about the receiver and that type of thing, and it was just a beautiful time of just seeing how God can speak to us through others, and so we want to close our time praying this prayer over everyone who's listening to our podcast.
• 19:42
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Father, bless me.
• 19:44
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Indeed, you are the blesser from whose hand every good thing comes.
• 19:49
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I want a front row seat on a life of your miracles.
• 19:55
  Kimberly Roddy: I boldly ask that you expand your kingdom through me, thrust me into the mainstream of your plans, way beyond my ability, and accomplish them by the exaltless energy of your Holy Spirit and in the freshness of your Holy Word.
• 20:11
  Kimberly Roddy: Make my prayer life and my life in your spirit match my assignment.
• 20:18
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I am totally dependent on seeing your strong hand on everything that touches me.
• 20:23
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I see before me human impossibilities, which is the realm of incredible blessings that you specialize in.
• 20:33
  Kimberly Roddy: Help me stand confidently against the enemy when I have stirred up all the hosts of darkness with kingdom invasion.
• 20:40
  Kimberly Roddy: Keep me relying on the sharp weapons of your warfare.
• 20:43
  Kimberly Roddy: Help me give no quarter to the enemy.
• 20:46
  Kimberly Roddy: Free me from ground I have given him.
• 20:49
  Kimberly Roddy: It is said that one love will quench another With passion for Jesus.
• 20:54
  Kimberly Roddy: Quench my pet sins of pride, judgment, anger and impatience.
• 20:58
  Kimberly Roddy: Spirit of the living God cleans me of insensitivity, hardness, indifference, ignorance and shallowness.
• 21:07
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Live in me a life totally explainable.
• 21:10
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Only that it's you, god.
• 21:12
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: We pray all this in your name, amen.
• 21:15
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: I want to thank you for listening to the Father's Business podcast.
• 21:21
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: This podcast is made possible through donations by people like you.
• 21:31
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: To donate, go to wwwthefathersbusinesscom.
• 21:35
  Elizabeth Gunter-Powell: Be sure to follow us at the Father's Biz on Instagram and Facebook.