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Does God Care About Your Dog? And Is Marriage Really Better Than Singleness? · Relish: a Christian podcast

• 0:00
  What is God's plan for pets and animals after they die?
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  Students really love talking about this. They do. God's going to do a lot more
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  for us than we ever can ask or imagine.
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  What does the Bible say about singleness? Is it okay to be single?
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  We will recognize each other, but Lord, I won't look like this.
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  But we'll recognize each other more on a soul.
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  Relish. Pleasing or zestful flavor. A quantity just sufficient to flavor,
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  to be pleased or gratified by, enjoy.
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  We are hoping that what we bring to your table today might add some spice to your life.
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  Welcome back to another episode of Relish. I am Rowan Miller.
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  This is Don Patterson. Don, how are you doing today? Oh, we're doing good.
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  Springtime, sun shining. Yeah, loving the weather. Yes, I even got some sun on my forehead. Yeah.
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  Been out in it. Yep. yeah oh i've got
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  i've got yeah oh yeah yes
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  are there any christian teachings that are deal breaking deal breakers for you
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  in relationships your friendships deal breakers for you and your friendships
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  christian teaching i don't think so much at hillcrest um like i guess it's kind of,
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  maybe that has kind of formed my core group of friends and uh just the other
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  people at school as well.
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  Um, but I know like in middle school and kind of from just what I hear now, there's, um,
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  Like, I guess treating others with some of it and, um, like leaving into earthly influences and, um.
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  Yeah, even substance stuff at times, like, um, kind of just aware of it.
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  And so is that, is that a positive thing that you're sheltered from that right now?
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  Or do you think that's a, I think, I think it's kind of, I think it's good right
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  now. and for a lot of people it is.
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  But I'm also aware of it coming from a bigger school.
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  So I'm not just going to be totally exposed to it for the first time sometime and give in.
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  I'm aware of it, but at the same time, I'm removed and not going to.
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  The question in church communities are, are we doing a positive thing for our
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  youth by pulling them into a spot? And that's the reason Hillcrest was created in the very beginning.
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  Are we doing them a positive or do we teach them better if they're actually
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  in a bigger environment and then dealing with those social influences early
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  rather than when they get into adulthood?
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  And I guess I appreciated the fact that I guess what we're doing at Hillcrest to do both.
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  Right. And especially during those years when there's quite a few things going
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  on in a high schooler's mind, you know, and a lot of different changes to the mind and the body.
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  And, yeah, it can be really crazy times.
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  Of course, you've never had crazy times, but that's good. I appreciate that. Right now, yeah.
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  Crazy times. That's only what we do here. It's relish. Get the two busiest people around it. Yeah.
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  Yes. You're right about that.
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  I think I got some for you here. Uh-oh. And these are Hillcrest questions.
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  Yet again, these are all Hillcrest questions. Wow.
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  We're still rolling off of those. So thank you to the students there.
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  Amen. Hopefully we'll get your question answered.
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  But anyway, what is God's plan for pets and animals after they die?
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  Students really love talking about this. They do. Of course, I have our beloved pets.
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  You know what? But Scripture really doesn't explain that very much.
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  The other side of the coin is when we see in chapters 21 and 22 of Revelation,
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  it's going to be really a neat place. So I can't imagine it wouldn't be without our pets.
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  Animals, basically, the soul of an animal is different than our soul.
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  And so we know from Scripture where our souls end up eternally.
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  But I'm sorry, I don't have a good answer as to where it would be for our pets.
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  I still believe God's a loving God, and I think part of his love.
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  Is manifest in our pets. I mean, really, I come home of an evening and Susie's
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  there and she's looking for me at the very,
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  I mean, her nose is right at the door when I get to the house and she's wiggling all over to see me.
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  And I can't imagine that something like that would not be in heaven.
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  That anticipation for you to be home, always happy for you to be home,
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  even if you've had one whale of a rotten day and the dog is just happy to see you.
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  And so I think there's going to be some aspect of that, whether it's in the
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  dog in heaven, I don't know.
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  I don't see it in scripture, but I guess I believe God's that good.
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  But we'll probably see our pets again just by his nature.
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  Yeah. I know relationships change also when you go to heaven. Do they? Yeah.
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  Would you recognize your pet? do you think? Yep, yep.
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  Definitely he'd recognize me. Yeah. And yeah, relationships are different in heaven.
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  We know from Jesus talking in Matthew that we're not given in marriage the same way.
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  So marriage relationships change in heaven.
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  We know that, I guess, the linear construct that we have of time and space going
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  in a horizontal plane may not be the same there,
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  because we will recognize each other,
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  but Lord, what thing I won't look like this?
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  But we'll recognize each other more on a soul recognition.
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  It'll be relational. It'll be personal.
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  But our bodies will remain like Christ's own glorious body. We know that from 1 Corinthians 15.
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  And so we won't look like this. Thank you.
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  So recognition will not be nearly only by sight.
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  It'll be more we will know as we are known.
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  So the human things that we, the tactile, the visual of a relationship may not
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  be there, but the heart pieces will be there.
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  You recognize him more for who they
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  are rather than what they look like yeah yeah yeah i
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  think i like reading the uh was it
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  called heaven is for real yes that's exactly what was in my mind and it was
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  the stillborn daughter unborn daughter and when he went to heaven he like met
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  her and she was they picture her as being around his age right she's a child
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  and yeah never never reached that age on earth.
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  So, yeah. And I, I didn't want to parallel that with scripture,
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  but that was what was in my mind when I was answering that because that, uh,
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  and I guess I've heard that from other, uh, experience of people who have died
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  and, and met family members and they weren't.
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  Recognizable, uh, at like when they died, it wouldn't have been their,
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  their last manifestation of physical, it would be more who they really were.
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  Yeah. And so the grandfather appears to the grandson, not as a old,
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  old man, but in his prime. Yeah. Yeah.
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  In his prime. Yeah. We're gone.
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  Yeah. I, I just, I, I had liked to see Don in his prime too.
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  I haven't No, I don't know. He's been there yet.
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  Uh, but that, that, that being like Jesus with our body being like his body, I, I think, uh.
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  That's the piece that, I guess, how can we be as glorious as Jesus?
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  That's the question that comes to my mind. So what will we look like?
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  What will we manifest like when we are given a body like Jesus is given?
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  Yeah. And so that could be pretty wild. I mean, I'm not sure we can conceptualize
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  that in the human because, uh, our body will be like his own glorious body.
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  Yeah, I think that happens a lot when speaking about heaven and the afterlife.
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  And there's just a lot of uncertainty and things that we right now cannot just understand.
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  And I'm all right with that.
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  I think there's a dangerous to give really tight answers on things like that,
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  because in doing so, we limit how God can be understood.
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  Right. I mean, it's the same thing with theology. When we give down pat answers
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  of God's logic, God's reasoning, we're putting it in a scope we can understand.
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  But when God manifests himself, it probably won't look exactly like that because
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  we still have put parameters on God that he doesn't need to abide by.
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  He's much bigger than that. So, I'm sorry I couldn't give a better answer,
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  but that's, I think that's probably the scope that answer needs to have.
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  Yeah, that's good. God's going to do a lot more for us than we ever can ask or imagine.
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  Ephesians chapter 3 has Paul's prayer. We can't imagine all that God's going to do.
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  And we shouldn't put limits on God either on what he's going to do. Yeah.
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  Good answer. Good question. Provocative.
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  Yeah. What does the Bible say about singleness? Is it okay to be single?
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  Actually, Paul would say it's okay to be single. It's a blessing in his mind,
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  maybe because he was, you know, but when we get to, uh, first Corinthians,
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  uh, six and seven, it's as if he, uh, says that's the way to be.
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  Um, he, he, he thinks it's a blessing. So yes, uh.
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  He's talking about people being in the same situation they were called to.
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  It's good for a man, verse chapter 7, 1 Corinthians, it's good for a man not to marry.
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  Doesn't say women, does it? Since there's so much immorality,
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  each man should have his own wife.
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  And so marriage, in Paul's mind, is to help us take care of immorality, our sensuality.
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  The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife
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  to her husband. The wife's body does not belong to her, but also her husband.
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  In the same way, the husband's body doesn't belong to him, but also to the wife.
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  And you should not deprive each other except by mutual consent.
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  But he goes on to say, now to the unmarried, in verse 8, and to the widows I
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  say, it's good for them to stay unmarried as I am.
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  But if you can't control yourself, they should marry. It's better to marry than to burn with passion.
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  Interesting. So it's as if Paul says, yeah, it's all right not to marry.
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  And to stay in the same, let's see, he goes further.
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  I would like you, so in verse 32 of chapter 7 in 1 Corinthians,
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  I would like for you, oh dear, Don forgot to turn his phone off.
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  I would like for you to be free from concern. An unmarried man is concerned
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  about the Lord's affairs, how he can please the Lord.
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  But a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world,
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  how he can please his wife.
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  An unmarried woman or a virgin is concerned about the Lord's affairs.
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  Her aim is to be devoted to the Lord in both body and spirit.
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  So, it's as if Paul is saying, yes, that singleness, celibacy,
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  turning all that energy that we would turn to a relationship with someone else
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  into energy for the Lord. That's important.
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  Yeah. And then, like, isn't that what monks and nuns do? It's like they're essentially
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  like married to the Lord?
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  This is the passage that the Catholic Church would take that from.
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  As if they were married to the Lord. Yes. Yeah. And so all that energy that
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  would be in other relationships is focused on God.
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  It's not a bad way to live. Yeah.
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  Yeah. Works for me. Yeah. It's a, yeah. I would, I would question though. Okay.
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  We are sensual. And if you do have a lot of passion and, and,
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  uh, uh, touch, uh, sensuality is big deal.
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  You may want to reevaluate whether being single is what you want to do.
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  Yeah. Because, uh, Paul is making
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  a distinction here that we are human beings. We have a lot of energy.
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  Uh, make sure you take care of that too. Know, know that that's part of it.
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  Don't make a rash decision and then all of a sudden fall on the other side of it.
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  So that's part, part and parcel of saying, okay, who, it's bottom line. Who are we before God?
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  Who is God calling you to be? before anything else.
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  So maybe he is actually calling you to be single, and that's a good thing.
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  Stay with it. Invest in that.
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  But if you have a hard time not being with other people and developing relationships
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  that sometimes brings you close to each other and things happen,
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  don't maybe go there.
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  And I still believe that In marriage relationships, God has certain individuals
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  called out for us in relationship so that we are better together than we would be individually.
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  Yeah. And so, like my wife, she's my better half because she sharpened me in
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  ways that nobody else could have. Yeah. So….
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  There's, there's a credibility to both being single and being married to the
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  very person that God's called you to be married to.
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  Yeah. Yeah. Good question. Good stuff.
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  Very good. I think that about does it for us. Okay. So thank you to everybody
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  at Hillcrest. Hope you enjoyed listening to their questions.
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  Thank you, Don, for answering them. Been a privilege. Let us know if you got
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  any more or. Yeah. If we didn't answer one good enough. Right.
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  Yeah, because sometimes, well, and Don gets on a rabbit trail. Sorry.
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  All good. Thank you guys for joining us. We'll see you next time. Lord willing.
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  Thank you for joining us for this podcast. Feel free to become part of this
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  ministry by sharing it with others.
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  Our goal is to help each other grow deeper in our understanding of who God is
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  and is calling to us in our daily lives.
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  Thank you again for joining us and may God bless your day.