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Lets go to Church · Fostering Faith

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Welcome back to Fostering Faith.
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And so today we are excited to talk about a topic that has been close to Gia's heart.
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And she really felt like it was important to discuss this topic as we've not talked
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about this topic before.
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And that is about finding a church.
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And so we know that it's really important to find your community and how to build a
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community and get plugged into a church.
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And so welcome back everybody to Fostering Faith.
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We're here to explore the ways to grow deeper in your walk with God and enjoy each other
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along the way.
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Hi, my name is Tracy.
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My name is Gia.
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And today we're going to be talking about something that is foundational to our faith
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journey.
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Finding and building a community and whether we're searching for a church or trying to
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get more family involved or wondering why community even matters.
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This episode is for you.
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And so as we can turn into scripture to set the tone, what does Hebrews 10, 24 through
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25 say Gia?
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And let us consider how we may spur one another on forward love and good deeds, not giving
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up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another and
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all the more as you see the day approaching.
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We aren't meant to do life alone.
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God created us to live in community and grow and encourage each other.
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And so as we go into why faith and community is so important, spiritual growth.
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And so a church community sharpens our faith and keeps us accountable.
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Proverbs 27, 17 says that iron sharpens iron.
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So one person sharpens another.
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When we're around other people who are pursuing God, it inspires us to do the same.
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And so what about this life challenge in supporting this?
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How has church made life better for you Gia?
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It has grew me closer to God really.
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And what else has it done?
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Grew me closer to the people that I love.
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And so from celebrating joyful milestones, walking through seasons of hardship and church
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family can encourage us.
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And whenever I started with whenever we started with City Hope, can you tell the listeners
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of how and what's our walk at church been?
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We started like a lot of how many years ago?
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Six.
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And while she would just drop me off at this one place, I have no idea where I went.
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I just played with one kid first off and then I got old enough to go into like the youth
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room.
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And then this guy taught us and then my mom started youth and we went and then we moved
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to like a different church with the same church, like a bigger building.
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And then we just kept on going and going.
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And so a little bit of a backstory and so I am a nurse practitioner now, but I was a
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staff nurse at a hospital.
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And so for Gia's child years, I worked weekend option.
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And so I worked every Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
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I did that for a decade and we I did not have the opportunity to go to church because I
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worked every weekend.
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And then as I became a nurse practitioner, I worked every weekend still and was on call
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24 seven.
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And so I spent most of my day at the hospital.
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And whenever I had an opportunity to switch jobs and was able to be off on weekends, Gia
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picked our home church, City Hope Church and was able to go start going to church.
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And as a parent, I know it's super important that you want our kids to be happy.
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And so that's where her friends were going.
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And that's why she picked City Hope Church.
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And as a mom and as a wife, I did have a husband and he has been on our podcast before and
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he mentioned that he did not go to church.
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He did not have a relationship with Christ at that point.
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He was mad at God.
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And so we went to church, I think it for two years, just by ourselves.
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And so every Sunday we would get up, we would go to church.
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Of course we would ask.
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And of course he said no.
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And so he had to walk through his journey with faith and just having a wife and a daughter
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that was just walking through their faith journey, just getting to know God and scripture.
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And so what Gia said, I would drop her off at kids.
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I would go and sit in big service by myself and I would be a back row specialist and just
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keep going.
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Really wasn't plugged in, really wasn't new small groups.
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And as my creativity, as my curiosity kind of grew, Gia was growing up.
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She was already having play dates and already having friends.
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And I was like, man, she's going to grow up and she's going to leave me and then I'm going
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to be by myself.
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So it's probably a good idea for me to get some adult friends.
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And so I joined a small group and just to reach out, to have adult conversations that
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weren't about work.
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And it just kind of spurred more faith because if you surround yourself with people that
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are trying to seek God's face and trying to be inquisitive and don't know everything and
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you're just walking through kind of life together, it really was just a week by week kind of
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thing and just trying to grow.
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And here we are leading the junior high now and we serve every weekend, have for the last
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several years and just really have become part of the church family.
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And so purposeful living.
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And so serving in church gives us opportunities to use our God given gifts.
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And so what is first Peter for 10 say Gia?
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Each of you should should use whatever gift you have reached to serve others.
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As faithful stewards in God's grace.
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And so finding a church, how can you start with a church if you don't know where to go?
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If you don't have a kid to blame it on where you guys don't have friends, you guys just
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move into town.
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We can start with prayer.
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And so James one five says, if any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God who gives
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us generously to all without finding fault and will be given to you.
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And so asking God to guide you to the right church for your family and trust that he knows
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exactly where you need to be.
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And so, I mean, people you hear even moved across the country to go to the church that
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God has called them to do.
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And so with any decisions, we always want to ask God whether it's going to high school.
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Do we pray about what high school we go to?
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Do we pray about what college or what career you're going to go to?
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Yes.
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And so we pray for everything.
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And so it's not silly.
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I mean, can you just walk randomly walk into a church?
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Yes, absolutely.
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If you have no churches in your local area that you feel comfortable with, you know,
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making sure that it's a Bible based church, making sure that you feel comfortable whenever
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you walk in.
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And so biblical teaching.
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And so looking for key elements in your church is making sure that it's Bible based.
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And so we are Christians.
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We do go by the Holy Bible.
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And so does your church preach the word God faithfully?
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And so Acts 2 42 says they devote themselves to the apostles teaching and to fellowship.
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This should always be a cornerstone of the church that you go to and that Christ centered
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worship.
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Worship should glorify God and lead you into his presence.
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What do you think about our worship at City Hope?
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I really like it.
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Why?
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It's really hype.
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And like, I just like the singers.
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And the presence of God is so present in that room and the altar is open and just people
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just surrendering their lives to God.
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And you can just feel the Holy Spirit just move through our auditorium and making sure
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that your church focuses on community.
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A church should feel welcoming, actively seeking connection with members, small groups, service
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projects, and other ministry having opportunities to serve.
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And so are you are there ways for you and your family to get involved with that church
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thrives with members participation?
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And so looking at those key elements about does your church serve itself or does it
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serve the community?
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And so is City Hope known for helping the community?
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Yes.
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And so what outreach have we done in the community?
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Serving food.
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Serving food.
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And like giving clothes out and everything.
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We did a youth project.
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And what we do there?
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We help people bag groceries or like take it out to their car.
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But it didn't work a lot.
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And so as youth for a serve day, we had the kids go out to the local grocery stores to
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help people carry out their groceries.
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And the kids were really set apart from what they experienced.
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What do you experience?
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People saying no and just not letting us help them really.
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And so just having that sense of like people are like, okay, how much is this going to
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cost me?
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And then they kind of realize that we were from City Hope and they're like, oh, you're
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a City Hoper.
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And so the community really does know our church for community based projects.
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We are equipped to have a few distribution that's associated with us.
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We have a clothing facility that we are able to, I think we distributed like 20,000 pieces
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of clothing last year.
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We are always seeking ways.
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We have huge serve days that we go out into the community where we are doing projects
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for people that can't have upkeep with their homes or their yards, doing beds for kids,
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redoing.
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What was that one project that we did a couple of years ago that you got to be part of?
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We got like, did we go clean out rooms?
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Yeah, so tell the listeners what that was like.
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We got a shop for this one boy's room and like we cleaned it out and like we got rid
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of all the stuff he didn't need and like what he wanted and what he didn't want.
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And we just reorganized his room, like blessed him with like a lot of stuff that we bought
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him.
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And we're able to do that for another girl and we were able to give them a bedroom.
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She hadn't had a bed and so we were able to provide beds and able to just decorate their
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room and just love on the community where they were at.
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And so, you know, visiting a church and having an open heart, you know, attending a church
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services just to observe, does a church make you feel welcome?
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Are there people friendly?
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What's the atmosphere like for kids and teens and adults?
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And make sure that you ask questions, introduce yourself to the leaders, take notes on how
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to engage with newcomers.
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Are they asking?
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And so I know for our church, they are very inquisitive about you.
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They want to connect.
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And a lot of people are hesitant about that connection card, making sure that you are
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reaching out to the leaders of the church.
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If you have questions, if you have concerns, don't complain if no one's reached out.
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If you've not reached out, they can't know.
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They can't know you.
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And so we have a thing at our church is called Know Your Row.
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And then do you know what Know Your Row is to you?
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Yeah.
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What is it?
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It's where like you know your row.
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It's like literally the name and like you get to know the people in a row and like if
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they're not there and like they're not there another week, you like tell the leader and
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like they text them to make sure if they're OK.
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Yeah, exactly.
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And so, you know, making sure that you know the community that you're going with.
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And so you may not know everyone's name, but you know, hey, the lady that always raise
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her hands like she's not there.
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And so telling your leader like, hey, so and so we have not seen him for the couple of
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weeks, because if you have a church of two to three hundred, five hundred people, four
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leaders of the church literally can't know everybody.
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And so it's about you because the person that is sitting in the chair that is sitting in
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the pew, we are the church.
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We are just going to a building.
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And so it's about knowing your row, taking accountability.
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And so is the leadership interested in getting to know you?
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Do they have a next step station?
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Do they have swag for people?
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And so a lot of churches have, you know, gifts to give to people.
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And so consider what your family needs.
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And so what should kids look for in church?
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Do you have a good youth space?
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I feel like is a big one and the youth leader and the atmosphere really.
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OK, is what's one thing that you think is important for the for the youth section?
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Like the youth room, like the people all of it.
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You don't really need a big youth room.
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I just feel like you just need a good teacher and like a lot of people that you know.
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And it'll just be fun.
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How many rooms have we outgrown?
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Three.
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Yeah.
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Two.
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Remember that very first room that we had?
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It was so small.
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And by God's blessings, we were just able to keep growing and to keep growing.
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And now we have a whole youth department and we have our own auditorium and we just keep
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growing by God's blessings.
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And we're just looking for that.
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And so look for what your family needs.
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You know, do they have a kid section?
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Do they have a youth section?
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And you know, what do they have for adults?
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You know, small groups, Bible studies, discipleship, the stages of life that you're in.
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And so really trying to see what they have to offer you.
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And so how do you get plugged in?
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And so that can be very overwhelming for people.
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And so start small.
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Once you find a church, don't rush into everything all at once because you will get burned out.
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You will get overwhelmed and it takes time to attend regularly to get to know the people.
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What does Proverbs 16 and 3 say to you?
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Say to the Lord whatever you do and he will establish your plans.
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And so whenever you want to start with a church, start small and just start just attending
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regular, you know, have your time with God.
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But I mean, so they could be having like five different, you know, planning ceremonies going
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on or something and join a group and join this and do do do.
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Don't do it.
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Start small.
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Once you find your niche and as you're praying to God and don't over schedule yourself, ask
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him what he wants you to do and he will let you know.
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And as we go into January, February, March, small group season is going to be starting.
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And so small groups is a great way to build deeper relationships.
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These are spaces where you pray and you share together.
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And we've talked about that on other podcasts.
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And so for teens and adults, check out your groups and your Bible clubs.
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These environments help people connect with peers and to share your faith.
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Do you feel like youth has a good small group?
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Yes, I feel like they do because we know each other like well enough now where we have like
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each other's phone numbers and everything and like we can take some of everything.
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What would be something encouraging that you could say to youth to get them to should they
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be scared about youth?
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No, because probably most likely every youth member has gone through the same thing that
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you have.
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And is is what you talk about in youth confidential?
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Yes.
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And so what's that mean?
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Like if someone like says something about their like home life, you're not supposed to be
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talking about it like to your friends at school because that's just not fair to the other
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person if you start talking about them.
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Is there anything else that you could that you could tell someone that's like kind of
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on the fence like, oh, that topic sounds really cool, but I don't know anything about the
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Bible.
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Do you have to know stuff about it?
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No, you don't have to know stuff about it.
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And even just for adults.
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And so just like whenever I said I was like, you know, G is actually going to leave me
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one day and I'm not going to have any like girlfriend.
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And as you go back into listen to our other podcasts, we this how I met my best friend
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was through a small group.
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And it's just like our lives completely meshed together.
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And our husbands love each other.
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Our kids love each other.
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We are really just a blonde and new brunette that really just have meshed well.
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And her family has just kind of just became one of us and we became one of them.
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And so just making sure that you're seeking the Lord, you're seeking good friendships
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and that you guys are both both going in that kind of same direction, just seeking God and
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so volunteering and serving.
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So ask whether church needs help serving not only blesses others, but it helps people feel
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connected.
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And so, um, what, where do we serve at Gia?
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The church.
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What do we do?
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Do we serve?
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What do we do?
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Do we volunteer?
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We volunteer for everything.
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Does that bother you?
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And be honest.
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Yes.
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Okay.
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Um, and so why does that bother you?
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Because we have so much stuff to do on the weekends.
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It just keeps on adding on to what we need to do.
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And what do you need to do?
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I have sports and everything like that during the weekends now and I have friends over and
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now we have to wake up early and everything.
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And so that is the real raw, um, of trying to disciple, um, your child into wanting to
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serve.
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Sometimes, um, I make her serve.
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I mean, it's not about her heart posture is not right.
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And so we get to serve at a food pantry or distribute, distribute clothes or, um, to
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go shop, um, for our homeless or unsheltered population and to put foods in the food bins.
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Um, we have, we got to serve for, um, the Christmas dinners and to deliver meals.
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Um, and so just, I know parents can be super frustrated with their daughters and their
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sons about not wanting to, but if we teach a child the way that they're supposed to go,
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they will see and they will reap the rewards of how their heart is as turning.
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And so you had talked about too, about building that relationship.
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What does Proverbs 17, seven say to you?
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A friend loves at all times and a brother is born for a time of adversity.
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And so stepping out of your comfort zone and introducing yourself to others and inviting
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someone for coffee or a meal, uh, making that connection and effort is, is totally just
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worth it.
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And so we want to stay committed to a church church won't be perfect because people are
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not perfect.
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Churches are for the broken.
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And so, so many times I hear, I'm not going to that church.
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I knew what they did on Saturday.
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Please know we are all sinners.
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We are all broken.
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We are all messes.
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If the church was for perfect people, it would be empty.
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And so we are there to learn to be like Jesus.
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And that is it.
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And so for the people that think that they're perfect, no, church is not for you.
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Church is for people that are broken, that don't have everything together and they need
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a Lord and savior to help them walk through life.
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Bottom line.
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So we hope that this message, um, encourages you parents and adults that are struggling
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with, um, just trying to find and what to do, um, with life.
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And so help your kids understand the value of church early on.
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Proverbs 22 six says, start children off the way that they should go.
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And even when they are old, they will not turn from it.
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And so just, that's what I was saying about making Gia get up and volunteer because I
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have to train her to have a servant heart because if I don't do it, society is going
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to do it and she, they may teach her wrong.
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And so just surrounding her with, um, scripture and knowing the right thing to do whenever
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you don't want to do the right thing.
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Sometimes you just have to do it and making church attendance a priority.
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And so it's skipping church on Sunday, an option.
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No.
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And so making church attendance a priority.
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And so talking about what they learned afterwards, engaging with your kid after they get out
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of Sunday school.
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So what did you learn?
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And so that even just talking about after they learned that lesson is going to just
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kind of reiterate how important it is and give yourself grace.
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Finding a community takes time.
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And so if you find that first church app, you know, like, I'm not going to church.
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I knew it was going to be like this.
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Absolutely not.
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You keep praying, keep showing up and trusting God is going to work into relationships.
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And remember that you're not just joining a church, you're becoming part of the body
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of Christ.
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And that is where every person matters.
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And so as we kind of wrap up this, this episode, I know it was pretty long, but church community
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is so important.
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And so, you know, pray for guidance, look for that Christ centered church and start
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small, get involved and stay committed.
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And so first Corinthians 12, 27 says, now you are the body of Christ and each one of
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you is part of it.
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And so whenever you are part of this journey, remember that God has a place for you and
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your family.
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Take the first steps and trust him with the rest.
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And so we want this week, you're not, if you're not plugged into a church, pray and research
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just a few churches in your area.
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And if you are already part of one, find one a way to connect deeper through the ministry
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connection cards.
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If you want to, you can turn into City Hope Church in Southern Illinois.
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If you need an e-learning church, we invite you always to church.
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We start at 10 o'clock.
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You are welcome.
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You can always sit by my husband if you need to.
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And so we want to do in this podcast in prayer, do you want to pray?
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Sure.
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Dear God, thank you for everything.
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I pray for the listeners that they just find a church and that they grow and they have
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a good church family.
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And I pray for the sick and hurt and they'll feel better.
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Amen.
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Amen.
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And so thank you so much for spending this time with us at Fostering Faith.
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We're building a community that takes effort and it's one of the greatest blessings that
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God has given us.
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And so please rate, review, subscribe, leave comments in the section.
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We know that we're getting tons of messages about upcoming topics.
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So we thank you so much for all the comments that we are getting.
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We appreciate it so much.
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And then so till next time, keep growing in your faith and encouraging others around you.
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See you later.
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Bye.
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Amen