Latest / The Wholehearted Enneagram Podcast / Why We Adore | a conversation with author Sara Hagerty

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Why We Adore | a conversation with author Sara Hagerty · The Wholehearted Enneagram Podcast

0:01
SPEAKER_04: Welcome to the Simply Wholehearted Podcast.
0:04
SPEAKER_04: Today I am honored to get to introduce you to one of my good friends, Sarah Higgerty.
0:10
SPEAKER_04: You may have heard of her name before.
0:12
SPEAKER_04: She has written a book called Every Bitter Thing is Sweet.
0:15
SPEAKER_04: It's a must read for sure to just her journey of just understanding the Lord and relationship with him.
0:26
SPEAKER_04: Today we're going to talk about adoration.
0:29
SPEAKER_04: We kind of start off a very light-hearted way, just sharing about how we know each other.
0:36
SPEAKER_04: Ashley and I know each other to Sarah, and then also sharing the kind of the story of how I met Sarah.
0:42
SPEAKER_04: It's just really, really neat to kind of it's a it's just a testimony to how God orchestrates our steps when we are looking to follow him.
0:52
SPEAKER_04: So today we're going to talk about adoration, and Sarah has been faithful to kind of lead her friends and followers in this process of what it looks like to adore God.
1:06
SPEAKER_04: Now you may have heard it before in kind of the presentation of how you would pray adoration, confession, thanksgiving, and supplication.
1:15
SPEAKER_04: And she had heard that term before, but a friend of hers kind of gave her a new perspective how to look at it.
1:22
SPEAKER_04: I'll let Sarah share more about her process and journey and then how you in turn can today start exploring what adoration might look like in your prayer life.
1:33
SPEAKER_04: Now, before we start that conversation, just a quick note summer is quickly approaching.
1:39
SPEAKER_04: So if you haven't already, we want you to check out the Super Summer Challenge.
1:44
SPEAKER_04: Whether you have one hour a week, one day a week, or 12 full weeks with your kids this summer, Super Summer Challenge is here to show you how to make the most of every minute.
1:54
SPEAKER_04: The Super Summer Challenge book, customizable templates, online workshop, and personalized coaching will show you how to plan for unplugged, purposeful, and intentional moments this summer.
2:05
SPEAKER_04: Instead of fighting against boredom, the 24-7 demand of electronics, or the crazy busy swirl of activities, Supersummer Challenge will give your kids new skills, build their confidence, and give dynamic family relationships.
2:20
SPEAKER_04: Find more at SupersummerCallenge.com.
2:23
SPEAKER_04: And now without further ado, our conversation with Sarah Higgerty.
2:30
SPEAKER_04: I love it.
2:31
SPEAKER_04: We're here, you're doing us.
2:32
SPEAKER_04: Thanks for being flexible.
2:33
SPEAKER_04: I I appreciate it.
2:35
SPEAKER_04: We we totally, you know, had fun.
2:38
SPEAKER_04: Fun jamming in a lot.
2:40
SPEAKER_03: How do you guys know each other?
2:42
SPEAKER_03: What's that?
2:43
SPEAKER_03: How do you guys know each other?
2:44
SPEAKER_04: I'll let I'll let her go.
2:46
SPEAKER_00: We just know each other from church, but we met one night right after it must have been like week one of Radiant.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: Uh or something.
2:52
SPEAKER_00: Anyway.
2:53
SPEAKER_00: It was a prayer meeting, and I showed up at the prayer meeting with my kids because I don't know why.
2:58
SPEAKER_00: My husband wasn't there and me and my I have four kids, but the three younger ones decided to go to the prayer meeting.
3:03
SPEAKER_00: And so I went, I was in the corner of the room, and they were just not, it wasn't it wasn't good.
3:08
SPEAKER_00: It was just not good.
3:09
SPEAKER_00: And so she was back there with her kids.
3:12
SPEAKER_00: I didn't even really notice her.
3:13
SPEAKER_00: And then they said, Okay, now find a partner to pray.
3:16
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, We are out of here.
3:18
SPEAKER_00: So I was about to gather my kids, and then she came over and was like, Can I pray for you?
3:22
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Okay.
3:26
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
3:27
SPEAKER_00: So anyway, we connected, and I'm really, really happy that she came over to pray because I was about to be out the door with my children who are not behaving.
3:34
SPEAKER_04: She's one of my 5 a.m.
3:36
SPEAKER_04: people.
3:36
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
3:37
SPEAKER_04: So you know, I mean different people at 5 a.m.
3:40
SPEAKER_04: in the morning.
3:41
SPEAKER_00: No.
3:42
SPEAKER_00: Am I one of many?
3:45
SPEAKER_04: It's a secret that you don't behave.
3:49
SPEAKER_01: You just do what you gotta do.
3:52
SPEAKER_01: Who do you meet with at 5 a.m.
3:53
SPEAKER_00: in the morning?
3:54
SPEAKER_04: Crazy people like me?
3:56
SPEAKER_00: Like Yeah, Friday mornings at 5, we we hit Starbucks and she makes me walk for 30 minutes and then we drink coffee.
4:03
SPEAKER_04: That's true.
4:04
SPEAKER_03: That is awesome.
4:05
SPEAKER_03: I could totally walk if coffee were well, I'm not a coffee drinker, but it's Starbucks worthy.
4:10
SPEAKER_04: So I'm shy afterwards.
4:11
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, well, I have the issue of Spencer has to leave work at for work at six.
4:17
SPEAKER_04: And so if I do anything, it has to be before six.
4:21
SPEAKER_04: And then you know kind of what our evenings are are looking like.
4:24
SPEAKER_04: And you know, it's usually, you know, sometimes some days, you know, it could be a full 12-hour day.
4:29
SPEAKER_04: So um yeah, so we just get it in when we can and yeah, it's good.
4:33
SPEAKER_00: And I my kids are at school all day, but if I want to see humans, I just do what I have to do.
4:36
SPEAKER_00: If I want to see adult other adult people, I don't know why.
4:39
SPEAKER_00: I don't have any I don't have friends, a lot of friends.
4:42
SPEAKER_00: So I don't.
4:43
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I've I've lived here for a few years and just whatever.
4:46
SPEAKER_00: So, but yeah, so I come out because I need the connection.
4:50
SPEAKER_00: So I appreciate it.
4:52
SPEAKER_00: Where are you guys?
4:54
SPEAKER_00: We're at a church in Olatha in a in a in a basement type room.
4:59
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
5:02
SPEAKER_00: It's all it's all official.
5:03
SPEAKER_04: It's like I know, isn't it great?
5:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
5:07
SPEAKER_04: The Lord blessed us with, I mean, I honestly, you know, this this was just this crazy idea that Spencer really had for me to do.
5:16
SPEAKER_04: And I started, you know, kind of taking all the steps, but the the whole technology side of it, even though I got training for it and everything, it was like you know, just that it's like, you know, building a website kind of and um anyway what happened is I just kind of made some on the Facebook page of our church um of kind of our leadership page.
5:38
SPEAKER_04: I was like, hey, you know, anyone know anything about sound?
5:41
SPEAKER_04: And would they be, you know, able to help me because I just needed to make some decisions that I I needed some input um for you.
5:49
SPEAKER_04: And instead what happened is this wonderful family who goes to our church that they had they do like big um productions and do sound and just have all this knowledge and know-how and recording our own music.
6:02
SPEAKER_04: So Andrew, who's actually graduating in a a week and a half, he records for us and then he helps edit, but he has a lot of the equipment.
6:12
SPEAKER_04: And he even wrote the little opener opener that we do for our opener closer music.
6:17
SPEAKER_00: Oh, he wrote the tune?
6:18
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, he wrote the tune.
6:18
SPEAKER_00: I didn't know he was the composer.
6:21
SPEAKER_04: He's the composer too.
6:22
SPEAKER_04: So and he's a really talented guy.
6:24
SPEAKER_00: So when he goes to college, one of us is gonna have to figure out some to figure it out.
6:28
SPEAKER_04: Maybe I'll be able to do that.
6:29
SPEAKER_04: He just told us tonight he's going to Nebraska.
6:31
SPEAKER_04: So we're really happy for him, but we're like, uh we're gonna go down a step in our equipment.
6:38
SPEAKER_00: All of a sudden our sound quality is gonna be like editing quality, but yeah.
6:42
SPEAKER_03: So this is he just keeps it at a at this church in Olafha.
6:46
SPEAKER_04: Well, they he happens to live close by and they have access here because they do a lot of the productions at this church, and uh he's just you know, really been willing and and we pay him nothing um in comparison to what uh he's been getting.
6:59
SPEAKER_00: And he's there right now, like does he just left the room and stuff out for a minute, but um so he listens to us interview people and he's probably bored out of his mind because you know he's a high school boy.
7:10
SPEAKER_00: All these women.
7:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, he's like, what are they laughing about?
7:14
SPEAKER_00: Like, why is that?
7:14
SPEAKER_00: Why was that funny?
7:17
SPEAKER_04: And why are we not we're just having a good old time and we're just like dying laughing and like this is so lame.
7:25
SPEAKER_04: Like these ladies, I'll tell you.
7:27
SPEAKER_04: Women.
7:29
SPEAKER_04: I love it.
7:30
SPEAKER_04: I know, it's so fun.
7:31
SPEAKER_04: It's just really cool.
7:32
SPEAKER_04: I mean, I I think it's like well, it's like how we all have connected our our fight club that we call it, the Sherman Five, really.
7:40
SPEAKER_04: I mean, I I the Sherman Five.
7:43
SPEAKER_03: The Sherman Five was what's the Sherman?
7:45
SPEAKER_03: The it is the weirdest thing ever.
7:46
SPEAKER_03: It is.
7:49
SPEAKER_04: No, I don't relate to it.
7:52
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's wild.
7:53
SPEAKER_03: Well, we're how are we for time?
7:54
SPEAKER_04: Oh, we're good.
7:55
SPEAKER_04: We're good, yeah.
7:56
SPEAKER_04: Okay.
7:56
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
7:57
SPEAKER_03: So we've met, we like all have this one mutual friend who invited us all to come and celebrate her for her birthday.
8:05
SPEAKER_03: Are you laughing at me at the way that I look?
8:08
SPEAKER_01: Are you looking at me?
8:09
SPEAKER_01: Are you following all that?
8:10
SPEAKER_01: It's asking, right?
8:11
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
8:12
SPEAKER_01: I'm looking at you.
8:13
SPEAKER_01: I just always look like that.
8:14
SPEAKER_01: I don't think so.
8:16
SPEAKER_01: I'm not laughing at you at all.
8:17
SPEAKER_01: I'm really laughing at my own.
8:22
SPEAKER_01: I love it.
8:24
SPEAKER_04: She looks like clothes are horrible.
8:29
SPEAKER_03: You look cute.
8:30
SPEAKER_03: This is late night.
8:31
SPEAKER_03: This is what I'm being goofy.
8:32
SPEAKER_03: But, anyways, we have this whole mutual friend who invited all of us to come to celebrate her birthday.
8:38
SPEAKER_03: And randomly, I'm not even sure.
8:40
SPEAKER_03: I think maybe we were talking about just kind of our history and journal entry.
8:46
SPEAKER_04: Like she was sharing her journal or something like that.
8:48
SPEAKER_03: She was sharing a journal entry from 2002, and she was like, Yeah, and I was in this what at this one concert in Texas, Sherman, Texas, which is literally the middle of nowhere.
8:58
SPEAKER_03: Oh, you kind of and I'm like, uh, I was there.
9:03
SPEAKER_03: I was at that.
9:05
SPEAKER_03: My friend Eliza Joy went with me.
9:08
SPEAKER_03: She's sitting right there.
9:09
SPEAKER_03: I was there too.
9:11
SPEAKER_03: We're like, this is really strange.
9:13
SPEAKER_03: Amy wasn't there, but came and joined us later, and we were like, Amy, this is really weird.
9:20
SPEAKER_03: Was it you that came and then Heidi?
9:22
SPEAKER_03: Basically, five of us who had no real connection other than two of us, except for this one friend, happened to be in the middle of Podong, Texas.
9:32
SPEAKER_04: Truly, cow pastures.
9:38
SPEAKER_03: Like it was like this.
9:40
SPEAKER_03: This is really strange.
9:41
SPEAKER_03: Like, how does that ever happen?
9:43
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
9:43
SPEAKER_04: It was Passion One Day, right?
9:45
SPEAKER_04: I have that.
9:45
SPEAKER_04: Was it?
9:46
SPEAKER_04: And that's a great album, too.
9:48
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it it really is.
9:49
SPEAKER_04: And it it was, it was just amazing.
9:51
SPEAKER_04: It was 2002, I think we determined.
9:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's one of the first ones.
9:55
SPEAKER_00: It was.
9:55
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it was it was the second one day.
9:57
SPEAKER_03: It was the second time they did one day.
9:59
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
10:00
SPEAKER_03: But I mean, how weird.
10:00
SPEAKER_03: It was like you were coming from Colorado, Eliza Joy and I were coming from Virginia, Sarah was coming from Ohio, Heidi was coming from Arkansas, yeah, and here we all were sitting at this table.
10:10
SPEAKER_03: I mean, weird.
10:11
SPEAKER_04: So all that to say, like you just listen to those little whispers of the Holy Spirit.
10:15
SPEAKER_04: And the whole reason I knew Sarah Markman was because I took the kids to Chick-fil-A after I sold something on Craigslist.
10:24
SPEAKER_04: And it was something that was not in our budget normally.
10:27
SPEAKER_04: But I sold something for like$15 or$20.
10:30
SPEAKER_04: And I thought, you know what?
10:32
SPEAKER_04: There's the Chick-fil-A right across the street.
10:34
SPEAKER_04: I never take my kids there.
10:35
SPEAKER_04: We should go and just, you know, do that and let them play in the playplace.
10:40
SPEAKER_04: And because of that, Sarah Markman and I met and we just started talking.
10:45
SPEAKER_04: And here we are, I don't know, like five years later.
10:47
SPEAKER_04: Chick-fil-A's the place.
10:50
SPEAKER_03: That is so wild.
10:51
SPEAKER_03: It does.
10:52
SPEAKER_03: It is.
10:52
SPEAKER_03: It's really, really cool.
10:54
SPEAKER_04: So I love it.
10:54
SPEAKER_04: I just, yeah, like you said, God sees and he orchestrates our stuff.
10:59
SPEAKER_04: So okay, enough about that.
11:00
SPEAKER_04: Now we want to hear more about you, Sarah.
11:03
SPEAKER_03: Just think about it.
11:03
SPEAKER_03: Also, Remind, I didn't quite understand on the email.
11:07
SPEAKER_03: Are we like starting now?
11:08
SPEAKER_03: It's a soft start.
11:09
SPEAKER_03: Like he just kind of decides when to we're in.
11:13
SPEAKER_03: What we've said already isn't on.
11:15
SPEAKER_03: It might be.
11:16
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
11:16
SPEAKER_03: Totally.
11:17
SPEAKER_00: This this here could be more delayed.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: We can edit this or it can stay.
11:20
SPEAKER_00: This is what we just said?
11:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
11:23
SPEAKER_00: It's important.
11:24
SPEAKER_04: Yes, it's good.
11:25
SPEAKER_04: It's a good start.
11:28
SPEAKER_04: Why?
11:29
SPEAKER_04: It was great.
11:30
SPEAKER_04: It's all good.
11:31
SPEAKER_04: It's all good.
11:33
SPEAKER_04: I'll let you I'll let you line.
11:35
SPEAKER_04: We'll go and get ready.
11:36
SPEAKER_04: Put the NYX on any of it.
11:38
SPEAKER_04: So you don't need to be able to do that.
11:38
SPEAKER_04: We're gonna do a fast turnaround.
11:40
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, you're good.
11:41
SPEAKER_04: There's no ready.
11:41
SPEAKER_04: This was so good.
11:42
SPEAKER_04: I promise.
11:44
SPEAKER_03: Oh my word.
11:45
SPEAKER_03: This is hilarious.
11:47
SPEAKER_03: My husband loves stuff like this.
11:49
SPEAKER_03: I need to like be prepared, have my mind in the right.
11:52
SPEAKER_04: No, you don't.
11:52
SPEAKER_04: No, not at all.
11:53
SPEAKER_04: This is good.
11:54
SPEAKER_04: It's just conversation.
11:55
SPEAKER_04: We're not videoing.
11:56
SPEAKER_04: It's all good.
11:57
SPEAKER_04: And we got an editor.
11:58
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
11:59
SPEAKER_04: It's okay.
12:00
SPEAKER_04: But it's all good.
12:01
SPEAKER_04: Because now we want you to share your stories.
12:05
SPEAKER_04: And um we're gonna talk about like for those of um my friends who are listening and who have heard the name Sarah Hagerdo before, is because um Sarah wrote a book.
12:15
SPEAKER_04: How many was it three years ago now that it came out?
12:17
SPEAKER_04: Or five?
12:19
SPEAKER_03: It came out in 2014, yeah.
12:21
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
12:21
SPEAKER_03: So just a little less than three years.
12:23
SPEAKER_04: Okay, less than three years.
12:24
SPEAKER_04: Every bitter thing is sweet.
12:25
SPEAKER_04: It's a fabulous book.
12:27
SPEAKER_04: Please go out and get it, read it.
12:29
SPEAKER_04: Um it's good stuff.
12:31
SPEAKER_04: And then um but one of the things, and and you're actually um releasing your second book in August, at the end of August, but we are gonna probably talk about that another time because we wanted to focus on another really important piece that um if anyone who's followed you on Instagram and um uh just some other social media spots is about adoration.
12:53
SPEAKER_04: Um and so I'm I'm really excited to share just uh how that uh has changed my life and my prayer life.
13:00
SPEAKER_04: And I know obviously, I mean that's your story.
13:04
SPEAKER_04: Um, but I would love for some people who maybe aren't familiar with your story, for you to share a little bit, just you and Nate and your adoption journey and um all the other good stuff that follows.
13:16
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, well, um, so Nate and I have been married actually this September it'll be 16 years, which is kind of crazy.
13:22
SPEAKER_03: Yeah congratulations.
13:24
SPEAKER_03: We always joke that we fall in love five years into marriage.
13:27
SPEAKER_03: So we've been in love for 11 years and we've been married 16.
13:30
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
13:30
SPEAKER_03: There you go.
13:31
SPEAKER_03: There's a lot of truth for that for a lot of people.
13:34
SPEAKER_03: Amen.
13:35
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
13:35
SPEAKER_03: Um, yeah, so we got married and and didn't necessarily talk adoption or even talk family size or anything like that.
13:42
SPEAKER_03: Um, but after several years of um what we discovered was infertility.
13:47
SPEAKER_03: It wasn't just like, wow, this has taken a really long time for us to start a family.
13:51
SPEAKER_03: Um, around that time, we were building a house.
13:54
SPEAKER_03: And while we were building a house, we needed a place to stay.
13:56
SPEAKER_03: And we were, and so friends of friends had this like little cabin, um, or little, I wouldn't say cabin, little cottage on their property.
14:03
SPEAKER_03: And so we lived there for four months while our house was being built.
14:06
SPEAKER_03: Well, they had uh at the time, they had two children that were adopted out of their five.
14:12
SPEAKER_03: They now have six.
14:14
SPEAKER_03: And um I think it was even the first night that we were staying there that Nate and I were falling asleep going, that we're here for way more than just like we need a place to stay.
14:24
SPEAKER_03: Um, I think even within maybe the first month of being there, we both kind of had this eerie sense of like, I think we're actually watching a family that's gonna be similar to our family unfold.
14:34
SPEAKER_03: We didn't we didn't even really know or have an idea of what that would look like.
14:38
SPEAKER_03: But then sure enough, I think it was two or three years later, we were on a plane to Ethiopia adopting our first two children.
14:45
SPEAKER_03: Wow.
14:46
SPEAKER_03: So we adopted our first two from Ethiopia.
14:49
SPEAKER_03: We thought that would be it for adoption.
14:51
SPEAKER_03: And yet, you know, while we're there, there's this, you know, seven, eight, nine in Africa.
14:57
SPEAKER_03: Sometimes birthdays aren't uh well, at least in the adoption world, you can't necessarily pin a certain date to a child for the birthday.
15:05
SPEAKER_03: Seven, eight, nine-year-old girl who was giving us a tour of the orphanage where our kids had been, and it was really clear, like she'd done this two or dozens of times, and she was there to help these families come and get their babies.
15:17
SPEAKER_03: And I'm looking at her, and she's got these eyes that are just saying, like, take me home.
15:21
SPEAKER_04: Please rescue me.
15:22
SPEAKER_04: Right.
15:23
SPEAKER_03: And and we left there and left Ethiopia and came home, and I just said to Nate, we have to go back.
15:28
SPEAKER_03: Not necessarily for her, but I just felt like, oh man, there are children who are older who are less likely to be adopted.
15:34
SPEAKER_03: And for whatever reason, at that point in time, I just felt a real tug.
15:37
SPEAKER_03: I think that's our next step.
15:39
SPEAKER_03: Um, so we were kind of naive enough.
15:41
SPEAKER_03: We were only in the adoption world for like a year.
15:43
SPEAKER_03: You know, we'd had our our kids home for a year, a little bit of a honeymoon phase, and we just dove right back in and went back to Uganda a year, uh two years later, and adopted two more children um who were five and seven.
15:58
SPEAKER_03: And um then afterwards.
16:00
SPEAKER_04: That would make them like out of birth order with the first they were all out of birth order, yeah.
16:05
SPEAKER_03: We kind of broke all the adoption rules.
16:07
SPEAKER_03: How old was it?
16:07
SPEAKER_03: The first two went the first two were one and three.
16:10
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
16:11
SPEAKER_03: And then the second two that we adopted were five and seven.
16:13
SPEAKER_03: We broke all the adoption rules.
16:14
SPEAKER_03: We were we we were young and naive and and kind of doing all the things that I wouldn't necessarily sit with somebody who's like in their 20s and advise them to do now.
16:22
SPEAKER_04: Sure, yes.
16:23
SPEAKER_04: Uh most of us have a lot of those stories, yeah.
16:26
SPEAKER_03: We do.
16:27
SPEAKER_03: Um yeah, and gray hair to show for it.
16:29
SPEAKER_03: But so yes, you know, it's been 13 years into marriage.
16:33
SPEAKER_03: We had this like crazy surprise, and um I conceived.
16:38
SPEAKER_03: Wow.
16:39
SPEAKER_03: And so we have and then I conceived again.
16:41
SPEAKER_03: So we've got you know, two biological children at the tail end of our big older crew, and they're kind of like the the house mascots.
16:50
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
16:51
SPEAKER_03: It's really fun.
16:52
SPEAKER_04: They're precious though.
16:53
SPEAKER_04: I mean, it's like I I just love being with your family and your kids, and uh, there's just so much life and vibrancy, and it's precious to see the olders interact with the youngers and take ownership and um you know, just be proud of them in such a unique, special way.
17:12
SPEAKER_04: Um, I I love it.
17:14
SPEAKER_04: I I just think it's great.
17:15
SPEAKER_04: I think the Hagerty family is fantastic.
17:18
SPEAKER_03: We we love how our family has grown.
17:20
SPEAKER_03: We really do.
17:21
SPEAKER_03: It's not at all what we would have envisioned.
17:23
SPEAKER_03: My my father-in-law said at one point, I never knew I'd be the patriarch of an African tribe.
17:28
SPEAKER_03: This is not a self-fit.
17:31
SPEAKER_03: No, I just cannot, I I I couldn't imagine it another way.
17:35
SPEAKER_03: I I really do love our family myths.
17:37
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's so perfect.
17:39
SPEAKER_04: I love it.
17:40
SPEAKER_04: Okay, so um I mean that is a whole story in itself.
17:43
SPEAKER_04: And and for those who want to know, you wrote and shared a lot of that journey in every better thing is sweet.
17:48
SPEAKER_04: And so I think that's a great place to begin.
17:50
SPEAKER_04: Uh because there's so much to the story, as you can imagine.
17:53
SPEAKER_04: If anyone ha can identify with uh infertility or just life not going as you planned and experiencing loss and what do you do through that, I think that's you know a great place uh to begin.
18:07
SPEAKER_04: Um but kind of like again, how we you know I said before, we wanted to focus on adoration and what that can look like.
18:15
SPEAKER_04: And and I know you have kind of a story that really s you know stirred this and gave you some language to what that would look like.
18:24
SPEAKER_04: Um and I think that's a a great place to start.
18:27
SPEAKER_03: Awesome.
18:28
SPEAKER_03: Well, I um I I actually can't exactly remember when.
18:32
SPEAKER_03: I want to say maybe seven years ago.
18:33
SPEAKER_03: I was having coffee with a friend and and um just kind of telling her about my life, and she was listening and um attentive, and then at the end of that time, probably like what was maybe an emotional dump, she said, had you ever considered adoration?
18:50
SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, sure.
18:51
SPEAKER_03: You know, I'm thinking up, you know, adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, sure, right?
18:57
SPEAKER_03: I've done it.
18:58
SPEAKER_03: We've all done adoration.
19:00
SPEAKER_03: And she said, No, like actually kind of setting yourself for a period of time to really adore God.
19:04
SPEAKER_03: And and she gave me some tools and kind of um not a ton, but really just kind of invited me to look at different angles of God that I was wrestling with.
19:14
SPEAKER_03: She she read from that time where I'm I'm just talking to her about life, just an undercurrent of cynicism in my heart, um, which was easy at that point, I'll say, because after years of infertility, and we had I had sort of a seven-year period of struggles in our marriage, um, husband's business up and then really, really down.
19:36
SPEAKER_03: Um my dad was diagnosed with cancer and died, and we had struggles with infertility.
19:40
SPEAKER_03: And so, you know, if unfettered, all of that can produce a lot of cynicism.
19:46
SPEAKER_03: And I just had that.
19:47
SPEAKER_03: So um she just invited me, hey, why don't you start looking at the sides of God that you really wrestle with in his word and start adoring him through his word?
19:56
SPEAKER_03: And so it wasn't rocket science, it was actually something I hadn't done before.
20:01
SPEAKER_03: I mean, I was like, sure, I've done adoration, but in in reality, I hadn't done this.
20:06
SPEAKER_03: Okay, let me see a side of God that I wrestle with and actually like take his word and put it in my mouth and say his word back to him and really be honest, I'm not feeling this, God.
20:18
SPEAKER_03: This isn't what I believe about you if I'm really honest.
20:21
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, um, but I'm gonna say it and I'm gonna pray it back to you, and I'm gonna ask you to make this reality true for my heart, even though I don't feel it right now.
20:29
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, that's good.
20:30
SPEAKER_04: Because I think a lot of times we we do do adoration because we um we have so much to be thankful for, and and that's what comes to mind in adoration.
20:40
SPEAKER_04: You know, thank you, God, for our house, our family, our health.
20:42
SPEAKER_04: You know, kind of we take off the list.
20:45
SPEAKER_04: But I think the perspective that you come from is going to the difficult places and going to the side of God that you know is true, but you're trying to get it into your heart where you really believe it.
21:01
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, that's exactly right.
21:02
SPEAKER_04: And that in a way where it it shifts your perspective on what it is that you're dealing with.
21:08
SPEAKER_03: That's exactly right.
21:09
SPEAKER_00: So I appreciate it.
21:11
SPEAKER_00: Oh, go ahead.
21:12
SPEAKER_00: I was just gonna say that I appreciate I'm already tearing up, so I'm just done.
21:15
SPEAKER_00: But just um the way you don't, you're not ign ignoring the negative emotions or like the questions.
21:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I feel like there's a tendency to in in in Christianity world to just, oh, you felt that, but just like push that off over to the side.
21:30
SPEAKER_00: Let's pretend you didn't just say that or feel that or like under the rug.
21:34
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
21:34
SPEAKER_00: But it's just but it's also not wallowing in it or like saying, Well, this is my reality.
21:40
SPEAKER_00: I just don't even, you know, I'm cynical and whatever, and life is hard.
21:43
SPEAKER_00: So it's a it's a good marriage between like recognizing the emotions you have and the doubts and the cynicism, but still applying truth to it in a way that is real though.
21:54
SPEAKER_00: It's like I believe helped my unbelief.
21:57
SPEAKER_00: Which is funny.
22:00
SPEAKER_03: It's as you're saying that I was actually, I was trying to remember, was it Mark 9?
22:04
SPEAKER_03: It's Mark 924.
22:05
SPEAKER_03: That's exactly right.
22:06
SPEAKER_03: Um help my unbelief.
22:08
SPEAKER_03: That that notion of, you know, for me, honestly, I think because we had so many years that were hard, I just couldn't fake it anymore.
22:16
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
22:17
SPEAKER_03: And I had been, I had actually been really, really good at faking it.
22:21
SPEAKER_03: But you know, I think there's a certain point that you hit where you're like, man, I just I have to cut through the chase of Christian ease and be really honest with myself if I'm going to grow in God.
22:31
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
22:32
unknown: Yeah.
22:32
SPEAKER_03: Um, and I think that's for me, that's been the power of adoration is that I actually don't have to come and act like I believe it.
22:39
SPEAKER_03: In fact, quite the opposite.
22:41
SPEAKER_03: I come when I am, you know, a story that I often tell because it's really real to me is I'm walking up the stairs, you know, on a particular day and I'm carrying a load of laundry and I'm looking at the load of laundry, going, you know what, these jeans, I think I washed them yesterday.
22:56
SPEAKER_03: Like my kid, I'm kind of realizing my kids have a great system for putting their clothes away and I can't.
23:04
SPEAKER_03: Just run back in the dirty clothes again.
23:05
SPEAKER_03: Right back in the dirty clothes.
23:06
SPEAKER_03: They don't fit in the drawer, just take them right back in.
23:08
SPEAKER_03: And going up the stairs, and I'm thinking to myself, like, man, there are so many hours of my day that nobody sees and knows.
23:15
SPEAKER_03: And like, you know, you're dreaming of all the people who are doing big and important things.
23:20
SPEAKER_03: And I'm saying that with in quotation marks, and I'm carrying this up the stairs, and yet I'm adoring through Psalm 139.
23:26
SPEAKER_03: And so I'm going, Lord, you search me and you know me.
23:30
SPEAKER_03: You know this moment.
23:31
SPEAKER_03: I feel totally unseen.
23:33
SPEAKER_03: I feel like my days kind of tick by with the same sort of rinse and repeat cycle, but you search me and you know me.
23:40
SPEAKER_03: And I adore you, God, who searches me and knows this moment.
23:43
SPEAKER_03: And you love this moment, and you love me in this moment.
23:47
SPEAKER_03: And that's kind of what adoration looks like for me.
23:49
SPEAKER_03: It's not me starting off with some, you know, great revelation about God.
23:54
SPEAKER_03: It's actually me starting off pretty grumpy.
23:56
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
23:56
SPEAKER_03: And and frustrated and feeling some kind of disconnect in my heart and going, okay, let me apply your word here.
24:04
SPEAKER_03: And Lord, would you help move through my emotions with your word and bring me to a place where I actually believe something I didn't believe 10 minutes ago because of the way your spirit infuses your word.
24:14
SPEAKER_03: Wow.
24:15
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, that's so good.
24:17
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, because it um I I think too, if if we're it's it's shifting our perspective because it's um just I I think when we when we look at him and we uh we just can see through his eyes, and not only that he sees and he knows us, but that he uh great uh draws great joy and pleasure from our adoration, from us stopping that thought process of the grumbling and the complaining and the griping, and if we stop and pause that and go, Oh yeah, Lord, you know, reading reciting his words back to him and and being grateful and and just looking to praise him.
25:03
SPEAKER_04: He takes such a joy in that.
25:05
SPEAKER_04: And how many people don't pause to do that?
25:09
SPEAKER_04: And because I think sometimes it's easy to think, oh well everyone does it, and it doesn't matter that much to him, but it does, it matter so much.
25:16
SPEAKER_04: And I just think of it in relation to my kids and you know, I've got one who's just been struggling with you know, everything's you know, we just find something to complain about or in everything, even if it's good, there's something to gripe about, and we finally just have this heart to heart.
25:31
SPEAKER_04: And I was so proud of them because they started to complain about something and they stopped in mid-sentence and was like, Oh wait, actually, thank you, Lord, for you know, and it was just so precious.
25:43
SPEAKER_04: And I, man, the joy I got in my heart from that shift.
25:47
SPEAKER_04: And I what I didn't I didn't think about where she was going originally with her complaint.
25:52
SPEAKER_04: Instead, I was like, Oh yeah, she's again, she was remembering.
25:56
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, she's fully grateful.
25:58
SPEAKER_04: And and I don't know, I just thinking in through all that that process, we not only get the benefit of how it shifts our minds and our thoughts, but you know, part of the reason why we get the benefit is because it brings such joy to the father that we would stop in the most day and go, Yes, I love you, Lord, and you are so good and your words are true.
26:20
SPEAKER_03: And anyway, so I just He loves that.
26:23
SPEAKER_03: I I have thought about it recently because I'm nursing, so I've got a lot of time kind of during the day that would be that I could easily fill with just kind of nothingness, you know, candy.
26:33
SPEAKER_03: Um so to speak, electronic candy.
26:37
SPEAKER_03: Um but I have just really taken that time to just dialogue with him.
26:41
SPEAKER_03: And I feel like, man, so many times I go away from that and really have the sense he enjoys this.
26:49
SPEAKER_03: Like he he, you know, I'm thinking he wants me to produce great fruit in my children and make a big impact.
26:55
SPEAKER_03: That's kind of in the back of my mind, but in reality, I think it moves his heart to have the middle minutes of our day be including just dialogue with him.
27:04
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and and part of what I love about adoration is that I I feel like it allows my grit to come up against his word.
27:15
SPEAKER_03: You know, it is it isn't uh let me get myself.
27:18
SPEAKER_03: I I think subtly a lot of us really feel like let me get myself to a better place, let me work myself up to have conversation with God.
27:26
SPEAKER_03: Right.
27:26
SPEAKER_03: When in reality, I think he wants us right at the moment where we'd rather just be cynical or frustrated and and actually taking those emotions to him.
27:36
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
27:37
SPEAKER_03: And saying, God, can you just meet me right here?
27:39
SPEAKER_03: Unpack it for me, unravel it for me.
27:43
SPEAKER_03: Right.
27:43
SPEAKER_03: Let your word come and speak right here, let it do what it's meant to do.
27:47
SPEAKER_03: His word is living and active.
27:49
SPEAKER_03: Okay, be living and active right now when I'm feeling stuck.
27:53
SPEAKER_04: Yes, yes, exactly.
27:55
SPEAKER_04: I think, like you said, where you're like, or even just um, you know, maybe you're just at a point where the provision isn't being met how you expected it to be or thought, and to be able to take that to him and that, you know, say, like, I thought you were Jehovah Jirah, my provider.
28:13
SPEAKER_04: I've I've read it, I've sung it, I've said it, but I'm not seeing it right now.
28:17
SPEAKER_04: You know, can you explain this to me?
28:19
SPEAKER_04: And I think we get afraid sometimes because we're either afraid that well, I think sometimes I get afraid that I'm not gonna hear anything back.
28:27
SPEAKER_04: And so then I, you know, think that it either I I feel afraid that my faith is gonna weaken or I'm it's not gonna be a good testimony because I know it, but I'm not experiencing it right now.
28:39
SPEAKER_04: And but instead I I feel like every single time that I've been honest and been like, I'm not seeing this right now, uh he's able to to point me.
28:50
SPEAKER_04: Um, you know, just whether he reveals himself in a new way or point me to a word or give me a new strategy or you know, just just um or just enlarge my faith so that way I can walk out the journey that he has through that circumstance.
29:06
SPEAKER_03: I totally agree.
29:07
SPEAKER_03: I think of one of a this was several years ago, but um we call adoration our passively active way to reach our kids' hearts, or the reverse, our actively passive way to reach our kids' hearts, because we do adoration with our kids.
29:22
SPEAKER_03: And um, especially the four that have been adopted, there's a lot that they don't have language for just yet in terms of their own pain in their history.
29:31
SPEAKER_03: And and I know just I had an intact family.
29:34
SPEAKER_03: My parents attended every one of my sporting events, and I still wrestle with the nature of God being good to me.
29:40
SPEAKER_03: And so, you know, given that, and then I look at my children and and I know that they will have a wrestle in their life to to believe that he is good given their histories.
29:50
SPEAKER_03: And so we do adoration with them mostly because at the moment it's not like I feel, you know, I'm seeing them really grasp these big concepts about him, but it is becoming a part of their language, his word.
30:04
SPEAKER_03: And I'm thinking of one night in particular that one of my daughters, I could just tell it was like heavy on her um, shame and and condemnation, you know, it's sort of the the thread of humanity where we feel like, man, I could be better.
30:18
SPEAKER_03: I I've got to do something to try harder, let me get myself out of this pit.
30:23
SPEAKER_03: And so it we I just kept her up late and she's an artist.
30:25
SPEAKER_03: And so I had her just hand lettering Psalm 18, 19.
30:29
SPEAKER_03: He delivered me because he delighted in me.
30:31
SPEAKER_03: So she's just writing it out, and and I'm talking to her and and just telling her like what I like about her.
30:39
SPEAKER_03: Oh, I'd start by telling her what I love about her, you know, in through the lens of God.
30:44
SPEAKER_03: Do you know God loves you when you sing in the shower?
30:47
SPEAKER_03: God loves you when you um, because she's she's really quirky, which all of my children are actually.
30:53
SPEAKER_03: They all are quirky.
30:55
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
30:55
SPEAKER_03: God loves you when you like wear your rain boots in the middle of summer in your bathing suit.
31:00
SPEAKER_03: You know, God loves you when you try and bike through the snow, those sorts of things.
31:03
SPEAKER_03: And then I move to like, he really likes it when you don't think anybody's around and you're belting show tunes in the kitchen.
31:09
SPEAKER_03: And he and she's kind of laughing, and and and she's hand lettering he delivered me because he he rescued me, he delivered me because he delighted in me.
31:20
SPEAKER_03: And and she looks at me and she's like, Do you think I'm the only person on the planet who doesn't think that God likes me?
31:26
SPEAKER_03: And it was so profound for me to think this is actually the wrestle of of our hearts that we don't really believe that he likes us and enjoys us.
31:36
SPEAKER_03: And here it is happening right here, that this this form of adoration where we're just talking about his word and she's putting it in her pen, you know, and she's she's artistically expressing it.
31:47
SPEAKER_03: We're going, no, this is more true than what you feel.
31:50
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you don't feel liked, you feel neglected or overlooked, or like you couldn't possibly stand in his presence, and yet his word continues to say the opposite.
31:59
SPEAKER_03: So let's just say it.
32:01
SPEAKER_03: Let's come raw.
32:02
SPEAKER_03: Okay, I don't really think he likes me that much.
32:05
SPEAKER_03: Honestly, I feel like at 39, sometimes I need to enter his presence and go, I don't really think you like me that much.
32:10
SPEAKER_03: I don't really like me that much right now.
32:12
SPEAKER_03: Can you tell me why you like me again?
32:15
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that you deliver me because you delight in me.
32:18
SPEAKER_03: You actually like me, God.
32:19
SPEAKER_03: How could it be you like me?
32:22
SPEAKER_04: Oh, I love it.
32:23
SPEAKER_04: It's so beautiful.
32:24
SPEAKER_04: Sarah, for you, um, you know, your friend, you know, kind of coached you to kind of start thinking a little bit differently about adoration, but for you practically, what did that look like and what has it become?
32:38
SPEAKER_03: You know, it's looked different kind of every six months.
32:40
SPEAKER_03: I feel like I get into a rhythm and then I kind of want to change it up.
32:44
SPEAKER_03: It has really been one of the most profound things, I would say maybe even spiritual disciplines for my own heart.
32:50
SPEAKER_03: And so for that reason, I've not wanted it to grow stale.
32:54
SPEAKER_03: Like I've not wanted it just get in a rut.
32:56
SPEAKER_03: Um, so it's hard to recall like at every season how it's looked different.
33:00
SPEAKER_03: Sometimes it's like writing a verse down that I'm gonna use for that day to adore God, and then I've got it stuck behind you, the sink while I'm doing dishes, or I'm it's like on my dashboard, or I take it to the gym and it's on the treadmill.
33:12
SPEAKER_03: Um currently, there's been other times where like I have a notebook where a moleskin, I love my moleskin journals, and I'll write down, say, 10 or 12 characteristics of God that I'm really wrestling with.
33:24
SPEAKER_03: And I'll write that characteristic at the top and then find scripture that tells me who he is, and I'll just leave that and leave it out, carry it with me where I am.
33:33
SPEAKER_03: Like if I'm feeling like, man, I'm not really convinced in my heart that he's gonna restore the hearts of my kids.
33:40
SPEAKER_03: So I have scripture that tells me God is a restorer.
33:43
SPEAKER_03: And throughout the day, I'm just saying back to him, man, I'm looking at this child.
33:48
SPEAKER_03: I'm feeling like we're gonna be at a dead end here.
33:51
SPEAKER_03: And yet your word tells me other otherwise about you as restorer, and I'm just reciting those verses back to him.
33:57
SPEAKER_03: Currently, it's in the mornings.
33:59
SPEAKER_03: Um, first thing we we have a verse that comes up on Instagram every day, um, and a whole sheet that you can use day by day for the month.
34:08
SPEAKER_03: And I will use that verse and I'll write it out, and then I will write like a paragraph or two.
34:15
SPEAKER_03: I'm a writer, and so I just like to write back to God what I'm feeling according to that verse and kind of even move my heart along.
34:23
SPEAKER_03: Like it usually starts.
34:24
SPEAKER_03: I think what was today's?
34:26
SPEAKER_03: I have to remember.
34:26
SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah, 1 Peter 5, 7.
34:28
SPEAKER_03: Cast all your cares on him, for he cares for you.
34:31
SPEAKER_03: So it started.
34:32
SPEAKER_03: I woke up late, um, had a late night last night, was just feeling like kind of bogged down by life.
34:39
SPEAKER_03: And so my adoration starts with, I feel overwhelmed.
34:43
SPEAKER_03: I feel like I don't know how to manage all the details, but your word tells me that you care about me and that you actually care about, you know, 657 on a Thursday morning.
34:54
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
34:54
SPEAKER_03: Um, your word tells me that you care about, you know, how my toddler does with his naps today and how my baby sleeps.
35:04
SPEAKER_03: Your word tells me that you care about how we how school goes for my kids.
35:09
SPEAKER_03: And so that's kind of what my adoration looks like.
35:11
SPEAKER_03: I write it out.
35:12
SPEAKER_03: I write my heart through.
35:13
SPEAKER_03: Like I start where you start in maybe the grumpy place and move with scripture towards, okay, maybe I might be able to believe this God.
35:22
SPEAKER_04: I love that because you you have plans that way people can print out the month ahead, you know, like on May 1st, you come out with a list and you know, people can see what scriptures you're covering and characteristics of God.
35:35
SPEAKER_04: And I love that you haven't like figured this all out.
35:39
SPEAKER_04: You're journeying at adoring and growing along with it with everybody else.
35:44
SPEAKER_03: That's that's definitely and I and I feel like right now that's what it looks like in three months, it might look different.
35:49
SPEAKER_03: I the bottom line is that I don't there are so many parts of his word that I really struggle to believe.
35:55
SPEAKER_03: And so if I can come and go, hey, I barely know you, God, which is honestly a prayer I feel like I pray at least several times a week.
36:03
SPEAKER_03: I barely know you.
36:05
SPEAKER_03: Hey, can we just get reacquainted?
36:07
SPEAKER_03: And I'll be honest, I'm really not believing these parts of what your word says.
36:12
SPEAKER_03: Can you, you know, Ashley, like you said, can you help help me?
36:16
SPEAKER_03: And like you said, like the man in Mark 9 said, help my unbelief.
36:20
SPEAKER_03: I believe, help my unbelief.
36:22
SPEAKER_00: And I think if you don't ever say that out loud, you don't progress.
36:25
SPEAKER_00: It's very much like the Psalms, what you just said.
36:27
SPEAKER_00: It's David starts off, like, when are you gonna wipe these people off the earth?
36:31
SPEAKER_00: You know, he's he's really mad.
36:33
SPEAKER_00: And then he gets to the end, and he's got worship, you know, in his mouth.
36:38
SPEAKER_00: But and sometimes I think we imagine that was like a fast process.
36:41
SPEAKER_00: Like, as fast as I read that song, that's how fast he got there.
36:44
SPEAKER_00: Right, right.
36:45
SPEAKER_00: Like, who knows how long that took or or what the pro and he was back writing another one a couple of days later.
36:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
36:50
SPEAKER_00: I mean, and so it's it's very much, but without I'm just really here, I am in this season of I've stuffed a lot, and I I'm just not I can't.
36:59
unknown: You know what I mean?
37:00
SPEAKER_03: That's exactly right.
37:01
SPEAKER_03: That is, I mean, I think that's what I feel like God is so much more tender towards our wrestle than we ever are with ourselves.
37:13
SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah, for sure.
37:14
SPEAKER_03: And so, you know, one of the the um great myths about Christianity is that this is really a a set of rules for really good living.
37:25
SPEAKER_03: It's actually this dynamic relationship where in many ways I'm still a seven-year-old little girl before him going, I didn't make this full play.
37:36
SPEAKER_03: And what do I do about that?
37:37
SPEAKER_03: You know, or whatever, replace your current scenario with that that maybe you had as a little girl.
37:43
SPEAKER_03: I feel like we gave a lot more permission to ourselves when we were younger to be human.
37:48
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
37:49
SPEAKER_03: And as adults, we feel like, man, I need to come to the Lord with um a slick conversation rather than just a real wrestle and let him come in and touch the places in us that are kind of the unmentionables.
38:05
SPEAKER_04: Yes, absolutely.
38:06
SPEAKER_04: That's good.
38:07
SPEAKER_04: Or that it has to be this formal uh just like a quick fix thing where we go to him at a certain time and that's it, and it and it fits in this little pocket of time, and like you said, whether you read through the psalm and then suddenly you're good to go.
38:24
SPEAKER_04: But I mean, not only are we talking sometimes it's year-long for the process, but it's also throughout the day where this conversation is going on all the time.
38:31
SPEAKER_04: Like you talked about, you know, you're carrying up a load of laundry and you know, this process is happening for you.
38:38
SPEAKER_04: It's it's starting your day, it's fixing a meal, it's um, you know, working with your kids, it's you know, driving the minivan all over to the practices and it's it's an ongoing conversation um rustling through it.
38:54
SPEAKER_04: He doesn't expect us to have this little bit of time with him at a certain point in the day and have it figured out.
39:00
SPEAKER_04: And you know, he wants us to continue to go, okay.
39:04
SPEAKER_04: He doesn't get sick of us bugging him.
39:06
SPEAKER_04: Like maybe that's exactly right.
39:08
SPEAKER_03: I mean, I think of some of the some of the um biggest heart shifts in my life in terms of understanding God have taken years of dialogue.
39:20
SPEAKER_03: I mean, I I would say right now, one of the sides of God that I'm most kind of in awe of is God is a healer.
39:25
SPEAKER_03: You know, I'm 39 and I just birthed a baby.
39:28
SPEAKER_03: You know, we've been married for 16 years.
39:30
SPEAKER_03: Like we certainly didn't plan for this.
39:32
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
39:33
SPEAKER_03: And um after 13 years, you know, of infertility.
39:38
SPEAKER_03: So I but I think that was eight years of me looking at his word and going, your word says that you heal, but I don't really believe it.
39:48
SPEAKER_03: And I'm not even talking about my body.
39:50
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's that's healing my heart.
39:52
SPEAKER_03: Like you start to have some physical stuff happen in your body, and what what really happens is your your heart gets unearthed.
39:59
SPEAKER_03: All the stuff underneath it comes uncovered, and you go, Man, the least of my worries is my body being healed.
40:05
SPEAKER_03: I got a messed up heart here.
40:07
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and I just think, man, that was eight years of me wrestling with God as a healer.
40:14
SPEAKER_03: Um, I just think he's so patient with us.
40:17
SPEAKER_03: I love what you said, Ashley, about just the David writing these Psalms and his his ongoing wrestle.
40:23
SPEAKER_03: And I I actually think there's something that's uh that he really takes delight in.
40:29
SPEAKER_03: I mean, we know it with Jacob, right?
40:31
SPEAKER_03: When we wrestle, like when we get in the game with not our game face on.
40:38
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
40:38
SPEAKER_00: Right, right, right.
40:39
SPEAKER_00: I don't know when the last time I had a game face was, so we gotta have one.
40:44
SPEAKER_04: Oh, this is so good.
40:46
SPEAKER_04: Sarah, I I really appreciate you giving us time.
40:50
SPEAKER_04: I know for us the these these are like the wee hours of the morning almost here after eight o'clock.
40:56
SPEAKER_04: Heading into I know lately with uh some of your projects it's been a lot of late nights and early mornings, but um I really just I I know so many people could benefit from making this, um just making that effort of adoring.
41:14
SPEAKER_04: And um I'd love for a couple things.
41:17
SPEAKER_04: If you could kind of tell people, uh we'll be sure and put the details in the show notes, but um, you know, just some specific things they could start doing and how to find more about this and where to follow you, um, and some things like that.
41:31
SPEAKER_03: Sure.
41:32
SPEAKER_03: I um I just had a website switch, so let me actually look up what is my website.
41:37
SPEAKER_03: Sarahhagerty.net.
41:39
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
41:39
SPEAKER_03: Sarah Hagerty.net.
41:41
SPEAKER_03: There's actually a whole link for adoration underneath there.
41:43
SPEAKER_03: Awesome.
41:44
SPEAKER_03: They could download uh um printable where we've got a verse and a and a characteristic of God for every day.
41:52
SPEAKER_03: If you don't even want to take that much of a step, honestly, I would say start in the Psalms.
41:57
SPEAKER_03: I feel like there are times where I'm really wanting to adore God through a personal, through a characteristic or a side of Him that I am struggling to believe.
42:06
SPEAKER_03: And there's other times where I just want the word directly to inform what it how I adore.
42:11
SPEAKER_03: So there was a year that I spent in the Psalms, just mining each psalm one by one and going, what characteristic of yourself can I like hang out with for a while, God?
42:23
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
42:24
SPEAKER_03: Um, and then if you're on Instagram, we've got I have a wonderful designer and she um and we've got some incredible photographers, and so it feels actually really very Holy Spirit infused, these photographs um with the image, the verse on it and the characteristic of God that we're adoring that just shows up every day on Instagram.
42:44
SPEAKER_03: I I say shows up, my designer would laugh at me because it's just like magical appears.
42:49
SPEAKER_00: It's magic.
42:51
SPEAKER_00: The Instagram fairy did it.
42:53
SPEAKER_04: Yes.
42:54
SPEAKER_04: By the grace of God, it all comes together.
42:57
SPEAKER_04: That's so awesome.
42:58
SPEAKER_04: I love it.
42:59
SPEAKER_04: Uh well, and one last thing.
43:01
SPEAKER_04: Would you give a little sneak peek about your next project that we'll see released in August?
43:08
SPEAKER_03: Oh, I'd love to.
43:09
SPEAKER_03: So that my book coming out in I honestly these days, I feel like all I need to do is say the title because there's I think there's and and sweet Amy.
43:18
SPEAKER_03: I suppose we could go on for a long time about this.
43:20
SPEAKER_03: We could do this in another podcast, but Amy actually named the book.
43:23
SPEAKER_03: Really?
43:24
SPEAKER_04: Which is really the Lord just spoke through me.
43:26
SPEAKER_04: That's all.
43:27
SPEAKER_04: Okay.
43:27
SPEAKER_04: I love it.
43:28
SPEAKER_03: I'll take that.
43:29
SPEAKER_03: Amy and Voxer, which man, that's a whole that's a separate.
43:35
SPEAKER_03: I need to put in Voxer needs to be in my life.
43:38
SPEAKER_03: I keep learning about Voxer because the title of the book is Unseen, which was Amy.
43:45
SPEAKER_03: That's that's what Amy named.
43:46
SPEAKER_03: Unseen.
43:47
SPEAKER_03: And the subtitle is The Gift of Being Hidden in a World that should be noticed.
43:51
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's a winner.
43:53
SPEAKER_03: Um so I probably don't even need to say much more than that.
43:55
SPEAKER_04: But it's no, I think that's a good, that's a good segue for sure.
43:59
SPEAKER_03: I think it's one other thing that I thought of that I, if you go on my website, somewhere on there, you can sign up for my newsletter.
44:06
SPEAKER_03: And the first two, I think, the first two notifications you get will be one is a uh 16-day adoration devotional.
44:14
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
44:15
SPEAKER_03: And the other is a book called Adore that um it's an ebook that my daughter and I wrote together.
44:20
SPEAKER_03: I wrote it.
44:21
SPEAKER_03: She helped me come up with the characteristics, but then she also was the illustrator, which she, you know, nowadays rolls her eyes because she's 13 and she did this when she was seven.
44:30
SPEAKER_03: And so she was like, Oh, mom.
44:33
SPEAKER_04: Well, but I think it's beautiful.
44:34
SPEAKER_04: No, it is beautiful.
44:35
SPEAKER_04: And I have to say, I I don't sign up for everything.
44:38
SPEAKER_04: I'm sort of picky um because I really want to read what comes in.
44:42
SPEAKER_04: But I and I know maybe I'm biased, but I really just whatever Sarah has sent and like that the adoration book.
44:49
SPEAKER_04: I've had our kids go through it together.
44:51
SPEAKER_04: Um we've kind of made it part of our homeschool day last year.
44:55
SPEAKER_04: And um, and I just love um the post and just the written word from Sarah, it's just been really uh encouraging to my spirit.
45:03
SPEAKER_04: So I appreciate you sharing your gift and being faithful, even in the midst of uh raising six kiddos and homeschooling and all of that.
45:12
SPEAKER_04: Like you just you've been faithful with the gift that the Lord has given you in this message, and I for one am very grateful, eternally grateful.
45:20
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
45:21
SPEAKER_04: Thank you.
45:21
SPEAKER_04: Thank you, Sarah, for your time.
45:23
SPEAKER_04: Thank you so much.
45:25
SPEAKER_04: Well, friends, I sure hope you enjoy that conversation as much as we did with Sarah.
45:30
SPEAKER_04: I love her heart, and her life is a true living testimony for how she's chosen to adore God through the good and the bad and how she's continuing on that process.
45:40
SPEAKER_04: I so appreciate how she is willing to share so vulnerably, not just in this time, but also through just her journey as she shares in her writing and her blog.
45:52
SPEAKER_04: I am certainly looking forward to um having her be able to share her next book.
45:57
SPEAKER_04: But in the meantime, I want you to be sure and check the show notes for how you can follow her Sarah Higgerty.net and on Instagram.
46:07
SPEAKER_04: She is every bitter thing is sweet.
46:09
SPEAKER_04: Though I'm sure maybe some of those will change, and we'll be sure to update those in show notes as those changes are pulled out.
46:17
SPEAKER_04: So until next time, we hope that you find more ways to live simply wholehearted.
46:22
SPEAKER_04: Finding time to live unbugged, purposeful, and intentional.