Latest / Faithful Fitness With Coach Alex VanHouten / Motherhood as Discipleship: Stephanie Joy Lasota on Parenting, Fitness, and Wholeness

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Motherhood as Discipleship: Stephanie Joy Lasota on Parenting, Fitness, and Wholeness · Faithful Fitness With Coach Alex VanHouten

0:02
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Faithful Fitness Podcast for My Dad. Coach
0:06
Speaker 1: Alex Van Houghten helps you get stronger in mind, body,
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Speaker 1: and spirit. He believes that your body's a temple, so
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Speaker 1: taking good care of it is an actual worship.
0:15
Speaker 2: I should know.
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Speaker 1: I live with them. Every week. He brings truth from
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Speaker 1: the Bible, tool from science, and stories that will set
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Speaker 1: your heart on fire. May God bless you to become
0:24
Speaker 1: everything He made you to be, just one percent better
0:27
Speaker 1: every single day.
0:29
Speaker 2: What's up, guys. This is coach Alex van Houghton on
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Speaker 2: the Faithful Fitness Podcast. I'm so excited to have you,
0:34
Speaker 2: and I'm so excited to have our guest Stephanie joy Lesta. Stephanie,
0:39
Speaker 2: how are you today on this Happy, Happy Thursday.
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Speaker 3: Thank you, Alex. I am blessed and highly favored and
0:45
Speaker 3: grateful to be here. I'm very humbled to be here
0:47
Speaker 3: and honored that you found me on the Revelation while
0:51
Speaker 3: on this website. People really do look and find people
0:55
Speaker 3: on there, so it's really exciting to be on your podcast.
0:58
Speaker 3: I appreciate it.
1:00
Speaker 2: I think this is going to be an amazing conversation.
1:02
Speaker 2: We're going to talk about motherhood. We're going to talk
1:04
Speaker 2: about discipleship. We're going to talk about using our body
1:07
Speaker 2: in the way that God designed us for his glory
1:11
Speaker 2: and for the Gospel, which I can't wait to talk about.
1:13
Speaker 2: But you're in a very special period of life right
1:16
Speaker 2: now that I'm also in, and that is young parenthood.
1:20
Speaker 2: And so before we dive into all this awesome stuff
1:22
Speaker 2: we're going to talk about, I do want to share
1:24
Speaker 2: or having a little story swap. So thinking over the
1:27
Speaker 2: last week or two, you've got a little boy and
1:29
Speaker 2: a little girl, correct, Yeah, that's right. Yeah, Okay, can
1:32
Speaker 2: you think through the last like like week or two
1:35
Speaker 2: and just share a story. It could be funny, it
1:37
Speaker 2: could be terrible. But what's something that stands out to
1:40
Speaker 2: you right now about your stage of motherhood that kind
1:43
Speaker 2: of lets everybody know where you're at.
1:46
Speaker 3: You know, my mind always goes to the most recent thing,
1:49
Speaker 3: because each day has enough trouble of its own. And
1:54
Speaker 3: then I was getting my daughters in an afternoon program,
2:00
Speaker 3: and you know, I really thought that this year there's
2:04
Speaker 3: pros and cons to every program and every schedule, right,
2:07
Speaker 3: and last year I ran into mourning logistical issues with
2:10
Speaker 3: both of them leaving at different times. But I can't
2:14
Speaker 3: be in two places at once. This year, I thought
2:16
Speaker 3: would be easier because she's afternoon program, So I get
2:19
Speaker 3: my son off to his thing in the morning and
2:22
Speaker 3: then we have our mother daughter time and then she
2:25
Speaker 3: goes to her afternoon program. But it's actually it's actually
2:29
Speaker 3: a bit challenging because once you're home all day or
2:32
Speaker 3: doing fun stuff all morning, it's hard to then go
2:34
Speaker 3: ahead and go to school in the afternoon. Yes, so
2:38
Speaker 3: she was, and she's usually very eager to go to school,
2:42
Speaker 3: and she likes the program and she's doing really well,
2:44
Speaker 3: but today was a hard transition. And so she's four,
2:49
Speaker 3: my son is seven, And I think a big part
2:52
Speaker 3: of where we are now is, you know, they're still
2:56
Speaker 3: very young, and their brains are still very young, and
3:01
Speaker 3: it's so such a present understanding to me to to
3:07
Speaker 3: help them with the coping skills. But you know, it's
3:10
Speaker 3: it's easier in theory than practice. So I think where
3:13
Speaker 3: I'm at is like that showing staying calm. It's constant regulation,
3:20
Speaker 3: it's constant keeping myself regulated, regulated, even in those tough
3:24
Speaker 3: moments where today she was dragging her heels and not
3:28
Speaker 3: wanting to get on the bus, and then having that
3:30
Speaker 3: balance of discipline and pushing through, but also warmth and
3:35
Speaker 3: gentleness and encouragement that you can do this. You like school,
3:40
Speaker 3: It's going to be a good day and I'll give
3:43
Speaker 3: you lots of hugs once we get strapped on the bus.
3:45
Speaker 3: And what was it tough? It's tough when when they
3:51
Speaker 3: leave like that. So definitely a big, big part of
3:56
Speaker 3: where I am is that emotional regulation now and teaching
3:59
Speaker 3: those hoping skills in the moment. And she's still a
4:02
Speaker 3: little young, but she does. She does a great job.
4:04
Speaker 3: My son, my son's a really expressive person, much like myself,
4:09
Speaker 3: so he's really great at even saying what he's feeling.
4:15
Speaker 3: And I think that's such a big step already when
4:18
Speaker 3: it comes to like emotional regulation, even recognizing like, oh,
4:23
Speaker 3: I don't know, it isn't good.
4:25
Speaker 2: So you use a term there that I'm so glad
4:27
Speaker 2: you're using emotional regulation. A lot of parents, a lot
4:31
Speaker 2: of parents do not understand this, and I'm not stepping
4:33
Speaker 2: on their toes. If you're a parent who hears that word,
4:35
Speaker 2: you have no idea what we're talking about. But this
4:37
Speaker 2: is so important because because emotional regulation is the capacity
4:42
Speaker 2: and I'm not an expert by any means. I just
4:43
Speaker 2: have two boys, so like, I live this every day.
4:47
Speaker 2: I don't know the first thing about raising a girl.
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Speaker 2: But emotional regulation is the capacity for a parent to
4:53
Speaker 2: teach their child how not to let their emotions get
4:57
Speaker 2: the better of them, while still validating the emotion itself.
5:01
Speaker 2: I'm angry, this is stupid. I don't want to do this. Yeah,
5:03
Speaker 2: I get it. Sometimes I'm angry too. We're gonna channel
5:06
Speaker 2: that energy into the things that that are productive and
5:09
Speaker 2: good in our life. Or oh, I'm so sad, I
5:12
Speaker 2: don't want to do this. I'm I'm gonna droop my
5:14
Speaker 2: shoulders and I might I might even have a crummy
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Speaker 2: attitude and be disrespectful to mom and and you know,
5:20
Speaker 2: kick my toys around or whatever. Yes, I'm so sorry
5:23
Speaker 2: you're sad. That that feels terrible. I hate that too.
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Speaker 2: Let's sit in that sadness for a second. But we're
5:28
Speaker 2: not going to stay here. We got stuff to do,
5:31
Speaker 2: so it's time to get up. And we can be
5:33
Speaker 2: sad while we do them, but we're gonna We're gonna
5:35
Speaker 2: get the things we need to done. And and what's
5:38
Speaker 2: putting right and what's crazy is what's so weird is
5:41
Speaker 2: I say that out loud because I teach my children
5:44
Speaker 2: these things. But what I've noticed, and I'd love love
5:48
Speaker 2: to hear from you, what I've noticed is it's in
5:51
Speaker 2: the moments that I'm frustrated or sad, or grumpy or
5:56
Speaker 2: angry or what lists the emotional wheel? Right to list
6:00
Speaker 2: the emotional wheel, which apparently we can only name like
6:03
Speaker 2: three of them. So having gonna having a vocabulary is useful.
6:08
Speaker 2: I am modeling to my child as a reaction to
6:13
Speaker 2: their emotion, how I regulate my own. Yeah, And it
6:17
Speaker 2: was so crazy for me as a dad when I
6:19
Speaker 2: realized raising my boys are ten and six, so I'm
6:23
Speaker 2: just a just a couple of years ahead of you.
6:26
Speaker 2: But but when especially my three and four year old,
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Speaker 2: Both my boys very expressive, very extroverted, very they feel
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Speaker 2: things so deep, you know, and it's it's hard not
6:36
Speaker 2: to be like, you know what, shut it down, like
6:37
Speaker 2: I don't. I don't know where this is coming from.
6:40
Speaker 2: It was it was crazy to me as a father
6:41
Speaker 2: to realize that if I'm if I'm going to say, hey,
6:44
Speaker 2: you come here, we need to have a conversation, and
6:46
Speaker 2: I would bring them to the room or wherever we
6:49
Speaker 2: need to be away from other people so we can
6:51
Speaker 2: have this talk and we're going to sit in front
6:52
Speaker 2: of each other, we're gonna make eye contact, we're going
6:55
Speaker 2: to breathe. Those moments were just as much for me
6:59
Speaker 2: as they were for them, so that I could respond
7:02
Speaker 2: having regulated emotions rather than blowing up at them or
7:07
Speaker 2: or letting my emotions get the better of me. And
7:09
Speaker 2: I think, what's so cooling coming at this from the
7:12
Speaker 2: perspective of somebody with slightly older kids. What's really cool
7:16
Speaker 2: is I can see the hard work paying off now,
7:21
Speaker 2: which is so cool. It's so cool to see that.
7:23
Speaker 2: And I work with children and children's ministry, so I
7:26
Speaker 2: can see when I'm working with a child whose parents
7:30
Speaker 2: haven't maybe maybe they've tried, but whose parents haven't quite
7:33
Speaker 2: gotten that lesson across to them in an embodied manner,
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Speaker 2: such a powerful tool. So thank you for sharing that,
7:40
Speaker 2: and also for the work you're doing with the kids
7:43
Speaker 2: on that front. Did you have something to add to that, No, it's.
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Speaker 3: That's where the rubber meets the road when you have
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Speaker 3: the opportunities to practice the emotional regulation, because you begin
7:54
Speaker 3: you're co regulating, you know, and you're working together as
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Speaker 3: a family and as a you know, a and a child.
8:01
Speaker 3: And you know then when you when you throw in
8:04
Speaker 3: like school staff and bus drivers, it's even more so.
8:08
Speaker 3: You know, it really so cliche. It takes a village,
8:11
Speaker 3: but it really does. Thank God for the patience of
8:13
Speaker 3: our bus driver today and just a little bit. But
8:16
Speaker 3: there's that balance of And I think Alex, you're probably
8:20
Speaker 3: around my age because the elder millennials are really coming
8:24
Speaker 3: up to middle age right now, and we are definitely
8:27
Speaker 3: a generation that likes to emotionally process things. And I
8:33
Speaker 3: mean that's a that's a generalization, stereotype major maybe, but
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Speaker 3: I do think that we we long for more authenticity
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Speaker 3: in our daily lives and uh helping our children to
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Speaker 3: not suppress but also realize that things don't revolve around
8:54
Speaker 3: them completely. So there's that balance, right. And then the
8:58
Speaker 3: other thing too is like we don't have to wait
9:01
Speaker 3: for things to explode before we work on those things.
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Speaker 3: So when you have moments of peace and calm in
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Speaker 3: your house, those are the times to talk about, you know,
9:13
Speaker 3: what you're feeling. And then you know what, talk about
9:18
Speaker 3: things in the past. You know, I remember when you
9:20
Speaker 3: got frustrated last week getting on the bus. But I'm
9:22
Speaker 3: really proud about how you know, how you push through.
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Speaker 3: You're a really strong person. And I do a lot
9:28
Speaker 3: of that with my kids, positively reinforcing them, you know,
9:32
Speaker 3: just random times, toughout the day. Something my mom always
9:36
Speaker 3: said was you can't spoil kids with too much love.
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Speaker 2: So right, Yeah, and.
9:41
Speaker 3: We're all thirsty for that love. Kids need it, they
9:44
Speaker 3: need it from their parents. So and not all parents
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Speaker 3: have received that either. And that's where you know the
9:51
Speaker 3: Gospel is so big and the good news because you
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Speaker 3: got to get it from somewhere. So if you hadn't
9:56
Speaker 3: seen it modeled for you, well, God's the best teacher.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, amen. Amen. And and it's been my experience that
10:05
Speaker 2: that if if there was something missing in me from
10:09
Speaker 2: my parents, perhaps there was there was something that that
10:13
Speaker 2: I didn't learn, and you know, they did their best,
10:15
Speaker 2: but there's something I didn't learn or something missing in me,
10:18
Speaker 2: those those gaps. If if I understand the Gospel and
10:22
Speaker 2: if I spend time getting close to the heart of God,
10:24
Speaker 2: he teaches me those things and he fothers me in
10:27
Speaker 2: those ways. And so when I in turn have the
10:29
Speaker 2: opportunity to father my children. Then then it's I get
10:34
Speaker 2: the opportunity to give what I've already received. I have
10:37
Speaker 2: the opportunity to to give that to them, and and
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Speaker 2: for for many kids when when I get to work
10:44
Speaker 2: with them. From a church perspective, what I what I
10:48
Speaker 2: come at because they're not my children, right so so
10:51
Speaker 2: discipline is a little different when when I'm not the
10:54
Speaker 2: father figure, or reinforcement or emotional regulations a little bit
10:59
Speaker 2: different when I'm not parent. But what I find is
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Speaker 2: my Father in Heaven gives me this validation, He gives
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Speaker 2: me this love, He gives me this direction or discipline
11:08
Speaker 2: or or whatever it is that I need. And then
11:11
Speaker 2: I have the opportunity to also give that as well.
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Speaker 2: It reminds me from a Gospel perspective, it reminds me
11:19
Speaker 2: why Christ is so important in our lives. Not just
11:23
Speaker 2: that he's the son of God, not just that he
11:26
Speaker 2: died for our sins, not just that he rose again
11:28
Speaker 2: and he was the perfect example and the perfect man.
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Speaker 2: But when he says to us to love the Lord
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Speaker 2: your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength,
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Speaker 2: and then to love your neighbor as yourself. When we're
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Speaker 2: raising these little ones, they are the neighbor. They are
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Speaker 2: the good Samaritan neighbor. They are constantly in need of
11:47
Speaker 2: a drink of water and clothes anes And so we
11:51
Speaker 2: have this opportunity as parents to have the greatest impact
11:56
Speaker 2: in ministry we can have to the little ones that
12:00
Speaker 2: God has entrusted us with. And I take that very seriously.
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Speaker 2: It sounds like you do as well.
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Speaker 3: Yes, and you I got a little distracted because I
12:07
Speaker 3: was trying to look up as scripture as you were talking,
12:09
Speaker 3: because this is what it is in Second Corinthians three stocking.
12:15
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, sucking Corinthians one three. Blessed be the God
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Speaker 3: and Father of our Lord, Jesus Christ, the Father of
12:20
Speaker 3: mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in
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Speaker 3: all our affliction, so that we may be able to
12:25
Speaker 3: comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort
12:28
Speaker 3: with which we ourselves are comforted by God. That is,
12:33
Speaker 3: and we tend to think maybe only in times of
12:36
Speaker 3: crazy distress or affliction, but that's actually a daily reality,
12:41
Speaker 3: just in those little little moments where our children need comfort.
12:46
Speaker 3: And sometimes as a parent, you know, it's easy to
12:49
Speaker 3: get dysregulated, It's easy to get compassion, fatigue, and burnt out,
12:54
Speaker 3: especially if we're not turning to God for that comfort
12:57
Speaker 3: ourselves and receiving it. We need to be filled up.
13:02
Speaker 3: We need to be filled up every day and keep going.
13:04
Speaker 3: And when we recognize we're on empty.
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Speaker 2: Then as you're speaking about that, it makes me think
13:11
Speaker 2: of this season of parenthood specifically. And we'll talk about
13:14
Speaker 2: the physical body in a second. But I'd like to
13:16
Speaker 2: ask you as a mom, because I know that as
13:18
Speaker 2: a dad, the way I fill up, or a better
13:22
Speaker 2: way might be to bring back or I like to
13:25
Speaker 2: redeem a very old school idea, the sabbath Ah. The
13:32
Speaker 2: way that I sabbath, I turn it into a verb,
13:34
Speaker 2: and that might be an American problem, I don't know.
13:36
Speaker 2: But the way that I sabbath is my wife knows
13:40
Speaker 2: that I feel closest to God when I'm out in nature,
13:43
Speaker 2: and I generally like to fast. I generally like to
13:46
Speaker 2: go for a hike. I will go find a waterfall
13:48
Speaker 2: somewhere to crawl under and spend some time praying and
13:52
Speaker 2: reflecting on things that have happened over the past few
13:55
Speaker 2: weeks and asking God for fresh vision for the coming
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Speaker 2: weeks and years. And then I come back to my
14:00
Speaker 2: household and I come back to my family and I
14:03
Speaker 2: am filled up. I'm ready to do what I need
14:06
Speaker 2: to do as a father and as a husband and
14:08
Speaker 2: as a man to lead my family. Well, I have
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Speaker 2: noticed that my wife's way of filling up is very different.
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Speaker 2: Very If you sent her out in the woods by
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Speaker 2: herself with no food to find a waterfall to get under,
14:21
Speaker 2: she would say that you were abusing her and that
14:23
Speaker 2: this is this is a terrible death march. And she
14:26
Speaker 2: didn't enjoy any any frame in that that whole day.
14:30
Speaker 2: So so you know, for her, that looks very different.
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Speaker 2: As a mom with two younger kids, what are some
14:37
Speaker 2: of the ways that God has led you to refresh,
14:40
Speaker 2: to recharge, to fill up your cup so that you're
14:43
Speaker 2: not pouring from an empty cup as a parent?
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Speaker 3: Well, for me, there's there's a lot of ways. I
14:50
Speaker 3: do find a lot of peace and solitude. I'm actually
14:53
Speaker 3: an extroverted introvert, so I have a really I have
14:56
Speaker 3: a pretty high capacity for people and being around and
15:01
Speaker 3: it both energizes me and drains me sometimes so so
15:07
Speaker 3: depending on the day. Having good fellowship and a good group,
15:10
Speaker 3: like I was at Bible study last night with our
15:13
Speaker 3: local church and that was so refreshing and like, oh,
15:16
Speaker 3: you know, life giving. Other times it will be like
15:20
Speaker 3: I say to my husband, I just need to go
15:22
Speaker 3: run errands by myself, or I need to go out
15:24
Speaker 3: on a walk. Obviously, fitness and exercise is a huge
15:30
Speaker 3: outlet for me, and I like when I'm doing my
15:34
Speaker 3: rev classes on Monday nights, like there's night and day
15:39
Speaker 3: difference from when I begin to when I end, because
15:42
Speaker 3: something happens when you move your body and you're able
15:45
Speaker 3: to just get wrung out and spend that time. So
15:50
Speaker 3: those are the ways that I'm also a very artistic person,
15:55
Speaker 3: so I do a lot of painting and art and
15:58
Speaker 3: creating and things like that, and it's filed closer to
16:01
Speaker 3: God in those things too. Yeah, it's all gonna be life.
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Speaker 2: I love it. I love it. Thanks for that now
16:08
Speaker 2: in your story because we're going to talk about fitness,
16:11
Speaker 2: but your testimony and your story have a lot to
16:14
Speaker 2: do with how God has taught you to move and
16:19
Speaker 2: to take care of your body and also to teach
16:21
Speaker 2: others to do the same for His glory. And I
16:24
Speaker 2: know that might sound weird to somebody who's not working
16:27
Speaker 2: out in a way that feels worshipful, or maybe has
16:30
Speaker 2: a strange relationship with how they move or their experiences
16:35
Speaker 2: in a gym setting or in a class setting. And
16:37
Speaker 2: I hope to address those together in a bit, but
16:40
Speaker 2: I'd like the opportunity to share a bit of your
16:42
Speaker 2: story and ask you there was a time where as
16:47
Speaker 2: I understand it and correct me if I'm wrong, There's
16:49
Speaker 2: a time somewhere around twenty twelve where you were pretty
16:53
Speaker 2: heavy into the self help, new age, spiritual maybe even
16:58
Speaker 2: yogi culture that wasn't explicitly Christian, wasn't wasn't even under
17:04
Speaker 2: the umbrella of Christ, but was spiritual, And I could
17:12
Speaker 2: you speak to that a little bit, like what what
17:15
Speaker 2: was that? Like? Where were you? And how did God
17:17
Speaker 2: get your attention and lead you to him?
17:20
Speaker 3: Yeah? Well, well twenty twelve was the time I came
17:23
Speaker 3: back to Christ, right, I oh, but as my born
17:26
Speaker 3: again experience. So but before that, and I was it's horrible,
17:31
Speaker 3: I should I should have done the math beforehand. By
17:34
Speaker 3: in twenty twelve, Oh gosh, how old is that? That
17:37
Speaker 3: was thirteen years ago? So was I like twenty six
17:41
Speaker 3: or twenty seven. So basically from my late teenage years
17:47
Speaker 3: to like my early twenties, I had sort of gone,
17:51
Speaker 3: you know, I had the knowledge and understanding of Christ
17:56
Speaker 3: and Jesus because I was raised in a believing family
17:59
Speaker 3: and I was used in church culture and going, you know,
18:03
Speaker 3: to services, and I always had a hunger for those things.
18:05
Speaker 3: I had a hunger for the things of God and
18:07
Speaker 3: the things of the Spirit, and I pursued those things.
18:11
Speaker 3: I remember at one time when I was younger, our
18:14
Speaker 3: family wasn't going to church consistently, so I used to
18:18
Speaker 3: walk up the road. We lived on a Saint Michael's
18:21
Speaker 3: Church road, so there was a Lutheran church up the
18:22
Speaker 3: street called Saint Michael's and I used to go there,
18:25
Speaker 3: and I had some neighbors and friends that went there.
18:27
Speaker 3: And I remember sitting in Sunday school class in some
18:31
Speaker 3: of the elderly men in the class because it was
18:33
Speaker 3: like a mixed age class, and they're like, wow, you
18:35
Speaker 3: really have, you know, a love for God. So it's
18:39
Speaker 3: like those roots were always there in my life. But
18:43
Speaker 3: when I was a teenager, I mean, it's I'm not
18:48
Speaker 3: going to say it's a cookie cutter story, because absolutely
18:51
Speaker 3: each of our testimonies are unique. But I don't think
18:53
Speaker 3: what I went through is uncommon to a lot of
18:56
Speaker 3: people in their teenage years or in their early time twenties,
19:00
Speaker 3: where I just basically got up, got caught up in
19:05
Speaker 3: gratifying my flesh and like wanting to pursue what felt
19:09
Speaker 3: good and meant you know, you know, being in relationships
19:15
Speaker 3: like sexually promised sexually promised uous relationships. And I was
19:21
Speaker 3: in when I was a teenager, a pretty serious relationship,
19:25
Speaker 3: you know, I was sixteen, So I thought it was
19:27
Speaker 3: going to last forever. Yeah, yeah, and it became it
19:35
Speaker 3: became greater than God. I said. You know, I had,
19:38
Speaker 3: like I said, I had the knowledge and understanding, but
19:40
Speaker 3: I thought my ways were better. I thought I could
19:45
Speaker 3: get around things somehow. And by the grace of God,
19:51
Speaker 3: you know, he had his hand on me the whole time,
19:53
Speaker 3: because that's not the story for for everyone that you
19:59
Speaker 3: know that has gone through sexual sin. You know, I
20:09
Speaker 3: never had an unwanted pregnancy. I never had any sort
20:13
Speaker 3: of illness or disease that happened to me, And that
20:15
Speaker 3: is only the grace of God, because it could have
20:19
Speaker 3: happened to me, and my consequences of my sin could
20:21
Speaker 3: have been a lot and a lot of people deal
20:23
Speaker 3: with that and deal with that brokenness. But that was
20:29
Speaker 3: sort of the start, like the self gratification and like
20:31
Speaker 3: the lust of the flesh. And then I was, well,
20:35
Speaker 3: you know, God can't possibly love me anymore, and so
20:40
Speaker 3: I'm just going to go after all the you know,
20:44
Speaker 3: but I'm still I still have this hunger and this
20:46
Speaker 3: desire for God. Right, So I started pursuing like other
20:51
Speaker 3: spiritual avenues, and I got really big into astrology and
20:56
Speaker 3: studied it a lot, and I was actually able to
21:00
Speaker 3: like read people like a book, like they you know,
21:04
Speaker 3: I'd tell them, you know, your moon is it here?
21:06
Speaker 3: And this and that, and so that went on for
21:10
Speaker 3: very many years. And I was on a yoga retreat
21:15
Speaker 3: in Costa Rica in twenty twelve, and and now I'm
21:19
Speaker 3: kind of I'm fast forwarding in the story, Alex because
21:23
Speaker 3: I don't want to take up too much time on it.
21:26
Speaker 3: It was the second time I was in Costa Rica.
21:28
Speaker 3: I had gone to Costa Rica in two thousand and eight.
21:30
Speaker 3: I was living there for a year teaching English. It
21:35
Speaker 3: was also it was part of my career, and I
21:38
Speaker 3: was pursuing my career. I had graduated with the degree
21:44
Speaker 3: in communications and then I was working in the field
21:48
Speaker 3: for a little bit, and I thought, you know, before
21:50
Speaker 3: I get married and have kids, like I want to travel,
21:52
Speaker 3: I want to do some other things. But still I
21:54
Speaker 3: was still very lost spiritually. I was lost, you know,
21:59
Speaker 3: didn't really know what I believed. But I'm still searching.
22:02
Speaker 3: So like this can't be it, Like this can't So
22:07
Speaker 3: I went on this yoga retreat. Now, mind you, my
22:10
Speaker 3: father and my older sister are believers, and my mother
22:13
Speaker 3: was too. My mom passed now. But so I said
22:16
Speaker 3: to them, I said, I'll take my Bible. I'll take
22:18
Speaker 3: the Bible on this yoga retreat. And I said, you know,
22:21
Speaker 3: I'm searching, but just pray for me. You know, God
22:24
Speaker 3: will reveal himself if this is if this is real.
22:29
Speaker 3: And so I'm on this retreat and it was a
22:31
Speaker 3: lovely time. But all I can say is I don't
22:39
Speaker 3: want to speak badly about anyone that was on the retreat,
22:42
Speaker 3: But as I was watching things play out, I could
22:46
Speaker 3: just tell that there wasn't like depth or truth to
22:52
Speaker 3: the things that we were talking about chanting about. You know,
22:56
Speaker 3: we would have these times of coming together and practicing yoga,
22:59
Speaker 3: and there would be evenings of like partying, and there'd
23:02
Speaker 3: be gossip and there'd be dissension over here, and I'm like,
23:05
Speaker 3: this doesn't seem very deep and spiritual to me.
23:07
Speaker 2: It felt like a mask, right, It felt like a mask,
23:10
Speaker 2: like you were trying on a spiritual mask, but it
23:13
Speaker 2: wasn't real.
23:14
Speaker 3: Yes, so it was definitely And what we would say,
23:19
Speaker 3: you know, is a counterfeit. How the enemy will take
23:26
Speaker 3: things that belong to God and spin it to a
23:30
Speaker 3: smaller truth. So I was chasing after all those smaller
23:34
Speaker 3: truths thinking because I was too broke. I was basically
23:37
Speaker 3: believing a lie Alex that I was beyond repair. I
23:40
Speaker 3: was too broken, I did too much. God doesn't want me.
23:46
Speaker 3: Those are all lies of the enemy that he comes
23:49
Speaker 3: in to whisper it to us.
23:51
Speaker 2: Right that you know so, And those lies go so
23:55
Speaker 2: deep you don't even know you're believing them. You'll act
23:58
Speaker 2: on them, and it's so interesting, like I'm too broken,
24:01
Speaker 2: I'm not enough and so so not even subconsciously consciously,
24:06
Speaker 2: you're seeking lesser gods. Really, because big g God, you're
24:10
Speaker 2: not good enough for him somewhere in there. And if
24:14
Speaker 2: anybody asked you at the time, I'm very sure that
24:16
Speaker 2: you would have said, no, that's not at all what's
24:18
Speaker 2: going on right right here. But in retrospect, it sounds
24:21
Speaker 2: like you've come to understand what those those lies were.
24:24
Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, and yeah. And as I was grappling with
24:28
Speaker 3: things too, there were people I remember along the way
24:31
Speaker 3: that told me things and also called me out on
24:35
Speaker 3: my thinking, on my double mindedness, because I remember thinking,
24:39
Speaker 3: you know, being so spiritual. But then I was going
24:43
Speaker 3: ahead and I was like, you know, sleeping around or
24:46
Speaker 3: having a lot of pride, and people would call me
24:49
Speaker 3: out on things, but I didn't feel like I was
24:52
Speaker 3: doing anything wrong. So but long story short, I was
25:00
Speaker 3: sitting after the yoga retreat. I was sitting back with
25:03
Speaker 3: some lovely people that I lived with in Costa Rica,
25:06
Speaker 3: in the town, in the town that I volunteered in,
25:09
Speaker 3: and I just felt the peace of the Holy Spirit
25:13
Speaker 3: wash over me. And you know, God just said saying
25:19
Speaker 3: like I'm here, I love you, You've never left my hand,
25:24
Speaker 3: and but you need to stay now, like you need
25:28
Speaker 3: to stop running. And so I always get teary eyed
25:31
Speaker 3: when I tell that because I heard him speak so
25:33
Speaker 3: clearly to me. And some people will think that's like nuts,
25:39
Speaker 3: but I just know that I had a lot of
25:43
Speaker 3: joy at that moment, and at that time I was
25:48
Speaker 3: I was living with my now my husband, but we
25:51
Speaker 3: were living together at the time, and so I actually
25:55
Speaker 3: moved out, moved out and went back home to my
25:58
Speaker 3: parents' house and before we got married married. We ended
26:00
Speaker 3: up getting married a few months later after I had
26:05
Speaker 3: kind of that moment because so, yeah, the fact that
26:09
Speaker 3: we'll be married thirteen years in October, congratulations hasn't thank you,
26:14
Speaker 3: and it's you know, marriage, Marriage is difficult already, I
26:19
Speaker 3: think a lot difficult for anyone. It's a challenge for anyone,
26:25
Speaker 3: but coming from you know, my background and things, it's
26:32
Speaker 3: just a miracle for me because I didn't think I
26:34
Speaker 3: would ever have like a family or a husband. I was.
26:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, So it was that lie that I'm not worthy,
26:45
Speaker 2: I'm not I'm too broken, I'm not like you know,
26:49
Speaker 2: I'm going to have to settle for something less. And
26:50
Speaker 2: it sounds like God has redeemed that in you and
26:53
Speaker 2: replaced that lie with a truth, which is you were
26:55
Speaker 2: a daughter of the most high King. You're a deemed
26:58
Speaker 2: by Christ Jesus, and you or your family is under
27:02
Speaker 2: that covering and you get to mother your kids and
27:05
Speaker 2: grow with the struggle of maturity, like well, like you
27:10
Speaker 2: were meant to which is excellent. Yeah, yeah, well, thank
27:14
Speaker 2: you for sharing that part of your story. I think
27:16
Speaker 2: it's so interesting that you are on a yoga retreat,
27:18
Speaker 2: and so I want to talk about this because there's
27:22
Speaker 2: something happening in the world right now, and I hesitate
27:26
Speaker 2: to sound too hoky, but I'm going to do my
27:28
Speaker 2: best to articulate this. Some of the things, spiritually speaking,
27:31
Speaker 2: aren't ineffable, which literally means you can't say them because
27:35
Speaker 2: there's no good words to describe it. But I feel this,
27:38
Speaker 2: and I see this in the world, and it started
27:39
Speaker 2: with COVID. There's something happened. There's something happening in the
27:42
Speaker 2: world with regard to the body. I feel like the
27:46
Speaker 2: Holy Spirit's moving in the world to redeem the church's
27:50
Speaker 2: understanding of why the body is important, because for a
27:54
Speaker 2: long time those things were separate. And I don't want
27:57
Speaker 2: to try to speculate as to why, but those things
28:01
Speaker 2: were separate in the mind of believers. I know, even
28:04
Speaker 2: growing up in my neck of the woods in a
28:07
Speaker 2: Bible believing church, people talking about the sins of the
28:10
Speaker 2: flesh and all that stuff, as if you could be
28:14
Speaker 2: good with God and be tight with God and follow
28:18
Speaker 2: Christ and stuff. But then there's this annoying meat sack
28:21
Speaker 2: you kind of have to live with, and eventually it'll
28:24
Speaker 2: go away and you get to be in glory and
28:27
Speaker 2: everything's good and you don't have to worry about your
28:29
Speaker 2: sin nature anymore. Blah blah. And unfortunately that is sut
28:35
Speaker 2: I didn't know this at the time, but that's a
28:37
Speaker 2: theological heresy called gnosticism.
28:40
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you what I just pulled up the definition
28:42
Speaker 3: of gnosticism.
28:43
Speaker 2: I hoping you were going to h So what's so
28:47
Speaker 2: strange is so as I'm saying this, this thing that's
28:52
Speaker 2: happening in our world that I can feel in my
28:55
Speaker 2: spirit and in a lot of ways, God's been preparing
28:58
Speaker 2: me for this in my life for twenty years, which
29:00
Speaker 2: which is great because this makes sense to me all
29:03
Speaker 2: the way down to my bones. It makes sense to me.
29:05
Speaker 2: And it's only now that I feel like it's actually
29:09
Speaker 2: coming out in a way that the rest of rest
29:12
Speaker 2: of the world can get on board, which I'm so
29:14
Speaker 2: excited about. But gnosticism originated back in I want to say,
29:19
Speaker 2: about as old as Christianity, So back in the early
29:23
Speaker 2: one hundred two hundred, three hundred AD times. And basically
29:27
Speaker 2: what it was is this idea that that was rooted
29:31
Speaker 2: in a heresy that Jesus was a spirit not a spirit,
29:37
Speaker 2: and a body not fully God and fully manned, but
29:40
Speaker 2: God kind of trapped in a meat sec so to speak.
29:43
Speaker 2: And so gnostics at the time, there's all kinds of
29:46
Speaker 2: strange beliefs, kind of like we were talking about a
29:49
Speaker 2: deeply rooted lie. There are a bunch of different things
29:53
Speaker 2: that kind of stemmed from gnosticism. But in the Church
29:56
Speaker 2: today gnosticism is alive and well, even though people who
30:01
Speaker 2: who think that way don't really know they're thinking that way,
30:04
Speaker 2: which is that my body has nothing to do with
30:09
Speaker 2: my walk with God. It's just this annoying thing I
30:12
Speaker 2: have to deal with. Sometimes it's in pain, sometimes it's suffering.
30:15
Speaker 2: Sometimes sometimes it wants to eat things that aren't good
30:19
Speaker 2: for me. Sometimes it wants to do drugs that aren't
30:21
Speaker 2: good for me. Sometimes it has lustful desires that aren't
30:24
Speaker 2: good for me. In some day I get to be
30:27
Speaker 2: rid of that thing. And so for now I'm going
30:29
Speaker 2: to build my spiritual self and I'm going to grow,
30:32
Speaker 2: and I'm going to do better and all that stuff,
30:33
Speaker 2: and then ask God to forgive me of this terrible
30:37
Speaker 2: body I have to deal with, you know, and have
30:39
Speaker 2: to put up with. And everything I've said in the
30:41
Speaker 2: last two minutes is a lie. That's a lie. Those
30:45
Speaker 2: are that's not the gospel. That's not what scripture tells us.
30:49
Speaker 2: Scripture tells us that we are. We are one being.
30:53
Speaker 2: That Christ was one being. He had a body and
30:57
Speaker 2: a spirit, and both of them were good, and he
31:00
Speaker 2: was sinless. And when he rose from the dead, he
31:03
Speaker 2: didn't say, Hey, everybody, look at my nail scarred hands,
31:05
Speaker 2: but don't touch them because you can't. I'm ghostly. He
31:10
Speaker 2: was risen and given newness in his body. And so
31:14
Speaker 2: I want to talk about this because something's happening in
31:16
Speaker 2: the world right now where the body of believers are
31:23
Speaker 2: being I want to say called compelled, pushed to get
31:29
Speaker 2: serious about the redemption and sanctification of our bodies. And
31:35
Speaker 2: in your story is one of the reasons I think
31:37
Speaker 2: that's so important, and that is that this new age
31:40
Speaker 2: self help spirituality does not neglect the body for many people.
31:45
Speaker 2: I went to a yoga class recently. I have a
31:47
Speaker 2: friend of mine who's gone through a five hundred hour
31:50
Speaker 2: yoga instructor course, and I'm in there and a lot
31:53
Speaker 2: of people are here for a spiritual reason, absolutely, but
31:56
Speaker 2: they're moving their body, you know, and it's deeply healing
31:59
Speaker 2: and help and good for them. And what's really interesting
32:03
Speaker 2: is a lot of these people don't go to church.
32:05
Speaker 2: This is church for them. And so one of the
32:08
Speaker 2: things that I would love to talk to you about
32:10
Speaker 2: is why does the body need to be important to
32:13
Speaker 2: the church? Because I see this area that we've kind
32:17
Speaker 2: of seeded, c ed ed, not the good seating, not
32:21
Speaker 2: when you're planting things, but like, hey, we're a church,
32:24
Speaker 2: but we're not going to do the yoga thing. We're
32:27
Speaker 2: not going to do the running thing. We're not going
32:29
Speaker 2: to do the revelation wellness fitness gospel preacher fitness teacher thing.
32:35
Speaker 2: We're going to leave We're going to leave the doughnuts
32:37
Speaker 2: on the counter and invite you into worship and then
32:40
Speaker 2: act like your bodies aren't really a part of this thing.
32:43
Speaker 2: Why in your mind and heart, is it's so important
32:46
Speaker 2: to you that the church changes the way we approach this.
32:53
Speaker 3: So many reasons, but I think the most important reason
32:59
Speaker 3: why so that we can love people better and understand.
33:04
Speaker 3: You know that God created man and woman in the
33:11
Speaker 3: garden and he said they were good. He created us good.
33:15
Speaker 3: Now we had the fall and like as you spoke about,
33:19
Speaker 3: you know, with the gnoscissism, and then this this idea
33:24
Speaker 3: that our flesh is something that is a hassle, that
33:28
Speaker 3: is a bother and it can be right. But I'm
33:34
Speaker 3: taken to I wish I would have wrote this one down.
33:37
Speaker 3: I wrote down many scriptures for today, but I didn't
33:40
Speaker 3: write this one down. Maybe know the reference the word
33:43
Speaker 3: became flesh and dwelts among men. I always go to
33:46
Speaker 3: that one. It is John one. Okay, I thought it
33:51
Speaker 3: was John, but I've got so many scriptures open now.
33:55
Speaker 3: I love that word because that right there. It sort
34:03
Speaker 3: of still boggles my mind that there are believers in
34:07
Speaker 3: Christians that don't understand the importance of the body and
34:10
Speaker 3: taking care of the body. But again, everyone we're coming
34:15
Speaker 3: from different backgrounds and journeys and experiences, and there's we
34:19
Speaker 3: have an enemy that wants to deceive and kill and
34:22
Speaker 3: steal and destroy. And if he can't steal your faith,
34:25
Speaker 3: he's gonna get you in other ways or cause you
34:29
Speaker 3: to be ineffective but for me especially, it's important because
34:37
Speaker 3: I saw and I was raised, you know, with church
34:42
Speaker 3: culture and believing parents, and like I said, so I
34:47
Speaker 3: have the knowledge of God from my roots. However, I
34:52
Speaker 3: think back to when I was a teenager, there was
34:54
Speaker 3: a couple people in the church that talked not really
34:59
Speaker 3: in reference to physical stewardship, but more like the purity
35:03
Speaker 3: culture stuff for like, you know, sex is for marriage.
35:06
Speaker 2: And.
35:08
Speaker 3: But it wasn't talked about too much. So and I
35:12
Speaker 3: don't I want to. I tried to stay out of
35:15
Speaker 3: the trap of placing blame on others for my life choices,
35:19
Speaker 3: right because I think that like in James it says
35:21
Speaker 3: it's the desires of our hearts that leads us away
35:24
Speaker 3: from God. So I don't know, but I do think
35:28
Speaker 3: that it's important to the church because it's a part
35:32
Speaker 3: of discipleship and we want to be telling people how
35:38
Speaker 3: loved they are by God and how important their body is.
35:42
Speaker 3: There's plenty of scriptures that say, you know, the body
35:47
Speaker 3: is for the Lord. I'm going to turn to one now.
35:54
Speaker 3: I was in First Corinthians, you know, First Corinthians three sixteen.
36:00
Speaker 3: Don't you know that you're you yourselves are God's temple,
36:02
Speaker 3: and that God's spirit lives in you. If anyone destroys
36:06
Speaker 3: God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is
36:08
Speaker 3: sacred and you you are that temple.
36:15
Speaker 2: Yes, Halls a huge proponent of this. He actually he
36:18
Speaker 2: actually implores us that we would present our bodies as
36:20
Speaker 2: a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. I want
36:24
Speaker 2: to say that's Romans. It is a calling letter. But
36:27
Speaker 2: but that that idea, that idea is not it's not
36:32
Speaker 2: foreign to the Jewish culture at the time, in the
36:35
Speaker 2: Christians of the time before the Gnostic heresy, which was
36:39
Speaker 2: called a heresy by the church. And root it out
36:44
Speaker 2: that that before that time, it was very evident to
36:48
Speaker 2: everybody that Christ's teaching about stewardship. As an example, this
36:57
Speaker 2: body is one of those talents, the parable of the talents.
37:01
Speaker 2: You have the servants who are given a specific part
37:05
Speaker 2: of the master's portion and asked that while he's away
37:08
Speaker 2: that they would take care of it for him. And
37:10
Speaker 2: when he comes back, the ones who actually saw return,
37:15
Speaker 2: the ones who are productive with the thing, are given more.
37:18
Speaker 2: And the one who kind of buried it out back,
37:21
Speaker 2: he's the wicked servant. He doesn't get to keep his talent.
37:24
Speaker 2: And there are many things that God gives us, and
37:29
Speaker 2: I would encourage all of our listeners to count their blessings,
37:32
Speaker 2: but one of the things that every single one of
37:35
Speaker 2: us has, because some of the things I have, you
37:37
Speaker 2: don't have, Stephanie, some of the things that God's given
37:40
Speaker 2: me to Steward, he hasn't given you to Steward and
37:41
Speaker 2: vice person. But we've all been given this body. We've
37:45
Speaker 2: been given the one body we've got, and he asks
37:48
Speaker 2: he asks us to be good stewards of it while
37:51
Speaker 2: we're here on earth. Like my mission in life is
37:55
Speaker 2: to help people to make the most of the body
37:58
Speaker 2: God's given them because that place of stewardship. I'd love
38:02
Speaker 2: your thoughts on this. It feels to me as though
38:07
Speaker 2: for many individuals their body is not a reflection of
38:11
Speaker 2: God's love and goodness in their life. Their body is
38:14
Speaker 2: actually a bit of cognitive dissonance. It's like I can't
38:19
Speaker 2: look at my body, not how it looks, how it feels,
38:22
Speaker 2: how it carries me around, how it does and doesn't
38:24
Speaker 2: do what I need it to do. All those things
38:27
Speaker 2: that I can declare God's goodness, but then I can
38:32
Speaker 2: ask for prayer request because my hip hurts so bad
38:34
Speaker 2: I can't get around, or I can declare God's goodness,
38:38
Speaker 2: but then I'm so in fear of this medical thing
38:41
Speaker 2: I have going on that I trust my doctors with.
38:45
Speaker 2: But I don't see that there's a stewardship in my
38:47
Speaker 2: body that God wants to bring my faith alive for
38:50
Speaker 2: me in my own body. How does that resonate with you?
38:57
Speaker 3: Yes, I turned to John, So I'm going to read
39:05
Speaker 3: those verses. In the beginning was the Word, and the
39:08
Speaker 3: word was with God, and the word was God. No,
39:14
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, it's verse fourteen. The Word became flesh and
39:17
Speaker 3: made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory,
39:20
Speaker 3: the glory of the one and only who came from
39:22
Speaker 3: the Father, full of grace and truth. And so I
39:29
Speaker 3: just love that we have in Jesus a picture of
39:33
Speaker 3: we have a savior, we have a model, we have
39:37
Speaker 3: a standard, and he became human. Literally, when I was
39:43
Speaker 3: telling you the story about my daughter getting on the
39:45
Speaker 3: bus we just brought, she said to me, I don't
39:48
Speaker 3: like to be human. And you know what gave mean.
39:51
Speaker 3: She's never said that before. I said, you know what, honey,
39:56
Speaker 3: it is hard to be a human. I said, that's
39:57
Speaker 3: why Jesus came to show us the perfect example for
40:01
Speaker 3: me to tell her. You know, that is why Jesus
40:03
Speaker 3: came to show us how to be, how to be
40:07
Speaker 3: in this world. You know, it says in First John.
40:10
Speaker 3: As he was in the world, so are we in
40:13
Speaker 3: the world. I love that Versus been feeding me a
40:15
Speaker 3: lot lately, and he really does want us to bring
40:24
Speaker 3: our whole selves. But then we come, we come as
40:31
Speaker 3: we are, I know in my classes, so my classes
40:34
Speaker 3: are very most of mine take place in the church,
40:37
Speaker 3: and so I really do think the Body of Christ
40:40
Speaker 3: is my number one like mission field. To be honest,
40:45
Speaker 3: I have had like people that are not of the
40:48
Speaker 3: faith come and it's been my classes are outreached to
40:52
Speaker 3: get you know, to share the gospel as well. But
40:57
Speaker 3: the majority of the people that come to my classes
40:59
Speaker 3: are believe, which is a beautiful thing. And I think that,
41:04
Speaker 3: like you said, Alex, that people are like waking up
41:09
Speaker 3: to their need for God in their bodies as well.
41:13
Speaker 3: That you know, we have this one, one life and
41:16
Speaker 3: one body to steward and it's beautiful. However, we come
41:23
Speaker 3: to Him because He loves us, and I know for
41:26
Speaker 3: me growing up, I had the model of my parents.
41:32
Speaker 3: My mother went through a lot of health struggles when
41:34
Speaker 3: I was growing up. So the beautiful thing about my
41:38
Speaker 3: mother's life and testimony because she was a believer, and
41:41
Speaker 3: I know for fact that her prayers availeth much God
41:44
Speaker 3: rest her soul. But I watched her struggle with her
41:50
Speaker 3: mental health and her physical health, and there was a
41:54
Speaker 3: bit of growing up. I didn't understand how, you know,
42:00
Speaker 3: we could have such a good like all powerful, mighty
42:04
Speaker 3: God and worship him, but then we were still walking
42:07
Speaker 3: through this brokenness, or there weren't answers, or I was
42:10
Speaker 3: seeing her suffer, which I felt that she was suffering
42:13
Speaker 3: more than necessary. And I do think at that time
42:17
Speaker 3: it was also at a different time, so I don't
42:18
Speaker 3: think that she had all the tools or the help needed.
42:23
Speaker 3: But then I did also see gaps, like in the church.
42:26
Speaker 3: I thought, well, other people aren't coming alongside her, or
42:31
Speaker 3: you know, there were things that weren't making sense to me.
42:34
Speaker 3: And then in my own life and testimony, I started
42:36
Speaker 3: to wander away from the church and look for all
42:38
Speaker 3: those things outside of the church, you know, and they
42:42
Speaker 3: were empty, they came up short until you know, Holy
42:45
Speaker 3: Spirit took to cold and then I found revelation wellness.
42:49
Speaker 3: I was actually doing like a scroll on my Facebook
42:52
Speaker 3: like background twenty fourteen or so, and I saw Alisa
42:57
Speaker 3: Keaton doing like a chair workout and talking about Jesus,
43:01
Speaker 3: and I'm like, oh, that's cool. It's like a combination
43:04
Speaker 3: of you know, Jesus and fitness and my mom. That
43:08
Speaker 3: would benefit my mom. But then I, you know, I
43:11
Speaker 3: ended up following the ministry and getting involved in becoming certified,
43:14
Speaker 3: and it's been It's just an awesome ministry and a
43:20
Speaker 3: tool for discipleship too. Is what I've really found is
43:24
Speaker 3: it's given me parameters and structures and structure to be
43:30
Speaker 3: discipled because there's so many people that have such a
43:34
Speaker 3: heart for God and a love for His word and
43:37
Speaker 3: wanting people to be free from the bondage of the
43:42
Speaker 3: past or deception or lies or pain. There's so much
43:45
Speaker 3: trauma that people carry in their bodies. Yes, that you
43:50
Speaker 3: know they may be aware of on a cognitive level,
43:53
Speaker 3: but they don't know what to do with it. They
43:55
Speaker 3: don't know how to work it out.
43:57
Speaker 4: So that is why it is so important for the church,
44:01
Speaker 4: because you can't you just can't separate your body from
44:06
Speaker 4: your your mind, and your spirit.
44:09
Speaker 3: It all works together.
44:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think I want to speak to this
44:13
Speaker 2: a little bit because from a scientific perspective, we're actually
44:16
Speaker 2: learning how this works. I think that's the cool thing
44:19
Speaker 2: about as an exercise scientist. What we learn in science
44:23
Speaker 2: is not anti scripture. That like there's again there's this
44:27
Speaker 2: chasm between science and religion. It's like, no, the more
44:31
Speaker 2: we learn scientifically speaking, the more we objectively study creation,
44:37
Speaker 2: what we find affirms scripture deeply. And so what we're
44:42
Speaker 2: learning in science is that our belief structures what we
44:46
Speaker 2: not just what we think, but some of it. Like
44:49
Speaker 2: like you said, I'm too broken, right, that's that is
44:52
Speaker 2: a belief. People have that belief. There are people listening
44:55
Speaker 2: to the sound of my voice right now who believe
44:57
Speaker 2: I am too broken for whatever reason. I don't know
45:00
Speaker 2: your story. I don't know what got you here, but
45:02
Speaker 2: you believe that I am too broken. You might not
45:04
Speaker 2: say you believe it, but watch how you think, and
45:09
Speaker 2: then watch how you act, and then watch how that
45:12
Speaker 2: gets encoded into the body. Because what's really cool about
45:17
Speaker 2: belief and Jesus taught us this belief can change in
45:20
Speaker 2: a moment. Yes, belief can shift, belief can change in
45:24
Speaker 2: a moment. The hard part is that our belief has
45:29
Speaker 2: to permeate our minds now because we have a lot
45:33
Speaker 2: of thought structures, and that this isn't anti scientific, this
45:36
Speaker 2: is neurological. We have thought structures that have formed themselves
45:41
Speaker 2: around the belief that has now shifted or changed. So
45:44
Speaker 2: let's say God redeems that untruth in you. I am
45:49
Speaker 2: too broken. He says, no, I have made you whole.
45:53
Speaker 2: I'm good. I don't make broken things. And so you
45:57
Speaker 2: have this truth now God has made me whole. Okay,
46:00
Speaker 2: guess what. Your brain's got to get reprogrammed. It's going
46:03
Speaker 2: to take some time to start noticing where I am
46:07
Speaker 2: too broken has seeped into the way you think. And
46:11
Speaker 2: that's what Paul calls taking every thought captive for Christ,
46:15
Speaker 2: right is saying no, no, no Christ. Because of Christ,
46:18
Speaker 2: all these beliefs are now not They don't have to
46:22
Speaker 2: be subject to these lies anymore. We can replace those
46:25
Speaker 2: with the truth of the Gospel. And so now we've
46:27
Speaker 2: got all these thoughts that are going to take I
46:30
Speaker 2: don't know, months, sometimes years. I'm curious are your thoughts
46:34
Speaker 2: on this? But scientifically speaking, we're noticing that this whole
46:38
Speaker 2: realm of mindset research is proving to us that we
46:42
Speaker 2: can actually change the structure of the way we think
46:45
Speaker 2: because of belief. And then here's the kicker, the way
46:49
Speaker 2: we act it out. Our body is a much slower
46:53
Speaker 2: process of change. You can't change the belief I'm too
46:57
Speaker 2: broken to I'm whole in Jesus name, and your body
47:01
Speaker 2: follows suit instantly, or for Jesus it did when he
47:05
Speaker 2: laid hands on somebody. You are no longer blind. Body
47:09
Speaker 2: done right. But in my line of work, I like
47:11
Speaker 2: to joke with my clients, I'm not quite as cool
47:12
Speaker 2: as Jesus. I'm doing my best to follow him. But
47:14
Speaker 2: this is going to take a few months at least
47:16
Speaker 2: to get your body on board to this, to this
47:19
Speaker 2: new way of thinking, this new way of believing and understanding.
47:22
Speaker 2: Because what we understand is that our cells and our
47:25
Speaker 2: body can adapt to stressors. But it takes a while.
47:30
Speaker 2: It takes, it takes practice, it takes consistency, it takes change.
47:34
Speaker 2: So the way when we change what we eat, when
47:36
Speaker 2: we change how we move, when we change how we rest,
47:38
Speaker 2: and we reflect those beliefs, then our body will get
47:43
Speaker 2: on board, but it takes. It takes a significant amount
47:46
Speaker 2: of time. I'll give you one example and the I'll
47:48
Speaker 2: let you speak to that. I'm working with a guy
47:50
Speaker 2: right now. I've been working with him for two years.
47:52
Speaker 2: Love this guy very much, has become a brother to me.
47:55
Speaker 2: But when we started working together, he said, he in
47:58
Speaker 2: his h he's in his mind, late sixties. He says, Alex,
48:02
Speaker 2: I'm too broken for physical therapists to want to take
48:05
Speaker 2: me on. Can you help me? And I'm being honest,
48:08
Speaker 2: I'm like, I don't know, let's work together. The nice
48:11
Speaker 2: thing about being outside of the medical community is that
48:14
Speaker 2: I can give you a waiver to sign that seeing
48:17
Speaker 2: be like this is not again, this is not medical advice.
48:20
Speaker 2: But we are going to explore what your body's capable of.
48:23
Speaker 2: And so when we started working together. My driveways forty
48:26
Speaker 2: feet long. He could not walk my driveway like his
48:30
Speaker 2: hips and his back and his knees everything hurt. He
48:33
Speaker 2: was in so much pain, on so many medications right,
48:35
Speaker 2: could not get to the end of the driveway. In
48:38
Speaker 2: long story, short, fast forward two years. This morning I
48:41
Speaker 2: had the opportunity to walk three miles with him and
48:44
Speaker 2: talk about his new grand baby that he was able
48:47
Speaker 2: to hold and be with the service that he's providing
48:50
Speaker 2: in the church and the way he's discipling younger men.
48:54
Speaker 2: He had two years ago given up on being useful
48:57
Speaker 2: to the body of Christ, and it was one hundred
49:00
Speaker 2: percent because of the condition of his body. Fast forward
49:05
Speaker 2: two years. It's not everything's perfect. He's still got the
49:09
Speaker 2: struggles of a you know, a late sixties guy with
49:11
Speaker 2: a few health conditions and stuff, but they're getting better
49:14
Speaker 2: and better every every year. And he's noticing that that
49:18
Speaker 2: he can actually step into the calling on his life,
49:21
Speaker 2: not just the spiritual calling, but the physical calling, the
49:23
Speaker 2: physical presence that he's been called to because of stewardship.
49:27
Speaker 2: And I believe that for many believers, that's the story.
49:32
Speaker 2: That's the story that I want for every believer, mother, father, grandpa, grandma,
49:38
Speaker 2: or child. It's the thirteen year old boys and girls
49:42
Speaker 2: needing to learn how to steward their bodies well and
49:44
Speaker 2: to know that their body is a gift from God
49:47
Speaker 2: and that they if they learn how to use it
49:49
Speaker 2: in that way rather than abusing it and breaking it
49:52
Speaker 2: and trying to satisfy it with anything other than God
49:58
Speaker 2: calling on their life that the well, that's that's what
50:02
Speaker 2: I'm calling the fifth grade awakening. So for you hearing
50:06
Speaker 2: that it sounds, I can see the smile on your face.
50:09
Speaker 2: I can see that you're seeing this some people who
50:11
Speaker 2: come to you too. Ministering to the body of the believers.
50:14
Speaker 2: Through the body, what does the spirit bring to mind
50:16
Speaker 2: for you?
50:17
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, it's so, that's so good. Praise the Lord
50:21
Speaker 3: for his progress and you're walking alongside of him. And yeah,
50:25
Speaker 3: so many people feel too broken or or dejected or
50:29
Speaker 3: of no use, and that's a horrible, horrible place to be.
50:33
Speaker 3: And I was. I was in that place in different ways,
50:36
Speaker 3: you know. But when I think of my own testimony,
50:39
Speaker 3: even with my mom, the most important thing is moving
50:44
Speaker 3: from death to life, right, And that's like a spiritual regeneration.
50:50
Speaker 3: And so as you were talking, I pulled up John
50:53
Speaker 3: five to twenty four when Jesus said, I tell you
50:56
Speaker 3: the truth. Whoever hears my word and believes him who
50:59
Speaker 3: sent me, has you eternal life and will not be condemned.
51:02
Speaker 3: He has crossed over from death to life. So Jesus
51:06
Speaker 3: is the one that gives empowers us in our lives
51:09
Speaker 3: right to overcome send to overcome temptation and to overcome
51:13
Speaker 3: even the flesh. Because yeah, you referred to it as
51:17
Speaker 3: when you say meat suits, I think you said meat suit.
51:21
Speaker 2: Me that.
51:24
Speaker 3: It's a real drag for people. It's a real drag
51:28
Speaker 3: in a lot of ways. And there are real issues
51:30
Speaker 3: and there's real hardships. But the good news of the
51:35
Speaker 3: gospel is that God meets you where you're at and
51:38
Speaker 3: that he promises death to life and goodness. And it
51:44
Speaker 3: doesn't necessarily mean there's going to be a quick fix
51:48
Speaker 3: like you said, or healing or breakthrough, but there is
51:53
Speaker 3: hope and it is that is what we need.
51:56
Speaker 2: I know.
51:57
Speaker 3: There's also also like brain sign brain research out about
52:01
Speaker 3: hope molecules as we exercise and move that our muscles
52:04
Speaker 3: release those things. Talking about brain health, I'm a big
52:07
Speaker 3: neuroscience nerd. So it's as we're building healthy habits and
52:14
Speaker 3: doing things, we are helping our brain to create new
52:17
Speaker 3: neural pathways. So we are literally changing our minds and
52:21
Speaker 3: renewing our minds, and we're combining the truth of God's
52:25
Speaker 3: word with fitness and wellness and movement. It's just such
52:30
Speaker 3: a powerful thing. And so I would say, like for
52:33
Speaker 3: my classes in Revelation Wellness, and my ministry name is
52:38
Speaker 3: Revelational Wellness, Faith and Fitness, so faith is really really important.
52:42
Speaker 3: I have been feeling pooled to go outside the church
52:45
Speaker 3: born more. I did some classes like in community spaces
52:48
Speaker 3: this year, and God's been pulling me out. So He's
52:51
Speaker 3: challenging me to get some other certifications and do things
52:54
Speaker 3: to move out more, which is exciting because I'm always
52:57
Speaker 3: trying to learn and grow. I've been serving primarily like
53:01
Speaker 3: in my church the last few years, and starting the
53:05
Speaker 3: children's class this past year was new because I, you know,
53:08
Speaker 3: I have the two young kids, and I wanted something
53:11
Speaker 3: to do with my daughter and to show her because
53:14
Speaker 3: there's a lot there are some children's activities in my area.
53:20
Speaker 3: There's like mommy and me yoga stuff like that, but
53:23
Speaker 3: I didn't see anything that the church was offering for
53:27
Speaker 3: like Christ's centered wellness, and so I wanted that for her.
53:32
Speaker 3: I wanted her to know like that, you know that
53:37
Speaker 3: she's important, valued, and I heaven, I would hope like
53:40
Speaker 3: each generation, we want our children not to fall into
53:42
Speaker 3: the same traps that we fell into. Right, So I
53:45
Speaker 3: think back on my life and going back to your
53:47
Speaker 3: question about why is this important to the church. It's
53:49
Speaker 3: important because we want to save souls and we want
53:52
Speaker 3: to win souls for Jesus, and we want them to
53:55
Speaker 3: know that God does care about your body. He cares
53:58
Speaker 3: what you do with it, and you were bought at
54:01
Speaker 3: a price. That is the scripture that really brought me
54:04
Speaker 3: back to crisis. We're bought at a price, and Jesus
54:08
Speaker 3: laid it down for us, and it's important that we
54:12
Speaker 3: honor him and for me and many others, and you too.
54:19
Speaker 3: You've got a busy life and we have families to raise,
54:22
Speaker 3: and we want to do things to the best of
54:25
Speaker 3: our ability. And we say in Revelation wellness the body
54:28
Speaker 3: is for ability, not for vanity. All the positive side
54:32
Speaker 3: effects that come with working out, you know, maybe we
54:35
Speaker 3: lose weight, we have increased energy, but and we may
54:41
Speaker 3: look better as well. Those are positive side effects of
54:44
Speaker 3: working out. But we're really moving because we have work
54:49
Speaker 3: to be done. We have work to be done. I mean,
54:52
Speaker 3: I'm on my feet like all day making snacks and
54:55
Speaker 3: meals and cleaning the house that never ends. It's like that,
54:59
Speaker 3: you know, pushing the boulder up the hill and coming
55:02
Speaker 3: back down. Parents can relate to that so fitness is
55:08
Speaker 3: absolutely like paramount to our daily lives as Christians. And
55:13
Speaker 3: I do think people are waking up too, and I
55:16
Speaker 3: do think that we're seeing a lot of manifestations of
55:21
Speaker 3: people that don't know christ. I've been very convicted myself
55:26
Speaker 3: about my testimony and that when I had my moment.
55:31
Speaker 3: And again, I'm an elder millennial, so I grew up
55:34
Speaker 3: without being all over the internet. I didn't have to.
55:37
Speaker 3: You know. Now the younger generation they have, so they
55:41
Speaker 3: lived through a lot of media saturation, and they're seeing
55:45
Speaker 3: things every day and being influenced by so many things.
55:48
Speaker 3: And I do thank God that my entire youth was
55:53
Speaker 3: not like broadcast on the internet, so I would And
55:58
Speaker 3: that's another health thing right there. We're not supposed to
56:01
Speaker 3: be seeing everything that we're seeing all the time, like
56:06
Speaker 3: God's the only one that's omnipotent and all powerful, and
56:09
Speaker 3: so it's not healthy for us to constantly be taking
56:12
Speaker 3: in media. So I just say that to encourage someone
56:17
Speaker 3: to guard your guard your heart, guard your eyes, your ears,
56:20
Speaker 3: and really steward that too, because it matters what you're
56:24
Speaker 3: taking in in that way. It's not just like our
56:26
Speaker 3: food and our and our hydration, but the media intake
56:32
Speaker 3: and let God lead you in that. You know, let
56:34
Speaker 3: God lead you in that. What that looks like having
56:37
Speaker 3: to lay things down sometimes, But I love that your
56:44
Speaker 3: ministry exists. I'm so grateful that revelational wellness exists. We're
56:49
Speaker 3: praying into some really wonderful things in the future. There's
56:53
Speaker 3: a great strength made simple program happening right now that
56:56
Speaker 3: people are walking through. I'm walking through it with a
56:59
Speaker 3: small group and it's been so beautiful. But uh, yeah,
57:07
Speaker 3: it's it's good stuff, Alex. I think that the body
57:12
Speaker 3: of Christ needs needs, it needs to move, you know,
57:18
Speaker 3: where his hands and feet. We're not just a mind,
57:23
Speaker 3: you know, a mind art and it's easy to just think,
57:29
Speaker 3: think and talk and not move.
57:31
Speaker 2: But well, the body of Christ are his hands, and
57:35
Speaker 2: his hands can hold on when others would let go.
57:38
Speaker 2: And the body of Christ is his feet, and those
57:41
Speaker 2: are the feet that can travel far without getting very tired.
57:46
Speaker 2: It makes me think of as you were speaking. I
57:48
Speaker 2: don't know why this was echoing in my mind because
57:50
Speaker 2: it almost sounds irrelevant, but it's not. And it's a
57:53
Speaker 2: passage from Isaiah that says our God is the everlasting God.
57:57
Speaker 2: He never grows weak or tired. He gives power to
58:00
Speaker 2: the weak and strength to the powerless. And even the
58:04
Speaker 2: youth will grow exhausted. But those who trust in the
58:07
Speaker 2: Lord will find new strength. They were so high on
58:10
Speaker 2: wings like eagles. They will walk and not grow weary.
58:14
Speaker 2: They will run and not faint. And I think, I think,
58:17
Speaker 2: as as we're speaking here and as we're coming up
58:19
Speaker 2: on our time, because I want to make sure that
58:21
Speaker 2: I have the opportunity to pray over you and your
58:22
Speaker 2: family and your ministry, as as we come up on that,
58:25
Speaker 2: I just I feel on my my heart with everything
58:30
Speaker 2: that's going on in the world right now, there are
58:32
Speaker 2: so many individuals who want to come to Christ. They
58:36
Speaker 2: want the truth. They want something real, not the not
58:39
Speaker 2: the new ag mask. They want something that's that's deep
58:42
Speaker 2: and rooted in truth and rooted in in well, rooted
58:47
Speaker 2: in the Gospel, rooted in something real that that maybe
58:50
Speaker 2: they haven't heard of or haven't understood, but but that
58:53
Speaker 2: through a practice in health and fitness, that that's something
58:57
Speaker 2: that I believe what you're doing in yours, I hope
59:00
Speaker 2: that's what we're doing in our ministry. We're introducing individuals
59:03
Speaker 2: and we're ministering to the body of Christ to become
59:06
Speaker 2: as strong and as stewarded as it was meant to be,
59:10
Speaker 2: so so that God's kingdom can be done here on
59:16
Speaker 2: earth as it is in heaven. So so can I
59:18
Speaker 2: pray over you and what you're doing, Stephanie. I've enjoyed
59:21
Speaker 2: this so much.
59:22
Speaker 3: Thank you so much.
59:24
Speaker 2: You've got to thank you.
59:26
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, thank you for sharing sharing that scripture. I
59:29
Speaker 3: was praying with some ladies earlier this afternoon and I
59:32
Speaker 3: shared that one. We shared a lot from Isaiah today,
59:34
Speaker 3: So that's confirmation right there. That's a good one.
59:38
Speaker 2: That is.
59:39
Speaker 3: Thank you for praying. Thank you for having me on Alex.
59:41
Speaker 3: This was a great, great talk, and I pray that
59:44
Speaker 3: it blesses blesses people.
59:47
Speaker 2: Same.
59:48
Speaker 3: Uh.
59:48
Speaker 2: Let's let's pray, Father God, thank you so much for
59:50
Speaker 2: this day. Thank you for the opportunity to sit down
59:53
Speaker 2: with my sister Stephanie, and thank you for the hard
59:55
Speaker 2: work that she's doing in her in her own mind
59:59
Speaker 2: and her own body, among her children and her husband
1:00:03
Speaker 2: and in her community. Lord, I pray that you would
1:00:05
Speaker 2: bless her with grace, give her an extra measure of
1:00:09
Speaker 2: wisdom and an extra measure of energy. As she is
1:00:13
Speaker 2: a mom does so many things. I pray that she'll
1:00:16
Speaker 2: be able to pour from a full cup. And I
1:00:18
Speaker 2: also pray Lord that what you're teaching her and I
1:00:22
Speaker 2: and your body of believers, your church, your bride, I
1:00:26
Speaker 2: pray that that represents you well in the world. Help
1:00:31
Speaker 2: us to be those who speak to stewardship and not vanity.
1:00:35
Speaker 2: Help us to be those who set good examples and
1:00:38
Speaker 2: are also blameless before you and before unbelievers, so we
1:00:43
Speaker 2: can spread you to every end of the earth. And
1:00:46
Speaker 2: that it's real and powerful and healing. We pray these
1:00:51
Speaker 2: things in Jesus' name. Amen.
1:00:54
Speaker 3: Amen.
1:00:55
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, Stephanie, And to the listeners guys,
1:00:57
Speaker 2: thank you so much for jumping on to the Faithful
1:01:00
Speaker 2: Fitness podcast. You guys know what I'm gonna say next.
1:01:03
Speaker 2: This has been Coach Alex van Hounten. Until next time,
1:01:05
Speaker 2: train hard, but pray harder.
1:01:11
Speaker 1: Hey, if this episode helps you, jare it with someone
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Speaker 1: who needs to hear it, and don't forget to subscribe
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1:01:40
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1:01:43
Speaker 1: the show notes. Don't be a big well bob, just
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Speaker 1: do it until next time. Don't forget Train hard and
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Speaker 1: pray even harder.
1:02:00
Speaker 2: A school