Latest / The Wholehearted Enneagram Podcast / Pleasant Places | a conversation with Christie Purifoy

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Pleasant Places | a conversation with Christie Purifoy · The Wholehearted Enneagram Podcast

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: Hi friends, welcome back to the Simply Wholehearted podcast.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_01: It means so much to have you choose to take our conversation along with you today.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Amy Wix, your host, and here at Simply Wholehearted, we provide simple plans for life's most creative endeavors.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_01: The culture around us lulls us to complacency, half awake to our purpose, and more often than not, it seems as if everyone around us celebrates mediocrity.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: But we believe there's more to your story.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_01: Awaken your heart with extraordinary tales of the ordinary.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: Find encouragement as you discover your creative purpose, and be empowered to create your unique masterpiece in life, family, and community.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: If you've tuned in the last couple weeks, you know we're taking the weeks of Lent to realize our need for a savior and ready ourselves and our family for fitting celebration of Easter.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm loving the conversations which have touched on our need to pause and notice what's more real than we imagine and draw us closer to the one who created and redeemed us.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_01: Christy Purefoy is sharing today how placemaking can create a space for others and how it provides a natural shift in our priorities.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: During Lint, placemaking isn't just about hospitality, it is also about making time to do without, so our ache for the Lord will increase.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: I so enjoyed this conversation with Christy and her unique writing perspective.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: You also may remember her sister, Kelly Campbell.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: She was on the podcast last year for a Memorial Day special and is a dear friend.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: So I was delighted to meet more of the family.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: And by the way, I want to give a shout out to Wendy, who is known as Covered by His Presence on Instagram.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: She's been a part of the simply wholehearted community for a while, and we enjoy the occasional email exchange.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: She's been on Christie's launch team for this new book, Placemaker, and has offered some great questions for today's conversation.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks so much, Wendy.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: So for you guys, how are you observing Lint right now?
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: What does it look like?
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: Did you grow up in a liturgical, you know, observation of Easter and the different seasons, or is this a new thing to embrace for you and your family?
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, it's it's not new for my kids.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: My kids are now growing up with it, but it's been something that I've only embraced as an adult.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: So as you were telling me earlier, I'm the same.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't grow up with these observances.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't grow up in a church that uh paid attention to the traditional church calendar.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: It was something I discovered uh only when I was older.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: And as soon as I did, I realized, oh, I need this.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I am a person who thrives on rhythm and routine and yeah, the seasons.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my goodness.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so I love the way that um there's this tool that tells a story, right?
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: It tells a story, but it does it in like the everyday stuff of our lives.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: So so yeah, it's different for my kids that this is just part of the fabric of our home.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: But also, I guess, you know, because I didn't grow up with it, they've also got a mom and a dad who are kind of figuring out as we go.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: Right, right.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: We're fumbling through.
• 3:18
  unknown: Yeah.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well, living honestly has been a real challenge for me.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like that is probably the seasonal observance that, at least where my kids are involved, well, actually, no, myself as well.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's the one that has come the least naturally.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like Advent is something I can just dive into.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's my natural bent, the anticipation, the waiting, and just the beauty of that season.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: But Lint is hard.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, that's the point of Lent, right?
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, I'm learning, I think, to give myself grace and to lean into that.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: So here's an example.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: What we're doing right now with our kids is we have, and we've we've done this before with the prop.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: So we pull out every year this cross that my husband made with uh old barn wood.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: So it's just super simple.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: So originally we had it because I had this idea that we would do some confession as a family.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: We would, you know, talk about our sins and maybe how we've hurt someone today, and then we would have a chance to hammer a little nail into the cross.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought, oh, love it, right?
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: A hammer and nails.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: So the hammering part was good, but oh my goodness, my kids did not want to talk about things they had done wrong.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: It was just to confess and own up, right?
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's a total failure.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: So the cross has come back.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: We're we're still doing hammer and nails, but I have I've I've kind of just changed it up and and just leaned into the fact that yeah, Lint is hard.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard for me, it's hard for my kids.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: We're talking about hard stuff.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I I so I'm going a little easier.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: So now we're using the cross um just to hammer in some little ornaments that we we color, we print out on paper, and they kind of go along with that night's devotional reading.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: Cool.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_02: But here's where we're at, right?
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: 40 days of Lent, how far we're we're a week and a half into it.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we've hammered in two ornaments.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: You've hammered in two.
• 5:07
  unknown: We did two.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I love what a beautiful concept to do that with your kids.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: And I I wonder even, you know, maybe maybe I'm like formulating, you know, I'm Enneagram three.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know what you are, but I'm Enneagram four.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: So we're, you know, we're three, wing four right here.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but so I'm thinking, man, it would make so sense, so much sense to use this idea and maybe work our way up to the repentance process, you know, with like prayer requests and concerns and laying it before the cross.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: Because I don't want to confess, like, you know, that's part of my th Anneagram threeness.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: We don't want we don't want to look like a failure.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: And our kids are no different.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I love that.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: Letting it be the journey, right?
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: Because it is meant to be a journey.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: So letting it be a journey, letting us work up to you know where we want to be on the eve of Easter.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and you know, that's the part about it that I just love that's been such a gift to me as an adult and embracing these seasons is that I always loved Easter, but Easter is better now.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: Easter is better because I feel ready.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I've been looking in that direction for a long time.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: It hasn't just shown up, you know, one Sunday morning and now I'm meant to, you know, celebrate, have my heart right in the right place.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and I think I'm a slow person.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: I need space.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: I need, you know, a little bit of buffer and time to do that, time for my heart to kind of go slow.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: So Lent uh and you know, it it allows me to do that.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's the the thing of it too, actually, is the fact that it's not a regular, you know, date on the calendar.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: Christmas gives us the concrete.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: We know it's happening December 25th every year.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas Easter jumps around wildly within, isn't it like a four-week span of time?
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it is.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so I do think we need Lent, even if it catches us, catches us off guard by starting, you know, February 1st, but to help ready ourselves and you know lead up into that time because otherwise it does take you unawares and you haven't felt like you even recovered from you know the last holiday.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um because I even wrote to kind of my little community about holiday fatigue.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's why I've put Easter a little bit on the back burner, unintentionally, because I love Easter.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_01: I love you know the fact what it all it represents and spring and new life and and the fun tradition surrounding it with family.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_01: And but um, but I think in America and some of the culture uh pull that gives, you know, kind of brings about holiday fatigue, Easter has been lumped into that with me.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so uh a few weeks ago I talked to Barbara Rainey and she kicked off our Lint focus.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: And that was I knew I knew where I was going and had an idea of where I wanted to go, I should say.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_01: And then that conversation with her solidified it so much and challenged me to go, oh yeah, I need to be, you know, I need to create this culture of Easter people for my family, for my heart, where I don't let the fatigue um that the culture is sort of you know perpetuated in my life to quiet out the really important celebration of Easter.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: So exactly.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, the fatigue is a big part of it.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's I so I've experienced that with Advent and Christmas.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: If I take that time to prepare and I don't just jump into Christmas celebrating on December 1st, yeah, then I don't need Christmas to be over on December 26th.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: I can then have a real season of Christmas, right?
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I think it's true for Easter as well that if we've taken this harder time of living with less or leaning into some of the just the harder aspects of of what Lint is all about and doing it with our kids and making space for that in our homes and families, then not only are we prepared for Easter, but we're able to do Easter better.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: We're able to receive Easter more fully.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: And Easter, again, you know, not you know, this was maybe a new knowledge for me just a couple of years ago, but Easter itself is is in the church traditionally a season and not just one Sunday.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: And it's actually a season that we're meant to observe for longer than we were in Lint.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: So we think, oh, Lent goes on forever, it feels so long because it's still right to outside.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but the Easter, the joy of Easter and the celebration of Easter is meant to occupy even more space in in our lives and in the you know the calendar year.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but we need Lent in order to be able to celebrate because even celebration is a kind of discipline and requires some commitment and some work.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, it's an extraordinary thing that sometimes we think, oh, I'm I'm just ready to go back to the ordinary.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: But I love what you said about that culture of being Easter people and so.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_01: I know, isn't that brilliant?
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: It was not my idea.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: Totally barbarinian.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, yes, I'm gonna adopt that.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: It's been fun seeing the different ideas that that has kind of sparked in people of okay, how can we do that real simply, uh, just in a real clear way that doesn't involve, you know, oh my goodness, all the prep that Christmas does, but yes, the same amount of importance and focus.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's really good.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: You know, one way uh we have done it visually, again, going back to this little barn wood crossing that is so great.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: Fill it up with these little nails, and I'm talking like little picture hanging nails, you know, but the perfect little nails.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then um the night before Easter, I pull all the nails out and then I try to kind of decorate the cross maybe with some fresh flowers or something, or something like that.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, maybe it's just a jar of daffodils, like really simple, or it could be little candles or something, but to sort of give that visual sense, and then the cross, you know, stays on our table through Easter, but to give that visual sense of from that hard, heavy thing of the nails, you know, covering the wood to something beautiful like flowers.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't talk about it, but there it is on the table, like oh, made a switch, and right and we're in the the spring, you know, now we're in the season of singing, as Song of Songs says about split.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's great because so much more is caught than taught, and that's a perfect example right there.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_01: You don't even need to say anything, yeah.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's just visually there.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: That's really powerful.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: Well, how have you how have you incorporated this idea of hospitality versus placemaking with your kids?
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: What does that look like?
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: It's again more is caught than taught, but what are you teaching them?
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: What's really important for you to show them about that difference?
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, maybe one difference, I haven't even thought about this before until you asked me just now, it's because we're thinking about the kids, and I'm thinking about that cross on our table.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm thinking about how now, for my kids, even when we don't have guests at our table, and um that's what we tend to think of as hospitality, right?
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: Although of course it's bigger than that.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: Entertaining Yeah, we think about entertaining, we think about other people at at our table, and maybe for those special hospitality moments, maybe we light some candles or we have flowers on the flowers on the table.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but my kids take it for granted that when we sit down at the table, we light candles.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so if I've forgotten or I haven't done that, my little kids will be rummaging, you know, for the matches or you know, rummaging for a candlestick because it's it's dinner, we're sitting down, we light candles.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so I realize that is so great.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: They know that this space, this place that is our table matters and we take care with it as much as we can, even when it's just us.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: And um, you know, and that too as parents, like we I think we show hospitality to to our kids.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, they're you know, they're they're they're given to us to love as well.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I think I guess I'm realizing you know, maybe they have caught this idea that the the place that is our table matters and we take a little care, even if it's just us.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it's not just a show, it's not just uh this um you know image of perfection that we project for other people.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_00: I know, yes, but it's just the dailiness of our lives.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, for instance, I it was a real epiphany for me to to think about this idea of placemaking versus hospitality because I'm an introvert.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so I can often be drained by too much time with other people.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: But when I realized that, um, just to name one example, so I love gardening.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: If I'm in my garden weeding and I'm all alone, uh, that's a precious time to me.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'm alone, it's restorative, but I'm doing it with other people in mind.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm taking care of my garden and other people will come into that garden and enjoy benefit from it, right?
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they will enjoy that place.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: And so my my solitary work, that placemaking work in the garden, is a kind of hospitality, or it just gives me this bigger image of what hospitality can be.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: So someone who um I I don't know, I think of those people who wear the vests and pick up litter on the side of the highway, right?
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they're doing it maybe on their own or maybe they're doing it with their club, but they're they're they're placemaking in a way that blesses and benefits many other people, even people they may never meet or know, right?
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: So placemaking is just, I think, a a more spacious term, but it certainly involves what we think of more, you know, as more traditional hospitality.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_01: So even if you kind of continue to dial down that one, I would think you're placing value.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: You're placing value by showing and demonstrating your kid to your kids that this table time, this you know, eating together is really important.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, and it carries great weight.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: You putting time into the flower beds and the garden and weeding, and to even though it's alone and a solitude and refreshing for you, you're placing value in that and what you're cultivating for others and what you might be able to share with others.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: So oh, that's so good.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's just placing the importance and a value on maybe some ordinary things that we take for granted.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's um, you know, it's a value that that God puts on places.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, God not only created the earth for us, but he carved out special places, right?
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: Like the Garden of Eden or the Promised Land or the Temple.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, um, and it isn't just one anonymous earth that's all the same.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but there are these special places within it.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so I think that somehow, you know, we're made in his image.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that is in our spiritual DNA as well, to care for carved out places, special places.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe that's our home, maybe that's our garden.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um, maybe we live in a city and that's the neighborhood park or the neighborhood school.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it can be maybe it's our church and our church building, you know, it can be a lot of different places, but um, I think it it we have we have that in us.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: And so our kids all have that in them as well.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so I think we can really model for them, hey, these things matter.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's we're not living these lives of here are the spiritual things that matter, and then here's sort of our ordinary lives, but um, it's all it's all this, it's all part and parcel, right?
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's all in integrated and interrelated and and and lighting that candle and sitting down and talking in a way that's our love made visible, right?
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, oh yeah, that's good.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: Beauty and and the beauty we cultivate in our places is one way that we make love visible.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: I love my kids, I love my guests, I I um I love my husband, and so I, you know, if I cultivate beautiful things in our environment, it's a way of sort of showing that love or making that love tangible in some way.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: And God does that for us, right?
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, this earth is so beautiful, it's so much more beautiful than than it needs to be, and that's I think tangible proof of his love.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's good.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_01: So, what led to this epiphany as an introvert um for you to even think about this idea of placemaking?
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_01: Because I I mean it's such a beautiful word.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think I've ever, that's not been part of my language or vocab vocabulary, but I'm going to adopt it for sure.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: What was it for you that you're like, oh, this is it, this is this is a secret to really, I mean, I always see it that sort of thing as a wholehearted living step of when you can identify what it is that your heart needs and how you can approach life in a fresh perspective.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: You know, honestly, and I think this is true of so many experiences in our lives, it's I I've come to see it and value it because of those seasons when I didn't have it or when it was hard.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: So I really value uh being rooted in a place.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, one way I talk about placemaker or placemaking is I say, you know, it's just being willing to sink your roots into a place, to love a place and let that place nourish you in return.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: And we're not always willing to do that because it's risky to love so hard sometimes.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: And it's and then we have to move sometimes and we lose those places and we have to pull up our roots, and it's very painful.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: And so I've experienced that.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: I've experienced you know, that longing to put down roots and either living in a place where the soil felt so rocky, I could not, it just would not accept my roots.
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I write about those places as wilderness places, like you know, I was just there, but I couldn't sink my roots in.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: And and uh, you know, I've experienced community and I've experienced the joy of like making a place and seeing that have value in other people's lives, and then I've had to leave those places and move on and and not be able to do that or or not have that same sense of rootedness.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's uh ironically in the not having, yeah, and in the missing and in the losing that I realized, oh, this was good and this was a gift, and this is something that if God brings me out of the wilderness and brings me into a new place where the soil is good, I'm gonna do that now deliberately, and I'm gonna I'm gonna live in that way with intention because I know what it is to live without it.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: So it's you know, God takes care of us in the wilderness places, He plants trees there, He causes water to flow there, and we just receive.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: So there are gifts that the wilderness gives.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: But one gift the wilderness has given me is I think this um this more holistic picture of what my love for home and and caring for home can really be.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: And and it's uh it's true spiritual value, which I think is immense.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just a hobby, it's not just stuff, it's not just walls, it's um it's it's connected with God's own heart for us.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: I think it comes from not having.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, right.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't that?
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: Oh man, so many, so many of our testimonies and stories is birthed out of the lack.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and that's Lint too, isn't it?
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like Lint is that season of letting go, of not having, of leaning into the things that are hard and hurtful, and and it's kind of a mini wilderness, right?
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: And and and then what's on the other side.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, new life.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, and you fours are so good for me in that because let me tell you, I have been, there's been a couple things that I would really prefer right now and shared with my you know closest friends of I really would prefer not to feel.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: I would just like to get past this and not even not even go there with my feelings.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_01: And and my wonderful friends who are fours come along aside and go, No, it's okay.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: You can you're you have permission to feel this is really hard.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: Don't don't screw past this past this because the Lord has something really wonderful for you in it, something you know, personally for you in this, not to just be miserable and you know be stuck in lament, but through the lament, uh, the other side, just there can be something really precious if you allow it and allow God to do that work.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: So during this Lent season, I'm that's what I'm working on.
• 20:49
  unknown: Yeah.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's the wisdom of Lent, isn't it?
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: And and the wisdom of the example of Jesus who who entered, you know, went into the wilderness and and faced these things.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um, exactly.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: And how, yeah, because he he faced those great trials and temptations and came out on the other side with just such victory, of course, not only for him and his perfect um being, but for us as an example, right?
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: To to show us that we can have authority as through him to be able to conquer these things that the enemy wants to use for death and destruction.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_01: Well, one of my friends who I'm a friend with because of Sarah, I think, is Wendy.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_01: And her, I think she is covered by her by his presence on Instagram.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_01: If I have that right.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: So she's been part of your book launch team.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, she has been such a support.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: She's incredible.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: She is awesome.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: And same here.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so we we email occasionally back and forth.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so I said, Well, I've noticed you're for sure on the team, and you've been doing awesome.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Job.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: What questions would you like me to ask Christy?
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: So I she had some really good ones, and it was just fun to hear her process and um what she thought about the book and your first book, and you're kind of speaking her language, and so she's resonated with so much of it.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_01: So I thought her question was really good, and she wanted to just see what you thought about the comparisons or similarities or differences between your two books.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: And if if you think this one's kind of an epilogue or you know, anything like that, as sometimes the Lord does, right?
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: In our story writing, sometimes they connect, sometimes they don't.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: Something, sometimes it's just about a new season in your life.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think um they're absolutely related.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: They are different in the sense that Roots and Sky, the first book.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: So the first book, it's it too is a book about place.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, centered in this new home.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's spiritual reflections based on just walking through the first four seasons of of life here at this old challenge.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: Which I love it.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: We talk about seasons here all the time.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, how God works.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: He uses it, right?
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, and oh man, there were so many lessons I learned that first year, really paying attention to the seasons as they revealed themselves.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so that to me is a zoomed-in kind of book.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's very intimate, it's very quiet, it's just sort of me and my head in this place, and the sky, you know, shifting overhead as the seasons, um, as the seasons pass, and and just the the spiritual reflections are really sinking into that, into that um that life.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's um very focused, very intimate, um, zoomed in as the you know the phrase I keep thinking of.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: Placemaker is uh so relevant, it's so related.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: We're still, you know, it's still about being rooted in this place, this this old farmhouse.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: And yet now I've kind of um zoomed back and I'm looking at the bigger picture and I'm look seeing this place in the context of all the places I've lived and realizing that it isn't that I've just arrived at a place that has value, which was uh how it felt, you know, yeah writing that first book, and that is kind of part of that story.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_00: But now I realize, oh, now Maplehurst has taught me the value that every place had and the and the good work I was doing in every place, even if I wasn't always aware of it.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: Maplehurst has sort of taught me what, you know, what was the what did I really take with me out of those wilderness seasons and those wilderness places?
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: Now I can see clearly the gifts I received because I sort of see them in the context of this of this journey.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_00: And not only that, um so here's something funny.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: I can remember after my first book came out and I was talking to my agent about what I might do for a second book, he very gently and very sweetly said, Um, Christy, do you think there will be any other people in your next book?
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: Of course, in the first book, it's just me.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: You know, my husband and my children make little cameos, but basically it's just me and my head and my reflections.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and I really took that to heart.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: And the the book Placemaker, it's me again, it's my reflections, but now it's opened up, not only as I I consider all these other placemakers who've gone before, who've shaped the places where I live, but also the community of people that God brought to us here to help us in this placemaking work.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_00: I really learned here at Maplehurst that I can't do this on my own, that it's that it's meant to be done in community.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so I write about other people in the uh who are a part of that.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: So for me, it has felt like like Roots and Sky.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: The first book was this seed and this kernel, this nugget.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: And in Placemaker, I've been able to open it up and sort of see where it goes and tell a bigger story.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my goodness, that includes more people.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I totally have this vision of this tree.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: And the second book is the tree and the branches and all the people sitting under it because of the fruit of your life, of what the Lord did.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's awesome.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I think that's it.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe Roots and Sky, the first book, was like an acorn.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: And now we're we've we've I you know we're seeing it green.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's awesome.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: I was just like, I could even envision, you know, people sitting under the shade of the branches in summer and the fullness of it and the beauty.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: Because that what little I do know from your sister and everything like that, of it just seems the season the Lord is inviting you into, not just with this book, but literally and you know, figuratively within your home.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's right.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_00: We have been working to build uh a barn.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_00: We call it the Black Barn.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's painted black out there, and the the shell of it is there.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_00: We're I think maybe about to take the step of finishing it out on the inside, but really with the hope of being able to to host gatherings and uh community events here and just have have people in this place and really create a place for people.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: So we're just sort of turning into that.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that is um that is so cool.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: That's the tree is the tree is growing and we're we're saying, come sit with us in the shades, which is so great because as an introvert, like that is sacrifice, that is ministry, that's truly place making.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_01: And and you're doing it, you're walking it out, and obvious that you know the Lord as He's done this work has been, you know, like allowing you to share it with the rest of us to kind of help the rest of us figure that out in our own lives.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: So that's right.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: As I learn and as I journey and discover.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_01: Right, right, exactly.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: And all of us, it's definitely a journey.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: We don't, darn it, we don't immediately get it.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: You have to walk it out.
• 27:31
  unknown: Yeah.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: Well, something that we've been having fun asking during the lint season is kind of lighthearted, but we all want to know because it's what we're talking about with our friends.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: And that is, um, and we talked about kind of your favorite lint practices that you're doing with your kids.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but for you personally, anything else that's kind of stood out to you that you're like, oh, that was really meaningful, it created a shift in my heart, or it was like, I knew that this is something that I wanted to practice.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, good question.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because there it this lint is a little different for me.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm I'm gonna admit something here.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: In past Lent's, I think I have, because it's just not an easy season for me, I have um, I've resented the call to fast and do without and do less, even though that's gosh, that's really Lent.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: And so I, for instance, um, I think it was last year or the year before, I'd read somewhere, oh, you know, Lent is really about our hearts.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: And so maybe what you need to do this Lent is add something.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_00: And so I've I've tried that for a couple of years.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: Last year, I think it was I added more prayer time.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I said, I'm gonna do some kind of fixed hour prayer, and I set an alarm on my phone, and so I was adding something to my life, and I was adding something good.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: It was good.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, sure.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: But I realized this year, oh Christy, you have been avoiding the thing that Lint is really inviting you to do, which is to give up, to do without, to to be hungry or to be uncomfortable, or to, you know, whatever it is, but to feel some lack and to feel some emptiness.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I just haven't, I I haven't wanted to do that.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_00: I, you know, I saw uh I think it was a meme on Facebook recently where it said something like uh about Lint, and it said, as memes do, it was pretending to be in the voice of God, which is so silly.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, pick and try.
• 29:18
  unknown: Right.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_00: As if God was saying, Hey, I never asked you to give up sugar.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: I never asked you to give up chocolate.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, the point of the meme was saying, like, you know, God cares about our hearts and it, you know, these super these things, if they're superficial, you know, what are they really worth?
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: But to be honest, I have realized this and and this year it's really coming together.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: You know what?
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe I just need to give up sugar.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe I just need to give up the child, you know.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe actually that's a hard thing for me.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it is, it's so hard for me.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, so this this this lint, I'm I'm trying to give up some of those comforts, some of those shortcuts I take to kind of shortcut how I'm really feeling, or if I'm bored or distracted, or whatever it is, and I'm not doing it perfectly, and it's not fun, and I think it's just exactly what it needs to be.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: That's good.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: I love your honest confession because honestly, comfort is my God, and that obviously is gonna get in the way of my relationship with the Lord, and so there this is an invitation, an opportunity to step back from that comfort, all those different comforts, right?
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: And run to the Lord instead.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: So but I hate it.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_01: I know, me too.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's so hard.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_01: It is not it's not fun.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_01: No, it's not, it's not, but we're doing it.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_01: All right, so on the other side of that, the celebration.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_01: I love Easter.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: I love the traditions of Easter.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: For you, what is it that you're really excited about this year?
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I am really excited about the same thing actually that I am, I get excited about every Easter.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: So, since coming to Maplehurst, gosh, almost seven years ago, um, the the first Easter in this farmhouse, that winter, I had looked outside and um the shape of our property is sort of unique.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_00: We have these long stretches of grass alongside this very long driveway.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: And somehow when I saw that, this thought just dropped in my head.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, what a great spot for an Easter egg hunt.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, well, at that point, we didn't know anyone, we didn't know any of our neighbors.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, we live in this old farmhouse, but it's surrounded by a new development of houses, so we have lots of neighbors.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I had this thought, and as soon as it dropped in my head, I thought, oh dear, I'm gonna have to do that.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I now I'm terrified.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_00: Introvert nightmares.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_00: But we did, and I I actually write about it in the first book, Roots and Sky.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_00: And um, it was such a gift.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's how we first met our neighbors, and so we've done it every year since.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I tell people it is the easiest way to show hospitality to a ton of people.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, it is.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: Because um, all we do is we um either save from the previous year or we purchase um the little plastic eggs.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yep with my kids during Lent.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_00: We fill them with candy and little toys, and then we put a little flyer on everybody's door in the neighborhood and and inviting them the day before Easter that morning.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_00: We we have everybody over for an Easter egg hot.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: And it's usually it's like a hundred people or more, maybe 50 kids running around.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but it's that is so great.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's easy, it's easy, and so once again, I'm really, really looking forward to that.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: It always feels like usually it's the first Saturday where all the neighbors are out and winter is finally over.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_00: They're glad to be outside again and the kids are happy, and it's just every year it marks like, oh, here's spring, here's new life, here's celebration, here's community, and uh yeah, it's great.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_01: That's a brilliant idea because not too unlike Kristen Shell turquoise table mimic.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, anyway.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: I love that concept because it was hospitality placemaking outside the home, so it took some of the pressure off.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's a great way, like you said, to get to know your neighbors.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you're you're making a place for your neighbors to feel welcome and everything with while taking out off some of the pressure of having to have this huge gathering in your house perfect and all the I don't have to clean my house, I don't have to clean a bathroom.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_00: We uh we pick up some cartons of orange juice and some coffee from the Dunkin' Donuts, and we just have it on a table outside.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I also this is another way I take the pressure off.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_00: I put on the invitation, hey, we'll do this rain or shine, but if the weather is really terrible, we'll just cancel.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_00: We won't, you know, try to come up with a rain date or you know, and it's it's always it's always gone off.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_01: It's never that's sometimes it's a little windy, a little cold, but we've always managed to do it.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_01: Well, now the best question that we all want to know what candy goes in the eggs, because you're really hoping to get some of the leftovers.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: There's still some of your kids.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I I feel like I I am intimately over these six years, I have become intimately acquainted with the kinds of candies that will fit in little things.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_00: But so I have to tell you, the first year, again, because I didn't know the neighbors, so I didn't know who would be coming.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: Who's gonna show up?
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_01: How many?
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so I was so nervous about so many things.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_00: And also, um, one of my children has always had very severe food allergies.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_00: So he could not eat any, you know, nuts or chocolate.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: He was allergic to milk, he couldn't eat um chocolate or nuts, or even a lot of candies are made with wheat, like twistlers and things like tits rolls and things like that.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we have some allergies, so I get it.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so he was very limited.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_00: And so that first year I told myself, okay, I don't want to cause some neighbor kid, you know, an allergic reaction.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_00: And I want my my own son to be able to eat anything, you know, that's in these eggs.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: So while I personally would love to find chocolate in my eater, right?
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, instead, we've just gone with the the sugary, even chemical-laden things that never cause allergies to die, all those things.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I have learned that like lollipops and those things, they won't fit in the egg.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but things like the the now and not now and later, the laffy taffy.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_00: They're too big, but you can bend them and you can squish them in there.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_01: That was so clever.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_01: Now we have all these, like, oh, that's what we do.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_00: And the other thing is because again, these people didn't know me this first year, I wanted all the candy to be wrapped in the eggs.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_00: So I think we can open up a bag of jelly beans and put a jelly bean in each one because I thought, again, they don't know me, and that feels weird.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I want them to feel safe.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so we we only use candy.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_01: Who might, you know, exactly.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: So starbursts are great.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_00: Starbursts are great, they're all wrapped.
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_01: It is.
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_01: That one's a perfect one, and everyone's happy.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_01: Surely there's a flavor you like.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, pink is the best.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I love it.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_01: Well, before I let you go, I thought this was another really great question from Wendy.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_01: And also, you know, a lot of my friends who listen to this podcast, they're, you know, out doing carpool and errands and you know, running around town.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I know there's lots of gold nuggets.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_01: But before they can get their hands on your book, how would you say, um, how would you apply placemaking to things outside our home, like an organization or group or you know, ministry, some different things like that, maybe out of the box that everyone would could see, oh, this is what placemaking looks like in my season of life.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_00: You know, one of the things I I I discovered as I was writing the book and telling my own stories, and I write in there is that, you know, sacred the thing that makes a place sacred is that it's cared for, it's loved.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, God cares for it, we care for it, we and we meet with God there.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so some of the places that we think, like our churches or neighborhood community centers, places that we think, oh, this should be a sacred place because it's so important to the life of our church or our community or neighborhood.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: But if we're not caring for it, if we're not tending it, if we're not showing up on Saturday morning to clean it or to plant flowers, if we're not making it beautiful in some way, then it it can't, it's no longer sacred.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's neglected and it and it doesn't reflect.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: It can't flourish.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_00: And so um, those really tangible things about picking up trash and doing being a part of the beautification board and planting out the the annuals, or those things that we can feel like, oh, who's got time, or does it really matter?
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's actually really important and it's really holy work, and it's so generous, I think, when we give beautiful spaces to people.
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_00: Another thing, I'll just throw this in.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's fun.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's easy, especially when when we think of children and the spaces they inhabit, um, whether we have young children of our own, or maybe we're a Sunday school teacher, or we we just see the the young kids in our neighborhood.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but taking care of the places where children gather or where children will be, whether it's their Sunday school room or their playground or their school environment or um or that empty lot in the corner where the kids all hang out, but no one's taking care of it, you know, whatever it is.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_00: But caring for a space where children will be is um oh, it's just one of the most I think precious ways that we can love um the the, you know, it's one of I I guess this is what I want to say.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_00: It's one, you know, I remember Jesus saying, let the children come to me.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: I think taking care of the places where the children will be is how we participate in that and say, Yes, let the children come.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus sees you and Jesus loves you.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: And so um I yeah, I just encourage people to think especially about where their children spend time, and maybe it's not even their own children, but it's the neighborhood kids or it's the church kids or it's um you know, whatever kids are kind of in their their community.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_00: How can we take care of their places?
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: And children, even if they can't express what it means or the difference it makes, uh they feel it.
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and they'll grow up to become placemakers, you know.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_00: They'll grow up to cultivate beautiful places because they've received it.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's good.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_01: It's really placing value in the ordinary.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_01: It is, absolutely.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, Rich, love this.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_01: I can't wait to personally get my hands on the book and I'm excited to share this with others because um it's beautiful.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_01: It really, I just felt like as I was reading through it and beginning to understand, I'm like, oh, it takes the words right out of my mouth.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_01: This is brilliant, this is wonderful, this is what the Lord has for us.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, and really in the end, he uses our geography if we'll if we'll let him, right?
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, not only to bless others, but to bless us.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_00: Like we can be blessed and comforted and nourished and and cared for by the by the place where we are.
• 39:47
  SPEAKER_00: We'll let it.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we'll let God work through it.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's so good.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_01: I love it.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_01: And now I've got this picture of this tree in the summer and picnics happening.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_01: I'll be just thinking about you and this.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_01: I can't wait.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_01: So good.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_01: It'll be so fun.
• 40:02
  SPEAKER_01: It'll be great to just watch through the well, really Instagram, because that's where I like to be if I'm gonna hang out, but see what happens with the Black Barn and the events and how the Lord unfolds all of that.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_01: I'll be sharing.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_01: Great.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_01: I know.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_01: I love the idea that placemakers aren't necessarily the ones who will change a place.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_01: They might be the ones who let themselves be changed.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_01: I hope during this lent season you might be creating more space in your life and in turn, making a safe place for others.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_01: I know you'll want to get a copy of Christy's new book, Placemaker, and follow her on Instagram.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'll be sure to put a link for both of those in the show notes.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_01: And if you haven't yet figured out yet, we have a giveaway almost every week, and often it's the newest book from our current guest.
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_01: If you aren't already following us on Instagram, we'd love to have you join the community.
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_01: Stay tuned because we are sharing more stirring conversations during the whole litten season to encourage us as we reflect, remember, and celebrate Rebirth.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_01: We'd love to have you share these episodes with your friends and family and join the simply wholehearted community.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome! Our 100th episode is coming up at the end of May.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_01: I would really love to celebrate by reaching 100 reviews on iTunes to help let others know which episodes are your favorite and why you like the podcast.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_01: We only need about 60 more reviews, and I know we have thousands of downloads a month, so it should be easy to reach 100 in no time.
• 41:31
  SPEAKER_01: Let's invite others to join us as we continue to pursue perspective, purpose, and plans for a simply, wholehearted life.