Latest / Conversations: Special Guests with Preston Scott / The Journey of Missionaries

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The Journey of Missionaries · Conversations: Special Guests with Preston Scott

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: All right, kids, welcome third hour of the radio program
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: affectionately known as Common Sense Amplified. It's me and him.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: That's Jose over there in Studio one A. I am
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: sequestered in Studio one B, and it's The Morning Show
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: with Preston Scott. Great to be with you, show three
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: and seventy five. But who's counting? I am, And I'm
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: grateful for every dog on one of those shows. And
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: I'm really grateful to have some friends in here with me.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: I got to know Chris and Lacy over the years
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: as we attend the same church, and so, as full
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: disclosure here, we attend Redhills Church. They won't be attending
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: there directly for much longer because Chris and Lacy are
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: about to head out to the mission field. Welcome to
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: the show. How are you guys? Great? How you doing? Yeah?
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: All right? So deep swallow here, share the short version
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: of where you've been before we talk about where you're going.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I guess I'll thanks some time sharing that.
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: So Lacey and I would say we both felt I
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: called missions pretty early in our life, our first like
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  Speaker 2: real foray into the.
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  Speaker 1: Ask, did you feel called missions separately before you were
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  Speaker 1: married hunt. Yeah yeah, really yeah in different ways too.
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  Speaker 1: It was pretty neat.
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  Speaker 2: That's a that's probably a story for another time, but
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  Speaker 2: it is pretty cool how the Lord brought.
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  Speaker 1: That all together. Nice okay.
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  Speaker 2: But we spent our like our first real launch into
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  Speaker 2: the missions world uh in Guatemala. We did like short
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  Speaker 2: term trips with an organization for years that was fighting
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  Speaker 2: human trafficking.
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  Speaker 1: Mm hmm. It was faith based, but uh, you.
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  Speaker 2: Know, attacking that issue had on sort of first, and
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  Speaker 2: it was in that space where both of us were
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  Speaker 2: really we had been dating and we're on a trip,
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: and we both were like, man, this is what the
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  Speaker 2: Lord is calling us to do together. And so we
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  Speaker 2: then got married and spent our first full for foray
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  Speaker 2: uh in a a country in Asia that I can't
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  Speaker 2: really share, but I'm confident everyone listening would know where
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: we were.
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  Speaker 1: Lacey, is that like, that's my man, We're going to
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  Speaker 1: get married and go work in the mission field in
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  Speaker 1: some Asian nation.
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  Speaker 2: Absolutely.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: I remember being in Guatemala and just and I knew
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  Speaker 3: what I wanted to do, and I knew what the
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  Speaker 3: Lord had been calling me to do, and I was
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  Speaker 3: seeing him work out those same gifts and I was like, oh, yeah.
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  Speaker 1: What you both learned from without naming the country, we're
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: leaving that out. What you learned from that experience?
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  Speaker 2: Oh man, One thing I learned is just how powerful
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  Speaker 2: God is in a country that is it's very difficult
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  Speaker 2: to even just say that you believe in God, follow Jesus.
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  Speaker 2: The zeal and the passion of the believers to put
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: Christ above everything else was like you read about that
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: kind of stuff, but it was shocking to see it
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  Speaker 2: firsthand and realize that, like, wow, people here are literally
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  Speaker 2: willing to die for the faith and like without a
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: second's thought, Like, without a second thought, did it.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: Cause you to look at American Christians differently? Yeah?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, I when we first came back, there was actually
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  Speaker 3: a lot battling, a lot of sort of anger. Yeah,
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  Speaker 3: but it did it definitely. You know, you see the
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  Speaker 3: persecution that people face, and you see that for their faith,
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  Speaker 3: for their faith, for their faith only. Yeah, and not
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  Speaker 3: even for fighting to you know, evangelize, but just for believing,
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  Speaker 3: just for wanting to go to church, just for participating
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  Speaker 3: in worship. You know, they're persecuted and they they see
• 3:41
  Speaker 3: that and they're grateful for it because and.
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  Speaker 1: When you're in that situation, there's this dynamic tension because
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  Speaker 1: as a Christian you're supposed to share your faith and
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  Speaker 1: what you believe, but you're in an environment in this
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  Speaker 1: case where you're literally risking your life to do it.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a really unique I think what's difficult for
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  Speaker 2: a lot of us too is we feel this, you know,
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  Speaker 2: this burden to be sharing at every opportunity. But there
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  Speaker 2: it was also a really like powerful thing to learn
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  Speaker 2: that like, uh, even I am just a vessel and
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  Speaker 2: like trusting what the Holy Spirit is doing and using
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  Speaker 2: me to do right now it might just be to
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  Speaker 2: build a relationship with this person so that they eventually
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  Speaker 2: get to get to a place where they can hear
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  Speaker 2: what they need to hear. Because if I were to
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  Speaker 2: say something right now, it could shut it down right now.
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  Speaker 2: So even that in itself was like wow, I actually
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  Speaker 2: have to take a step back, Like I have to
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  Speaker 2: be the I have to realize like, oh it actually
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  Speaker 2: it actually doesn't all rely on me, so I can
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  Speaker 2: I can just be patient and wait for what God
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  Speaker 2: is doing.
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  Speaker 1: And like see in partner with him in that. So
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  Speaker 1: you got to walk around with your discernometer on full
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  Speaker 1: tilt to know whether it's time to share or not
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  Speaker 1: be just wait.
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  Speaker 3: Und percent yeahah and that Actually the second thing we
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  Speaker 3: learned was how much we needed training, how much we
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  Speaker 3: needed to you know, we had the zeal, we had
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  Speaker 3: the love. It was confirmed that we absolutely knew this
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  Speaker 3: was what Jesus, this is what the Lord was calling
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  Speaker 3: us to do. But man, we needed someone to teach
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  Speaker 3: us how to do it in a way that wouldn't
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  Speaker 3: hurt the people we were ministering to.
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: Back with Chris and Lacy Ryan, when I say missionaries,
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  Speaker 1: I mean.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Do you feel like missionaries? You mentioned the need Lacey
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  Speaker 1: to get training. Did you do you feel different now
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  Speaker 1: when you say to yourself I'm a missionary than you
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  Speaker 1: did before the training.
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  Speaker 3: Oh. I was gonna say a thousand percent, but honestly
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  Speaker 3: it's more than that.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. Why what comes about through the training that is
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  Speaker 1: so I guess defining for your.
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  Speaker 2: Role probably the tripping away of self simple.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, whenever I think whenever we went to
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  Speaker 3: our first field, we brought way too much of who
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  Speaker 3: we were. We brought way way too much of what
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  Speaker 3: presuppositions and just you know, oh you need this. I'm
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  Speaker 3: coming to give you something that you know you need,
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  Speaker 3: which is true in a sense. But we learned that
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  Speaker 3: you know, we're we're just like Chris said earlier, we're
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  Speaker 3: just the vessels for what the Lord is doing.
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  Speaker 1: I heard someone once say that that the essence of
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  Speaker 1: sharing the gospel, and whether that's just a couple of
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  Speaker 1: people here in America or doing what you're doing overseas,
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  Speaker 1: that the real boiled down, distilled version is one beggar
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  Speaker 1: showing another beggar where they found bread. That's good.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's very good. Yeah, So that that resonates especially
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  Speaker 2: and this is related to that. But you what what
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  Speaker 2: you find in especially in a cross cultural situation, is
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  Speaker 2: way before people respond to the Gospel, they respond to you.
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  Speaker 2: And so like that that was what was and this
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  Speaker 2: is what Lacy was touching on when she was talking
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  Speaker 2: about what we took away.
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  Speaker 1: From the training.
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  Speaker 2: But it was like, I want people to re spot
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  Speaker 2: on the gospel. I don't want to come with like
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  Speaker 2: things about me from my culture that I like that
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  Speaker 2: are important, but those are the things that the people
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  Speaker 2: are going to see first and here first, and I
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  Speaker 2: don't want that to take away from the actual message
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  Speaker 2: that I want to bring them.
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  Speaker 1: So you've had a couple missions experiences, trips, stays, training,
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  Speaker 1: and now in my mind, just you guys know me
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  Speaker 1: just well enough to know that this is entirely possible.
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  Speaker 1: I'm thinking dart board with the world. We close our
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  Speaker 1: eyes and we throw a dart How'd you end up with?
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  Speaker 1: Czech Republic?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: So one of the things about our previous time, in
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  Speaker 2: our first long term stay was even though it was
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  Speaker 2: really difficult, we realized that, like, that's what we wanted
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  Speaker 2: to work in. Like we felt called to difficult, complex areas,
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  Speaker 2: and when we had opportunity to go visit the Czech Republic,
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  Speaker 2: we realized that, like, wow, this is one of those places.
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  Speaker 2: And but it's even what makes it even more unique
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  Speaker 2: is it's sort of like an overlooked hard place because
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  Speaker 2: students of history and theology will be very familiar with
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  Speaker 2: people like Yan Who's and the Moravian Brotherhood. Those are
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  Speaker 2: all Who's was a precursor to the Reformation. The Moravian
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  Speaker 2: Brotherhood is the precursor to like the modern Mission's movement.
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  Speaker 2: Those are all guys from the Czech Republic. This is
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  Speaker 2: a place where like Christianity used to thrive and now
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  Speaker 2: it's less than half a percent Christian. Wow, which when
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  Speaker 2: you look at the world, that ranks it in some
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  Speaker 2: of the most There's a lot of debate in the
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  Speaker 2: missions war about what unreached means. But like, if we're
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  Speaker 2: talking about people who just don't know the Lord, that's
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  Speaker 2: pretty unreached.
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  Speaker 1: If he asked me, well, I was just gonna ask,
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  Speaker 1: is it half a percent Christian? And the majority is blank?
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  Speaker 1: Or is it blank as in they don't have them? Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: they're secularists, they're humanists.
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  Speaker 3: It's like five like less than five percent has any
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  Speaker 3: kind of believe anything at all. And then so ninety
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  Speaker 3: five percent of the country is atheistic.
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  Speaker 1: Really, that is hard to get my mind around. So
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  Speaker 1: how do you even begin that process? Because I mean,
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  Speaker 1: you're going, this is where you're going, and we're going
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  Speaker 1: to tie into that a little bit more in a moment.
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  Speaker 1: But where does that mission start? Well, part of.
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  Speaker 2: It is I mentioned their history. I want like people
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  Speaker 2: there will see that, Like it's not that I'm even
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  Speaker 2: bringing something new to you, this is something that is
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  Speaker 2: part of your Like I am a Christian today because
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  Speaker 2: of the Zech Republic in a lot of ways, like
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  Speaker 2: because of work that God started there. And so I'm
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  Speaker 2: not even bringing you something you haven't heard before, it's
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  Speaker 2: just something you've forgotten. Like this is woven into who
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  Speaker 2: you are as people that the motto of the Czech
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  Speaker 2: Republic is truth prevails, which is really interesting because they
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  Speaker 2: are living in a place of you know, post truth.
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  Speaker 2: But so I just want to help you rediscover, not
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  Speaker 2: even bring in something brand.
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  Speaker 3: New and on an individual basis, it starts with just
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  Speaker 3: earning trust and going over there and learning from them.
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  Speaker 3: You know, this is a long term thing. It's not
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  Speaker 3: just we're just going to go over.
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  Speaker 1: And this isn't a three months six month.
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  Speaker 3: Mission, you now, Yeah, this will take indefinite years of
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  Speaker 3: building trust with individuals and showing them that we're not
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  Speaker 3: there to just you know, bring them something and leave.
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  Speaker 3: We're there to love them, just like Jesus would.
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  Speaker 1: I would imagine that part of I mean, I'm not
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  Speaker 1: trying to pat you guys on the back, but the
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  Speaker 1: fact of the matter is anyone that does this is
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  Speaker 1: making a remarkable personal sacrifice. You are leaving your families
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  Speaker 1: and what you know to go and love these people
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  Speaker 1: that you do not know. I would imagine that is
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  Speaker 1: part of the entry point is for them to see that.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good way to put it, because people
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: when people understand that, they do see just how much
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  Speaker 2: it's authentic.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. I warned him before we ever started. I said,
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  Speaker 1: it's going to be scary and frightening. How fast the
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  Speaker 1: time is going to go by? And here we are
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: the final second. You're heading to the Czech Republic if
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: all things go the way that you want them to go.
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: And you were just saying the visas are approved, and
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  Speaker 1: that's a miracle in and of itself, the speed of that.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, they'd say two three months, maybe longer, and it
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: was just a day or two past one.
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  Speaker 1: So God wants you in the Czech Republic apparently, right,
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  Speaker 1: So explain to people how that functions in your situation.
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: What does that look like going to the Czech Republic.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, So we are actually going to be partnering with
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: a really healthy local church in Prague, which is a rarity. Yeah. Yeah,
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  Speaker 3: And I mean that's a whole miraculous story.
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  Speaker 1: Is it a rarity because there is a church and
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: because it's local, and because it's healthy, all of those
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: things make it rare free together?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, and just the way that it's led and
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  Speaker 3: the discipleship orientation, and I mean they really pursue discipleship,
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  Speaker 3: which is kind of rare in Czech Republic unfortunately. But
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  Speaker 3: so we are actually going to be partnering with them
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  Speaker 3: because they they want to be missional and they have
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  Speaker 3: a lot of young people there that are are hungry
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  Speaker 3: to be really you know, evangelists that that want to
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  Speaker 3: be discipled in a way that hopefully they will become
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  Speaker 3: future church planters.
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  Speaker 1: In my mind, I picture based on kind of what
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  Speaker 1: you were describing, Chris, with the background of that there'd
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: be this remnant of older women with scarves tied around
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  Speaker 1: their chin, right, that are that are make up that church.
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  Speaker 1: And when you say there are young people there that
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  Speaker 1: that really excites me.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. People familiar with Prague will know that Charles University
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  Speaker 2: in Prague is one of the oldest, like continuously functioning
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: universities in the world. So not only do all of
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: Check people from all of Check come to Prague for
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: that school, but people from the throughout the world go
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  Speaker 2: to Prague for that school. Okay, so you actually have
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  Speaker 2: this group of people sort of like constantly coming in
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: and out of younger people from Czech and throughout the world.
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  Speaker 1: So there are two specific needs that exist right now.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about first the need to get there. What's
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: the finances look like.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, so in order to get there, that's plane tickets,
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  Speaker 3: that's apartment deposits, you know, all the things. We're looking
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: to raise thirty five thousand dollars, okay.
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: And that's you're kind of liquidating your life here on
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: Stateside and it's moving everything that you have with you
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: and the whole nine hours.
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  Speaker 2: We actually own about eight moving boxes of things total
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: right now, so like we don't have anything. That's also
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: partially just establishing a life there because like, yeah, we
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: are basically starting over.
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so you're you're purchasing residents and you're purchasing what
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: you need to function in the chest to public furnitures
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: and different things like that. All right, to give and
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: to help with that, what's the best way for people
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: to do that. The best way to do that is
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: actually really simple. It's give sendg dot com.
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: Slash ryans and that'll bring you to a our like
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: kind of campaign page for that.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: I have posted this of folks on our ex page
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: and I know some of you are like, I don't
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: do Yeah, I don't either, all right, but we have
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: the page and the link is there. I just pulled
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: it up. Give send go dot com slash ryans. You
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: can just write that down friends. I'm posting this on
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: the blog page as well, and this is for just
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: singular donations to help get you over there. Yes, right,
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: then there's the second level of need.
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  Speaker 2: The second level of need is that that amount just
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: gets us there and gets us established in the country.
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: We we then need about six thousand a month as
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: just our how we live, like our regular ministry funds,
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: being able to buy food, all of that stuff, like
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: our yearly salary for the both of us, and that
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: is like a recurring need that we would need, you know,
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: and are.
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: You right now on support?
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: My last update was that we're at about forty seven
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: hundred a month, So we're about thirteen hundred a month
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: below what we need to be at to just to
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: function indefinitely.
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: So roughly speaking, you're about two thirds there, yeah, yeah, okay,
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: just about eighty percent.
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: So if we had thirteen people listening right now and
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: they wanted to give one hundred dollars a month to
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: support it, you're done.
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: I buy plane tickets.
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: Now we might not get all the stuff over there,
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: but I'll buy the plane guys there. And we've got
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: a link for that as well. But that process is
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: a little bit more because it is a we're hoping
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: for months commitments. I mean, you're not going to turn
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: anybody away that wants to help give anything towards that.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: But what really, and I know this from our previous
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: efforts here on the show, what makes a difference is
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: a monthly commitment of whether it's twenty dollars or fifty
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: dollars or one hundred, whatever it is. And so that
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: is through the Clearinghouse. Yes, real quickly, what's that about.
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: So yeah, we are missionaries sent out by our sending church,
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: Red Hills, but we are also a partner with the Clearinghouse.
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: And essentially what they do is they handle all of
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: the finances for missionaries. You get set up with them,
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: they handle everything you need, any forms you might need
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: for governments, for visas, all of that. When people when
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: you give to them, it's tax deductible, all of those things.
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: But they're essentially they help missionaries get to the field
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: by taking care of the finances for them.
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: Folks have got a link to that as well on
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: the X page, and I will have that on the
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: blog page as well. We're going to get updates m HM,
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: and we're going to believe that God's going to meet
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: these needs quickly. Absolutely, Thanks so much for what you're
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: doing and what you're going to do. It's you know,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: and folks that listen know my heart on this. I
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: never ask people to give to what I don't support,
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: and so friends, I'm saying this to you not because
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: hey me, I'm saying it because I want you to
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: know that my wife and I have sown money into
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: Chris and Lacy for a number of years. We will
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: continue to do that and I'm asking you to join
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: us in that effort. So I'm better for knowing you,
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: and I'm grateful for what you're doing. Thank you, Thank
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: you all right, Chris and Lacy, Ryan, and again more
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: on the blog page. The links are on the X
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: page right now. Time for news, It's the morning Share
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: with Preston Scott