"No Pain No Gain"

0:00 Hey, this is Jimmy and Annette and of course, Mr. Chevy is with us today. He's always got to be with us and I actually said that loudly. He popped his head up and was like, what? You talking to me? He wants to talk. I know he wants to talk. Chevy, do you have something to say over there, buddy? He's looking around like, I know you're talking about me, but I don't know what's going on. So Mr. Chevy's getting a big old haircut tomorrow because he looks like a mop.

0:52 Yeah, when I was in high school, I had a very cool car at a 69 Chevelle Supersport. Rub it in. I had a station wagon. I had to get that in there. I'm 16 driving a full-size station wagon. My parents hated me. My dad tried to kill me because at 14, he bought me a 69 Chevelle. Well, he really was trying to kill you. Mine at least were trying to keep me safe, I think. You were in a tank. I was in a tank. That was a small island actually, that big station wagon. It was unbelievable. It was ugly. Anyway, all that to say, all that stunning dialogue there to say, he looks like I used to wash my own car back in the day when people actually wash their own cars. Which we haven't done in forever because we keep getting rain. Which is good. We needed the rain. But back in the day, you know, you'd wash your own car, but you had those wash mitts and they're like a big fluffy furry white. That's what you're saying Chevy. That's what he looks like. I've been tempted to use him. He looks like a mop that I used to use when I would mop my floors. Oh, he's funny. Why'd he jump down? What's he doing? I don't know. Chevy, where are you going, buddy? We got a show to do. Come on. He's pouting because we called him a mop. Oh, sorry. He's getting his hair cut tomorrow, right? I know. Yeah. Bright and early. He's going to look like a poodle again instead of a mop. So, how are you, Miss Annette? I'm doing great. It's been a quiet day. We needed a quiet day. So, what do we do on Monday?

2:20 Mondays are our Sabbath day and we rest. We do what we want to do, which is fun. We don't work, which actually work is fun to me. Right. Me too. I love what I do. I always do a little bit, but you don't. You're not supposed to. But I enjoy my Mondays. Yeah. This one was very peaceful today. We went to the gym. That's one of the things we love to do. We met in a gym. Met in a gym. So, we have to go to the gym on a Monday. After 30 years of while, we still meet in a gym. A couple of times a week, three times, hopefully. That's what we try to do. But yeah, we went to the gym today and it's been kind of weird because it's been overcast, then sunny, then overcast. Storm clouds everywhere. All around us. But they miss us. It's the strangest thing. It goes all around us. Yeah. I'm looking at it right now. We'll get a little bit of sprinkle and then that's it. Yeah. And then we'll get these warnings and calamities coming. Take cover, but there's nothing in our yard.

3:20 Yeah. Anyway, it's overcast now. It's beautiful. But anyway, we went to the gym. Really relaxing. TV does not go on. How are we doing? How many weeks are we into this now? You came back from Pink Impact, from Dallas. And you said, let's talk. And I've purged ever since. We have purged ever since. It's more of a purge for you. I could take it or leave it. But yeah. Right. But it's been wonderful. I've totally enjoyed not turning the TV on. Unless we want to watch a movie that we'll find on PureFlix. Right. We love that. Sometimes Amazon Prime will have a great movie that we are interested in. But for the most part, the TV does not go on. You said, was it last night or today, that you just said out of nowhere, our house is so peaceful.

4:07 Yes. I did. It was probably last night and this morning. Yeah. Because it is. I'm loving this. I'm loving this simplifying. I'm loving this dialing things back, not having on. And I did really good on my phone today. I mean, I'm a phone guy. I saw you on the phone a little bit with Adam. With Adam Curry. He's the only one that you will talk to. We're bromance. We've got to talk every day. That's just the way it is. Sorry. Don't get jealous. He just asked me if we were doing our show this afternoon. He goes, hey, I'm looking. Is the show going to happen? I know. People have been asking me, when are you recording? That's crazy. Later. We've had some really, just a lot of encouragement lately. I mean, one of the things that at church on Sunday, people were talking to us about the show. Sometimes we wonder if anybody is even listening. Does anybody really care? Is this really happening?

5:00 Because you've never really talked about it in church that we're doing this. Not as much as I should because I need to get the word out and get our folks listening. Jennifer Marshall came up to me and she said, I love your show. I love your point of view. It made me so happy because sometimes I think, does it even matter what I have to say? I don't know Jennifer that well, but she's just got this God presence on her. There is a light shining bright through her. She's got this smile and this light about her. When you go through tough things, which she's going through a lot of, she's got a lot of challenges in her life right now. One of her family members is getting married, so she's involved in that. There's some other things going on.

5:44 Yet, I could see this bright light all over her. I saw her walk up to you on Sunday after church and I was like, wow. Just like shining. I know. Yet, she was going through some stuff, which we all do. We're all going through something. I've been talking about this in our church. There's no perfect people allowed. The whole point of it is we're all Mr. and Ms. Dumpty. You're so funny having the church. Dumpty, Dumpty sat on a wall. Come on. You've got a great fall. You have the whole church. Go through the... They're getting better at it actually. They're really getting into the groove. It's funny. I usually have to do two starts on it. So are you going to do that every week? Every week during this series. The whole point is this. We're all Humpty Dumpty. All of us. We've all fallen off the wall. Nobody can put us back together but God.

6:25 Only God. That's what we say. When we get to the end of the little thing, I say all the King's Orphans are like, couldn't put Humpty together again. I say, but God can. That's really the whole point. That's the whole message. It's really the whole point of what we're doing here with a podcast. It's called Living Up in a Down World. Our goal, our heart, first of all, we want to live that way. It's a target. It's a goal. But you have to be intentional about that. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. I don't know that people can understand that, that it takes intentionality to do that. Because if you allow yourself to get wrapped up in the news and the things that are going on, where they can just overwhelm you.

7:06 Urge yourself. Oh, I mean it can be tough. Run away. Run away. You have to be intentional. Quit watching the news and start listening to the No Agenda podcast with Adam Curry and John Dvorak. They unpack, they call it media assassination. They deconstruct the media and the news. They've really helped us understand that everything is fake out there. Right. Yeah. Well, Adam's background, of course, he was on MTV back in the day, I think about nine or ten years. And being in that world, he just saw the fallacy of it all. It's just fake. It's posturing. And so he came away from that, not bitter, which is awesome. And a lot of people do come away bitter. I had a dear friend in Nashville who was on tour for ten years, lived in a tour bus from the age of 19 to 29.

7:52 And he came away bitter. I mean, bitter and broken. And he's doing well now, but I remember meeting with him and walking through some tough stuff with him. I'm not going to name his name, but he's a lead guitar player. OK, I don't say. But I'm not going to say who he is. I know who you're talking about. Yeah, you know who I'm talking about. But anyway, he came away very disillusioned from that whole celebrity life. He seems to be doing very well now. No, I'm very proud of him and super cool. He's got a level head. He's growing up. You know, he's getting older and kids are growing up and his wife. And so, yeah. But anyway, that whole idea that just you can't really believe what you're seeing, especially on those main news media outlets and they're tearing people up. I call it getting spun up, spinning people up.

8:34 And, you know, we're obviously not putting our head in the sand. We're actually looking at headlines. You know, we're just not going. We're not letting it overtake our lives. Exactly. But when I heard that the border was opened up, it literally began to bring fear inside me. And I was like, OK, no, no, I'm not going to live in fear. There's always something going on in this world and around us. And I can just sit there and dwell on it or I can say, you know what? No, that's how fear can grip you and paralyze you. And I just refuse to walk in fear over this.

9:14 We choose faith over fear that we're going to trust God no matter how things look. And even if bad things do happen, you still trust God. Because God's about the biggest picture, the bigger picture, the bigger story. And so you just you know Igbok, right? You know what Igbok means, right? It's going to be OK. I got that amazing piece of information off of a coffee mug at Puckett's Cafe, Puckett's in Franklin, Tennessee. Oh, which we get to go to in two weeks. Oh, yeah. Bring that up. I didn't even put that on the show notes. Yeah, we're going to Nashville. What are we going to do in Nashville? The K-Love Awards. K-Love Fan Awards. Fan Awards, excuse me. Because we're all super fans of Christian music.

9:55 Oh, my goodness. So many artists. We get to have private concerts just there in a in a. I don't know how big the room is at the Gaylord, but it's going to be at the Opera Land Gaylord, which is a really fun, almost Disneyland experience. We've been there before. We used to live there. And putting money aside and taking care of this trip for one year. We had one of our church members, Christy Klocker, last year when she came back. She said you have to go. And she knows how much we love Christian music. Yes. Well, you're a guitar player. Right. I'm a total Christian music nerd. And I mean, I love my rock and roll, but I just can't hardly listen to it anymore.

10:38 And that's not a weird thing for me. It's just I can appreciate talent. But if I want I want music that's going to lift my spirit, it's going to move. Yes, definitely. I tried to listen to some rock while we were I was listening to Extreme Rise, you know, Betancourt's got like the solo of the century right now. I have no idea what you're talking about. He's the new Eddie Van Halen. And I had to check it out. And it was cool. It's pretty amazing. But when it was over, I got to go back. I'm going to listen to Mercy Me because I love those guys. Oh, gosh. After going to that concert. But yeah, so appreciate it. And they're going to be there. They'll be at the K-Love Awards doing a collaboration with somebody during the show. So there'll be a red carpet event where if we get to I almost said we have to we get to dress up.

11:21 They said dress up as much as you want or as little as you want. Are you serious? Why am I taking a suit? I told you you're not listening to me. Yeah, I told you a lot going on. Well, I said, listen to me. Look at me. See, this is the problem. People love it when you scold me because it's all every man in America to me. You can I said, wear your suit. Right. But don't wear a tie. Just leave your shirt open that way with you. Yeah. Or you can wear your nice slacks. We bought you in a jacket. Yeah. But you don't have to fully dress up. I know what I'm wearing. It was like a big. Well, you're surprised. I want you to dress for an award show. I see opposite of what we're going to dress when we go to the mini concert.

12:04 Yeah, just normal. Those are going to be casual. Well, I'm looking forward to it. So, yeah, we'll get to catch up with Michael and Daniel and Robby and all the guys from Mercy Me. That's going to be fun. Your new bro. Romance. Other bromance. We've got a text chain going. It's insane with Michael and the guys with the bass player. Do y'all sleep? You're always talking to them. I know. I know. It's fun. It's fun. I just I just love music and so appreciate it. And music to me is such a gift and it got me. I would say it's cheaper than therapy, but as many guitars as I have it. No, no, no, I'm looking around. But you know what? I said no. I you actually decided I'm done.

12:44 Decided you're not going to buy one. And yet two days ago, you said I need money to buy a guitar. You were like, can I let me have the credit card? I decided not to pull the trigger. I don't. I'm shocked. This is I'm good. Maybe you're growing up. No, no, no, no, that's no, no, that's against that. Oh, OK. OK. No, I'm good. I so what I do to help me keep me from buying guitars is I just rebuild them all. I just put different next sounds a lot more fun than buying new ones. It's pretty fun getting a new guitar. I'm not going to lie, but but I'm going to break that. I don't want to think I got to have another one. What pastor whose job is pastoring not playing the guitar when you play the guitar at the church, it's volunteer and it's just a couple of hours on Sunday.

13:33 Why would you need 12 guitars like you have? I don't I don't get that. You so don't understand. I don't understand. I said but this is what I said. If you want to buy a guitar, fine, but get rid of the guitars. You just hardly ever play actually play every one that you're OK. People are going to think you don't really have a job. If this is all you do is play your guitar therapy. It is your therapy. We're going to K level words. It's going to be amazing redirecting here. Wow. I'm a pro at it. OK. So pastors learn to do that. We learn to redirect masters of it. So redirect to combo. But anyway, we're going to do that and it's going to be a great trip. And we're going to see Mark and Alicia.

14:13 We're so proud of them. They're doing so great. And we did get Sam what we got a week and a half ago at the wedding. And so it was so fun having them here with us. But we get to go get to hang out with them a little bit. And then we're going to do the whole K love thing and do the opera land gaylord thing, which is fun. Really a lot of fun and lots of music. That's what I'm pumped about. Lots of worship to which I'm a I'm a worship music nerd for sure. I love it. It'll be fun. Yeah. I believe I always say that the Lord used ACDC to train me for work. I grew up, I cut all my chops on early rock, classic rock now, but ACDC, Bad Company and all those bands.

14:56 Pat Benatar, our our opening is an ACDC type of a ripoff. Yeah. So Jeff Smith, who I so appreciate, he's he's a session music musician. You can meet him when I'm hoping I'm going to see if he's even going to be he may not even be there. But you know, when you live in Nashville, you never go to anything. You might can contact. I'm going to reach out to him to see if he's going to be around. But Jeff is such a neat guy. But he did the opening. So the music that you're hearing and when they asked me, I saw an atom about it, we were brainstorming. Adam goes, what do you want the vibe to be? You said you want the sound. I said, oh, that's easy. ACDC. And you just came up with that right off the top of your head. You didn't even have to think about it.

15:37 Literally didn't have to think about it. I just want it to be jamming. I wanted some guitars. And so Jeff put that track together. Such a blessing. And yeah, I hope to get to connect with him. And again, back to the heart of music and why we love. And so we're going to this. And so, yeah, we're going to be just enjoying it. I mean, it's the whole point really is to just enjoy being around a bunch of people who love God and love music. That week, we won't be able to do our podcast till later in the week because we will be out of town. Yeah, you're right. We may have a. We'll be able to do it next week, but the following week, we'll have to put it off a couple of days. We'll be able to do a little bit. What? Take this with you on the plane? No, I cannot take my task. No, there's no way. It's too big.

16:18 It's a big roadie makes a new a new small. Oh, no. Now you want something else. No more. We're good. We're good. But it's one you could take. It's very small. So, hey, we could do one on our phone like it's the total in the raw. Really? That would be really rough. It sure would. That's a bad idea. No, I forget that I'm mixing. I'm going to give you some tips of what to do. Yeah. I don't know. So let's talk just for a moment. I think this is kind of cool. We found a new show. Now that we've purged ourselves from from just regular TV and just kind of mindless TV, we always used to say I'm vegging, you know, but really just mindless, not totally mindless because we're also taking in things.

17:01 But so we we got pure flicks, which we'd checked out a couple of years, three years ago. And it was kind of cheesy. There was a lot of cheesy. There was. And I was like, we tried to watch it. We're like, this isn't quite. But the level, the game has changed. I think The Chosen has really helped raise the bar. And now, of course, Jesus Revolution really raised the bar. So I think we're going to see we're seeing a lot more good things come along, come along and production values a lot higher. So this show that we've been watching, it was a series, there's only six episodes or five. It's called Going Home. That has been a little bit about that. So powerful. OK, I'll talk. I'll say it. So the premise of it is and why it's so I'll just tell you why it's so near and dear to me.

17:43 It's about a nurse who who's kind of the head nurse. And it's a palliative care unit or home called Sunset House. And what they do, it's a hospice. Exactly. And so each week there was a story around one or two of the residents, you know, who people who were brought in for hospice, a football player who is who is liver was fried from too much ibuprofen and drugs to take care of the pain of an injury. And then and then a young person who had, you know, an incurable disease. And so every week there was a different but it also talks. It's a story of her engagement of the nurse.

18:25 And her calling, she believed it was a calling to help escort people over the line into heaven. And there's just a lot of wisdom in this show. But if you if you ever want something really life giving to watch, then also is just loaded with great truths. It is. It's a great. It's called Going Home. And I highly recommend it. And, you know, Pure Flix is like I said, they're coming up. I mean, they're really raising the bar on it. And so they'll do a new season in the fall, believe we read and looking forward to that. There was a line that came out of it. I brought all that up just to say this. And it just really, really stuck with me so much. So I wrote it down, which I never do. Watching, watching stuff.

19:06 And it's this live life is not lived in a straight line. That's profound. It is. It's very powerful. And I heard that. I just thought that is the truth. Sometimes we have these ideals or an idealistic attitude that that there's going to be a day where things get easy. There's going to be a day where I'm going to hit a plateau. All smooths out from here on out. And no, you know, like a roller coaster, isn't it? Yeah, definitely not a straight line. Right. See, I think of the movie What Father of the Bride is that the where she's where the grandmother says life is a roller coaster.

19:47 Yes. Yes. I'll never forget that as long as I live. And then she said, I like roller coasters. I like roller coasters. I mean, and it was in the midst of chaos that her son, who was Steve Martin and his wife were fighting. They were arguing and it was profound. And then they just looked at her and they just I mean, it was first. He thought it was dumb until it dawned on him. She was right. Life, it doesn't ever get that smooth. Not that you don't have moments of respite and peace. You can have peace in the midst of the storm. You can live up in a down world. You can't. That doesn't mean it's always easy and it doesn't mean that it doesn't take work on an ongoing basis.

20:30 It's just something that it's it's it's when when the roller coaster ride comes and it's hard to bear, you just don't let it take you out. You live above that. And that's what we've had to learn in our life. It took us a long time to get there, though. Yeah. Call it living above the fray. The fray is the noise and the clamor and the den of noise of this world. And but living above the fray is that rising above that. Not that you're superior. It's not even that's not even the idea. The idea is that the world can have its it's like walking away from a fight. You know, when I was a young person, I had to walk away from a few fights. I got in a few fights.

21:11 I just don't get that. I never got into any. But sometimes you got to live above the fray, get above it and say, you know what? I'm not going to lower myself and participate. And so living above the fray is finding peace in the midst of the storm. Right. Because life is not lived in a straight line. No, it's not. It's not. So I want to encourage you as you're listening. First of all, I want to say thank you for listening. We're Jimmy and Annette and we are living up in a down world. That's the name of our podcast. The name of the podcast is very intentional and it's it's our hope for you that you'll be able to find peace and find joy in the midst of a world that seems to be losing its mind. And that's why we're here. So we want to encourage you and and help you in any way we can.

21:55 Another thing I want to talk about, which was kind of just a neat thing this week, this last week, it was a lot of road time. It was a lot of travel. We got to go to Austin twice. Well, you did. I went only went once. And that's kind of it's not I mean, it's like an hour and 30 minutes, hour and 40. But, you know, each way. And so we went midweek. I had this really cool opportunity that came along. Actually, in 2019, I was I received a call from from the Capitol building from the Senate side of the Capitol saying, hey, I'm so and so I'm with the Senate. And and you've been recommended to come and pray.

22:37 Would you be interested in coming to pray to open up one of our sessions? And I'm like, let me check. And why didn't you ask who recommended you at that time? I didn't think about I didn't even know you had to be. I did. It just came out of nowhere. So I didn't even know anything. Didn't know the rules or there was protocols. So we went and we did that in 2019. And it was a wonderful experience. Do you remember that? It was a great experience. We were met with just so much. So many gracious people. Yes. Senators. Was it Dan Patrick? He's the one who came up to you after our lieutenant governor. Your prayer was so profound and so needed.

23:18 You said all the right things that they needed for that session. Obviously, you didn't know what it was about. Right. Yeah. So it was a really cool thing. You trying to get Chevy to jump up in your lap is acting weird. I don't know what's wrong with them. Anyway, keep going. You'll tend to Chevy. So we got called back again and we went and we went early that night because it's the next morning. So we stayed the night and we get to the hotel and oh man, we're both excited. First, we go shopping. Oh, yeah. And we buy you a new suit. So you can you did because you needed. You're getting a little on the girth side. Yeah, a little wheel.

23:59 What do they call that? No tires. What they call that's what they call. That's how I feel right now. Their tire. But anyway, so we had to buy you a new suit. Couple of them. And so we got you a couple of suits and some pants and tie and the whole works. We get back to the hotel. We get so excited. And I realize you left my clothes at home on the dresser. Yeah. No, no, no. I know. I see a look on your face. I didn't say anything. Actually, you went you actually padded the garment bag to see if there was anything in it. There's two hangers and two dresses in there. So so it you just went, oh, this is empty.

24:43 I thought it was empty because normally we got home. I looked at it. You could see the dresses. You have 15 garments. You even said, do you want this one or this garment bag? And you said, oh, this one, because you're you're going light this week. So you already forgot your mind was somewhere else. You really feel so I didn't get to go. I had to stay in the hotel room because I had no clothes. Get out and go shopping again. Yes. No, and I did not want to go in for the night in downtown Austin. So yeah. So yeah, you just said, hey, you go. I'll chill. I'll rest. And so I thank God, Adam recorded it so I could hear it. That's cool. I wish I could have uploaded the sound. You have but you didn't think about it.

25:23 I may do that for next week. So anyway, it was good. You have to pre-write your prayer and you have to submit it and I get it. I can't imagine pastors. I mean, I know that they'll pre-write it and get it approved. But how many of them actually take liberties is what I'm worried about. And I know you would call that pray preaching, pray preaching. Oh, I can I can just imagine how many go off pastors that go off script. I don't do that. Which is why they called you back, I think. I want to always be honorable of what they're asking. And I believe that that God hears all of our prayers and that even if I'm not saying it exactly like I would at church per se in an environment and context that is blatantly Christian, I still think I can be completely anointed in the moment. Exactly.

26:13 And and so it worked out great. It was beautiful. Again, I was met with so many gracious senators, both male and female, who stopped by because you know that you sit right under the lieutenant governor's stand. He sits in like a tower. It's this massive, huge piece of furniture. He's really up towering above everybody. And so you sit right below that. And I sat with a couple of runners who they they run all the legislation, the paperwork. They're all over the place. And I sat with them and they were both just delightful young people. And I asked them why they couldn't wear tennis shoes. My goodness. You guys should be wearing tennis shoes. We had a great conversation. Of course, they love Fredericksburg.

26:54 And so we talked about Fredericksburg. Everybody loves Fredericksburg. But it's a great experience. And senator after senator stopped. And because I'm the designated prayer, you know, and every one of them, not all of them, but most of them came over and shook my hand and said, so glad you're here. Welcome to the Senate floor. And just what I what I realized, and I learned this a long time ago in politics, whether you're on the House side or the Senate side, outside of chambers, they're there. The gloves come off. These guys go out and have a beer together and go hang out and spend time together inside. The gloves go on. The cameras are rolling. Photo op moments happen. And I call it optics are happening all over the place.

27:39 So much is theater, so much is for the cameras and for the six o'clock news. And so I saw that four years ago when you were there and just went, oh, this is like a big show. It literally is like a big show. Right. It is. And a lot of because remember they were doing a major vote last year about no, well, 2019. They were doing this major vote about getting Chick-fil-A into San Antonio International Airport and the city council barred them from coming in because they wouldn't open on Sunday. And presumably, but not stated directly because of their stance on LGBTQ, RST, I.V., whatever, all the different ones. And so they it was a mega debate.

28:25 So we happen to be there right in the middle of fascinating. But one of the representatives, Kyle Biederman, he's not in the House now, but he hung out with us and kind of gave us the back what I call the back door tour, which you get to go places others don't. And that was really cool hanging out with with with our our representative. And he just he looked at us and he goes, you see all this right here? He said, this is all for show. You see, we already know what the he said. Yeah, we already know already know what the votes that just floored me. I just kind of went, what? This is all he said. Let's see all the cameras. There were cameras everywhere. He said, that's what this is for. I went, this is a show.

29:05 We're at the show. That was disappointing, actually. But anyway, so this time there was that education issues going. So they had the gallery filled with children. I saw that I went online. I could see it online. Yeah, it's very interesting. After the fact, very interesting. Anyway, great experience and so appreciative that they had me back and I visited with my liaison and she said, we will definitely have you back. And I said, give me a call just an hour and a half down the road. What an honor. Yeah, I'm thankful. It was humbling. But I'm very grateful that I got to do it. You feel like you're participating in a little piece of history at some level as a minister getting to step into what I feel like is a very important.

29:55 And thank God it hasn't been left out and forgotten. Exactly. It's really amazing to me that in this season of our culture and history that they still open with prayer. I know. It really says a lot. How long do you think that will last? I don't know. I'll be there and I'll do it as long as they'll let me do it because I actually really enjoy doing it. So anyway, that was a sweet time. And then you got to go back on Saturday. I came home for a day and turned right around and I went back on Saturday with Adam Curry. So no agenda. John Dvorak and Adam Curry have had this podcast for 15 years, got 850,000, nearly a million listeners.

30:40 And it's phenomenal. I highly recommend you listen to it, especially to unpack the news and what's really going on right now, but from a conservative standpoint. So he said, hey, you want to go to a meetup? And a meetup is where they just get the word out in a particular area, hey, we're doing a meetup for no agenda. And then all the people that are big. But John Dvorak doesn't show up. It's just Adam. No, no, no. He lives up in Silicon Valley. Do they do meetups up there? They do them all over the place. I don't think John attends many of them. But Adam tries to attend as many as he can. He does a lot of them, yeah. I mean, they just did one in Nashville. Tina Curry did one up in Chicago.

31:20 So yeah, they try to make them. And so I said, man, I would love to go because Tina was coming back from New York City and you were going to drive to San Antonio. Pick her up. Which is a big adventure for you. Right, because I don't want to drive in San Antonio. Proud of you for doing that. So took her out. So I rode over to Austin on a rainy, rainy Saturday. And we had a blast. I mean, it was such a neat thing. There were probably 40 to 50 in attendance. And it's just a social. I mean, people are eating and enjoying beverages and just hanging out and talking about what we all have in common, which in that context, it was in the No Agenda show. But what I found out, which I didn't really expect, it was a very pleasant surprise, even though Adam and Tina said, hey, you're going to have some fans there.

32:06 And I'm like, fans? Fans? Do we have fans? Chevy's our fan. He's our number one. But anyway, so sure enough, it didn't take long. After being there, people started coming over and talking to me saying, yeah, yeah, we've listened to your podcast and we love living up in a down world. And I was like, wow. And then people say, hey, can we take a picture with you? I'm like, wow. Seriously? So me? Moi? Sure, you know, I don't want to break the camera. But anyway, we had, it turned into about three hours of delightful and life-giving conversations. That's great. And a pleasant thing happened that I did not expect.

32:47 What? So this is not a Christian gathering, right? These are just people. And it's Austin. So enough said about that. It's Austin. So I didn't know what to expect. And once people found out that I was half of living up in a down world and that I'm a pastor, one after another, all day long, all over those three hours, people were coming to me and talking about their faith life. And most of them were not in a good place. They felt like they've gotten away from their faith. And you were able to share with them. Just able to have conversations. Just turn around. He's right there. Yeah, yeah, one really cool conversation, especially that one.

33:28 But I got to talk about leaky buckets and just show up and let Christ leak out of you. And we just go everywhere. We just go make beautiful messes. That's the whole point. It was so cool to see Adam and his environment as well with his people. And it was hard getting away because, man, people want to talk. And we were all talking. So we finally pulled ourselves away, walking to the car. And I said, bro, that's your church. He goes, yeah, those are my people. I said, that's your church. You're like a pastor. We kind of do the same thing just on two different levels. But anyway, a beautiful time. I really appreciate Adam inviting me to go along.

34:08 And gosh, I definitely want to go back at some point and experience that. He wants us all four to go to meet up. Oh, absolutely. That's coming up soon. I don't know. They do them once a month in Austin. Oh, they do? Yeah, Scott over there heads all those up. He coordinates them. It's just a great experience. So yeah, it was one of those weeks of just some really out-of-the-box experiences. It wasn't a typical week by any means. No, not at all. I was in the office, out of the office, all over the place. And I loved every second of it. But boy, I was tired. Man, I'm still feeling it. This morning was hard to get up, I think. It was. For both of us. I usually get up at 6, whether I set my alarm or not.

34:50 And boy, this morning I slept in 710. I know. I know. I feel like the day was half gone when I got up. It was. Oh, no, I've overslept. The sun's coming up. No, your body needs to rest. Definitely needs to rest. I was proud of you, Miss Annette, through it. Because you drove by yourself to San Antonio. I almost canceled and said, Tina, you might have to get an Uber. But only because I thought it was going to be storming. Because we had all these warnings. Oh, my goodness. It's dark again outside right now. It is. But the weather turned out beautiful and I was able to drive. It was an easy drive.

35:31 It's really interesting when we drive. Because when I'm driving with you and you're driving, all the crazies are out. And they're driving slow and you're trying to go around them and you're saying things that you have to repent for. Oh, that's a little exaggerated. No, not much. But when I drive, I didn't have any of that. Literally, it was such an easy, calm, peaceful drive. Well, sounds like I'm the common denominator there. I think you are. You did tell the church that that is the one area that you have a hard time with. Definitely. I have my fully human moments. I'm glad there's not a gun on, what do you call it?

36:13 On the hood of my car. With a trigger on the steering wheel. It would be carnage all over the road. Farmer Joe is always in front of you. I'm certain God puts him there on purpose. To do what? To calm you down. Yes, and someday it will work. To make you enjoy the journey. You always talk about enjoying the journey. And I'm always like, I just want to get to our destination. And you're like, no, but you've got to enjoy the journey. See, this is why I appreciate Tina Curry. Oh, because she is just like you. We get each other on this. And Adam and I just want to enjoy the journey. Adam, I know you're going to hear this later, but 67 miles an hour, it was killing me.

36:55 Oh my gosh, I would love that. It looked like a tour bus. He was in no hurry. He was living up in a down world. He had no agenda. I didn't have a break on my side, but I sure wish I had a gas pedal. It would not have bothered me at all. But we got there safe and sound, and I'm so proud of you going to get Tina. That's kind of a win for you. For people that don't know me. I have a lot of anxiety in really tough traffic. It started happening when we lived in Nashville, which is one of the reasons why I wanted to get away and live in a small town. But it was fine. I did fine.

37:35 I passed the test. I'm really proud of you, Ashley. You did. I'm super proud of you. So we had a request. Meta, Pugh, Meta, Meta. Not Meta, it's Meta. She goes to our church. Wonderful. Our husband, Tom, he's just kind of helping us. Oh, helping us. He's head usher. Running our usher ministry and host ministry. We need him because our church is growing. He's taking it to a new level. We're packed, and it's just sometimes hard to get people in the seats and stuff. He's an amazing guy. Meta wrote in and just said, Hey, would you all talk about grace and forgiveness? I said, Oh, we can talk a lot about grace and forgiveness. So we, on Sunday, our worship leader in production, who's head of production, he's an associate pastor, Russ Hearn.

38:21 He just picks the bumper videos. He'll send me a couple and go, Hey, which one you think works? And he always, man, he just, he knows my heart and he knows what I like. And he showed this bumper video of a jar that fell off of the table and cracked open, you know, broke. And then on the screen, all these things start coming up. Divorce, grief, loss, all kinds of things. Addiction. Diagnosis. All kinds of things. And I mean, abandonment, rejection. All these words are flying at you. And you lean over me and say, We've experienced every one of these.

39:03 Of course, I was like, everybody here has experienced every one of these. This is the world that we live in. It is. It's very difficult. I have been starting this series talking about God's love for people because I think in the middle of all the distraction and all the craziness that's going on in the world, whether you're addicted to the news feeds or you're addicted to social media or you're addicted to TV or whatever, we're just taking in so much more information than we were meant to. Our hearts were not created to handle everything that's coming our way. Look at what's happening in the schools and with all the young students that...

39:45 They're overwhelmed. And they're all depressed. Many are on antidepressants. Anxiety and depression. Yes, they have anxiety issues. I don't think I've met a child recently that is not dealing with some kind of issue like that. And a lot of it has to do with what we're filling our minds with. Well, think about it. These things that we hold in our hand, these screens, whether it's a tablet or iPhone or a galaxy or whatever, they have more information coming to them on a moment-by-moment basis than most people knew in a lifetime a hundred years ago. Technology, which can be very helpful, and I'm thankful for so many advances in science, especially in the medical industry, some really neat testimonies there.

40:35 But what's happened is we're overwhelmed with images and articles and propaganda. A lot of it that's even designed to spin us up. And it's creating such chaos in people's lives. And so now we have to come in and say, wait, you forgot something. You forgot how loved you are. You forgot how important you are. You forgot that you are worthwhile. You forgot that Jesus died for you. That's how much he loves you. And so I'm having... I almost feel like I'm starting from behind the line. If you're racing a hundred-meter sprint, but you're ten meters behind the line, you're already at a deficit, right?

41:18 It's going to be hard to win that race. And I feel like so much of what we're doing, other pastors as well, we're having to help people just get to ground zero right now because they're so overwhelmed because life is hard. And the world is coming at you fast. Well, and then if you have issues with unforgiveness because you've been harmed in some way, hurt in some way, rejected, that is a very, very tough issue to get over. And honestly, I don't believe you can do that without Jesus Christ, period. I don't know how anyone... Self-help is a myth. It is.

41:58 I mean, you go into Barnes & Noble and you see the section titled self-help is massive. It's one of the biggest sections in the whole store because everybody's trying to say, well, it's four keys to this and it's five steps to this and four or whatever, the ABCs of success in life. And we need someone, not just something, we need someone that's bigger than all of this to take us by the hand and lift us up, lift our feet up out of the miry clay, to use a Bible phrase, lift our feet up out of the miry clay and set us on a rock because we cannot do it ourselves.

42:43 Well, how do you handle when people come to you and say, I'm having a hard time with unforgiveness towards someone, how do you handle that with them? You know, I've even just recently had what I think is a revelation on that. And a revelation means something's been revealed that you didn't know prior. And I even brought it up on Sunday. I used it in terms of grace. So grace and forgiveness go a lot hand in hand. I used this phrase, I said, you know, and I'm going to say this to you listening because you need to hear this, is that until you can forgive yourself and be gracious with yourself, it's almost impossible to forgive others.

43:26 And the only reason why I can forgive myself and have grace towards myself is all I have to do is think about how much grace and forgiveness God through Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit has shown to me. It continues on a constant basis. And so you heard me, I really went there on Sunday on that topic because it's almost like God was showing it to me in real time and I was like, oh my gosh, this is huge. And I just said, you've got to be gracious to yourself. Have some grace for you. We all have fully human moments or as Pastor Robert Morris calls it, we're divinely human. We're both divine.

44:07 We have the God Imago Dei, image of God, and we're human. We have fully human moments. And every person in the Bible had the same. They were the same. They're us. They are just like us. Different culture, different time, but same human dynamics. And so on those days when you just feel like, I know I need to forgive this guy. I know I need to let this go. You need to look in the mirror and start with you. You've got to forgive yourself. You've got to forgive yourself for missing it, for blowing it, for missteps, for mistakes, for bad choices. You cannot live looking in the rear view mirror.

44:48 The kingdom doesn't have a car with a rear view mirror. It only goes forward. And you have to begin to say, I'm going to release myself. And the reason I can forgive myself is because God in Christ has already forgiven me. When I was thinking about this, when I made that comment to you about forgiveness, and I think about, and I've said this before on the show, but I'm going to say it again. When I was having issues with my father and my ex-husband for that matter, but let's just talk about my father growing up in a very abusive home, when I became a Christian, I didn't easily forgive him because I didn't understand the concept of forgiveness.

45:33 But as I grew in my walk with the Lord and matured, I was able to come to a realization that there was something that must have happened to him in his childhood or early adulthood or whatever that caused him to become an abuser and an alcoholic in our life, in his life. And so I had to come to that realization that this wasn't about me. This was about something that happened to him. And I really went from contempt to compassion for him.

46:13 And when you begin, another thing is to me, when you really need to forgive someone, pray for them. When you pray for someone, you can't be in anything but love for that person eventually. Now at first, you're, ah, forgive that person, you know, and you're just, you're kind of mad, okay, I'm going to forgive him. And then he does something else again to you, and you continue. But there's a point in time when it really takes hold. And you can let go and realize you've got to love that person no matter what. It doesn't mean, you can still set boundaries, obviously.

46:54 Of course, absolutely. And you have to. But you can have the love, but it's a love that's different than just, you know, we have a love for people where we want to spend time with people because we love them. But then there's another kind of love that God gives us for all people that don't look like us, they don't act like us, they don't have the same values, but we can still love that person. That's a love that only God can give. No one else can give that. And so that's what I, when I think of forgiving, I think of praying, loving, letting go, let God love through you.

47:36 You can't do it physically and of yourself. You can't. It has to come from the Lord. Love that. So with you on all those points, and we've had to walk this. We have. We'll always have to. Again, life's not lived in a straight line. Exactly. We'll walk that again. Exactly. It would be wonderful if you think, okay, well, I've had, I got offended once and I got over it now, it'll never happen again. No, no, no. No. It's just preparing you for the next level. Exactly. It will be worse next time. And that's not a, I don't want to. And it's like a test. It's not fatalistic. It's not fatalistic. It's not fatalistic. And you have to keep repeating. Exactly. Until you get it right. Well, and then there's other tests. There's higher levels. Exactly. And so, yeah, I actually was talking to a lady on Sunday, precious, precious lady, older lady, and she was talking about having a hard time forgiving someone.

48:19 I mean, after we just talked about it. And I said, you need to forgive them for your sake, not just theirs. I said, unforgiveness is a prison of our own making. Right. And I said, you're trapped in your own prison. And I told her, I said, just because you forgive them doesn't mean that there's not consequences for what they've done. Exactly. There are natural and logical consequences. God always has the last word. And they're, but that's not for you. That's boundaries. Yes. You've got to let them go for you. For her. Because you can't live tethered to that issue, that problem, that person.

49:00 She dwells in it. And then as she's talking about it, she has starts having a visceral reaction. Oh my goodness. Wow. And I said, and I patted her on the shoulder and she said, you need to let them go for your sake. For your sake. And it doesn't condone their behavior. Exactly. And I was clear with that. And I think people don't have a realization of that. They don't have that revelation. I think if I forgive them, that means what they did was okay. That is not true. Never. That ever happened to me in my lifetime that was horrific is okay. But I've let it go. I've released it and given it to the Lord. He judges them. I don't.

49:40 That's right. That's right. I let it go and move on. When we let them go, it's actually releasing us. Exactly. So forgiveness for me is, is, is releasing myself from a prison. That's what unforgiveness is. You bind yourself to them. Right. When you don't forgive, you actually think about them all the time. You see their car. You're repulsed by them. You see their car in a parking lot and you go somewhere else. Right. I've done that before. I've driven up into a parking lot. We've all done that. I was like, no, I'm not, can't handle it. I'm not, I'm not ready for that. Turn around and go out. And then later I'm like, now why did you do that? It's time to grow up.

50:21 Exactly. Let it go. John Eldridge has a great little exercise. He calls it the one minute pause. It's a simple little prayer where he says, you go to Jesus and you say, you say, Lord Jesus, I give everyone and everything to you. I give everyone and everything to you. And I've pulled that into my vocabulary and you know, it's okay to adopt other people's prayers and adopt phrases that work. And so I would encourage you listening, if you're struggling with that or just you're facing things during a given day, go back to the simple phrase, father, I give everyone and everything to you.

51:01 And if you have to say it five times, say it again. I give everyone and everything to you. I release it. I let it go. And you may have to say it again and again. And even if you don't get peace after you say it, just know you have made a declaration that is important and it does change things. The peace will come, it will come eventually. It will. It just takes time. But keep going. Keep stepping down. So when Mayda was asking you about grace, do you know what the context of that was? No, there was no context in that. I think it was in relationship, relational context. For example, you and I, I mean, we have to walk in grace to each other.

51:46 So we got to show ourselves grace. Actually, if I ever flare up with you nine times out of 10, I'm actually mad at myself. I know that I am too. We get ashamed. Why did we go there? Why did we do that? Why did we blow up? But then we blow up on the other person, but we're actually mad at ourselves. Because we're safe with one another. That's true. Absolutely true. We are very safe with each other and we've been together 30 years. We've been through a lot together. So when one of us blows up, it doesn't create massive drama. It usually kind of ends right there. We don't care. It wasn't that way in the early days. No, no. Early on, we had to learn how to fight fair and we had to learn what it meant to have grace for each other and then feel safe.

52:34 And that is powerful. Just learning to be safe with one another and knowing that there's nothing in that, that Jimmy Pruitt can say to Jimmy Pruitt that's going to cause him to leave ever, no matter what. And once you get that, then, but here's the thing. Once you feel that safety, you actually do say things. Sometimes you regret and that'll sometimes escalate things. We have our moments. My gosh, we just do. We're human beings being human. And so there are times, you know, they don't get too volatile like they did in the early days, but still we have moments, you know, we had a moment last night over the guitar.

53:15 Yeah. That's right. Yeah. Cause I was like, Hey, cause I had mentioned to you about, you know, this guitar and you wanted to buy, but it was out of production and they were doing another run on them. And I, and I saw online yesterday that they had, they're going to be releasing them out now. So you asked me for the credit card. I said, so, no, I said it this way. I said, well, just letting you know that guitar is available now. And I said, what did I say? I think you said, you think, wow. He said something about, I don't understand why you need it. I said, go ahead, put it on the card. But I don't understand when you have 12 guitars hanging. So that flipped a switch. It did. And you got a little testy.

53:55 You got testy. I got frustrated because I thought I had a full green light, but then you do. Right. Got it. And I'm saying that my feelings and, and then I, I flared up at you and I felt horrible about it. And then this morning you apologize. Of course we didn't go to bed mad or anything. Not really. I mean, we just don't, I mean, we don't hold things anymore. You know, I was mad at myself last night. I wasn't mad at you. Actually it was mad at me. Well, and if you recall a few weeks ago, I told you there's a guitar through Veritas. Is that what it's called? Yeah. Veritas. And that's what I said is top one. It's the ultimate. It's the Cadillac.

54:36 And I'm like, why don't you hold off and get the ultimate? And you're like, ah, I don't know. I just, I want this one. And I'm like, why? When you can have the ultimate, you can just get rid of five guitars and have the ultimate, but that's not a good guitar. Guitar players don't do that. Right? There's something called gas. All guitar players have gas. Yeah. What is that? It's gas. What do you mean? What is it? Gas. We all have gas. It's guitar or gear acquisition syndrome. Oh my gosh. Is that what that is? It is. So all my guitar friends go, yeah, I got gas really bad here. Oh my God. I have never heard you say that.

55:17 I haven't because you're not a guitar player. No, I'm not. That's spinning. Yeah. There's just something about musicians, you know, and instruments, you know, every instrument's got a different tone, sound, feel, all that. But most, most musicians live on a quest for the right sound and the right feel. They want to bond with the instrument. Aren't most musicians, aren't they in a band or no, I don't know. I have a standing gig every week. Every week. Wow. Maybe the church should buy you. No, they shouldn't buy you a guitar. I played through COVID when paid musicians weren't getting to play. I still had a standing gig every weekend. You did.

55:57 You still had to play. No, it's a love thing. It's a love of the game and the fact that for me, my playing is worship. It's another expression that's outside of my voice. I guess it's like, you don't understand why I need another dress because, you know, I like to buy dresses. But what do I tell you? Go get what you want. And what did I say with the guitar? Get it. I said, just because I don't understand it doesn't mean you can't have it. But you, you chose not to. You changed your mind. And I put a different neck on that. And now it's a brand new guitar again. It's like a new guitar. Oh my gosh. Well, if that's all it takes, I'll just start switching all the necks around.

56:38 Start screwing everything, pulling my guitars apart for me. Yeah. So yeah, but that's part of the dynamic of grace too. Grace is, grace, so grace means this. You're here to identify it as or define, most Christians say it's unmerited favor. You know, you're getting something that you didn't really deserve. And that's, that's an element of grace, but really grace is God's power. It's God's strength. It's God's authority. It's God's favor on your life to do what you cannot in and of yourself do. So when I'm being gracious towards someone, I'm exercising what I don't have in myself.

57:18 It's actually a complete abandonment to say I trust, I trust God's goodness. And so I'm going to be gracious, which means I'm going to, I'm going to act towards you beyond what I normally would. In other words, I might get frustrated or I might hold a grudge or about one to even retaliate. But when you're gracious and you're living a grace laced life, then you actually go above and beyond a completely let things go. You just switch a neck instead of saying, well, I wasn't applying it to that situation. Yeah, yeah, you look for alternatives. Okay. I don't, I'm not going to do that.

57:59 I'm going to take a step back and do something different. That's not going to cost a dime. And and yeah, I'm going to enjoy the guitar and have fun with it. And now we're smiling. And boy, look at those pearly whites you got going on there girl. My teeth hurt. Why do your teeth hurt? This whitening, you know. So Annette did this like, no, we talked about it on the show. The industrial grade whitening. And it's like creating. It's like having toothache on every tooth you have. It's it's been tough. I can see the pain in your face right now. I can see it. It is the process. You look like you're hurting right now.

58:39 Yeah. Mr. Chevy, you doing okay over there? Listen, guys, we love y'all so much. Thank you so much for the comments. Thank you for the yeah, thank you for the comments. Thank you for the notes, the tech, everything. We want to hear from you. Go to our website, livingupinadownworld.com. We want to hear from you. We want you to let us know how you're doing. And if you need help, I mean, in terms of just whatever we can do to help in terms of counsel, encouragement, scripture, we always want to be here for you. We're proud of you in the sense that you're even listening to the show because you're going to learn some things. We feel like we've 30 years of marriage and I'm not even going to say our age because I don't want to hear your story.

59:21 We already do that. Did I? Well, we're getting up there. Just say we've got some miles, some trade wear on our tires. But we love you guys. Have an amazing week on purpose and go out there and live up in a down world.