The Life Challenges Podcast
Modern-day issues from a Biblical perspective.
The Life Challenges Podcast
Recalibrating Faith in a Changing World: CLR’s 42-Year Journey
What happens when scientific advancement outpaces our ethical frameworks? As Christian Life Resources celebrates 42 years of ministry, this compelling discussion explores how a once primarily pro-life organization evolved to address the complex moral questions of our time and prepare for what's ahead.
The conversation takes us from CLR's humble beginnings—marked by a watershed moment when U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop spoke at their 1984 convention—to today's expanded mission addressing everything from surrogate parenting to end-of-life care. National Director Bob Fleischmann candidly shares how the organization matured from focusing solely on fetal development arguments to helping Christians navigate ethical dilemmas through a biblical lens.
Looking forward, three critical frontiers demand our attention: revolutionary procreation technologies including artificial wombs, CRISPR gene editing that blurs the line between healing and enhancement, and artificial intelligence that's reshaping human interaction. These advancements arrive amid deepening social fragmentation, where truth increasingly becomes whatever opinion garners the most likes.
Yet amidst these challenges, CLR maintains unwavering hope grounded in Scripture. The organization is preparing for the future with exciting initiatives: succession planning for leadership transition, a comprehensive "Debunk" series addressing common misconceptions about life issues, an AI-enhanced website launching this fall, and expansion of their New Beginnings - A Home for Mothers and elder care ministries.
Have questions about navigating today's complex ethical landscape from a Christian perspective? Visit lifechallenges.us to explore our resources or contact us directly. Remember, while the challenges change, our foundation remains the same: honoring and glorifying God in all we do.
SHOW NOTES:
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On today's episode. I mean, we're already facing that. Now you know, when you have people who are suspended from sports for using steroids or something like that, you know where they have an unfair advantage. Well, crispr holds the potential of giving you all sorts of advantages.
Paul Snamiska:Welcome to the Life Challenges podcast from Christian Life Resources. From Christian Life Resources. People today face many opportunities and struggles when it comes to issues of life and death, marriage and family, health and science. We're here to bring a fresh biblical perspective to these issues and more. Join us now for Life Challenges.
Christa Potratz:Hi and welcome back. I'm Krista Potratz and I'm here today with Pastors Bob Fleischman and Jeff Samuelson, and this month we are celebrating the anniversary of Christian Life Resources. Bob, what year is it?
Bob Fleischmann:This would be 42.
Christa Potratz:42. Okay, good, all right With anniversaries too. A lot of times we think about things in the past and things that we've achieved over the course of I mean for Christian Life Resources for these 42 years. But we also, too, want to look to the future as well. But thinking about the past first, bob, can you fill us in on maybe just some of the highlights or things that maybe even you and the staff here have been kind of reflecting on this year for the anniversary?
Bob Fleischmann:Perhaps one of the big things that happened is we had the US Surgeon General speak for a convention. I'm trying to remember the year I think it was 1984 that C Evercoop spoke for us. I just remember it was held at Wisconsin Lutheran High School but we had gone in with Marquette University. They were looking to bring him in as a speaker and so we kind of split the plane flight and stuff. We weren't allowed to pay him because he was employed by the government, but it was a high point we felt pretty good about that, Kind of got into a cycle of high-profile speakers, which of course made for big conventions.
Bob Fleischmann:But really the organization took off when we established full-time staffing in 1988, which is why we have full-time staffing. I mean, up until 1988, from 1983 to 88, we were all volunteer and pretty much getting hardly anything done, Because you know, I was a parish pastor in a mission church, the other board members were all full-time employed in different things. We had great ideas and no time to do it, and so when we got the funding to go full-time, well then we started doing things and right now, to be honest, I think we're really acknowledging the anniversary by looking forward. We've got some big plans, what we want to do.
Christa Potratz:Christian Life Resources. I think it is interesting how it did get its I don't know formation really, maybe is I don't know if that's the best word but its start in the pro-life movement. Its start in the pro-life movement. But over the years you've taken on a lot more issues than just the abortion issue too.
Bob Fleischmann:Well, that's part of the reason why I want to mention Coop is when Coop spoke at our convention it was on the heels of the 1982 baby dough situation in Bloomington, indiana, where a child was born with an opening in the esophagus so the child couldn't be fed, couldn't take food without that being repaired. And that could have been repaired. But the family decided the child would not lead a worthy life and decided not to authorize the surgery. So the child was put in the back end of the neonatal care unit and I remember at our convention Coop made the statement. It's a small leap in logic, going from taking life inside of the womb to taking life outside of the womb, and that probably would be a good umbrella statement for how the organization began to expand.
Bob Fleischmann:I took the office of national director on July 1st 1988. I think it was within five days or six days. We had been asked to deal with is some birth control abortifacient? And then the second non-abortion related issue was a church out in California had a woman who wanted to become a surrogate parent and should surrogate parenting be a good thing? Even though she wasn't married, but she wanted to bear a child for someone else. And then I think the third really big issue was Jack Kevorkian and what was going on. And I wasn't aware of it at the time, but the head of communications for Wells was Pastor James Schaefer. We called him Jeb Schaefer and unknown to me that whenever anybody was asking the Synod for what is our position on, and then you fill in the blank, jeb would always say, well, we now have this organization that can answer and I remember we even got a PETA request what is our sinister position on people for the ethical treatment of animals? And that's when I began to realize that something was afoot and then Jeb had told me what he had been doing.
Bob Fleischmann:But there is a common thread that goes from taking life inside of the womb to taking all sorts of life, and that common thread has to do with mankind supplanting God as the authors of their own fate, the authors of their own destiny.
Bob Fleischmann:And that has really, I think, when I look at it from a staff perspective today, when I look to the future, I think that that's the area at least for my time remaining in my office will be to try to keep emphasizing that common thread. We can change the laws, but the laws don't change the hearts. We could protest, but sometimes a picture of an aborted child and all that kind of stuff does have an effect, without a doubt. Sometimes when you see it for the first time, you never realized what was going on. But change, especially God-pleasing change, is only rooted in faith, and faith doesn't happen by flashing up pictures and protesting and changing laws. Faith is the proclamation of the gospel. So I've tried to in the last few years very strongly embrace our mission vision statements of trying to use life and family issues as bridges to talk about Jesus Christ.
Christa Potratz:Yeah, I think it's interesting and a good reminder too, because I think you know, even as I sit down here today, I'm like, okay, like let's talk about the issues. Let's talk about the issues that Christian Life Resources covers. Let's talk about, you know, what we think for the future. But just remembering, like how you're saying, bob, I mean it really goes above the issues, into how we are going to communicate these concepts in a Christian-loving way and what we are ultimately using these and like the bridge building, and they are issues in which you can become far more ideological than you could be theological.
Bob Fleischmann:So, in other words, it's like we're pulling out all the stops to pass this legislation, we're pulling out all the stops to make this statement, to elect this candidate, and those are all good things, and we do personally I mean my wife and I financially support those efforts. If any of you have heard me speak, I've always mentioned to you I do think you should be supporting your local Right to Life affiliate. I think Christians should be getting involved in politics and so forth, but you should never lose sight of how real change takes place and that's a heart ministry. And it pains me when I see even our pastors sometimes sound more ideological than theological. There's a deeper problem than just the fact that a woman wants to take the life of her unborn child. That's systemic of something else going on, and that's where Christians should be, not just the pastor, but all Christians should be, because you all have the gospel and that's what needs to be happening.
Christa Potratz:It is interesting, though, just all of the different topics and things that Christian Life Resources covers too. I know I've told this story before, but just when I first started coming on to CLR and the volunteer role and okay, you know, bob, what should I do? Oh, just, you know, read the website, krista, and I was just blown away by, I mean, christian Life Resources. Well, who would have thought it has a lot of resources? You know about a thousand or so articles that I found when I went on there. That was really my first introduction just to the wide variety of topics that Christian Life Resources covers. And you know now I mean we have this, just all this information, in our podcast too, like the different topics that we've covered over the years. Now, I mean anywhere from like IVF to organ donation, to birth control, family issues. There's just so many different things that Christian Life Resources has touched on, so I guess you know, with some of it, like in looking toward the future now, I mean, what like man, like what other topics are there?
Bob Fleischmann:Well, I do see three main areas that are going to for the remainder of my lifetime, I think are going to really drift front and center For the remainder of my lifetime, I think, in a really drift front and center, and that would be in the area procreation, which is just innovations in how to bring about children. There's progress made on artificial wombs, there's progress made on male birth control. There's progress in that whole area of procreation. I think we're going to see some pretty dramatic changes. Area procreation I think we're going to see some pretty dramatic changes.
Bob Fleischmann:I think CRISPR is going to be another area where we're going to run into some very difficult bioethical issues between the line that's drawn between curative and enhancement. I mean, we're already facing that now. You know when you have people who are suspended from sports for using steroids or something like that, you know where they have an unfair advantage. Well, crispr holds the potential of giving you all sorts of advantages, but I also think there's going to be problems there. And then the third thing that gets a lot of attention on the bioethical journals is the role of artificial intelligence. But those are the three that I think you're going to see come up in many different ways, all three of them. I see very positive things coming from them and very scary things.
Jeff Samelson:Without really predicting particular issues or anything like that. I think just more in terms of trends and what's kind of going to be in the background of everything and complicating everything there. I'd like to be optimistic and say everything's going to be in the background of everything and complicating everything there. I'd like to be optimistic and say everything's going to be getting better, but unfortunately I don't think there's there's too much cause for that kind of optimism. What Christians need to be in an organization like CLR needs to be is prepared for things to get a lot worse in many respects. Just some of the broad trends in terms of like socially, I think that the loneliness and the disconnectedness and the social fragmentation we see now, I think it's just going to get worse. I don't really see signs that it's improving. There are some people, you know people are calling attention to it and doing certain things, but I don't really see a whole lot that's going to bring people together in the way they used to be together, and a lot of that is driven by technology, which is another area that's going to be driving a lot of stuff. And, leaving AI aside, for the moment, what we're seeing in terms of people's interactions with tech is more and more reliance on it for everything, not just to simplify tasks in their lives or to lessen their workload, but also to give them pleasure, especially on social media. You know the way people identify according to their amusements, and you know I'm a gamer, those kinds of things and people will identify. You know it's like I'm an early adopter. You know I'm the kind of person who drives this kind of electric car and things like that.
Jeff Samelson:And politically, which is probably what I pay most attention to, sadly, I think that the partisanship and polarization that we see today is just likely to be getting worse and worse, as people and politicians just kind of dig in and don't really open up anymore to considering the other side.
Jeff Samelson:Or maybe I'm wrong on this or anything. I'm wrong on this or anything. And as far as the pro-life and pro-family movements, I think that's eventually going to cause a reckoning of sorts for them. You're going to have to face up to the reality that there are going to be a whole lot of battles that just aren't worth fighting anymore. They could throw as many resources as they wanted at it and it still wouldn't budge anything politically, so they're going to end up having to turn around and shore up and defend what they already have, what's already theirs, and try to protect that more than getting out uh to try to do things that uh are not currently in the pro-life or pro-family um column. And I just I guess one of the other changes is that things that we previously thought of as relatively permanent politically in terms of the people who are on our side, the people we can count on for support, that has shifted a lot just in the last five years and I think that that's also going to be causing this kind of reckoning and re-evaluation of things.
Christa Potratz:Well, now that I'm thoroughly depressed, Jeff.
Paul Snamiska:Hey, that's what I was aiming for.
Christa Potratz:Kind of a doubter there. I think this is maybe a good transition then, with Christian life resources too and the work that can be done. I mean it sounds like you know, just from what you explained and then also just from how Jeff has illustrated things kind of going that there really is a lot of potential opportunity for Christian life resources to really keep going.
Bob Fleischmann:I guess you know part of it is just like being realistic when Jesus said because of the increase of wickedness or lawlessness, the love of most will go cold. Well, all you have to do is sit still for a moment and think about well, what must that look like? And we think progressively that it should be worse today than it was yesterday, and it'll be worse tomorrow than it is today, and I would say that seems to be fairly accurate. I mean, there were things going on during the time of Christ and the Apostle Paul, when they were on earth, that were pretty bad. You know, the things of Nero and things of Rome that were going on are bad by our standards.
Bob Fleischmann:The other thing too and I just used this reference in a correspondence with someone that had asked a question and that is we're told that sometimes people get to the point of calling good evil and evil good. And so what does that look like? And again, I look around and I'm going oh my goodness, we're there, some of the things they're doing, and I think, kind of at the risk of making you even more depressed, to get on to Jeff Spandwagon here that is, if you are living your Christian faith correctly, and especially when we get into these life and family issues and you find it's going well for you, I'm pretty convinced you're doing it wrong because you don't want to be combative. When you're standing your ground, because you should always be looking be combative when you're standing your ground because you should always be looking to bridge build. But Jesus said they hated me, they're going to hate you. I mean, it's just the reality. And it is funny because when you're trying to navigate a ship, we try to do it, clr you're trying to do it with the full awareness that sometimes you feel like you're the captain of the Titanic. You know is that, except that God still promises his blessing. He still promises to watch over us and to work all things out for good, even the things that look like they're going south in a bad way, that somehow they're going to work out good for his people, and we trust that.
Bob Fleischmann:But in order for me to do that as the national director, my biggest challenge, like right at this moment, is to get people to recognize there is only one reliable standard of truth and that is Scripture. Beyond that, everybody's just dealing with opinion. I just wrote an article as part of our Debunk series in which I talk about. There's a section in which I talk about that we literally just surrender objective truth for an opinion that gets the most likes. Likes and somehow I don't know if we're just getting that daft that we begin to believe that that just because people agree with me, agree with Scripture.
Bob Fleischmann:Carl Truman, who's one of my favorite contemporary writers, religious writers, a Presbyterian professor, but he writes this article about he wrote this little editorial piece where he said you know, I'm really not interested in your opinion. You know, if I'm wrong on something, if I'm wrong biblically on something, I have no interest in being wrong. Correct me, but correct me based upon an object of authority. If all you're going to do is share with me your opinion, don't waste our time. And the problem with what we have today, in our climate today, and that is social media, is social media has a way of venerating opinion to the level of objective truth and we declared, or we sense it to be, that by the number of likes we get and the number of followers we have and that kind of stuff, and I don't know, you know, when you figure that this world is naturally opposed to God, you know it's hostile to God, I wouldn't find a lot of flattery if a lot of people in the world really get on your bandwagon.
Christa Potratz:It's funny that you mentioned that too, because I was just thinking every once in a while I read something in Scripture that I mean maybe I've read a hundred times and I'm just like, wow, that is just so true of now and it probably was also true back then too. But I'm just I believe it comes from Romans, the do not conform to the ways of this world, and that just really hit me. I mean again, and just hearing you talk too, bob, about like how we are just we could get so zapped into what this world tells us is true that we forget what is actually true, and just that whole thing about how, yeah, I mean we just we can't just get sucked into this world and what it tells us.
Jeff Samelson:I'll just add, going against my own prior statements, a note of optimism, I guess.
Christa Potratz:Thanks, Jeff.
Bob Fleischmann:There is still heaven.
Jeff Samelson:We've also got to be on the guard, you know, always as Christians, against any kind of what I've called Christian fatalism, which is that things are bad, they're always going to be bad. There's just no point, and you know well that's not a biblical attitude. And he promised that our prayers will be answered.
Jeff Samelson:And he promised that when we do the work there will be fruit. It won't always be the fruit we're looking for, but just because the general arc of history is heading to bad things in an end doesn't mean that tomorrow necessarily is going to be bad, and it doesn't mean that we shouldn't be working and praying and speaking and arguing and such to make tomorrow and next year and the next decade and the next generation better than it is today. And if you look at history, countless examples of times when things looked really bad but largely through the work of Christians, they got better. Maybe not in all ways, but in many ways. And then the new responsibility is to try to maintain what you've got. But there's nothing in Scripture that says you can't have shorter-term improvements, even while the general trend of history is toward evil.
Bob Fleischmann:A lot of times in staff meetings I always talk about recalibration, which is what I think CLR is all about. We're trying to basically recalibrate Christians because, kind of going back a little bit to what you were saying, Krista, with being conformed to the world, kind of going back a little bit to what you were saying, Krista, with being conformed to the world, I think we woefully underestimate how worldly all of us have become, myself included. And I've talked about Revelation 3 before in the Church of Laodicea you do not realize—you say I'm rich, I don't need a thing. You don't realize you're pitiful, poor, blind and naked. And I did a deep dive into what does secular history say about Laodicea? And Laodicea said that first of all, it was very wealthy, it was a very—it was a kind of a port area and it was very wealthy. But they also were very much of I do my own thing. And it was an earthquake-prone part of Asia Minor. And so they had a big destructive thing and Rome came in and said, okay, we're going to bring in some people, we're going to do it. And they said, no, no, we don't want your help, we can do this ourselves.
Bob Fleischmann:And it seems like that mentality and that's from secular sources had infiltrated into the church and he said you somehow missed the point. And the point that I have trouble, or I'm struggling with, in getting people to realign to, is that how do you get conformed to the world? Well, the way you get conformed to the world is that their values become your values, their goals become your goals, their treasures become your treasures. And the way you get recalibrated is you got to remind yourself why was I created in the first place? And Scripture has a very unworldly explanation or answer to that, and that is to honor and glorify God. That is why we exist. We do not exist to get a career, we do not exist to become wealthy, to be happy. We exist to honor and glorify God. And we do that within a career and within a geographic location and so forth.
Bob Fleischmann:And when you understand that, it then begins to formulate how you respond to the latest ethical and bioethical challenges that come your way, because you're looking at everything and you begin to say well, you start off by thinking like the world, what would be good for the world? You know we've talked about that with CRISPR. Oh, I'm not sure the world's good, ready for that, and everything you know. But really, you know, a Christian says how do I honor and glorify God through this? How do I honor? And you begin to think about the ethical choices you make in life. I'm dating, Do I have sexual activity? Well, okay, we can talk about the dangers and all that kind of stuff.
Bob Fleischmann:When we first started CLR, we were talking about fetal heartbeat and brainwaves and fingerprints and fetal development, all that kind of stuff. And we have matured, I think, over the years to talk about why are we here in the first place? I don't destroy life because I cannot find in the destruction of life a way to honor and glorify God. And then I cannot find in being sexually promiscuous, how do I honor and glorify God? So, when I'm faced with a decision, do we move in, live together, do we get married? But it's not just that Everyone wants to start on the wrong end. They always want to start what's your position on abortion? What's your position on cohabitation, on IVF and everything, when really the front end is we're talking about honoring and glorifying God. Now, how can I do it? And so CLR really has tried, first of all, to help you understand what's at play in an issue.
Bob Fleischmann:What does it mean to be a surrogate? You know what's, the mechanisms and the biology and stuff involved, but the fundamental question remains the same how do I honor and glorify God?
Christa Potratz:question remains the same how do I honor and glorify God? Yeah, well, so then, also thinking about the future of Christian Life Resources, what are maybe some plans for the future?
Bob Fleischmann:Well, I know that the board, the CLR board, the National Board for Christian Life Resources, is concerned about succession planning. So I've been doing this for you know well, full-time since 1988. So I've been around a couple of years and so in that time, you know, I've made a ton of mistakes and hopefully have learned from most of them, and so they're trying to figure out a way how do we preserve some of that knowledge and then prepare for the future. And I know that we're talking about, you know, eventually, soon, you know, within the next couple of years bringing in new leadership and I might just be in the background maybe more writing and something like that Just start new ways, a new way of thinking and so forth, which I think is always healthy for an organization. I'm a little bit atypical than a lot of people. The way I was thinking this year is dramatically different than I was thinking three years ago, and the way I'm thinking two years from now will be dramatically different than the way I'm thinking now. I've always been that way. People who've known me when I was a kid said I was that way even I just never liked status quo. So the board is very concerned about preserving so the fact that the podcasts are recorded, record and transcripts and so forth I've been presenting at the last few and for the next few board meetings, our presentations, just kind of going through the whole ethical, bioethical, christian perspective on things, so that it gets down and those meetings are recorded and so forth so that if God decides to take me soon, we got a record of that.
Bob Fleischmann:Along that same line, our series, our debunk series that we've been doing those of you who get our email service, lifewire Casey, our creative content director. She came up with this idea. Why don't we just take the worst statements made about the issues we talk about and debunk them, address them, and so I've been writing on it. It's been quite popular. We just received a request that we try to convert it into some Bible study material and so forth. So we're going to see it.
Bob Fleischmann:We're going to compile them into booklets. We've got the booklet already put together on the debunk series on abortion. We're working on an assisted suicide and I'm ramping up the series on gender issues and we're going to go into relationship issues as the next debunk series. So we're trying to put that all together. And then AI and those of you who've listened to the podcast in the past, know that I'm aware of the dangers of AI. I am worried about some of the directions we go, but I love AI. If you are aware that even AI has a bias, you can be prepared for it. But we're going to be integrating AI into the CLR website. Krista, when you first became involved as a volunteer, you said you know there's thousands of articles on our website and that's the shrunk down website.
Bob Fleischmann:Yeah, yeah because our old website had many more articles than that and there's going to be a new website launched within the next, hopefully by September. We're going to have a new website loss, a new interface that's going to look different, but then we also are going to integrate AI so that instead of going you know, I'm thinking about surrogate parenting, I'm thinking about IVF, I'm thinking about abortion, thinking about birth control you might not know the key words to search for it, but you might just come to the website and say my spouse has been diagnosed with a type of cancer and I don't even know what it is and I don't know what the Christian attitude should be on it. You can ramble on like that in an AI text box and it will sort out what you're really trying to say and then point you to the articles and we figure that's going to be a great help to people when they come to our website.
Christa Potratz:You know we've talked about a lot of different things and sometimes, like with looking to the future I mean, I always think too there just is good comfort, I guess, in just knowing that God has the future. And you know anything else maybe that we can just encourage our listeners to maybe ponder, think about from a biblical perspective when thinking about the future.
Jeff Samelson:God is in control. That's a main thing. Who is God? He's almighty. He's always working things out for the good of his people. He has a plan. He's sticking to it. Nothing is impossible for him. We have access to him through prayer. We have God's perfect wisdom readily available to us. In the Bible we have baptism in the Lord's Supper to give us confidence and strength for whatever struggles or challenges we might face or suffering that we might have to endure. And I guess a lesson from recently passed well, I guess we're still in the Easter season, but it can also go all the way to the end of the Bible and end of time with the book of Revelation.
Jeff Samelson:With the book of Revelation, winning. Jesus won, Jesus wins. Jesus will always win, today and tomorrow, just as much as he beat sin, death and Satan at the cross and with his empty tomb. And his victory over sin, death and Satan has been given to us as our own. Even when it might feel like we're losing in battle against the culture or politics or science or whatever, that's not who we are, we're not losers. And if it feels like we're being persecuted, we're not victims. We're victors because Christ has made us so. So that does away with pessimism that does away with despair. We're on the winning side, no matter how things seem to be going in the moment. We're on the winning side because Jesus has made us his own and as long as we cling to him and his cross, we're in good shape and we're prepared for whatever comes. There's still work to be done. Jesus said we must work while it is day. It is day now. It's not night yet. You know there's things to be done, but we can be confident and comforted in the meantime.
Bob Fleischmann:Well, you know, in that regard, one of the changes that I've seen, you know, in the years I've been here, is volunteerism is a struggle. You know CLR. You know when we began in the 70s and 80s, when we formed the national organization in 83, we were like the premier volunteer organization. All of our affiliates were run by volunteers. We had, you know, cores of volunteers. People were showing up close to a thousand for convention to get involved, even though we'd like to think that maybe other people are becoming more worldly. But I'm not. We all have found other things to do than thinking more of others than of ourselves, and so forth. And so one of the changes that we made at CLR in the last couple of years is we brought Rachel Greiner on board, and Rachel's job is basically the bridge ministry part. So we're looking at New Beginnings. Right now our home for mothers is full. We just accepted a resident that we can't take last night, just accepted a resident we can't take because we have no room and we are going to be. It looks like we're closing on the sale of a gift of property that was given to New Beginnings. That closing will be taking place in a week, and when that happens. We're going to relaunch the capital campaign. We've got to get the new building built so that we can handle more mothers, but we can always use more volunteers. Meanwhile and Rachel will be overlooking that part we have a staff at New Beginnings, but Rachel's in charge of our bridge ministry.
Bob Fleischmann:And then we've got the program where we send out care boxes to people who have had miscarriages, you know, to show that there's a support group behind them.
Bob Fleischmann:We're looking at starting to strengthen our affiliates and the pregnancy care work that they're doing in those affiliates.
Bob Fleischmann:We're looking very strongly at elder care, specifically indigent elder care, the people who cannot afford a couple hundred thousand dollars in the bank account so that they can, you know, live in some of the commercial elder care environments that we have today.
Bob Fleischmann:So we're trying to look at filling these gaps. But it is going to require Christians to challenge themselves and say can I support it financially, support it? Can I support it with my time? Can I volunteer? And we're going to try to design some programs that can be done on the congregational level. So maybe you can't afford to build your own home for mothers and take care of single mothers and have them in a program for up to four or five years, but maybe you can have something in your congregation that goes above and beyond just wringing our hands over the bad situation that it is and doing something positive. So, when we look to the future, even though we're going to have problems, even though we're going to be persecuted there's going to be defeats the work, the assignment given to us is that the way we honor and glorify God is we love others, as we know God has loved us.
Christa Potratz:Thank you both for everything that we've discussed here today, and we thank all of our listeners too, and the many listeners too that have supported Christian Life Resources over the years. We thank you especially as well and just a reminder and I think Bob just touched on this too but all of our episodes now we do have transcripts for, and so if you are interested in getting a transcript of any of these episodes, please reach out to us. You can reach us through lifechallengesus there's a place for comments there, and we'd be happy to send you a transcript of the episodes. We thank all of you for joining us and we look forward to having you back next time. Bye.
Paul Snamiska:Thank you for joining us for this episode of the Life Challenges podcast from Christian Life Resources. Please consider subscribing to this podcast, giving us a review wherever you access it and sharing it with friends. We're sure you have questions on today's topic or other life issues. Our goal is to help you through these tough topics and we want you to know we're here to help. You can submit your questions, as well as comments or suggestions for future episodes, at lifechallengesus or email us at podcast at christianliferesourcescom. In addition to the podcasts, we include other valuable information at lifechallengesus, so be sure to check it out. For more about our parent organization, please visit christianliferesourcescom. May God give you wisdom, love, strength and peace in Christ for every life challenge.
