Glimmers of Faith and Hope!!!

Arten describes experiencing spiritual warfare, feeling a sense of accomplishment after overcoming perceived demons, and then receiving an overwhelming feeling of divine love and joy after attributing the victory to God.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:25

Well, welcome to another episode of Glimmers of Faith and Hope. My name's Rob Stafford, and I'm pleased to be here with my co-host George.

SPEAKER_02 0:32

How are you doing?

SPEAKER_01 0:33

And uh pleasure to introduce Arton, and he's gonna be our guest today. And uh so we'll get going. So, Arton, nice to meet you.

SPEAKER_03 0:43

Nice to meet you, Rob. Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Yeah, you're welcome. Um just like to, if you start out, tell us a little bit about yourself and uh so we can see where you're at.

SPEAKER_03 0:54

Awesome. So essentially, I am a PE teacher and AAU basketball coach. I am a Southern California product, I'm born and raised here, right? My parents come from Armenia. They're born and they're born in Iran, but grew up in Armenia, but we're Armenian.

SPEAKER_01 1:17

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:18

Um they they met in Armenia, got married, had my brother, my two older brothers in Armenia, moved here, had me here in 1995. Okay. Yeah, and they came they came here in 89. Thank you, thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:35

Yeah, that's good.

SPEAKER_03 1:36

Um, so so yeah, it's it's great. Um, I have a lot of it's my my perspective on life is very interesting. I have a lot of like Armenian roots, and you know, but I'm born and raised in Southern California, so it's a very interesting perspective to have, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:51

Yeah, one foot here, one foot touching maybe a little bit of Armenia.

SPEAKER_03 1:57

Yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Yeah, that's good. It gives you uh new perspective or perspective that other people might not have, especially in the times that we're in right now.

SPEAKER_03 2:06

Yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_02 2:08

Yeah. How about faith? How has that developed in your life?

SPEAKER_03 2:14

So faith is something that as someone that has been brought up in our Armenian household, it is part of our culture in a sense. Uh and I was telling George about this, but uh Armenia as a nation is one of is um believed to be the first country to accept Christianity as a national religion. Okay. So we're kind of brought up, whether we know it or not, with ethics, principles, morals, values that correlate with the Bible and its teachings. Right? Whether some of our people know it or not, you know. Uh as a nation, we're very religious and we believe in Christ. Uh, and I think sometimes we uh we just think we're kind of saved in a sense, right? We're pre-saved. Yeah, kind of, you know, so so that's that's it's it's very interesting, but but yeah, so my personal faith with Christ, I grew up having that fear of God in the household. Um, but I never really had a relationship with him growing up because I didn't really understand uh the dynamic of it and how it works, and you know, uh I wasn't well versed in scripture. Uh even now, like I'm not a I'm not shy to share, like I haven't read the Bible in its entirety, right? I'm a student of it right now. I'm learning it. I'm I'm trying to learn it. Uh so so yeah, I just feel like my faith would would have started when I was like, I want to say like 16 or so. I had a moment like uh uh like that movie Bruce Almighty where you know I was just like frustrated, angry. I I was a bit a bit lost, scared. And I had like a moment where I was like driving my car and I was talking to God and you know asking him to uh show me something, like reveal himself to me, like I can be such a you know vessel for him to serve him, and like I just want him to reveal himself to me so that I can live in kind of more peace, you know, without without that uncertainty. And uh slowly but surely he began revealing himself to me in different ways and signs and things like that. Uh and the first moment where I feel like uh there was a prayer that I made that I received what it wasn't, it was very interesting, but it's uh I've I felt this need for intimacy right with uh with like a female companion. And uh I had two older brothers, didn't really have sisters. My mom was like my main like companion, like my my best friend growing up and stuff. So my brothers were obviously they're a little older than me. Right. My mom was like my best friend growing up. So but I felt this need for like a companion of my age that I can kind of grow grow old with in a sense, right? And I don't know, I felt that need at like maybe like seven, like 17, 19 already. I kind of wanted that already. Um you're ready to settle down. Yeah, I was I was pretty much, yeah. So uh very interesting. But my girlfriend was in a class, my current girlfriend who I've been with for now eight years, getting ready to get married very soon. Oh, congratulations. Thank you. Congrats, thank you. We so the the prayer was essentially I asked God for that, like a woman in my life um that you know is gonna be my better half, you know, keep me level-headed and just like something like someone I can be intimate with and love and you know, be very close with. And after having a class, maybe like a few years later at GCC, I had a class with my current girlfriend, and it was a speech class, and she was giving her speech and just kind of out of nowhere, just like the thought of like wife. Just I've never I haven't had any conversations with her or anything, but the thought of like your wife, wife, just came up in my head because I was looking at her, I was like, Oh, she's so beautiful, and all this, and just that thought, just like I wasn't even, it's weird, but like it just came up, and uh the class finished, and we we didn't really end up doing anything, but on Facebook, I kept seeing her Instagram uh Facebook picture, and it kept saying you on the area where you may know these people. I don't you probably you guys know what I'm talking about, you may know this person, and it just kept popping up, kept popping up, and I clicked on it, and I was like, Oh, it's the it's the girl from speech class. So I just kind of like sent her a message saying, Hey, you know, would you like to get together? Uh and stuff, and she was uh she was up for it, and we did it. And since then we've just been like inseparable. Um, and it was just like we lived like 40 miles apart from each other, too. Okay, and we were just inseparable. Our parents kind of realized that they kind of communicated with each other, and they're like, hey, like they're young, but they want to get married, so like we you know, we gotta keep our eye on them, and you know, when the time comes, we'll have them get married essentially.

SPEAKER_01 7:23

You guys throw down some big wedding part, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:26

Yeah, we do, yeah, definitely. Uh a lot of money wasted though. I will say, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:34

But it makes a memory, but yeah, dude. I'm blown away. So you see you were praying for God to give you the woman of your dreams, and I'm like, what were you asking him for?

SPEAKER_03 7:48

Like I said, kind of like just my better half. You know, I felt growing up, you know. I've I don't know if I shared this with George, but I was kind of like a little bit of like a troubled kid, like just like always causing trouble, is causing havoc, doing things like crazy things like jumping off the second floor of my uh apartment building into bushes, like just like all sorts of stuff, you name it.

SPEAKER_01 8:12

Total, total the baby of the family.

SPEAKER_03 8:14

Yeah, yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 8:16

So like I don't I don't know about that. I don't know about that.

SPEAKER_03 8:19

No, but yeah, so like I was that kind of kid, so just like a better half, someone to keep me, you know, uh guide me, help help guide me, you know. Uh not that like I needed her guidance, but like just to like help me be a voice of reason in certain scenarios and someone to love and someone to be close with and have that that real intimacy with.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

Were you looking for uh a godly woman? Christian.

SPEAKER_03 8:47

I was so very great question. That's I that I that's where I was gonna go next. So she's brought me closer to Christ. That's the whole point of like why I brought this up, is like she comes from a family uh that was brought up Catholic, but her grandma was really Christian. And her grandma, she had a very, very close relationship with her grandma who uh passed away like maybe a uh year two years ago. And she had this whole thing where she had to go, she went there and helped her with her faith as she was passing. Um so that grandma helped her, you know, keep her faith in Christianity, and like she not not that they're that different, but uh essentially she her family is religious, but not to she's kind of like the outlier in a sense, and her faith is was like just so powerful. And um during like COVID and stuff like that, uh she started you know pushing it more and more onto me, uh, as I kind of wasn't on that uh like I was, but I wasn't. She was more into it, and she's brought me closer to Christ and has helped me with that a lot.

SPEAKER_01 9:53

So are you still a troublemaker?

SPEAKER_03 9:55

No, definitely not. Yeah, I try not to be definitely I can relate, man.

SPEAKER_02 10:03

Like I wasn't praying for a good godly woman, and I wasn't like I was just trying to figure it out about how am I gonna like become my own man first, and like blessings that God like for me, like he knew that I needed my now fiance in that moment to grow, and she actually led me to like my passion and like led me to um like developing Spanish as a second language and developing uh an interest in going into physical therapy, and she literally like brought me so much closer to God, just like you said your girlfriend did. And we were both raised Christian, and the first night we met we talked about it. We were we were like, Are you religious? Do you believe? Um, she was like, Yeah, I'm Christian, but and I was like, I'm I grew up Christian, but I don't know right now, like I'm not sure. And that was like something that we started to get back curious in and like start exploring together, and we started praying, and we she introduced me to Montrose Church, which is how I ended up meeting Rob. Nice, and so we that's the church she grew up in, and we started going there, we started reading the Bible together, and it changed my life, man. And like one thing that we do is a daily devotional, and where we read the Bible, like uh a chapter, a verse, at least of you know, one verse a day, because we have grown so much by reading the word and then praying together about it. We try and pray before n before bed and first thing in the morning. That's ideal because like it just has bonded us so much on a spiritual level, an intellectual level, an emotional level. We feel like we trust each other with everything, we have no secrets, and that's all glory to God. But it it's inspiring. And like to for the people, I want to say to the people who haven't found the one, like I don't even I wasn't, I don't I don't even know, like I hadn't established myself, and yet he's still like his plan was for me to meet her at that time. Yep, it's all God's timing. You may think, like, I've got money, I've got a solid job, I've got all these things. Why haven't I met the right one yet? Because it's all God's plan, and he's just he has that plan for you. Like, whatever happened in your past, that all is like a clearing a path to like the one.

SPEAKER_03 13:01

Yeah, for sure. To answer your question, Rob, um, I actually didn't act didn't specifically ask for a godly woman. He gave me a godly woman.

SPEAKER_01 13:12

Can't beat that.

SPEAKER_03 13:13

Yeah, you can't really, you can't. And that's that would be I would say that that's my first testimonial. My second one, which is you brought up a good point, which is glory to God. Um, this one happened maybe about a year ago. Uh I I won't get into the details of it, but let's just say I was having like a spiritual warfare in a sense with a close person of mine that had to had to have some tough love, right? Um as I was driving to work, uh, I was thinking of that moment, and there was, I don't want to say pride, but there was some sort of like like a good feeling conquering, let's say, like demons and like just dealing with that, right? Like like conquering that and standing up for righteousness, right? Yep, there was a good feeling, and in that moment, I just naturally pointed my hand up and I said, All glory to God, Jesus in your name. Uh, you you gave me that spiritual shield to be able to go into that battle, and uh immediately, like literally immediately, all I could feel was just goosebumps all over my body and an overwhelming feeling of love. That I I all I could do was just cry. That was the only only but tears of joy. Tears of joy of my prayers being answered, of like re reveal yourself to me in a sense, but not visually, but like in a feeling, like I just felt it, like I felt his presence, the love that that he represents, and it just it was so overwhelming. I couldn't, I just kept crying, uh, cry like of joy. Straight joy. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:02

Powerful. How about you? What about me? This is not about me, man. No, I want I just want to say that uh it's so it's such a great experience for me to listen to young people and talking about their faith, their Jesus, and uh, and how you know you've come to really grow in the Lord and everything. It's uh it's kind of reminiscent of the Jesus movement back in the 70s because it just seemed to be a really good movement. And uh in one of the previous podcasts, uh a couple comments came from people that they were just so encouraged by uh who we interviewed before, um and just as we just I want to see more young men come to the Lord, so it's really makes my heart feel again.

SPEAKER_02 15:59

Something that you just said uh about goosebumps. You know, people ask for signs, people say, like, where's the proof? I've experienced that, and I experience it frequently. The goosebumps, it's something that I'm sure others have experienced, but it's like it's like the we we believe that's the Holy Spirit, like his presence just comes over you, and you feel like it's not a scary goose, it's like a comforting, like I feel connected with the Lord right now, and it's a feeling that you just know, and it comes more with like like I experience it in church when I'm worshiping, when I'm singing, or like the tears of joy. Like I've experienced that when I'm a lot of times listening to worship music, and you know, or something like I've been struggling with, or um something bad has happened, and then I'm kind of recovering from it. And it's because I've been spending more time with the Lord trying to trying to recover, and then he just like I just feel him, and I'm just like, wow, I'm so grateful for like being one with you, being you know, just being your son, and it it's like a feeling that you have that I would recommend everybody surrender to and try and just like form a relationship with God and with Jesus. And like you said, you just called out to him. Like I've heard testimonies of people like never you know, picking up the Bible, nothing, but they just like randomly call out to Jesus and they're like, Jesus, like I need help, I need you to save my life, and then they just feel that, you know.

SPEAKER_03 17:44

Yeah, so that's a good good thing to bring up, actually, because that's something I've been talking with my buddy about as well a lot. And essentially, uh our faith determines how Jesus God reveals himself to us. Um, I feel like the the concept of like free will, like he wants us to come to him with, you know, like in a sense, kind of like blind faith, kind of, right? Uh but some people, I feel like some people's souls have uh potentially gone down so far down a road where it may be hard to save them that he has to do something more drastic to be able to save their soul.

SPEAKER_01 18:31

Well, yeah, like Paul, he's pretty soul. That was pretty drastic.

SPEAKER_02 18:37

You want to tell us about that?

SPEAKER_03 18:38

Yeah, tell us about that.

SPEAKER_01 18:41

Well yeah. Paul. Before he was Paul, he was tall, and he was like a hated manner. He was like walking on the road. Terrible person. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:17

Yeah, I know that Paul also like hated Christians. He thought Christians were like um he thought that it was fake and he thought they were spreading a false doctrine and they were trying to just get as many people as they can and all that, and that's not what it is at all. And he went from that to having a supernatural encounter, the what kind that we're describing, but to the point where he went blind and when he regained his sight, he became one of the biggest spreaders of Christianity. And it's just proofs that what we're trying to do is an invitation. We're not pushing, we're we're just talking about our personal stories with Jesus and with searching for meaning, because we all wonder like why we're here and what what can fill the emptiness inside, because that's also something we can all relate to. And I've heard so many stories of all the ways you can try it, but that Jesus is the one that really kills you.

SPEAKER_01 20:30

Well, sometimes there's people that they're totally not Christians or you know, they might even be atheists, and they set out to prove that Jesus, you know, and then they end up going like, oh yeah, you know, and so it's that's a great story. But I wanted to follow up and see, like, you know, you had this great revelation by finding the woman of your dreams that could be a godly woman, and how is your faith um affect you like in your day-to-day uh your job or your life outside of like maybe your fiance?

SPEAKER_03 21:10

Um so my fa so my faith overall, like one thing I try to really just do all the time, uh and I uh even when emotions get high or low, you know, is to just act in the image of Jesus, right? Like the that loving person, just love everyone, love everything, try to understand, put yourselves in other people's perspectives, um, avoid conflict, avoid confrontation as much as possible, but don't don't fear it, don't don't shy away from it if it if it's for righteousness, you know. Um with my girlfriends specifically, we operate, we try to operate the way the that the Bible asks asks us to, which is You know, God, man, wife, in terms of order, right? So she is my backbone, and you know, she she does a lot, probably more than I do, but uh she trusts my guidance, right? In terms of what are we doing, what how are we gonna conduct ourselves, what are our priorities, um, and and we operate like that. So she looks for guide uh for my guide for my guidance, um, but she she's she shares what uh when she feels she needs to have a say, or like if I'm wrong, you know, she comes always from a place of love rather than like uh like quarrel, quarrelsomeness, you know, like like there is no conflict. She she always tries to help me understand, like if she feels like something I'm saying or something I'm doing is wrong, she always tries to help me understand that uh from a loving place.

SPEAKER_01 23:02

Well, since you're both uh are in the marriage uh lane, you know, remember that marriage is not a 50-50 deal. It's like 100%, 100%. Yeah or 150%, 150% because you know one thing you don't want to do is no one's right all the time, of course. But and you can't you know you don't want to quarrel over well I did XYZ and why didn't you do this and that, you know, because sometimes you give more, sometimes your other, you know, your other half gives more.

SPEAKER_02 23:41

But you know like the level, sometimes one's at 90, the other's at 10. You have to pour into each other, yeah, support each other. And like you said about the hierarchy, that's how the Bible says that man was first, and then woman was made to be man's just like backbone, like you said. I think you put it really well. Like as men, we make the final decision. We make we're the we are the leader of the household, and we lead our household to Christ. And women are our best counsel, they're there to aid us, to help us think clearly about things, and there's so many things that they do that I haven't even, you know, fully, I can't even like fully relay it all, but I know that they're like the best counsel and decision making, and sometimes you make the wrong decision and they told you to make a different decision, but that she was still with you, even though you made the wrong decision, yeah. And the you know, supported you anyway. Like it's just like you said, 150 and 150. You gotta be um like for each other and for the right cause. If you're if you can be for each other and be for the right cause, then you guys are gonna be.

SPEAKER_03 24:59

Yeah, shoot. So Eve was made of Adam for Adam, right? It was this is his rib, right? That's how God made Eve, right? Rob? Yep.

SPEAKER_01 25:11

And then there's a pizza place, uh like a barbecue place is called Adam's Rib.

SPEAKER_03 25:15

Oh, really? Interesting.

SPEAKER_01 25:16

It was a it was a mash episode, so that's interesting.

SPEAKER_03 25:19

And then and then the other thing is that every other man that will or has come at since Adam has come of Eve from Eve, essentially, right? We were all we couldn't be born if it wasn't for her, right? In a sense. So yeah, so it's interesting, you know. But yeah, I think we have our roles. There none, like you said, none is, you know, more or less. They're slightly different from each other in terms of the roles, but I think we have to uh play our roles and do our roles the the way it's intended for it to be. And sometimes, you know, like yeah, you might I might have to step into kind of a little bit of a uh not I don't want to say a feminine role, but like a feminine like just to help her a little bit because her cut her thing is she's not at 100% right now, and the same the other way, you know, she has to sometimes take on a little bit of a masculine role to like help me out because you know I'm either dealing with you know I'm dealing with something or whatever, you know, I'm not a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_02 26:19

Very introspective that you said that you have to step into a feminine role sometimes, and she has to step into a masculine role sometimes. It's not like I only do the man's stuff and you only do the woman's stuff. It's like that's that's really introspective of you. Um like going back to Adam and Eve and the fact that they made a they were the most perfect couple and they made a mistake. Like we're gonna make mistakes in our relationships, and that's why I think prayer is so good because when you make those mistakes, you just like come to God and like ask for his guidance, ask for his support, and that you guys can work on the things, and then there's the scripture to read together to learn how God wants you to act as a couple.

SPEAKER_03 27:10

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 27:12

Well, I think this is a good time to wrap it up. I appreciate you coming in today, Arton. My pleasure. It's good to meet you a little bit, learn a little bit more about you. Thanks again, George. Thank you very much. And uh we'll see you later. Until next time.

SPEAKER_00 27:27

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