The Power of Gratitude – Spiritual Growth and Jesus Reflections

Summary

In this episode, Tony and Mike delve into spiritual growth and reflections on Jesus through the lens of gratitude. The multifaceted nature of gratitude, how it evolves through different life stages and circumstances. They emphasize the importance of recognizing gratitude not just in good times but also during challenges, and how it can serve as a powerful perspective shift. The conversation delves into the spiritual aspects of gratitude, its role in faith, and the necessity of acknowledging the good in life, even amidst difficulties. Through personal anecdotes and reflections, they encourage listeners to cultivate a grateful heart and recognize the blessings in their lives.

Takeaways

Gratitude can look different depending on life stages.

It's important to recognize gratitude in both good and bad times.

Gratitude is a powerful perspective shift that can change how we view our circumstances.

Acknowledging gratitude can lead to a deeper appreciation of life.

Gratitude is not just a surface-level emotion; it runs deeper than that.

Life's challenges can often lead to a greater sense of gratitude.

Faith plays a significant role in how we perceive gratitude.

Practicing gratitude can improve emotional health and well-being.

Gratitude can help anchor hope during difficult times.

It's essential to express gratitude for the small things in life.

Chapters

00:00 The Essence of Gratitude

03:39 Gratitude Across Life Stages

05:47 The Transformative Power of Gratitude

08:16 Gratitude in the Face of Adversity

11:05 The Role of Gratitude in Perspective

13:54 Finding Gratitude in Everyday Moments

16:11 The Spiritual Dimension of Gratitude

18:32 Navigating Hard Times with Gratitude

21:18 The Impact of Gratitude on Life Changes

23:48 Gratitude as a Lifelong Journey

27:27 The Power of Gratitude

28:54 Generational Perspectives on Gratitude

30:38 Transforming Perspectives: From Why to Thank You

32:57 Finding Meaning in Adversity

34:21 Understanding God's Role in Our Lives

36:16 The Importance of Acknowledging the Good

39:41 Season One Reflections and Future Directions

45:08 Podcast Ending 2_00.mp4

Blue Dark Fira Custom Gifts:

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Previous Episodes:

1. Introduction 

2. Tony tells about his journey to Jesus Christ

3. Mike tells about his journey to Jesus Christ

4. What is the Bible

5. Free Will (Part 1)

6. Free Will (Part 2)

7. Family – Why it Matters

8. Church in the Cul-De-Sac

9. Faith and Family: The Braswell Legacy

10. Information Ep 9.5 Exploring BC A journey of 

     faith.

11. Hard Times & Strength

12. Bitterness and Peace

13. End Times

14. Faith and Healing: Felisha Madison’s Journey

Transcript

Tony (00:02.203)
Hey everybody, welcome to episode 15 of Let's Talk Basic Christianity. Whether you're driving, sitting with a cup of coffee, or just needing a moment of encouragement, we're really glad that you're here. My name's Tony, and this is my dad, Mike. So today we're talking about something that sounds simple but can't be, that can be really hard. It's called gratitude.

Mike Kocienski (00:19.778)
Bye. Hi everybody.

Tony (00:30.683)
It's not the surface-level kind, but gratitude when life doesn't actually feel easy. I've got my dad here with me today, and I wanted his perspective because gratitude looks different across seasons of life. So dad, I want to ask you something. When you hear the word gratitude, what comes to your mind?

Mike Kocienski (00:47.896)
Mm-hmm.

Mike Kocienski (00:53.614)
Well, a lot of things. But I think the biggest thing is the gratitude for the fact that I'm still here. Considering what's happened to me and the cancer and everything like that, putting things into God's hands, it's made a big difference in my life. The gratitude is there that I found Jesus, and that I also have the family that's been there for me for the most part through this whole thing. So that's...

That's where I feel gratitude. I mean, there's a lot more to it than that, but that's where I am. But how about you?

Tony (01:29.551)
Well, personally, gratitude for me personally looks like when I can watch Welcome to Derry. It's stuff like that. But like that's just a personal gratitude. I love learning about the lore of Pennywise the Clown, but gratitude specifically, though, for me is that

Mike Kocienski (01:30.478)
Thank

Mike Kocienski (01:41.153)
EHEH

Mike Kocienski (01:45.72)
Thank

Tony (02:00.395)
I have a family now, like something that I have never actually thought that I would have. And now that I have it, I actually don't want to give it up. And I'm grateful to wake up every single morning knowing that I get to wake up to my beautiful daughter, my beautiful fiance, the birds chirping, even though it is absolutely cold as heck out, things like that.

Mike Kocienski (02:07.703)
Okay.

Mike Kocienski (02:27.297)
Mm-hmm.

Tony (02:30.139)
Truthfully, I do have a lot of things to be grateful for. The fact that I was able to come into this at an early age made a lot of this today possible. I'm able to actually pray about the things that are in correspondence with God's will.

which actually allow me to make better decisions in my life in regards to how I want to live my life. As long as I'm surrendering my way to God's plan and not my own plan. These are just like simple things though that I am absolutely 155 % grateful for. But...

Mike Kocienski (03:18.059)
Okay.

Tony (03:26.007)
The thing is, that there's like two, I feel like there's a lot of different things that you can be grateful for, you know? And I feel like as if gratitude comes in different ways, like you can be grateful at such of an age, like my age versus what yours is and that kind of act.

Mike Kocienski (03:37.952)
Right.

Tony (03:52.329)
actually allows me to ask you this next question that I have is that, do you think that the gratitude looks different now than it did, like, let's say, when you were my age?

Mike Kocienski (04:06.925)
100%. However, I was in a different situation than you were. I was basically, you know, living on a whim and a prayer. was active duty military. I was, you know, working three jobs to try to keep things together. And I was grateful for the fact that I had, you know, the ability to be able to do that. it wasn't

Tony (04:08.43)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (04:34.583)
To be honest with you, wasn't even thinking about being saved or anything like that. I I had a different perspective on all that back then. But the thing is, is that I never, ever didn't believe in God. And I always tried to do the right thing. Like I prayed, I've told you that in previous episodes. And I've been doing that for years. My differences came from other sides of the fence that I don't really want to get into, but maybe someday.

Tony (05:03.359)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (05:04.301)
Yeah, you know, at 30 years old, uh, compared to 62 now, or 32 compared to 62. Yeah. I'd say, no, I'm talking about, I'm sorry. You're right. 30, 30 compared to 62, you know, um, yes, my, I'd say that it's, it's way different, but at the same time, um, when you look at it, you're grateful for kind of the same things because you're grateful that your kids are healthy.

Tony (05:12.291)
I ain't 32, Dad.

Mike Kocienski (05:33.058)
You're grateful that you have a roof over your head. You're grateful that you have food on the table. You're grateful that you have a car that you can drive every day to get back and forth to work. You're grateful for, you know, the ability to be able to live mobile and free without any type of ailments when you're younger, you know? You're grateful for a lot of things and that sense of gratitude actually never goes away. It just changes like shape.

and then.

Tony (06:03.459)
It almost like manifests, you know, like it turns into something bigger than you would have ever thought in your entire life. These type of things typically happen when usually like something life changing happens and you're actually able to cope with what you have and then deal with it in such a positive way.

Mike Kocienski (06:06.229)
Right.

Tony (06:33.878)
that a lot of things that you were to think that were bad just wind up turning into something good for you at the end of the day. And a lot of people think that gratitude means like pretending everything is fine, but if you think about it, that's kind of not biblical. A lot of the things that people are grateful for, truthfully, I always had something crazy go on in their life. And then

Mike Kocienski (07:02.957)
Mm-hmm.

Tony (07:03.503)
shortly after you read on and on and then you next thing you know you're like wow he was grateful or she was grateful for what happened here versus then in their life you know like like things like that man you know

Mike Kocienski (07:16.071)
Right, Yeah. Well, you know, if you're going to, if you're going to think about it in perspective, let's, let's, let's look at it this way. When before, and I don't want to get into like the whole saving thing right now, because of course it's important, but I want people to understand that there are two sides to the fence. Okay. There's the side before you become saved and there's the side after you become saved. Before you become saved, you're grateful for things like,

having a job, know, people in your life, your friends and everything like that. Don't get me wrong, you still are after you're saved. But differences is that after you become saved, the gratitude and the happiness become different because you realize that all the years that you were getting all those things, we don't own anything on earth. Nothing belongs to us. It's all his and he allowed us to have it, you know? And, and

Tony (08:07.348)
Nope.

Tony (08:13.484)
Right.

Mike Kocienski (08:14.533)
When you find that out and you have that wow factor, you're like, that's so true. And then you become grateful because there's a lot of sayings out there that people say all the time, they don't even realize it, that are in the Bible. And one of them is the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. That's in the Bible. But people say it in gist, but that is a very true statement.

You can be plucked out of here in a second at any moment. could be doing this podcast and one of us could very well take our very last breath. You never know what's gonna happen. But the thing is, right, exactly. And the thing is is that you know what? You gotta remember too, gratitude is not just like on the surface. Gratitude is like love, peace, kindness.

Tony (08:52.021)
Yeah, no, that's true, That's absolutely true.

Mike Kocienski (09:10.987)
You know, that's where I get really perplexed at times and I've learned to deal with that too. like, you know, how we have like, like Facebook and we have different platforms that we try to have our, you know, send out our message on. And people don't realize that Christianity is not a religion. Okay. It's a way of life. And what

It sends, mean, you know, what's in the Bible. mean, yes, there's a lot of drama in there. That's true. But think about this. Think about if you're if you're a non-Christian, which is OK, think about this. Everything you have, it came from somewhere. OK. And if you're going to if you're going to be negative every day, why do you want to live like that? Isn't it better to live with love in your heart? Peace in your mind? You know.

Think about all the people around you and the things that you have. Just think about that because you have them and you should be happy for what you have. And you know, not looking for the next score or whatever it is that you do, but just be happy that you know what, you're alive and that you get to look out every day. Look up in the sky, check out the trees, know, check out the birds flying over, check out the dog walking down the street. Just listen to raindrops fall on the ground.

Even listen to that stupid city bus if you live in a city that's driving down the road it drives you crazy. All of that is because of him. And whether you want to accept that or not, it's fine. But we're not out there as co-hosts this show trying to change you. We're not even, like I said, what do we always say, Tony, when we do this show? We're not teaching, we're not preaching.

Tony (10:56.566)
We're just two guys that are having a conversation that are just trying to talk about our opinion on everything that's going on.

Mike Kocienski (11:05.431)
Right. listen, we just did a show on End Times, and End Times is hard to talk about. But if you look at all the things going on in the world, if you stop and do... Right, exactly. Think about it. Stop and, you know what? Take a deep breath of that coffee, or a deep smell of that coffee in the morning that you drink, and think about, my God, how good is this taste? Or how good does this smell?

Tony (11:17.726)
It gives you a lot to be grateful for too.

Mike Kocienski (11:35.214)
you know, don't, mean, smell a rose, you know, um, just go, you know, you know, my biggest, my best, my most of my fondest memories, and you know, I played baseball for a long time. And one of my fondest memories, my favorite day of the year was opening day because we would get to go out and play again. And like, regardless of how old I was, whether I was seven years old or 57, my last year I played every year, the first thing I did,

Tony (11:38.645)
Yeah?

Mike Kocienski (12:02.807)
when I got out in that field for the very first time or out there is when I put my glove on and I went out and stood, whether I was in the outfield or second base or wherever it was was playing, I would basically take a deep breath in and smell the fresh, cut grass because it always was, and then take a sniff of my leather glove because that to me was like, I was grateful for that. It was just, it's just things that you, mm-hmm.

Tony (12:26.83)
Well, it brings you back, you know, it definitely I would say personally, like I smell crush grass. I smell cut grass and. I go back into this. Certain area of my life where I'm like, dang man, it feels good to be a kid again, you know, and.

Mike Kocienski (12:51.019)
Yeah, yeah.

Tony (12:53.051)
At the end of the day, just feel like every time I have that set and it always comes around during summer. Every, every specific time when winter comes around, like, yeah, it's cold, but that said of being cold is like, all right, that brings me back to when I was like, I don't know, maybe 10 years old, throwing snowballs at cars and then ducking behind cover.

Mike Kocienski (13:08.001)
You know, I,

Tony (13:22.748)
and having fun, you know, just enjoying those times.

Mike Kocienski (13:24.429)
I was doing that at 32. You know, what I do is, you've been down to Georgia and by the way, it's not, we're cold right now, but not like that. I mean, we had a couple of days of cold weather, but today, I'm not gonna lie, I'm taping in the show, it was 72 outside today. So it was nice, but we've had nights now down until mid 30s, low 30s, couple nights for the 20s.

Tony (13:50.889)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (13:51.938)
But down here, the kids play sports all year long, okay? And you know that I was a baseball coach for many years for Little League. And my neighbor's kid, Jason, everybody knows Jason, he's been on the show, for those of you that don't, he's a youth pastor for one of the churches down here.

We had a scheduling conflict. This show was supposed to be Christ the King, but because of a scheduling conflict, we just couldn't get it done and we feel terrible. So we decided we wanted to come out and do this show in case you were looking for the other. So I just wanted to get that in there. But I go outside. I go outside and I sit down. I got this little swinging chair. You've been down here. You saw the swinging chair out in front of my house, right? Like next to the door, the front door. And I'll sit on that or sometimes I'll just open up the garage door and I'll watch the two.

Tony (14:29.299)
Right.

Mike Kocienski (14:44.417)
the two boys play baseball. They'll either be playing pitch and catch or they'll play wiffle ball or whatever it is. Sometimes they're playing basketball and I just sit there and it's, you know, I miss the fact that I can't do, I mean I can but not good anymore. But I just love sitting down and watching them do it and thinking, you know, the glory days, you know, growing up when I was that young and I'm grateful that I had those times. There you go with that word grateful, you know.

Tony (15:14.344)
Yep.

Mike Kocienski (15:14.379)
So I understand, I'm also grateful when I see kids playing in a pool and their father's in there with them throwing them in the pool. I mean, I did that with you guys. So there's a lot. mean, 62 years, I got so much I'm grateful for. And I'm hogging, but I just, I am definitely so happy with my life. I'm not sad about I still having cancer or anything like that. I'm just, I'm so at...

peace with life and it's taught me to love deeper, be humble and kind, be grateful for what I have today, don't worry about what's gonna happen tomorrow, to just be a better person all the way around and that's a hard thing to do. But the thing is, the thing I really wanna say in this whole subject is that

And I said it before, isn't it easier to live without anger than it is to live with anger and lying and all that stuff that you do? I mean, why would, you know?

Tony (16:25.946)
It is.

I mean... Don't get me wrong, dad, like...

A lot of the time, we'll be sitting here and then at the end of the day, there's always going to be something that just agitates the heck out of you. if you think about it too,

I'm kind of grateful to have those emotions. It's nice to not be emotionless either, you know?

Mike Kocienski (16:57.677)
Of course.

Mike Kocienski (17:01.761)
Well, no, I'm not. don't mean it like that. But what I'm saying is that, you know, we're all we're all human. We're going to sin. We're going to make mistakes, you know, but like you always say to me, he paid the price for that already. You know, the biggest thing is to come back and just say to him, God, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to do that, you know, and, you know, just just repent for it, I guess. I mean, you know, I don't I don't go around every day, you know, breathing down people.

Tony (17:03.922)
No, I know you don't.

Mike Kocienski (17:30.059)
next about Jesus or anything like that. My platform is the podcast and I'm grateful that we have this because this is what Jesus wanted us to do. mean we've already had, we told the story about that, you know, in one of our podcasts. But I'm grateful for this, you know, I'm grateful that there are people out there listening to us that love it, you know, and I've had conversations with people that I know are listening to it and

Some of the things that the feedback I got is that, you know, it's so nice, like, you know, to listen to a nice, gentle conversation between a son and his father and just to, you know, to get the understanding from a chilled perspective, you know? So I'm grateful for that. But at the same time, Tony, we still get mad, you know? But that's human nature. That's the work on.

Tony (18:21.794)
absolutely.

Mike Kocienski (18:26.571)
You know, it's to be expected. That's how we are designed. But the biggest thing is, is people just know right from wrong. You know, that's really what it's all about. Do you know right from wrong? Because the only person that was perfect was Jesus. And he died on the cross for us, like you always say. He was the perfect one. And he died to basically have our sins forgiven.

Tony (18:53.81)
Yep. That's a fact.

Mike Kocienski (18:55.799)
And I'm grateful for that.

Tony (18:59.132)
So I'll tell you one thing though.

With everything that's been going on in life though, with your cancer treatment and all that, there is a verse out there that's actually 1 Thessalonians 5.18 and it says,

Mike Kocienski (19:25.879)
Mm-hmm.

Tony (19:34.424)
Now, it doesn't say for all circumstances, it says in all circumstances. You know, so let me ask you something. How do you personally understand this verse?

Mike Kocienski (19:53.036)
Read it to me one more time so I can give my actual perception of it so I can give it what I think.

Tony (19:58.19)
Yeah, for sure. says, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

Mike Kocienski (20:09.547)
Okay, all circumstances means that whatever is going on in your life at any given time before you do something, I would say be thankful for it or actually, you know, if it's going to be possibly something bad, say, what would Jesus do? You know, and then if it's something that you can do and it seems fine, then be thankful that you can do it. You know, I mean, that's that's the perception that I get from it, you know.

Tony (20:35.066)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (20:38.925)
Other people might get something else for it. That's the cool thing about the Bible is that everybody reads something different when they read it or everybody interprets something different and it's supposed to be like that because it's supposed to touch you for whatever circumstance that you're under at the time or whatever it is that you're going through. So that's my perception.

Tony (20:59.813)
break.

Tony (21:04.464)
No, that's a fact though. I mean, every single person's gonna read it in a different way, you know? so here's another thing though. Have you ever actually struggled with feeling thankful during the hard times?

Mike Kocienski (21:14.635)
Right.

Mike Kocienski (21:25.389)
Of course. If I said no, I'd be lying. And no, yes, of course I had. I mean, when you go through with divorce, I mean, how can you even at the time that that's happening feel thankful for that? know, unless it was so bad and sometimes you don't know. Or say, for instance, when, you know, you

you lose a job or something like that. How can you in your heart at that very moment feel thankful for that? Maybe later, but not at that moment. There are circumstances for everything, you know? So you just, you just got to remember that, that, you know, there's going to be different things that happened in your life. mean, if we could, if we could sit here and say, we're going to be perfect about everything we do, then what do we need God for? You know, what do we need Jesus for? What are we being prepared for? You know?

Tony (21:58.019)
Great.

Tony (22:21.196)
Right. It's not perfect.

Mike Kocienski (22:23.009)
But Tony, listen, I... No. But listen, at this point, I want you to introduce everybody to our new sponsor. I mean, they're not online, but we have an advertisement to read for them. And we're so grateful because they've been helping us out for Season 2. So this is going to be their first advertisement with us, and they're going to be showing up on our website at some point. And before we get started, I want to tell you, we have a code.

that if you use them, just, when you get a hold of them, do, for Let's Talk Basic Christiania, you would do LTBCPC2505. And the 05 is they're gonna give you between now and the end of the year a 5 % discount if you go to them and you use that code. That way they'll know that you got it from the show. So Tony, if you wanna give them their shout out, it would be great at this time.

Tony (23:03.728)
into the-

Tony (23:19.643)
my gosh, absolutely. So we would definitely like to give a special shout out to the Blue Dark Fira custom gifts. It's your go-to source for meaningful personalized creations from custom tumblers, t-shirts, totes, wall art, wind spinners, and so much more. They bring your ideas to life with the creativity and care. So if you guys are looking for the perfect gift,

Or something special for yourself. Just visit blue dark fear custom gifts dot my Shopify period dash com dot that's blue dark fear custom gifts where every item is made with purpose and heart. Thank you for supporting honestly the local creators.

Mike Kocienski (24:10.081)
Yes, and that information will be in our information for this podcast. just give them a shout out. And like I said, use code LTBCPC2505 and they'll give you a 5 % discount. Tony, they're doing great for us. mean, they made us up keychains. have some t-shirts now.

and on all this stuff is we actually also we're gonna have the made up some mugs for us too didn't they? they're gonna they're gonna send them out to us soon so they gave us

Tony (24:39.875)
Yep. Yeah, they made a lot of, they made some mugs for us and everything.

Mike Kocienski (24:45.377)
Yeah, so and they did a great job. I got everything here, unfortunately. Tony doesn't have anything, I'll try to put some pictures out somewhere on Facebook or something so you can take a look at them. And what I'd like to offer anybody out there right now is if you're the first two to get ahold of us by email, which are, know our email's out there, but I can give it to you. It's ant.mike.

PC dot two zero two five at gmail.com if you're one of the first two people to send us an email with your address and Your t-shirt sizes will send you each a t-shirt and a keychain Just to add of thanking you for you know being a part of the show and anybody else that emails us We'll give you a shout out at our next show by the way This is probably our last show for the year and we're gonna get back in for a minute back into the rest of the stuff, but

We're going to be doing some rebranding. We're going to be changing up things for next season, making it more exciting. Not that it wasn't exciting, but I want to tell you we thank you so much for everything this year. We've had a very successful season for a first year Christian podcast. you know, we know it was Jesus and God or Jesus Christ that helped us get here, the Holy Spirit. So thank you to all of you who have have tuned in.

For that, we want to give away one of the t-shirts we have and hopefully we have your size. We don't have any smalls. They run a little small, but that's why we only have from medium up through, believe, 2XL. And some of them have already been given out to some of our guests that were on the show, but we'd like to get one out there to the first two people. with that said, that's all I got to say on them. So Tony, let's hop back into the show.

Tony (26:24.053)
Yep.

Tony (26:37.27)
Absolutely. So basically though, gratitude doesn't always change our situation, but it does change how we see it. know, Psalms is one of the greatest things to look at when you're looking at gratitude. Excuse me. One of them is Psalm 136 through one.

It says, thanks to the Lord for he is good for his steadfast love endures forever. God's goodness doesn't actually disappear when life gets confusing though. So everybody. Truthfully has this. And including myself, for example. Life tends to get, you know, drastic.

It gets very, very hard sometimes. You know, it feels like to me it's like one of those tests that, you know, that kind of is like, all right, what are you capable of showing me right now? You know, or what can you understand about this situation that's going on in your life that's making you so frustrated about having everything going on?

that it is hard to be grateful for, you know? So like, God's goodness doesn't really stop when you stop with Him, you know? Because He's always going to be there. I mean, have you ever seen gratitude change a perspective during a tough season? Yeah. I mean, I know I have.

Mike Kocienski (28:26.177)
Yeah, absolutely.

Tony (28:28.929)
You know, and it always happens like that. You may not realize that it's happening at that particular moment because you're sitting there like, wow, this could not get any worse. But then all of sudden out of nowhere when you just cry out and you just look at the man that created you, you start to see things from a different perspective about how everything's going to be in your life. And

when that happens you truly start to see things in a spot where you're like, all right, well, yeah, things went bad for a while. Like I won't forget the time when I lost my job. I thought I lost absolutely everything and then I got blessed with another place, you know, and

Mike Kocienski (29:14.509)
Mm-hmm.

Mike Kocienski (29:21.037)
Yeah.

Tony (29:22.989)
I was very, very happy. I was very blessed. was grateful. I was happy to the point where I just was like. Everything else along the lines of where I was before to now. Changed drastically, and I couldn't have been more grateful for that. Truthfully speaking, I mean.

Everybody here has had a moment in their life where they've lost something that was big to them. And then all of sudden, yeah, man, like 100 % indeed. You know, we've all lost something that was truly a big deal for that person or for you or for I. And then next thing you know, something else comes into the picture. And the next thing you know, you're like, well,

Mike Kocienski (29:58.156)
100%.

Tony (30:19.293)
I can just forget about the things that had happened, had happened. You don't really forget them. You just learn to make it better with the new place that you're at in your life. You know, that's...

Mike Kocienski (30:34.421)
Right, true, absolutely. Absolutely. And you know, it does, it makes complete sense. You also got to remember though that your, as life goes on, your perspective of things of where you are and you know, what is you're grateful for and stuff like that is different from what it was when you're 30. I mean, these things are still there, but you don't see them as much as you do when you're 62.

Tony (30:41.29)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (31:03.895)
I'm going to give you an example, okay? And I know that I bust all the time about Grandma Mary and my dad and stuff like that, but they're 80 and 82, okay? And I'm going to send a shout out to my mom because I am grateful for her and I'm grateful for my dad to have them. And, you know, I talked to them and she's praying for me all the time. Her prayer group is praying for me all the time.

Tony (31:16.075)
you

Mike Kocienski (31:31.02)
My dad calls me all the time now, you know, your grandma and grandpa, you know, and you know, their perspective is different from my perspective and, every, everybody with their, their gratitude is as different as they go along, you know? So, I mean, with that being said, because, you know, we never know when we're going to go. There's Psalms 118 24. This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it. So,

Tony (31:34.735)
Yeah.

Tony (31:55.083)
Right.

Mike Kocienski (32:00.226)
You know what I'm saying there is that you know what grateful joy happiness be proud have gratitude for where you are today because tomorrow is not promised you know it's not and I'm grateful for my my my my brothers you know I'm grateful for everybody my sister you know everything you know I am and or my sisters I am I'm grateful for all of them and

Tony (32:10.581)
That's fact.

Mike Kocienski (32:28.781)
If they're listening, want them to know and I'm grateful for for all you kids too, you know, but my gratitude is I'm sure different from yours, you know, but but it's the same but it's different. Does that make sense? Because I'm seeing it from the perspective of I'm 62. My parents are 80. I still have them. So I'm grateful for that, you know, where you look at me right now and you say my dad's gonna be around for a while.

Tony (32:53.087)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (32:56.141)
You know, my mom's gonna, know, stuff like that. Robin's gonna be around for a while. My mom's gonna be around for a while. So I still have time, you know? And I used to think like that too when I was 30. But you never know, you know? You just never know. So with that said, mean, what are, I mean, and also don't get me wrong. I'm grateful for like fate and I'm grateful for the grandkids. I'm grateful for John and Kevin and Mikey and everybody, you know, they're significant others and all of that.

you know, and they should know, you know, that I am, you know, Jimmy and Missy, you know, I'm grateful for them and the three grandkids down there in Florida. I love them all and I'm grateful that they're in my life, but you know what? It all stemmed through me anyway, so I'm grateful for that too.

Tony (33:29.565)
yeah.

Tony (33:48.66)
Yeah. Amen. Sheesh.

Mike Kocienski (33:51.351)
So what about you, Tony? I just, you know, I just blurted out a hundred words. What about you?

Tony (33:58.442)
I mean, as far as what? Like,

Mike Kocienski (33:59.352)
Yeah.

What what what yeah what's what what are you you know if you had to look at from a perspective okay I'm I I looked at it from a 60 year olds perspective okay and I want you to you know I want you to think of it from for 60 not from like where where I am but from where you are what at 30 years old what is your gratitude compared to what mine might be you know

Tony (34:26.73)
I'm still happy I got my dad. Out of, know, truthfully speaking, I'm grateful that you're still here. Out of, you know, a lot of people are less fortunate. A lot of people don't have what we have. And I'm grateful that I have the things that I do. I mean,

Mike Kocienski (34:29.867)
Well, I appreciate that.

Tony (34:56.842)
Truthfully speaking, I sit here every single day, like I pray every single day, like, thank you for the food on the table. Thank you that I have a roof over my head, things like that. But I'm really just grateful that I have my dad still, you know, of all the things that that could be in my life.

Mike Kocienski (35:21.357)
Well, thank you, Tony.

Tony (35:27.334)
I'm truly grateful that I still that you're still here, you know, not to mention like. I have and I have a one year old. Which is absolutely crazy, because I had no idea ever in my mind where I would think that I would ever be a dad. You know, it's like the cycle continues.

Mike Kocienski (35:33.389)
Thanks.

Mike Kocienski (35:51.062)
and

Yeah. Yeah.

Tony (35:56.958)
Yeah, seriously. You know, it's just, truthfully, it's one of those things that you just have to practice. You know, it grows over time, I think. That when something crazy happens in your life, the first thing off the rip, you're just like, yo.

Why, God, why? You know, and...

Then when you start changing it, the changing the wording, right? And you're like, thank you, Lord. Thank you for this. Thank you for that. And thank you for keeping your hand on my shoulder when I didn't realize I had anybody to be looking after me like that. You look at it at a different standpoint.

Mike Kocienski (36:41.409)
Mm-hmm.

Mike Kocienski (36:54.327)
Well, you know.

Tony (36:57.384)
You you look at things from a different point of view when you start saying thank you instead of why. You know.

Mike Kocienski (37:05.769)
Exactly. 100 % exactly. You nailed it on the head. But you also nailed something else too. And that's the fact that, and I wanted to hear what you were going to say and you know what? Everybody really does feel the same way when it comes to gratitude. They, they, you know, I do it still. Thank you for the roof over the head, food on the table. You know, I thank you for Robin. Thank you for the kids. You know, I go through the whole list all the time.

and on but i also you know i also say in the end i always say but lord most of all thank you for you thank you for being who you are and and having me be part of your family you know that it's i so i mean that's i do that all the time so you said exactly what i was hoping you would say at the same things that everybody else says and you know like you said you thank your parents you know you you know it's man

Tony (37:47.613)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (38:03.543)
This subject is so tough because you don't want to step on people's toes. it's more about what are you, when you look inside yourself, okay? It's not about what Bill down the street or Mary downtown or Steve up in the building or Fred on your baseball team, whatever it is. It's not about what they're grateful for, okay? It's about what you are grateful for. So if you're listening to this show,

Tony (38:24.776)
Right.

Mike Kocienski (38:32.467)
Sit down for a couple minutes, just sit in the park or your favorite place, wherever it is, and just sit down and just think to yourself or write it down, whatever you want to do, and think, what am I grateful

Tony (38:47.76)
Yeah. Heck yeah.

Mike Kocienski (38:48.013)
And you know, and then when you sit it down and when you do that, you'll realize how lucky you probably actually are. And believe it or not, as bad as you may think you have it, there's always somebody who's worse off. There always is. And I've realized that because I went through the

Tony (39:08.828)
Hell yeah, absolutely.

Mike Kocienski (39:16.203)
The poor, pity me, boo hoo, I've got cancer. And don't get me wrong. I mean, what happened to me is devastating. I mean, I never expected that, to ever hear those words, you know? Never in a million years did I expect to hear those words. And at first, I was so angry. And if you remember during my testimony, when I told you, I got down on my knees and I said, why me, God?

Tony (39:30.854)
Yep.

Mike Kocienski (39:46.092)
Why did this happen? Well, at the time it wasn't clear, but now it is. This happened because it was my call back to him. That's what it was. And my, I'm grateful every morning now, cause you know what? Almost every morning, Tony, you know what I do? I get my, I get put my earphones on and I take my phone and I listen, I have that Bible I listened to. Remember I told you and I listened to it every.

And then after I get done listening to it, I meditate with this music I have every morning. And I do this for anywhere from an hour, from a half hour, actually sometimes just 15 minutes of the Bible and 15 minutes of meditating up until sometimes a couple of hours, depending on what time in the morning it is when I get up. And you know what? I'm grateful I can do that because there are probably some people out there that are so sick they can't even do that. You know what I mean? So.

Tony (40:43.803)
Yep.

Mike Kocienski (40:44.841)
And like I said, doesn't want that. God doesn't need that. He just wants your love. He wants you to follow His commandments and just live up. But He wants your heart. That's the main thing. And you know what? The other thing is too, is somebody had addressed this thing like, why does God let all this stuff happen? know, God's not the one that's letting it happen. Okay? Things just happen.

Tony (40:55.558)
He wants your heart.

Mike Kocienski (41:14.955)
You know, God loves you regardless. and it's, this is what people don't understand is God doesn't make things that happen here. Things just happened because, because we're human beings, because it's life, because, know, it's not God, it's the devil's playground, you know, and, and God doesn't, doesn't want these things to happen to you, but you know what he wants? Pray to him.

Right? Right. If you this is the whole thing. God doesn't make this happen. And that's where I was trying to go with this. And I couldn't find the words. But here's where we are. We had an episode on free will. Remember, there are choices that you make throughout life. OK. And if let's say, for instance, you get in a car accident. OK.

Tony (41:45.402)
Yeah, he definitely gives you a choice, man. He gives you a choice. How are you gonna react?

Mike Kocienski (42:13.645)
Maybe it's your fault. Maybe it's not okay, but you had to get to where you had to get to God wasn't driving the car God wasn't the one that was driving the car that hit you you were Okay, the thing is is you're alive because God kept you alive You could have easily died in that moment Okay, but you stayed alive because you still have a mission that you need to do God doesn't sit there God doesn't make the

Tony (42:31.824)
Yep.

Tony (42:39.822)
I'm sorry.

Mike Kocienski (42:43.543)
God doesn't make the diseases that are out there right now. They're in the earth. They're everywhere. it's just, I guess what I'm trying to say is that it's not God's fault when you have a problem. God didn't make the problem. Somehow, some way, it was either manmade or it just happens. We're human beings. And God's not about that. God's about

peace, love, and happiness. listen, I could be angry right now and say, God, why did you let this happen to me? Am I, Tony?

Tony (43:23.316)
No, you're right. No, you're right. mean, you have, like I said, you have a choice to literally be spiteful of the fact that things have happened or like the title of this episode is, is grateful that you have a chance to learn from what's going on and then maybe, just maybe,

Spread your faith and spread your wings a little bit further today to be like, alright, this may be happening to me, but you know something? How am I going to react to it at the end of the day? And if I choose to actually end up being spiteful of the fact that these things have happened, it's okay. God still loves you about it. But the thing is, is that it's one of those things that it feels like it's kind of like a test to me.

Mike Kocienski (44:12.011)
Right.

Tony (44:18.412)
you know, personally.

Mike Kocienski (44:19.533)
Well, everything's a test. Everything is a test. And you know what? Let me go one step further with the God. Why did you let this happen to me? All right? Let's say you're out having a good time. Okay? And you have a great night. Nothing happens. You go home. You go to bed. Everything's fine. Do you thank God for that? Do you say, God, thank you for letting me have a great time tonight?

Do you? Or do you just take it for granted? And then, let's say that you go out 20, 30 nights, 40 nights, 100 nights, 20 years, you go out every night and you have a great time. Are you with your friends and you have a great time? Do you say every time you go, God, thank you for letting me have a great time tonight with my friends? No. But as soon as something bad happens to you, it's his fault. It's his fault right away.

Tony (45:12.029)
No.

Tony (45:15.97)
You're right there. Yep.

Mike Kocienski (45:19.733)
Somebody dies or somebody something happens God. Why did you take him from me? It was their time It wasn't that he wanted to take them. It was their time and why don't we're

Tony (45:30.178)
You wanna know something? It's- that's so funny that you bring that up. I want you to continue, but that's actually a,

Mike Kocienski (45:34.167)
Thank

Tony (45:42.57)
That's a huge thing actually because a lot of people, they stop going to God because things are going good. And then the minute that things start screwing up or whatever, they're like, like that cultural Christian, hey, I need your help. Please come to my aid. You know what I mean?

Mike Kocienski (46:05.132)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (46:09.741)
Right. And you know what? And I was guilty of it, too, Tony. I mean, you know, I would go out and I would do things and like, you know, and I would be like this. Why did you know I'm having such a great time? You know, I didn't say thank you, God, for this, you know. However, when I got up to the plate, I would do the sign of the cross because, you know, that's that's what the Catholics used to do. I mean, the sign of the cross. So I would do that before I got up to that. If I got a ground out, I didn't yell. Why did you let that happen? God, you know, it was part of the game.

Tony (46:14.242)
Me too,

Mike Kocienski (46:39.895)
But you know, I was blessing him for letting me play the game and getting that at bat, you know? But everybody seems to think that you can do a thousand things. You can go and win a million dollars. You can go, you know, hang out at casinos. You can go and you can, you know, go to baseball games. You can bet on sports. You can do all these things that whatever you want to do because you have free will and you don't thank him for that.

Tony (46:39.969)
Yep.

Mike Kocienski (47:09.365)
What you do is you ask him why did this happen after something bad happens. So then you expect him to fix it for you because you you you feel like you have that coming. You know and I'm not saying you know like things like for instance like. Now that's a whole nother story. I don't want to get into that right now. Let's keep this at you know let's keep this at what the subject was but.

What I'm trying to say was, you know, for all the good, for all the bad, when the bad things happen, thank Him for the good things. So when the bad things happen, He's, you know what though? He still hears you. Even when you don't say anything to Him, if you ask for His forgiveness, He will hear you. He will listen. He may even come to you. Yep. It's never too late for Him to listen to you.

Tony (48:01.123)
He feels it in your heart,

Mike Kocienski (48:09.227)
And you know, I feel like at this point that I beat a dead horse. I've said everything pretty much that I want to say about,

Tony (48:09.281)
Right.

Mike Kocienski (48:19.117)
being grateful. There's so much more I could say. There's so many pieces to being grateful like love, peace, and happiness, tranquility, and there's just a lot. And you know what? It's out there. You can find it. And I want people to know that our podcast isn't about trying to convince you to do anything.

Tony (48:34.787)
you

Mike Kocienski (48:49.151)
our podcast is just to say, hey, we love God, we love Jesus, we love the Holy Spirit, and you have to come as you are, we aren't asking you for anything, you know? We don't even ask for donations, you know? I mean, this is like a hobby for us. mean, we would love to have the help, you know, but we don't ask for it, you know? We don't ask for it. If it's meant to be, it'll happen on its own. So.

Tony (48:56.802)
And just comment if you are.

Tony (49:11.36)
Amen.

Tony (49:18.189)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (49:18.701)
But Tony, I have said all I need to say and I've said a lot tonight. And like I said, I feel like I was a honyuck on the show, but I know you have some things you still want to say. mean, fire away, fire away, young Skywalker, fire away.

Tony (49:28.035)
You ain't. I'm a founder.

Tony (49:38.998)
Now you basically hit everything that I wanted to say on the head. And you know something? Like I said before, gratitude isn't about denying the pain. It's literally just about anchoring hope.

Mike Kocienski (49:55.585)
Mm-hmm. Amen.

Tony (49:56.523)
You know, don't give up when something bad happens to you. You know, believe me, I am a prime example of that, if that makes sense. When things got difficult.

I got more.

I got more difficult There you go.

Mike Kocienski (50:23.957)
Yeah. Yeah. But the, you know, the other thing is too though, is that if people are feeling down, you know, and think it's important that we put this out there. There are so many different places out there that can help you. And you and I talked about this to this afternoon Tony, because we're thinking about getting into helping the vets and you know, other people through the show. And, but there are places out there that you can call. mean, if you're feeling like you're lonely, I know there's a, are you're feeling suicidal? There's a suicide hotline.

There's different things that you can call or that can take care of you. But don't ever feel like you're alone. let me look up something here real quick.

Tony (51:11.521)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (51:18.445)
If you ever feel like you are, you know, are feeling like, you know, like you want to give up on life or whatever, and a lot of this came to fruition last week with me with Felicia on the show, the last show. There's, guess it's called 988lifeline.org or you can text 988 or you can call 988 or there's a chat on your phone. Just put in suicide hotline and...

Get online with somebody and get help. Everybody's life is precious. You know what I mean?

Tony (52:00.155)
Just be grateful for what you got instead of what you don't have already, you know? Just keep going, keep fighting the good fight. Endure to the end. Live each day like it's your last. Don't be anxious about anything. Just keep...

being you and don't stop being you.

Mike Kocienski (52:27.081)
Amen. So I think that's a good segue for us to say a couple things to end out season one.

Mike Kocienski (52:39.393)
Season one has been amazing. We've had ups, we've had downs, we've, you know, we've come a long way. Felicia's podcast was the quickest to reach 100 listeners. And we hope that that's an indication of what's to come in the future. There will be a part two to Felicia. That's going to be, I believe, didn't we say Tony is going to be the very first show of next season? That'll be part two.

Tony (53:05.504)
Yep.

Mike Kocienski (53:06.349)
That'll be an extension of what she went through, the things that she did. There's also, for those of you who are just logging or just coming into the show or whatever, there are so many shows out there that are available to listen to and I want to go through a quick list of them. Are you okay with that, Tony? All right, so with that said, Season 14, or Season 14, don't I wish?

Tony (53:27.731)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (53:35.906)
Season one had like 12, 13 actual episodes that were actual podcasts. We had an introduction, which was just that introduction, but then Tony and I in episodes two and episodes three respectively, Tony and two, me and three, we gave our testimonies. Episode four was what is the Bible? And that was a good one. There was two parts to Free Will.

Tony (53:36.286)
Wow.

Mike Kocienski (54:02.701)
That was episodes 5 and 6 and they're pretty close to head and head, you know, with running and everything. Episode 7 was why family and why it matters. Episode 8 was Church in the Cul-De- Sac, which is a good one. That one had Bishop Curtis, both Bishop Curtises, Elijah and Nathan. It had Jason, Pastor Spell, Jason Spell, who was supposed to be on the one we're going to be actually doing Christ the King with at some point.

Tony (54:12.319)
Thank

Tony (54:22.335)
you

Mike Kocienski (54:32.717)
There was also the Braswell family legacy. That was a good one too, Tony. He gave a good interview, you know? And then there was, let me see, hard times and strength, bitterness and peace. And one of my favorites was actually end times. you know what? End times is a tough one to talk about. People don't want to talk about it. But we didn't take it from the perspective of we want, like, you the world's going to end tomorrow or anything like that.

Tony (54:40.328)
Yeah.

Tony (55:01.045)
Yeah, no that was not the aspect it was more of along the lines like Hey, you know, this is what could happen which will happen in the future Just keep aware

Mike Kocienski (55:01.709)
from the perspective of.

Mike Kocienski (55:13.163)
Right. But the... Yep. Yep. And the thing is, is that we talked about this today too, you and I, that, you know, it's gonna be humankind that ends the world. And then at that point, that's when you're gonna hear the trumpets coming on and everything like that, because the human beings will be the first ones to draw first blood. You know, I truly believe that. So, you know, you can postpone the inevitable by changing your way of life and doing things, but eventually it'll happen. But the thing is...

Jesus doesn't want to end the world. wants you to live and be in peace and have a good time. But you also got to understand that it's not always us that's doing it. Our world leaders are causing problems too. So you got to take everything, weigh everything that's going on. But I'm going to put all that information out. We do have a Facebook page that if you want to follow us, it's out there. It is Let's Talk Basic Christianity podcast.

Tony (55:59.238)
Amen.

Mike Kocienski (56:11.411)
Are there's a private one and there's a public one if you want membership to the private one just go online go to our public one and let us know you want access to it and then we'll grant you access. Next season that'll be more prevalent than this year because we'll have special information on that for members only we talked about that right Tony. We're gonna have next year we're gonna have actual nice videos of us on online so people who like to see visual.

Tony (56:30.237)
Yep.

Mike Kocienski (56:38.349)
the show visibly will be able to do you will be doing that next year through our YouTube channel. A lot of this stuff is new to us and we're really trying to work the kinks out as we go. And I think you know if you would like to I mean also subscribe to the show you can do that through Buzzsprout or you can do that through our website which is www.letstalkbcpc.com. And the other thing is too is we brought it up.

If send us an email, we'll give you a shout out at the beginning of next season. And the last thing is, is that if you really would like to donate to help us offset the costs, we don't make anything at this. I mean, we are so, I think the last time we talked, Tony, what did I tell you? We're like close to $4,000 in the hole on doing this, but we're not doing it for the money. We're not. We don't, it's not about the money, trust me. But if you want to help us, we would love it.

Tony (57:26.197)
Yeah.

Mike Kocienski (57:33.897)
If you don't, we don't care if you keep coming back and never get a penny as long as you continue to enjoy the show. And pass on about us. If you like the show, let other people know you'd be surprised the people that will actually will be receptive to listening to the show if you like it. And although, you they might you might think they don't want to hear it. But in retrospect, I found that a lot of them actually do if you you just give them the chance. So, Tony.

Did I cover everything? there anything else you want to cover?

Tony (58:03.038)
You nailed it.

Mike Kocienski (58:07.117)
All right. Well, then you know what? Why don't you close the show? Because I talked through the whole thing.

Tony (58:15.526)
Nah.

Mike Kocienski (58:17.07)
So So with that said We love all of you We hope to have you back for season 2 look for changes and I have the thing I always say may God watch over you until we talk again ciao