People Want Real Again

This week on The Weekend Joyride, Mac and Rhoni are talking about why people seem to be craving “real” again.

Real books. Real conversations. Real memories. Real places. Real rest.

Inspired in part by Phil Wickham’s song “Hometown,” this episode turns into a thoughtful and personal conversation about familiar roads, grief, healing, church seasons, Pastor Ray, little escapes, summer reading, baseball cards, grounding, gardens, and the God who still knows how to surprise us.

Mac and Rhoni reflect on why shallow things do not help much when life hurts — and why ordinary things may matter more than we realize.

Maybe people want real again because real is where God has been meeting us all along.

This week, take the long way home and let God surprise you.

Links for this week's show:

Phil Wickham — “Hometown”  -  https://music.apple.com/us/album/i-believe-hometown-version/1737520927

 Libby app - https://share.google/iGiUjRjwXj3gQx7QR

 Ruby Payne / aha! Process - https://share.google/Qz0chW5jHp4rGBdnp

Echo by Pam Muñoz Ryan - https://www.pammunozryan.com/echo/

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry - https://share.google/ODBXWzf1EC5wnsOxX

The Joy Bomb by Tauren Wells - https://share.google/yQATyX26zoC5Tsh5E

Contact us: hello@weekendjoyride.com

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Transcript

Open

Mac 0:07

Hey, it's Mac and welcome back to the Weekend Joyride. This week's episode is called People Want Real Again. And I think that says a lot about where many of us are right now. We're connected all day long. Phones and screens and calendars and messages and alerts, but somehow a lot of people still feel real disconnected from actual life. Real books, real conversations, real roads, real memories, real places, real peace. This conversation started with something Ronnie noticed in Phil Wickham's song Hometown. Not as a song review, really, but as a doorway into something deeper. The way God can still amaze us in familiar places, even in places that hold grief, even in seasons that have hurt, even in the same town, on the same roads, in the same ordinary life. So today Ronnie and I are talking about soul tiredness, little escapes, books, family, baseball cards, gardens, grief healing, and the God who still knows how to catch us by surprise. Because maybe people want real again. Because real is where God has been meeting us all along.

Rhoni 1:19

We're Rhoni and Mac, and you're listening to The Weekend Joyride.

Mac 1:24

Glad you're back with us. This week we're talking about something that we have both been noticing. Yeah, we're tired. Every day.

Rhoni 1:31

Super tired.

Mac 1:33

People seem tired. As a rule, general rule. I mean, you know, I mean, everybody says, uh, I'm tired. I didn't want to get up this morning.

Rhoni 1:40

It's not just physically tired. I think that we live fast and we're so tired.

Mac 1:47

Yeah. Yeah. Everything's rushing. I felt that. What did I hear the other day? Noise. It was the noise that I heard somewhere. We were maybe even at lunch on Sunday after church.

Rhoni 2:00

Oh, it was the child screaming. Yes.

Mac 2:03

And nothing against kids. That's great. But this one was, man, this one was. I even turned around. It looked like a shh. Here, little darling. Here's some, here's some candy.

Rhoni 2:14

Can you take that child outside?

Mac 2:16

Yeah, no kidding. But we're just kind of like it's it feels like we're always rushing.

Rhoni 2:22

Yeah, I'm around kids all day.

Mac 2:24

So I want quiet. I thought about that when that child was doing that in the restaurant. I thought, I should not be feeling the way I do because you deal with that all day, every day. It's amazing.

Rhoni 2:34

But we're just we're tired of screens. And really I'm tired of technology. And this is the ironic part. It's that it's like we're connected. We're wired up on our phones, our iPads, our emails, our Google Calendar pings us when there's something. We're connected all around. But it's interesting that people are still feeling disconnected from actual life at times. That's really interesting. Do you feel like that? I feel like that.

Mac 3:04

I absolutely do. Because sometimes I want to just shut everything down and walk away, but I'm so drawn back to it because I'm interested in it and it does so much for me. But still, I just want to like that's a strange part.

Rhoni 3:17

Because we have all these ways to communicate. And so you and I have talked about how uh the iPad is our newspaper. We read digital news.

Mac 3:27

Yeah.

Rhoni 3:28

So it's hard to put it down and not pick it up because you really get disconnected from the stuff you need to know. Well, we don't even have a newspaper that's coming to the front door anymore.

Mac 3:39

No, I don't even know if they do that anymore. But you know, there's still a lot of people I think are the same way as we are. They they seem hungry for something that's that's real.

Rhoni 3:50

We want real books that we can smell and touch.

Mac 3:53

You love that. I love that. I love the books we've built.

Rhoni 3:56

But here's the irony of it. We have an entire library at our house.

Mac 4:00

Yeah.

Rhoni 4:00

And books in every room.

Mac 4:02

Yeah.

Rhoni 4:02

And what do I do? I download a book from the Libby app or the library, and I lay in bed and read it off my iPad. Yeah.

Mac 4:10

I get that. I mean, some of it's convenience because that to me is convenient because you don't have to have an overhead light on to read, and my reading glasses get to stay on the counter because it can make the font bigger, all that, but still, you still love that, just like I mentioned a few episodes ago. How I love the smell of a store, certain store that I think it's Blair's Western Wear or Harry's Boots in San Saba. But when I walk in there, that smell is just that is real to me. That is it has texture and weight and all that.

Rhoni 4:43

Yeah, I think people are just ready for real memories and real places, just kind of getting back to life. Things that don't disappear when you close the app.

Mac 4:59

Yeah. That kind of got a little more personal for us this week because you came across Phil Wickham's song Hometown, and I was surprised it wasn't new. You said no, it's it's a couple of years old.

Rhoni 5:09

No, I just it's on repeat for me. And it just it hit something on the inside of me. Not that we're turning this into a song review because we're not, but the song is titled Hometown. And Hometown being around people that we love and people that love us has been tender for us lately. It wasn't just the hometown idea, it's the words of this song that are about how God is still able to amaze us. Even in these familiar places, even waking up every day, just knowing that he's tapping me. He's tapping me and saying, Notice this. Just know it's a sweetness. Yeah, it's a sweetness, it's a it's a notice me. And it's sometimes in familiar places and things that I'm doing that are ordinary. It can be on a road that we've driven a thousand times, it can be in a season that's had just major heartbreak in it. But it's a feeling that God keeps tapping me and saying, Look over here, notice this, notice what I'm doing now.

Mac 6:33

Yeah. Yeah. And if you look, you could see it. That's the part that got me too. Sometimes you think, you know, I've seen this road, like you said, a thousand times, but same town, same roads, same routine every day. I think about my routine. I do the same thing every morning. I get up and I go get us coffee and I sit down, and you know, we have this certain time by this time, but then God will catch us by surprise sometimes. Yeah. And it's I think it's because home isn't always simple. It's beautiful and it's familiar, but it's not always just simple.

Rhoni 7:04

Yeah, being home is comforting and being in a place where we are rooted is comforting. But some of these same places also hold some grief for us. Yeah. It holds change. Yeah. It holds memories that you're thankful for.

Mac 7:20

Yeah.

Rhoni 7:22

Thankful. But they're also memories that hurt.

Mac 7:27

Yeah.

Rhoni 7:28

And I would rather still be in this place where we are loved and we love people, even when you're dealing with some hurtful things. Yeah. Yeah. Because you you're in a place where you still belong. It feels right.

Mac 7:43

It feels right for you. Even in that hurt, because we have had some hurt in this past season, like leaving a church that we've been to for 20 years. That that was a heartbreak.

Rhoni 7:52

People disappointed us. You know what I'm saying? People that we were close to in our former church really disappointed us. I mean, we saw we saw a side of some people that we thought loved us dearly. Yeah. And it was disappointing to learn that the feeling that we had for them was not reciprocated to us. That was painful. That was heartbreaking. That was heartbreaking.

Mac 8:22

And then losing Pastor Ray, even this past Sunday, a wave of emotion came over me. As I was sitting in church. Yeah. I wish I had him to just give me a second. And that, you know, it that just I know the waves will go away over time. They will. Yeah.

Rhoni 9:00

I noticed that at Wednesday night church. You brought candy, but I immediately thought, I wish he was here to pitch me that almond butter granola bar that we both like, that we both snagged.

Mac 9:18

Yeah.

Rhoni 9:18

But here's the part that amazes me. Because we're talking about how God amazes you in the middle of it. How Pastor Cricket and Pastor Trey, Pastor Ray's wife and son show up strong, full of joy, full of purpose, leading the rest of us. And I just look at God and go, then how do we why would we sit here and flop around in our sadness when the people closest to our beloved pastor are showing up strong? Yeah. Right? God amazes me. That only by God could that happen.

Mac 10:12

Yeah. Because I walk in there and I think, okay, we need to be strong for them.

Rhoni 10:16

No, but they're walking in being strong.

Mac 10:21

Yes. In the entire church.

Rhoni 10:22

And that's just, you know, God. I think that's why that song touched me because God doesn't always heal you by taking you somewhere brand new. He heals you right where you are. Right there in your same place on these same road roads in this same town, same memories, around the same people. We all love each other. We all are going through it together.

Mac 10:48

Yeah.

Rhoni 10:48

But it just amazes me how he flipped the script and the pastor's wife and son walk in and are just moving forward in anointed power and strength.

Mac 11:01

That's that grace of God that's showing up again and again.

Rhoni 11:04

It's awesome.

Mac 11:05

Yeah, it is amazing. It's a and that's a big thought too. It is that whole thing.

Rhoni 11:11

And I think just to connect what so many people are feeling right now, whether it's you're tired of screens and AI and all of this digital everything, or tired of people not being who you thought they were. I think people are just feeling right now that they want real connection. We don't want distraction. We want meaningful moments. We don't want to just escape into something, but we just want to get back to being real.

Mac 11:54

Yeah. Because when things hurt like that, shallow things don't help that much.

Rhoni 12:01

Everybody's going through something. Like one of my favorite pastors, Funny, used to say, Everybody's got an issue. Everybody's got an issue. Everybody's going through something, right? We're all dealing with something. Whether it's just being tired, just being stressed, dealing with the economy, or you're going through something heavy.

Mac 12:19

Yeah.

Rhoni 12:19

Everybody's got something.

Mac 12:21

So today that's what we are going to be talking about, why people are craving real life things again, why ordinary things matter more than we realize. And I think we ought to stop and take a look at that and why maybe God is meeting us right here in the middle of the life that we already have. Yeah.

Rhoni 12:38

It's right here in our home. It's our little town, right here in our little garden. Sometimes it's in the books you read. Um he led us from one church to another through the book The Joy Bomb by Tauren Wells. That was one of those breadcrumbs for us. But it's in these places that we realize that we are slowly learning not just how to hope again, but we are coming alive again. We're coming alive again.

Mac 13:14

Haven't you noticed recently that people seem to be more intense? We've used this word a lot, more intentional about little escapes.

Rhoni 13:21

Yes. And I like that phrase little escapes because we're not really talking about just running away from your life or running away for a lengthy period of time. We actually went on a week-long cruise not so long ago. But we're talking about small moments that really help you come back to your life. I don't know how to say it except with just a little more breath in your lungs.

Mac 13:42

Yeah. Even things like going to the coffee shop or the bookstore. We went in the bookstore the other day, and we both love going in the bookstore.

Rhoni 13:49

Yeah, but we just wander around. But we walked out of the restaurant the other day, and I said, Oh, summer. I'm just gonna come down here and bring a book to this coffee shop or that coffee shop. I mean, that was a little escape I'm looking forward to.

Mac 14:01

Yeah, but it's little road trips too. We love those. And we haven't taken any hill country drives, all those.

Rhoni 14:07

Yeah.

Mac 14:07

Just spending an afternoon somewhere quiet.

Rhoni 14:10

I think it's important for your soul piece to be reminded that life is really bigger and should be bigger than your to-do list. Remember, the Bible says, beloved, I wish that you would prosper even as your soul prospers. What we're really talking about today is helping your soul to prosper again. That's right.

Mac 14:31

And I think people really need that, they need something to look forward to.

Rhoni 14:35

They do. Looking forward to something is so important. The proverb says that hope deferred makes the heart sick. And I think a lot of people understand that more than they even realize. When all you have ahead of you is bills and stress and deadlines, appointments, or even bad news, your heart just gets so tired. And I do remember when we were surrounded by some of our really fun big thinking friends, our entrepreneurial groups. We learned how to begin to dream again. We had gotten pretty stuck in the rat race of life. But we're pretty big thinkers and dreamers now. We really do pause often. But I feel like listeners also need to be reminded. That's what we're talking about today is stopping to notice life again. But people do need anticipation, they need some joy, and beauty and rest should be in your life. It's got to be more than just pressure in your life.

Mac 15:46

Yeah, and that that kind of changed the way we started thinking about travel and experiences and that kind of stuff.

Rhoni 15:54

Yeah, because we talk about someday we want to go to Europe. We haven't been yet. We talk about trips that we wish we had taken with our kids and we didn't.

Mac 16:03

Yeah. But I was just thinking, you and I are busier now than we probably ever have been in our lives. It's like where's an open spot right now? I'm kind of past that point to where I say someday we're gonna make that memory. Because the years go by and you don't even know it. Believe me, I can speak for that. The years go by and you don't even know it.

Rhoni 16:23

Yeah, and we actually joined a travel club because we just made the decision. Number one, we want to do things that we don't take steps toward. And it's not about being extravagant, not about needing luxury or impressing people. It's just that we have decided we're going to stop postponing joy forever.

Mac 16:49

That's a good way to put it. That's a great way to put that.

Rhoni 16:52

After the loss that we felt and the disappointments that we've had, we just began to realize that life is not guaranteed to stay the way it is, that people move, that seasons change, that even church seasons change for us, that people you love go home to be with the Lord. If you're not careful and you keep waiting for the perfect time to live, you may miss it.

Mac 17:18

Yeah, because there may not be a perfect time. I wanted to add that one thing my dad used to say, one of his favorite sayings is nothing is constant but change.

Rhoni 17:27

It's true.

Mac 17:28

Yeah.

Rhoni 17:28

Yeah. So we just decided to try to be a little more intentional about planning for trips. Yeah. And small escapes or big escapes. I know that we are very intentional with our parents. Um we now, after my brother went to heaven, we became very intentional about uh spending it a point. Making it a point. We always did, we've always been close to my parents. Yeah. And we always did have dinner with them and that sort of thing, but we have established a routine. We we eat dinner with them weekly.

Mac 18:08

And especially since my parents are are gone, they've passed on. Uh and your parents are what we have, what we have left. And I don't even call them your parents anymore. Yeah.

Rhoni 18:18

But again, we're talking about making time to be intentional, to connect and do things that aren't screen related, and noticing the just having more of a let's go anyway attitude.

Mac 18:36

Right? Oh, we've got this to do, we've got that to do. Let's go anyway, because we need to get out of the house. We need a little drive, we need a meal, we need a quiet place. Let's go listen to some music somewhere, a place where you can I think God's still here. We're still here. Life is still all of this around us is worth noticing instead of just racing by.

Rhoni 18:55

It's just that God is just helping me notice that the grace to do the things I need to do and the grace to do the things I want to do are available. And where we live is precious. It is a place we wouldn't live anywhere else. This community holds our memories, our laughter, it holds our tears.

Mac 19:23

Yeah. All of that.

Rhoni 19:24

And we're happy to be where we are, but I feel like people are craving real.

Mac 19:32

All those little trips are good and great, but uh a tiny escape. The escapes we're talking about isn't about abandoning our real life, because our real life has has that sweetness attached to it and all that other stuff attached to it, but maybe it helps you come back and look at it with I don't know, softer eyes, maybe.

Rhoni 19:51

I do think it goes beyond traveling, though. We're really talking about, again, is people craving tangible life beyond screens and apps, yeah, beyond pressure and stress.

Mac 20:04

You kind of see it everywhere. And I kind of have a a bird's eye view of it in my everyday job at the radio station. I interview lots of people, and I've interviewed the people about the county fair that's coming up, and you know, enter your grandma's quilt. And I'm in fact, I meant to tell you about that. There's a there's actually a thing coming up in the county fair where they have legacy quilts, and you can enter your grandparents' quilt or whatever.

Rhoni 20:26

I need that information.

Mac 20:28

So that but collecting things again. We still collect things that that mean things to us, uh writing in journals and just taking a drive through the small town again. It's like people just want to touch life again.

Rhoni 20:42

Because so much of modern life just feels kind of flat. It's just no one is more digital and connected digitally than we are, but it just seems so rushed. I'm getting tired of it. And I feel like people are just also saying, I need something I can feel.

Mac 21:00

I think that's like our son-in-law and grandson are getting into baseball cards. I mean, those I thought those were long gone. But I love that. That's great.

Rhoni 21:09

Because collecting is about the story.

Mac 21:12

Yeah.

Rhoni 21:12

It's not about the object, it's about the story behind it.

Mac 21:15

The memory attached to it. Right. Yeah.

Rhoni 21:17

And those baseball cards are they really carry a little piece of history. It's like the player, his season, the connection between generations is interesting.

Mac 21:25

That's good, yeah. Gives you something to hold on to, too.

Rhoni 21:28

It does matter more than we realize because again, so much of our life happens through the glass, you might say.

Mac 21:36

Yeah.

Rhoni 21:37

Scrolling, streaming, swiping. Yeah. Yeah.

Mac 21:40

It's yeah.

Rhoni 21:41

Everything feels available. This is the irony of it, but not everything feels meaningful. It's like we get we can touch everything, but it's out there and it's not really a part of our world.

Mac 21:52

And that's a strong thing there. It's available and meaningful are not the same thing.

Rhoni 21:59

So this is funny. Along those same lines, people are intentionally going outside barefoot because physically touching the earth helps regulate stress and anxiety. We laugh about it because my nephew is all into this. He's out there living in California. He walks around barefoot because he's always grounding. And we laughed out loud when we first read about it, heard about it, but I don't know.

Mac 22:31

Then we did it, didn't we? You did.

Rhoni 22:33

I walk outside barefoot a lot just because of that.

Mac 22:37

I don't do it a lot, but I do. And it feels good when you do go hungry or something. I don't know.

Rhoni 22:43

It's interesting because the older I get, the more I think that humans touching earth once in a while is not such a crazy idea. Now, what you're gonna find if you go out and you research grounding, I don't see us doing this because the neighbors would talk about us.

Mac 22:58

They got cameras too.

Rhoni 22:59

But they say you go out and you you get all you get your feet all planted, but then you actually hug the tree and you you become one with the tree. And I'm not there, I'm not there.

Mac 23:12

I might go out and lean against one. But no, I'm not gonna go hug trees. But I do think that there's probably somebody that's listening to this that is probably taking off their socks and shoes right now.

Rhoni 23:22

Yeah, I think it's good to go touch the grass. I do seriously think there's something to that, but not in some weird, overcomplicated way. It's just this very simple sense that God made us embodied people. We're not just brains with Wi-Fi, we're not just bodies and souls. We need sunshine, we need air, we need dirt. Yeah, you know, we we need real life. We were created living beings, and it's interesting and ironic at the same time that so much of our world is turning artificial.

Mac 23:59

Yeah. And when you say it that way, it sounds a lot less like a trend and more like, you know, remembering just getting back to it.

Rhoni 24:09

People, I think, are remembering that life is not supposed to be lived entirely in a feed. It's that joy has a smell. It's remembering the cantaloupe when the the cantaloupe smell oftentimes reminds me of my grandmother's house in the summer, West Texas, cantaloupe from her garden, and it's that smell.

Mac 24:32

You mentioned I love the smell of that cut grass. Oh, yeah. It's just that smell. Yeah, all that.

Rhoni 24:38

And that goes back to remembering that your healing and your rejuvenation and your refreshing oftentimes just happens in the most ordinary places.

Mac 24:50

Like right here in hometown, back to hometown.

Rhoni 24:53

Especially there, because familiar places hold so much of you. They they hold your good stuff and they hold the hard stuff. But if you let God into your places, if you let God let me say it like this if we can just get back to being amazed by God, falling in love with God again, as the deer panteth for the water, is what the word says. So my soul follows hard after you. If we can get back to that, then he will start making us feel alive again. Not untouched by pain, but more like not owned by it either.

Mac 25:39

Just it's more tangible. It's just like we're getting back to trying to recover wonder. You do you remember wonder?

Rhoni 25:48

Yeah. That's cool. Huh? Just the weight of something real. Yeah. Sound of a record. And that whole idea of this song just took me. It really took my soul upward, reminding me that God is still the artist.

Mac 26:04

This is Hometown by Phil Wickham.

Phil Wickham 26:08

I can see you in the morning. I can see you in the stars at night. And we have me recorded.

Mac 27:40

So we've been talking about books being real and touching them and smelling them and all that. What's on your summer reading list this summer? Because I know you have one every year. This is what I'm gonna do. But this year you've already said I'm gonna do it.

Rhoni 27:53

Yeah. I should ask you what's on yours, but I'll go first. I'll go first. All right. Mine's all over the place. First, I'm going to enjoy the feel of a book. I am going to continue to read on my Kindle because I do try to read a lot when I have the time. But I am going to try to be intentional about back to the book instead of the Kindle. I actually just finished reading a young adult book that I loved called Echo by Pam Munoz Ryan. It happens to be one of my favorite young adult novels that I think adults could enjoy too. It's layered, which I like, layers. It's emotional and it's beautifully written. It reminded me that middle grade and young adult literature can actually carry some real depth.

Mac 28:38

You talked about that book for days.

Rhoni 28:39

It is a great book. It is a great book. But it stayed with me because good stories do that. They rearrange the furniture in your heart, you might say.

Mac 28:50

Yeah.

Rhoni 28:50

That was a good book.

Mac 28:51

It sounds like something an English teacher would say. Yeah, and I stand by it.

Rhoni 28:55

But I also always have at least some professional books going on because my teacher brain really never fully shuts off. So I plan on reading something by the educational leader Ruby Payne. There's one called Under Resourced Learners. I plan on reading that one. I'm going to read a couple of books from cover to cover that I've read excerpts in many of my writing trainings, but I've haven't read the books cover to cover. So I'm going to try to do that. But the books that I enjoy are historical fiction and Christian fiction. So I will be digging for something along those genres. Not sure what it's going to be yet, but I will read a couple of professional books and a couple of young adult books and then a couple of for me books.

Mac 29:46

You have heavily encouraged me to pick up Lonesome Dove this summer. Because I am one of those people that will read manuals. I read manuals. I read how to operate Chat GPT. How can I fix this computer? Those are the kind of things. How do airplanes work? Yeah. Those are the kind of things I I like to read. But you've also seen me get lost in things like the um what do they call it? The left behind series. I think in the first six years we were married, I read that four times, I think. That's the thing. I read fast, but I don't retain much, so I can go back and read it again like I've never read it before. You read very slow, but you retain everything. And I say you read very slow, not necessarily.

Rhoni 30:25

No, I do. I read slowly and I'm thinking about it, and the whole scenario is being played out in my head as I read. But I did I hear you say for sure you're gonna you're committing to Lonesome Dove. I mean you're Texan, you should read it. It's it's Texas, it's friendship, it's grit, it's myth, it's humanity. You're gonna love it once you survive the first hundred pages.

Mac 30:44

Yeah. You've said that a couple of times now, so now I'm wondering about that. But I don't know. That's just seems like one of the reasons that books still matter. So you slow down long enough to feel something, actually feel it, because I know books can do that for me.

Rhoni 30:58

Yes, but stories like Lonesome Dove matter because they remind us that people are complicated, life can be hard. It's a great story about how friendship matters and how place that whole idea of your sense of place, which we're talking about in this episode. Your sense of place matters, memories matter, but brings us back to the same idea. People really want to get real again. Well, here's the deal you start 17 books and then you finish two and a half of them.

Mac 31:28

That's not fair.

Rhoni 31:29

I know. I do the same thing. I but here's the thing: I give us permission to abandon a book.

Mac 31:36

Yeah.

Rhoni 31:36

I tell students that you have permission to abandon a book, but you need to read three to five chapters. Go ahead and read three to five chapters, but then you can abandon it.

Mac 31:45

Yeah.

Rhoni 31:46

So it's okay to abandon the book.

Mac 31:48

Yeah. That's I think that's why it's so valuable to me that in our Bible study each week at church we go through a chapter line by line by line and talk about each line by line. And that that slows me down to what do I say? It it catches on in my book.

Rhoni 32:07

Well, it helps you to you're learning it. Yeah. You're not just skimming, but you're allowing it to soak in, which that's another book we're reading. We're starting Galatians Wednesday.

Mac 32:18

Oh yeah. We can call that a book, can't we? It is.

Rhoni 32:23

So we will be maintaining multiple literary relationships over the next few months.

Mac 32:30

Another thing that only an English teacher would say. That's fun.

Rhoni 32:35

You know, what keeps coming back to me through all of this and what captured my heart with this song is God as artist. From the beginning, God placed humanity in a garden. It wasn't a factory, it wasn't a system, wasn't a screen.

Mac 32:54

It was a garden. That says something.

Rhoni 32:56

It does. It he surrounded his man with beauty and food, relationship. You said it earlier, wonder. There was work, but there was rest. And creation, think of it like this, was not just empty decoration. It was actually a part of how God made life to be experienced. Beauty was not an afterthought. Wonder wasn't an extra, but creation was part of the way God revealed his heart to us. And in that song, Phil Wickham is recognizing that, that you bring color to my life like a California sky. And how you amaze me, God, that creation was a part of how he was revealing his heart.

Mac 33:50

I think that deep down inside of us, our souls remember that.

Rhoni 33:55

That's why I think people garden it. Gardening calms people down. And lots of people sit on the porch and watch a sunrise or a sunset. It just gets you quiet. For me, songs bring tears to me before I even understand completely why.

Mac 34:09

Absolutely. Yeah, that's the kind of thing you can't explain with a chart or on a screen.

Rhoni 34:15

One of my favorite moments in scripture is when Job is overwhelmed. He is grieving, he is exhausted, he feels like he's lost everything. And when God responds, he does not give Job this little, you know, five-point explanation. He starts talking about his creation. He asked Job, Where were you when I laid the earth's foundations? Have you entered the storehouses of the snow? God said.

Mac 34:49

Exactly.

Rhoni 34:51

Exactly. And I don't hear God's words to Job as being cruel. No. I hear it as God expanding Job's vision. It's like he's saying, Listen, there's still wonder. Yeah. After all of this, there's still wonder. There's still order. There's still my hand on the things that you cannot understand yet.

Mac 35:14

And that that settles things. That settles something.

Rhoni 35:17

It does. And Jesus said it this way. He said, consider the lilies. He's saying, look at creation. Uh-huh. Look at beauty. Notice me in creation. Look at provision. Slow down long enough to notice what God has placed right in front of you.

Mac 35:36

Which is really hard to do when you're rushing all the time.

Rhoni 35:40

Oh, so hard. I think that's why we're centering up on how people are hungering for real life and the things that matter.

Mac 35:50

Intentional things.

Rhoni 35:51

Yeah. Not just being nostalgic about something, but just really trying to be human again.

Mac 35:56

Yeah, that's really strong.

Rhoni 35:58

Yeah, and I don't know about you, but I'm tired of being managed by my Google Calendar, by my notifications. Just tired of having the entertainment. Yeah. But not really feeling deeply nourished in my soul.

Mac 36:14

Yeah, it is so empty.

Rhoni 36:16

It just we can feel a whole day with motion and we can still miss the life that's inside of the day.

Mac 36:23

So the answer is not necessarily throwing everything away and go to live in a cabin somewhere.

Rhoni 36:28

Although that's tempting from time to time. That's fair, yeah. But there's really a simpler point that we're making. Just pay attention. Touch the real things, read the book, or take the walk.

Mac 36:43

Yeah. Call that person that you've you maybe hadn't thought about calling in a while. Sit in the quiet. Let yourself grieve.

Rhoni 36:50

Let God meet you in the place that you actually are.

Mac 36:54

Not imaginary.

Rhoni 36:56

Yeah, just the actual place. There may be dishes in the sink. There may be books half-read, maybe your plans changed. But let God meet you in that space and notice notice his presence and notice how he's constantly amazing you. Trying to amaze you. Yeah. Trying to surprise you.

Mac 37:22

And maybe in all those places you just talked about, and books half read and plans change, all that stuff, maybe that's where God still catches us by surprise. Yeah.

Rhoni 37:33

So we just encourage you. This week the invitation is pretty simple. Don't escape your life. Just return to it.

Mac 37:41

Yeah. Open your eyes and return to it. Go outside barefoot and plant those herbs. And but just not too long ago, you reminded me to go renew my library card, plan a little trip. And maybe pay attention to the places you've been trying not to feel, those memories or the songs or the roads.

Rhoni 37:57

It might be the people that you miss or the chapters that ended differently than you wanted. But remember that God does not only meet us in brand new places, He is ready to meet you right here in the familiar. People really want real again because Real is where God has been meeting us all along. And this week, take the long way home and let God surprise you.

Close

Mac 38:33

And that's the weekend joyride for this week. I hope this conversation gives you permission to slow down a little and notice your own life again. Not the imaginary version, not the perfectly organized version, but the real one, the one with dishes in the sink, or books half-read, plans that changed, all that stuff, and the grace you may not have noticed yet. This week, maybe go outside barefoot, pick up that book, call that person, take a little trip, sit in the quiet, and pay attention to the ordinary places where God may still be saying, Look over here, notice this. I'm still here. Because real life is not always easy, but it is where beauty shows up, it's where healing begins, and it's where God still surprises us. Thanks for riding with us this week on the Weekend Joyride. You can reach us anytime at hello at weekendjoyride.com. And this week, take that long way home and let God surprise you.