27 - We're Back! A Little Rusty and a Conversation About Discipleship

After accidentally exporting an entire episode with no audio, a power outage, and an unexpected week off, we're finally back behind the microphones!

This week starts with a catch-up on Patty's trip to Park City to meet her new nephew (Harry V!), help a family adjusting to life with a newborn, and learn the proper etiquette for Spanish olives at a dinner party. Amy shares life at home while the kids were away and the challenge of letting go as a mom.

The conversation then shifts into something much deeper: discipleship. What does it actually mean to follow Jesus in everyday life? We talk honestly about seasons of feeling like a "lukewarm Christian," the fear of talking about our faith, and why discipleship is often less about having the perfect words and more about loving people well.

We also discuss how God doesn't ask for perfection, only our willingness to keep coming back to Him, the beauty of serving quietly without recognition, and how small acts of kindness can become opportunities to reflect Christ to others.

If you've ever felt intimidated by sharing your faith or wondered if you're "doing enough," this conversation is a reminder that following Jesus often begins with simply noticing people, loving them well, and faithfully showing up where God has placed you.

Bible verses referenced:

1 John 4:11-12
"Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us."

Revelation 3:15-16
"I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I am about to spit you out of my mouth."

Matthew 6:3-4
"But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome back to 27 Good with Amy.

SPEAKER_00 0:03

And Patty.

SPEAKER_01 0:04

And we have missed you. We missed everyone last week. We have so this is gosh, we'd have to check, but I think this is episode 26 or 27, which is like six months. Six months of 27 Good. Right. And the podcast we went to edit the episode and no audio was coming through. And we learned that somehow I muted the track when we actually was gone. I tried everything.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

I was on support. I was just like, it's fine. What are you gonna do?

SPEAKER_01 0:35

I know I was so okay. Two just always worries someone's mad at them.

SPEAKER_00 0:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 0:39

I'm like, I messed this up, and you're like, it's fine. And seven's like, no big deal. No big deal. No problem. We'll do it again. We tried to re-record. We skipped. We lost power. It was just not good. We just couldn't.

SPEAKER_00 0:51

We feel like there were lots of things that were keeping us from doing this one. So we put a pause on it. We were trying to get through it to get it posted because on Thursday of last week, when it would have posted, I was on vacation. Yes. And so we were on this time crunch of we have to get it done before I leave. And then it just ended up being, we're just gonna have to skip a week. So have to skip a week. I think two of our listeners, my mom included, three maybe. We have three. Two people told me said, like, where's the episode?

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Where's the episode? My worker went back and listened to the one about Mason when life was heavy and said it was uh Yeah. So that was so nice to re-listen. Yeah, my sister was like, Where's the last two weeks? It was one week.

SPEAKER_00 1:30

My mom sent me a bunch of audios today. She sends likes to send an audio message, and I gave her a hard time that when I added them all up, they were like over six minutes. I was like, Mom, I have six minutes of audios now to catch up with from you. And she was like, Well, you and Amy do 27 minutes of audios every week that I have to listen to. She's like, and then I reply. Basically, what this is, right? It's just us chatting and catching up.

SPEAKER_01 1:55

So funny. We actually had to put the brakes on chatting because I haven't seen you in.

SPEAKER_00 1:59

Yeah, we've been sitting in my family room. We recorded my family room for an hour, actually. And we've just been chatting for an hour, and I was like, we're never leaving tonight if or ending this if we don't get recording. Yep. Yeah. So tell us about the trip. Okay, so I went to Park City, Utah. My older brother lives there. His name's Harry, and he's married. His wife's name is Lauren, and they had a baby in April named Harry as well. My brother is Harry the Fourth for like some dynasty or something. Royalty. Yeah. One of my students when I the when he was born, I announced to my class that I had a new nephew, and I said his name was Harry the Fifth. And one of my students was like, What are you guys like? Royalty. Like, we just think we are. Since my mom is disabled, it's something um grandma would absolutely do with flying out there, helping out, meeting the baby. My brother has a daughter from a previous marriage. Grace is her name. She and I are best buds. And she's she's nine. Okay. And so before the baby was even born, I had called him and just said, I know mom would just be dying to come out there if she could and she can't. And so I could come just by myself. And I said, Is that but I right away was like, I want to be helpful and I don't want to be in the way because I'm a sister-in-law to Lauren. We get along really well, but you know, it's not my it's not your sister. And you're in like the throes of postpartum. Yes. Do you want a guest in your home? Right. That's not your family. So if they're the perfect guests, like you were, I hope. I did say at the the last day, like that I tried to be so helpful, but that I know a guest is really hard. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

But you took the baby in the morning and went on, took both kids in the mornings within walks, let them sleep.

SPEAKER_00 3:42

Right away when I got there, I said, What do you think would be the most helpful that I could do while I'm here? And she was like, He just doesn't sleep. And I said, Well, what if in the morning, like I could just get him and then you could go back to sleep for a few hours? I did all their laundry, and then she had a pile of things that needed ironed, and I ironed a bunch of stuff for her. That one was kind of funny because she was like, You are not doing my ironing for me. And I was like, Yes, I little do you know? Actually, I have I love to iron.

SPEAKER_01 4:08

I like actually There's probably so many people, but I imagine like four people in the world who still iron, but obviously.

SPEAKER_00 4:17

So my brother and I cooked a couple nights, but then it was equal parts, me really just wanting to be with the baby, see where they live, and them wanting to show me the park city so great so that I would come back. Yeah, we went on a hike. Which when I saw that, I was like, How is Lauren hiking? How? So yeah, we went hiking. Her parents live there, so they had us over for dinner one night. Her mom's like this fabulous chef, of course. She had her own restaurant. Oh my god. Like, really? Yeah, she had her own restaurant in San Diego. Doesn't anymore, but she's just she's like that level of cook where you're like, Oh, okay. Do you know what I mean? If I had people over in my house, I'd be like grilling burgers. Yeah. She was making this Greek dish. Actually, so she had these olives and they were from Spain. And she had this whole story of when they were traveling in Spain, she fell in love with these olives. She gets them like shipped from Spain. So right away I like pop one in my mouth. Well, it had a pit in it. And there were other people at this dinner party too. And I was like, oh no, what's the etiquette? Yeah. What is it? Do you know? Well, so you swallow the pit. No, I put it in my pocket. What else are you gonna do? And then I waited, and another girl grabbed an olive, and I thought, I'm gonna watch her. She seems like the type that to do in an olive party. There's a little dish next to the olives that you put it on. That you put it in. They purposely leave like an empty dish by them. And so then I took it out of my pocket and put it in there.

SPEAKER_01 5:47

Steph stresses me out. Me too, sometimes. Yeah, it's like I this is Yeah. I have not had experience with this level of fine dyeing. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:56

And thankfully, it was very chill in the sense of grab a plate, grab what you want. I didn't have to worry about like what silverware to use. You know, it wasn't anything like that, but I had to figure out what to do with the pit of the olive.

SPEAKER_01 6:05

Wow, how fun. She cooked all of it.

SPEAKER_00 6:08

Yeah, it was she had like these appetizers. She had yeah, just delish chicken and rice and yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:16

I made chicken pitas tonight and I made my own taziti. Am I saying that right? No, yeah, it was okay. Um taziki. Taziki. Yeah. Yeah, sorry. I was trying to find it at Aldi today and they didn't have it. And what I thought to myself was, oh, I should have warmed up the pita bread. So that's the level I'm on.

SPEAKER_00 6:34

This is like she was warming up her pita bread in a pandemic. Yeah, I should have done it in a cast iron. And then she cut it up, and we had these different things to put on the pitas. They were all delicious. Couldn't tell you what they were, but they were flavorful. So yeah, it was just a great trip. I will say, I think just hard to be away. The boys are so busy. They're in the throes of basketball camps and all these things going on. And I feel like it was this whole fine art for me to figure out who's running where. Yes. Brian was home. He worked three, I was gone four nights. He worked three of the nights at the pharmacy. And so any evening running I had to make sure that was handled. My in-laws live a mile from us, and so they did all of that. And they cooked for the boys. They told me, like my mother-in-law told me before I left, don't even worry, we'll cook every meal. Like they can come eat, like, Eat and Brian. So yeah, that was all done. But I came home to get ton of laundry piled in laundry baskets. But they've they were really proud of themselves because they had done the laundry.

SPEAKER_01 7:29

Which folding is like the most at all. So funny.

SPEAKER_00 7:33

But I guess it's better than dirty laundry piled in the laundry.

SPEAKER_01 7:35

She'd at least fold it on an hour than like hours.

SPEAKER_00 7:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:40

It is. It's so hard for mom to be away. I had the opposite example a couple weeks ago. My mom or my kids went to my mom's for a week, and it was just like, gosh, everything to pack, and you just never stop worrying. All the things. My mom is amazing. She's never overwhelmed by anything, it seems like. She was like, they're fine, we're fine, everything's fine, everyone's great. And it was so weird not having the kids for a while.

SPEAKER_00 8:03

The one thing that we really wanted to talk about on the episode that deleted was discipleship. Yeah. And it comes from our church. We've talked before, is going through kind of like this transitional period. And there are two women. I asked ahead of time if I could talk about it on the podcast. And their names are Emily and Angie, and they're moms in the church. Angie has kids my kids' ages, and then Emily has younger, a little bit younger kids. And they took it upon themselves to just do a Bible study this summer because we don't really have a pastor right now to lead us in something like that. And the Bible study is with a book called Deep Discipleship. And they're reading it and then just talking to us about it. We aren't all reading it, which I think maybe if we did another one, that would be my suggestion is we could all just have a book to read. You know, it's nice not to have any homework to do. I just show up and like I'm a and can be a part of the discussion. But I think some of the stuff that they've been talking about is really, is really good and worth chatting about. And I think a little bit sometimes when we talk discipleship, it's a little bit like scary.

SPEAKER_01 9:04

It feels like you just don't want to mess it up. And I think there, for me at least, is always like a fear of what someone will think.

SPEAKER_00 9:11

I feel like even if you I feel like there have been situations where you might feel the Holy Spirit prompting you to go say something to someone and you just uh you're just scared about Well, I will say my on this trip alone, my sister-in-law was asking me a little about just what church we go to, what religion, and all these things. And I f I ended up saying that I like to go to church on Sundays because it's a great way to start the week. And that's true. Yeah. But I really go to church because I'm a follower in Christ and it's what Jesus wants us to do, right? Yeah, and I think But you find I found myself like dumbing it down. Like, oh, I just go to church because it's a nice thing to do on a Sunday. I don't know, it was silly because that's the thing. I think we get I never want to come as much as we're supposed to, I don't really want to come across preachy.

SPEAKER_01 10:00

I know. Well, I think it comes down to yeah, I don't know. It really is. Like, how do you find the best way to love someone?

SPEAKER_00 10:06

Yeah, and to guide them in that way. Yeah. So one of the things I think that they've talked about a little bit in this Bible study is the idea of a lukewarm Christian. So have you heard of that term before? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:22

And I always feel so convicted because it same, it always feels like a roller coaster for me. And I don't know if other people can relate to this of like when you really need God, you're all in on like praying, you know what I mean? And then when life is good, you just kind of coast in. And it's like, oh yeah, coffee's cold. Hmm, wonder why, you know.

SPEAKER_00 10:39

Right. Yeah. So the idea of the lukewarm Christian is like you're doing all the things, you're checking all the boxes. Maybe you're reading your Bible and you're going to church, but you're not really in it. Yeah. You're not really all for him. And so I think it comes down to making sure that God is at the center of everything and we just are so easy to put ourselves always first. Always a natural reaction to do.

SPEAKER_01 11:03

But he really does. He calls us to be selfless, which I think is so hard. I think though, okay, maybe this not to sidebar us. I think that I have had this is like the weirdest analogy, but just or real weirdest example that just roll with me. Okay, so let's say so at a work thing, and I was so pregnant, and I just was worried there wasn't gonna be enough food for me, and I was so hungry. You know, the saying that leaders eat last, like you let everyone eat baby, right? And I was like, I'm going first. I'm going first. I'm so pregnant, I'm so hungry, and like we're gonna run out of food. And obviously we did not. Right. And if we would have, there's more food in the fridge at work. But I feel like my a small shift I'm trying to make, and truly, I think we've all seen this, is when you give and you are selfless, God does always provide. There's always enough for you. It's never, oh, if we give, if this person gets a blessing, then like that's out of yours. Like it's not that, it's like abundance versus scarcity mentality. But that example is just so funny, and I feel like it's been a conviction lately of like you need to be giving more and you need to whatever. But be there for all the just fine, yeah, and like be selfless. Like you are always taken care of, and truly, we lack nothing. What do I lack? I have everything. Right. You know, we have whole gosh, most everyone in America has everything that they would need. And it's just yeah, thinking of others and how can you bless them and then ultimately like the one the Bible verse we were going to share is just so good and leads, if I can just share that now, into it. It's one John four, dear friend, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God, but if we all love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. Essentially saying, if we act as we're supposed to as Christians, then God's love just kind of flows right through. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 12:57

Yes, I love that. I wrote down too that his faithfulness and love for us is not contingent on our ability to show up. I feel like that's a great thing to always remember that he's waiting. I know. Like, girl, read your Bible, come to me.

SPEAKER_01 13:12

Hang out with me.

SPEAKER_00 13:13

Yeah, come hang out. Tell me what you're worried about instead of yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:16

Did you do a good job today? You can't like sit with me unless you've read your Bible, which is not true. Right. I feel that way sometimes.

SPEAKER_00 13:22

Yeah. Mm-hmm. The another thing that I heard once on a podcast when we were kind of researching some of the stuff for this episode was that to fall away from God, like what you need to do for that to happen is actually nothing because it's just natural for us to be so self-centered and do what makes is best for us. And so really to have that relationship with God, you have to do something. I think that's the thing that is hard is to be like we are supposed to be actively pursuing.

SPEAKER_01 13:51

That's kind of truly like any friendship or relationship, though, isn't it? Like if you're not hanging out or not ever, I don't know, making a point your spouse, especially or a friend, anyone, yeah, you fall apart. Yeah. Does that make sense? This kind of the thing you just said about because being contingent on step. I wish I had it written down, but they talked about it at church a few weeks ago. Of just like one truth that we have to accept is that God loves us no matter what, which is essentially what you just said. But that is so hard to think that someone is so crazy about you, especially. I don't know if others do this, but um of course you just only see all of your faults, all of your shortcomings, all of your sins for sure. You know what I mean? And so it's just the coolest thing that we have this creator that made us in his image and loves us so much and just wants to hang. Right. That's what I just wanted to prioritize lately, yeah to him. Because I for sure feel like definitely can be in seasons of lukewarum of like doing the Bible in the year, and it's just like listen, listen, and like I'm in second Kings and excuse me, chronicles right now, and it's just not that fun for me.

SPEAKER_00 15:01

Yeah, I actually think that's why I quit the Bible because I felt like I was just doing it to do it, and it was like I'm not really getting anything out of it, so not thinking about it as I read it. Yeah. And yeah, at church we've talked about how we can build disciples in the church and get people fired up to want to be spreading God's word. So, what do you think it is? How do you can you be a disciple? There's another like say it.

SPEAKER_01 15:25

I feel like I'm just bouncing all over these. That is like people don't want to hear a sermon, they want to see it. And I truly think it is just your actions. You can say you're a Christian, you can be involved in church, but if you are m nasty to people and you don't love others, we've talked about that before. Yeah, you love yourself.

SPEAKER_00 15:40

Well, it's supposed to be that if you're a believer and you're a follower, then you like, isn't it? You look different, you have this light about you.

SPEAKER_01 15:46

Yeah. It's supposed to be that. I think it is. I think you see that in people when you're just walking and someone smiles and is just kind, you know, it's just someone um like that. I for sure think what you're talking about with Lauren. When you ask, I had this lady who mentored me, gosh, it's been 10 years ago, and she actually scared me because she wanted to meet, and she was like, You need to be reading your Bible every day. And uh, this is little me with like no kids. I was like, I do not have time for that. So funny. Right. And she met with me and we read this book together, and she was someone I had worked with, and she was like, I still remember her saying, What would you say if someone asked you who Jesus is? And I was like, I don't know. I have no idea what I would say. And she was like, You need to practice an elevator pitch. This is your job, is to like lead people to um to God, and you have to know what to say in that moment, which was so funny because I and I haven't thought about that, gosh, in such a long time. That memory just popped up. But it kind of is that of like if you were, it's like preparation kind of, you know.

SPEAKER_00 16:48

I think it's easier for me to throw it in when we're talking about something like maybe something at work would happen with a coworker where they are going through something hard at home, and I can say, Have you prayed about it? Like, you know, God wants to hear you. So sometimes it's easier for me to do that than to just openly be like, this is why I love Jesus or something.

SPEAKER_01 17:06

I love that so much of praying with people. Yeah. I feel like anytime anyone has ever prayed like for me or with me, especially when they're like, Oh, can I pray for you right now? Right. And it feels kind of awkward because you're like, this is kind of weird, but my gosh, it's so powerful. There's this girl at work, Jamie, and she listens and she's amazing. And this was the first time, maybe not the first, but there was like something I asked her to pray for me about, and she sent me the whole text of her prayer, and I was like, gosh, you know how to pray. And I would love to learn how to pray like that because I do not know how to do that.

SPEAKER_00 17:36

I think when it's the right time, it just comes out. Gosh, it was so good.

SPEAKER_01 17:41

And I think, yeah, I agree.

SPEAKER_00 17:43

Because it's not making it perfect, you know.

SPEAKER_01 17:45

I also think you can do things for people without them now, like you can just pray for people. Yes. I agree. Okay, so I just finished this book that you just started, The You of Golden, and so good. Five stars? Cannot five stars for me. I'm eager to hear what you think of it because it's only untempered. I love a book at the end where I could not see at all like what maybe it could have like when there's such a twist that like makes so much sense, but I had no idea. Yeah. And it's just so good. And this book, this guy is his name is Theo, and I will not tell much because everyone should just go read it because it was such a good one. But he's so generous, and he was talking to someone, I forget what the who he was talking to.

SPEAKER_00 18:30

Well, he comes into this town in this book named Golden. Yes, so it's and he's like 86. And there's an is it a bar, a restaurant? It's a coffee shop, a chalice, yeah. There's these portraits of all the people from the town that someone has done these, and are they just pencil sketches? In my mind, they're pencil sketches. And he's gonna buy them and return them to the people. Yep. So where I'm at in the book is he's only done that to one person, but he's brainstorming kind of to himself of like what order he should do it in, like how should he choose the next person of whose portrait to get. He picked the first person he picks for a reason. He explains to her, but like what's now gonna be his. He's like, Do I go oldest to youngest, youngest to oldest? Do I pick the people that like look the nicest? Like, how do I yes?

SPEAKER_01 19:13

Okay, so that sparked it for me. So, this what I wrote a note about is he, a reporter, wants to meet with him, and he is this doesn't ruin anything, but he's telling her this and he said, Um, because she wants to tell everyone all this like cool thing he's doing, and he said, Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. And he's like, Essentially what I'm trying to say is do good, but try to do it without notice or hope of reward. And I think our pride gets in the way, and we want people, and one example he gave was like, I have had buildings named after me, and it's so um, it's just so different versus when you do things in the quiet. And I think that's part of discipleship too, and being um just doing things only for glorifying God and not doing them for your ego and for others to know how good you are, posting about it on social media. Yeah, and I just think there's so much sweetness and goodness in the quiet. Right, I agree for sure. Yeah, it's I love that. Yes, it was so good. Um, so maybe that's the if we're giving everyone a little challenge this week. Is so from this book, too. One thing is that he just really sees people. And I've been trying to be more, I don't know, just attentive to that. Of like when I'm out and about, like just really looking around, like when you're stopped at the car, you know, just like smiling at the people next. It sounds so silly.

SPEAKER_00 20:30

Yeah, but I think that's a really easy way to be a disciple is just to be kind and say, like, God bless you or and I also think then.

SPEAKER_01 20:39

And not when they see you, yeah. God bless you, my hands on everyone. I think though too, if like you're not open and looking around, you don't see needs. We've talked about this at the grocery store of who could you offer to grab something for or hold a door open to? Yeah. And this doesn't cost any money, but also you might find where there are needs that you could be generous and not tell people. I don't know. You know what I mean? It's just cool. And I I think the more you lean into it, the more fun it is that it's just a little thing you keep to yourself or share with like a couple close friends. You know, I don't know. Love it. It's just fun. You have a prayer for Andy Natas.

SPEAKER_00 21:16

I do have a prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you for calling us to follow you. Help us to be faithful disciples, listening to your voice, trusting your guidance, and sharing your love with others. Give us courage to walk in obedience and reflect Christ in our daily lives. May our hearts grow closer to you each day. In Jesus' name. Amen.