24 | When You Don't Recognize Your Life Anymore... and Still Keep Going with Jay Setchell

Life doesn't always unfold the way we imagined.

Sometimes illness changes everything.

Sometimes loss reshapes our future.

Sometimes we wake up one day and realize we hardly recognize the life we're living.

In this episode, Laura welcomes Jay Setchell to the Counter. Jay has survived multiple near-death experiences, paralysis, dozens of surgeries, and more than seventy operations. Yet through every challenge, he has discovered something deeper than endurance: the strength that God places within each of us to keep taking the next step.

Together they explore:

• What to do when life looks nothing like you expected
• The difference between hope, belief, and faith
• Finding strength within life's hardest seasons
• Why small steps matter more than giant leaps
• The importance of community when life feels overwhelming
• Learning to persevere one day at a time
• Discovering purpose even after life changes

Jay's story isn't simply about surviving difficult circumstances.

It's about learning that even when life changes, God hasn't changed.

If your life feels unfamiliar, overwhelming, or you've wondered whether you still have purpose after everything you've been through, this conversation is a reminder that your story isn't over.

Breath Prayer

Breathe in: God of strength...

Breathe out: Help me keep going.

☕ Pull up a chair. There's always room for you at the Counter.

Connect with Jay

Learn more about Jay and his work at NeverQuitting.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Welcome to At the Counter with the Baking Pastor. I'm Laura. Pull up a chair. There's no rush here. This season, we're sitting with the hard days. The ones that don't resolve quickly. The ones that change us in ways we we didn't ask for. Here at the counter, nothing needs to be fixed. You don't have to have the right words. You don't have to have it all figured out. You can just come as you are and stay awild. This is hard days at the counter. Today we're making space for a conversation that touches a place many of us reach at some point when life looks different than we expected, and we find ourselves wondering how we got there. Wherever you are, whether you're driving, folding laundry, or sitting with a cup of coffee or tea, I'm really glad you're here. Today I'm joined by Jay Setchell. Jay comes with a life story that carries way more than most of us could ever imagine. Between multiple life-threatening experiences, dozens of surgeries, seasons of paralysis, and a long road of learning what it means to keep going when life doesn't look the way you thought it would. But what stands out most is not just what he's been through, it's his perspective and how he brings it. Jay speaks about strength, not something we either have or don't have, but something we discover sometimes slowly, sometimes in the moment when we need it most. His life has been shaped by faith, perseverance, and a deep belief that even in the hardest seasons, there is still a way forward. Jay, I am really grateful you're here. Welcome to the counter. When someone reaches a place in life where they look around and think, I don't recognize my life anymore. What do you think is happening in that moment?

SPEAKER_00 2:21

Not been asked that before. Good question. I think you just have to go back to your roots, your beginning, and work your way forward because you'll always find where you're at if you follow the road you've traveled, whether that's a good road or a bad road or a difficult road. And bring yourself to your current position. From that, it gives you a perspective to where you need to go or where you want to go.

SPEAKER_01 2:47

In your own journey, what has it felt like to face moments where life didn't look anything like you expected?

SPEAKER_00 2:54

Don't believe, even with the times I've been dead and they got me back, the near deaths, everything I've been through. I don't think I've had anything that I've never thought I can't overcome. Because I've always believed that God's got me here for a reason, that I have a purpose in life, even though I didn't know what it was or I was searching for it. We all have a purpose, and we may be serving that purpose, we just don't recognize it. And especially if you're doing for others, I think that helps you as a person because I believe you become a better person by helping other people. And that's a strong statement, but it's really true. And that's why God's got you here is to help each other. And we've gotten to a point where a lot of people don't believe that anymore, or they don't understand it, but we we need to get back that.

SPEAKER_01 3:49

For people who may be in a similar situation where things didn't look like they expected, what do you think makes those moments so disorienting?

SPEAKER_00 3:58

I would say for some people, maybe it's disorienting because they've not been through a lot of hard stuff in their life, or maybe through difficult, or even thought about it. I don't know whether to use the word, but hand it to them, or it didn't come hard. And I was raised, nothing came for free. Nothing. Everything you were responsible. I mean, if you didn't do it, well, there's 10 two-letter words that I've used for decades, and that is if it is to be, it is up to me. And that doesn't mean that your parents aren't involved, or your neighbors aren't involved, or your pastor is not involved, or somebody else isn't helping or working with you, but it still falls back on you to accomplish that. It's kind of one of those things you can always dream big or think big, but take small steps and learn a little bit at a time. And I think that's what got me through a lot. And I think others, if they look at it like that, instead of trying to take a big step, like I want to be over there and do it all at once, take a little bit at a time. That way, if they run into a difficulty, hey, maybe it's time to stop and say a little prayer. Maybe it's time to just stop and think about where you're going and what that next step is going to take you or where you're gonna go with it. And it gives you that opportunity to make that little change that takes you in a different direction and helps you.

SPEAKER_01 5:19

I think there's something about those seasons we go through, loss of identity, control, or something deeper when things that are really hard, it's not that they're hard, it's that they're unfamiliar. And I know you talk a lot about inner strength. Why do you believe that that's important and where does that inner strength come from?

SPEAKER_00 5:42

I do talk a lot about inner strength. That's part of the name of my book, is the strength within you. I first started out with the strength inside of you. But inside Laura, it's like your heart is inside you. Okay, your your stomach is inside you, some of your feelings are inside you, but the strength within you comes from all sorts of different things. In my opinion, and having been there, if you're breathing, you should be moving. Because once you quit moving, you die. Your strength, does it come from your DNA? Does it come from the way you were raised? Your parents, your travels, your friends, your religion. Does it come from being irritated, aggravated, frustrated? Does it come from pain? I have a lot of pain. I've had 73 surgeries, 15 back surgeries. My back is always in pain. It's just whether it's not too bad or if it's terrible. But the thing is, it's like having a good conversation or working on something. If I've got a problem with my mouse here and I'm really thinking about my mouse and I'm working on it, or we're having an in-depth conversation of something that's got you thinking about something else, your pain becomes less. And when you quit thinking about it, or quit having your conversation or being concentrated, all of a sudden your mind does what? It goes back to the pain. And now your pain's back again, or it's hurting. And especially if you're sitting here all alone, you're depressed, or you're down, or you're not feeling good. All you do is think about your pain. It even becomes worse. And it isn't really any worse. It's all your mind is thinking on. But I just think that it's a matter of digging within yourself, finding those strengths that got you through something. Whether you had your leg cut open and you had to have it stitched. I've got an old saying that I would say at this point: sweat dries, blood clots, and broken bones heal. Suck it up. And really, I think that it's pretty much accurate. I know I see a smile, but I think that that's what God would want. Jesus would sit and go, Well, you're gonna be okay. He's not gonna let you go because of that. So work your way through it. And when you do that, it gives you a strength that you become more resilient. And it's not just, I was gonna say my opinion, but it's fact. And um, it's like when you run into an obstacle, it's not so much getting through the obstacle, it's how you got through the obstacle. It's what you did to get over it, through it. And what did you learn from it that will help you in the future on your next obstacle, your next adversity or detour? And how do you bring yourself back into alignment to keep moving forward?

SPEAKER_01 8:25

So, yes, I was chuckling. It made me think of a family comment that we have, which is suck it up, buttercup. So you're not always going to things, but God's there for you and you're good.

SPEAKER_00 8:38

I've heard that a lot of times.

SPEAKER_01 8:39

You have a huge understanding of strength, physical, mental, and you mentioned something that really stood out the difference between hoping and truly believing. Can you say more about that?

SPEAKER_00 8:52

I really believe there's a huge difference between faith and believing are very close together. But hoping, it's a generic term for winning the lottery in a sense, because I hope I can do that. I hope I can hit the target if you're shooting, I hope I can do whatever. It just I hope. To me, it's just a word. But if you have faith and you believe, I just believe that faith and hope is what God has really put in your heart. And if you have that faith and belief, if you have that faith, I'll give you a quick one. When I had died my third time and they told me I would never move again from the shoulders down, I truly believe because of prayer, because of how I was lifted in prayer by thousands of people and how and what happened. I believed I was gonna walk. I had the faith that I was gonna walk. I didn't hope I was gonna walk. I had the faith that I was gonna walk way before it ever happened. I could see it. I had a vision. And it's like it was put in my heart that it's gonna happen. You just have to keep working at it. If you hope something's gonna happen, when you hope and it doesn't happen, you just quit. The hope stops. It's great to have hope and love and all that stuff they talk about in country songs and whatnot. I don't discount the word hope because we need hope. And I feel sorry for people that don't have any hope. But believing and and faith are so much stronger and it's so much in your heart. I don't have the words, I'm not an educated individual, or I'm a high school graduate, that's all I am. And I don't have these fancy big words to say it. It's there or it's a few minutes ago.

SPEAKER_01 10:31

You said, if it's to be, it's up to me. How do you hold that belief alongside faith, community, and needing other people?

SPEAKER_00 10:40

I think it all works together. I think it's all like making a meatloaf. It's not just the celery and the meat and the breadcrumbs or the egg or whatever you're putting into the meatloaf. It's a combination of, and fortunately, raised I was raised on a big farm, and our farmers were our community. We lived out three, four miles outside of a small farm town, 4,000 people, which was big really compared to a lot of towns around us. But we were a community. My mother taught, and we had four kids in our family. My dad was always on the school board or involved, but we always helped each other. You knew each other. If somebody was sick, you took them a pot of stew and a peach cobbler, and you took them enough food to help them for a couple of days to get through it. Or if they were injured, you helped bring their crops in or feed their livestock, or you took money to help them have fuel to get through the winter. I'm talking now 50, 60 years ago because I'm 76. But the people in town would even help, or you would help them. So that's the community side of it. But that if it is to be is up to me. It is up to you to make that final decision and push through that difficult time and to make those choices. But that doesn't discount the fact that you've got friends and other people, whether it's a pastor, a Sunday school teacher, or a neighbor that is part of your community that helps you forward and helps give you the insight or helps give you the faith and the confidence and the belief it's going to work. And that all comes back to community. And it's something that we don't have a lot of anymore because people don't even know their neighbors. They don't know the person that lives next to them, across the street from them, above them, below them, beside them. And we used to know people that live 10 miles away. You didn't see them often because they were doing their thing. But I think it all works together.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

Well, Jay, I know you're making people hungry at the counter today, talking about meatloaf and peach cobbler. Well, I apologize.

SPEAKER_00 12:45

I was to say, You're the baker. You know me you should be talking about you know I know.

SPEAKER_01 12:49

Well, I'm not going to tell you that I had orange cinnamon rolls that I made fresh this morning.

SPEAKER_00 12:54

Oh, that sounds pretty good too.

SPEAKER_01 12:56

I think that we've got some important tension here because we need both personal responsibility and support of others. So when someone feels stuck in life, they don't always recognize it. But what's one place they can begin?

SPEAKER_00 13:10

Not been asked that either, exactly. But in my experience, I've been stuck either in thought or in physical conditioning, the lack of physical paralysis. So you just have to reach out and have the intestinal fortitude or the faith and belief that there is other help, and what can you do? If it is to be, is up to me, is a good saying. But a lot of it isn't up to you. It is up to others, but it's up to you to make that decision on who to ask or who to believe and who to work with. There's an old saying, too, it's hard to soar with the eagles when you're when you're uh hanging out with turkeys. So if you're going to ask somebody for help or direction, or if you're stuck, do you ask somebody that's I'll use the word smarter than you are, or more experienced than you are, or you see has already accomplished something, ask that person. Don't ask somebody that's not accomplished it, or somebody that's failing. You're not helping yourself. Surround yourself with people that are on the same mission that you're on. If you want to be a good Christian or you want to be someone that helps other people, work with people that do that. Don't hang out with people that think I'll go to the bar and get to where I can't drive home. That's not what you're doing. And that's going to be detrimental to your goals and detrimental to what you're trying to get accomplished. So I think it's really getting back to community. It's surrounding yourself and working with others and making good choices. And that's a very difficult thing to do today because of the where we're at in this world and how many people make crazy choices. But you still have to make those good choices.

SPEAKER_01 14:53

Yeah, because I think people don't always know where to begin, how to begin, should they begin. You and I were talking before, we started recording, and people like want to be somewhere else, but there's like a gazillion little steps in between. You're not gonna do that, it's the baby steps that get you there.

SPEAKER_00 15:10

Right, right. And we did talk about that is dream big. You can dream big, but take small steps to get there. So that's whether you're dreaming big or you're stuck someplace. If you're stuck someplace in trying to get up, and I've made the comment before that if anybody ever tells you you're not down or you're never going to be down or disappointed, aggravated, irritated, frustrated, all those ED words, or just down in life, just down on yourself, they're lying to you because you are. But it's whether you stay down or whether you get up that matters. Now, I tend to give myself a certain length of time, and I get down sometimes because it's physical, it's pain, it's my paralysis. But I'll give myself no more than 24 hours or 12 hours, and here's what I'm gonna do, and I'll write it down. And then I aim towards that. I don't know if that's a good suggestion for other people, but that's what I do. And you can't stay down, you have to keep looking and keep experimenting, but do it in small steps. My grandmother had a saying, gosh darn, I'm full of sayings, aren't I? Between that and cook, and she was Pennsylvania Dutch, and she used to say, inch by inch, it's a cinch, yard by yard, it's very hard. It's kind of like the old thing, how do you eat an elephant one bite at a time? You can try going this way, but just go a little bit. And if you find out that that's not the right way, then go back to your left and let's get back to center. And then you can continue on.

SPEAKER_01 16:45

That's funny because I was just thinking, how do you eat an elephant one bite at a time? And then you say it. I think people have to go back and re-listen to the episode with a sticky pad, write down all the little sayings and pop them up on their wall for inspiration. With all that you had going on, surgeries health-wise, how did you keep going potentially when everything in you felt like quitting?

SPEAKER_00 17:06

Stubbornness. I think stubbornness. I've gone through so much, so many years, Laura. I had stepped on nails probably three or four times when I was about seven years old. I stepped on a nail and it was on a two by four, about two feet wide. My grandfather was ahead of me. There was snow on the ground, and I had boots on. And when I stepped on this nail, the nail went up through my boot, up through my shoe, up through my foot, out through my boot and was sticking out. And I yelled, grandpa, wow, and I'm looking down, I'm like, oh my God. And uh he came back to me and he squatted down and said, I want you to lean back and squat, sit down a little bit. And he put his foot, one on the left and one on the right side of the two by four, to hold it to the ground. And he put his hands behind my knee and he said, Okay, now on three, I'm gonna pull your foot off. One, two, and it came. He never got to three. So from that point on, I had multiple injuries. When I was 17, I stepped, I was on a feeding auger and I was getting ready to jump off into a snow, and the auger got turned on just for a split second and barely turned. And augers go pretty quick, but it broke my ankle, sliced my leg open, sliced my boot open. But if that auger would have been on for three or four seconds, I would have been turned into hamburger. I was grateful that I didn't go down the auger. I wasn't even thinking about my ankle. I knew I had the pain and I knew what had happened. I could see it and the blood was running. But at the same time, I'm thinking, oh my God, thank you, Lord, thank you, thank you, thank you. Because I didn't go down the auger. I've continued this cycle of damage to my body for decades. And when I was 23, got hit by a drunk driver. When I'm 31, I'd break my neck in multiple places and drown and never supposed to move again from my shoulders down. I've been through bloodborne MRSA staff 25 years ago, and they didn't think I'd make it. Um, when I was 71, I had COVID Delta and I spent five months in four hospitals, and they told my wife, when they admitted me, to go home and make funeral arrangements. That was on a Monday. They didn't expect me to make it to the weekend. And the pulmonologist that let me out told me, he said, the only you just made it because you were stubborn. You were mad. Oh my gosh, every time you'd asked me if I thought you might make it, I told you I didn't know. And you would cuss me out and swear. I asked your wife, where does he come up with us? She said, He's an old marine. But he said, It was your attitude, it was your mindset. You were not going to quit. You weren't gonna let it happen. And it re-paralyzed me worse than I was before. Two years ago, I was eastbound on Interstate 10 towards Florida, and I got hit in the back end of my handicap van that holds my wheelchair with a ramp and stuff. And it threw me two lanes to the left and back five lanes after I bounced off the concrete median, across five lanes of traffic, down into the ditch, totaled the van, all the tires are blowing out and all that. And they they got me out. My right leg was cut, and I felt like I was the toothpick stuck up in a marshmallow. I just felt like God's hand was around me as I went through that whole thing. But when I was up between the EMS vehicle and the state trooper car, the EMS guys came up, my blood pressure was 110 over 62. And they looked at the van and they said, You know how many people ever make it through something like that alive? None. They just don't. You don't seem to be very worried about having what gone through what you just did. And I said, Sir, you don't have a clue what I've been through in my life. I don't know, Laura. It's just the fact that if you continue on, God's got me here for a purpose. Whether that's to spread hope, faith, determination, resilience, belief, stubbornness, but let people know that it will work. If you want it to work, you will find a way to make it work.

SPEAKER_01 20:58

Yeah, Jay, I I know so many people that go through a knee, hip, shoulder surgery and they go to PT and it's too hard, so they quit, or they have cancer and they chemo gets too hard. And instead of wanting to eradicate every cancer cell in their body, they give up, and oftentimes that stubbornness going the wrong way um will take their life. I'm glad God has kept you here and can keep sharing with us all the lessons you have learned. I have to chuckle. I think your grandfather and my dad went to the same school of counting when I was little and had a tooth loose and it just would not fall out. Dad had the thought that we would try tying it to like a door and shutting it. And well, that didn't work. I think it was needle nose pliers, and again, that count, that one, two, and I was waiting for three, and he goes, Here it is, and it was like Yeah, yeah, that's except they only can learn to count to two.

SPEAKER_00 21:54

That's the problem. It's like, how do you ever learn to count past two?

SPEAKER_01 21:58

That's like a DJ, check one, two, one.

SPEAKER_00 22:00

My mother, one of the things she did teaching and then taught piano lessons to hundreds and hundreds, probably thousands of students, was the metronome with the one, two, three, one, two, three. And in her last days of life, she had cancer, she had uh a breast removal when she was uh 88, and within a week she was walking a mile. She said, I'm not gonna quit. She was stubborn, oh, she was a stubborn woman, trust me. She was part Czech and German and Polish, and she was a stubborn, stubborn woman. And that's where I probably got some of it. But the thing was, when she got dementia in her mid-90s, and uh we went to Florida and visited with her, she was down with my sister, and she would go, one, two, three, one, two, three, one, two, three. When you could ask her a question, and she'd go, one, two, three, and she'd look at you like, Who are you? She thought I was her little brother one time, and then all of a sudden, out of the blue, she remembered my name, and 20 seconds later I was gone. Maybe the stubbornness isn't the word, Laura, but stubbornness is just the way I say it. It's that instinct inside of you that's not going to quit. I don't care what it is, it's not gonna quit. And people look at you and wonder, how the heck are you hanging on? How are you still doing it? I think something else, and if I may, that plays into a lot of this, and I'm just gonna throw this out because it's kind of like believing in faith versus hope. And that's life and time. And we have so much to offer life, and life has so much to offer us, and people miss out on that so much. And I spoke at a high school here and they were all seniors, and I mentioned, I said, how many of you with a show of hands? You're not going to hurt my feelings one bit, not a bit. How many of you are judging me because I'm here in a power wheelchair cruising around in front of you with a microphone? And I know you are. So how many of you will admit with a show of hands are judging me for some reason? And then most of them raise their hand, and I said, Okay, and that's that's good. I would expect you to, because if it was me, I would be sitting, does he have messed? Is there something else? What happened? Did he have a one? A lot of you are young enough that you don't know what a stroke really is yet, but you've heard the term. But I said, I've been dead a few times and I've had all these surgeries and this and that, and my paralysis has gotten worse. And I worked over paralysis and I was able to get from when they told me I would never move, I was able to walk. I was able to walk with leg braces and a cane for about 17 years, and I had more brainstem surgeries. That put me on a walker for about 18 years. And then my left knee's been replaced three times, and I had to be in a power wheelchair now because I can't be on a walker. So I can accept that. Let's talk about time. How many of you, by a show of hands, can remember being in eighth grade and never thinking you're gonna make it to be a senior because it's so far away, and then graduate in eighth grade? That's long that just getting through a freshman year. Virtually everyone raised their hand. They just never thought they'd be a senior. That's a long time. And I said, okay, now by another show of hands, how many of you can look back today knowing you're gonna graduate in less than six weeks and think you were just in eighth grade like a week ago? Time is just gone. And they've all raised their hands again. And I said, Well, that shows you how fast time goes. But here's the sad thing the next 20 years of your life is going to go as fast as the last four did. And before you know it, you're gonna be pushing 40. So think about all the things you're gonna go through in that length of time, whether it's injuries, education, family, divorce, children, it doesn't matter. But all that's gonna happen at the blink of an eye, and it's over with. Because all these people that have, and you've most of you out here probably have younger brothers or sisters. How long ago was it that they were wearing diapers? And now they're in fourth grade, playing littly. It's like it just happened. And how did it happen? It's kind of an interesting concept to think back about like that, but that's how we find ourselves, our purpose. I think that our purpose changes as we move through life, as we grow and change our directions, our purpose changes, and I think God has us change our purpose because Jesus walks with us and he helps us change our direction and our purpose and what we're doing. Because the more we learn and the more we do, we're able to change our purpose to help people. I would never have thought I would be on a podcast ever in my life talking about this seven months ago. And here I am. But I never thought I'd write a book. And I mean, for 50 years, people wanted me to write a book, but had I written it 30 or 40 years ago, I would have missed a lot. And the book really it talks about my medical stuff, but it's more about finding that strength within you. And what do you do with it? How do you overcome your adversities and move forward? I've got a website, and I don't know how she ever found my website because it's not in the book. This happened a week about a week ago. She was 88 years old, her husband had died about five years before. She she sent me this little letter and she said, you know, sir, I was wanting to quit. I just didn't care. I mean, I don't want to just die, but I'm not looking forward to living. And she said, I read your book, and I want you to know that it inspired me enough that now I am planning my 95th birthday, and I'm 88. So she's planning seven years out. So that changed her life. It changed her outlook. And it was from reading a book about the strength within you, it's always too soon to quit. That gives me a purpose, Laura. It shows me that God's here helping somebody, reaching out and touching lives. And I think that's really what we're here for. I really do.

SPEAKER_01 27:42

I do too. I think the word that came to mind when you were talking about strength was tenacity. That's where we have the tenacity to move forward. And as a chaplain, at one point, I can tell you that I would be called to visit people because the nurse would hear somebody say, I don't want to do this anymore, after a spouse had died. What was interesting when I went to several people on the premise that these people wanted to commit suicide, I would go sit with them and I'd say, So why do you think I'm here? And they're like, I don't know. Maybe the nurse said something. Well, tell me what's going on. And they said, I just don't want to be here. Okay. Do you want to kill yourself? And they're like, No, my spouse is gone. I don't want to do life without him. I don't want to do anything to harm my children, so I'm gonna stay. But I just want you to know I don't want to be here and I don't want to do this, but I'm gonna continue. And I think that's huge with that lady that wrote to you because that could have been taken a whole other way. And and maybe in her case, she was sort of planning not to be here. Um, but now she's planning a birthday that's several years away. And I think you know that tenacity can be important for everyone. And so I really wanted the folks who come to the counter to hear your story, to hear your message, and to to know if they were feeling overwhelmed and facing whatever's going on, to hear your voice and to learn about your book and to be able to say, maybe there is hope, or maybe I can dredge up my strengths inside of me and and be able to move forward. I am really glad that you shared those stories.

SPEAKER_00 29:14

You're welcome. And I that that is a word I haven't used in a while, but it's a word I used years ago, and that's the tenacity. It's just like it almost sounds like a monster word. Life is a wild ride. Grab a hold of it and hang on. Well, that's what people miss anymore. It's like the excitement of life and learning about I don't know, maybe when you were younger, maybe some friend of yours or some friend's family had a convertible and the weather's perfect, and you get to put the top down and go for a ride at 60 miles an hour and your hair is blowing, and you were younger, maybe you had a scarf and the scarf's flapping. But it's like, wow, it's like a whole different world. And we miss that. And you gotta look back. And you know, something I ask people, and this is something for everybody that's listening to, is I've asked people this for years and years and years and years, is if you had the ability to go back and live one of your favorite experiences, one of one of your best memories. But if you had that opportunity to go back and relive it again, would you rather do that but never remember it after it's over? Or would you rather keep it as a memory forever? I've never had anybody say they would like to go back and relive it. Never. Everybody's always said, I'd rather keep it as a memory. Because it can draw tears, it can draw a smile, it can, you can tell it to other people, you can share that experience. I the reason I brought up the convertible thing is it's just I remember an instance like that back when I was about 12 or 13 or 14. It was like, wow, well, this is crazy, you know. And that was back before seat belts, and you're standing up in the backseat at 70 miles an hour and you're with the top down, and it's a good smile, it's a good time. And people need to look for that. You mentioned orange cinnamon rolls cooked. My gosh, I gotta go get another cup of coffee, but that sounds great. If you come into a house and it smells like that, and you are offered that with some fresh creamery butter and stuff and whatever, and they're nice and warm. Man, that just puts a different attitude in your life. It gives you a tenacity to live. You know, it's like you just mentioned that that lady that was 80. I mean, that got to me too. I mean, it didn't give me tears or anything, but it got to me. I mean, I would never have thought my words would affect somebody that's 12 years older than I am in that way. My mother and father came and visited me, and I think this is an important thing for everybody to think about. And it's a good thing with is I was at the rehab center, it was about four months after I had broken my neck. I was there about eight or nine weeks, roughly. And my mom and dad came and she said, How are you doing today? I said, I'm pretty good. And I told her, Mom, I'm trying to figure out I had this hate low cast. You can see the scars. I got a tracheotomy. I've had 32 facial fractures, and my skull was crushed in and my hair was burned off. But I said, Why me? Why me, mom? And I don't mean why me in a bad way. I didn't mean like, why did God do this to me? That that wasn't the thing. And it wasn't, woe is me. Why me? I mean, I should have died in the feeding auger. I should have died and stayed dead. Well, I died, but stayed dead in the Marine Corps, or when the drunk hit me, or when I just drowned, I was gone. I was completely gone. What is it that this happens time and time and time and time again? And she said, Jay, no matter what, you made the decision to jump in the pool. Even though those other guys were gonna throw you in funning around on the 4th of July, you made the decision to jump in the pool. Take your boots off, take your bill fold out, and jump in the pool. Well, when you did and you broke your neck, that was your decision to jump in. But when the lady that jumped in to help you after you were turning colors because you had drowned and you'd already been dead a couple of minutes, two, maybe three minutes, and then another guy realized she couldn't bring you up and he jumped in and helped her. Together, they got you to the surface and over to the edge of the pool. It was you that made the decision to jump in. It was God that made the decision to help bring you out. And he gave them the power and the strength and the intuition to bring you out. God helped save you. And Jesus has walked with you a lot, Jay. You're gonna continue on because I know you're not gonna quit. You're not, you're never gonna quit. You're never gonna give up. She said, You're too damn stubborn. God wants you to be here, or you wouldn't be here. You wouldn't be alive today if God didn't want you here. And he wanted me back, so he helped somebody come in and save me. That's a strong message. I think that's a good message.

SPEAKER_01 33:47

Wow, such such powerful message for us, Jay. Let's pause at the counter for a moment and take a slow breath in and let it out. If y'all are listening today and you feel like your life looks different than you expected, just notice this. Where did you feel the weight of that most right now? No pressure, just noticing. And set with it for a while. Thank you, Jay. I am so glad you took the time to come sit with us at the counter today. I'm grateful for your honesty, your stories, your strength and your tenacity, and for the perspectives that you shared with us.

SPEAKER_00 34:25

You're more than welcome, Laura. I'm glad to have been here and glad to have been invited. Thank you very much.

SPEAKER_01 34:30

And if you'd like to learn more about Jay and his story, you can visit his website, neverquitting.com. His message centers on perseverance, courage, and continuing forward, even when life feels overwhelming. Before we close, let's take one more breath. As we inhale, say God of strength. And as we exhale, help me keep going. My friends, hear this blessing. As you return to your day, may you remember that even when life doesn't look the way you expected, it's not without purpose. May you find strength in the ways that you surprise life, and may you take this next step forward, even if it's just a small one. God has big plans for you. Amen. Thank you for sitting at the counter with me today. If something in this conversation stayed with you, you might want to carry it gently into your day. No need to rush past it. And if you need a place to pause, reflect, or simply breathe. You can find more at bakingpastor.com. Until next time, take a breath. Notice what's in front of you, and remember, you're always welcome here at the counter.