Red Dirt Catholics
Join Jayce, James and guests from "Red Dirt" Oklahoma as they discuss what evangelization and discipleship looks like in real life.
Red Dirt Catholics
FACT(s) of Mission | Part 1
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In this episode, Jayce and James explore how the FACT framework (Faithful, Available, Contagious, Teachable) serves as both a barometer for disciple readiness and a personal examination tool for those leading others toward Christ.
Have you ever wondered what truly makes someone ready to be a disciple-maker? This episode dives deep into the first half of the powerful FACT framework – Faithful and Available – that serves as both a barometer for discipleship readiness and a personal examination tool for spiritual growth.
• Faithfulness includes alignment with Church teaching, honest acknowledgment of struggles, and consistent striving toward holiness
• Being faithful requires humility and obedience rather than elevating personal opinions above Church teaching
• True availability doesn't mean an empty calendar but rather a heart oriented toward what truly matters
• Availability means being present in the moment, putting down phones, and prioritizing prayer despite competing demands
• Our availability or lack thereof reveals "who we are bowing to" - what we truly worship
• A "schedule conversion" may be necessary if we're too busy for prayer and silence
• Seeking counsel from trusted friends provides essential perspective on our blind spots
• Making even small adjustments can significantly align our lives more closely with Christ's call
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Links and other stuff from the show:
Pastoral Letter, "On the Unity of the Body and Soul:" archokc.org/pastoral-letters
Red Dirt Catholics Email Address: reddirtcatholics@archokc.org
The Book "From Christendom to Apostolic Mission" (Digital and Print): Amazon
The Social Dilemma: https://www.netflix.com/title/81254224
Daily Examen Prayer: https://bit.ly/309As8z
Lectio Divina How-To: https://bit.ly/3fp8UTa
so I went to houston recently, as a or my whole family did the me, danielle and peter we all went to houston to go and visit chris beck nice, our long, our long lost podcast buddy. We went to their house. I have a few thoughts on the Houston area. So we were actually an hour south of Houston, basically in Lake Jackson, texas. First off, it's as hot and humid as they say it is.
Speaker 2:Very humid.
Speaker 1:Like it's so hot and humid that in their homes they're setting the temperature to 75 degrees because if they didn't, their AC bill would be another $150 a month if they put it at like 72 or something crazy like that. So Danielle and I You're just sweating, we were just sweating, like seven months pregnant, danielle was just sweating.
Speaker 1:I'm not conditioned for this, chris, I was sweating, but we got to go to the beach for the first time. I actually found out. Are you a beach person? I love the beach, yeah, okay, so then walk me through why you love it. I don't I. It wasn't my thing, um, but not because I didn't like the water or making sand castles, like all of the beachy stuff like I was a fan of I liked. But this idea of oh man, I can't lock my car, really, because it was one of those like drive up beaches where you can't really like like lock the car why because you have your, because where would?
Speaker 1:I put the keys like I'm in the water, uh, um. Or if I did, like it's in a bag and someone takes that bag, someone could steal it. So I had those feelings, but even like with Danielle, peter and I going out to sea like I just have, like I wasn't scared of like a shark attack or a jellyfish attack or whatever, but like if a rogue wave hits Peter he's a very good swimmer, but if we're out there too far. So I was just like you were like I enjoyed myself.
Speaker 2:I was. I was full-blown safety dad and I hated me, I hated it. You're like my dad my dad did not like who I was on the beach. My dad does not like the beach.
Speaker 1:Same reasons, I think yeah yeah, like I love jumping over the things, but danielle was kind of pushing the envelope going out there, so like we had a great time and I'd go back, but I just would need to like find a way to like marry some of these things.
Speaker 2:Hmm, well, bring some alternatives. You like to play Frisbee, Mm-hmm Right, so bring some discs.
Speaker 2:That's a great spot for it. You know, a ball One of my favorite things is kind of goofy, but I bring a real shovel. You get deep, yeah. Like we build serious adventure creation things. Like all right, we built this thing that looks like a boat, you know, and we're able to play in the boat. Or we like built a mad, awesome river moat thing and so the activity changes and then you have a big duration where you're playing in the hot tub you built. You know that's filling up from the beach, but you didn't spend an eternity to make it happen that way because you have a real shovel. Huh, not bad. That's been fun For me, like I'm someone that sometimes like overdoes, overperforms, overworks, you know, doesn't get enough silence. And so the beach the reason why I love it is like I love the sound.
Speaker 2:Well, I love the sound, it's peaceful. Well, I could have my phone on me, like the glare and the sand, like if anyone's trying to get a hold of me. It's just not going to be productive anyway, so that stays in the car. So it's like that's in the car. People kind of understand you're not gonna talk on the phone while you're on beach vacation. And then my kids, just for whatever reason, like once they're in the sand they could be entertained for all day. It's like emily and I can actually like sometimes we're playing with them but like until it's time to eat at least they're fully entertained. We're just talking. So it's like a little retreat in that way, like in the, but like for me, one after like three days of sand I'm over the sand part. You know, it's like let's hang out at the pool for a while.
Speaker 1:I did have to take like chris's shop back to our car. Yeah, as a result, and we were trying so hard, but, but anyway. But the other cool thing your kids are into bluey, just like every other kids, right? No, we haven't introduced, you haven't, no, you haven't been introduced to the cult of Bluey. Wow, I mean, I'm aware of Bluey, but we're staying away. Counter cultural. Bluey's great it's one of the great like, if like there's few media that I'm like happy to show my kid Bluey's one of them.
Speaker 1:Okay, it's just very, it's very wholesome and like there's like Catholic hymns in the background and the music.
Speaker 2:Oh really.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's one. One of the episodes is like oh God, beyond all praising, oh, that's sweet.
Speaker 2:There's one on form. I don't think it's Bluey, but there's straight up like Catholic people singing.
Speaker 1:It's like really well done, high quality but if you find yourself vacationing in Houston this summer, at the Galleria they took Bluey's house and made it like, and made it and made Bluey's house inside of a mall where you buy you buy a $30 ticket, you go in and inside this house. There's like Bluey's house inside of a mall where you buy a $30 ticket, you go in and inside this house. There's like all these different cast members that are playing the games. From that the kids play on the show, so it's like an hour-long immersive experience.
Speaker 2:So Peter got to go inside Bluey's.
Speaker 1:Inside Bluey's house play the games that Bluey's things played. Have watched the kids do little skits.
Speaker 1:Oh, he loved it. It was really really fun. Like, yeah, highly recommend. It's like at the camp at Houston is like the name of it in the place, but it was fun. Highly recommend. If you're Bluey people, but if you're wholly like James, don't go, you know, and. But we're talking about, we're talking about fact today. But we're talking about fact today and we've probably mentioned fact 50 times already on the podcast, but I don't know that we've set aside time to talk about it, so I'm excited yeah.
Speaker 2:So, james, will you start us in a prayer, absolutely In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Heavenly Father, thank you for how you made us. Thank you for the constant love you have for us, the way you delight in us, the way you sing over us. Thank you for giving us your son. Thank you for leaving us the gift of the Holy Spirit and dwelling inside us. I ask, as we talk about faith today, or in fact today, that you can kind of stir up in our heart real applications in our life of how we can maybe better be faithful, available, contagious, teachable, but also how we can discern the folks we're calling into mission around us, like if and how they're ready, and how we can cultivate them and help them be more at your disposal. Lord, we ask for a great docility, an increase in understanding, and we beg you for a beautiful fruitfulness here in Oklahoma City and in all those lives that listen to this podcast.
Speaker 1:In your name we pray.
Speaker 2:Amen Amen Father.
Speaker 1:Son, holy Spirit, amen, Amen. So kind of like why we want to talk about this.
Speaker 1:So I'm entering month three at the cathedral now and we're in the middle of something that we're calling the discipleship series, where we're cranking out and just kind of trying to dive into some key aspects for leaders of what discipleship really is, and I'm just being reconvicted by all of it as I'm putting it together, going in it also, also realizing how good a job I did of hiding or at least muting a little bit my focus stand feeling where I'm just really into everything that focus has ever made, whereas when I was here at the Archdiocese I didn't do that as much because we had an archbishop's vision, which was super awesome. But at the parish I'm like kind of letting the flag fly a little bit more. So we're going through it all and Jared Williams, our guy who's at we just did the last two episodes with a former Focus missionary.
Speaker 1:He gave a talk Wednesday night, two nights ago, on the three main habits of missionary discipleship and fact. And when we talk about fact, like really quickly, it's faithful, available, contagious and teachable. And, like when I was a missionary, we kind of used it as a quick barometer of whether or not somebody might be interested or is ready or is a good fit for discipleship in the way that Focus was doing it then. But it's just so much more than that, I think, and I wanted to talk about it. So that's where it came from.
Speaker 2:That's where it came from.
Speaker 1:So, from those things, james, will you start unpacking, like what is faithful, like me?
Speaker 2:Yeah, faithful. I think there's a couple litmus tests because we don't know everyone's heart, right, am I talking about like in my life, or am I talking about looking at another? By the way, both. So, like you know, let's say let's start with inside, like an honest assessment, right, yeah, so faithful I think has kind of two layers, like one would be like okay, am I faithful to like what the church asks of me?
Speaker 2:I guess a level and then one layer deeper is like am I faithful to what Jesus is calling me to Like, am I, am I abiding in the promptings of the Holy Spirit in Jesus and listening to the promptings that the Spirit's given me? So like a mark, right, it's like, of that is like, in some sense, if I'm faithful to that secondary, deeper level, jesus says, well, I pray. But Jesus also says I'll know them by their fruit, right, so like, if I'm faithful, there's going to be some level of fruitfulness happening naturally in my life. But yeah, I would say you see me praying. I'm active in the sacramental life of the church. Since we're Catholic, I'm probably frequent with the sacramental confession, more so than the church would require, and I'm going to put big emphasis on I'm a hearer of the word and a doer of the word for faithful. It's going to that next level. What do you'm a hero of the word and doer of the word for faithful Like? It's like going that next level.
Speaker 1:What do you mean here of the word and doer of the word?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, I believe Jesus talks about this like whoever is it when they're talking about Mary and Mary meeting his mom, or something he says, whoever you know here's, here's my word and does my word.
Speaker 1:It's my.
Speaker 2:Um, similar to Jesus says not everyone who says Lord, lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven. And so what Jesus is trying to describe is like this is a lived thing, like you're going to hear what I've asked, you're gonna be faithful to listening to what I say and faithful to responding. And so I think sometimes, as someone who's being a Christian, trying to be a Christian, sometimes we do only do one of those things. You know, uh, maybe we're just like really good at doing, like we're really working hard, we're really trying to perform, we're trying to serve, we're doing all this stuff, but we're not hearing, we're not listening, or maybe like we've got a really great yeah, we're not being filled like the inhale exhale that josh was talking about.
Speaker 2:Yeah yeah, and so I think um, yeah, I would put that there, um I think there's a few other things involved within there.
Speaker 1:I think that those are the kind of the big ones and a lot of these other things kind of start happening as long as you have those two. So I like where you started, but I think that I mean, frankly, I encounter this all the time and I think that we just have to be more. We have to be more honest with ourselves, of like actually believing what the church teaches on all of it.
Speaker 1:I think, I think that there's such a like. We are the universal church, we are the Catholics, Like we have. We have this absolute gift of the church providing what's good, what's not good from everything in the moral life, essentially all the way through, even letting it bleed out in a parish sometimes. Is that we like?
Speaker 1:elevate our own opinion on something. If it's above where the church is at, yeah, and I think that that's just a that thing in and of itself, regardless of what it is Like. I think I see it on both sides. Regardless of what it is Like, I think I see it on both sides. You can see it, for you know, lgbtq stuff on the left and you can see it on immigration stuff on the right, and I'm not interested in talking about either of those things, but those are like common areas where super prayerful, holy people that.
Speaker 1:I love have really hot takes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, which is interesting. So we have these hot takes that are blended with our experience, blended with a prejudice, blended with some ideal, blended with some political ideology right, but in reality, pick any other several examples. It's like Jesus and his church have threaded that needle very clearly in the realm of mercy. Here's truth and a high call and here's great love, and they're inseparable and we want to choose the easier way. Frankly, with my hot take yeah, most of the time. Yeah, I love that example.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's just like Everything, everything, the church teaches, and I'm constantly trying to be converted to the fact of where I'm off on that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and, and and if someone challenges you on that, I mean that'll get into the teachable side of it. But, um, then being open to it and like, and just going to the catechism and being like all right, and sometimes I think that we it's just, it's just the pride, it's just that initial pride. I do this all the time of like, how do I interpret what the church is saying right here into more into? What my initial worldview is on it instead of the other way around, and we have to.
Speaker 2:I'm really power. I just think that that's a huge issue To embody this part of the F part of fact, the faithful part. We also to your point.
Speaker 1:What I'm hearing some nuance on is like we need to be able to be humble and obedient you know, yeah obedience, yeah, I mean when you ask a priest, um, how they're holy and they won't tell you how many, how all the hours they pray. They won't tell you because they say mass every day. They'll say because I'm obedient is where, like, the source of a lot of my growth and transformation.
Speaker 1:I've heard that from several priests Is, and we needed it ourselves and we don't want it ourselves. But I just think that and it hurts, like in the terms of like missionary discipleship and our message. It hurts when we're not united. Yeah, like that's like the main, one of the main draws.
Speaker 2:It's also what's interesting to me when you think about like fruitfulness and discipleship, like if I'm on mission, if I'm not faithful, like if I'm a hypocrite.
Speaker 1:Yeah Right, I guess that's a strong way to say.
Speaker 2:Like there went the moral authority Right. So Paul says like, be imitators of me. Okay, like he can only say be imitators of me because he's confident that he's patterning himself after Jesus and he's being obedient to what Jesus said, he's being obedient to what the church said. He's all in and so like, hey, if we're not committed to continue to try and be that way it's actually, we're probably not, we're, we're. We're either going to be leading a discipleship of me and it's going to fall flat, or we're probably not going to lead appropriately because we know we're not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're missing a key thing that's, that's so good and it's so key, um, to be going about it that way because, like, you talk about the moral authority and like, and to be really clear, you do not have to be perfectly moral to lead somebody that's not what we're saying like you just have to be actually striving and have the have the humility to look at yourself with truth.
Speaker 2:Well, it's a lot like the moral life isn't unlike that by some prayer. Like I need to be honest and consistent. Yeah, right, okay. So like moral life. Like, hey, I need to be honest that I'm failing at this, struggling with this. You know it's hard. I need to be honest that I'm failing at this, struggling with this. You know it's hard for me to obey this. That would be the honest part. Consistent is like I'm striving for it to your point.
Speaker 1:Yeah this isn't. We're not built like the faithfulness, isn't like the cancel culture. Part of discipleship.
Speaker 2:You know, I guess that's not what we're interested in.
Speaker 1:We're not perfect performers per se, strivers, consistent, consistent. That's what we're looking for more than anything. I mean, do you have anything else specifically within faithful that you think is important thing to like? Touch on Like perfection isn't important, isn't necessary and, frankly, like if you present yourself as a perfect human being, it becomes less attractive, it's not authentic.
Speaker 1:Yeah, human being, it becomes less attractive, it's not authentic, um, but it's still necessary, because you do have to be able to say like hey, if you're like noticing something that's like public about somebody that you're discipling, you have to come from a place of, like you said, authority so much as you can, but it can come from the authority of. I struggle too, and we got to get out of this together. Yep, you know, you know, um, it's a very attractive authority.
Speaker 1:I think we've hit the high points pretty well, so you you mentioned you mentioned earlier, when we were driving in the truck on the way here, I made james. I made james pick me up from the cathedral because he had spiritual direction ahead of time and uh, and then I made him like reorganize his entire car, um, because he had like a few things from their business in the front. So, anyway, really grateful for your hospitality.
Speaker 2:But you were telling me in the car.
Speaker 1:Availability is something that you feel like is something where you want to work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was excited about the topic because I've been working on the A and I've been working on the T. You know, available and teachable.
Speaker 2:Not faithful though. Well, obviously I've been working on it, but I feel like those are generally trending in the right area. But like, well, it's actually. I'm glad you illustrated it because it's a good discernment tool. Right, Like, if we're looking at this model for ourselves as being a fruitful missionary disciple, it's actually a decent discerning tool of like, hey, which one of these might be limiting me the most? These might be limiting them me the most.
Speaker 2:Yeah, let's work on that one. Um so like, available, run a couple businesses, have four kids and trying to forget being perfect, struggle with perfection you know, trying to be a perfectionist and struggle with workaholism, have all sorts of idols, like what people think about me, what my balance sheet looks like, am I being, you know, excellent? Um, and those things are not the priorities of god. Um, and since they're in my life that way, um, well, family is a priority of god, of course, and he has me, he'll be, has me doing these businesses, so I have to be obedient to him in some respect, right, but, um, the idols aren't a priority. So what I've realized is, like, the things I'm engaged with in the world, because I've made them a priority, if I'm not careful, I give my agency to them and I want to, you know, put a priority on my time towards them, right, well, if there's, if you're over full on priorities and you're giving your time to them and you're trying to be perfect, you might be giving too much time. Yeah, you're going to lose, right, and so, if the major game, if the major league we're playing, is getting to heaven and bringing as many people with us as we can, and doing that within the context of our vocation and in the context of our A vocation, our job. Like, if that's the reality that we're all living in, which newsflash it is Jesus gave us all one mandate, one job. And then there's some nuance underneath that. Well, if I'm majoring in the minors and that's dictating my schedule and my priorities and my heart is changing my inside right. So I've basically just taken an honest look at like, okay, what am I committed to? Some of these things are making me lose my peace. And like, as an honest look at a backward look on last week or last month or last year, here's what my calendar looks like. And it's it's kind of incongruent with who I want to be and who I think God's leading me to be Right. So I've just been like counterbalancing, like am I really the right person for that thing within my business? Like, no, I've been taking someone else's role. You know she needs to do that. Or like, should I even be doing this? No, I've been anxiously doing that as a way to get ahead and I shouldn't, you know. So just like some of that's natural you're hearing coming through. But then, like the one that I spent some time with. This morning it was, I had a call with a friend. It was a neat thing. Sometimes, a friend, it was a neat thing.
Speaker 2:Sometimes we're tempted to like fix our problems with more, yeah, or to fix our problems by addressing the problems. There's some wisdom there. But let's say, our wounds, our sins, our bad habits are like a little faucet that's on. It's leaking poison into the system. We might want to go turn off all those faucets and spend a lot of time on that, overcoming it, whatever. Yeah, go go release the valve on the dam that is the river of life. His name's Jesus and flood the system with the life of Jesus. Reprioritize, put where you're praying back into your life. Put abiding in Jesus, wanting to be obedient to him, as the priority. Hey, is some poison still going to leak into the system, like we live in the world? Yeah, but he's flooding it out, you know.
Speaker 2:And so for me it's just like been like. One priority change I've made is like look, I am at a place I have enough agency over my life to have a holy hour. Most days my ideal time is before kids wake up, and it's in my own home, because that works. That doesn't happen every day, because sometimes they wake up and interrupt it. I do own my own business. I do not always take lunch break, so I can have that holy hour sometime before lunch or at lunch, like I can have an ABC. So I've like one priority I've changed is just like I'm going to be available to what the Lord's wanting to tell me for an hour a day.
Speaker 1:Available to the Lord. That's awesome. I think one of the biggest like when someone is sitting in a church pew or sitting in a chair, sitting in your car listening to this podcast and you hear being available means like, oh, I have to, I have to which like could be a part of that discernment process. But I just want to encourage that available doesn't mean you're not busy, like that's not, and I don't want you to hear this and they need to be available and then look at your schedule and be like it's tough. That's not what it's necessarily means, and I think that the key thing, the key thing that I hear from you as you're describing it, is that it is just a, it's just an orientation of this, of like being convicted in this matters and I have to make it matter Like.
Speaker 1:I was on the phone with a, with a mom the other day who was wanting to learn about what we were going to be doing for confirmation for her, for for her children her, her child is in ballet class like four days out of the week, evenings out of the week, and one of those evenings is when we were planning on doing our confirmation classes and her initial thought was like, well, is there anything you can do? Is there any? Is there any movement behind doing a weekend one as well and all this and like, I'm not trying to change anything. So we're going to stick with what it is for now, but we probably will, because I want the sacrament to be as available as possible. But I digress, it kind of boiled the conversation kind of boiled down to do you want to be, do you want to be confirmed or closer to the lord or not?
Speaker 1:And I think that we have to look at ourselves and like be honest about it. Yeah, you know of like does does it matter? And and find a way to get it in. Like you can be creative, you can be busy and all of that, but we got to keep. Do you have anything else? With availability, we could sit here.
Speaker 2:I do actually. I think you brought up a really key note. Um, we could be tempted to, you know, go you know full-on aggressive at our calendar, right, and like start deleting stuff and for clarity, your way for clarity you might need to do.
Speaker 2:I can first move, actually complete detachment over everything I'm committed to and what my goals are. And just ask the Lord here's my calendar, here's my commitments how do you want me to change things? How do you want me available? But what you're describing is a movement of the heart. Yeah, and so, like I would say, sometimes I'm unavailable for this set of relationships to be who God wants me to be, because I'm attached to my vision for myself and how they might look at me. Right, so available might just mean am I available to be vulnerable here? Am I available to be honest? Am I available to put down my phone and pay attention? Put down the phone, be with the human and I'm saying that because I've struggled with it. Right, like I'm being that, but like that device is designed to rob our attention in real life.
Speaker 2:Let's take the basketball practice or whatever you were mentioning, right? Yeah, I could be sneaking in a little extra work. I could be staying over there with the three or four other parents and getting to know them, watching how my son's engaging with that other kid. That's available. I'm there anyway. That is available. I'm being obedient to what's on my calendar and I'm there my wholeness of person. So sometimes it looks like present to the moment. That's true, right. But then available, I also think, means ready. So like what did Paul say? Always be ready to give the reason for your joy. And so available is like disposed for the Lord's work. Right, it doesn't mean like doing nothing, it doesn't mean doing all ministry work in a ministry setting. You know, it means being an instrument for God and letting him play you, and that's an art form and it's a time constraint and it's a reality of my emotional maturity. There's a lot there actually available and it's worth discerning those things A huge amount.
Speaker 2:And yeah, and the church just needs that, I would say, if you are so busy that you have not had any, you haven't had measurable silence this week or time in prayer this week. You need a schedule conversion, you have to cancel something or you have to prioritize when this happens and so like that doesn't mean like upend everything, undo everything, but let's make it. If you have time to take a poop, you probably have time to pray, like right.
Speaker 1:If you have time to drink water. We really touched a nerve for you here. This is fire, james.
Speaker 2:I've been there, you know, like, like this is like wake up. Like okay, If you didn't, we have to breathe or we won't be alive. Like, if you're going to lead someone, if you're going to be a prophet, the prophet's job first was listening to God before he proclaimed it to all the people.
Speaker 1:And we're all called to be, we're all called to be prophets?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so we're not. We're not going to get through all the facts, which is, which is fine. So we we can. We can ruminate here on availability for a little bit longer, but I just think that I love what you're saying, with just like presence of the moment, getting rid of the phone, like the schedule conversion that we need, like there is, we are the mask that it is, we are the mask that it is.
Speaker 1:Like, the thing that I heard the most was like being okay if, like something is dropping, like that to what the Lord is calling you to, and not being so worried about what someone in this one other group might think or what this person is actively thinking about it Like. I mean, it's just like having a, having a, a tiered list of like who are we serving and what are we caring about? And and like man, I find myself like you, like you, me, of like I will do things and make things because of like oh, but this person will be sad by this or won't, won't be happy, um, if I'm not getting this done in a timely manner and could put something off, like there's a. For instance, I was about to go. This is a real peek into Jace's daily life.
Speaker 1:The other day I was about to go pray. I was going to go pray a holy hour. I was about to walk, I had my Bible, I had my notebook in hand and then a coworker kind of brought something to me that wasn't actually urgent, but was something that I wanted to get done and it was just like the opportunity. So instead of going and praying, that day.
Speaker 1:I went and got that thing done because I out of fear that I would have another opportunity granted, or just wanting it to get done and wanting to be available to that other coworker, and that was a mistake, like in prayer in my why do you think you did it what I did it because I didn't want to let the team down.
Speaker 2:Why didn't you want to let the team down?
Speaker 1:Because I wanted to be good at my job, even and what happens if you're not good at your job well, yeah, there's like you know, people think less of you yeah yeah, so what's the divine longing there? Well, yeah, the divine longing is is to like the longing in the brokenness there no, yeah, I mean, what's good about that longing, that like wanting, oh? Wanting to be good, yeah, yeah, I mean wanting to be more like Christ and do the right thing and, yeah, being conformed and transformed.
Speaker 1:But that good is actually. I know where you're going. That good is actually happening when I just go sit in the pew.
Speaker 2:Well, I think the thing I wanted to illustrate is it's interesting and you might be going to a similar place, but it's like it would have been okay for you to say, hey, I'm so excited to help you on that. Like I just set aside some time for a holy hour. Can we revisit this a little later this afternoon, or whatever. Right, and it would have been okay. And, frankly, probably you taking that to the Lord and sharing it with him a little bit when you reentered, it might've been more fruitful. It's interesting.
Speaker 2:I'm going to shout out to Father Rex I'm robbing from what might be a future homily that he shared with me as an idea, but he's going to ask a question of who are you bowing to? And part of that's liturgical. Like we don't. Some of us are disoriented and not catechized in understanding or we don't think about it. We're kind of bowing to the cross or we're bowing to the altar.
Speaker 2:It's like we, up in my mind, as we're just in faithful and available, my availability and how I prioritize this thing might be telling me who and what I'm bowing to. You know, and so like. Let's take the example of the. I'm worried, you know I'm not as available or not as vulnerable, because I'm wondering what they might think I'm bowing to the opinions of men. Sure, instead of bowing before the creator and trusting that his gospel has power and that, if he's asking me to speak here, that he'll provide the resources needed for these people to receive it the way he needs to receive it, he needs to receive it the way he needs to receive it. He needs to receive. And it's interesting, like I think, in some sense like an examine, a particular examine on availability might give us a sense of who and what we're bowing to.
Speaker 1:I hate that and I love that at the same time. Yeah, so that's super real. So if any of this as we were kind of landing the plane like the thing that I want to, the plan Like the thing that I want to like, we're.
Speaker 2:we're pretty fiery, we're pretty, we're pretty convicted today, which I didn't know it would be- either.
Speaker 1:I thought this would just be really simple of like, let's talk about what these things mean For me.
Speaker 2:This is coming from like me, like looking inward over the past few months and I didn't know you were going to have this topic and like really trying to say, like I've been in this place, lord, want to be all yours again, I feel like I need to do a little bit of surgery and I need you to do a little bit of surgery.
Speaker 1:Yeah we need him to do surgery on us, and I think that in today's, today's, the way that things are, the echo chambers that we live in, the places where we are like, that is a scary place to like be, to look at us, to look at ourselves with truth and be like you know what I actually need, this, and then and then like, like. I think I can see myself really truthfully, like for me, I was processing with you.
Speaker 1:Having the discipline to like really change is something that is a struggle for me, and so I guess the, the, the exhortation, is to not dismiss or look at yourself like obviously you always look at yourself with love and gentleness, especially if that's something that you struggle with as like being too harsh yeah, but at the same time, like be really critical, um, and looking at it and like ask a friend, ask, yeah. Ask a friend, ask a spouse, you, they're really good at that.
Speaker 2:But this is like key human stuff that we have to go through and it's so easy to just to dismiss it and say I'm doing good and I do that all the time and I don't want and like, like I would second where you're at both notes you shared about like not being self-loathing in this examination and assessment, but also not not assessing and just saying, hey, I'm good, I'm fine, I'm busy, life's good, you know, not being that service level with yourself, but then, yeah for sure, invite a friend to it and know how much God loves you amidst it.
Speaker 1:The funny thing that James or not James Jared said during his talk the other night he was like, and he said it really fire. He was like if you don't agree with the church on something, seek counsel bro.
Speaker 2:That's what he said. Can you imagine Jared saying that? Yeah, I can imagine.
Speaker 1:Or if you're too busy to like pray, seek counsel, bro, and so that's the fire way of saying it.
Speaker 2:And the gentle way of saying it and the general way of saying it is like get in there. Yeah, I'm actually kind of glad that we went at depth, that we couldn't go to contagious and teachable yet, because I think the challenge is like hey, examine, faithful and available in your own life, and talk to a friend about it, talk to your spiritual director about it, ask Jesus about it, make a little 1% adjustment, you know.
Speaker 2:Or like, if you're praying the examine prayer over it, like make that resolution in there, um, can we end in a prayer In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit Amen, father, um, we've talked about a lot today and I just want to ask that, um, while we go into this high level of self-awareness, looking at these things that you can keep at the top of our mind, at the top of our hearts, some God awareness, some awareness of who you are and how you look at us.
Speaker 2:In Zephaniah we hear that you sing songs over us, like one sings at a festival. So for each one of us, you sing and rejoice. And when you look at us, even when we've missed the mark, it's much like how your son looked at the woman caught in adultery, risked everything to protect her from the consequences of the time and showed her great love and also showed her a great high call go and sin no more. And so it's with this great joy and love you shower us with, and with the great mercy of Jesus and with our indwelling Holy Spirit, that we ask you to be with us as we think about these things for our life, as we try to bear much fruit for you. In your name, we pray.
Speaker 1:Amen, amen, father, son, holy Spirit, amen, we'll see you next time.