HOTLCAST
HOTLCAST
Blind Dates, Big Prayers, and Bigger Lessons
In this episode of HOTLCast, the crew dives deep into the theme "Pray More, Worry Less." Join Cyle, Jared, and Mark as they share personal stories, honest struggles, and biblical wisdom on how prayer can transform anxiety into peace. From hilarious dating adventures to heartfelt discussions about trusting God in every season—relationships, finances, health, and more—this conversation is both relatable and encouraging. Whether you’re facing uncertainty or just need a reminder to trust God’s plan, this episode will inspire you to lean into prayer and let go of worry. Tune in for laughter, real talk, and practical faith!
Hello and welcome to the podcast here with myself, mark. Yeah. And Jay Red is lonely. You know? You know what it is. Well, that's brutal. You know what it is, Jared? We gotta talk about some. Things at this podcast. See,
this is what, this is why I asked about what this podcast was about. So he, he, before we started,
yeah.
It's only the sermon. We, I mean, we're gonna get there. Yeah. Okay. We're getting to the sermon. We'll get there. We're gonna talk about your, uh, your adventurers. Oh man. The adventurers of Jared land.
You're so invested in his love. He's so invested in my love.
Yeah, that's, so tell us, dear, has anything new happened in your life since the last time you've been on a podcast here?
Actually, if you, I just realized why you said that. Yes. There has been something new. Uh, I went on a blind, a date, A blind date photo shoot. That's so surprising. I didn't know you were in Oh yeah. It's not like you made a shirt or anything and Yeah. Was public with it. Um, no. Yes, I went on a blind date and, uh, it was a lot of fun.
It was a lot of fun. We did not mesh. Uh, so it's okay. I mean, I, I
was there for some of the pictures. You were there for the first 30 seconds. You were forced to uncomfortably mesh at the beginning. We did.
That was awkward. We, we did. It was awkward, but it was really, it was actually really fun. Like we laughed through the whole thing.
So she
seemed like to, to be a really good sport about it.
She was a good sport about it. Yeah. I mean, as we touched foreheads. You know, it was that. That would be tough. That would be tough. Yeah, it was. It was interesting. But it was good. But I will tell you something that I actually did not tell you this morning in our meetings.
Oh, I will tell you this. Uh, so I had somebody hit me up from Honduras. Oh. And they're like, Hey, I have this beautiful girl, you know, this, this and that. And I was like. Do you, do you know her? Are you just you giving me to her what is going on? So, so, uh, so yeah, no, it was, so what I'm hearing season
two is going international.
Yeah, I've heard. So I'm not, I, I've, I
don't, this is really like, love is blind 'cause they go to Mexico. I know the thing like, you're
going to Honduras. No, I'm not going to Honduras, Kyle, I just, I'm just saying there are a few options that have presented themselves and. We'll see if we'll explore any of that.
Yeah,
I mean, central America is a far way to go to find love. It's okay. I mean, there's
some, there's some people in Brooklyn as well. Do you know we have a
missionary we support here who he married. His wife is from Columbia.
Is he a missionary in Columbia?
No, he is a missionary in Mexico. Okay. I was like, that's, that's a conflict of interest.
But he's actually, he's been supported by our Jackson campus Uhhuh, which which was formerly Pathway and formerly em. Okay. For many years. Uh, Steve Murray and his wife Maria, and they met when he was on Mission in. Um, in Columbia and fell in love and like they're wonderful people. I thought you meant Lake
Columbia.
No. Like, no, like the country.
So like, there's a reality. You go down, here's what's gonna happen. I'm Mark and I See, here we go. Here's what's gonna happen. Mark.
Yeah.
In three weeks.
Okay.
Jared like, Hey guys, like, I'm gonna go, I got a gig and I went to Ms. Church. I'm gonna Ms. Church. Do not do that. I'm to Ms.
Church. And, uh, it's gonna be, and we're going like, where are you gonna go? He like, I don't tell you. And he's like, I don't, I won't tell you. And as I'm gonna ask him later, he's like, it's Honduras,
it's s we all know why
I got it. It's gonna be one of air quotes. I got a gig. Inpro two gig, GoPro two gig.
It's for the Lord.
So, so, no, but it was good. Um, thank you for everybody's support. Thank you Kyle, for your support as well. I think
it's been cool. The church has really. I mean, we are a church that we believe the culture of honor says Care about what the people care about. Care about.
Yeah.
And I felt like the church really supported you in an honoring way, like they really did.
I mean, yeah. I, we, we, we we're your friends. I mean, it's also so we're silly about it, but like, I feel like you, it's been kind of cool.
I feel like you use that phrase to like, as a cop out though. Yeah. To let you do weird things from state. Listen, no, we care about you. He, he kind of just a combo funny one with the shirt.
I know. And
I'm like,
all right
dude. But you knew, so he knew. Of course. I thought it was funny. Yeah. He didn't know about the shirt
ahead of
time, but he knew something was going on. I
did not know what the.
Normally we would have you 100% in on the joke. Even without the joke.
I, I like not beating on the joke all the way though.
It makes it funny to me. It's, it's the first service. It's the second service. Service. You already knew the joke.
Yeah. Hard to pretend like I, I'm surprised. Oh, are those shirts
still available?
So here's the thing.
Oh, no.
It's really hard to produce like one or two or three shirts at a time. So like if we get a bulk quarter, we'll do it.
We need just a bulk order, blank shirts, so then we can just print different stuff. Honduras
edition,
no, we're not doing not Uras edition, but there is a rumor. There is a rumor that season two might be you in production. Between me and you, I don't know.
Yeah, we, so we're gonna work on season. I, here's, here's what I told Jerry.
What are we announcing right now? This has nothing to do with the message, but like, here's what I told Jerry today. I randomly sitting on my porch at night.
This is weird.
And I'm like, this is a real story. And I'm like, you know what? Every time I was trying to find a show to watch, because it was like, it was like, it was probably what, six o'clock at night?
Everybody was gone. I think the kids were at youth group. I'm like, I don't know what I should be doing. And then I'm like, you know what? No, it was, you were at home then, I think you were at home with Booker. Oh yeah. And, uh, hanging out. Oh, he was at Booker's house. Yeah. Oh yeah. You called Tuesday night. And so I'm just thinking I can't find anything on Netflix.
And I'm like, normally all the shows I watch, I've, I pretty much watched it all way through and they're usually about 13 episodes.
Right.
So I was thinking about this and I'm like. I feel like we only got seven episodes of your show. We did get episodes and so I text Jared and I can, I can actually read it here.
Oh my gosh. I literally mark, this is the, the word for word. I wanna
hear this. I wanna hear
this.
So just randomly, where's it at? Here.
You sure did text me though. I it,
I said, uh, where, where is it at? Did I, did I put that in a group? No, I put that in a
group chat. No, you did not. Did you Actually,
yeah. I had to put that in a group chat.
Nah, I don't think you did.
Yeah. 'cause I, yeah, I put it in a group chat.
You're so wild. What was the group Who was in the group? Let's see, it. Was it Cody? There was no way it was in a group chat.
It was definitely, uh,
the suspense is killing me.
Um. I gotta find my group chat with you in it. So anyways, I'll tell you what the group chat was.
Uh, I can't find it right now. Who was in that group chat? So I said to Jared, I said, Hey Jared. I said like, feel like all of my favorite shows have roughly about 13 episodes. And since we only got seven episodes. Oh, I said a video. Yeah, it was a video. Yeah, it was a video. Lemme play. That's why I can't find it.
It's a video. It was a video. It wasn't a text. Here I'll just play the audio. Let's do it. You'll
play it into your microphone. You're just gonna put play your
new microphone.
My new mic.
So Jared, I'm sitting here thinking even my favorite TV shows. Give me 13 episodes. I'm pretty sure you only gave us seven.
So by my count, you still owe us six, six episodes of. Love is Blind Air Jared edition. So I'm thinking definitely second half of the season one is season two. Let's get on it. I could use it by the end of the week.
I could use it by the end of the week is crazy. I was just thinking I need some shows to watch this weekend.
Oh my goodness. So he wants to watch my show, so. So anyway. That's our life. So what is, what is the advertisement right now? Are we advertising if anybody wants to be part of season two? Yeah. If, if you wanna be part of season
two, reach out,
fill the application.
We we're changing it up though. We're gonna talk about it.
Yeah, we're, we're gonna talk about, we're gonna do another episode just about that. But that's facts. Um, so it's been fun. But seriously, secretly, not secretly publicly, we, we, we want the best for you as your friends. And we want, we want you to have what you want in life, which just is a great relationship with a woman who loves the Lord.
That's your goal. It's been so being part of the journey. I know we, we are silly 'cause that's what we are by nature. Oh, we, we, we
hilarious.
We really are behind you and, and know who you are and a great man of God you are. And so we, well, and trying to help you.
You know, speaking of, um, relationships, I, I, I would say I pray more about my relationships, I worry less
Yes.
About Barbara. So, you know, you see the season,
you see, you see what I did there. You see what I did there?
Let's get
into the sermon's, smooth. Jerry's like, I'm done. I'm
done. You know why he is worried less? 'cause he is got a bunch of wing man here at church. That's right. But
don't point at Mark. He's not,
but no.
So, uh,
we'll follow on the journey as we go, but seriously, let's get back into this sermon. Yeah. You are the one that needs to be raided in. By the way, don't look at us like we need to be raked in.
You led this. Yeah. You guided this path.
I mean, what people don't know is we went shopping for like hours. We did for clothes for Jared.
Oh, the three clothes you go and then we, we got this house and then we spent another couple hours and you tried on every outfit, outfit after outfit. That's not that something I felt like, I felt like we were teenage girls. I did. I was modeling them. Go try out another outfit, Jared, and people
are still comment, commenting on which outfit I should wear.
Yeah. Yeah. I still got some comments yesterday. I know people voting on your outfits and then I'm like, go get, go get different shoes. And then Cody, we called Cody, we put him on FaceTime, like, yeah, that's literally what we were doing. So. I think that people wonder, do you guys goof around all the time?
Yeah. We, we do, we do, but we do get our job done. And so we, we do that because we, we live in relationship with that. And when it comes to pray more, way less, like that's part of it is just being in community with people. You could encourage each other in your journey. Mm-hmm. And for some people, the journey's not exactly what you want it to be right now.
Mm-hmm.
At
this place in life. It might be with your health situation, with your relationship status, with your career, with your finances, whatever it may be. And. The Bible does give us a plan in that stress, in that anxiety of life. Turn to God. And there's a peace that God gives you that is surpasses all the understanding of the world, and he will give you peace in your heart and mind about what you're going through.
That doesn't mean he's gonna solve it right there for you because you, you want him to, but there's, God has a plan and you have to live the plan, and you have to walk the path and the way of Christ. And so we do that in community with each other, publicly, corporately, through the church, privately in relationships and friendships.
And I think that's why we. We can get to a place where we can pray more and worry less because we have a support system that can help us do that. Mm. And so I think that's the fun part about being friends, about being in community, working together is like we're all in a journey together. And the Bible clearly tells us we've been going through Philippians four, uh, six and seven.
That's been our passage about being anxious and nothing but in everything through prayer and supplication. Go to the Lord and he'll give you peace. I mean, that's, mm-hmm. That's the goal. And that's, we're spending a good number of weeks like focusing on this. We're going deeper and deeper into this passage.
We're gonna expand out the next couple weeks outside of the passage and really look at this understanding of peace and prayer. We've talked about different ways to pray. Uh, the first week of the series we talked about PRAY, which was praise ask, repent, yield, kind of giving people a process for prey.
Mm-hmm. Um, and a prayer, and then. This week we talked about tall TAL or you can add an extra L but that was just, you know, um, what was it? Anybody know where that was on test time? Mark? Yeah. What was it? Mark? No idea. Mark wasn't here. Yeah. What was it? I was not here. What was it? Jared, you know Matt,
you know, God's telling me to ask
you that man, so tall was TAL for thank.
So we are told to give with Thanksgiving. Go take our request to God. Yeah. That's Old Testament, new Testament. Both say that with Thanksgiving, take our request to God. So we thank God for who he is, the glory of what he shows us, who he has revealed himself to be. Thank him for providing for us, for taking care of us, for loving us, for forgiving us.
All those things. And then A is ask, then we go, that's the supplication that the Philippians is talking about. We go. We make our request known to the Lord. Whatever the desires of your heart is, whatever that your want is, whatever your need is, we ask And then L, this process of prayers. Just listen. Mm-hmm.
Like just, just like stop talking and listen.
That's one. People forget I feel like all the time though. Yeah. Like that. That's the one I feel like I've always forgotten in my life. Is like, you know, you thank the Lord. Oh, thank you for this food. Uh, we ask that, you know, the rest of our day is good. Okay. In Jesus name.
Amen. And then we go to eat like, you know, or do whatever. Like, I don't, we don't sit there and actually listen for the Lord's answer, right? Right. After we ask the questions, can you hear
some tummies, gremlin? That's facts. Some hangry people. But like, we should do that more. I mean, really we should, I would say we're probably all three of us equally guilty of not doing that enough.
Yeah. Yeah, of course. And today in Bible study with our fourth watch Bible study, I'm gonna start calling it 'cause we're in the fourth watch of the night. Um, what? It's, it's the whole thing. Okay. We didn't get into it. It's from, it's from Matthew Bible. Bible passage. Okay. Just means we're at like six o'clock in the morning.
Oh. So our six o'clock Bible study, we were talking about Jesus walking on the water and what happens before Jesus walks on the water to with Peter is Jesus is on a mountain praying. This is after feeding 5,000 PE men and then probably 15,000 people. He goes away, he sends them away and goes up in a mountain and prays by himself and he just goes and talks to God and listens and.
Like oftentimes before the biggest moments in Jesus' life, he's praying like garden goem, right before he goes to the cross. Like,
yeah.
Um, you know, he finds out John the Baptist dies and we, that's part of what's happening before he goes on the mountaintop is John the Baptist is dying. And so like he has been murdered.
And so he goes and he goes and prays. And so Jesus goes out in the desert, prays like Jesus often pulls away to pray in these big moments. And I think that we, we tend to go to God and say, give me what I want. Now you're my genie. Make it happen. Instead of saying. Hey, I'm just gonna go find time for you, and I'm gonna Thank you.
I'm gonna ask you, and then I'm just gonna listen to you and just be quiet, be still. And I think in the famous words of Josiah Queen right now, like he's got this song, right? Oh. Which is Watch Your Mouth. Boy. You know that. That's Wow. But like it's really about, sorry, I feel
like the people didn't hear what you just said.
Could you say it one more time? I feel like you weren't as close to the mic.
I think this mic is in my mouth. Oh, is it? Yeah. But it really is just about thinking about what you're saying when you're saying, while you're saying it, and sometimes we just need to shut up. We need to shut up and just listen to God and recognize it doesn't really, God doesn't need us to say anything truthfully.
Mm-hmm. I mean, the Bible tells us God knows the desires of our heart. He knows our needs. That actually tells us in scripture that the Holy Spirit knows what we don't have the words to say, groans with us and says the words for us. So God doesn't actually need us to say anything. He just needs us to listen and follow what he is telling us to.
And so I think if, if we transform our prayer life to. Being all about, you know, treating God as a someone who just like almost a, it's like one of those, um, gumball machines where I put, if I put enough in, I'm gonna get the, this little gumball out and it's gonna be the one I want. That's how we treat God.
If I just put enough Jesus stuff in, he's gonna grant my wishes to me. And instead of just recognizing it's not that at all, God just wants us to be faithful and just listen and then let him lead. And I think that's where modern Christians get it wrong. Yeah.
Because it's, we need to just be faithful no matter what.
'cause we treat it transactionally. We're used to transactional situations. I do this, you do that, I do this. You give me this. Like, and that's the expectation we seem to have when we're like praying, when we're asking, talking to God, right? Is like, especially like, I know I've been guilty of it. We're like, I'm like, God, help me through this.
I'm like, why didn't you gimme an answer? It's kind of a selfish, Hmm. Self-focused perspective as opposed to God focused. Right. God like God first perspective. Yeah. Like we put ourselves first and we forget that when the Bible talks about it. When the Bible guides us, it needs to be God first. God number one.
Well, yeah. Number two.
Well, yeah. I was like gonna say too, is like the, the thing that I find is when I pray and I don't get the answer I want. What is the action I do after that? Right. Like, and that, that's like, you know, that's the thing I have to think about is because if I pray and say, God, I want the situation to be like this, you know, I ask, I ask, I ask.
I listen. I listen. I listen, and God says, no. Then am I gonna go back to worrying, or what am I actually gonna do with that answer,
you know? Right. This reminds me of a conversation we had at the mall. I think it was at the mall. Me, you. Yeah. When we were shopping, we were shopping. We were shopping for clothes for your day.
Fantastic. See, I gotta see, this is, this is cyclical. It goes back, but we were talking like it, it comes to like prayer. Right? And we were talking about like that, the concept of is does God have one soulmate for you?
Yeah. Oh, right. Or
is, is there multiple? And do you just need to be faithful to pray that God directs you to.
One of those people who could, he could have for you. Yeah. Or the one of those many people that could have, and it, it's a profound conversation, right? Yeah. It's really what you were saying is I need to pray. I mean, you were essentially saying, I need to pray more and listen more to what God's leading me to, instead of trying to like find that one person.
Right. Uh, and it's a different perspective and you're kind of just, your question was, well, what do you think about this as a biblical perspective? Like is there one person for you or is there many people for you? But it really comes down to like your faithfulness and prayer. In your prayer life and following God's leading, because if you're trying to solve the solution, you're not actually listening to God's solution.
Right. Right, right. Mm. You know, that's good. Yeah. And that, that's, I think that's the. Especially for younger people. I think that was one of the big overarching questions for us is like, is there out of 8 billion people, is there one person for us? Right. Because like how my dating life has been, uh, she died at birth.
I mean she gone, you know, I'm sorry.
I'll
tell you what I was sorry, but it's true. That's all the people
gonna remember from the start. Oh no, I'm sorry. Sorry. Goodness. Yeah. So what you got, mark? It's hard to wrestle with though. 'cause I think I, I remember when I felt like I was at that point. Yeah. Or like Kyle and Cody were like encouraging me to go on dates.
I'm like, I got to a point. I was just like, please leave me alone. Yeah. Right. Because
we not believe, I
was like, selfishly, I was just like, yeah, I was tired and if I would've just given up, I would've, I wouldn't be blessed with what I have. Yeah. So, yeah. That's fair with Brie, like it's just, it is tough and you don't always have the answers.
And I wonder if sometimes God does that on purpose. Mm-hmm. To push us to trust him. Like, he's like, no, just trust me. I can, I'm taking care of you. Believe that I've got your best interest at heart. Right. Even if you can't see it and you don't get it.
Mm-hmm.
But if you're gonna believe and you're gonna trust him, you have to listen.
Yes. Exactly. I mean, just have to, like, you have to be able to listen to God and finally just say, all right, God, I'm tired of doing my thing, trying to force my solution. How about I just listen to what you have for me. Mm.
Yeah.
Follow your spirit and, and, and when people finally do. It just changes everything.
Right. And I mean, even in some of your posts, you, I mean, I've seen some comments where people have been talking about kind of that same scenario. Yeah. Like, like, you know, well, God, God will have something for you in time and just wait like, like these are conver, these are real conversations. But really it comes down to the core of like faithfulness, prayer, trusting in God, having his peace.
Like, that's where all of this comes from. We do need to pray more and worry less about
Yeah.
The, the things in life, uh, and, and go to God and just trust him in the processes. I know that's what you're doing, like Yeah. We're, we're having some fun with your, oh, we have a great time. Your journey right now.
But I also know it's a real thing and I don't wanna make light of. Like for you, this is something I know that's important to you. Yeah. Important in your heart of finding that person to, to love. But, and we just keep praying for you and with you that, that you're, God gives you a peace in this season to know that he's, he's good and walks through it with you.
And I think that's where, if you've got a health situation, if you've got a financial situation, if you've got a, you know, relationship issue, family issue, whatever it may be, like you just gotta go to God and just trusted him and listen and let him lead. And it may take longer than you want. It may take his time.
But God is good. And the Bible repeats that promise.
Yeah. And we sang even on Sunday, like that's why I love this song so much. Like we sang I Trust in God and the lyrics are like, I trust in God. You know? And it talks about, you know, he's the one that never fails, like, you know. And if we truly believe that, then.
You know, we should be just praying more and relying on God and not really worrying about our situations. Like I, you've, you've actually taught me a lot about that with all the car stuff that you, you're been going through. I remember you just like, man, I don't even worry about it. And I was like, how do you not worry about it?
Like, you know, but you have four cars go down. And I know. And like it changed my whole perspective on life though. Like when you said that and I explained it and I was like, this is way before we even did the series, but yeah. Yeah. No, no.
I about, I'm gonna have to pay $900 for one of my cars today. I'm like, oh my goodness.
He's like, what you gonna do? I was like, I don't know. It'll. So it's crazy. It'll work out. I can always walk. That's crazy. I'll be, I'll lose a bunch of weight and start walking anywhere. Hey, hey, there you go. It might be the best plan for me. So,
but it's, it's a head space you gotta put yourself in. That's like Matt, right?
Matt and I were talking earlier today about like how you might not be able to control the situation you're in. Always. There's this tip, sometimes there's a level, sometimes there's not. But what you can do is control how you respond to the situation. That's good. How you take that information, you receive that information.
And use it. Yeah, that's good. So like where you could have been panicking and freaking out about your vehicles, you're like, uh, I'm sure there was a level of stress, but you're also like, eh, God's got me. Like we'll figure it out. God will take care of us. He always has. He always will. And for you it was a matter of just like, yeah, we'll it's gonna be okay.
Yeah. Like I know that you could easily have been like stressing and panicking and freaking out and then said you're like. God. God is good. Yeah, like I
mean, the words of the words of Forrest Frank, God's got my back so I don't have to worry about it.
That's kind of my back. Don't, don't sing it.
Okay.
The music guy's like, don't sing any songs. Don't sing. I love that song. I like Forrest
Frank, but
I hope people, I hope if you listen to this, just know that we're trying to. The stuff that we're teaching and we're preaching, we're actually trying to live it out. Mm-hmm. And we're not just living out individually like we are encouraging each other to live this out.
Yeah, that's true. Like we're encouraging each other and even like my broken car situation, health situation, I'm trying to deal with this with my mom and her. Situation with cancer and chemo. I mean, we're hanging out at the mall talking about these deeper truth is worth shopping. Like we are really, we're not just telling you these things and saying, Hey, this Bible is, you know, vice and we don't follow.
We're actually trying to live this out. Like we believe this. Yeah. Because it does matter and does change us and we want it to. Matter and change you to, because Jesus Christ says Holy Spirit can change you. 'cause he, he not only promises, he does, but we've seen it time and time again. So we hope you, um, pray more, worry less if you miss the sermons.
Go back and listen to 'em. Go back and watch 'em, and continue on the journey with us as we figure this out over the next couple weeks, and we get excited about what God has to come here, not in the life of our church, but in your lives as well. Thanks for listening.
Bye.