Thoughts & Prayers 🤔🙏🏻

Join us as we discuss thoughts & prayers. Many people use this statement to encourage others that are going through something hard.  We talk about the heart behind the statement and how it can be received by the recipient. 
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This season we push the depths of our relationship even further. Tackling the difficult conversations that we fear may separate us.

Tina, a conservative Christian woman and Bonnie Violet, a trans gender queer drag queen have an anti-cancel culture conversation. While many family members are choosing to no longer speak, we have chosen to sit at the table and engage in difficult conversation to find peace and restoration.

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Transcript

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[Music] says

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[Music]

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hi everyone welcome to splintered grace i am bonnie violet and i'm a trans

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genderqueer spiritual drag artist and digital chaplain and i am here with my lovely co-host

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hey everybody it's tina frank it's like wow all those titles are kind of intimidating it's just me i'm a mature

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christian woman i'm here to have an amazing conversation um and today we thought

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we'd talk about thoughts and prayers after the last couple weeks we thought we needed to i

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don't know he's into some other things huh right yeah just kind of mix it up a little bit you know we have talked about

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you know prayer i think a lot over time just in bits and pieces but we haven't necessarily just like

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focused on talking about prayer and i know initially when we talked about you

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know like i do with our titles we we talked about prayer and meditation

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um and then i was thinking and then i came across oh thoughts and prayers is kind of like a

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i don't know like a catchphrase or at least it was for a moment as far as like it was kind it kind of became came under

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critic critical like it was people were being critical of it

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when like on social media and whatnot folks would put thoughts and prayers say after a mass shooting or

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um something like awful happening and some people felt like like that wasn't enough

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to just say thoughts and prayers like there needs to be more action or there needs to be something beyond this and so

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i thought oh well that might be a good way for us to title this and maybe

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maybe in the searches it will come up i don't know okay

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so i had i did not know um the correlation between the phrase and some of the things that have been happening

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so so that that's interesting to me because i use um i don't use thoughts so much

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but uh prayers i use a lot to put up for people and i know something's they're struggling with something

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yeah well and i think sometimes i mean i don't know about you but have you ever had a moment in your

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life when somebody said i'll pray for you and you were you were kind of

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had a resent like it didn't hit you well like you were like i i don't know maybe took it as a

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judgment or i mean i don't know i know i haven't always taken somebody saying they'll pray for

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me as like oh thanks so much you know i you it's been a long time um

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since i haven't but i i think it was when i needed something tangible

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and and they were like okay uh i'll pray for you so that might be probably the only time

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that i'm like really that's that's it you can't even give me another phone number or send me some place where they can actually help

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me take care of this this need that i have so in that instance yes i

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i would say yes i have had those instances which i think is similar to like the idea of folks who are criticizing

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thoughts and prayers it was like oh oh you're praying for me but what about you know what about

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the thing i really need help with or whatever you know what i mean and prayer and prayer um

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and thoughts you know do can serve a great purpose um and they do

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i think they can be helpful i have often found myself um

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uh i've always been like unsure about prayer and meditation or had different

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thoughts or you know there's some of the dragons oh i'll pray for you sounds a little like um

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i don't know you know religious or whatever and so it can kind of have that like initial like

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thought or like process with it but sometimes i feel like that's what i can like

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sometimes i i will say you know um thoughts and prayers or um

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uh can i light a can i like to light candles as um part of my prayer

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um and so like i'll often just ask can i light a candle for you or whatever and you know sometimes i feel like sometimes

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i feel like that's the best thing i can do for someone because

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you know because there's there are a lot of things that we just don't or that i don't have power over or can't do in a

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situation and i think by saying to somebody who is open to being prayed for

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or alighting a candle i think in in some ways just asking that question

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and letting them know um that you're praying for them i think just helps them maybe feel seen

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or touched or understood that this might be a difficult time or that i'm here for

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you as well or maybe even just a reminder that um god you know god is around

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you know because i think sometimes we can forget about that sort of stuff when we're in real difficult times yeah i i agree i

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agree with all of that um i when yeah i want to pray for someone um

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it's my way of saying i care about what's happening to you um and the the since there's really not

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anything tangible i can do then i will be with you as you walk through this and i'm going to pray for

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you as you walk through this that you'll have the strength to move forward that you'll be able to hear god's voice and

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respond that he'll you'll have peace sometimes people just need to have some

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peace so they can think through what needs to happen next and and move forward so when when i say

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prayer that's what i mean uh when i'm praying for someone like that in in a moment like that i'm not

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real big on commenting on things or with people that

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i don't know or or things like that i'm not the drive-by

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like praying for you person that's not my my gig yeah yeah

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yeah it's like kind of an intimate um connection or an intimate offer you

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might offer somebody who you know you love or that you're connected with in that way

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yeah you know sometimes it's good just to know even when everything's crazy that

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someone cares enough about you to one reach out to you and to say something kind like i'm gonna

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i'm gonna pray for you because it's what i know i can do for you rather than not having the phone ring at

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all or when people know that you're struggling then they just kind of steer clear

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right right someone's joined us hey kayla hey kayla

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so glad to see you uh here with us again this week we always look forward to seeing you pop in

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um for folks who are um popping in um and last and and here live um we'd love

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to have you interact with us um so feel free to put questions or comments in the

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or questions or comments in the comments and we will interact with them as best

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we can um we'd love to have you be a part of this uh conversation

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um as we always do even if you're not here live please do engage with us um we'd love to

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hear um your thoughts and your experience around the things we have to say sometimes

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and i think kayla is that a new hairdo i know it's i know it looks like i'd

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like a new haircut yeah yeah or just maybe styled maybe it's just style different i'm not sure well it's

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definitely a new profile picture but it is it is a new profile picture looking good

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so thanks for joining us yes um one of the things about prayer you know i mean

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you i'm assuming that like i don't pray

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nowadays the way that i used to pray and i don't pray

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for the things that i used to pray for you know i think when i was younger

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there might have been this more idea of like maybe i had an a relationship with

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god that was more kind of like i would like this or can i get this or like you

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know it's kind of more of like asking god for like specific things um

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and um now that's not quite um how i've evolved

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to and that don't get me wrong they're probably still those times that i have what folks might call foxhole there's

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also like the foxhole prayer right like you only pray when it's like

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you have nothing else you can do but pray and then you're like praying to get like saved or

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like get me out of this thing and i will blah blah blah i'll change my ways or

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you know like that sort of thought like i'm only praying during emergency or crisis

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um rather than just like praying for any reason you know what i mean like

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not only just when it's um a crisis situation um aaron says hello hello aaron great to

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have you here with us and kayla said yes i got a bad one and had to cut it off and regrow

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oh that happens i had a little bit of a hair snafu this week too

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so i know how that goes and yep just try to grow it back yeah restart so you can do some new things

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right hats can be fun too huh absolutely

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just things to mix it up a little bit i was just looking at a bunch of hats in my closet today

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do i keep these do i get rid of these i only wear them like i don't know half a dozen times during the year so

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yeah yeah i think so like back to kind of prayer no no i think the way that

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i know the way that i do prayer now is more so because i i think

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part of it is i don't always think i know what it is that i want anyway like to pray for what i want

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anyway and at the end of the day i want to

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have a certain experience um with my time on earth and a certain experience with people and a

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certain relationship with god and oftentimes i sell myself short when i say oh i want

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this job or i want to do this thing or that thing or i want this

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partner or i need to get married or you know whatever and then and then

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other things happen um and sometimes they're better and some sometimes they're maybe not

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but oftentimes if i'm open to the possibility that

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there might be a different way in which i'm my prayer is

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being answered um like it might not always be um that i got that job but maybe it was

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that this other thing happened that addressed this other part that often to me sometimes i feel like god higher

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power you know god is god understands that right in a way and sees that in a way that i don't and so for me a lot of the

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times i just um i don't know what i pray for anymore

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like it's usually just more of just kind of connecting you know just kind of acknowledging

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um that we're both in the world that we're all in the world you know what i mean it's just

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like taking an acknowledgement um stillness um

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so for me it's just a lot of just kind of like pausing i think for the most part and

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just kind of taking that moment how about you yeah um for me prayer is is more like a

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conversation like like this a prayer that a conversation i'd be having with with god

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i believe that to be in relationship with god i have to spend time with him so i talked to him

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and like you my prayers have changed over the years it's it's god has not been a vending

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machine for me for a long time although there was a time in my life where that's exactly what it was

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um he's not just my rescuer either although he does rescue me a lot

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but he's my he's my friend uh he's my companion uh and i talk to

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him a lot but i i think for the

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main moments when i pray uh you're right it's stillness i have to be

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still because i have to remember that prayer is a two-way conversation

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and just like i'm talking to you if i'm going to have a conversation with god i need to be still so that i can allow him to move in the

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spirit for me and and speak back to me by confirming my my my thoughts or my instincts or you

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know confirming the word i'm a i believe that if i pray the word of god over my life that it'll come come to life it'll

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have meaning for me and and help to guide me so i that's the that's how i

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pray but i have to be honest and i think i pray mostly for the people that i care about

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um the people that are going through things maybe people that are are struggling in areas

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of their life some people have asked me to pray for them some people are not but i feel like part of the reason i'm

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here is to when i observe something in someone it's not necessarily to go over and tell them

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i think it's for me to pray for them you know so i think you know you're talking about experiences and we're in

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the middle of something i don't think we can always see what's around us and i'm a believer that every day that i

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wake up my day is full of opportunity but sometimes i can't see the opportunity because of the muck

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that is around my life the things that i've even chosen to be a part of and sometimes i can't see so when i can

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see someone and i can see something that they're missing if they're not open for me to say it to them i'll pray that they would

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see it that they would they would have something happen so that they would recognize it for what it is or that they

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would ask me so that i could tell them and be open to and be open to receive so

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i take prayer as a great responsibility um not just for for my only

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communication and relationship with jesus but an opportunity to pray for the people that i have placed around me

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what for i mean i guess you know in the idea of thoughts and prayers i think and kind of comparing the two i

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sometimes i think thoughts might be used for people who don't um pray or don't have like a relationship

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with prayer like in some ways maybe prayer is a synonym for thoughts

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not necessarily but you know what i mean like it's it's a substitute if you will but maybe

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has a similar impact on people maybe don't you think people have kind

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of categorized prayer to christianity and so someone doesn't want to be part

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of that they won't they don't want to use that phrase or well go ahead yeah or any or many other kind

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of religions or yeah you know like it's it's um it's for those for those people

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yeah or religion i think that's not for every question yeah kind of thing yeah um i saw that aaron has

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a question or a statement here so i'm going to go ahead and read that um aaron says i try and pray to be

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connected with god but if i'm honest prayer seems pointless sometimes god often doesn't always answer our prayers

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so it can be hard to understand the purpose of prayer i do think sometimes when we pray for

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others we do it because we desperately want to help in some way but don't know how

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well yeah a lot was a lot was said in that and i related to almost every bit of it

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at least at some point in time in my prayer life um

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probably even now or you know just over the years yeah yeah

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you know there's like you said there's a lot there um i've realized as i've gotten more mature

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that sometimes i believe that god answers prayer all of our prayers the challenge is that god doesn't always

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answer the prayers the way i want them to be answered and so sometimes if i'm so focused on

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what i want and how i want it to look i miss the opportunity that god's given and an

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answer that he's given because i that's not the one i was looking for sometimes it can be a better and

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sometimes it's like wait a second that wasn't even in my in my peripheral right right

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yeah i mean i think that's the um i remember like that country song about thank god for unanswered prayers

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um and oftentimes yeah like i think in that country song at least you know there's

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this like i prayed for this thing over here and this other thing happened and i'm so

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glad that this other thing happened and my original prayer was not unanswered

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or was unanswered and again that's kind of like your same thing the same thing you just said and their prayer was

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answered it just it just came in a different form again a lot of like what you just

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what you just said yeah yeah i think if we ever if we looked back

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over the things that we prayed over i think we'd see that happen a lot in our lives

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totally totally yeah i mean i know for a long time i i struggled with the idea of like understanding that me praying did

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anything for god um and maybe it doesn't um but my question was what does it do

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for me like why do i do it what do i get or what do i benefit what's the result

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that happens when i pray like what does it do in my brain what does it do with my heart what does it do with my spirit

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and i and for me because i think there's so much more benefit for myself

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you know because because part of me feels like god is good you know god don't god don't need me to

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um you know to talk to them about the things right but sometimes i need to go

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through that process of kind of like processing or reminding myself of what my focus is or

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what it is that i do or i don't do or what i want or i don't want in life or

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certain situations and so to me i feel like it's it's a great way of reminding myself of

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like my intention and of course my connection with god but i feel like it's for for me

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and then in that though i also wonder then then what is it for me to pray for somebody else

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um what do you what do you think well i think it helps me to not

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be self-centered to not be um full of

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what's going on with me or you know what i mean to kind of um and to remind myself that um i do care about

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this person or that i do have um community or i have you know what i mean i think there's

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probably that aspect to it as well yeah yeah there's definitely a difference when i'm praying for someone

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that i that i know are praying for myself so and i can feel it

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um inside and you know i'm a i believe in prayer i pray daily

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um i've learned over the years that i've stopped asking god

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because i believe my steps are ordered and i know that he created me for a purpose

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so i'm going to trust him to align me with that purpose and so i just want to pray that

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i would be in his will i would pray that he would guide me i pray that he would i would hear his voice

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and respond and then i pray for those around me based on my perspective of what what i've i've

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seen based on what they've asked of me and also based on what the word of god says because you know

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i as much as i can pray and ask for things that aren't good for me so can other people

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and so especially when i'm praying for my children and my grandchildren

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you know i found over the years for a long time that i had an agenda for my kids imagine that

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you know i i had these ideas for them and things that i thought they would be great at and opportunities that i

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thought they should take and to a point where it was like you can't not do that

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right we've worked so hard for you to do that you can't not do that

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but then micromanaging yes but just that and just like what you had said

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you know the god's plan is so much better why would i limit and put put that in a box

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and not allow them to experience the fullness of how god and why god created them

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and i love them and i'm thinking i'm doing this in love but the reality was i wasn't i wasn't

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allowing them to experience the potential because i was hindering their ability to see

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because i was trying to direct them away and then not only was i doing that every day of talking to them now i'm doing it

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when i'm praying for them yeah yeah well you can't show up

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you can't show up for people in a way that they need it if you already have it figured out how what you

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need to do and how you're going to respond and all this so you can't really actually tend to

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um to to it in in maybe the most connected way at least you know right in a way

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that probably uh god would have me do in my ideal way i

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i am sorry aaron i um had my notes up and i noticed you had some com some comments

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um that i want to go ahead and connect with i just my notes covered up the comments so i apologize so aaron says i

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want to believe prayer is important but it's hard to understand um

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yeah i know i don't know if i understand it but i do i do know i feel

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i often feel better yeah or i often feel less heavy

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or i feel normally often times there is some sort of um

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positive effect if you will yeah like i call it peace there you go there's there's peace

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within my spirit and then aaron also says yes the answers aren't what we want or expect often

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times yeah that makes me that makes me think of also the other

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the other uh saying that was said a lot and i totally relate to is like be careful what you pray for

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um and i think for me that's what became um especially like because i think when i

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know from you i had this certain i came to this certain point in my spiritual life and and really most of my life but

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when i became i was really earnest and just really feeling earnestly that i

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wanted to grow in my spirituality or i wanted to be humble or i wanted to like these big

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words like i wanted to experience them and so i'd pray for them because often times i didn't know how to do it

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and then it would begin to happen you know and and especially like around

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humility you know often times these things that we pray for or the the things that were you know

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whatever it's a difficult or painful yeah process of receiving that right

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exactly you're exactly right yeah yeah because that thing that we desire

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we don't have it yet because we haven't um uh i don't try to figure the right word the

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word grown up maybe or haven't allowed ourselves to uh mature in those areas so that we can

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manage that well i think we we often need something outside of ourselves to

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cause us to do something different so that we can begin to get a different result that's true we need it we need

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someone to spur us on or in a situation or or something

24:58

[Music] yeah yeah why i say change is always good i may not like it but

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something good that comes out of it yeah do you want to read what aaron just said sure

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aaron says so ye so yeah we totally need to be careful what we pray for can you

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think of something that you prayed for that i'm like i'm trying to think if there was anything specifically that i prayed for that i was like oh shoot

25:23

once it started happening um well

25:29

i can't think of anything specific but but i will say that um

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i i always pray and i i still do that i want my life to be blessed i think we all

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have a desire for our life to be blessed and i think we all have a different idea of what that blessed looks like

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and what i forget sometimes is that because my definition of blessing is different

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and i really was thinking i wanted what i saw other people's blessings look like that when that blessing came one it

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wasn't exactly the way i thought it would look and two it required something of me that i wasn't ready to do

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yeah you know i'm an entrepreneur and um in that pursuit of

26:13

a successful business the way i perceived that it needed to look because again we all have

26:18

our own perspectives on that um i did i wanted what the next person had or what my mentor had you know we're

26:25

big on mentors and mentees and all that stuff but what i had to realize was that there was a process that these people went through

26:32

to get that yeah and if i wanted to pursue that the way they did then i needed to be

26:39

willing to do that so sometimes when i would pray for this thing without knowledge of how they got there

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when that process would start i was like oh no no no no no i'm not doing that and

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so then therefore i was like backpedaling and uh thank praise god he's like okay well

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there's another way yeah yeah well and so for you not the way you chose for yourself

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right right so with prayer there's action

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absolutely there is yeah so it's like you can't just say i'm gonna pray for this

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and do nothing right like like there there's certain actions

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that probably that need to be taken in one form or another yeah

27:24

yeah so i also think that there's um uh some importance when when i tell you

27:30

that i'm gonna pray for you that if i don't follow through i think that's not a good thing for me

27:36

yeah you know what i mean i need to follow through on that action um for myself and for whoever i'm praying

27:43

for i think that's important yeah i i agree um aaron says

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yeah i used to pray for patience and god would give me opportunities to be patient yeah i can imagine

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i know it's like you think you need patience now you just wait you just wait um

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one of the things that um was coming up also just in talking about prayer um when i first got into recovery and i

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think it's probably common in a lot of other spiritual settings or whatever um

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was the idea that if i was having a difficulty with someone like i was

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really having a hard time caring for someone or i was thinking poorly of them or i was judging them or

28:29

i was hurt by them i had a resentment over them that i pray for them um and i

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pray for them on a regular basis and eventually um it goes away yeah like you that

28:43

resentment goes away that whatever you know goes away

28:49

yeah that's true i've had to deal with that a lot in my in my own life

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yeah it's so and i think for me you know i i recall doing that a lot in the beginning of my

29:01

um recovery at times you know just praying for i mean and praying for not only praying but when we pray for that

29:07

person i think to pray for them for the what we want you know what i mean like pray for them to have what we

29:14

have or what we want or you know something along those lines i think you know half the time again i don't think

29:20

it matters what you say it's just the fact that you stopped to pray like you stop to take that moment create the

29:27

space and mention the names and you know do all that do all that sort of stuff but

29:32

i think don't you think it's like a heart issue i mean i could say oh yeah i prayed for

29:38

that person bless them jesus but if my heart's not in it

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i don't think it'll have that power that you just talked about well but and what is that power though i

29:48

mean i think part of that then what is that power um what does that power do if

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you know what i mean i i call that power of the holy spirit and we talked about that a couple weeks

30:00

ago so i get to choose um how i respond to people and you know the bible says that

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we're supposed to pray for our enemies i know enemies is a strong word but if someone offends me that kind of takes on

30:13

that the outskirts yeah enemy status and so if i can find in my heart to pray

30:19

for them because i feel like a prayer act and even as we've described it now is is an act of love

30:26

if if if you follow through if you're just saying it to say it it's not an act of love it's like you said there's an

30:32

action that needs to happen so if you tell someone that you're going to pray for them or you can meet them in

30:37

a position where they're hurting and they know and they appreciate and can receive that you're connected with them

30:42

you're going to pray for them that you're going to stand by them in this and do the best you can that's all you have to offer and you're going to give

30:48

it all and follow through then i think that's where that power and that holy

30:54

spirit and that's where that mindset will change because you're going to change that offense into oh i kind of care about what's

31:00

happening to this person even if you start by just praying for them even if you pray the things that you

31:06

want i think it's a step in the right direction i was uh i'm like holding back from

31:12

giggling but when you no it was cool because this visualization came up when we were talking about like so what does that

31:18

prayer do like what does that energy do or whatever and you said oh that's the holy spirit and for whatever reason my

31:24

mind went into this like video game mode of like some sort of like street fighter

31:30

or whatever where you're like pow and you're like sinning the power of like

31:35

you know blessings or whatever to this person and then they're gonna receive it and i don't know it was just funny i

31:41

don't like the idea of fighting but it was just kind of like that thing kind of came to mind for me

31:46

which i think could be kind of like cool you know if like for me to like for me sometimes visualization is helpful so to

31:54

think that like i can like kind of put that out in the world i can cast a blessing i can say a blessing

32:00

and it actually like i can imagine it going and hitting the person i think that's great

32:06

especially as a receiving like especially if somebody's like going to receive it

32:12

um you know like they're open and they want it i do i know we've talked about this and i know we think very different on

32:18

this but um i do not believe in praying without consent

32:24

um so i would only pray for people oftentimes i ask people if i can pray

32:29

for them rather than praying just praying for someone i might

32:35

if in my heart and in my spirit i know they wouldn't mind me praying for them

32:41

um and i haven't asked them quite yet i i but i'm just saying like i really put some thought into it and i'm not saying

32:47

that other people don't but prayer has often been used as a weapon or the i'm going to pray for you or that

32:54

you know what i mean like it's a weapon and like you said it's powerful um and if the person on the other end is not

33:01

wanting to receive that um i don't know i guess i just i just want

33:06

i want consent i'd say i i i don't know i i i think it using your

33:12

analogy that people that that don't ask for prayer don't want prayer don't know they need

33:18

prayer i feel like they don't need no they need it and so they walk around with this force field so as you and i are blasting them with

33:24

blessing they're bouncing off i think eventually there comes a nick in that armor

33:30

where they can actually start to receive and there's there's there's power and authority when you ask and i think

33:36

there are moments when you should ask for someone because i do but i do pray when i'm praying and if i

33:44

feel like though i've been i don't know something's been dropped into my spirit again i believe the holy spirit

33:50

communicates um i'll start praying for that person or i'll start praying over an area of

33:55

people you know if i see something horrific on the news and it moves my heart that's the first thing i can't

34:01

tangibly do anything today in that moment but i can certainly pray and so in that moment

34:07

i'll pray and so is that often like you're praying for somebody but you're not necessarily voicing that to them

34:15

like it's like you you yourself are having that relationship and that prayer for that

34:20

person but it's not like you're and the reason why i say pray without consent is like i had an

34:26

experience where um and i know i've shared this with you but i had an experience where i was at this

34:32

event where they were doing advocacy for um for po around poverty and it was like

34:39

a whole community coalition of churches and they were really working hard to

34:44

work on legislation so that you know we could address poverty and so the group believed they knew what

34:52

the best answer was and so they had um representatives and centers and folks that were there to

34:59

hear what they had to say and um if a representative or senator didn't

35:05

agree with the group then they would stop everything and they would say they would stop

35:12

everything everyone would stand up and we were like in a huge church with like hundreds of people and we would like lay

35:18

our hands across the aisle to this person and pray for them that

35:24

they would you know what i mean and there was just something about that particular moment it just felt violent

35:31

it felt like a violation um in in that particular moment in that

35:38

particular way and so that really caused me to question this idea of consent around prayer and

35:44

part of that is i think is because they were publicly you know they were publicly stating it

35:49

it wasn't some sort of like thing that you're doing with yourself in private i guess

35:54

um as a as a form of care and concern and love but more as of some sort of

36:01

like i don't know i just feel like it was worth it yeah i mean i just felt like it wasn't

36:07

a great way to i don't know present prayer or to pray

36:13

um not that i get to say what's you know but that's just what's the feeling that i

36:19

that i had aaron said um that is an interesting concept of

36:24

consent i like that idea i have had prairie used as a weapon against me so

36:30

many times and amy vance says i'm so thankful for you both

36:36

so so glad you could join us amy i don't recall seeing amy before have has she

36:41

been on before she's a friend of yours i'm assuming yep yep i know awesome amy i'm not sure what part of the country

36:46

she's right now she's been on the east coast for a while i can't remember awesome yeah i'm so glad you could join us amy

36:53

um it's good to see you on here yeah thanks for joining us and we'd love to hear some comments if you have any

37:00

um well and um i guess you know we can kind of talk what's the difference then

37:05

between prayer and meditation so what's meditation

37:10

to me meditation is when i meditate on something that i've read usually in my bible maybe

37:17

something someone had said to me that i need to consider that will help shape and so that's something i i i think

37:24

about ponder meditate on it and uh kind of assess and see does this fit does this

37:29

not fit is this something i need to consider or not so that's is it kind of

37:35

is meditation more of a form of like receiving maybe like you're receiving whether it's more

37:42

information you're receiving something whereas maybe prayer is kind of casting

37:47

enough casting is the best word but you know what i mean like if that would maybe be a difference

37:52

um again prayer is communication goes both ways um to me someone's me seeking and

38:00

talking to god and and hoping for a response be it in something i prayed for

38:05

something that i feel in my spirit meditation although sometimes the holy spirit will

38:11

engage me in that and try to start and start a conversation but meditation for me is usually like i said

38:18

considering something that was said now i like you i believe we're both trying

38:24

to fulfill our purpose and we want to be all that we can be so in that i understand that i'm not

38:30

perfect so i'm always open for uh people to

38:35

i don't know speak to me and and talk to me about things and sometimes if

38:40

something that i wasn't sure about or something that maybe even that i've been praying before about and comes up

38:46

and someone says something to me then i want to take that and i'm going to meditate on that i'm going to listen to that and say okay is this valid is this

38:53

something that i need to consider something i didn't consider does this person see something around me that i can't see because i'm stuck in the muck

39:00

and i need to give this some credibility so to me that's more of a meditation point it also is a point sometimes when

39:07

i'll sit and i'll and i remind myself i don't know if you've ever done this

39:12

before but sometimes i'll have a bad day or i'll get into a situation where i've had a lot of people throw up on me for

39:18

different reasons and i just need to sit and meditate on

39:24

who i know that i am because i don't know about you but when someone throws up on me it's usually

39:29

personal attacks and it challenges um who i feel that i am or who i i

39:36

feel i'm called to be and where i'm going so i'll step back and i'll meditate and i'll remind myself

39:42

yeah of who god says that i am and yeah i'm here so when i get to see like expectation yeah yeah no and hearing you

39:50

all say that i get that and and i still kind of take that as receiving or as taking something in

39:56

whereas like i think prayer is putting something out there you know it's like like you said it's taking that inner

40:03

energy and putting it out maybe charging the holy spirit if you will whereas meditation might be more receiving the

40:10

holy spirit yeah i think that never had considered it that way so that's that's all i hadn't i hadn't either

40:16

because i think it's important that we you know it we do both you know like you do both i mean i think sometimes we

40:22

think of prayer as like a christian thing and maybe meditation is like an eastern

40:27

kind of cultural like buddhist uh sort of thing and and there's actually both prayer and

40:34

meditation in in most um i think traditions in some form or another so i think having both

40:41

prayer and meditation are i think important i i think they're important they're

40:47

important for my life i i utilize both yeah and aaron's also says i think

40:54

prayer and meditation are both about focus that's true i agree indeed

41:00

i would have to concur so we are coming up around at the end of the the time i know it went so fast wow um

41:08

one of the things that we were talking about as well um before was like um

41:14

just being able to talk a little bit more about like the logistics of like what we're doing in the sense of like

41:20

we'd love it if you were to share this um this podcast or other podcast with folks

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contribute to what we're doing in some sort of way you know we we do this and it's not a huge expense but there are

41:39

just you know there's little fees we have to do to keep things up and you know what i mean like it's nothing

41:44

really major um but um i feel like we need to ask sometimes for support in different ways

41:50

or i need to i'm working on that um but if folks feel so inclined that

41:56

they would like to though it doesn't need to be a must we do have like a patreon through splintered grace in

42:03

which is a way that you could contribute on a monthly basis as little as like three dollars and 33 cents because i

42:10

like numbers like that um and um again it'll just kind of help us

42:16

go to um to supporting more of the work of a queer chaplain um and splintered grace

42:23

um we also have merch so if you want to get like uh don't we don't have any of our merch on today or

42:31

a coffee cup but we do have coffee cups we have um uh we have like a mask and we have

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uh we have like coffee yeah i said coffee cups already right and we have and we have the glasses with the straws

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yes so we have quite a few things i think we might even have t-shirts and a hoodie or

42:53

something we have there's yes so check out the link in the description

42:58

or we do have it on the screen right now it's just a queer chaplain dot creator well it's it's a little much to just say

43:05

so uh check it out in the description um if you're interested in any sort of

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thing like that and i would like to take a moment to thank folks who are supporting us on patreon like to thank

43:16

casey mark todd jonathan windy city humanist jeff

43:22

jeffrey and violet thank you all for your continued support of a queer chaplain

43:29

um what else do we have to say just you know if there's ever a topic

43:35

that you guys want us to talk about we would love to hear it bonnie and i uh are growing and are in

43:42

our relationship and we are sure enjoying life together um and we want to share i mean whatever questions you have

43:48

how we get along being so different how we communicate whatever that is even the hard stuff we're willing to answer

43:55

those questions the best that we can um but we would love to talk about things that you guys want to talk about

44:00

um otherwise you'll just get to hear about bonnie's travels and whatever we feel like talking about

44:07

whatever we feel like talking about and i think i think part of that too is not only just an invitation to talk about us

44:13

but like as a couple as a couple as a as a pair but also like if there are

44:19

individual questions about certain aspects of our life that you don't

44:24

understand maybe you want to understand christianity more or you want to you don't understand what it means to be

44:29

trans or you have you know those sort of nitty-gritty questions

44:34

feel free to you know bring those to us as well and we'll do our best to you know

44:40

uh address those um however possible and you can do that in a public way like in the comments or you can direct message

44:46

us and let us know that you have those questions so that it's done in a more anonymous or confidential way

44:54

um do you want to take us out tina i can do it hey everybody it has been our

45:00

pleasure we hope you're having a wonderful week we look forward to next time so see ya

45:07

all right splinter grace podcast

45:12

is brought to you by a queer chaplain follow us on all of our social medias

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song is original by stephen sandov the chasm between us rest in peace

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