Episode notes

Amazing! Weren’t our hearts on fire within us while He was talking to us on the road? Didn’t you feel it all coming clear as He explained the meaning of the Hebrew Scriptures?

Luke 24:32 – The Voice

When we avoid talking and emotionally engaging conversations, we stifle the fire burning within us.

Our relationships with God and spiritual friends are meant to make our hearts come alive, but they will remain superficial when we refuse to acknowledge and address what is in our hearts. Our willingness to talk at a deeper level affects not only us, but how we are in friendship, marriage, dating, and especially relationship with God. We must be willing to be honest about the fears, guilt, sadness, and anger that we often stifle if we want to have in our hearts the same fire the disciples in the above scripture felt around Jesus.

Join Russ Ewell and friends as they continue to “talk about talking,” and learn how to make your heart come alive with God.

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Transcription

Russ: 00:07 All right, welcome back. You know, we’re talking about words and you know, Scott, I was thinking about with regard to the talk you gave. Can you share with us some more scriptures and some more of the ideas that you were trying to talk about and, and what your thinking was and what you were, specifically too as you share them, what you’re learning from it all, how’s it changing your life and how do you think you can change our lives?

Scott: 00:43 Yeah. Great. Well, one of the, one of the Scriptures was proverbs 18:21 in the message, and I like it because it’s very straightforward. Words kill, words give life. They’re either poison or fruit, you choose. And that just made me think about the impact of the words that I’m saying. And even going back to what we were talking about, about our heart condition behind that. When I’m hard-hearted my words kill and I don’t even realize that it is happening and I need other people to tell me that because by being hard-hearted I’m insensitive and I don’t see even what is happening when I’m talking. But this happens to me at home a lot. I see it because I don’t reveal like Cameron you just did about a hurt or a disappointment that happened before. You know, because I don’t do that and I’m silent. I just sit there hard-hearted and I take out the feelings that I have, whether it’s guilt or hurt or anger on whoever I’m talking to. And I can do it with my kids. I can do it with my wife, I can do it with friends that I’m talking to. So that scripture helped me to realize what’s going on in my heart is what’s going to influence the impact that my words have. It’s not even the words that I say. It’s what’s behind it. It’s the feeling and the heart that is behind it. So that was one of the big ones that impacted me.

Russ: 02:03 You talked about fire and burning hearts and something like that about Jesus. What was that all about?

Scott: 02:07 Yeah. In Luke 24 32 it was a time where Jesus had been crucified and he had resurrected and it was before he left and went up to heaven. And two guys were walking down the road from Jerusalem to a town called Emmaus and they were just talking about what had been happening. It was just a conversation. And then Jesus showed up with them and they didn’t recognize who it was until he had already left. And then reflection about the conversation, they said this, this is in Luke 24 32, amazing, weren’t our hearts on fire within us while he was talking to us on the road. Didn’t you feel it all coming clear as he explained the meaning of the Hebrew scriptures? This one hit me because I just, Jesus had a way of igniting reaching a heart and igniting that heart, making it come alive when it’s been dead. And so I can feel dead inside sometimes. I can feel like my passions are, you know, going down.

Russ: 03:10 What, why is that?

Scott: 03:12 Hmm. I think it’s the hardheartedness. I think it’s the weight of things that are not talking about. It can be guilt. It’s just not, when I’m not connected to and not talking to God, my heart doesn’t come alive.

Russ: 03:25 Now you, in the script we have put together on this scripture, you have a phrase called one talk can change everything. So how does that fit in with the scripture and how does that fit in with like your talk with you and Margot years ago? Like how do you get, it’d be really helpful for everybody, I think to know how do you get from having a heart that doesn’t want to talk to having a heart that does want to talk and what does that one talk like? Like what’s the one talk that can turn us from not talking to talking?

Scott: 04:01 Yeah, that’s a great question. I, I think the first thing that comes to my mind is talking to God is praying and, and how prayer can change everything. And the difference maker for me in prayer is when I’m emotionally honest with God and I’m telling him everything that I’m feeling and what’s at the depth of what I’m feeling. That’s really hard for me. I have to do it every day.

Russ: 04:27 Why is it hard? I think that would really be a cool thing for a lot of people to know. Cause I think a lot of people probably experience that.

Scott: 04:34 I think it’s hard for me because I don’t want to feel a lot of the things that I feel. I don’t want to feel guilty. I don’t want to feel.

Russ: 04:39 Why do you think you don’t? Why do you think you and other people don’t want to feel what they feel? What is it about feelings that are so repellent?

Scott: 04:48 I think that it’s out of control that I can’t control them. I think that some of them are pain and I don’t want to feel pain. I think that’s even with talking, talking makes me kind of relive a pain that I don’t want to feel. So I think some of it is pain. I think some of it is embarrassment. I think I want to believe I’m a certain person and when I’m really emotionally honest, it shows that I’m not that person I think I am or that I want to be. And so that can I think be the deterrent to me being emotionally honest in prayer and emotionally honest when I’m talking to somebody. But when I do, there’s a relief that comes in.

Russ: 05:23 So how does a person get emotionally honest.

Scott: 05:26 I think that I have with God, I have had to let the Bible really probe and be willing to read scriptures and be honest about whatever it is, pointing out to me. Sinshurts, disappointments. I think letting, whether it’s Margot or a friend, probe my heart and ask me questions to help me identify and figure out what’s going on inside. And usually Margot, when she’s doing that, she has to get through my anger and resistance first because I’m usually resistant to that. And when she pushes through then I can kind of, Oh, here’s what’s really going on in here. Here’s, here’s what’s happening. So it takes giving someone permission and welcoming somebody to come in and kind of probe and ask those questions.

Russ: 06:12 So Cameron, when you’re thinking about what Scott’s talking about as far as getting into a conversation cause I really want to explore how do you have these conversations that do that? And just one thing I want to slip in before you comment on that is a quote, Scott, based on what you were saying, there’s a book called the friendship factor. How to get closer to the people you care for. And there’s a great quote in chapter 11 by Golda Meir, it says I have always felt sorry for people, afraid of feeling, of sentimentality, who are unable to weep with their whole heart because those who do not know how to weep do not know how to laugh either. And I think that when I was listening to what you were saying, Scott, is that a lot of us don’t understand that in John 10:10, when Jesus says, I can give you life to the full, a full life is to experience joy and sadness. Is to experience victory and defeat. We can’t be empathetic toward people if we only pretend to live a victorious life. For me, having defeats failing in leadership having embarrassments having a family with a disability in it. All these things I think have made my life more full right now, not pain-free, but I can relate to people better today than I did when I was 21 and had not really experienced or 20 and had not really experienced pain. And so I just think this is a really good quote and I’m gonna, I’m gonna read it again cause I want us to really hear it and then I’m going to let Cameron get in there. And again, this book is called the friendship factor. Chapter 11. It’s a cool title. I didn’t even get it a chapter 11 book friendship factor. Mike’s gonna like this title when tears are a gift from God. And here’s the quote again. I’ve always felt sorry for people, afraid of feeling, of sentimentality, who are unable to weep with their whole heart because those who do not know how to weep, do not know how to laugh either. Golda Meir.

Cameron: 08:35 That’s so good. I mean it. So I think that’s the perfect quote for these scriptures and what you guys are sharing. Cause I think it makes me think about hardening my heart and the capacity if I don’t feel the capacitythat I have to hurt other people, but also the capacity that can get hurt from words and also the capacity to be inspired and to, it’s like either side of the spectrum. Like it’s, if you’re not allowed, if I’m not allowing myself to feel that. And I lot of times I don’t, I’ve struggled with depression, anxiety most of my life. And so I don’t like feeling those feelings cause I’ve been there and I’ve been in those dark places. So for me I have a propensity to stay away from those or like, you know, keep up my guard so to speak and not want to venture into that territory. It’s so true because when I don’t experience that sadness and don’t allow, you know, those real feelings that are already there, you know, I’m just not talking about them or not willing to explore them or pray about them or, you know just think about them even. When I don’t do that, then yeah, I don’t, not only do I not get the closeness in relationships with my friends and with God, but it doesn’t allow me to experience the joy. And then, you know, the sad part is, and I can’t inspire anyone because I can’t help anyone through that journey, which we’re all on that journey. I think, you know, whether you’re have depression or not, like I think and I like what you said is that pain and everything you’ve gone through has allowed you to then connect more deeply with other people if that’s what life’s all about. So I miss out on what life’s all about and I forget it too. And I think that’s what the hardening and the desensitizing does to me is I forget what I’m even in this for what I’m even in these relationships for.

Russ: 10:17 Well, and I want to just, I’m going to keep working on that and, and get into the dating thing. Cause I think a lot of, you know, dating’s a tough thing. And you know, thank God literally that I became a Christian when I did because I was just a walking disaster emotionally surety wise. It’s just sad, just sad, you know, and I look back and I go, man, I wish I’d known. Like, I wish they would tell you all this stuff. You know, you gotta like when I was in fifth grade or something, we had like the education class about the birds and the bees. It was basically a physiology class. I’m like, you need to, I mean, I did. I did need a physiology. I didn’t even know what was going on. But, the problem is there was never an emotional class. There was never a how are you functioning class. Right. And, and I think that’s why being a Christian is so important. That’s why when people blow off Christianity, I think they do that at their own peril because Christianity helps us understand ourselves, why we’re here, who we are, how we function, what really matters. But I think when it comes to dating and marriage and I would not even begin to say I’m an expert. I’m a failure at those things. And you know, failure teaches, and eventually after you bang your head against all the four walls in the room, you find the door. And so, you know, I banged my head against all four walls in the room. Oh, there’s the door. And I found my way out. But I think that one of the big things you’re talking about is vulnerability. The capacity to reveal your whole self to a person in language, in language. And so many guys are so aware of their desire for pleasure and so keenly aware of the pizza and the football game and you know, the let me go, you know, jump out of an airplane climb a mountain score, 30 points.

Cameron: 12:13 Classic Dude behavior

Russ: 12:14 You just diagnosed me. CDB, classic dude behavior. CDB. All right. But I think what it is, and I think this can be, this is a really good thing. I, I’ve seen guys judge their dates and say, oh that date was boring. And whenever I hear it, I go complete absence of self awareness. Like you’ve been on five dates. They were all boring and the only person who was on each of those five dates was you. But, seriously, I had guys like going, are there no people around to date. I’m like, dude, dude. The problem is you’re like a castle with a moat around it and anybody who tries to get to know you drowns in the in the Vat of your selfishness. And so, and why are we selfish? Because we don’t want to be vulnerable. I’m talking from personal experience. I’m not, I’m talking about how I lived and the learn how to identify yourself as the problem is what the cross is all about. The Cross is all about you got a problem, the problem is sin. You don’t need to feel guilty. You need to get better. The sins been nailed to the cross. The problem is you’re still hanging on the cross. You got to get down, get in the ground, be reborn, changed your life. And I think this is a great one because I think we just got to help encourage people. We got to encourage the ladies. Look, sometimes you’re going out with a guy, he’s, you know, he’s 26 but he’s five. You know what I’m saying?

Scott: 13:48 Margo and I, when we first went out on a date, it was right when we just started dating. It might’ve been our first or second date after we had become boyfriend, girlfriend. Yeah. I got my feelings hurt at the beginning of the date because she was paying attention to somebody more than me. And I didn’t tell her and the entire rest of the date was basically me brooding and being into myself and you know, just like a little hurt puppy but not saying anything and being mad and then end ended the date. I said exactly what you said. I said, man, that was just really boring. But it was, it was me shutting down at the beginning instead of just saying, oh man, I really like you. And I really would love to be able to talk and also instead of letting her kind of help and help me figure it out. I just still got mad.

Russ: 14:38 So think about that stat you gave, when you say that 7,000 to 20,000, so you said it’s boring. It’s boring, 2 words. Like you said, you should have said, I’m really disappointed… You went off for a bit there about a paragraph. You had about 200 words you could have said and you nailed it in 2. That’s how we’re falling behind the ladies. The ladies are out there, they’re thinking and living in color. We’re black and white, classic dude behavior. I’m telling you Mike, I’ve seen so many guys, they come and talk to me and they’re like, ah, yeah, I don’t think that young lady I went out with is really great. And what it is is that that young lady she’s in like, what’s not HD? What’s the high level? Now she’s in four K and you’re an analog. I mean, you know, you’re on the radio. The guys are on the radio with FDR doing fireside chats and the ladies are doing 4K and I have, I’m telling you, if I made money off, if I made $100 off each of these guys, I would be a multimillionaire that come to me and say it, and I did it. I used to go, aw man, this is just terrible because I was a nonfunctioning human being. And I think it’s important to understand that, that, that we have to start learning how to talk. A great way to start is by making some friends. Like we talk about one talk that can change everything. First thing you got to do to have one talk to change everything is you’ve got to have a relationship with God. And you gotta have some friends. You know what I’m saying? Some French fries, friend fries. Gotta have some friends. I’m just saying now I want you to ask this question. How many of you talk more easily to, say your wife than to guys? Is that or your girlfriend or your date? Is it easier to talk to guys or it easy to talk to ladies.

Cameron: 16:34 It is easier to talk to a woman for me.

Scott: 16:37 At this point it’s usually talking to Margot. Yeah.

Mike: 16:38 Same for me. Not Margo, but you know, my wife

Russ: 16:44 I would say it’s far more beneficial and enjoyable for me to talk to Gail but I’ll talk to anything that moves. I don’t necessarily get any depth out of it all, but you know, and things that don’t move. I would say that’s probably more true. I find myself talking to just, you know objects, hello, how you doing? But I think it’s good. It’s a good thing when you talk to your wife more easily than anyone else and other than God and that that’s a good thing. So I think that two things we are learning, the one taught that can change everything, talk with God, pray. And that means being emotionally honest, it’s laid out, being emotionally honest. And I think being emotionally honest means you’ve got to talk about the positives and you gotta talk about the negatives. And two. And if you believe you’re only talking about the negatives or they only talk about the positives, and I want to say for those who want to talk about the negatives, well, we don’t have how bad we feel about ourselves, how we mow blown it. You say, well, how can I be positive when my life isn’t positive, simple. I’ve learned this a lot in the last three weeks. I’ve been working on this. Praise God. Be Positive about God. Even if you don’t feel your life is positive, guess what? God is great, awesome, deliver savior, comforter, compassionate, understanding. His understanding is infinite and that’s what praise is about. Praise is so we can talk positively and before you know it, when God gets bigger than our problems, suddenly we’re having a positive prayer for those who are positive and never share anything negative, you know, come on. Now the first thing is, that’s why 1 John 1 says that you need to be honest about your sin because you always had Romans 3:23 all men have sinned, tell God, Hey, I’m hurting that I’ve gone down this way. 2 Corinthians 12, weakness, go through these things. Cameron, what do you think?

Cameron: 18:35 Yeah, well it makes me, it just totally clicked for me what you’re saying because I think the, how we get it just reminded me of just how I am just when I’m, when I’m dark and despairing. Life’s hard. But I stopped praising God and I think it reminded me of Romans 1 when it talks about. (drum Tap) We’ll have to edit this out so I can find it, but it says it’s…

Russ: 18:58 Everybody will like listening to your little drum tap. Do you want me to help you?

Cameron: 19:07 It’s the one that says they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, I’m trying to find the exact, where it talks about they refused to praise instead of giving thanks to God. Where is that? It’s so good.

Russ: 19:20 While they’re finding that, let me talk about the importance of searching for scripture. Like sometimes we just go, hey, I just want to kind of slam it out there. It’s Romans one, somewhere in there. You know what, take the time. We’re going to do it right now. We’re going to take the time to find the scripture. Your life doesn’t end.

Cameron: 19:37 It is 21. Yeah. So it’s for although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. And although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immmortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds, animals and reptiles. And it goes on. But it totally is what you’re saying. And I think I oftentimes do that and get mad and despairing and like just kind of in this little pit of despair I guess. And I forget that, Okay, this isn’t necessarily God, this is just life and things that are going on. A lot of times it’s me not talking about my emotions, not talking to him about it. And it’s like, I forget to thank him. Forget that he is good. So I was just agreeing with you, but that scripture came up.

Russ: 20:20 I love it. You know, connects with Ephesians 4 because Ephesians 4 talks about futility. Romans one 21 talks about futility and they both talk about the darkening that happens and a lot of times the futility is trying to get different results with the same methods. That’s what futility is. It’s like I’m going to keep not talking about how I feel and how I’m doing and hope to be closer to people.

Mike: 20:39 And that part makes sense to me. That’s what I was thinking cause I was thinking about how like, like immaturity came to mind. Like for me, like because I don’t talk, I’m still dealing with a lot of the same issues that I have for like a lot of years. And I go back to the same, I have my ways of coping with things is to shut down to read articles or play a game or like my usual go to’s instead of going like, I’m hurt. Fr, for being a dude in my thirties. It shouldn’t be so hard to say like, you know, hey I got my feelings hurt.

Nathan: 21:10 Pardon the interruption. We wanted to let you know about our deep spirituality youtube channel. I have my buddy Cameron here to tell us about the latest stuff you can find on the youtube channel and why you should head over to youtube and check it out. Cameron, tell, tell the people what they need to hear.

Cameron: 21:25 Yeah, youtube is a great place to get material. If you’re a visual learner or you’re looking to get more out of your Bible, maybe you’re having a hard time connecting or you don’t know what to study out. There’s so much content on there. We have more bare bones, quiet time videos, which is just more of the Bible to more heavy commentary and even spiritual video essays on some of your favorite movies and you can even just put it on and listen like you would a podcast. Too many of these videos,

Nathan: 21:52 This is the dopest thing we have going right now. So if you’re already on youtube, we are excited about providing a creative spiritual experience for you. Head over to our deep spirituality, youtube channel to find these fun, easy to digest pieces of content for everyone. And these can even be used as you took quiet times, as Cameron said to just to kick off your morning to start it, start it strong. So go to www.youtube.com/deep spirituality to check out the youtube experience. All right. Back to the show.

Russ: 22:21 Now, why do you say that? See, I think that’s part of the problem. And I don’t want to be negative here, but you say for a dude who’s in his thirties, I shouldn’t be there. See, I think that’s part of the problem. Part of our problem is men, as we continually tell ourselves, we shouldn’t be there. I shouldn’t be at a point where I don’t know this. I shouldn’t be at a point where I can’t do this. I actually think it’s okay. I think it’s okay to be there. I mean, golly man, you’re way ahead of me when I was,

Russ: 22:44 I seriously, I mean, I’m glad I suffered because I’m, you know, I changed a lot, but I didn’t enjoy it. I didn’t enjoy it, but I embraced it. I realized that it was necessary and I’m grateful to people around me who forgave me, who understood me, who were patient with me because I don’t think any human being can grow without the soil of good friends around them and understanding people and people you hurt that even walk away and go, ehh, he’s kind of a messed up dude right now. But you know, maybe if I’m patient with them and I forgive him, he’ll get better. And so I think what you’re saying actually I would say is it’s totally appropriate for a 30 year old guy to still be trying to navigate these issues because we don’t, you know, nobody’s saying to us, hey, and nothing, I’m advocating this. Nobody’s saying, hey, here’s some dolls to play with and have them learn to talk to each other. Like you see a girl playing, I’m not saying all are playing with dolls

Russ: 23:45 My sisters loved barbies and a bunch of other dolls and when they played with their dolls, they were talking, hey, do you want to go out and eat lunch? Let’s have tea, right? All this stuff. And I’d be like, what are they doing? I had combat soldiers. I was trying to invade and I was shooting and I was killing. I’d go outside to play and this is back, you know, in the day. And I had guns play guns, but I had guns and we play what we called then, the cowboys and Indians or native Americans. And so I was not going any place in my life where someone was saying, learn to have an emotional conversation, whether it’s with a real person or it’s pretend. And so I think it’s appropriate for us to sit down and say, wow, maybe if we can be better, we can teach our boys to be better because they get the opportunity of having fathers who are not afraid to have those conversations.

Russ: 24:43 I’m not disagreeing with you. I’m saying I don’t think you should apologize for not being someplace. Part of what I think women do better than we do is saying, this is where I am and this is how I feel and that’s why, I know me and my marriage when Gail says this is where I am this is what i feel, I’m like, okay, again, I don’t want to feel that way. That’s messing up my day. And women tend to go, no, no. If we talk about it, it resolves, then we can have a great day. Does that make sense?

Mike: 25:14 Yeah. Well, and even that last part is like, it’s always like staggering to me. Like when I talk with my wife and she’s expressing, you know, hurts or anger and I’m trying to slowly getting my stuff out. And then after a conversation like that, it’s been, you know, what feels like a long time for me, you know? And then after the conversation she’s like, man, I feel great. And I’m like, great. So I’m always like little by little that I think has helped me. Yeah, for sure. But it’s so like not how to use Cameron’s words, like how I’m wired.

Russ: 25:45 Do you ever feel that feeling like I’ve done this before where you think, oh, we’re having this conversation to fix something. Oh, and so you kind of feel like, wait a minute, how could it be better? We didn’t actually fix anything.

Mike: 25:54 Oh totally, and then it makes it hard to listen to my wife to listen to me when she’s trying to just like say stuff. Come on. Okay, well what’s the problem? And I already feel insecure about my ability to help diagnose or whatever, you know? So I’m kind of like, I just get stuck and then I’m just like rambling or getting angry and frustrated. A lot of times I’m as angry and I don’t know why. Mid Conversation when and I just interpret every emotion as like anger towards me and that dries, you know, Amy crazy, right? Cause she’s just, I’m just trying to say about how my day went and now it’s like, you know, you feeling like I’m mad at you or something, you know? And that’s a common thing for us that drives her crazy. And that’s because of my lack of self-awareness and maturity and ability to process and talk.

Russ: 26:34 That’s why we need to have, have a talk, a podcast about talking because I think we need to make it okay to talk. We need to make it okay to say things and have great conversations. And you know, we’ve got a good age distribution, even sitting here of experiences. Let me just round some things out. And then I’m going to come to you guys and I’m going to want you in the closing section to give me some kind of a movie, music or character recommendation to go with the podcast character from the Bible movie or music recommendation. And you do not get to steal one from the list that, that our producers provided for us. You have to come up with your own and I’ll have you to give you a little time for everybody out there. One, I want to thank you ahead of time for listening. I really have enjoyed this podcast. I hope you have. If you haven’t, I learned a lot. There’s a couple things from that we want to throw out to you.

Russ: 27:32 A good recommendation is the book the female brain. It’s from 2007 by Brizendine, I’m mispronouncing some words today because I didn’t go over those words and make sure I would know how to pronounce them names particularly, so forgive me for that. But that’s the female brain by Louann Brizendine. The studies show that women speak an average of 20,000 words a day while men speak on average 7,000 words a day. That’s where that comes from. And then another book teaching men to be emotionally honest, Andrew Reiner, or it’s an article from the New York Times 2016 as men continue to fall behind, women in college while out-pacing them four to one in suicide rate. Some colleges are waking up to the fact that men may need to be taught to think beyond their own stereotypes.

Russ: 28:21 And, and to think beyond your own stereotypes is what we try to talk about today talking. Then there’s some great scriptures. Luke 6:45. It’s the same with people of person, full of goodness in his heart produces good things. A person with an evil, evil reservoir in his heart pours out evil things. The heart overflows in the words a person speaks. Your words reveal what’s within your heart. And so that’s something you could maybe do a quiet time on. You can think about, you could share with your friends. And really it’s a way for us to talk about biblically what we were mentioning earlier about sensitivity and conscience. That when, when our words are coming out, they’re revealing what’s within our heart. If you, you’ve got a sparse sharing of words, there’s probably something keeping you from being vulnerable.

Russ: 29:08 In Matthew 12:34 in the voice translation for the mouth simply shapes the hearts impulses into words. Great scripture to check out. Those are some of the scriptures. Now for a little bit of fun, closing it out. We want movie, we want character, we want, what’s the other one? Music recommendations. You know, I already share it with you about the shaim and the bad boys. I’m not sure that’s one that should be listened to. I didn’t listen to, so if you listen to it and the language corrupts your mind and you go around swearing. Don’t blame me. You’re an adult.

Russ: 29:43 Blame the podcast. Blame the producer. Blame Chris Broussard, the Great Reporter of basketball in the NBA. So what do you got Cameron.

Cameron: 29:50 Before it gets stolen, a Good Will Hunting man for the whole talk scene, it’s just like the best. I had to throw it out.

Russ: 29:58 All right. I got a question for you. In the movie good will hunting. What set of brothers is in the movie good will hunting

Scott: 30:19 Affleck brothers. The Affleck brothers. Casey and Ben.

Russ: 30:20 Which one of those brothers has won an academy award?

Cameron: 30:26 Casey.

Scott: 30:26 Well Ben did too because did the screenplay for goodwill.

Russ: 30:31 He won it with Matt Damon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You trying to get, trying to get by on a legalistic sharing. He won half an academy award. Okay. Yeah, that’s good. Both Affleck brothers.

Cameron: 30:44 But I got a character study. Moses didn’t like to speak. Well, he was afraid of speaking and didn’t think he was good at speaking even though God was telling him to speak. And so I think it has to do with this a little bit. Well, I’m making a study, a quiet time video on our youtube channel about this. So stay tuned.

Russ: 31:06 Did he not like to speak publicly or did he not like to talk? I’m going to need some clarification there. He not like to talk or did he not like to speak because he wasn’t he being asked to go speak to all of Israel and like lead them. I don’t want you to be squeezing the scriptures and shaping them and junk.

Cameron: 31:28 Either way, he was afraid to speak, that’s for sure. The scriptures. I’m just trying to keep you honest man.

Russ: 31:40 So what we’ll say is that talking was hard for him. Talking was hard for him when it was in front of a lot of people. He seemed to talk quite fine when he went to Israel and said, I’m the one, you know, I want to lead you and come on, let’s go people, you know. So he was talking pretty good then, but he lost his voice when he went through suffering. He lost his voice. Sounds like a good one. Make sure you’re accurate in the Bible on those podcasts, my friend… It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault. You were watching goodwill hunting instead of reading the Bible. I liked that though. I’m going to take all my joke and a part. I just said, I’m getting tired. I had to joke. So I like the idea of Moses. I love the idea of Moses. I think there’s a lot of great characters in there. So you’re going to give us Moses.

Cameron: 32:36 He was a guy who had a lot of insecurity. I think he’s Kinda classic dude behavior right there.

Russ: 32:43 You coined the phrase. You coined the phrase you coined to diagnose it. Someone walks up to you and says, you have a bad case of CDB. Well, I’ll know what it is. Okay what have you got Scott?

Scott: 32:55 Music, the song Can we just talk Khalid wow. Can we figure out where we’re going?

Russ: 33:08 You sure you can understand Khalid? There are some kids out there right now going, come on. Come on, pops. You can’t be rolling up on us with Khalid. You looked that up on Wikipedia. What’s the name of it again?

Scott: 33:24 Oh, it’s just, it’s called talk. The words I can we just talk. Okay. Okay. Another one, Andy Grammar. It’s a song called good parts and it’s about don’t leave the good parts out when you’re talking, which is the internal stuff. Movie, Jerry Maguire Cuba Gooding Jr character. Fast forward that first scene though. Oh, this a long time ago I watched this movie. So youtube, the scenes.

Russ: 34:05 I’m not trying to be a prude for those who are judging me. I just can’t watch stuff like that.

Scott: 34:09 I just like, it when Cuba Gooding saying, man, you think we’re arguing? And he’s kind of yelling. And he’s like, ah, now we’re finally talking. So now we’re finally communicating with each other. I love it. I love it. I love it. And then Bible, I gotta go comparing Judas and Peter Because Judas didn’t talk. He had a lot of thoughts that he didn’t say he had. He had the thought about the woman and the price of the perfume that he didn’t. Have…

Russ: 34:33 How do you know that was a thought.

Scott: 34:36 Well because it says it in there.

Russ: 34:37 I don’t know if I trust you. I like to push back a little bit. Make sure we doing our homework. Okay, so Judas and who?

Scott: 34:49 And Peter Because Peter was much more communicative. He was much more, Jesus that can’t happen to you. Get away from me Satan. And then even after he denied him, he went back and swam to shore so that you can talk to him. He was eager to get it.

Russ: 35:03 So you’re saying when you read the Bible, you see silence with Judas. Talkative with Peter. Both sinned, but one communicated it and the other didn’t.

Scott: 35:11 Similar people, similar sins, different outcomes.

Russ: 35:13 That’s Kinda hot right there. I kind of like that. That might be a good Bible study right there. You got write that. You gotta write a devotional on that Mike, you gotta have a devotional on that for the site. He’s stealing it.

Cameron: 35:25 We’ve got one coming out on Peter before and after he denied Jesus. That’s coming out.

Russ: 35:29 I hope it’s written well. I haven’t seen it. Seriously? Nice. You got a youtube quiet time coming out this Friday. Woo. Peter before and after he denied Jesus Youtube quiet time? That’s hot. That’s hot man. Hey, if you’re out there, you’ve got gotta get that. Get over to youtube Friday. Yeah, it’ll be, it’ll be out by the time you hear this. How do your hip people say it as popping on Fridays. Okay. Pop and popcorn ain’t going to be popping. Anything else? Somebody popping pills. I heard about that back in the seventies and eighties. You’re popping pills. Half the NBA was popping. They weren’t popping three pointers popping pills. All right. What do you got for me, Mike? Just so we can set it up, Cameron and Scott have rolled it up. They brought in some Khalid. They brought in some Moses. Cameron is making inappropriate hand gestures during that. Well now see people out there wondering, what hand gestures. It was something closer to Spock’s Vulcan be peaceful and prosper. Let’s just, let’s keep it clean over here Mike. A bit clean move. You’re supposed to be at Christian allegedly.

Mike: 36:58 All right. I’ll go with one I saw recently, monsters inc. I think their friendship was… You have a little kid. Yeah. Well it’s funny. She’s asleep and we watched it. The friendship of the two monsters, like and their ability to just to kind of like, like spill on each and then they have like a falling out. Sully and Mike. Yeah. So it’s a friendship.

Russ: 37:37 Roll some music. Are you solely Mike?

Mike: 37:42 I haven’t actually thought about it for myself. Music I’ll go with I’ll go two album recommendations. They’re both albums that are artists describing their life. And like they’re kind of life story experiences, different genres, different time periods. One throw back Alanis Morissette jagged little pill. When that album came out it was quite a splash, but she’s very young at the time. The artist she talks about growing up in a hyper religious environment, talks about bad relationships. Talks about just anger. She doesn’t know what to do with. It talks about just trying to be optimistic. So a lot of good stuff in there. And then of course you can go Kendrick Lamar either. You can go either to pimp a butterfly or the good kid Mad City.

Russ: 38:47 He has got been on Wikipedia for sure. I’m glad you guys researched billboard 100 before he came here. I’m reading it out loud as I speak now. Now you missed your opportunity. You know you’re sleeping, you’re sleeping. You can’t be like, rewind. What does this look like? Does it look like we have a tape player in the car right here doing the rewind. Go ahead and give them one and then Mike’s got to drop.

Cameron: 39:19 My cousin just dropped a sweet track. Kai Straw. Brighter me.

Russ: 39:23 Okay. First of all, full disclosure, are you getting any money out of this? Listen to my cousin, I’m making a dollar. Use the Promo Code CamStraw.

Cameron: 39:36 He’s got millions of listeners, but he’s on Spotify. All those things. Kai Straw, brighter me. It’s kind of dark, but it describes the kind of inward battle of someone going through, I don’t know, basically addiction or something. It’s pretty deep, but it’s, it’s a guy.

Russ: 39:55 With the song brighter me, he needs to be out on my podcast. I want him on my podcast. You can come here and talk about brighter me. That sounds like, I love the title. It’s really loving the title. It’s deep. Okay. There’s just, what is it?

Russ: 40:10 Monty Python, look on the bright side of life. That was a good one. That’s a good one right there. Oh, I’m not sure I can recommend watching Monte Python. That goes back to my old days classic. That goes back to my old days. Yeah. I don’t remember much about that movie. I just, you know, I remember going, I remember going, seeing all those. Okay. So I think that was a good job on that. Now look, everybody we really appreciate you listening to the podcast and we want you to go back and check www.deepspirituality.com. There’s a whole bunch of articles coming out. Mike, we got some new stuff on change coming out, right?

Mike: 40:47 Well we’ve been putting out youtube quiet time videos as Cameron alluded to earlier. So I think we’re starting with that. You can expect, right now you can go to youtube, check our video the God of change. That’s going to be on there. We’re going to be putting this week out, a Bible study to go along with the videos that we’re putting out and stuff. About how God is the God of change and how he helps us along. How do we become people who want to change? Yeah, there’s going to be one of those coming. So you can expect this weekprobably in the next couple of weeks it is gonna drop on Wednesday. So you get a couple articles online.

Russ: 41:34 Mike’s got it. Mike’s going to give you some, you know what? We’ll tell you what, we’re going to put some dates out there for you on the notes and we’re also gonna drop. We’ll put some more announcements in this podcast. We’ll make sure they’re in there. So by the time you’re listening to this, hopefully you’ll either, you know what, right after my voice is done, you’re going to hear some good stuff about when these are going to drop. Cause I know you’re going to love this series. We’re putting together on change. And then I’m going to go ahead and I’m going to give you a little bit of a teaser. I’m not going to tell you when it’s coming, but there’s something special coming about the spirituality of stranger things. Oh yeah, it’s coming. It’s coming.

Russ: 42:10 It’s cooking, it’s cooking. It’s coming out. It’s coming out. And when it comes out, we’re going to nail it with a beautiful article. We’re gonna slap down with an awesome podcast on it. And if you’re a stranger things person, my recommendation is go ahead and the next week here, try to get as close as you can to the completion of the third season, and we’re gonna roll it out. It’s going to be, it’s going to be spiritually groundbreaking stuff about, I’m going to go ahead and give you the title. Should I give him the title? Do it. Oh, producer said, no, you can’t have the title. Spoiler alert, you got rocked on that. You know what? What can I say? He said, he said, you get the sprinkles, but you can’t have the ice cream. The spirituality, we’re out, in the upside down. [inaudible].

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Episode notes

Amazing! Weren’t our hearts on fire within us while He was talking to us on the road? Didn’t you feel it all coming clear as He explained the meaning of the Hebrew Scriptures?

Luke 24:32 – The Voice

When we avoid talking and emotionally engaging conversations, we stifle the fire burning within us.

Our relationships with God and spiritual friends are meant to make our hearts come alive, but they will remain superficial when we refuse to acknowledge and address what is in our hearts. Our willingness to talk at a deeper level affects not only us, but how we are in friendship, marriage, dating, and especially relationship with God. We must be willing to be honest about the fears, guilt, sadness, and anger that we often stifle if we want to have in our hearts the same fire the disciples in the above scripture felt around Jesus.

Join Russ Ewell and friends as they continue to “talk about talking,” and learn how to make your heart come alive with God.

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Transcription

Russ: 00:07 All right, welcome back. You know, we’re talking about words and you know, Scott, I was thinking about with regard to the talk you gave. Can you share with us some more scriptures and some more of the ideas that you were trying to talk about and, and what your thinking was and what you were, specifically too as you share them, what you’re learning from it all, how’s it changing your life and how do you think you can change our lives?

Scott: 00:43 Yeah. Great. Well, one of the, one of the Scriptures was proverbs 18:21 in the message, and I like it because it’s very straightforward. Words kill, words give life. They’re either poison or fruit, you choose. And that just made me think about the impact of the words that I’m saying. And even going back to what we were talking about, about our heart condition behind that. When I’m hard-hearted my words kill and I don’t even realize that it is happening and I need other people to tell me that because by being hard-hearted I’m insensitive and I don’t see even what is happening when I’m talking. But this happens to me at home a lot. I see it because I don’t reveal like Cameron you just did about a hurt or a disappointment that happened before. You know, because I don’t do that and I’m silent. I just sit there hard-hearted and I take out the feelings that I have, whether it’s guilt or hurt or anger on whoever I’m talking to. And I can do it with my kids. I can do it with my wife, I can do it with friends that I’m talking to. So that scripture helped me to realize what’s going on in my heart is what’s going to influence the impact that my words have. It’s not even the words that I say. It’s what’s behind it. It’s the feeling and the heart that is behind it. So that was one of the big ones that impacted me.

Russ: 02:03 You talked about fire and burning hearts and something like that about Jesus. What was that all about?

Scott: 02:07 Yeah. In Luke 24 32 it was a time where Jesus had been crucified and he had resurrected and it was before he left and went up to heaven. And two guys were walking down the road from Jerusalem to a town called Emmaus and they were just talking about what had been happening. It was just a conversation. And then Jesus showed up with them and they didn’t recognize who it was until he had already left. And then reflection about the conversation, they said this, this is in Luke 24 32, amazing, weren’t our hearts on fire within us while he was talking to us on the road. Didn’t you feel it all coming clear as he explained the meaning of the Hebrew scriptures? This one hit me because I just, Jesus had a way of igniting reaching a heart and igniting that heart, making it come alive when it’s been dead. And so I can feel dead inside sometimes. I can feel like my passions are, you know, going down.

Russ: 03:10 What, why is that?

Scott: 03:12 Hmm. I think it’s the hardheartedness. I think it’s the weight of things that are not talking about. It can be guilt. It’s just not, when I’m not connected to and not talking to God, my heart doesn’t come alive.

Russ: 03:25 Now you, in the script we have put together on this scripture, you have a phrase called one talk can change everything. So how does that fit in with the scripture and how does that fit in with like your talk with you and Margot years ago? Like how do you get, it’d be really helpful for everybody, I think to know how do you get from having a heart that doesn’t want to talk to having a heart that does want to talk and what does that one talk like? Like what’s the one talk that can turn us from not talking to talking?

Scott: 04:01 Yeah, that’s a great question. I, I think the first thing that comes to my mind is talking to God is praying and, and how prayer can change everything. And the difference maker for me in prayer is when I’m emotionally honest with God and I’m telling him everything that I’m feeling and what’s at the depth of what I’m feeling. That’s really hard for me. I have to do it every day.

Russ: 04:27 Why is it hard? I think that would really be a cool thing for a lot of people to know. Cause I think a lot of people probably experience that.

Scott: 04:34 I think it’s hard for me because I don’t want to feel a lot of the things that I feel. I don’t want to feel guilty. I don’t want to feel.

Russ: 04:39 Why do you think you don’t? Why do you think you and other people don’t want to feel what they feel? What is it about feelings that are so repellent?

Scott: 04:48 I think that it’s out of control that I can’t control them. I think that some of them are pain and I don’t want to feel pain. I think that’s even with talking, talking makes me kind of relive a pain that I don’t want to feel. So I think some of it is pain. I think some of it is embarrassment. I think I want to believe I’m a certain person and when I’m really emotionally honest, it shows that I’m not that person I think I am or that I want to be. And so that can I think be the deterrent to me being emotionally honest in prayer and emotionally honest when I’m talking to somebody. But when I do, there’s a relief that comes in.

Russ: 05:23 So how does a person get emotionally honest.

Scott: 05:26 I think that I have with God, I have had to let the Bible really probe and be willing to read scriptures and be honest about whatever it is, pointing out to me. Sinshurts, disappointments. I think letting, whether it’s Margot or a friend, probe my heart and ask me questions to help me identify and figure out what’s going on inside. And usually Margot, when she’s doing that, she has to get through my anger and resistance first because I’m usually resistant to that. And when she pushes through then I can kind of, Oh, here’s what’s really going on in here. Here’s, here’s what’s happening. So it takes giving someone permission and welcoming somebody to come in and kind of probe and ask those questions.

Russ: 06:12 So Cameron, when you’re thinking about what Scott’s talking about as far as getting into a conversation cause I really want to explore how do you have these conversations that do that? And just one thing I want to slip in before you comment on that is a quote, Scott, based on what you were saying, there’s a book called the friendship factor. How to get closer to the people you care for. And there’s a great quote in chapter 11 by Golda Meir, it says I have always felt sorry for people, afraid of feeling, of sentimentality, who are unable to weep with their whole heart because those who do not know how to weep do not know how to laugh either. And I think that when I was listening to what you were saying, Scott, is that a lot of us don’t understand that in John 10:10, when Jesus says, I can give you life to the full, a full life is to experience joy and sadness. Is to experience victory and defeat. We can’t be empathetic toward people if we only pretend to live a victorious life. For me, having defeats failing in leadership having embarrassments having a family with a disability in it. All these things I think have made my life more full right now, not pain-free, but I can relate to people better today than I did when I was 21 and had not really experienced or 20 and had not really experienced pain. And so I just think this is a really good quote and I’m gonna, I’m gonna read it again cause I want us to really hear it and then I’m going to let Cameron get in there. And again, this book is called the friendship factor. Chapter 11. It’s a cool title. I didn’t even get it a chapter 11 book friendship factor. Mike’s gonna like this title when tears are a gift from God. And here’s the quote again. I’ve always felt sorry for people, afraid of feeling, of sentimentality, who are unable to weep with their whole heart because those who do not know how to weep, do not know how to laugh either. Golda Meir.

Cameron: 08:35 That’s so good. I mean it. So I think that’s the perfect quote for these scriptures and what you guys are sharing. Cause I think it makes me think about hardening my heart and the capacity if I don’t feel the capacitythat I have to hurt other people, but also the capacity that can get hurt from words and also the capacity to be inspired and to, it’s like either side of the spectrum. Like it’s, if you’re not allowed, if I’m not allowing myself to feel that. And I lot of times I don’t, I’ve struggled with depression, anxiety most of my life. And so I don’t like feeling those feelings cause I’ve been there and I’ve been in those dark places. So for me I have a propensity to stay away from those or like, you know, keep up my guard so to speak and not want to venture into that territory. It’s so true because when I don’t experience that sadness and don’t allow, you know, those real feelings that are already there, you know, I’m just not talking about them or not willing to explore them or pray about them or, you know just think about them even. When I don’t do that, then yeah, I don’t, not only do I not get the closeness in relationships with my friends and with God, but it doesn’t allow me to experience the joy. And then, you know, the sad part is, and I can’t inspire anyone because I can’t help anyone through that journey, which we’re all on that journey. I think, you know, whether you’re have depression or not, like I think and I like what you said is that pain and everything you’ve gone through has allowed you to then connect more deeply with other people if that’s what life’s all about. So I miss out on what life’s all about and I forget it too. And I think that’s what the hardening and the desensitizing does to me is I forget what I’m even in this for what I’m even in these relationships for.

Russ: 10:17 Well, and I want to just, I’m going to keep working on that and, and get into the dating thing. Cause I think a lot of, you know, dating’s a tough thing. And you know, thank God literally that I became a Christian when I did because I was just a walking disaster emotionally surety wise. It’s just sad, just sad, you know, and I look back and I go, man, I wish I’d known. Like, I wish they would tell you all this stuff. You know, you gotta like when I was in fifth grade or something, we had like the education class about the birds and the bees. It was basically a physiology class. I’m like, you need to, I mean, I did. I did need a physiology. I didn’t even know what was going on. But, the problem is there was never an emotional class. There was never a how are you functioning class. Right. And, and I think that’s why being a Christian is so important. That’s why when people blow off Christianity, I think they do that at their own peril because Christianity helps us understand ourselves, why we’re here, who we are, how we function, what really matters. But I think when it comes to dating and marriage and I would not even begin to say I’m an expert. I’m a failure at those things. And you know, failure teaches, and eventually after you bang your head against all the four walls in the room, you find the door. And so, you know, I banged my head against all four walls in the room. Oh, there’s the door. And I found my way out. But I think that one of the big things you’re talking about is vulnerability. The capacity to reveal your whole self to a person in language, in language. And so many guys are so aware of their desire for pleasure and so keenly aware of the pizza and the football game and you know, the let me go, you know, jump out of an airplane climb a mountain score, 30 points.

Cameron: 12:13 Classic Dude behavior

Russ: 12:14 You just diagnosed me. CDB, classic dude behavior. CDB. All right. But I think what it is, and I think this can be, this is a really good thing. I, I’ve seen guys judge their dates and say, oh that date was boring. And whenever I hear it, I go complete absence of self awareness. Like you’ve been on five dates. They were all boring and the only person who was on each of those five dates was you. But, seriously, I had guys like going, are there no people around to date. I’m like, dude, dude. The problem is you’re like a castle with a moat around it and anybody who tries to get to know you drowns in the in the Vat of your selfishness. And so, and why are we selfish? Because we don’t want to be vulnerable. I’m talking from personal experience. I’m not, I’m talking about how I lived and the learn how to identify yourself as the problem is what the cross is all about. The Cross is all about you got a problem, the problem is sin. You don’t need to feel guilty. You need to get better. The sins been nailed to the cross. The problem is you’re still hanging on the cross. You got to get down, get in the ground, be reborn, changed your life. And I think this is a great one because I think we just got to help encourage people. We got to encourage the ladies. Look, sometimes you’re going out with a guy, he’s, you know, he’s 26 but he’s five. You know what I’m saying?

Scott: 13:48 Margo and I, when we first went out on a date, it was right when we just started dating. It might’ve been our first or second date after we had become boyfriend, girlfriend. Yeah. I got my feelings hurt at the beginning of the date because she was paying attention to somebody more than me. And I didn’t tell her and the entire rest of the date was basically me brooding and being into myself and you know, just like a little hurt puppy but not saying anything and being mad and then end ended the date. I said exactly what you said. I said, man, that was just really boring. But it was, it was me shutting down at the beginning instead of just saying, oh man, I really like you. And I really would love to be able to talk and also instead of letting her kind of help and help me figure it out. I just still got mad.

Russ: 14:38 So think about that stat you gave, when you say that 7,000 to 20,000, so you said it’s boring. It’s boring, 2 words. Like you said, you should have said, I’m really disappointed… You went off for a bit there about a paragraph. You had about 200 words you could have said and you nailed it in 2. That’s how we’re falling behind the ladies. The ladies are out there, they’re thinking and living in color. We’re black and white, classic dude behavior. I’m telling you Mike, I’ve seen so many guys, they come and talk to me and they’re like, ah, yeah, I don’t think that young lady I went out with is really great. And what it is is that that young lady she’s in like, what’s not HD? What’s the high level? Now she’s in four K and you’re an analog. I mean, you know, you’re on the radio. The guys are on the radio with FDR doing fireside chats and the ladies are doing 4K and I have, I’m telling you, if I made money off, if I made $100 off each of these guys, I would be a multimillionaire that come to me and say it, and I did it. I used to go, aw man, this is just terrible because I was a nonfunctioning human being. And I think it’s important to understand that, that, that we have to start learning how to talk. A great way to start is by making some friends. Like we talk about one talk that can change everything. First thing you got to do to have one talk to change everything is you’ve got to have a relationship with God. And you gotta have some friends. You know what I’m saying? Some French fries, friend fries. Gotta have some friends. I’m just saying now I want you to ask this question. How many of you talk more easily to, say your wife than to guys? Is that or your girlfriend or your date? Is it easier to talk to guys or it easy to talk to ladies.

Cameron: 16:34 It is easier to talk to a woman for me.

Scott: 16:37 At this point it’s usually talking to Margot. Yeah.

Mike: 16:38 Same for me. Not Margo, but you know, my wife

Russ: 16:44 I would say it’s far more beneficial and enjoyable for me to talk to Gail but I’ll talk to anything that moves. I don’t necessarily get any depth out of it all, but you know, and things that don’t move. I would say that’s probably more true. I find myself talking to just, you know objects, hello, how you doing? But I think it’s good. It’s a good thing when you talk to your wife more easily than anyone else and other than God and that that’s a good thing. So I think that two things we are learning, the one taught that can change everything, talk with God, pray. And that means being emotionally honest, it’s laid out, being emotionally honest. And I think being emotionally honest means you’ve got to talk about the positives and you gotta talk about the negatives. And two. And if you believe you’re only talking about the negatives or they only talk about the positives, and I want to say for those who want to talk about the negatives, well, we don’t have how bad we feel about ourselves, how we mow blown it. You say, well, how can I be positive when my life isn’t positive, simple. I’ve learned this a lot in the last three weeks. I’ve been working on this. Praise God. Be Positive about God. Even if you don’t feel your life is positive, guess what? God is great, awesome, deliver savior, comforter, compassionate, understanding. His understanding is infinite and that’s what praise is about. Praise is so we can talk positively and before you know it, when God gets bigger than our problems, suddenly we’re having a positive prayer for those who are positive and never share anything negative, you know, come on. Now the first thing is, that’s why 1 John 1 says that you need to be honest about your sin because you always had Romans 3:23 all men have sinned, tell God, Hey, I’m hurting that I’ve gone down this way. 2 Corinthians 12, weakness, go through these things. Cameron, what do you think?

Cameron: 18:35 Yeah, well it makes me, it just totally clicked for me what you’re saying because I think the, how we get it just reminded me of just how I am just when I’m, when I’m dark and despairing. Life’s hard. But I stopped praising God and I think it reminded me of Romans 1 when it talks about. (drum Tap) We’ll have to edit this out so I can find it, but it says it’s…

Russ: 18:58 Everybody will like listening to your little drum tap. Do you want me to help you?

Cameron: 19:07 It’s the one that says they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, I’m trying to find the exact, where it talks about they refused to praise instead of giving thanks to God. Where is that? It’s so good.

Russ: 19:20 While they’re finding that, let me talk about the importance of searching for scripture. Like sometimes we just go, hey, I just want to kind of slam it out there. It’s Romans one, somewhere in there. You know what, take the time. We’re going to do it right now. We’re going to take the time to find the scripture. Your life doesn’t end.

Cameron: 19:37 It is 21. Yeah. So it’s for although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. And although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immmortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds, animals and reptiles. And it goes on. But it totally is what you’re saying. And I think I oftentimes do that and get mad and despairing and like just kind of in this little pit of despair I guess. And I forget that, Okay, this isn’t necessarily God, this is just life and things that are going on. A lot of times it’s me not talking about my emotions, not talking to him about it. And it’s like, I forget to thank him. Forget that he is good. So I was just agreeing with you, but that scripture came up.

Russ: 20:20 I love it. You know, connects with Ephesians 4 because Ephesians 4 talks about futility. Romans one 21 talks about futility and they both talk about the darkening that happens and a lot of times the futility is trying to get different results with the same methods. That’s what futility is. It’s like I’m going to keep not talking about how I feel and how I’m doing and hope to be closer to people.

Mike: 20:39 And that part makes sense to me. That’s what I was thinking cause I was thinking about how like, like immaturity came to mind. Like for me, like because I don’t talk, I’m still dealing with a lot of the same issues that I have for like a lot of years. And I go back to the same, I have my ways of coping with things is to shut down to read articles or play a game or like my usual go to’s instead of going like, I’m hurt. Fr, for being a dude in my thirties. It shouldn’t be so hard to say like, you know, hey I got my feelings hurt.

Nathan: 21:10 Pardon the interruption. We wanted to let you know about our deep spirituality youtube channel. I have my buddy Cameron here to tell us about the latest stuff you can find on the youtube channel and why you should head over to youtube and check it out. Cameron, tell, tell the people what they need to hear.

Cameron: 21:25 Yeah, youtube is a great place to get material. If you’re a visual learner or you’re looking to get more out of your Bible, maybe you’re having a hard time connecting or you don’t know what to study out. There’s so much content on there. We have more bare bones, quiet time videos, which is just more of the Bible to more heavy commentary and even spiritual video essays on some of your favorite movies and you can even just put it on and listen like you would a podcast. Too many of these videos,

Nathan: 21:52 This is the dopest thing we have going right now. So if you’re already on youtube, we are excited about providing a creative spiritual experience for you. Head over to our deep spirituality, youtube channel to find these fun, easy to digest pieces of content for everyone. And these can even be used as you took quiet times, as Cameron said to just to kick off your morning to start it, start it strong. So go to www.youtube.com/deep spirituality to check out the youtube experience. All right. Back to the show.

Russ: 22:21 Now, why do you say that? See, I think that’s part of the problem. And I don’t want to be negative here, but you say for a dude who’s in his thirties, I shouldn’t be there. See, I think that’s part of the problem. Part of our problem is men, as we continually tell ourselves, we shouldn’t be there. I shouldn’t be at a point where I don’t know this. I shouldn’t be at a point where I can’t do this. I actually think it’s okay. I think it’s okay to be there. I mean, golly man, you’re way ahead of me when I was,

Russ: 22:44 I seriously, I mean, I’m glad I suffered because I’m, you know, I changed a lot, but I didn’t enjoy it. I didn’t enjoy it, but I embraced it. I realized that it was necessary and I’m grateful to people around me who forgave me, who understood me, who were patient with me because I don’t think any human being can grow without the soil of good friends around them and understanding people and people you hurt that even walk away and go, ehh, he’s kind of a messed up dude right now. But you know, maybe if I’m patient with them and I forgive him, he’ll get better. And so I think what you’re saying actually I would say is it’s totally appropriate for a 30 year old guy to still be trying to navigate these issues because we don’t, you know, nobody’s saying to us, hey, and nothing, I’m advocating this. Nobody’s saying, hey, here’s some dolls to play with and have them learn to talk to each other. Like you see a girl playing, I’m not saying all are playing with dolls

Russ: 23:45 My sisters loved barbies and a bunch of other dolls and when they played with their dolls, they were talking, hey, do you want to go out and eat lunch? Let’s have tea, right? All this stuff. And I’d be like, what are they doing? I had combat soldiers. I was trying to invade and I was shooting and I was killing. I’d go outside to play and this is back, you know, in the day. And I had guns play guns, but I had guns and we play what we called then, the cowboys and Indians or native Americans. And so I was not going any place in my life where someone was saying, learn to have an emotional conversation, whether it’s with a real person or it’s pretend. And so I think it’s appropriate for us to sit down and say, wow, maybe if we can be better, we can teach our boys to be better because they get the opportunity of having fathers who are not afraid to have those conversations.

Russ: 24:43 I’m not disagreeing with you. I’m saying I don’t think you should apologize for not being someplace. Part of what I think women do better than we do is saying, this is where I am and this is how I feel and that’s why, I know me and my marriage when Gail says this is where I am this is what i feel, I’m like, okay, again, I don’t want to feel that way. That’s messing up my day. And women tend to go, no, no. If we talk about it, it resolves, then we can have a great day. Does that make sense?

Mike: 25:14 Yeah. Well, and even that last part is like, it’s always like staggering to me. Like when I talk with my wife and she’s expressing, you know, hurts or anger and I’m trying to slowly getting my stuff out. And then after a conversation like that, it’s been, you know, what feels like a long time for me, you know? And then after the conversation she’s like, man, I feel great. And I’m like, great. So I’m always like little by little that I think has helped me. Yeah, for sure. But it’s so like not how to use Cameron’s words, like how I’m wired.

Russ: 25:45 Do you ever feel that feeling like I’ve done this before where you think, oh, we’re having this conversation to fix something. Oh, and so you kind of feel like, wait a minute, how could it be better? We didn’t actually fix anything.

Mike: 25:54 Oh totally, and then it makes it hard to listen to my wife to listen to me when she’s trying to just like say stuff. Come on. Okay, well what’s the problem? And I already feel insecure about my ability to help diagnose or whatever, you know? So I’m kind of like, I just get stuck and then I’m just like rambling or getting angry and frustrated. A lot of times I’m as angry and I don’t know why. Mid Conversation when and I just interpret every emotion as like anger towards me and that dries, you know, Amy crazy, right? Cause she’s just, I’m just trying to say about how my day went and now it’s like, you know, you feeling like I’m mad at you or something, you know? And that’s a common thing for us that drives her crazy. And that’s because of my lack of self-awareness and maturity and ability to process and talk.

Russ: 26:34 That’s why we need to have, have a talk, a podcast about talking because I think we need to make it okay to talk. We need to make it okay to say things and have great conversations. And you know, we’ve got a good age distribution, even sitting here of experiences. Let me just round some things out. And then I’m going to come to you guys and I’m going to want you in the closing section to give me some kind of a movie, music or character recommendation to go with the podcast character from the Bible movie or music recommendation. And you do not get to steal one from the list that, that our producers provided for us. You have to come up with your own and I’ll have you to give you a little time for everybody out there. One, I want to thank you ahead of time for listening. I really have enjoyed this podcast. I hope you have. If you haven’t, I learned a lot. There’s a couple things from that we want to throw out to you.

Russ: 27:32 A good recommendation is the book the female brain. It’s from 2007 by Brizendine, I’m mispronouncing some words today because I didn’t go over those words and make sure I would know how to pronounce them names particularly, so forgive me for that. But that’s the female brain by Louann Brizendine. The studies show that women speak an average of 20,000 words a day while men speak on average 7,000 words a day. That’s where that comes from. And then another book teaching men to be emotionally honest, Andrew Reiner, or it’s an article from the New York Times 2016 as men continue to fall behind, women in college while out-pacing them four to one in suicide rate. Some colleges are waking up to the fact that men may need to be taught to think beyond their own stereotypes.

Russ: 28:21 And, and to think beyond your own stereotypes is what we try to talk about today talking. Then there’s some great scriptures. Luke 6:45. It’s the same with people of person, full of goodness in his heart produces good things. A person with an evil, evil reservoir in his heart pours out evil things. The heart overflows in the words a person speaks. Your words reveal what’s within your heart. And so that’s something you could maybe do a quiet time on. You can think about, you could share with your friends. And really it’s a way for us to talk about biblically what we were mentioning earlier about sensitivity and conscience. That when, when our words are coming out, they’re revealing what’s within our heart. If you, you’ve got a sparse sharing of words, there’s probably something keeping you from being vulnerable.

Russ: 29:08 In Matthew 12:34 in the voice translation for the mouth simply shapes the hearts impulses into words. Great scripture to check out. Those are some of the scriptures. Now for a little bit of fun, closing it out. We want movie, we want character, we want, what’s the other one? Music recommendations. You know, I already share it with you about the shaim and the bad boys. I’m not sure that’s one that should be listened to. I didn’t listen to, so if you listen to it and the language corrupts your mind and you go around swearing. Don’t blame me. You’re an adult.

Russ: 29:43 Blame the podcast. Blame the producer. Blame Chris Broussard, the Great Reporter of basketball in the NBA. So what do you got Cameron.

Cameron: 29:50 Before it gets stolen, a Good Will Hunting man for the whole talk scene, it’s just like the best. I had to throw it out.

Russ: 29:58 All right. I got a question for you. In the movie good will hunting. What set of brothers is in the movie good will hunting

Scott: 30:19 Affleck brothers. The Affleck brothers. Casey and Ben.

Russ: 30:20 Which one of those brothers has won an academy award?

Cameron: 30:26 Casey.

Scott: 30:26 Well Ben did too because did the screenplay for goodwill.

Russ: 30:31 He won it with Matt Damon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You trying to get, trying to get by on a legalistic sharing. He won half an academy award. Okay. Yeah, that’s good. Both Affleck brothers.

Cameron: 30:44 But I got a character study. Moses didn’t like to speak. Well, he was afraid of speaking and didn’t think he was good at speaking even though God was telling him to speak. And so I think it has to do with this a little bit. Well, I’m making a study, a quiet time video on our youtube channel about this. So stay tuned.

Russ: 31:06 Did he not like to speak publicly or did he not like to talk? I’m going to need some clarification there. He not like to talk or did he not like to speak because he wasn’t he being asked to go speak to all of Israel and like lead them. I don’t want you to be squeezing the scriptures and shaping them and junk.

Cameron: 31:28 Either way, he was afraid to speak, that’s for sure. The scriptures. I’m just trying to keep you honest man.

Russ: 31:40 So what we’ll say is that talking was hard for him. Talking was hard for him when it was in front of a lot of people. He seemed to talk quite fine when he went to Israel and said, I’m the one, you know, I want to lead you and come on, let’s go people, you know. So he was talking pretty good then, but he lost his voice when he went through suffering. He lost his voice. Sounds like a good one. Make sure you’re accurate in the Bible on those podcasts, my friend… It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault. You were watching goodwill hunting instead of reading the Bible. I liked that though. I’m going to take all my joke and a part. I just said, I’m getting tired. I had to joke. So I like the idea of Moses. I love the idea of Moses. I think there’s a lot of great characters in there. So you’re going to give us Moses.

Cameron: 32:36 He was a guy who had a lot of insecurity. I think he’s Kinda classic dude behavior right there.

Russ: 32:43 You coined the phrase. You coined the phrase you coined to diagnose it. Someone walks up to you and says, you have a bad case of CDB. Well, I’ll know what it is. Okay what have you got Scott?

Scott: 32:55 Music, the song Can we just talk Khalid wow. Can we figure out where we’re going?

Russ: 33:08 You sure you can understand Khalid? There are some kids out there right now going, come on. Come on, pops. You can’t be rolling up on us with Khalid. You looked that up on Wikipedia. What’s the name of it again?

Scott: 33:24 Oh, it’s just, it’s called talk. The words I can we just talk. Okay. Okay. Another one, Andy Grammar. It’s a song called good parts and it’s about don’t leave the good parts out when you’re talking, which is the internal stuff. Movie, Jerry Maguire Cuba Gooding Jr character. Fast forward that first scene though. Oh, this a long time ago I watched this movie. So youtube, the scenes.

Russ: 34:05 I’m not trying to be a prude for those who are judging me. I just can’t watch stuff like that.

Scott: 34:09 I just like, it when Cuba Gooding saying, man, you think we’re arguing? And he’s kind of yelling. And he’s like, ah, now we’re finally talking. So now we’re finally communicating with each other. I love it. I love it. I love it. And then Bible, I gotta go comparing Judas and Peter Because Judas didn’t talk. He had a lot of thoughts that he didn’t say he had. He had the thought about the woman and the price of the perfume that he didn’t. Have…

Russ: 34:33 How do you know that was a thought.

Scott: 34:36 Well because it says it in there.

Russ: 34:37 I don’t know if I trust you. I like to push back a little bit. Make sure we doing our homework. Okay, so Judas and who?

Scott: 34:49 And Peter Because Peter was much more communicative. He was much more, Jesus that can’t happen to you. Get away from me Satan. And then even after he denied him, he went back and swam to shore so that you can talk to him. He was eager to get it.

Russ: 35:03 So you’re saying when you read the Bible, you see silence with Judas. Talkative with Peter. Both sinned, but one communicated it and the other didn’t.

Scott: 35:11 Similar people, similar sins, different outcomes.

Russ: 35:13 That’s Kinda hot right there. I kind of like that. That might be a good Bible study right there. You got write that. You gotta write a devotional on that Mike, you gotta have a devotional on that for the site. He’s stealing it.

Cameron: 35:25 We’ve got one coming out on Peter before and after he denied Jesus. That’s coming out.

Russ: 35:29 I hope it’s written well. I haven’t seen it. Seriously? Nice. You got a youtube quiet time coming out this Friday. Woo. Peter before and after he denied Jesus Youtube quiet time? That’s hot. That’s hot man. Hey, if you’re out there, you’ve got gotta get that. Get over to youtube Friday. Yeah, it’ll be, it’ll be out by the time you hear this. How do your hip people say it as popping on Fridays. Okay. Pop and popcorn ain’t going to be popping. Anything else? Somebody popping pills. I heard about that back in the seventies and eighties. You’re popping pills. Half the NBA was popping. They weren’t popping three pointers popping pills. All right. What do you got for me, Mike? Just so we can set it up, Cameron and Scott have rolled it up. They brought in some Khalid. They brought in some Moses. Cameron is making inappropriate hand gestures during that. Well now see people out there wondering, what hand gestures. It was something closer to Spock’s Vulcan be peaceful and prosper. Let’s just, let’s keep it clean over here Mike. A bit clean move. You’re supposed to be at Christian allegedly.

Mike: 36:58 All right. I’ll go with one I saw recently, monsters inc. I think their friendship was… You have a little kid. Yeah. Well it’s funny. She’s asleep and we watched it. The friendship of the two monsters, like and their ability to just to kind of like, like spill on each and then they have like a falling out. Sully and Mike. Yeah. So it’s a friendship.

Russ: 37:37 Roll some music. Are you solely Mike?

Mike: 37:42 I haven’t actually thought about it for myself. Music I’ll go with I’ll go two album recommendations. They’re both albums that are artists describing their life. And like they’re kind of life story experiences, different genres, different time periods. One throw back Alanis Morissette jagged little pill. When that album came out it was quite a splash, but she’s very young at the time. The artist she talks about growing up in a hyper religious environment, talks about bad relationships. Talks about just anger. She doesn’t know what to do with. It talks about just trying to be optimistic. So a lot of good stuff in there. And then of course you can go Kendrick Lamar either. You can go either to pimp a butterfly or the good kid Mad City.

Russ: 38:47 He has got been on Wikipedia for sure. I’m glad you guys researched billboard 100 before he came here. I’m reading it out loud as I speak now. Now you missed your opportunity. You know you’re sleeping, you’re sleeping. You can’t be like, rewind. What does this look like? Does it look like we have a tape player in the car right here doing the rewind. Go ahead and give them one and then Mike’s got to drop.

Cameron: 39:19 My cousin just dropped a sweet track. Kai Straw. Brighter me.

Russ: 39:23 Okay. First of all, full disclosure, are you getting any money out of this? Listen to my cousin, I’m making a dollar. Use the Promo Code CamStraw.

Cameron: 39:36 He’s got millions of listeners, but he’s on Spotify. All those things. Kai Straw, brighter me. It’s kind of dark, but it describes the kind of inward battle of someone going through, I don’t know, basically addiction or something. It’s pretty deep, but it’s, it’s a guy.

Russ: 39:55 With the song brighter me, he needs to be out on my podcast. I want him on my podcast. You can come here and talk about brighter me. That sounds like, I love the title. It’s really loving the title. It’s deep. Okay. There’s just, what is it?

Russ: 40:10 Monty Python, look on the bright side of life. That was a good one. That’s a good one right there. Oh, I’m not sure I can recommend watching Monte Python. That goes back to my old days classic. That goes back to my old days. Yeah. I don’t remember much about that movie. I just, you know, I remember going, I remember going, seeing all those. Okay. So I think that was a good job on that. Now look, everybody we really appreciate you listening to the podcast and we want you to go back and check www.deepspirituality.com. There’s a whole bunch of articles coming out. Mike, we got some new stuff on change coming out, right?

Mike: 40:47 Well we’ve been putting out youtube quiet time videos as Cameron alluded to earlier. So I think we’re starting with that. You can expect, right now you can go to youtube, check our video the God of change. That’s going to be on there. We’re going to be putting this week out, a Bible study to go along with the videos that we’re putting out and stuff. About how God is the God of change and how he helps us along. How do we become people who want to change? Yeah, there’s going to be one of those coming. So you can expect this weekprobably in the next couple of weeks it is gonna drop on Wednesday. So you get a couple articles online.

Russ: 41:34 Mike’s got it. Mike’s going to give you some, you know what? We’ll tell you what, we’re going to put some dates out there for you on the notes and we’re also gonna drop. We’ll put some more announcements in this podcast. We’ll make sure they’re in there. So by the time you’re listening to this, hopefully you’ll either, you know what, right after my voice is done, you’re going to hear some good stuff about when these are going to drop. Cause I know you’re going to love this series. We’re putting together on change. And then I’m going to go ahead and I’m going to give you a little bit of a teaser. I’m not going to tell you when it’s coming, but there’s something special coming about the spirituality of stranger things. Oh yeah, it’s coming. It’s coming.

Russ: 42:10 It’s cooking, it’s cooking. It’s coming out. It’s coming out. And when it comes out, we’re going to nail it with a beautiful article. We’re gonna slap down with an awesome podcast on it. And if you’re a stranger things person, my recommendation is go ahead and the next week here, try to get as close as you can to the completion of the third season, and we’re gonna roll it out. It’s going to be, it’s going to be spiritually groundbreaking stuff about, I’m going to go ahead and give you the title. Should I give him the title? Do it. Oh, producer said, no, you can’t have the title. Spoiler alert, you got rocked on that. You know what? What can I say? He said, he said, you get the sprinkles, but you can’t have the ice cream. The spirituality, we’re out, in the upside down. [inaudible].

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About the show

The Deep Spirituality Podcast is a show about having spiritual conversations. Join our Editor-in-Chief Russ Ewell and guests as they have candid discussions on spiritual topics ranging from faith to anxiety to vulnerability, inspiring you to go deeper in your relationship with God and have challenging and honest conversations of your own.

The Deep Spirituality Podcast is a show about having spiritual conversations. Join our Editor-in-Chief Russ Ewell and guests as they have candid discussions on spiritual topics ranging from faith to anxiety to vulnerability, inspiring you to go deeper in your relationship with God and have challenging and honest conversations of your own.

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