Circle 31 Podcast

Note: Please note that the text below is an uncorrected transcript of the audio captured for this podcast. We pray the Lord uses these words to bless you as you seek Him!

Kendra LeGrand: All right, everybody, we're back with the final episode of the relaxed portion of Circle 31 Book Club. So we're wrapping up our last week together. We're going to read part four, which is fabulous. But before we do, Megan, you asked us this question last night at dinner, and I got very choked up talking about it.

But now I want to talk about it with you guys. What is something that you're looking forward to maybe in this next month? Spring 2025. What are you looking forward to coming up, coming down the pipeline?

Ellen Adkins: OK, this was an answer that I shared last night. I'm going on an archaeology dig.

Kendra LeGrand: Did you get to hear? Did you tear up about it like I did?

Ellen Adkins: I did not tear up about it. But it's just it's like an hour and a half away from where I live. It's a very cool site and you can just go for a Saturday. The whole community is invited and you can just go and sign up and go do an archaeology dig.

Kendra LeGrand: Do you have your own tools?

Ellen Adkins: I don't have my own tools. Maybe. Maybe somebody will let me borrow theirs.

Kendra LeGrand: One can only hope or you're digging with your hands, which sounds tough to do. Real tough. All right, Megan, do you have something you're looking forward to?

Megan Fate Marshman: Do I am taking my boys to Uganda this summer for almost three weeks? Wow. Yeah, I'm excited to see how that combats any entitlement in their bones. And we shall see how that works. No, but the actual backstory is pretty cool. A gal that's discipled me for the past over a decade. She adopted two boys from Uganda who had lost their dad and my boys have lost their dad. And so they connected in a very intimate way. And this is going to be the 10 year anniversary of them going back to Uganda.

And they're going to bring our family with them.

Ellen Adkins: How special.

Megan Fate Marshman: And then I'll also get to do a cool event called Therefore with Katie Davis Majors. Yes. And get to teach women there as well.

Speaker 1: So it's going to be quite a trip.

Kendra LeGrand: Oh, that's awesome. I remember reading her book back in the day. I was telling the girls last night that I'm just looking forward to watching my son continue to grow up in all his little things that he does. His little quirks and learning to talk and all the things.

Megan Fate Marshman: So beautiful moment of that was that she could barely get through the sentence because of the delight.

Kendra LeGrand: Dang it. I thought I could get through it. Yeah, the delight true of just watching him grow up. Man, it's so good.

Megan Fate Marshman: Which is take a second considering our heavenly father who delights in us. In the similar way as I'm looking at your eyes full of tears, thinking about the delight of each stage. I wonder if the Lord looks at us in a similar way.

Kendra LeGrand: Thank you.

Megan Fate Marshman: Don't be discouraged with the stage you're in. He's he's looking over.

Kendra LeGrand: I never used to cry. And then I would say the past two years have become very emotional, which is a good thing I've learned to embrace it. Counseling has helped me with that, though. I used to really excuse it away, but now I try to try to go. But something I've noticed about you, Megan, which is helps me get emotional around you is that you're very authentic and real.

You don't try to button it up or you're just very you're a very relatable person, which is very nice to be around. And in your book, you talk about going to God at the end of every chapter and what that looks like. And so has it become any easier for you to go to God in the hard moments and the emotional moments in the maybe in the in the moments where you make a mistake that you talk about in your book? Has it gotten any easier or is it a day to day?

Megan Fate Marshman: I would say choice over the past few years of kind of discovering how I need to go to God because I naturally go to myself. So again, the book kind of combating that the temptation toward autonomy, doing life without him, even for him. I think in the past few years, since knowing that I need to go to God, what has surprised me is my expectation of what he does in response. I think I used to expect that I would say something to him. So for instance, let's say I have a moment with my kids and I walk into the other room super frustrated and I just tell him something. I think I used to have the expectation that in that very moment, he would equip me with the love that I would just need to come in there and the right sentence that would calm them down. I think I had those types of expectations early on, where now I just realize it's a journey and I'm becoming more and more OK with it being a journey instead of just big moments. I think I thought faith was about big moments. I walked into quiet time expecting big moments. I went to church services expecting big moments.

And now I'm just expecting presence. And like truth that I already know and what I'm realizing is the going to God is more of an opening to that truth instead of necessarily discovering new truth. It's open to the truth I already know, which requires something that it feels assumed, but I can't assume it anymore. It assumes that you know how to be honest with God and take the time it literally takes.

One of my editors kept critiquing my book because I kept saying that phrase, take the time it literally takes, take the time it literally takes. Because I can say, trust in the Lord with all your heart and everyone can go, yes and amen. And not take the time it literally takes to go, God, I'm so fearful of the future. And while we maybe are, you have to take the time it literally takes to share it, to share it in a sincere way. And some of the best ways to do that is in community.

God's presence is literally with us. I heard a story recently of a guy who went into a barber shop. It was such a simple story where he goes like, I'm in the barber shop and I just needed a haircut. So I just went into a barber shop and I happened to be a pastor, but I didn't talk about that. I was just talking about just life and being interested in my barber. And right before I went to leave the barber's like, dude, your presence was like really significant for me. I was, I'm really sad in life. And I feel like you give me a lot of hope to like, like people care and just thinks, and the guy walks out and gives this testimony to go, I think we forget who it is that we carry.

Just by showing up. I think we forget who it is we're talking to each time we show up to pray. He's with us. And here's the last encouragement, which is why we can be relaxed. Everything we will become as a Christ follower, what we've been predestined for based on Romans 8.29.

It says you have predestined. That's not self-thick. That's not based on how you're saved. It is, we are predestined to be conformed more to the image of the sun. We are, if the spirit of the living God is in you, you are predestined to become more like Jesus.

And here's the crazy part. Jesus is already within, which means everything you will become is already within, which makes sense by the way, why it's not an achievement of me reading more books, content from the outside in. It's more of an opening the truth you already know. to the one inside who's wanting to form you more into his likeness and he's interceding on your behalf.

So when you see things like worry or anxiety or fear, I wonder if that's the answer to his prayer by letting us see it, different take on what we're trying to show away.

Kendra LeGrand: That's good.

Ellen Adkins: It's so good. No, we're wrapping up the final part of Relax, which I love how the last chapter gets its own part dedicated to it. And in it, you kind of give like a bit of a commission or almost a charge to people. You write, while I can't tell you where he might direct you, I can tell you that whatever he will have you say, know, believe, or do will be loving. He may not tell you what to do, although I know he loves to give hints. Yeah, I know he loves to give hints, but he will form you more into his likeness. Remember, he is love so that you can do what you believe he would do if he were you.

Kendra LeGrand: I think that's beautiful. And Megan, I love that you say he gives you hints. And I think just the whole idea of going to God, I think opens up like our perspective and our eyes to like maybe see those hints or spend some time with the Lord to like have like, cause we're all busy and distracted.

And so when we take time, like you talked about like the coffee pot, the elevator, and all those little moments that you like weave into your day, it allows God to like show us those hints cause we're more intentional. The last go to God section, it's on page 197 if you have your book in front of you, but if you're driving, don't get it out. I don't want you to be unsafe. Stop it a stop sign. Stop it a stop sign, pull over, you know?

There's ways to do it. And Megan, I would actually love if you could read it and then talk about just the way that you ended this book and any encouragement that you have with it.

Megan Fate Marshamn: Yes, God's invitation to follow him assumes he's already moving. Sometimes I feel the need to start something or be the source of something profound. I have a gift for you here in the conclusion of this book.

You don't have to start something new. You're invited to open your heart through honest prayer and join in on the good work that God has already begun. Rather than asking God, what would you have me do? Ask God, what are you already doing? Follow up with that. Follow that up with, and how can I join you?

Let's dance. I used to think that finding God's will was finding the center dot on an imaginary bull's eye until Dr. John Koh talked about our 15,000 choices we have a day and how what if God's will is not finding a center dot, but becoming a Christ-like chooser? What if it means throwing out, trying to find some imaginary center dot of what perfect means? We found Jesus, thankfully, the one perfect one. And so for us, I wonder if it's more about God.

What are you doing in the world? Because we can know that. We may not know what he wants me to do or who to date or what school to go to, but what we can know is what he's up to in the world. And as we know in the book of Revelation 21, he is making all things new.

And I think he always wants to start with us. And so even as we get self-reflective at the end of this podcast or just in life, I wonder if we can take that question and do a test. God, what are you already doing in me?

And here's the big surprise. Look at your life and not just the good stuff. What are you doing in my anger?

What are you uncovering about a portion of my heart that I didn't see? Because the truth is I'm really angry about some stuff. We're doing an entire message on anger once.

And I did some study where there's levels of anger and let's just make it simple. Level one is I'm bugged. Level two is that's not fair. Level three is that's really not okay.

And because a lot of us haven't communicated honestly that level three anger, we react to level one annoyances with level three anger because we simply haven't dealt with what's within. So God, what are you already doing as you look at your life listener and you think about being disappointed with any part or you think about your secret or any other portion of your life? I would ask that simple question. God, what are you doing? And even if what you feel right now is shame, God, what are you doing with that? What are you trying to uncover that I don't have to live? Like open even the shame, open the worry, open the fear to a God who knows it and has been interceding on your behalf that you might see it. Because when you see it with his presence and you realize his love for you has never been dependent upon your good behavior, it just is.

Then I think we'll know more intimately the unmerited favor of God that meets us right where we're at and doesn't leave us there. So I just really like the question, not what should I do in response? But Lord, what are you already doing? And how can I join you? And I'll tell you lastly this, to take the time it literally takes to listen. So I'll do that for all of us. Instead of just telling you to do it, let's take a moment. Think on your life, think on the Lord.

And here's a simple question. Heavenly Father, what are you already doing? And let your mind wander. And Holy Spirit, how can we join in on that for your glory? What, how do we need to respond appropriately to what you're already doing in our life?

Heavenly Father, I pray that we would not do a single thing alone and yet I know that we will. So help us remember. Because we know it's by your spirit. We cry out, Abba Father. It's by your spirit we even think to pray. So Lord, help us pray. We pray. Amen.

Kendra LeGrand: Amen. Megan, thank you so much. We do have an opportunity to hear from you one more time at our Beyond the Pages event on February 27th. And that event, the whole idea is that we don't just close the book and put it back on our bookshelf, that we actually take what we're reading and hopefully through the power of God's word, which we know does wonders. We grow and we become more like Christ. And so we're gonna celebrate all that we learned through this book and through God's word. So with that, everybody, good things happen when you grow. We are excited to continue to grow with you and we will see you soon. Bye, everybody.