Episode 2 – Basics For The Abundant Life

Kimberly Faith: Welcome to the Truth in Love podcast with your host, Kimberly Faith. We seek to present God’s timeless truth through the lens of his remarkable love. Welcome to episode 2, which is the basics for the abundant life. I have, again, with me here, my lovely guests, John and Lynn McLarty, my parents to, so welcome today.

John McLarty: Thank you, Kim.

Kimberly Faith: And because we’re what we’re doing is we’re laying a foundation with these first two podcasts of what a satisfying life, what an abundant life looks like according to the truth that is in God’s word as experienced through the lives of real people. And so today’s goal in, in, in discussing the basics for the abundant life is to give an overview. And the reason we’re doing this in the second podcast is because everything else that we will build in this podcast, in the in the the podcasts that follow, will spring from the foundation of the first podcast, which is salvation, and then the second podcast, which is the basics for living the abundant life. So, without further ado, let’s jump in and discuss, in a nutshell, if you were to name the top three things that are that make up the foundation for an abundant life based on God’s word, what would what would you say those are, dad?

John McLarty: Well, it’s interesting you said 3 because, I think of being born again, we were born again.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: That’s what salvation brings. So you’re new babes in Christ. So new babes need to grow. New babies need nutrition. They need to be in the right environment, and they need exercise to grow.

Kimberly Faith: And exercise can be includes communication.

John McLarty: Communication Right. Includes, interaction and communication.

Kimberly Faith: So as that translates to God’s word, would that would it be fair to say, maybe the top 3, prayer, studying the word, and a church community, would that

John McLarty: Prayer, studying the word, and a church community, especially in the idea of that’s exercising your faith and Right. Interacting with others.

Kimberly Faith: There’s obviously a lot of things that are gonna spring from, each, each category, and we’re not trying to limit the bible or or or or draw lines in the sand. But I think it’s good just to give, people an idea of these are the things we’re gonna talk about, and this is going to be very foundational in where we go in all these podcasts because it it’s kinda like, one of my favorite preachers is Lon Solomon. And one of his things he always says at the end, like, it it maybe the the halfway point of his message is, well, so what? You know? Why why does that matter to me when I’m driving on the beltway?

Right? And so kind of, laying this foundation is kind of answering the why it’s relevant. And and and I wanna talk about this in the context of both of your experience in your own spiritual growth. So let let’s just, first of all, let’s just take prayer. I I mean, if that’s okay.

Mom, you’re known as the local prayer warrior in our in our family. And, what what are your thoughts on, how prayer gives you an abundant life?

Lynn McLarty: Well, it first of all, you’re speaking to the creator, and you’re hearing from the creator. That’s like that’s like I mean, people might think that getting a call from the president’s great, but

I get talks with the creator.

Kimberly Faith: I just wanna say something. Mic drop.

Lynn McLarty: So, to me, that’s just, a foundation is our relationship and our communication with God and hearing from God.

Kimberly Faith: And this is interesting that the the first lesson first Thessalonians 5 17 says, pray without ceasing. And that’s what you’re talking about. Yeah. What what it’s it’s I always liken things to the army. You know, if if if a person’s out in an aircraft flying in enemy territory, he needs to have great comms with the command, you know, with the command.

He he he has to be in constant communication.

Lynn McLarty: Yeah. Like, listening through your day, listening to the to your your commander in chief. And, I mean, when I leave the house, I have a list of all things I need to do, and I think, oh, well, this makes sense. But I get in my car, and if I’m listening to god, he may totally change my he may see somebody needs to hear about him over here. And I was going right, and he said no.

Go left.

Kimberly Faith: You know, that that kinda changes your your to do list into an eternal, difference making excursion.

Lynn McLarty: Yes. Yes.

Kimberly Faith: And and it’s and it’s kinda like, you know, if you’re like like our you know, your grandson, my son flies, an helicopter, an attack helicopter. He’s gotta be listening, and he’s gotta be con communicating.

Lynn McLarty: Yes.

Kimberly Faith: You know? And both of those things, prayer make prayer very powerful because like you said, this is the creator of everything. He’s already in the future. He’s been in the past. He knows the heart of every person.

Why wouldn’t we wanna listen to him?

Lynn McLarty: He knows what’s around the corner. We have no idea what’s around the corner.

Kimberly Faith: Exactly.

Lynn McLarty: We can’t see around the corner. So

Kimberly Faith: And and do you think and and, dad, you weigh on this. Do you think that prayer is probably one of the most, heavily attacked items in our arsenal?

Lynn McLarty: Oh, yes. I do. Because if I’m not Brian, it’s just like I’ve lost communication with the unit.

Kimberly Faith: Mhmm. Mhmm.

Lynn McLarty: And so, yeah, it’s it’s vital.

Kimberly Faith: I I think, definitely, it’s I I I’ll just tell you. I’ll confess this on this, podcast. One of my new year’s resolutions every year, the last couple years seems to be spend 20 minutes praying out loud with God every day. And and I, you know, and and I don’t know why that’s so difficult. But I do spend time throughout the day like you’re talking about, but there’s something so powerful about being alone with the creator and engaging your your your, because you when you talk, you have to engage your entire focus.

John McLarty: Mhmm.

Kimberly Faith: And I know that is just the enemies, you know, who are who are saying, oh, no. Don’t do that. We don’t really want you to be at that much of that that great communication with him. Right?

John McLarty: I would say and and go ahead.

Lynn McLarty: I remember when I was first saved, driving down the street, talking to the Lord and out loud because that that is important, I think. And and that’s why it’s it’s kinda hard for you know, it’s hard when you’re in a family because you you need to get alone with God to be able to talk out loud, kind of unhindered Right. By who’s listening. Right. Because it’s between you and God.

But I remember thinking, well, people must think, who driving next to me? Who is she talking to? But I remember what sweet moments those were, just talking to God, listening to a woman. I mean, that great communication.

Kimberly Faith: That reminds me of, Susanna Wesley. You know? She had these kids. And and because she could never get alone, she put the apron over her head, and and the kids knew that when the apron was over her head, she was praying they needed to leave her alone. So she created

Lynn McLarty: her own little prayer room

Kimberly Faith: under her apron. Deb, what were you gonna say?

John McLarty: Just an indication that there’s an attack on prayer is just to attempt prayer, try prayer, and notice how easy it is for your mind to wander.

Kimberly Faith: Yes. And that’s especially true in our in our culture where our attention is being snapped back and forth in all these sound bites by every platform of social media. You know, how many times you sit there and you’re praying, all of a sudden you think, I should pray for this person. Oh, I wonder what they’re doing. Then you’re on Facebook trying to figure out what they’re doing.

And then suddenly, you’ve read you’ve watched 15 reels. You know? So, yeah, it’s it’s true.

John McLarty: I would say that Lynn really, as we learned in her the first, podcast, her first prayer was answered, and that was that I would be saved. So, Lynn really developed that that, habit of prayer early in her Christian life. And it was a real, real key, strong point.

Kimberly Faith: You know, it’s it’s it is very empowering to see your prayers answered. And I’ll I’ll just give another example. And it’s in my testimony on on the website. But when I was at the bottom, and I couldn’t pray, I didn’t feel like I could pray because I had sinned so much. You know, God knew what was in my heart.

And in my heart, I was sitting there, you know, as it it was right after I had, you know, right in the middle of my divorce and I was sitting in this little apartment building and and I was thinking, I wasn’t praying, I was thinking, I wish I had 5 acres with a nice view, on a paved road close to my office. That was just my thought. And, and, and God, he, he took that thought and he revealed his answer and his love. That’s why we call this truth and love. Because God didn’t come back and say, and you you have to start obeying all my commandments in order to have this prayer answer.

No. That wasn’t it wasn’t the way that’s not the way god operates. He gave me not 5 acres, but 45 acres with the most beautiful view in the county on a paved road and 2 minutes from my office. And that’s when I knew that I had been seeking a lesser God my entire life. I had been worshiping at the altar of some other God when this omniscient, omnipotent, amazing, words can’t even describe.

God was saying, if you just would just ask me.

John McLarty: God’s goodness led you to him.

Kimberly Faith: Repentance. Yeah. That’s when that that’s when everything turned around in my office and that repentance that like, wow, I’m gonna see God. So prayer is an indisputably, you know, one of the most powerful tools that we have. So let’s what about the, dad, you wanna kinda take the lead on on this, this fundamental of studying God’s word or the importance of God’s word?

John McLarty: Well, that’s really interesting because Lynn focused a lot on prayer, which, and there’s not a one size fits all for our whole Christian life. Right. Because here I am, you know, after 40 years of Christian life, I’ve retired maybe 45 years. Well, no. It’d be for about 40 years of of delivering the Christian life.

I retired from a day job, and my prayer life began to improve just because I had a desire to do it. And I just had a more relaxed. I didn’t work at 8 o’clock in

Kimberly Faith: the morning. Right.

John McLarty: But in my early Christian life, I really got into studying the word. And that was through, a church relationship. Our pastor was teaching us an incredible, series of Bible studies called the concepts, which we’ll build within later podcasts. But it just got me into the word and how the word connected to itself and to our lives and explained so much. So it really, that series of studies got me into the word, and the word is alive and would speak to me.

So I really got into bible reading and then outlines and, you know, doing reference verses and getting, you know, just deeper into the word.

Kimberly Faith: I think so.

John McLarty: And that really fulfilled me even though my I’d say my prayer life was lacking. Mhmm. But that drew me into learning the word and then teaching others, and it’s very fulfilling for me.

Kimberly Faith: You know, you I think there was something said in the last podcast about how when you’re born again, God’s word changes from just an intellectual pursuit to a, we get to be in on him discerning the thoughts and intents of our heart and transforming us through his word, which is which is Jesus. Jesus working in this mysterious way. You you know, it’s it’s always interesting to me if if you go into a, you know, you’re standing in a mall and you read a verse from God’s word, people will look at you like you’re crazy, or people who are born again will say, oh, yeah. I connect with that. If you read a a verse from, you know, the Quran or from a recipe book, nobody’s really gonna it’s not gonna be controversial.

But God’s word, that’s because it’s him, you know, and he is he’s empowering his word. I think about the, the promise, you know, everybody listening to this podcast wants peace. Everyone listening to this podcast would like to live a long time, you know. And and Proverbs chapter 3, verses 12 says, my son, do not forget my law, but let your heart keep my commands. For length of days and long life and peace will they add to you.

And then, you you you connect that with 2nd Timothy 2:15 that says, study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. You know, when I think about those 2 verses in the context of the military, you know, if you’re in basic training and you don’t learn, you don’t learn the basic doctrine of the army, you know, the basic rules of operation, then you will not know how to operate when the when you’re under fire. And and and and your days are gonna be pretty short because you’re gonna upset yourself in the enemy’s path, and you’re going to, be an easy kill. Right? But and it’s the same.

I mean, if we trained our churches with even just the basic training, the army used, you know, 8 weeks basic depending on which branch you’re in or, you know, whatever it is now. If if if every church trained their their bill the believers that were part of their church with just that, And not just, you know, in in basic training, you don’t just learn doctrine. You practice it. Mhmm. You are you’re you’re taking your weapon.

You’re cleaning your weapon. You’re learning to shoot your weapon. You’re learning to shoot and move. You’re learning to to be defensive. You’re learning to breach areas.

You’re learning all kinds of things. Right? And so if if we’re taking the word and and doing this training like you were talking about, you know, churches need to be taking people into, into outreach, taking people into, you know, when I teach a concept study, one of the things I start doing about the the second time through with a person is, now you teach it back to me. And, you know, it’s it’s you said it’s so reward it’s so rewarding as a teacher to see your student, saying, you know, I had this guy I was talking to the other day, and he and he, he had some version of truth, and and I said, well, how is that satisfying you? And and, you know, because we want, if truth doesn’t if your truth doesn’t satisfy you, then that’s basic concepts number 1, poles of influence.

Right? Where do you get your truth from? So this truth is so foundational because it gives us not only the the, the operating, the operating system we need to run by, but it also satisfies us because it is what Jesus said. He said he was the bread of life. He his word is food.

He is the living water, and it and it teaches us to grow. You know, trainee a basic trainee on day 1 is is is is much different than a basic trainee, on day, 40 or 50. Right? Mhmm. And in the Christian walk, we I think we have to we have to evaluate.

Are we seeing that in the church? Which brings about the next one. I mean, is there anything else? I’m sorry. About the word.

John McLarty: Just a tie in between what Lynn said that that when we pray, we’re praying to the creator. When we read the word, this is the word of God. It’s not just some book of brand of doctrines, some religious studies. It’s the word of God. So it’s alive and powerful and it’s speaking directly to our soul.

So prayer and the word are both from God directly. So it’s that direct input from the mind of God into our mind just as prayer is.

Kimberly Faith: Right. So that kinda brings us to our our 3rd our 3rd, broad category, which is the church and the church community. And, you know, we were in church yesterday and and heard remarkable example of what this looks like from one of the one of the mess the, messages, by Brad Jones, and and he used the example of the Sequoia root system. And I didn’t know this, but it is such a great example of the the way a church community should look. And, you know, the sequoias, grow taller than any tree in in in the world.

They are heavier than any tree in the world. Some of them get get get as heavy as a freightliner, and they’re they and a lot of them are there’s several of them that are older than 2000 years. They they think maybe even 3000 years. And and and it the question is, how do they how do they survive fires and wind and disease and and, and, you know, all the things that that kill trees? And it and it goes back to their root system.

The roots grow together in a way that not only do they actually connect, the roots actually grow into each other, but they they feed each other. And and they’re only 5 or 6 feet at the most deep, but there there’s thousands of them interconnected. And I I don’t know what y’all thought, but I thought that was a great analogy for the church.

John McLarty: Incredible.

Lynn McLarty: Well, I I was thinking of something about the church. You have prayer. You have getting into God’s word, and this happened to us salvation first, then learning to pray. Like I said, my first prayer was answered. Studying God’s word.

All of that was in our life, but we were still wandering around Junebugin. Junebugin looking for a place to settle, you might say. We didn’t even know what that what what was next. But when we found, the church we’re going to now, Mission Boulevard, What happened to us then was we became grounded. We became we found a home where we could grow, and we immediately our pastor immediately got us into a concept study, which was the basics of the Bible.

I did know not know Matthew from Isaiah. I I had no idea there was even an Old Testament or a New Testament. I mean, I kinda started reading God’s word, but it kinda didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. But when we found the church and the church taught us started teaching us the basic bible concepts, Like, it’s kinda like an overview of the church and how it all connects, kinda like those sequoias. They all connected.

And it when we started studying, god’s word started jumping out at me.

Kimberly Faith: Making sense.

Lynn McLarty: Making total sense. And, I mean, not not being raised to know anything about god’s word, it was such a an incredible enlightening time in my life to, kinda cross the t’s and dot the, you know, just everything just started making the word just became alive to me.

Kimberly Faith: Well, the and the concepts, you know, which we have we have 7 of them on our website, but, god willing, dad and I are gonna do that whole study on our podcast.

John McLarty: Great.

Kimberly Faith: What that does for so many people is, you know, when when you go to learn a a subject that you have no idea what it’s about, you kinda like to know the why. You know? Why am I learning this? How does this make a difference in our lie in in my life? And what what is this what is this going to teach me that will make my life better?

I feel like that’s what the concept says because you start with what is truth, who am I, who is God, what is salvation, you know, what is spiritual warfare, and and what is the church? I mean, you start and then you go to the overview, and it’s like, okay. Now when I read contextually, I can understand God’s word. Does that sum it up?

John McLarty: That sums it up well. Something else I’ll add in addition to that is we weren’t just learning the concepts from a book we bought at a Christian bookstore. Our our who became our pastor was coming out to teaching us. And then through the church we joined, we were interconnected with another a lot of people that were doing the same thing. But just Brian, Brian Disney, the pastor of our church, would come out.

We were about a 45 minute drive from Fayetteville, and 30 minutes of that was down up a dirt road to Sugar Mountain. And he came out every week just to teach us. So his his care for us impressed us. So it was learning the word, learning the concepts, and seeing his concern just for our growth. And then when we joined the church, it was just like a lot of people Doing the same thing.

Doing the same thing.

Kimberly Faith: It’s kinda like those those sequoia trees all growing up together, their roots interconnecting. They they have a community of roots.

John McLarty: Right.

Kimberly Faith: And, you know, it’s interesting about your testimony too. I I remember you saying this at one point. You know, you brother Brian was teaching this study. And and and you finally just asked him, so do you have a church? He wasn’t putting pressure on you to join his church.

John McLarty: Right.

Kimberly Faith: He was just loving you. And this is he was giving you the truth in obvious love because he was sacrificing. You know? Everything from his his car being a rattled trap to just his time. You know?

2 hours on the road or whatever to come out to you all. He didn’t even know you. And and that is just a remarkable example of how you know, it’s interesting. In the great commission, Jesus said and this was directed to the church. Go ye therefore and teach.

Isn’t that interesting? That’s the first word he used teach. Mhmm. You know, teach doesn’t just mean teaching the people in the church. Teaching means you have a colleague at work says, how come you have so much joy?

Why do you have joy? I wanna where do you get your peace from? Hey. I’d love to have coffee with you and explain that. You know?

And and that’s exactly what should be happening to us every day as a church. Right? But that’ll be another that’ll be another podcast.

John McLarty: But one point is we’re we were feeling cared for or loved by Brian. And so, you know, by this, you’ll all but know your disciples that you’d love one another. As we love one another and show concern for another, that’s attractive.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: It’s attractive to experience it. But then as others see that love among the brethren and not and then the love of to the community, you know, in just various ways, you know, caring for people. That’s, that that’s attractive.

Kimberly Faith: It should be attractive. A church the church should be attractive to desperately longing souls who do not experience love, joy, peace, the fruits of the spirit. Right?

Lynn McLarty: And that’s and God’s love through us, we can’t fake that. Mm-mm. Because you run-in you’re loving somebody and you run into a kind of an an ordinary person. All of a sudden, your love can change real quick. If it’s yours.

If it’s yours. But if it’s God’s love, you you don’t get offended. Good Lord. You realize that you’re just doing what God has, and God loves this person, and you’re gonna continue to love him. And God’s love through us is different than there’s a lot of people who act loving in the world.

Right. Until Something happens.

John McLarty: Something happens.

Kimberly Faith: You know, that that I’ll never forget I was in a study with a group and one of the ladies said, well, I try really hard when I’m out out at Walmart to have the joy and the love and the compassion, for people, but it is it it’s almost impossible. And I said it as I said to her, I said, it’s so good that you understand that it’s impossible because if it’s yours, it’s not gonna work. It has to be that wide open faucet of the the well of God spirit flowing through you because then you’re giving away what you have and you have it in such abundance. You don’t need you don’t need it back. You don’t need it in return because you you don’t have room for anybody.

I mean, you have so much to give. I wanna I wanna just compare, you know, Ephesians, chapter 4 talks about the church, and I wanna I kinda wanna talk about this in the context of this Sequoia root system. Okay? It’s it it the the apostle, Paul says that he gave himself, meaning Jesus, gave some, sorry, to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors, and teachers for the equipping of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro, carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but speaking the truth in love, ding the podcast. May grow up in all things into him who is the head Christ from whom the whole body joint and knit together by what every joint supplies according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.

You know, you you hear all these these people say, well, I can do church on my own, but you’re missing out. Yeah. You you know, if the sequoia tree was in the desert by itself, it wouldn’t last. Its root system isn’t deep enough. But the forest is what gives the strength to each tree.

And that’s just a a remarkable

John McLarty: The connected system.

Kimberly Faith: The connected. Mhmm. And, you know, in the in the in the concept study in the in the part, the section on the church, we have these one another commands. And and, dad, you’ve taught the concepts way more than I have, but do you wanna kinda give us a a a brief overview of these one another commands, as we kind of wrap up on the church here?

John McLarty: Well, you can just look through the the new testament, especially, and there’s all these, commands to love one another, prefer one another, greet one another, serve one another, forgive one another, consider one another, all the the one another’s.

Kimberly Faith: Mhmm.

John McLarty: And those can only be done with other people. Right. You can’t just be out living in the woods in a a log cabin being a hermit and do all these one another’s.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: So these are all only possible in in a local assembly of believers

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: That are interconnected with each other.

Kimberly Faith: You know, I wanna bring up the the bear one another’s burdens out of, out of Galatians 62. The other thing that we’ve heard in the sermon yesterday that was so remarkable was the story of, Brad Jones, and Michelle Jones. They’re 9 19. Was he 9 was Greg 19 when he died? He was young.

John McLarty: Yeah. Yeah.

Lynn McLarty: He had Might have been 19.

Kimberly Faith: He he was given a testimony about how when his son was dying of did he have cancer?

John McLarty: Cancer.

Kimberly Faith: Cancer. How there’s no way he could have walked through that by himself. But the whole church community surrounded him in such a way. I don’t know, mom. How would you describe what he what he the way he described that?

Lynn McLarty: Well, I experienced just being around Brad and Michelle, and they went through it like the Lord had them in their hands, in his hands, and was carrying them through it. But it was the brethren that was there supporting them in prayer and love and compassion. And their son I’ll tell you what. Their son, Greg, was a born again believer, saved, and he was ministering to his mom and dad. He was ministering to the brethren.

It was just

John McLarty: like nurse staff, hospital

Lynn McLarty: staff. Nurse staff

Kimberly Faith: and whoever he was around. I mean That kinda goes back to that root system.

Lynn McLarty: You know?

Kimberly Faith: The the the the body of Christ was was new was feeding them with love, with joy, with peace, and and Greg had peace.

Lynn McLarty: And Greg had peace.

Kimberly Faith: He knew exactly. When he drew his last breath on earth, he was gonna be drawing his first breath in heaven.

Lynn McLarty: That’s right.

Kimberly Faith: And he knew that. Mhmm. And and, you know, again, back to kind of the first thought podcast, there’s nothing that is more convincing that God’s word is the truth, in in my opinion, than a transformed life. You know, we we follow people who know where they’re going. Mhmm.

And when when Christians are strengthened in a body of Christ, that that is there’s just nothing to really, substitute that for.

John McLarty: Mhmm.

Kimberly Faith: When you’re strengthening God’s word and prayer in the body of Christ, then the things that result and I wanna cover some just a few things that that you’re, we as Christians, should be producing and doing if these three things are in our life. We should be serving. We should be serving whether that is serving through prayer because maybe we’re homebound, bringing people meals, teaching bible studies. We should be in service. Love God is love.

Love is selflessness. Selflessness translates into service.

Lynn McLarty: Yeah.

Kimberly Faith: Right?

John McLarty: That’s right.

Kimberly Faith: And we should be sharing and teaching. We each have the great commission as our personal responsibility, and each one of us can teach something. Matter of fact, we will teach something. We’ll either teach complacency, idiocy, you know, slothfulness, or we’ll teach passionate service for Christ. I’m not saying there’s only 2 things, but you get the point.

What what else do you think will be resulting from the evidence of the first three, the prayer, the studying the word, and the church community? What other things?

John McLarty: I’ll just go back to the title of this podcast, the basics for the abundant life. I would say Lynn and I have been blessed with an abundant life, just full, fulfilling, exciting, and there’s been tough times, but God’s been with us through them. And we’ve experienced abundant life because of a prayer life, God’s studying God’s word, trying to be in God’s word and because of the church community that we’re a part of. So it’s produced the abundant and fruitful life, very satisfying. We we don’t know the word boring, does not exist in our experience.

Kimberly Faith: And and, you know, I’ll just say this about the church community too because I I think one of the the breakthroughs in my thinking about the church was that everybody has a community that they build. And if you don’t, it’s it’s very sad life of of people who don’t. I I think about when when I used to be a big CrossFitter. Okay? I mean, that was my those were my people.

You know? We had a goal. We were gonna be fit. We were gonna go to the CrossFit games. We were gonna, you know, do all these things and all centered around physical athleticism.

And it was we were tight. That was where we liked to go. We wanted to go to the gym and hang out. We wanted to go, another community. I was my volleyball community and my softball community.

I we would travel, like, to tournaments and eat together and stinky because stinky and sweaty together, and we just loved it. Right? Well, the church community should be our number one community. And and what does that mean? That means we’re side by side.

We’re sweating on the court together. You know? We are, we are, we’re praying fervently over people together. It’s like we’re, we have a recognition of the warfare that we’re in and that we need to be tightly knit together. We need to be forgiving each other.

We need to be forbearing each other. And we we all have stinky habits. You know, some people’s b o stinks worse than others. Right? And we have to we have to come to grips with the fact that we are a family and we will not we will not leave anyone behind.

Right? Right. And, and and that what that does is that unfetters the holy spirit and that allows us to have that truth that that flows on the wings of love. Right? I mean, when we go places, we can’t keep Jesus a secret because he’s the first thing people see.

You know? The first thing people should see is our peace. Right? Our love. And and that comes from Christ, mom.

Lynn McLarty: I was thinking too, and we can’t commit I mean, just think about army unit out on the field in Afghanistan or some place. What if one of those guys offends the other one, and he says, well, I’m going home.

John McLarty: Right.

Lynn McLarty: I’m leaving this unit. Right. Well, man, if he was the gunner and he just decides he’s gonna quit, just think about the big hole that leaves

Kimberly Faith: The fallout.

Lynn McLarty: The fallout for that whole unit now is lacking this gunner. Right? So, you know, when we’re in a a group or a family, just say a family.

John McLarty: Mhmm.

Lynn McLarty: I mean and one of our kids just goes crazy. Well, they’re still part of your family. You know? You still gotta support them. You still gotta love them, and you gotta be a unit.

You can’t just leave Right. And go your own way. I mean, that’s like, what if what if me as a mother just decided, well, I’m I’m just gonna I’m gonna go shopping. It’s time for dinner, and and, well, good luck, family. I’m I’m leaving.

I’m going

John McLarty: That would be disastrous. Yeah.

Lynn McLarty: You can’t experience that with dad, making oatmeal.

Kimberly Faith: Well, and I think I think this is a really great, a great way to kinda wrap up today because what we’ve been talking about is some very basics that if if we’ll just apply these, we can we can live the abundant life. And as a unit, not just as individuals, but it’s

Lynn McLarty: As a unit.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. As a unit, and then that unit has an effect on the neighborhood, on the community. You know, just like when when you go in as a peacekeeper in a in a in a place where there’s war, you’re gonna have an effect on those villages. Right? That’s that’s what we’re supposed to be doing as part of our abundant life.

And so, this is a great foundation. I appreciate both of you and what you’ve shared today, because the next sequence of of podcasts are actually going to be on a very foundational set of truths that Jesus taught us, in the Sermon on the Mount, and that is the beatitudes. I am gonna just introduce this by saying, it has been one of the most pivotal growth factors in my life to study the beatitudes of Jesus, and, and what he what he is telling us need to be our be attitudes. The attitudes for us as Christians that should be manifested in us as as kingdom citizens. So, anything y’all wanna add?

We’re kind of get a little bit long here. That’s okay. But anything y’all wanna add to wrap this up?

John McLarty: I’ll I’ll just add all these things, kind of all equate to our part of abiding in the vine. The prayer, the reading the word, the the being in the community of believers are getting us closer to Jesus. Mhmm. And that’s abiding in the vine out of John chapter 15. But we abide in him through these mechanisms directly to him in prayer and the word and then with the brethren, and that produces the fruitful life.

Yeah. And we’ve experienced that firsthand.

Kimberly Faith: Well, I think that’s a great way to end this podcast is is what with with that verse out of John. And I, why don’t you just read that to us, Ted, and we’ll

John McLarty: I will. It’s John 15:45. Abide in me and I in you as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine, no more can ye, except ye abide in me. I am the vine. Ye are the branches.

He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. For without me, you can do nothing.

Kimberly Faith: Well, that’s just wonderful. That is just wonderful. And and what a great way to segue into the attitudes that Jesus told us to develop in order to be kingdom citizens. Thank you both for joining us today, and, hope everyone enjoyed this episode. You have been listening to the Truth in Love podcast with your host, Kimberly Faith.

To discover more answers to the big questions in life, visit us atgofaithstrong.com. Hallelujah. You rescued me.