Latest / The Lila Rose Show / E88: How to Hear God’s Voice with Dan Burke

Transcript

E88: How to Hear God’s Voice with Dan Burke · The Lila Rose Show

• 0:00
  I do want to talk about discernment because it's like
• 0:02
  the number one question of someone who's trying to serve
• 0:05
  God. It's like, how do I know what is
• 0:06
  God's will for my life? Yeah, and it's always a tough
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  question we have in the New Testament, this idea that God is
• 0:12
  seeking to communicate to us, but that we need to have a
• 0:16
  framework through which we can determine, Is that me?
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  That's one source. Is it the demonic?
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  That's another source. Or is it the divine?
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  You have to tune your heart to His voice.
• 0:31
  Welcome back to the Lila Rose podcast.
• 0:33
  Today we're going to talk about how to discern what God's will
• 0:37
  is for your life, how to make decisions, and then how to
• 0:40
  navigate, yes, spiritual and sort of just emotions in
• 0:44
  decision making. Because I think so much of our
• 0:47
  life comes down to those pivotal moments of when we choose what
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  career to take, what school to go to, who to marry, if we get
• 0:54
  married, where to live, all of these big decisions.
• 0:57
  And for those of us who are people of faith, which is many
• 0:59
  of people who listen to this podcast, we want that to be and
• 1:02
  I think everyone wants that to be the right decision.
• 1:05
  We hope that it's God's will. So we're really, really blessed
• 1:09
  today to have on the podcast. Dan Burke.
• 1:11
  He is the author and editor of 17 books, former editor of a
• 1:15
  national newspaper. He's worked at a lot of great
• 1:17
  organizations. He founded his own.
• 1:19
  Now he runs the site. His organization, the Avila
• 1:21
  Institute runs the site, spiritualdirection.com.
• 1:24
  A lot of fascinating stuff there.
• 1:26
  But my my favorite book that Dan has written that I've read that
• 1:29
  I love is called Spiritual Warfare and the Discernment of
• 1:32
  Spirits. I've given this book away to
• 1:33
  several different people and it really goes into the heart of
• 1:37
  decision making and navigating the spiritual life.
• 1:39
  So we're going to get into that with Dan.
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  And we're also going to hear a little bit about Dan's
• 1:43
  background, which is really fascinating as well.
• 1:45
  And his personal story was. So without further ado, Dan
• 1:48
  Burke, welcome to the podcast. And Lala, it's great to be with
• 1:53
  you. I've been an admirer of your
• 1:54
  work for a long time and we've crossed paths, I think 1 to
• 1:58
  Napa, maybe. But yeah, it's great to be on.
• 2:01
  We have, we have, I think, a handful of mutual friends and
• 2:04
  all for the good of the Kingdom. So it's it's a joy to be with
• 2:07
  you. Thank you.
• 2:08
  Thanks for making the time. So I want to start with your
• 2:11
  background and your story. The first few chapters or was
• 2:15
  the 1st chapter of your spiritual discernment book, I
• 2:18
  just cried because it was so moving as you shared some of
• 2:22
  your personal story. But I'd love to hear, I'd love
• 2:25
  for people to kind of know where you're coming from as you've
• 2:28
  gotten to become really an expert in discernment and the
• 2:31
  spiritual life. Yes.
• 2:34
  So I'm Jewish by birth and converted to Catholicism and
• 2:40
  Christianity some time ago, but still Jewish, Hebrew, Catholic,
• 2:46
  I guess. But we were a nominally
• 2:49
  religious family, even though that is very much my identity.
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  But my mother dabbled in the the occults.
• 2:56
  And sometimes when you call into the darkness, nothing comes.
• 2:59
  And unfortunately sometimes something does come.
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  And in our home it did. And it really was a terrifying
• 3:08
  reality. I mean, there was also abuse
• 3:11
  just on a human level, I'm sure aided by the spiritual.
• 3:15
  My stepfather, you know, fired a gun in our home, beat my mother
• 3:18
  into the emergency room, terrorized this kid.
• 3:21
  So there was this combination of a cult issues, practices and
• 3:26
  really to honor my mom, she was just doing what she she was just
• 3:33
  looking for answers. You know, a lot of people do
• 3:36
  that, look into the wrong places when they're suffering.
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  And her mother attempted to kill her father, her and then her
• 3:47
  mother was institutionalized when she was a teenager.
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  So so my mom ended up being mom as a teenager to other two other
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  siblings. Dad was a Barber, you know,
• 3:57
  World War 2 vet. So just, you know, she grew up
• 4:00
  in a tough situation and then when I was born, my my older
• 4:05
  brother didn't make it into this world and then I was born and
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  then she had cancer. So just, and I was born very
• 4:13
  sick without hearing and, and severe lung disease And just so
• 4:19
  so she's just rattled with life and looks to the occult.
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  So she went to, you know, you're just your typical astrologers,
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  palm readers, Seon sort of stuff.
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  And something came and it was in it, in it.
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  It's it's it's extremely difficult to talk about.
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  I've only written and talked about it a very little bit
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  because it's so hard to explain. I mean, it's, it's like stuff
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  out of movies, you know, like the movie Poltergeist.
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  If you remember that one split, split.
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  It's, it's sort of happened a long time ago, but it's just,
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  there is a spiritual reality out there.
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  And, and unfortunately, when people call and, and it happens,
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  it really creates A profoundly frightening environment,
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  especially for a young boy who's living in the midst of all that
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  other chaos and, and then dealing with the, the demonic
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  element. So you don't.
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  Mind me asking before I want to, I want to hear, I want to hear
• 5:31
  obviously the, the, the becoming Christian thing.
• 5:34
  It's so incredible. But when you mention, you know,
• 5:37
  you're this little boy living in this abusive household, your
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  mother is really struggling. It's really tough.
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  And you mentioned, you know, there's this now really a portal
• 5:45
  to the demonic world that's opened up in your own home.
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  And it was very scary for you. Can you share more about what
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  that looked like? You know, I don't know, you used
• 5:57
  the word portal, which is interesting because that that
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  isn't in a sense, what it was. You know, it's just so
• 6:06
  difficult. Lila, I what you see an
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  experience is like living in a dream, but you're awake and it's
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  during the daytime and you're seeing and hearing voices and
• 6:16
  you're seeing demonic activity and you just like I had.
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  No, I now, because I'm involved with exorcism deliverance
• 6:27
  ministry and we have an exorcist that works for our organization
• 6:33
  and I've lived it, you know, from that angle, it's sort of
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  interpreting backwards into what I was seeing as a young boy and
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  knowing I'm saying, of course, right?
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  And knowing I was saying then it's still even difficult.
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  It was just like living like if you think of your nightmares
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  that you have, but I had them in the daytime and, and experienced
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  that kind of darkness and while I was awake and, and, and how to
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  explain it. It's, it's, it's just, you know,
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  I guess I could bring the, I should probably think of movies
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  and scenes or something. But when a demonic entity is
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  invited in and it does respond and it's allowed to respond or
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  more, I don't even know if there were more than more than one.
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  Their whole modus operandi is to control you and to get you to
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  separate from God and separate from one another and move you to
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  despair and move you into the dark, draw you into the darkness
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  so that then you can be manipulated.
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  And, and that was just my battle as a young, as a boy.
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  It, it was just, it was terrifying.
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  I had the scene you referenced. Well, one of the scenes you
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  referenced was one time during the day, I was seeing and
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  hearing those things, whatever they were, the demonic things.
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  And, and, and, you know, I had no emotional capacity to deal
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  with it. It was just terror on a level,
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  you know, you think of on a scale of 1 to 10.
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  It's off the scale. How?
• 8:14
  Old were you? And I was probably was, was
• 8:19
  before junior high, so, you know, probably 9 or so 8-9 years
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  old. And so I did something really
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  irrational, which sounds strange, but I just tried to
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  bury myself in the couch and put my head in the couch.
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  And but I was crying off, you know, I was just scared out of
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  my wits, 'cause you like, you can't run to a location to
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  escape that. So, you know, so then when, when
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  my mom got home, you know, she just found me hysterical and,
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  and just proceeded to hit me. And, and I guess, you know, a
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  more most positive explanation of that is to sort of, you know,
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  you slap somebody out of their, their kind of strange delusion
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  or whatever was going on. But it really didn't work out
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  that way, you know, So, yeah, it's as close as I can get.
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  I mean, I later on after I became a Christian, I actually
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  saw demonic entities, which I probably some of your honors
• 9:22
  just thinking that's just not to who claims that.
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  But you know, I know an exorcist who actually can see them, which
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  is not a gift that all exorcists have.
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  And then of course, I've seen them manifest in and through
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  people who are possessed. So so, but I actually saw them
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  in a church setting and that drove me to get deliverance.
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  But that I'm sort of jumping back and forth.
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  So that's my best attempt without.
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  Yeah, it's, it's just very difficult.
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  Well, thank you for sharing. And you had in your book, I
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  remember just to kind of hear a little more about your
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  childhood, there was a scene as I remember it in, in your book,
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  where you talked about, I think it was, you know, experiencing
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  lovelessness, you know, not feeling wanted or loved.
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  And I think then you, you write later on about having that wound
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  healed as an adult as part of your conversion.
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  So I'd love to hear you share about that as much as you're
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  comfortable because I, I do think that is really powerful
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  and really encouraging because many people experience, you
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  know, varying degrees of wounds and from their childhood.
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  Yeah, yeah, certainly. And I did.
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  I mean, I heard I heard things, you know, spoken to me that
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  people who were caring for you shouldn't.
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  And, you know, some kids are more resilient than others.
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  I primed I'm a melancholic introvert.
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  And so everything amplifies that enters into my realm, you know,
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  especially when when you're a little bit less mature as a
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  child. And so, yeah, that that was
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  difficult. But so growing up in that
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  brought, brought me, of course, to despair by the time I was
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  19/18/19 and really came to the conclusion that there if I
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  couldn't find a reason for the suffering because I'd left home
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  and, and, and realized, well, leaving home to go away to
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  school didn't solve the problem. It because it, it stays with
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  you. All those wounds and just out of
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  desperation came to the conclusion that I was either
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  going to put a bullet in my head or find a reason and
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  interpreting backwards because, you know, through our, the lens
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  of our faith. Now, it was like the Holy Spirit
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  said to me, Well, you've seen you, you know, beyond the shadow
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  of a doubt, the spiritual world exists.
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  Look there, it's not just all darkness, you know, so so that's
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  where I began to look and, and started to and I began where my
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  mother's, you know, bookcase led me initially, which was
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  unfortunately in the new age movement and a lot of things
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  like Edgar Cayce and, you know, these so-called prophets.
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  And, and but quickly I realized as I was a voracious reader,
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  that the rationally, all the claims that, you know, all roads
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  sort of lead to the same place. And, you know, all these great
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  people who have influenced the world spiritually, like, you
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  know, Buddha or Gandhi or, you know, Lao Tzu or whatever,
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  these, these Eastern religions or Jesus, you know, among them,
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  as they described him, we're, we're all to be revered.
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  And they all just, you should just lean in and figure out
• 12:46
  which one works best for you. Just was, you know, profoundly
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  irrational to me, because if you go an inch deep into any of the
• 12:52
  major religions, their claims about who we are as human,
• 12:57
  humans, who is God or, or the, any conceptions of God's, what
• 13:03
  it means to be in, in a kind of a pathway to salvation, whatever
• 13:09
  that looks like, if it's Nirvana or, or just, or mindfulness or,
• 13:14
  you know, or total detachment, whatever the they were, they're
• 13:17
  all different. And so I'm looking at it
• 13:20
  thinking, well, this is sort of a ridiculous potpourri of ideas
• 13:25
  that people try to manufacture into some kind of commonality.
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  And I, it just didn't seem true. And so in that process, of
• 13:34
  course, I stumbled into the claims of Jesus and, you know,
• 13:40
  and, and ultimately came to believe in those.
• 13:42
  I can share more about that journey in detail, but I want to
• 13:45
  I want to go wherever you want to go.
• 13:47
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• 13:55
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• 13:58
  prayer app. It's got a great simple
• 14:00
  interface and it's something that I've actually been using
• 14:02
  over the last two years because it's so simple and easy to use.
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• 14:10
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• 14:16
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• 14:19
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• 14:31
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  You can put in your headphones. It's a great way to just
• 14:36
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• 14:39
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• 14:43
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• 14:45
  I think you're going to enjoy it and join me and many others on
• 14:48
  the app who are praying with it every day to deepen their walk
• 14:52
  with God. Well, and you have shared in
• 14:56
  different books and obviously you're speaking and stuff that
• 14:58
  there's many steps on your journey for folks listening.
• 15:01
  You know, you you're Catholic, you were, I think evangelical.
• 15:04
  You mentioned before that new age.
• 15:06
  Give us the Cliff notes on, you know, that progression because I
• 15:10
  think the bottom line there is you have experienced a lot of
• 15:13
  spirituality and you understand, I think the spirituality of a
• 15:17
  lot of different kinds of Christians.
• 15:20
  Yeah, so when I came to that point of despair and, and that
• 15:27
  just, you know, it was essentially a crying out to God,
• 15:30
  it occurred in that context. I mean, I remember I was on the
• 15:34
  corner of Thunderbird and 19th St. in Phoenix, AZ at the
• 15:38
  apartments where where I lived and, and just said, Lord or God,
• 15:42
  if you're there, whatever I said, you've got to help me
• 15:45
  because I am, I'm dying and I, I, I need answers and can't,
• 15:50
  can't, can't live with this, you know, drinking myself to sleep
• 15:53
  at that time or trying it actually doesn't work case
• 15:56
  anybody is wondering. And and he began to send people
• 16:01
  into my life to bear witness to me of his existence.
• 16:05
  And, and one of them was a evangelical Christian.
• 16:09
  He was played a 12 string guitar, worked with me at Pizza
• 16:15
  Hut when I was going to school there.
• 16:17
  And he was a special guy. I mean, he had a real
• 16:20
  conversion. He was a cocaine addict prior
• 16:23
  and he told me it's, you know, shared with me.
• 16:26
  Ultimately, he ultimately befriended me, which was not a
• 16:29
  good easy thing to do because at that time I was still in this
• 16:33
  phase of people hurt really bad. And so the best thing to do with
• 16:37
  people is to keep a distance. And so, as you would imagine, my
• 16:41
  affect was sufficiently defensive and and not friendly,
• 16:47
  but the love of Christ in him really helped him to overcome
• 16:52
  whatever, you know, my my issues were.
• 16:56
  And he you know, he would get his work done and help me.
• 16:58
  And initially with the funny part was I, I thought he was
• 17:02
  hitting on me because I, I couldn't figure out a reason
• 17:05
  anyone that would be nice to me in general.
• 17:08
  And, and like, for no reason, right?
• 17:10
  There's, I didn't have anything to offer him.
• 17:13
  So I took him out back and threatened his life.
• 17:15
  And, and he told me that at least I, I, I, I of course
• 17:20
  wouldn't do that sort of thing today, but that's where I was
• 17:23
  then. And I just, he just said, well,
• 17:25
  look, I'm a Christian. I, I, this is, we're supposed to
• 17:28
  be nice. And I, you know, he, he, he, he
• 17:30
  was pretty excited and had his hands up like in a defense
• 17:34
  posture that I don't remember exactly what I said to him.
• 17:38
  So you, so you. Actually threatened his life you
• 17:41
  were you were a tough idea so so had you done that to someone
• 17:46
  before I mean was that was that like a thing you know I.
• 17:50
  Grew up, I grew up in a pretty tough situation.
• 17:54
  I'd never, I and I did have an anger problem and I had, yeah, I
• 17:59
  had, I had done things that were stupid like that.
• 18:03
  So that was not outside of my, my, my normal behavior,
• 18:06
  unfortunately. But thankfully, you know, he
• 18:10
  said, look, I'm this, we're supposed to be nice.
• 18:12
  I remember him saying that, which was kind of funny in
• 18:14
  retrospect. And, and then he told me about
• 18:19
  that. It sort of morphed into, you
• 18:22
  know, him like sharing his motivation, which was, look, I'm
• 18:26
  just, you know, I've been saved by grace.
• 18:29
  I, the Lord has helped me and I'm, that's what I'm about.
• 18:33
  And I'd love to tell you about it.
• 18:35
  And another funny moment was he, he said, he said, you know, he
• 18:41
  saw me responding. Well, I sort of calmed down and,
• 18:45
  and he, so eventually he invited me to like do a Bible study with
• 18:49
  him. And it gives you a little more
• 18:52
  picture where my head is at, you know, he says, so I said, well,
• 18:55
  what is that like? And he said, well, we get
• 18:57
  together and we read the Bible and we talked about our, our
• 19:00
  feelings about it. And I'm like, wow, that is
• 19:03
  really gay. There is no way I'm doing that
• 19:05
  with a dude. You know, I said, I said, so I
• 19:09
  said, look, if you want to go out in the desert shooting or
• 19:12
  you want to go do something, you know, I'm cool with that.
• 19:15
  But I am not sitting around with some other dude talking about my
• 19:19
  feelings in the Bible. And so, you know, God be
• 19:25
  praised, you know, he, he, he, he became a friend and and he
• 19:29
  was a he was a comfort to me, tried to take me to church.
• 19:34
  But given what I was giving off, I think I don't really know.
• 19:40
  I don't know what I was like to other people.
• 19:41
  But when I when I went one time, I was like in and out because I
• 19:46
  got I remember it. It sort of reminds me of of a
• 19:50
  guy I met at my parish one time who had a ball.
• 19:53
  It was bald, he had a goatee, huge tattoos, dressed like a
• 19:57
  biker. He looked very dangerous.
• 20:00
  And I saw him going up for communion and I thought he
• 20:03
  looked like a Skinhead. Well, I later discovered he
• 20:06
  worked for the he worked for ATF, alcohol, tobacco and
• 20:11
  firearms and he and he and he impersonated skin and
• 20:16
  infiltrated Skinhead gang. So he looked really
• 20:20
  uncomfortable to be around. And I, and I, so I'm thinking
• 20:23
  probably something like that happened to me in the church I
• 20:26
  went to 'cause people were looking at me like at least it
• 20:29
  felt like they were looking at me like, what are you doing
• 20:31
  here? Why, you know, you don't belong
• 20:33
  here. And so I left even before like
• 20:37
  figuring out what Christians do in a service, you know, so, but
• 20:44
  he had a lasting effect on me as as did a number of others that
• 20:48
  God sent my way. But eventually, you know, I
• 20:52
  started listening to evangelical radio because he was one of
• 20:54
  those. And it was interesting to me.
• 20:57
  Moved back to California and listened to one guy, Bible
• 21:02
  answer man on evangelical radio who I really liked because he's
• 21:06
  kind of a jerk. And he, he was sort of, he
• 21:09
  thought and talked, talked like me, but without certain
• 21:12
  language. And in the sense that he was
• 21:15
  very honest about his views. And he would say, this is what
• 21:19
  this scripture passage says, this is what these three schools
• 21:23
  think of it. And this is my view.
• 21:26
  And I just liked his, you know, the way I, I just felt like he
• 21:30
  was very direct and clear. So he, he let it slip he was a
• 21:33
  Southern Baptist. So I decided, well, what the
• 21:35
  heck? I mean, I guess they're all
• 21:37
  good. Southern Baptists are good
• 21:39
  because I didn't know anything. So I just looked in the white
• 21:42
  pages. I don't know if you're, you even
• 21:44
  know what that is given your age, but it's, it's, it's, it
• 21:48
  used to be a huge book that had all the addresses and name, you
• 21:51
  know, it's like what we have on the Internet now.
• 21:54
  And I triangulated the closest Southern Baptist church and I
• 21:58
  went and sat in the back on the left hand side to be Incognito
• 22:02
  because I had no clue what happened in a Christian service.
• 22:06
  I'd been in synagogue when I was a kid, but I didn't know there
• 22:10
  was any relationship, you know, similarities between the two.
• 22:12
  So sat in the back and then unfortunately, well, fortunately
• 22:17
  for me, this was a front row back Baptist Church, not a back
• 22:20
  row Baptist Church. So in this case, the 55 pews
• 22:24
  across the whole front filled up.
• 22:26
  Somehow the pastor had convinced people to do that.
• 22:29
  Then there's about 20 empty pews and me all Incognito, hiding out
• 22:34
  just and all by myself, as glaring as a, you know, sore
• 22:38
  thumb. And so the pastor who saw that
• 22:42
  and he pounced on me after the service and he said, what are
• 22:46
  you going to? This is a great question, by the
• 22:48
  way, that every that Protestants ask, that every Catholic should
• 22:52
  ask and know. But he said, what are you going
• 22:55
  to do when God, when you get to your judgement and God asks why
• 22:59
  I should let you in? What are you going to say?
• 23:03
  Yeah. And I said, I'll just tell you
• 23:07
  exactly what I said. So forgive me for those spicy
• 23:10
  language, but I said, I don't know what the hell you're
• 23:12
  talking about, but I said, I'm dying inside.
• 23:24
  And I said, but if you have answers and you think you can
• 23:27
  help me, then I will listen. And so it's it's, it's funny how
• 23:34
  the emotion never goes away. So by God's mercy, this guy was
• 23:40
  serious, you know, and so me and my cousin, we're living
• 23:44
  together, we're working construction for my dad's
• 23:46
  company. And so he said, well, I can come
• 23:49
  over to your and walk what walk and answer all your questions.
• 23:54
  So he did for a year, every Thursday night, me and Mike and
• 23:59
  and Pastor Lass was his name. We went through evidence demands
• 24:04
  A verdict, which is a, which was the perfect book for me.
• 24:08
  It's, it's a, a look at the evidences for the veracity of
• 24:13
  Scripture, Old and New Testament based on a legal standard of
• 24:19
  beyond a reasonable doubt. And so we looked at the
• 24:22
  archaeology, the internal consistency, the, the claims of
• 24:27
  the authors, you know, all of these different aspects, you
• 24:31
  know, comparing, you know, the veracity of Scripture with other
• 24:35
  ancient texts that are accepted to various levels like Plato and
• 24:41
  Aristotle and that sort of thing.
• 24:43
  And, and eventually I was convinced that the Bible at
• 24:47
  least was a reliable document, historically, at least the Old
• 24:52
  Testament was. And in particular, the the Dead
• 24:55
  Sea Scrolls played a big role in that and, and, and eventually in
• 24:58
  my conversion. But then then he said, well,
• 25:03
  let's look at the prophecies of the Messiah of the Old
• 25:05
  Testament. So for, for instance, in Isaiah,
• 25:08
  to whom he would be born, or in the Psalms, where he would be
• 25:14
  born, how he would be killed, all of these different aspects.
• 25:18
  And then comparing it to Jesus in the New Testament.
• 25:21
  And of course, you know, there's just nobody who really looks at
• 25:26
  all of that with open an open mind can walk away going yeah,
• 25:31
  there's I don't know how anyone would conclude based on just a
• 25:37
  rational examination of the evidence that that the the New
• 25:42
  Testament is true, that Jesus is who he claimed to be beyond a
• 25:46
  reasonable doubt. I just don't know how I couldn't
• 25:49
  escape the conclusion. I mean, CS Lewis helped me kind
• 25:53
  of put a a final nail in that coffin.
• 25:55
  And I'll, I'll pause here once I tell you this so you can steer
• 25:59
  me in where you want to go. But I read mere Christianity and
• 26:03
  he, he postulated that Jesus is either a lunatic because he
• 26:07
  believes he's God and he know, you know, and he's not.
• 26:10
  He's a liar because he's, he knows he's not, but he's, he's
• 26:14
  falsely claiming to be so, or he is who he said he was.
• 26:18
  And I will add when he said to the to the, you know, the Jewish
• 26:23
  leaders at the time before Abraham was I am, which caused
• 26:26
  them to tear their clothes and cry out blasphemy because he was
• 26:29
  claiming to be pre exist their fathers, you know, Abraham and,
• 26:36
  and he claimed to be that I am who I am, which was God meeting
• 26:42
  Moses in the burning Bush. And of course they knew there's
• 26:45
  no more powerful way to claim to be God.
• 26:48
  And so at that point I just said, OK, I'm you are God.
• 26:52
  I'm not Please help me, rescue me, set me free.
• 26:57
  I I'm, I'm lost and I need to be found.
• 26:59
  And you know you, you borne witness to me and these people
• 27:03
  you sent to me, I believe. And so I was baptized in Glen
• 27:08
  Memorial Baptist Church in Covina, CA a long time ago.
• 27:15
  It's a new year, so it's time for some new meat.
• 27:17
  Time to check out goodrangers.com, which is
• 27:20
  American meat delivered. You've heard me talk about it
• 27:22
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• 27:29
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• 27:34
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• 27:37
  In fact, they have a special where you get free annual supply
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  Their steaks are delicious. So if you're into steak, if
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• 27:58
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• 28:00
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  This is a pro-life, pro family company by the way.
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  The owners are amazing. They're great team over there.
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  lovegoodranchers.com and you can get $20 off and 2 lbs of free.
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• 28:17
  out and you Sign up today. So go to goodrangers.com and
• 28:21
  enjoy your American meat delivered.
• 28:23
  What's so awesome about your story, Dan?
• 28:25
  I know there's so much more to it.
• 28:27
  We could just do the whole episode on your story and
• 28:29
  there's so many elements to it. But you know, you were, you've
• 28:32
  been in so many difficult places.
• 28:36
  You know, I was a kid and then, you know, as a young adult, like
• 28:38
  you've been feeling suicidal, like you said earlier.
• 28:40
  And you know, you like when you hit rock bottom, you know, and
• 28:44
  then you rise up and you, you came to the faith.
• 28:47
  Now you're obviously doing this incredible mission work that
• 28:50
  you're doing now. I don't know, just everything
• 28:53
  that you say. I, when I read it anyways, I
• 28:55
  know other people I talked to about your work.
• 28:57
  It's just you, you feel that empathy and that understanding
• 29:00
  because you've been there, you've walked it.
• 29:04
  So, you know, I, there's so much I want to talk to you and I'm
• 29:06
  like, ah, there, we need like 3 hours.
• 29:08
  We're going to have to maybe do this again.
• 29:09
  But I do want to kind of talk about the discernment and stuff
• 29:13
  because that I think is on so many people's minds.
• 29:17
  And we have a lot of folks who listen to the podcast who are
• 29:20
  actively making decisions about their life.
• 29:22
  And it's always a question, how do I, how do I know what is
• 29:26
  God's will? So I want to start with that.
• 29:29
  You know, you've become a Christian, you eventually enter
• 29:31
  the Catholic Church, you were baptized Baptist, then you
• 29:34
  become Catholics. You've been on all sides and you
• 29:38
  know, you get this question. I know you run a
• 29:40
  spiritualdirection.com, but it's like the number one question of
• 29:44
  someone who's trying to serve God.
• 29:45
  It's like, what? How do I know what is God's will
• 29:47
  for my life in the decisions that I'm making?
• 29:52
  Yeah, and it's always a tough question, you know, because we
• 29:56
  do by God's mercy have this promise from Jesus himself where
• 29:59
  he says, I think it's in John 14.
• 30:02
  You know, my sheep hear my voice and they know me.
• 30:06
  So he also says in John 14 that when we live in this, this is
• 30:12
  my, this is what I would call a Dan slation.
• 30:14
  So I'm summarizing when we live in this up when this covenant of
• 30:17
  love with him, which means that we live according to the
• 30:20
  covenant that he will manifest himself to us and and he and the
• 30:26
  Father will come and abide with us so that he's promising the
• 30:31
  self revelation. He's promising that his voice is
• 30:35
  discernible and we can hear it. So how do we hear it?
• 30:38
  And, and if we were to ask, you know, one of the greatest
• 30:42
  spiritual masters that's ever lived, Saint John of the Cross,
• 30:46
  who's heralded as a Mystic by, you know, the folks, one of the
• 30:51
  greatest poets at the Spanish world, whether or not even
• 30:55
  people are religious, He's, he's revered.
• 30:58
  And his answer to the question is to, to know his voice.
• 31:02
  You got to get to know him. So he would say to, to study
• 31:06
  him, emulate him, love him. And it's similar to a
• 31:10
  relationship, you know, we're, we're both married.
• 31:14
  How do you know your spouse? How do you know who they really
• 31:17
  are? Like what do they, what do they
• 31:20
  and, and how do you really truly know what means the most to them
• 31:24
  and what do they mean by what they say to us?
• 31:27
  You know, it's can be a challenge.
• 31:31
  And the way you know is to spend time with them.
• 31:34
  Fundamentally, the, the most important secret to knowing the
• 31:38
  word of God, that knowing Jesus, knowing God is spending time
• 31:43
  with him in prayer and, and reading his words and, and
• 31:47
  meditating on his words and on his life so that you can, you
• 31:53
  can discern when you hear things which scripture reveals you, you
• 31:57
  will. Is this God talking or not?
• 32:01
  Or is it me? You know?
• 32:03
  So the, the voices in my head is often where we get to where
• 32:08
  we're praying in silence and we hear, Oh, you know, you should
• 32:11
  do this thing or that thing or think about this or that.
• 32:14
  People say, well, how do I know if it's a God's voice or my
• 32:17
  voice? Well, the answer is you, you
• 32:19
  have to tune your heart to his voice, right?
• 32:24
  I think foundationally it's also important to know what is
• 32:28
  revealed in the New Testament with, you know, like in first
• 32:31
  Timothy 14, Saint Paul talks about deceiving spirits in his
• 32:39
  work. In Second Corinthians, he talks
• 32:41
  about the devil masquerading as an Angel of light.
• 32:44
  And Thessalonians, he says, test all things, hold fast to that
• 32:48
  which is true. And then we have the apostle
• 32:49
  John and his epistle, first one first epistle, he says don't
• 32:55
  believe every spirit. So we have in the New Testament
• 32:59
  this idea that God is seeking to communicate to us, but that we
• 33:05
  need to have a framework through which we can determine is that
• 33:10
  me? That's one source.
• 33:12
  Is it the demonic? That's another source.
• 33:14
  Or is it the divine, which is another source.
• 33:18
  And the New Testament is very clear that we have, we can hear,
• 33:23
  but we have to, we have to discern which is which.
• 33:28
  OK, so how do you discern which is which?
• 33:30
  You're praying or you're you're you're just kind of like driving
• 33:34
  in your car and you have this thought or inspiration.
• 33:37
  Maybe it's something like kind of scary or negative sounding.
• 33:40
  It's like a warning, like you're going to crash your car.
• 33:43
  This happened to me before, by the way, and I didn't crash my
• 33:45
  car. And it was more like my
• 33:47
  imagination because I'm very imaginative.
• 33:49
  But you know, there's people who said, oh, a guardian Angel, you
• 33:52
  know, God told me I was going to crash my car.
• 33:54
  And so I had, I moved lanes and it saved my life, you know.
• 33:57
  So what? What are some of the ground
• 34:00
  rules for discerning voices or ideas that come to 1's mind?
• 34:07
  Yeah, a good shortcut, which those aren't always good in this
• 34:11
  context, but a good shortcut is, is, is the when you look at the
• 34:15
  fruits of the Holy Spirit in the New Testament, which are
• 34:18
  Lovejoy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, gentleness
• 34:21
  and self-control. So when you hear a voice, if,
• 34:26
  if, what does it convey to you fundamentally?
• 34:30
  Does it convey those things? So, but there's a qualifier.
• 34:35
  So let me back up and say the way that the good spirits and
• 34:40
  the language of the New Testament is also carried out
• 34:43
  through the followers of Jesus in and outside of the Catholic
• 34:48
  Church. But what I'm going to shift to
• 34:50
  is Ignatius of Loyola, who really became probably the, the
• 34:55
  most widely known disciple of Jesus in the Catholic realm
• 35:01
  because he helped us to understand how to live what the
• 35:06
  New Testament reveals, right? So he's, he, he discovered
• 35:10
  through his prayer and, and helping people in the faith that
• 35:16
  there were two kinds of people and, and that the good spirits
• 35:20
  and the bad spirits communicated two kinds of ways to those two
• 35:23
  kinds of people. So the first set of people are
• 35:26
  people who are going from mortal sin to mortal sin.
• 35:30
  And for Protestant or evangelicals who are listening,
• 35:33
  he gets that language from the epistles of John.
• 35:36
  You know, sin unto death or not. John distinguishes between sin
• 35:40
  unto death or other kinds of sin.
• 35:42
  So in the Catholic realm that's called mortal or venial sin.
• 35:46
  That's how we categorize those. And so he, he, he, he reveals
• 35:50
  that when somebody's going from mortal sin to mortal sin,
• 35:53
  meaning very serious sin to very serious sin and over and over.
• 35:58
  So let's say it's adultery just doesn't mean it's, or porn.
• 36:01
  It's the, you know, those are the easiest ones the most.
• 36:04
  They plague most young people today.
• 36:06
  When you're in those contexts, the the bad spirit will try to
• 36:13
  entice you with ideas and feelings that mimic piece
• 36:22
  related to doing the sin again. So this so you so essentially
• 36:26
  they try to give you this false piece about the sin.
• 36:30
  Now you might say well how does that work with porn?
• 36:33
  Maybe a better example is 2 young people living together who
• 36:37
  aren't married. And So what is what happens in
• 36:41
  the context of that relationship?
• 36:43
  Well, there are, there are sexual things that happen.
• 36:46
  There's relational things that happen that may that give each
• 36:50
  person some measure of comfort on a temporal level that fills
• 36:57
  the memory and that affects the emotions.
• 36:59
  And so the bad spirit will play on that and then try to elicit
• 37:04
  this, do this again. Stay committed in this
• 37:07
  relationship. You don't need to worry about
• 37:10
  marriage. Isn't it?
• 37:10
  Doesn't it feel good? Don't you remember this instance
• 37:14
  and how it made you feel good? And so it gives you this false
• 37:16
  peace. And then the the good spirits,
• 37:19
  this is God working is constantly saying to you, you
• 37:22
  know, so you might say to the man, she's not your wife.
• 37:27
  You know, you were brought up in a Christian home.
• 37:30
  You know what's right and you don't know that she's not
• 37:34
  somebody else's wife. And by the way, she's she's a
• 37:37
  daughter of the king. I made her for a different kind
• 37:40
  of life. And you are perpetuating this
• 37:43
  and you're taking advantage of her and you won't you know,
• 37:47
  you're not committing to her to marry her.
• 37:49
  So that's the bad. The good spirit is making you
• 37:51
  feel bad of he's he's pricking and biting your conscience.
• 37:56
  He's making you uncomfortable. So this kind of blows up a a
• 37:59
  common myth that is really often unfortunately given to people
• 38:06
  are bad advice, which is if you feel peace, it's God's will.
• 38:10
  No, no, no, it might be, but that, but that has to be
• 38:14
  discerned within a broader context.
• 38:16
  So if somebody came to me and said, well, I feel peace because
• 38:20
  no, we're not married. You know, I love her and she
• 38:24
  loves me and I feel it all feels great.
• 38:26
  And I feel, you know, if I feel like we don't need a marriage
• 38:29
  contract, well, you know, if I, you know, it's easy to discern
• 38:35
  that person's being deceived by the bad spirit.
• 38:38
  And I could easily ask them questions to, to reveal why in
• 38:41
  my, I would ask them a question like, well, do you ever feel
• 38:44
  guilty? And if they're honest, they're
• 38:46
  going to say, yes, I do. Well, tell me about how often,
• 38:50
  how long does your peace last? And they would tell me it
• 38:54
  doesn't last very long. I have to be back with the
• 38:57
  person which you see, there's this dependent relationship
• 39:01
  that's unhealthy. And so it's easy to discern, OK,
• 39:04
  they're in the first rule, which is Ignatius said that where the,
• 39:08
  the bad spirit brings a false peace, the good spirit pricks
• 39:12
  and bites the conscience to bring discomfort.
• 39:14
  So that's, that's one scenario. So I'll quickly give you the
• 39:17
  second category of people and then you can take this where you
• 39:20
  like The second category people are people going intensely from
• 39:24
  good to better. These are people who've said,
• 39:26
  you know, I know, I know what's right.
• 39:29
  I may not be in the best place now, but I'm going to run after
• 39:32
  God now and I'm going to give my life to him and whatever he
• 39:35
  says, I'm going to define as good or bad.
• 39:38
  And, and then the then the then the behavior shifts.
• 39:43
  So then the bad spirit and that person is going to try to
• 39:45
  dissuade them through what is called desolation, which is this
• 39:50
  depressing in and darkness that brings about doubt, despair and
• 39:55
  narcissism. Just, you know, darkness of
• 39:58
  soul. There's many ways that Ignatius,
• 40:00
  you know, describe this that I could give you.
• 40:02
  But and then the good spirit's going to say no, but you're
• 40:06
  making the right decision. The good is is in on God's path
• 40:12
  and you should do that. And I'll I have a curiosity.
• 40:14
  Can I ask you a question? Of course.
• 40:20
  So when you were doing when you were doing investigative work to
• 40:26
  reveal the craziness going on in the the abortion industry, did
• 40:31
  you ever feel as you were moving into it, though, you were deeply
• 40:37
  convicted about the rightness of what you were doing, a kind of
• 40:40
  oppression and darkness that tried to dissuade you from doing
• 40:44
  that good that you were doing? Did you ever experience that?
• 40:47
  Yeah, I mean, there is definitely kind of like a heart
• 40:51
  sickness level to a lot of it because it just felt very dark.
• 40:56
  I did feel very confident that it was the right thing to do at
• 41:00
  the time because there were some folks who came along my way that
• 41:03
  said, you know, it's immoral to represent yourself as someone
• 41:06
  you're not in this context. But I never felt a guilt or
• 41:09
  shame or like on a spiritual level, a question that I was
• 41:13
  doing something immoral in that sense.
• 41:15
  It was certainly like oppressive and dark and I didn't enjoy it,
• 41:20
  you know, but it was, you know, it was a, it felt that I was
• 41:26
  doing the right thing for the sake of, you know, trying to
• 41:29
  follow God, obviously, and then trying to help people that were
• 41:33
  in danger. Yes, I'm AI was 100% certain of
• 41:37
  what you were going to answer and and and you did and the
• 41:40
  reason is is because you were a person going from good to
• 41:42
  better. You're living a life of faith
• 41:45
  and the and though convicted about a good thing, the enemy
• 41:49
  wants to dissuade you and so he's going to press in as much
• 41:52
  of that darkness as he can to try to dissuade you.
• 41:55
  And that's just you can ask just about any priest who's ever
• 41:59
  been, you know, willing to share what happened before their
• 42:02
  ordination, you know, all or maybe even when you decided to
• 42:06
  start this podcast, you know, which is also a good thing.
• 42:09
  Like, did you feel like, what can I really do this?
• 42:12
  And the enemies you know, probably saying, you know, who
• 42:15
  are you to do this and who wants to listen to you or whatever or.
• 42:18
  When we get when I got married because like the podcast Getting
• 42:22
  married, obviously those are two different kinds of things.
• 42:24
  The getting married is like so vocational, but this is
• 42:27
  vocational work too. But there was, there's, and then
• 42:29
  there's the time to like self absorption, like, well, I don't
• 42:32
  like how I, how it appears and putting yourself out there so
• 42:35
  uncomfortable and you get, you get all wrapped up and like
• 42:37
  yourself, right? And you're like, that's not why
• 42:39
  I'm doing this. Like, you know, it's, it's OK if
• 42:42
  you don't look perfect. It's OK if he's messed up
• 42:44
  because you're doing this for, you know, Dan Burke being on
• 42:47
  your show to talk about this stuff and you know, bring these
• 42:49
  things up again and again. And you know, you worry about
• 42:52
  the impact and this and that, but it's like that doesn't
• 42:54
  matter. You're, you're doing a faithful
• 42:55
  thing. You're trying to be faithful
• 42:56
  with it. And I remember getting married
• 42:58
  too. Like there were a lot of
• 43:00
  curveballs that just kind of shook your sort of emotional,
• 43:04
  psychological level of like, is this, you know, I don't want we
• 43:08
  don't have to get in all the gory details, but like the wet
• 43:10
  feet syndrome of like this decision and these imaginations
• 43:14
  of other things. But then at the core, it was the
• 43:17
  piece of like, no, this is something not irresistible
• 43:21
  because I mean, I was deeply in love with my husband, but it was
• 43:23
  like this very core feeling of I want to do this at a very deep
• 43:29
  level. I feel that God is with me in
• 43:31
  this, even though there's turbulence at this, like on this
• 43:35
  like more superficial level, on the the deepest level there is a
• 43:39
  anchor and that's, you know, where you stay the course.
• 43:44
  So let's dissect it a little bit in terms of now we're.
• 43:47
  In a spiritual direction session, which is great.
• 43:53
  But it's, it's good, it's, it's good to help people like get the
• 43:55
  real thing. So what, what was going on with
• 43:58
  you? So in, in 2nd Corinthians 10, it
• 44:00
  says that though we, we live in the world, we not, we're not,
• 44:04
  we're not carrying on a worldly war.
• 44:06
  So we're in a war. And then he says the weapons of
• 44:08
  our warfare are not worldly, but have divine power.
• 44:12
  So we're in a war, we have weapons, we have divine power to
• 44:15
  destroy strongholds. What are those?
• 44:19
  We just, he goes on to say we destroy arguments and every
• 44:22
  proud of obstacle to the knowledge of God and take every
• 44:25
  thought captive to the obedience of Christ.
• 44:27
  So what's what's going on in these moments?
• 44:29
  Well, there's a war and the war is between you and the enemy of
• 44:35
  God who hates you because God loves you and he wants to wreck
• 44:40
  you to get back at God, right? And so he doesn't want you to do
• 44:44
  anything that advances your, your, your calling, your
• 44:50
  ultimate fulfillment in him and all of that.
• 44:53
  So you're whether you're heading toward marriage or a podcast or
• 44:55
  any major decision, if you're going from good to better, the
• 44:59
  enemy is going to try to get you into the realm of doubt, despair
• 45:03
  and narcissism. Any, any, any form of those
• 45:07
  three, which are the opposites of faith, hope and love.
• 45:09
  Some people think the opposite of love is hate, but it's really
• 45:12
  it's narcissism because love is meant to be given to the other
• 45:16
  and it's when it's turned on itself, it, it becomes
• 45:18
  narcissistic. So, so you know, you described
• 45:22
  doubt, not doubt of your love for your husband, but just as
• 45:28
  kind of a prop. It was probably a very vague
• 45:30
  notion that caused anxiety or maybe that about the podcaster
• 45:34
  or, or how you appear or you know, all of these sorts of
• 45:37
  things. That's for someone going to get
• 45:39
  to better. The enemy is is going to always
• 45:42
  look to. So those those elements of
• 45:47
  discontent. So Ignatius uses words like
• 45:50
  disturbed, disquieted, agitated, tempted, unconfident, hopeless,
• 45:55
  lazily tepid, sat alone and separated.
• 45:58
  Those are the words that he uses.
• 46:00
  And of course, all of the synonyms of those words, they
• 46:04
  all roll up to doubt, despair, and narcissism.
• 46:07
  What is the good spirit looking to do to you in those moments to
• 46:10
  say to you, no, Lila, you know, I, I, I'm sure you heard
• 46:13
  something like this, Lila, look at what the Lord has already
• 46:16
  done with you. And, and if you can achieve
• 46:19
  this, like a podcast is going to be easy.
• 46:22
  You know, you fought these battles, you're going to be
• 46:24
  fine. Or Lila, like when I wrote my
• 46:27
  last, well, not my last book time book before last was devil
• 46:31
  in the castle. The voice was, was, you know, I
• 46:36
  know you don't like writing, but because I don't.
• 46:40
  But imagine how many people are going to be impacted and, and,
• 46:45
  and really brought to freedom when they understand the great
• 46:48
  wisdom of Teresa of Avila and the progress of the soul.
• 46:51
  And think about those, you know, the effect of all your other
• 46:54
  books. You know, all my books sell very
• 46:57
  well. You know, so this good spirit is
• 46:59
  saying, you know, look, look to God's plan, God's fruit in you
• 47:07
  and I'm going to be with you and the Lord's going to help you.
• 47:09
  And so, but we have to do what that passage says in the
• 47:13
  Corinthians. It's we have divine power.
• 47:16
  We have, we, we have to become aware of our thoughts and then
• 47:21
  we have to decide what to do about it.
• 47:25
  And we either embrace the thought, which means we, we
• 47:29
  allow it to influence us, or we reject it.
• 47:32
  And in your case, with your marriage and with your podcast,
• 47:36
  you, you rejected the, the, the negative of the enemy and
• 47:41
  embrace the good that God was presenting before you.
• 47:45
  And then you, you fought through and, and you carried out with
• 47:49
  his will. And the fruits of both are, I
• 47:53
  have no doubt evident. I mean, I see you all over
• 47:56
  YouTube whenever I'm searching for this or that you're popping
• 47:59
  up. So you're making a difference.
• 48:00
  You're in the algorithm, you know, so it's evidence of God's,
• 48:03
  God's blessing. So that that's how that's how
• 48:07
  you learn the voice of God. And, and I think fundamentally a
• 48:12
  basic idea that we need to understand is from a negative
• 48:16
  standpoint, many of the thoughts in our heads are not or ours and
• 48:19
  we shouldn't listen to them. And that's usually very
• 48:22
  revolutionary for people because and and and more so for men,
• 48:27
  women than men, by the way, because women so more closely
• 48:32
  identify with their emotions than guys.
• 48:34
  Guys are tend to have to learn to connect with their emotions.
• 48:38
  Women are wired by God to be more receptive and naturally
• 48:43
  connected to their emotions. So women typically when they
• 48:46
  think I, I think I feel, I think I perceive, I feel I am, is a is
• 48:53
  1 one thing. And so that's the that's a real
• 49:00
  tough thing. Guys do it too, but it's just,
• 49:03
  you know, what I have to do with men usually is to make them more
• 49:06
  aware of actually what they're feeling back that into their
• 49:10
  thoughts and then connect those two for them and then have them
• 49:13
  realize they're being manipulated.
• 49:15
  But women, it's more of AI think I feel I am is one thing and and
• 49:19
  saying, well, actually, no, I think may not even be I it may
• 49:24
  not be that you may not be the source.
• 49:26
  And then I feel should be disconnected from I think
• 49:31
  because you're being manipulated, you know, so just
• 49:35
  an it's an interesting dynamic between men and women.
• 49:38
  But I think that's why, you know, Eve was was of course
• 49:41
  tempted first because she's women are designed to be
• 49:45
  receptive and and of course Adam abdicated his leadership role
• 49:52
  and stood there. Why she's talking to this weird
• 49:54
  creature that doesn't, couldn't have looked all good, you know,
• 49:58
  But anyway, that that's discernment of spirits.
• 50:02
  And the more you practice that awareness, and the more you
• 50:05
  learn the rules of discernment that Ignatius gives us in
• 50:08
  Scripture reveals, then you become really good at
• 50:13
  distinguishing where this is coming from or not coming from.
• 50:17
  Are you a coffee lover like me? When you wake up, you need to
• 50:20
  have your cup of coffee. That's me.
• 50:23
  And in my first trimester pregnancy, that wasn't me, but
• 50:25
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• 50:28
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• 50:34
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• 50:41
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• 50:51
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• 50:53
  So what are you thinking if you're getting your coffee off
• 50:56
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• 50:59
  Instead, you can go to sevenweekscoffee.com.
• 51:02
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• 51:15
  So go to sevenweekscoffee.com today if you haven't done this
• 51:18
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• 51:23
  And you can use the code Lila at checkout for 10% off your order.
• 51:28
  That's seven weeks coffee.com. Don't forget the code Lila at
• 51:31
  checkout for 10% off your order. So what about I have so many
• 51:35
  questions. What about the scenario?
• 51:38
  The menace is a common scenario where there's two good options
• 51:43
  or there's multiple good options and you know, you would like,
• 51:47
  and I, this has been my experience in life that there's
• 51:50
  only one decision that's the best and God's will and I need
• 51:54
  to know what it is. And I you can get paralyzed
• 51:57
  because you've got these multiple, you know, it's schools
• 51:59
  you're going to go to to tend to college, maybe, you know, or
• 52:01
  different job offers and you don't have peacefully about
• 52:05
  maybe any of them. You know, you have doubts about
• 52:07
  all of them. Maybe some look better than the
• 52:08
  other One wise spiritual guy told me once, you know,
• 52:12
  discernment is thinking, thinking under the light of
• 52:15
  grace, you know, using your reason under the light of grace.
• 52:20
  And that, you know, God doesn't, like, punish us for choosing one
• 52:24
  of two good options if there's no sin involved and we're doing
• 52:26
  our best and he has a plan no matter what.
• 52:29
  But I'm the type who's like, I want to do the one life that God
• 52:32
  wants me to live. Like, I want the maximally holy
• 52:36
  fruitful life to get as many souls as possible to heaven.
• 52:38
  And so, you know, when you're in that zone, you're like, is super
• 52:41
  zealous. And every decision, it's like,
• 52:44
  is this God's will? What's the right approach there?
• 52:47
  Yeah. We've already given good hints.
• 52:50
  You know, we're people of faith and reason, right?
• 52:52
  So God gives us an intellect and a free will and expects us to
• 52:56
  use them. So the beginning point is, is
• 52:59
  should always be what is the truth?
• 53:02
  What is God's, what is God already revealed?
• 53:05
  So the it's for Catholics and Protestants.
• 53:09
  I can say this both the highest form of public revelation is
• 53:13
  Scripture, which and and it and for a lot of process made me not
• 53:17
  know this, but the Catholic Church teaches that nothing can
• 53:20
  supersede that. So it is it is the the most
• 53:24
  sacred deposit we have of the revelation of God himself and
• 53:29
  his will and his word. So the first thing is, you know,
• 53:32
  does what I'm does either one of the options.
• 53:35
  Well, let me just say first this you got to get it out of your
• 53:39
  head because the the mush of the decision making process and the
• 53:45
  related emotions can cause distortions in our perception.
• 53:51
  So it's really good to just do, you know, side by side, pros and
• 53:55
  cons, get it out of your head on the paper.
• 53:58
  Right. So then the first question is,
• 53:59
  how does it comport with with the highest form of revelation
• 54:04
  that we Revere? And is it in contradiction to
• 54:07
  any of that? So then that's that solves a lot
• 54:09
  of problems. The next is what is your state
• 54:11
  in life? So where you and I are, you
• 54:13
  know, both married. And so if one option in some way
• 54:17
  compromises my state to some degree and another doesn't,
• 54:22
  that's easy. I can't do the one that
• 54:24
  compromises my, my, my state or my vocation in life.
• 54:28
  So those are some easy qualifiers and then another.
• 54:33
  And then but let's say they're equally beneficial that, you
• 54:37
  know, we get down to that and like we so I live on 64 acres of
• 54:42
  retreat center, Our Lady of Mount Carmel Retreat Center.
• 54:45
  It's the home of the Avila Foundation, the Avila Institute
• 54:48
  and also the Apostle via community.
• 54:50
  But we have a discernment house where guys will come who are
• 54:54
  asking the question, am I supposed to be married?
• 54:57
  Am I supposed to be a priest? And so one of the things I tell
• 54:59
  the guys, you know, because married life is good and
• 55:02
  priestly life is good. So one of the things I tell them
• 55:05
  as they're discerning is I want you to spend some time imagining
• 55:08
  both. So imagine in your head, what is
• 55:12
  a good holy Catholic marriage look like?
• 55:15
  What is it like to be with a holy woman and have children
• 55:18
  and, and all the good and the difficult?
• 55:20
  What's it like to change a fill full diaper?
• 55:24
  And what's it like, you know, when your kid gets sick and
• 55:27
  what's it like when they get in a fight at school?
• 55:29
  You know, just sort of what's it like to get in a fight with your
• 55:32
  spouse, you know, So imagine all the good and the normal things
• 55:37
  related to that. And now let's imagine, let's say
• 55:39
  diocesan priesthood. What is that like to the best of
• 55:42
  your knowledge? And maybe in both cases, they
• 55:45
  need to go explore and see. So, so let's go spit with Father
• 55:50
  Jones. Let's look, go, let's go look at
• 55:52
  where he lives and let's let's follow him for a day.
• 55:56
  So till we get this holy imagination.
• 55:58
  And then I want you to before the Blessed Sacrament, imagine
• 56:01
  those. And then I want you to tell me
• 56:02
  what are the movements in your soul as you imagine those
• 56:06
  things? And so if you're moved to faith,
• 56:10
  hope and love as you're imagining these things, maybe
• 56:14
  that's the one. If you're moved to kind of,
• 56:17
  well, this, this isn't really there for me.
• 56:19
  It's not moving me that direction.
• 56:22
  Well, maybe it's not for you. So that's another Ignatian kind
• 56:27
  of approach where you're using your intellect, you're, you're
• 56:30
  kind of cataloguing the differences, they're both good.
• 56:34
  And then you're trying as best you can to put yourself into
• 56:37
  those realities and seeing where God leads you.
• 56:41
  Does it bring you to consolation or does it bring you to
• 56:43
  desolation? We have a, we have a guy here
• 56:46
  who was just about to be ordained A Deacon and a diocesan
• 56:51
  seminary at a Mundelein in Chicago and in, and he's doing
• 56:57
  that and he's going, I am not called to be.
• 57:01
  And diocesan life. I just, there's nothing about it
• 57:04
  that is compelling to me. The priesthood is compelling to
• 57:07
  me. Religious life is compelling to
• 57:09
  me because he's called a deep life of prayer.
• 57:11
  But in that process of just, you know, it just became super
• 57:15
  clear. And he and he had to exit
• 57:16
  seminary before he was ordained because he realized then he's in
• 57:20
  the diocesan system and it's not what he's called to be.
• 57:23
  So those are ways that we can use the imagination and the
• 57:29
  trusting God to convey to us in that seeking in the pros and
• 57:34
  cons and using our intellect and asking for his intervention that
• 57:39
  he's not going to allow, He's not going to lead us down a path
• 57:43
  that's going to be a path to destruction.
• 57:45
  He, you know, he's trustworthy. So that's an example.
• 57:48
  What if you've got like a blind spot or a wound?
• 57:51
  Use the example of the, you know, the the men deciding.
• 57:54
  Do you ever. I feel more drawn to marriage
• 57:56
  when I imagine what it really is like versus like diocese and
• 57:58
  priesthood. And like, what if you, you know,
• 58:01
  grew up in a broken home, you witnessed an abuse of marriage.
• 58:04
  So you just you have this ambivalence or these, you know,
• 58:07
  wounds about marriage or, you know, God forbid on the
• 58:10
  priesthood side, like you were abused by a priest or you had
• 58:13
  some horrible experience with religious people.
• 58:17
  So how does one navigate that? And even maybe they don't even
• 58:21
  know, maybe it's subconscious. They don't even know they have
• 58:23
  that. Yeah, I mean, those are
• 58:26
  complicating factors. Whenever you're deciding big
• 58:29
  things like this, A really you should have a spiritual
• 58:32
  director, a spiritual guide. Where you know, where you're,
• 58:35
  you've got an objective outside observer who has been trained in
• 58:39
  how to help people make these decisions.
• 58:41
  And they would know, I mean, they would know to ask the very
• 58:44
  questions that you asked. So, you know, like for me, I, my
• 58:48
  conception of marriage was, was 100% negative.
• 58:53
  My, both my parents were married and divorced three times.
• 58:56
  So it was, and it was all, you know, chaotic and, and painful.
• 59:01
  But Even so, you know, when I would, when I, when I was became
• 59:05
  Catholic, I was single and I, and I had, I had been in
• 59:09
  seminary, I was an Anglican seminarian when I converted.
• 59:13
  And so I keep when I came into the faith.
• 59:15
  But by that time, you know, I'm older and, and I and I had come
• 59:20
  to discover by I obviously knew that I grew up in a really bad
• 59:24
  situation. I was very aware of all of that.
• 59:26
  Been a Christian for a long time.
• 59:29
  And so I did get a spiritual director, but I, I, I had a
• 59:33
  conception of what holy marriage could be and what holy religious
• 59:38
  life could be, which is what I was discerning.
• 59:40
  And I knew, I knew I needed a particular kind of woman based
• 59:46
  on my own background, you know, I knew I needed a very strong
• 59:48
  woman and very intelligent. I needed a woman who was totally
• 59:52
  sold out for Jesus. You know, I, it's, it's funny
• 59:56
  because so I became Catholic. I exited out of my Anglican
• 1:00:00
  seminary, kind of my Bishop didn't know I was going to RCIA.
• 1:00:05
  So you. Went new age Baptist, Anglican
• 1:00:08
  and then Catholic. Right, right.
• 1:00:12
  Right. It's yeah, it's yeah.
• 1:00:14
  The Lord knew what I needed. But it was essentially as a
• 1:00:18
  Protestant, I was reading back in history.
• 1:00:20
  And so I was, I became convinced of Apostolic succession.
• 1:00:24
  That's a long story, but so, yeah, so I, but so I had an
• 1:00:31
  altar from when I was in seminary where I would pray the
• 1:00:34
  Book of Common Prayer, which we call our version of that is a
• 1:00:37
  bravery or, or a divine office in the Catholic Church.
• 1:00:41
  So as soon as I became Catholic, I got a hold of the Catholic and
• 1:00:45
  a version and began to pray that everyday.
• 1:00:47
  And so I had an altar there and, and as I discerned religious
• 1:00:52
  life and realized, no, I'm pretty, probably pretty wired to
• 1:00:55
  be married. I need somebody more.
• 1:00:57
  I need to be accountable. I need to be molded.
• 1:01:00
  I need, I need a woman. I need the, the only kind of the
• 1:01:04
  healing that a woman can bring and the kind, you know, I just
• 1:01:08
  knew I, I was too deficient psychologically, spiritually to
• 1:01:14
  be healthy in a religious life by myself.
• 1:01:18
  So, so I then I thought, well, marriage is once you get once
• 1:01:24
  you know, a real marriage is one time.
• 1:01:27
  And so I thought, well, if I could find a woman that will sit
• 1:01:30
  next to me here in this prayer and pray with me every day where
• 1:01:35
  Jesus is the center, we're going to be good.
• 1:01:38
  So I went to Hobby Lobby. I had a bench, you know, where I
• 1:01:41
  sat on. I got the exact same bench and I
• 1:01:43
  moved mine to the left and I'm not kidding you this, I know it
• 1:01:47
  sounds a little corny, but it's what I did.
• 1:01:49
  And I put a seat next to me so that now, you know, there's a
• 1:01:54
  focal point of Jesus, the icon of Jesus and my altar.
• 1:01:58
  And I and I actually printed out a reserve sign and I put it on
• 1:02:02
  the bench next to me for the woman that God would bring that
• 1:02:06
  would would make Jesus the center and who would pray with
• 1:02:09
  me at that altar And God be praised.
• 1:02:12
  He brought me an amazing woman and I and I was yeah, I mean,
• 1:02:17
  it's just been really beautiful. But that's that was my
• 1:02:20
  discernment process was eventually I knew I was
• 1:02:25
  deficient based on the things that you described.
• 1:02:29
  And I knew until, you know, reason and faith that I probably
• 1:02:34
  wouldn't have. I needed more form.
• 1:02:37
  I needed more human formation that I couldn't get in a in a
• 1:02:41
  kind of religious context and I would probably get lost, you
• 1:02:44
  know, emotionally, psychologically.
• 1:02:46
  And so then, well, then who, well, The Who has got to be a
• 1:02:50
  woman who's sold out for Jesus, Who it like, you know, because
• 1:02:55
  I'm so messed up. I'm going to be really honest
• 1:02:57
  with you because I'm so broken. My only hope is she's looking at
• 1:03:02
  Jesus and I'm looking at Jesus, which means as we draw near to
• 1:03:06
  him, all things will be healed and all thing and, and we will
• 1:03:10
  be, we will come together always in that healing.
• 1:03:15
  And so that was the discernment process and I went through and
• 1:03:17
  and it and it turned out to be true.
• 1:03:20
  You'd have to have her on the show to to testify if I've been
• 1:03:23
  healed. But I I claim that the Lord's
• 1:03:25
  healed me of a lot so. It's beautiful.
• 1:03:29
  Yeah, we should have. It's Stephanie, right?
• 1:03:31
  Stephanie, your beautiful wife. We should have her on the show.
• 1:03:34
  Better speaker. Than I am, yeah.
• 1:03:37
  OK, There's a couple things you said that I wanted to pick up on
• 1:03:40
  because they're so interesting and important.
• 1:03:42
  So you were talking earlier back to the kind of two types of
• 1:03:45
  people in the way that the different spirits, you know, the
• 1:03:48
  Holy Spirit versus like the devil basically will interplay
• 1:03:51
  with those people. And you're talking about the
• 1:03:53
  person in mortal sin going from serious sin to serious sin.
• 1:03:56
  So they're living a life of, you know, really outside of grace in
• 1:04:00
  this unrepentant sin. And they're justifying it
• 1:04:03
  typically. And they're saying, I like the
• 1:04:04
  way I live. I feel good most of the time.
• 1:04:06
  And then they get their conscience pricked.
• 1:04:08
  And then they, you know, they maybe hate, you know,
• 1:04:11
  Christianity or the Catholic churches.
• 1:04:13
  They're like, you're putting these rules on me that are
• 1:04:14
  hurting me and you're making me feel shame.
• 1:04:17
  There is this big thing in our culture which is you make me
• 1:04:21
  feel bad. And that is a bad reflection on
• 1:04:25
  you. You're the bad guy because you
• 1:04:27
  have these morals that are making me feel bad.
• 1:04:29
  Just live and let live. Let me be free and in their,
• 1:04:32
  like, supposed freedom bubble. And I'm talking about people who
• 1:04:35
  are, you know, yeah, maybe living up, living together
• 1:04:38
  before marriage, you know, the kind of LGBT world of like,
• 1:04:41
  actively living in ways that are not in order with God's plan,
• 1:04:45
  you know, adultery, you mentioned porn, all of these
• 1:04:47
  things. Or just, you know, super
• 1:04:49
  selfish, materialistic. This is all about me.
• 1:04:52
  I just want to crush it. And I'm not going to care about
• 1:04:55
  relationships, that kind of stuff.
• 1:04:57
  And there's probably more we could come up with, right?
• 1:05:00
  But what would you say is the way if somebody knows someone
• 1:05:05
  like that that they love and they'll just move, go there, how
• 1:05:10
  can they, you know, speak the truth, But they also don't want
• 1:05:14
  the person to shut them out like they're that person's shutting
• 1:05:17
  out the good spirits voice, right?
• 1:05:19
  But they so they want to be in that person's life.
• 1:05:21
  Any recommendations for that? So I would say love built a
• 1:05:26
  bridge over which truth can pass.
• 1:05:29
  And I don't mean, I don't mean I don't mean like love, like kind,
• 1:05:35
  like shallow kindness. What I mean is the guy who
• 1:05:42
  witnessed to me first that I thought was hitting on me, he
• 1:05:46
  finished his work every day and and then he he would come and
• 1:05:50
  then ask to help me do my work. The first day I said I had to do
• 1:05:54
  bathrooms and I was whining about it.
• 1:05:57
  He said, I'll do them for you. And you know, I never did
• 1:06:00
  bathroom duty at that restaurant because he always took it up for
• 1:06:03
  me. So you, you have to love people.
• 1:06:07
  It what in a way with, I would call extraordinary.
• 1:06:10
  So it's not using turn signals, it's not smiling, it's not being
• 1:06:13
  polite. It's implicating yourself in
• 1:06:16
  their life. You know, Mark did that for me.
• 1:06:18
  I'll give you another example, a woman named Phyllis.
• 1:06:23
  So I went to work for Focus on the Family, which Doctor James
• 1:06:27
  Dobson, you may know. You know, it was great man in
• 1:06:31
  the evangelical world taking up the same 'cause that you did
• 1:06:34
  that you have and for the unborn.
• 1:06:36
  And, and I was very anti Catholic at the time because my
• 1:06:41
  Baptist folks who brought me to Jesus were very anti Catholic.
• 1:06:44
  And then I had the wounds when my stepfather fired a gun in our
• 1:06:48
  home and did all that was Catholic.
• 1:06:51
  And so I was very anti Catholic. And I ran into this woman named
• 1:06:54
  Phyllis and, and I would do Dr. Bys with her and I would just
• 1:06:58
  say you're going to hell. You know, you believe in you
• 1:07:00
  know, you worship Mary and all this other junk and she never
• 1:07:04
  until I was still a lot by the way, obviously I had a lot of
• 1:07:08
  sanctification to work out even after becoming a Christian.
• 1:07:11
  I'm still I was just really good at being a jerk, but I was I was
• 1:07:15
  sincere in my beliefs. I was just working through all
• 1:07:17
  the junk. She never responded negatively
• 1:07:21
  to me always said well, I'd love to talk with you about that and
• 1:07:26
  she but she was a lousy apologist.
• 1:07:28
  Interestingly enough for the faith.
• 1:07:31
  But so then there's this point at which she was leaving focused
• 1:07:35
  on the family. And I thought, good, you know,
• 1:07:36
  you're a false Christian. You shouldn't even be here, you
• 1:07:39
  should leave. And somebody said there was a
• 1:07:41
  going away party and they they called me and said, Phyllis
• 1:07:45
  wants you to come. And I'm like, I'm not coming.
• 1:07:46
  I'm glad she's leaving. So I sent somebody of higher
• 1:07:49
  rank and said, you have to come. And then I ended, I entered this
• 1:07:53
  room. There's like 60 people.
• 1:07:54
  She was very well loved and for good reason.
• 1:07:58
  Yeah. And there was 5 chairs, pie
• 1:08:00
  chairs. And she put me in the first one
• 1:08:03
  and it was a chair, like a bar stool chair where your feet are
• 1:08:06
  up off the ground. And then she proceeded to tell
• 1:08:09
  everyone in the room how grateful she was to me for
• 1:08:15
  challenging her faith and for, you know, and making her dig
• 1:08:22
  deep and try to figure out answers like to what?
• 1:08:24
  Because I was accusing her of things that weren't true, you
• 1:08:28
  know, And then, and then Lila, she took off my shoes and she
• 1:08:31
  walked my feet. No.
• 1:08:35
  And I'm, I'm just going, who does this?
• 1:08:39
  Who treats someone who persecutes them and treats them
• 1:08:45
  poorly with love? And I realized in that moment,
• 1:08:50
  like, she was a better person than me.
• 1:08:52
  She was a better Christian than me, even though I thought she
• 1:08:55
  believed bad, you know, false things.
• 1:08:58
  And it really made me, really browed me.
• 1:09:00
  I'm thinking, you know, here I am, this jerk saying these, you
• 1:09:04
  know, cruel things to her all the time.
• 1:09:07
  And then she puts me up in front of everybody as somebody who's
• 1:09:11
  good, you know, and washes my feet.
• 1:09:14
  And so I always tell people love built a bridge over which truth
• 1:09:17
  can pass. She wasn't even good at
• 1:09:21
  conveying truth, but she was good at loving.
• 1:09:25
  And everybody can love. Everybody can love.
• 1:09:29
  Everybody can give themselves to other people.
• 1:09:32
  Everybody can commit acts of self sacrifice.
• 1:09:34
  Everybody can finish their work early and help somebody else.
• 1:09:37
  Everybody can go help somebody move.
• 1:09:39
  Everyone can grieve with those who grieve, you know everyone
• 1:09:43
  can you know help that you know young mother with a new baby
• 1:09:48
  who's sick and bring food and every you know so love.
• 1:09:52
  So she loved me. Mark loved me, all these people
• 1:09:55
  loved me with time, with service, with patience.
• 1:10:02
  And what it did, is it, it, it, it enabled me to 1st hear the
• 1:10:07
  message of Jesus and become a Christian the 1st place and then
• 1:10:13
  be open to maybe the Catholic Church isn't this crazy
• 1:10:17
  institution of people with all these weird beliefs because
• 1:10:21
  Phyllis is something special, you know, So that's the, this,
• 1:10:26
  this secret. Now, if you go to the New
• 1:10:28
  Testament and you said to say, if you asked Saint Paul the same
• 1:10:31
  question, you know what he would say?
• 1:10:33
  He would say, shut your mouth and live your faith.
• 1:10:42
  And then elsewhere it says be ready to bear witness to what
• 1:10:50
  he's done for you. The reason for the hope that
• 1:10:52
  lies within you is what the Scripture passage says.
• 1:10:55
  So we get both of these pieces of advice from Paul to the
• 1:10:59
  believer to the unbeliever. Be quiet and live and be ready,
• 1:11:06
  which is different than a lot of people come to me and say,
• 1:11:09
  what's the bumper sticker? They want the zinger that'll
• 1:11:13
  make people come to Jesus or get their life right.
• 1:11:16
  And I, I always say there's no bumper sticker answer to this
• 1:11:19
  problem. It took me 20 years to come to
• 1:11:24
  fall on my face and say I'm done being the God of my universe.
• 1:11:29
  You know you, you are it. You got to help me and it and it
• 1:11:34
  and it came through love and truth, but in that order is is
• 1:11:40
  really the most important advice I think that I could give.
• 1:11:45
  That's so beautiful. It's such a a good reminder too,
• 1:11:49
  because I think about my life and the people that have made
• 1:11:52
  the biggest impact. I think anybody listening right
• 1:11:54
  now, we think about that like who were the people that really
• 1:11:57
  showed us love? And that's more compelling in
• 1:12:01
  the end than the arguments, then the debates, then the certainly
• 1:12:04
  then the like fiery discourse that is so much as social media
• 1:12:08
  say, like politics and media now, not to say those things
• 1:12:13
  don't have a role and they can't have value, but you know, back
• 1:12:17
  to kind of the spirit that we possess with them.
• 1:12:20
  You know, I, I'm convicted of this regularly because of like
• 1:12:23
  social media and being on social media so much.
• 1:12:26
  But that desire, that temptation, I should I'd say to,
• 1:12:31
  you know, say something clever. It isn't even clever, but you
• 1:12:35
  know, say usually not. But you know, just to say
• 1:12:38
  something, you know, a random comment, an aside, you know,
• 1:12:42
  about some evil in the world or something crazy happening.
• 1:12:45
  And that's basically entire sort of social media personalities
• 1:12:49
  and accounts are built on that kind of stuff.
• 1:12:52
  And but it leaves you kind of feeling like afterwards, it's
• 1:12:56
  been my experience. And you wonder is this
• 1:12:59
  persuading people? Now some people it does persuade
• 1:13:01
  because I think that there's conscience pricking that
• 1:13:04
  happens. That does need to happen for a
• 1:13:05
  lot of people or just like eye opening stuff.
• 1:13:08
  But do you have any thoughts about our disposition as
• 1:13:11
  Christians in, you know, yes, in a world that needs the truth and
• 1:13:16
  there's people that need to be convicted of the truth and maybe
• 1:13:19
  we feel called to speak it, but to still possess that love, so
• 1:13:23
  much of love is an action, right?
• 1:13:25
  But maybe your action is just speaking the truth.
• 1:13:27
  And so how do you, how do you add the love in there without
• 1:13:30
  being like, like, you know, sugar sweet, right, like, oh,
• 1:13:35
  every, you know, just just be the nice girl, be the nice guy.
• 1:13:39
  Like, is that really what you're supposed to be doing either?
• 1:13:43
  Well, you just describe why I'm not on social media and haven't
• 1:13:46
  been there for three years. Like I told you, you're.
• 1:13:48
  A wise man, Dan. Well, well, I'm just.
• 1:13:51
  No, I ignored it. Well, because you.
• 1:13:52
  Would rage tweet. Would you?
• 1:13:55
  Would you? Yeah, I, well, I, you know,
• 1:13:57
  yeah. Why aren't?
• 1:13:58
  You on social media I'm. A Jew, you know, I'm a Middle
• 1:14:00
  Easterner. We have firing temperaments.
• 1:14:04
  So I, you know, I just realized that I was not being charitable
• 1:14:08
  and, and gave the password to, to the folks here at the Avalon
• 1:14:12
  who said you can put stuff on my page, but I'm never going back.
• 1:14:15
  So I haven't even looked at it once since then.
• 1:14:17
  So because I had, you know, I just didn't treat people with
• 1:14:19
  the kind of love that I, that I know I'm capable of to the
• 1:14:22
  standards I want to have. But I know there are people, of
• 1:14:25
  course, as you say, who are, who are called people like you
• 1:14:28
  probably who are a little bit more measured in your
• 1:14:30
  temperament and can and can kindly express, you know, what
• 1:14:35
  should be expressed. But I'm going to leave my my
• 1:14:38
  connections mostly to face to face.
• 1:14:40
  That's that works better for me. Any advice for people that are
• 1:14:45
  in that space? A lot of people listening spend
• 1:14:47
  a lot of people a lot of time on social media.
• 1:14:49
  Some of them are doing kind of the influencing thing.
• 1:14:53
  Yeah, yeah. I mean, I, I think the, the
• 1:14:57
  influencing thing is, is good. I think that there are there are
• 1:15:01
  people who are doing it really well and need to get the message
• 1:15:05
  out. But I think the the, the
• 1:15:08
  sickness of the social media culture is that is the
• 1:15:13
  fundamental assumption. It reinforces in us that we
• 1:15:17
  should say everything we think and everything we think is valid
• 1:15:21
  to say and, and we should just sort of throw up all over
• 1:15:25
  everyone all the time. And it creates a really
• 1:15:29
  disordered kind of communication where we're not listening, we're
• 1:15:33
  not trading with each other with charity and, and and we're just,
• 1:15:38
  you know, just throwing up on everybody.
• 1:15:40
  So, yeah, I just, I don't know how it fits with the the
• 1:15:44
  admonition of Saint James in the New Testament of, you know, be
• 1:15:47
  slow to speak. The the social media teaches you
• 1:15:51
  to do the opposite. Be quick to speak and quick to
• 1:15:56
  anger, which is the opposite of what James the Holy Spirit said
• 1:15:59
  through James. But so much of the New
• 1:16:01
  Testament, you know, when you, when you, when you ask the
• 1:16:04
  question of the Holy Spirit, you know, how is it that I'm
• 1:16:07
  supposed to interact with other Christians?
• 1:16:11
  You know, a lot of us, a lot of my trad friends and I'm, you
• 1:16:14
  know, I'm in that, in that realm, I'm in that corner.
• 1:16:18
  You know, we, we say, well, we should just take a whip and turn
• 1:16:21
  over the tables like Jesus in the in the temple.
• 1:16:25
  And I want to say, well, that was a uniquely prophetic act,
• 1:16:27
  specifically prophesied in the Old Testament to the New and
• 1:16:31
  that was given to him. But what does the Holy Spirit
• 1:16:33
  say to us and how we're supposed to interact with people?
• 1:16:36
  And it says, it says we're supposed to have patience and
• 1:16:40
  kindness and gentleness. And we're supposed to, you know,
• 1:16:43
  be really aware of and circumspect of our own sins so
• 1:16:45
  we don't fall into it. And we're, you know, so and, and
• 1:16:49
  by the way, he says, you know, let my house be a House of
• 1:16:51
  prayer. I want to say, why don't you
• 1:16:53
  focus on the prayer thing, not the whip thing, because nowhere
• 1:16:58
  are you, are you called to Ted to do the whip thing.
• 1:17:02
  Let's focus on the House of prayer thing.
• 1:17:03
  Let's focus on showing people the love of Jesus.
• 1:17:06
  One of the reasons I love the chosen series because Jonathan
• 1:17:10
  Rumi is, is so gifted at communicating compassion and
• 1:17:16
  mercy without compromising truth.
• 1:17:19
  You know, I, he's just masterful at that.
• 1:17:22
  I mean, of course, the writers and the, the producers and all
• 1:17:25
  of that, that surround that show.
• 1:17:27
  And I think that's why in the New Testament, why a prostitute
• 1:17:32
  would spend time with him and why a tax collector would spend
• 1:17:36
  time with him. Everyone when he looked at
• 1:17:38
  everyone, what they saw in his eyes was I know you and I know
• 1:17:44
  you're broken, but, but it's OK, it's OK.
• 1:17:49
  I'm interested. Anyway, let's hang out.
• 1:17:51
  You know, that's what they saw. Not you know, oh, you're you're
• 1:17:55
  gay and so you're bad or you're, you know, what's the list,
• 1:18:00
  right? You're a drug addict, so you're
• 1:18:01
  bad or you're a you're a heterosexual who can't control,
• 1:18:06
  you know, his libido. So you're bad, you know.
• 1:18:08
  He looked at people and and he they saw in his eyes, you know,
• 1:18:12
  come unto me all you were weary and heavy laden.
• 1:18:15
  I will give you rest. You know my peace.
• 1:18:17
  I give you my peace. I leave you not as the world
• 1:18:19
  gives to do. I give to you, you know, don't
• 1:18:22
  let your heart be troubled. Let's walk together.
• 1:18:24
  You know that's that's you. You live like that and you admit
• 1:18:31
  you. You know, I'll give you one more
• 1:18:33
  example. I know we're you're probably way
• 1:18:35
  over time, but I had to go to this hair shop to get my hair
• 1:18:38
  cut one time and it and I was late.
• 1:18:40
  I couldn't do the normal appointment.
• 1:18:42
  And so I ended up at this place that I never go to.
• 1:18:46
  And the woman who cut my hair, half of her head was shaved.
• 1:18:50
  So you kind of know the symbolism of that.
• 1:18:54
  And so she asked me what do I do?
• 1:18:55
  And I said, I'm I answer differently to different people.
• 1:19:00
  So I kind of thought I would like to talk with her.
• 1:19:02
  So I didn't say, well, I'm the president of, of a global
• 1:19:05
  Catholic News organization. I didn't say that.
• 1:19:06
  I said I'm a writer and and and then was, was to invite
• 1:19:11
  conversation. She said, what do you write
• 1:19:12
  about? I said Catholic mystical.
• 1:19:14
  Oh, I love mystical stuff and just talking.
• 1:19:18
  So she figured out pretty quick that I was not like opposed to,
• 1:19:22
  I wasn't judging her. And she had, she asked me, she
• 1:19:26
  said, you know, it's so emotional.
• 1:19:30
  She said can I ask you a question?
• 1:19:34
  And I knew what she was going to ask.
• 1:19:35
  I don't know if the Lord reveals it to me or what.
• 1:19:37
  I said I know what you're going to ask me.
• 1:19:39
  She says, what do you think I'm going to ask you?
• 1:19:41
  I said, you want to know what I think about people like you.
• 1:19:45
  And she, she looked shocked and she said that's exactly what I
• 1:19:49
  was going to ask. And I said, can I answer a
• 1:19:52
  different question? I said what?
• 1:19:56
  What is What do I think about people like us?
• 1:20:02
  I'm like, so immediately I'm saying it's not, we're not
• 1:20:08
  different categories of humans here.
• 1:20:11
  I'm not better or worse than you, I said, I said, I want to
• 1:20:16
  answer the question, what do I think about people like us?
• 1:20:19
  And Mike? My answer is we're all broken in
• 1:20:22
  the need of a Savior, every one of us.
• 1:20:26
  You know, and, and, and you know, there's, there's a
• 1:20:30
  thousand ways I could have answered that that would have
• 1:20:33
  wrecked her conception of, you know, a Christian God or a
• 1:20:37
  Christian. But the Lord blessed me with
• 1:20:41
  something that said to her what I think would be something like
• 1:20:46
  if she met Jesus in the 1st century, what it would have felt
• 1:20:49
  like, which is, you know, nobody's judging you.
• 1:20:54
  That's not what this thing is about.
• 1:20:56
  You and I were both created for an eternal relationship of love
• 1:21:00
  with the creator of the universe.
• 1:21:02
  That is our purpose. And you and I both have screwed
• 1:21:07
  that up to greater or lesser degrees.
• 1:21:11
  So can we just walk together and talk about Jesus, talk about
• 1:21:14
  that and how he makes all things new?
• 1:21:19
  I mean, who? Who could turn that down?
• 1:21:22
  You know, so let's contrast that to Fred Phelps, right?
• 1:21:25
  God hates fags signs, you know it like and you tell me which
• 1:21:30
  one is Rep represents Jesus. I know which one does.
• 1:21:34
  It's the one that says, you know, we're all broken.
• 1:21:37
  We all need a savior. So that's, that's, that's how
• 1:21:43
  you reach people, I think in a, in a culture that's, you know,
• 1:21:47
  telling lies to heterosexual people and homosexual people,
• 1:21:52
  either culture lies to all of us about who we are and who we're
• 1:21:55
  called to be, what's important, what we should care about, what
• 1:21:58
  we shouldn't, what we should hate, what we should love.
• 1:22:00
  It lies to all of us. And all of us agree with those
• 1:22:04
  lies to a greater or lesser degree.
• 1:22:06
  Now you and I hopefully have worked out most of that and you
• 1:22:09
  know, but who knows what, what still lingers underneath the
• 1:22:11
  surface that isn't perfectly, you know, oriented to God's will
• 1:22:15
  and ways, but God be praised. If we look to Jesus, we know we
• 1:22:21
  have a really good, strong sense in the New Testament, so clear
• 1:22:25
  of how we should Orient ourselves to those to everyone
• 1:22:28
  in the world who yet knows him, doesn't know him yet.
• 1:22:33
  And, and but always from a place of look.
• 1:22:36
  If, if, if, if God, if, if it were about justice, I would be
• 1:22:41
  in hell for all of eternity. That's just the reality.
• 1:22:44
  I'm so that means so. So if somebody else is living
• 1:22:48
  currently living a life where you would say, yeah, they're
• 1:22:50
  going to hell, well, great. So now you're in a equal playing
• 1:22:53
  field. So if it's about justice, you're
• 1:22:55
  both deserved to be in hell for all of eternity.
• 1:22:58
  But it's not about justice. Scripture says we reach out
• 1:23:00
  beyond justice to mercy. You know, that's Jesus.
• 1:23:04
  It's about mercy. Yes.
• 1:23:06
  The price had to be paid. He had to pay it.
• 1:23:09
  But let's talk about that story together as broken people
• 1:23:13
  together, not as you're that in this bad category and I'm in a
• 1:23:18
  better category. What a what a crock.
• 1:23:20
  You know, how could I ever claim to be better than somebody?
• 1:23:25
  It just, it makes no sense to me.
• 1:23:27
  I've done. And maybe it's just because I've
• 1:23:29
  seen so much. I don't know.
• 1:23:30
  I don't know, maybe people send a lot less and they look at
• 1:23:33
  other people and there's some sort of right judgement that
• 1:23:35
  they're better. I don't know how to get there
• 1:23:37
  from where I start. Well, I look at a lot of people,
• 1:23:42
  I meet people and they don't share my faith.
• 1:23:44
  They don't in some ways share a lot of my values or beliefs, but
• 1:23:48
  they're just like good people, you know, you know what I'm
• 1:23:50
  talking about, Like just, they've got this, like, you
• 1:23:53
  know, this goodness and sincerity about them.
• 1:23:55
  And I think you're, you're a better person than I am.
• 1:23:58
  Like, I may have the faith and like the answers and I'm trying
• 1:24:01
  to live this life of, you know, virtue da, da, da, but it's
• 1:24:04
  like, you're just better than I am.
• 1:24:05
  Like, so you know, it is amazing, like the the way that
• 1:24:09
  the Lord gives his gift of virtue.
• 1:24:12
  And just because you have faith, like Saint Paul says, doesn't
• 1:24:14
  mean you have love and you can have love and not have really
• 1:24:19
  enter fully into the faith yet. So I mean, often they do come
• 1:24:22
  together, but it took. Me a long time to get past.
• 1:24:25
  Yeah. That external jaw, that's junk I
• 1:24:28
  grew up with. And my nickname at Focus on the
• 1:24:30
  Family was Nuke. I'm not proud of that.
• 1:24:32
  That's short for nuclear, you know, but yeah.
• 1:24:38
  Did you ever get written up over there?
• 1:24:42
  I got the Scrooge award without trying every year.
• 1:24:47
  So yeah, I did get no, I did. I got in trouble too.
• 1:24:50
  I did. The Lord used that place to
• 1:24:52
  really purify me a lot of ways, heal me.
• 1:24:54
  I went through a lot of healing processes, getting rid of all
• 1:24:57
  that anger and and that brokenness.
• 1:25:01
  Dan, there's one more question. I know we're running out of
• 1:25:04
  time, but this has been so awesome.
• 1:25:05
  I really wanted to ask you about desire because I think that's
• 1:25:09
  plays into discernment and decision making so much like
• 1:25:11
  what we do with desires that we have.
• 1:25:13
  Like I have this desire to, you know, marry a certain kind of
• 1:25:17
  person or the desire to do this certain kind of work.
• 1:25:20
  You know, I have this like image or this like idea of, you know,
• 1:25:23
  being, you know, like 1/4 of all kids today a Gen.
• 1:25:26
  Z or is one of the Youtubers, right?
• 1:25:28
  As an example, I think it's alpha kids generation, A1
• 1:25:31
  degree, one level younger than Gen.
• 1:25:35
  Z1. Fourth of them want to be
• 1:25:37
  Youtubers like that to them is the desirable life to live in
• 1:25:41
  the future more than like an actor or a banker or, you know,
• 1:25:44
  a businessman or whatever. So what do we do with?
• 1:25:48
  How do we discern which desires are from God versus a bad desire
• 1:25:54
  or just a desire that is subpar to what God wants us to do?
• 1:26:00
  Yeah, it's a good question. And the answer is similar to,
• 1:26:03
  you know, discerning God's will back to the simplest, you know,
• 1:26:06
  first step, which is what is who does God say that you are?
• 1:26:11
  Who does God say that you're called to be?
• 1:26:13
  You know, what is it that he wants you to to what is the
• 1:26:17
  highest expression of, you know, your goodness, what he's
• 1:26:20
  designed in you. And you know, I love this
• 1:26:22
  passage in Philippians where it says, finally, brethren,
• 1:26:25
  whatever is, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever
• 1:26:28
  is just, whatever's pure or lovely, gracious, if there's any
• 1:26:32
  excellence, anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.
• 1:26:36
  The word dwell can be translated obsessed, you know, on these
• 1:26:39
  things what you've learned and received and heard and me do.
• 1:26:42
  And the God of peace will be with you.
• 1:26:44
  So, so the prescription of Saint Paul is, is is obsessed over
• 1:26:50
  what it means to be a godly person and then do and live in
• 1:26:56
  that godly way. And then the God of peace, which
• 1:27:01
  means the God who will speak to you in that peace and guide you
• 1:27:05
  in that peace, will transform what you conceive of that you,
• 1:27:10
  you aspire to be into what he desires for you to be.
• 1:27:14
  That's that way. It purifies all of your motives
• 1:27:17
  and clarifies all of that. And, and of course, when anyone
• 1:27:20
  does that, they find that peace that passes understanding and,
• 1:27:23
  and, and it's compelling to them and they want to live the life
• 1:27:26
  more fully. And I think that begins then to
• 1:27:28
  reveal to you who you're really called to be.
• 1:27:30
  I mean, I, you know, I thought I was called to be, I was really
• 1:27:33
  good at business. My first book I published was a
• 1:27:37
  business book and it did very well, which is not easy to do in
• 1:27:42
  the secular business and technology world.
• 1:27:45
  And I wrote it and I, when I, when it was done, I was like
• 1:27:47
  just completely unfulfilled. I was a dream.
• 1:27:50
  It was a goal. I had all these goals by the
• 1:27:52
  time I was 40, you know, run a tribe, compete in the triathlon,
• 1:27:55
  get published, you know, get a, get another degree or whatever.
• 1:28:01
  And I accomplished a handful of those things and, and realized
• 1:28:04
  in the end that they were, they were not so bad things, but they
• 1:28:09
  weren't, they were sort of empty things that really didn't mean
• 1:28:12
  the most. But in the process, because I
• 1:28:14
  was in Scripture every day, because I'm in my faith every
• 1:28:17
  day, God was purifying my aspirations, my desires, and
• 1:28:23
  then through achieving some of them and then realizing how
• 1:28:27
  shallow and empty they were, including making a lot of money.
• 1:28:31
  I, I realized that that wasn't what my calling was and my true
• 1:28:34
  calling was in a different direction.
• 1:28:37
  So I think it's just about spending time with Jesus and
• 1:28:40
  letting him speak to you and letting bringing every thought
• 1:28:45
  captive to the beginnings of Christ, learning the teachings
• 1:28:48
  of the Church of the faith, living those.
• 1:28:50
  And then his his will emerges in you and you discover, you know,
• 1:28:56
  that even if you're an introverted, melancholic, hyper
• 1:29:00
  introverted, melancholic, maybe you're supposed to speak to
• 1:29:02
  thousands and thousands of people and get and do the very
• 1:29:06
  thing that makes you uncomfortable, but that bears
• 1:29:08
  all this fruit. But the only way to do that is
• 1:29:11
  by walking with Jesus. I mean, there's no like
• 1:29:13
  shortcut. It's.
• 1:29:14
  Beautiful, yeah. And I think that part of what
• 1:29:17
  you're describing too, in that intimacy of prayer with the Lord
• 1:29:20
  is also vulnerability, you know, being willing to be vulnerable.
• 1:29:24
  And if you have desires, don't so just stifle them and bury
• 1:29:28
  them, but be honest about them with the Lord and then say,
• 1:29:31
  Lord, what do you think? Like purify this, reveal what
• 1:29:34
  you want from me here. But you know, it's also if
• 1:29:38
  you're sick with desire, but you're not even acknowledging
• 1:29:41
  that desire or you're running from it without being real, even
• 1:29:44
  if the desire maybe it seems bad.
• 1:29:45
  You're like, I'm just struggling with this, you know?
• 1:29:47
  And that's where like you said earlier, a good spiritual
• 1:29:49
  director, a good advisor is really powerful too, to help
• 1:29:55
  navigate the the desires. Exactly right.
• 1:30:01
  Good. All right.
• 1:30:03
  So such good stuff. This has been awesome.
• 1:30:05
  Dan, where can people find your work?
• 1:30:08
  I mentioned spiritualdirection.com, but I
• 1:30:11
  know you've got all kinds of amazing work that you do through
• 1:30:15
  the Avila Institute. How can people find your work?
• 1:30:18
  Yeah, I mean spiritualdirection.com is the
• 1:30:20
  portal and everything really thousands of articles, videos,
• 1:30:24
  podcast, this avila-institute.org, you know,
• 1:30:28
  graduate and personal enrichment studies, spiritual formation and
• 1:30:32
  we we were also forming priests and for 85 diocese, which is
• 1:30:35
  really great blessing for us. And then a possibly be a
• 1:30:39
  community if, if anyone's interested in the living the
• 1:30:44
  contemplative life that we, we live.
• 1:30:47
  But anyway, thank you so much, Lila, for all your good work.
• 1:30:51
  I just want to say really grateful you're out there and
• 1:30:54
  doing doing so much to bring the faith into difficult corners of
• 1:31:00
  the Internet. I've watched you in some pretty
• 1:31:02
  fascinating interviews with some fascinating people and then in
• 1:31:05
  your own outlets. So thank you for all the good
• 1:31:08
  and and be assured of my prayers and please pray for me.
• 1:31:12
  Thank you, Dan. Thank you for saying yes to God
• 1:31:14
  and putting yourself out there as an introvert and writing even
• 1:31:18
  when you don't want to write because it has blessed me so
• 1:31:20
  much and I know it's blessed countless other people and is
• 1:31:24
  going to bless many, many more. So thank you.
• 1:31:28
  God be praised. Thanks for listening to this
• 1:31:32
  episode of the Lila Rose Podcast and the interview with Dan
• 1:31:36
  Burke. I really enjoyed that
• 1:31:38
  conversation with him and brought tears to my eyes a
• 1:31:40
  couple times. But it was also very encouraging
• 1:31:43
  to remember how the Lord works with us, that He is always
• 1:31:46
  working with us, and that there are rules and guidelines for how
• 1:31:50
  we can discern His voice and continue to run after him.
• 1:31:53
  So I hope you enjoyed it. As always, do not forget to
• 1:31:57
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• 1:31:59
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• 1:32:52
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