Live from the Pathway Studios in Johnston proper, you are Live from the Path. My name is Ben Foost. Thanks very much for tonight. This is a special edition of Live from the Path. We are broadcasting from the Pathway Studios here in Johnston, Iowa at 8 o'clock. It's an early round here at the Live from the Path Studios. We've never done it. Yeah, it's not been done. It'll be a… Anyway. So here's the reason that we are in here early. For those of you that are joining us, we normally broadcast from 10 to midnight here on Live from the Path. We're talking about honest faith, fierce grace, and sometimes donkeys. Just want to be some guys that are trying to follow Christ on the path to Jesus

and what our lives and conversations may look like so that you can kind of take a peek into that, hopefully see yourself in there and some opportunity to get closer to Jesus as part of that discussion. But tonight, we're getting together for a special broadcast to talk about some events that have happened here in Johnston over the last 24 to 48 hours. There have been two unexpected deaths within the community, one at Johnson Middle School and one at Johnson High School, both suicides. And so we've had some things scheduled for tonight. Jeff Arendale was going to come in and he was going to play some stuff off his new album and had graciously agreed to come on on a different day so that we can kind of spend a little time walking through this because there are a number of responses when it comes to tragedy, even broadly tragedy specifically, you know, people taking their own lives. And I think we just wanted the opportunity to sit down and kind of talk through this to digest it a little bit. Maybe for us, who are a task community, we hold our services are held at Johnston Middle School. We were there Sunday morning with our services, had spent some time in prayer for the family and friends, a community that surrounded the first notification of someone having died. And then by the time we hit Sunday, we thought, you know, what can we do for the community to kind of help in the grieving process,

help in the healing process. So part of it, we just wanted to spend the show tonight kind of talking through those things. For those of you that are joining us online, if you could, you can use the chat feature there to ask any questions or, you know, provide any commentary and we'll try to get to questions as they come up. And I don't know that we have much of a specific forum here except for just to kind of digest it a little bit, talk through it, see how people are feeling, kind of talk about what the reactions are from a situation like that. And frankly, what do we do as people that are following Christ? You know, what is the appropriate reaction? How do you help people that are hurting? You know, how do you process this? What does this look like in the context of a loving and gracious God? I think that's what we're going to try to hit tonight. We are joined by Don Hensley.

Don, thank you for joining us. I appreciate you coming in. Don has some experience with Christ. So maybe just tell us a little bit about your experience in Indiana. I was on the critical stress management team with the Indiana State Police. I was chaplain with the Indiana State Police for 16 years while ministering at a local church there as well. The chaplaincy program was a volunteer program, so it wasn't a paid staff. And then before I moved to Indiana, I was with the Iowa State Patrol, but not on a critical stress management team, but certainly involved in some critical situations. And retired three years ago after 41 years in the ministry. Also serves a chaplain with the Bloomington Hospital. That would be an associate chaplain kind of thing. Let preachers like Dan go home and be with his family or get some rest.

Listen, but I guess my life has been ministry ever since I was a young lad growing up in the church in the mountains of Virginia. That's a pretty strong statement, you know. You don't get to see a lot of people that get a chance to say that. So that's very cool. Well, the Lord has certainly blessed me and blessed my family through ministry. And we're all involved in ministry if we're Christians. Yeah, yeah. And where I might be able to minister in one specific area, someone else is able to minister in another way. Right. And when the whole body is doing that, then we have a healthy church. I agree. Yeah. I like your style, though.

Yeah, yeah. So within that context, we talked a little bit about kind of the situation over the last 48 hours. We've had two suicides within the Johnston community. And, I mean, there's a lot of different ways to deal with a situation like that. And what was interesting is I thought about your work as working with kind of the police department and the state patrol. I mean, there has to be all manner of tragedies and grief that these officers are exposed to, that the people in the community are exposed to. I mean, where do you even start trying to process and deal with something like that? Well, trying to be there to be supportive is one thing. On a chaplain's role, I might be called to the hospital. Families, you know, for instance, there was a deputy, young deputy lady, who was directing traffic one night. Young fellow got out to get a Coke out of the Coke machine, and his car went across the road and into an embankment. And so they had to bring a wrecker to pull the car out. And she was directing traffic, and a young high school girl was driving that night and struck her.

And, of course, she was taken to the hospital, and I was called to go to the hospital and be there with her husband and other law enforcement personnel that she worked with. And so my thing was just simply being there and being available and to go in the room with her husband the first time that he saw her after the accident and just to be there, sometimes not saying a lot. But I think the ministry, our presence, often is as important as trying to say something, just being there. And especially if you're from the church, they know your background. They know that you're praying for them. They know that you're there to be supportive. But sometimes it's just being there. Yeah, you don't have to worry about saying the right magic words or what if I fumble up or just you being there shows that you care is a presence of peace and comfort for them knowing somebody is here with me. They got my, somebody has my back. Right. That's good. You know, it's kind of funny because, you know, now that you mentioned that, God kind of takes the same tact. You know what I'm saying?

He's not generally a beat you over the head kind of guy unless it's time. You know, like, you know, and I've noticed that a lot in my life, you know, when things kind of get a little hairy, you know, God just kind of, he seems to show up right when he needs to be, you know. And sometimes, actually, it's a bit abrasive, you know, for the God stuff right off the bat. You know, like, something bad happens and you're still trying to process what's happening and you're like, I don't, I don't even know what I think yet. You know, like, something's just bad. You're just like, I can't, I'm not even thinking straight. I'm not even feeling straight, you know. You see something like, you know, a good friend of yours will pass away or there's been a bad accident and you know you should feel sad but you don't feel anything. You're just like, I don't know quite what to do yet, you know. And then all of a sudden, you know, here comes people with, you know, God will comfort you. God will take care of this guy, which are, they're all very encouraging words but you're just not quite in the place to hear that yet, you know. It's not like you're, you know, if you know Christ, it's not like you're denying Christ for 10 minutes while you handle your earthly business because I don't think that's the case. But, you know, I've been in this situation before where I've been, I should have been distraught and I wasn't because I just didn't know how to feel quite yet, you know.

And people are showing up left and right with, you know, encouraging statements and encouraging words and, you know, trying to tell me that, you know, God will get you through that. I'm like, I know, I know, I know. You've got to let me get there first. You know, you kind of got to just give me a little space. And I think that's true. I think, you know, some people's hearts are in the right place and their hearts go out. And they really just, they want a comfort because they, you know, they feel it in their heart to be a shoulder to cry on and a source of God's love to somebody else. But, I mean, very similar to all, even the great missionaries in the New Testament, you know, you got to get them where they're at and you got to, they have to be ready to hear it. And if they're not, that takes a lot of, that's a lot of the relationship part of probably the ministry, right, is getting to actually know the person and read some body language and have been in that situation a couple times before, you know, to know whether it's time to start talking. And sometimes it's just not. Sometimes it's time just to be there, like Don was saying. I think that's pretty, that's pretty impactful to a lot of people, even if you, I mean, even if you just show up, you know, that you're in the room as available, you know. Well, we started talking Sunday night, you know, one student early morning, Saturday morning, took his own life and in a shockwave was kind of making its way through the community as students were finding out about it.

And, you know, Facebook was on fire and all the people were just trying to figure out what in the world was going on. And, of course, we had church Sunday, like Ben, you mentioned, we stopped in this church. We prayed and paused, prayed for the community, prayed for the family, just because, you know, it was a tragic event. And then that night, I think around 645 is when the police were called, that there was another student that, from the, you know, same school district, they were, they knew each other, you know, of course. He took his life and, you know, just things started buzzing, people like, hey, you know what's going on? I'm like, well, yeah, we know what happened, thinking about what had happened the day before. And Shanna jumps on, of course, she's in ninth grade, she's the same age as the first student and friends and everything with him. And she's looking around and all of her friends are starting to report things and words coming in. And so then, as a staff, we started, like, hey, we've got to do something. And kind of like, you know, people are still processing what's happened, and we're jumping in to, we want to help, we want to do something. And so we just started brainstorming on Facebook, you know, we're all four, communicating back and forth on that. And it was led to the prayer room. It's like, well, what can we do?

And there's no guarantee people even will accept what we have to do, you know, that anybody really cares that we have anything to do. I mean, they don't want us to hear us to preach at them. They don't need us to give them, you know, seven lessons on why not to get suicide or something. Yeah. And so we thought, there may be a time for that, but not yet. Right. So that led to the prayer room. We thought, well, that's something we've done in the past. You know, in the middle of the night, there were four of us, you three happened to be, us three happened to be, three of them. And Shelly Carson came out, and we started putting paper up on the walls and providing a place where people can come and just be quiet, just pray, sing, whatever. Probably not going to be a lot of singing going on, but it could be. At least they have the option. Yeah.

Just sit there and just in a place set aside for the presence of God to figure out what in the world is going on. Well, you know, I think that's pretty huge, too, because that blossoms out way bigger than just the people that knew the people involved. You know, like, I mean, I didn't know any of the kids. And actually, this is, I mean, this is a much broader problem, like in the last, you know, six months compared to just what happened this weekend. You know, and so I think it started to fire and hit people. And just as a dad, you know, like, I just, it just broke my heart. You know, you take that and project that back on your own kids and go, you know, I mean, it's very easy for you to watch like a TV show or a reality situation, you know, where they're, the dad's drunk. And, you know, the kid was, you know, into some bad stuff and then you're like, well, the parents are to blame or this is to blame, you know, and then, you know, there's certain situation where it just kind of happens. Everything looks pretty on the up and up and, you know, it's a strong family life. And then that's when people are just taken aback, like how or why, you know, and it gets you to start thinking. It's like, well, you know, what can I possibly do, you know, what can I do to try to protect my child from this? And then you just think about everybody's kids and you're just like, I just need to help the community. I need to talk to God about this thing because this is completely out of my hands.

I'm overwhelmed at the thought of this with my own kids and with kids I don't know. And that was kind of the point, I think, of the prayer was it was not just, it's currently not. I mean, it's still up and running, right? I mean, but it's not just for people that are directly involved because really if you're in this community or you have a child, you're involved, man. Like this is, I mean, it's in our public schools, it's in our community as a whole, and it just broke my heart. I mean, I don't have a comforting word to say, you know, like I'd be in the same place that, you know, the people that are directly affected are. You know, I'm speechless. I'm still kind of speechless. I just thought the only thing I could think of was I can pray. That's what I can do, you know, because I can't sort this out on my own. It's a me and a God thing because I don't have anything to say now, you know. So, yeah, I think that kind of hits the nail. And this is something Don and I were talking about just before we went on the air was, you know, there's probably not an expert here.

There's probably not an expert, a person who is qualified to fully deal with this. Words are not magic. Hugs are nice, but they're not long-term solutions. You know what I'm saying? Like these are not, these are things that we can come up with and things that we can do, but they're just temporary things. And so sometimes we get hung up on, you know, what will I say? Well, what could you say? I mean, seriously, if I gave you 10 years to think about what to say, are you going to come up with something that's just really going to sail this thing home? Right. It's not going to happen. And part of that is coming to that realization. I think, you know, you can cause when you're grieving, sometimes there's frustration because you're like, I just don't know what to do. I want to do something, but I don't know what to do.

And I think, you know, sometimes we react in ways as if words were magic or as if, you know, certain things were able to just, you know, solve problems. But these aren't problems that are solved with, you know, two steps. There's a grieving process. There's a, you know, it changes the way that you think about the world around you. It changes the way that you think about yourself, especially if you're close to that situation. I mean, you start looking at everything within your life and saying, what could I have done? What should I have done? Right. Where did I fall? What happened? What was the one thing that triggered or what? You know, I mean, you start, your mind will drive you crazy. Yeah.

And so, you know, and I think that's why when we talked about the prayer room, I thought, you know, that's the only thing I could ever, I would ever do on my own. Like if I was in as part of the process of grieving, that's the first thing I would go to. Beyond that, I don't have any other recommendations. It's just time alone, you know, talking to God or sharing that with other people and looking for the only place where I know where comfort comes from. But we underestimate the power of prayer in our lives and in the lives of those that we pray in for. Sometimes they don't realize it, but God does. I know when I was out this afternoon and I didn't know either of these families knew very little about the situation, but I knew that there was a need. And so as I was praying, I just I just left everything to God. He knew these families. He knew what their needs were. I went before the Lord on the behalf of the parents and and brothers and sisters, if there's brothers and sisters involved and grandparents, because I'm a grandparent, as you were relating earlier and extended families and neighbors. And and then the school and teachers, the whole community. So many layers has been devastated.

By this. And God can give a peace that that we can't. Right. You know, like through the words, the things we can do, the hug and ever so forth. We can only do so much. And and so praying for them is such a higher thing because God can bring peace that no one understands. I think this is a thing where the whole community comes together and the church does her part. But there are certainly professional counselors that I'm sure that are going to be involved dealing with these kids and with the parents. And it just takes every every one of us doing what we can to try to be there for them and get them through this immediate time, especially. Oh, yeah. I'm just interested if you were called in to come into a classroom today. This is the first time the schools come together since two of their classmates had passed away. You know, Friday night, they're hanging out at the basketball game and everybody's having fun and everybody's smiling and happy.

No one had an idea. Anything was was up. And then today, you know, over the weekend later, it's devastation. And they say, Don, we'd like to have you come and talk to this class. There's, you know, no, no strings attached. So you can even talk about Jesus. You know, what would you say? You know, I'm just interested in your perspective as someone who's been in ministry for a long time, who's been in crisis situations. And I'm interested. What would you say? I guess one of the things that I would do would be let them know that I'm here to let them talk. I want to listen. I might make some suggestions or some comments, but let them let them talk.

That's that's one of the things that we do in a debriefing is that we gather together, maybe a team that are going to lead out in the debriefing and bring in everyone who's involved. And like in this particular case, you know, you got all these kids that are going through some tough times. So you may be doing a debriefing with kids. You may be doing a debriefing with law enforcement who came to both of those and they have some tough things that they have to deal with. Yeah. They're not machines. Right. I mean, yeah. And even the ambulance driver or fireman, all of these people, we would often bring them in together and then just sort of talk through this. Let them talk. No notes, no taking anything out of the room. They can speak if they want to. And you may go around the circle two or three times and you have an individual who hasn't said a thing.

And maybe that third time around, they just open up their hearts. They didn't even think that this would be helpful to them at all. But just being the support and talking through. And I guess that's what I would do if I went into a classroom. I would give the kids an opportunity to talk and maybe talk about their friends that they have just lost and some of the good memories that they've had. But, you know, I think that's healthy. But to say their name out loud, you know, it's OK to mention that, you know, there's there's still a valuable part of your life and your memory. And and absolutely don't don't let that go. And as I was mentioning to you this afternoon, it is not a time of making any kind of judgments. It's a time of ministering. It's not our role to make judgment. God does that. Yeah.

But we're there to minister. So I don't know if I answered your your question specifically, but that's where I would begin. Well, you know, and actually, I think I think I can actually take a lot away from what you've said. Right. Because like usually my first thought, my first reaction when bad stuff like this happens, I'm like, we got to get God in there. We got to you know, we got to talk to him about Jesus, you know. You know, and and I think it's it's it's not necessarily a bad thing because that's my first thought because that's where I go, you know. And so if if if people don't know God is God and don't know Christ is their savior, I'm like, I don't know what I do without without God. And so that's my first reaction. But actually, you know, when you talk about it and you think about it in a realistic fashion, you know, God started out with love and he's always had it and he has it for everybody equally. And and and and and if we can start with that, you know, like like if you want to be a good example of of of Christ and and of God's love, do that. Love them first. Just listen, you know, listen and talk and let them talk.

And and I think sometimes and me and I assume others, but I know me, for example, you know, I'm thinking, man, we just we got to get him to know Jesus. Like today is the day. Take it, you know, take the situation and put God in there. And now, you know, now get him to know Jesus. And actually, like it's a more it's a more palatable and a more real interaction with God when it's brought with love like God has. You know, I'm saying, because that's the God that you're going to get to know. And that's the God that's that that's loved you always anyway. You know, and so that's a way more realistic relationship than trying to take advantage of the situation as it sits, you know. And so I don't know. It seems like very, very wise, very wise words that I probably would not have. I don't know. I just wouldn't have thought that's just not the first thing that comes to my mind. You have to build a relationship with people, you know, without that relationship.

It's really hard to penetrate where they what they need to hear and they won't accept it until you build a relationship. You're just some fuddy-duddy adult coming in, you know, and it's like they'd rather hang out with their friends and process this and figure this out on their own. But that's a way you can help them do that, you know, to let them give them freedom to speak and and, you know, earn earn people's trust that way. So then you really can help them legitimately individually, you know, that's good. And they might ask, well, why did this happen? If I could go back in 41 plus years of ministry and answer all the whys, boy, I wish I could do that. Yeah. But sometimes I didn't have an answer for the whys. I had the assurance that God was present and that he will see us through these tough times, even the times of death. That is so hard for someone to hear in the raw moments. Right. Of grief. You know, what do you what do you mean God was there?

Why did why didn't God stop it? Yeah. You know, how did God allow this to happen? You know, is often part of our nature. I think we'll kind of strike back, you know, and what do you mean? It's easy to become too preachy. Yeah. Yeah. Well, what do you say to somebody that says something like that, though? You know, like if like I mean, they're honestly seeking the difference. They say, what? Why didn't God stop it? What do you say?

That's a tough. That's it. It goes back to the why there there. There's no way. I mean, I remember when 9-11 happened and, you know, all these people died and buildings crumbled. And it was an awful experience of people saying, how did God let that happen? And I think it was Franklin Graham. I could misquote. I think it was him who had made some statement that that kind of made its rounds and emails and, you know, type of thing of saying that God was there. You know, God was helping that person as the building was crumbling, knowing, you know, he was in their arms. And, you know, I mean, that sounds still like, well, why didn't he stop it? You know, that's where we are. It's the world we live in.

And sometimes bad things just happen. And he's there now. He's there now. He's there if we reach out to him to go after comfort, to ask him to help us process this. He is there. But, you know, we can't. We don't want to push him back. Right. Explaining that to somebody who does not know God is extremely tough. Because there's a lot that encapsulates, you know, God. And a lot of that is done through study of his word. You know, now someone who has some background, you know, in the relationship with Christ, you know, it's a little bit easier to say, you know, things like, you know, God has given us a free will to live in his world and a free will to love him and a free will to do things. And with that free will comes the opportunity for people to choose to sin, which as soon as he takes that away, he takes away our free will.

As soon as he steps in and stops the plane, the free will is gone. You know, as soon as he steps in and stops things, then the free will is gone and he doesn't have people that voluntarily love him. He has a bunch of robots that he's programmed, you know. And that's much easier to explain to somebody that knows Christ. Now, it's not comforting. It certainly does not make that go away. Well, you're never going to find comfort in there are consequences to acting a certain way. Because to who would it ever be comfortable to say, you know, you know, this person did this and as a result, they died or they got hurt or they're really sick. And no one say, well, that's, yeah, that makes sense that it's common sense is never comforting. Right. You know, and in that in that case, the truth, frankly, is not is not all that comforting. But but but that does bring up that does bring up a reasonable question, though, is in a situation like this, it life is gone. Life life was there.

And through a choice, life is no longer there. And the question is, is, you know, looking at it retro like reactively. How how how does that how does that happen? I mean, obviously, we can't and frankly, it's not even worth speculating what is in the mind of someone who who does that. But but the question is, is like what where do you have to be to be able to get to that point? And then and how do you counter the thoughts in the the view of of life and of the world that allows you to get to that point? Because because we would be missing an opportunity to keep others from making another choice of which, you know, everyone around you is impacted to not say that was a choice. Someone did choose to do that. They chose they made a choice that had this impact that is impacting families and friends and communities. And it was an option. There was an option to not do that. And so, you know, is it is it is it healthy to to to I would really think about how do you not get there? What do we have to understand to not get there and not make a choice like that?

And I'm granting that I'm asking, like, the world's biggest question. Right. I can tell you. Do you have something? No, go ahead. Well, I was gonna say in my family, we have always taught our children. And I'm not saying these parents didn't do this. But I'm saying this has been our approach that to look at everything long term, whatever situation you're in right now is not forever. You know, if there's a boyfriend, girlfriend problem, you know what? You might feel like it's the worst thing in the world right now. It won't be at some time if there's a health issue going on. You know what? You might spend the next 40 years in a certain health situation.

You know what? It is a blink of the eye compared to eternity. You know, it may seem like forever, it might sound like, man, that's the worst thing I could ever hear, that to keep that eternal perspective on God will help you. He'll be your anchor. He will help you through rough times. He'll help you through good times. He'll help you through positive times. If you keep him as your anchor, no matter what's going around around you, the winds, the storms, the rains, all the things crashing against your life, you keep that foundation on Christ. And the eternal worldview, whatever happens in the decades that you're alive, if you get to live that decades, you know, it's just a blink of the eye. The whole life is a vapor, Scripture says. Well, and, you know, obviously any situation of which someone, you know, chooses to take their own life is a misjudgment on a temporary situation. I mean, always, right? Like, you have the option to do A or B.

You chose A. And usually you're just not in your, for whatever reason, you're not in your right mind at that moment. Yeah. You know. Well, I think we have to realize in this, these two incidents, you have children, basically. Mm-hmm. And you don't know what was going on in their minds at that particular time, you know, that's why we have to be careful with what we say. Mm-hmm. And just simply be there for those who need you. Mm-hmm. Whether it be the families or school or community. And I think by making yourself available as you have, and people know that you're here, and they know that you're a friend to them, and they know the opportunity is here if they need you. And it may not be tomorrow night or the next night or the next night, but it might be down the road somewhere, a week or two weeks or maybe a month.

Right. So, you're sowing some seeds right now, and then God can use those seeds in ministering to people. Mm-hmm. And that's it. I mean, we honestly want people, we want people to know that we honestly care, you know. Right. We're not just trying to throw out something. And that's what we're like, you know, well, we could throw out an hour program, or we could throw, you know, that was part of our thing is, what do we do that legitimately, you know, offers the community? We don't know how to help. There's nothing we can do, nothing we can say. Here's this space, you know, and you come out and just spend some time alone if you want. Just come in here and cry. You know, come in here and cry out to God.

Come out and cry out to nobody. You know, it's especially for the people more directly involved. But even as you get a little bit farther out, you know, it gets very hard to react appropriately when, it gets very hard to react honestly when surrounded by your old surroundings where that situation was, and that person was part of that situation, you know. And the more you can, you know, it's not going to cause instant healing, but it helps to gain a perspective when you're pulled away from the emotional draw, you know, when you're buried in it. You know, I mean, especially with a child, you know, if you're in the house with the same room, I mean, it's just an emotional avalanche on you, you know, every time you have to walk past it. And so, I mean, just taking the time to get out, and whether it's at the Pathway prayer room here or it's just outside or somewhere where you don't normally go, I don't know, it just gives you a chance to remove yourself from that situation just for a little bit and gain yourself some perspective on what's happened. And, you know, it's also helpful, so in case, if you're watching and you're not familiar, the way that this prayer room is set up, it's a room that we have here at our ministry center. It's at 6510 Merle Hay Road. We're going to have it open 24 hours a day through Friday at least is our plan to make it available to anyone that wants to come and use it. We'll have people here, again, into the middle of the night and throughout the days to kind of get you in here and kind of point you in the right direction. But it's a big room that we have here, and the walls are all lined with paper. We've got some – the lighting's a little bit low in there. There's a candle going just to kind of give the place the feel of something, I don't know, contemplative.

And the thing really is to share your thoughts, share your prayers, share your questions, you know, write them on this paper that's lining the walls. And then as people come in after you, you know, they can read things that you've written and they can pray over them or they can, you know, they can cry along with them. They can think about them. I mean, it's just – it's a way so that the person can walk into the room and they can see the evidence of people praying. They can see the evidence of people thinking and mourning. And they can – there's a sense of community even if you're the only person in the room. You can be standing in the middle of an empty room and see the thoughts and prayers and questions of the community around you and at least in that moment be comforted in knowing that you're not alone dealing with that circumstance. As people are dealing with it in different ways and with different levels of impact. But as you sit in that prayer room, you have an option to look around and really understand that there are people around you that are going through similar things and that are praying for you and that are praying for your circumstances and the circumstances, the family and friends. You know, we use it in the context of the church. We have – we do one twice a year for a couple weeks, you know, 24-7 prayer for two weeks at a time twice a year. And those are just awesome experiences, just seeing people share themselves and the things that they are praying about and then being able to see in the next prayer room we can generally see how God has answered a lot of those things. Right.

And, you know, and provided that. And so I would encourage you that it's not a – it's not tied to any particular denomination, right? Like we just – it's just something we want to make available. There's no pamphlets in the corner for you. There's no guy standing at the front trying to get you to, you know, believe something you don't believe. It's an opportunity just to be in the presence of, you know, other people that are thinking the same thing and that are mourning about the same thing and praying on the same thing. And just be surrounded by that at any time of day. So, you know, and there's a lot – I know there's a lot of other things going on in the community. There's a meeting tomorrow for parents at 5 that the district is putting on for parents, I think, just to provide some kind of, you know, ways to talk with this with your kids. And it was interesting. We had our youth leader, Shelly, so she was here, you know, in the early morning this morning helping get everything set up and had kind of provided some insight on things you can do as a parent when you're in this type of situation. Dan, would you mind sharing a few of those that she had sent out? Sure.

This is on protecting your child. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, protecting your child from potentially getting into this situation. One is to guard your child's heart, you know, that's kind of one of those churchy things. You can hear about it in books, guard your heart and all this stuff and everything. But it truly is important to put your child in a setting where they're surrounded with an understanding of God and a worldview of God and, you know, praying together as a family and talking to God talk, so to speak. Not just the language, but being godly people around your child, that is very important. She has guard your child's time, especially teenagers, and they can just start wandering around. And the more they're responsible for, the more they can get a little, you know, look for things to do and maybe get themselves in trouble. And even, honestly, right now, with all of these teens that are in a grieving process, it's almost like you don't want to leave them all alone too long. You want to give them some space. But if you get them along too long, their emotions are so high. There's just a lot of things.

You want to have some guidance. So guard the time. Guard the group of friends. Friends definitely have influence. And if you had children old enough to have friends, you see that. I mean, there could be two, you know, and they're in a sandbox. Their friend influences everything. Oh, yeah. I can tell when my, you know, four or five-year-old has hung out with a certain friend. Exactly. They just act differently. And it's the same all the way as adults as well. So guard the group of friends that your children have.

So, you know, there was one thing that she had written that I think is really, really important. And it was the question was, is it possible to have terrific kids to guard their hearts, time, friends, and still have this kind of tragedy strike your family? And the answer is yes. Yeah. It is sad, but the answer is yes. And, you know, when you give out, you know, tips like this and things to keep an eye on, the worst thing that someone can do, and it's a big mistake, is to assume that because something has happened to a family or a person, that they failed in one of these areas. Oh, right. And that's not true. And so, like, these are things to keep an eye on and to try to, you know, deal with situations. But sometimes things just happen. You know, there are moments, there are lapses in judgment.

There are circumstances that, you know, control you for a matter of seconds, and you make terrible decisions. And, you know, it was weird. You know, Mike and Dan and I were here earlier this morning as we were trying to get that prayer room set up, and we were talking about the impact of some of those momentary lapses. And the thing is, is everybody does that. Everybody has times in their life where they just make a terrible decision. The distinction between that and, say, these, you know, these circumstances are there's just more dire consequences. The consequence is different. Right. I mean, you can find me in a given week making a bad decision about something on impulse, with the wrong heart, with a mind that's not in the right spot. It just happens, right? It could be, you know, I'm going to buy these cupcakes.

Yeah. And later on, you're like, what did I do that? I didn't need those. I just ate. But in this case, it's a permanent thing. Yeah. But, yeah, you're right. But, like, some of that's just the nature of people. And I think because it has larger consequences, I think sometimes, you know, people feel like they can make judgments as if the person that made that decision did so with the full understanding of the weight. Because that doesn't tend to be the case. No. Because, I mean, nobody can process that, right? Like, I couldn't process that if I sat down and think about it.

And so, I mean, I don't know how long you'd have to really think that. It's not, it just, I don't know, like, it does, it almost seems like you have to be in a different state of mind. You know, one that's not, you're just not, you're not processing correctly, you know? And it does, it really does parlay to something so simple as a bad move, a bad decision, you know? You looked at two options and you chose A, like Ben said, you know? And like you said, I mean, I've made that mistake probably three times since I've been up this morning. I've looked at something and made the wrong decision. I know, but there's a lot of percentage. I mean, there's no way to know. But there's a lot of people that if there was somehow they could redo it, they probably would have chose the other way. You know, it would be like, I didn't really mean that to happen. You know, I was just, I was, I wanted to get back at someone or I thought, boy, I'll show them. Not thinking through the fact that I'll never know that I showed them.

Well, there's a certain amount of grass is greener on the other side. You know, like all you can see is the pain that you're in and the situation you're in. You're like, anything's got to be better than this. This is terrible. You know, and, you know, decisions start to flow from that. I've made poor decisions from that very standpoint. So I suppose that then emphasizes the importance of keeping God in the center of your family always. You know, not just a, that's a Sunday morning thing. Or, well, at the Sunday school, they'll tell you about Jesus because, you know, we don't want to talk, you know, we don't talk too much about it. We're religious freaks. Because when that moment comes, you want as much weight on the God side as possible so that the mind goes to, I think, that's not a good idea. Right, the seesaw starts to tip. And, right, you want the fat kid on the God side of the seesaw.

You know, I mean, that's, you do. I mean, that's what you want. Like, you want way more. Or, because otherwise, if the seesaw just has a cracker box on it, it don't take much to tip it. You know, and that's probably the truth. And, I mean, if you look at the first, you know, throughout most of, especially the first four of the Gospels, right, like, and that kind of goes back a little bit to the parable about building on a foundation and building on sand. You know, the house, when Jesus talks about that parable, he talks about building your house on a solid foundation versus building it on sand. And, I mean, as it's a fairly obvious illustration, the one on a foundation can take a little bit of a beating, you know, without devastation. The one on the sand topples pretty quick. Well, and the assumption in that parable is that there will be a beating, right? The assumption is. Because it's life. Yeah, is that, like, the thought that your life is not, you're never going to run into troubles is dead wrong.

And the parable, Jesus did not give the option to say you can build your house with a solid foundation, build it on sand, or just build it up high where there will be no trouble. There wasn't a third option. Or build this juggernaut of a house that is just totally indestructible. You know, that's not what he says either. He just says it's going to take a beating, and sometimes it's going to get damaged. And your decision to base the foundation on Christ and actually the life statutes and the morals and the values and the system of thought and the way that you make your decisions based on the teaching of Jesus, it's always your fallback. That's a pretty sweet fallback, right? Like, I am devastated right now. I don't know what to do with myself. I'm not even thinking straight, but I know that my life pattern and the way that I make decisions is based on what Jesus has told me. So I'm going to assume the God that created me has got a handle on this, whether I do or not. And that's the house on the foundation, not the house on the sand.

Because, I mean, when the house on the sand goes, now you're left standing in a bunch of rubble, and you're like, do I want to build this up again? Because you know it's just going to topple. But, you know, that's a state. That's a whirlwind. You know, that's the tornado you get in where it just keeps falling. You build it, falling, you build it. And you're like, I don't even want to build it anymore. Yeah, yeah. You're listening to Live from the Path, a special broadcast of Live from the Path here from the Pathway Studios in Johnston, Iowa. We will be broadcasting. Broadcast started at 8 o'clock, so we will not be doing our normal 10 o'clock to midnight show tonight. We're going to do our 8 o'clock show. And we're broadcasting just outside of a temporary 24-7 prayer room that we put together as a response to some circumstances that have gone on here in the Johnson community over the last 48 hours.

There have been a couple of suicides within the community at the middle school and at the high school. And kind of our conversation up to this point, I think it has pointed towards we just wanted to make a place available, a safe place within the community for people to come and share and mourn and pray if they wish. Right, and this applies to, I mean, whether you know God or don't know God, or you currently have a relationship with Christ and you have relationships with people that don't, or it really is just open to anybody. It is a room set apart for contemplation and thinking, praying to God if you choose to. There's paper on the walls, it is just a place outside of where you're at to be, to think, to pray, and not just people who are directly involved in the situation. I prayed there last night, and like I said, I don't have a personal relationship with the families, but I grieve for them. And I know that there's a dad in that situation that I can relate to. You know, I'm a dad, I know there's a dad, and I know that in that position as a father, I've been pretty devastated all day. You know, and I just don't know, like I can't imagine just running into that guy and just wanting to hug him for an hour because I don't have the words, you know. But like the prayer room gave me an opportunity just to sit down and just, I prayed, you know, I prayed and I thought about the families and I prayed for the families. And, you know, it's a space available for anybody in the whole community if you just want to pray for the kids involved or just kids in general. You know, the kids in the community, the kids in the schools, the administrators in the schools, the teachers that have to answer the questions, the counselors that, you know, that God can help facilitate them some words to say. You know, and just to, you know, just for God to envelop that situation and, you know, lift some hearts up because it's going to be a tough, rough goal of it.

And there is every one of God's children involved here. Old, young is involved, and all of them need prayer, and all of them need some time thought about them, and all of them need love. And we can provide all of that through a medium-sized room in the middle of the community, you know, and it's available for anybody. And the reason we did it 24 hours is, you know, we could have just made it convenient and say, hey, we'll be here from 5 to 8 or something, you know. But grief is such a thing, it's pretty messy. You know, you're hurting when you're hurting, you know. And if it's 3 in the morning and you're laying around and you're rolling in bed, you're thinking, I'm going to go out and go for a drive, you know. You know, you can go out and do something silly, or you could come, not the driving silly, but, I mean, you know, I'm just saying you could do something, make one of those poor choices yourself. Or wouldn't it be nice to have somewhere where you can go that's a destination, you can stop, you can park, you can, someone will be here to let you in. They're not going to sit there and talk at you the whole time. If you want to talk with them, they're available. If you want them to go away, they'll go away. Yeah.

And it doesn't have to be an individual, it could be a couple people that work together, who knew this family, a group of people who might want to come and just spend some time together. And they know they have a place away from everything that's going on. And they can just pour out their hearts to each other. Yeah, yeah. It's amazing. To me, anyway, it's amazing in there. Because of the way we do it, we cover all the paper, the wallpaper and everything, it's a unique room, and it truly feels like an escape from everything. I don't know. I always get that, even just in our normal prayer rooms. No matter what's going on outside and what's going on anywhere, I can go in this room, and it's just like this moment of peace. You know, you've still got to go out and face the life again. Right. But it's like a reboot, so to speak.

It's like if I can just go here and hide for a little bit. But sometimes you hide or just hang out with a friend or something. That's what this is for. Yeah, so I mean, I guess kind of what we're driving at is I would encourage you, if you feel the need to get away or to find a place to pray, apart from even just your family. You know, if you just want to be on your own and do some praying, and you know anybody that is involved or not involved or just lives in Johnston or lives in Waukee, this has been an issue. You know, in the surrounding communities here in the last six months, Southeast Polk, just in our whatever, our 20-mile radius, it has been a deal. And this is not just an issue that is attuned to Midwestern Iowa. I mean, it's a situation, and it all requires prayer. It all requires God's guidance, not only about what your personal role involved with how to react to certain things, but just his loving hand in general, his grace that he gives us all, and, you know, that you can just pray that it'll be shown to everybody through, you know, the love that he has to give. And so, I mean, all those things are worth praying for. And, you know, if you don't want to pray for him here, pray for him at your house. You know, the important thing is to get to talking.

If you have a relationship with God, get talking to God about it because, you know, like we said, there's no expert on this situation. God's the one that sees it, and God's the one that watches these things and watches his kids and watches how they interact and how they get here, and he knows. I mean, he knows more than I know, you know, and he knows more than any expert knows, and so he's the guy. You know, I didn't think about that until Mike had said something earlier today when he said, you know, we were praying. He said, you know, I can't imagine how much it grieves God to see his children, you know, come to that. And I, you know, it's, I don't know, it's helpful for a lot of people to think of it from God's perspective, but I think, you know, I just know a little, and I know how much I love my kids and how much I, you know, love my family and my community. And if you think of God's love and how much it grieves him for something like that and what that must look like from his perspective, you know, he has the perspective of the Father. And I don't know, it was just interesting to kind of think about it from that direction, you know, and that God shares our grief as dads, as members of the community, you know, like that is, you know, he's, he understands where that's coming from and how you're, and how you're feeling, you know, even if you relate it to, you know, his own son, you know, he knows,

he knows what it's like to have the grief of a father and has that experience shared with us and, you know, has gone through it. He's, you know, beyond everything else as a wise counselor, he has that shared experience. And I don't know, to me, that's comforting to me. I don't know, it was just an interesting thing to kind of think about as we were praying through it. You know, we could say, well, God, you don't understand, but he does understand because he's gone through everything that we go through. The only difference, he came out victorious. And the only way we become, come out victorious is through him. And, you know, you are, you are listening to live from the path. You can catch us every Monday night. Normally we're broadcasting from 10 to midnight at live from the path.org. There's a interactive chat feature here. If you had any questions or comments that you wanted to share tonight, please, please do so.

After the show is over, it will be posted. We will, the audio is, is goes through our audio podcast. You can sign up for that. There's a link on live from the path.org to sign up for the audio podcast. And we'll post the full video of tonight's show on our Blip TV channel. If you go to livefromthepath.blip.tv, you can watch archives of the show that will include this one. This one will probably be up sometime early tomorrow morning, three or four in the morning or so. I would, I would imagine it'd be up and available. And if there's any part that's helpful, we'll also post some of it on YouTube for you to share with others in case it's something that will be of help. I would encourage you to, you know, if there's anybody that you know that is grieving through this process, to offer them the prayer room here at Pathway. It's at, it's at our ministry center, which is at 6510 Myrtle Hay Road here in Johnson.

It's right on, on the main drag of Myrtle Hay. If you're heading north out of town, it's on the left-hand side. Sign as bright as, as if we run a gas station. Yeah. It's a bright sign. It is pretty bright. But, um, I can't, I can't get Jesus as the fat kid out of my mind of the seesaw. Here's the thing. That person is sticking with me. I have to explain things so they make sense to me. And that's what I think of. And so, I don't know what to tell you. Maybe I'm the common man.

Maybe I'm out there. I don't know either way. But for some reason, that analogy just really stuck with me. Maybe other people think like me. You don't know. You don't know. So, so I don't, so what, what do you, um, what do you think, fellas? Like, what do we do, what do you do from here? Because I think one of the things that you find in a situation like this is, um, uh, people trying to find things to do and you come in and, and we, we put together, there's, you know, vigils and, um, and, uh, programs and a prayer room and all that stuff, um, which, which may need, uh, meet some immediate needs within the community. But how does, uh, I mean, where does the community go from here?

Or to, to help continue to, to process it and to move, uh, and to move through it? Because, I mean, this isn't something that, you know, just because you put a, it's because you come in here and you spend an hour in the prayer room, two hours, I don't care how long you spend in here. It's not as if your life will have changed and the situation will not have happened, right? It's a, it's part of a grieving process and can help with that processing, but it doesn't eliminate the circumstances that caused it. It doesn't, you know, negate memories in your mind or thoughts that are, that come out of it. Um, you know, what is this, what does it look like long-term? What do you do to provide long-term support to community in this situation? Great question.

Yeah. I think that, um, society and in our culture, we're kind of almost cruel to, to the point where we give people a couple, three weeks, you know, you're in a, having a hard time. You've lost someone close to you, a father, a mother, a child, whatever, uh, relationship the person is. And then it's almost like we expect people to, to kind of get on and get over it, you know? Well, it's not that easy, you know, the person's gone and you're trying to rework that relationship in your mind of, of, I mean, cause you still have the memories, you still have those feelings and you still have a connection, but you don't have a way to, to communicate with them and and you're dealing with the fact that you never will again. And, and so it's this very long process. You know, people talk about the first year of all these milestones that happen, but that's

just the beginning. I mean, it doesn't, it doesn't end up the first year. Right. There's not one year that that birthday is going to show up and you're not going to go, Hey, that's so-and-so's birthday. I told you today, today I went to a funeral. All right. And I'm at the funeral and a guy talks to me because how much to come meet someone? I said, okay. So this is like afterwards, you know, a little meal thing. And I go over to the guy and he goes, uh, your, your dad's Jim Hudson, right? Like, yeah, my dad died in 1994. Okay.

I spent a long time ago. Uh, I can't tell you the last time a stranger knew my, you know, said my dad's name. Yeah. Right. And, uh, well, we served together in, uh, in the guard, uh, the Iowa air national guard, you know, and for X number of years together, we went on all these trips and blah, blah, blah, you know, the little summer things they do. And, and both of them that had knew my dad and, and they started talking about him. I'm like, that is wild. I have not seen him for, what is that? The past 17 years or whatever. And, uh, 18 years or so. And is it, it's different now than it was 18 years ago.

It was pretty painful in the beginning when he first passed away and, and it maybe gets better, but, but still it's never over. Yeah. You know, it's never over. So what does the community do? I think you've got to allow people to have time. You've got to allow people to grieve. Everybody grieves a little differently. You've got to allow, you've got an honor. I believe those people in there and the memories is that helps in the grieving process. That was kind of helpful for me today to think, wow, all these years later. Right. Somebody even knew, knew his name, you know, I could say they knew him and to hear, and

to hear his name and someone speak at that in a positive way, it was awesome. Yeah. You know, it wasn't always positive. No, but you know, I mean, it was, it was healthy and it was, and it was good. And I said, wow, he died in 94th. Like, wow. You know, the whole thing. And I still, this is Air Force ring. I've been wearing it since the three days before he passed away. He gave it to me. And they're like, oh, wow. Yeah. I recognize that.

And, and, um, it was just kind of a neat experience. So I think that's where we need to give people some, some permission to grieve. Yep. You know, okay. It's been two weeks. Yeah. Guess what? It's going to be another two weeks and another two weeks and another two weeks and, and, and let them, let them grieve. One thing we're going to do, I've been really thinking about this. We have a 13 week course on grieving called grief share that, um, is an excellent resource. It's helped me tremendously, uh, through my own grieving of, of situations in my life. Of losing people.

I think we'll wait maybe a month and maybe start letting people know we're going to offer that again. Cause I'd say it's a 13 week. It's a pretty big commitment, but it's extremely helpful in helping people process because then you have, you have your counselors, but you also have a group of people going through the same setting and they get to talk. Yeah. Here, here's my person who passed away and, and, and here's how I remember them. Here's how I love them. Here's what I miss about them. And it also tells you things that, um, I, you know, I went through things when, when, when Sean Engeldinger, our, uh, executive pastor a few years, a couple of years ago passed away at that, uh, in, in grieving, I didn't know it was grief and explains things that people

do that are normal that I'm like, Oh, I thought I was just, I mean, things like you can talk to someone and we're having a conversation. I'm thinking, I have no idea who you are. I'm thinking, I know, I know you, right? If I, if I, if you were to ask me to say, uh, introduce him, I'd go, this is, this, this is my friend in the red shirt. This is my buddy. And honestly, it would be a, so I honestly couldn't remember, you know? And I thought, I thought, man, that's a common thing with grief. You will forget things. It'll come back, you know, but you go through this period of, you just don't remember things. Um, you'll, you'll forget. I had a, uh, a GPS and I remember driving home from somewhere in Des Moines.

I've spent most of my life in this community. It's not that big of a town. Yeah. And I'm like, I have, I don't know where I am or how to get home. I mean, honestly, I was like, I don't know if I should turn right or left. So I just plugged in home in the GPS and they got me home. There was a couple, three times that happened. Well, later on, I took this class. They're like, Oh yeah, that'll happen. Huh? I'm going, it's kind of cool to hear someone else say that. So some of the stuff you're going through, you find out, well, that's right. It's not so weird.

It's not so crazy and actually part of the process. And you know, 13 week does sound long, but I mean, think how short it is. Think how short it really is compared to, you know, what you have to deal with. And especially instead of doing it on your own, I mean, that's a painful, that's, that's a painful long time, 13 weeks with a group of people and a little bit of insight on people who have gone through it before is, is very beneficial. The first few weeks can be kind of raw, but by the time you're at the end, people are smiling and laughing and, and, and you learn how to give yourself permission at some point, you know, you, you look up and you see there, there are stars again, you know, the sun does shine and you almost feel guilty. I shouldn't laugh. You know, I, I'm, I'm grieving, you know, and it just goes through, it covers so many things.

Uh, so I want to give it some time. Yeah. Uh, so we'll probably say, we'll probably wait a month and then we'll start from promoting to tell them people know what's happening and then probably wait another month. It'll be a couple months down the road. We had a gal take it that, uh, her mother had passed away like 16 years prior and she thought, I should just take this. She was, she was in tears, you know, cause she had never processed some things properly. And once she learned the process that it helped her tremendously. So it's, it's, it's a, it's a valuable thing that, um, that's, that's a little tool, at least that we will offer, um, to, to, to our community. Anybody who would want to take us up on that. Well, and I think that's the, that's the consistent kind of narrative through all this

is, uh, is not feeling like you have to go through this process on your own, right? Being able to recognize that we are made, um, for community. We are, we are made to kind of lean on each other, um, because circumstances are what they are and we, in, you know, um, you know, we, we're just, we can't carry a lot of that stuff on our own and we've actually been provided, uh, you know, family and friends and community to go through these things, uh, together and provide support. And, um, and it's not a matter of how strong you are. It's not a matter of, um, you know, how well you think you deal with things or frankly, how you think, uh, other people believe you should deal with something like ultimately, um, you know, are you dealing with it in a healthy manner that results in your ability to, you know, process this thing, um, and, and continue to, and to live with it, right? Because again, it's not going away, but to live with it in a manner that is, that is healthy, um, uh, for you, for the memory of the person that you're grieving, uh, and all that stuff

and using community, uh, to do that. Uh, and, and I think all ultimately it all, it all goes back to, uh, to what Don said, which is just, just the presence is being there. People who are, who are willing to say, I care enough to not have my body at home in its chair or on its couch, but to have it sitting right here to you. Even if, uh, I know I can't say anything that will help. And even if we don't talk at all, right, just, I, I, you know, I'm, I'm caring enough to, to say, I, there's nothing else that I'm going to be doing right now, except for being here next to you, you know, being of whatever assistance I can. Uh, and, and that's, that's, that's the community part is, is people just, you know, recognizing that, that someone cares enough to do that. Cause I mean, it's ultimately what you're demonstrating is, is, is I have a choice. I have a choice to, to come, come to this place or come to their house or, and grieve

with them and sit next to them. Or I could do a million other things, right? There's a million other things someone could be doing with themselves, but, but as, as the hands and feet of Christ, we can say, look, I'm, my hands and feet are going right there and I'm going to put them right there. Um, because there's no place that I would rather be, uh, except for standing next to you and trying to help in this process and my presence will do that. And, and you have to grieve. Some people will try to cover it and hide it and run from it, you know, fill up with busy stuff and, and, you know, add that or schedule or do somehow just not talk about it, not face it. And that's where you can come 16 years later and, and wow, I never processed this. You have to grieve.

Uh, one of the things, this thing, uh, this class will teach you is to lean into it. You know, if that makes sense, you know, just, just, you have to go through it. You can't go around it. You can't go under it. You can't go over it. You have to go through it. And as you go through it every day, it's a little better, a little better. And it'll teach you how to reach out to Jesus for peace, you know, as opposed to just saying, well, just, just Jesus, peace, you know. Right. Yeah. Right. Just take it all.

It's a bumper sticker. Did you see the bumper sticker? Yeah, exactly. I'm ready for this to go. It shows you how to do that and, and, and, and shows other people's path that they've traveled and their relationship with Jesus. And there's a little work book you go through that, that it will be just very helpful for people to process it, but you have to go through it. You can't run from it. It'll just, it'll, it'll, it'll danger you damage your own soul. I was given an example today of how long grief might last. A lady that I had ministered with, she and her family over 16 years ago, and she was saying today on Facebook how she missed her husband who's now been deceased for 13 years and wish

he was there today. She's still going through that process and I reminded her of some, you know, some good things that, that happened and especially in my role in their life and his ministering to me and pretty soon she was laughing and, but she may cry tomorrow, but then she'll laugh again. Yeah. And, uh, that's why it's important just to continue to be there for people when they need to, to, to help someone learn how to continue living. Cause that's part of the class too, that I don't want to keep going back to the class, but it's a big deal is, you know, you, you haven't died. I mean, it was awful that your friend died, your, your spouse died, your child died, but you haven't. So at some point you've got to give yourself time to check out, you know, but at some point

you, you have to re-engage and, and to come back into life, that's, that's, that's exactly what they would want. You know, they didn't want you to go with them. They want you to, to be happy again and to, to smile again and, and to enjoy life. And once you go through the grief, you can. So that's how, that's one way we will, we will partner anyway. Yeah. Um, with, with people, uh, for those who want to participate, you know, in that. I like it. And I think, I think broadly from a, from a community standpoint, um, uh, individually within the community, um, to create the proper, proper atmosphere, I think you, you nailed it is to, is to not put a time limit on someone's grief to not say, okay, you should be, you should be done.

Uh, my mom died three years ago and I was fine after 12 weeks. I mean, like seriously, you know, put yourself away for a while, um, focus on that person. People grieve differently, they react in different ways. Um, you know, and, and, and frankly, you know, be open to the possibility that perhaps you did not grieve in a healthy fashion. Cause I mean, sometimes we set standards in a way like, well, this is what I did without considering the fact as to whether, you know, you did so in a, in a healthy fashion that you are not still weeping daily that your mother died three years ago is, is not the same as the fact is whether you dealt with it in a healthy fashion. Uh, and sometimes it's an opportunity for, for you to even, you know, be part of that. I don't know that it necessarily has to be that you're grieving about the same thing. It's just, it's just mutual understanding if we are in a place of hurt, um, and we're willing to support and share with each other.

Yeah. I don't, I don't remember it was it in, in the Jewish culture, was it just marriage or was it also, do you remember when it was, was it at death also that like military people, you had a year off that, that you just, you just didn't, you just got to check out for a year. And I, maybe I remember remembering that. What did the same thing with marriage too? Like marriage. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, I think I'm linking those two together, but I think so because they understood what good are you going to be? You know, you've got to heal.

Then you can, then come on back. That's a long time. A year. You know, like I say, we get people, well, you have five days bereavement. Well, you're still getting the business side of it done. Well, yeah. You know, if you're in that role. And to, to, to then be able to, to kind of shut down for another week would be nice, but it's pretty tough. Well, and it's, and it's kind of weird to think, you know, if you look like a cultural comparison of where we, where we put values, even on the marriage comparison, right? A guy would get married and he'd be out of the military for a year because his, you know, to, to orient himself to his life with his wife.

We don't do that. I mean, you could, people get married on a Saturday so that they can, you know, bargain with a couple of the days so they can take a honeymoon out of five days and be back to work in a week and a half. And it's just, some, some of it's a cultural priority. And we, I think we deal with death the same way. I mean, the clock keeps spinning. Somebody needs to, you know, time to make the donuts and you move on. And it's a, and when sometimes the outpouring of that is that we don't, we don't deal with things in a healthy fashion. We've set unreasonable expectations on ourselves as a people and as a culture, you know, and then we're surprised that we're unhealthy when it comes to our, to our mental state or physical state.

Um, because we simply have, you know, have chosen to slave to time as opposed to like healthy ways of actually, right. And show me a time when one of your loved ones has passed away and it fits in your schedule. Yeah. You know, it's just, it's just not one of those situations, you know? And, uh, I, I think you're probably right. People try to force it. And like, I just got to get back to my regular day-to-day routine, you know, not realizing that your day-to-day routine included those people. And so, you know, until you, until you've processed that they're not going to be there in that day-to-day routine, maybe it's not great to go slamming yourself right back in. Yeah. That's, and that's the mistake of a phrase like life will go on, right?

Yes. Life will go on, but differently. It has altered. Yeah. Something has changed about it. And, and I think sometimes people, you know, well life, life will go on. And so what they try to do is treat life as if something wasn't changed. And that's the mistake you can't deal with. You can't deal with a life when you act as if something like that's, that's a, that's a lie, frankly. And, and I, you can't live a healthy existence trying to, you know, live your life based upon the lie that something didn't just drastically change. So, I mean, life will go on, comma, differently than it was before.

And, and that's an appropriate realization. And, and I think when you recognize that it can and should be different, you don't start wigging out when it is. But, but I think sometimes we think life will go on and we try to do the same things. We say, I just can't pull myself together. Well, of course you can. Yeah, right. Life is different. You had lunch with your mom every Friday, every Friday. And then what, every, every time Friday comes around and you didn't deal with it, that's going to be tough. You used to pick your friend up for, for work every day. Work the same place you worked.

You know, you think you're going to go back to that job and everything's going to be just like it was. And, and obviously not. There's going to be a huge hole there. There's going to be a guy missing from your car. Or, and a buddy that you used to eat lunch with, or, you know, I mean, there's a, there's, I guess you probably don't realize the holes that these people filled until they're gone. You know, and then, and then you try to approach that same situation as if that hole's not there. And then, then you fall in it, you know, and, and, and that's very, very, I might have to go to this grief thing just because I'd like to know more about it. I'm kind of excited about the program now. It's, it's great.

I've done it twice now. It's because I, you know, I can help facilitate it. And, and, um, every time I watched, I'm going, there's a video with discussion and we call it a, um, top board group. Uh, we call it a recovery group. You can't see it, but Dan's doing this to imply that you will know what it is that we're talking about. You know, a play, a support group. That's all. It's as simple as not a complicated versus the support. I really expected more. Yeah. Sorry.

I thought it was like video and something. People often leave conversations with me saying, I expected more. I've been disappointed. What, what do you do to, for those people who don't come here to the prayer room, don't come to the, uh, uh, grief course, uh, how do you minister to them? That's the thousand dollar question. Yeah, I, I think one of the greatest ministries of the church in particular, those who live in Johnston, those who meet these people at, uh, come and go, or, uh, you know, it's a grocery store and, uh, those sometimes can be opportunities. They will probably bring it up if given the opportunity. You don't have to. Yeah. That, you know, and I, I, that's, that's true.

I've, I've had that experience. I've, I'm always concerned, um, about asking about how people are doing. Cause that's the, I don't know what I'm walking into or if this is a rough spot for them or if they're going to say something that I don't know how to react to. But I think, I think Dawn's right on. Like if it's something that they are, that they want to talk about, it'll, it'll show up like simply by caring, you know, and, and, and taking the time with someone, it'll bubble up when they've got something. I don't know. My wife gets me on this. Every time I'm trying, like there's something that's bothering me, but I'm refusing to say it. You know, my wife can pick that out.

It's like, well, what's the matter? Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. It was, it take 45 minutes and finally I'm like, well, well, here's the deal. Someone ate some of my Cheetos. Yeah. Yeah. You know. Our all wives shall lie. Yeah. She's straight through us. That intuitive thing.

Right. God doesn't tell you that's part of marriage, right? I'm going to let your wife know when you're telling the old Fibberoni. That should have been a proverb. By the way, she knows. She already knows. You might as well just tell her. But it's the same thing. Like if you can look at your own life and say, I just can't hide things from people. Like I probably even want to talk about it, right? But I'm for some reason I'm holding back as if I'm not going to share it. Maybe so it's more momentous when I do. But you know, people, when they want to talk about something, they will find a way to talk

about it. And frankly, they're probably just looking for an ear. There's just someone to listen to. As a goofy man as he is, you find few people that can listen as well as Dan Hudson who will just sit and listen to you talk about something. And it's just, I mean, it's something where you just, you have to, you have to understand where the person who's talking to you is coming from. And frankly, they just, they just want to talk. They want to get stuff out. They want to share. And they're not expecting you to solve their problem. That's a dude issue. That is.

That's a dude problem is to say, I'm a man. Tell me your problem. Right. And I will fix it. I'll give you three steps. That's why there's no dude newspaper columnist that do advice, right? It's always dear Abby, dear Susan. They're ladies. There's not a dear Leonard, right? Because guys are not helpful. They're like, here's what you're going to do. So, and I think as men, it's something to be, frankly, that's true in your own relationship with your wife and your kids is recognizing when people are just trying

to share with you. They're not asking for you to fix their problems. And I think grief sometimes is the, is the no man's land intentionally with that gender because like, we just don't know how to behave. You can't change anything about the thing. We can't go out and do something and make the person like whatever event has caused the grief go away. You can't say anything. And it's just, it's very difficult for a man to deal with other people that are grieving because they just don't know what to do. And I don't know, would you be, maybe part of that, as you say, going into the community and rubbing shoulders with people is give them permission to grieve because the rest of their, well, in this case, it won't be mother co-workers.

They're still going through, a lot of people going through this, but in a typical set of situation, everybody has shut them down now and you spend two weeks, you know, quit talking about that person. Come on, you know, maybe for us to say, Hey, you know, it's been six weeks now since you lost your son. How are things going? Don't be afraid to use the name. You know, they want to hear the name. Don't, I mean, you don't want to get all creepy about it. And every time you see them, but, but, you know, right. I mean, show that you care, right? I mean, act like you even half, half understand. I mean, you don't understand what they're going through, but you, you want to share that

experience with them if they want to share it with you. You know what I'm saying? And so by saying, you know, like you said, you don't call them every day and say, you know, how's the grief? How's the grief? What's the grief? How's the hanging? You know, it's going okay. You know, but if you happen to run into them and you say, you know, how, how, how have things been? I want you to know I'm still praying for you. Assuming you are. Right.

You know, yeah, certainly do not say that if you're not doing that, but, um, well, you should feel bad because you ain't, but, uh, you stick with it. You know, and maybe that's something to keep in mind too, is as part of your prayer life, you know, don't, don't cross them off the list after two weeks, you know, put them there for a while, pray for them, you know, for a year, put them on there. Say just, just for the next year, I guess that's, that's what I'm going to do. You know, they need God every day, regardless if they're struggling that day or not. And so you just as well pray for them. Yep. Like Don said, who's going to, who's going to do it that, uh, people need to share the gospel as we might as well be me. Yeah. I like that as well.

Well, you have two families here that are grieving and I understand that both families are, uh, active in a church. So I'm sure their ministry is there. I'm sure they have people in their churches there. And this is something that we can do as, as the church beyond where we go. A title, a name. Yeah. Yeah. Right. That we can, uh, band together in providing the support, uh, not only for the two families, but for all the kids and, uh, the teachers and anyone who had, uh, any type of relationship with these two kids. I agree.

Definitely. Yeah. And, I mean, and I, and again, that's a, it's a community band together. And then, um, I don't know, just making sure that, that it's, uh, recognizes it's, it's, it's okay and it can persist and you can continue to provide support. Um, like I said, there's a number of things, uh, coming up as, uh, with the community is offering. There's a, there's a parents meeting tomorrow, um, and I think it is at the, at the high school auditorium. Um, yeah, it's, it's, uh, it's from five to six at Johnson middle school auditorium. There'll be two experts on loss and grieving that will provide, uh, insights on guidance and how to talk to and support the kids. Um, so that, that'll be going on, on Tuesday. Um, the, uh, I believe the funerals are this week.

There's one on Thursday and one on Friday. Um, I mean, so there's, there's a lot that is just a process of, of going through dealing with things, things like that. And so, you know, being in continued prayer about those events, recognizing that, um, you know, any one of them can be a trigger for the reality of the situation. Like sometimes, um, the reality doesn't hit until you've, you start doing the formal processes, uh, that surround it. I remember my, um, my grandma died. It had been five years ago, I think. And, um, uh, you know, it was, she was older. Uh, it wasn't expected, but you know, she passed away. And I wasn't until we got to, um, the, the graveyard, uh, you know, and we, we, you know, we'd done the viewing, we'd kind of walked by our body and, you know, and all that stuff.

And I think once we got to the graveyard, then was the time was like, okay, she's, she's gone, gone. Yeah. Um, and there's no, and some of it was because, you know, the, the, the funeral and all that stuff was still focused on her. We're still talking about her. We're singing songs that she likes. Um, you're surrounded by family and then you kind of recognize that as you're walking away from that, from that grave site, um, you just feel a little bit lonelier than you did when you got there. Um, and there's just something about the reality of things like that, um, that can trigger those, those emotions. So, I mean, recognizing that, um, you know, you're, you're a day or two days out on some

of these things. Um, there are a number of things this week that just, just need prayer, um, because there's still a number of steps through the, just the process of someone passing away, um, that have the opportunity to bring stuff back up. That was, it's actually really funny because, uh, uh, I mean, not comedic funny, but, uh, because you, you know, that same situation, it didn't hit me until we got back to, uh, grandma grandpa's house and her car was in the garage. And it hit me that no one's there that that car has, doesn't have an owner. Like it was really, it was really odd. Like, you know, the whole day, like Ben said, you're just surrounded by family and everything's there. And, and then, uh, we got back after the funeral, pulled in the driveway and of course she wasn't driving the car because, you know, you know, she died.

And then I looked at her car. I'm like, who's going to drive her car? And then it went from a kind of a smirk, you know, like who's going to drive her car to, she's not here to drive her car. You know, like it was just, it's just a really odd situation, you know, like, and, and I think that's, um, you know, and I think that's, that's a very good justification of why the prayer room will be open this week, you know, things like that are going to come up, you know, the, the, you know, you, you pass by where they used to work, you know, some of those students would stop in and, and, you know, where they had their part-time jobs and, and they'll just happen to stop in as part of a regular week. And then, you know, it'll hit them that they're not there. And it's like little things like that will, are the mountains, you know, the big heavy stuff are so filled with people and emotion and, and testimony that, that they tend to

get glossed over, you know, and then it's the, the brass tacks of, of reality that, that really start to get you like, you know, cleaning the room or, or, you know, the yearbook when it comes out and, you know, those kinds of things are just, they're just going to be very heavy situations. And so, um, you know, heavy prayer on, on, on, on our part and, and then, you know, just, just a hand, I remember, I remember when grandma died, which would be like the most, most recent death in our family, um, uh, for me anyway. And so when my, when my grandma did die, I remember, uh, what somebody from my family came up and walked up to me and they didn't say anything is put their hand on my shoulder and then they looked at me and just kind of went and then walked away. And that was the most helpful thing that happened to me. That's something like the whole funeral and everything. Like, you know, everyone had, had a bunch of words to say and, and, and a bunch of things

and, and hugs and, and, you know, people, of course, I don't remember from ages ago, you know, showing up out of nowhere and telling how great. We knew you when you were cuter. Right. You know, they're like, I remember you used to run naked around my house. I'm like, I didn't do that. You know? And, uh, and, you know, I loved your grandma. She was a great lady. I'm like, yeah, she was, you know, then you say that 50 times. And then, you know, just that one person walks up and puts their hand on your shoulder and goes, and there's nothing I can say. And then walks on and you're like, yeah.

That's again, is the ministry of presence. Just be in there. You know, some people have the gift of mercy. They go to a funeral home. They put their arms around the person. They weep with them. Others go and they can't find the right words. And sometimes they say the wrong words and we just need to be there. I tell you, I leave, I leave hospitals. I leave, uh, funeral type settings so many times throughout the years feel like a complete failure thinking I did nothing to fix this. And I have to keep reminding myself, I can't. Right.

There's nothing I can say. There's nothing. I was there. And then I think, well, that wasn't enough. Thank you. You bring the message. What else could I do? The one who can fix it internally. Yeah. He may not be able to fix it except to help people get through these times. Yeah. But through our faith, we know we have victory. Yeah.

I think the shoulder and the look is the, well, I think, I think you can help, um, be along some, someone with a grief in how you would grieve. Like, don't be something that you're not unless you're a jerk and then stop being a jerk. Right. Like, I don't want, I don't want to go overboard because if you're not a good person, you can change your way. But, um, but you know, generally speaking, I don't, I'm not a, I'm not a hugger. You know, I, I've, I think I've, I've found situations where someone was grieving and I think I've put my hand on someone's shoulder when I normally wouldn't because I felt like that was, I felt like doing it, but I mean, I'm not going to, you know, big hug somebody and start talking to them in a way that I'm not comfortable with doing. Cause that's not, people don't want you to be fake. They just, they just want to have you, you know, want you there.

They want you to be alongside them, not some sort of, uh, you know, uh, phony version of you to try to trump up the situation. Exactly. Like as if your perception has changed and your life has changed and you're a completely different person and now are some super counselor to the start. If that's not, you don't do that. It's, it's, uh, we've set up a really bad situation. If people don't know how to grieve comfortably, right? If they feel to help others that you have to become something that you're not, um, I think don't hit it. Some people just have that. Some people have, you know, the, the ministry of mercy where they're just able to, uh, my grandma was like that.

Like she could, you know, she could talk to anybody and they would open up to her and you know, and she knew all these things about people and like, I'm, I'm an awkward guy. I kind of like, I say, hello. And I say, is this your daughter? It's like, Oh no, that's the neighbor. They're just standing next to me. He's like, Oh, okay. Like this, these are situations I get myself into. Um, I just don't, I don't have that same perception that people have. Um, but, but, but I think, you know, like in Mike's situation, if a guy comes up and you know that he's grieving and he grieves in a way that he does, like you recognize that you're going to the same thing, not that he's covering up his stuff to try to help you with yours.

He's just saying, look, we're doing this thing together. So, you know, if you're in the process of grieving or you want to help other people grieve, just do it as you would do it, you know, be yourself and how you do it. Uh, don't, don't feel like you have to do something. It was my first reaction when we were put in the prayer because I said, what if people show up and what if they start? I don't know what to do. I don't know what to say. What are they going to ask? And, and like, how, how can I help? And, and, and the more, the more time we spend in there setting stuff up, you know, more I thought I can't do anything. I can just, uh, but I'm more than I want to be here and I can, I can point them in the

right direction and how to get in there and how to use the wall. And if they want me to pray with them, I certainly can pray with them because I, you know, I know what they're, what they're going through or the situation that caused it. And that's what I can do. And I can be honest about that's what I can do. And that's what I will do. Um, so do what you can do, do what God has given you the ability to do and help people in the way that he's, uh, given you the ability to help because it's, it's sufficient, right? God is not going to put you in a, in a position where he's going to say, I've, I've underskilled you and now I'm going to ask you to do the, I set you up to fail, right? I need you to help men to, you know, to help get involved with this situation. By the way, you're going to fail at it. You know what I'm saying?

That's not generally God's MO. He gives you the strength to do the things he asks you to do and he empowers you to do the things that he asks you to do. And so, uh, and maybe take that as, um, uh, a time to step back and pray and say, if this is what you're calling me to do, I'm, I'm hearing what you're saying and I'm, I'm on it. I'm in, you know, don't shy away from something that's, I mean, and this is true. This is not, this is true with the grieving process. This is true across the board in your life. You know, God will do these things to you, uh, uh, more often than not, you know, he'll, he'll, he'll find a place where he wants you and you'll go, eh, that's not really my strength. You know that God, you know, we've been together for a while. You know, that's not really my thing. And, uh, uh, that's a huge mistake.

When God tells you to do something, you close your eyes, pray on it, make sure that it is him saying it. And then when you find out it is, you say, okay, you've equipped me for every good and perfect work. I'm ready to go. You know, and, and, and, and the same thing with the grief process, you know, I would tend to shy away from somebody that I would know that like this thing has happened to them recently. If I saw them at the gas station, my general personality is to just not bother them because I wouldn't want to be bothered. Uh, but if you feel the Holy Spirit knocking you on the shoulder and saying, I need you to go say something, you know, don't back out of it because you didn't want to put your personality on the table for Jesus to use.

You know, if, if he's calling you to do it, do it. Uh, you know, it was weird. Uh, if this was really random, my wife, um, we, we bought our homeschool curriculum from somewhere and then they just randomly sent her a book and it's called the 10 second rule. And, um, she was telling me about it. And the whole premise of the book is in the next 10 seconds, are you going to do what God wants you to do? Like, I mean, seriously, like, would you willing to commit whatever it was? Would you do that in the next 10 seconds? And a lot of times we fail that, right? Like we make God kind of heavy, man. I, it is. I agree.

And I don't think that the conceptually is if the Lord is going to like ask you every 10 seconds to do something, but the thought process is, is like, move the car, shovel the back. I think the thought process is, is like, do I make God beat me over the head with something? Do I really make him just knock me out with it before I say, before I, I submit? Am I, am I trying to say, God, you're going to have to strong arm me or am I saying, whatever this is, it's yours in, in, in this, for at least I can commit to 10 seconds. I can, I can say I'm going to do everything God wants me to do over the next 50 years. But I'm pretty sure I'm not going to do that because I'm a fallible human and I will do what I want to do and I will worship the wrong thing and I'll do the wrong thing and I will love myself more than God and it's going to happen. Right. But in the next 10 seconds, can I say, you know, under any circumstance, I'm going to do

what God wants me to do and a lot of times when we, I think we can recognize where that interval was. You drive down the interstate and you see a guy sitting on the side of the road and I think, man, I should pull over and I got half a mile to do it and like, I think, oh, I can't make it and I could have made it. Oh no, I've passed it. And then I drive by him and I think, you can't back up now. I think, yeah, I can't get off the next exit. I can't go back. What am I going to say to the guy? What if he, you know, what if he beats me up with a tire iron? Right. How embarrassing that I had to go all the way past him and come back around, he's going to know that

I skipped him the first time. Yeah. Or what if he's gone? Now what? I've just wasted gas and time and, you know, and so, but, but in that 10 seconds, if I just said, yeah, I'm going to pull over, you know, what would your life look like if you lived it in 10 second chunks in which you said, I'll do what God wants me to do. And, and I think some, a lot of that's taking you out of your comfort zone and, you know, people going through the grieving process is way out of my comfort zone because I feel like I don't, I don't share this experience with you. I don't, I just don't know. That book blows my mind. I'm not going to read it.

It sounds way too heavy for me as it sits. Yeah, I don't like it. I sound like I'm going to come off as a disobeying jerk at the end of the time. I like the 60 second time manager. That's better. Another thing that people can do is pray as they go by the school. Yeah. When they pass the school bus, knowing there's kids on there who, you know, who have been affected because of these two deaths, there's all kinds of places we can pray. There's these opportunities we provide like here at the prayer room. But then there are those other opportunities. Oh yeah. Those buses are all over the place.

I mean, right. You know, twice a day. I've often found myself praying for kids on a school bus when I pass a school bus. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, you've been listening to Live from the Path. So just a reminder, we will have a prayer room open 24 hours a day, at least through the end of Friday here at the Pathway Church Ministry Center. We're located at 6510 Merle Hay Road in Johnston. If you're heading north out of town, you go past the Walgreens and it will end up being on your left-hand side.

If you're coming in from the north side of town, it'll be on your right-hand side before you hit the Walgreens. There you go. That's good. So we'll have someone here 24 hours a day up through that, at least through Friday. We are inviting you to come in regardless of the time. The middle of the day is awesome. The middle of the night is awesome. We'll have someone here expressly for the purpose of you having a place where you can go in a safe environment to kind of continue to deal with the situation that we have here in Johnston. And as a church, I know that we can commit to praying for you, praying for the community, praying for the family.

And we will be doing that for you. But we just want to make sure this prayer room is available for you. Again, it's a, you know, again, there's no pamphlets here. There's nobody trying to convince you to believe something that you don't believe. It's just a space to come together and kind of share those things. You can pray if you like. There is, I mean, there are Bibles in there. But, yeah, it's basically God stewarded a space to us and we're stewarding it to his people. That's all. Yeah. You know, I mean, God gave it, gave the space that we currently are abiding in. He blessed us with the area that we have and with the land that we have.

And, you know, whether you currently are in relationship with God or not, you are still his people and it is available. And so if you would like to stop in, that is exactly what it's for. So that will be going on. And, again, just things to keep in mind that the funerals are coming up towards the end of the week, the visitations. There's just a number of people impacted by that, the students, the teachers, the counselors. You know, I didn't think of that. Look, the police officers, the people who kind of have to deal with the situation and write it up and, you know, it's just, there's just a wide ranging impact in the community. So, you know, you just keep those, those folks in your, in your thoughts and prayers. If you need any specific guidance or you want to talk to someone, there is, I know the school made some, some folks available and there's a meeting tomorrow with the parents at five

o'clock at the middle school auditorium to kind of walk through, I think, ways of handling that grief and how to talk with your kids and things like that. We will have our, our youth group does meet here on Wednesday nights here in that same building at 6510 Merle Hay Road. And I know, you know, a lot of those kids are, are in the Johnston school district. And so they'll be doing some of that, you know, processing and stuff. So if it's something where, you know, you just want a space and you want to have, we have kind of kids of that age, our, our, our youth group will be here on Wednesday at seven. And they will be addressing the topic. I'll be talking through that. Yeah. Okay. Talk through that stuff.

So, um, well, so I, I think we'll, uh, I think we'll go ahead and, and, uh, and cut the show, um, so that, uh, uh, you know, you guys can kind of get on with your evening and we can, uh, we'll, we'll, we'll be here at the prayer room. I think, uh, uh, we'll, you know, I'll, I'll be here for another three or four hours. I think Dan's going to be hanging out. Um, so, so we'll have some folks here if you're interested in coming by. Um, next Monday, um, we are broadcasting at our normal timeframe from 10 to midnight here at live from the path.org. Uh, Monday's kind of exciting. We have, or, uh, February is kind of exciting. We have a lot of, uh, a lot of guests that we've never had before coming in the studio and we'll like to, we'll get Jeff Arendale, uh, who has a new CD coming out, uh, rescheduled. He was scheduled to be on today.

Yeah, I'd really like to say thanks to Jeff because he graciously, uh, you know, we kind of told him the situation and he graciously said, I totally understand. And, uh, he was very, very cool about that. And so we appreciate his, uh, uh, his thoughts and, and, and, you know, he's preying on the situation too. He's a pretty solid dude. So, um, you know, if, if you, um, if you haven't checked out anything by Jeff Arendale, you can check out his music on the web and just do a Google search. You'll find him. Um, but he's got a new album coming out and he's coming on the show in February. Uh, I, we haven't found another date for him yet, but we'll, um, we're trying to get him in, uh, get some time so we can come in and kind of hear his music. He's, I got to hear a cut from it.

It's, it's pretty cool. So I'm excited. He's been, he's been on the show before. If you go to our YouTube channel, it's live from the path, uh, or excuse me, youtube.com backslash live from the path. You can see clips, uh, from our past shows. We actually have talked about, uh, suicide once before, uh, I think about a year and a half ago, um, when something had otherwise impacted our church. And there's a three part series on us kind of talking through that. Um, and I think you can, you'll see, here's some of those same sentiments echoed in kind of dealing with it. But, uh, but if you want to go back and check that out as a reference, it's there, but we also have clips from, um, previous shows and, uh, some from our artists that have been

on, um, uh, recently, Jesse Anderson has been here. There's been a number of, uh, uh, we had three songs posted from her. They're just, they're excellent there. Uh, and, uh, Jeff's got some stuff that's on there and, uh, lots of, from our other artists. So, um, thank you again for joining us. We really appreciate you taking the time, uh, out of your evening to, uh, to spend it with life on the path, uh, Dawn, I want to thank you so much for coming in and sharing your insight and wisdom. It's been very helpful, especially, um, you know, coming from someone who has, who's kind of been around that process of, of people, um, you know, grieving and, and, uh, you know, going through those, those types of things and how to deal with them. And we really appreciate your insight. And, uh, thank you so much for listening to life on the path.

And, uh, we will see you, uh, here at the prayer room. If you, uh, if you want to come in or, uh, next week from 10 to midnight at life in the path dot org.