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Becoming Whole
Relationships and sexuality are areas of life that can be beautiful or confusing, life-giving, or painful. Becoming Whole is a conversational podcast for men, women, and families seeking to draw nearer to Jesus as they navigate topics like sexual integrity, relational healing, spiritual health, and so much more.
Becoming Whole
Remember: You are what you Forget
Healing by Remembering: Overcoming Trauma and Sin
Join us today as we explore the importance of remembering our personal pain and triumphs, focusing on how past trauma and unwanted behaviors are connected. We will look at the Israelites and Peter to explore how God helps us remember and heal. A few key points for this episode include practical steps on dealing with trauma, the significance of community, and finding hope through suffering. Tune in for a journey toward deeper healing and understanding.
00:00 Introduction: Understanding Struggles
01:31 The Israelites' Journey and Forgetfulness
05:10 The Importance of Remembering Pain and Grief
09:16 Understanding Trauma and Its Impact
17:15 Healing Through Community and Faith
29:36 The Role of Sin and Redemption
33:45 Conclusion and Prayer
ReMember: a night full of worship, art, dessert, stories of God’s goodness, and an opportunity to partner with Regeneration. We invite you to join us for our annual dessert Regeneration fundraiser. We’d love for you to join us, It will not be the same without you. RSVP here!
It’s that time of year! We are inviting YOU to our annual dessert banquet.This year we have something special planned to go with our theme "RE-MEMBER."
Join us to see, hear, and learn the beautiful ways God remembers details of our stories with us.
Saturday, April 12th DC/ Northern VA: Click this link for more information and to register.
👉Men's Overcoming Lust & Temptation Devotional
👉Women 21-Day Prayer Journal & Devotional - (Women overcoming unwanted sexual Behavior)
👉Compass 21-Day Prayer Journal & Devotional - (Wives who are or have been impacted by partner betrayal)
Your sexual struggles are not accidental. Your mental health struggles are not random. Your outcomes are not arbitrary. Today I'm joined by Aaron Taggart, one of our spiritual coaches here at Regeneration. Welcome, Aaron.
Aaron Tagart:Hey, good to be on as usual.
James Craig:Yeah, we're continuing this series. We're in number three of our Remember series. This idea of God remembers us. We remember things and God remembers us. He puts us back together.
James Craig:If you're watching on YouTube, you'll see me putting my hands together, and so we wanted to talk about this idea today, related to especially our unwanted sexual behavior, but also all these other types of struggles sometimes mental health or other outcomes with our behaviors that these things aren't random, and the idea here is that you are what you forget, that our minds, our brains hold a lot, and if we are quick to forget our past or things we've been through, it impacts us. So there are things going on. In other words, there are things going on that you might not be aware of that are impacting you. It can be called implicit memory.
James Craig:I saw a podcast from Adam Young, who has an incredible podcast called the Place we Find Ourselves, about how implicit memory has a significant impact on us, especially as we're trying to get whole and heal. So we want to start. We've been looking some through the Old Testament as we've been going through this, and we want to start with the Israelites, aaron. It feels like the Israelites are so quick to forget what they had just been through where they were for hundreds of years and the prayers they prayed to get out of there.
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, yeah, man, so, so quick to forget, and it's almost mind-bending how quickly that they could forget, bending how quickly that they could forget. You know, I mean in early exodus they are crying out, uh, and the lord hears their cry, right, and I think it's exodus 3, when god kind of commissions moses to go free his people, um and so and so, and, and it says in there that you know, I have heard, you know the cries of my people Um and so, and so these are the same people who end up in the wilderness, you know, freed from Egypt's um rule, and, and you know, slavery and and all of that, right, and so there are actually about seven different times where the Israelites are grumbling, uh, between Exodus, chapters 11 and 21.
James Craig:And that's like right after they got free, right Didn't they get free? And was it nine or 10 or somewhere in there, somewhere close?
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, I mean, I think they cross the river and there's like a complaint, like they're scared, like something's going to happen to them. You know that Pharaoh's after them and and all of that, right, and so it's. It begins like you know, almost immediately, um, and then it hits you know some human kind of needs. You know they, they're hungry, you know they, they're hungry, you know they're tired, they're all these things Right. And I think, when I think about you know, our, our listeners, right, and the times where you know, you know acting out might take place because of we're hungry or we're tired, or you know, there's almost this kind of equation of we're forgetting.
Aaron Tagart:You know, in those moments we it's so easy to forget because I think of the human uh element, right, and so just really interesting that you know there's this kind of idea of you know they're, they're crying out, um, and complaining, and and sadly, as a result, you know that they didn't get to enter the promised land. You know the Lord freed them from slavery and the intention was that they would become, they would enter, you know, into the promised land, but they had to wait a generation, so that group had to continue to live in the wilderness. Because really I think what it boils down to is they weren't trusting God, and they didn't trust him for the small things and they didn't trust him for the big things, and that lack of trust in what the Lord was doing kind of kept them in the I call it the in-between neither here nor there. They remained kind of in that wilderness in the in-between.
James Craig:It's almost like they weren't ready, like just knowing how merciful God is and I know sometimes when we read the Old Testament it can seem like God is pretty harsh with them. But knowing his character is merciful, his character is defined by love. There undoubtedly had to be a mercy in them not being ready. So part of what happens is and we talked about this last week with Kyle God started teaching them hey, make Ebenezers, make these structures with stones after they finally did cross in another generation later into the promised land. Make these things to remember. And so one way we could say it is guys, remember your pain from slavery, don't forget what you just came out of. Remember one way we could see this as an application, especially for those dealing with unwanted sexual behavior remember the despair you felt after the last time you gave in. Now I'm not saying become despairing, but remember it was painful. It was more painful than whatever pain we're struggling to face that might lead us back into it. And also thinking about betrayed wives, thinking about future generations. Remember them, remember the pain or betrayed husbands. Remember the pain and remember the pain or betrayed husbands. Remember the pain and remember the legacy you want to pass down. But the other thing that I think that they didn't remember. They didn't remember to grieve.
James Craig:Now, this is a little bit of conjecture, we don't for sure know this, but there seems to be this idea of they're not taking the time the way we see all throughout the Psalms. Most of them were not written in the time of the Exodus, most of them were written under King David. There were a couple from Moses, but Moses actually, in his amazing Psalm, psalm 90, he does talk about remembering his grief and pain. But I wonder how much the Israelites struggled to grieve, to process, to lament the slavery, because if you're that ready to jump right back into it, just like we are with pornography or other sexual struggles, it's. It shows that maybe we haven't really remembered or processed or lamented, but we had just put ourselves through yeah, yeah, we spoke more in depth about grief and lament.
Aaron Tagart:To start the new year in complaining to the Lord about and actually like that is part of lament is complaining. But I think the complaining that the Israelites are doing is more kind of trivial, more on the human side, like hey, like you know we're hungry, you know what are we going to eat. It would have been better for us to stay there and at least have our these needs met and still be in those conditions, right, and it's like, are you kidding me? Like you're the same people that were crying out to to be free from that and you want to go back over some bread, uh, or you know, because of you're hungry. So you know, uh, you, you know processing that through crying out, through you know that movement, uh, of lament which ends back on that trusting really in god, um, and and maybe that's the difference.
James Craig:Maybe grumbling is this distrust, this despair, it's lack of hope, this lack of love. Yeah, maybe lament has has some mixture of those ingredients faith, hope and love mixed into it to whatever degree.
James Craig:And here's the thing, guys God remembers the sins done against us. God remembers the trauma that these Israelites were put through. If you remember the story, not only were they enslaved, not only were they, I think, making perhaps the pyramids or other significant archaeological not archaeological other structures, but they also were worked extra hard when Moses started intervening for them. They were brutalized. They were being treated so poorly that Moses, who lived in the house of Pharaoh and had undoubtedly some of the privileges of living in that house, was willing to murder someone. You know, kind of without thinking it through well, but he was willing to murder someone because of how brutal his people were being treated. And so one thing we want to talk about today, friends, is that trauma creates a wedge between our brains and our bodies. Trauma has a significant impact on the way we see the world.
James Craig:There's two types of traumas I just want to highlight briefly and we'll get to talk more about this and how we see this in our coaching but, broadly speaking, this is taken out of Living from the Heart. Jesus Gave you, a fantastic book from Jim Wilder and several other authors. But type A traumas are absences. These are often easier to remember because they're things that we can realize. Okay, my mom didn't give me this, my dad wasn't there for me emotionally, whatever it is but we're a lot less likely to give type A traumas any significance. We downplay them. I don't know about you, aaron, with the guys you coach or the guys you've led through Unwanted, but for so many of us we completely downplay the significance of lacking, being given what we needed, the malnutrition, emotionally speaking or otherwise, or literally malnutrition, whatever it was.
James Craig:We often downplay these absences because we look at type B. Type B are simply the bad things that happen to us. They're the abuse or this or that which do have more of an impact, by the way, on our memory. We'll talk about that in a second. It makes it harder to remember. But we look at those and say that's real trauma, but what I've experienced is not real trauma, and so we don't really recognize. Hey, this is actually having a pretty significant impact on our minds.
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, yeah, and I think even within that, you know, there are, you know, what's kind of referred to as the big T traumas. I think when you get into that kind of that second trauma you're talking about and the things that, the bad things that happen to us, but then there's also the things that can be more subtle, it seems a little smaller, um, exactly, yep, that's what I was going to say Little T traumas and it's kind of that idea of like death by a thousand cuts. You know it's these little tiny things like a paper cut. You know it's like oh ah, you know that hurt a little bit but it's not really that big of a deal, you know. But over and over and over again, you know that that wound, you know, becomes pretty significant.
James Craig:Um, like, imagine, imagine just a vitamin example. I don't know why this is coming to mind. Imagine being inside all day, no sunlight, so no vitamin D is coming from the sun. No milk, milk, whatever other things give vitamin d, like that's actually. They found a very significant uh correlation with that and certain mental health outcomes. So imagine your whole life you're never getting vitamin d. What that's going to do to your, your development, your, your maturity, your health yeah it's a it's, it's a it's, it's a lack, right.
Aaron Tagart:And you know, when we lack something, you know either our body tries to make that up or we we try to seek out something in its absence. Uh, you know addiction and things like that, but it that's kind of what comes to mind. You know, we, we turn to these pseudo things, whether it's pornography or masturbation or acting out in other ways, and and it's a large part because you know there's we're lacking something. Maybe it's even just thoughts about ourself or um, you know, some of these little, these traumas are coming in and and we're trying to in some ways rewrite that story or forget that this thing's happened or or whatever. And so you know, we try to supplement and that's what you know, I think of supplements in the, in the kind of health world, right or to kind of make up for the lack of what you're not getting, maybe in your diet.
Aaron Tagart:So you need to take certain supplements right, because you need to make sure your body still needs that, and so then we end up supplementing for the things that we're lacking.
James Craig:So let's say you're an infant and you need deep care. But that care either didn't come. You need the nurture, you need the gaze of your mother and of your father, you need that deep sense of care. But that either didn't come or it came with a price tag. You know quid pro quo, a thing for thing. Mom or dad only gives us care to the extent that we're behaving well, things like that.
James Craig:It's not going to be that surprising to us as coaches or others that you walk with in this field. That maybe part of, let's say, you're going to pornography, part of what you're looking for in that place is care. Now, does it actually really satisfy? I mean, thankfully I don't know about you, aaron I take a vitamin every day and I use, you know, protein powder. Those things actually do help. Granted, if I got enough through my food, you're right, I wouldn't need them. But what pornography does does not actually help. It's a pseudo care. It's like Christopher West describes real eating versus fast food and fast food. You know, it might feel good going down, but it is not actually giving your body much of what it really needs.
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, sorry, I'm just starting to think of like all the Taco Bell memes like in the right. Now I digress.
James Craig:Yeah. So just briefly, in Living from the Heart Jesus Gave you, they outline three steps for type A traumas One, recognizing the extent of the wound. Number two, facing the pain. And number three, welcoming life-giving relationships that satisfy the long-neglected absences. And so when I think back to the Israelites again, you know there's plenty left unsaid.
James Craig:Undoubtedly many conversations were happening, but did they recognize the extent of the wound? Did they recognize the extent of the lack of freedom that they had? I just watched Braveheart last week and a friend is turning 34. He had never seen it and he loved it. It's one of those classic movies for many men. But there's that lack of true freedom that they were experiencing. They didn't even have the freedom, maybe, to worship God in the way that eventually we know God wanted them to worship him, wanted them to live. So they needed to recognize the extent of that, the extent of their slavery, face that pain and enter into these life-giving relationships that can satisfy those long absences. So in some ways, what I'm saying is, freedom didn't come naturally, because they were so trained out of freedom. They were so trained to expect the lack, to expect to not have the nutrient, so they got used to it, and maybe that's part of why this generation wasn't ready to live free in the promised land.
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, yeah, that very well could be. I mean, it makes a lot of sense, you know, especially when you go from you know having all your needs met in a way, but the conditions aren't so great to you know. Now, you know you're in some hard conditions, in the sense of the wilderness, and your needs are provided in a way almost relying, but you have to rely on God in the midst of that. And that is our story, isn't it Like the relying on God and the need to turn to him and to rely on him. We can't face the pain by ourselves, you know, we can't really recognize the extent of the wound by ourselves and we can't really welcome life-giving relationships and the fullness of what God has intended in those by ourselves. You know, all that points back to him.
James Craig:And doesn't it? Isn't it so similar with so many of our clients here in that they say, hey, I got three square meals a day. My parents were both physically present. I should not be considered to have trauma or I shouldn't, I shouldn't be having this addiction at all, like what's and obviously there are totally different levels of you know, some people didn't have three meals a day, et cetera. But we can't. Actually, pain is not like a zero-sum game, like, okay, Aaron, you weren't fed as a child and therefore I can't have pain because I was fed. That's just not how pain works. Pain is completely individualized and so we need to recognize that, like for so many of our clients, yeah, you were fed three square meals a day, maybe in your slavery in Egypt, but you still weren't getting everything you needed. You still did not receive all that you were made for.
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, yeah, and I think that's the you know, it makes me think of and this is probably the number one thing I think that comes up with clients when I, when I do some work with them is is that concept of honor and honesty, uh, and being able to name things in your story, um, and this comes from from Jay uh Stringer and his work in unwanted, but to be able to identify um and to be honest with how you perceive something, how you experience something, and also being able to simultaneously honor the individual. So, by speaking that truth, it's not saying, oh, my mom's to blame, my dad's to blame, this person's to blame, the situation's to blame. It's just simply stating that I'm going to be honest with myself and that I experienced a lack here, but can fully understand, maybe why, depending on circumstance, and hold that person still in honor, without blaming them. You know for something, cause it's not about blaming them, it's just about being able to have the freedom to name something in your story.
James Craig:And this is the thing about trauma guys. Um, we, we need to take ownership. It doesn't mean we're the one who brought it on, especially for those of us who are wrestling with that. I caused this abuse. No, it's never. You know, if you're in a situation of abuse it's not your fault. And yet we need to recognize this did happen. These things happen.
James Craig:So let's talk about type B briefly. They talk about again these are bad things that happen. One we need to find the wound. So if we can't remember many of us struggle to because again these kinds of type B traumas impact our memory areas in our brains we need to find the wound. I'll talk about one way. I do that with clients, actually in a moment. Number two, though we need to open that hurt feeling in the presence of caring persons, enough to understand the effect of the trauma. So that might look like a trauma-informed Christian therapist. That might look like one of our spiritual coaches here at Regen. Obviously, we know our limits as non-clinicians, as non-therapists, what we need to refer out for if the trauma is significant enough or whatever, but nonetheless we can provide that kind of caring place for you to experience love and acceptance in that, and then we can actually pray for full healing. Notice I didn't uh, they didn't actually add in prayer for the first one, because so often with type A traumas we get prayer, we feel a little better. But what we need the most is those long, life-giving, healing relationships With type B traumas. Once we do open those up, we we find the wound, we open the hurt feeling. God does incredible work when we pray for that healing, because we're inviting him then into that wound. We're saying there's a real wound here, it's really infected. I'm opening it back up so that you, god, can come in with your healing. Balm year.
James Craig:Betrayed spouse.
James Craig:Not only might there have been, not only was there likely a type B trauma, this wound of infidelity or hidden and lied about pornography for years but part of what you might also be experiencing even if some of that wound has already been healed maybe you've been working on this is that you also may have experienced some of these absences, these type A traumas in the sense of you weren't really being loved, and traumas in the sense of you weren't really being loved and you didn't know why you weren't really being pursued.
James Craig:Now, this is not to say we need to have perfectionistic standards, and any spouse who betrayed was also just traumatizing you across the board or trying to. But there can be this realization of all that hidden porn use, all of that hidden behavior. A lot of their kind of energy was being funneled there, and so I'm not actually crazy for having wanted more of that. So it applies to those who have experienced betrayal and it very much applies to those dealing with the unwanted sexual behavior, that there are undoubtedly at least type A traumas and often type B traumas in your past that are, you know, fueling this addiction without maybe you realizing it.
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, I think there's, you know, part of that too. Do we cling to, you know, the past, the memory, the pain you know, or are we you know, or are we um, are we clinging to the hope of the future and the redemption and the healing and and those things that the, the fullness of restoration to the lord, has uh for us, with those um, with those types of traumas? So, you know, I think that process of finding it, the wound opening that hurt, in a, in a safe way, to be able to enter in with, with others and also Jesus, um, then to to pray for healing, I think all of that points forward, it points towards hope, it points towards, uh, healing, um, and so I think, just, you know, self-examination of you know, what are we clinging to? What you know? What memory you know might make you cry or run? What memory do you live with that aren't healthy? How are those memories impacting you?
James Craig:And how are they impacting others through you? Yeah, and you know, some of it is we can't remember. So if we can remember, there's this invitation to engage that wound right to to, to open it in a safe place, in a safe way, in a safe time. But for many of us we can't remember things well. So one thing I'll use with clients sometimes I believe I got this from drew bow at husband material is recognizing where in their body they felt the trigger that led to their sexual behavior. So I primarily coach men dealing with sexual sin and so we might look back at the most recent time and say where was that trigger and where did you feel it in your body? Then we ask the Holy Spirit to come and show where that feeling in their body connects to a previous memory. And I've been shocked, aaron, like this is something that it's like really. This thing works.
James Craig:But because trauma is held in our bodies, our bodies keep the score. As Bessel van der Kolk taught us, we can actually find connections between where we're holding in our body and the trauma in our brain. So I've had a client who we did this together and he was brought back to a very significant memory of the first time he ever looked at porn, all the feelings that came up in his body, all the shame and excitement and tension and fear and desire. It was such a messy place, you know, because porn is trying to grab onto all those things. So we were able to find the wound, we were able to open up some of the hurt and begin to pray for some of the healing.
James Craig:And so I just believe that, whether we kind of recognize it in our body or we just begin this process of praying Lord, I don't really know where this trigger is coming from. I've been in recovery for a while. I'm still struggling. Ask him and maybe he will lead you to someone who can walk you through this process of feeling in your body. Maybe you could even do it now, but he will help over time, at the right time, reveal the origins of these wounds so that we can begin this process of deeper healing. Healing of that wound, yeah, yeah, and that process. It reminds us of uh, romans 5, um, right, aaron, like this idea that it's not suffering is not. You know, trauma tries to make suffering the end all be all. It leads us to despair, if never. But paul's saying actually there's a process and there's something beyond the trauma beyond the suffering yeah, absolutely.
Aaron Tagart:I mean suffering in some ways, um, and I know this can sound initially maybe a little daunting or or or kind of horrifying, but in some ways suffering is kind of the beginning. Um, you know, cause, according to Romans, five, three through five it says, you know, but we also glory in our sufferings because we know that suffering produces perseverance, perseverance, character and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who's been given to us. So the kind of, you know, it might start with suffering, but with Christ it can actually end in hope. And to me, again, that's that pointing forward, that walking towards that hope in a future is a game changer.
Aaron Tagart:And if you don't have that hope, maybe you're in that perseverance, you're kind of still working in that perseverance, you're still working out that perseverance and the suffering produces perseverance or perseverance, character, and all these things can make us sharper with the Lord Again, kind of culminating in that hope. And it's not just like, oh man, I hope God, god's gonna do this or I hope he shows up, it's like a it's. It's this knowing, like in our heart of hearts, that that things are different, things can be different. Uh, that he makes a difference in the midst of wherever we find ourselves and sometimes we need to borrow that from a friend.
Aaron Tagart:Oh yeah, I mean.
James Craig:I recently found there in this translation called the Y'all Translation, and it's what everyone's always dreamed about. Every most use in the New Testament are y'all In the King James, some people still like that, because it says ye, which actually means you, plural. And so one of the missing ingredients, friends, for so many of us is people, it's community, it's a team around us. Maybe it is a coach, Maybe it is a group, maybe it's our pastor and our friends. There's this assumption, there's this ingredient so often missing from our culture.
James Craig:So, in order to see suffering not just be this debilitating trauma that keeps us away from the promised land, in order to see it be like, in order to see it like Kintsugi, like this bowl that maybe originally was nice, broken, but now it's being put together with glue that's made of gold or looks like gold and it's more beautiful than it ever was, we need community, we need people around us, and we also need a mindset, like Aaron's kind of saying, to engage instead of avoid. This mindset is hey, I know I've been stuck, I know I haven't been able to figure out my way around this, but in community, with God's help, I'm going to engage my pain, I'm going to engage my wounds, I'm going to engage my grief. I'm going to engage my wounds, I'm going to engage my grief instead of avoiding. And a huge portion of this, if you mix in community and a mindset to engage, with God's help, in that community, can help us through that progression of suffering, ultimately leaving us with this resilient hope that we all long for. And you know, friends, this is true even with sin, and we're going to kind of wrap up with this God helps us remember our sin.
James Craig:You know, not just the sins that have been done to us, the traumas we've experienced, but also the sins we've done. And he doesn't do this out of a place of punitiveness. He does it because sin seeks to disintegrate us, to pull us apart. God helps us remember our sin because he wants to remember us, he wants to put us back together, to reintegrate.
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, yeah. So Peter is a great example, I think, of this. And Jesus even calls Peter out and says to him, before he is crucified, right Before he's arrested, that you know, before you know the rooster crows, that Peter's going to deny him three times, um, and why is that a big deal? Well, we also kind of see in scripture, too, that you know that denying Jesus and his name is actually a pretty big deal. Um and uh.
Aaron Tagart:So you know, in in, in a way here, you know, uh, paul, um, peter is sinning, um, and this is the guy who Jesus said like I'm going to build my church, like on this guy, like he's going to be the rock, right, and if you've seen the chosen, uh, spoiler, if you're not into that season, yeah, I think it was season four, but when jesus calls him, that you know he gets he kind of puffs up his chest and he's like, oh, hey, guys, like, look at me like I'm, I'm the guy, and. And then yet he falls short, right, and then actually one of the gospels says that he basically runs away, you know, weeping, because he realized, I think in that moment, the impact After denying Jesus.
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, after denying Jesus three times, and, and that the one that the Lord said that he would do that, and two, that he actually did that, thinking that no man like I'm going to stand with you. Like all the way to death, and he didn't Right, and so, shame, different things enter in. Like all the way to death and he didn't right, and so, shame, different things enter in. But there's the full redemption of that story is after jesus resurrection in john 21. Um, I think it's 21, yeah, um, you know, jesus, uh is cooking fish up on the shore, uh, and they see him, uh, you know, from the boat and they're fishing and they come up and have breakfast with him.
Aaron Tagart:But then Jesus meets with Peter personally and then asks him three times do you love me?
Aaron Tagart:And you know, of course, you know Peter's responses are yes, you know. And then Jesus is you know, feed my sheep, tend my sheep, you know, feed my lamb, I think my lambs is the first one, but, you know, with some action. So, and then he ends with follow sheep, you know, uh, feed my lamb, I think my lambs is the first one, but, you know, with some action. So, and then he ends with follow me, you know. And so there's this beautiful restoration of of Peter and Jesus, knowing full well how he fell short and that he was going to fall short and that yet he is still right there with him and that Jesus believes in him just as much as he did, you know, before he actually denied him, and so I think that's just a really beautiful you know that he remembers our sin, but we don't have to be afraid of that, this invitation to sit with him in that, to be with him in that and let him speak to us and over us and help us to remember, you know who we are in him.
James Craig:So there's something God does with all of us that he wants us to remember our past. He helps us remember our past. He's putting us back together. He's remembering us in the present, but he also, because he's outside of time, he remembers us as we will be. It says in Ephesians that we're seated with Christ in the heavenlies. He saw Peter as the great man that God always intended him to be, the man, ultimately, who would be in glory with him, but also the great leader of the church after Jesus did reinstate him. And so God remembers, friends, what has happened to you, he remembers what will happen, and he is remembering you, he's putting you back together. So we hope to leave you with that hope. Aaron, could you just pray over us as we close out today?
Aaron Tagart:Yeah, I'd love to pray over us as we close out today. Yeah, I'd love to Abba. Father, we thank you for this conversation today, lord, we thank you for the ways that you are present with us, lord, in our traumas, big or small. Lord in our healing. Lord, on our journey. Lord, in our sin, that you still long to be with us and that you speak a better word over us, lord, that, despite our shortcomings, you are the God in which we hope, and you are the God that speaks our true identity, and so may we walk in the fullness of what you have for us and the fullness of our identities as sons and daughters in a loving father. We thank you, lord, for this word and for this conversation. We pray these things in Christ's name, amen.
James Craig:Amen.
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