Episode 54
True Cultural Sensitivity in Missionary
This episode delves into the intricacies and responsibilities associated with missionary work, positing that true discipleship requires a profound engagement with individuals and their cultural contexts. I reflect on the notion that missionary efforts should not merely be transient visits aimed at superficial interactions, but rather enduring commitments to build relationships and foster genuine spiritual growth within communities. We explore the distinction between holistic health and traditional missionary approaches, emphasizing the importance of understanding and respecting diverse cultural practices while sharing the Gospel. Furthermore, I challenge listeners to reconsider their own mission fields, advocating for the belief that every individual is called to engage with those around them in meaningful ways. Ultimately, this discussion invites a deeper contemplation of how we, as Christians, can embody the Great Commission in our daily lives and local communities.
Takeaways:
- In the realm of holistic health, the integration of cultural and spiritual dimensions is paramount.
- True missionary work encompasses the establishment of deep, meaningful relationships within communities.
- Holistic health emphasizes the unique and individualized nature of one's spiritual journey with Christ.
- Missionary efforts should prioritize local engagement over transient visits to ensure sustainable impact.
- Cultural understanding is crucial; missionaries must assimilate into local cultures rather than impose their own.
- The Great Commission calls for a genuine commitment to discipleship and community involvement.
Companies mentioned in this episode:
- Weston A. Price
Transcript
Foreign.
Speaker A:Hello, everyone, and welcome back to Casting Seeds.
Speaker A:I'm Savannah, your holistic health practitioner and host, and you're listening to the only holistic health podcast that uses God's singular truth to give you individualized discernment.
Speaker A:So today, it's actually an episode that I've been really prayerful over and kind of careful over as well, just because I know that my views don't necessarily match every single Christian's views.
Speaker A:But then again, that's.
Speaker A:That seems to be a very common theme in this podcast.
Speaker A:And I do think that there are circumstances where the opposite view does work.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:But I, I am pretty stubborn on this because I have strong convictions on this.
Speaker A:So I would love to hear obviously your guys's opinions and verses to back up what you think about this topic.
Speaker A:And if you.
Speaker A:I mean, obviously, you know, because you have read the title of this week, but this is about missionary work and missions in general.
Speaker A:And I, I think a lot of people who are reading this are like, what does this have to do with holistic health?
Speaker A:And I would say a lot, a lot, a lot.
Speaker A:I really want to blend in the views of traditional medicine and understanding what that looks like in a community.
Speaker A:Traditional community values versus Western values, because Western tends to be associated a lot with Christianity, even though it's technically not.
Speaker A:And also understanding what true, in my opinion, true missionary look work looks like.
Speaker A:And it's.
Speaker A:I think, I think a lot of Christians listening may already have this view, but I think quite a few that are not maybe from either my friend group or in California, you know, they may vary.
Speaker A:Especially I think people outside of our country may see missionary work very differently.
Speaker A:Uh, and why does this all tie together is because holistic health, or holiest holistic health, as we like to say here on this podcast, has so much to do with how we integrate Christ and culture.
Speaker A:And understanding the difference of Christ does not always ask us to change our culture.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker A:But when you become a Christian follower, your culture of what you worshiped and what you put first is going to change.
Speaker A:So I want to dive into that and explain what that means and what that looks like, because this is going to vary.
Speaker A:And this is why I love holistic health, because like we talked about in the beginning intro, it's individualized, and it's going to be individualized relationships with Christ.
Speaker A:And that means individually in each culture.
Speaker A:How Christ could change or dramatically disrupt things or even let things lie is going to vary in every culture.
Speaker A:So let's get into what that looks like and what I mean and get into a few examples, because we have listeners who listen all over the world right now who are in drastically different cultures.
Speaker A:And what Jeremiah and I experience here, what we experience here in Southern California is going to be so different from our friends in India, our friends in Australia, even our friends in Canada right now.
Speaker A:Yeah, there's just a lot of big changes happening, and Christians are the most persecuted group in the entire world.
Speaker A:And I think if we start understanding that Christians are not here to change the culture, but we're here to spread the gospel in the Great Commission.
Speaker A:It doesn't mean that we're here to do the great culture.
Speaker A:We're not here to change culture.
Speaker A:We're here to help filter people's hearts and allow them to have a relationship with Christ and support that.
Speaker A:So let's get into it.
Speaker A:Okay, first and foremost, what is the great commission?
Speaker A: ,: Speaker A:Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and behold, I am with you to the end of the age.
Speaker A:So the Great Commission is for us to go and spread the gospel all over the world.
Speaker A:And I think this is where a lot of missionaries will say, okay, great, we are called to go on these trips to go help and teach and preach and then give out some Bibles in their language.
Speaker A:If we haven't give out some food, talk, you know, start something stirring, basically they talk about just like a stirring, and then we leave.
Speaker A:And to me personally, that is not true missionary work.
Speaker A:When it says therefore and make disciples of all nations at the beginning of.
Speaker A:Of verse 19 and Matthew chapter 28, making disciples and having discipleship means to have an intimate relationship.
Speaker A:So even for me, in holistic health and healthcare, when I am breaking someone's labs down, when I am talking to them, before we even get into any types of testing, I talk to them about their health, history, their life.
Speaker A:I do life with them a little bit.
Speaker A:And if I do life with them outside of work and we are actually friends or we hang out, I.
Speaker A:I'm doing more life with them, right?
Speaker A:Or if I talk to them about spiritual things, we're doing discipleship in different ways.
Speaker A:And sometimes I even learn from my clients and vice versa.
Speaker A:Same thing at church and in other places.
Speaker A:So when we talk about what true discipleship is, it is growing with that person, doing life with that person.
Speaker A:It is discipleship.
Speaker A:And sometimes it can grow to ironing, sharpening iron, or it can go Back into more of a discipleship, friendship, whatever.
Speaker A:But it is doing life.
Speaker A:And in order to do that, you can't just go on a one week or two week missions, trip somewhere and pass out food or medicine.
Speaker A:And I'm not saying this to make people feel bad who do do these trips quite often, but if you're not called the same place to go back over and over again and build relationships with people, I do want you to genuinely question, like, if you've gone to five different locations and you didn't, you were there just to kind of like gently stir hearts, but not to be one with the people, why are you there in the first place?
Speaker A:And especially too, if you're not doing missions at your home where you live, if you're not spreading the gospel where you live, why are you going out to other countries and other places just to kind of be there?
Speaker A:And I think this is hard because I have family who does this, I have friends who do this.
Speaker A:And the same way that I feel like I lost a lot of people in my intimate group because of like our stance on IVF and things like that, you know, I.
Speaker A:I've lost people from having this conversation as well.
Speaker A:But the reason why I challenge this and ask this is because even my sister came back from India, you know, this past week, and it was really hard.
Speaker A:You could tell that she was having like a stirring and a frustration that like even they went to a leprosy colony and they got there a lot later in the day than they expected.
Speaker A:They were only gonna be there for that one day.
Speaker A:And they got to lay hands on people and pray with them.
Speaker A:Leprosy is very misunderstood.
Speaker A:Same with Mersa.
Speaker A:But anyway, besides that point, you could tell she was really broken and hurt over the fact that she like these people.
Speaker A:And even the kids really looked up to them, you know, for having, I, I don't know, just like being white.
Speaker A:A lot of people in India, and I would love our India listeners to reach out to us as well.
Speaker A:But a lot, a lot of Indians will look up to people of lighter skin tone as almost like they're better.
Speaker A:And it is a cultural thing.
Speaker A:And I'm so thankful that the group that they went with is going in and being countercultural in that and saying no one is better from skin color, from age.
Speaker A:We can all learn from each other.
Speaker A:And they really do go in and they help people from the very beginning to wherever they are placed.
Speaker A:And they continue to let them grow and get educations and they help so much.
Speaker A:So the group that they went with is wonderful.
Speaker A:I'm not saying that they went and just did crap over there.
Speaker A:But what I am saying is she came back partially fulfilled, right?
Speaker A:She felt almost a little bit more empty when she came back than how she went there.
Speaker A:And I think it's because she started to realize that, you know, just going there for five to eight days, I don't remember how many days exactly they were there, but going there for that short amount of time and then not being able to continue to build these relationships with these people and love on them and endure with them, do life with them and truly have that discipleship with them, it broke her heart.
Speaker A:It broke her heart seeing and meeting like these kids like for one moment and not saying that they didn't have awesome experiences, that entire group.
Speaker A:But you can truly tell, in my opinion, who's truly called to missions and who isn't.
Speaker A:Because someone who's truly called to the mission field, they will go to that place and love on people in that community and pour out into that community.
Speaker A:Jeremiah and I felt very called to move here in our city that we're in, in Southern California.
Speaker A:And we know our entire community.
Speaker A:We know the pizza guy from down the street, we know all the shop owners around here.
Speaker A:We have given them free work.
Speaker A:We have loved on them intimately.
Speaker A:We've had people over at our house.
Speaker A:We have shared the gospel with many people and they have invited us over.
Speaker A:This is first and foremost, our home is our mission field, where we do life with our community.
Speaker A:And I don't think enough people look at it that way.
Speaker A:When people are called to missions, they are going to a place to build a home, to build a church and grow a community.
Speaker A:And yeah, Silas and Paul, they went and built communities and stayed there for a couple years, started churches and then moved on.
Speaker A:And they checked in that, I mean, that's what the letters from Paul are for, right?
Speaker A:That's the most of the New Testament.
Speaker A:So what I, I want to encourage, and this is obviously like a.
Speaker A:I feel like this is a summary of the in depth that we're about to go into.
Speaker A:But I want this episode to really challenge people's hearts to understand that if you don't get this premise, then the rest of this episode is going to be so confusing for you.
Speaker A:But if you don't look, start looking into mission fields as your life is now.
Speaker A:The mission field where you are right now is where God has you and he's calling you into missions now.
Speaker A:He's calling you into the Great Commission right now where you are.
Speaker A:If you're listening to this in your office, in your car, I don't.
Speaker A:I don't know, and I don't care, to be honest, but you are called to love on the people he has called you to right now.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:And that means you have to give sometimes biblically harsh and loving truth.
Speaker A:That means sometimes you have to take a step back when you don't want to.
Speaker A:That means asking for wisdom and discernment.
Speaker A:Everything that we have talked about in holistic health, when it comes to individualized healthcare and understanding the aspects of what your body needs right now, that is exactly what you need to do spiritually, right?
Speaker A:So just because you want your mom saved doesn't mean that you are called right now to be the one pouring into her.
Speaker A:But you are always called to pray for her.
Speaker A:Just because you want your neighbor Sally saved doesn't mean you're gonna be the one who's gonna help her get to the point where she's getting baptized and going to church.
Speaker A:But you could still help plant those seeds.
Speaker A:I mean, think about the whole point of casting seeds.
Speaker A:This podcast, if you understand the parable of the seeds, you can be a part of different steps of people's life and salvation.
Speaker A:I'm so honored that I got to be a part of every step of my husband's.
Speaker A:That that wasn't planned, and I am so thankful to see that.
Speaker A:But if you have children, you.
Speaker A:You could be a part of seeing being able to see every step, but doesn't mean you're going to be a part of every step of influence of what helps them get saved.
Speaker A:So if you are a parent, your first and four, or even if.
Speaker A:Let's back up, if you're single, bare one, like, bare minimum, it's your community and who you're doing life with.
Speaker A:Now, if you're a person who is married, it is your husband or your wife and then your community that you're doing life with, right?
Speaker A:Your community that you live in and you are a part of right now.
Speaker A:That's also why I think it's.
Speaker A:My church is very big about being a part of a local church, a church that's close to you.
Speaker A:And that's why they encourage, like, if you love a church, move close to it, because it's really hard to do life with that person that's 40 to 50 miles south, and then the other person's 40 to 50 miles north.
Speaker A:You can't really do life with that church, the whole church, right?
Speaker A:So which I actually, I was like, wow, that's true.
Speaker A:Again, it's not.
Speaker A:It's not a salvation issue.
Speaker A:It's not like if you can't do that, it's not a deal breaker.
Speaker A:But what I'm trying to say is you need to start understanding that there are people all around you that need help, that need to hear the gospel and they need to understand what that means through you and your life and doing life with them.
Speaker A:Through discipleship, through ironing, sharpening iron, through God's love, God's grace, but also God's truth and God's justice.
Speaker A:Justice is strong.
Speaker A:It is you.
Speaker A:You can't go too far in the grace category and you can't go too far in the just category.
Speaker A:Only God could do both perfectly.
Speaker A:But you have to find that balance as well with each person individually.
Speaker A:Okay, the next aspect that I want to get into is the culture aspect.
Speaker A:So I think a lot of people assume that when they are going especially I'm going to just say we are in a first world country here in the United States.
Speaker A:When we go into second world and third world countries, A lot of US citizens who have not traveled enough, who don't understand cultures, who don't understand how the rest of the world works, especially here in California.
Speaker A:It is so easy to just think that the way that we live is normal and it's not.
Speaker A:We are in the top 1% of the entire world.
Speaker A:Even if you are a homeless person here, you would are a lot better off than most of the people in the rest of the world.
Speaker A: So Mark: Speaker A:Acts 1:8 says, if you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witness in Jerusalem, in all of Judea and Samaria, and to all of the ends of the earth.
Speaker A:Last one I want to read right now is Isaiah 6, 8.
Speaker A:And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I send and who will go for us?
Speaker A:Then I said, here I am.
Speaker A:Send me.
Speaker A:So the reason why I read these verses are because if you truly feel called to go to a different area, to go to a different location outside of the US Outside of your regular culture, and go into something more countercultural cultural from what you are used to, you need to understand that you are being prompted and called by the Holy Spirit and really, really assure that because you are going to go into a position where you need to be like Jesus.
Speaker A:Jesus didn't come into the culture of Israel and Judea and Rome.
Speaker A:He didn't come into this culture and give it all the middle finger, right, and say I'm God.
Speaker A:This is the rules are going to around here.
Speaker A:Uh, I mean definitely he was setting those things up, but he came into the culture as a infant, as a baby, as a human.
Speaker A:He all a hundred percent human and a hundred percent God.
Speaker A:He came into our culture, he ate like us, he drank like us, he went to the restroom like us.
Speaker A:He did, he washed his hair, his hands, he even had a job like the culture around him, right?
Speaker A:He had, he had the medicine of the culture around him.
Speaker A:He didn't come into is Israeli culture and say all of this is dumb.
Speaker A:You need to be like how it is in heaven right now.
Speaker A:No.
Speaker A:And so many Americans, and you know what, let's just scratch Americans.
Speaker A:So many western cultures over time have given Christianity a bad rep because they have come into different cultures which are just countercultures, right?
Speaker A:It's not a bad thing.
Speaker A:They're just countercultures from what they're used to.
Speaker A:And they said, because the medicine that you eat must be wrong.
Speaker A:The lifestyle that you're doing, it almost be 100 wrong.
Speaker A:And I'm going to tell you that's untrue.
Speaker A:It has been proven by science over and over and over again that people with genetic makeup and genetic DNA of the culture that they're in and the lifestyle that they're in, okay, the medicine that they eat, the food that they eat, even the types of clothes and all natural linens and things that they have made by hand in that area, even hair products, skin products, all those things God cultivated, where those people will thrive in that culture.
Speaker A:Now mind you, if people in this culture are, let's say they're putting on a hair mask because it helps them worship some sort of fertility deity, then yeah, of course, as a Christian, when you come in and you're learning about the culture and you're understanding why people are doing what they're doing, their beliefs, their background, what is unhealthy culture and what could be brought in and changed as a biblical culture.
Speaker A:If you're trying to share the gospel, absolutely.
Speaker A:I, I mean as long as someone you can come in, I don't know, I'll use that hair mask.
Speaker A:You can come in and say like, oh, okay, yeah, let's come to this ritual that you gu are doing.
Speaker A:They sit and they understand, they're kind of assimilating a little bit.
Speaker A:And they don't have to be a part of the hair mask ceremony, but they can watch and see why they do it and what they believe and then talk about the Bible and how God explains like you don't.
Speaker A:In order to get close to our God, you don't have to put on a hair mask once a week.
Speaker A:I know that sounds crazy and silly, but if you read the scriptures, people were sacrificing their own children, they were doing crazy things to try to get close to their deities, right?
Speaker A:Like at the end of the day, if they did anything with their hair that made them want to worship a deity, then yeah, the Bible says like cut those things off.
Speaker A:And I'm not saying that the Christian should come in and be like, let's start buzzing heads so you don't worship your hair deity.
Speaker A:But he, he or she can do things in a way of understanding.
Speaker A:Like look, there are practical things that are really great about this mud mask that you guys have made.
Speaker A:It's beautiful.
Speaker A:It's made your hair so healthy.
Speaker A:But we can thank God for the creation and worship creator separately.
Speaker A:So I, I hope you guys.
Speaker A:Is everyone understanding what I'm getting to starting to understand and bring into the aspect that we don't need to worship creation and it's not offensive to go and do this thing as well.
Speaker A:Very left wing views are.
Speaker A:If you are to tell someone they are wrong for what they worship and to try to change their heritage or culture in this way, then you are either a bigot, sometimes it also makes you sexist and all these other random terms that have nothing to do with anything.
Speaker A:But ultimately it's understanding that if you're doing the Great Commission, if you're spreading the gospel, if your friend next door in America or in a first world country is putting on a hair mask and she's so obsessed with her hair that she actually gets distracted from God and like from loving on people properly because of it, that sin is just as bad as the tribe who was worshiping a God or a deity.
Speaker A:Because that person, your friend who has to do a hair mask every night has to take care of this.
Speaker A:If they don't do this, they also are worshiping a false God and it's themselves.
Speaker A:So if you are a Christian and you have that type of heart of humility and understanding that this mission field is the same whether it's across the world or right here in your own room, then you are going to be an amazing missionary no matter where you are, if you're truly called to missions.
Speaker A:So that's why I read those verses, because I want people to understand that just because A cultural view of somebody making it very obvious they're literally worshiping some sort of false God.
Speaker A:If you start learning to see the false gods all around you, where you're at now, then going to another country and explaining it to someone will be the easiest piece of cake ever.
Speaker A:Because if you can have these hard conversations with the people you're doing life with around you, that I think that's actually a lot harder than going up to some random person in a tribe and explaining the difference between your God and their God.
Speaker A:But to get back to the actual healthcare aspect as well, Western A.
Speaker A:Price is somebody that I've mentioned constantly throughout this podcast.
Speaker A:I've been a member of theirs for seven years, maybe longer, I don't know, I don't know, maybe a decade.
Speaker A:But the Weston A.
Speaker A:Price foundation is wonderful because we get letters and updates on new studies and scientific information that they find from all around the world and how they support that.
Speaker A:But to give you an overview, Weston A.
Speaker A:Price was a dentist.
Speaker A:He was at the turn of the 19th century, so the 18th to 19th, the 18th to the 19th century, he traveled the world, not understanding why people in technically first world Western medicine had horrific teeth.
Speaker A:But people from native tribes, whether they were Inuits, which is another word for Eskimo, that I, I guess that's like not a proper term anymore.
Speaker A:I don't know, African tribes, people, and the depths of the Amazon, all of these untouched areas, and even parts of like Mongolia and China, not Japan.
Speaker A:But yeah, random countries, whether they be, you know, from any background, when they were untouched from outside food and influences and medicine, and they were truly living off of the land that their genetic DNA had been used to for a couple hundred or maybe even a couple thousand years at least since the Tower of Babel.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:If you're a Christian, uh, it's understanding that God created and cultivated their gut biomes because your mouth is the first step of your gut to literally be able to assimilate and take most of the nutrients out of that area more than anyone else in the world.
Speaker A:So when Weston A.
Speaker A:Price came to their area and he exchanged some goods and stuff and he took pictures of their teeth before and after, he would see children's teeth start to rot out when they had not even just like sugary foods.
Speaker A:Cuz people assume like, oh, they must have started eating sugar, they must have started eating carbohydrates.
Speaker A:No, they had their own natural sugars and natural carbohydrates and high fat diets and meat and high vegetable diets.
Speaker A:But they were from that area.
Speaker A:And if he brought food from South America to the Inuits that were up in Alaska, he noticed that the Inuit's teeth would start to rot out.
Speaker A:And then vice versa.
Speaker A:If he brought blubber from the Inuits and brought it to Africa, let's say, and they weren't used to that diet, the people in Africa's teeth would start to rot out.
Speaker A:So what I'm trying to say is the culture shift that a lot of Christians do when they come to missionary work in other countries is they try to involve and bring their own culture into the new culture.
Speaker A:They are not assimilating into.
Speaker A:Keyword there is not assimilating into.
Speaker A:And what we understand biblically is that Jesus came and assimilated into the healthy culture of what was going on.
Speaker A:He still did feasts, he still did all of these things that were a part of the Old Testament, even though his whole meaning of coming was to show that the Old Testament, everything in the Old Covenant was, was about to be broken, but he still did what was biblically okay.
Speaker A:I still do think the reason why my sister came back, even though she does feel fulfilled and is really happy that she did it, but still like had kind of a sorrowful response when she was telling us about it.
Speaker A:Like, you could tell she wanted to do more and be more and she felt like she didn't do as much as she wanted to.
Speaker A:That I think they all did to an extent, from what I heard in her story.
Speaker A:Then again, this is my interpretation of her story.
Speaker A:I do think it's because she had that like split second interaction with them.
Speaker A:You know, she didn't really get to go be a missionary.
Speaker A:She got to go and help out other missionaries who were there.
Speaker A:And I think if I were to sum up this episode with anything, I just want to say that if you're a Christian who does kind of do, I call it missionary hopping, where you kind of jump on other missionary bandwagons and go and visit other missionary places.
Speaker A:You are helping the missionaries that are there.
Speaker A:I don't consider you a missionary.
Speaker A:Wherever you are and wherever you live, that's where you're a missionary.
Speaker A:And that's where I think I offend a lot of people.
Speaker A:I don't know.
Speaker A:I would love to hear what you guys think and what you would have to say because I don't consider myself.
Speaker A:That's why I've never gone on any of those trips.
Speaker A:I have wanted to help.
Speaker A:At my old church, they needed healthcare providers to come and help because we planted a Church in Guatemala.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A:But I wouldn't come back and be like, I'm now a missionary from Guatemala.
Speaker A:No, I'm a missionary here in Southern California.
Speaker A:I'm a missionary on my podcast to anyone who I can love on through this, but I wouldn't claim missionary status in any way, shape or form.
Speaker A:I haven't gone and done a church plant anywhere.
Speaker A:If you're a church plant, you're a missionary.
Speaker A:I'm a missionary where my church is right now.
Speaker A:I'm a.
Speaker A:But it's not.
Speaker A:I didn't start the church plant, you know, So I hope, I hope that people understand the difference between God coming in, assimilating, being a part of culture, but then understanding that he was counterculture cultural towards worship, where your heart worshiped, what you did.
Speaker A:And again, like we say every single episode of this podcast, who are you doing it for?
Speaker A:What are you doing it for?
Speaker A:Everything that you decide and do and you do in life.
Speaker A:What's the plan and what's the purpose?
Speaker A:What's the heart behind it?
Speaker A:And everything I can say that my husband and I do, we do check on.
Speaker A:I will say the one thing that we are so good at in our walk is constantly asking, who are we doing this for?
Speaker A:Even when we mess up so badly, which we do.
Speaker A:We're humans, we mess up all the time, but we constantly go back to, okay, but why?
Speaker A:What was our heart behind that?
Speaker A:And we challenge each other in it.
Speaker A:And it's hard and we have hard conversations, and it's a little bit harder for him than for me to have those difficult conversations.
Speaker A:But also, I'm a woman.
Speaker A:I communicate a lot more.
Speaker A:I communicate a lot better.
Speaker A:It's kind of.
Speaker A:Women do that better in general.
Speaker A:And it's.
Speaker A:I would say that he does a really good job at teaching me to be still and just kind of allow God to speak when I want to.
Speaker A:So with that, I want everyone to know that I'm really thankful for what God has called you to do.
Speaker A:But if you're a Christian and you are not doing any type of call to commission in your area, if your friends and family don't really know you're a Christian, if you're not led by the Holy Spirit, and if you're not surrendering to yourself under God's grace and his truth, he's the only one who can give you mercy, my friend.
Speaker A:The only one.
Speaker A:And the only way he can give you mercy from what you.
Speaker A:You are supposed to go to hell.
Speaker A:I am supposed to go to hell.
Speaker A:But he gave us Grace and mercy and love and life for dying on the cross for us.
Speaker A:And then on top of that, that's all.
Speaker A:I mean, the fact that he did that was amazing.
Speaker A:But then he also gave us intimacy through the Holy Spirit to be able to be led every single day.
Speaker A:And if you're gonna give me any excuse that you didn't go talk to that person or you aren't honest with your friend about what they're doing and how you see them doing something unbiblical, or you didn't even be.
Speaker A:You weren't even encouraging when you saw them doing a great thing.
Speaker A:If you are not discipling or being discipled or having an ironing, sharpening, iron relationships, if you do not have biblical relationships in your life, you cannot call yourself a missionary in any way, shape or form.
Speaker A:So holistically, this has everything to do with community 100%.
Speaker A:It has everything to do with you understanding that you are countercultural already for loving Christ.
Speaker A:And wherever you go, no matter what you do, you will have to assimilate yourself to that culture.
Speaker A:But then say no to the things of that culture that are idolatrous, that are anti God right now.
Speaker A:I am anti my culture.
Speaker A:I'm counter California culture.
Speaker A:I go against everything that is culturally okay here, whether it be homosexuality, transgender, even just body dysmorphia, the way people dress sexually, let me think.
Speaker A:Even music, the way that we vote, the way that we stand for life, the way that we even, I mean, holistically live.
Speaker A:Everything that we do is under the glory of God.
Speaker A:The way, I mean, our garden flourishes while other people's are dying right next to us.
Speaker A:And they're like, what do you do differently?
Speaker A:I'm like, I pray over my plants, I pray over my garden.
Speaker A:And even the way that we have fertility and that we're pregnant.
Speaker A:Everything that we have done has been countercultural.
Speaker A:People have wanted us or made suggestions to do certain things, and we said, no, we're gonna leave it in the hands of God.
Speaker A:And God has only blessed us.
Speaker A:And we've been able to use those blessings to share on our podcast.
Speaker A:We've been able to use it to share love and conviction into people's hearts here in the missionary field here in Southern California.
Speaker A:And that's our main goal.
Speaker A:So if you guys could please, please tell me, share stories with me on how you have been accepting of culture and countercultural.
Speaker A:Have you.
Speaker A:How you have shared the gospel, how you've been rejected by the gospel.
Speaker A:I'm sorry, not by the gospel, by people.
Speaker A:Because of the gospel and how you have been loved by God through those hard times and through those blessings.
Speaker A:We want to hear those things.
Speaker A:But ultimately I want you guys to know that you are not alone in those seasons that are hard.
Speaker A:And God, I'm gonna cry.
Speaker A:God is so proud of you and loves you through every step of your missionary journey and your sanctification journey.
Speaker A:Yeah, this is.
Speaker A:This is a thing I've been wanting to say for a while, but I didn't know how to go about it and I've just been praying about it.
Speaker A:And since we had to put off the tech conversation for a few weeks, I just realized it was the right time.
Speaker A:So I'd love to hear more about what you guys have to say.
Speaker A:And just know that casting seeds is all about how we can plant seeds in people's lives, whether it just be holistically based as a start, but everything is always about planting seeds of Christ's word and truth.
Speaker A:So we love you guys.
Speaker A:We pray that you keep casting seeds no matter where you are and remember that your missionary field is where you are right now.
Speaker A:Have a blessed and beautiful week and I can't wait to have our TikTok next week.
Speaker A:All right, you guys.
Speaker A:We hope you enjoyed learning how to cultivate God's creation from a Biblical perspective.
Speaker A:Perspective.
Speaker A:Holyistic health is to prioritize whole person wellness through Christ like and comment on what topics we're casting seeds or casting pearls.
Speaker B:If you found this information provided useful, subscribe to our podcast for future updates.
Speaker B:Leave a review to help us improve and share this episode.
Speaker B:We would like to remind you before we leave that perfect health cannot be attained in this world.
Speaker A:Only spiritual salvation through sanctification and repentance to God and turning away from sin will give you a perfect body in the kingdom come.
Speaker A:Nourish yourself in the Word, in prayer, and in biblical fellowship daily.
Speaker B:Thank you for joining us today and a special thank you to our listeners for making this podcast possible.
Speaker A:Always praying.
Speaker B:Keep casting seeds.
