LET'S DIG | Pierre & Danilee Aristil
Pierre and Danilee Aristil let you in on their personal chats. Inspiring you to DIG deeper relationships with God, yourself and others.
Jesus said, “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind… and equally important: Love your neighbor as yourself.”
- Matthew 22:37-39
Life gets better when our relationships do.
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LET'S DIG | Pierre & Danilee Aristil
A Deep Conversation with our Guests Jonathan and Rebecca Germain on lifestyle, culture, church, marriage, parenting and more!
Ever wonder if your relationships could be better? Tune in NOW with our special guests Jonathan & Rebecca Germain as we dive deep into culture shifts, leadership, marriage, spiritual disciplines, and the quest for authenticity in all of our relationships.
Ever wondered how faith and fashion can blend seamlessly? In this special episode of Let's Dig the Podcast, Rebecca and Jonathan Germain, lead pastors from North Miami and my treasured family members, join us to shed light on this intriguing blend of topics. Rebecca, who has always been like a second mom to Pierre, talks about her streetwear fashion line, Holy Vibes Only, born out of the challenges she faced. Her inspiring journey of aligning her love for fashion with her spiritual beliefs is both heartwarming and eye-opening, especially as it ties into our ongoing series on walking with God and nurturing healthy relationships.
Leadership within the church today is under the microscope. What are the pitfalls, and how can leaders avoid them? Rebecca, John, and The Aristils' dive deep into the generational shifts in ministry, examining how past generations emphasized spiritual disciplines and how the recent focus on relatability might have missed the mark. In our candid conversation, we also explore how to introduce children to faith without making it feel oppressive, finding that sweet spot where faith is encouraged and transformative. This episode is packed with heartfelt stories, valuable insights, and inspiring discussions that promise to offer something meaningful for everyone.
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Welcome everybody to let's Dig the Podcast. Today is a special day because we have our first guests, our first guests. These guests that we have, they are special to us. You probably already saw it in the thumbnail, and everything that you saw in the thumbnail is not clickbait. We're going to talk about some real things today, and so today I want to introduce to you guys my family. This is my sister, and when I say sister, I'm not talking about like sister, sister, like just black power type of sister.
Speaker 1:This is my blood sister. This is my older sister. She's like my second mom. You guys know my mom passed several seasons ago almost two years ago, going on two years. And my sister is like my second mom to us and growing up she used to bathe me growing up, which is crazy. So she is here today with her and her husband. They are lead pastors in south florida, miami, north miami, florida. So everybody make some noise and welcome my sister. This is john and rebecca germaine what's up hi? Guys, I straight did spirit fingers.
Speaker 1:Yes, I should have you know what? Hold up. Pause real quick. Please clarify for the people. I know some of you guys see the red cup and some of y'all are judging Matter of fact they were I'm judging, I judged Wait first of all I'm getting memories.
Speaker 2:First of all I'm getting memories that you gave me a hard time about my Coke Zero and my Celsius and you'd be like Shorty, please get a cup. It looks better for aesthetics. Blah, blah, blah. And then he, I have my cute cup with my glass straw and you have the nerve to sit down with a solo cup today.
Speaker 1:Okay, on my defense, I was born and raised in church and so for the people that were, in the world. I do not even know what this means to college students.
Speaker 2:It's just party cups, it's not like drinking cups.
Speaker 1:I just thought about it. I'm like people see this cup and think, oh my gosh, what is he drinking? I'm drinking water.
Speaker 2:Boring water.
Speaker 1:I was born and raised in church, and so when I see this cup, I do not think anything.
Speaker 2:I don't think anything. It's just a cup. It's not a great pop color.
Speaker 1:I would say I love the way the red just pops, it actually goes to your hat. Speaking of outfits, so you guys can probably already see this fire shirt that I'm rocking. So, my sis, this is her brand, this is her line. We're going to drop the link in the description.
Speaker 3:Matter of fact, john is rocking one right now. Yes, got the baby. Got the baby, holy vibes. Only he got the baby blue. You know we're from Miami, so Miami likes colors, and I know in.
Speaker 2:LA, it's different.
Speaker 3:It's all just like the monochromatic. There it is, I'm here for it, because black makes you look skinny, so it doesn't matter where I'm from. I will always be wearing black because it just singes you In the heat of Miami Florida.
Speaker 2:Yep, that's right. Rebecca Germain is still in black, Always. You know what?
Speaker 1:I'm liking this Holy Vibes. Only, we've actually been on a series right now. In the podcast you guys already know, we've been talking about cleaning up our relationships, we've been talking about walking with God, we've been talking about catching toxic relationships, we've been talking about things that we can do to save our marriages, and so holy vibes is really cool because for us, as believers and followers of Christ, this is the life that God has called us to live. So, becky, take a moment kind of talk about what we're rocking right now, today. I love it.
Speaker 3:Thank you, that's a perfect segue. It is so. The line this is a streetwear line that God gave to me in 2020 in a dream. In a dream so when I was younger my brother can attest to this I've always been into fashion and but as I got older, you start to infiltrate different things and start to hear different voices and, yeah, the industry, especially in fashion or entertainment. They say if you don't do something by a certain age, then it can't be done. So I got into corporate and really just began to just buy into that narrative. So I never did anything in fashion, but anybody who knows me knows I will dress up anything and I'll find a way to make it eclectic and make it my own.
Speaker 3:So it was a vision that I left. I mean, really, when I was a kid, never cared about fashion industry. What does that have to do with me? So, in 2020, actually, I just had a dream in the middle of having shingles.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 3:COVID.
Speaker 2:Yep.
Speaker 3:So we're in the middle of COVID and I caught shingles.
Speaker 2:I forgot you had shingles.
Speaker 3:I had shingles when I was 16.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's like extremely rare for us to get younger.
Speaker 3:Correct. So, shingles is not for young people.
Speaker 2:It's not for the old people, and we had it young. It's not for the old people, and we had it young.
Speaker 3:It's not for young people. Okay, that's crazy it is due to an immense amount of stress that your body endures, and it will just induce that type of and it's not painful, it's just so painful.
Speaker 3:So here I am, just in a hotel room. For three days we flew to Miami to go hang out with your family and do some renovation at your parents' house. And, yeah, I'm sleeping and the Lord gives me this vision and I find myself just at a almost like a museum, a museum that had a whole bunch of different textiles and fabrics. And as I'm walking around I saw I was having a conversation with someone and I'm like man, you know, I would love to have a fashion line and something that's for just people with sensitive skin, and just the fabric has to matter. I didn't understand then why that was important until later down the line.
Speaker 3:Long story short. In talking to that person, they were just very discouraging because they're like well, what are you going to call it? And if you're going to, you know, go this direction. Just a lot of obstacles and just very discouraging. Anyhow, I said, I don't know what I'm going to call it, but I just feel that this is what I'm supposed to do. And in the dream the Lord said remember that you're adorned by me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's crazy.
Speaker 3:And I woke up and I said, oh, that's the name of the brand, that's amazing.
Speaker 2:Adorned by him. I love it so much.
Speaker 3:You guys are going to learn this about me real quick. I'm a scripture girl, let's go. So the Lord told me to just go right into the scripture and he took me to Isaiah 61, verse 10. Okay, and it says I delight greatly in the Lord, my soul rejoices in my God, for he has clothed me with garments of salvation Wow and arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness salvation. And arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 3:That's amazing and I'm like okay, god, so what do I do with this next? And that's the thing, god will give you something in seed form, and he just wants you to trust him.
Speaker 3:So, anyways, long story short, God will give you something in seed form, and he just wants you to trust him. So anyways, long story short, four years later I started with just one shirt and here we are, and it's all undergirded in scripture. This is, you know, isaiah 61, verse 10, holy vibes. Only that is our 1P115. So, in short, it's 1 Peter 1, verse 15. It tells us we also have our content collection, that's our pH 411, philippians 411. When Paul says I've learned to be content, I know what it's like to have a lot. I know what it is to have a little but, I, can do all things through Christ, who gives us strength.
Speaker 3:So, just out here walking in obedience.
Speaker 1:Here we are, so we want to encourage you guys like support, support, support, support. But you know what? This is not really just about support. This is about getting in alignment with what God has for us, and so these shirts, this brand, this is stuff that has been anointed, has been prayed over. So I'm telling you how you know, because I already know.
Speaker 2:I already know.
Speaker 1:Look at you and my I already know, it's been, it's been prayed over. So listen, y'all, listen. Whatever you're going through in your situation, I want to encourage you guys like partner up with brands like this, brands like that that speak life into your situation. You might be in a dark situation right now and you might be able to put on a shirt like this and to know, like you know, what God has called me to live in high places. He's called me to be holy, right, he loves me. I'm adorned by god, so I love that. All right, so we're gonna drop the link, thank you, in the bio. We're gonna drop it in the description right here. We'll put it somewhere so that you guys can get it.
Speaker 1:Come on, let's let's make this mug go out of stock yes, yes, yes okay, so we all have some conversations so I know you guys were talking earlier about some stuff we're gonna talk about.
Speaker 2:I missed the whole thing thank you, but you did a great job as our production crew.
Speaker 1:So, thank you so much, let's go.
Speaker 2:We appreciate your ministry. So we were talking a little bit earlier about how, um, we did the last last week's episode about you know, unfortunately, leaders falling in that it's a real uh problem in the church right now, and so we were just chatting a little bit of what does that look like for us in ministry? All four of us are in ministry, we carry a lot of weight, and so what does that look like for us? And because that's what I said in the last episode too, I was like I don't want to just point fingers to point fingers, I want to talk about what I see in the church as a whole, but then I want to reflect it on me and say, okay, so how do I keep myself from falling into that or looking like that? Or is that my heart posture? What do I need to do to make sure that when I'm doing something for the Lord, it is not look at me, look at me, but it is look at him?
Speaker 1:It's funny too, because this is such a different generation now, and just so you get to give you guys some content on the demographic, um, people that are listening not everyone's that listened to the page is a believer, right. So when you say the Lord, when you say God, the church, right, there's some that understand what we're talking about and some that don't understand what we're talking about.
Speaker 1:And for those of you that that aren't believers in Christ, we all make always make sure that you guys know we're going to always point you to Jesus, right, because he's the one who saves. But in the church world we've seen there's been this facade right, there's been this coverup. I believe that we are the religion, we are the faith that has the truth, but we tend to be the most fake. We're the ones that lie about things.
Speaker 1:We're the ones that cover it up until someone else uncovered it right and people are falling because they're watching people who are religious leaders like, not live the life that crisis called us to live. That's right. Like you know what I mean and like what's what has been, you know, like in this whole season.
Speaker 3:Like, like, tell us just your your perspective and what you've been noticing, noticing just especially in the shift in generations. Now, people, we want the truth, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think about the israelites and how there was three different generations. There was a generation that they knew god, they experienced god, and then there was another generation that heard about god yeah, but then there's a generation that didn't know anything about god, and I believe there's just this gap and we see that there's nothing new. There's nothing new, it's cyclical. We're seeing the same thing is happening. There's a generation. I'm like okay, you know what? Back in the days, we knew fasting and prayer and you know spiritual disciplines.
Speaker 3:That's what we lived by, because we were brought up by the people who knew God, they experienced God, and so we followed in that same vein, but unfortunately, I believe there was a gap, there was a lack from my generation to this next generation, where we missed the mark in transferring that knowledge and that experience. Instead, we wanted to be friends more than discipling. We wanted to be homies because we're over man, all right, I'm about to get real. So we're wanting to overcompensate for the people that wasn't there for us or the ones that made us feel some type of way.
Speaker 3:So, then we go the extra mile to say I'm never going to make you feel this way, but you can way, it's the pendulum.
Speaker 2:Yes, you can't swing Our generation is working so hard, and it's not just in this, but in so many aspects In parenting yeah, the principle at large In bringing our kids to church, whether we force them.
Speaker 2:But we don't want to force them because we were forced and we hated it. So let's not force our kids to go to church, let's just suggest, sure, but the pendulum has swung way too far where we're too soft about it, that's right. And then we're not actually letting people know the experience of what the Lord, what Jesus, has done for us.
Speaker 3:That's right.
Speaker 2:Because we soften it so much that we don't want to be hard like our parents.
Speaker 1:Like you're going to do this, you're going to do that, and it's. And now. And now I see why Gen Zers don't want to get married.
Speaker 1:So John as a pastor right, you have Gen Zers in your church, you have different generations in your church and what has been the pulse like when people's perception towards marriage? Yeah, even down in Miami there's such like a vast distance when it comes to like the perspective of marriage. Um shoot, the other day, uh, I was having a conversation with a few guys and there's some guys they've been dating for like years, yeah, and they just really just holding back and saying I don't know if I'm up for it and I think, really like when I think about it.
Speaker 1:It's um growing up. I didn't have leaders. That was close to me.
Speaker 1:So, like this generation, like they're looking up to leaders who can really pour into them and so, because they don't see that role model, they don't see that role model that's saying, hey, they have a healthy marriage and so this is something I want to emulate. So a lot of them they're saying, hey, I haven't seen a healthy marriage at all, so I don't even know if I want to go in this direction. And so, like guys are coming up to me and, like Pastor, I don't know if I can do this, like I see your marriage.
Speaker 3:It looks healthy, but I don't see anybody else. We're the anomaly, so there's a lot of times we're standard, for marriage is the norm. An unhealthy relationship is the anomaly. An unhealthy marriage, an unhealthy relationship is the anomaly. Because, when he created it, he said it was good.
Speaker 3:He said that it was good, it wasn't supposed to be Not saying that you're not going to experience hardship because we're imperfect people, to experience hardship because we're imperfect people. But God created a perfect design, a paradigm that, when it's inhibited by two godly people, that we can submit to him and then submit to one another. So no, we're not lucky because we get it all the time.
Speaker 1:We're not the anomaly. It's God's standard. A healthy relationship is.
Speaker 3:God's standard.
Speaker 1:But I think this is why, like it requires, like in this season, like we really need leaders that are stepping in and pouring into this generation, that are close, yeah, that are close, because for me, just thinking about it, there was a lot of people I looked up to and I didn't know what was happening behind the scenes.
Speaker 1:And until I grew up, that's when I realized that's crazy. It wasn't as healthy as I thought it was Right, wow, it wasn't as healthy as I thought it was, and so this is why, like just seeing leaders, like falling out of ministry and just hearing a lot of the issues, is it's because of what happened at home? Right, because the marriage is where it's not healthy. Yeah, and so this is why, like, close proximity in ministry is so important. It's so prevalent.
Speaker 2:Like it needs to, it needs to show up and honesty and like just being open and honest to people who are looking at you and saying like yeah, we do fight, like we had a couple ask us a few months ago do you guys ever fight? You know, that we almost filed for divorce, like, of course we fight, but also that was our unhealthy season, but knowing that, yes, we still fight, even in a healthy place, but there's a healthy way to do it, because conflict is an opportunity for intimacy, wait say that.
Speaker 3:One say it one more time Conflict is an opportunity for intimacy.
Speaker 2:I'm going to steal that from now on. Yes, but church people and leaders in our like for who we grew up under, we didn't get to see that they hid every single part of it. We were the gap was too wide.
Speaker 3:We're too far.
Speaker 2:There was no intimacy for us with leaders. So now I know I can say this for all four of us sitting in this room that it is part of our mission, that's right, to show that transparency and share that intimacy with those who are following us and saying, hey, this is what we go through, but this is how we deal with it, this is how we take it to the Lord, this is how I submit to my husband, this is how I serve my husband.
Speaker 1:And like all of those things that are missing right now. I had a friend I won't say his name is going, it's a guy, he was born a guy and he identifies as a guy and he's a guy.
Speaker 3:Do you guys see what I did, what I had to deal with growing up?
Speaker 1:Here we go. Okay, so he was going through a really tough situation in his marriage. Yeah, like messed up on his wife, stepped out drugs, alcohol, all this stuff. Yeah, he was at church, plugged into a church, yeah, and when he got to the point where he's just like man, I really just I really need to figure this out. Yeah, he goes to his pastor and says I need help. It says all this stuff that he's going through. His pastor says so. The pastor points him to someone else. The friend tells me this like a year later. I'm like that's what he told me. That's crazy. I said did you decides to come to me? A lot of times they just, like you said it's the proximity. They want to just get close enough to say how are you guys making it through? Because I see you guys are good, you guys look like you're doing good, so therapy is good. We've gone through therapy.
Speaker 2:It saved our marriage, so I'm not against it.
Speaker 1:I'm not saying don't do therapy right, but what I'm saying is our point of just like we carry the truth. Yes, that's, and sometimes we don't want to share the truth because it embarrass the embarrassment. Long story short that pastor, yeah, that leader of that guy, yeah, matter of fact, yeah, it came out in the news, yeah, that he was stealing money. Yeah, messing around with girls just divorced his wife left the church and the church is now divorced.
Speaker 1:His wife left the church and the church is now out on its own, left the wife behind and they're trying to figure out what's going on with the church. Now we understand what's going on and what I'm saying is we're living in a time right now where podcasters are coming out, where ministers who has fallen are now talking about here's what happened, here's how it got restored. But what we should be doing is, while we're in the middle of it, just sharing. You don't have to share the details, but just letting people know like, hey, we're going through some tough seasons that we're working through. That's why I said it last week Shout out to Tony Evans, who didn't share what he was going through, and I appreciate that, because sometimes, when he shared right away, it gives justification for people to say like I'm gonna do the same thing because we know we're gonna get restored.
Speaker 3:And there are people that don't have the spiritual maturation to be able to differentiate between certain things, it becomes a blanket statement and they don't know what to do. It's like giving them a loaded gun and you just give me permission because, wait, look at this person and I'm good, this makes up for it. So, yes, you need to have oh, you need to have the spiritual acumen to understand what you share. You can still be authentic, but not everybody gets transparency.
Speaker 3:There's a difference, because it's it's the relationship that warrants the level of transparency. I will always keep a rule with you I will remain authentic, but if I don't believe, you have the maturity and you have the experience or even Paul tells us in Roman to not be a stumbling block. If this is an area of struggle for you, my sharing that with you may not help you. I learned this from.
Speaker 1:You.
Speaker 3:Don't say everything Right If it's not going to be. You have to be able to differentiate between what's helpful and hurtful. If I say this to you and it's going to be hurtful, how am I helping you? Sometimes it's in the restraint. I will remain authentic and I will have to gauge and I will need to discern what I can and cannot share with you.
Speaker 3:So I'm not being dishonest and I'm not being disingenuine, but I am also protecting you because you can't handle this but there's still a level of communication going back to the three generations of Israelites where, okay, well, from the first generation, the ones that experienced God, how much did you talk to the next generation about what you experienced?
Speaker 1:in God. I really appreciate that and, just as you're speaking like, just thinking, as a pastor, I think sometimes like this is why, for me, I have to always go at the feet of the Lord and remind myself I'm human, just as everybody else. You know you mentioned Tony Evans and that shocked me.
Speaker 2:That hit hard.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah that hit hard because I remember I said I'm good. You know, as long as Tony Evans ever goes down, I'm good.
Speaker 3:And to hear we did, we did.
Speaker 1:But that's because, that's because I feel like we've elevated pastors at such a high position and even like the reverence that is to be given to God, we've placed it on pastors.
Speaker 2:That is very true.
Speaker 1:And so now, like pastors, have this high position and we revere them so much, and it's gotten to the point where, because of the lack of humility, even us as pastors, we forget that we're human as well, we forget that we need to live a humble life as well, we forget that we need to live above reproach. And because of that, I feel like you know, for many of us like we feel like, hey, we're not going to go through certain things, we're not going to experience certain things. But I have to remind myself like, the same way God has called me, he can call someone else too.
Speaker 1:It's like we all have the same calling, which is to proclaim the gospel you know, and I think as pastors sometimes we forget that as our church begins to grow, as our popularity begins to grow, influence all of that, as that continues to grow, and then that separates me from a relationship with Jesus. And now I feel I can Lord myself over the people that God has called me to shepherd and man, like it's like for me almost every day. I got to you know, just praying like Lord keep me humble, keep me humble.
Speaker 1:And because of that, that keeps me, um, where I'm willing to be transparent, yeah, willing to be transparent and just share. That's crazy man. I'm human, just as you. I'm human just as you. I can fall, just like, just like you are, um, but this is why I got to stay close to the Lord and I like the verbiage of just like you know. Yeah, keeping that space of like. Okay, I'm not going to tell you intimate, like intimately, what's happening personally in my marriage right now, currently, as I'm dealing with some stuff, but I'm here to tell you like we are all going through things, we all face tough shit. Yeah, like like we all go tough.
Speaker 2:Wait did you say At the same time we both went wait, wait, I caught myself.
Speaker 3:I was in the middle of saying shift, he said shift.
Speaker 2:No no, no shift.
Speaker 1:I was in the middle of saying toughness and hardship and hardship and some of you are like wait, did he say ship or hardship, or hardship, or hardship we're going to have a hard time. We're all going through some hard ship Because the way we both responded at each other.
Speaker 2:I was like wait what?
Speaker 1:Hardship. First of all, I'm going to need everybody to relax, Listen this is accountability at its finest.
Speaker 3:All right, we digging right now. You see how we all just looked at it like and we're like no, we say it. So this can we pause. Can we pause? And this is, this is, this is the epitome of when you live and walk in godliness, godliness and holiness, yeah, even in seasons of hardship, even in seasons where you can get tripped up.
Speaker 3:I believe how you navigate through that is a byproduct of how you live daily. Yes, right, so if you don't have a sailor mouth, even in tripping over a word, there's certain things that's not going to come out of you because it's not in you.
Speaker 1:Right, that's right. You see what I'm saying? It's not going to come out of you and y'all already know we talked about Danny Lee. I was gonna say but what?
Speaker 2:happens, if it.
Speaker 1:God was okay, guys we still digging too.
Speaker 2:Mrs Becky, this is the one that we said to each other accountable.
Speaker 3:We gotta do better. We gotta do better.
Speaker 2:People are looking to you. That's right. We gotta fix our words, that's right you mentioned her last.
Speaker 3:Last week it was a different episode and even recently, the Lord just brought it back to my remembrance because, listen, we're all sinners.
Speaker 2:We go through hard seasons and things come out.
Speaker 3:We go to your girl. Seasons man, your girl has a little bit of an anger issue. I got the Peter spirit and you know, if I'm not in consecration you can chop somebody's ear off. You know I do. I do because I get very passionate.
Speaker 1:All I get very passionate. All right, I'm Haitian, I'm from New York and I'm just passionate. I'm passionate, like people used to say all the times like why is Pierre always yelling?
Speaker 3:I'm not yelling, he's not yelling, he's just passionate. This is how he speaks. We speak with our hands and we're passionate, you guys, you guys already know.
Speaker 1:Like they're like Pierre's always mad. No, I'm not mad loud enough. I was trying something new last week he was like really chill and then today he's like so today we gonna be here and I was like yeah, that's it, it's the red cup. It's the red cup. You sure that's water. It's the water of life.
Speaker 3:Yes, I don't know, but even recently, he just reminded me of just being a representative, you know, of the kingdom and yes, we are human and we are to continuously bring our shortcomings to him, because the Bible says all have sinned and fallen short of his glory. But I had to remember that. Well, what's the driving force behind certain behaviors, certain things? What's behind it? Because what's in me is holiness.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 3:What's in me is holiness, which is why, when I do the things that I don't want to do, similar to Paul, that I feel that contritement and I feel that dissonance and I feel that brokenness. So when I curse and it slips up, I don't feel great. No, I feel broken because what's in me is the holiness, what's in me is righteousness. You see what I'm saying, but again, this is me. To reiterate what's in you is what you will produce, even with a struggle.
Speaker 3:Oh, just tying it back to the fruits of the spirit. So there you go. What's in me is the fruits of the spirit, so self-control instead of giving into. Okay. Somebody made me very upset and no, I could say the F word, but I'm not going to say the F word, because it doesn doesn't glorify god.
Speaker 2:It's not a witness there, it is jesus, that's a witness I love. Our pastor used to always say like that ignorant people cuss yeah, but it actually takes much more control and much more wisdom and like brain power, intellect to intellect, to use other words and I thought that's so true because it is easy to drop an f butbomb.
Speaker 2:But in that of what you were saying. I also love that as leaders. It's showing and modeling that, hey, I can struggle with this, but it's not like, well, that's who I am and that's where I'm going to be. It's literally showing and walking out in front of people hey, I struggle with a sailor mouth in front of people. Hey, I struggle with a sailor mouth. Therefore, watch me fix my words, because holiness is inside of me and I won't stay in a sailor mouth world. I'm going to grow and the grace of God is going to help me do better.
Speaker 2:But like showing people that and saying like nah, I struggle with these words, man, they be coming out sometimes.
Speaker 1:Let me take a moment to say if you guys are enjoying these conversations, don't forget hit that button. Like Some of you guys don't want to commit yet. I just found out today that a lot more people are following the page than I think, and I get it. Hitting subscribe is a big commitment, but it doesn't cost nothing.
Speaker 2:It don't cost nothing, it's free. It don't cost nothing.
Speaker 1:And it don't cost nothing and don't you want to hang out with people? You want to become? So I want to encourage you, like, if you're enjoying this YouTube video, hit that button, like, if you feel like this conversation could bless somebody that's in your life. Don't send it to them all passive, aggressively. Share it with them. If you're listening to this on Apple Podcast, on Spotify, google Podcast, leave us a review. Tell us how you really feel. If it's a one star, that's fine. That's, that's okay. We'll say I'm not gonna judge you too hard, but we're gonna know who you are all right, hit that review, right, yeah, but I want to encourage you seriously, like if you're really liking this.
Speaker 1:Like we say this all the time, our goal is not to go viral. Our goal is to give value. That's what we're trying to do here, and so we're not trying to create a bunch of clickbait. We're not trying to like trigger words like oh, we're going to talk about sex today, guys. Yeah, we're probably going to talk about it because that's what we're going to talk about it might come up in this conversation which we should probably talk about it.
Speaker 2:Oh, you want to go Okay.
Speaker 1:Oh, but what I'm?
Speaker 3:saying is my husband's already whispering like oh, my favorite topic.
Speaker 1:My favorite topic. Let's go, let's talk about it. Well, you know what we're gonna talk about it, but this is not. This is not right now for us to talk about sex, for you to just feel all good and comfortable. Some of y'all might feel uncomfortable because I'm saying right now, like there's people that have been degrading what sex was created right to be.
Speaker 2:That's right. You know, I'm saying and it's happening in the church oh yeah, it's happening everywhere, like the perception of sex.
Speaker 1:You know, people think all types of things. And it's been polluted, man, it's been destroyed, yep.
Speaker 2:Yep, yep, crazy huh. That is true. So, john, yes, what do you want to talk about? About sex? What's on your heart?
Speaker 1:Let's talk about sex.
Speaker 3:Let's talk about sex baby, which is one of my favorite topics because it is a gift from God.
Speaker 1:I'm going to say this right now Don't hit unfollow, don't hit unsubscribe. It's a gift from God that God created for a man and a woman that are married to have. It's great.
Speaker 3:And I just want to put this out there for anyone who feels like, well, I lived a life of promiscuity and I didn't save myself a marriage, god's grace can reach you where you are. It's never too late for you to practice celibacy. It's never too late for you to say, hey, god, I want to do it your way, because that's what a godly marriage exudes is, when you follow God's paradigm and you get to live under the blessings of God when you do it God's way.
Speaker 3:I say this if you want it God's way, then do it God's way.
Speaker 1:Right, that's good, right so.
Speaker 3:I just want to encourage someone, and it's not too late for you Start right now, start today. Whoever's on your, whoever's in your DM, don't respond. Whatever phone number you need to delete or whoever you need to just no longer block, it's not too late. The enemy wants to deceive you and make you feel like, well, this can never happen for you, you can never be in a godly marriage or a godly relationship, and that is a lie from the pit of hell.
Speaker 1:Start today and hit us up and we'll hit us up.
Speaker 3:They'll guide you.
Speaker 1:We'll walk with you, We'll walk up, we'll hold you accountable. Like confession is good for the soul man. It's the first step to be set free.
Speaker 1:So tell us, tell us about it. It's not to put you out. You know you could hit that, send text message, right, I think there's a link for that but we actually want to hear back from you guys. If there's anything in these categories that you guys feel like man, as they're talking, like I'm feeling conviction, that's actually a good thing. That's actually a really good feeling. We want to walk you through that next step. But, john, share with us, especially for you as a pastor. Right, you lead all levels of people, all ages, large, demographic, and everyone has come into your congregation with different perspective of sex. Some people think we've heard some people I'm going to drop one name right now. We've heard people leaders like Jamal Bryant say stuff, stuff, like we should switch up the gospel for people who's already had sex before. Right, that's the thing. Oh yeah, we've heard those type of comments. There's people in the church that think, well, what happens if you've already used to getting some and you're not married anymore?
Speaker 2:He was saying basically, we can't expect people who have already been used to getting sex to live a life of celibacy, so we need to flip the gospel for them.
Speaker 1:So as a pastor. That's Galatians right there, just a completely different gospel Straight up. And for me, being married, sex is a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful thing. It was ordained by God. It's what God has designed for a husband and a wife to just really connect emotionally, spiritually.
Speaker 2:Thank you, for saying that, because I feel like when sorry, I'll let you speak, but when Christian couples say sex is a gift, I think people on the outside think we're just talking about the feeling of it. But it's actually an intimacy and a connection one and bringing us together. It's way more than just the satisfaction of my flesh correct. It's not just my satisfaction of my flesh, it's actually the way that I feel so close to you and that we become one so thank you for saying it's more than that becoming just.
Speaker 1:You said becoming one um, and it, it's, it's really god ordained. Uh, and so be. With that being said, I I think, growing up um being in the in the christian, in the christian household, like we were told that hey, don't, don't um, like we didn't talk about sex they didn't preach about sex.
Speaker 1:You don't have sex before marriage, like all this stuff. And what's interesting, like you hear all of this stuff about um not having sex and then now you come into marriage, oh, I'm supposed to have sex, like, and this is why I think the church needs to talk about it more. We need to have more conversation and even as leaders, yeah, like I talk about statistics.
Speaker 3:Statistics show that christians are having the least married. Christians are having the least amount of sex but it was created for us crazy for us the least amount and we have a higher divorce rate than the world yeah, make it make sense.
Speaker 1:That's wild to me make it make sense man um, but even even with, like you know, growing up and being told, like you know, we shouldn't have sex and all that. So so I found myself because I was told not to. So I went ahead.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the forbidden fruit.
Speaker 1:Sure, sure, try to figure it out because nobody was telling me yeah, here it is Like I'm having all these feelings rise up on the inside of me.
Speaker 2:It's natural you wake up and you're like what's that?
Speaker 1:You know, all these things are happening, but there's nobody I can talk to, nobody that I can have a conversation with. And so I found myself, you know, just living this promiscuous lifestyle and even just living in this lifestyle. Even then, like the people that I was, you know, I was having sexual encounters with, like this was like people in the church, people outside the church, yeah, and it was just tough to just navigate through. You know, I thought that, hey, because I was, I came showed up at church on Sunday morning, I did the sound, hey, everything was fine, not realizing that, hey, I wasn't even being discipled throughout the entire time. I was a leader. And that's the thing. Like, even in the church today, man, like many pastors, we know that there's people who's having sex and we still allow them to stay in leadership, even outside of marriage. And this is where, even for me, like, I'm reminded, lord, that the Lord's going to ask me in front of the couch as a leader.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's good man as a leader.
Speaker 1:And so like we really as leaders, like really just need to come alongside individuals and share. Hey, this is my story. Yeah, you know, but even though this is my story, but look where God has brought you know, look how God has navigated through our lives Transferring the information.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, look, look how God has has brought me through all of this, just as you were saying like um, but it requires us, as leaders, really taking hold of our responsibility, really taking hold of what god has called us to do and to really just navigate life with people. Yeah, as opposed to just relying on our sunday morning experiences, like sure it's more than sunday, yeah, yeah, it's more than sunday.
Speaker 1:It's crazy. It makes me think like if the conversation of sex was having more, or the conversation about sex was having more um, in in houses yeah, like we were talking about it more. Like we have a 10 year old son, yeah, and I told him last month that him and i're gonna have a man-to-man conversation I told you I'm like it's coming, and he said he said like what's it gonna be about that?
Speaker 1:yeah, and because he calls me dad. Now, once he went into the double digits, he's like I'm not calling you daddy anymore.
Speaker 2:We told him he had to be 10.
Speaker 1:So so for the whole first month he called me dad and I wouldn't respond yeah, yeah, I wouldn't respond what we told him, it was 10.
Speaker 2:You're not talking to me, but anyway.
Speaker 1:he said what are we going to talk about? I said we're going to talk about the S word. Do you know like what the S word is? He thought I was talking about stupid. Yeah, no.
Speaker 3:Like no, it's not stupid.
Speaker 2:Our kids are so sheltered, they're so Christian, they're so safe. Our kids are really safe?
Speaker 3:Sin, yeah, sin, salvation, shame, sabbath.
Speaker 1:Yeah, shame, sabbath. Sabbath, I said we're going to talk about sex, son, yeah, we're going to talk about sex. We're going to talk about, we're going to talk about our body parts, that, your sister, we're going to talk about all those things. And because I realized, man, just what we're talking about. Like we, as the body of Christ, we actually follow the truth, we know the truth.
Speaker 1:We carry the truth and we keep the truth to ourselves and we wait till someone falls, till they stumble, till they mess up and say you know, we're going to talk about the truth, we're going to finally let it all finally talk about it. I'm like why?
Speaker 1:Why didn't we talk about it before you fell and it's like what you said, it's the gap in all the generations, correct, right? I love how you said earlier, bro, of every day you're praying God, humble me, yeah, because when you humble yourself, serve for yourself. Yeah, so you humble yourself, you make yourself available. You're like you know what I'm gonna talk about this, where I messed up. So to me, I'm like I'm gonna talk about this to my son, because I'll be damned if the world, or the school, or te, or youtube is the first one to teach my son about in my house and that's what's happened to us yes, I know, yeah, yeah, crazy, huh, that is so good is so good, as I think about.
Speaker 3:Everyone has their own experience when it comes to being exposed to the topic of sex and your perception around it, and so something that we struggle with in the beginning of our marriage, when we got, when we started having sex, is is I noticed that my husband had a higher libido, and we know that most times, men tend to have a higher libido, so I just attributed it to he's a guy, real quick.
Speaker 1:Can you define that for the people that I know what it means, you know what it is. It's for the ones that don't know.
Speaker 3:Someone's libido, that's your sex drive. So my husband has a higher sex drive than I do, and we find this to be typical with men in general. But you take that combination and you mix it with being Caribbean and also growing up Pentecostal and charismatic, so you're fighting the demonization of sex, right? Um, and the lack of that conversation, and then the whole like okay, well, I couldn't have sex, now I'm allowed to, and I don't know what to do. So, uh, I experienced something that I didn't have language for. So my low libido didn't correlate it to experiencing sexual molestation at a young age. So what that did, is it turned off something that God created to be normal, outside of the scientific aspect of women. Listen, we think about everything, everything, everything, but I didn't correlate.
Speaker 3:So it wasn't until, like, when we would have sex, I want to put clothes on, or when my husband wants to touch me in a certain way, I would feel shame and guilt and I'm like man. I don't know why I'm feeling this, because if God created this thing to be good, why is it that I don't want it? I don't desire it, this thing to be good, why is it that I don't want it? I don't desire it and it wasn't until really just the Holy Spirit illuminating, but conversation that we've had, but also too, like getting into therapy, going to different counseling sessions and having the language because you don't know what you don't know. And it wasn't until I was able to directly connect. I had been sexually molested at seven and seven, eight, nine.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:But for me, back in my head, nothing to talk about growing up Haitian, sure, sure.
Speaker 2:You don't think about it.
Speaker 3:Who do you talk to about it?
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 3:So I was the person that saved myself and I'm like, the person I marry is going to be the one that I give myself to. And here's the person that I marry, I'm giving myself to and I'm like why am I feeling all of these feelings that they're not good feelings?
Speaker 1:That's crazy.
Speaker 3:And now it places this divide between us. I remember, like the first few years of marriage. It was a struggle in our marriage because I'm like, bro, you want to have sex. But now I'm having flashbacks, jesus, certain smells and certain sounds, things that just remain undealt with and what you don't heal, you pass down. So didn't have the language. So, even as that relates to bringing it back full circle in sex, I had to now start working through healing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's crazy man. You know what I'm saying, but this is why, like, sex is so much more than just physical, correct? Yeah, um y'all, I got a good husband. Yeah, I'm gonna need him to talk into the mic, though we got this thing right here, bro.
Speaker 3:All right, I got a good.
Speaker 1:I got a good now the levels ain't gonna be consistent now. So now you guys gonna hear me um, but yeah, no, this is why sex is so much more than just physical, you know, because, even though, like I, can have sex every day 100 miles per hour, and he's not kidding like every day, right?
Speaker 3:boom honey, yeah, boom. Is this an EG like no?
Speaker 1:okay, alright. From what your audience is about to find out, only thing we don't do is cuss on this channel.
Speaker 3:Okay, so it's MA, it's MA.
Speaker 1:All right, but we can say sex, oh my gosh, oh my Like. It's just, I'm done with you. I know in our church we had like our couples group and one of the books we were talking about is we had a talk about sex. Like it was so hard for the couples to say the word sex we had. We had married a dog like liar liar, so you had to do an exercise so we did an exercise.
Speaker 3:We had to go outside and just shout and we had a few that could not do it. They're just not comfortable.
Speaker 1:They're not comfortable which we can go, yeah um, but yes, this is what I was saying. Um, this is why, like sex is so much more than just physical. Because, even though, yeah, because, even though, like I have a high libido, um, I had to, I had to step back and realize who I'm having sex with. Who am I? Um?
Speaker 1:you better yeah good for you, um, like it's more than just a physical, and so like, even for me, like we were having more conversations, and this is what you don't hear when it comes to sex.
Speaker 1:Like we were having more conversations, like we were talking through it, like how does this feel? Like you know what, what, what came to mind, what, what's happening here, and I tell you the more. Like man, I forgot the name of the book, but like 31 days to great sex, check it out. So, yeah, we realized that the more conversations we had, the more intimate that we became, correct, which is why, like, our hearts were connected, like emotionally, spiritually, we grew in understanding.
Speaker 3:We grew so much more because we were having more conversations. You grew in knowledge and understanding just like in your faith wall. Yes, as you grow in knowledge and understanding, so you should see that reflected in your behavior yeah, you know what?
Speaker 1:it's wild because we talked about that and the last time we talked about sex on this channel, yeah right, we talked about. The more you talk about it. Oh my gosh is the more you're set free the more it's revealing because everybody goes into a relationship with their mindset on what they see sex to be.
Speaker 3:Yeah, basically, and I couldn't pray this away. Like that's where you got to be able to separate trauma from the truth. I know God's truth, I know his standard, but my trauma now started to distort his truth.
Speaker 1:And to your point.
Speaker 3:You need to be able to have those conversations. They're tough, but this is why who you marry matters.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so this is why, like, even though, like, my libido was high, I had to realize this is not just about me.
Speaker 3:No, it's not.
Speaker 1:It's not just about meeting my needs or just fulfilling my needs, and you know how it makes me feel. But, no, we're in this together Like this is why I say this all the time Marriage requires work. It's a full-time job.
Speaker 3:You don't clock out, and he handled me with so much care.
Speaker 2:I hear that in how he's talking about it right now. There was no judgment.
Speaker 3:There was no oh gosh man.
Speaker 1:Okay, this is going to require.
Speaker 3:No, my husband provided so much safety for me. Things that was coming out of my mouth, that's never. I've never vocalized. That's now coming out of my mouth, and this is not the first year. First year, second year, third year, we ended up getting pregnant with London, our third year of marriage still working through this because now it gets, it compounds, because now having a kid, my body's changing.
Speaker 3:All of these things now just kind of gets enmeshed and yeah, it has. It's taken a new form. It's enigmatic. So you need to be able to take that time to have the conversation, to vocalize, to articulate because you can't set expectations when you haven't communicated.
Speaker 2:And these are the layers of marriage and how you build a godly relationship. I think it's so important to I love that you said you know I had all these things that I never talked about and now all of a sudden we get married and it's supposed to be one thing. I think so many women more than we even know they have to deal with. I was a good girl, so I don't have sex. But now I'm married, so now I can have sex, but then I feel like a bad girl, correct and like working through that mindset, like I talked about it in our sex episode of I couldn't find that line.
Speaker 2:Like then we ended up in strip clubs and so then I was like wait, this doesn't feel holy either, like I couldn't find what does this? Look like in holiness and purity, but taking care of my husband, or satisfying or enjoying the gift that God gave us of sex, I'm like I don't know where I belong.
Speaker 1:It was, it was yo, you guys remember it was all wrong. It was all wrong.
Speaker 2:We thought like now we're free to do anything about it with our sexuality Cause we're married, so that gives us freedom to do all of that. Let's start watching porn.
Speaker 3:License, let's start going strip club. We went through that.
Speaker 1:And there was positions you just like. Oh, you felt so dirty.
Speaker 3:And it's like because porn did that.
Speaker 2:You saw how dirty that person looked.
Speaker 1:So it got distorted, correct. I mean question, sure, but like we're good now. Yeah, we talked it through how's?
Speaker 3:sex for you guys. Oh, come on. Okay, there you go. All right, it's still, ma all right, this is. This is 14 years, guys, and we're 14 years.
Speaker 1:Same thing. We got married two months later, two months, so they got married. I will say this I no longer have to ask no, I'm the initiator me.
Speaker 3:I no longer have to ask no, I'm the initiator Me.
Speaker 1:I no longer have to ask Wow.
Speaker 3:The one who sits at Jesus feet is out here initiating, and, trust me, my husband is not in lack in any way, shape or form.
Speaker 1:Glory to God.
Speaker 1:Good, but what I realize is that you know like sex starts before you enter into the bedroom correct so true, like I, I realized and I had to think through okay, how can I serve my, my wife, yeah, how can I come alongside her? Yeah, yeah, I didn't think about this going in, like there's dishes that's dirty. You didn't know, I didn't think about, hey, the house is dirty, so you know she's gonna be thinking about that instead of, you know, thinking about me coming home. Right, yeah, I didn't think about that. And so, like it's, as we're growing and having more conversations, I'm like, why are you not present?
Speaker 2:You know, she's like yeah, because I'm thinking about the kids.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm thinking started doing acts of service. Like her mind was free.
Speaker 2:Yeah, uh-huh, to take care of you, and I was present. But even the conversation of initiation, and what does that look like for me, what does that look like for him? And what does that look like because of the day, like even just that intricate intersection of sex Yep, what does initiation look like is a whole topic in conversation, it's all about conversation, though, guys.
Speaker 3:That's what it is. We need to dismantle this mental construct that every time you guys are, we're gonna have sex. It's gonna look like what the movie said that we're gonna be ripping our clothes off, and it was just all so spontaneous and that may happen, and then it just roll over and it happens far and few. But you also need to know what, what season you're in. Yes, because when it's a crazy season, this is where it's important to schedule sex. Yes, that doesn't demean it. No, it doesn't minimize it, it feels great.
Speaker 3:Matter of fact, we find that we enjoy it more because, from that day, that morning we are ready to prepare.
Speaker 1:And tonight, don't forget.
Speaker 3:So we're texting, we're texting.
Speaker 2:Sex pair tonight. Yes, so we're texting, we're texting sex thing. What is it when you it's, it's happening. My husband went somewhere. He's coming back. He did go somewhere, so we're flirting with each other throughout the day.
Speaker 3:We're being intentional. I'm not gonna cook that night, we're just gonna order takeout. Yeah, because it was scheduled. This is us being intentional and marriage requires intentionality.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's it's and you said it earlier, bro it's work. I want to encourage you guys like don't just endure and tolerate your relationships.
Speaker 1:Like, show up every single day and make a decision. It's a choice. You can't sit and say you know, I'm going to tough it through, just going to do it, and then what happens is one day you're going to blow up and you're going to be like man, where did this come from? And that's what's been happening. We've seen it in the generations before us, where they just endured. You know my parents, um, I, you know, you guys know we've like, we've talked about it. My mom passed away and I didn't talk about this much, but my dad already moved on really quick. Him moving on wasn't the problem, but it was coming. To find out that it was like four decades of just enduring and tolerating each other. And I see the relationship. I'm just like I don't want that. Like you're my person, you're my best friend. I'm like yo, let's talk through this so that we can actually celebrate each other and not tolerate each other.
Speaker 3:That's right and what?
Speaker 1:happens is people say well, you know what happened. They divorced after 20, 30, 40 years. What happened? Well, because the common denominator like the kids or the business, or the church or those type of things moved out and now they're like okay.
Speaker 3:All the transactions.
Speaker 1:Then now your eyes open, you have time to spend time with someone. You realize like oh snap.
Speaker 3:I hate you.
Speaker 2:I actually don't even like you, I'm like yo celebrate, don't just tolerate.
Speaker 1:Like, show up every single day, show up for work. And you guys heard me say this before plenty of times. Man Fellas, I'm going to talk to the guys right now. Married men like if you don't do your job, so now it's going to do your job. It's true.
Speaker 2:Stop clocking out, it's true. Stop checking out.
Speaker 1:Like I know for me, like if I want sex at night, like I know how to fill her tank, like you said, it Correct, right, I'm going to love on her all throughout the day. It's a choice that we make, man, it's a choice that we make, man, what time is it man?
Speaker 3:Because it's also lunchtime. We've been going for a while. Can I speak to the ladies real quick, though I love that.
Speaker 2:Go ahead, talk to them. Ladies, hey, what you don't do another woman will.
Speaker 1:I think about.
Speaker 3:Samson and Delilah yes Woo. I define that as a place where he can be emotionally vulnerable. He was so comfortable that he then ended up giving her power. That's crazy, because that's the power that we have as women when we create that space for our men.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So, women, what a guy desires is a place where they can be emotionally vulnerable. Are you creating that space? When he shares something with you, are you sharing it with other people when he's wanting to be vulnerable? Are you too busy for you to slow down and not recognize and not discern that what he's saying is not necessarily what's happening?
Speaker 3:Because sometimes the words you use, especially as men, yeah it is, um, just a defense mechanism, right, but it's my ability as it's, it's my job as your wife to be able to discern and sift through your, your words, decode what it? Is that you're actually saying and then take action and realize, oh, you know, my husband is well. I know your words are saying one thing, but in between that I'm seeing that there's something else.
Speaker 2:That's crazy man so it's our jobs to create that emotional safe space for our men and in that safe space so that you feel you still feel respected. Correct, because that's the hugest thing for men is to feel respected. So if you finally give me a little bit of emotional vulnerability, I better do my darndest that I protect you and I still honor you and respect you in that moment because you shared that with me, and then I'm going to be the one to build you back up. Ain't nobody else going to tell you? That's right. No other hoe going to say that to me.
Speaker 3:Okay, All right.
Speaker 1:Listen, nobody else is going to do that. That's my job. So before we go into some final words, I got this red box. You guys remember that red box from a couple weeks ago.
Speaker 3:Oh, I was thinking the same thing. Oh Lord, why don't you grab that? I know John said he had you, said you had a comment. Yeah, go ahead, John, oh no.
Speaker 2:The other thing I was just going to make him do John, you're going to pick a card.
Speaker 3:Becky, you're going to pick a card and we're going to read it to each other All right, so here we go. Oh boy, I'm not comfortable with this. Guys, I have had the craziest like fiber thing in my eye this whole time I by now my eyes would have been red, okay.
Speaker 2:Are we all doing one?
Speaker 1:Okay. So so we'll go so Check One, two check. End of test. End of test Check check, check, check. That's how the Haitians be doing it, all right, okay, I'm going to grab a card. I'm just going to read one to you. Okay, this is, um, this is perception. Perception category. Okay, between the two of us, between the two of us, who's most likely to make us late?
Speaker 2:for an event. That's not a fair question. I love this this is easy, it's easy, it's me all day Listen. I just can't find what I want to wear, and that's annoying.
Speaker 1:But you know what I'm going to say this right now Quick, babe, I love you because you've been so respectful when it comes to time management, because my dad growing up he would sit at the door banging on the door. Everybody made him late and he would leave you.
Speaker 1:You told me that story from the moment we dated and I've never made you leave me. Yeah, I've never had to leave danley once. So actually you're most likely to make us late, but I can say 14 years of our marriage, you haven't made us late thank you and we don't and I.
Speaker 2:Punctuality is key for me yeah, I've never made anybody, I actually I give you full etas since being married to you. I hate the feeling of being late, but before we were married I was the always five minute late person.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So that's really cool to be able to say that Actually, neither one of us Good for you, good for you. Oh man, let's go baby, Hit me.
Speaker 2:Okay, in your opinion, this so embarrassing? Okay, in your opinion, how am I holding myself back the most?
Speaker 3:Yes, Ugh, what I don't like. I don't like these questions. This is wild. I don't like these questions.
Speaker 1:What category is this?
Speaker 3:This one was what oh reflection.
Speaker 2:Oh, reflection category, in my opinion.
Speaker 1:Oh wait, you. You. You've asked me this one before.
Speaker 2:Really yeah, really yeah. I don't remember your answer.
Speaker 1:Okay, you're, you're overthinker. Oh, I do remember that I said it in oh man, I'm so glad that my answer was the same, cause you imagine my answer would be different, like people were listening to say that's completely.
Speaker 3:Maybe, like commenting, be like, that's not what he said last time he just wants to keep hitting her with all these darts.
Speaker 1:Right, right, right you're. You're overthinkers. Yeah, I am like. I think like when it's down to the buzzer bottom of the nine, all these situations like you overthink where you missed the shot, you overthink where you overshoot, you overthink where you look back and say like man, I should have moved quicker and what I said was overthinkers don't know we're overthinking yeah, you don't know in the moment, over contemplating, you're actually bringing value to the situation.
Speaker 2:And actually all it does is cause us to spin circles.
Speaker 1:And hold yourself back and you look at all these risks. You look at the cause and it paralyzes you. I think that's what holds you back in the last 14 years of being married to you. Was you overthinking?
Speaker 2:There's some times you come to me with some opportunities and I back and say, yes, do it so true, okay, there we go, all right good to see a reflection like this is this is our marriage, so it is we're the same people we talk about this all the time yeah, I never text them.
Speaker 3:Wait what why yeah?
Speaker 1:he was overthinking.
Speaker 3:You were over yeah, but I thought because no, just text him out. He like he just wants to analyze and he does like these pie charts and he's like risk analysis, bruh. Yeah, you're going to figure it out in real time. Tell them, yes, tell them.
Speaker 2:yes, okay, we're back up. All right, here we go.
Speaker 1:Oh Lord, cards at them. What was the hardest thing for you to understand about me early on? The hardest thing I will say one.
Speaker 2:We don't need a list the hardest thing, no S.
Speaker 1:Well, I think it was after we got married. It made me think we never had any arguments.
Speaker 2:No, before you got married, you didn't have any arguments.
Speaker 1:We never had any arguments, so I thought we were smooth sailing, sure.
Speaker 2:That would make you think that I thought this was going to be great.
Speaker 1:Until that time, until we were driving to church.
Speaker 3:And I think it was a build-up or something like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, um capital p passionate or the real word yeah a temper. He didn't know that I had a temper yeah, I never knew, so it caught me off guard after marriage after marriage now you're gonna see who you really are with. She did a really good job in just holding it back, controlling it. Wow, that's a really good job. So, um, yeah, it caught me off guard. Yeah, as we're going to church, it's that church girl facade thing that we were conditioned to do. That's true.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's true, and for me it's childhood trauma because I didn't want to make pop upset.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So you had to perform. Well, I had to perform well.
Speaker 3:So even when I would feel explosive or I needed attention of some sort, there was no place for me to get it. So, a lot of it just got pushed down and, you know, dismissed, but it was still growing. It became very eruptive. So, I even started to tell myself that I don't have an anger, an anger issue, and I don't have a temper. I'm just mad because nobody heard me out.
Speaker 1:And it was, but I've never seen her mad, no, so that was the hardest thing to like, understand, like what's going on.
Speaker 2:Where did he come from? We're married.
Speaker 1:I'm like this is not the person I married.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Send her back, and I was scared that if he, if my temper got exposed to him before we got married, that he wouldn't want me. Wow, childhood trauma yeah, so yeah that's okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, all right.
Speaker 2:Oh boy.
Speaker 1:So what's one small thing I do that tells you everything you need to know about me.
Speaker 3:What's one small thing I do that tells you everything you need to know about me.
Speaker 2:That's tough. So what's?
Speaker 1:one small thing that you do that I do that tells you everything you need to know about me.
Speaker 3:Ooh, Hmm, so you are naturally an affectionate person. You're an affectionate person, but when you get extremely affectionate, it says a lot. You're telling affectionate person, but when you get extremely affectionate, it says a lot. You're telling me something. You haven't found the words yet, but you're telling me something and it's a doorway. It's a doorway that you're, you're ready to be vulnerable emotionally vulnerable.
Speaker 1:About to open up. You're going to open, about to open up floodgates.
Speaker 2:She rolled her eyes yeah.
Speaker 3:And open up. You're gonna open about to open up floodgates. She rolled her eyes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and and it's a big thing because you come from a family where you guys are yeah emotionally detached, yes, so never said I love you, you don't?
Speaker 3:they never said I love you. I mean, we didn't say that either. Yeah, but we weren't emotionally detached, that we had other issues. But for someone that grew up in a home where emotions wasn't really catered to, and to be so affectionate, that tells me a lot.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It tells me a lot. So, yeah, that's crazy man.
Speaker 1:That's crazy, that's cool guys.
Speaker 2:Thank you guys for being a part of this. I'm so happy that people got to see my sis, because I tell people all the time I'm like no y'all, if y'all know my sister, which we just say sister.
Speaker 1:So we are just not but that's just sis. That's it. You're my sister too.
Speaker 2:Ew, I'm like get out of here we're part of another kingdom? Yeah, In that kingdom. She could be your sister Right when we get an eternity. I'm not just his sister.
Speaker 1:In the HG community. You're Sister Pierre.
Speaker 2:That's right, yes, you are. Or Sister Maestro.
Speaker 3:I'm Sister Jonathan. This is so annoying.
Speaker 2:So annoying. Honestly, I always talk about you and how much I love our friendship and how much just sitting around you is so like fulfilling and I told y'all before we started. I was like man. People wouldn't believe us if I said like this is how we really have conversations. This is really what we talk about, and this is genuinely the relationships that God has blessed us with of like how it is with you guys and us. Our families can live together for two weeks and we love every minute of it.
Speaker 2:We never were like at each other's throat Like we just our four kids get along Like. God has really, really blessed us with the friendship of our family. It's cool.
Speaker 1:It's cool to have you guys here. For those of you guys that don't know that, they passed a really cool church, a growing church in North Miami, and God has really used them to really take it to a whole nother level. So Five City Chapel. So if you guys are in South Florida, if you guys are in North Miami area and you're looking for a church to be part of I'm not talking about church hopping, not talking about because you don't like your pastor. You still need to work through that. I'm not talking about because you can't stand. Some people work through that. But I'm telling you, if you're genuinely looking for a place, grow deeper. You want to dig some really deep roots. We talked about that in our conversation before here, about remaining in God and that you will really produce fruit. So they're a really solid community to be part of. So I want to thank you guys again. Just some final thoughts. I want to encourage you guys. You guys already know it man, like, hang around, hang out with the people you want to become.
Speaker 1:So, if there's any toxic relationships that you're part of, get rid of it, man, you don't owe nobody nothing, man, you don't owe anybody nothing. We want to encourage you guys to keep on digging right All those negative things that are deep down inside you, the temperaments, man, you don't have to live with it, you don't have to tolerate it. Man, find someone to talk to, find someone to walk with. And I'm telling you, man, life gets so much better when relationships do, the ones that are up, the ones that are down and the ones that are all around. Man, life was not meant for us to do it by ourselves. You look at the Bible, you look at everything Pairs, groups, teams, leaders and so, even in your workplaces, in your homes, you get your lives better, your relationships better. Everything grows, man. So continue to dig. We love you guys, we appreciate you guys. Any final thoughts? Yeah, no thank you.
