"It’s a Foible!"
EPISODE 205
Love Others as Yourself
What happens when you expect a friend to never let you down or have a fault? How do we stay steady and reliable in our love for others? Here, in session four of our Two By Two study, we get to the heart of friendship. We work through how we look out for each other — from demonstrating mercy to friends to saying “I love you” without making it weird. We’re breaking out some of Scripture’s greatest hits — like the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37) and Paul’s great Love Chapter (1 Corinthians 13) — to apply Christlike love to the people in our lives. Go to biblegeeks.fm/twobytwo for all the videos and study guides. And don’t forget to vote at biblegeeks.fm/bracket as we wrap up this year's Bible Bracket on favorite stories!
Takeaways
The Big Idea: Love and compassion are the super glue that binds a friendship together.
This Week's Challenge: Ask a friend, "How can I be a better friend to you?"
Episode Transcription
What is the right word to describe this? It sounds Yiddish, doesn't it? It's a foible. Well, hello everyone and welcome to the Bible Geeks Podcast. This is episode 205. I'm Bryan Schiele. I'm Ryan Joy. Thanks so much everyone for tuning in. We're in our two by two guided study that we're right in the midst of. And this is session four. Speaking of being in the midst of the session, the topic in this conversation is the heart of the matter. We're talking about what makes a friendship successful. And to kick off this conversation, we have a conversation starter that we'll get into right about now. This is two by two world's strongest adhesive. A few years back, a German company secured the Guinness record for world's strongest adhesive. Using just enough adhesive to cover the top of a Coke can, they held up a 17 and a half ton garbage truck. From macaroni art glue to the industrial adhesives that hold our cars and iPhones together, it's nice to find something sticky enough to keep things connected. And that brings us right into the heart of friendship. So here's the big idea. Love and compassion are the super glue that binds a friendship together. Scripture explains the bond between two of history's most famous friends, David and Jonathan, by how they love each other. It's no wonder they were knit at the soul when three times it says Jonathan loved him as his own soul. Jesus illustrated how to love your neighbor as yourself with the story of a good Samaritan who felt compassion and then showed mercy. We must do likewise, turning empathy into active kindness. You need someone who knows you, who bears all things and believes all things when you're not at your best. One who embodies the proverb, "A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity." Raymond Buran defined friends as people with whom you dare to be yourself, adding, "You do not have to be on your guard. Friends understand those contradictions in your nature that lead others to misjudge you. Who wouldn't want that? But as Emerson said, the only way to have a friend is to be one." Christ elevated the word friend forever when he described his incredible love for us as friendship. He called disciples friends and said, "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends." So here's the big question. How are you demonstrating love for your friends? So follow along with this guided study of biblegeeks.fm/2x2, and may the Lord bless you and keep you today. Shalom. So the big idea that we tackled there was that love and compassion are the super glue that binds a friendship together. I love that hook that you put in there, that thought of the world's strongest adhesive and thinking about love. It just feels like such a positive emotion, right? We associate it with all those ooey gooey over the top acts of affection, like the big giant stuffed bears or the box full of chocolates or whatever, just that over the top kind of affection. But- The past Valentine's Day now, but- We are so past Valentine's Day, but I think about that old Nazareth song that said, "Love hurts." Love isn't always existing in easy times, and love isn't just relegated to the month of February, but it's shown off in the hard times. Love is that garbage truck that is trying to move away from whatever it's attached to with that little bit of adhesive. And it's the pulling it back together in those times of stress and strain that really shows love's true power. So love really does demonstrate itself, I think, in these moments of great challenge. So when you say "Nazareth" in the Bible Geeks podcast, I thought you were going a totally different place. Oh, that's totally true. Because there was a Nazarene who showed us the power of that love that pulls people together and pulled us and God together whenever it seems an insurmountable problem. And love does that between friends, and love does that between enemies. That's the power of the gospel. And the question that we talked about there at the end was, "How are you demonstrating that love for your friends?" And I think, obviously, the key word here is demonstrating, as in acting or showing them. And Adrian and I put a line in our wedding vows that we would love each other in ways the other person could understand. And that was like, we had a lot of conversation about that. And that was like, we built that into both of our vows. In other words, you will know I love you because it'll be visible, it'll be clear. I'll be speaking your language, I'll be connecting with you in ways that are meaningful to you. And obviously, I'm talking about marriage and there's no other relationship like marriage. But friendships are also built on commitment and on caring and acting and showing up when you're needed. And so we need to demonstrate, we need to show that we care, you know, our commitment to our friends. And so I think it's a helpful question. Oh, 100%. The way that we can demonstrate that love and just how much power love has. I think Huey Lewis in the news also had a great song about the power of love. And so as we move into our- Oh, the dad rock here. Yeah. Absolutely. 100% dad rock. So as we move into our next segment here, let's get into an icebreaker question, ask ourselves something a little bit lighthearted to kick this thing off. How do you say I love you to a friend without it being weird, Ryan? Well, you have to be careful if you don't want it to be weird. I just compared friendship to marriage. So, you know, it's, we're already in a dangerous ground. You know, I think action, obviously, like we were talking about, but if we're talking about saying the words, I think you can say it. I think you throw it out there in those critical moments, you know, somebody's going through something and I, here's a classic Ryan go to phrase. I like to in a text or in a, you know, when I'm talking to somebody say, love you guys, or even, you know, just to generalize it even more, I could say, we love you guys. So it's expressing the love, but it's not just from me and it's not just to you. And it kind of softens that weirdness because it spreads that love out. And, uh, you know, that's a go-to, but I think you can also say, I love you, brother. I love you, man. I love you. You know, that kind of thing. What about you? I don't know, man. I think so much about like the Holy kiss in the new Testament and greeting each other that way. Right. And I'm just like, I really feel like we've missed the mark. I think we should bring back the Holy kiss and just, you know, make it awkward all the time. Anytime we express our affection for each other. No, but seriously, I think for me it's I'm a hugger. I don't know if that comes across all the time, but for most guys I'll get in there, you know, with the like two real strong back taps, those just kind of get in and get out. It's probably still a little bit weird, but that's one of my ways of just showing somebody that I love them without it being super weird. But, you know, you kind of have to watch that with the ladies. So maybe give like the side hug in that case, but for me it's just a nice way of connecting with somebody. Although I guess that is still kind of weird. So not everybody's a hugger for sure. Not everybody. You got to read people, but you know, you can do the handshake into the hug. So you got your arms between you. That's a good one. I like the pat. Like you said, that the taps, yeah, that always softens it. But I think that can be important to express that in, like you said, our version of a Holy kiss. Sometimes a handshake goes a long way to like a warm handshake, but that can be pretty formal these days. I think I love coming up with like with young people, you know, like a handshake, a special handshake that's just ours. And that can be fun, you know, just to say you matter to me, you know, we have something and I don't know, I don't know how nerdy it is when people see us doing it, but I feel like it's a nice thing to connect with people, to have your way of connecting something insider, you know? I kind of like tying that into what you were saying about marriage and your vows, like in a way that they will understand. I think having something like that is pretty cool. All right, so let's get into our first substantive conversation here in the episode. And that is our Jesus said segment. We're going to go back to somewhere where Jesus shows us by his words about friendship and learning this lesson, I think from Luke 10 verses 25 to 37. Yes, one of the great contenders, our number two seed in the Bible bracket for the profound parables regional, we're going to the good Samaritan. And this is of course, Jesus answering the question of a lawyer, a scribe who came to him and said, you know, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? Jesus said, what does the law say? And the guy nailed it. He quoted Jesus in the greatest two commandments. And Jesus said, you got it. Good job. Do this and you'll live like question solved. But the man desiring to justify himself said, who is my neighbor? And then Jesus told, of course, the wonderful parable about the priest and the Levite who walked by this man who's been beaten half dead by the side of the road. And then the good Samaritan comes and sees him. So what do you take from this wonderful classic story of Jesus? I think for me, I know this is just a story, but this is obviously Jesus making an intentional point to put the Samaritan out there as a hero. Definitely. He's the one who showed being a neighbor more than anyone else. And Jesus actually did not answer the man's question. Who is my neighbor? He just said, go be like this Samaritan who showed mercy. And that was the answer to the question that he should have been asking, not the question that he actually asked. But I think for me, especially when speaking to a Jewish audience, it is an interesting decision to choose the Samaritan as the hero of the story. This is very common. Jesus does this a lot. And especially in Luke, we see Luke pointing out a lot of these moments where Gentiles are held up in high regard in Jesus' words. And so I wonder if Jesus chose a Samaritan here because of the Samaritan's past. And the Samaritans typically were viewed as outsiders to the Jews. They were viewed as outcasts. And maybe not reading too much into the story because obviously it is just a story. But I wonder if the Samaritans' background of being an outcast and an outsider made him more receptive to showing mercy and compassion than obviously this story of the priest and the Levite who walked on by, these Jewish people who they were highly regarded. But a Samaritan can really understand what it's like to be the man beaten down on the side of the road. I think a Samaritan could probably understand better than these other two what it was like to be an outsider. And so I feel like Jesus using a Samaritan here in this story is helping us to see that we have a real skill that we have to develop in connecting with other people, I guess, in ways that are outside of the norm or outside of our comfort zone. You know, if I've had an easy life and everything's just worked out well for me, can I really put myself in the shoes of somebody else or can I at least listen to the problems of somebody else and believe that they really are valid issues that these people are going through? I think that's compassion, right? Compassion is not necessarily seeing somebody and saying, "I know exactly what you're going through because I've been there myself." It's just the ability to say, "I have something that I can do. I can step in here and I see you and I'm going to be here for you and I'm going to help you and show you mercy like Jesus talks about here." But I wonder if the Jews in this story are just so desensitized to seeing somebody who's outside and outcast that they can't connect with them. And so, I don't know, for me, I think they needed to develop that skill. And that really is what Jesus is trying to get this lawyer to understand is to develop the skill of seeing other people who are outsiders and showing them the kind of mercy that you'd want someone to show to you. And so, I feel like for me, this is just a helpful reminder in my friendships to be able to show up with love and empathy and genuine care for people. That's a great skill to hone and develop as I become a better friend to people. Yeah, these aren't real people, but Jesus has seen Levites and priests and people walking around that he's, you know, he's, there's a reason he's telling this story this way. And, you know, it is easy whenever, like you say, you haven't gone through things, it could be easy to be desensitized to not have the kind of empathy that we talked about there in the conversation starter that we want to, you know, the more I go through things, the more softened I am to others, the more I can feel for, sometimes we say I feel for them, the more I can feel for others. And compassion here, mercy is something in this story that is done. He did mercy, but compassion is something that was felt, you know, and the one leads to the other if it's rightly done. And I was thinking about, you brought up seeing, and I think that's an interesting part of this story. There's that old saying, I think from Julius Caesar, "I came, I saw, I conquered." Okay. Well, the three men on the road, all, as Jesus tells it, they all came and they all saw, but that's where the similarity ends. And Jesus makes this emphasis. The first two came, they saw, and they passed on to the other side of the road. And again, Jesus like zeroes in on this fact. The priest saw him, the Levite came and saw him, but the Samaritan came and saw, but then he felt compassion and acted. And the word for compassion describes that deep sympathy, that feeling of pity that moves him to get involved and do whatever he can to help. I mean, it has the, it ties to the word for like your guts, right? And it has to do with him caring enough, seeing the situation and recognizing that this could be me, right? I could find myself in this situation and I'm going to help this person. I'm going to love my neighbor as myself, which is the question Jesus is answering. And as Jesus implied, the Samaritan proved to be a neighbor. And you explained that really well, how Jesus flipped that parable on its head, the answer to the question. But if I want to be a friend to you, or I want to be a friend to anybody, I need to care. I need to show up when somebody needs me. I should be willing to do that for a stranger. How much more should I be ready to do that for a friend or a brother or a sister in need? And so that's, you know, obviously that's the point of the story, but it's seeing and then what happens. Do you see and say, I don't know about that. I got things I got to do. Or do you see and you feel that compassion enough to get involved? It's so intricately connected to something like faith too, right? I mean, if you think about, you know, you hear the truth, what are you going to do about that knowledge? Right. And if you see a need, what are you going to do about that need? I think that's a really important connection here in our conversation. As we begin looking at something that Jesus said, let's move on. You know where we're going. So let's just get there right as soon as we can. And that is our next segment, scripture du jour. What is the soup du jour? It's the soup of the day. That sounds good. I'll have that. So our scripture du jour today is first Corinthians 13 verses four to seven. I know it's a shocker. It seems like we talk about this verse quite a lot, but it's such an appropriate verse or set of verses to consider as we talk about friendship and the way that we love each other. Well, I talked about marriage vows earlier. We're grabbing onto a passage here that has been read and how many weddings I love you, man, through the years. Yeah. So this is the great love chapter and these verses verses four to seven of first Corinthians 13, one of the most beloved paragraphs in the Bible, this description of love that I think it highlights the maturity that the Corinthians lacked. There's a lot of these keywords that Paul uses in this description of love that show up throughout the letter to the Corinthians as if to say, here's what love does, and here's what you guys are not doing. And so this is like Christ-like love. That's not unlike them. It's not puffed up and it's not this kind of self-absorbed, irritable thing. And this love is the secret sauce of great relationships that last and grow and through the years, they don't crash and burn whenever tough moments come. They see them through, they hold on like that world's strongest adhesive. And so the more you spend time with someone, the more this becomes important because you get to know people and as your friendship goes along, you start to see faults and imperfections. Like they're going to show up. Studying the passage again, I was struck by the way these traits of love overcome the failings of other people. Paul wants these Corinthians in the church to deal with each other in this way of patience and love and humility and forgiveness and a great way to destroy a friendship is to expect your friend to never let you down, never say the wrong thing, never do the wrong thing. You want to choose friends with character, but they will all have character flaws somewhere. If you know them well, I mean, like if you don't know people very well, you can just admire them from afar and they can be perfect. But whoever your friend is in real life, they're a sinner like you are. I mean, they have fallen and will fall again in some way. It sounds like never meet your heroes, right? That's basically exactly it. Like you can view them from afar, but like, oh man, you get close and you realize, wow, they're not as nice as I thought they were going to be. Yeah. Yeah. That white horse is pretty tall up there and you're likely to fall down from time to time. So how do we deal with it? How do we deal with the foibles? And, and I like that word foible. I was thinking of what is the right word to describe this? It sounds Yiddish, doesn't it? But like they're going to have to deal with our foibles. We're going to have to deal with their foibles and I just want to keep saying foible, but oh man, I love it. But so as we like run into these moments where, you know, somebody disappoints you, somebody hurts you, somebody says something and you think, I can't believe they did that, you know, what do we do? And Paul talks about love here. Love is this kind of agape that he's describing. It is not irritable. It is not resentful. You know, it bears all things and believes all things and hopes all things and endures all things. Is that the kind of love that we have here in this friendship? Do we resent them and keep a record of wrongs? Kind of a literal meaning of this Greek phrase. Do we keep a record of all the things they did wrong and hold on to it? Let it frustrate and darken our view of them. Do we get irritable about every little annoyance or can we see past it? Do we deal with the issues? Do we talk about things when we need to talk about them and overlook them when we can just overlook them? And do we keep bearing things and believing in them, seeing them with confidence of their good motives whenever it's possible? That's what jumped out at me as I read through this. As you looked at the scripture du jour, what did you see and are there any interesting Yiddish words that come up? Oh man, not too many Yiddish words here, but I did notice as we looked at this list, something that popped out to me that I hadn't really noticed before. And that's how the quote unquote list starts and ends, like the bookends of this really became kind of obvious to me as the important things to remember here. And so thinking about this first phrase, love is patient and just you could camp on that and think about the patience that's required in love. And I think it really does tie in very nicely with what you were talking about. You get to know somebody and you spend time with them and you start seeing things you never saw before and you didn't realize that's who this person was or that this person isn't as perfect as you thought they were going to be. And the patience required to just be with them and to endure things with them is necessary. Like you have to have that patience and going back to obviously friendships are a key part of that. But I think about marriage, like we've been talking about on this episode in the beginning of a marriage, it's really a lot of that infatuation and that Twitter patient and those exciting moments that you have. But at some point years down the road, everything just kind of locks into place. If you are the kind of person that you need to be and your spouse is the kind of person that they need to be, things lock into place in a way that's like completely opposite to that original, you know, Twitter patient and infatuation. You're dealing with things like this verse is talking about. You're showing up to be patient. You're showing up to be a good listener like we're going to talk about in our next conversation in this series. You're doing a lot of things that don't have on the surface to be a lot of like romantic kind of or like really warm and fuzzy kind of feelings. You're doing things like being patient, which is, you know, something we talk to our kids about. It's like when they keep pushing us, they keep wanting to go somewhere, they keep wanting to do something. We just say, Hey, be patient. You got to wait. And that's not a, that's not something I immediately attach to a loving kind of attitude, but going to friendship patience is absolutely a critical piece of this. But then you look at the very last thing that he says here that love never ends. And like, isn't that exactly the same kind of thing you were thinking about with the patience piece of it? How patience is going to stick it out. It's not going to end. Like your love for this person is not going to end. I don't know. I mean, it just feels like it's a permanent part of our character. And as a great reminder for friendship, it's like, you're going to go through stuff and things are going to happen and you're going to have to make it through some rocky times, just stick it out. Yeah. There's a steadiness to love. There's a steadiness to the way that we show up for each other. There's a consistency and reliability. And this goes somewhat with some of the things we're going to talk about in session six about safe spaces, but it's, it all comes from love. This is the nature of love to not fade away, to not flake out on somebody. Right. And by the way, I like your Twitter patient. You use that twice. That's right up there with foible, I think, which by the way, when I should have been listening to you, I looked up foible, not Yiddish. It comes from the French, but it has to do with the part of a fencing blade that goes from the middle to the point, like where it's weakest. Oh yeah. So that's interesting. Interesting little bit for me. I'm going to remember that forever. And I really like your point there about this enduring patient quality of love and a friendship. Yeah. And I think that really leads us nicely, I think to our reach out question. So let's move on to that here. Yeah. So our reach out question is when have you shown a friend your worst side and they loved you anyway? You know, there's nothing more fun than talking about those moments where you show people that you love your worst side. I love what we really have set ourselves up here. I think we have, but you know, I think that's what these reach out questions are all about. It's easy for us to talk about other people's foibles, but what about my own foibles? I mean, how much time do we really have to talk about my foibles? We could spend quite a lot of time, but I will just be honest here and say I'm not very good at friendship, which is really the reason why this year and my theme this year has a big focus on friendship as a part of it, because it's something I need to work on. But I haven't always been a great friend. And I think that lack of love has shown up in many ways, but I think maybe the most pertinent way in our conversation in the context of just talking to you here on the podcast, yeah, I think about some of the ways that you and I have worked together over the past and we've been friends forever. But there was a time when we transitioned from being friends to working together as deacons when we were deacons together at Monovista years and years ago. And I think about those moments when we would work together and there were tense moments sometimes when things were happening and expectations were there that weren't met. And a lot of it, pretty much primarily all of it was me and my need to have things a certain way and my type A personality. And those fussy standards that I had did not line up with what I was just talking about with patients there from first Corinthians 13. Not being a patient person really put, I think, our friendship to the test in those moments. And there were a lot of times when I probably said things or did things that I absolutely was showing you my worst side in those moments. And yeah, I think of us kind of as like an odd couple in a lot of ways. We just have very different personalities. I'm a spreadsheets guy. You're like a whiteboard guy. And as best we've been able to work together over the years, I think we found a really nice dynamic. But a lot of the tension that comes really is on my end for the type A-ness of my personality. But I think not having brought my best side to our friendship a lot, I can see just that steadfastness and that steadiness like you were just talking about showing up on your end, especially as you were able to just kind of bear with it and work with me through it and help me deal with those moments. Yeah, I mean, thinking about this question, when have you shown a friend your worst side and they loved you anyway, it's like exhibit A is our friendship right here. And I think it's such a testament to real friendship, right? Is that we're still friends. Decades later, even though we've gone through a lot of stuff, it's been great. But obviously, there could have been moments where I should have chosen better. We definitely are an odd couple. And I think the place where I disappoint myself the most and get and feel bad in not just our friendship, but other relationships is whenever I feel like I have not kept a commitment, whenever I have, you know, left someone patiently waiting for something that I committed to deliver on or I didn't deliver the way that it was, you know, expected and not meeting expectations and just, I just feel like people have been very, you very much included, you have been very patient and forgiving with me in my foibles. I'm a terrible judge of time and how long things take. And I'm a terrible judge of certain things. And then you're like, you know, hanging your head ready to just like hear somebody chew you out and feeling like I deserve everything that's coming at me. And then somebody is, that's okay. No, no problem. And it's like, okay, wow, that was a refreshing relief right there. And I don't know, there's so many different places and times when you, this question, your worst side takes you right to the the little corner of your life that you don't want to explore, but there it is. And friends see you that way, like that quote in the conversation starter, they see you that way and they see your contradictions and they allow room for it and are patient, not enabling, not saying, oh, there's an excuse, everything is okay, but just forbearing because we may, you know, we're all trying to figure it out. And the more somebody does that for you, the more you want to do that for somebody else. And it just becomes an opportunity to reflect the grace of God and the grace often of the other person back to them. I totally agree with what you're saying. And I feel like this going back to the Good Samaritan conversation, right? It's like the power in a question like this is that once you can see that you are guilty of having a worst side, right? Like this little corner of your life that you wanted to hide away and put in a dark corner, like once you can see that and acknowledge it, I think then it becomes a catalyst for you turning around and extending that kind of mercy and grace and love to other people. And it is exactly why I was thinking about the Samaritan as being the one who was more likely to step in because the Samaritan was probably the one who had seen that side of himself at some point and could connect with someone else facing the same thing. So if we can view ourselves as bad friends sometimes, then we can help other people when they're not acting as friendly as they should be acting. And I guess that's really the kind of question that Jesus would ask somebody is how much of a friend are you being? Like how loving are you being? You know, and could you really be better at that? Yeah. And were you being a friend to God when he acted as a friend to you and forgave you? You know, can you ever catch up with him, with what God has born and forgiven and been patient with you about it? So it just becomes like a throwdown challenge. That's kind of a blessing to be able to reflect that and start to be more like God in small ways. Look at you, a consummate professional pointing us right to our throwdown challenge for the week. I am ready to face any challenges that might be foolish enough to face me. And it's like we've been doing this for 200 something episodes, but our challenge for this episode for this week is to ask a friend, how can I be a better friend to you? You know, maybe you can do that as you're giving somebody a warm hug or maybe as you're, you know, doing some other act of love towards somebody, just ask them, how can I be a better friend to you? I think you want to leave some room to talk about it. Don't ask this in passing when there's no time to talk. Hey, see you later. Oh, by the way, how can I be a better friend to you? You know, and each friend might have totally different needs and ways to improve. So I, you know, I would say, I don't know, I think I might ask this more than once this week, make a little project of it. And, you know, you tend to find what you really seek. So if you want to be a great friend, ask and welcome the answer. And your friend might need to sit with it and get back to you. And that's okay, too. You just, I think it's a worthy aim to be a better friend. And what a cool way to, to inspire that if nothing else, it lets someone know you want to be a better friend to them, even if they don't have a good answer for you. And they just say, you're doing fine just the way you are. Okay, well, that may or may not be true, but you know that I want to be a better friend. And maybe there'll be an opportunity where they feel more comfortable sharing something later that they would love for you to serve them in a particular way. I preached a lesson where this was my challenge a few weeks ago and it was amazing how many text messages I got from people and my wife got from people all asking, how can I be a better friend to you? It really is a great question. It is like, it is such a powerful question. And I think a lot of it comes down to like, well, wait, wait, wait, no, no, how can I be a better friend to you? Right? Like after someone asks you, it really does. Do you want another in honor? It prompts. Yeah, exactly. That outdoing one another in honor kind of that circle of, of trying to make ourselves better. So as we close out this conversation, let us go to God in prayer. And our prayer for this conversation comes from John 15 verses 12 to 15. And the suggested prayer in the study guide is to tell God, Lord, thank you for sending Jesus to sacrifice for us, his friends. And so let's go to God in prayer. Our Holy Father, Lord, we're in awe of your love for us in your compassion. You extended your mercy and your grace to pick us up from the side of the road where we were broken and beaten down. And you've brought us to a place of healing and restoration. Your steadfast love, Lord is better than life. We ask that as we consider your love for us today, how you sent Jesus as our sacrifice, that we'd be able to take that love to others, that we could look around with hearts of compassion like yours in the grace and the mercy that you extended to us as we saw in the cross and that we'd be able to extend that grace and mercy to others. Lord, we thank you for sending Jesus to die for us, to demonstrate his love and his friendship towards us. And we ask that you'd help us to increase our love for our neighbors in every part of our lives. We ask this prayer in his name. Amen. Amen. Okay. Well, on our next episode, we are getting into the Bible bracket draft results. So it's, it's time. That's one shining moment. It's an opportunity to see what the final four favorite Bible stories are. And then we'll also talk about what the winner is. And we'll probably really dive into those stories. I see a here's the story segment perhaps coming. Oh, it's going to be great. Yeah. But then after that, we'll get back to session five on listening. It's called listen up. And if you want to right now start getting ready for that, you can read James one verse 19 proverbs 12 verse 15, also proverbs 18 verse two and 18 verse 13, a lot of proverbs, a lot of really helpful encouragements to listen better. And I'm excited for that episode because I think listening and love are really intertwined and super connected to each other. I think as we've been talking about here on the episode, so get into that, but yeah, Bible bracket draft results. I'm stoked on who's going to be the favorite Bible story coming out of that one. So yeah, absolutely. I mean, I'm sure some people have their brackets that they're trying to follow, you know, how far Duke and North Carolina are going to go, but I want to know how far the creation and the flood and the Exodus and Jonah and the big fish are going to go. Oh man. It's going to be great. So everybody tune in for that episode. Look for that one on our next conversation. So thanks so much everyone for tuning in to episode two Oh five of the Bible Geeks podcast. You can find show notes for this episode in your podcast player of choice, or at biblegeeks.fm/205. If you want to follow along with this guided study, you can go to biblegeeks.fm/twobytwo, and you will find an online course that you can go on and follow along with us in these conversations. Thanks again everyone for tuning in and until next episode, may the Lord bless you and keep you. Shalom.