“Forgiveness, Grief, and Healing the Body with Leah Fruth”

In this powerful conversation, Coach Alex sits down with health coach, fitness instructor, and workshop leader Leah Fruth to explore the often-overlooked role of forgiveness in our physical and spiritual health. Leah vulnerably shares her own story of profound grief, unprocessed pain, and how God taught her that healing the body is inseparable from healing the soul.

Together, they dive into what it means to release bitterness, walk in freedom, and treat the body not as a project to fix but as a temple to steward. From homemade kombucha to workshops on stretching and prayer, Leah models what it looks like to integrate spirit, body, and soul in everyday practices.

This episode is both deeply practical and spiritually uplifting—reminding us that true health begins at the cross.

Main Discussion Themes
-How forgiveness accelerates breakthroughs in health and fitness journeys
-Leah’s story of grief, loss, and finding healing through Christ
-Why unprocessed grief manifests in the body as stress, illness, and pain
-Daily practices for releasing bitterness and living in freedom
-The biblical foundation of forgiveness and whole-person stewardship
-How to reclaim God’s truth about the body vs. the world’s lies
-Leah’s “Be Still” workshops: combining stretching, journaling, and scripture

Timestamped Outline
00:00 – 05:00 | Intro banter: coffee, kombucha, and why sleep matters
05:00 – 12:00 | Introducing Leah Fruth: fitness instructor, mom of three, and health coach
12:00 – 20:00 | Why forgiveness belongs in health coaching (real client stories)
20:00 – 28:00 | Scriptural foundation: Jesus’ command to forgive before worship
28:00 – 37:00 | Leah’s testimony: losing her parents, unprocessed grief, and the physical toll
37:00 – 45:00 | The turning point: counseling, Revelation Wellness, and integrative healing
45:00 – 55:00 | How grief, stress, and forgiveness impact immune health and daily life
55:00 – 01:05:00 | Exercise as worship and why slowing down is essential
01:05:00 – 01:15:00 | Leah’s “Be Still” workshops: stretching, journaling, and prayerful rest
01:15:00 – 01:20:00 | Free resource: Let’s Reclaim the Truth About Our Body ebook
01:20:00 – 01:25:00 | Closing prayer and blessing

Move Forward Today
✅Get Coach Alex's new book today! Faithful Fitness Devotional (40-Day Guide): https://faithfulfitnessdevo.com
✅Join the BetterDaily community! Faith And Fitness Foundations: https://betterdaily.live/beginner ✅Download Leah’s free ebook – Let’s Reclaim the Truth About Our Body: https://leahfruth.myflodesk.com/gn5sau7ha2
✅Reflect on forgiveness – Write out who you need to forgive and bring it to Jesus.
✅Subscribe to the Faithful Fitness Podcast so you don’t miss more episodes on embodied discipleship.

Featured Guest Resources
✅Free Ebook: Let’s Reclaim the Truth About Our Body: https://leahfruth.myflodesk.com/gn5sau7ha2



Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/faithful-fitness-by-better-daily--5150768/support.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to the Faithful Fitness Podcast for My Dad. Coach
Alex van Houghten helps you get stronger and mind, body,
and spirit. He believes that your body's a temple, so
taking good care of it is an actual worship.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
I should know.

Speaker 1 (00:15):
I live with them. Every week he brings truth from
the Bible to some science and stories that will set
your heart on fire. May God bless you to become
everything He made you to be, just one percent better
every single day.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hey, there, are you free of all grudges or grief?
Coach Alex fan out and Faithful Fitness Podcast. Here we
help you make the most out of the body God's
given you. And in this episode we're talking to Leah
Fruth and we'll be talking about how grudges in grief

(00:52):
don't just affect your mind and your emotions, they affect
your body too. It's time to forgive time to process.
If you haven't picked up your copy yet, you need
the Faithful Fitness devotional final link in the show notes.
All right, let's get into it. What's up, guys. This

(01:15):
is coach Alex finn Houton on the Faithful Fitness Podcast.
Our mission is to help you make the most out
of the body God's given you, and I know this
episode is going to help you do just that. I
am joined by my new friend, Miss Leah Fruth. Good morning, sister.
How you doing morning?

Speaker 3 (01:29):
I'm doing so well, bright.

Speaker 2 (01:31):
Edd and bushy tailed. It looks like, yes, yes, I'm ready.
Before we get into our conversation we've got we're going
to talk about grief and stress, which is actually more
fun than it sounds because it's going to be redeeming conversation.
We're also going to talk about forgiveness and what that
has to do with our health, which which a lot
of people don't understand how that's connected. So I'm excited
to dive into that. But before we get there, we're

(01:53):
we're friends on the front that we like our coffee
and our kombucha. You have kombucha in that cup.

Speaker 3 (01:59):
Right now, Yes, homemade, homemade.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
What's the flavor? What's what are you going for this?

Speaker 4 (02:04):
I just I just put ginger in it, just like yeah, nice,
kindred spirits.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
Can you please explain to my audience what kombucha is
in why you like it?

Speaker 4 (02:14):
Well, it's just tea, but it's fermented tea, and so
I don't know it just it. I I'm a big
coffee drinker, but my stomach feels so much better when
I don't drink coffee, and so I've just found a love.
But I love all drinks. So like you name it, coffee,
macha tea, kombucha, I love them.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
Also, how how long have you been making your own kombucha?
That's a thing.

Speaker 4 (02:37):
A little over a year. It's really simple. I did
soured out the whole sourdough thing in twenty twenty, and
that is so much more work than kombucha. Kombucha is
way simpler, I feel like. And I went into it
saying it's fine to be average at some things. That's
why I tell myself. And so I'm an average kombucha maker.

Speaker 2 (02:56):
Perfect. I keep it.

Speaker 4 (02:58):
Average and it's good and it's a lot cheaper than
the store.

Speaker 2 (03:01):
No joke.

Speaker 3 (03:02):
That's why I had to make it because I was
like my pocket.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
Even dollars for like like twenty ounces, right, yes, yeah,
so I.

Speaker 4 (03:09):
Can't do this because I was limiting myself and I
wanted more, but I won't spend that much money.

Speaker 2 (03:13):
So no joke. That's that's awesome, very very thrifty of you.
My wife went through the sourdough thing too, and she uh,
I want to say, we had like four years of
sourdough and it got to be like a chore. You know.
I like to run, so so sourdough is great, great
fuel for running in the the the probiotics and whatnot
that come out of that. We're nice to my stomach.

(03:35):
Most breads don't sit well with me, so so it
was great. But after a while it was like, we
have to eat two loaves of bread every like to
justify this, we have to eat two loaves of so
we ended up eating a lot to the chickens and
she was like, I'm over it. So so basically it's
the you have to you have to keep your culture right,
and you have to add it to your your team
mixture and then you it sounds like you flavor with

(03:58):
ginger and then you're good.

Speaker 3 (03:59):
It's really easy.

Speaker 4 (04:00):
I always have it on my counter fermenting, and then
I bottle it and so I have my three bottles
on my counter and my fermented going and it's it's
really takes like twenty minutes at a time, but so awesome.

Speaker 2 (04:12):
Does anybody else in your house drink your kombucher. Is
this just I'm.

Speaker 4 (04:15):
Pretty stingy about it. I'm like, you can only have
a little bit. But my youngest really loves it, and
so he's always.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
Sneaking, So that's hilarious. That's like, then I.

Speaker 3 (04:28):
Feel bad because I'm like, I should be more givving
with it.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
But hey man, and you made it. You're like, I
bet your youngest could figure it out, Like if you
taught him, he probably a little batch.

Speaker 3 (04:38):
He probably could.

Speaker 2 (04:41):
That's awesome. Well, I'm so glad that we get to
have this conversation. And to those listening, if you haven't
tried kombucha and you're not making your own kombucha, it's
actually got some very good research around consuming fermented foods.
Kombucha is one of them. You can have all kinds
of other fermented foods, but fermented foods are really powerful
for your microbiome and can help your immune system. Sounds

(05:03):
like it helps your stomach leah, So that's awesome. And
I find that if you make something, especially it's cost effective,
but if you make something, you tend to enjoy it
more and it brings an element of like peace and
accomplishment to the process as opposed to just picking it
up off the store shelf and you know, not having

(05:24):
to worry about what ingredients are in it.

Speaker 4 (05:26):
Yeah, yeah, and absolutely less sugar too in it too,
so that's.

Speaker 2 (05:32):
Yeah, my store bought ones probably like thirty grims of
sugar is serving there's a great post workout, but not
it's general good for okay. So so for our audience,
you're a mom, you are a fitness instructor, you are
a health coach. You are really passionate about helping individuals
find freedom from stress, from grief, and from the things

(05:54):
that ail our bodies in well, in just about every respect. Right.
So I want to dial in on something that you said.
We're going to talk about stress, We're going to talk
about grief, We're going to talk about fitness as worship
and stewardship. I want to talk about something that you
said in our in preparation for interview, and you said
something along these lines. I don't want to put words
in your mouth, so if I need to correct it,

(06:16):
please please help me hear you said. I want to
be able to talk about forgiveness because many people don't
understand what this has to do with their health and
fitness journey. So that's a very powerful statement. It's also
an odd statement, not bad odd, but like good odd,

(06:36):
like huh. There might be something too that, Leah, can
you talk to me about in your time as a
fitness instructor and health coach are what are some of
the ways you're noticing forgiveness as a starting point or
at least a necessary place in somebody's health and fitness journey.
What are you noticing that makes you makes you connect

(06:58):
the two?

Speaker 4 (06:59):
Yeah, I feel like so many of my clients come
in and like my last client, for example, she came
in saying she was so angry all the time, and
she didn't like it because she says, I'm not an
angry person, but she has two kids and every single
thing is just setting her off, you know, and she
didn't like it. When we have our first session, I

(07:20):
always have a first session getting to know their story,
and then by the second I always offer forgiveness as
our second option. And the people, the clients that grab
hold of that and are saying, yeah, I need to
forgive someone. That's one of my first questions in their paperwork.
Who do you need to forgive? Is there anyone in
your life you need to forgive. Everybody always has somebody,

(07:42):
you know, if they're willing to admit it. And usually
they're not just little things. They're huge, huge moments in
their life, traumas and hurts and pains, and so when
you're not willing to when you're holding on to all
that and you're not willing to let it go, and
that's not forgiveness is ever saying.

Speaker 3 (08:00):
What they did was right or it was okay.

Speaker 4 (08:02):
Even it's saying I give that to Jesus to handle.

Speaker 3 (08:06):
He's got it. It's not on me anymore. I can
let that go.

Speaker 4 (08:10):
When you let when you let that go in that way,
it's it frees you up so much to live fully again.
It frees you up to do the things they're looking for.
They're coming in for health coaching, saying I want to
move my body, I want to wake up earlier, I
want to be with Jesus more, I.

Speaker 3 (08:27):
Want to eat better.

Speaker 4 (08:28):
But they have they're holding onto this for years, and
once you let it go, it's unbelievable that it's like
the thing that supersede super speeds, like it's in the
health journey. It is so much quicker than when people
are like I I don't know if I want to
go there. It's a slower process. But these people when

(08:50):
they come in and they forgive. By the next session
that lady was hearing from God for the first time,
she was waking up, wanting to do some just be
still time. She started moving her body. Within eight weeks
she was like a totally different person. And all we
did is meet with Jesus most of the time. So
it's just forgiveness is how we were designed. It's it

(09:15):
I think we forget sometimes. It's what Jesus came for.
It's was his whole mission, is like forgiving us and
us receiving forgiveness from him, and he called us to forgive.
Jesus designed us to live healthy, and that was one
of his secrets I think he gave us is forgive,

(09:35):
be quick to forgive, and we would live better.

Speaker 3 (09:38):
Yeah, our lives right.

Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yeah, there's a there's a couple places in scripture, so
you know, for those who are familiar with the Gospels,
I highly recommend reading the Sermon on the Mount that's
in Matthew chapter five, six and seven, and in the
amount of times that Christ talks about forgiveness in that
sermon is pretty powerful given that it's it's such a

(10:02):
it's such an amazing sermon all the way across, and
he addresses so many issues. But but forgiveness is a
recurring theme. If I'm not mistaken, it's there that he says,
when you have a gift to give to God, so
you bring your gift to the altar. When you notice
in your heart that you have something against your brother,
you have, then leave your gift. In other words, don't

(10:23):
even try to give it to God. Don't even try
to give your offering. Don't even try to bring your
worship to God. Go go make peace with your brother,
Go finish that conflict, Go forgive, and then come back
and give your your offering to God. And it's such
a to me, that's such a poignant We don't have

(10:43):
temples anymore, or I mean most most aspects of Christian
they don't have temples anymore. Not many of us are
bringing our gifts to an altar. Through the Holy Spirit
and following Christ, we have an opportunity every every day
to bring our worship to God and worship Him in
spirit and in truth. But that is so poignant command.
He's not suggesting it. He said to do it. It's

(11:04):
such a poignant command. Hey, hey, if if you have
something to give to God, if you have worship to
offer to God, if if you want, if you want
to be close to God, then before you do anything
you need to you need to deal with this, this
conflict in your heart and your mind against somebody else
and what like. That's if you live that out. That

(11:29):
is quite the command, because you said, hey, when you
write stuff down, when when people when people report that
in your sessions, everybody's got something and it might be
way back in the past, and it might be big,
deep and dark, and we can talk about bitter roots
and bitter fruits and all that stuff. But like, like
I'm a dad and I'm a husband and I'm a
business owner. Stuff happens every day that I need to

(11:54):
forgive and I'm not perfect. I need to be forgiven about.
And so that's a that's a thing that if I
if I don't, if I don't give it up, if
I don't let it go, if I don't, if I
don't actively go through the process of shedding the weight
that I accumulate and unforgiven masses over time, yes, I

(12:16):
will carry that thing in my spirit and that shows
up in the body.

Speaker 4 (12:21):
And like if you're if you haven't forgiven things weigh
in the past, it seems to be that you're just
letting it all add up and you're not forgiving the
daily things either, And that just I mean, think of
carrying around all that weight all the time and trying
to live this hard life that it already is. It
stops you and gets you stuck a lot of times.

(12:43):
And also it's really hard to explain what forgiveness does
because it's like something you can't hold on to. You
can't it's a spiritual thing that makes no sense really.
But when I walk people through how to forgive because
we're not taught how to forgive either, it's not just
like I forgive them and you're good. I mean I
have them visualize the person. I have them go through

(13:05):
this whole visualization process and name every single thing that
person did to them. So there's naming it out loud,
then saying I forgive you and handing them off to
Jesus and saying it's your And it's very powerful, but
you can't explain it until you do it right.

Speaker 3 (13:22):
And the freedom that it brings.

Speaker 4 (13:24):
And I mean I years ago, sat down one day
before I did any of this health coaching and felt
the Lord convicting me of having to forgive people. And
I thought it was like one person, and he told
me to make a list. I started making a list
and it was a page long, and I was.

Speaker 2 (13:41):
Like, I was shocked.

Speaker 4 (13:44):
Shocked, but it brought so much healing to start going, Okay,
I'm holding this stuff against all these people.

Speaker 3 (13:50):
That's exhausting.

Speaker 2 (13:52):
That's exhausting and an what an honest what an honest exercise.
It's being honest with yourself. It's also being honest with God.
And it's not like you said. It's not saying it
doesn't matter. It's not saying like what they did wasn't
wasn't painful or hurtful or it's not. It's not absolving
the action. It's saying that that As for me and

(14:13):
my part, I'm not going to hold onto this anymore.
It makes me think of do you like to garden?
Have you ever kept a garden?

Speaker 3 (14:20):
Not great at it?

Speaker 2 (14:20):
Not not great at it? Much much more into the
kombucha and sourdough thing. Yeah, So it makes me think
of a garden. I like to garden, or I like
to think I like to garden. It's not my favorite
thing to do. But if I have a garden and
I'm trying to grow some tomatoes, which are much harder
than it sounds, by the way, If I'm trying to
grow some tomatoes and I've got these weeds springing up
in my planner boxes, the weeds steal nutrients from the

(14:44):
good plant, right, And if I have a bunch of
weeds stealing nutrients from the good plant, the good plant
is going to be well, it's going to be stunted
and its growth. There's only so much nutrients to go
around in the soil, and sometimes the weeds can can
choke it out, and sometimes the weeds can overshadow it
and all that, and so so if I let those
weeds accumulate, my good fruit won't grow. And forgiveness is

(15:06):
kind of like that. It's like, throughout your life, you're
going to have these little little things spring up that
can steal the nutrients from the good plant of your life,
from the good soil of your heart and your mind.
And when you remove those weeds, then you well, you're
kind of free. You're not carrying it around anymore. You
you've got all the nutrients and goodness that you need
in the soil of your life. But to carry this

(15:28):
metaphor just a little farther, if I pull the if
I pull the top of the weed out, weed whack them. Yeah,
if I we whack them and I don't get the root,
it doesn't fix it. They'll they'll they'll spring back up,
sometimes even stronger than before. Right. And so what you're
talking about there is is actually getting the root. You
define the whole thing, and you you don't pull any

(15:52):
punches like this is what happened, this is how it hurt.
Here are all the ways it affected my life. Here,
here's here's the at that whole root of that weed.
And then you can pull it out and go here
you go all this stuff. God, I'm not holding on
to do it anymore. That's your weed to deal with.
It's out of the garden of my life. Do you

(16:12):
have anything to add to that? I think that's a
good visual for what you're saying, two.

Speaker 4 (16:16):
Things and handing them off to Jesus, like visualizing giving
those people to Jesus, because that's powerful in itself too.
It's saying not only is he a just God and
he can handle things that have happened to you wrongily.
But also that you can say he can do a
miracle in that person too, and even he can, he
can take care of that person and pray that they

(16:38):
see Jesus, you know.

Speaker 3 (16:40):
So that is huge.

Speaker 4 (16:41):
And also you can do this alone one hundred percent.
You can do this you and God is beautiful that way.
But I also found power in having another person there
because when you're naming those things out loud, someone's there
to hear you and say that's valid, like that is real,
And so that matters because so many things are holding
on the inside that no one ever knows, you know.

(17:02):
And also it can be things in your life that
I say often. If you felt it was true, it's
true in this moment. So if you felt like someone
looked at you funny and things awful of you, you know,
that's a simple thing. But if you felt it was true,
it's true for you. And so that's not going out
and telling people, you know, it's when you're forgiving someone,

(17:23):
it's between you and God and if you feel it,
you're holding onto it, so it's true for you.

Speaker 2 (17:29):
It's like so my son, my son has loose ankles,
like I do, and he can step off a sidewalk
or something and roll it. Poor guy. So I've been
through this in my life. I'm going to get to
help him walk through this well, no pun intended, but
so he rolls his ankle, and at first, as a dad,

(17:50):
I'm like, dude, get up, like dust yourself off, stop crying,
like what's wrong with you? This happens all the time,
because I've lived through almost forty years of this issue
you in myself. But but what I understood in my
life was that just because there was a time in
my life where I felt like my pain didn't matter
to anybody else doesn't mean that my pain doesn't matter.

(18:12):
And that's not something I should project on my own children.
I need to teach him your pain matters, Like what
you what you just wrestle with? That hurts man, It's
it's awful. I hate that for you. I'm here for you,
and and here's the deal. Your pain matters. But as
your dad, I care so much that this doesn't keep
you from living your life to your fullest right. And

(18:34):
that's the thing about forgiveness is acknowledging, Hey, my pain matters.
This suffering was real, This was difficult and hard at
the same time. I don't need to let that be
what defines my life. I don't need to let that
be what eats at me on the inside. I don't
need that to take up any any bandwidth up here.
I don't need to hold on to it in my spirit.

(18:54):
And this makes me. It reminds me of what Jesus
said about forgiveness and judgment as well. He's but if
we don't forgive the wrongs done to us, then our
father in heaven will not forgive us of the wrongs
we've done we've done to him. And he also goes
on to say judge not lest you be judged. That

(19:15):
doesn't mean don't judge. You got to finish the sentence
for whatever judgment we put on somebody else. That is
the that is the litmus test, that's the judgment that
will be put on us. So if we're willing to forgive,
then what God does for us is he gives that
same level of forgiveness and that same love to us

(19:37):
that we're willing to send extend to other people. And
so I think that's a wonderful thing to start with
in your practice. I'm so grateful that you do it,
and I imagine that the individuals that you work with
from a health coaching perspective didn't know they were coming
to you for that at first, but then weeks after
they're like, man, this is wonderful.

Speaker 3 (19:56):
Yeah they always, yeah, it's always.

Speaker 4 (20:01):
You have to be really gentle in that, right, but
it's but there when they go for it, they're amazed,
you know.

Speaker 3 (20:08):
And these people a.

Speaker 4 (20:09):
Lot of like my last one, had gone to a
bunch of different health coaches and felt like she's gotten nowhere,
you know, but it wasn't. It wasn't just putting a
program on her. It was the inside work that needed health.
And our health is whole person, right, That's how I
approach it. It's not just the body, but it's not
without the body.

Speaker 2 (20:27):
So well, so, so you said something there I have
I have a guy in my mind. There there are
some people that I've worked with in my career. I'm
so happy I got to help them, and and they
they've done amazing things, and their bodies and their minds
and their spirits have have shifted and changed, and I'm
so proud and excited about that. But there are some
people in my journey that I wasn't able to help

(20:50):
that that I didn't have the tools, I wasn't wise enough,
I wasn't mature enough. Whatever the case was, that that
when when I started working with them, I didn't understand
how deep things went. So so this is probably a
decade ago now, but but I remember working with a
guy who was really wrestling with He would call it
food addiction. Looking back on it, what I would say

(21:11):
is there was there was a numbing mechanism for him
that he was using food to cover up. You know,
there was pain, there was suffering, it was difficulty, resentment,
and he was using food to regulate himself when the
day was overwhelming, when things were hard, when he was angry,
whatever he was, he was, you know, digging into recee
cups and stuff. So you know, in the infinite wisdom

(21:33):
of an of a health coach that doesn't understand me. Obviously,
all you have to do is cut out sugar, dude,
Like that's no problem. Like he could just stop beating
sugar like, which, if you're not wrestling with that sounds
very easy. Okay, I guess I'll cut out the recy cups.
But but for him, this was actually way way deeper.

(21:56):
This had. This had a lot to do with with
things that that came out in our sessions. You know,
we're working out and stuff, and somehow we would end
up talking about the things his brother did to him
when he was young, or the things his his father
wasn't there for that he was frustrated about, and the
things that he was failings as a father and a husband.
It was like, oh my gosh, no, wonder all you

(22:19):
want to do is eat recy cups because that sounds
way easier. It sounds way easier than digging into all
this pain. But easy he's not good. Easy doesn't mean
it's good. It's it's an indication that something is wrong.
And I want to, you know, tell our audience here
if you find yourself wrestling with behaviors that that from

(22:43):
a health perspective, you know aren't good, but you can't
stop doing them. I would love, I would love for
you to begin exploring what Lee and I have been
talking about here, which is is there anything that I
need to forgive somebody of because I don't need to
hold that anymore. You got enough working against you. Don't
let this be one of the things. Right, Do you

(23:05):
have anything you'd like to address to individuals who are
wrestling with similar.

Speaker 4 (23:08):
And also not just stopping things from doing. If you
know all the right things to do and you can't
do them like they're exhausted, that's what I find a
lot of people come to me like, I know all
the things, we have so much information, we know what
we have to do, but you're not doing them like
there's usually more there, you know, and six weeks of

(23:30):
pushing yourself doing all the right things is not going
to be it either. In the long run, you want things.
If you do the deep inner work, you're going to
be able to sustain your health and do it and enjoy.

Speaker 2 (23:43):
It too, well said, well said, thank you for that.
I think that's that's ex fuent. Now, this wisdom is
not easy to come by. I know it says it
right in scripture. I know it says it. But just
because it says it doesn't mean we always do it
and doesn't mean we always understand it right. So so
this is hard one wisdom on your part, I imagine,

(24:03):
And and so so that said, can can you talk
to me about how you came to understand this for yourself?
I understand that there were there was a season of stress.
There is a season of grief and whatnot. But but
for you, this this idea of forgiveness and overcoming stress
and overcoming grief. This is deep to your story. Do
you know? Actually fun fun fact. Do you know what

(24:25):
your name means?

Speaker 3 (24:28):
I weary one, doesn't it?

Speaker 2 (24:30):
Yeah? So, so there's two translations, so that the Hebrew.
The Hebrew, like if you translate Leah literally means weary
one or a grieved one. Wow, but you could take that.
That sounds right, you know, but but check it out.
Check it out because because you can take a name
to be a to tell you what you are, or

(24:53):
you can take a name to understand who you'll become.
And and so when when you translate it that way,
it's one who who knows how to deal with grief
and weariness? Right like whoa Like that's so great because
it was so funny when when you when you put
that in our interview, I was like, what, Like I
couldn't have planned this any better. Your name is Leah,

(25:15):
did you know? Like that means the one who's.

Speaker 3 (25:16):
I never really put it together the way you just worded.

Speaker 2 (25:19):
So another another boom moviment. But but so so this
is hard one wisdom. You have dealt with grief, you
have dealt with stress, You've dealt with forgiveness. So can
you can you tell me a bit about in your
story how how God taught you that this was a
part of the health and fitness of your body.

Speaker 4 (25:37):
Yeah, well, everything I've learned, I feel like, first I
learned in real life. Uh so, Yeah, everything is hard
fought and everything that I come with for health coaching
is experienced. So I will start like forward. I the
forgiveness piece, I feel like came in when I the

(26:02):
world was just a mess, right, and I had lots
going on, hadwough yeah, even tower though that was part
of the like stress, probably working out the sourdough. But
we had a lot of church. Our church sort of
exploded at the same time, a lot of church hurt.
And that's in every relationship. I live in a small

(26:24):
town and so every relationship was wrecked in some way
by that close friends, family, all sorts of things. And
so that's what started the forgiveness going, like I I
can't walk around with this weight every day. I'm gonna
these are people I see every day, these are people

(26:45):
I'm going to live with, you know, whether we and
we disagree on things, and people stayed and people left,
and so that started it. But then in that process,
I learned that there was so many people from my
entire growing up years that I had never forgiven and

(27:05):
I was holding all of that, and.

Speaker 3 (27:09):
So that was the process.

Speaker 4 (27:10):
That's what started, and it really took me on a
greater journey of healing that I see that as like
the pinpoint. But then going through so many other things
with wise people helped me grow in so many ways
after that. But my story, I lost my dad when
I was ten. He was sick for two years with

(27:33):
a heart disease that he had a heart transplant, and
so he was in the hospital a lot those two years.
So I mean I had all that weight as a
ten year old of feeling like I was taking care
of my siblings. I had two other siblings at the time.
So I'm one that takes on everybody's grief too. Is
what happens a lot in my life. I take on

(27:55):
one make everybody else feel okay, even though I'm not.

Speaker 3 (27:58):
I'll say I'm good. I'm good.

Speaker 4 (27:59):
I got everybody else. But my mom quickly remarried and
we moved to a new Town and they had four boys,
and so I was the oldest of seven very quickly.

Speaker 2 (28:07):
Oh my goodness.

Speaker 4 (28:08):
Yeah, and so here I am caring for more but
also never processing my pain about my dad and so
my body. Looking back now, I'm like, doctors knew what
they knew at the time, but there's so many things
that were happening in my body that I couldn't explain.
And I had mono multiple times, so of course they
took my tonsils out, and then I had team j

(28:31):
problems where I was so bad i'd go through physical
therapy because my jaw with her. In high school, I
had stomach issues severely and like all these things that
they would dislabel stress, but it was just unprocessed grief
and carrying a lot of weight that I just had
nowhere to go with, you know, into college where my

(28:55):
one my hands completely went numb in college and they
can't figure out ended up just being my muscles getting
so tight that it was constricting my nerves.

Speaker 1 (29:05):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (29:05):
Can I pause your story for the second? I want,
I want you to continue, but but this is this
So I do a lot of work in children's ministry.
It's not like my primary job or anything is just
a volunteer thing I think is important in our community,
and my wife does as well. And we were we
were just we were just teaching our Wednesday night, like

(29:26):
it's like we call halftime ministry, but they dance and
they sing and they play kickball and then we go
through go through scripture together. And this little girl, she's
in third grade. She she came up to my wife
and she's just bawling, like and we're like, oh, no,
what happened? You know, do you fall on the sidewalk
or whatever? You know, I'm coaching kickball over here. I
don't I don't know what's going on. I'm just trying
to make sure the fourth graders don't yell at the
first graders to me, so they get really competitive. And

(29:49):
she's just bawling and I and my wife's like, what's
what's going on, sweetheart? And she said, I miss my grandma.
Well her grandma died, you know, two months ago, and
and she was just bawling. And my wife said she
walked her through kind of do you know what grief is, sweetheart?
Do you understand? She's like, I don't know why, I
don't want to and she's like no, honey, you're grieving

(30:11):
right now and that's okay. And she was explaining to her,
you know, I lost my grandma, I lost my grandpa,
I lost my dad. And she was explaining it to
this to this young girl, and she just let her
talk and then prayed with her and stuff, and she goes, honey,
it's going to get easier, but it's okay to grieve.
It's okay. It's okay for this to be a thing.
And she was saying, like, how many kids get the

(30:32):
opportunity for somebody to just like tell them what they're
going through, Because kids grief. I don't care if you're
in I don't care if you're four years old or
if you're ten years old. Your body and your mind
go through the process of grief that adults do, but
most of the time you don't understand what's happening. And
so you're right. It's internalized as anxiety, it's internalized as stress,

(30:53):
and when you internalize that much emotion and feeling, it's
going to come out in ways that are almost impossible
to explain, like TMJA or your arm going numb, and
it affects our immune systems. We're learning that that grief
affects our immune system. So everything you're saying is it's

(31:16):
just so like it makes me heartbroken for children to
help them and double down on making sure that they
can process their grief and whatnot. But it also makes
me heartbroken for unhealed adults who went through this stuff
and then well kept struggling.

Speaker 4 (31:35):
As if I just keep treating the body, which is
good and needed, but also if you don't, like we said,
take care of all the inside stuff, it's just going
to keep going.

Speaker 2 (31:46):
It's going to keep piling up. It's going to keep
piling up. So I interrupted you at college, but but
it's so powerful and important, please continue.

Speaker 4 (31:54):
Yeah, it just keeps going. So I got married to
my high school sweetheart. We moved back home to our hometown.
Life was good.

Speaker 2 (32:03):
You know.

Speaker 4 (32:04):
I have my little siblings, So the youngest are in
second grade at the time, you know, so we're spending
lots of time with them. When we got married, they're
in second grade. So wow, we're fifteen years apart so
from the youngest. And so I had my first child
when I was twenty six. I honestly remember him being
nine months old and being like life because of what
I had gone through. I was like, a life is

(32:26):
too good right now, Something's going to happen. That was
the mentality that I had, and real like I didn't
just say that as like, oh, something's gonna no, like
I like felt it. And then it proved true, which
is like the worst. You know. Shortly after, my mom
got diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and so that diagnosis right away,
you just it's you know, it's gonna be death, you know,

(32:49):
like they're most likely. And so here I am new mom,
running a business, trying to take care of my siblings,
and trying to take care of my mom, who was
my best friend at the time. And she lived a
year after which we were very fortunate for that year,
but it was the year of pure exhaust I was
never I mean I would cry, but like I was

(33:12):
never processing any of my own stuff.

Speaker 3 (33:14):
I was just taking care of everybody else.

Speaker 2 (33:16):
There was too much care of you.

Speaker 4 (33:19):
To take care of ye, right, So when she died,
then I'm still Now I'm really trying to take care
of my brothers because they're in middle school and early
high school and I'm trying to be there for them
and take have another kid, you know, and but in
that time, I truly found Jesus. I grew up in
the church all my life, but I had never really

(33:40):
followed him if I mean, there's a difference, and so
I believe, but I didn't follow him. And it was
like there was a moment when she was sick, my
mom was sick that I was like, it just hit me.
Either this world is all we have and it really stinks,
or there's something more and it's still real, you know.
So it was just that moment, and so began to

(34:01):
seek him after she died in a new new way,
but also very struggling. And so it got to a
point where all of a sudden one summer, I thought
I had food allergies. I blamed it on I removed
all food because my stomach was bothered me so bad.
Every time I ate, I would just be sick. And
so I was down to eating protein shakes and rice cakes.

(34:23):
And I'm not kidding, like I said, that's the only
thing that doesn't hurt my stomach. And I had friends
that kindly gave me, you know, every product, there is,
every cleanse, every you know, thing that they could throw
at me, but I mean none of it worked, and
I got to the point where I was in a
surgeon's office this exploring options and they were going to

(34:44):
scope my stomach and do all these things, and that
kind doctor, I still say it was. The Lord asked
me multiple times what happened in the spring when this started?

Speaker 3 (34:54):
What happened? What happened?

Speaker 2 (34:55):
What happened?

Speaker 4 (34:56):
He asked me, probably five times, And I was so oblivious.
This is how BLIVI was. I looked at them and said.

Speaker 2 (35:01):
Nothing, nothing, Nothing happened in this nothing.

Speaker 4 (35:04):
Nothing happened in the spring. But on my way home,
I realized my youngest brothers had graduated that spring, and
it was the first time I wasn't having to pour
into like them and take care of them. And I
was like losing that peace of my mom again, you know,
like I wasn't being their mom now, you know, and

(35:24):
don't have my mom, so I don't have that connection
and you know. And the next day I called a
counselor and realized I needed to start. And so that's
where I started, as counseling and seeking the Lord.

Speaker 3 (35:34):
But then I found Revelation.

Speaker 4 (35:35):
Wellness and started listening to their podcast when I worked out,
and combining the Word and God and found so much
healing in that, and so it just kept going, you know,
combining all the things, you know, getting out my grief,
moving my body, but to truth and seeking the Lord.
He just kept me, bringing me on a journey healing

(35:56):
and restoration more and more.

Speaker 2 (35:58):
Wow, that's us awesome, Thank you, thank you. That. So
that's a huge story, but you did an amazing job
of sharing it succinctly. I think. I think there's so
much power and truth in that that that I want
to stop down on a few things for for our listeners.
And the first thing is that that our body and

(36:19):
our spirit are not separate. Like our spirit influences our
body their whole thing. Like and when I say spirit,
I mean like like if I'm grieving, you might not
see that in my body, right yeah, but my spirit
is is wrestling. I'm having a hard time. Man, I'm
crying randomly between like driving from one place to another,

(36:43):
there's nobody in the car. Finally I'm all by myself
and I can just let let that go, right. Uh.
But But that that that comes at of cost and
a price to the body. For for those who aren't aware,
there's a there's an amazing set of of research and literature,
Roger Pennabaker did some amazing work. He called it healing

(37:05):
it up by writing it down. And the idea though
being is that back in the eighties they did they
did research showing that if you wrote down your most
traumatic memories, if you wrote them down, if you took
fifteen twenty minutes he had he wrote it down, that
actually impacted your immune system. You'd be in a terrible
mood for a week, your immune markers or T cells

(37:28):
and stuff would actually increase in your body. But then thereafter,
six months later, your incidence of illness compared to the
average population who didn't go through that, your incidence of
illness dropped forty percent by comparison, and you would actually
report being less depressed, less anxious, and doing much better.

(37:48):
And that was the start of the research. But the
idea of being like, how does that work? How does
it work that things that I have in my mind
and in my heart so to speak, how does that
influence and impact the body? And it turns out the
way God made it, they're not separate, they work together.
It reminds me of the story where the friends of

(38:10):
the paralytic man drop them dropped him down from the
roof to be at Jesus's feet, and Jesus says to
the man, your sins are forgiven. Like what does that
have to do with anything? Guy wants to walk, But
that's what he says. That's what he says. He ties
right in that moment. He ties the man's spiritual health

(38:31):
to the strength of his body. And then you know,
the Pharisees are all you know up in our like
who's this guy? And he's like, Hey, which one's easier
to forgive sins or tell this guy to walk? And
so he asked him to pick up his mat and walk.
And I don't believe it's a mistake that those things
are tied together in that moment with Christ, because what
the man needs is to be forgiven, and that has

(38:53):
a lot to do with him getting up and walking.
And so it's so in your stories that is there's
a there's a huge, deep truth there that that I
want our listeners to get, and that is, if you
are wrestling in your body with unexplained health issues, and
you have been for a while, it's very possible that

(39:13):
that there are things in your spirit that are affecting
your body. And this is not wu, this is science,
this exists, Like we can study this and that and
that wrestling with that will actually improve your your health outcomes.
It sounds like it did for you.

Speaker 3 (39:31):
Yeah, and it doesn't.

Speaker 4 (39:33):
It's not a huge overhaul that you have to do it. It
doesn't take much like sit with the Lord and write
on an honest prayer today, Like just right out and
don't hold back, don't don't edit yourself, just let it
all out and then ask him what he has to.

Speaker 3 (39:46):
Say to you.

Speaker 4 (39:47):
Like you start there, like it can be so simple,
and he he's like the best at telling you what
to do next. So like it doesn't have to be
these huge things, but just start to notice, Like when
I began like I always treated my b over here
in one box. You know, my spiritual life in this box.
You know my emotions over here, And when I finally
understood they were all like under one umbrella, it changed everything.

(40:10):
It changed everything.

Speaker 2 (40:12):
Yeah, well said, well said, So thank you, thank you
so much for sharing that story, and thank you for
being open and honest about that. I did also want
to point out this happens to a lot of moms,
and I'm not I'm not a mom obviously, and I
love my wife and I'm so glad she's the mother

(40:32):
of my children. That there's this thing that happens in women,
and that is that. And I say this as a guy, Okay,
I understand. I don't know. I don't know what it's
like to be on the receiving end. But you can
be going through all this stuff and then you can
get pregnant, and then you can have a baby, and
you can go through all the physical stress involved of
like building a life and breastfeeding and sleep deprivation and

(40:54):
all that stuff, and for a while, you kind of
lose yourself and you don't have control over that. You're
you're you are now mom, and you're going to be
mom by golly, despite whatever else, whatever whatever else was
going on. Uh. When you are on the other side
of that, though, it's not like all that stuff in

(41:15):
your life didn't happen, it's still it still can affect you.
It can still affect your health, it can still affect
your your physical body and stuff and so and so,
what I love about your story is that is that
God gave you the opportunity to become a mom. God
God gave you the strength you needed to be there
for your siblings and whatnot. But he also guided you
in a process of healing so that that wasn't your

(41:37):
whole story for the rest of your life. You could
be a grandma someday still with all that stuff. But
but uh, but as a as a mom going through
that in your heart and mind, is that something that
that you could deal with with toddlers? Is this something
you have to be at a certain stage of motherhood
before you can look back on those stuff in your heart?

(41:58):
But what do you believe about moms seeking their freedom
from grief and stress and also for forgiveness.

Speaker 4 (42:06):
Yeah, there's never a good time in motherhood to do it.
Write like I'm just starting to get a high, Like
I have a high high schooler now, and it's so busy.
It's crazy, you know, Like I thought I was busy
before I didn't know busy, Like you know what I mean.
It's just so there's never a good time. It's And
the people who come in for health coaching, they feel

(42:30):
like they have this guilt for like taking care of themselves,
and we almost put it. I'd almost even say it's
a pride of like I can do this all, Like
we think we need to do everything and we don't
need to take care of ourselves in that like that,
let's just throw that out the way. Does it does
not take a long time. None of this takes long,

(42:52):
but it takes promising yourself you'll show up. When I
started counseling, I told myself I would not counsel I
would not cancel a single session because I knew every
time it was gonna come up, I didn't want to
do it, and I didn't have time, and I needed
to be with my kids because my kids were young
and I was driving. They didn't have online counseling at

(43:13):
the time, so I was driving an hour and spending
an hour there and then driving an hour home. Who
was time for three hours every other week?

Speaker 2 (43:19):
I didn't.

Speaker 4 (43:20):
Yeah, it was so selfish leaving my kids with a
babysitter when I could barely get a babysitter for my worktime.

Speaker 3 (43:25):
You know, Like.

Speaker 4 (43:26):
It's never easy, but it's so worth it, because if
we're not healing ourselves, we're just gonna like put that
on our kids. Like if I still felt all that
the anger that would come up quicker when they're like
messing up, would it just wouldn't be good. But it
doesn't take a lot. And even my last person, I
health coach, she came in and she thought, like, the

(43:47):
homework's gonna be so the homework's gonna be so much.
I don't have time to overhaul my life. I have
two kids, I work, you know, all the things. But
it doesn't take a lot. She just started waking up
in the morning and listening to up a lectio three
sixty five, which is just like a be still time
with the Word of Jesus. Like she started there, so
what's ten minutes? And that then it added to something

(44:10):
else and now she enjoys it so much she doesn't
want to give that up. And so it's just adding
little things and or making little space for you to
simply be and and you can work through these things
in simple ways. It doesn't have to be these huge
things and doesn't even have to be counseling or you

(44:30):
know what. It can be starting with forgiveness and you'll
see this huge shift and you know, take a half
hour and do that, and it's good. It's good to
do that even when your kids are busy. It's good
to make that space.

Speaker 2 (44:46):
Yeah, that's right. One of the reasons I love exercise
as a as a habit, is, as a good habit,
as a redeeming habit is because this this idea of
taking time for myself, idea of carving out a space
to move to do something that's good for me too,

(45:07):
you know, to have to plan around that, like and
you know, the cool thing about exercise is you can't
really do a lot of other things while you exercise.
You can't. You can't be like like, I'm also gonna
mop while I do my stretching, Like, no, you're not.
It's not gonna happen. You need you need to stretch,
or or I'm I'm also going to uh plan out
the budget while I go for a run, Like good

(45:28):
luck with that. You might think a little better. You
might be able to solve a few problems. You're not
going to be able to keep all those numbers in
your head, right, You just got to run right in.
What's what I love about exercise is for me in
my life, you know, hence the hence the setup. It
has always forced me to spend time with my father,
whether it's whether it's in worship, whether it's in thought

(45:50):
and prayer, whether it's just Uh. I don't know how
you feel about this, but when I get broken down physically,
when I'm at the end of a very terrible set
or something, you can't not pray. Have you heard the Joe? Uh?
It's a pastor. He gets to heaven and a taxi
driver gets to heaven and and they're standing in line,
and Saint Peter, it's a silly joke. This is not
this is not like like scriptural, but it's it's it's

(46:10):
still kind of funny. And so the pastor gets a
gets a wool robe and a wooden staff, and then
the taxi driver comes up to Saint Peter and he
he's a welcome, good and faithful servant. He gets a
golden staff and a silver robe. And the Pastor's like, wait,
I'm a pastor, he's a taxi driver. What what's going
on here? And Saint Peter goes, well, well, when you
preached your sermons, everybody fell asleep, but when that man

(46:32):
drove people were praying.

Speaker 3 (46:37):
That's funny.

Speaker 2 (46:38):
It's such a dumb joke. But but like exercise can
do that because it breaks you down to the root
of yourself, where where there's no pretense, there's no there's
no I can do this on my own. My physical
body literally can't go on. And guess what happens. You
start going, Lord help me, Lord, Lord, I'm not enough,

(46:58):
Like there's only have a little bit left. Please be
with me, you know. Like it's it's so strange the
prayers that can come out when you realize that you
can't do this all by yourself. And exercise is such
a cool discipline in that respect because because if I
say to somebody, hey, I need you to pray first
thing in the morning for ten minutes, not everybody knows

(47:18):
how to how to how to approach God's heart groggy
and coffee. It's something you can learn. It's not a
bad discipline. But if I say, hey, I need you
to go for a ten minute walk, and while you're walking,
I want you, I want you to thank God for
your day, and I want you to spend some time
with your father, and I want you, I want you
to listen to some worship music that that really lifts

(47:39):
you up. And that's that's all you're going to do
for ten minutes. What's what's cool is when you set
a timer and go for a walk, you walked, Yeah,
whereas you know, some some individuals, if I asked them
to spend ten minutes in prayer in the morning, they
somehow end up on their phone. Anyway, It's huge. I
love that exercise is a discipline you have. You have

(48:00):
some workshops that you get to teach. Can you tell
us about how how you help people make the space
yea or for coming together and spending time in their
exercise discipline.

Speaker 4 (48:10):
Yeah, I do these be still stretching and journaling classes
that are an hour and a half and they're always
on a certain topic. Like my next one's about when
anxiety is overwhelming, how to breathe through it. And so
we teach like I teach the science, like I. First,
we slow our bodies down, we do some breathing always,

(48:31):
but I teach the science first because God God designs science,
so people want to know the science behind these things.

Speaker 3 (48:37):
So we teach the science.

Speaker 4 (48:39):
Then I move into usually a journaling practice, and so
it's guided journaling. They're not left on their own to
do whatever, but it's questions to really reflect and so
they're getting that soul work done in that time that
they don't often don't make time for right, So I'm
just creating the space and time. You schedule this class
and then you get to sit and then you go
do it right, get to go do it, and you're

(49:00):
guided through it. You don't have to wonder what do
I do?

Speaker 3 (49:02):
What do I do? In the time.

Speaker 4 (49:04):
So they work through that and then I move into
biblical teaching on the topic. And then we stretch and
we do really slow gentle stretches, but we get it
in our body, so we just learn things. But now
we're gonna, you know, move to gentle music and be
reminded of what we learned throughout it and keep stretching
our bodies. And then we have time where we just
lay on the mat. They're just laying. They get a blanket,

(49:27):
a pillow, a good smelling lavender towel, you know, all
the good things. So they're very rusted. Yeah, we just
meditate on that. So we'll do breath prayers, we'll do
meditating much on scripture, asking questions of the Lord. But
it's such a sweet time and people are so restored
after it and feel.

Speaker 3 (49:47):
Like that it was so good. We need that space.

Speaker 4 (49:49):
We don't when do we ever carve ninety minutes out
just to go slow? Like not very often I mean
even like.

Speaker 2 (49:58):
A year ago. I think I did a year ago.

Speaker 3 (49:59):
I'm just yeah, right exactly. But it's so so needed.

Speaker 2 (50:04):
Yeah, I love that. Thank you for that. I think
that's so good, you know. I when when I I
disciple men in my community, and one of the things
that I do is I'll say, hey, I want you
to meet me at my house. I want you to
come fasted, and we'll go from there and I will
take I will drive them. We live in the great
State of Arkansas, so so there's the state parks all

(50:26):
over the place. It's the natural state. I will drive
them to a hike. We will hike, and then we
will literally sit at a waterfall and just spend time talking, praying,
and then and get under the waterfall, because that's what
guys do, and latest canto I highly and then and
then peace out. And it's like, oh my gosh, I
needed that so much. I know that that's how I

(50:48):
get away and spend time with my father. Jesus did
that all the time. That was that's how he did it.
And and creating that space in an exercise workshop sort
of sort of way is so so powerful. So I
just want to say from me to you. Thank you
for what you do. I think that's amazing. Exercises great,

(51:08):
Lifting heavyweights is awesome, Jumping around and doing jumping jacks
is powerful. Going for runs, eating, well, all that's good.
All that's good. But if our soul is separate from
that practice, our if our spirit and the things we
need to forgive and the grief we're wrestling through, if
it's separate from that practice, sometimes it can do more

(51:30):
harm than good. And I just want to say I'm
so grateful that you're helping individuals integrate that, and I
also want to recognize God's goodness and helping you do
the same for yourself.

Speaker 3 (51:40):
Thanks.

Speaker 2 (51:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (51:42):
Yeah, And when we do separate, I'd just like to say,
we treat our bodies like a project, like something to
be fixed, separate than us, but when we combine them,
it's just something to be cared for and take like
it's a gift. And so it just changes your mindset
when you bring worship and your whole self into taking

(52:03):
care of your body.

Speaker 2 (52:04):
Yeah, well said, well said. Well, this has been such
such a useful and powerful conversation. Thank you, Leah, And
I wanted to point listeners to you. You actually have
a free ebook that they can get connected to. I
think the title is Let's Reclaim the Truth about Our Body.
That link is in the show notes. Can you can
you tell my listeners when when they get a hold
of that, what are they going to find in there?

(52:25):
Let's Reclaim the Truth about our body?

Speaker 4 (52:28):
There's five days in there to read, a super short thing,
just different truths about your body and the biblical perspective
on that. We learned so much from the world. The
world has told we let the world be our teacher
about our body. But God says a lot about it
in his word, and so you'll just discover that in
there of what he says about your body. And then

(52:50):
there's truth cards at the back that you can post
on your mirror so you can repeat that truth of yourself.
But it's good to know what he's saying about our
body because it's a very different from what the world
has said.

Speaker 2 (53:04):
True. That true, that's that's and he made it. So
like let's let's let him tell us what we need
to think and do about it. Yes, yes, awesome. Well,
hey Leah, thank you so much for the opportunity to
get together. I want to make sure that I pray
over you and pray over your family and your ministry.
So if you would buy your head with me. Yeah, Father, God,

(53:25):
thank you so much for this day. Thank you for
the opportunity to connect with my sister, and thank you
for the path that you have led her on. Leah
doesn't mean she's weary and grieving. Leah means that she
is one you have talked to deal with grief and
to deal well with weariness. And God, I just pray
that you would bless that in her so that she
can help other individuals to be able to wrestle that

(53:48):
out too, to get close to your heart. That you
would give them rest and peace in the workshops that
she leads. That you would bless her words as she
speaks over her children and her husband and the individuals
that she leads when they work out. Lord, I just
pray that you would also give her good health and
good joy in the time that she spends with you. Lord,

(54:11):
I pray freedom, grace, and blessing in the truths that
you've spoken over her, and I pray that those things
will trickle into those who have been informed by the
world but need to be close to your heart so
that their bodies are a part of their walk with
you not separate. God, bless this time and bless our
listeners in Jesus' name, Amen, man Leah, thank you so

(54:34):
much for the time today. Guys, this has been coach
Alex ben Holton on the Faithful Fitness podcast. You guys
know what I'm going to say next. Until next time,
train hard, but pray harder.

Speaker 1 (54:46):
Hey, if this episode helped you, jare it with someone
who needs to hear it, and don't forget to subscribe
and leave us a raving review so more people can
find Faithful Fitness. Oh and my dad, That's new devotional
is almost out now. You can grab a copy for
yourself and then join our free community at Better Daily

(55:09):
by clicking on the links in the show notes below.
We all have a cross to carry, but it's lighter
when we do it together, so check out both links
in the show notes. Don't be a big well bob,
just do it. Until next time, don't forget, Train hard
and pray even harder.