June 4, 2025 • 35 mins
Some seasons will shake you more than others—but when you're led by peace and walk in unity, you can face anything together.
In this heartfelt episode of Love Like Crazy, Jay and Stacey open up about the many seasons of life they’ve walked through—newlywed adventures, career changes, big moves, raising three boys, empty nesting, and now, stepping into grandparenthood. With honesty, laughter, and vulnerability, they reflect on the life-changing decisions they’ve made—some scary, some exciting—and how unity, faith, and listening to the Holy Spirit helped them navigate every twist and turn.
Whether you’re facing change in your marriage, family, or personal life, this episode is a gentle reminder that you don’t have to walk through it alone. From building a life together to letting go as kids leave home, Jay and Stacey share powerful lessons about teamwork in marriage, trusting God’s timing, and choosing peace over fear.Key themes:
Don’t forget to:
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Podcast Produced by Hi Hello Labs
Website: hihellolabs.com
In this heartfelt episode of Love Like Crazy, Jay and Stacey open up about the many seasons of life they’ve walked through—newlywed adventures, career changes, big moves, raising three boys, empty nesting, and now, stepping into grandparenthood. With honesty, laughter, and vulnerability, they reflect on the life-changing decisions they’ve made—some scary, some exciting—and how unity, faith, and listening to the Holy Spirit helped them navigate every twist and turn.
Whether you’re facing change in your marriage, family, or personal life, this episode is a gentle reminder that you don’t have to walk through it alone. From building a life together to letting go as kids leave home, Jay and Stacey share powerful lessons about teamwork in marriage, trusting God’s timing, and choosing peace over fear.Key themes:
- Navigating seasons of change in marriage and family
- The emotional and spiritual challenges of big transitions
- The importance of unity, communication, and faith in decision-making
- Encouragement for couples walking through uncertainty
Don’t forget to:
- Like, subscribe, and leave a comment with future topic suggestions
- Share this episode with friends or anyone facing a tough season
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Podcast Produced by Hi Hello Labs
Website: hihellolabs.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
Hey, everybody, welcome back to lovel Like Crazy. Today, we
have a wonderful episode that we're going to talk about
different seasons of life that we walk through. And I
know that no matter where you are in life, if
you're maybe newly married, or you've been married for quite
some years, maybe you're an empty nester, maybe your single
mom or dad, we all experience this because seasons are
(00:44):
part of life.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Yeah, and we just want to give a big shout
out to all of our listeners. Thank you so much
for just following along, sharing to your friends the different
episodes that may minister to you and we hope this
will be one of them. And thank you to for
subscribing to our YouTube channel.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Yeah, it's not hard to hit that subscribe button on
that YouTube channel. Just go click and the next thing
you know, it let you know about different episodes that
are coming up. And we so appreciate you guys helping
us to grow this podcast.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
We also love all those listeners though on Spotify and
Apple and wherever else as well, so I'm going to
give them a shout out.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
To Well, I do love apples. So are you ready
for this?
Speaker 2 (01:30):
I'm ready for this. We're going to talk about navigating
changing seasons and maybe even talk a little bit about
how we had to do that.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
Yeah, and I know you love change.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
I do not love change. I don't really know too
many people who love change. But I'm really one of
those that I really don't like change at all.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
I know a lot of people who love to say things,
who love to say things like I love change, but
really they don't know.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
No, I don't really think there's anybody that it does.
I'm just I'm very much one that shoes away from
the sudden change is what throws me, you know, And
so I'm getting better at it, though.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
So I try to ease you into change, like we're
in the process of I'm trying to get you, hey,
let's build a new house, like right, Yeah, that I know,
she just kind of like shut down, like right.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
That would be that would be a sudden change.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
I saw it that.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Those those of you watching on YouTube, Yeah, that is
definitely something like that. We're going to have to talk
about a lot.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Well about the reason for that. This is I like
to build at the church. We've done a lot of construction.
I built this house for her some years ago, and
I'm like, you know, what as we get older, we
don't necessarily need house this big, and I'll build you
a brand new house. And she was kind of like,
you know, like.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah, you think that's enticing me, but.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
She's like, I'm not sure I want to stay where
I am.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
I like it, and you're very settled. Yeah, that would
be a big change.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
Well, seasons are a part of life. We know that
we have the seasons of you know, spring, summer, fall, winter,
and out of those seasons, I love fall and winter.
I love it whenever we get into as people would
say that pumpkin spice. You know, now I'm not into
that at whatever, but I do love as we get
into the fall, you know, the leaves start falling. Here
in Louisiana, we don't have changing leaf colors, leaf colors.
(03:27):
We it's green and then it's brown and then it
falls off the tree. So we don't really have a
lot of seasonal change like that. But I like it
whenever the weather kind of starts to change a little
bit and we can go outside, we you know, make
a fire in the fire pit, go to the camp,
hang out there a little bit. I love the wintertime.
She loves it whenever and there in the wintertime, I
can build a fire in the fireplace. So those seasonal
(03:49):
changes are something that we enjoy. And I know, we
got summertime people, wintertime people. Some people love it. It's
one hundred degrees nothing not with sko.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
I'm probably you're more falling winter, and I'm probably more
spring in summer. I do I like. I like the warm,
you know, summertime, being on the beach, are being on
the boat, are the boat, are the pool? And spring
is you know, very short here in Louisiana. And just
(04:19):
like we don't have a lot of color in our
in our leaves in the fall time, our spring is
so short, and so to where it's not too cold,
are not too hot because when it gets summertime, it's
hot hot.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Yeah. Well, it's like we have what we call here
fake spring, and then second winter it's like, you you know,
things start, you know, blossoming, things start moving in the
right direction towards spring, and all of a sudden you
get a cold snap and it's in the thirties and
it's like what happened? And the plants and stuff are
so confused. But we're used to seasonal things. In fact,
(04:55):
a lot of people love to quote this. In Ecclesiastes
chapter three, We're Solomon talks about that basically there's a
time and a season for everything under heaven, and he
goes on to you know, a time to live, a
time to die, a time to mourn. He talks about,
you know, a time to plant, a time to harvest.
That you guys probably know the crux of it. He
(05:18):
goes through just basically talking about the seasons of life. Right,
and if you've never read through Ecclesiastes, Solomon is he's struggling.
He's at this place where he's kind of cynical with
some different things as he's working through some things within himself.
And as you go through the different seasons of life,
you can actually begin to get to that place. If
you're not careful, you can actually kind of get a
(05:39):
little cynical about different things. And so today we're going
to talk about that change. We're going to talk about
the different seasons of life and how we can navigate
those things appropriately. And to me, I know, one of
the things I've learned is navigating change appropriately is a
lot easier if you allow the Holy Spirit to lead
you and direct you than just coming up with good
ideas and fly by the CD of pants and so Stacey,
(06:02):
I know that for us, we talked about change, change
within our family. What is the biggest change that we've
ever experienced that you know.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Of the biggest change as a family was when we
made a huge move from Lafayette, living in Lafayette to Batinaries.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
Okay?
Speaker 2 (06:21):
Is that what you were thinking? Well, you got something else.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
But I also want to ask you this, what is
the biggest change that we've made as a married couple.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
As a married couple yep, becoming empty nesters? No, No,
what are you thinking?
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Well, I'm thinking like when we made the move from
we got married, we lived in Pineville for a couple
of years because that's where our family is, Okay, and
then we made that major step of moving from Pineville
to Lafayette to go step into ministry as our occupation.
That was major. Now, maybe it was made more major
for me because you had left and been away from
home for four years when you were at college, right,
(06:58):
And for me that was really the first time I
moved away.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Well. Yeah, when we were newly married just a few years,
we had an opportunity to go into full time ministry.
We were volunteer youth pastors working within the church where
we grew up, and so then we were offered this position,
and I remember we weighed out the pros and the cons,
(07:22):
you know, for this big change, and it was leaving
our family behind, you know, and everything that we knew
from growing up. Now, yeah, I had been away at
school and gone back. But then for us to make
that move as a married couple, I remember us saying, Okay, well,
these are the pros and these are the cons, and
(07:43):
if it doesn't really work out, that's okay, because we
can just easily pack up and move back home where
we grew up. But you know, it ended up working
out great. We lived in Lafayed, worked at a church there.
We lived there for eight years, seven or eight years,
and we had all of our three sons were born
(08:05):
during that time that we lived there, and it was
a great training season in ministry and uh and we
didn't live that far from our families.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
Our and twenty minutes.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Yeah, so we made trips often. Even with having little kids,
we were able to go back and forth. But it
was a big decision, and I think there was a
few times that after we moved that we thought, do
we make the right decision?
Speaker 3 (08:32):
You know?
Speaker 2 (08:33):
And but I look back and I think, you know,
it was it was a great season of our life.
And before we ended up making another major move.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Well, let me speak to that before we get to
that one, because I know for us it was a
it was a young married couple picking up roots and
moving to a different place. And it kind of felt
like we were stepping out and making a life on
our own. It's like we lived in close to our families,
we were always together. It's like we were kind of
stepping out on our own and we were experiencing this
(09:06):
ecclesiast Solomon's talking about an ecclesiaste, you know, the season
four what is upon us? And for everything there is
that time or season. It's like, Okay, we've lived at
home for this this period of time. We've got mom
and dad here fairly close, Granny fairly close. But now
we're stepping out and it's make it or break time.
I do remember though, as you said, we had the
(09:28):
conversation it was like, well, we don't have a house,
we don't have any kids, so there's really nothing holding
us here other than family.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
We could just take this step of faith if we wanted.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
To, and if we get there and it blows up
in our face, we can always move back. And you know,
the job that I had it was it was one
where I could probably turn around and get another You
were school teacher. I worked in finance, and so you know,
we can recover from this if it doesn't quite work
out the way that we thought. Little did we know
that was the Lord's plan. We go step into that.
We trained for where we are now, and we made
(09:59):
a lot of great friends when we lived in I
loved Lafayette, absolutely loved it. The food unbelievable and.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
We still have friends you know that are family.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
The people there are are just awesome. There were a
couple of places we said we've lived in Louisiana. There
were a couple of places that we said we will
never live at Louisiana, but Lafayette was top of the list.
And that was a great season for us of being there,
a great season. That was the season that we began
to discover that within us there were these things that
(10:29):
needed to be dealt with us. When we began to
step out and really get help, that have brought some
healing aspect to our marriage. But beyond that, we learned
about being responsible financially. We learned about buying our first home.
I think we bought a mobile home. We lived in
that a few years, and then we bought a house
and we redid that. So, man, we learned so much
(10:51):
during that season. And I really do think not only
do we learn dependence on God, we really learned dependence
on one another and one another.
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Yeah, it was definitely a time where a season where
we were able to grow. You know, there was a
lot of growth spiritually and within our marriage at the time.
And I do know that there were some of the
ones who we were so young when we made that
(11:19):
move that we found out later they were like, we
didn't think you were going to last long at all.
We thought y'all are going to get homesick and you
were going to move. And we were like, no, we
were you know, we want to We wanted to step
out on our own and we wanted to to, you know,
try something new. And it was it worked, it worked
out good for us, you know, but there there were
(11:41):
all there were often times like oh, did we make
the right decision?
Speaker 3 (11:45):
You know?
Speaker 1 (11:45):
But I think every every place you want always place
that you you're going to go to You're always going
to have those times that are discouraging, and that's where
the devil wants to come in and try to cause
you to you know, to question or to you know,
question God's plan or question each other. Right, And it's
like that I was going to say this to me.
That's really when we began to work and kind of
(12:08):
form together as a team. You know, before that, we
were just young, dumb and in love.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Okay, yeah, very newly married at the time. Yeah, it's
true because I mean the decisions that we had to make, Yeah,
we needed to pull together, and it formed more of
a team mindset I think for us. And yeah, there
was a lot of growth during that time. And I
(12:33):
think even even when they're I don't want to make
it sound like there were never any challenges, because there
definitely were, and those were the things that brought about
a lot of growth in our marriage at the time.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Well, and I know that when we stepped from there,
you've already alluded to this. The biggest step that we made,
not as a married couple but as a family was
whenever we decided to the Lord opened the door and
we picked up roots and we moved here to and
Rouge to pastor right.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Yeah, that was a really big, a big change and
a big decision. Like I was very settled living in Lafayette.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Loved her house. I had just built a big old
patio on the back of the house where they swing
for her to sit in.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
And I loved my swing. And you know, I had
my friends. I was settled there. All three of my boys,
you know, they had their their little friends at church.
And it was a comfort.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
It was comfort.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
It was it was comfortable. And and I think that
I had already had so so many other sudden changes
in my life, like we've talked about in other episodes.
You know, I lost my mom when I was younger,
and just just things in life had happened, which was
a lot of sudden change. And so whenever you approached
(13:51):
me about you know, hey, there's this church in Baton Rouge.
You know, I think we need to check into this.
I know you were. My response My response was not oh,
this is great.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Yeah. It was not like we'll praise the Lord.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
It was it it was like, get the behind me, Satan.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
Yeah. I probably did not respond the best way in
the beginning. I was very defensive like, no, I don't
I don't want to give up my my home. And
now I'm settled.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Well, actually, at first you were somewhat receptive to it
because I don't think it was real at.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
That point, so you were just talking.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
We were just talking. And then it, you know, when
we made contact and gave a resume. That's whenever it
became real, because they wanted to talk to us. And
I remember we went over, we interviewed with the board.
We actually they wanted me to come preach one Sunday,
So we went and we preached, and it was so
funny because the boys, we had them all dressed a
little Khaki's.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
Little little shouting shirts.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
And we drive there and we the first thing that
happens we get out in the parking lot and Tyler
he pukes all over his shoes because he got carse hit.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
And I thought, there's a.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
There's a sign from the way this is not for us.
So anyway, we go through this process. We preach, we
go eat lunch with the board and spend time with them.
And I told Stacy said, don't worry about it. They're
going to interview me and talk to me further. Little
did I know that all the wives were going to
have her off in the other room more or less
interviewing her and grilling her. So we got into a
(15:22):
little interrogated Yes, we get in with vehicle with the boys.
We were heading out and we're like, let's get out
of here as quick as we can. This is not
for us. And so we had agreed to go back
Wednesday night speak again. They wanted to hear Stacy speak,
so we went back to fulfill the obligation. And literally
while we're there that night, it's kind of like the
Lord spoke to both of us, like this is where
(15:42):
you're supposed to be. And I remember us driving over
the Missippi River bridge leaving out of bad Rigi and
we're discussing vision. We're discussing we could do this and that,
and it kind of looked at each other like wait,
I thought we weren't coming here. And that's when we
realized like, okay, the Lord is in this.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Yeah, So all of a sudden, we just we had
a lot of vision and we could really see some
things happening.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
So it's starting to get real. And what happens is
they have a vote of the board. This took place
over a course of about a month and they got together,
they voted. They said, hey, we want to extend the
call to you guys to come be our pastor. And
I remember I hang up the phone, I walk in
our little house there, Carracra walk in till Stacy. They
(16:27):
want us to come be the pastors there. And this
is her response. She says, well, you can go if
you want to, but I'm not going.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
That was something else. Yeah, I know that wasn't the
best response. That I was not being a very supportive
life at that time. Yeah, I think it really like
it hit home and it dawned on me, Oh that
means I'm actually packing up.
Speaker 3 (16:53):
My life is going to be disrupted.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Yeah, and it's going to change. And so I really
got a little fearful, to be honest.
Speaker 1 (17:01):
Well, noticed what had happened when we moved to laugh
Yet we didn't have a house, we didn't have kids,
no big deal for this doesn't work.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
And we had the backup plan of hey we can
go back no home.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
But now we have a house, we got three kids.
You know, we have our friends in a life here.
So if this blows up in our face, well we're
going to be in a bind.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
Yeah, yeah, it was. It was a much bigger decision
and just more responsibility, more weighing on that decision than before.
Speaker 1 (17:28):
And here's what's crazy about it, because everybody says, oh, well,
had y'all prayed about it? Absolutely, we had prayed about it.
We had prayed together, we had prayed separately. The entire
thing was Okay, if this moves in this direction, it's
the Lord. Because we had prayed about it, and we
both felt comfortable in our hearts like that this is
this is if it goes in this direction, we're comfortable with.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
Yeah. I think I just realized that, you know, in
making that kind of big change, I mean, I remembered
when we moved, you know, to life yet there was
an adjustment period. You know, we didn't know anyone and
so so there was you know, some awkwardness and just
just the things that you deal with when you when
(18:10):
you're starting over somewhere fresh, and and I think I
was thinking, I don't necessarily want to do that again,
but but yeah, pray, we prayed about it, and I
came around. I think it was fairly quickly.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
I don't know, let me say this, because what what
made laugh yet a little bit easier. You're right, we
didn't know anybody. The people in laughing yet. The Cajun
people are very welcoming, very open uh to to having people.
But here here's the thing that takes the season. They're
going to watch you. They want to make that you
make sure that you're sincere, you are who you say
(18:43):
you are. And so it was probably about a six
month to a year period they were inviting us to stuff,
but we didn't really feel like part of the family.
And what happens with the Cajun people. Once they take
you in, you're in. You are family. And so there,
I mean, there's friends that we will call there, you know,
to this day, and they are family to us. And
(19:03):
that's how the Cajun people are. And so it had
taken the culture. It had taken that period of time
for us to get there. But we've been there eight
years and this this is our family. We love these people.
It's a major change. So I go to her and
I say, hey, they want us, they want us to
come be the pastors there. They want us to come
back and preach. They're going to have a churchwide vote,
but they feel pretty confident that that you know this
(19:24):
is going to happen. So they want to extend this
call to us, and Stacy says, you can go if
you want to, but I'm not going. So my mind
and this is what I told her. Is a very
emotional moment. She starts crying and I said, well, that
this is then then I'm going to have to you know,
I've already told you know, the pastor that that we
if this goes in this direction, like we're we're moving
(19:46):
to baton Rouge. He's fully behind us, fully supportive of us.
But we've already moved in this direction. We've already you know,
pulled this trigger. We can't take it back. And so
you know, I can get a job off shore, I
can go work at at and t something of that nature.
I go back into finance and she's like, well whatever,
but we ain't going to baton Rouge. And so I'm
just kind of like, oh my gosh. And I remember
(20:08):
telling her this to her, what is more important to
me than ministry is my family is you and my family.
So I'm not willing to make this move if it's
going to disrupt our marriage and our family. We have
to do this together. We've got to be in unity
about this. And so fast forward from that conversation. Two
hours later, I'm in the living room. She comes in,
(20:31):
she's crying, and I give her a hard time. She said,
she's crying, and.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
I'm like what.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
She's like, what's I'm like, what's wrong. She's like, I
know that we're supposed to go to Baton Rouge. I'm
just scared.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
That was the truth.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
And I remember grabbing you and hugging you and telling you,
you know what, it's going to be okay because we're
in this together.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Yeah, we're going to do this together, and.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
The Lord is going to go before us and make
a way.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
And it was kind of like she softened in that moment.
I remember we prayed together and then we launch out
into this massive decision and now here we've been here
for twenty three years.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, And I do think not only was it that
I was I was scared for me, but then I
was like worried about my kids. Though they were very young.
They were like what three, five and seven I think
at the time, so it really which was really a
good age for them to make a move like this.
I think I was concerned, you know, about them being
(21:37):
settled and have the stability. You know. That was something
that I was definitely mindful of and intentional to to
make sure that there was consistency and stability for my kids.
So any kind of routine that they had before, I
(21:58):
would try to, you know, duplicate that and just be
mindful to make it a smooth transition for them. And
and I mean it did. It worked out just fine.
I hate that I did have those initial initial feelings
in the beginning, and.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
I think that that's that's the human side of it.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
It is, and I.
Speaker 1 (22:19):
Think what it did was it helped draw us closer together.
Speaker 3 (22:21):
And really.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
You saw through that, hey, you know, this is something
that we've made this decision together. We're in unity about this.
But from my perspective, I think you saw it like
I've got this, I'm.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
Going to take care of you and I'm going to
take care.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
Of the family, right, And so it was it was
a big change, and we navigated it well, I thought.
I mean, there's always difficulties when you change. You weren't
necessarily changing careers. We were still in ministry, but it
was a change because you became the senior pastor and
(22:58):
not just a staff pastor, so that that was different,
and I became the worship pastor, and I want.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
To be being a pastor on staff, as a children's pastor,
associate pastor, whatever role we held during the time, or
whatever roles. You know, actually you might be listening to
this and maybe you are on staff somewhere to church.
That staff role is amazing. We absolutely loved it, but
whenever you step into that lead role, there's a lot
more responsibility on your shoulders. Fortunately for us, the church
(23:29):
was much much smaller at that time. I think on
average we fell around thirty thirty five people. And what's
really kind of cool about that because we followed the
leading of the Lord and what he has done over
these years bringing us to the place where we actually
wind up launching a new church. We have two campuses now.
I have reached so many people in the community and
that's a direct result of two things. First of all,
(23:52):
just God moving and second of all, I believe us
being obedient to what the Lord had for us as
a husband and wife asters and as a family.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
Well, and I want to say, because we were obedient
to the leading of the Holy Spirit, you know, he
had provision for us when when we got here whatever
was needed for us personally and for our kids. You know,
the Lord, we saw his hand of faithfulness, you know,
(24:22):
to take care of us. And so again, it was
a lot of different situations that brought growth, you know,
to us as a family and as a as a couple.
But I'm very thankful that that we were obedient and
that we are here and able to serve in this
(24:45):
community the way that we have over all these years.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
And great church family there in that time that that
was very There were challenges along the way, there were
different things, obstacles that we came up against, and but
but good church family who always stuck with us through
those different things. And I'm to say it like this,
two things that came through that season of change. First
of all, we decided to be in unity with each
other and with God. And the second thing was you decided,
(25:09):
I'm going to listen to what the Holy Spirit saying here,
not my fear, not my feelings. And you decided to
listen to him instead of aligning those emotions to lead you.
Because too many times we let our emotions step in
and lead us. And it works the other way as well,
because I'll say this just because something looks good. Just
because something sounds like a good idea does not necessarily
(25:31):
mean that it's God. You better be in unity with
your spouse because there are a lot of times that
I've had ideas and I'm like, what about this this
and this sounds so good, and you're just kind of like,
I can't get a peace about this, And so because
of us operating in unity and as a team, might
back off something and then later down the road you
see like, whoa, that was not a good thing. Thank
(25:52):
goodness that you know, and vice versa as well.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
Yeah, I really do believe that it's important that we
you know, we pray about these these changes that we make,
and that we're led by the Holy Spirit and that
we follow peace. You know, it's it's risky, you know,
it can be risk taking to make a change like
a career change or a big move or or something
(26:17):
to that magnitude. But if you have peace and your
hearten and your spirit about it and your inunity, then
and you know that God is all over it, then
take that step of faith and see him do his thing.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
Well, we're talking about the different seasons of life, big
changes that we are, big steps that we take. I
think that for us, this whole thing was a learning process,
moving to laughy At, moving to Baton Rouge, because it
really helped bring us to the place where we functioned
as a married couple. Of everything that we did from there,
(26:52):
raising the kid's decisions, regarding the kid's decisions about you know,
buying a home together, we always made the decison vision
that when we make these decisions, we're going to be
in unity. We're going to function as a team. Now,
you have done a great job of you know, we
know that the Bible talks about the role of spiritual
leadership that God gives the husband, and you've done a
(27:14):
great job of leaning on me in that direction and
have allowed me to make the decisions. But with that said,
I don't like making those decisions if I know that
they're going to be disturbing to you and if you're
not feeling peace about those things. So, really, what we've
learned above everything we talk about unity, but functioning as
a team, doing things together, making decisions together, and especially
(27:38):
with the kids. And so you go through all of
this and now we've brought the boys through elementary through
teenage years, through college. Then they start getting married off
and the next thing, you know, I would say that
for me, I'll let you you talk about you know,
the biggest one was moving to Baton Rouge. One of
the biggest ones for me is empty nesting and person
(28:00):
I thoroughly have enjoyed my kids getting.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
Out of here.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
You are the most excited about the boys being gone,
and I was over here crying, Yeah, you know, crying.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Well, let me say it like this. I think that
the reason for that is because it may have been different. No,
it probably would have been different if it was girls,
because I don't necessarily like my friend Casey, he's got
all girls. He and Wendy have all girls, and he's like,
I wanted my girls to live at.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
Home forever because you're so protected.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Well, because you're protective, you're worried about them moving out
starting a life. But for boys, you're excited about them stepping.
Speaker 3 (28:33):
Out into they're becoming men, their career, all these different things,
building a family, and so there's that, but not only that,
I was just excited for them to move out, so
I had you all to myself well, and.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
And again that empty nesting, that was it was a
change of season. I mean, things were not going to
remain the same. They weren't going to live at home anymore.
It wasn't going to be the same kind of interaction.
I wasn't going to see them as as often, and
I do. I see you all the time, and I'm
(29:11):
very blessed by it. But you know it, it really
was probably I would say, as the mom, it was
the bigger change to I'm not going to say it
wasn't as difficult as like making a move to a
different city or what it was. It was different. It
(29:31):
was it was a true it was a true life change.
You know. We had hit some milestones. They had graduated
high school and they'd gone to college, and they were
getting married, and we had celebrated these There was that
excitement of yes, they're stepping out on their own, and
we're so proud of them and what they've accomplished. And
(29:52):
I remember after the last one was married, we high five.
Do you remember that? We were like high five? We
did it. We we we got them successfully into adulthood.
And so so that was really a time of celebration
for us. But it did take me a little bit
longer than it took you to get used to. You know,
(30:13):
them not being here all the time, though we do
see them often. They all have bought a home nearby.
We do talk to them on the phone and we
do get to see them. But honestly, things really changed
when they're like, it gave us a lot more freedom
(30:34):
and we could just have been travel and.
Speaker 1 (30:37):
There have been those times where we're like, you know,
I know one time we left and we went to
Waco because you wanted to go to the Magno you know, yeah,
and we wanted to go eat cookies there and you
spend my money and all that kind of stuff. But
I remember we were driving there and one of the
boys called and it was like, you know, hey, what
are you doing? And you were like, we're on our
way to Waco, Texas And they were like what yeah,
(30:59):
And it was just kind of we didn't even tell them.
It was just kind of a shock. They were like,
why are you going?
Speaker 2 (31:02):
Awake them?
Speaker 1 (31:03):
We're like, we're just getting away for a couple of
days because we.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
Can go if we want to go do that now,
you know.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
And you know, it was kind of like that that
shock on their end, But it was I'm enjoying this
season of life just being able to go and do
and being with you. And so I would say this
out of all of this, we're talking about navigating the
different seasons. When Solomon's talking in Ecclesiastes three about the
different seasons that we face in life, they are inevitable.
(31:30):
Some seasons you will feel more than other seasons. Uh,
you know, it's kind of like this, you know, time
to live in, a time to die. There are ones
that you will lose and you will walk through that
season and grief. You're definitely going to feel that a
lot more than other things that you experience in life.
And so some seasons will affect you in different ways,
and it's.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
Okay to make those and feel sad.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Exactly for us, I know that what has helped us
to navigate change these different seasons is togetherness, making sure
that we are together, making sure that we are functioning
as a team, making sure that we are in unity
about things. As a man, as a husband, leaning into
my wife and asking, or you know, do you feel
(32:14):
peace about this? Not just being like I'm the man,
I'm going to make this decision, but leaning on this
one that God has given to me for me to
share in life with to be helped me as we
see in Genesis chapter two. We want to be in
unity together, so leaning into her and saying, hey, are
you feeling peace about this? And if she's not, then
maybe I need to press into the Lord a little
bit harder because that we should be together on this.
(32:37):
And so for me personally, that is probably the greatest
way to navigate change, to face different seasons that you're
going to encounter. And you said this earlier, listening to
the voice of the Holy Spirit, because there are things
that we will face that will be fearful, like a
big move, and it might make you a little nervous.
I know for me personally, whenever we wound up launching
(32:57):
a new church, the facilities we have, we we sold
those facilities, and I remember we were leaving to go
sit in a closing to sign away those facilities, and
we were at a place where we had purchased property,
but we had no building at that time to hold
services in. And I was I was confident that the
Lord was leading in this direction, but I was nervous
because I'm going to this closing to sign on behalf
(33:20):
of the church to make a sale. And I remember
you asked me and said, do you want me to
go with you, and I'm like, yeah, yeah, I do.
I want you to go with me because you know
we can you can help me be at peace praying
for you. And so we prayed the whole way there,
and so listening to the voice of the Holy Spirit.
And you said this earlier. It is the most powerful
thing that you can do as a husband and wife,
(33:40):
as a married couple to navigate those changes.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
That's right. And so now that now we're in this
new season with our grandkids and we're loving that as well.
And so you know, enjoy I think too. You navigate
the big changes that you have, but then you need
to enjoy the different seasons that you that you rest
in as well.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
I think that's probably the biggest thing. And just enjoy
the season that the Lord has you in.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
And so I'm going to keep praying about whether we
build another house or not.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
Oh, it's happening, always happening. You don't know this, but
I went to a closing yes today and sold this house.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
Oh you do not? Oh that would that would be
a whole nother podcast.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
Yes, all right, Well, look, it's been a lot of
fun talking about this because this is something that I
don't care who you are. We're going to face different
seasons in life and we've had a good time sharing
this with you today. So walk in unity with the Lord,
walking unity with your spouse, be together, function as a
team because that is so powerful. You have anything you
want to have when we wrap this up.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Teamwork is important, Stay in unity and follow peace.
Speaker 1 (34:43):
What does it say teamwork makes the dream dream work?
Speaker 3 (34:45):
All Right?
Speaker 1 (34:46):
I love it. Listen. If you've enjoyed this, make sure
you like on the YouTube channel, make sure you subscribe,
and you share this with other people. Leave us a comment,
give us a review. We love hearing back from you
guys as we're moving this podcast forward and we you're
building stronger marriages and a stronger families always. I'm Jay
and and this is love like crazy girl.
Hey, everybody, welcome back to lovel Like Crazy. Today, we
have a wonderful episode that we're going to talk about
different seasons of life that we walk through. And I
know that no matter where you are in life, if
you're maybe newly married, or you've been married for quite
some years, maybe you're an empty nester, maybe your single
mom or dad, we all experience this because seasons are
(00:44):
part of life.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Yeah, and we just want to give a big shout
out to all of our listeners. Thank you so much
for just following along, sharing to your friends the different
episodes that may minister to you and we hope this
will be one of them. And thank you to for
subscribing to our YouTube channel.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Yeah, it's not hard to hit that subscribe button on
that YouTube channel. Just go click and the next thing
you know, it let you know about different episodes that
are coming up. And we so appreciate you guys helping
us to grow this podcast.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
We also love all those listeners though on Spotify and
Apple and wherever else as well, so I'm going to
give them a shout out.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
To Well, I do love apples. So are you ready
for this?
Speaker 2 (01:30):
I'm ready for this. We're going to talk about navigating
changing seasons and maybe even talk a little bit about
how we had to do that.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
Yeah, and I know you love change.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
I do not love change. I don't really know too
many people who love change. But I'm really one of
those that I really don't like change at all.
Speaker 1 (01:51):
I know a lot of people who love to say things,
who love to say things like I love change, but
really they don't know.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
No, I don't really think there's anybody that it does.
I'm just I'm very much one that shoes away from
the sudden change is what throws me, you know, And
so I'm getting better at it, though.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
So I try to ease you into change, like we're
in the process of I'm trying to get you, hey,
let's build a new house, like right, Yeah, that I know,
she just kind of like shut down, like right.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
That would be that would be a sudden change.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
I saw it that.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Those those of you watching on YouTube, Yeah, that is
definitely something like that. We're going to have to talk
about a lot.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Well about the reason for that. This is I like
to build at the church. We've done a lot of construction.
I built this house for her some years ago, and
I'm like, you know, what as we get older, we
don't necessarily need house this big, and I'll build you
a brand new house. And she was kind of like,
you know, like.
Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah, you think that's enticing me, but.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
She's like, I'm not sure I want to stay where
I am.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
I like it, and you're very settled. Yeah, that would
be a big change.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
Well, seasons are a part of life. We know that
we have the seasons of you know, spring, summer, fall, winter,
and out of those seasons, I love fall and winter.
I love it whenever we get into as people would
say that pumpkin spice. You know, now I'm not into
that at whatever, but I do love as we get
into the fall, you know, the leaves start falling. Here
in Louisiana, we don't have changing leaf colors, leaf colors.
(03:27):
We it's green and then it's brown and then it
falls off the tree. So we don't really have a
lot of seasonal change like that. But I like it
whenever the weather kind of starts to change a little
bit and we can go outside, we you know, make
a fire in the fire pit, go to the camp,
hang out there a little bit. I love the wintertime.
She loves it whenever and there in the wintertime, I
can build a fire in the fireplace. So those seasonal
(03:49):
changes are something that we enjoy. And I know, we
got summertime people, wintertime people. Some people love it. It's
one hundred degrees nothing not with sko.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
I'm probably you're more falling winter, and I'm probably more
spring in summer. I do I like. I like the warm,
you know, summertime, being on the beach, are being on
the boat, are the boat, are the pool? And spring
is you know, very short here in Louisiana. And just
(04:19):
like we don't have a lot of color in our
in our leaves in the fall time, our spring is
so short, and so to where it's not too cold,
are not too hot because when it gets summertime, it's
hot hot.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
Yeah. Well, it's like we have what we call here
fake spring, and then second winter it's like, you you know,
things start, you know, blossoming, things start moving in the
right direction towards spring, and all of a sudden you
get a cold snap and it's in the thirties and
it's like what happened? And the plants and stuff are
so confused. But we're used to seasonal things. In fact,
(04:55):
a lot of people love to quote this. In Ecclesiastes
chapter three, We're Solomon talks about that basically there's a
time and a season for everything under heaven, and he
goes on to you know, a time to live, a
time to die, a time to mourn. He talks about,
you know, a time to plant, a time to harvest.
That you guys probably know the crux of it. He
(05:18):
goes through just basically talking about the seasons of life. Right,
and if you've never read through Ecclesiastes, Solomon is he's struggling.
He's at this place where he's kind of cynical with
some different things as he's working through some things within himself.
And as you go through the different seasons of life,
you can actually begin to get to that place. If
you're not careful, you can actually kind of get a
(05:39):
little cynical about different things. And so today we're going
to talk about that change. We're going to talk about
the different seasons of life and how we can navigate
those things appropriately. And to me, I know, one of
the things I've learned is navigating change appropriately is a
lot easier if you allow the Holy Spirit to lead
you and direct you than just coming up with good
ideas and fly by the CD of pants and so Stacey,
(06:02):
I know that for us, we talked about change, change
within our family. What is the biggest change that we've
ever experienced that you know.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Of the biggest change as a family was when we
made a huge move from Lafayette, living in Lafayette to Batinaries.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
Okay?
Speaker 2 (06:21):
Is that what you were thinking? Well, you got something else.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
But I also want to ask you this, what is
the biggest change that we've made as a married couple.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
As a married couple yep, becoming empty nesters? No, No,
what are you thinking?
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Well, I'm thinking like when we made the move from
we got married, we lived in Pineville for a couple
of years because that's where our family is, Okay, and
then we made that major step of moving from Pineville
to Lafayette to go step into ministry as our occupation.
That was major. Now, maybe it was made more major
for me because you had left and been away from
home for four years when you were at college, right,
(06:58):
And for me that was really the first time I
moved away.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Well. Yeah, when we were newly married just a few years,
we had an opportunity to go into full time ministry.
We were volunteer youth pastors working within the church where
we grew up, and so then we were offered this position,
and I remember we weighed out the pros and the cons,
(07:22):
you know, for this big change, and it was leaving
our family behind, you know, and everything that we knew
from growing up. Now, yeah, I had been away at
school and gone back. But then for us to make
that move as a married couple, I remember us saying, Okay, well,
these are the pros and these are the cons, and
(07:43):
if it doesn't really work out, that's okay, because we
can just easily pack up and move back home where
we grew up. But you know, it ended up working
out great. We lived in Lafayed, worked at a church there.
We lived there for eight years, seven or eight years,
and we had all of our three sons were born
(08:05):
during that time that we lived there, and it was
a great training season in ministry and uh and we
didn't live that far from our families.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
Our and twenty minutes.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Yeah, so we made trips often. Even with having little kids,
we were able to go back and forth. But it
was a big decision, and I think there was a
few times that after we moved that we thought, do
we make the right decision?
Speaker 3 (08:32):
You know?
Speaker 2 (08:33):
And but I look back and I think, you know,
it was it was a great season of our life.
And before we ended up making another major move.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Well, let me speak to that before we get to
that one, because I know for us it was a
it was a young married couple picking up roots and
moving to a different place. And it kind of felt
like we were stepping out and making a life on
our own. It's like we lived in close to our families,
we were always together. It's like we were kind of
stepping out on our own and we were experiencing this
(09:06):
ecclesiast Solomon's talking about an ecclesiaste, you know, the season
four what is upon us? And for everything there is
that time or season. It's like, Okay, we've lived at
home for this this period of time. We've got mom
and dad here fairly close, Granny fairly close. But now
we're stepping out and it's make it or break time.
I do remember though, as you said, we had the
(09:28):
conversation it was like, well, we don't have a house,
we don't have any kids, so there's really nothing holding
us here other than family.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
We could just take this step of faith if we wanted.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
To, and if we get there and it blows up
in our face, we can always move back. And you know,
the job that I had it was it was one
where I could probably turn around and get another You
were school teacher. I worked in finance, and so you know,
we can recover from this if it doesn't quite work
out the way that we thought. Little did we know
that was the Lord's plan. We go step into that.
We trained for where we are now, and we made
(09:59):
a lot of great friends when we lived in I
loved Lafayette, absolutely loved it. The food unbelievable and.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
We still have friends you know that are family.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
The people there are are just awesome. There were a
couple of places we said we've lived in Louisiana. There
were a couple of places that we said we will
never live at Louisiana, but Lafayette was top of the list.
And that was a great season for us of being there,
a great season. That was the season that we began
to discover that within us there were these things that
(10:29):
needed to be dealt with us. When we began to
step out and really get help, that have brought some
healing aspect to our marriage. But beyond that, we learned
about being responsible financially. We learned about buying our first home.
I think we bought a mobile home. We lived in
that a few years, and then we bought a house
and we redid that. So, man, we learned so much
(10:51):
during that season. And I really do think not only
do we learn dependence on God, we really learned dependence
on one another and one another.
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Yeah, it was definitely a time where a season where
we were able to grow. You know, there was a
lot of growth spiritually and within our marriage at the time.
And I do know that there were some of the
ones who we were so young when we made that
(11:19):
move that we found out later they were like, we
didn't think you were going to last long at all.
We thought y'all are going to get homesick and you
were going to move. And we were like, no, we
were you know, we want to We wanted to step
out on our own and we wanted to to, you know,
try something new. And it was it worked, it worked
out good for us, you know, but there there were
(11:41):
all there were often times like oh, did we make
the right decision?
Speaker 3 (11:45):
You know?
Speaker 1 (11:45):
But I think every every place you want always place
that you you're going to go to You're always going
to have those times that are discouraging, and that's where
the devil wants to come in and try to cause
you to you know, to question or to you know,
question God's plan or question each other. Right, And it's
like that I was going to say this to me.
That's really when we began to work and kind of
(12:08):
form together as a team. You know, before that, we
were just young, dumb and in love.
Speaker 2 (12:13):
Okay, yeah, very newly married at the time. Yeah, it's
true because I mean the decisions that we had to make, Yeah,
we needed to pull together, and it formed more of
a team mindset I think for us. And yeah, there
was a lot of growth during that time. And I
(12:33):
think even even when they're I don't want to make
it sound like there were never any challenges, because there
definitely were, and those were the things that brought about
a lot of growth in our marriage at the time.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
Well, and I know that when we stepped from there,
you've already alluded to this. The biggest step that we made,
not as a married couple but as a family was
whenever we decided to the Lord opened the door and
we picked up roots and we moved here to and
Rouge to pastor right.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
Yeah, that was a really big, a big change and
a big decision. Like I was very settled living in Lafayette.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Loved her house. I had just built a big old
patio on the back of the house where they swing
for her to sit in.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
And I loved my swing. And you know, I had
my friends. I was settled there. All three of my boys,
you know, they had their their little friends at church.
And it was a comfort.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
It was comfort.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
It was it was comfortable. And and I think that
I had already had so so many other sudden changes
in my life, like we've talked about in other episodes.
You know, I lost my mom when I was younger,
and just just things in life had happened, which was
a lot of sudden change. And so whenever you approached
(13:51):
me about you know, hey, there's this church in Baton Rouge.
You know, I think we need to check into this.
I know you were. My response My response was not oh,
this is great.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Yeah. It was not like we'll praise the Lord.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
It was it it was like, get the behind me, Satan.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
Yeah. I probably did not respond the best way in
the beginning. I was very defensive like, no, I don't
I don't want to give up my my home. And
now I'm settled.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Well, actually, at first you were somewhat receptive to it
because I don't think it was real at.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
That point, so you were just talking.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
We were just talking. And then it, you know, when
we made contact and gave a resume. That's whenever it
became real, because they wanted to talk to us. And
I remember we went over, we interviewed with the board.
We actually they wanted me to come preach one Sunday,
So we went and we preached, and it was so
funny because the boys, we had them all dressed a
little Khaki's.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
Little little shouting shirts.
Speaker 1 (14:50):
And we drive there and we the first thing that
happens we get out in the parking lot and Tyler
he pukes all over his shoes because he got carse hit.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
And I thought, there's a.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
There's a sign from the way this is not for us.
So anyway, we go through this process. We preach, we
go eat lunch with the board and spend time with them.
And I told Stacy said, don't worry about it. They're
going to interview me and talk to me further. Little
did I know that all the wives were going to
have her off in the other room more or less
interviewing her and grilling her. So we got into a
(15:22):
little interrogated Yes, we get in with vehicle with the boys.
We were heading out and we're like, let's get out
of here as quick as we can. This is not
for us. And so we had agreed to go back
Wednesday night speak again. They wanted to hear Stacy speak,
so we went back to fulfill the obligation. And literally
while we're there that night, it's kind of like the
Lord spoke to both of us, like this is where
(15:42):
you're supposed to be. And I remember us driving over
the Missippi River bridge leaving out of bad Rigi and
we're discussing vision. We're discussing we could do this and that,
and it kind of looked at each other like wait,
I thought we weren't coming here. And that's when we
realized like, okay, the Lord is in this.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
Yeah, So all of a sudden, we just we had
a lot of vision and we could really see some
things happening.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
So it's starting to get real. And what happens is
they have a vote of the board. This took place
over a course of about a month and they got together,
they voted. They said, hey, we want to extend the
call to you guys to come be our pastor. And
I remember I hang up the phone, I walk in
our little house there, Carracra walk in till Stacy. They
(16:27):
want us to come be the pastors there. And this
is her response. She says, well, you can go if
you want to, but I'm not going.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
That was something else. Yeah, I know that wasn't the
best response. That I was not being a very supportive
life at that time. Yeah, I think it really like
it hit home and it dawned on me, Oh that
means I'm actually packing up.
Speaker 3 (16:53):
My life is going to be disrupted.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Yeah, and it's going to change. And so I really
got a little fearful, to be honest.
Speaker 1 (17:01):
Well, noticed what had happened when we moved to laugh
Yet we didn't have a house, we didn't have kids,
no big deal for this doesn't work.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
And we had the backup plan of hey we can
go back no home.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
But now we have a house, we got three kids.
You know, we have our friends in a life here.
So if this blows up in our face, well we're
going to be in a bind.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
Yeah, yeah, it was. It was a much bigger decision
and just more responsibility, more weighing on that decision than before.
Speaker 1 (17:28):
And here's what's crazy about it, because everybody says, oh, well,
had y'all prayed about it? Absolutely, we had prayed about it.
We had prayed together, we had prayed separately. The entire
thing was Okay, if this moves in this direction, it's
the Lord. Because we had prayed about it, and we
both felt comfortable in our hearts like that this is
this is if it goes in this direction, we're comfortable with.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
Yeah. I think I just realized that, you know, in
making that kind of big change, I mean, I remembered
when we moved, you know, to life yet there was
an adjustment period. You know, we didn't know anyone and
so so there was you know, some awkwardness and just
just the things that you deal with when you when
(18:10):
you're starting over somewhere fresh, and and I think I
was thinking, I don't necessarily want to do that again,
but but yeah, pray, we prayed about it, and I
came around. I think it was fairly quickly.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
I don't know, let me say this, because what what
made laugh yet a little bit easier. You're right, we
didn't know anybody. The people in laughing yet. The Cajun
people are very welcoming, very open uh to to having people.
But here here's the thing that takes the season. They're
going to watch you. They want to make that you
make sure that you're sincere, you are who you say
(18:43):
you are. And so it was probably about a six
month to a year period they were inviting us to stuff,
but we didn't really feel like part of the family.
And what happens with the Cajun people. Once they take
you in, you're in. You are family. And so there,
I mean, there's friends that we will call there, you know,
to this day, and they are family to us. And
(19:03):
that's how the Cajun people are. And so it had
taken the culture. It had taken that period of time
for us to get there. But we've been there eight
years and this this is our family. We love these people.
It's a major change. So I go to her and
I say, hey, they want us, they want us to
come be the pastors there. They want us to come
back and preach. They're going to have a churchwide vote,
but they feel pretty confident that that you know this
(19:24):
is going to happen. So they want to extend this
call to us, and Stacy says, you can go if
you want to, but I'm not going. So my mind
and this is what I told her. Is a very
emotional moment. She starts crying and I said, well, that
this is then then I'm going to have to you know,
I've already told you know, the pastor that that we
if this goes in this direction, like we're we're moving
(19:46):
to baton Rouge. He's fully behind us, fully supportive of us.
But we've already moved in this direction. We've already you know,
pulled this trigger. We can't take it back. And so
you know, I can get a job off shore, I
can go work at at and t something of that nature.
I go back into finance and she's like, well whatever,
but we ain't going to baton Rouge. And so I'm
just kind of like, oh my gosh. And I remember
(20:08):
telling her this to her, what is more important to
me than ministry is my family is you and my family.
So I'm not willing to make this move if it's
going to disrupt our marriage and our family. We have
to do this together. We've got to be in unity
about this. And so fast forward from that conversation. Two
hours later, I'm in the living room. She comes in,
(20:31):
she's crying, and I give her a hard time. She said,
she's crying, and.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
I'm like what.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
She's like, what's I'm like, what's wrong. She's like, I
know that we're supposed to go to Baton Rouge. I'm
just scared.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
That was the truth.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
And I remember grabbing you and hugging you and telling you,
you know what, it's going to be okay because we're
in this together.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Yeah, we're going to do this together, and.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
The Lord is going to go before us and make
a way.
Speaker 3 (21:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
And it was kind of like she softened in that moment.
I remember we prayed together and then we launch out
into this massive decision and now here we've been here
for twenty three years.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, And I do think not only was it that
I was I was scared for me, but then I
was like worried about my kids. Though they were very young.
They were like what three, five and seven I think
at the time, so it really which was really a
good age for them to make a move like this.
I think I was concerned, you know, about them being
(21:37):
settled and have the stability. You know. That was something
that I was definitely mindful of and intentional to to
make sure that there was consistency and stability for my kids.
So any kind of routine that they had before, I
(21:58):
would try to, you know, duplicate that and just be
mindful to make it a smooth transition for them. And
and I mean it did. It worked out just fine.
I hate that I did have those initial initial feelings
in the beginning, and.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
I think that that's that's the human side of it.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
It is, and I.
Speaker 1 (22:19):
Think what it did was it helped draw us closer together.
Speaker 3 (22:21):
And really.
Speaker 1 (22:24):
You saw through that, hey, you know, this is something
that we've made this decision together. We're in unity about this.
But from my perspective, I think you saw it like
I've got this, I'm.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
Going to take care of you and I'm going to
take care.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
Of the family, right, And so it was it was
a big change, and we navigated it well, I thought.
I mean, there's always difficulties when you change. You weren't
necessarily changing careers. We were still in ministry, but it
was a change because you became the senior pastor and
(22:58):
not just a staff pastor, so that that was different,
and I became the worship pastor, and I want.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
To be being a pastor on staff, as a children's pastor,
associate pastor, whatever role we held during the time, or
whatever roles. You know, actually you might be listening to
this and maybe you are on staff somewhere to church.
That staff role is amazing. We absolutely loved it, but
whenever you step into that lead role, there's a lot
more responsibility on your shoulders. Fortunately for us, the church
(23:29):
was much much smaller at that time. I think on
average we fell around thirty thirty five people. And what's
really kind of cool about that because we followed the
leading of the Lord and what he has done over
these years bringing us to the place where we actually
wind up launching a new church. We have two campuses now.
I have reached so many people in the community and
that's a direct result of two things. First of all,
(23:52):
just God moving and second of all, I believe us
being obedient to what the Lord had for us as
a husband and wife asters and as a family.
Speaker 2 (24:01):
Well, and I want to say, because we were obedient
to the leading of the Holy Spirit, you know, he
had provision for us when when we got here whatever
was needed for us personally and for our kids. You know,
the Lord, we saw his hand of faithfulness, you know,
(24:22):
to take care of us. And so again, it was
a lot of different situations that brought growth, you know,
to us as a family and as a as a couple.
But I'm very thankful that that we were obedient and
that we are here and able to serve in this
(24:45):
community the way that we have over all these years.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
And great church family there in that time that that
was very There were challenges along the way, there were
different things, obstacles that we came up against, and but
but good church family who always stuck with us through
those different things. And I'm to say it like this,
two things that came through that season of change. First
of all, we decided to be in unity with each
other and with God. And the second thing was you decided,
(25:09):
I'm going to listen to what the Holy Spirit saying here,
not my fear, not my feelings. And you decided to
listen to him instead of aligning those emotions to lead you.
Because too many times we let our emotions step in
and lead us. And it works the other way as well,
because I'll say this just because something looks good. Just
because something sounds like a good idea does not necessarily
(25:31):
mean that it's God. You better be in unity with
your spouse because there are a lot of times that
I've had ideas and I'm like, what about this this
and this sounds so good, and you're just kind of like,
I can't get a peace about this, And so because
of us operating in unity and as a team, might
back off something and then later down the road you
see like, whoa, that was not a good thing. Thank
(25:52):
goodness that you know, and vice versa as well.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
Yeah, I really do believe that it's important that we
you know, we pray about these these changes that we make,
and that we're led by the Holy Spirit and that
we follow peace. You know, it's it's risky, you know,
it can be risk taking to make a change like
a career change or a big move or or something
(26:17):
to that magnitude. But if you have peace and your
hearten and your spirit about it and your inunity, then
and you know that God is all over it, then
take that step of faith and see him do his thing.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
Well, we're talking about the different seasons of life, big
changes that we are, big steps that we take. I
think that for us, this whole thing was a learning process,
moving to laughy At, moving to Baton Rouge, because it
really helped bring us to the place where we functioned
as a married couple. Of everything that we did from there,
(26:52):
raising the kid's decisions, regarding the kid's decisions about you know,
buying a home together, we always made the decison vision
that when we make these decisions, we're going to be
in unity. We're going to function as a team. Now,
you have done a great job of you know, we
know that the Bible talks about the role of spiritual
leadership that God gives the husband, and you've done a
(27:14):
great job of leaning on me in that direction and
have allowed me to make the decisions. But with that said,
I don't like making those decisions if I know that
they're going to be disturbing to you and if you're
not feeling peace about those things. So, really, what we've
learned above everything we talk about unity, but functioning as
a team, doing things together, making decisions together, and especially
(27:38):
with the kids. And so you go through all of
this and now we've brought the boys through elementary through
teenage years, through college. Then they start getting married off
and the next thing, you know, I would say that
for me, I'll let you you talk about you know,
the biggest one was moving to Baton Rouge. One of
the biggest ones for me is empty nesting and person
(28:00):
I thoroughly have enjoyed my kids getting.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
Out of here.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
You are the most excited about the boys being gone,
and I was over here crying, Yeah, you know, crying.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Well, let me say it like this. I think that
the reason for that is because it may have been different. No,
it probably would have been different if it was girls,
because I don't necessarily like my friend Casey, he's got
all girls. He and Wendy have all girls, and he's like,
I wanted my girls to live at.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
Home forever because you're so protected.
Speaker 1 (28:27):
Well, because you're protective, you're worried about them moving out
starting a life. But for boys, you're excited about them stepping.
Speaker 3 (28:33):
Out into they're becoming men, their career, all these different things,
building a family, and so there's that, but not only that,
I was just excited for them to move out, so
I had you all to myself well, and.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
And again that empty nesting, that was it was a
change of season. I mean, things were not going to
remain the same. They weren't going to live at home anymore.
It wasn't going to be the same kind of interaction.
I wasn't going to see them as as often, and
I do. I see you all the time, and I'm
(29:11):
very blessed by it. But you know it, it really
was probably I would say, as the mom, it was
the bigger change to I'm not going to say it
wasn't as difficult as like making a move to a
different city or what it was. It was different. It
(29:31):
was it was a true it was a true life change.
You know. We had hit some milestones. They had graduated
high school and they'd gone to college, and they were
getting married, and we had celebrated these There was that
excitement of yes, they're stepping out on their own, and
we're so proud of them and what they've accomplished. And
(29:52):
I remember after the last one was married, we high five.
Do you remember that? We were like high five? We
did it. We we we got them successfully into adulthood.
And so so that was really a time of celebration
for us. But it did take me a little bit
longer than it took you to get used to. You know,
(30:13):
them not being here all the time, though we do
see them often. They all have bought a home nearby.
We do talk to them on the phone and we
do get to see them. But honestly, things really changed
when they're like, it gave us a lot more freedom
(30:34):
and we could just have been travel and.
Speaker 1 (30:37):
There have been those times where we're like, you know,
I know one time we left and we went to
Waco because you wanted to go to the Magno you know, yeah,
and we wanted to go eat cookies there and you
spend my money and all that kind of stuff. But
I remember we were driving there and one of the
boys called and it was like, you know, hey, what
are you doing? And you were like, we're on our
way to Waco, Texas And they were like what yeah,
(30:59):
And it was just kind of we didn't even tell them.
It was just kind of a shock. They were like,
why are you going?
Speaker 2 (31:02):
Awake them?
Speaker 1 (31:03):
We're like, we're just getting away for a couple of
days because we.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
Can go if we want to go do that now,
you know.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
And you know, it was kind of like that that
shock on their end, But it was I'm enjoying this
season of life just being able to go and do
and being with you. And so I would say this
out of all of this, we're talking about navigating the
different seasons. When Solomon's talking in Ecclesiastes three about the
different seasons that we face in life, they are inevitable.
(31:30):
Some seasons you will feel more than other seasons. Uh,
you know, it's kind of like this, you know, time
to live in, a time to die. There are ones
that you will lose and you will walk through that
season and grief. You're definitely going to feel that a
lot more than other things that you experience in life.
And so some seasons will affect you in different ways,
and it's.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
Okay to make those and feel sad.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Exactly for us, I know that what has helped us
to navigate change these different seasons is togetherness, making sure
that we are together, making sure that we are functioning
as a team, making sure that we are in unity
about things. As a man, as a husband, leaning into
my wife and asking, or you know, do you feel
(32:14):
peace about this? Not just being like I'm the man,
I'm going to make this decision, but leaning on this
one that God has given to me for me to
share in life with to be helped me as we
see in Genesis chapter two. We want to be in
unity together, so leaning into her and saying, hey, are
you feeling peace about this? And if she's not, then
maybe I need to press into the Lord a little
bit harder because that we should be together on this.
(32:37):
And so for me personally, that is probably the greatest
way to navigate change, to face different seasons that you're
going to encounter. And you said this earlier, listening to
the voice of the Holy Spirit, because there are things
that we will face that will be fearful, like a
big move, and it might make you a little nervous.
I know for me personally, whenever we wound up launching
(32:57):
a new church, the facilities we have, we we sold
those facilities, and I remember we were leaving to go
sit in a closing to sign away those facilities, and
we were at a place where we had purchased property,
but we had no building at that time to hold
services in. And I was I was confident that the
Lord was leading in this direction, but I was nervous
because I'm going to this closing to sign on behalf
(33:20):
of the church to make a sale. And I remember
you asked me and said, do you want me to
go with you, and I'm like, yeah, yeah, I do.
I want you to go with me because you know
we can you can help me be at peace praying
for you. And so we prayed the whole way there,
and so listening to the voice of the Holy Spirit.
And you said this earlier. It is the most powerful
thing that you can do as a husband and wife,
(33:40):
as a married couple to navigate those changes.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
That's right. And so now that now we're in this
new season with our grandkids and we're loving that as well.
And so you know, enjoy I think too. You navigate
the big changes that you have, but then you need
to enjoy the different seasons that you that you rest
in as well.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
I think that's probably the biggest thing. And just enjoy
the season that the Lord has you in.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
And so I'm going to keep praying about whether we
build another house or not.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
Oh, it's happening, always happening. You don't know this, but
I went to a closing yes today and sold this house.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
Oh you do not? Oh that would that would be
a whole nother podcast.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
Yes, all right, Well, look, it's been a lot of
fun talking about this because this is something that I
don't care who you are. We're going to face different
seasons in life and we've had a good time sharing
this with you today. So walk in unity with the Lord,
walking unity with your spouse, be together, function as a
team because that is so powerful. You have anything you
want to have when we wrap this up.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Teamwork is important, Stay in unity and follow peace.
Speaker 1 (34:43):
What does it say teamwork makes the dream dream work?
Speaker 3 (34:45):
All Right?
Speaker 1 (34:46):
I love it. Listen. If you've enjoyed this, make sure
you like on the YouTube channel, make sure you subscribe,
and you share this with other people. Leave us a comment,
give us a review. We love hearing back from you
guys as we're moving this podcast forward and we you're
building stronger marriages and a stronger families always. I'm Jay
and and this is love like crazy girl.
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