Joshua Keith Craft

0:52 I think that's when you start to step in general into maturity. is when you stop to stop thinking about just really what everything is means to you. Yeah. And and a defining moment becomes about what that means to other people or what you meant to other people. Like I have a you know there's a Viktor Frankl and Man's Search for Meaning. He talks about how the question of meaning is not a question that we get to ask. It's a question that we get to answer. Very meaning of our life. It's a paraphrase, but he says it really well in the book. But the meaning of our life consists of, you know, every day we're asked questions and the meaning of our life consists of our answers to those questions. Like the way I interpret that is the meaning of my life is not what I think it means, it's what it means to other people. And I have people in my life that my life needs to be meaningful to. Mhm. And so what I can't do is have a negative perspective on my past because that puts me in a place where I have a negative perspective on my present and then I'll build a negative future. Well, if I have a negative perspective on my present, what I start to do is think that well, and I've always had this really interesting relationship to this stuff in general because I don't get validation from I'm not saying this cuz I think I'm a weirdo. It's just I don't get validation from the same places that maybe other people do, especially in my position.

2:14 Yeah. Like I've I'd agree with that. I've I I speak a lot. I don't get I don't care about crowds. You're the guy that's trying to hide everything you do. Yeah. I mean, I don't want to know anybody. I mean, it's just it's just weird. Appreciate being your friend, dude. Well, one of the things I say to people, I probably said this to you when we first became friends, is um if you're going to be my friend, you're really going to understand, uh you're really going to have to be the initiator in our relationship cuz I'll never think about you. I know. I'm going to break the code, dude. And I'm not saying that negatively. I just like people that have really been my friends in life, they understand uh with for lack of a better way of saying it, they understand how weird I am that I'm just I'm not really naturally in who I am. I'm a if you see me at church or you see me in public, I'm a very relational person. Yeah, you are very caring. I'm I'm not that way actually in my life. Like I'm not actually super relational. I'm I'm I have a lot going on inside my head.

3:14 internal for me to be fake. I'm in. But um what I've realized in my life and what I continue to realize is there's stuff that you want to do and there's things that there's stuff that you want to do. There's things that people need you to do and there's what God's called you to do. And these are like three different things. Sometimes they're all in alignment and it's like that's the most beautiful day of your life. Yeah, you know, the most beautiful day of your life is when what you want to do, what people need, and what God wants are all in alignment. Amazing. Um, it's very challenging the other 24 hours, 23 hours of the day where those three things aren't often in alignment and I have to decide which one I'm going to step into. Yeah. Right. So for me, a lot of my journey has been uh looking at what God's called me to do or even what I've decided to do that is what people need and going, "Well, this is not at all what I want."

4:13 Right? And does that does that would that be enough, you know, would that be enough for me to like feel like I'm living a good life or, you know, can can I can I pause you for a second cuz I think you just said something that really uh is the three things you just listed out. I think that's actually really profound because as I'm sitting here, this is one of the things I love about doing this. I feel like I process in real time. And so I'm sitting there thinking about God's ability to love us because he is love, but also he needs nothing from us, which so that he's he it's like that that understanding the actual nature of God. I started to go down that and I was like, I don't think my finite brain is quite able to grasp that. But for us, when we're talking about defining our past and redefining things, you just said it's either what you want to do, what you need to do, or what you're called to do. Now, what's so interesting about that is this is really what it is to define moments is what are you it's what are you relating it to, right?

5:07 Because if you're relating things to what you want, like you said, it's going to be a lot of pain. What your dad said, it's it's stories told from a selfish place, right? And but I think where we begin to become um where we become begin to become overcomers and where we can really truly change the story of our life which is so closely tied to our identity and where we can step into who God's made us to be is when we begin to relate the stories of our life not to what we wanted not to what the timeline that we thought not to what was normal or the other people we knew or your family but when you step out and you relate it to an eternal timeline and see God's purpose in the earth and then see that actually you're just you just play a part in that purpose. Now, what is that? It's exactly what you just said. It really isn't about you. And we hear it isn't about you and we go like, "Oh, yeah." Because it sounds like a humble thing to say. But when you actually understand the whole of what's going on is that God created and that he's introducing himself to us. That it was all it was always about he wanted to he he like he didn't create us from a place of need, but from a place of want as a father. And you start to go like, "Oh, wait.

6:05 That now that now you've changed. You can redefine moments because now it's not in relation to like, oh, but I thought this." It's like, okay, this is this this is what I'm relating to is this eternal line. And man, that that that is a whole different perspective. Well, it's it's really hard, though. I mean, I think like like Joel, who's sitting here helping us record this podcast, this is the conversation me and him were having before you got here. Oh, really? Yeah. Cuz we were He was like, "Man, does that just mean you confine yourself to a miserable existence?" You know, because my my thing is look like like we all we everyone who's a Christian, they they're like, I follow Jesus, right? And that that means I model my life after his. And then the and then Jesus goes to the garden of Gethsemane and he says, well, not my will but yours be done to the point where he's sweating blood. He just so doesn't want to do what he's being asked to do. Right.

6:57 Um is that the Jesus that I'm following? Like cuz cuz you know, do I get to pick? cuz I don't want that part. Like I don't want to I don't want the part where I have to sacrifice a lot of what I want or even any of that for the sake of what God wants, right? And I think that's a very true thing in all of our life. It's not like um it's it's you know and and the way I grew up the way you you grew up too like growing up in church it's like oh God please don't send me to India. I I don't want to be I was it was Africa. I don't want to be some African like oh God please don't send me out to the bush somewhere. Right. And um that's that's a that's a very simplistic way to me of looking at it because if you look at your life and you look at your past and you ask yourself this question, did have I gotten to do what I want in life? Pretty much everyone's answer is going to be no, right? You know, yeah, it's not gone exactly how you want.

7:47 I mean, my my I thought I was in college. I thought I was going to be a documentary filmmaker. I thought I was going to be in the creative world. You're well on your way, dude. Um not doing any of that. Right. There there's been so many things in my life that I've felt like, okay, this is just about to happen. This is what I'm supposed to do. And then it all is over. I go, okay, let's re recalibrate. Cuz I I I go down this road of like pursuing something that I want. And then it's like there's a reset that happens. So it's like, okay, there's probably some things I need to learn there, right? Then then the other then the other question is still not that great of a question. And cuz that's that's a lot of people's story I think too is them saying, "Well, did I do what everyone needed me to do?" Which means how good of a people pleaser were you? Yeah. You know, and so a lot of people they have this perspective on life that they've they've given their whole life and they've sacrificed everything to do what other people need even though that's what they knew that they shouldn't be doing. And so there's a balance to doing what people need.

8:42 Like I there are so many people in my life that I piss them off. I'm very disappointing for them. I'm very frustrating for them because I don't do what they need me to do, right? I'm not because my one time I was um working creative work, you you see this all the time, right? You work in the marketing world like every client comes to you and they're just just some some clients very few clients are very easy to work with. Most of them are very difficult. Right. Right. They're just so hard. They don't understand this world. They don't even understand what they're asking. And you just live in this constant state of like I would have people come to me and they'd be like, "Let's make a we need to make a viral video." Oh, that's easy, dude. Yeah. Just he's like, "Okay, well, what's your what you guys idea?" We don't have any. It's just film a bunch of videos. And you know, like I was working one time with someone who works in the immigration world. Okay. Okay. And they they help people get certain visas. Like not a cool industry.

9:35 I mean, it's it's makes money, but not like, "Oh, that's so cool. It's so like high-tech." And so this person's like, "We need to promote our business. to make a viral video. Like, well, I don't know. This was way before these modern modern like we could probably come up with some cool creative stuff with ice, but that's probably not what we'd want to do is be controversial. Yeah. So, we'll help you avoid ICE or whatever. Like, you know, but so this person was like, I we just need to make a viral video. You don't understand how viral videos work. So, I would I would live in this space and then I and then I joined the church world, which honestly was way worse. Like I would rather do regular client work than do church work 100 days out of a 100 because then you go work at a church and all these different people that are leaders within the church want all these different projects from you all the time, right? And everybody's a little bit mad at you because you're sabotaging their ministry if you don't give them the creative project, right? You can tell they don't have any pain that's associated.

10:29 No, you've totally settled all this, man. you're demonstrating what it is to have defined I go to my I go to my mom one time and I'm like I'm working for my parents so at that time and I'm like I I I'm sorry I can't do this job. She's like what do you mean? I go I everyone's just mad at me like you y'all got to get someone in here who's not going to disappoint everybody. And she said something man that this statement this statement honestly it changed my life for real. She said you know what I just think you need to choose who you're willing to disappoint. And I sat there and I was like 23 years old and I go, I can do that. Yeah, I can choose. I can listen to someone's expectations of me. Yeah. And say to myself, yeah, I'm not doing any of that. I didn't know that was an option. I thought it was like you were still 12-year-old Josh. Like, man, I'm still 12-year-old Josh like needing to do what the teacher says to me so I don't get in trouble. So that that set me on this course, and this is like again talking about defining moments.

11:23 that set me on this course where I realized I don't need to I can't be what everyone needs me to be. I can't I can't step into meeting everybody's needs. Right? That's that's how you that's how you live a life that's just not not burned out. It's just something else. It's not even really sacrificial. It's like that's how you become a martyr, right? Really is you go, well, I'm just going to make sure everyone else has what they need and doesn't, you know, it doesn't I don't matter at all. That's the a really bad way to approach it. So my encouragement is just choose who you're willing to disappoint. So there's a lot of people in my life who I don't disappoint or there's a there's a there's a short list. There's less than five people in my life who I'm unwilling to disappoint. Um there's a list that's 150,000 I don't even know, right? A billion people long full of people that I'm more than willing to disappoint. I'm willing to disappoint commenters.

12:19 I'm willing to disappoint church people. I'm willing to disappoint. On and on and on I could go. So my defining moments aren't based on what people need from me, right? Because if I if I if I lean to me, if I if I lean too far that direction, what I end up doing is I base my sense of self-worth on whether or not external people approved of what I did. Yeah. Now what real quick man on that I think what's um you know it's it's so funny to hear you talk about how you you get like the the ability to disappoint people but one of the one of the underlying things there cuz you know who else disappointed people was Jesus and cuz one of the underlying things and something I've observed well he's still disappointing the Jews to this day he's not the Messiah's disappointment right but but I mean even his own followers were like man you know they they watched they didn't like the his death I think there was there was a prophecy I was just reading about where it says his death will seem will will mean seem to mean nothing to to his followers now and like imagine you're like man and like even when they're walking on the road the to Emmaus they're talking about they're like we thought you know we thought he was the Messiah he was a prophet great in power indeed and they're talking to Jesus obviously they don't know and he opens up their eyes and I kind I think that I like the story of the you know Jesus says unless you drink drink my blood and eat my flesh you'll have no part of my kingdom they're all like peace and the Bible says this was a hard saying and many left and then he looked at the 12 and he goes goes, "Are you guys going to leave too?"

13:42 And Peter's like, "We got nowhere to go, man. Where are we going, man? We've left everything." Jesus's like kind of life and ministry was kind of a little bit filled with Yeah. But but probably human disappointment related. But here's why. Here's why I think that is and what and part of what you're saying because to me the answer to all of this about who do I disappoint, how do I do all these things because we've kind of veered off towards that is I think the more that you grow in love because you gave the client example and what I was literally just talking about this to somebody who's inexperienced. I said, you know what, the more experienced I get, the better I am at at knowing the difference between what a client actually wants and what they're asking for. And that comes because I' I've got a lot of reps, man. People start ask like if someone said, "Oh, we need to do a viral video." My first thing I would ask him like, "What do you what do you want to accomplish with that viral video?" Because a lot of times, and this is humanity, well, if I do this, then this is going to happen. And then we're wrong, right? And so, the difference between us and God is that God knows. And so, like, we're very we're really bad at knowing what we need.

14:37 And I think that's where you can you can sometimes disappoint people, but actually be doing the best for them from a place of flowing in with the Holy Spirit, from a place of growing in love, which is the hallmark of maturity, is that like cuz what would make Jesus want to pour it all out, man? Like, I'm getting ready to play Jesus this weekend. recording this is Good Friday and dude I this is my third year in a row of being Jesus is a is you know a huge honor to play Jesus in the play and every year the garden of Gethsemane scene like I cry on stage for real and every time even in practice dude like I' i'm yet to do it where I don't have tears in my eyes and I cuz I can't like it it hits me every time Jesus really didn't want to do this he had the deepest connection with God as his father yeah however however much as a human being you cannot want to do something like whatever the max level of that is which none of us have experienced, right? Even though he knew how important it was.

15:29 Yeah. None of us have experienced that level of anguish and despair where you're like I mean I think about that too like with Abraham being willing to sacrifice Isaac where God's like go kill your son, right? So, you know, I like I'm just I'm just while you're talking, I'm just bringing that to the forefront that this is, you know, the the however however hard anything's ever been for any of us, like add a add a million times to it and that's yeah, that's what you're asking. And even with such great purpose, like he knew what he was doing. It wasn't like he was like, "Oh, I wonder how this is going to work out, but I trust you." Like he knew who he was. He knew Yeah. Like it it was not like it was not like he was sitting there going like, "Oh, I'm not sure about this." Yeah. Exactly. like, "Oh, well, I guess I guess this is what I'm supposed to." He knew, right? And he knew what he was fulfilling scripture. He got and prophesied a third a third of the Bible's prophecy. It's like it was all and yeah, he's bringing the new covenant. He says it before. I mean, before the garden, he said this is the this blood.

16:22 And he's still And he's still having a hard time, right? And but like so I can only surmise because I mean I love what I think it's Paul writes in Philippians 2 where he talks about take the same attitude that Christ had. He did not consider equality. Yeah. He did not consider equality with God to be grasped. Even though he was God and he poured himself out. And so to me, I look at that like as we grow in love and as we grow in maturity, we will pour ourselves out. But what that doesn't mean is that we we don't become people pleasers. We learn to love people the way they need to be loved. And that comes from a place of knowing what they actually need as opposed to what they want in the moment. That to me is is a maturity where you can disappoint someone and it can be the best thing for them. Uh and unfortunately it doesn't always end up that neatly because they still have a choice in it. But to me, that's how I see those things. But but like um you know, going back to the the the what we're comparing ourselves to to give meaning, I think that that all comes from a place of eternity. And this is what I mean when I watch these shows, just kind of tying a you know, close my own story loop for in my head. When I watch those shows, Mad Men and that movie Hitman, this is to me what is so missing is because the it's this small little world of just me as if that works. And it's like, no, until you like look at your life in the context of God's whole story on earth, you're going to misinterpret so much, man.

17:37 So, and that's the third thing is like, you know, to me, that's the way I see it is uh how much of my life is something I'm called to, you know, um that God created me for that is maybe not something I would choose for myself. And there's this weird there's this weird um alignment synergy. It's like a dance of gifts and talents that God's given us and abilities and greatness that's within us that has to be developed and then how God wants to use that. And sometimes God wants to use that in a way that we want. Yeah. Sometimes God wants to use that in a way that seems like we're not being used at all. It's like just the the so there's a sovereignty aspect to how God is. And when you when you understand that about your life. So if I understand that about Jesus and I understand this this dynamic that is really there's a pattern all throughout scripture of this but this dynamic of there's a story that God's writing that I'm not the main character in but I play a part in. you know, Epictetus uh he talked about he's a Stoic philosopher and he talked about how u the life is a play right and they he used this perspective he wasn't a Christian but I think this is very much how it works life is a play and you don't get to decide your part you just get to decide if you play your part well right so I I I personally have this really great belief in the sovereignty of God that God has a great plan for humanity has a great plan for the world God has a great plan for the future I don't know the future I don't I love the future future. I I would love to live there. I don't know what it's going to be like, right? Um but God does. And so there's a part that he wants me to play right now that's maybe a predictive element of that future that will require more sacrifice than I think it will require, you know, and and if Jesus if Jesus did that and I follow him, I should expect that I'll have moments like that. Like I should expect that I'll have moments in my life where I'm like, "God, I don't want to do this."

19:40 Like this is this please use somebody else. Please ask somebody else. Please don't let me don't don't allow me to be the person that's having to experience whatever this experience is. And a lot of times it's a sacrificial experience. It's it's not dying on the cross like thank God, but it's something else that's attached to that. And I've had I've had, you know, at 38 now, it's like I thought I would have those experiences in my 20s and they would be developmental. Like I continue to have experiences like that. And I'm my my response is okay, God, you just you know what you're doing. Like I'm just trying my best. I'm trying my best to be who you need me to be, who who I feel like you want me to be. I'm trying my best to and and you know, we have to and we talked about this a few episodes ago when we were talking about Rian and everything that y'all navigated that week. But you have to relinquish outcomes.

20:31 Yes. So you get to this point in your life and and I think I think we often don't realize how much we're focused on outcomes. So when I think about my destiny, what I want like telling a story selfishly, what I'm thinking about is I need the outcome to look like this. Like I I need for this to happen for me to feel what I need to feel or for me to experience what I feel like God's called me to experience. And that's really not the the journey. I think the journey is you have a part to play. Yeah. Play your part and the way the way I see it is like a you know when you when you play football or you play a team sport you have a position that you play and there's plays that get called on the field and you have a part to play in the play. You're probably not going to get the ball. Like I played basketball growing up and 90% of the game of basketball is played without the ball in your hand.

21:23 Right. Right. So, if you're if you're if you're a on a five-man team, you're only going to get the ball if you're good maybe 10% of the whole game. But what determines how the game goes is what you do at the 90%. Right? So, in life, it's good. I might not I might only get to do what I want to do 10% of the time, but what my life means and and how God uses me is what happens with the 90%. And so if I realize if I realize that God's created me and has a great plan for my life, then what I can what I can separate from outcomes is who I am. Right? So I've developed and a lot of this is through through my own story, right? Like I've developed this thought process. Romans 12:2 uh says, paraphrase it, it says that God's will for you is to change your thinking, right? You know, and there's there's a longer this the longer verse than that, but don't be conformed to the patterns of this world, but allow God to transform you into a new person by changing the way that you think.

22:26 Then you'll learn to know God's will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect. So God's will for me is not a job title. It's not an amount of money. It's not a position that one day I'm in. It's not how many kids I have. It's it's none of this stuff. It's not it's not some because we all as human beings, it's like the human mind is conditioned to think in terms of outcomes. Yeah. Of course. So we sit here and we talk about God's will and we go well God's will is some kind of outcome like God's will is for us to be billionaires God's will is for this to happen and for that to happen and what is God's will for the earth like what is God's you know so we we we just think so much in terms what's God's will for America how's it all going to work out like God's God already knows so he's not concerned with that what he's concerned with who is who we're becoming which we've talked about a few times on the podcast but when you develop that that actual thought process and you look, you know, to me, I look back at my life and I go, okay, that situation or that era or that season didn't go at all the way I thought it was going to go and but that developed this in me.

23:32 Mhm. Right. So, that's that's to come back to where we started. That's defining the moment. is saying, "Well, here's here's what I experienced and here's what that means to me that has that has led to some kind of positive outcome in my life cuz I need outcomes." Like God doesn't need outcomes. Totally understand it. God's not focused on outcomes cuz he he controls them all. It's really easy to be that way when you have absolute control like you know like my kids are always u worried about uh where we're going to go or what we're going to do cuz they never know what's going to happen. I always I always know I'm not ever worried about where we're going, what time we're going to be there cuz I have the GPS. I know exactly what's going to happen. My kids are like, "How many how much longer is it? How much?" So, this is like the same as our relationship with God. So, I understand we need outcomes and God will God will give us outcomes along the way, but we have to be the one that sees the outcome in a certain way. So, for me, you know, I've heard my dad say that my whole life, you never fail if you learn.

24:30 So even at the moments of my worst failure that I can look at it's like oh I learned some great lessons related to that or um having having other experiences like for me one of the one of the experiences that I've had a lot in my life is really feeling like I'm giving 100% I'm giving my absolute best and then it just doesn't happen and or or feeling like I was telling you this before we started recording this episode but I've had so many different times in my life where I've just fought fought fought built built built put stuff together put stuff together and it's been right. And I don't want this to be like a narrative that I have, but I'm like, what is God trying to show me with this, right? Where I build and I work and I build and I work and then it feels like it's just about to start clicking. Everything's just about to start working and then it's all over and I didn't get to control that, right? I've had just at least 10 things 10 huge things happen in my life that you I'm just like man like that was right there was right there about to happen and then it just was gone you know and I'm like what is God what is God showing me through that I don't know but what I can say that that what I can say that that's that's meant to me I don't know what God's doing right I don't know what God's doing with my life but what I can say that stuff like that has meant to me and shown me one of my biggest life lessons in my life has been the understanding faithfulness like just are you going to keep showing up? And so where I continually kind of get tested a little bit is what if I what if and I'm not saying God says this to me, but although I do feel like God says this to me, like what if I took away all your reasons for showing up?

26:01 Would you still show up? Mhm. Like I don't know. Well, let's see what that would be like. Right. Like, okay. Yeah, I'm going to show up. All right. I'm I'm going to stay in it. I'm going to stay in the fight. I'm going to stay in, you know, cuz you'll run out of reasons. I think I think at the end of the day, you you will run out of reasons for doing anything except for understanding that okay, this is probably just a part of the story God's telling and I'm in the middle of it. So, my job is just to live in the middle of it and then watch what he does like watch the world that gets created in the in the context of that. But you only I think you can only land there when you understand, you know, and we talked about that a few episodes ago, but when you understand um the grace of God that's on your life, you know, and and the fact that it is it's God's plan, not mine. So as much as I feel as a human being, as much as I feel like deeply concerned about maybe a lack of outcomes in my life or I feel deeply concerned about how certain moments have gone, what I've decided is that my focus in terms of my past at least my focus is not on what did I want that I didn't get or what did I want that I got. That's not my focus.

27:13 Although I can be really grateful for stuff that I've got and and it makes me aware of that I can be grateful for God's blessings in my life. not what did people need, you know, although I can look back and if I can become aware of that, I can realize the impact, right? Like I can look back and go, "Wow, man, I didn't realize people needed this from me, but when I came and brought it, it really changed some things for some people." And I can look back and that's another practice of of gratitude that I can do. The third question to me is the most important question and is that am I doing am I doing everything I can to step into being what God's called me to be and doing what it is that he's put in front of me right now. You know, and um I want to be able to confidently confidently answer that question. Yes. I want to I want to be able to look back at my past and not go was I really happy with everything? Did all that work out? Um like like well I'll give an example. So, I've I've worked with my dad for almost 20 years, you know, and um there's limitations to that. There's absolutely limitations to that. Like, when you work for somebody else, there's not a lot of control that you possess. Like, I have a great relationship with my dad, so it's not a complaint. It's just I worked with them for 20 almost 20 years. And uh when you decide to align your life with with a with people, you the the word decide comes from the the Latin root is is uh d insist. It means the cut off.

28:39 Mhm. Right. So when you decide like when you decided to marry Rian, you cut off Yeah. all other potential people you could have married. Right. Right. So that's just a decision. That's how decisions work. So, I decided that I was going to roll with my dad no matter what, right? And so, I've missed out on in innumerable opportunities in my life. And I could look back and go, "Wow, man, maybe I missed God." Maybe I did, you know? I mean, I don't really know. I I I don't sit here as a person who has absolute confidence that the decisions I've made are the right ones. But um what I look at is for me personally in my own story, God God made me a son for a reason. God gave me the daddy he gave me for a reason and my dad's a great man and I would rather look back on my life and alignments are so important. Yeah. Right.

29:30 Um I would rather look back on my life and I I because I think one of the aspects of being the best person that you can possibly be is knowing who you're supposed to be aligned with and serving those alignments. Mhm. So, I know that God put me in the family that he put me in with the dad that he put me in for put me with for a reason. I know that when my dad dies and goes to heaven, I'm not going to look back on this season of my life, however long it is. Could be 30 years of working for him, whatever. I'm not going to look back at this season of my life and go, man, I really wish that I would have just been a little bit more selfish, right? Like, I really wish I would have focused more on my best and highest years. I really wish that I would have put myself out there more and taken more advantage of all the opportunities that I had. What I what I know and that's and that's even to what you're saying when you develop this really long-term perspective. Yeah. I know that when I'm on my deathbed, when I'm like 70, 80, 90, 100 years old, however old God allows me to live to, I'm going to look back on this season of my life and go, "Wow, like I got to have really great relationships with people really close to me, and I got to serve those, and that would that would really be enough for me, you know, and I got to do what I got to do with my family. I got to build a great relationship with my wife and with my kids. And sure, there's other ambitions and other things that I might have to leave on the table as it relates to serving that. But the cumulative nature of that and what that means uh to me and what I think what I feel like that is as it relates to even my the reason why God's put me put me on the earth is way more important than me sitting here saying oh I could have gone and right you know I could have gone and done a bunch of guest speaking at churches or I could have gone and done this or I had my own vision or whatever that is that that people get hung up on like because the problem When you to me the problem is the problem when you tell yourself a selfish story is you actually make your world a lot smaller.

31:30 Yeah. You know because you make everything about you. And if you don't tell yourself a selfish story then then that's that's great. But it's more than not telling yourself a selfish story. It's telling yourself it's it's getting to the point in your life where you can really ascertain I think the road the journey that God has you on. Cuz it's really not my story. Exactly. Like because if I say, "Well, I'm not going to tell a selfish story." Then I probably step into p to being a person who's just whatever people need me to be. So it's not it's not enough really to be unselfish. What you have to do is step into understanding that there's like this whole this whole story of my life, the journey of my life is a story that God's writing. And I have to ask myself this question. And I ask myself this question all the time, especially when I'm in like moments of conflict or whatever. is um based on what I know about scripture, based on what I know God requires of me, like what is it that is the is the God answer?

32:24 Mhm. In this situation, and it for me personally has always come back to faithfulness. So that's why I'm like, okay, like that's that's what God's continually teaching me. That's like full circle in my life. And it's not the same answer for every person, right? For for me, that faithfulness piece has become really huge. But for other people, that's a different thing. But there's always been this thing that God's trying to teach you because that's one of the biggest parts of your life that can affect that can be what people need that you don't that they don't even know that they need is they need you. They need to see you as a honoring person or they need to see you as a loyal person or they need to see you as a joyful joyful person. Whatever that is that you keep kind of coming back around to some of that's where God wants to work on you. And then when you step into God working on you, what's really interesting is he he opens up all these doors in our in our lives for us to be used in ways that maybe we don't even want to be used. But he uses us in the part in in the context of this really great story that he's telling that we've just decided that okay, I'm going to be a part of this and I'm going to let God worry about everything else.

33:33 Thank you for listening to The Dialog. Make sure to like, share, and subscribe. And also, if you think someone else would enjoy this, please send it to them. If you want to get in touch or learn more about me, what I think, speak, and write, you can go to joshuacraft.com. Or you can also follow Nick and I on Instagram. Our handles are in the show notes. We'll see you next time.