Conversations on Soul Work and Inner Healing with Pastor Chip

Wellness is a practice, not just a word.

Welcome to the Synergy Podcast, where myself, Kelly Engelman and Lori Essery shed light on powerful tools and topics that nourish.

Your body and most importantly, feed your soul.

Welcome, guys, to the Synergy Podcast. We're back together today for another exciting episode, and I'm really blessed today to have Chip Henderson here with us. We're going to dig in with Chip today. Chip has been my pastor for 20 years. It's hard to believe that we've been blessed with the same pastor for 20 years. I've seen amazing growth in our church, but also in Chip and Chip's heart. And I'm just excited that he's here with Lori and I today to dig in and really talk about things. Chips is the senior pastor at Pine Lake Church here in Mississippi. There are many locations of Pine Lake. It started off just than the reservoir campus where I attend, but now we have many campuses throughout the state. And his mission is really to change Mississippi one person at a time. And that's so synergistic with the mission of Synergy. Right. We've been working with you guys as patients in changing your life, making the changes every day that help impact your life day to day. So, Chip, thanks for being here.

Absolutely. Kelly, it's a joy to be with you and Lori and to be a part of the Senergy family. And thank you for your kind words in the introduction.

So we wanted to start out and ask you a little bit about what brought you into ministry to begin with. Tell us your story.

Yeah, Lori, that. Wow, that's. How much time do we have, you know, because it's quite a journey. My story is my dad was a pastor growing up, and it's the last thing I wanted to do. Not because I thought it was bad, it just wasn't on my radar. I went to college to be an orthodontist. Long story short, it just didn't work out. I wound up just. Chemistry was a hard thing for me, and so I was not going to have a career in medicine or dentistry. It was clear. So I got into communications management on a whim, just because my roommate was in that. Long story short, I started going to a Bible study. Then I was asked to lead a Bible study, and people started responding to the Bible study. The guys that I was with really seemed to enjoy it. I seemed to enjoy it. So I began to pray about, is this what God wants me to do with my life? God, is this it? And so at a point, as a sophomore in college, I sensed that that's what God wanted me to do, is to use my life to help other people experience him and encounter him through the Word. And so through that journey, I wound up being. Being a pastor and have been a pastor. Went to seminary in New Orleans and then a pastor. This is my third church to be a pastor. Did student ministry at a couple of churches, but then have been a pastor and Tangipahoa, Louisiana for a couple of years. Brookhaven, Mississippi for a couple of years. And I've been at pine lake approaching 25 years. Wow.

Incredible story.

Yeah. Sometimes the thing that we run away from is what God brings us back to. It is and, you know, has a bigger plan.

I lived for a long time, you know, my. My story, everybody's got one. But my story for a long time is I trusted Christ. I believed Christ, you know, and I knew that my, you know, had a relationship with God, but I really wasn't developing and growing in it. I would go to church, I would read my Bible some, but I really was what the Bible would. Would call, you know, neither hot nor cold. You know, where I grew up, we would call it sitting the fence. Had a foot firmly in the world and a foot firmly in the church, and, you know, just kind of going back and forth. But it was once I got to college and kind of got through my first year, really started pressing into my relationship with Christ. And so it wasn't that I was necessarily running from it, but I sure wasn't running to it. Right. And it's just as I walked, walked with Christ, this. It began to evolve in my own spirit, that this was the thing that God had really cut me out to do. And all of my experiences and in the past, even though I didn't know that that's what God was shaping me for, I was just raised in church, around church, and so I knew a lot of things, even though I wasn't necessarily pursuing those things. And so, you know, God never wastes anything. He doesn't waste my life and you guys life or any of our listeners on Synergy today, every experience, God can redeem, use, and ultimately transform for his own purposes. And that's kind of what he's done for me. The good, the bad, and the ugly, he's done that.

I remember one sermon Chip, early in my Pine Lake attendance, I came to Pine Lake a little bit resistant. I grew up very legalistic Baptist, and then as an adult, went kind of the Methodist route and swore I would never go back to a Baptist church. And my kids were at the age where they wanted to be involved in the youth ministry. And so there really were. They were the pull back to Pine Lake or to Pine Lake. And I remember sitting in a sermon and I felt like you had been hiding in my house, knowing exactly what I needed to hear from the Holy Spirit. And I remember you saying, God will move heaven and earth to get you back.

Yeah.

And I was in a place in my life where I knew right from wrong. I knew that I had a relationship with the Holy Spirit and with Jesus, but was not always pursuing that. Was kind of doing my own thing, so to speak. So I knew at that moment I was in the right place. And it's kind of been that journey for me there from that very moment of just always feeling like you're talking directly to me or aspects of my life that you can't get anywhere else but the Holy Spirit, you know, that's when, you know, the Spirit's moving.

That's it. And I don't have a recorder in anybody's house. People say that, but look, God does. God.

Thanks for clearing that up. Thanks for clearing that up.

Shut up. For the record, neither you nor Lori. But, you know, it's just. It is. It's the work of the Spirit. And, you know, my faith teaches me the word of God. You know, as I read it, I understand it is that when once God starts a work and you Philippians one, success, he's not going to quit. And so you may not be pursuing him, but he is relentless in his love and in his pursuit of you. No matter. No matter where you are, God is always pursuing you. And we may feel like we've let go of him to chase other things, but he never. Once you have Christ, he never lets go of you. And so I love hearing your story of just his constant pursuit.

Yeah. So listen, one of the things that Lori and I deal with and our other functional practices deal with is obviously the body. And, you know, we think the body is everything. And one of the things I've heard you say is we're spiritual beings living in a body. And as a believer, we have an obligation to take care of our body, but we can't make our body our idol. Right. And I feel like you do a really good job of breaking down the body, the soul, and the spirit. Can you go into that? I know you usually draw the circles, and we don't have visual today to draw the circles, but can you go into that a little bit? I think it'll have relevance with what we're going to talk about today?

Absolutely. I think The Scripture teaches first, Thessalonians 5, 23. Paul prays that the Lord would preserve us, spirit, soul and body. And so the Bible teaches, I believe that we have a body which is a temporary housing of our soul and spirit, which are both eternal. So I don't believe that we are physical beings seeking a spiritual experience. That's what we think. What the scripture actually teaches is that we're spiritual beings having a temporary bodily experience. Our, our bodies are a tent. The Bible says they are a temple where we have the potential for the Holy Spirit to dwell with inside of us. God inside of us, as we by faith receive Christ and trust in him, and he makes our spirits alive. And so we have body, soul and spirit. And the scripture teaches that we're to honor our body. We're to take care of our body, temporary as it is, for God's service. And so our bodies are an instrument for God to use. Romans 6 says, we're to present the members of our body as instruments of righteousness to God. And so I think that means we care for our body. The Bible talks in first Peter Timothy 4, 8. It says bodily discipline is profitable for a few things. So it doesn't say, don't worry about your body. No discipline your body. Go to the gym. That's what the word discipline mean. It's gum nag. So it's where we get gymnasium. So work out, care for your body. But the Bible is also very clear that godliness is profitable for all things. And Paul would say our bodies are tense and they're wasting away. And so we're painfully aware of that. Right? And so anytime we have a sickness, we know our bodies are temporary. And so you're right. We want to care for our bodies, but we don't worship our bodies. We know this is man. We want to care for it so that we can be honoring to God. But our value and the eternal part of us is inside of us. It's our soul which is eternal. That's what Christ redeems, and it's the spirit inside of a man. When the Holy Spirit comes to dwelling outside of us, our spirits are now made alive. And so we live from the inside out. Most of us live from the outside in. We try to do things in our body to make me feel better on the inside, give me peace, or to give me peace of mind to, you know, deal with, you know, whatever these things are that are in my mind, my memories, the agreements I've made, and the Bible Says it's actually backwards. You actually learn to live from the inside out. You invite the Holy Spirit to control your mind, to change and transform the things that I think about, what I desire, the things that I choose. And then those choices begin to manifest in your physical being. And so you're living from the inside out. I think healing of body, soul and spirit. I think it comes from the inside out. The healing of memories, past traumas, agreements we've made from things that we've experienced in our, in our childhood. I'll. I'll never be like my mom or dad or I'll always succeed or whatever. The healing for that. We need skilled therapists to help us. Your soul. The Greek word for soul is suitcase. Where we get our word. Psychologist, psychiatrist. We need folks who are skilled that way. But the deepest healing comes when the Holy Spirit of God is helping you with a skilled professional psychologist, psychiatrist, through therapy or therapies with medicine. That's the way healing flows from the inside out. Transformation flows from the inside out. Addictions are broken, mindsets are changed. I think the scripture teaches that's an inside out work, not an outside in work.

Yeah, and I agree with you so much. So much of that hit home for me as I was listening to you. I honestly could listen to you forever. You know, it just aligns with what we talk about when we, we talk a lot with our clients about doing their work. Yeah, you got to do your work, right? You got to do your work. And so I'd love to know because, you know, I think oftentimes we can say this is what has to be done. These are the changes that have to be made. But the question is always how. So I would just love to ask you, how do you do your work? What does that look like? How have you gotten to where you are?

Well, I think at a spiritual level, the easiest way to say is I pursue the Lord in a daily relationship. I think he wants to have relationship with me. And so my disciplines would look like. I get up each day and I listen to a little Lectio 365 or an abide app. A devotion kind of helped me to center my mind spiritually on the Lord. I read the Word, I read through the scripture each year. So I read a little bit. I have times of prayer and just communing with God. God, what do you want to teach me about you? What do you want to teach me about me? And what do you want to teach me about this life together? So there's an aspect of doing my Daily constant work. And then through the year have some, some times when seasons where I just focus on my spiritual development physically I do my work, I try to stay healthy. And Kelly alluded, you know, the running groups we used to do back in the day and I've done triathlons and ironman, stuff like that. And I've always been athletic. I take care of my body. I try to work out, you know, four or five times a week. But the, the soul work, Lori, that I've been doing over the last probably five years, you know, for a long time I thought I had my stuff together. I thought, you know, everybody else may have problems, but you know, man, my parents were great. My, my childhood was great and they were, they were amazing. But nobody's perfect and nobody's upbringing is perfect. And so just as begin to look at what does it mean to have first. Peter 1:22 says that just as you have an obedience to the truth purified your soul for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart. The command is clearly to love one another from the heart passionately. But it says you can't love until you've purified your soul. And so I began to pursue my own soul help meaning to look at the bad fruit in my life. Why do I get so defensive when people challenge me? Why do I have to drive all ways to win, to. To succeed at everything, to sometimes be a workaholic? Why, why is that? Why do I take rejection from my wife or from other people? Why does that devastate me so badly? And so I went and have done a couple of weeks worth of intensive work, just one on one with a psychologist, a trained counselor up in Michigan. And just to try to look at those places in my own soul that were broken. It doesn't make me bad. It just is an acknowledgment that as I grew up, there were things that maybe happened to me that shaped me or things that didn't happen, that I didn't get a lot of emotional support or I didn't have a lot of physical touch maybe from my parents. And so what did that do inside of my mind and my soul that are now manifesting in my life. And so just trying to unpack that and we may talk about it in a minute, but I know, you know, last September I did. I gave a message about a guy named Asa very godly man who, man, he, he had a moment where he just lost his stuff. And as I studied that text, it talked about how he couldn't be corrected. He made a mistake. There's a mistake. But when he's called out on it, man, he just goes off and he crushes people. And when you look at what that story and the. The Hebrew words used, I just saw myself. That's what I do. I shut people down. I'm putting my wife in prison. I'm flipping it around, making feel crazy. I crush her heart toward me. And it just was heartbreaking to see it and say, that's me. I'm Asa. I have this part of me that. It doesn't mean I'm all bad, but there is this part of me that I need healing for. And so that's part of doing my work. I go to counseling. I'll talk to a counselor later today just to say, hey, help me understand and process through these lies. I believe, these strategies I've developed, these memories that I've got that I need to get out of me and bring into the light and ask the Holy Spirit to help transform these places in me. And so that's kind of what my work has looked like. I've been doing counseling for several years and still continue to do that to this day.

That's a very vulnerable place, as you are sharing. I find that some of the hardest work that I've ever done, and I have yet to do, because it's a constant work in progress, is work on the soul. But sometimes I tell people their food changes. They're like, that's hard. And I'm thinking to myself, that's actually easy work compared to the work that you're doing. Right. The soul work. You know, I. I think about even, you know, men work versus women and that, too. And I. I think about in conversations that I've had with several men clients and. And talking to them about of even going to counseling, how did you get to a place that there was willingness to even go? Because that's a real soft spot for many. Yeah, a hard spot.

Absolutely it is, Lori. And look, I can tell you there was a lot of, you know, skid marks, heel marks, whatever you want to call them to get me there. Because again, for a long time, two things. One. One is I thought I was good. You know, I don't have. I don't battle depression. I don't battle. You know, I'm not an addict, and so I'm good. And I thought, man, my upbringing was great. Was. And I was a mess on the inside. I still had these things. So I would say I was really, really reluctant. And in our culture for anybody to go to counseling or they got real problems if you go to counseling, you know? And so there was this stigma about anything about. About counseling or going to a counselor, and I just had to overcome that. And I thank God for my wife, who in some ways was blazing a trail in front of me. And her story is amazing, but it's. As I watched her and as I began to look at me, I began to open myself up to say, you know what? I think I've got stuff, too. And so here was my process. I read some books, and I was like, okay, I started listening to some podcasts, maybe like, you know, the one we're on right now, right. Listening to some helpful podcasts where you can really begin to get some language around what we're even talking about. And so, you know, I can give you those names of those podcasts that I listen to, but just. I began to understand attachment styles. I began to understand what it means to have trauma or wounds or neglect. I began to understand just some of these concepts that you go, okay, bad fruit in my life. I see that. Where's the bad root? And how can I then invite God? With the help of maybe a professional who can really help me, how can I invite God to bring that healing to me? So it was very slow, but I would say to all the men who are watching, or if you're a lady watching and you have a man in your life, be slow. Pray men are defenseless against your prayers. I'm certain my wife prayed that one day I would have my eyes opened up, and ultimately God heard those prayers. But I think instead of saying, hey, you need to go to counseling, what worked for me was, hey, would you listen to this podcast? Tell me what you think. And so it was kind of an easing me into an arena of, most of us don't want to do what we don't know. And when men don't know, we sure not going to do it. And so by helping me get a little bit more familiar even with what we're talking about, then I was able to take the step of just saying, all right, I'm going up here to talk to this guy who's, you know, 12 states away, who has no idea who I am, and he can't hurt me, you know, with any information I'm going to share. But once I got there, I just said, look, if I'm going to be here, I'm giving him everything. And it was the first time I really opened up about everything about my life in a Vulnerable, safe space. And he was able to help me then unpack that and bring healing in some of those places a little at a time.

I love it. You know, you said a lot there. And one of the things that you have alluded to before is this whole concept of soul surgery, you know, which I think a lot of people can relate to. Going to an orthopedic surgeon and having their meniscus repaired, or going to the heart surgeon and having heart surgery, but what you're describing and going to that counseling and doing an intensive where you did just unpack everything and let them walk you through a process, however slow or fast it needed to be, to help you see things that you couldn't see, your blind spots, and where true healing, where the spirit can come in and truly heal what you had going on. And I love that because that's where true healing happens, is when we're able to actually be aware of our blind spots. If we can't see it, we can't fix it.

Yeah, that's right. And Kelly, my experience with that is, you know, look, I believe you can pray, God heal me and God can heal you like that. Sure, 100%. Part of my understanding though is that just like you're saying, there are times when you need a skilled surgeon to help you work out some places where you may get healing, but if there's still poison in there, it's just going to re poison, or if there's still fracturing, there's just going to refracture everything. And so what that idea of soul surgery is, it's not just treating, hey, can we, can we get this thing fixed out here on the outside? It's going deeper to the root cause. That's part of, you know, even physiologically with your brain, you may have bad expressions where you lose your temper and God heal me, God forgive me. Okay, God can forgive you that he does forgive you already. And God, I want that healed. Okay? But every time you get a stimulus in the next day of somebody cuts you off in traffic. I had an addiction. A neurologist who was an addiction specialist, he explained it this way. You get this ping out here on your radar at 50 years old, and it pings all the way back down into your memory to where you were five years old. And so your response is not as a 50 year old, your response is as a, a 5 year old. And until you have somebody help you go back and address that five year old experience and what that five year old needed, your brain in your amygdala Just gets stuck. And so every time that stimulus happens, it's that same result. God forgive me. That's why we get so frustrated. I'm praying the same things over and over again. God does forgive, but you need somebody to help you unearth that original place of wounding, agreement, whatever that was, to say, God, heal that place in me. And when God heals that place in me, then the manifestation of it stops happening. It doesn't necessarily mean it'll never happen, but it's. The response can be more appropriate. Man, this dude just cut me off. But I'm not flipping the bird and, you know, cussing like a sailor and whatever. Because you. What is that? Because you disrespected me. You. You treated me like I didn't matter. Well, when did that happen the first time? Well, way back down here. And the truth is, you do matter. God loves you and he respects you, even if nobody else does. And so that's kind of a short version of what that soul surgery looks like. It's going and resetting the heart of the issue, which is the heart of the issue, our heart. But there's a physiological component of our brain that is impacted by our soul. And so there is interconnection. We're three in one. Right. Body, soul, and spirit. And they're all interconnected.

Right. So the amygdala. I want to talk a little bit about that, because we talk about that quite a bit with our patients, especially in the world of chronic disease states. A lot of times our physical response is also a trigger response and an automatic response that our body has set up as a way of dealing with some of those traumas. So a lot of times, as we're willing to work on that part of the brain, the amygdala, those automatic responses, responses, that's when we begin to see true healing in the physical body. So there's a lot of power there. There's a lot of power in the work that you can do around retraining those responses, not just emotionally, but also how it affects the physical body.

Oh, no doubt there's a psychosomatic connection.

Yeah.

You know, that it really is. And our brains, you know, they just have a. A groove, a channel, a lane, that when this happens, man, your brain just automatically falls into it. But the beautiful thing is, as you guys know and probably have talk, there's a lot of research being done now on neuroplasticity and learning to retrain your brain. And so Caroline Leaf and others who have talked about that, and that is true, the Bible says we can renew our minds, right? We're not to be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of our mind. And that's it. I think that neuroplasticity, the Bible's way ahead of us on that. It says we have to God's going to give us the mind of Christ. And so learning to retrain our brain to not believe lies, to not believe old patterns and old ways, but to let Christ truly transform that. And again, sometimes you need the help of a pastor, sometimes you need to help the need the help of a physician. Sometimes you need the help of a psychologist or a psychiatrist or a trained counselor. But all of these things do inter. Relate. There is synergy, right? There is a working together, coming together energy in that. And so God made us to be a wholehearted being. Wholehearted, meaning there's no separation between body, soul and spirit. All of us connected, perfect peace, body, soul and spirit. And so that's the idea of letting our brains even introducing the Holy Spirit to help me to have the mind of Christ, a healthy mind, a whole mind. And so you're, you're on it. You're. You're ahead of it. I don't know a whole lot about the amygdala, but I know enough to say there is a connection.

So listen, Chip, you mentioned renewing of the mind. You mentioned your discipline of getting into the Word every day. And I did not realize until today that you are the co creator of the L3 journal. Yeah, so I have been using the L3 since it was on paper. Remember the paper L3 journal that we.

Used to have back in the day?

I don't know if it's still on paper, but I know that it's on the app now, the Pine Lake app. So for those of you that are app people, I love opening my Pine Lake app in the morning and reading the Word. I love the different variations in the reading plans. I've done the one year plan, I've done the two year plan and then this year I decided to do the story plan. I always thought that was for babies, but it's been really cool to go back and re listen in that way and really get into the stories behind the scripture. Right. So I had no idea that you were co created that. So it's a great tool. It's a great, you know, easy way. It's already planned for you structure in multiple forms that you can kind of bite off and take throughout the year. I love it. It's been really profound for Me to be able to renew my mind in a way every single day. And if I don't want to read it because I'm too lazy, you can actually listen to it. So there are some days when I just listen to the Word of God through my old free journal on the app. So I love it.

Well, look, get your mind transformed. And the way God primarily reveals himself to us is through the Word. And so, Kelly, what you're saying is we just created this way to interact with God through the Word. And so there's. There are multiple reading plans now. And listen your listeners, you can listen to. Listen to the Word on your commute to work or on your way to lunch and have someone just read the Word over you. There's just something powerful about hearing the truth of God's Word. And so sometimes people say, well, you know, I don't really understand the Bible. Well, here's what you do. Before you listen to it or before you read it, say, holy Spirit, help me understand. Because you can't understand it without the Holy Spirit's help. Jesus said that he's going to. The Holy Spirit is going to be the one who guides us into all truth. And you can't have the Holy Spirit unless you trust Jesus. So that's key to Jesus. Just show yourself to me, Holy Spirit, help me understand this. And then as you listen, there's just a way of putting yourself in the presence of God's truth that can be and is, I believe, very transformative forming. And so I've done several of the plans as well and just encourage you in any way you you can to just let the Word begin to be in you. As I grew up, I would just do the, you know, I need to read the Bible, just open it up somewhere. And that. That never worked really well for me. But what the L3 does is it, I know what I'm going to read. I know. I know where I'm starting. I know where I'm ending every day. And so that, to me, is half the battle. I know what I'm going to read or be read to me. And so ask the Holy Spirit, God, show me something. Show me something about me, and show me something about this life together. And then God, he just meets me, right?

So one of the things that we oftentimes see when there's been a chronic disease state or a physical manifestation of sorts, that we just can't get resolved with the patient, a lot of times the root cause or part of the root cause of that is just incongruence in their life. So believing one thing and doing something else else. Right. And then beating themselves up for the lack of congruence or the lack of resolution. So what would you say about that? Do you see that also as a pastor, in people?

Yeah. Tell me a little bit more or give me an example of that, Kelly, of that incongruence. Believing one thing, doing another.

So say you believe that you should be. Let's just keep it really simple. Eating better.

Yeah.

You know, your body needs more vegetable intake. And each week you say, this week I'm going to do better. And maybe Monday, you start off the day and you're eating pretty well, you know, but by Tuesday at lunch, you're out eating a pizza and drinking a beer or whatever. Let's be extreme about it. But, you know, it just doesn't. You're just not able to keep the pace with what you're doing. And it could be as complicated as, you know, being married but also being on porn. Right. We see that, too. We see other more major congruences, but typically speaking, it's lifestyle things. It's things that they're just not able to let go of for whatever reason.

Yes. Not only is that common, that's every man's battle.

Yes.

Every woman's battle. Right. And so how do you. How do you deal with that? And I think part of it is coming to the truth that while I do have this desire to follow God with all of my heart, I also live in this body that has its own mindset and fleshly desires. And so Paul would say it this way in Romans 7. Why do I keep doing what I don't don't want to do? And why can't I do what I do want to do? He says it in Galatians this way, the spirit and the flesh are in odds. The flesh is not gonna let you do what spirit wants. Spirit's not gonna let you just do what the flesh wants. So what's the solution? So, yes, there's incongruence in all of our lives to some degree. Yes. And I think the pursuit of the Christian life, what the Holy Spirit's trying to do is to bring congruence into our lives. And so for me, one of the keys to seeing a consistency where my life really does reflect what I say I believe is stop white knuckling and saying, I've got to do better. I've got to eat better, I've got to quit looking at porn and say, holy Spirit, help me. This is a spiritual thing. Again, we're going to live from the inside out. So transformation doesn't come by you doing better in your body. And all of a sudden, my heart follows. That's not. Is. Holy Spirit, I need help here. I'm. I'm powerless to do this. But, God, I want so much to honor you. And I do believe you want me to be pure or healthy or whatever. I don't worship my body, but I do want it to be healthy for you. And so, Holy Spirit, help me. I want to present my appetite to you. Change me. Help me. And so I think that is a huge part of it. Second part of that is you got to be known. Okay. When you fight alone, if you're the only one who knows your struggle, if you're the only one who knows your binging and then purging, if you're the only one who knows that behind closed doors, you're looking at stuff you shouldn't be looking at, and it brings such shame to you, man. The enemy, the devil, he'll just eat your lunch. Hebrews 3 talks about man, if you. If the enemy can get you alone, he's got you half eaten. So what I'm finding is, for the first time in my life, I've got a group of guys that know me, and that if I'm struggling, I can say to them, pray for me. I'm really vulnerable right now to whatever or, hey, this is my story, and they can pray for me. And so I think, knowing it's a spiritual battle, I can't do it on my own. Having some other people around me who can help me, pray for me, encourage me. Those two things are helping to bring congruence in my experience, you know, as a person, as a whole being. And God made us to live in community with him and with each other. And so those are two of the things that I would say have really helped me personally. And as I've watched my wife and other friends, those are two very powerful things that can help bring congruence.

Yeah, we say we heal in community. That's what we say. We heal in community. And, you know, we oftentimes say we become the average of the five people we hang around.

Yeah.

You know, so picking our friends, wisely, picking the people that we do trust to share with, wisely safe people, people that will tell us the truth and not just tell us what we want to hear.

That's right.

So having those people in our lives, surrounding ourselves so that we have that resource.

Yeah. You know, I referenced my friend, a doctor in Houston, who's a neurologist and an addiction specialist. When we were visiting with him some years ago, he told us about a. It's a YouTube video. It's an old TED talk. And it basically is. The punchline is the opposite of addiction is connection. And I won't ruin it for you. You and your listeners can go find it on YouTube, I'm sure. But basically a study of Vietnam veterans returning from war, some, many of them addicted to heroin. How did those who get out get out of the addiction? And what they found was those who had community got out. Those who didn't have community didn't get out of the addiction. And so the conclusion was the opposite of the addiction is connection. If you've got connection, you can break free. If you're known, you have a support system. It's just what you're saying. We heal in community. And this speaks to, again, some of the men that I would speak to. There's so much shame, ladies, to so much shame that's revolving around maybe trauma of your past abuse, of your past present addiction or stupid behavior. And you feel so shamed by that. That's the devil. There's no condemnation in Christ. That's what Paul says. I don't do what I want to do, who's going to set me free? Thank God. There's no condemnation in Jesus. What you couldn't do, man, Christ did for you. And so there's so much shame. But whenever you know that God knows you and loves you, and whenever you can be vulnerable with another person and be known, there is something healing that happens in you and in them actually, as you share your journey and your struggle.

You know, my spiritual mama, I like to call her a lady that I spend time with who is well beyond me in chronological years, but well beyond me in wisdom, but has always been a mentor for me, has once said, and. And I hear it in my head all the time, is that there's no healing without revealing. Yeah, there's no healing without revealing. And in that revealing that revealing can be so incredibly painful. And kind of going back to what you said earlier is. Yeah, I mean, absolutely, I believe 100% that God can heal that immediately. He can, but it's that walk through that. Honestly, if we didn't go through that, the transformational work happens or the transformation happens in the work work that we do. She also said this. I don't know if it's a poem. I don't know who said it, but it's something that I have had to repeat several times. Two natures beat within my chest. The one is evil, the other is blessed. The one I love, the other I hate, the one I feed will dominate. And that goes back to what you were saying about daily disciplines. And what do you do daily? Weekly. Who's on your wellness team? We call it a wellness team, but honestly, it's community.

Right?

Who's on your wellness team Team? Who do you have that you can be accountable to? And are you willing to be vulnerable? And so much here today, just that obviously, we could spend hours and hours and hours talking to you, Chip, you're. You know, you just are filled with so much knowledge and so much. I think that in your vulnerability, I kind of wish in some ways that you could see you. But just in your vulnerability and willingness to share your story, it has such power to change other people's lives. Lives, truly.

Look, that again, that's. I tell y' all often, you know, I'm a beggar. Tell another beggars where I'm finding bread. I'm in this journey, and God's helping me, healing me. And so I'm just turning around, telling you guys, hey, here's. Here's how that's happening for me and. And believing that it can happen for you. And they're like, you. I have. I have a wellness team. I have a group of men that know me, my wife and other people that know me, and that's new for me. I haven't always had that, but I can tell you that my. My journey toward wholeheartedness has been commensurate to or equal to my willingness to have people around me who know me.

Yeah. That's awesome. Powerful. Well, Chip, is there anything you want to say, anything coming out for yourself or Pine Lake, anything you want to share to our community? Any resources?

Yeah. You know, I would say, man, look, my heart is for our Pine Lake family, but I know your audience is much larger than that. And so, look, it's. For anyone, if you are listening to this, it means God made you, and God loves you, and you're not a loser. You're not worthless. You don't suck because you struggle. Okay? I mean, all the things that we hear in our mind in our worst moments. And so my heart is just to say to you that God loves you like crazy, and he loved you so much that he sent his son for you and gave himself as a sacrifice to get us out of this mess. We're in this. This cursed world that we're in. And again, it's. That's a. I Don't want to get too deep off into the theology of that, but just that there's a rescue from the things that we have been a part of, creating our bad choices, the choices of people that have been bad, that have happened to us, that Christ is the one who can forgive you and free you and has done everything needed for that. And all you need to do is in humility, say, God help me, Jesus help me, and he will meet you in that place. And so if you don't have a church family, certainly we would welcome you to be a part of our Pine Lake family, either personally or if you're too far away, you know, you can do it virtually through our app or website, whatever. But you need to find a community where you are to be a part of, to know God and to be known by God and other people. And so I just speak that life can come. God is a resurrector. He's a redeemer. And so I want to speak Hope. Over everybody listening, there is hope for you. You don't know my story. You don't know my wife's story. You don't know our marriage story. That's another podcast. Yes.

It is considered an invitation.

Yeah. But listen, God is a redeemer. God is a resurrector. He gives beauty for ashes. He just has a way of doing what we cannot do. So just speak that word of hope and life and love over anybody listening.

Well, thank you so much for joining us today. I know that, like, Kelly opened up with, you are out and you're away and you're doing your work, it sounds like. And so we appreciate you taking time out of your schedule to meet with us today. And I think we're gonna have to take him up on that. Kelly.

Yes.

Another.

I think having you and Christy on would be amazing.

Anytime.

Excellent. Well, thank you so much, Chip. We really appreciate it.

Absolutely. Thank you, Lori. Thank you, Kelly. God bless you and bless you guys, guys at Synergy and. And what you're doing. And I pray that God will just release healing and wholeness to all those that you guys come into contact with, use you as his healing hands.

Thank you. Thanks so much for listening to today's episode. You can find more information about Synergy at Synergy for Life. That's S Y N E R G e E. The number4life.com.

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The purpose of our Synergy podcast is to educate. It does not constitute medical advice. By listening to this podcast, you agree not to use this podcast as medical advice to treat any medical condition in either yourself or others, including but not limited to patients that you are treating. Please consult your own physician for any medical issues you may be having.