Living A "RE" Life

Transcript of a Sage Hill Live Fully Podcast conversation with Dr. Chip Dodd. Lightly edited for readability; speaker labels omitted.

You're listening to the Sage Hill podcast with Dr. Chip Dodd. Sage Hill is a social impact organization that helps people see who they are made to be so they can do what they're made to do. Hey, Chip. Hey, Stephen. Hey, Jeff. Welcome to the podcast. Thank you. Yeah. You know, I was thinking this week, Chip, about god's grace and in that thinking about, like, god's a god of the do over. Like, we get the do over. And then that got me thinking, like, in this deep thought thought about I know it's like deeper, deeper thought. Yeah. This thing that that you've been talking about for a long time about God being the r e God. Right? That this grace, this do over God is more about he's the God of the r e. Yeah. The recreation, the Yeah. The renewal

The restoration. Right? Because, you know, you and I have talked a lot about that that there's there's no escape from life, except, I guess, death. So either we face it and live it or we run from from it and miss it. God. So okay. That's just heavy. Is it? Is it? Yeah. If it is true, isn't it? It is true. So we have to be good at struggling. That's, you know, the word Israel means to struggle with God and implied in that is live. So we have to be good at struggling. But we've all been trained to because we don't know how to struggle well for what we're gonna talk about in just a minute, we try to find a place called away. And we don't realize that the only place, you know, that that I gotta get away, there's no such place as away. Yeah. I mean, struggle and survival can feel so similar sometimes. It boy. That's true. Yeah. That's really true. But since there is no such place as a way, we either survive or we learn to struggle. And and there is a difference between the two, which we'll get to. But no such place as a way means there is no place we can go to where we don't have to either survive or struggle to find our lives. The garbage dump is where we throw things away. Well, they're still there. So there's no such place as away. Even that phrase, we throw something away, is not true. It's just not in our sight. Yeah. Yeah. Can't get away from my side. And we've talked about it before, but even vacation literally means to vacate. So we we go on vacation, and who are we? We're not ourselves. We wherever we go, there we are. We go on vacation, so I'm not there. So, it it it just it's a mix mash mishmash of of conflicts. So I go on vacation to get away from my self, really thinking I'm getting away from my stress and problems. But wherever I go, there I am. So there's no such place I can go to get away from the stress of having to have myself. Ritual of having to have the bills paid, the house cleaned, like, all the things I need to do Yeah. To go on vacation is Yes. Almost not worth going on vacation. Absolutely. It takes especially if you go for a week, it's two two days to decompress, three days to vacate, and then two days to get prepared to go back. Mhmm. So you might get three days that are really not that memorable because you know what it costs to to get get to them, and then you gotta get ready to go back. Wow. You know? So so Happy spring break. Happy spring break. Enjoy yourself. But there is a way to actually go places and live our lives since there is no such place as a way. We have to face that and grieve that and and not stop wishing it because we all wish it. And it has reflections of heaven in it. There's no question about that, You know, that that we wanna go to a place in which we long to be. You know, we've talked about longings in terms of safe place, a home place, and so on. But but since there is no such place as away, then what is there? And what there is is we have limited energy. We pour ourselves out in a day. If you pour yourself out into the day like we're a pitcher of water, if you pour anything out, it needs to be refilled. So since there's no such place as a way, there is the experience of r e. So we can replenish. We can get, restoration, which means to re refill the storehouse. In fact, the word restaurant comes from restoration. You go to a place where you're served food. It it refills your Yeah. Stomach and also, hopefully, you're cared for and even nurtured, and you're in a community of others who are serving you to get you back onto the road of living again. So restoration and restaurant. I wanna go to that restaurant. Yeah. It's a good one. It's a place that everybody knows your name. You know? Redemption, that when you're not feeling worth worth that much or you're forgetting what it's worth, Redeemed means to get your value back in terms of what you're doing, what you're doing for. Recreation is to stop and remember. Recreation. Recreation. Yeah. The the literally stopping and having fun and taking a break. You and your sons, you know, you're all playing video games. You were, in some ways, recreating. You were reestablishing your relationships, and you're remembering being together, and you're taking a break from the life that of responsibilities that you have to address. They're gonna be there when you stop, so you're, you know, you're recreating. And recreating means to get back in touch with creation again as you're really made. You're also made for joy. And if you get caught up in looking for a place called away, you're never gonna be joyful because there's no such place. You're always gonna be

predominantly unhappy on some level. So what you're talking, thinking, I can't think of one r e word that has a negative connotation to it. Yeah. There are quite a few, actually. I know. I So I take that back. That's probably a stupid idea. No. But look at this. Most of them were positive and good relief. We think of this Renewal. Yeah. Renewal. Relief means to have life again. The word leaf is a is a word that references life. Leaf. Life. Yeah. So, remember, we've mentioned before, means to come back together, to remember yourself with because the day will split you into pieces all over the place. You have to stop and remember, regather yourself. And that is a morning to evening experience that that god is the god of knowing that we're made out of dust and knowing that that the day it said is enough trouble of its own. Give yourself to it completely and fully, which means bring your heart to it. At the end of that time, you're going to need something to restore you. Even if even repentance has has become a word stamped with a lot of ugliness that actually means to come back to your heart again, to turn away from that which won't feed you towards the need for that which will feed you. Do you know? And I guess I guess we could say we need to repent from continue trying to find a place called away because away requires, anesthesia to go to a place where I'm not experiencing the struggle of joy and the struggle of grief, both, we live between those two places, then I've got to anesthetize my heart. So maybe repenting, turning away from that which makes me not fully alive, maybe that's a a proper thing. I wanna turn away, take my heart to what makes me live. So repentance is even has a an a a re re a thing to it, to to refill, to return, to turn back again, to redeem, all those things. So Wow. It's a daily experience. Hey. Look. I'm not God and you're not either. I am very limited. I don't know all the answers. I'm in need. You're in need. I make mistakes, and so do you. We need to stop every day and recognize that the pouring out Recognizes the Recognizes exactly. Be cognizant of, again, that of those things. And stop and get that which we need so we can go into the next day and live it. And here we are, you know, birthed in neediness, have to live live in neediness, or our expertise needs to be in neediness. And that part of that neediness is knowing it's a it's an RE life. God meets us in the day with REs.

This is Stephen James, the executive director of Sage Hill Counseling. Thanks for listening to the Sage Hill podcast with Dr. Chip Dodd. Sometimes in life, we get stuck or blocked or reach an impasse. At times like these, an intensive short term therapy could help you overcome what's keeping you from the growth and changes you desire. At Sage Hill Counseling, we offer therapeutic incentives to help couples gain new momentum in their recovery process. If you wanna find out more, please visit sagehillcounseling.com.