0:02

Good morning, my friend. Dr. Lee Warren here with you for some self-brain surgery.

0:06

And it's Theology Thursday, and I'm going to bring you back a special treat.

0:11

Back in September, shortly after the launch of my new book, Hope is the First

0:15

Dose, I had the incredible privilege to sit down for an hour and have a long

0:19

talk with my old friend, Max Lucado. And I'll give you the whole setup in a minute, but there's so many new listeners

0:25

here, and it's Theology Thursday. And on Thursday, we tend to go a little deeper on the spirit side here on the podcast.

0:31

Now, if you want to go super deep on the spirit side and smash faith and scripture

0:35

together, the Spiritual Brain Surgery Podcast is doing that.

0:38

We've got some incredible things coming up for you on the Spiritual Brain Surgery Podcast.

0:42

But here, we take a little more science-first approach, and we smash faith and science together.

0:48

But on Thursdays, I like to wrap it all up and bring it home.

0:51

And today, we're going to have a talk with Max. I'm going to bring you back

0:54

from September because there's so many new listeners.

0:57

We had Tara Lee Cobble on the show recently. We've got hundreds of her listeners hanging out with us now.

1:01

So grateful if you came to us from the Bible Recap or from hearing Tara Lee

1:05

or some of the other incredible guests we've had recently on the show.

1:09

Then I want to give you an opportunity to understand how hope and your brain

1:12

work together. How does your brain react to hope?

1:17

And when you're fighting through the traumas and the dramas and the tragedies

1:20

and the massive things of life, what do we do when we need hope?

1:23

And how do we use our brains and our minds to manufacture it when it seems to be in short supply?

1:28

That's what we're going to talk about with Max. It's a great talk with one of my favorite people.

1:32

Max is an incredible human being. In addition to being one of maybe the most

1:38

successful living Christian writer and maybe one of the most successful Christian writers of all time,

1:44

Max is the guy who understands how our spirit and our great physician work together

1:51

to remind us of truth and help us to use our minds to change our brains, to change our lives.

1:56

And without further ado, let's get into this talk with Max. And I'll be back

1:59

with a brand new Frontal Lobe Friday episode tomorrow in response to a listener

2:03

question that's really going to help you change your mind about something important.

2:06

How do you arrive at mastery of self-brain surgery?

2:10

And how do you avoid the sort of shame and guilt and doubt when it seems to

2:14

be really hard to get your mind under control and use it to help you and not

2:18

to hurt you? That's where we're going tomorrow in in front of a little Friday.

2:20

But for now, let's get after this talk with Max Lucado for Theology Thursday.

2:24

God bless you, friend. We'll talk to you soon. Good morning,

2:27

my friend. I hope you're doing well. I am Dr.

2:29

Lee Warren, and I am really excited to bring you this episode of the Dr. Lee Warren podcast.

2:34

We're going to do a little self-brain surgery with an old friend of mine.

2:37

Back on September 7th, I had an opportunity to sit down for an hour via Zoom with Max Lucado.

2:44

Of course, he needs no introduction. Max has sold literally hundreds of millions of books.

2:49

He's He's probably the most successful living Christian author, maybe of all time.

2:53

One of the most successful authors in the world at this current moment.

2:58

Um, Max has written, I think over 40 major books, plus a bunch of children's

3:03

books and Bible studies. And he's just America's pastor, as he's been called by USA Today and other papers,

3:09

other newspapers he's prayed with and for presidents and world leaders.

3:14

He's just an incredible, incredible leader in the inspirational space and,

3:19

and has always been a personal friend of Lisa and Tata and I,

3:23

he was our pastor in San Antonio. Antonio Dennis worked side-by-side with him at the Oak Hills Church for years

3:28

as the pastoral care minister there. And Max has been really important to me in my faith walk, not only through his

3:35

writing, but through his friendship. He's one of the people I call when something hurts in my life.

3:40

He's just been an incredible friend. And with this book, he not only gave us an endorsement, but he also offered

3:45

to do this live one-hour event.

3:48

And we had it back on September 7th. It was hosted by the great people at Baker

3:51

Bookhouse in Michigan and Waterbrook, the publisher.

3:54

And we finally got the video. I told you I was going to be able to share that

3:57

video with you, and they finally sent it to me.

4:00

So I want to just strip the audio out of the video, and I want to give it to

4:04

you here in case you listen to podcasts somewhere in the world where you can't get the video.

4:09

We're going to have the video available for you soon on my website.

4:12

We're working on that and for some social media clips and all that.

4:15

But here's the full-length, uncut, hour-long conversation between me and Max,

4:20

hosted by Baker Bookhouse. You'll hear the Baker Bookhouse folks at the start of the episode.

4:26

And I just wanted to put it in a convenient place for you so you could hear this incredible hour.

4:31

I told you we're going to do a lot of neuroscience in Season 9.

4:34

In this conversation, we talk about your brain, how your brain processes trauma.

4:38

We talk a lot about faith and doubt and how hope springs up in the midst of all of that.

4:43

And so this is going to be a good place for you to have a resource to hear me,

4:48

the surgeon, talking to Max, the pastor, and two guys who have known a lot of

4:52

heartache and pain and how we find our faith in the midst of all those doubts.

4:56

So there's really only one question.

4:59

Hey, are you ready to change your life? If the answer is yes, there's only one rule.

5:04

You have to change your mind first. And my friend, there's a place where the

5:08

neuroscience of how your mind works smashes together with faith and everything

5:12

starts to make sense. Are you ready to change your life?

5:15

Well, this is the place, Self-Brain Surgery School.

5:18

I'm Dr. Lee Warren, and this is where we go deep into how we're wired,

5:22

take control of our thinking, and find real hope.

5:24

This is where we learn to become healthier, feel better, and be happier.

5:28

This is where we leave the past behind and transform our minds.

5:32

This is where we start today. Are you ready? This is your podcast.

5:36

This is your place. This is your time, my friend. Let's get after it.

5:42

Music.

5:48

Good evening from beautiful Grand Rapids, Michigan. Welcome. I'm Dr. Bart Denny.

5:52

I am the nonfiction, Bible, and academic book buyer here at Baker Bookhouse.

5:57

And on behalf of all of us here, thank you for joining us tonight for an evening of hope.

6:02

It's an honor to introduce to you our distinguished panelists.

6:06

Dr. Lee Warren and Max Lucado are here with us to discuss Lee's fabulous new

6:11

book, Hope is the First Dose.

6:13

Lee is a neurosurgeon and inventor and an Iraq war veteran who wrote about his

6:18

experiences in his excellent book, Nowhere to Hide, A Brain Surgeon's Long Journey Home from the Iraq War.

6:24

And as a fellow Iraq war veteran and brother in Christ, Lee,

6:27

I just can't praise that book highly enough.

6:30

I read it some years ago and loved it. Can't praise it enough.

6:35

Lee plays the guitar, loves to make connections between faith,

6:38

science, and the realities of life. And Max Lucado needs almost no introduction. Max is a pastor,

6:45

a speaker, a best-selling author whose books have sold over 145 million copies in 50 languages.

6:53

And in his writing, Max's passion for Jesus Christ and his love for people shines through.

6:59

Max has brought encouragement to countless thousands of people over the years, including yours truly.

7:04

And thank you for being here tonight, gentlemen. We surely do appreciate it. And again, Dr.

7:11

Lee Warren and Max Lepedo are talking about Dr. Warren's newest book, Hope is the First Dose.

7:16

And I know everyone here is looking forward as much as I am to this discussion.

7:21

But just a few notes of housekeeping.

7:24

We do hope that you'll interact with each other in the chat room and that you'll

7:27

encourage one another there. However, Lee will not be taking questions from the chat room.

7:34

In fact, when you registered for this event on Eventbrite, there was an opportunity

7:39

for you to ask a question beforehand.

7:43

So after the book discussion, Lee will field as many of those pre-submitted

7:48

questions as our time allows. And if you don't have your copy of Hope is the First Dose, you can find it on

7:55

our website at bakerbookhouse.com.

7:58

And for a limited time, a very limited time, just through this weekend,

8:02

we're offering this tremendous book for 30% off.

8:07

That is the best price I could find anywhere online. And we can only hold that for a few days.

8:13

But again, that's BrickerBookHouse.com and just search for Hope is the First Dose.

8:19

And, folks, before Lee and Max get started, would you mind joining me in a moment of prayer?

8:26

Our Father in heaven, Lord, we are truly grateful for this time together.

8:30

Lord, we look forward to what you have laid on Lee's heart.

8:35

We pray that this discussion might bring encouragement and hope for those who need it.

8:42

I pray that this discussion will help each of us to grow, Lord,

8:46

in our daily walks with you. Most of all, Lord, I pray that this time together tonight serves to glorify

8:54

you, Lord, and ultimately to point others to the greatest source of hope,

9:00

Jesus Christ, our Savior, in whose name we pray. Amen.

9:04

Amen. And well, with that, Lee, I would love to hand it off to you and to Max.

9:11

And we look forward to, again, what the Lord's laid on your heart tonight.

9:15

Thank you, Bart. Bart, we're so grateful to have the folks at Baker and Waterbrook

9:19

supporting us tonight. Max, I'm so thankful for you, my friend. It's good to see you.

9:23

Good to see you, Lee. You look terrific. Been too long. You look great.

9:28

You do, too. It's been a long time, and hopefully we get to see you down in San Antonio soon.

9:33

Yeah, yeah. You know, I'm at the church office right now.

9:37

I know you're at home, and I had your book out this afternoon,

9:42

reading it for the second time. I'm so honored. Oh, my goodness. So honored to be one of the people who endorsed that book.

9:50

But I got to tell you, I might need to get another one, because as I was walking

9:54

down the hallway, as often is the case at a church building,

9:58

I ran into somebody who had been in a counseling session.

10:02

And so we chatted and I said, how are you doing? And it's not going too well.

10:07

She's had a bit of trauma. And I said, well, I've got just the book for you. I gave her mine I got to get

10:14

it back because I realized that was my signed copy I know where she lives I

10:19

can get it but it's a great,

10:22

it's a great book and I've been so happy to endorse it not just publicly but personally,

10:30

in urging people not only is it full of insights it's just beautifully written

10:37

just beautifully written so well done my friend Thank you, Danny.

10:42

Well, I want to just thank you for that, Max. You know, you and I have had a

10:46

few conversations over the years of the idea of me having two sort of two careers.

10:51

And you were so kind. You can't figure out what you want to do when you grow up, can you?

10:57

When I finally grow up, maybe I just got out of the operating room.

11:00

That's why I'm still wearing scrubs today. I love it. And Bart mentioned that you're a guitar player.

11:09

I was going to pull that one out myself because I remember some of the best

11:13

conversations we had were back when you lived here in San Antonio and you played

11:18

on our in our praise band and we would have visits either before or after church or at rehearsal.

11:25

You're a you're a really good guitar player.

11:27

Thank you. I remember we did a song one night.

11:30

I played at the first Saturday night service that O'Kell's ever had played lead

11:35

guitar. And we actually sang one of my songs that night.

11:38

It's kind of a rock and roll kind of song.

11:41

And you came out and the first thing you said was, this ain't your grandma's church, people.

11:49

Yeah, we've never quite recovered from that, Lee. I don't think so.

11:54

Hey, Max, I want to tell you, you know, I think all of our children were baptized at Oak Hills Church.

12:00

And all of them, you know, as they've grown up. and it's been a long time since

12:05

you've seen them, but you knew Mitch. I did. We're here tonight to talk about some of the things that we've learned

12:12

in our experience now over a decade of being bereaved parents,

12:16

which nobody ever wants to be.

12:19

But I just want to remind you and thank you that in the days after Mitch died,

12:24

I got a package, a FedEx package from you, and it was a copy of your book,

12:28

You'll Get Through This, before it was even published.

12:31

And that meant so much to me and Lisa.

12:34

And I've just reached out to you over the years as a pastor and a friend.

12:37

And so many times you've come alongside me when things were hurting and been

12:43

there with a text or a phone call.

12:45

And I just, I'm really grateful for you and Dean Lynn and the way that you knew

12:49

and loved Mitch, but the way that you've come alongside and pastored and befriended us over the years.

12:53

Well, it's my joy. It's my joy. I love you guys. I love Lisa, your wonderful wife.

13:01

She's a great, great friend and has a beautiful voice.

13:05

And of course, at the risk of taking up all our time, letting people listen

13:09

to how much you and I like each other, what people may not know is that your

13:14

father-in-law, Dennis, was one of, when I came to this church in 1988,

13:20

we had three people on staff.

13:24

I think he was number five or six. Dennis could tell us.

13:29

And he was just right down the hall from me. He was the equivalent of an executive

13:33

pastor. He ran our business.

13:36

But then what we found is that, though he did a fine job running the business,

13:41

what really put the wind in his sails was when he would go visit someone in

13:47

the hospital, And he would come back just full of insights and encouragement and what to say.

13:53

And so it wasn't that long before he became our chaplain.

13:58

And I learned so much from your father-in-law.

14:01

So please, and your mother-in-law, Patty, who we cherish, who's in heaven.

14:09

But please give Dennis my love when you get the chance.

14:12

I will. He's listening right now, so I'm sure he heard you. And you spoke at

14:16

Patty's funeral. So we have had a long history together, Max,

14:19

and we're grateful for you. A lot of cross paths, a lot of cross paths.

14:23

And you've helped me, Lee. I don't know if you remember.

14:26

I wrote a book on anxiety, Anxious for Nothing.

14:30

And I was really trying to get my mind around all this medical terminology about the amygdala.

14:37

And I'd heard people say things and I didn't even know if I was pronouncing it correctly.

14:42

And I said, what am I doing hitting, beating my head against the wall?

14:45

Paul, I know a neurosurgeon.

14:47

So I don't know if you remember this, but I emailed you and you gave me a thorough explanation.

14:54

I probably owe you some royalties because, you know, you just helped me understand

15:01

that and the role that the amygdala plays in anxiety.

15:07

And so, yeah, you've been a go-to guy for me and I appreciate it.

15:13

I hope I don't ever have to come to you for brain surgery, but if I ever need it...

15:17

I got your number. I hope not, too. I'm pretty good at neurosurgery,

15:21

but I'm not that great at giving haircuts. So you'd be in a little trouble.

15:27

I appreciate that. Max, you know, I asked you if you would do this tonight because

15:31

I thought it would be helpful for folks to have a conversation between a pastor and a surgeon.

15:38

Both of us walk alongside of a lot of people who are hurting.

15:42

And, of course, a lot of times in my career, I have to be the guy to deliver

15:46

the bad news. And in your career, you're the first people somebody calls often

15:49

when something is happening and they're hurting.

15:52

And so I thought it'd be an interesting conversation to have about hope and

15:55

the difference between hope and faith and hope and optimism.

15:59

And I thought you might have some questions for me about the science side of all these things.

16:03

And then my world is kind of a dual path between being a bereaved father and

16:10

a surgeon who helps people in these hard times and a guy who's been trying to

16:14

figure out how to find the light again a few times in my life.

16:17

And so I just I couldn't think of anybody better to call than Max Lucado to

16:21

say, hey, what do you think about having this conversation? So grateful that you're here. And why don't you just talk about some of that

16:27

stuff for a minute and then we'll chat about it. Well, I'm very grateful.

16:32

No one can talk about massive trauma better than someone who has gone through it like you have.

16:42

And there is no more raw trauma than outliving your child.

16:48

Yeah. I just don't think there is. I think it's tragic when you bury your spouse.

16:54

I think it's heartbreaking to bury your parent.

16:58

But to lose a child it's just there are just no words there are simply no words

17:06

and even the word trauma seems weak but.

17:12

To try to articulate what I imagine you must have gone through.

17:19

Lee, I think you've done all of us a favor by exposing your heart,

17:27

letting us feel your pain with you as you not only inform.

17:35

Remind me, but inform most of

17:40

the passing of Mitch and how you had to process that and your unique ability

17:47

to process it and help us understand what in the world is happening in our brains brains, uh,

17:57

and how our mind, as you call the software of the, of the brain, uh, activates.

18:05

Neurons and syntaxes and that, that, that, that we're not just going crazy.

18:10

We're not just going crazy. Um, so I think if, if I could ask you, if I could pretend I'm interviewing you,

18:19

I think my My first question to you would be, was there a moment,

18:28

was there an event in which you said,

18:34

I'm going to be able to breathe again?

18:37

You know, was there something? I've heard you talk about hearing the promises of God.

18:44

I know that you had a grandbaby born the same day you buried your son.

18:49

And so most of us know what the tunnel of trauma is.

18:55

We go in and we just think we'll never get out of it. But we do.

19:01

Was there a time in which you turned to Lisa or said to yourself,

19:06

you know, there's some there's some light in the sky again?

19:11

Yeah, you know, I think there's there's two things that stand out.

19:14

One is, as you mentioned, we had Scarlett, who was our first granddaughter.

19:18

And there was this kind of a dual complexity to the tragedy,

19:23

this massive thing that we talked about, because we were all planning on being

19:27

in San Antonio on that Friday when we had Mitch's funeral instead.

19:31

And our daughter, Katie, was

19:33

unable to come to be at her brother's funeral because Scarlett was coming.

19:37

And so there was all this complex stuff where there was things that were supposed

19:42

to be really happy that weren't happening and things that were supposed to be

19:45

unifying family event of having a funeral that parts of our family weren't able to be at.

19:51

So it was this big, complex, jumbled up mess. But I think.

19:56

The fact that that light of a new life and a new member of our family came into

20:01

the world on the same day that we were going through the hardest thing we'd

20:04

ever gone through gave us kind of a tangible reminder that there was still good out there.

20:12

You know, one of the things that happens to people in trauma sometimes is they

20:15

get into this lie, really, that your brain tells you that this is it. I'm done for now.

20:20

It's never going to be okay. It can never move forward from this.

20:24

But we had this little baby that had a whole life in front of her, holding her in our arms.

20:30

And there was still something new to live for. There was still some good out there.

20:35

And so I think that was one thing. It's just that God gave us that timing of

20:39

Scarlet was we knew that there was still purpose and meaning in our family.

20:44

We knew that all of us had things to live for and to look forward to.

20:47

And we just had this little person who reminded us of all of that.

20:52

So that was part of it. And I think another part of it was from a scientist's

20:57

side, you know, I had this constantly work in this kind of dual world between

21:01

the things we believe and the things we know.

21:03

I wrote a whole book about that in the past.

21:06

And we were in the Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research Center a few weeks after

21:11

Mid-Staff when we first went back to our office. And our office was in this place at the Auburn University campus where there

21:17

was a lot of research going on in the brain imaging of what happens when you

21:22

think about certain things. And for the first time, Lisa and I were able to watch an experiment happen where

21:27

the researchers were asking people to think about certain things that made them

21:32

sad or think about things that made them happy. And we could see it on the screen, what was happening inside these people's

21:37

brains when they changed the things that they thought about. Yeah.

21:42

The researcher would say, okay, think about the worst day you've ever had in

21:45

your life. And you could see what parts of the brain would activate and where

21:48

the blood flow was happening. And then they would say, okay, now think about the best thing that's ever happened

21:52

in your whole life, the happiest memory that you have.

21:54

And the brain would come alive with all these different lights and blood flow was changing.

21:59

And Lisa tied that to the idea of what Paul was talking about in Philippians

22:03

4, which you wrote a whole book about.

22:05

And she said, these people change their brains by changing what they were thinking

22:09

about. And to me, it reminded me that God has given us all this hardware to

22:16

take command of the things that we think and feel.

22:20

And we can change it by deciding to obey him and believe his promises are real.

22:25

Because he says, I do have good things yet in store for you.

22:29

This is not the end for you. And no matter what you're going through, there's a possibility of hope and a future for you.

22:34

That's what Jeremiah 29 is about. And so, you know, I think it satisfied that

22:38

science piece in me to actually see it with my own eyes that these people change

22:43

their minds and that's how they were able to change their life.

22:46

It's self brain surgery. And that kind of that did something to me as the scientist. I had the I had

22:52

the dad part and the grandfather part. And then I had the science part. And then my spirit just started coming alive

22:59

with the possibility that I could feel something like hope or happiness again. Yeah.

23:04

It's not easy, though, is it, Lee? It's not.

23:09

It takes sometimes it takes everything we've got just to defy despair, much less pursue hope.

23:20

Those shadows, they can they can come really, really quickly.

23:24

Can you talk for just a minute about the difference between fact and feeling

23:33

and how feelings cannot be trusted?

23:40

I think we've talked about this before, and so I'm hoping you're nodding your

23:44

head because, you know, I'm kind of luring you into it. I think it's a fascinating conversation.

23:51

Well, I think that if we zoom out from this conversation a little bit and just

23:55

look at our society right now, I mean, we're living in a society that tells

23:59

people that what you feel should be pursued and almost worshipped.

24:04

Like, if you feel it, you go get it, you know, take it.

24:07

And so we have a cultural part of that. But from the neuroscience side,

24:11

it's very clear the things you feel are not facts. They are chemical events in your brain.

24:15

So when you feel fear, for example, your brain can tell you that you ought to

24:20

be afraid, even if there's nothing that you really ought to be afraid about.

24:24

A good example of that is if you open a drawer in your house in San Antonio

24:28

and there's a rattlesnake in there, the brain is going to tell you to be afraid

24:32

because there's something really to be afraid of.

24:34

But that same set of chemical triggers, Max, happen if you hear a noise in the

24:38

middle of the night and your brain says, oh, there's a killer in my house that's going to murder me.

24:42

You feel the same thing that you felt when that rattlesnake was there because

24:46

the same chemicals trigger that event. And it's a limited palette of neurotransmitters that make you feel the things that you feel.

24:53

But the truth is feelings aren't facts. They're just triggers that point us

24:57

towards something that may or may not be true. And so understanding that is the first step to saying, yes, I feel this set of things,

25:06

but I can take command of my brain and I can tell my brain to take charge of

25:11

those feelings and I can turn those thoughts around and my brain will reliably,

25:16

your brain will reliably produce different chemicals if you tell it different things to think about.

25:21

And so that's a critical piece of understanding the trauma response and understanding

25:26

grief and anxiety and all of these things is just to understand that just because

25:30

you feel it doesn't mean it's true and you can change how you feel by changing what you do.

25:38

There's something to the Apostle Paul's admonition then, isn't there?

25:43

Take every thought captive. Take every thought captive.

25:47

Like a man said, just because you have a thought, you don't have to think it. That's right.

25:54

That's a great quote, isn't it? Yeah, it's your quote.

25:59

I put that one in the book. That's all thought management.

26:04

Thought management. You know, and this is this is a bit of a new idea for many people.

26:11

And that is when you have these thoughts swirling around in your head,

26:16

take them captive and take them before, you know, the apostle says,

26:22

take every thought captive and present it before the throne room.

26:25

And so we take that thought and we present it before Jesus. And a practical

26:31

practice of this, Lee, that I've found is we talk to Jesus and we say,

26:36

Jesus, I'm having this thought of despair right now.

26:40

I've just buried somebody I love more than life, and I haven't seen sunshine.

26:46

And I feel like I'll never, I'll never, ever be happy again.

26:51

That's how I feel. But Lord Jesus, is that true? Is that true?

26:58

See, what we're in pursuit of is truth. Jesus said it's the truth that will set you free.

27:04

And so the truth is, according to the Bible, weeping may last for the night,

27:09

but joy comes with the morning.

27:13

So in a moment like that, equipped with a few statements of truth, you choose.

27:21

You say, OK, I don't feel like I'm ever going to be happy again.

27:25

Yeah, I don't. And can I quickly say, if that's you...

27:30

Be kind to yourself. Be kind to yourself. Cut yourself some slack.

27:35

But see if you can't give ear to the truth, because that's what truly will set you free.

27:44

It may take forever. It really may take a long time. Or it could be tomorrow.

27:50

You just don't know. But what you don't want to do, right, Lee,

27:53

is just cave in to that despair.

27:57

That's right. That's exactly right. Right. You know, we we teach this this thing.

28:01

It sounds silly, but we talk about this bad thought biopsy.

28:05

I think about when I when I take care of somebody, if you come to my office

28:09

and you tell me I've been having these headaches and I say, well,

28:12

let's go to the operating room and I'll open your head up and see if I can find

28:16

a tumor in there. You would say, hey, time out.

28:18

Don't you want to do this? I think I won't. Yeah. You'd say, well, let's get some data before we take action on this thought. Right.

28:27

Because that might not be the right diagnosis and I might not apply the right

28:31

treatment if I don't get some facts first. And so we teach this idea of biopsying those thoughts. That's what Paul's talking

28:37

about in biblical terms in 2 Corinthians 10 5 of taking every thought captive.

28:42

The thing about doing a biopsy is, though, is that once you grab that thought

28:46

and you just put a little space in between the feeling or the stimulus and the

28:50

response that you take, once you grab that thought and critically examine it,

28:54

then you can ask yourself three questions of it.

28:56

And the first question is, like you said, is this thought true?

28:59

And sometimes it is true. I mean, when you lose somebody, especially,

29:03

you say, I'm never going to feel anything other than sad about losing my son. That's true.

29:09

But the next thought might be, well, that means my life has no more purpose. And that's not true.

29:16

And so you take the first thought, and if it is true, then your second question

29:19

is, is that thought compassionate or is it at least unharmful to me?

29:25

And if it's not a compassionate or unharmful thought, then I need to direct what my next step is.

29:30

So you can have a true thought, but then you decide what to do with it and turn

29:34

it into something more helpful to you.

29:36

And the third thing can be, is this thought harmful to me? Is it untrue and harmful?

29:43

And if it is, then you need to replace it. You need to do some kind of radical

29:46

thought transplant and let God put something more hopeful and helpful in there for you.

29:50

So I've learned to sort of take command of that first thought because five to

29:56

one, we know from the neuroscience side that about five to one,

30:00

your thoughts are biased towards negativity.

30:03

And that's just that's true. That is amazing to me. I've heard you say that before.

30:08

Did I read that in the book, too? Yeah. Or did I read that in one of your interviews?

30:12

I think that's worth underlining. I wish we could pull out a highlighter and highlight our screen.

30:19

Five to one. Five to one. So only one out of every five thoughts I have are

30:28

really worth thinking, right?

30:31

Yeah, that's true in general terms. And the reason for it is God wired us to

30:35

protect us. So when you're a baby and you touch a hot stove the first time,

30:39

you make a very powerful synapse in your brain that says, that thing is going

30:43

to hurt me if I touch it again. And so then for the rest of your life, when you see a stove,

30:48

you know not to touch it without having to think about it.

30:51

You see the hot curling iron, you know you ought not to touch it because it's going to burn you.

30:54

But the problem is that we have a lot of things that make us feel that same

31:00

set of chemical transmitters that feel like pain.

31:02

And so we'll say, wow, you know, somebody broke my heart one time,

31:06

so I can't get close to somebody because I'm going to feel that same thing if

31:09

I do, and it's going to hurt me again. And so we have all these synapses that fire based on prior experiences that

31:15

aren't necessarily true in the current moment.

31:18

And that can be really harmful in the post-trauma, post-massive thing phase,

31:23

because you start feeling all these things that remind you of what you felt

31:28

when you lost that person. Or when I went through the Iraq War, I had a lot of those triggers when I got

31:32

home, things that made me feel like I was getting mortared when I wasn't getting mortared.

31:36

And then if you get stuck in that feeling, then you can get stuck in rumination

31:41

or in shame or regret or all these what-ifs, and you can't move forward in your life.

31:47

How do you move forward? How do you take that memory and the false triggers

31:55

that subsequent events have, how do you rewire that?

32:02

I think the first thing is to be aware of what's happening in your brain.

32:06

There's some fascinating research that's been published recently.

32:09

Mary Frances O'Connor, who's going to be on my podcast pretty soon,

32:12

did some brain imaging research of these people that go through what we call complex grief.

32:17

Complex grief is about 10% of people that have gone through some major trauma

32:22

or major loss and they get stuck there and they just can't move forward.

32:26

They're stuck in rumination. They're stuck in guilt and thoughts of the past.

32:29

And the brain imaging has shown that there's an area of the brain called the

32:33

subgenuine anterior cingulate cortex.

32:38

We'll call it the cingulate. And that part of the brain is right in the middle,

32:42

and it's like a big switchyard, almost like a gear shift in your car, Max.

32:47

And it gets stuck in neutral sometimes when you've had major trauma.

32:52

And it's like taking the gear shift in your car and putting it in neutral.

32:55

And no matter how much you push on the gas pedal, that car is not going anywhere

32:58

because it's stuck in neutral. And so the cingulate, if you can re-engage your cingulate gyrus,

33:04

then you're going to be able to say, OK, yes, I'm hurting.

33:07

Yes, I miss that person. Yes, I feel devastated. But I need to re-engage my

33:13

brain and let myself move forward.

33:15

And you do that by remembering that this isn't the first hard thing that you

33:21

or other people have been through. And that other people have made it forward in their lives.

33:26

And you have too in the past. And so there's possibility of moving through that

33:30

hard thing because other people have done it. And that's why I love the Lamentations so much. You know, the guy in Lamentations

33:36

is remembering all these horrible things that are going on and he decides to take action.

33:41

He says that I'm gonna move towards hope. I take hope, I grab hope.

33:44

Hope is a verb, it's an action word.

33:47

And I see it as that shifting the gear and making that cingulate gyrus do its

33:51

job again and getting me moving forward again.

33:53

So I think just knowing that parts of your brain are going to tend to be immobile

33:59

and stuck when you're going through hard things and then remembering that it

34:03

is possible to motivate them to move forward by thinking about different things.

34:07

And that also happens when you move your body physically.

34:10

So when you're feeling stuck and you're feeling depressed and you're feeling

34:14

like you can't do anything, that's a good time to take a walk or make a phone call

34:18

or read your Bible or do something thing because your

34:21

brain can't really multitask it's just really good at switching

34:24

back and forth really fast and so when you do something

34:27

else you generate positive neurotransmitters and

34:29

you'll start building rewards around that and you'll start making

34:32

new synapses that'll help you switch and drive forward out of that hole you're

34:36

basically creating new thought habits right that's right we tend to have bad

34:43

habits when it comes to thinking uh

34:46

one of the things that i I see people struggling with a lot of spiraling.

34:52

You know, this is bad. Now this is bad. This is bad. Now this is bad.

34:56

And it's a habit. It's a thought process. So something bad happens.

35:01

And so you assume something else is going to happen. And that reminds you of something else.

35:06

And then you get ticked off at so-and-so. And then you wish we had a different president.

35:11

And then you think, you know, we're potty trained too early.

35:14

And it's a downward spiral.

35:18

So what you're talking about is developing a new way of thinking.

35:24

And I think what the Apostle Paul said, let your mind be transformed.

35:29

Is that correct? Am I? Yep. Romans 12. Yeah.

35:33

And so the Holy Spirit will help us have a new way of thinking.

35:38

You talked about lamentations. It made me think about the psalmist who said,

35:43

I lift up my eyes whence comes my hope.

35:47

And I think there's something physical there. You know, the psalmist could keep

35:51

focus down, but the psalmist says, no, I'm going to lift up my eyes from whence comes my hope, my help.

35:58

And it's almost like a victorious or fist clench or punch of the air.

36:03

My hope, my hope comes from the Lord.

36:06

And so it's a conscious choice. Joyce, I have a good friend.

36:12

He's a well-known, I won't say his name, I don't have permission to do so, but he lost a son.

36:18

And he said that for about...

36:22

I want to say 30 days, they kept praise music going in their house nonstop, 24 hours.

36:30

They just put a praise station on and let Christian music and praise music so

36:36

that it would always be sowing seeds of hope,

36:41

you know, to counterbalance the challenge of despair.

36:47

Despair and so what you're describing here lee

36:49

i think it's just powerful powerful well

36:54

i you know i think it's really important to say this

36:57

at this juncture in our conversation like if you're hearing us and you are dealing

37:01

with serious anxiety or serious depression and you really can't move forward

37:05

and you're trying don't forget that sometimes you need a doctor and sometimes

37:10

you need a therapist and sometimes you need medicine and there are times when

37:13

you need professional help. So don't, don't hear us.

37:17

Don't think that we're saying there's no role for that. I'm not saying that

37:21

at all, but there's a tremendous amount of positive movement that you can make

37:26

in your own life by these techniques and things that Max and I are talking about.

37:30

Tremendous amount of power in remembering that you've come through hard things before.

37:35

There's a tremendous amount of power in recounting God's promises and looking

37:39

for ways that they've turned out to be be true before, because they will turn out to be true again.

37:43

And I saw, you know, we had this, this day that Lisa and I came to,

37:48

to think about the fact that do we really believe that we get to see Michigan?

37:53

Do we really believe that? Because as Paul talked about, I can't,

37:57

can't think about where he said it right now, maybe first Corinthians 15,

38:01

where he says, if there's no resurrection, then we're above all people,

38:05

most to be pitied, right? If we're living our our lives and it's not even true, then that's just pitiful, right?

38:10

So we had to come to believe that because for...

38:13

For me, I started thinking, gosh, if I don't get to see him again,

38:17

then what is life really? I mean, is life really have a meaning and a purpose or is it just you live out

38:23

your days and it's all over? Like I needed to believe that he was alive and I would get to see him again.

38:28

And that became this real thing for me. I understood why people feel that way.

38:32

And so I started saying, well, if that promise is true and I need it to be true,

38:36

then all these other promises have to be true, too, because the Bible says that

38:40

God can't lie and that every scripture is true.

38:42

And so then when he says that the Lord is close to the brokenhearted,

38:46

that needs to be true, too. And all of a sudden I started seeing it. I would have the worst day ever and

38:52

you would send me a text or I would open up my mail and there was a book from

38:56

Max Licato in the mailbox or Lisa would walk in the room right at the worst

39:00

moment or one of our kids would call her. God was just showing up and being kind to us in different ways.

39:05

And so then that day was a little bit better because he was kind and close to

39:10

the brokenhearted. Right. And then when you feel all alone and I felt like nobody understands and maybe

39:15

even God doesn't care about me anymore, I would open up my Bible and I would

39:18

find the Lord longs to be gracious to you, Lee. He will rise to show you compassion.

39:23

He'll get up out of his chair, Max, to come and be nice to you when you're hurting.

39:27

And I would just start finding those words and they started coming true.

39:32

And over time, the light just started kind of coming on again and it got a little

39:36

bit brighter. And it's this kind of dual, I call it quantum physics thing,

39:41

because in the quantum physics world, more than one thing can be true at the

39:45

same time, which is hard to understand.

39:47

But the math is true that God can say something like, Jesus can say in John

39:52

16, 33, this world is going to give you trouble. You're going to have a hard time in this world.

39:57

And he can also say in John 10, 10, I came to give you an abundant life.

40:01

And both of those things can be true at the same time. And that's how we can

40:05

make it through because when it's all hard, you need to know that it's also

40:10

still good, that there's still good stuff out there.

40:15

When you think of hope and compare that with optimism,

40:24

biblical hope, as opposed to, I don't know, secular optimism or just the optimism.

40:32

Can you unpack those two concepts from your viewpoint?

40:38

I think so. So, you know, there's a lot of science around, there's a lot of

40:42

research around hope and the difference between hope and optimism.

40:46

And actually from a secular scientific point of view, some people say optimism

40:49

is better than hope, but I think that's not true. I think it turns out to not be true.

40:54

Optimism is this, and sort of secular hope and optimism, I kind of put those

40:58

together, is this idea of hoping for a particular thing to be true or to come

41:04

true or to come to pass, right? that if this happens, I'll be happier.

41:08

If that happens, I'll be okay. Or I'm going to make it as long as this set of circumstances occurs.

41:12

And that, and you can be a generally optimistic person and sort of be always

41:16

willing to say, Hey, it's going to be okay. Or that's going to work out for me.

41:19

And you can have all that, but it may or may not turn out to be realistic.

41:23

And then when, when you lose the thing that you thought you had to have in order

41:27

to be helpful, then if that's what you built your hope on, then you turn out

41:33

to be hopeless and hopelessness turns out to be the most dangerous thing anybody can have.

41:38

It's way more dangerous than cancer. Hopelessness is the deadliest disease that people can encounter.

41:43

But biblical hope, Max, isn't something, is not hope for something, it's hope in someone.

41:49

And so if Jesus really did pay for my sins and he really did die and he really

41:55

did overcome death and he rose up again, then that means I can believe that

42:00

he's going to do that for me, too. And so I think that some people say, what's the difference between faith and hope?

42:05

And I think it's the easiest way for me to say it is faith is the belief that

42:09

God can do anything he says he can do.

42:12

And hope is the knowledge or the belief that he'll do those things for me.

42:16

And so will he do it for me? And I believe that he will.

42:19

And so Jesus lived this life and he did the things that he did and he overcame

42:25

death, hell and the grave. And because of that, that's why I know Mitch is alive.

42:29

And that's why I know Patty's alive. And that's why I know I'll get to see him

42:32

again, because hope really is a hope in someone and the things that he's done for us.

42:38

And so I think that's the biggest difference is if your hope is based on something

42:42

that you could find out isn't true or that could be taken from you,

42:46

then you're really in a dangerous place. You're in a very dangerous place if your life's happiness and meaning and purpose

42:53

depends on a circumstance that could change or a person that could die or an

42:57

amount of money that could become less because of inflation or something else.

43:01

If your hope is in something that cannot be taken from you, then it can really

43:05

be bulletproof. And that's what we learned after we lost Mitch,

43:08

that we dipped down for a while and we were doubtful and we were hurting.

43:11

But it turned out that the bottom of all those emotional holes held.

43:15

And the bottom was, he's really true and he's really real.

43:19

And I'll give you one more. You know, this is a long answer to your question,

43:22

but people say all kinds of weird things to you after you go through major trauma.

43:26

Maybe you lose somebody. People say, the well-meaning Christians say, Romans 8, 28, at your son's funeral,

43:32

you know, God's going to work this out for good somehow. And most of the time

43:36

you want to punch them when they say things like that.

43:38

It doesn't feel good. It doesn't feel right. So it's not a good thing to say

43:41

right after somebody dies. But I'll tell you something that's weird, Max.

43:45

Over the 10 years since we lost Mitch, two different times I've gotten emails

43:50

from people who said, Hey, Dr. Warren, I was going to kill myself today until I listened to your podcast or

43:56

until I read that email that you sent out. And I feel a little hopeful and I'm not going to do that now.

44:01

And so because I started writing and podcasting and doing all these things out

44:06

of the pain of losing my son, a couple of people have lived that might've died.

44:12

And that's a good thing. So here we are back to quantum physics.

44:14

So it's never going to be good that Mitch died. It's never going to be okay. It's never going to stop hurting.

44:20

But good has come out of us being faithful and moving forward towards those

44:25

promises and deciding that other people could be helped by learning some of

44:29

the things that we've learned along the way. And that's why we do all these things. And so Romans 8, 28 turns out to be true,

44:35

that good things can come.

44:37

God can work good stuff out of any soil that your life is tilling if you'll

44:43

just hold in there and hang in there long enough.

44:46

It takes time and it takes years sometimes, but you'll start seeing that even

44:50

that hard one to swallow can turn out to be true.

44:55

Don't waste your sorrows, in other words.

44:58

That's right. So would you say then that a person who has gone through a trauma,

45:05

whether they wanted to or not,

45:08

has been enrolled in a particular school of suffering?

45:13

And some graduate with postgraduate degrees in the School of Suffering,

45:21

which qualifies you to do something that somebody is going to need.

45:30

You know, you and Lisa and your family can do what a thousand of us pastors cannot do.

45:39

You can sit next to somebody who has just bid farewell to a child they love more than life itself.

45:47

You can sit down on the couch next to them and say, I know how you feel. I know how you feel.

45:53

As a pastor, I might say, I can't imagine how you feel, or I try to imagine, but I've not been there.

46:01

But because of your particular struggle,

46:05

you can, and you can then with the same comfort God gave you,

46:13

you can begin extending that comfort to other people.

46:18

And what I'm hearing you say is that though you would give anything to not go through it.

46:26

But you're discovering some purpose in it and that God can use it.

46:31

And that that buoys you and helps you go through it. Am I hearing you correctly?

46:37

That's exactly right. I mean, that school of suffering. I remember this Isaiah 4810.

46:42

He says, see, I have refined you, not like silver is refined,

46:45

but I've refined you in the furnace of suffering.

46:48

And for me, I remember talking to God about that verse as I read it.

46:52

And I was like, I don't feel like you're refining me. I feel like you're cooking me.

46:56

I feel like I'm being burned up. And I came to this crossroads where I had to

47:00

say, okay, God is telling me that this fire can turn me into something better

47:06

than I was before. He can burn something out of me.

47:09

And I'm not saying he put me in the furnace for that purpose,

47:12

but I ended up there and he can turn it around and he can burn something into

47:17

my life that will be powerful and meaningful.

47:20

And I remember another surgeon came up to me shortly after Mitch died,

47:24

and he was not a friend. There's a guy that I knew who was another surgeon,

47:28

and he was one of these kind of, I don't really know what the word is, jock.

47:32

He was kind of one of these big kind of burly sports guys, you know, orthopedic surgeon.

47:36

And we never really had talked, and he walked right up to me,

47:39

Max, and he put his hands on my shoulders, and he braced me the first time he saw me.

47:44

And he said, Lee, I don't know what to say to you, but I know this.

47:49

I know your son wouldn't want his death to cause you to die too.

47:54

Said don't let it have a 200 mortality rate because

47:58

your son would want you to make something out of your life that would honor

48:01

him and he just walked off like that was the that was the most important thing

48:04

anybody said to me after mitch died is don't let his death kill you too and

48:10

i think that that comes into the context of this school of suffering idea in this that mitchell.

48:18

Would want his dad to tell a story with my life that honors him.

48:23

And so his life means something beyond that it just wiped me out.

48:29

And so in the context of my relationship with him, his life still has all kinds

48:33

of meaning and purpose because I'm using what I learned from him and from even

48:38

my experience of losing him to try to help somebody else find that context.

48:44

Viktor Frankl said that famous line that he said, that suffering stops feeling

48:48

like suffering when you give it purpose. And that's what I think the School of Suffering is all about. Yeah, yeah.

48:55

I think we've talked about my father and my dad died of Lou Gehrig's disease or ALS.

49:02

We were serving in South America at the time. We were in Brazil.

49:06

And I had volunteered to my father when he was diagnosed with ALS.

49:12

I had volunteered not to move to South America.

49:17

And my dad wrote me a letter that I'll treasure to the end of my life.

49:21

And in one of the lines, he said, go, please, God, I have no fear of death or eternity.

49:31

Now, my dad wasn't a theologian. He was a mechanic. He made his living in the

49:35

oil fields of West Texas. But he had landed on a faith that enabled him to weather that trauma.

49:44

It was horrible. I mean, it was two years of horror.

49:49

You know what ALS does to a body. And here's a robust mechanic in his early

49:55

60s who was hoping to pull a camper trailer around the U.S. in his retirement.

50:00

And all that was taken from him. But he said, I have no fear of death or eternity.

50:07

And even that, though, wasn't quite enough for me. I think I was struggling

50:12

with it, Lee, more than my dad was.

50:15

But there was a moment some month or so after my dad died that I received a

50:21

letter from a friend of my father's.

50:26

I didn't know him well, but they worked together as mechanics.

50:31

And this friend wrote me and he said, I would visit your father every week.

50:37

Week, and he watched my father, you know, digress into a wheelchair,

50:44

into a bed, and onto a breathing machine.

50:48

He watched that digression, and he came to the funeral, and I remember meeting

50:53

him, but I didn't know him well.

50:55

But he said, I watched your father suffer with dignity, he never complained.

51:04

And I decided that what Christ did for him, Christ could do for me.

51:10

And I became a Christian at the funeral.

51:14

Now, Lee, it didn't surprise me that somebody would respond to my dad that way,

51:22

because daddy really did suffer with dignity.

51:25

But what I needed to hear, I needed to hear that my father's passing had an eternal impact,

51:34

eternal impact, not temporal, but literally changed a person's eternal mailing address.

51:43

Wow. And I just needed to say, okay, there was a significance in that.

51:50

God was using even that tragedy to reach someone's life.

51:57

And, of course, the ultimate expression of that is the death of Jesus on the cross.

52:01

Take a human being, place them at the foot of the cross on the day Christ died,

52:05

and they'll say, well, there's no purpose in this.

52:08

No meaning in this. This is horrible. Here's a man being butchered and slaughtered

52:14

and stripped and whipped and crucified. There's no good in this.

52:18

But man, here we are still talking, you know. Three days later,

52:23

Jesus vacated the grave, and we realized that he did it for us.

52:27

And the greatest display of love was in the most atrocious murder that the world has ever seen.

52:37

And so this is what you're talking about how something can be horrible.

52:46

Can I use the word beautiful? You know, horrible, but also we can find beauty in it. We don't dismiss.

52:52

We don't dismiss. We don't pretend. We don't suppress.

52:56

Just the opposite. We elevate the pain. We present it before God.

53:01

But then we say, Lord, help me to find the beauty in this and help me to find the meaning behind it.

53:07

Wow. I think it's exactly the right point.

53:10

And I think one nuance of that that we need to say for the people listening

53:15

who are hurting over something, Jesus rose from the dead after that beautiful, horrible, cruel thing.

53:24

And he came back with his wounds. Okay. This is really important, friend.

53:30

All you listening, Jesus didn't come back with his wounds all healed up.

53:34

And the reason he didn't is because Thomas needed to see them. am.

53:37

Jesus said to Thomas, you want to know who I am? You put your hand in my wound and you'll know who I am.

53:43

And that's what we have to do is live in this life with our wounds visible.

53:46

Because my friend, Jarrett Stevens, who's a pastor at Champion Forest Baptist

53:50

Church in Houston says, scars tell better stories than trophies do.

53:55

It's exactly right. People need to see your wounds. And thank you for sharing that incredible story.

54:01

You know, Max, we got, we had about 10 minutes left And there are two questions

54:05

that people wrote in, just hundreds of you wrote in beautiful questions.

54:09

There are two that I thought we needed a pastor's touch on.

54:12

And the first one is a woman named Tamara wrote in, Max, and said this.

54:17

How do you deal with the guilt of losing a child?

54:20

My son, Kenny, at age 20, passed away from suicide five years ago.

54:25

And I struggle with guilt and the things I should have daily.

54:30

Max, how do you, as a pastor, how do you address that? I had the parental guilt

54:34

of a child's suicide. That's just devastating. I think, first of all, what was her name again? Tamara.

54:44

Tamara. Tamara, if you were right here with me in my office,

54:49

I would say, can you be kind to yourself?

54:55

Don't feel bad for feeling bad. Yeah. Okay. Just don't. Just don't.

55:01

Give yourself permission. And don't put yourself on a clock. you say it's been five years you may have

55:08

placed an expectation on yourself that well after five years i should be over

55:12

this or somebody may have said that to you we all heal at a different pace,

55:17

and so be kind to yourself take a deep breath and um and then secondly um i

55:26

have um And I tell about J.J.

55:29

Jasper in one of my books, and he lost a child, and he had to call.

55:35

You had to do this too, Lee. He had to call the siblings.

55:40

The little fellow was killed in, I think it was a four-wheeler that flipped

55:44

over, a little youngster, single age. I can't remember the age, but he had.

55:49

So J.J. called the siblings, and he said, as he called them,

55:53

I think there were four of them. He said, I want you to think about all the good you know about God.

56:01

Before I give you this news. There's some wisdom in that.

56:06

So Tamara, think about the good you know about God. He still loves you. He still cares.

56:12

He's watching over you. He's going to get you through this.

56:16

Don't give up. So hang on to the good. And then lastly, I think what we've been

56:22

saying is really helpful here. What's feeling and what's fact.

56:27

You know, you didn't make that happen.

56:32

You did not make that happen. And that's not a message from God when you have that thought.

56:39

So you need to please take that thought captive, present it before the throne

56:44

room of Christ to say, God, is this true?

56:46

Is this true? No, it's not true. It happened. It's horrible.

56:50

If you could do anything to have prevented it, you would have.

56:53

But you've got to move out of this feeling of guilt, got to be kind to yourself and begin responding,

57:01

break out of this cycle, this downward spiral, just kind of push out of it and

57:06

say, okay, dad, come it, dad, come it.

57:09

I'm not going to let that thought hold sway over me.

57:12

And the more you do it, the more you'll create that faith thought habit that

57:17

we've been talking about. It's not going to come overnight, but it will come. It will come.

57:23

That's exactly right. I have nothing to add. That was a perfect answer.

57:27

We needed some pastoral wisdom on that. And Max, the other question is just equally devastating.

57:33

A woman named Sherry, my faith has been shaken.

57:37

My 10-year-old granddaughter, Jalen, passed away in May from glioblastoma, brain cancer.

57:42

Such a tragic loss for me and our family. Here's the question. How do we go on?

57:51

So again, if you were here in my office, I would not give you a quick answer.

57:55

I would want to hear more. I would want to hear more about how this hurts, how it makes you feel.

58:02

And so based on that, we might go two or three different directions.

58:06

I quite likely would invite you to consider a couple of scriptures.

58:13

One of which is the words of the Apostle Paul, that this brief and momentary

58:20

struggle, It's not worth comparing with the glory that outweighs them all.

58:27

And that passage can come across a bit trite because I'm not saying that what

58:33

you feel is brief or momentary.

58:35

But I think what the Apostle Paul was saying there is in comparison to eternity

58:40

and the eternity that Lee will have with Mitch and you will have with your granddaughter. daughter.

58:49

Can we put eternal perspective here? I wanted more time with my dad. I sure did.

58:57

And everybody on this call, I imagine, has somebody that they would say got taken too soon.

59:04

I get that. And I hear that.

59:07

In comparison with eternity, I think my dad, who's probably Probably in that

59:14

great host of witnesses, Mitch and your granddaughter would say, you know what? I'm OK.

59:21

I'm OK. You stay faithful because it's brief and momentary. And boy, a vapor.

59:28

And we're going to be home with them and in the presence of Jesus.

59:32

I do not mean to downplay. I would not get to that point in the conversation quickly, you know,

59:38

only if you allowed me that permission, because you got to grieve.

59:41

You got to grieve it out. But you can't grieve like those who have no hope.

59:47

Because we have that. That's right. Thank you so much, Max. And,

59:50

you know, a couple more things. We're almost out of time. I want to respect

59:54

your time. You've been so gracious. Max has taken a night to night with us less than a week before his own book launch.

1:00:02

You've got a brand new book coming out, Max. And just tell us just a second about your new book.

1:00:07

I'm so excited about it. I don't have a copy yet, but I've already ordered it.

1:00:10

So tell us about your new book. Well, I just happen to have a copy.

1:00:17

Now, I am excited about this. This is called God Never Gives Up on You.

1:00:22

And it's a conversation about one of the most fascinating people in Scripture, Jacob.

1:00:29

Jacob, you know, he was a scoundrel. I mean, the guy was a scoundrel.

1:00:35

He seemed to be running from God more than he was running toward God.

1:00:39

So if you've got it all together and you're always running toward God, this book's not for you.

1:00:43

But if you've got a few more downs than you do ups, you might learn something

1:00:47

and benefit from how God was faithful.

1:00:49

The hero in the Jacob story is not Jacob. The hero is God.

1:00:54

Amen. You know, it's amazing to me that you've been doing this for as long as you've been doing it.

1:01:02

I've written three books and it's like it's like people say it's like having

1:01:05

a baby. Maybe I can't say that I'm not a woman, but it's certainly a labor of

1:01:09

love and it's difficult. And friends, I would encourage you, Hope is the First Dose has a bunch of stuff

1:01:14

in it that we didn't cover tonight that will be helpful to you if you're hurting.

1:01:17

Max's books always do that for me. He's the one guy that I can say without question, I read everything you write

1:01:24

and it just means so much to me.

1:01:26

And Max, I just, it would mean the world if he would just leave us tonight with a word of prayer.

1:01:30

And I'm just so grateful for you and Dean Lynn and the work that you're doing

1:01:33

and the help that you've been to me in my life. And for your time tonight, thank you so much.

1:01:38

You really helped me to put some words on hope.

1:01:40

It's my honor. It's my honor. And thank you, Lee.

1:01:43

Not only does this book contain amazing wisdom, it's just beautifully written.

1:01:49

Just beautifully written. I don't get why some people can be brilliant surgeons, great writers, and play the guitar.

1:01:59

Could you not just give me one of those? Lord, we thank you for this time. We do. I thank you for Lee. I thank you for Lisa.

1:02:10

I thank you for Dennis. And I thank you for Patty and for all these dear ones.

1:02:18

We thank you for Mitch and pray just a blessing over his memory and continued

1:02:25

help and strength for the Warren family.

1:02:30

And all these who have been kind to lend in an hour of listening and thought, we pray for them.

1:02:37

We know that you hear everybody's concerns, and we pray for strength and faith.

1:02:42

Help us to be strong in these very, very difficult and dark days.

1:02:46

We pray for those who are lonely, who are depressed.

1:02:50

We pray that if anybody's considering suicide, that you'd urge them,

1:02:55

call them back, call them into hope. And that, Heavenly Father, you would hear the prayers that are being offered.

1:03:02

We thank you for the empty tomb. We thank you for the promise of heaven in Jesus' name. Amen.

1:03:11

Amen. Thank you so much, Max. And friends, all over the world,

1:03:14

I notice there's at least five countries represented here in the folks listening.

1:03:17

We're so grateful that you spend an hour of your time with us.

1:03:20

And remember that whatever you're going through, God has a plan and a purpose,

1:03:24

and you can give it meaning and purpose, it won't feel as much like suffering.

1:03:27

And there is a plan. There's always a plan. You can change your life by changing

1:03:31

your mind. And hope is the first dose.

1:03:34

So shameless plug for the book. And I'm so grateful that you spent some time

1:03:38

with me and Max tonight. Max, love you. Thank you so much, brother.

1:03:41

Love you too, Lee. See you soon. Yes, sir. God bless you. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.

1:03:47

Music.

1:03:54

Hey, thanks for listening. The Dr. Lee Warren Podcast is brought to you by my

1:03:58

brand new book, Hope is the First Dose. It's a treatment plan for recovering

1:04:02

from trauma, tragedy, and other massive things. It's available everywhere books are sold.

1:04:07

And I narrated the audio book if you're not already tired of hearing my voice.

1:04:12

Hey, the theme music for the show is Get Up by my friend Tommy Walker,

1:04:16

available for free at TommyWalkerMinistries.org.

1:04:19

They are supplying worship resources for worshipers all over the world to worship the most high God.

1:04:25

And if you're interested in learning more, check out TommyWalkerMinistries.org.

1:04:30

If you need prayer, go to the prayer wall at WLeeWarrenMD.com slash prayer,

1:04:35

WLeeWarrenMD.com slash prayer, and go to my website and sign up for the newsletter,

1:04:40

Self-Brain Surgery, every Sunday since 2014, helping people in all 50 states

1:04:45

and 60-plus countries around the world. I'm Dr. Lee Warren, and I'll talk to you soon.

1:04:50

Remember, friend, you can't change your life until you change your mind.

1:04:53

And the good news is you can start today.