Josh Tells His Story (episode 50)

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Welcome back to When You Love a Prodigal.

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If you love a prodigal,

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you can discover help and hope for

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your wilderness journey right here at our podcast,

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and also help and hope for your own life journey.

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Today is a big day because it is our 50th episode of our podcast.

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I, whoever thought I would do a podcast much less 50 of them,

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and I'm planning to continue.

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But today is especially big because we have a very special guest.

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That guest is my son, Josh,

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who is the one who made this podcast happen.

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Today he will be telling us whatever he wants,

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but a little of his story,

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his journey as a prodigal,

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things that brought change in his life and where he is now.

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I want you to listen.

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I want you to be encouraged by Josh's story and how he's made a major turn in his life,

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and be thinking as you listen to his story of ways that you can interact with

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your own prodigal and things that might be helpful to you.

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Jot them down so you don't forget.

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I want this to really be a helpful time for you.

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Here we go. Josh, welcome to what I consider your podcast.

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Thank you.

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You're so welcome. Thank you.

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I just want you to know, Josh,

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that many people who listen to this and read my book are very grateful for you.

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They've said that and you have a chance now to even

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expand the ministry that you have in the lives of people who are going through

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some of the things that you and I went through over some 15 years.

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First, I'd like it if you could tell a little about your first eight years

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before you came to be a part of our family with your birth mom,

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and some of what you experienced then.

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I don't tend to remember quite a bit about that time.

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I mean, I remember a little Jots of things.

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I just remember growing up in many different places, many different houses.

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The main time that I do remember,

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I couldn't tell you my ages,

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probably birth and eight years old,

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spent in a trailer that my grandfather had purchased for my biological mother.

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That time growing up,

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I wasn't going to school on a regular basis.

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It was whenever she would want to send me.

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That tended, of course, to get me in trouble.

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Me just making choices that I shouldn't be making.

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I just remember a lot of little things.

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Most of the things are not good.

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Just a lot of traveling here and there with her doing drugs,

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and she was prostituting to make money,

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which meant I was around a lot of different guys and their kids if they had them.

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Did you ever feel unsafe or hungry or

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confused by all the different people and things going on?

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I'd have to say I was always confused just because I never knew what was going on,

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on a day-to-day basis,

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except for throughout that time of growing up one to eight,

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I had spent time on and off with my grandparents,

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which those were the times where I really wasn't all that confused,

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but the times of hitchhiking with my biological mom and whatever else may have been back then.

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However, we got places.

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I was definitely confused on why there were so many people always around.

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Hungry, yes.

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My grandparents tried to make it,

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so she had something as well as being on welfare.

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But yes, there were times where I didn't eat or I remember,

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this is of course one of the little tidbit things that I remember.

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I remember whenever we would go to a fast food place,

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she would have me go in with her and say that there was something in our meal,

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and of course back then they would give you a free meal and others, I guess.

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Definitely confused, sometimes hungry.

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But not afraid?

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No, I don't think I was really.

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There might have been times where I was afraid just because she did a lot of drugs,

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which the people that she was with did drugs,

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and there would be fights.

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That would probably be about the only time that I think I was ever really afraid.

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But even at that, I don't.

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I think it was just a norm for me.

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You were used to it?

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To most parts, I was used to it.

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There's things that I saw that I couldn't comprehend until a later age.

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Then realized, hey, those weren't good things that was happening.

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Then you were taken from your mom and you went to your grandparents.

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As far as you knew, that was just one more time you went to your grandparents, I guess?

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It was just another time that Papa would come pick me up,

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and I'd stay over there or we'd go on a fishing trip or a camping trip.

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Then all of a sudden,

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you were put in our home.

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I know that the day that you actually came to live with us,

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not just visit us,

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you didn't know you were coming to live with us.

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Nobody had told you that.

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But how were you feeling for as much as you knew about what was going on when you

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came to live with us? What were your thoughts or feelings?

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Do you remember that?

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I think it's hard to remember,

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but I was more confused than anything else.

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I didn't know why they were taking me away from my biological mother and my grandparents.

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I still remember the day in court when the judge asked me if I wanted to change my name.

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I told him that I wanted it from Alan Shane to Shane Allen or something like that,

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not knowing that he meant my last name.

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That's why your name got changed to Joshua Shane Allen.

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I didn't realize that that was what caused that.

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Yeah, I think that's about one of the only things that I remember of that day,

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that we went to court for the final process of the adoption.

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Right. Well, it was foster care and then later was adoption,

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and that would have been the changing your name.

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Yeah.

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So thinking back on those early times with us, with our family,

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what do you remember about that?

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What was hard about it, but maybe what was good about it?

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It was weird.

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The fact that you would sit down and have dinner together,

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weird that there'd always be somebody there when you went to bed and woke up.

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Those things were, I remember that was very strange to you,

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that there were limits on what you could watch on TV,

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and that there was actually a bedtime.

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There was no cable, that's for sure.

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You went to school.

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Yes, I went to school full-time every day is when I couldn't get out of not going.

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So see if you can think about the kinds of things when you first began to get in trouble,

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when you were at Pine Castle School and sometimes were not doing really well.

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What can you remember about that?

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Can just remember some of the things that I did to get myself in trouble.

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I think some of it was probably just rebellion because of what had been going on in my life and the changes.

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Certain things that I remember doing to get myself in trouble,

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and finally just getting myself in trouble enough that they ended up having to take me

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and a few others out of the actual class and having to learn with somebody that wasn't even necessarily a teacher.

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I don't know why I did the things.

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It probably was to get more attention.

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You struggled in school as well.

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Yes, I definitely did.

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That played a lot with not going to school in my early years of when kids normally start school

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and learn their ABCs and specific things that's going to help them when they continue to another grade.

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After the adoption and you were really ours, not just foster child for us,

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we had great hopes that things would get better, that you would feel more secure,

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that you wouldn't be abandoned or turned away or something like that,

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that we were really committed to you and loved you.

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Then you started sixth grade.

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You were ahead of your time, I mean age-wise,

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and so you were bigger than all the kids in your grade and also still not really caught up quite.

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From the beginning of the time you were in middle school,

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you began to have more and more trouble with the wrong friends in school.

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I got to know the teachers and the counselors and the vice principal and then the principal.

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Can you think of what some of your thoughts were when you were there in middle school

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and really beginning to get in trouble more?

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Probably because I started seeing things that I saw when I was younger

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that made me want to start doing those things.

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At that point in time I was getting a little older

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and I'm a little bit more upset with the situation that I was in from being taken away,

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put in a home with people that I didn't know.

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Other people were talking about their parents and brothers and sisters

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and it probably made me think, well I don't have that per se even though I did,

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but that's when things kind of started hitting me a little bit more of what was truly going on

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as well as what had gone on when I was younger with the drugs.

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So that's probably what made me start acting out a little bit more.

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So at that time, you don't know this probably, but they were about to kick you out of school.

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No, I think I knew that.

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Okay, because they just really were struggling with your disrupting in class

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and you had joined a gang and so we were pretty desperate

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because we didn't know what else to do to help you.

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And so that's when we sent you to House of Hope.

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Would you like to comment about your year there?

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I met some good and interesting people there.

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It was very helpful and it was probably what brought me closer to God back then

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due to having to memorize verses and read your Bible every day and having daily devotions.

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But it was hard because I once again was in a place that I could not leave even though I tried.

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But it was a good time where I had a chance to be able to try to better myself

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and have people that were there that wanted to help me do that

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and try to get out of the way of being that kid getting in trouble.

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And I had a lot of great people there to help.

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Of course, you know who I'm going to say were the most helpful there, and that would be Mike and Rose Young.

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Definitely.

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They were just, you knew the love that they had for the kids and me that were there,

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even though we were horrible to them.

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They were always there.

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It was a good time of growth and I'm glad and also not glad that it happened.

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Right. Maybe you don't know this, but one of the things for us that was good, other than a little piece at home,

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but we really fell in love with you.

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One of the things they required was that we come and have time with you every week.

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And there we'd sit and we got forced to develop a relationship, which had been hard to make happen before.

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And also, Mike led you to Jesus and what happened that night?

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When or that afternoon?

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He baptized me in the lake that was behind our house that we had.

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The next day, actually, they caught a, I think it was like a seven or eight foot alligator right at the same place that he had baptized me.

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Well, we're glad the alligator was not there the day you got baptized.

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But for me, something that happened that night that I actually haven't talked to you about, but it's in my book,

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it was like you were born in my heart as my real son, as opposed to just this boy that God had sent to us

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and that we were growing in our love for. But all of a sudden, you were more than just an adopted boy.

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You were like really and truly my son. It was a very special time for me.

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And that's been true ever since. God gave me a real love for you. And you know that.

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So then when you graduated from House of Hope,

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you came home and we did some homeschooling to get you all caught up.

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And you then begged and begged to get to go back to school.

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You really didn't like spending your days with me all the time.

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And I was fearful because you hadn't had the right kind of friends.

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And we had all sorts of constraints of what you could and couldn't do in order to get to go back to school

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and not continue homeschooling. And that's the things we were concerned about all began to happen.

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Because you found your old friends that you had been separated from for that year and a half.

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What were you thinking when you got back with them and some of the things that started to happen?

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Anything particular?

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Not that I necessarily could remember other than it felt more like freedom to me.

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It felt like it did back before I was adopted that I could kind of just try to do my own thing.

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So you didn't feel so controlled?

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Correct.

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But then you began to make some really poor choices.

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Yeah, I made quite a few poor choices, that's for sure.

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Then I just made those choices because it felt good.

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And it's not that I didn't feel good over the years.

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It's just that was a feel good that, again, that's kind of hard for me to explain.

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I sometimes have a hard time finding words for things.

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So do I.

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It made me feel good. It made me feel happy. That's, of course, what things do when you're doing things that you're not well.

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Things like drugs and alcohol?

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Yeah, like drugs and alcohol. That to me, again, was just something that I started to realize,

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hey, that's what these things are. That's what I saw when I was younger.

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So I'm going to do it. And I did it. And it made me feel good most of the time.

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And I knew it was something I should do.

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But I did it anyway just because I wanted to be rebellious and not listen and be my own person.

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You did get in a little trouble there.

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I do remember the very first time I got in trouble.

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Funny enough, I don't really remember all the circumstances that had to do with it. I've gotten in some trouble.

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Then you can actually probably refresh my memory because I know you remember completely.

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But when I ended up going to juvenile detention and then ended up going into a similar type of program.

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Yeah, you really what happened was you'd had your wisdom teeth out and you had your pain medication

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and decided to take it all. And then you came down the stairs clearly out of control with a bag you'd packed and said,

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I'm leaving. And Steve took one look at you and said, there's no way you're going to drive your car.

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And that led to a confrontation. And you actually called the sheriff's to come.

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Yeah, I do remember exactly. I told you, you'd remember. And I remember as soon as you said it.

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I do remember that day. I definitely was on a lot of medication.

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And I was the very first time that I really ever had an encounter with the police.

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And I remember the lady sheriff.

231
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Yeah, a lady sheriff.

232
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I remember, I guess she said that I started walking towards her with my fist.

233
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And she told me that she was going to shoot me if I didn't stop. And I guess I stopped.

234
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And thank you, Lord.

235
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Went back with her, turned around and walked home. I can't remember exactly what I did.

236
00:21:00,400 --> 00:21:06,320
But yeah, that was the very first time that I had ever had interaction with the law like that.

237
00:21:06,320 --> 00:21:14,560
Yeah, it was a scary time because it was a confrontation with Steve, your dad.

238
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So they took you away. And in the middle of the night, you called.

239
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And you said, come get me out of here. I said, we can't do that. You have to have a hearing.

240
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And that's not for two days. And so you spent two nights at JDC.

241
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And we went to court and they set a trial date. And we're going to send you home with us.

242
00:21:39,040 --> 00:21:43,440
And Steve said, well, we're his parents and we care about him.

243
00:21:43,440 --> 00:21:50,720
But we're also the victims because of the way you attacked Steve, tried to. You didn't actually.

244
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And so that's when they sent you to Boys Town for three weeks until your trial.

245
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And then the judge was kind and just put you on community service.

246
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Instead of putting you in jail. And we were grateful for that.

247
00:22:06,960 --> 00:22:10,880
But of course, you didn't go to your community service very much.

248
00:22:11,840 --> 00:22:19,200
No, I did not. I do remember where I did some of the community services, that wildlife refuge.

249
00:22:20,320 --> 00:22:24,800
Yes, you did go to some, but then you didn't.

250
00:22:24,800 --> 00:22:28,560
And so eventually you were back before the judge.

251
00:22:28,560 --> 00:22:40,080
And he said, all right, if you don't go do your community service, then you will be in jail or go to prison for the damage.

252
00:22:40,080 --> 00:22:45,600
That was a different thing, though. That had to do with the gate.

253
00:22:45,600 --> 00:22:49,920
Damaging. Yes. Yeah, that was. Yes. OK. Yes.

254
00:22:49,920 --> 00:22:51,600
Yeah, those are two different events.

255
00:22:53,040 --> 00:22:56,560
That includes the night you spent at 33rd Street.

256
00:22:56,560 --> 00:22:59,920
Jail. So you had some.

257
00:22:59,920 --> 00:23:03,120
Not enough was across the street or across the lake from outside.

258
00:23:03,120 --> 00:23:05,600
I know. I always thought that was interesting.

259
00:23:07,120 --> 00:23:14,800
So let's kind of switch gears here and tell us about some of the really important people in your life.

260
00:23:16,800 --> 00:23:19,600
That's I've got quite a few.

261
00:23:21,600 --> 00:23:24,560
You guys, for one, are very important.

262
00:23:24,560 --> 00:23:43,520
In my life now, as I got older, I finally learned that it took a long time to Mike and Rose again have been very since House of Hope, very important to me.

263
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And then my grandparents.

264
00:23:48,560 --> 00:23:51,920
My grandparents had all have been there throughout my entire life.

265
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And they have not ever necessarily let me down.

266
00:23:56,720 --> 00:24:00,320
So I would have to say that they were very, very important to me.

267
00:24:01,280 --> 00:24:04,320
That's really true. They were so key in your life.

268
00:24:05,040 --> 00:24:07,200
And I definitely want to get back to that.

269
00:24:07,200 --> 00:24:15,760
But I've got my best friend, John, but he's very important in my life and his his family is also important in my life.

270
00:24:15,760 --> 00:24:18,800
And then I've got my family now.

271
00:24:18,800 --> 00:24:29,840
But my grandparents, I and you guys, my grandparents have been there for the entire time and you guys have been there for the majority of my life.

272
00:24:29,840 --> 00:24:38,960
But my grandparents just never they always believed in me, even though I was not doing the right thing.

273
00:24:38,960 --> 00:24:42,640
Unfortunately, my grandfather's passed some years now.

274
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My grandmother's still living. 97 years old. She is.

275
00:24:47,680 --> 00:24:51,520
Yeah. And I will be going to see her with my family tomorrow.

276
00:24:52,320 --> 00:24:54,800
But she's down the street for me.

277
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I finally was able to convince her a little over a year ago, I think now to move closer to rehab slash long term facility here down the street for me.

278
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So I still get to go see her. And there's a lot of times that we'll talk about the old days because now that's mostly what she remembers.

279
00:25:19,360 --> 00:25:25,440
Yeah. So I'm very grateful that my grandparents have always stayed in my life.

280
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They've been so good to you.

281
00:25:27,120 --> 00:25:34,480
In fact, when your grandfather was failing and eventually passed, they were very happy to see you.

282
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My grandfather was failing and eventually passed. You may not realize this, but we were afraid you would take your life.

283
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You had come close a couple of other times. We just knew that it was devastating for you to lose him, that papa was so important to you.

284
00:25:53,440 --> 00:25:59,760
And yet instead it became a turning point in your life. Can you talk about that?

285
00:25:59,760 --> 00:26:05,840
That was definitely a turning point in my life. I had just gotten out of a very bad marriage.

286
00:26:05,840 --> 00:26:13,200
Basically, I'd become an alcoholic at that time. Right before my grandfather passed away, I met my wife.

287
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She was there for me the entire time, right before he had passed.

288
00:26:18,480 --> 00:26:28,960
That was the turning point in my life. After we had gotten together and my grandfather passed away, I was still hurting from that and still drinking.

289
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Basically, my wife, when we were dating, she was there for me to be my supporter, as well as you guys, of course.

290
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She was the changing point in my life where I started to get my act together.

291
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I think one of the main reasons is because she forced me to do that and kicked me in my butt to do it.

292
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I still remember, I don't know if it was the day that we were getting married, when I had asked her.

293
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After she said yes, she basically said, I'm not going to marry you if you continue drinking.

294
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That day is when I stopped. We had a tragic thing happen at the house that I had lived in with a roommate taking his life in the house.

295
00:27:16,720 --> 00:27:20,240
She was there for that as well to help me get through that.

296
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I ended up going to stay with her during that time because I wasn't going to stay at the house.

297
00:27:26,640 --> 00:27:32,480
Every time I would walk through it, I would just see things that I didn't want to see.

298
00:27:32,480 --> 00:27:43,120
Throughout that time of us living together, I had worked on and off during that time, but never really a full-time job.

299
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I started working when I was living with her. We got married and ended up moving out to the country.

300
00:27:51,360 --> 00:27:56,640
That's when I started a full-time job that I'm still with right now.

301
00:27:56,640 --> 00:28:01,920
I still was making definitely bad choices before I met her.

302
00:28:01,920 --> 00:28:06,960
Do you remember when Papa died what you said?

303
00:28:06,960 --> 00:28:17,440
You planned the memorial service that we had for him. When you shared then, you said a hugely important thing.

304
00:28:17,440 --> 00:28:21,280
Right now, I can't remember that.

305
00:28:21,280 --> 00:28:26,080
What you said was, I want to make Papa proud.

306
00:28:26,080 --> 00:28:33,200
I'm going to live a different life than the one I've been living because I just want...

307
00:28:33,200 --> 00:28:38,240
He's just been such a wonderful model and I want to please him.

308
00:28:38,240 --> 00:28:44,720
Yeah, I do remember saying that, yes. That's what I've strived to do since his death.

309
00:28:44,720 --> 00:28:49,120
I feel that I've come a very long way with that.

310
00:28:49,120 --> 00:28:53,760
You certainly have. Why don't you tell us a little about your farm?

311
00:28:53,760 --> 00:29:00,000
Well, like I said, after we got married, we had moved out to our first farm.

312
00:29:00,000 --> 00:29:06,000
We had some horses, we had cows, chickens, turkeys, pigs, all of it.

313
00:29:06,000 --> 00:29:08,000
Sheep?

314
00:29:08,000 --> 00:29:14,560
We ended up moving to another farm, a little bit smaller, so we had to get rid of some animals.

315
00:29:14,560 --> 00:29:22,640
We had started selling and raising some pigs that we now sell as a side business.

316
00:29:22,640 --> 00:29:30,160
But it's something that now, which is really weird because of course I grew up in the city.

317
00:29:30,160 --> 00:29:33,520
I grew up fishing and surfing and the beach.

318
00:29:33,520 --> 00:29:40,560
So I never really... I liked the country and definitely started liking the country more when I came to live with you guys.

319
00:29:40,560 --> 00:29:46,160
Just because we had family in Texas and they had horses.

320
00:29:46,160 --> 00:29:50,000
I don't know. I just... I love... I've always loved the animals.

321
00:29:50,000 --> 00:29:55,280
But now having them, it's just... it's more responsibility.

322
00:29:55,280 --> 00:29:59,040
And it's something that I just... I like to do.

323
00:29:59,040 --> 00:30:07,520
And it's... amazingly, I've become a builder, a planner, a farmer now.

324
00:30:07,520 --> 00:30:13,840
You love being outdoors. You prefer that. Your job keeps you outdoors as well.

325
00:30:13,840 --> 00:30:20,560
You drill wells and install equipment for water wells. That's...

326
00:30:20,560 --> 00:30:27,200
So you keep... Here's the thing that's amazing as we've watched you work.

327
00:30:27,200 --> 00:30:34,160
Because in those earlier days, Steve called you the most creative work avoider he'd ever seen.

328
00:30:34,160 --> 00:30:40,880
And now when we watch you between your job and the farm,

329
00:30:40,880 --> 00:30:45,040
you might be one of the hardest working people I know.

330
00:30:45,040 --> 00:30:49,520
And it's not just that it's hard labor, because it is a lot of it. It's just work.

331
00:30:49,520 --> 00:30:56,880
I mean, because you all moved to another farm, you just installed a thousand feet of fence in yourself.

332
00:30:56,880 --> 00:30:58,480
And...

333
00:30:58,480 --> 00:31:00,240
You have to start all over again.

334
00:31:00,240 --> 00:31:08,640
Right. And so it's been thrilling to see the change that God has made in your life

335
00:31:08,640 --> 00:31:17,760
to enable you to work. When we come to visit you, you'll say and talk with us for a while.

336
00:31:17,760 --> 00:31:22,960
And then you say, whoop, I gotta go do something and take care of some animal or something at the farm.

337
00:31:22,960 --> 00:31:27,920
You know, so... It's such a contrast.

338
00:31:27,920 --> 00:31:34,800
What caused you, do you think, to turn into such a hardworking man?

339
00:31:34,800 --> 00:31:40,320
What you had said, that I had said at Papa's funeral, that I wanted to make him proud.

340
00:31:40,320 --> 00:31:48,640
That was the kick for me. And my wife has really been the one that's made me want to do it,

341
00:31:48,640 --> 00:31:55,120
to make her proud and to make you guys proud to know that I'm now working so hard.

342
00:31:55,120 --> 00:31:57,840
But just for my family.

343
00:31:57,840 --> 00:31:59,440
Tell us about your family.

344
00:31:59,440 --> 00:32:07,200
I've got three girls. I've got a 19 year old, five year old and a 15, 16 month.

345
00:32:07,200 --> 00:32:14,400
They're just, they're all great kids. The middle child is definitely, as I look at her right now,

346
00:32:15,840 --> 00:32:20,000
she becomes more and more like me, which is scary.

347
00:32:22,240 --> 00:32:27,760
But every day she is more like me. And then my littlest one,

348
00:32:27,760 --> 00:32:34,480
she's starting to talk now and just goes crazy and runs around everywhere.

349
00:32:34,480 --> 00:32:38,800
And you can't keep her in the house. You can't keep her in a stroller.

350
00:32:38,800 --> 00:32:44,480
And then my oldest, which is of course my wife's daughter, she's an awesome kid.

351
00:32:44,480 --> 00:32:49,600
She's about to start going to school to become a pharmacy tech.

352
00:32:50,240 --> 00:32:52,240
My family is what keeps me going.

353
00:32:52,240 --> 00:32:58,640
The days I get off of work at six o'clock and get home at now 6.15, since I was so close,

354
00:32:59,440 --> 00:33:00,400
I do it for them.

355
00:33:01,760 --> 00:33:05,280
That's awesome. Let me ask you one last question then Josh.

356
00:33:06,000 --> 00:33:10,080
So where has God fit into all of this in your life?

357
00:33:11,200 --> 00:33:16,720
God's been in my life this entire time. I mean, ever since before I was adopted,

358
00:33:16,720 --> 00:33:23,920
I went to church with my grandparents. But God really didn't become a part of my life

359
00:33:23,920 --> 00:33:31,120
until House of Hope. I went to church with you guys and tried to, I guess, play the part.

360
00:33:31,760 --> 00:33:37,280
But House of Hope is where he became real to me.

361
00:33:38,080 --> 00:33:44,400
And even though that I've strayed throughout the years, he's still in my life.

362
00:33:44,400 --> 00:33:46,960
But I still do try to keep a relationship with him.

363
00:33:48,240 --> 00:33:51,840
One of the things that I know that you do is pray a lot,

364
00:33:52,640 --> 00:33:58,400
or ask for prayer. You not infrequently text me and say, I'm having a hard day.

365
00:33:58,400 --> 00:34:07,040
Please be praying for me. So it seems to me that your relationship doesn't look like everyone's,

366
00:34:07,360 --> 00:34:12,400
but that it's got a real personal sense to it, that God is real to you.

367
00:34:12,400 --> 00:34:20,000
And you know that he's got things under control and that you turn to him often.

368
00:34:21,040 --> 00:34:29,680
And let me just say finally, Josh, it has been such an incredible journey to walk with you

369
00:34:29,680 --> 00:34:36,160
for all these years. You've been with us for more than 20 years now.

370
00:34:36,160 --> 00:34:43,760
And actually more than 30 years is what I meant to say. And you are an important part of our life.

371
00:34:43,760 --> 00:34:49,680
Your sisters, our daughters, love you like someone who'd been born their brother.

372
00:34:49,680 --> 00:34:56,160
They really care for you. And it has been a hard journey in a lot of ways.

373
00:34:56,800 --> 00:35:05,200
It's a journey that's made a difference in my life. I've been radically transformed in a lot of ways.

374
00:35:05,200 --> 00:35:11,040
Because of journeying through the hard things in your life.

375
00:35:11,040 --> 00:35:16,080
And I don't think they were all rebellion. I'm sure some of it was.

376
00:35:16,080 --> 00:35:21,840
But a lot of it was the pain that you grew up with and the losing of your mom.

377
00:35:21,840 --> 00:35:29,120
I remember wishing that you could love me as your mom. But you said no.

378
00:35:29,120 --> 00:35:36,640
Julie was your mom. And then later you finally were able to express that love.

379
00:35:36,640 --> 00:35:41,760
And that's been a growing thing for us to be able to have that kind of relationship.

380
00:35:41,760 --> 00:35:50,320
But most of all, it's been a joy to see you really wanting to be the person that God made you to be.

381
00:35:50,320 --> 00:35:56,160
Knowing you still have growing to do. But to see you working well, working hard,

382
00:35:56,160 --> 00:36:03,360
making such good choices for your life compared to what you did in those earliest years.

383
00:36:03,360 --> 00:36:11,680
And having a ministry without doing it yourself. Because your life has touched so many people.

384
00:36:12,320 --> 00:36:18,800
And so I would say thank you. I think that our listeners would say thank you as well.

385
00:36:18,800 --> 00:36:26,880
I'm just grateful that I get to be your mom and watch what God continues to do in you and through you.

386
00:36:26,880 --> 00:36:30,720
And I believe he's got even more ahead for you.

387
00:36:30,720 --> 00:36:34,240
Yes, and I'm very grateful for you guys. And I love you very much.

388
00:36:34,240 --> 00:36:42,160
And I am now definitely glad that I was adopted and that you guys chose to let me stay with you.

389
00:36:42,160 --> 00:36:44,560
And become my family.

390
00:36:44,560 --> 00:36:50,080
It is a joy. I love you. Thank you so much for doing this.

391
00:36:50,080 --> 00:36:50,880
Love you.

392
00:36:50,880 --> 00:37:02,880
Love you, hon. So to my listeners, glad you could listen in as Josh and I kind of work through his life.

393
00:37:02,880 --> 00:37:10,480
And as is true for all of us, he still has a way to go. God's still working. All of us. That's true.

394
00:37:10,480 --> 00:37:18,320
And so again, let me ask you listeners that you would think, what can I apply? What would I want?

395
00:37:18,320 --> 00:37:24,400
Whether it's in your relationship with your prodigal or in your own life.

396
00:37:24,400 --> 00:37:32,640
Is there something in that God has said to you through this conversation that will really help you as you keep going?

397
00:37:32,640 --> 00:37:41,200
And in your relationship with God and with any prodigal in your life. God bless you.

398
00:37:41,200 --> 00:37:49,120
This is the 50th episode. I'm kind of thinking we'll pause for a couple of weeks. I need a break, I think.

399
00:37:49,120 --> 00:37:56,080
But all the old episodes are available and you can go back and listen to them.

400
00:37:56,080 --> 00:38:05,120
And we'll pick back up and a number of things planned for when we pick back up in the middle of February.

401
00:38:05,120 --> 00:38:26,480
God bless you.