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117: Discover Your Life Within “The Story”

S7 E117 · Normal Goes A Long Way
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47 Plays16 days ago

Happy New Year and welcome to Season 7 of Normal Goes A Long Way! This season, we will be releasing weekly episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays (KIDS VERSION) over the course of 31 weeks. We invite you to join our host, Jill Devine, and follow along as we go through the story of the Bible through the words of “The Story”. At the end of Season 7, our hope is you’ll be able to say your spiritual life received a boost in terms of knowledge, awareness of God's involvement in your days, and in your prayer life.

Here’s more information about “The Story” from Zondervan, a world leading Bible publisher and provider of Christian communications:

You may be a bit intimidated by the Bible. You’re not alone; many people are. And no wonder, its pages mention odd names like Jehoshaphat and Nebuchadnezzar. It contains accounts from places you probably never heard of, like Sinai and Samaria. And it seems to be made up of a lot of different, seemingly unrelated stories. But it really is one big, exciting story. You can see it easily if you open your Bible to the beginning and then flip all the way to the end.

The first words found in Genesis 1:1 read: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” Then, if you turn all the way to the back of the book, Revelation 21:1, you find, “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away . . .” In the beginning God is creating the heavens and the earth. At the end he is creating a new heaven and a new earth. So the big question is this: “What on earth happened between the beginning and the end of the Bible?” If you can answer that question you will have uncovered the one seamless story of God.

We’d love for you to read along with us! Here’s a link to purchase your own copy of The Story.

Normal Goes A Long Way Website: https://www.normalgoesalongway.com/

Normal Goes A Long Way Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/normalgoesalongway/

Normal Goes A Long Way Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Normal-Goes-A-Long-Way-110089491250735

Normal Goes A Long Way is brought to you by Messiah St. Charles: https://messiahstcharles.org/

Normal Goes A Long Way is hosted on Zencastr. Create your podcast today! Get 20% off when you choose Zencastr for your podcasting needs: https://zencastr.com/?via=jill

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Transcript
00:00:00
Speaker
The following podcast is a Jill Devine Media production.
00:00:20
Speaker
Welcome to normal goes

Reflections on 2025 and Mid-Decade Milestones

00:00:21
Speaker
a long way. I'm your host Jill Devine and also Happy New Year. It's crazy that it's another year. A new year is upon us and where does the time go, right? And then I look at that it's 2025 and I was reading an article and an author had said that We're in the year 2025, which means we are halfway through the decade. And I thought this author was losing her mind because I couldn't comprehend that we are in the middle of a decade.
00:00:58
Speaker
I admit I'm not great with math, and that might have been one of the reasons, but it just felt so foreign to me. And so when I finally came to that realization that it is in the middle of a decade, that we're smack dev in the middle of the decade, I started having some crazy thoughts about What have I done or not done the first five years and what do I want to do these next five years?

Embracing Grace in Goal-Setting

00:01:25
Speaker
And those thoughts kind of started spiraling and I had to just stop and quiet my mind and focus on gratitude. And that's my encouragement to you.
00:01:36
Speaker
Whatever you are planning for the new year regarding your goals type of person, a theme type of person, or you just take one day at a time, I encourage you to have grace throughout the entire year.
00:01:54
Speaker
because it is very easy to beat ourselves up and feel like we failed at something and that's not it at all. Just remember that you deserve grace and each day is a brand new beginning.

Season Seven Focus: Enhancing Biblical Literacy

00:02:10
Speaker
Something that's also really cool this year, we're doing a new season of Normal Goes a Long Way. So we are entering into season number seven. And season number seven is going to be so much different than our past seasons, at least for the next four to six months or so.
00:02:28
Speaker
And the reason why it's going to be so different is because we are going to be focusing on a sermon series that we're doing at Messiah, which is the church that I work at, also the church that I attend with my family. The sermon series that Messiah and Normal Goes a Long Way have dedicated the next few months to is based on the book, The Story, by Randy Frazee.
00:02:51
Speaker
And I've often heard the story described as the Bible in novel form. And I want to give you a little bit of a background from an article on what the story is about and then explain why we have chosen to reach on this on Sundays and put this in season seven of the podcast. So this is Haster's article from Zondervan. And it says, you may be a bit intimidated by the Bible. You're not alone. Many people are.
00:03:21
Speaker
No wonder. It's pages mention odd names, it contains accounts from places you probably never heard of, and it seems to be made up of a lot of different, seemingly unrelated stories. But it really is one big exciting story.
00:03:37
Speaker
The first words found in Genesis 1.1 read, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Then if you turn all the way to the back of the book, Revelation 21.1, you find, then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. For the first heaven from the first earth like passed away. In the beginning, God is creating the heavens and the earth. At the end, he is creating a new heaven and a new earth. So the big question is this,
00:04:06
Speaker
What on earth happened between the beginning and the end of the Bible? If you can answer that question, you have uncovered the one painless story of God. So the question becomes why? Why devote so much time and energy into the story?
00:04:22
Speaker
And we believe that we need help with our biblical literacy and that we need to be rooted in God's word. like We cannot grow as Christians in our faith unless we are confident about the story of the Bible and its usefulness in our lives.
00:04:38
Speaker
and then We take that and we go lead our neighbors. We go lead our community. That's why. But there's another factor, especially if you're a parent. So going back to this article, it says, why not read God's story with your family this year?

Family Bible Engagement and Faith Retention

00:04:54
Speaker
Studies indicate if the extent of your child's exposure to things of faith is only weekly at church, the likelihood is very great when he or she graduates and leaves home, his or her relationship with the Lord will turn cold.
00:05:08
Speaker
However, if you as a parent engage your children in the experience of reading and discussing the Bible, chances go up astronomically that they will remain strong in their faith after leaving home. You don't have to be an expert.
00:05:24
Speaker
or grab all the answers. You just have to be willing to experience it with them. And that is why we have decided to spend a number of months and devote a lot of time to the story. We want to help our neighbors. We want to help our community. We want to become biblically literate, and we also want to help our families.
00:05:46
Speaker
We want our kids to know the Lord, not just now, forever.

Episode Format: Adults and Kids

00:05:51
Speaker
And so here's how that's going to look for Normal Goes a Long Way in season seven. On Tuesdays, you will hear a new episode based on the previous Sunday's message at Messiah.
00:06:06
Speaker
So I will take whatever the pastor's taught on and I will put it into podcast form. So you will get a new episode. You will hear where we are at in the story. And then I will also give you some questions to dig a little bit deeper or at least tell you where you can get those questions to dig deeper. And then on Thursdays, so help families. Hannah Lang, who has been on this podcast many times,
00:06:33
Speaker
is teaming up with April Mueller. April is the wife of Pastor Jim Mueller, who has also been on this podcast a number of times. Miss Hannah and Miss April are going to take the story and put it into the kids' version story for you.
00:06:50
Speaker
So families get to listen together, they get to understand a little bit more and how to explain it to their child. And so what's gonna happen this coming Thursday? Miss Hannah and Miss April are going to explain exactly what their episodes will be like. So I encourage you to come back on Thursday and listen to that. And again, this is the recap on how this season's gonna go. Season seven will have two episodes every week.
00:07:20
Speaker
Tuesdays, you're going to hear the message that one of our pastors gave on the previous Sunday. And then Thursdays, you are going to hear from Miss Hannah and Miss April. And they are going to give the kids version of the story.

Encouragement to Subscribe and Engage

00:07:36
Speaker
And there will be a couple of breaks here and there for Easter and some other things, but I will make sure to give you a heads up on that.
00:07:42
Speaker
And to always follow along, I encourage you to subscribe to Normal Goes a Long Way. That way you will get notified when a brand new episode launches. I am so excited to start the story with you. I am excited to hear what you have to say, find out how it has inspired you, how it's inspired families, and really make a difference in our community. Thanks for listening to Normal Goes a Long Way.