Podcasts about Christmas

Happy Magna Carta Day, everyone! One of them, anyway. Now that that's out of the way, there's heated debate on The Billie Piper Matter in both The Sun and The Telegraph, and the Three Who Rule add their shopworn takes to this interminable discussion that will be an absolute delight until Xmas 2026. Plus we have a set report from 2004, the iPlayer possibly re-re-re-inventing cable and hosting rival broadcasters, the Ianto Shrine nearing its end and the feelings around that, and most importantly, Part the Second of our "The Mysterious Planet" Classic Series Commentary! Links: Support Radio Free Skaro on Patreon Happy March 4 The Sun: 2026 Doctor Who Christmas Special will not feature Billie Piper as the Doctor Why No One Wants to be the Next Doctor Who Season 3 scripts were being prepared before cancellation The Whoniverse Show: Russell T Davies' Ultimate Guide to Being the Perfect Companion BBC Says iPlayer Could Host Rival Broadcasters As Corporation Sets Out Charter Renewal Funding Vision Set report from 2004 first Doctor Who location shoot Doctor Who Magazine 627 released Ianto shrine in Cardiff to be taken down at the end of April Gareth David-Lloyd talks about the Ianto shrine removal Change.org petition to save the Ianto shrine Big Finish The Fourth Doctor Adventures: The Ministry of Death released Big Finish The Death and Life of River Song: War Widow due Sep 2026 Retro TV drops Doctor Who Commentary: The Mysterious Planet Part Two

https://wels2.blob.core.windows.net/daily-devotions/20260308dev.mp3 Listen to Devotion God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8 True, Lasting Peace Amidst the struggles and hassles of our lives, there is a longing for true, lasting peace. If only there could be the peace that existed in the Garden of Eden. Our first parents lived in perfect harmony with God. They were his friends. And out of that peaceful relationship flowed a warm relationship with one another. The tragedy of sin was that it shattered both the peace between God and people and the peace among people. Quickly after the fall into sin, we see the rise of doubts and fears and hostility, which people directed both toward God and toward one another. True, lasting peace was lost. It's not hard to point to examples in our lives that demonstrate the truth of this: the envy in our hearts, the lust of our eyes, and the hurt that we cause by wayward words and selfish actions. For all these sins and the many more we do, we truly deserve God's eternal wrath and the pronouncement of his condemnation. Yet the remarkable thing is that God loves us, and he demonstrated his one-of-a-kind love by reestablishing peace between himself and his sinful, rebellious world of people. Listen to the words again: “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Every teaching of Scripture rests upon this truth. Though all people are undeserving sinners, Christ sacrificed himself in their place to win peace between God and us. Peace was reestablished through the death of Jesus Christ for “the punishment that brought us peace was upon him” (Isaiah 53:5). God’s righteous wrath against sin was directed at Jesus, and he paid the deadly price for sin with his own precious blood and his innocent sufferings and death. Jesus said, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid” (John 14:27). Prayer: O Jesus, by humbling yourself and dying for me, you rescued sinners from the condemnation I deserved. Comfort me with the true, lasting peace which comes from knowing and believing that you are my precious Savior. Amen. Daily Devotions is brought to you by WELS. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. ™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Fluent Fiction - Danish: Farmyard Frenzy: Lessons in Collaboration Find the full episode transcript, vocabulary words, and more:fluentfiction.com/da/episode/2026-03-08-07-38-19-da Story Transcript:Da: Under den klare forårssol stod Mikkel på stien, der førte til gården.En: Under the clear spring sun, Mikkel stood on the path leading to the farm.Da: Han åndede dybt ind og kunne lugte friske blomster og nypløjet jord.En: He took a deep breath and could smell fresh flowers and freshly plowed earth.Da: Det var i dag, han ville vise alle, hvor meget han vidste om landbrug.En: Today was the day he would show everyone how much he knew about farming.Da: Hans bedste ven, Freja, gik ved siden af ham, mens klassen traskede hen mod Kaspergården.En: His best friend, Freja, walked beside him as the class trudged towards Kaspergården.Da: De nåede indgangen, hvor Kasper, den garvede landmand, ventede på dem.En: They reached the entrance, where Kasper, the seasoned farmer, awaited them.Da: "Velkommen til min gård," sagde han med en stemme, der var lige så robust som hans håndtryk.En: "Welcome to my farm," he said with a voice as robust as his handshake.Da: Mikkel kiggede rundt med julelys i øjnene.En: Mikkel looked around with eyes like Christmas lights.Da: Han havde læst om kvæg, maskiner og afgrøder, og nu ville han bevise det.En: He had read about livestock, machinery, and crops, and now he wanted to prove it.Da: "Ved du, hvad det er?"En: "Do you know what that is?"Da: spurgte han højt og pegede på en stor, rød traktor, da de gik forbi markerne.En: he asked loudly, pointing at a large, red tractor as they passed by the fields.Da: "Måske kan du forklare det for mig?"En: "Maybe you can explain it to me?"Da: svarede Kasper med et listigt smil, hvilket fik Mikkel til at blive lidt rød i kinderne.En: replied Kasper with a sly smile, making Mikkel blush a little.Da: Freja stoppede ved dyreindhegningen fyldt med får og geder.En: Freja stopped by the animal pen filled with sheep and goats.Da: "Se, de er søde," sagde hun, mens hun vinkede til en lille, uldet ged, der nysgerrigt kiggede tilbage.En: "Look, they're cute," she said, waving to a small, woolly goat that curiously glanced back.Da: Mikkel, der ønskede at forstå det hele, fulgte sine venner og begyndte at hjælpe Kasper med at fodre dyrene.En: Mikkel, wanting to understand everything, followed his friends and began to help Kasper feed the animals.Da: Men snart stod han overfor sin udfordring - den høfeber, han altid havde nægtet at anerkende, snurrede i næsen.En: But soon he faced his challenge – the hay fever he had always refused to acknowledge, tickled his nose.Da: Han nøs højlydt og skræmte en flok høns, som pludselig flaksede rundt, deres fjer flagrende i luften.En: He sneezed loudly and startled a flock of hens, which suddenly fluttered around, their feathers floating in the air.Da: "For pokker, Mikkel!"En: "For heaven's sake, Mikkel!"Da: råbte Kasper, da hønsene vrimlede ud af deres hegn.En: shouted Kasper as the hens swarmed out of their pen.Da: Panikken bredte sig i gårdspladsen.En: Panic spread in the farmyard.Da: Mikkel stod paralyseret, indtil Frejas hånd trak i hans arm.En: Mikkel stood paralyzed until Freja's hand pulled at his arm.Da: "Kom nu!En: "Come on!Da: Vi skal hjælpe!"En: We have to help!"Da: sagde hun ivrigt.En: she said eagerly.Da: Sammen begyndte de at samle hønsene igen.En: Together, they began to gather the hens again.Da: Mikkel, nu ydmyg og beslutsom, arbejdede hånd i hånd med Freja og Kasper.En: Mikkel, now humble and determined, worked hand in hand with Freja and Kasper.Da: De sakkede frem og tilbage, rakte ud efter de forskrækkede fugle og ledte dem tilbage i sikkerhed, frustration og latter i et underligt fællesskab.En: They rushed back and forth, reaching out for the frightened birds and guiding them back to safety, frustration and laughter in an odd fellowship.Da: Da den sidste høne blev sat tilbage i sit bur, klappede Kasper Mikkel på skulderen.En: When the last hen was placed back in its coop, Kasper patted Mikkel on the shoulder.Da: "Godt arbejde, dreng," sagde han med et respektfuldt suk.En: "Good job, boy," he said with a respectful sigh.Da: Mikkel kiggede op på Kasper.En: Mikkel looked up at Kasper.Da: "Jeg troede, jeg vidste alt," indrømmede han.En: "I thought I knew everything," he admitted.Da: "Nogle gange lærer vi mere ved at lytte og arbejde sammen," svarede Kasper med et skævt smil.En: "Sometimes we learn more by listening and working together," replied Kasper with a crooked smile.Da: Deres klassekammerater så til, og nogle af dem klappede.En: Their classmates watched, and some of them clapped.Da: Mikkel følte sig varm indeni.En: Mikkel felt warm inside.Da: Det, han havde opnået i dag, var ikke kun anerkendelse, men en vigtig lærdom i samarbejdets kraft.En: What he had achieved today was not only recognition but an essential lesson in the power of collaboration.Da: Sammen gik de alle tilbage mod bussen, med solen strålende ned over de blomstrende marker, og en ny forståelse for, hvad ægte viden og respekt indebærer.En: Together, they all walked back towards the bus, with the sun shining down on the blooming fields, and a new understanding of what true knowledge and respect entail. Vocabulary Words:path: stiplowed: nypløjettrudged: traskedeseasoned: garvedelivestock: kvægcrops: afgrødersly: listigtpen: dyreindhegninghay fever: høfebersneezed: nøsflutter: flakseparalyzed: paralyseretswarmed: vrimledecoop: burhumble: ydmygdetermined: beslutsomfrustration: frustrationfluttered: flagrendeessence: væsentligblooming: blomstrendeentrance: indgangacknowledge: anerkendeflock: flokstartled: forskrækkedehandshake: håndtrykrubust: robustcuriously: nysgerrigteagerly: ivrighedrespectful: respektfuldlaughter: latter

The passage we'll be studying today, Eph 4:25-32. Today, as we finish up chapter 4, we'll discover how a new life in Christ must lead to a new lifestyle. This passage represents a total shift in character, moving from selfish behavior to a life of love, integrity and community building. Thanks for listening. God bless you! And a happy and blessed Christmas to you and yours! To find out more about our church please go to www.whccnb.org.

If the NFL Draft is like Christmas for teams around the league getting shiny new toys, then NFL Free Agency is like a high end garage sale. When you have a garage sell, sometimes you have to let go of things. It's Friday night tap-in with the “Homies” as we talk about AFC North players relocating in 2026. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Trolls in Scandinavian folklore can be a little different from what’s imagined in the rest of the world.  We begin our show with a montage of clips from recent movies, Trollhunter (2010), Troll (2022), and Troll 2 (2025) — the latter two being Netflix productions that have rekindled interest in the subject while reimagining trollsin a way that does not always conform to the folklore. While all Scandinavian countries have their share of troll lore, this episode focuses specifically on Norway, the country with the most compelling collection of troll folklore. The first portion of our show looks at the Norwegian writer Henrik Ibsen’s play along with  incidental music composed for the play by his associate Edvard Grieg. Introducing this topic is a clip from the 1970 musical Song of Norway, a fanciful Edvard Grieg biopic that garnered particularly bad reviews.  We learn a bit about why Grieg hated his well-known “Hall of the Mountain King,” a composition which accompanies Peer Gynt’s encounter with trolls inside a mountain in the Dovre mountain chain. We also learn what Ibsen hoped to achieve in telling the story of his antihero Peer Gynt, and how he wrestled with the movement known in Norway as Romantic Nationalism. Next we look at two figures integral to this movement, Peter Christen Asbjørnsen and Jørgen Moe, a pair of folktale collectors often described as the “Brothers Grimm of Norway.”  Their 1841 publication, Norwegian Folk-Tales, along with updated volumes published in 1844, 1845, and  1871, provide most all the troll tales with examine in this episode. An exception to this is a book authored by Asbjørnsen alone, High Mountain Scenes, volume 2, Reindeer Hunt at Rondane. Published sometime before 1846, it’s the only volume referencing tales told about Peer Gynt, those being very loosely represented in Ibsen’s play. Asbjørnsen & Moe’s “Norwegian Folk Tales” The first of these we retell concerns a creature known as “the Bøyg,” something referred to as a type of troll in the story is described more  as a giant serpent of sorts. We follow this with more Peer Gynt episodes involving male trolls flirting with human females and a troll poking his enormous nose through a cabin window and suffering the consequences inflicted by Gynt.  The final story, “The Cat on the Dovre-Mountain,” takes place at Christmas, a time when troll encounters are particularly prevalent, and involves Gynt outsmarting a group of bothersome trolls via a peculiar stratagem. Next, we run through some lesser-known details of the best-known troll tale “The Three Billygoats Gruff.”  We follow this with another well-known (in Norway) story, “The Boy Who Had an Eating Match with a Troll.” It involves a youth outwitting a troll with a particularly gruesome ruse It was familiar enough to Norwegian audiences to be referenced in Trollhunter. Next we look at a character Askeladden, who is pitted against trolls in several of Asbjørnsen & Moe's stories.  He’s usually describing the good-for-nothing youngest brother of a trio, an underdog who surprisingly achieves great things. His name (literally “ash lad”) referenes his stay-at home habits, in particular, sitting by the hearth playing in the ashes. We learn of several characters with related names and habits in Scandinavian literature and a more insultingly rude nickname for such characters, one which Asbjørnsen & Moe chose to censor from their stories. Theodor Kittlesen, “Troll Pondering How Old iIt Is” (1911) Our next troll tale, “The Lads who Met the Trolls in the Hedale Woods,” gives us particularly monstrous trio of trolls sharing a single eyeball.  While this is atypical, we also encounter here the common trope of trolls sniffing the air for “Christian blood,” a suggestion that their kind of an older pre-Christian order.  A reference to trolls using magic is also contained in this story, something we’ll run into in other tales. We then hear some clips from a couple of Asbjørnsen & Moe-inspired films, the 2017 Norwegian film Ash Lad: In the Hall of the Mountain King and its 2019 follow-up, The Ash Lad: In Search of the Golden Castle.  The “Golden Castle” in Norwegian film title and  the title  of the relevant Asbjørnsen & Moe story is “Soria Moria Castle.” This one also features trolls, but in a peripheral role.  It’s a longer legend quest rather than a short folk tale in which we encounter three multi-headed trolls holding human women captive in three different castles. Our last story, “The Hen is Trips in the Mountain,” takes its  weird title from a strange phrase uttered to open a door into a mountain, like “Open Sesame.” When a young woman enters theis particular mountain looking for a lost hen, she meets an unpleasant end, as does her younger sister, but when the youngest of the three enters, she manages not to repeat the mistakes of her two siblings and later discovers that trolls can explode when touched by the first rays of dawn (as well as turning to stone, another common folklore trope). We wrap up the show with some interesting stats regarding the fascination trolls exert over the heavy metal subculture. Theodor Kittlesen, “Mountain Troll” (1887)    

A Match.com message. A Facebook Live wedding during COVID. A zero sperm count diagnosis. And then — twin boys. Gregory and Jennifer File's path to parenthood was anything but conventional, but they'll tell you every detour was part of God's plan. In this episode of the Embryo Adoption Podcast, hear how embryo adoption gave them the family they'd always prayed for. 

https://wels2.blob.core.windows.net/daily-devotions/20260307dev.mp3 Listen to Devotion The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you. “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.” Genesis 12:1-2 Making a Name for Yourself More than one has dreamed of it. Some have been lured by its promise. Others have cursed its lack of fulfillment. We call it many different things: “making it,” “success,” “winning.” Striving for it is as American as Mom and apple pie. It all comes down to making a name for yourself. People have gone about it in different ways, from getting an advanced degree to destroying personal relationships. “How much do you want it?” seems to be the strategy of success. Abram was already a success in the eyes of the world. He was married and wealthy. Then God changed everything. God promised Abram even more. God promised Abram a name so great that generations would remember it. Abram believed God’s promise, left his home, and went to a land he had never been to before. God makes a promise to you, too. His promise is that your name will be great—maybe not here on this earth, but certainly in the roles of heaven. God will make your name great, too. How much do you want it? Believe in Jesus. Abram did. That’s the way God marks success. Prayer: Savior, may your promises fill my heart with eager anticipation to see your glory forever in heaven. Amen. Daily Devotions is brought to you by WELS. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. ™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Brendan talks about the movies he watched in the last six months that weren't horror movies or Christmas movies. Join us, won't you?Mickey 17 (2025)Mickey 7 discussionParanoiaThe Woman in Cabin 10 (2025)Rear Window (2022)John Candy: I Like Me (2025)Margin Call (2011)Ponzi Scheme (2015)Spotlight (2015)Watergate (2019)The Life of Chuck (2024)Holding On: The Troubled Life of Billy Kerr (2018)Labyrinth (1986)Jim Henson's Labyrinth: The Board Game (2016)Notting Hill (1999), Sleepless in Seattle (1993)Fog of Love (2017)Rental Family (2025)Jiangshi: Blood in the Banquet Hall (2020)The Hobby: Tales from the Tabletop (2024)An Honest Liar (2014)What films did you watch in the last six months? Share your views over on boardgamegeek in guild #3269.

Fluent Fiction - Danish: Transform Your Space with the Urban Jungle's Green Oasis Find the full episode transcript, vocabulary words, and more:fluentfiction.com/da/episode/2026-03-07-08-38-19-da Story Transcript:Da: I hjertet af København, hvor byen summer af aktiv liv og travle mennesker, står en oase.En: In the heart of København, where the city buzzes with active life and busy people, there stands an oasis.Da: The Urban Jungle er mere end bare en butik.En: The Urban Jungle is more than just a store.Da: Det er et sted, hvor grønne planter og duften af nybrygget kaffe mødes i en harmonisk symfoni.En: It is a place where green plants and the aroma of freshly brewed coffee meet in a harmonious symphony.Da: Her, på en tidlig forårsdag i marts, søger Lars efter en ny begyndelse.En: Here, on an early spring day in March, Lars seeks a new beginning.Da: Lars er arkitekt med en forkærlighed for naturen.En: Lars is an architect with a fondness for nature.Da: Alligevel føles hans lejlighed tom og livløs.En: Yet, his apartment feels empty and lifeless.Da: Han vil have en plante, som kan bringe foråret ind i hans hjem.En: He wants a plant that can bring spring into his home.Da: Luften i The Urban Jungle er mild og fugtig, fyldt med lyset fra de store vinduer.En: The air in The Urban Jungle is mild and humid, filled with light from the large windows.Da: Indgangen byder på et væld af planter, der står som et grønt tæppe.En: The entrance offers a plethora of plants standing like a green carpet.Da: Sofie, butikens hjælpsomme assistent, hilser på Lars med et varmt smil.En: Sofie, the store's helpful assistant, greets Lars with a warm smile.Da: Hun kan se hans tøven, mens han går rundt blandt de mange planter.En: She can see his hesitation as he walks among the many plants.Da: "Hej, kan jeg hjælpe?"En: "Hi, can I help you?"Da: spørger hun venligt.En: she asks kindly.Da: "Ja," svarer Lars lidt usikker.En: "Yes," Lars replies a bit uncertainly.Da: "Jeg leder efter en plante, der kan lyse min stue op, men jeg er lidt i tvivl om, hvilken jeg skal vælge."En: "I'm looking for a plant that can brighten up my living room, but I'm a little unsure which one to choose."Da: "Måske kan en fiddle leaf fig være noget for dig?"En: "Maybe a fiddle leaf fig could be something for you?"Da: foreslår Sofie.En: Sofie suggests.Da: Hun peger på den smukke plante med store, grønne blade.En: She points to the beautiful plant with large, green leaves.Da: "Den kræver lidt opmærksomhed, men den kan virkelig forvandle et rum."En: "It requires a bit of attention, but it can really transform a room."Da: Lars tøver.En: Lars hesitates.Da: Han kigger på den stærke, oprejste plante og føler et stik af tvivl.En: He looks at the strong, upright plant and feels a pang of doubt.Da: Hvad nu hvis han ikke kan passe den ordentligt?En: What if he can't take care of it properly?Da: Mikkel, en anden kunde, står i nærheden og lytter med et glimt i øjet.En: Mikkel, another customer, stands nearby and listens with a twinkle in his eye.Da: "Bare rolig, ven," siger han.En: "Don't worry, friend," he says.Da: "Jeg startede med en fiddle leaf fig før jul, og hvis jeg kan klare det, kan du også."En: "I started with a fiddle leaf fig before Christmas, and if I can manage it, you can too."Da: Lars griner.En: Lars laughs.Da: Han føler en varme sprede sig i brystet.En: He feels a warmth spreading in his chest.Da: Med opmuntring fra både Sofie og Mikkel beslutter han sig.En: With encouragement from both Sofie and Mikkel, he makes his decision.Da: "Jeg tager den," siger han beslutsomt.En: "I'll take it," he says decisively.Da: Med planten pakket omhyggeligt går Lars mod kassen.En: With the plant carefully packed, Lars heads to the cash register.Da: Sofie ønsker ham god påske og god fornøjelse med hans nye ven.En: Sofie wishes him a happy Easter and enjoyment with his new friend.Da: Da Lars forlader The Urban Jungle, føler han sig lettere.En: As Lars leaves The Urban Jungle, he feels lighter.Da: Med fiddle leaf fig bringer han ikke kun naturen ind i sit hjem; han bringer også et lille stykke forår og fornyet håb.En: With the fiddle leaf fig, he brings not only nature into his home; he also brings a small piece of spring and renewed hope.Da: Han er klar til at påtage sig ansvaret og se sin lille oase vokse og blomstre lige så stille, akkurat som han selv.En: He is ready to take on the responsibility and see his little oasis grow and bloom quietly, just like himself. Vocabulary Words:oasis: oasearoma: duftenharmonious: harmonisksymphony: symfoniarchitect: arkitektfondness: forkærlighedlifeless: livløsmild: mildhumid: fugtigplethora: vældhesitation: tøvenuncertainly: usikkertransform: forvandleupright: oprejstpang: stikdoubt: tvivltwinkle: glimtencouragement: opmuntringdecisively: beslutsomtregister: kassenEaster: påskeready: klarresponsibility: ansvarbloom: blomstrequietly: lige så stillespring: forårrenewed: fornyettake on: påtage sigcarefully: omhyggeligtleaves: blade

Episode Title: "Bang Bang A-Boom!" - Season 12 Retrospective & Big Finish Review - Patreon Exclusive #85 SPECIAL MAIN FEED RELEASE - PATREON SHOWCASE DOCTOR WHO THEME MONTAGE: The Tardis Elliot Video: John sent Jim a montage from Tardis Elliot (a fan who makes trailers of Doctor Who episodes) featuring title opening sequences. John's Reasoning: "This is the last, with Tom Baker, the last hurrah for the original version of the Doctor Who theme. After this, we're going to start seeing the variations. I thought, give me a little sneak peek at what's in store for you if you continue on into the new series and all." NO COMIC THIS WEEK: Jim: "What a relief that was. It's terrible for me to say that, but what a relief. It was nice having a break. It really was." SEASON 12 RETROSPECTIVE: SEASON AVERAGES: Jim: 10.2/15 John: 11/15 Overall Average: 10.6/15 Jim: "Some of that is nostalgia for you." John: "Absolutely." SEASON 13 SPOILER CARDS: The Three Cards: Ncuti Gatwa Fembots Classic Movies JIM'S CHOICE PROCESS: "How in the world could I possibly pick? I can pretty quickly eliminate Classic Movies, even though I like classic movies. I'm really intrigued by the other two." Fembots: "I'm not as big of a Bionic Woman fan as you are. I didn't watch it regularly like I did $6 Million Man. I know who the Fembots are and I liked that she had a recurring adversary, that was sort of her Daleks." THE PICK: NCUTI GATWA THE REVEAL: PYRAMIDS OF MARS BIG FINISH: BANG BANG A-BOOM! Release: December 19th, 2002 (their second Christmas episode) Writers: Gareth Roberts & Clayton Hickman Director: Nicholas Pegg Doctor: Sylvester McCoy Companion: Mel THE BASIC PLOT: "Star Trek meets Space 1999 meets Eurovision." The Setup: "The TARDIS lands on Dark Space 8 and finds themselves dealing with a whole bunch of aliens who are on the station because the Doctor is mistaken for the replacement commander for the station." The Backstory: "The TARDIS winds up on a shuttle that's transporting the new commander, but it explodes before it reaches the station. They are beamed onto the station - he and Mel - as the only survivors of it." Beamed vs. Transmitted: "They actually say 'beamed' in this case. They don't use the term transporter though. But I think that term was already being used in science fiction before. It's like blasters. I was naive enough to think that blasters came from Star Wars, but in Foundation by Isaac Asimov, the guns are called blasters." THE ELEMENTS: Space 1999: "The Space 1999 bit is the medical doctor who sounds an awful lot like Barbara Bain. She's going out of her way. She's the one doing medical logs like Bain did in Season 2 of Space 1999. Barbara Bain had a very distinctive voice. This woman seems to be placing that same emphasis on it there." Star Trek: "There's a lot of references to Star Trek. You look and you go 'Oh, now they're referencing this episode. Now they're referencing that episode.'" Eurovision: "They got someone who did a dead-on impression of the guy. For years Eurovision was hosted by a BBC presenter Wogan from Northern Ireland. So they have their version being Logan and he sounds just like him. It was cute." THE INTERGALACTIC SONG CONTEST: "On the station, while he's trying to figure out who tried to kill or not try to but successfully killed the new commander, the Doctor's also got to deal with an intergalactic song contest." JOHN'S VERDICT: Worth It? "It's worth a listen, especially if you are a Star Trek fan. And in my case, I had to laugh at the Eurovision spoofing they did." NEXT TIME: Friday (Patreon): Big Finish's "The Ark" - Jon Lucarotti's original story before it became Ark in Space Saturday (Main Feed): Reissue/release of a Patreon episode - Jon Pertwee Retrospective Monday (Patreon #86): "Primarily we're going to be focusing on the comic strips that were on during the break." The Reality: "It's going to be a mix of stuff from the strip and also a comic from the TV Comic Annual for 1976." "And that is our Big Finish for this show!" Support at patreon.com/thedoctorsbeardpodcast for $3/month - early access, exclusive episodes, and bonus content! Subscribe on all platforms. Email thedoctorsbeardpodcast@gmail.com or join our Facebook community. Hashtags: #DoctorWho #PatreonExclusive #Episode85 #BangBangABoom #Season12Retrospective #TomBaker #FourthDoctor #Robot #ArkInSpace #TheWirrn #GenesisOfTheDaleks #Davros #Nyder #RevengeOfTheCybermen #TheSontaranExperiment #K1 #GiantRobot #SarahJaneSmith #HarrySullivan #HarryIsAnImbecile #BestCompanion #SarahIsntThereYet #ItHappening #Vira #Bettan #MissWinters #PeterMiles #Kettlewell #OutOutBriefCandle #HaveITheRight #JumpRopeScene #PyramidsOfMars #Sutekh #Spoilers #NcutiGatwa #Fembots #ClassicMovies #DoctorWhoTheme #TardisElliot #PeterHowell #NeonLogo #TheBrigadier #BigFinish #SylvesterMcCoy #Mel #SeventhDoctor #GarethRoberts #ClaytonHickman #NicholasPegg #StarTrek #Space1999 #Eurovision #Wogan #BarbaraBain #TheChimesOfMidnight #PaulMcGann #EighthDoctor #Jameson #ListenerMail #UNIT #Assembled #TheChurchAndTheCrown #Erimem #FifthDoctor #Pathfinder #RPG #ExternalHardDrive #TheArc #JonLucarotti #JonPertweeRetrospective #TVComicAnnual #1976 #ClassicWho #Retrospective #BestOf #FunniestMoment #BestMoment #GuestStarDebate #10Point6Average #DoctorWhoPodcast #TheDoctorsBeardPodcast #Whovian #PodcastCommunity #PatreonShowcase

Brendan talks about the movies he watched in the last six months that weren't horror movies or Christmas movies. Join us, won't you?Mickey 17 (2025)Mickey 7 discussionParanoiaThe Woman in Cabin 10 (2025)Rear Window (2022)John Candy: I Like Me (2025)Margin Call (2011)Ponzi Scheme (2015)Spotlight (2015)Watergate (2019)The Life of Chuck (2024)Holding On: The Troubled Life of Billy Kerr (2018)Labyrinth (1986)Jim Henson's Labyrinth: The Board Game (2016)Notting Hill (1999), Sleepless in Seattle (1993)Fog of Love (2017)Rental Family (2025)Jiangshi: Blood in the Banquet Hall (2020)The Hobby: Tales from the Tabletop (2024)An Honest Liar (2014)What films did you watch in the last six months? Share your views over on boardgamegeek in guild #3269.

It's Festive Friday and we've got a wild holiday rom-com to discuss today! ABOUT THE CHRISTMAS DECOY A socially awkward man is bribed by his narcissistic best friend to run interference with a woman who won't leave him alone during the holidays. The Christmas Decoy is a rom-com full of mischief, mismatched intentions, and holiday heart. AIR DATE & NETWORK FOR THE CHRISTMAS DECOY August 24, 2025 | Streaming/Rental CAST & CREW OF THE CHRISTMAS DECOY Stephen Fisher as Jeff Wilkins Marguerite Haines as Sophia Wilkins Hope Harvard as Mia Barrett John Allen as Allen Bontrager BRAN'S MOVIE SYNOPSIS We meet Jeff as he jumps out of bed and starts singing Joy to the World. I guess he like owns a hotel and also lives there. He gets a call from someone named Jordan who tells him that she's not coming to help at the hotel this holiday season. Instead, she's sending a girl named Mia...someone who has a massive crush on Jeff since they were kids. The problem is Jeff can't stand Mia. So he's really mad about it so he drives to his buddy Allen's house. He has a request for him - will you work at my hotel for 2 weeks and work alongside her - run interference so I don't have to be around her? He pushes back because he doesn't want to take 2 weeks off of work but ultimately gives in. He starts to like her and they end up going on a date. One date leads to another date which leads to a kiss. Jeff starts getting jealous - he wants her to keep liking him even though he's not interested because he's a psycho. So he texts her to go to a movie and she says sure and then asks if Allen is coming. So he says yes. But at the movie, he tries to hold her hand. She's not interested. She holds Allen's hand instead. The next day, Allen tells Mia the truth about how he was only hired to run interference which makes her mad. He goes after her and tells her he loves her and they kiss. Jeff is forced to move on and says hi to the next girl who walks into the hotel. Who knows what'll happen next. Watch the show on Youtube - www.deckthehallmark.com/youtubeInterested in advertising on the show? Email bran@deckthehallmark.com Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

In 1892 the world's largest telescope, the Lick Observatory's 36 inch refracting telescope made the news when E.E. Barnard discovered, Amalthea, the 5th moon of Jupiter. In 2025 this historic telescope made the news again when on Christmas morning winds of 114 mph blew off a 3 ton piece of the shutter on its dome.The adaptive optics research pioneered at Lick Observatory helped in the creation of the twin giant 10 meter telescopes that sit atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii.

https://wels2.blob.core.windows.net/daily-devotions/20260306dev.mp3 Listen to Devotion [Abraham] is the father of us all. Romans 4:16 Abraham’s Faith One of the giants of the early Christian church was John Chrysostom. He served as a pastor about 300 years after Jesus rose from the dead. Trained in classical rhetoric, John easily could have made a comfortable life for himself in various professions. Instead, he devoted his considerable gifts to the proclamation of Jesus Christ. Like many a Christian before him and after him, John Chrysostom read from the Old Testament about Abraham. He read how God called Abraham to leave the familiarity of his homeland and live as a permanent stranger somewhere else. He read how Abraham, surrounded by a godless and calloused culture, publicly proclaimed the name of the Lord. And he read how Abraham heard God’s promise that the Savior of the world would one day come from his family, and how Abraham believed that promise. As he thought long and hard about Abraham, about the profound faith Abraham possessed, John Chrysostom said this about Abraham, “He asked no questions, demanded no signs, but trusted the promise alone.” Let’s read that again. Of Abraham, John Chrysostom said, He asked no questions, demanded no signs, but trusted in the promise alone. It is no coincidence that the apostle Paul calls Abraham, “The father of us all,” the father of all of us who believe in Jesus as our Savior. He says this because Abraham embodies what it meant to trust the gospel promises of God. Paul marveled at Abraham’s faith. So did John Chrysostom. So did Martin Luther. How could he do it? How could he trust so fully, without question? Was it his innate strength of character? Was he simply a better, more spiritual, kind of person? That cannot be it. The Bible makes it clear that Abraham was born a lost, broken sinner just like the rest of us. In the end, the answer does not lie in Abraham. Rather, it lies in the power of the promise itself—the promise of full forgiveness in Jesus alone. It is the same promise that feeds your faith and mine. Prayer: Lord Jesus, feed my faith by the power of your promise. Amen. Daily Devotions is brought to you by WELS. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. ™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

We finally reminded Bryan enough that he remembered to get the follow-up video to our last Mountain Monsters episode! It's a Christmas miracle! Donate to St. Jude, The National Breast Cancer Coalition Fund, the ASPCA and the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence Leather diapers Our old Dr. Phil advertisement Bhad Babie (catch me outside) We're back again with Mountain Monsters in their hunt for the Cherokee Devil War music An elite group Buck is having a mental breakdown The must find Huck Mr. Tumnus Huck is buck ass naked, covered in mud, and humping a totem pole Head of Security Aliens or drones Text us or leave us a voicemail: +1 (212) 433-3TCB Follow Us: IG: @thecommercialbreak TikTok: @tcbpodcast YT: youtube.com/thecommercialbreak www.tcbpodcast.com Executive Producer: Bryan Green Hosts: Bryan Green & Krissy Hoadley Producer: Astrid B. Green Producer & Audio Editor: Christina Archer Christina's Podcast: Apple Podcasts & Spotify Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Skip straight to the case: (11:37)Welcome back to another episode of the True Crime Society Podcast.In this episode, we discuss two separate cases where missing people have been found ALIVE years after their disappearance, in crazy circumstances. In December 2001, North Carolina woman Michele Hundley Smith told her three children that she was going Christmas shopping.  She never returned.  Over the next two decades, Michele's husband faced scrutiny and many wondered if he may have been involved in her disappearance.  In February 2026, Michele was found to be alive and living in a trailer park, two hours from the home of her family.  She asked that her location not be disclosed to them. Colorado attorney Royal ‘Scoop' Daniel III went to the office of his law practice one morning in April 2007.  When other staff arrived, Scoop's dog was left in the office alone and there was no sign of his owner.  An investigation into Scoop's disappearance revealed that he was hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt.  Scoop was found alive in 2011 when he attempted to cross from Mexico back into the US, using his own passport.  He was arrested and sentenced to 12 years in prison. Read our blog for these cases - https://truecrimesocietyblog.com/2026/03/01/missing-people-found-alive-michele-hundley-smith-and-royal-scoop-daniel-iii/Be sure to join us on Patreon for weekly exclusive episodes and all episodes are ad-free - Patreon.com/truecrimesocietyJoin us on Instagram for the latest crime news - Instagram.com/truecrimesocietyThis episode is sponsored by:IQBAR is offering our special podcast listeners twenty percent off all IQBAR products—including the Ultimate sampler pack—plus FREE shipping. To get your twenty percent off, text CRIME to sixty-four thousand. Message and data rates may apply. See terms for details.

Colin Gray guilty. All counts. Second-degree murder. Involuntary manslaughter. Cruelty to children. The jury needed less than two hours.Colin Gray guilty of murder makes Georgia history—the first parent in the state convicted for a school shooting committed by his child. The Colin Gray guilty verdict came after two weeks of testimony that destroyed every excuse he offered.The evidence that made Colin Gray guilty was damning. FBI agents warned Colin Gray in 2023 after his son Colt threatened a school shooting online. Colin Gray bought Colt an AR-15 seven months later as a Christmas gift. No gun safe. No trigger lock. The rifle sat in a fourteen-year-old's bedroom beside photos of Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz—which Colin Gray claimed he mistook for "the guy from Green Day."Weeks before the shooting, Colt texted Colin Gray: "Whenever something happens just know the blood is on your hands." Colin Gray convinced himself it was about something else. The morning of September 4th, Colt sent goodbye texts. Colin Gray read them, asked what was wrong, and stayed at work. Nineteen minutes later, four people were dead.Colin Gray guilty was confirmed by his own family. His daughter testified Colin Gray asked her to lie to investigators. His wife said she begged Colin Gray to lock up the guns. Colin Gray took the stand alone, cried, and swore he never saw it coming. The jury rejected every word—Colin Gray guilty on all charges in under two hours.Colin Gray guilty sends a clear message. Crumbleys got manslaughter. Colin Gray guilty of murder raises the stakes. Parental accountability just became very real.Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspodX Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePodThis publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.#ColinGrayGuilty #ColinGrayVerdict #ColinGrayGuiltyVerdict #ColinGrayConvicted #TrueCrimeToday #ColinGrayMurder #ApalacheeShooting #ColinGrayTrial #ParentalAccountability #ColinGraySentencing

Colin Gray guilty. Every count. Murder. Less than two hours of deliberation.Colin Gray guilty on all charges makes him the first parent in Georgia history convicted for a mass school shooting committed by his child. The Colin Gray guilty verdict exposed a father who had every warning imaginable and chose to do nothing.Colin Gray guilty was inevitable when you see what he ignored. The FBI warned Colin Gray in 2023 after Colt threatened a school shooting online. Seven months later, Colin Gray bought his son an AR-15 for Christmas. No gun safe. Rifle in the kid's bedroom. Shrine to Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz on the wall—Colin Gray claimed he thought it was "the guy from Green Day."Weeks before the massacre, Colt texted: "Whenever something happens just know the blood is on your hands." Colin Gray told himself it was about custody drama. The morning of September 4th, Colt sent goodbye texts. Colin Gray read them. Stayed at work. Didn't call the school. Four people died nineteen minutes later.Colin Gray guilty came down to his own family's testimony. His daughter Jenni testified he asked her to "cover for him." His wife Marcee said she begged him to lock up the guns. Colin Gray took the stand, cried, and claimed he never saw it coming.The jury saw through it. Colin Gray guilty—all counts—in under two hours.Colin Gray guilty of murder changes the game. Crumbleys got manslaughter. Colin Gray guilty raised it to murder. The message to parents everywhere: accountability is real.Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspodX Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePodThis publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.#ColinGrayGuilty #ColinGrayVerdict #ColinGrayGuiltyVerdict #ColinGrayConvicted #HiddenKillers #ColinGrayMurder #ApalacheeShooting #ColinGrayTrial #ParentalAccountability #ColinGraySentencing

Welcome back to another episode of the unSeminary podcast. We're talking with Dr. Allen Holmes, Senior Pastor of Definition Church. Allen has served at Definition for 25 years, leading it from a congregation of 30 people to one of the fastest-growing churches in the country. But in this conversation, we don't start with strategy—we start with the soul. Allen shares how a personal marriage crisis early in ministry exposed deep character issues and launched him on a decades-long journey of spiritual formation that has shaped both his leadership and his church. Is it possible that the greatest lid on your ministry isn't your strategy—but your inner life? Allen challenges leaders to rethink success, crisis, and longevity through the lens of character formation. Pressure reveals who you really are. // Leadership rarely collapses because of incompetence—it collapses because pressure exposes unaddressed character issues. Early in seminary and marriage, Allen's wife told him she didn't love him and didn't want to remain in ministry. The crisis shattered his sense of calling and identity. Allen—by God's grace—was able to ask: What in me has produced this? That shift from defensiveness to humility marked the beginning of deep transformation. From gifted producer to formed leader. // Allen explains that many leaders are rewarded for production, not formation. A gifted communicator can build a crowd while remaining insecure, defensive, and relationally immature. You can be a great producer and a poor leader. True leadership requires learning to lead yourself. For Allen, that meant confronting independence, insecurity, and relational blind spots—issues rooted in his upbringing that were sabotaging both marriage and ministry. Prioritizing presence over performance. // The turning point in Allen's growth was deceptively simple: he began prioritizing his relationship with Jesus. Guided by a mentor, he learned to read Scripture for formation rather than information and to cultivate rhythms of prayer, worship, and dependence on the Holy Spirit. Ministry leaders face an occupational hazard—handling Scripture transactionally for sermons while neglecting personal communion with Christ. For Allen, consistent morning surrender became the foundation for long-term sustainability. Marriage as spiritual formation. // Allen describes marriage as God's primary classroom for sanctification. Drawing from the biblical metaphor of Christ and the Church, he explains how learning to live in the presence of his wife taught him how to live in the presence of God. Simple daily rhythms—morning prayer, consistent check-ins, shared meals, evening walks, praying together—have sustained their relationship for decades. Rather than competing with ministry, his marriage strengthens it. What God forms privately shapes what leaders produce publicly. Culture flows from character. // Over 25 years, Allen's commitment to personal formation has shaped Definition Church's culture. Every staff member has a “rule of life” and an intentional growth plan. Personal development is written into job descriptions as the number-one responsibility. Staff are given monthly retreat days to spend extended time alone with Jesus. Spiritual practices are embedded into the life of the church. Allen believes you reproduce who and what you are—so the greatest contribution a leader can make is becoming more like Christ. The power of staying. // Allen notes that lasting impact often requires long tenure. His senior leadership team has served together for decades, building trust and shared formation. In a skeptical culture, credibility grows through consistency. But longevity without formation is dangerous. The process prepares leaders for the purpose; bypassing the process risks collapse. Like Joseph's journey from entitlement to anointing in the Old Testament, leaders must pass through refining seasons before they can steward influence well. To learn more about Definition Church, explore their resources, and connect with Allen, visit definition.church. Thank You for Tuning In! There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I'm grateful for that. If you enjoyed today's show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they're extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally! Lastly, don't forget to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, to get automatic updates every time a new episode goes live! Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Portable Church Your church is doing really well right now, and your leadership team is looking for solutions to keep momentum going! It could be time to start a new location. Maybe you have hesitated in the past few years, but you know it's time to step out in faith again and launch that next location. Portable Church has assembled a bundle of resources to help you leverage your growing momentum into a new location by sending a part of your congregation back to their neighborhood on Mission. This bundle of resources will give you a step-by-step plan to launch that new or next location, and a 5 minute readiness tool that will help you know your church is ready to do it! Click here to watch the free webinar “Launch a New Location in 150 Days or Less” and grab the bundle of resources for your church! Episode Transcript Rich Birch — Hey friends, welcome to the unSeminary podcast. So glad that you have decided to tune in. Today’s going to be a really good conversation. It’s one of those conversations that I think we all need to have, looked carefully at, think about ourselves, think about the teams we lead. I really do think it’s one of those make or break kind of conversations. And so you’ll be rewarded for tuning in today. Rich Birch — Excited to have Dr. Allen Holmes with us. He’s a senior pastor of a church called Definition Church. He’s been there since 2000, so a few years. They’re located in North Carolina and is one of the fastest growing churches in the country. They have a residency program as well that’s called to train and develop next generation of mission-minded ministry leaders. And believing that generosity is a privilege, Definition Church also partners with a number of other ministries, churches, and organizations to really serve their community. Dr. Allen, so glad you’re here. Thanks for being here today.Allen Holmes — Wow. Well, I’m so excited to be here, Rich, and appreciate the invitation.Rich Birch — Oh, this is going to be a fun conversation. Why don’t you kind of fill out the picture?Allen Holmes — Yeah.Rich Birch — Tell us a little bit about Definition. Kind of tell us the story. Give us a sense of the church.Allen Holmes — Well, my wife and I, we grew up down in Wilmington, which is on the coast of North Carolina. In 2000, we were finishing seminary and looking for a church, really looking for a city where we could plant our life and stay in one place kind of forever. And we were in a small town. Our first church was in a small town of about 1500. And Greensboro was one of the cities we visited, and there was a church here that had lost their pastor. They only had about 30 people.Allen Holmes — And the truth is that was safe and kind of gave us a a lot of freedom to make mistakes and learn and grow as leaders and as a man and a woman, as a married couple, as parents, you know, all the things without mistakes, really the pressure of a big church and a lot of expectations. And that was perfect for us. And and we fell in love with the city and it’s been 25 years now. It’s hard to believe that. And and but we love it here. Greensboro’s home now and and Definition’s been great to us.Rich Birch — So good. Well, I want to take advantage of the fact that you’ve been at your location, at your church for a number of years. When you look back over two and a half decades of ministry, and you know you’ve seen a lot of churches in your community, and then just even wider you know across the country, that sort of thing. Where have you seen leadership fall apart in churches? We’ll start with the negative to start.Allen Holmes — Yeah.Rich Birch — When’s it break down most often? Why does, you know, why do the wheels come off? Where have you seen that happen?Allen Holmes — You know, I think generally it’s just anything that creates pressure. So I think we have a tendency to train and prepare as leaders when there’s no pressure.Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — And then all of a sudden we find ourselves in a situation where there’s a tremendous amount of pressure. And in those moments, it’s not what we know that matters, but who we are. Rich Birch — So true.Allen Holmes — It kind of gets it gets exposed. And this happened for me the first time I was in seminary. It was my second semester. My wife, Tina, and I had just gotten married. So we were five months into marriage. I was living my dream. I mean, seminary for, you know, somebody who wants to be a pastor is like Disney World, right? I mean, I’m in class every day studying the Bible, surrounded by all these people that love Jesus. I’ve got this vision for changing the world. I mean, it was just wonderful.Allen Holmes — And in month five, towards the end of that second semester, I came home and and my wife wasn’t doing well. I didn’t realize, you know, how bad it was. But that day I came home and she said, I don’t love you. Rich Birch — Wow.Allen Holmes — And I don’t want to be married. I will never be in the ministry. I'm going home.Rich Birch — Wow.Allen Holmes — And it’s like, all of a sudden, my whole world just began to fall apart. You know, at that stage of life, the only thing that really mattered to me was ministry. You know I had this call, this sense of calling. And my marriage.Allen Holmes — I really I grew up in a broken home, really didn’t have any family. And my wife and actually her family were family to me.Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — And so in that moment, it felt like I was losing everything that mattered. Rich Birch — Wow. Allen Holmes — And I realized that despite all of my gifts and my zeal and my passion and my good intentions, beneath the surface, I had all of this on all of these unaddressed issues from my life story that were now coming to the surface and creating a mess in my marriage. And that crisis, that pressure exposed those things and created an opportunity for me to learn and grow. And by God’s grace, we dropped out of seminary, we moved back home. And I met Dr. Bennett, who became a mentor to me. He was a retired pastor.Allen Holmes — And I just started this journey of instead of being focused on just what I do and what I could produce, which is all I knew up until that moment, to really asking some deeper questions about who am I? And what’s driving all of this behavior and what’s creating this problem in my marriage? And how do I invite Christ to really do a deeper work in my heart and life and character? And and I’ve been on that journey now for almost 30 years.Rich Birch — Wow. That’s incredibly compelling. One of my mentors, he talks about how he burnt out early and he had kind of, you know, ended up on the side of the road and, you know, in a really bad spot in life. And he says, he looks back on that and says, wow, by by God’s grace, that happened. Allen Holmes — Right. Rich Birch — You know, and, and wow, that, you know, his whole, it changed the whole trajectory of you know his life and he made a whole bunch of changes. And he feels really, in a weird sort of way, thankful for for that, if even though you’re thankful, it feels like a weird emotion to have around such a crisis you know in you know in your life. Allen Holmes — Right.Rich Birch — Now, so many leaders, we’re so focused on the mission. We’re so focused on leading others. We’re so focused on pushing forward. We miss this stuff. There's there are these things bubbling under the surface. And and we haven’t had the grace of a wife who would raise her hand and say, hey, this enough is enough. Why do you think that gap is so common in ministry? Why is this just like a thing we see all the time?Allen Holmes — Well, I think to your point, in ministry, just like not just in ministry, but any organizational leadership, you’re rewarded and celebrated for what you produce. And the truth is that’s all most people can see. I mean, when my marriage blew up, if you would have gone around and interviewed my friends, my family, Tina’s family, my professors, if you would have asked anybody about me, they would have said, Allen's a rising star. He loves God. I mean, he he’s doing all the stuff. He’s checking all the boxes. This guy’s going to really be somebody one day.Allen Holmes — But what you couldn’t see is that beneath the surface, I didn’t know who I was. And I was insecure. I was defensive. I was independent. I really didn’t know how to do relationships well. I was insensitive.Allen Holmes — I didn’t have like a bad, ugly heart. I mean, I loved and cared about people. I just had all of these unaddressed, unfinished issues in my life. But my giftedness would allow me to produce despite that.Allen Holmes — You know, I think sometimes people um wonder why are leaders great at leading, but, you know, they struggle to lead themselves. I’m not sure that’s really a real thing. What leaders are good at doing is they’re great at producing. They’re not great at leading if they're not great at leading themselves. In other words, I can be a great producer and a bad leader.Rich Birch — Right. Right.Allen Holmes — I can be great on stage and draw a crowd and kind of be a slave-driving leader. And it might, from a numbers perspective and people that aren’t close, they look at it and think, wow, this is wildly successful. But the people on the inner circle know better, that the culture is unhealthy and and this person’s, you know, shallow or he’s a tyrant or whatever the, you know, whatever the case might be.Allen Holmes — There’s all kinds of ways to build a crowd in American culture today that have very little to do with Jesus. And we’ve seen that over and over and over again. So I think in order to be a great leader, you have to be able and willing to lead yourself.Rich Birch — So what did that process look like for you the kind of internal journey of trying to name what your wife had or or define maybe what your wife had named to really get clarity on that? Maybe unpack that step a little bit first before we get on to what changed. You know, how how did you, what did that look like? How, what kind of space did you have to create? What, what, did where did that, what did that part of the journey take you?Allen Holmes — Yeah, that’s a great question. You know, when I look back on all this, I’m, you know, I’m just so grateful for God’s grace because I didn’t even understand the process I was in. I mean, you know, I was just in it and trying to navigate it. But by God’s grace, I decided to ask the question, what in my character has produced this in my marriage. And what’s really shocking about that is all of my seminary buddies were saying, what is wrong with your wife? Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — And I, by God’s grace, was saying, what’s wrong with me?I had enough humility to look at my wife and go, you know, I married this woman because she was so full of grace and kind and gentle, this beautiful soul, this beautiful person. So if she’s reacting this way, chances are she’s not the problem. You know, sometimes.Rich Birch — Wow. Wow.Allen Holmes — Something about our relationship is producing that. And actually, so what it was is, my wife grew up in this really great, healthy family, parent, two-parent home, siblings, people in her house all the time. Her mom cooked every night. I ate at their house five nights a week. I mean, it’s like their family became my family.Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — Well, I grew up with none of that. I grew up with a single mom, basically all by myself, raising myself. And those two worlds just collided. So when we went seminary, I was doing school full-time and working full-time, and she was working full-time. And I thought, well, that was normal. That’s what I’d been doing for years and years. I’d worked my way through college. I’d been and on my own since I was 18.Allen Holmes — And so that seemed normal. But for Tina, it’s like she went from living in this beautiful community to being all by herself at seminary, and I’m not even there. Rich Birch — Right, right. Wow.Allen Holmes — And she’s and so she was relationally just dying, and I didn’t know how to be sensitive to that. You know, I wanted to just say, you know, get over it. Life’s hard…Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — …which would not have worked. Rich Birch — Right. Yes. Allen Holmes — You know But I just had enough grace to begin asking, God, what are you trying to do in my heart? And and like you were saying earlier about your buddy, the thing I would say today, if I would have married a woman strong enough to tolerate that moment, I would have been I would have never survived in ministry because I would have been a driven, legalistic, judgmental, demanding kind of pastor that that really, I think, used the Bible to beat people up.Allen Holmes — And I mean, instead of being a man who really actually experienced, I guess, an inner this inner, deeper work and can invite people into something that is deeply spiritual and transformational and life-giving, you know, I would have just been this ugly, difficult pastor to be with. And so I’m so grateful. I mean, that that really began this journey that just changed and has literally touched everything about my life and ministry and our marriage today. I mean, it’s amazing.Rich Birch — Yeah. So what, what changed? What, how did you change your, you know, approach to making decisions, to dealing with the pressure, dealing with the pace? You know, obviously we were kind of at the point in the journey where you took a pause and made some changes, but eventually, you know, you ended up back on that path and back into ministry and have been leading and the ministry has been flourishing. So what were some of the, the kind of shifts that you made that were that, in hindsight seemed like that was, those were keystone decisions.Allen Holmes — Well, this sounds so silly to even say it, especially to Christian leaders, but I had to prioritize my relationship with Jesus.Rich Birch — Right, right.Allen Holmes — Well, there’s a good idea.Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, exactly. Write that down. What did he say? No but that’s true, though. Lean in on that because you know that there are…Allen Holmes — Yes.Rich Birch — Listen, we all know we go, we all go through seasons where that our relationship goes colder. Some of us, we, you know, we just, it’s been like years, decades since we feel like we’ve had a thriving relationship. So lean in on that.Allen Holmes — Well, you know, it’s interesting when I when we moved back to Wilmington and I started spending time with Dr. Bennett, he just he just pressed me on that all the time. Give your mornings to Jesus. Give your mornings to Jesus. And I just began learning how do I develop a meaningful time with Jesus every day? How do I read the Bible for formation instead of information.Rich Birch — That’s good.Allen Holmes — And how, you know, how do I worship for formation? How do I what is my relationship to the Holy Spirit and inviting him into those moments to help me see and to understand, to teach and to heal and to counsel me into healing, wholeness, growth, all those things.Allen Holmes — You know, how do I press into community? You know, I was so independent. And the truth is, I mean, 30 years later, I’m still working on this.Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — I was so trained to be independent and I liked being independent. I wasn’t unhappy independent… Rich Birch — Right. Allen Holmes — …but independence allows you to hold on to your immaturity because nobody’s challenging it.Rich Birch — Nobody’s in your business.Allen Holmes — Nobody’s confronted. That’s right. And so I just began really developing that time with Jesus and just fell in love with spending time with Jesus. And again, that that changed everything. And again, as silly as that sounds, I’ve been in so many groups. It’s kind of shocking how often I’m with pastors and they just say, I just, I don’t have time to read my Bible.Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — I don’t have time to worship. I can’t give 15 or 20 minutes in the mornings to the Lord. And it’s like, if that if that’s true, then something is just so out of order about our life and ministry. And we’ve not learned to juggle all of that. And because we’re not handling that well, so many pastors, they don’t finish in ministry. Rich Birch —Right.Allen Holmes — Ministry chews them up and spits them out. And so we have to make that the priority. So important. So important.Rich Birch — Yeah, I really appreciate that. I appreciate you leaning in on that. And this is an area where it’s an occupational hazard in what we’ve picked to do…Allen Holmes — Oh, yeah. That’s right.Rich Birch — …because our our job is to produce that in other people. And so we have to handle the scripture in in a way, you know, it’s like a part of what we do to produce the content we produce or whatever that is. And it can become very transactional if we don’t watch. And so I really appreciate you leaning in on that.Allen Holmes — That’s exactly right.Rich Birch — What about on the married side? What advice would you give? Again, you’ve, you’ve are happily married today and you know, all these years later.Allen Holmes — Yeah, that’s right.Rich Birch — And, what, what rhythms have you found that have worked well for you and your wife, for you to continue to lead and to lead, you know, at a high level. The reason why we’re talking is because you’re leading a fast-growing church.Allen Holmes — Yeah.Rich Birch — But, you know, you’re doing that and keeping your marriage. What are some of the rhythms that you, that you help coach other, maybe younger leaders to, to really instill on that side, to, to, to be, to be whole on that side?Allen Holmes — One of the things that was so helpful early on is recognizing that my marriage was God’s gift to me to learn, not just to grow and to mature as a man, but even to learn to walk with God.Allen Holmes — And one of the things you see in Scripture over and over and over again is the primary metaphor God uses to describe our relationship with Him as a husband and a wife, that we’re the bride of Christ.Allen Holmes — And what I found is that my marriage and my relationship with Jesus were running in parallel. So if I learned something with Tina, it strengthened my relationship with Jesus. And when I would learn something with Jesus, it would actually strengthen my relationship with Tina, that they were you know playing off of each other that way.Allen Holmes — And so as Tina and I started working on our marriage, I mean, it was it was as simple like even when I think about giving my mornings to God. When I wake up every day, the first thing I do is I roll over on my knees. I acknowledge Jesus, you are my king, king of my heart and life.Allen Holmes — I invite the Holy Spirit to fill me fresh for that day. And I probably pray there three to five minutes, and then I roll over on my back and put my hand on my sleeping wife. And I just take a minute and begin praying and and blessing my wife.Allen Holmes — And then I’ll get up and I’ll I’ll kind of have of usually a couple hours where I can just be in the Word, I can worship, I can be in so have silence and solitude and just allow God to minister to my soul. And then i don’t ever leave the house without giving my wife a kiss, telling her I love her, embracing her.Allen Holmes — During the day, I’m going to check in two or three times. How’s your day going? What’s going on with you? You know, if I’m driving somewhere or between meetings, you know, little quick touches. Rich Birch — That's good.Allen Holmes — When I get home, I’m going to walk in the house. The first thing I’m going do is I’m going to find Tina. We’re going to eat dinner together that night. At the end of the day, we’re going to maybe go on a walk that night. We may get in bed and just both be reading a book for a little bit. We might talk about our day or what’s going on with our kids or life.Allen Holmes — Before we go to bed, before we go to sleep, we’ll pray together. And again, I want to make sure that I’m affirming my love for… When I describe all of that to people and what I try to tell them is have a response. The Christian life is learning to live in the presence of God. And marriage is learning to live in the presence of your wife.Allen Holmes — And so I know throughout the day what’s going on in the heart of my wife and how to love and serve her well, even when I’m here at work. And as a Christian, I’ve got to learn how do I live in the presence of God and recognize he’s always with me. And I want to bring Jesus into every moment, every meeting, every decision. And versus I have devotional time and I leave God at home. And then I come to work and do my work.Allen Holmes — So that’s just one example. As I learned how to do that with Tina, I saw how to apply to my relationship with God and vice versa.Rich Birch — That's so good. Yeah, that’s so helpful. Let’s talk about how your internal life and your own growth and your own staying close to him, what impact has that had on the church, on your team, on the people you lead? How do you see those two, you know, working together?Allen Holmes — Yeah, that’s a great question. So part of it is you reproduce who and what you are. Rich Birch — True. Allen Holmes — So what we’re describing, and of course, I’ve got 25 years of this, and so that gives me a little bit of an advantage in that regard because this takes time to build. You know, it doesn’t happen overnight. But when this has been kind of the direction of your life for over 25 years, then it becomes the direction of the organization and the people that you lead. And so on our on our church staff and our church and the way we do ministry, the way our we you know our mission is all affected by what we’re talking about.Allen Holmes — And so our staff, that you know, they all have a rule of life. They all have a very intentional plan a plan for their spiritual and personal and leadership growth in their life. And and we work as a team to to facilitate that. In fact, in our job descriptions, their number one responsibility is their personal growth and development. And we tell them all the time, the greatest thing you can do for everyone in your life is to learn and grow as a leader. That’s the greatest contribution you can make. When you do that, you everybody comes up. you You bless everybody. So work harder on who you are than what you’re building.Allen Holmes — And so we just emphasize that. And and then we do little things like, you know, in our in our church culture, we once a month, they have a retreat day where they’re required to go and be alone with Jesus for a whole day. And they’re being paid to do it. Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — It’s their, you know, it’s part of their job. We emphasize a spiritual practice every month, and we’re doing that in all of our groups, and we model that as a staff. Like in January, our spiritual practice is fasting, and we’re about to begin you know a season of prayer and fasting like a lot of churches do in January. And so that’s integrated into everything that we’re doing as a church and to our staff. They’re encouraged to do that, and so we’re just constantly making sure that they’re learning and growing. And then that begins to shape the culture your church. It shapes your ability to actually make disciples in your church. I mean, at the end of the day, if on a scale of 1 to 10, as a follower of Christ, if I’m a five, I can only lead three and fours… Rich Birch — Right. Allen Holmes — …and I can only attract twos.Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — And then there’s nobody that I can help, right?Rich Birch — Right. Yes. Yes.Allen Holmes — Because I’m already at the bottom.Rich Birch — Right. Right. Yeah.Allen Holmes — But if I can be an eight and lead sixes and sevens and attract four and fives, then we can reach down and help the two and threes get up, you know. So my what God is doing in me, and that’s true for everybody on our team, is the greatest contribution they can make, and it brings everybody up. And so that’s just really worked into our culture.Rich Birch — Think at like from a diagnostic point of view. A church calls you up and they feel stuck organizationally. They feel like, man, things are just, they’re not going well. When you take a call like that, is your reflex to go towards, well, where are things with the with the leadership team internally?Rich Birch — Or you know do we start organizationally? Hey, let’s fix a couple of things. Help us talk think Help us think through um how do you handle that kind of conversation? Or how does this conversation inform a conversation like that when it comes your way?Allen Holmes — That’s a great question. I mean, generally my response will be, I’ll tell people really, if you need organizational, just kind of practical, how do I do it information, I just give them some resources, you know, so I’ll send them, go to the Grow Conference. They’re probably the best in the world at it. Rich Birch — Yeah, they're so good.Allen Holmes — They can tell you how to do these different things. But then I want to come back to the thing I think we can help you with is really the soul of your organization, which is a reflection of what God’s doing in you. So let’s talk about who you are as a leader, the way you live your life, the way you lead your staff, the culture that you’re building and creating. Because ultimately, if you get all these systems, but you don’t have culture, culture trumps systems every single time.Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — And when you get the systems and the culture right, you begin, everybody’s attracted to that. In fact, I think maybe one of the big problems in Western culture, and this is hard to admit, but I think the church has to admit this, is that people, people are not going to church. Church attendance is on decline, but it’s not because people don’t want God. They’re just not convinced they can find him at church.Rich Birch — Right. Yeah, that’s so true. Yeah.Allen Holmes — I mean, they’re they’re spiritually hungry, but the cultures of our church, people come into that culture and what they kind of intuitively know is that this doesn’t feel healthy or spiritual. So you can create all the systems you want and send out flyers and do all kinds of things. But if people show up at your church and what they intuitively know is that this isn’t healthy and spiritual, you can’t grow your church. So you have to begin there.Allen Holmes —It’s also true if it is healthy and spiritual, even if your systems are a little suspect, people will tolerate a lot of a lot of that because they’re so spiritually hungry. And I think that’s more true than ever before.Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s very true. Yeah. Well, yeah, my good friend, Carey Nieuwhof, he says like, man, it would be so sad if people came to our churches and all they found was us, right? You know, at the end of the day, right? Like we were trying to point them to Jesus and as as kind of elementary as it sounds, but it’s just so true.Rich Birch — If there isn’t something happening there that’s bigger than just what they can get anywhere else, why would they come to us? Why would they engage in our churches? Yeah, that’s that’s…Allen Holmes — You know, we just came through Christmas, and and one of the things that I think Protestants miss is is when we think about Christmas, we think about Emmanuel, God with us. We think about the incarnation, God became flesh, and we think that’s something that happened 2,000 years ago. And the truth is, that’s supposed to be true of the church today. We are the body of Christ.Rich Birch — Yes.Allen Holmes — God in us. And when that’s true, people, when they show up at our churches or show up at our dinner table, they should experience Jesus when they’re with us because we’re becoming more and more like him.Rich Birch — Yes. Yeah, it’s good.Allen Holmes — And then our life gives validity to our message.Rich Birch — Well, one of the things I’m working on a book for for churches about breaking the 2,000 barrier. And one of the interesting stats that we’ve bumped into is that oftentimes the, when a church breaks the 2,000 barrier, the senior leader and often the senior leadership team have been there for going on two decades, 18 years, 19 years, 22 years. Like it’s just a really common pattern you see.Rich Birch — Now that’s not the perception. Our perception is like, oh, there’s like the just add water mega fast church that just explodes and it all happens. But that actually isn’t the normative pattern. the Normative pattern is it’s it takes a long time. You’ve been at your church for 25 years. Talk us through how longevity, how does that tie into this conversation? How does it tie into the impact you’re seeing, you know, at Definition? Talk us through that.Allen Holmes — Yeah. You know, it’s interesting when I, one of the other real key moments for me is I went back to do my doctorate of ministry degree at Gordon-Conwell in redemptive leadership. And so much of what we were studying is how God works in the crisis, in these pressure moments to, you know, expose the unfinished places in our character so that we can grow and become more like Jesus and therefore maximize our kingdom impact in the world.Allen Holmes — And one of my professors, Dr. Powers, he actually wrote a book called Redemptive Leadership. It’s a simple little book, but profound, where he describes leadership development in five stages. And stage one is is a skilled leader where you get a leadership role just based on your skill. So maybe the ability to preach. And so they call you to be the pastor. That’s how I became the pastor of my first church. I could preach. I hadn’t done anything else. But they let me be a pastor because I can preach.Allen Holmes — And then the second stage is a principal leader where you begin to understand why you do what you do. But the third stage, which is so important, is the character stage. And in order for a leader to go through the character stage, God always uses a crisis to bring him into that stage. But when he comes into that stage, he has a choice.Allen Holmes — In that stage, he can open his heart and allow God to do that deeper work, or he can go back and hide behind his skills and principle. And that’s what pastors do a lot of times. The reason you see this turnover every, you know, depending on what statistic you read, every two to four years, pastors are leaving churches is because they come into a church and they have this honeymoon season, and then all of a sudden there’s a crisis that exposes some things, and they start floating their resume and hiding behind their skill, rather than allowing God to deal with their character so that they can advance and become a transformative, redemptive leader. Rich Birch — That’s so good.Allen Holmes — So I think one of the things that’s been so true for us is we’ve just tried to say to people, when there’s a crisis, don’t panic, don’t run away, see it as an opportunity.Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — In fact, I ended up doing my dissertation on the idea that if we could teach this model to leaders, that it would cause them to respond differently in the crisis. Instead of running from it, they would run to it and open their heart, and God could use that to really propel them into their redemptive future. And the research said that was true.Allen Holmes — And so we’ve tried to really work that in our culture to understand when something goes wrong, don’t run away and don’t hide.Rich Birch — Right.Allen Holmes — Let’s run into it and trust God to meet us there so that this thing, God works redemptively to use it for your benefit and to launch you into your future. And because that’s been our culture, people have stuck around. I mean, my lead team, Rick has been here 25 years. He’s actually here two Sundays longer than I’ve been here. Rich Birch — Love it.Allen Holmes — Eric’s been here 24 years. Jonathan’s been here 19 years. Steve’s been Chelsea’s been here almost this year will be 14 years. Steve’s been here 10 years. I mean, so they’ve just been here a long, long, long time, and that but that’s why, is that they’ve seen these moments and we’ve helped them to find God in it so that actually works for us instead of against us.Rich Birch — Yeah, that’s that’s great. I love that. You know, I think if more churches, if more leaders had the mindset, even as we led our people that like, hey, if they come to us and it feels like there’s a crisis brewing here, I do feel like our culture is so bent towards like, it’s not just them leaving, it’s us leaving them. It’s like, okay, time’s up, you’re done, like move on. We would never say it that way because we’re better Christians and we know, but but that’s the vibe we give people.Allen Holmes — Right.Rich Birch — And And I do think it’s been interesting as we’ve been looking really from a church growth point of view, this is a really sticky trend that we see that it’s like you, the key leaders have to be here for a long time. And it makes sense on lots of levels. Allen Holmes — Right. Rich Birch — This level, it makes sense. It makes sense on just like community influence. Like you you have to be around for a long time. People are super suspicious of the church and they’re not You know, they don’t come like that maybe 30 years ago, people trusted the church. Well, that’s just not true anymore. Allen Holmes — Right. Rich Birch — And so when you’re around for a long time that, you know, that makes a difference. And it’s hard to, it’s not like a really pithy bullet point because it’s like, well, just stick around. But it is, it’s critically important to the, you know, to the overall mix.Allen Holmes — Yeah, you know, that make that reminds me of a couple of things. One, one of the, think, things we have to be careful about today is I think we are doing such a good job of planting churches. We’re all for church planting. We just help the church in our city plant. We’re about to launch somebody out next year to plant under the church. I mean, that’s a fantastic thing, but we’ve gotten so good at it.Allen Holmes — If you’re a 30-year-old and you plant a church and you start with 500 on day one, it could be detrimental to your spiritual journey. And we just have to kind of recognize that.Rich Birch — Talk more about that. Why would that be?Allen Holmes — Well, like when I think about myself, when I came to Definition, we had about 30 people, and we did not average 100 for an entire year until my seventh year here.Rich Birch — Right. Right.Allen Holmes — Now, during those seven years, I thought it was the greatest church in America. I mean, we were having a good time, and we were basically a college ministry more than a church back then. When I came, we had an older congregation, but my first Sunday, 15 college students showed up.Rich Birch — Okay.Allen Holmes — And, of course, I was only 26, and so I naturally gravitated towards them. We kind of became this college ministry, and it wasn’t until several years later that they were old enough to get married and start having babies that we actually became a real church. And, uh, but during that time, the truth is God, I just believe God was in that because I was still so young and inexperienced and immature as a man and leader that the last thing I needed was any more success.Allen Holmes — It would have really, success can really blind you to your areas of, you know, where you need really need to grow. In fact, one of the things that you see in several places in Scripture, and one of the things that we tell our church all that time, that the Christian life is a lifelong, transformational journey with Christ. Rich Birch — Yep.Allen Holmes — And you see this in several places in Scripture. Let me give you a couple examples. You think about Joseph. I don’t if you’ve ever thought about this story, but I was preaching on it a couple of years ago, and I realized in this story, there are three times that Joseph has a coat. His first coat as a child is a coat of entitlement, and it needs to be ripped off.Rich Birch — Yes.Allen Holmes — His next coat was given by Pharaoh. It’s a coat of self-sufficiency. It needs to be ripped off, and Potiphar’s wife took it off. And then third, there’s a coat of anointing where he’s come through this crucible. He’s come through these seasons of pain and struggle and wrestling and and suffering that has produced this character. And now God can elevate him and give him almost unlimited power and authority without the threat of him abusing it.Allen Holmes — Well, without that process, God could never. If God puts any man in that position without that process, it destroys you. I mean, you you’re not prepared. You can’t handle that. You know, tell people all the time that one of the reasons God doesn’t just tell us our future, you know, people are always wanting to know, you know, what’s God going to do?Allen Holmes — And the truth is, if God told us what we were going to be doing in 10 years, we’d try to go there tomorrow. And the process prepares us for our purpose. You cannot bypass the process… Rich Birch — That’s good. Allen Holmes — …and still fulfill your purpose.Rich Birch — That’s so good.Allen Holmes — And so God works in that that challenge. I think about Psalm 23, and I think Psalm 23 describes three stages. First stage is that I’m this child. I’m very young and immature in my faith. And then I become this warrior. And then I eventually become friend. But I have to go through the valley of the shadow of death to get up that mountain in order to be a friend of God. Allen Holmes — And there’s no way to bypass that. it’s seeing you You see this over and over and over again in scripture. And it’s just part of our sanctification. It’s the way God works in our lives.Rich Birch — It’s so good.Allen Holmes — Now, one of the things that sometimes somebody might hear all this and they go, well, I know so-and-so. I’ll give you a great example, classic example of this. Chris Hodges is one of the most respected pastors in America.Rich Birch — Yeah, for sure.Allen Holmes — And he he has pastored one of the fastest growing churches in in America. But there is a reason he has been so fruitful. And the reason is before he ever became a pastor, he didn’t start that church until he was 40.Allen Holmes — And before becoming that pastor, he’d served under two of the best pastors and two of the strongest churches in America. So he was so much more mature than the average church planter when he started. And I’m 53, I don’t think I’m where Chris was at 40 when he started that church.Rich Birch — Right. Right.Allen Holmes — So that was a big advantage in why they’ve been able to be so consistently fruitful for such a long period of time. And we just have to recognize that. And again, that’s why it’s so important that we’re focused on what God is doing in us… Rich Birch — So good. Allen Holmes — …because over time, that’s what produces the best results. It’s just a mature man or woman of God.Rich Birch — Yeah, it’s so good. Love it. Well, Allen, thank you so much for today’s conversation. This has been a great, it’s been really rich conversation. There’s a lot more we could we could talk about, but I really appreciate you giving us the time today. As we wrap up today’s episode, what any kind of final words you’d give to a leader, as they’re thinking about reflecting on this kind of inner life, leading themselves, you know, trying to align who they are outside with who they are inside. Help us Help us with the kind of final word as we kind of wrap up today’s call.Allen Holmes — Yeah, you know, I was reading a book recently, and and this quote, I’ve just been meditating on it the last couple of weeks, and it the quote is, God loves us as we are, not as we should be, for none of us are as we should be.Rich Birch — It’s good. Oh wow that's good.Allen Holmes — And I say that just to say I think so many pastors are trying so hard like the older brother in the prodigal story. They’re trying so hard to work for God and to prove something. And I just think we got to begin with falling in love with him and trust he’s better at producing than we are. And if we just fall in love with Jesus and allow him to make us more like that father, his kids will come running home.Rich Birch — That’s so good.Allen Holmes — because they’re looking for fathers. They’re they’re looking for that place of grace and life and hope. And so that characterizes who we are in our soul. And people are just so attracted to that. So I would just say to all the pastors and leaders listening, God is crazy about you. You can’t do anything about that. You don’t have to earn it and none of us deserve it. And if we can learn to really receive that and fall in love with Jesus again, it just changes everything.Rich Birch — So good. Well, sir, I appreciate you being on today’s episode. If people want, if we want to send people online somewhere to track with you or with definition, where do we want to send them so they they could connect with you?Allen Holmes — Yeah, they can just Google Definition Church. And I do have a website. There’s not much on it yet. There’s probably not anything there that’s going to help them. But I need to do a better job of developing some content and getting it out there. But the best place to look would be just to go to our website. There are some resources there for churches.Rich Birch — That’s great.Allen Holmes — And of course, you know, we’d love to hear from them. And we really appreciate you just letting us, inviting us to be on the show today and to get to encourage leaders is such a such a privilege.Rich Birch — No, I appreciate you. I just want to honor you. You know, publicly. We reach out to churches like this, frankly, because you end up on the fastest growing church list. And we’re like, hey, what’s God using? And I love where this conversation went today. I think super helpful for people. So thanks so much, Allen. Appreciate being on today.Allen Holmes — Thanks, Rich. Have a great day.

Fi joins Jane from a top-secret bunker today, with a surprise appearance from Nancy (the greyhound). They contemplate exactly what they would ask the "Great Orange Blimp" if given the chance. Plus, Fi speaks to BAFTA-winning filmmaker Georgie Wileman about her powerful short film, This is Endometriosis. Our next book club pick is 'A Town Like Alice' by Nevil Shute. Our most asked about book is called 'The Later Years' by Peter Thornton. You can listen to our 'I'm in the cupboard on Christmas' playlist here: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1awQioX5y4fxhTAK8ZPhwQIf you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: janeandfi@times.radio Follow us on Instagram! @janeandfi Podcast Producers: Hannah Quinn and Eve Salusbury Executive Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, join Peter and Chris as they deep dive into the third track off of RiddleBox, the almighty third jokers card from ICP , "The Show Must Go On" Sit back and listen as they dissect the lyrics and content of the track, discuss Shaggy 2Dope's tight Wranglers, talk about the best tacos in Mexicantown, and tackle important topics like what the rednecks are watching when Mr Red Neck Fat Balls is pranking them!      The LinkTree is at https://linktr.ee/juggalorwd... Twitter/X: @JuggaloRWD IG: @JuggaloRWD Facebook: @JuggaloRWD TikTok: @JuggaloRWD Threads: @JuggaloRWD BlueSky: @JuggaloRWD The website is www.JuggaloRewind.com. Join us everywhere to talk to other listeners and about ICP, Twiztid and random juggalo nonsense. Email us at juggalorwd@gmail.com or call/text us at (810) 666-1570.        Join our Patreon! For only FOUR DOLLARS a month, you can join Kilnore's Army and get at least two bonus episodes per month, videos, chats and more! Even without paying, you can join the Patreon community! Become an official member of the Phat or Wack Pack today! -- Juggalo Rewind Patreon. Additional music provided by the IRTD. Voiceover work provided by Christmas. All music played is owned by the respective publishers and copywrite holders and is reproduced for review purposes only under fair use. #ForTheJuggaloCulture

This week, we're joined by the hysterical Andrew Mensah to talk step brothers in law, Canadian Apology Syndrome, Tie Domi's dimensions and wanking before going to the strip club. Follow Andrew at @andrewmensah_ Get the Patreon-exclusive second part of this episode (45 mins of bonus content) here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/152153150 WE NOW HAVE MERCH! Get your Glue t-shirts, mugs and totes in time for Christmas here (discount code for Patrons is on the Patreon): https://visualanticsapparel.com/collections/glue-factory Olga's special taping and tour dates can be found here: https://www.rocknrolga.com/ Milo's tour dates can be found here: https://www.miloedwards.co.uk/liveshows Follow us online to get Glue-related clips and updates: https://linktr.ee/gluefactorypod Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

https://wels2.blob.core.windows.net/daily-devotions/20260305dev.mp3 Listen to Devotion What does Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.” Romans 4:3 The Same It’s about thirty years after Jesus has risen from the dead and ascended into heaven. His followers have eagerly shared the Good News of what Jesus has done. As a result, many have come to faith in Jesus as their Savior from sin. New congregations are forming. There is even a gathering of Christians in the capital city of the Roman Empire. Moved by the Holy Spirit, the apostle Paul sits down to write a letter to these Roman believers. What Paul writes is a letter that outlines some fundamentals of the Christian faith. As he does so, he quickly takes on one of the oldest assumptions people make about their relationship with God. That old assumption is this: I assume that, somehow, some way, I have it in me to set things right with God. Sure, I know I’m not the person I should be or could be. But if I keep improving myself, if I make up for the bad in my life by doing good, if I can live a life that’s a little better and more spiritual than most, then I’ll be in a proper position to receive blessings from God. It’s an old assumption that never dies. If Paul were to have a chance to tour our twenty-first century society, nothing would shock him. Even secularists are using the same old tools: Trying to find peace, meaning, fulfillment, identity in what I do. As old as this assumption is, Paul asserts that it is wrong. The answer to “ultimate meaning” lies not in me. It lies only in Jesus Christ. And all he has won for me—forgiveness, peace, meaning, identity, fulfillment—all this is mine through Spirit-created faith in my Savior. Faith alone. To prove it, Paul points back 2,000 years. He points back to Abraham. After God gave Abraham a cluster of promises, at the heart of which was the promise of the coming Savior, the Bible records that “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness” (Genesis 15:6). For Abraham. For Paul. For us. The answer is the same. The answer is Jesus. Prayer: Lord Jesus, when the temptation comes to look inward, move me to look to you. Amen. Daily Devotions is brought to you by WELS. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. ™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

"What time is it?" It's time to talk Oscars, but more specifically, Kerry and Collin are focusing on one of the front-runners to win the night, Paul Thomas Anderson's timely and sensational "One Battle After Another," a movie that somehow predicted our world today, with often comedic and exciting results. What does it have to do with Christmas? Well, it's highly recommended that you see the film before listening to the episode, because it certainly can't be explained in a single-paragraph summary for a podcast episode. How did Anderson get this film through the studio system? Just how powerful is the Christmas Adventurer's Club? What are its chances of winning Best Picture? All these questions, plus some general Oscar talk and some new blu-rays forth adding to your collection.  Go to MovieZyng to start or continue your DVD/blu-ray/4K collection.   Visit collinsouter.com RogerEbert.com Follow Collin and Kerry on Letterboxd. Blu-rays covered: Warner: "Ben-Hur" (1959) - 4K "All The President's Men" (1974) - 4K Lightyear: "Heaven" (1987) Sony: "Richard Pryor: Here and Now" (1983) - 4K Criterion: "Play Time" (1967) - 4K Gemini: "Bucket Of Blood" (1959) Warner Archive: Fred Astaire Collection Broadway On The Big Screen Collection "Stranger On the Third Floor" (1940) Loopy DeLoop Collection (Hanna-Barbera)  

A Ghostly Plea For Appreciation.Based on a post by SandyMarl, in 4 parts. Listen to the ► Podcast at Steamy Stories.A Christmas Ghost Story For ScroogeDana got ready to roll the movie as The Chix settled in. “What’s the movie?” asked McNally.“A Christmas Carol, it’s the classic tale by Charles Dickens.”“Damn. Not a Christmas movie? Did I ever mention that I am so over Christmas right now? Bah Humbug!”Annie snorted, “McNally, you make a better Scrooge than Patrick Stewart.”“I’ll drink to that,” McNally said as she tipped her stemware to wash down a handful of popcorn. “Let me say it again, Merry Fucking Christmas, because I am so done with Christmas.”“Merry Fucking Christmas” was echoed around the room, followed by giggles among gathered good friends as the opening scene played.Annie was dabbing at her eyes as Tiny Tim cried out in the movie’s final scene, “God bless us, everyone!”As the credits rolled, Annie turned to McNally, “Well, Ebenezer Scrooge, do you still hate Christmas? Or did the ghost of Christmas Future shake you from your Bah Humbug! ways?”“I don’t hate Christmas; I just get worn out by this time of year. Christmas has been going on since before Halloween and that’s way too long, even for a vibrant spirit like me,” replied McNally.“Are you still so entrenched in your ‘Bah Humbug’ world-weary ways Ebenezer McNally or is it possible that visitations of the cinematic Ghost of Christmas Past, Present and Future have softened your hardened holiday heart?” pried Patricia.“Don’t be picking on McNally, she’s just been more emotionally honest. I have heard Scrooge speaking through all of you. Chix, take a look inside and tell me if Christmas hasn’t lost its magic for all of us this year, or for that matter, several years running.” Dana’s call for introspection brought the room to silence.Dana continued, “Let me play Ghost of Christmas Past; let me take us back to time when we were young, and Sander and I stretched our budget and bought this cabin and had The Chix and their boys up here around Christmas time? Remember those times?”“Those were the good days,” recalled McNally. “I remember Orlando mixing exotic cocktails for everyone to try. The guys kept making sweet drinks and urging us girls to taste one new one after another. I’m sure they were in cahoots, working on the theory that 'Christmas candy is dandy, but liquor is quicker.’”Patricia chimed in, “Yeah, I remember that year, I remember laughing a lot of silly laughs and being chased around the cabin and out into the snow by three horny abominable snowmen until I finally let one catch me and haul me off to his lair where he threw me on the bed and ravaged me.”“I sort of remember that too - only I think I enjoyed Orlando’s cocktails too much too soon to fully remember every detail. But I have a vague memory of laughing on my way to a strange bed as I hung over Nelson’s shoulder as I pounded on his back as a captured maiden, but not really feeling much distress. I remember trying to help Nelson undress me, but I was too giggly, so he just ripped my clothes off.”Dana reminisced, “Anybody remember the year we all wore those sexy Santa’s Naughty Elf costumes?”“I still have mine in a closet somewhere I think,” snickered McNally. “We put on a pretty good show for the guys that one year when we performed in those outfits. Thanks to Annie for sewing them,” McNally tipped her glass toward Annie.“It was your choreography McNally, and your audacious moves that gave me the confidence to bump and grind along with the rest of the Chix. I’d never have been able to even think of doing something so feminine and sexy if it weren’t for you McNally,” complimented Patricia.“I still get wet every time I hear Eartha Kitt sing 'Santa Baby’ and I think of how hot we Chix looked and how mercilessly we teased those boys,” chuckled McNally.“Speaking for me,” said Patricia, “I’d say all of that dance practice and the sexy dance tips from everyone else showing me how to strut my wares. Our sexy little routine was well worth it a little later that night.” All The Chix giggled and nodded with Patricia, each recalling the thrill of having their men rush the stage and cart off the four costumed naughty little helper elves for a roll in the sheets.“Dana are you sure you’re alright with us bringing up these memories?” asked Annie in a cautious tone.“Annie, I’ve already told you that good memories and present friends are what are important to me tonight.”“Allow me to play the Ghost of Christmas Present,” said Dana in a soft voice. “If the Ghost of Christmas Past has drawn for you scenes of past holiday lovers, good times and Christmas cheer; what do you see when the Ghost of Christmas Present hovers above your lives tonight and points to your actions and attitudes of this present Christmas?”The Chix again sat thinking in silence.McNally answered Dana’s challenge first, “Well, I’ve already told everyone my grim view of this present Christmas. There is a poverty of spirit where I operate; Christmas has become nothing but joyless deadlines for me. I’ll confess, 'Bah Humbug!’ is truly what the Ghost of Christmas Present is pointing at in my life.”“Or would Scrooge use a more contemporary phrase, maybe something like 'Merry Fucking Christmas?” needled Patricia.“Yeah but…” Annie joined in, “…Those really were Merry Fucking Christmases in the past - literally. Those years when we all used to come up here with our hubbies and enjoy playing games and cooking together, remember? And it seems like every night ended in a night of passionate love making,” she added wistfully. “Why did we let that slip away? Where did the holiday love magic go?"I have a confession too, McNally has nothing on me, I’m just as much of a Bah Humbug personality as McNally - if not more so. Only I’m just a Scrooge still in the closet. I guess it’s time I came out to my friends. It was me who first suggested that I’d be ready to exchange Nelson for someone to clean my house. Honestly, how Scrooge-like is that?"The Ghost of Christmas Past showed that Scrooge rejected his old flame, Belle, to pursue a respectable wealthy status above love. Like Scrooge, I’ve let the passion for my old flame, Nelson dim, and for what? A respectable status of a well cleaned house? I’ve been saying 'Bah Humbug!’ from inside my Scrooge closet."I chided McNally for her poor attitude when we first drove up this afternoon,” recalled Patricia. “But then I fell right in with her complaining about my grueling holiday schedule and all I had endured. So, I guess that makes me not only a Scrooge, but a hypocrite as well. How’s that for a bare-bones confession to the Ghost of Christmas Present?" Dana’s Christmas Ghost"Excuse me,” declared a mildly irritated McNally, “enough indulging in this group psychotherapy playing with literary ghosts. I can’t stand it any longer, I’ve gotta find out from Dana if Sander’s ghost is really visiting us here.”McNally’s abrupt demand brought a heavy hush to the room.All eyes were locked on Dana. “All I can say is that I came up to our cabin for the first time since the accident. I hoped I was ready, but I wasn’t sure. The real reason that I invited everyone to join me was so I couldn’t back out, even if I wanted to, since I had extended an invitation to The Chix. Patricia, Annie, McNally; you’re my insurance as I forced myself to be a brave widow."I came two days ago for solitude. I thought I would be alone up here. I hoped I’d be brave enough to finally be alone with my thoughts. I was going to force myself to stay here until reinforcements arrived in the form of a carload of wild, raucous and fun-loving Chix."To my surprise, I had it all wrong. I was not alone here. Sander was waiting for me. It was good to find him here; he has been a comfort for me. I told him I was sorry for making him wait. He let me know that he understood why I waited. He assured me that it was alright for me to wait, coming only after I was ready."When Sander came to me the first night, he comforted me, bringing good memories of us in this place, like the Ghost of Christmas Past. He reacquainted me with faded memories of Patricia and Will, Annie and Nelson and McNally and Orlando all gathered in this place with me and Sander back in those days at the beginning. The images he brought to me made me feel grateful for all of you."I told Sander that those were lovely, warm memories, some of the best; but that they were far in the dim past. When Sander wrapped those memories around me; I felt warmth and saw a radiating brightness, happy for what we had once shared together. He said that that is why he had to brighten them for me; otherwise, neither I nor anyone else in those images would be able to clearly see them as they once were."I began to cry as those bright images of our past passions and fellowship with our friends began to fade before my eyes. I cried even more at the fear of losing him and everything good once again."He warned me that squandered time, tyranny of the mundane and careless love will steal from the human soul, draining the treasures of passion and good memories, leaving murky, pathetic sketches in place of those forgotten treasures. Sander let me know that I still had all of you wrapped around me to shield me with love. He was pleased that The Chix had taken such good care of me after he was taken from me."Sander told me he could not keep the past images bright, the power to do so was only given to the realm of the living."I cried in my grief and in my fresh fear of loss. I tried to hold him, but of course, I could not. I pleaded, 'How can I keep those memories of you and warm feelings bright?’ I didn’t know how to find the power to keep from losing all that was meaningful to me. I cried, 'Please Sander, show me, show me how not to lose you and everything again. Don’t let me drain away into the murky darkness where all warmth and love have been stolen from the human soul.’"I cried, kneeling on the floor. Sander said nothing as he stood close to me as a kind and gentle spirit with a comforting patience waiting for me to finish my hot tears. When I wiped away my tears and looked into his face, he pointed and guided me to look for my answer. I saw The Chix checking their messages, returning calls, checking their calendars trying to squeeze in a meeting, an appointment and a Christmas cookie exchange. I saw that we were rushing to the shopping mall, ordering online, checking our phones and returning home exhausted, drained of warmth and love, leaving nothing for those around us."I was shown Will, Nelson and Orlando taking the cars in for servicing because it was time. I saw these men checking their messages and making out-of-the way runs to pick up store items and a few groceries because their wives had sent them a text message. I witnessed The Dix on their own initiative coming home with a takeout meal that they served to their exhausted wives and then taking out the trash the night before pickup without a reminder. The guys were up late at night, opening the bills and writing the household checks and balancing the accounts, toiling like the loyal Bob Cratchit, Scrooge’s unappreciated clerk. I had been shown Christmas Present. I was sad to have seen that exhausted misery spread to all of our present lives."I cried, 'Oh Sander, where is the joy and the love for our friends? Everyone looks so exhausted and joyless and without hope or purpose. Tell me Sander, what is going to happen to them?’ Sander looked sad and did not answer me."He began to fade into the darkness, and I begged with renewed tears, 'Sander please don’t go, please don’t leave me alone again.’ But he was gone.I crawled off the floor, lifting myself into bed and cried myself to sleep. I remembered his words, 'Squandered time, tyranny of the mundane and careless love will steal from the human soul, draining the treasures of passion and good memories and leaving murky, pathetic sketches in place of those forgotten treasures.’"When Sander slipped away from me that night, I understood that he had shown me that the same was happening to Orlando and McNally, Will and Patricia and also to Nelson and Annie. His visit was a warning. Just as I lost Sander, everyone here is facing a Christmas Future where you will discover that you’ve lost all that really matters in life."Sander came again the next night. I was glad to see him. I wanted to know if it was too late for our friends to rekindle the love that had somehow drained away. 'Please, Sander, tell me that there is yet hope for them this Christmas Season,’ I begged."He showed me some bright and warm memories from long ago, some personal and some with The Chix. He showed me those visions to let me know that I still had love and support from you guys. But I was haunted by those visions of Christmas Present that I’d been shown the night before. He was happy that I was so well cared for now. And yes, he was happy to know that I got surprised by some needed loving attention from a partridge, a turtle dove hunter and an old barnyard rooster who had a few tricks to make a French hen cackle. Yet, the peril of the bleak Christmas Present remains, unless friendship and love is cherished and attended, it too will soon perish, and I’ll see my friends fade away into murky darkness as Sander had."Again, I looked into his gentle eyes and asked, 'There is still time isn’t there? We haven’t squandered our time, it’s not too late, tell me sweetheart, there are warm and bright memories of love and affection still to be made, nourished and cherished.’ Sander smiled his warm smile of assurance that I had missed so much, and I was happy."I woke, realizing that the sun was shining off a fresh morning snowfall and I threw off my heavy quilt. I sat up in bed, remembering that on our last morning together; Sander had been working on something secret that morning before the accident. I remembered asking him, 'Sweetie buns, what are you working on the hill behind the cabin?’"He smiled that warm, smug smile of mischief on that last morning that we were together and told me, 'I’ve got a Christmas surprise to show you tonight, it has to be revealed once it is dark. So, you’ll have to wait until we finish a few runs on the slopes this afternoon.’"Of course, we never came back here together. I had forgotten about Sander’s promised secret Christmas surprise until yesterday morning. When Sander told me he had a Christmas gift waiting for me after dark, he was holding an electrical extension cord behind his back with his mischievous smile stretched across his ski slope tanned face. 'I’ll plug this in to brighten your night tonight, as a token of how you have brightened my life,’ he said. Recalling some of his last words, I jumped out of bed and checked this morning; that cord is still lying on the deck where Sander left it last year.Annie was crying, as usual, but so were Patricia and McNally.Dana reached for her purse and pulled out her phone and looked at her messages and began to text, as The Chix took a few moments to rein in their emotions and check their composure before speaking or asking Dana any questions.Annie brushed her cheeks, "Oh Dana, that is the sweetest, saddest story I’ve ever heard… Excuse me, I can’t stop weeping… I don’t even know if these are tears of joy or grief… excuse me, I don’t know what to feel or say,” she said as the flood gates reopened.Patricia felt it was her role to wade in and tidy things up and drain the emotional swamp in which they all found themselves wallowing in. “Dana, it sounds like you’ve started to find some peace after last year’s events. I am glad that you shared with us how you are coping with Sander’s passing…”“Patricia, Jesus Christ on a bicycle! Don’t be such a cold and analytical mother hen all the time for us Chix. Dana’s story is not about coping, it’s about us - all of us and all that we once had and what we might lose, including Will, Nelson and yes, Orlando too. Dana, your conversation with Sander really got to me there…” McNally paused, looking emotionally rattled.“I guess everyone can tell, your story about Sander got to me also,” said Annie after managing to dry out enough. “I feel like McNally. Dana, what you said really touched me; I don’t know what to say… Yes, I actually do, I want to say that what Sander said is right; my joy has been stolen from my soul, I feel drained inside, I have let the things I hold most dear fade away. I am Scrooge - and I’m sorry, but so are all of you.”Turning to Patricia, Annie asked, “Don’t you feel what McNally and I feel? Don’t you feel that you and I and McNally, and certainly Dana, have lost something precious? Together as The Chix, we are a sum greater the whole - and that has, or should, include our husbands. I believe Sander told Dana to warn us all before it is too late. Patricia, don’t you feel like me that we should do something before the Ghost of Christmas Future makes the vision of an estranged and murky end to all that we enjoy a grim reality?”Patricia teared up and nodded silently. Then lifting her head, she asked Dana, “Is there hope? Did Sander give you hope for us?”“There is hope. There is still love here, and where there is love, there is hope. Sander showed me that the future can be changed by what we do now. Sander showed me that there is hope for us, hope for The Chix.”“And… And… What is that hope?” asked McNally. “And… And… And I got lots of questions about you and Sander up here in this cabin, but first - that was a gripping Christmas ghost story with Sander, but it seemed kind of weird that as soon as you finished driving your emotional steamroller full speed over our sympathies that you then broke character, ignoring us to check your phone. Isn’t checking your messages part of that tyranny of the mundane that Sander warned you about? Who is so important that you were texting them rather than dealing with us in this room and our emotions?”“The Ghost or the Ghosts of Christmas Future,” was Dana’s curt, cryptic reply.“You asked about our future, you asked about hope; I don’t know exactly how to answer those questions,” said a thoughtful Dana. “But I know where I want to look for starters. There is Sander’s unrevealed Christmas surprise waiting for me - or us, on top of the hill behind the cabin. It was Sander&rsq

A Ghostly Plea For Appreciation.Based on a post by SandyMarl, in 4 parts. Listen to the ► Podcast at Steamy Stories.A Christmas Ghost Story For ScroogeDana got ready to roll the movie as The Chix settled in. “What’s the movie?” asked McNally.“A Christmas Carol, it’s the classic tale by Charles Dickens.”“Damn. Not a Christmas movie? Did I ever mention that I am so over Christmas right now? Bah Humbug!”Annie snorted, “McNally, you make a better Scrooge than Patrick Stewart.”“I’ll drink to that,” McNally said as she tipped her stemware to wash down a handful of popcorn. “Let me say it again, Merry Fucking Christmas, because I am so done with Christmas.”“Merry Fucking Christmas” was echoed around the room, followed by giggles among gathered good friends as the opening scene played.Annie was dabbing at her eyes as Tiny Tim cried out in the movie’s final scene, “God bless us, everyone!”As the credits rolled, Annie turned to McNally, “Well, Ebenezer Scrooge, do you still hate Christmas? Or did the ghost of Christmas Future shake you from your Bah Humbug! ways?”“I don’t hate Christmas; I just get worn out by this time of year. Christmas has been going on since before Halloween and that’s way too long, even for a vibrant spirit like me,” replied McNally.“Are you still so entrenched in your ‘Bah Humbug’ world-weary ways Ebenezer McNally or is it possible that visitations of the cinematic Ghost of Christmas Past, Present and Future have softened your hardened holiday heart?” pried Patricia.“Don’t be picking on McNally, she’s just been more emotionally honest. I have heard Scrooge speaking through all of you. Chix, take a look inside and tell me if Christmas hasn’t lost its magic for all of us this year, or for that matter, several years running.” Dana’s call for introspection brought the room to silence.Dana continued, “Let me play Ghost of Christmas Past; let me take us back to time when we were young, and Sander and I stretched our budget and bought this cabin and had The Chix and their boys up here around Christmas time? Remember those times?”“Those were the good days,” recalled McNally. “I remember Orlando mixing exotic cocktails for everyone to try. The guys kept making sweet drinks and urging us girls to taste one new one after another. I’m sure they were in cahoots, working on the theory that 'Christmas candy is dandy, but liquor is quicker.’”Patricia chimed in, “Yeah, I remember that year, I remember laughing a lot of silly laughs and being chased around the cabin and out into the snow by three horny abominable snowmen until I finally let one catch me and haul me off to his lair where he threw me on the bed and ravaged me.”“I sort of remember that too - only I think I enjoyed Orlando’s cocktails too much too soon to fully remember every detail. But I have a vague memory of laughing on my way to a strange bed as I hung over Nelson’s shoulder as I pounded on his back as a captured maiden, but not really feeling much distress. I remember trying to help Nelson undress me, but I was too giggly, so he just ripped my clothes off.”Dana reminisced, “Anybody remember the year we all wore those sexy Santa’s Naughty Elf costumes?”“I still have mine in a closet somewhere I think,” snickered McNally. “We put on a pretty good show for the guys that one year when we performed in those outfits. Thanks to Annie for sewing them,” McNally tipped her glass toward Annie.“It was your choreography McNally, and your audacious moves that gave me the confidence to bump and grind along with the rest of the Chix. I’d never have been able to even think of doing something so feminine and sexy if it weren’t for you McNally,” complimented Patricia.“I still get wet every time I hear Eartha Kitt sing 'Santa Baby’ and I think of how hot we Chix looked and how mercilessly we teased those boys,” chuckled McNally.“Speaking for me,” said Patricia, “I’d say all of that dance practice and the sexy dance tips from everyone else showing me how to strut my wares. Our sexy little routine was well worth it a little later that night.” All The Chix giggled and nodded with Patricia, each recalling the thrill of having their men rush the stage and cart off the four costumed naughty little helper elves for a roll in the sheets.“Dana are you sure you’re alright with us bringing up these memories?” asked Annie in a cautious tone.“Annie, I’ve already told you that good memories and present friends are what are important to me tonight.”“Allow me to play the Ghost of Christmas Present,” said Dana in a soft voice. “If the Ghost of Christmas Past has drawn for you scenes of past holiday lovers, good times and Christmas cheer; what do you see when the Ghost of Christmas Present hovers above your lives tonight and points to your actions and attitudes of this present Christmas?”The Chix again sat thinking in silence.McNally answered Dana’s challenge first, “Well, I’ve already told everyone my grim view of this present Christmas. There is a poverty of spirit where I operate; Christmas has become nothing but joyless deadlines for me. I’ll confess, 'Bah Humbug!’ is truly what the Ghost of Christmas Present is pointing at in my life.”“Or would Scrooge use a more contemporary phrase, maybe something like 'Merry Fucking Christmas?” needled Patricia.“Yeah but…” Annie joined in, “…Those really were Merry Fucking Christmases in the past - literally. Those years when we all used to come up here with our hubbies and enjoy playing games and cooking together, remember? And it seems like every night ended in a night of passionate love making,” she added wistfully. “Why did we let that slip away? Where did the holiday love magic go?"I have a confession too, McNally has nothing on me, I’m just as much of a Bah Humbug personality as McNally - if not more so. Only I’m just a Scrooge still in the closet. I guess it’s time I came out to my friends. It was me who first suggested that I’d be ready to exchange Nelson for someone to clean my house. Honestly, how Scrooge-like is that?"The Ghost of Christmas Past showed that Scrooge rejected his old flame, Belle, to pursue a respectable wealthy status above love. Like Scrooge, I’ve let the passion for my old flame, Nelson dim, and for what? A respectable status of a well cleaned house? I’ve been saying 'Bah Humbug!’ from inside my Scrooge closet."I chided McNally for her poor attitude when we first drove up this afternoon,” recalled Patricia. “But then I fell right in with her complaining about my grueling holiday schedule and all I had endured. So, I guess that makes me not only a Scrooge, but a hypocrite as well. How’s that for a bare-bones confession to the Ghost of Christmas Present?" Dana’s Christmas Ghost"Excuse me,” declared a mildly irritated McNally, “enough indulging in this group psychotherapy playing with literary ghosts. I can’t stand it any longer, I’ve gotta find out from Dana if Sander’s ghost is really visiting us here.”McNally’s abrupt demand brought a heavy hush to the room.All eyes were locked on Dana. “All I can say is that I came up to our cabin for the first time since the accident. I hoped I was ready, but I wasn’t sure. The real reason that I invited everyone to join me was so I couldn’t back out, even if I wanted to, since I had extended an invitation to The Chix. Patricia, Annie, McNally; you’re my insurance as I forced myself to be a brave widow."I came two days ago for solitude. I thought I would be alone up here. I hoped I’d be brave enough to finally be alone with my thoughts. I was going to force myself to stay here until reinforcements arrived in the form of a carload of wild, raucous and fun-loving Chix."To my surprise, I had it all wrong. I was not alone here. Sander was waiting for me. It was good to find him here; he has been a comfort for me. I told him I was sorry for making him wait. He let me know that he understood why I waited. He assured me that it was alright for me to wait, coming only after I was ready."When Sander came to me the first night, he comforted me, bringing good memories of us in this place, like the Ghost of Christmas Past. He reacquainted me with faded memories of Patricia and Will, Annie and Nelson and McNally and Orlando all gathered in this place with me and Sander back in those days at the beginning. The images he brought to me made me feel grateful for all of you."I told Sander that those were lovely, warm memories, some of the best; but that they were far in the dim past. When Sander wrapped those memories around me; I felt warmth and saw a radiating brightness, happy for what we had once shared together. He said that that is why he had to brighten them for me; otherwise, neither I nor anyone else in those images would be able to clearly see them as they once were."I began to cry as those bright images of our past passions and fellowship with our friends began to fade before my eyes. I cried even more at the fear of losing him and everything good once again."He warned me that squandered time, tyranny of the mundane and careless love will steal from the human soul, draining the treasures of passion and good memories, leaving murky, pathetic sketches in place of those forgotten treasures. Sander let me know that I still had all of you wrapped around me to shield me with love. He was pleased that The Chix had taken such good care of me after he was taken from me."Sander told me he could not keep the past images bright, the power to do so was only given to the realm of the living."I cried in my grief and in my fresh fear of loss. I tried to hold him, but of course, I could not. I pleaded, 'How can I keep those memories of you and warm feelings bright?’ I didn’t know how to find the power to keep from losing all that was meaningful to me. I cried, 'Please Sander, show me, show me how not to lose you and everything again. Don’t let me drain away into the murky darkness where all warmth and love have been stolen from the human soul.’"I cried, kneeling on the floor. Sander said nothing as he stood close to me as a kind and gentle spirit with a comforting patience waiting for me to finish my hot tears. When I wiped away my tears and looked into his face, he pointed and guided me to look for my answer. I saw The Chix checking their messages, returning calls, checking their calendars trying to squeeze in a meeting, an appointment and a Christmas cookie exchange. I saw that we were rushing to the shopping mall, ordering online, checking our phones and returning home exhausted, drained of warmth and love, leaving nothing for those around us."I was shown Will, Nelson and Orlando taking the cars in for servicing because it was time. I saw these men checking their messages and making out-of-the way runs to pick up store items and a few groceries because their wives had sent them a text message. I witnessed The Dix on their own initiative coming home with a takeout meal that they served to their exhausted wives and then taking out the trash the night before pickup without a reminder. The guys were up late at night, opening the bills and writing the household checks and balancing the accounts, toiling like the loyal Bob Cratchit, Scrooge’s unappreciated clerk. I had been shown Christmas Present. I was sad to have seen that exhausted misery spread to all of our present lives."I cried, 'Oh Sander, where is the joy and the love for our friends? Everyone looks so exhausted and joyless and without hope or purpose. Tell me Sander, what is going to happen to them?’ Sander looked sad and did not answer me."He began to fade into the darkness, and I begged with renewed tears, 'Sander please don’t go, please don’t leave me alone again.’ But he was gone.I crawled off the floor, lifting myself into bed and cried myself to sleep. I remembered his words, 'Squandered time, tyranny of the mundane and careless love will steal from the human soul, draining the treasures of passion and good memories and leaving murky, pathetic sketches in place of those forgotten treasures.’"When Sander slipped away from me that night, I understood that he had shown me that the same was happening to Orlando and McNally, Will and Patricia and also to Nelson and Annie. His visit was a warning. Just as I lost Sander, everyone here is facing a Christmas Future where you will discover that you’ve lost all that really matters in life."Sander came again the next night. I was glad to see him. I wanted to know if it was too late for our friends to rekindle the love that had somehow drained away. 'Please, Sander, tell me that there is yet hope for them this Christmas Season,’ I begged."He showed me some bright and warm memories from long ago, some personal and some with The Chix. He showed me those visions to let me know that I still had love and support from you guys. But I was haunted by those visions of Christmas Present that I’d been shown the night before. He was happy that I was so well cared for now. And yes, he was happy to know that I got surprised by some needed loving attention from a partridge, a turtle dove hunter and an old barnyard rooster who had a few tricks to make a French hen cackle. Yet, the peril of the bleak Christmas Present remains, unless friendship and love is cherished and attended, it too will soon perish, and I’ll see my friends fade away into murky darkness as Sander had."Again, I looked into his gentle eyes and asked, 'There is still time isn’t there? We haven’t squandered our time, it’s not too late, tell me sweetheart, there are warm and bright memories of love and affection still to be made, nourished and cherished.’ Sander smiled his warm smile of assurance that I had missed so much, and I was happy."I woke, realizing that the sun was shining off a fresh morning snowfall and I threw off my heavy quilt. I sat up in bed, remembering that on our last morning together; Sander had been working on something secret that morning before the accident. I remembered asking him, 'Sweetie buns, what are you working on the hill behind the cabin?’"He smiled that warm, smug smile of mischief on that last morning that we were together and told me, 'I’ve got a Christmas surprise to show you tonight, it has to be revealed once it is dark. So, you’ll have to wait until we finish a few runs on the slopes this afternoon.’"Of course, we never came back here together. I had forgotten about Sander’s promised secret Christmas surprise until yesterday morning. When Sander told me he had a Christmas gift waiting for me after dark, he was holding an electrical extension cord behind his back with his mischievous smile stretched across his ski slope tanned face. 'I’ll plug this in to brighten your night tonight, as a token of how you have brightened my life,’ he said. Recalling some of his last words, I jumped out of bed and checked this morning; that cord is still lying on the deck where Sander left it last year.Annie was crying, as usual, but so were Patricia and McNally.Dana reached for her purse and pulled out her phone and looked at her messages and began to text, as The Chix took a few moments to rein in their emotions and check their composure before speaking or asking Dana any questions.Annie brushed her cheeks, "Oh Dana, that is the sweetest, saddest story I’ve ever heard… Excuse me, I can’t stop weeping… I don’t even know if these are tears of joy or grief… excuse me, I don’t know what to feel or say,” she said as the flood gates reopened.Patricia felt it was her role to wade in and tidy things up and drain the emotional swamp in which they all found themselves wallowing in. “Dana, it sounds like you’ve started to find some peace after last year’s events. I am glad that you shared with us how you are coping with Sander’s passing…”“Patricia, Jesus Christ on a bicycle! Don’t be such a cold and analytical mother hen all the time for us Chix. Dana’s story is not about coping, it’s about us - all of us and all that we once had and what we might lose, including Will, Nelson and yes, Orlando too. Dana, your conversation with Sander really got to me there…” McNally paused, looking emotionally rattled.“I guess everyone can tell, your story about Sander got to me also,” said Annie after managing to dry out enough. “I feel like McNally. Dana, what you said really touched me; I don’t know what to say… Yes, I actually do, I want to say that what Sander said is right; my joy has been stolen from my soul, I feel drained inside, I have let the things I hold most dear fade away. I am Scrooge - and I’m sorry, but so are all of you.”Turning to Patricia, Annie asked, “Don’t you feel what McNally and I feel? Don’t you feel that you and I and McNally, and certainly Dana, have lost something precious? Together as The Chix, we are a sum greater the whole - and that has, or should, include our husbands. I believe Sander told Dana to warn us all before it is too late. Patricia, don’t you feel like me that we should do something before the Ghost of Christmas Future makes the vision of an estranged and murky end to all that we enjoy a grim reality?”Patricia teared up and nodded silently. Then lifting her head, she asked Dana, “Is there hope? Did Sander give you hope for us?”“There is hope. There is still love here, and where there is love, there is hope. Sander showed me that the future can be changed by what we do now. Sander showed me that there is hope for us, hope for The Chix.”“And… And… What is that hope?” asked McNally. “And… And… And I got lots of questions about you and Sander up here in this cabin, but first - that was a gripping Christmas ghost story with Sander, but it seemed kind of weird that as soon as you finished driving your emotional steamroller full speed over our sympathies that you then broke character, ignoring us to check your phone. Isn’t checking your messages part of that tyranny of the mundane that Sander warned you about? Who is so important that you were texting them rather than dealing with us in this room and our emotions?”“The Ghost or the Ghosts of Christmas Future,” was Dana’s curt, cryptic reply.“You asked about our future, you asked about hope; I don’t know exactly how to answer those questions,” said a thoughtful Dana. “But I know where I want to look for starters. There is Sander’s unrevealed Christmas surprise waiting for me - or us, on top of the hill behind the cabin. It was Sander&rsq

Rod and Karen banter, seeing Liz Miele and Brian McGuinness do standup, and Rod saw an accident. Then they discuss the primary results, Graham Platner making more Nazi gaffes, Trump Kennedy Center Honors, gas prices rise, Father who gave gun to Georgia school shooting suspect for Christmas is guilty of 2nd-degree murder, Brian McKnight Sues Radio Station For Claiming He's An Abusive, Awful Dad, league pass commercials, Teddy Riley Apologizes to Survivors, Cancels R. Kelly Project, Man, 29, Jailed For Felony Frappé Attack, Mom and kids ready to enjoy Burger King meal are carjacked and attacked, Pastor 'violently pushed' elderly woman down cement steps and sword ratchetness. Podjam 3 Tickets: https://events.humanitix.com/podjam3 Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/theblackguywhotips Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@rodimusprime⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@SayDatAgain⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@TBGWT⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@TheBlackGuyWhoTips⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Email: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠theblackguywhotips@gmail.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Blog: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.theblackguywhotips.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Teepublic Store⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠- https://the-black-guy-who-tips-podcast.dashery.com/ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Amazon Wishlist⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ – https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/1PDD9JUQUNVY5?ref_=wl_share ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Crowdcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ – https://www.crowdcast.io/theblackguywhotips Voicemail: ‪(980) 500-9034Go Premium: https://www.theblackguywhotips.com/premium/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Mens Room Question: What's in or on your body that you weren't born with?

A Georgia jury just made history. Colin Gray—guilty of second-degree murder on all counts. Less than two hours of deliberation. The father who armed his troubled son now faces up to 180 years in prison.True Crime Today breaks down the Colin Gray verdict with criminal defense attorney Bob Motta.This is only the third time in American history a parent has been held criminally responsible for a school shooting committed by their child. The Crumbleys got manslaughter in Michigan. Georgia prosecutors went bigger—and won murder convictions.The evidence was relentless. An FBI warning Colin Gray ignored in 2023 after his son threatened to shoot up a school. A Christmas gift AR-15 kept unsecured in a 14-year-old's bedroom. A "shrine" to Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz. Texts from Colt Gray warning his father: "Whenever something happens just know the blood is on your hands."His own daughter testified he pressured her to lie to investigators. His estranged wife said she begged him to lock up the guns and was knocked down trying to take the rifle from Colt's room. Body cam footage showed Colin saying "God, I knew it" within minutes of the shooting.Colin Gray was his own only defense witness. He cried on the stand. He insisted he never saw it coming. The jury needed under two hours to convict on every single count.Bob Motta analyzes the trial, the defense failures, and what this verdict means for parental accountability going forward.Join Our SubStack For AD-FREE ADVANCE EPISODES & EXTRAS!: https://hiddenkillers.substack.com/Want to comment and watch this podcast as a video? Check out our YouTube Channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8-vxmbhTxxG10sO1izODJg?sub_confirmation=1Instagram https://www.instagram.com/hiddenkillerspod/Facebook https://www.facebook.com/hiddenkillerspod/Tik-Tok https://www.tiktok.com/@hiddenkillerspodX Twitter https://x.com/TrueCrimePodThis publication contains commentary and opinion based on publicly available information. All individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Nothing published here should be taken as a statement of fact, health or legal advice.#ColinGray #TrueCrimeToday #GuiltyVerdict #ApalacheeShooting #SchoolShooting #MurderConviction #BobMotta #ParentalAccountability #ColtGray #TrueCrime

Chances are, your accounts receivable (AR) is not dialed in. Kiera provides very tactical, specific tips on how to get your AR cleaned up and start bringing in money you've already earned. Episode resources: Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast Schedule a Practice Assessment Leave us a review Transcript: The Dental A Team (00:00) Hello, Dental A Team listeners. This is Kiera and today is a very important topic But one the people like my rat rat rat, but guess what my rat rat rat is gonna make you a lot of money So I hope you're excited for it. So we'll take that rat rat rat into kaching Because it's dentistry party done and we're just gonna like help you out. I hope you guys enjoy hanging out with me This is my like nerdy geeky side that definitely loves and obsesses of being able to help you guys and it's been so fun I'm working with some people and teaching them about this and   getting them excited on how they can fix their AR ⁓ is something that just like really, really lights my fire because doctors, you do the freaking dentistry, get paid for it. Can I get an amen out there? Like seriously, you do the dentistry and AR and making sure you're paid is something that I am so obsessed about. So, and this doesn't mean doctors, have to do it yourself. So I want us to get into the AR like the womp, womp, womp, it's annoying, but guess what? These are billing tips that work that are gonna make you a lot of money for work that you've already done.   This is like people like, Kiera, how can I make more money and not do more work? And I'm like, just take the money, the what you've already done. it's crazy. lot of people come in and like, Kiera, you're really going to be able to like, ⁓ give us an ROI on your consulting. And I'm like, time. Why? Because I know your AR is out of control. have yet to meet a practice that has perfect AR. And if you are the practice email me, I'm going to give you a freaking shirt and we don't get out done on a team shirts anymore. So yeah, you should definitely email us. ⁓ there are a couple of practices out there.   But most the time, AR is something that is not dialed in. It does not have a plan. And this is something that is going to be very tactical for you. So first step is AR. What is AR? It's the accounts receivable. Okay. And there's two parts to it. AR has the patient portion and the insurance portion. Okay. So when we do dentistry, we need to make sure we collect money and we bill insurance and then we make sure that we get paid for that. Now, insurance is such a sneaky little game and I get so annoyed by it I love to teach people this.   So we need to have it where there's like a few processes that make AR really good. So we're gonna break it down very simply. Number one, good information in means good clean claims going out. I'm always like, we send clean claims. Clean claims mean, clean claims, clean claims. Clean claims, clean claims. ⁓ Clean claims. I'm gonna giggle saying it. I can hear the little jingle in my voice. Clean claims means that we...   have the correct information. So I've got the patient's name, the date of birth, the insurance information. That's all correct. I've got the group number and please for the love of everything, holy, do not make a million group numbers. Do not do that. Make sure AR are so messy and your insurance box is so messy. We just have it. We also need to have fee schedules that are up to date every single year. Please do that. We need to attach it. We do not want write-offs. So what this means, ⁓ also another like, it's not a pet peeve. It's just like,   Oh, I'm sorry. You need to like listen to the podcast and implement this. Stop reporting to me your fees in gross numbers and do it in net. So many times I get on calls with people and they're like, Kiera, we produced like 2 million, but we collected one. And I'm like, ouch. And they're like, well, like our net was like, you know, 1.2. I'm like, so tell me you produce 1.2. Let's live in real land numbers, not the 2 million. Cause you're always going to be mad at me. They're like, well, I produced 2 million, but I'm only making a million. Well, yeah.   Because guess what? You didn't really produce two million. I know you want to say you did, but guess what? Insurance is what really is paying you. So we've got to do that. And I know you don't want to, but when you will do this and you attach the correct fee schedules to it, you are actually going be able to predict your numbers better and your money and your finances are going to get better on your personal side too. So hear me out. It was the worst day. was worse than Christmas getting a lump of coal. I took our production and it dropped us by 30%. And guess what? My goals are to produce 20 grand in a five out practice per day. You want to know how hard that was? I was like, I'm never going to make it.   But guess what? Because I was reporting in real numbers, me even as a TC and an O.M. we were able to schedule more correctly and get us to the actual 15 grand of true 15, 20 grand per day of true production that we were collecting. How much do think my business grew? ⁓ a lot because we were actually producing incorrect numbers, not inflated numbers. So clean claims. We're back to that clean claims mean we've got correct information. We've got the correct ⁓ all of the information is correct.   We've got our insurance verification done and we've got the fee schedules attached. So then when I'm giving an estimate, I'm estimating to the best of my ability. We do not send pre-Ds. I call them pre-denials. You can have your own opinion, but I really truly do not like pre-denials. They take time, they waste energy. And to me, guess what? I got the best information. I'm a thousand dollars. I'm an insurance coupon. I need to be a dang good treatment coordinator that's able to communicate this. And if the patient owes money, guess what? We've got to be really good at communicating that too. This is our best estimate.   I'm gonna do my absolute best. We called your insurance company. I've got the best insurance verification. This is the absolute best I can get today. We're gonna take care of that. And on the flip side, hey, worst case scenario is you're gonna owe this much out of pocket. Tell them that. Then they're not mad at you when you call them. like, hey, insurance didn't pay as much as we thought. But remember, worst case scenario, this is what it is. And I can work with you to get that collected, okay? So then from there, we make sure we have correct documentation as well. We need to attach the correct narratives.   ⁓ insurance or excuse me, x-rays, intra-orals, whatever we need to get that paid. Insurance companies are obsessed with not paying for you, but it's because they play the game. So just figure out the rules of the game. We have our fee schedules in there. We send the correct documentation and we send it out every day and we check to make sure none of these claims get stuck in our claim sender. Okay, so we wanna make sure it goes through the clearing house. It doesn't get stuck there. I feel like that's like the post office for claims. We send it through and we make sure all of them get pushed through to the insurance company.   and then we follow up. And now this is where I need owners of each of them. So we need somebody to make sure that all of our intake process is correct. We need someone to make sure that our, what we send out in our claims is correct. And we tell the clinical team what we need for every single claim. And then from there, we have one person who owns our billing department. AR needs to have a clear owner. Who is our billing person that works on this every single day? Yes, you heard me. Because the goal is to get our claims paid within 30 days. You can do it. It's doable, but you gotta have a process.   So that person then their job is I recommend we run the AR list at the beginning of every single month. Then we put it into an Excel spreadsheet or however you want to do it. I found that it's easiest in Excel and then we have it color coded. And I like it to be broken down so that way the biller, their goal is to get through every single patient. Yes. And I have seen 2,500 patients, 7,500 patients. Like it is amazing how many like line items we can get. Hopefully you're more like the 500 to 700 patients on that AR list.   Then what we do from there is we've got patient portion and insurance portion. And what we want to do is we want to actually get this really, really dialed in to where we are collecting at time of service, the patient portion. My hope is that your patient portion that's due is very minimal. And the only time we have a patient portion due is because insurance didn't pay as much as we expected them to. So we got to go collect. We've already collected the money before they go out. Please, for the love of everything, holy do not let your patients just be like, I'll pay you with an insurance pays. Absolutely not.   collect the money today. It is much easier to collect today and give a refund than it is to go chase money. I'd rather you get paid today, wait on insurance. That's fine. But be like, hey, we call your insurance. We estimate really, really well. This is how much we're going to collect today. And then, hey, if it's good news, great. We're going to be able to get you a refund. And if it's not, then great. We're not going to have to call you and ask for as much in the future. So this is what we're estimating. This is our best estimate. We've called your insurance company. We've done everything we possibly can to make sure it's the best we can. And I guarantee you, we're going to take great care of you.   Collect the money. Then when it comes in, what I like for the biller to do is to look, what did this insurance company actually pay? And then go update your fee schedule to the true numbers, because fee schedules are just very generic, but for your area and your zip code, we actually like, if insurance billers will go through and look at that and be like, on a crown, Delta Dental actually pays $758. You're like, yeah, right here, it's like 500. Okay, so $558, but we had 500 in there.   Go update that so then we collect more accurately throughout the year. If we are really disciplined in this and our insurance biller will do this, your billing gets so much tighter and we have less money in our AR. Then we go through it, we go through every single claim. Now if your insurance is a lot in the AR, because we haven't worked it, you're gonna wanna work with the top pieces first. The most expensive, the biggest accounts, and I work insurance ones, and then I work patient ones. And I also am looking at the 90 days, and then the 60 days, and then the 30 days.   And then the zero, don't even like zero to 30. don't even touch that 30 to 60. Yes. 60 to 90. Yes. Over 90 for sure. I'm going to hit that. So you can sort your listing Excel of the biggest account balances. And we're going to call the insurance. We're going to call the patients because you feel like you made like a lot of progress. Also, we can look down at the bottom. Another thing too, is sometimes there's like $5, $10. If your insurance list is really big and your AR is really large, sometimes I recommend writing like below $10. Now this is your money. It's not mine. So you do what you want to do with it.   Sometimes I do recommend writing that off, but before we do it, we're to want to send statements to everybody, see if we can collect any of that. Then we have a set date where we're just going to write it off and call it bad debt. We're going to fix our processes moving forward. But if you will do this and you follow it and everybody follows it every single week, every single month, your AR is going to get cleaned up. So people are like, but it's so hard. And we have like one person who owns it. And I say like Tuesdays and Thursdays are insurance and Monday, Wednesday, Fridays are patients. And we call our patients and we do our insurance.   and we clean it up and we get the correct fee schedules and we make sure that we're following up consistently. We're hearing, excuse me, what they say on the ⁓ claims. We're hearing what they are denying. Also, just because it's on a claim and they on an EOB and they say, you need to write this off. We do need to be really smart on insurance and we don't just say, we wrote it off. Absolutely not. We double check, we verify why was it written off? What were the reasons for it? Can we resubmit it? Can we get this paid? Is this a patient portion that needs to be paid?   Do not just write it off because the EOB says it was written off. So we do not do that. Then what I also recommend is we often wait till the end of the month. We talk to our billers and they didn't get through all their AR. Office managers should be meeting every single week with their billing coordinator and the biller needs to be reporting. Here's how much AR I've completed. This is where I'm at. This is my plan for the next week. I'm going to get through every single patient this month. Also, we do not just send statements out. People love to do this. I'm very pro.   We call first, we text and then we send a statement. Why not just call them right then and there and be like, hey, Kiera, great news. We got insurance paid, we owe this amount and I can take card when you're ready and get that all cleared up for you. Send them a text with the payment link. Here you go, this is the balance and they will pay it. Send them a statement that has a QR code to pay online. You guys stop having them write checks and send it to the practice. Make it easy, talk to your payment processor. I love Moola for this. They make it so easy for patients to pay and their fees are so low. So if you need it, tell Moola, The Dental A Team, sent you.   They're incredible and they're a great processor for you. But this is where it has to be. And I'm really big on what we need to have our goals be. So I like to make this simple. Our over 90 should be no more. All of our collective AR should be no more than one month's worth of collection. So if you're producing 100,000, there should be no more than 100,000 sitting in AR. you've got more than that, let's fix   the way I like the goals to be is I like it to be it's no more than 15 % is in our 30 to 60. And the reason why is because that's going to be pretty big. Now zero to 30, I don't worry about, but it's 15 % or less in our 30 to 60. Then it's 10 % or less in our 60 to 90 and less than 5 % over in our over 90. We want to make sure that it follows that. So that way you guys are able to, but great. And those are very generic and you can get those lower. The only thing that usually impacts are over 90 are usually payment plans and also ortho.   So if you have those in there, there are ways that we can discuss with you on how to get those out to clean up your AR, but you've got to have this structured. We've got to have this to where people are following it. And we need to get this in every single week and like truly work with our billers. And if offices will follow this, you guys, this is something that is not hard, but it does take discipline and discipline does equal freedom. And doctors, had a doctor and she was just like, Kiera, I'm not making any money. And I was like,   I don't understand because you have so much money in AR and your production's so great, but we're not collecting the money. So step one is we collect. Now, if your AR is also like ballooned out of control, we can fix it and we collect money when they check in and we make sure we collect on the checkout. So this way we're catching both sides of when patients are in the practice. And some people are weird about that. And I'm like, why are you weird about that? We know they have a balance and we're gonna collect it when they check in. Think about going to the doctor's office. So like perfect, they collect money as soon as you check in every single time.   It's not weird for people to do that in healthcare. So let's collect on the intake and let's collect on the outtake when we're giving the treatment plans. These two areas are gonna fix AR and people are like, that's so hard. And I'm like, I would much rather collect money when they're in the practice rather than needing to call them. Also, another mode of thought is I don't ever give more than 1 % of collections in refund checks every single month. So refunds and credits can get really ballooned people are like freaked out about that. Cause maybe like collected too much, which is like,   High five, good. I'm not saying over collect, like, hey, insurance paid more like that's a win. But before we give those refund checks out, those are the ones I'm gonna call first to see, do they have unscheduled treatment? Like, hey, great news, your insurance paid more than we thought. Let's get you scheduled, let's use that credit for this treatment. So it's a great way to fill your schedule too. But hey, if there's a true credit on the account, let's just start writing 1%. So if we're producing 100,000, what's 1 %? You got it, a thousand bucks, okay?   So 1 % of that, we're gonna then write those refund checks back for that month. This way it doesn't hurt your overhead of time. Now watch because there are certain state laws that do require you to give refunds sooner than that. So check your state laws and make sure like whatever it is. There are some new ones that have just come out. So be sure to check that so you're compliant with your state laws. If there's nothing about it, 1 % is usually a pretty good frame of mind. So that was a quick down and dirty and I hope you enjoyed it. But really taking it from clean claims, you're welcome.   to fee schedules being entered in, to submitting claims and making sure they go through, to following up on our insurance, making sure that we're tracking that so everybody knows where our claims are at, what things are going on with that. And then from there, we're gonna make sure that we have ⁓ every single week check in with our biller. And billers know we want 15 % in our 30 to 60, 60 to 90 is 10%, over 90 is no more than 5%, no more than one month's worth of collections total in our AR, and giving back 1 % refunds.   You guys, this is something I obsessed about. This is something we work with billers on. I have a practice in Oklahoma that we worked with. They had 2,700 line items of this and we just worked with our team and we cleaned and we cleaned it and it took us about two years and we were able to get them back into perfect collections, perfect processes. It took a while, but discipline, dedication and setting these things into place now are going to protect you and prevent this from happening in the future. Also, there are some great AI companies that you can use.   ⁓ Lassie is a great one that I've heard of. There's a few new ones coming up on the market. So if you need help with it, insurance verification, you can outsource. We have a lot of resources. So if you need any email Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. And if you're like, I need help, I'm drowning, I'm not making money. Let's talk. Profit production guys. it's the way we get more profit. We either increase our production, decrease our spending or increase our collections. Those are the three levers. So whatever those three we need to work on. And sometimes it's so hard because you're like,   But like I'm doing dentistry all day long, Carrie, I have time. You're right. You're supposed to be the dentist and the CEO. Let us train your team for you. That's what we love to do. Work with you and your team. So reach out. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. Commit to being profitable this year. Commit to getting your AR in place. Commit to following these billing tactics. You guys, it is not hard, but it does require discipline. And we're happy to help you set it up. We're happy to follow through. We're happy to show you how to have the conversations. We're happy to show your team how to do this. We're happy to build KPI scorecards so you can watch it and utilizing analytics for it. So it's never daunting and scary.   It's disciplined dedication and dedicated time to make sure this happens. And usually team members get scared and it feels daunting. So it's kind of like the laundry. just like keep letting it pile up, but doctors, this is your hard earned money. And I don't believe it should be like laundry that piles up. It'd be, should be something that we are actively engaged in fixing and working through to make sure that you're getting paid what you need to be paid. So reach out. Hello@TheDentalATeam.com. And as always, thanks for listening. I'll catch you next time on the Dental A Team podcast.

This episode was inspired by ordinary trip to the gym, but it quickly turned into a spirit trying to visit someone in class.  I share a moment when someone asked me if I could feel her grandmother around her at the gym. Normally, I'm completely off and don't sense energy randomly. I also talk about why reading someone else's energy without consent is unethical. I share a story about a mother's energy that lingered around me at the gym for a week. It took me months to realize it was one of my friend's moms. This led to a deeper reflection on how, as adults, we rarely talk about our passed loved ones even when our friends are mediums. The realization came at a Christmas brunch while discussing family traditions, when I discovered two of my friends had lost their moms. The energy I had been feeling at the gym turned out to be one of their moms visiting. The synchronicity was uncanny, especially since we all go to the gym at the same time every day. Tune in for this story about noticing energy, the ethics of delivering mediumship messages, and how the spirits of our passed loved ones can show up in the most unexpected places even in the middle of your workout. Are you a Reiki Level 2 Practitioner ready to take your skills to the next level? Join The Advanced Reiki Practitioner Masterclass happening virtually on April 25: ADVANCED REIKI MASTERCLASS Register for the next virtual Usui Reiki Level One Course on June 13 & 14: REIKI LEVEL ONE Register for the next virtual Usui Reiki Level Two Course on March 28 & 29 or May 30 & 31 (there will be no April course): REIKI LEVEL TWO Sign up for the monthly Mediumship Practice Circle on Friday, March 13th and Saturday, March 21st:   https://www.themediuminthemiddle.com/meeting-in-the-middle Book a session with Medium in the Middle (Virtually (currently full) or in-person in Banff): BOOK A SESSION WITH MEDIUM IN THE MIDDLE Follow along on social media: Click here for the Free Facebook group for developing mediums and sitters: MEDIUM IN THE MIDDLE FACEBOOK MEDIUM IN THE MIDDLE ON INSTAGRAM MEDIUM IN THE MIDDLE TIKTOK

The Gary & Shannon Show Hour 1 (03/04) - Gary's long-overdue doctor visit, Iran strikes enter day 5, and Justin Timberlake sues to hide his DWI footage. Gary visits the dermatologist after a long hiatus — Shannon grills him on questions the doctor should've asked Christmas blanket found in the studio in March Operation: Epic Fury Day 5: audio from Sec of War Hegseth and General Caine NewsNation's National Security Correspondent Lt. General Newton joins on the latest in Iran and escalating White House tensions U.S. strikes on narcoterrorists extend to Ecuador alongside Ecuadoran military Texas and North Carolina primary takeaways: Trump's endorsement still carries weight, will Dems moderate? Justin Timberlake sues to block DWI body cam footage — his team calls it "irreparable harm," Gary & Shannon ask why he didn't just have a driver See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jello again. Jack lost the diamond wristwatch that Phil Harris gave him for Christmas. Unfortunately, Jack finds out there is more to the story of this expensive gift than anyone imagined.Episode 261 of The Jack Benny Show. The program originally aired on on June 6, 1937.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/classic-comedy-of-old-time-radio--5818299/support.Please email questions and comments to host@classiccomedyotr.com.Like us on Facebook at facebook.com/classiccomedyotr. Please share this podcast with your friends and family.You can also subscribe to our podcast on Spreaker.com, Spotify, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, iHeartRadio, and Google podcasts.This show is supported by Spreaker Prime.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/classic-comedy-of-old-time-radio--5818299/support.

King and Queen Tut return today to discuss the big philosophical questions: banning flavoured hot cross buns, diplomatic slappers, and misleadingly dirty lyrics. Plus, Jane speaks to Labour MP Naz Shah about her memoir, Honoured. Our next book club pick is 'A Town Like Alice' by Nevil Shute. Our most asked about book is called 'The Later Years' by Peter Thornton. You can listen to our 'I'm in the cupboard on Christmas' playlist here: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1awQioX5y4fxhTAK8ZPhwQ If you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: janeandfi@times.radio Follow us on Instagram! @janeandfi Podcast Producers: Hannah Quinn and Eve Salusbury Executive Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Inside Cinch: Wilmington's New Billiards Bar with Cocktails, History, and Hands-On Buildout On the Whiskey and Wisdom Podcast, Chris Kellum and Tyler talk with Haley and Joe in a new location, Cinch in downtown Wilmington. Joe and Haley describe opening Cinch on December 5 after signing the lease in June and completing a roughly six-and-a-half-month buildout that transformed the former Christmas shops space, including extensive demolition and discovering historic features like 1960s dress boxes, a hidden salon in the basement, old deposit slips labeled “US Depository,” and brick walls. They discuss the concept as a high-end but casual hangout with four quality pool tables, a lounge and TVs, and a cocktail program featuring drinks like the Dirty Cinch, “We Should Start a Podcast,” and “Pony Up,” with seasonal additions. They share hours (4:30 daily; 12:30 weekends), free pool Monday–Tuesday 4:30–6 with two drinks, and closing times (12 weekdays, 1 weekends). 00:00 Welcome to Cinch 00:15 Meet Haley and Joe 01:10 Opening Date and Buildout 02:02 From Christmas Shop to Vision 03:05 Signature Cocktails Talk 04:50 From Rum Cow to Underfront 07:00 Why a Billiards Bar 09:03 What Cinch Means 11:30 Building History and Basement 13:05 Design Choices and DIY Build 16:24 Downtown History and Hidden Finds 19:05 Hours Specials and Popular Drinks 20:16 Custom Bar Art 20:56 Curated Cocktail Menu 22:32 Classic Cocktails Explained 24:20 Chain Restaurant Nostalgia 26:36 Why Food Quality Dropped 27:32 No Food and Ghost Kitchen 28:51 Selling vs Building Legacy 32:48 Building the Space 35:41 Pool Table Deep Dive 37:53 Wild Sports Tangent 40:38 Make Drinks and Wrap

Join me for a break down of Chapter 15 of Midnight Sun, 'Probability', in which the meadow may now be a metaphor, Edward picks out a skimpy outfit, and Carlisle is filled with gay Christmas cheer... 'Breaking Down Bad Books' is a podcast analysing trashy bestsellers from a literary perspective. Currently breaking down Stephenie Meyer's Midnight Sun - a re-purposing of Twilight from Edward's POV.Sign up to be a patron at www.patreon.com/breakingdownbadbooks for access to exclusive bonus episodes breaking down Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets every week, as well as a back catalogue analysing Fifty Shades of Grey, Fifty Shades Darker, Fifty Shades Freed, and The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner.Read along with me and let me know your thoughts on Instagram @breakingdownbadbooks or email me at breakingdownpod@gmail.com.Hosted by Nathan Brown, who you can find on Instagram @nathanbrown90 or YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/@nathanpatrickbrown. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/breaking-down. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

https://wels2.blob.core.windows.net/daily-devotions/20260304dev.mp3 Listen to Devotion [Abram] … pitched his tent there, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the LORD and proclaimed the name of the LORD. Genesis 12:8 Proclamation “I can worship God at home. I can read the Bible at home. I can pray at home. And so, I really don’t get what the difference is between my worship at home and my worship at church. Isn’t it all the same thing?” Yes. And no. Can I praise my Lord in the privacy of my home? Yes. By myself, can I let the Word of my Lord speak to me? Yes. When I am all alone, can I talk to my Lord in prayer? Absolutely. And thank God for the privilege. But if I then conclude that there is no need for me to gather with others to do what I can more conveniently do at home, then I have overlooked something; something big. Then I need to sit down for a moment and watch Abram. Abram had just completed a journey. In this journey, he left his homeland far behind. Throughout this journey, he did not know where he was going. But now God has made it clear where Abram is to live. He is to pitch his tent in the land of Canaan; a land, God says, he will give to Abram’s descendants. And so, Abram pitches his tent. He, his family, along with the families of his shepherds, herdsmen, and laborers—they all set up camp. But the episode does not end there. Surrounding Abram’s household is a Canaanite culture that is calloused and often shocking in its ungodliness. And so, what does Abram do next? He builds an altar and proclaims the name of the Lord. He proclaims the Lord. Publicly. Openly. He does not just have a quiet devotion in the privacy of his tent. He does not just meditate on God’s Word by himself. He does not just pray to the Lord when he is all alone. He builds an altar and proclaims. For all to see. For all to hear. He publicly proclaims the only Savior from sin the world is ever going to have. Like Abram, let’s take advantage of every opportunity to publicly proclaim the name of the Lord. Prayer: Lord Jesus, you’re the only Savior there is. Move me to proclaim you with my fellow believers. Amen. Daily Devotions is brought to you by WELS. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. ™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Season 9 comes to a close in spectacular fashion! We have multiple guests in tow from family, friends, and foreigners! We can't wait to see you in Season 10!Check out the time stamps below for our show topics and skip ahead if you desire! As always, thank you to all of our ITMers for the love and support!The best way to support the show (or purchase ad space) is on our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠!Thank you to our patrons: Hannah Haggard, Eric Rourke, Joe Roth and Hunter KeeThank you to our sponsor: McNary Chiropractic in Russell, KSCheck out our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Merch Store⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for all of your ITM gear and novelties!Use our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Linktree⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to find us on ALL the sites and socials.Timestamps:0:00 - Intro, Shoutouts, and McNary Chiropractic Dad Joke of the Week.7:44 - Oste Family Christmas27:42 - Alex Neighbor Claus1:14:40 - Pharo's Aussie X-Mas1:50:02 - Outro

Hilarious show for you today! It's Christmas time and we tell you all of the highs and lows of the season. Then we of course have to talk about our sports, including the World Cup draw! Finally we fight to the death using nothing but items you can only find at winter time!Check out the time stamps below for our show topics and skip ahead if you desire! As always, thank you to all of our ITMers for the love and support!The best way to support the show (or purchase ad space) is on our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠!Thank you to our patrons: Hannah Haggard, Eric Rourke, Joe Roth and Hunter KeeThank you to our sponsor: McNary Chiropractic in Russell, KSCheck out our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Merch Store⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for all of your ITM gear and novelties!Use our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Linktree⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to find us on ALL the sites and socials.Timestamps:0:00 - Intro, Shoutouts, and McNary Chiropractic Dad Joke of the Week.9:01 - Christmas Best/Worst47:08 - Athletics Talk1:29:16 - Winter Battle Royale1:57:20 - Outro

It's time for a very important H-word to be introduced to Harry. No, Fat Lady, it's not the one you experienced over your holiday break! Join the MuggleCasters as we discuss Chapter 17 of Half-Blood Prince, in which Dumbledore introduces Harry to 'A Sluggish Memory'. The Fat Lady seems to be telling herself to practice abstinence after the holidays. Sounds like it was a party in the portraits over Christmas! How do students end up missing the new Common Room passwords? Is it the school's fault, or is it the students? It's time for the students to learn how to apparate! ... For a price. We look at why Hogwarts and the Ministry might be charging for these additional lessons. Dismissive Dumby: Albus' ego is on full display as he plays off Harry's questions about Snape and Draco. As expected, Andrew comes in with a #DumbleDefense.  Back in the memories, Dumbledore shows Harry more about Tom Riddle's time at Hogwarts. Why didn't Dumbledore do more when Tom Riddle was at school and clearing causing trouble? We learn the real reason Dumbledore asked Slughorn back to teach, and we hear that certain H-word a first time (No, it's not 'Hufflepuff' or 'Horace') Connecting the Threads: There are some big parallels between Chapter 17 of Chamber of Secrets, and this Chapter of Half-Blood Prince! MVP: Which memory truly is THE most important memory Dumbledore has collected? Lynx Line: You've just learned to Apparate. Where are you going first? Quizzitch: While Lord Voldemort commits patricide by killing Tom Riddle Sr., what is the broader term used when someone kills a near-relative of theirs such as a grandparent? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A history making verdict out of Georgia today: it’s the first time the state has held a parent criminally responsible for the actions of his child. A jury took less than 2 hours to decide the fate of 55-year-old Colin Gray, convicted of 4 counts of 2nd degree murder and manslaughter along with dozens of other charges. Gray has been held responsible for the shooting deaths of 2 high school students and 2 teachers after police say his 14-year-old son, Colt, opened fire on his classmates and teachers. Prosecutors say Gray gave Colt, who he knew was emotionally troubled, an assault rifle for hunting, on the Christmas before the mass shooting.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This episode of Unlocked is one I didn't know I needed. Contemporary Christian singer-songwriter Matthew West joins me and what starts with laughing about The Masked Singer somehow turns into one of the most honest conversations about faith, shame, marriage, and what it actually looks like to live what you preach.We talk about growing up with pressure around faith, feeling like all eyes are on you, and the danger of becoming performative instead of personal. Matthew opens up about being better at talking about God than talking to Him. That one hit me. We talk about grace, about shame, about how easy it is to remember our worst mistakes and forget that God doesn't keep score the way we do.We also get into marriage in today's world, breaking generational cycles, apologizing to your kids when you mess up, and why humility might be one of the most powerful things a parent can model. There's something really beautiful about hearing a man talk about choosing his wife every day and putting faith at the center of his home.If you've ever questioned where God is in the middle of your hardest seasons… if you've wrestled with shame… if you're trying to build something healthy after coming from dysfunction… this conversation is for you. And yes, we also talk about his unreleased song that might just save a few marriages.LET'S BE SOCIAL:Follow Savannah Chrisley:Insta: (https://www.instagram.com/SavannahChrisley)TikTok: (https://www.tiktok.com/@SavannahChrisley)X: (https://www.x.com/_itssavannah_)Follow Matthew West:Insta: (https://www.instagram.com/matthewjwest/)TikTok: (https://www.tiktok.com/@matthewjwest)X: (https://x.com/matthew_west)YouTube: (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs7x1ETqOho69bBQqHCJx7A)Website: (https://www.matthewwest.com/)Follow The Unlocked Podcast:Insta: (https://www.instagram.com/UnlockedWithSavannah)TikTok: (https://www.tiktok.com/@UnlockedWithSav)About Matthew West:Dubbed “one of Christian music's most prolific singer-songwriters” (Billboard), Matthew West has notched 38 No.1 songs combined as an artist and songwriter and has been awarded RIAA Gold and Platinum certifications. West is also a five-time GRAMMY nominee, NSAI's 2022 Songwriter-Artist of the Year, ASCAP's 2023 Golden Note Award recipient, ASCAP's Songwriter of the Year recipient, and a multiple ASCAP Christian Music Songwriter/Artist of the Year winner. He has received an American Music Award, a Billboard Music Award, K-LOVE Fan Awards, GMA Dove Awards, and has been named Billboard's Hot Christian Songwriter of the Year. A recipient of the Rich Mullins Impact Award, West also received a Primetime Emmy® Award nomination for Original Music & Lyrics for the title track for the feature film “The Heart of Christmas.” See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

A history making verdict out of Georgia today: it’s the first time the state has held a parent criminally responsible for the actions of his child. A jury took less than 2 hours to decide the fate of 55-year-old Colin Gray, convicted of 4 counts of 2nd degree murder and manslaughter along with dozens of other charges. Gray has been held responsible for the shooting deaths of 2 high school students and 2 teachers after police say his 14-year-old son, Colt, opened fire on his classmates and teachers. Prosecutors say Gray gave Colt, who he knew was emotionally troubled, an assault rifle for hunting, on the Christmas before the mass shooting.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A history making verdict out of Georgia today: it’s the first time the state has held a parent criminally responsible for the actions of his child. A jury took less than 2 hours to decide the fate of 55-year-old Colin Gray, convicted of 4 counts of 2nd degree murder and manslaughter along with dozens of other charges. Gray has been held responsible for the shooting deaths of 2 high school students and 2 teachers after police say his 14-year-old son, Colt, opened fire on his classmates and teachers. Prosecutors say Gray gave Colt, who he knew was emotionally troubled, an assault rifle for hunting, on the Christmas before the mass shooting.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Send a textA “rehabilitation” program that feels like prison. A forgiveness ritual that ends at a paint shed. A Christmas day so rare that 60 people sprint down Hollywood Boulevard to seize it before it's canceled. We take you inside Scientology's Rehabilitation Project Force through Amy and Mat's first-hand stories—four RPF assignments, the even harsher RPF's RPF, and the daily grind of segregation, hard labor, and sleep deprivation designed to break people in the Sea Org.We unpack how the system works: coerced confessions followed by immediate punishment; “amnesty” used as a data trap; the e-meter's “rock slam” turned into a label of evil that justifies years of discipline and forced auditing; and the relentless pressure at the Int Base under David Miscavige—midnight meetings, public humiliations, and punishments like running around a palm tree in dress shoes. Watchdog Committee posts pile onto one person, creating guaranteed failure and a ready-made scapegoat. Security fences, restricted lists, and bus checks keep people contained. When you're stuck on-base, you make a bed in an electrical closet or a loft and learn to survive on minutes of sleep.This conversation also exposes the social machinery that keeps people silent: sham Sea Org marriages never filed legally, disconnection that severs spouses overnight, and liability formulas that demand public confession and hundreds of signatures before you're allowed “back in.” The trap gets tighter when entire orgs are kept in permanent “lower conditions,” making reentry mathematically impossible. And yet, resistance finds a way. From the legendary “Christmas dash” to quiet acts of kindness—passing gold coins, sharing food, planning escapes—people create cracks in a closed system. Amy and Matt's reunion after being sent to opposite sides of the country is proof that solidarity and persistence can beat engineered separation.If you care about cult dynamics, coercive control, and how institutions weaponize ritual, policy, and tech, this story pulls back the curtain with lived detail and dark humor. Hit play, then share your biggest question or takeaway with us. Subscribe, leave a review, and pass this episode to someone who needs to hear how control works—and how people get ouSupport the showBFG Store - http://blownforgood-shop.fourthwall.com/Blown For Good on Audible - https://www.amazon.com/Blown-for-Good-Marc-Headley-audiobook/dp/B07GC6ZKGQ/ref=tmm_aud_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=Blown For Good Website: http://blownforgood.com/PODCAST INFO:Podcast website: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2131160 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/blown-for-good-behind-the-iron-curtain-of-scientology/id1671284503 RSS: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/2131160.rss YOUTUBE PLAYLISTS: Spy Files Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWtJfniWLwq4cA-e...

Picking between the Big Island and Kauai sounds simple until you realize one wrong choice can eat your whole budget, your driving days, and your sanity.Big Island vs. Kauai FREE Decision GuideThese two islands could not be more different, and for Hawaii travelers trying to make the most of one week, the gap between a great trip and a frustrating one often comes down to this single decision.

This episode originally aired on October 28, 2018. It has been remastered and now includes new information at the end regarding significant developments in this case.At 8:30 PM on December 9, 2001, 38-year-old mother of three, Michele Lyn Hundley Smith, told her family she was going Christmas shopping. She left her home in Stoneville, North Carolina, driving her green 1995 Pontiac Trans Sport van with North Carolina license plate “ROK-N-ON.” She was headed to Martinsville, Virginia, less than 20 miles away.Shopping at night wasn't unusual for Michele. It wasn't long before Christmas and shortly before her oldest daughter's birthday. No one thought twice about it. But by midnight, Michele still hadn't returned. Her husband woke their 14-year-old daughter, Amanda, concerned that something was wrong. Michele never came home.For more than 24 years, Michele's disappearance remained unsolved. Then, in February 2026, the Rockingham County Sheriff's Office confirmed that Michele had been located alive. This re-release contains the original episode as it aired in 2018, followed by an update segment at the end discussing these recent developments.If you have a missing loved one that you would like to have featured on the show, please fill out our case submission form.Follow The Vanished on social media at:FacebookInstagramPatreonSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Today we're talking about grief, loss, and the power of forgiveness.Gary and Mary Malachowski share the story of their daughter Hannah, who was killed in a tragic accident just days before Christmas. In the middle of unimaginable heartbreak, Gary made a choice that would shape the rest of their healing journey—he chose to forgive.This is a tender conversation about suffering, marriage, faith, and the God who meets us in the darkest places. If you're grieving—or walking alongside someone who is—I pray this episode reminds you that you are not alone.