MJ Sage After Hours

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Enjoy it, share it. But most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing the Truth Podcast Network. This is the Truth Network. Coming to you from an entrenched barricade deep in the heart of central North Carolina, Masculine Journey After Hours.

A time to go deeper and be more transparent on the topic covered on this week's broadcast. So sit back and join us on this adventure. The Masculine Journey After Hours starts here now. Welcome to Masculine Journey After Hours. We are in the middle of finishing.

Middle of finishing. I meant it that way. Thank you for the laugh, Andy. It was not humorous as I thought. I didn't mean it to be. But we're in the middle of our last stage on the Masculine Journey, are we not?

Andy, that'd be you with the microphone. It's your week. It's your topic. Yeah, yeah. Glad this is about over with. Yeah, so we've had six weeks of going through this. Twelve stages. Twelve stages, exactly. That's what they used to do in the Old Testament, but we've shortened it to six stages. I think you're thinking about school where you repeated each grade twice.

I was kind of wondering if it wasn't AA. There you go. That's steps, Jim. So back to the six stages of Masculine Journey. I know we've been talking about it for six weeks now, but you want to recap just a little bit?

Yeah, real quick. Boyhood. That's ages zero to 12. Cowboy Ranger, 10 to 20s. Warrior, 16 to 30 and beyond. Lover, late teens and beyond.

King, 30 to 60s. And the sage, 50 to 90s. We've talked numerous times about the key points of learning and how is it wounded in the other stages, but I'll go through the sage real quick again.

It's not the time to check out. Time to offer counsel and wisdom. Bringing weight and learning to younger men. Knows God as friend, which is, to me, that's key. I mean that's the good part of life, you know, and that's when you're around the time you have grandchildren and stuff too, right?

Lives in deep communion with God and not an expert, but somebody who has mastered some of these things through life, you know. So how it's wounded, you know, through dismissal like you're riding off into the sunset. Treated as no longer relevant. Old school, yesterday's man remains undeveloped if the man does not take the journey or fails to learn from it. So I think, to me, the biggest thing in the stage, if you don't learn from your mistakes, you're just, you're still unfinished.

You're still just like any of these other guys that didn't get what they needed in the other stages. What I think is important I was thinking about was just a sage. You just, people experience pain by not doing the right thing and you can, you can either experience the pain and learn from that or you can experience, you can learn from somebody else's pain and not experience the pain yourself.

You get it second hand and I think that's what sages offer a lot of times is what to do but what not to do as well. Yeah, I think in that part where you talk about that they're unfinished men, I can't really say who this person is. They're no longer around but I watched closely and then also from a distance later on, this person kind of refused to move past a certain point in their life. I'm not going to deal with it. They just became more and more bitter. His life kind of came at him because life comes at all of us and it comes at us pretty wickedly a lot of times and a lot of times and very painfully. They just became more and more bitter and as this person got into his elder ages where he could have been a very good sage because he had not let any of that stuff, learn from it, move on and was so bitter that no one wanted to be around him including his family. You know and it was just so sad but it was also very much brought on not letting God you know, father you. Just stepping back and saying no I'm going to deal with this on my own.

I'm going to shove it down. It doesn't matter. Whatever that case is the enemy got a hold of him and it's just very sad because he could have had the opportunity. He had lived enough life in a lot of different situations that he could have been a very powerful sage but because of that part of it, he was unable to fulfill that. Yeah, I think the important part about sages too is you know as we're going through life, I know I wanted to do it alone.

We were talking about the man on the island and that kind of thing. I was sages in Seattle you know. I didn't want anybody to speak into my life because it would reflect what I didn't know or where I was incomplete but once you come under it to where you're open to being fathered you know the when the pupil is ready the teacher will appear. I mean when those things happen then you open yourself up then everybody becomes well not everybody but you weed out who's a good sage or not but you allow people to speak in your life and it's much easier to get through life whenever you're being fathered by God through other men. Yeah, one of the things that's not mentioned in our little list that we have here that's important about the sage stage is a sage will point you back to God where an expert is what they call the other person. An expert always brings you back to them. Right. You come to me for the answer come to me for the answer when eventually you know the sage is going to give you good advice but eventually it's going to lead you right back to God. You have to think about the definition of expert that's a has-been drip under pressure. Do you want to go to that kind of person?

Not necessarily. Danny you have a microphone now and you have the first clip that's amazing how that works here the first clip on the second show. So well it's still a first clip it is still record still holds it's an asterisk to your streak yeah yeah it's got yeah they'll be and also competed you know that yeah yeah it's glad Rodney's not here to pick up on the sport you're Mr Congeniale of the club world yeah this this clip is from Blue Bloods and it's when I think of sages I immediately go to thinking of grandpas because you know the older folks and and I've had many many sages in my life I figured God figured I needed a lot of wisdom poured into me because I did a lot of stupid human tricks and but this is from an interchange between Jamie who's the grandson who is Tom Selleck's son and his dad Tom Selleck's dad in the show Henry and an interchange where they're in the kitchen which lots of wisdom poured out in that kitchen and lots of anger sometimes but at the interchange and and Jamie's asking him a question and Henry pours into his life over a piece of pie or a whole pie actually but anyway the you can play the clip busted what I just got my second win you want in no but I do have a question shoot how'd you feel when dad stopped reaching out to you for help when did that ever stop no I mean back in the day when he was coming up he used to say that he had your own speed down for like a decade and along came that fateful day June 6 1982 you remember the date Francis was excited because he had managed to diffuse a war between two Chinatown crime bosses everybody else was excited for him I realized he'd never so much as mentioned it to me so it stung a little bit maybe more but I was proud too knowing he was able to strike someone out because I taught him how to throw the fork ball so what didn't you go to him for busted just this thing with his retired cop but I handled it handled it or handled it well both but Eddie thought differently I keep wondering if she was right and I was just being defensive here's the dirty little secret about climbing the ladder the higher you go the more you second guess yourself yeah and with marriage it's third and fourth guessing so I'd say you're on the right track thanks pop I'll get out of here so I can finish the pie yeah so the you know Henry has been police commissioner he's come up through the ranks and here's Jamie his grandson who's coming up through and you know it made me think a lot of you know my own father who's soon be 80 and you know the wisdom he's poured into us when you can kind of as we've talked about go to him and kind of pry stuff out of him sometimes but you know also made me think a lot of my father-in-law who passed away last year and ironically Tuesday was his Tuesday was it would have been his 70th birthday and you know there were so many I watched his grandkids come to him you know my son would go to him I went to him you know for wisdom and you know he would share his strengths and his failures and things with you and help you get to another place and that's just you know to me that's what sage is about is that you know God puts those people like Andy said in your life and it's whether or not you use them because I've spent this last week looking at this this stage and think man I wish I'd have prided a little more when this person was around or when that person was around and you know because there's so much there there's just a wealth of knowledge and and wisdom and that you know you miss out on so yeah there's this arrogance especially as you're young that that's his grandpa or it's just whoever right yeah they're just spouting off about something and then you realize the older you get how much value that would have had and how many mistakes you could have avoided if you just would have sat down and either asked or listened when they were offering and so Harold you are the resident sage here just not only age-wise we give you a hard time about being age but you are just a very delightful man that gives great advice you don't speak often but when you do it's it's well received and it's very needed and so we thank you for that but I want to turn it kind of over to you to talk a little bit about your experiences with sage or whatever you want to talk about on the topic well first of all thanks for the compliment I appreciate it even though at times I don't feel like I deserve it but one of the things that is written in the description that Andy gave is being a friend of God and that's something that just astounds me that God would consider me with all my faults and failures to be a friend and yet he does and he's gone way beyond what we would consider friend to extend to me the the grace that I don't deserve but that he gives to me the the other thing is that at this stage of life you have to learn to let things kind of roll off your back like water off a duck my sweetheart has a way of calling me a dinosaur reflecting technology and that kind of hurts I hope you're listening because I was in computer programming systems analysis for nearly 44 years and yes the technology I worked in was not what is current but logic doesn't change smart doesn't change and so what what's missing today I think is that so many of the people that are really whizzes at the technology don't have a clue on how people operate and what needs to be done to make things better for the people forget how pretty it looks make it simple and easy to work with and you'll be more successful in my opinion and I'm Jim you you look like you have something to add well it's amazing how much you can learn when you start with an abacus and you work your way up into cell phones you've done it all and I can say that seriously because I used an abacus but that used to be the computers yeah when I was in college we had slide rules yeah we didn't even have handheld calculators at that stage but I do treasure the times that times that I can hopefully help somebody by sharing some of my mistakes and say you know watch out for this one of the things that that I would caution people in this stage or below is stay away from pride pride will be your downfall you will lose all credibility and you won't be able to help anybody with anything and he's looking at me as he says that we all are jim no I I appreciate this group so much because I am quite a bit older than everybody else I just turned 81 a little bit back but I've been welcomed in and I've been treated as a peer and and just to let you know when you're old and yet you get treated like you're younger it's a wonderful feeling to be a part of a group thank you Harold and for over a year now Harold you have not been old you are now not only a sage but you're venerable a word I'll have to look up after this or I'll google it David just you know I can do uh Harold I do want to come back to you in just a little bit about who was a sage in your life and so I want you to think about that and if I remember I'll get back to it at the end of the show but David you're up with the best omiyagi yes I'm a yagi of Stravaganza it is um so for me you know almost everyone in this room has been a sage to me at some point um no I'm kidding everybody has definitely spoken in life to me and I'm not saying that because you know I'm young and everybody else in here with me is old I'm just saying that you know I found this band of brothers at the right time when everybody could be at some point through the last year of my journey a sage to me um during that so I just wanted to say that but this my clip is uh all the best uh well some of the best quotes from Mr Miyagi there's a lot of them from the karate kid um but we'll take a listen to it and um come back and talk about it a little bit to make honey young bee need young flower not the whole prune well at least I've come up right side see walk left side safe walk middle sooner or later get the squish just like grape wax on wax off don't forget to breathe very important wax on wax on wax off concentrate look at my eye like a hand thumb inside my hand look I always look I come back tomorrow balance good karate good everything good balance bad better pack up to home those than yourself for person with no forgiveness in heart living even worse punishment than death never put passion before principle even if win you lose rule number one karate for defense only rule number two first run rule number one Miyagi father always say best way to avoid punch no be there listen lie become truth only if person want to believe it is that another old local now and saying okay once I choose always grow because root too strong you choose always do karate same reason yeah but I do it your way I one day you do my own way sometime better be sometime better be better full stomach than empty one oh great great another great thought you know he said a lot of funny quotes throughout the movie but he said said several ones throughout that that definitely uh spoke life into um Ralph Macchio who played Danielson during the movie uh one of them that I really picked up on is um paraphrase it basically was uh if you win without passion are you really winning um and and I think a lot of times uh wins passion before principle yeah passion before principle yeah yeah and uh thank you I thought I had it on my phone but I didn't um there's that technology we were talking about I interrupted you David I apologize no no it's fine it's fine I mean I'm used to it so um but you know at the stage stage um you know unfortunately I can't really speak on that uh because um you know nowhere close to that age yet I still got a little while to go but uh you know we were having a conversation earlier before the show started um that we talked about where necessarily doesn't age isn't necessarily a factor in this age and I wholeheartedly agree with that I don't think it has anything necessarily to do with a numerical age or how long you've been on this earth it could also do with your spiritual age as well um you know I've met people throughout my life in just this year or um previous that you know were younger than me older than me that would speak speak life into me or God would use them to speak life into me um you know just in the profession that I do on an average I see about three thousand people a day and I know I've met people from that were knee high all the way up that just you can see that in them as they're walking through whatever walk they're going through yeah I think even you know David you're you're clearly in the king stage as far as you know what you do and all that but in any of those places if you're walking with God you have the opportunity to speak sage into somebody's life you know what you were saying there and the opportunities are there you know I've had my kids really speak into my life in ways that yeah definitely they're not sages yet age-wise but there were things that they said that impacted me as if it was from a sage oh yeah absolutely you know which which is pretty cool we've got one more clip that will play this is this is my clip it's from and then we'll come back and talk about some other stuff but it's from the original fellowship of the ring I believe and this is when Gandalf and Frodo are in the the mines of Moria Moria and Frodo has seen Gollum Smeagol following them and and and uh that's right and Gandalf's aware of it and so they have this interchange which is pretty good I didn't keep that in here and then Frodo's reflecting back and he's saying to Gandalf right at the beginning of this I wished that this hadn't come to me I wished I wasn't on this adventure I wish wish I wasn't in this place in my life at this moment which I think we've all said that at some point and so listen to what Gandalf has to say to him and then we'll talk about it I wish the ring had never come to me I wish none of this had happened so do all who live to see such times but that is not for them to decide all we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us there are other forces at work in this world Frodo besides the good of Evo Bilbo was meant to find the ring in which case you also were meant to have it and that is an encouraging thought what I like about this this little short clip is you have Gandalf that truly listens to what Frodo has to say and that's something a sage does they listen they're not ready to give you an answer they're not going to jump in with the answer they're listening to what you have to say and then thinking on it for a minute and then entering into the conversation which he did and then in that conversation he really tells Frodo what he needs to hear at that point that you know you have what it takes you know this is this is for a reason there's a purpose here and you have what it takes to get through this I think a sage does that a lot of times as they remind you of things that are long forgotten or that the enemy has stolen from you right that you wouldn't be in this position if you didn't have the opportunity or the ability to with God's help to to get through it and and so the question that I turn to for you guys is just again thinking about sages that's come along in your life and I tell you this is a great exercise to do I hope that all of you at some point do the sonship talk because that is very impactful to look back and see how God has kind of woven people in your life in and out of your life just when you need them so just kind of throwing it out there anyone want to talk first Robby you have something yeah you know one of the gigantic stages in my life was when I was in the car business I worked for Royce Reynolds who owned the crown organization and I was about 33 or 34 so you know trying to own the world in the car business so to speak he he had you know unbelievable faith in Christ I had was nowhere close but interestingly where he approached me was he was where my interest was he said you know Robby if you don't study and read and try to learn what you're doing you know you you'll never get any further the ones that really succeed are the ones who spend time studying and this and whatever and he he put you know the series of power of positive thinking in my hands probably knowing well that the opening said you're supposed to get up an hour early every morning and read the bible which was really a life change thing that was spoken into my life that radically changed the entire direction I was going and would go for the rest of my life you know with one you know just piece of advice at exactly what you said of sage does he pointed me to god without me knowing he was pointing me to god you know and by offering that phenomenal wisdom just to get up an hour earlier every morning and read the bible and and pray to do it it changed everything thank you anyone else have a sage they want to talk about Harold well mine would be a gentleman named Brad Brumley he was the preacher at Columbus Mississippi when we moved there and he completely changed my attitude toward church because I had grown up in small churches without elderships where he was constant fighting to see who's going to get to have their will carried out even if you had to go get the town drunk to come in so he could vote but it was different Brad Brumley was one of the smartest people that I had run across he had a very raspy almost difficult to listen to voice because he'd been in a car wreck that killed his wife and his larynx was crushed but you know you almost had to strain to hear him but you wanted to hear what he had to say because it was wonderful so he was a he was one of the sages there were others but he's the one that comes to my mind my second son is named after him wow anyone else have a story they'd like to share Jim not sure why this came to me but I was with him a few weeks ago I've had as I mentioned earlier there have been several people that were in my life at a appropriate time one of those was Steve Brown and started on the radio and became a groupie and saw him every chance I could at the cove and my wife and I were there about a month ago but he was the first man where I looked in his eyes and I saw Jesus looking back where I absolutely knew that's who I was saying and it was very impactful for me to hear from him that God wasn't mad at me because I've made a lot of mistakes as we all have and it was really the focal point of his ministry is grace and there are other ministries that have grace in the name but they're talking legalism most of the time but that he and he gets attacked for it but he basically preaches grace and does it in a way that is funny and it touched my heart and he I really appreciated getting a chance to talk to him and tell him that that he'd meant so much to me. Andy we got one minute did you have something? Yeah so me just the whole group here I've talked about it many times so many have spoken in my life the one that I want to talk to about though is as Harold you know becoming from an IT a fellow IT guy the whole dishwasher story and and how he was analytical and how he went about that problem and how how that played out in his life and his relationships with his wife and stuff it was really eye-opening to me and it was a sage moment for me so I love Harold my sage. Well thank you the one that I threw out there I don't remember who said it to me but they made the statement you can get you can stay bitter you can get better and that's one that I've had to focus on because there's a lot to be bitter about out there and so step away from bitter move towards better go to masculinejourney.org to register for the upcoming boot camp November 17th through 20th we'll talk to you next week. This is the Truth Network.