On this episode of The Good News, Angie Austin welcomes Grace Fox to discuss her devotional work ‘Finding Hope in Crisis’. The conversation offers insights into maintaining joy through adversity and the importance of developing a positive morning routine. With touches of humor and personal anecdotes, they explore how trust in God and organized daily practices can lead to a more peaceful life, even when challenges arise.
Welcome to The Good News with Angie Austin. Now, with The Good News, here’s Angie.
SPEAKER 03 :
Hey there, friend. Angie Austin and Mrs. Jackie Calloway for The Good News. And Jackie, as you know, is an author, and she is also a counselor, a mom, a grandmother. And we are continuing our conversation on refusing to take offense. Welcome back, Jackie.
SPEAKER 04 :
Thank you, Angie. Good to be back.
SPEAKER 03 :
All right, so I love this topic because we sometimes have such a hair-trigger temper, and we take offense at something when the person may be having a bad day, a bad life, a bad moment, whatever, and we just assume the worst or that it’s about us. And I mentioned last week that the weatherman that I was doing maps for before I became… a weathercaster in Los Angeles, that he was very moody and depressed. And he’s like, this is just how I am, Angie. It’s not always about you. And I’m like, did I make you mad again today? It’s not always about you. It has nothing to do with you. And so I realized I was taking offense and it had nothing to do with me. And you say it’s a trap that we fall into.
SPEAKER 04 :
It is. I would like to recommend to people the book, The Bait of Satan.
SPEAKER 03 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 04 :
And that is by John Bevere. And that bait is offense. And if we are quick, well, in Luke 17 and 1, Jesus said to his disciples that offenses will come. He has warned us that offenses will come. there will be things that will come in our lives that are… It’s not always the way we want it to be or the way we think it is. And usually the main thing is not the main thing. When you have a situation with a person and they’re angry about something, it’s usually something else. There’s some hidden… There’s some history, usually, behind our feelings that we express. But I would ask the audience to think about, is there someone who has offended you and you have carried that? Is there someone that you’re angry with that has possibly really done you wrong? The thing about it is we have to forgive, and the definition of forgiveness is to let it drop, release it, and let it go.
SPEAKER 03 :
Okay, say that again.
SPEAKER 04 :
Let it drop, release it, and let it go. My mother used to tell me that when I would come to her with something that was on my heart, she’d just say, just go on. Don’t stop here. Just go on. And, you know, I wanted to cry and wanted her to feel sorry for me. But she was continually pointing me in the direction that I should go rather than getting stuck. And one of the things that happens when we take offense is that we carry that. And you can just hear the person’s name sometimes, and it’ll dredge up that feeling. And those things become strongholds in our lives. And those are dangerous. Because then we process everything that we take in through those lenses. Through those lenses of offense, possibly, if we’re holding something. So I encourage everyone to be quick to forgive. And you’re going to be offended. There are offenses are going to come. I always say you can get offended at Walmart.
SPEAKER 03 :
Right.
SPEAKER 04 :
It doesn’t take much.
SPEAKER 03 :
Oh, my mom does almost every time she goes to Walmart.
SPEAKER 04 :
You can get offended in the parking lot.
SPEAKER 03 :
Oh, boy, yeah.
SPEAKER 04 :
People cutting in front of you on the highway, but you have to refuse to take offense. I have had people to cut me off, and they cut me off and then give me the fingers.
SPEAKER 05 :
Oh, my goodness.
SPEAKER 04 :
But I’ve learned to say, Father, I ask that I pray the Lord of the harvest would send the perfect laborer across their paths and that they’ll come to know you in the pardon of their sins. So we have to walk in love. And We’ve learned to love the people that we want to love, and we want to curse the rest of them. We don’t have to necessarily curse, but we don’t want to have anything to do with the rest of them.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, you know, when you mentioned, you know, the bait of Satan, I know it’s a bestseller, so I just clicked on it. And it says, you will encounter offense, and it’s up to you how it will affect your relationship with God. Your response will determine your future. If offense is handled correctly, you will become stronger rather than bitter. And in this book, John Bevere shows you how to stay free from offense and escape the victim mentality. I love that. And they talked about how we why are we always compelled to tell like our side of the story? You know, like we want to make sure people hear our side so we can, you know, you know, show that we were in the right. Or it talks about how you stop rehearsing past hurts. I mean, I’ve heard so many of my mom’s past hurt stories on so many occasions that I know them sometimes better than she knows them. And so do the kids, you know, and generally they’re not pleasant stories. And, you know, they’re. very angry stories as well. And when your grandchildren know you’re angry, past hurt, this is rehearsing, stop rehearsing past hurts. When they know your past hurts as well as you do, it’s too much.
SPEAKER 04 :
It is. And you can look in Matthew 18 and 18 and Where it talks about the young man who was forgiven of his debt that he had. And it was a lot of debt. It was maybe, we’ll just say a million dollars. I don’t have the scripture in front of me right now. But say it was a million dollars that he was forgiven. And then he goes on that day. And he meets a guy that owes him 20 bucks. And the guy says, oh, give me time and I’ll pay you all. And he said no. And he took him and he had him thrown in prison until he could pay it. And so the friends that were around this guy went back and told the master what he had done. So all of this is saying that when you have taken offense and when you are holding unforgiveness in your heart, it affects the people around you. They see you, and it really affects your children. Oh, yes. Like you were saying. Yes. And then for him to have been forgiven so much, and we have been forgiven so much by God as he sent his son, Jesus. To die for our sins. So we have to forgive those people who offend us in this life. One of the things I know is a preacher is known not for what he preaches, but what he lives. People are watching us. The world is watching us as Christians. And I don’t even, you know, Christian has gotten such a bad rap. I’m a believer, and I believe what the Bible says. So I want to live what this Bible says. And I found out that you can refuse to take offense.
SPEAKER 03 :
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Yeah, I’m with you there. But I think it takes such conscious effort. So I actually did buy the book that you suggested, The Bait of Satan, John Bevere. I have Audible. And so I can listen to books. I do that oftentimes, I guess I’m going to sleep because it really takes my mind off of all the noises around the house. And I listen to Dateline a lot. And I’m like, if I hear another kid that kills his parents, that’s the last thing I need to be hearing about in my sleep, right? Because these crime stories, they put me to sleep. And I’m like, okay, so first I work in the news business where I cover crime. And then I fall asleep listening to crime shows or crime books. And I’m like, no, I need to listen to things. And I I know that when I listen, there’s a brain fog book I’m reading right now or listening to by a doctor. That stuff really does stick in your brain. You wake up knowing a lot of it. And then I just restart the book the next night, kind of where I left off. And so maybe I only hear like 20 minutes, but then you’ll kind of be half awake, half asleep. And you will take in some of the good information about healthy diet or how to make your brain healthy or in this case, you know, how to avoid offense.
SPEAKER 04 :
And so even though it’s not about the Bible.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, I never thought about listening to the Bible at night.
SPEAKER 04 :
The Bible, Jesus said, my words are spirit and they’re life. And it is a life-giving source. And as you listen to the Bible, as you listen to the Word, and as you, and you know, I read the Word because I have to sit in it and settle in it. And so that should be the first thing that comes to our minds as we are out here in a world that is offensive.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yes, and that’s a good way to put it. It is a world that is offensive. So how do we not? It is a trap, as you put it last week. I think that’s such a good way to put it. And I know that I don’t have a temper like I did when I was younger, that’s for sure. And it takes me a long time to reach my temper. I have to climb a little mountain to get to it. But when I get to it, I’m definitely jumping off quickly.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I’ve learned to quickly jump. Bring a scripture to mind. Proverbs 15, it says a soft answer turns away wrath. And I’m conscious of strife. I don’t want to be in a situation where there’s a lot of strife. Sometimes you can avoid it. But if you go in in the right spirit, it makes a difference. It can shift the atmosphere.
SPEAKER 03 :
You know, it’s so interesting because some girl pulled up next to us and was giving the finger, as you said, to my son and I. And my son rolled in the window and just looked at her because he had her video camera on us. And I tried to get over to the left lane, so I just needed to swing through her lane. I wasn’t going to cut her off. But when she saw my blinker on, she spit. I sped up as fast as she could so I couldn’t, you know, move over to the left lane. And then we ended up right next to each other because, of course, I wasn’t cutting her off. I wasn’t going to end up in her lane. I wanted the left lane. So we’re right next to her. So she’s flipping us off and she has her camera on us and my son rolled down the stairs. the the window and just stared at her and i’m like she’s videotaping he’s like what is she gonna do put it on tiktok like he’s like it’s her problem and i just thought gosh i just i’m so glad that he doesn’t have a horrible temper and that he didn’t say anything to her but he did look at the guy behind him you know because he was staring at all of us you know and he’s just put his hands in the air pointed at her like i don’t know cuckoo like i don’t know what she’s doing And I just think about these people that overreact in those situations and, you know, how I want to be a good example to my son, but how they overreact. And it’s just, oh, yeah. If anyone wants to get in touch with Jackie, you can always go to my website and get in touch with me, AngieAustin.org. Thank you, Jackie. Merry Christmas.
SPEAKER 04 :
Merry Christmas to you. Bye-bye.
SPEAKER 07 :
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SPEAKER 02 :
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SPEAKER 03 :
Hey there, friend. Angie Austin here with the good news along with my friend, our friend, author Grace Fox. We’re talking about her devotional, Finding Hope in Crisis, and we’re starting off today with Morning Joy. Welcome, Grace.
SPEAKER 06 :
Thanks so much, Angie. It’s always good to be with you.
SPEAKER 03 :
All right. Tell us about this devotional, and then we’re going to tie it in a little bit about something going on in your life. It’s a pretty big deal. You’re supposed to be in Egypt right now, and you’re not, so we’ll get into that as well.
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s right. Well, this devotional is called Morning Joy. And the verse that I chose for it was, Weeping may last through the night, but joy comes with the morning, at Psalm 30, verse 5. And when I wrote that, I was just thinking of how often we might go to bed with problems in our head, right? There’s all kinds of stuff that we’re dealing with. It’s there, it’s there, it’s right at the forefront. We go to sleep, we wake up, and we wish that was resolved, but it’s not. And it’s still there facing us. We just wish that life could be so predictable that we wake up in the morning and it’s fixed. But life doesn’t work that way. And the psalmist, when he wrote this, he assures us that sorrow will end in the morning. But he doesn’t specify which one. It might be a morning that’s three months down the road. It might be you wake up in the morning and wow, all that. pain and hardship has finally been resolved and the healing has begun but that might be a year from now he doesn’t say which morning it’s it’s um you know you’re going to experience joy when you wake up and that’s interesting But we have to trust.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, I saw that. And the reason I picked it is because I’m not a morning person. And I hear everybody get up. Like the girls got up really early for Bible study this morning. And my youngest one, and they’re all in high school, so you’ll laugh. But she has been sick. And so she likes to sleep on this gigantic chair we have. It’s big enough. It’s like for a bed for her. We call it the snuggle chair. It’s this gigantic chair I used to. I bought it because they’d all want to snuggle with me at the same time when they were younger. So I had to get all three of them on the chair with me. And so now she’ll use it when she’s sick because she likes to sleep in our room. So it’s dark and I hear the alarm go off and I’m like, oh. So I knew it was her getting up for her Young Life Bible study they have every week. And then… the other one got up too and they come up to our room the other one hope comes up to get her phone because we don’t let them have their phones at night we have them off in our room and so i heard her coming to get her phone it’s still dark then i hear the door shut and it’s still dark so i’m assuming my husband’s gone because a lot of times he takes him to school but i forgot you know he that they had to go early this morning So anyway, then I make some noise a little bit later, and he’s asleep. And he’s like, hey. And I’m like, oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were still here. And then my son leaves a little bit later. But I’m still in bed through all of this, right? And I don’t want to get up. And so I start a lot of my interviews later in the morning for my show. And I don’t have joy in the morning. And I want it. It’s like I want to have joy in the morning. Like I keep trying to come up with a plan. Should I go walk the dog? Should I love baths? Should I take a bath? Like what would give me some joy in the morning? Like I’m more a joy in the evening person.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, you know, Angie, a couple of practical things on that just to add joy to your morning is when you wake up in the morning to train your brain to just go to the Lord. And you do it by… by developing the habit. So start the habit by saying, good morning, Lord. This is the day that you have made. I will rejoice and be glad in it. And then do that before your feet hit the ground or do as one of my girlfriends says she does. She learned this from her mom. And now I practice that too. And in my head, I’ll just say, hey, Lord, what great things do you have planned for us today? And I love that using the us because it really shows inviting him into the presence of the day and acknowledging that he’s there. You don’t have to do this day by yourself. You don’t want to do this day by yourself, right? But it’s just inviting him in. And then with that attitude or that outlook, it’s an outlook of anticipation that God is there and he’s got good things in store. So let’s not go through life with our eyes half closed. Let’s, you know, through a little prayer like that, it kind of opens our eyes to God. to what he’s doing, even when we, you know, it might be so, might be a small thing, might be a very small thing, but it’s something that we would tend to overlook on our own. But when we pray that prayer, I think he opens our eyes to those things.
SPEAKER 03 :
You know, it’s funny that you say that because I actually did write that down, that your friend said that. You know, I wrote it. In fact, I think it’s in one of my notebooks over here that I wrote that down. That’s so funny that your friend started the day off like that. I’m looking at my notes because I keep some notes sometimes during our interviews. And, you know, what great things do you have in store for us? And I do like, you know, this is the day the Lord has made. Let us be glad and rejoice in it. And I should remind myself that because I’m kind of ashamed that… I’m not more excited to get up in the morning that I do schedule things kind of later because I don’t like to get up early. And I think a lot of that does tie. I wake up every morning around between like 3 and 4 for a little while. And then I’ll put on a podcast or a book or something to listen to because for 20 years, I woke up for a morning show and I’m not a morning person. So it was very unpleasant to get up between like my alarm went off between 2.45 and like 3.45 ish. And so for some odd reason, even though I hate that time of the morning to wake up, I still wake up then almost every single morning because my brain is like trained. And then of course I go back to sleep. So I think maybe from that 20 some odd years of getting up so early, I was constantly sleep deprived and felt like I was walking through life kind of in a fog. And it’s almost like when you’ve been in poverty and you’re afraid of being hungry, like my pantry is really full because I used to be poor growing up. And I think that that’s a result of that, that it’s ridiculous. Like I’ll never, we’ll never eat everything in our pantry and I have three freezers and they’re awful. It’s like stupid, you know, it’s just goofiness. And I’m the same way with sleep. Like I’m always afraid that I’m going to be tired. So I’m always like, oh, I should just sleep a little bit more. I should, you know, I don’t want to be foggy all day and I’m just so afraid I’ll be tired. and so i do think that you know i do need to turn to the lord in the morning that some of us that aren’t morning people and i know a lot of morning people and i’m so envious like i i do owe it you know to god to be a little more receptive to those waking hours and try to take advantage of that time rather than just snooze it away i think this verse is is uh
SPEAKER 06 :
really neat to look at it another way too not just mourning m-o-r-n-i-n-g but when he talks about weeping may last through the night but joy comes with the morning i’ve i’ve um often thought about that joy comes with the morning m-o-u-r-n-i-n-g and um how when when we’re in that midnight hour Weeping may last through the night. We’re in the midnight hour of our lives. We have a really tough situation where we can’t see the light, and we’re weeping over whatever is going on. But joy comes with the mourning, the weeping that goes along with it. And I know that’s just doing a play on words, and it’s not exactly what the psalmist meant, but I think there’s a whole other truth of principle here. that can be tied in with that too, that even in the midst of the weeping in the night, even in the midst of the grief that we feel, the sorrow that we feel, or whatever it is we’re facing, there can be joy because God is with us. He’s with us in the night. He’s with us when we wake in the literal morning. He never leaves our side. And because of His presence, Scripture says there is joy in His presence. and, you know, talks about having supernatural joy or peace that passes human understanding. All of these things are truths that sometimes I wonder, do we really know what it is to walk in those kinds of truths? Or do we let our emotions lead us along, right? Take us by the hand and lead us down that dark path. But, There is so much hope in the scripture, so many reasons for joy, even when we don’t get what’s going on in our lives.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, and I think the more that we rely on that, you know, the better we feel. I also, besides mourning joy, I noticed you had another one in here that’s a few pages forward. which I do, but I do an interesting to-do list. I don’t know that I do it the same way a lot of people do. Mine’s kind of like a running to-do list, and there aren’t a lot of things that I absolutely 100% have to do today, except, of course, my show and whatever things are involved with the kids, but… When it comes to my to-do list, it might be like a physical I have to schedule for someone or glasses that I need to order or contacts that could be done like maybe anytime in the next week or even month. And so I have a to-do list that if I didn’t touch it that day, it’d be okay, but I keep it running because these are things I know ultimately I have to do. So I think I have like a much lazier to-do list than the average person because it doesn’t have a lot of deadlines on it. I mean, a few things, yes, like paying bills and you know what I mean, but… a lot of the things can be put off for a little while. So I know that you’re a big list maker as well.
SPEAKER 06 :
I am. Boy, I have lists everywhere. My daughter and I were laughing about this just last week when I was still up at her place. And she’s a list maker too. And she’s saying, you know, I never get through my to-do list in a day. Like I’m thinking, oh, who does? I’m enjoying life here. This is the way life is. But she just laughed and she said, but sometimes it makes me feel good to recopy my to-do list. Even if I’ve only been able to strike one thing off, I can recopy it because now it’s got one less thing on it. But there we go, you know, recopying our to-do list and that type of thing. But, you know, there’s so many things. All our lives are different. All of our to-do lists would look different if we compared them. But there is something that’s on the believer’s to-do list. It’s every believer. And it’s from 1 Thessalonians 5, 16 to 18, where where Paul wrote this to-do list for Christ followers. Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. And I love that. So no matter what our physical to-do list looks like, no matter whether we get through it in a day or in a month or we never get through it all, Still, we have these things, if we say we’re Christ followers. These are the things that are kind of non-negotiable. We just need to do them. Because they’re good for us. Not because we must, you know, like somebody’s standing over us with a weapon they’re going to wield over us if we don’t do it. But it’s because we get to do these things because Jesus is with us. His Holy Spirit lives in us. And this is what we can do because of the power that’s in us.
SPEAKER 03 :
You know, I was looking at a friend’s to do list and she she kind of we were just talking about this last week and she showed me her sons because I kind of have one for my daughter that has ADHD. Well, she has it and she has a to do list for every single one of the rental houses she has. Then she has a house that she does like Airbnb. So she calls it the hotel house because she has to clean it a lot. So she does the cleaning herself because she’s very particular and that’s something people really care about when they come to stay at a house. So she has that. And then she has her own to-do list. Then she has a to-do list for each kid. and a to-do list for like things maybe she has to do for her husband or taxes or things they’re going to do together. So it’s like about a dozen to-do lists. And I was like, Oh my gosh. And I felt bad about my, my one that I was showing her, but you know, I had, there was so long and I was like, Oh my gosh, like you have a dozen. She’s like, well, they all need new roofs, all the rentals because of the hail. And then one needs HVAC and other needs, you know, um, a dishwasher and like each one has these specific things and taxes and this that and the other and i was like oh my gosh like a dozen to-do lists but i do see why in rewriting it it’s also satisfying charles stanley used to say to go through your prayer list like you know i’m equating that to a to-do list and see that the prayers that god has answered so i think it’s satisfying to go through the to-do list and see the things that you’ve accomplished
SPEAKER 06 :
There is something very satisfying about that. There’s just something very satisfying about taking a pen and striking through that one thing, even one thing. You feel very accomplished.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, it does feel good, especially when you’ve been working on something for a long time. You know, if you want to find Grace, GraceFox.com, that’s your website, Finding Hope in Crisis, Devotions for Calm and Chaos. And we’ve got about 20 seconds left. Do you have a title for your next book?
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, I have one that’s coming out next July, and the title is Names of God. Living Unafraid. So I’ve explored seven names of God, gone into a deep dive. What do they mean? Where do they show up in Scripture? And how do they apply to us today in overcoming fear?
SPEAKER 03 :
I love that. GraceFox.com. Always a blessing, friend. Thank you. You bet. Have a great day.
SPEAKER 01 :
Thank you for listening to The Good News with Angie Austin on AM670 KLTT.
On this episode of The Good News, Angie Austin welcomes Grace Fox to discuss her devotional work ‘Finding Hope in Crisis’. The conversation offers insights into maintaining joy through adversity and the importance of developing a positive morning routine. With touches of humor and personal anecdotes, they explore how trust in God and organized daily practices can lead to a more peaceful life, even when challenges arise.
