Hunt Prep | Heart Prep | Spiritual Gain

In this episode, Reese and Amber speak on a huge issue that tends to happen every September all around the US, heart posture during hunting season. How is your spiritual life in August compared to when hunting season starts rolling in?! They give great advice on their strategies, and also gives some tips to gain the most heart from your sit in the woods! Thanks for listening! Let’s Go 🏹🦌 

• Psalm 139:23–24

• Proverbs 4:23

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:21

Hey guys, Winklin Amber here. Welcome to another episode of the Seek and Find podcast. Hello, hello. So it might be a little hummy or noisy as we have a busy week leading up to our first annual Operation Freedom Beard fundraising banquet. That is this Friday, September 5th.

SPEAKER_01: 0:56

Well, the reason it would be noisy or hummy. Hummy? Is that what you said? Is because we're driving.

SPEAKER_00: 1:04

Oh, I didn't know.

SPEAKER_01: 1:05

You didn't say that, no.

SPEAKER_00: 1:06

Oh, yeah, so well, I was gonna say we have a week leading up to the event.

SPEAKER_01: 1:10

So we have four days leading up to the event.

SPEAKER_00: 1:12

And I just happened to get a few jobs this week. So there is a lot of uh running around. Um purposeful running around.

SPEAKER_01: 1:28

He does mailbox installation and he does roof rejuvenation and uh soft washing and pressure washing. So that's our side business. That's what pays our bills. Um, in case you guys didn't know.

SPEAKER_00: 1:43

And so we still didn't know.

SPEAKER_01: 1:46

So we still do uh normal kind of work and we're running around this week kind of crazy trying to get all of our uh ducks in a row, if that's possible, and uh get this banquet together, and we literally have to crunch everything.

SPEAKER_00: 2:04

And God may still kill a few of those ducks. That's okay, just so we don't have them in a row, so that we rely on to get them in a row.

SPEAKER_01: 2:11

Yeah. Right? That's yeah. Whatever he needs to do.

SPEAKER_00: 2:17

So let's this podcast is going to be not about this event. You guys, you guys happy about that? Um past two episodes have have been pretty much not a lot about it, but um this podcast specifically is going to be preparing your heart before the hunt. If you guys don't know, this is the first of sepond of 1st of September today, uh Labor Day, and we don't have too much longer until deer season starts, archery season. Uh it's we don't really even count South Florida archery season starting. This is like the official start of archery season. Um just kidding, but kind of. Anyways, so preparing your heart before the hunt. So we're gonna base this off of Psalm 139, 23 through 24, which is search me, O God, and know my heart. Test me and know my anxious thoughts. Point out anything in me that offends you, and lead me along the path of everlasting life.

SPEAKER_01: 3:41

So super good. I want to ask a question before we get deep into that.

SPEAKER_00: 3:46

What's your question?

SPEAKER_01: 3:48

Preparing your heart for the hunt. Is that what you said?

SPEAKER_00: 3:51

The topic preparing your heart before the hunt.

SPEAKER_01: 3:53

Before the hunt. Okay. So hunting season's coming up. We all have preparations to make for hunting season, right? If you're a hunter, you have things to do to prepare. Reese, tell me or our listeners what you do to prepare for hunting season. What are your like normal check list items?

SPEAKER_00: 4:19

Alright, well, normally I wait until September 1st, and then the cue for me to get my button gear is when I start getting calls for folks that need arrows cut or archery work done, which is already too late, but that is usually when I kick myself into gear, start shooting. I've already shot, I'm already good out to 50. I've been practicing probably every other day. Um normally I will have private property, and I have the past four years, but this year I do not. So I am focusing more on public land when I'm home. And then we will be doing a lot of Mississippi hunting personally and through Operation Freedom Beard, um, serving and guiding with others, and then other states also that we have partnered with through Operation Freedom Beard. So this year's gonna be a lot of letting Jace hunt a lot behind the weapon. Well, when rifle season starts. Um, archery season, I'm probably gonna go hard at it. And then all of the most of our events and different hunts and camping trips outside of Florida is when muzzle loader and gun season start come November. So September to November is probably gonna be a lot of filming, uh seek and find TV, our YouTube channel, and getting some content there. But let's get back to the subtext.

SPEAKER_01: 6:03

So, yes, preparing for hunting season. So you get your bow checked, right? Make sure you're tuned in. Um, and he also mentioned he starts getting phone calls to do archery work. He also is an archery tech on the side, if you didn't know.

SPEAKER_02: 6:18

Yep.

SPEAKER_01: 6:19

Um he's we've got like an archery shed, and he's got the whole setup in there to cut arrows and uh put strings on bows and so normally it's a hunter thing.

SPEAKER_00: 6:28

So what you study deer sign, you look for deer sign, you go to the property that you hunt, whether public or private, scout, put your feet on the ground. That's the only way absolutely, huh?

SPEAKER_01: 6:41

Put your feet or feed on the ground.

SPEAKER_00: 6:44

Feet and feed on private.

SPEAKER_01: 6:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 6:48

Do not put feet on the ground on public, or you will be speaking to Mr. Me uh Green Jeans. Um, you know, sighting in weapons, sharpening broadheads if you're a fixed head guy, checking stands and blinds, um, shooting lanes, all those things. Um, you know, preparing for those early mornings, those long sits, and deer that 99% of the time do not cooperate with what you feel and think they're going to do.

SPEAKER_01: 7:19

Oh, they always change it up as soon as the season opens.

SPEAKER_00: 7:23

Right. So, how, with that said, how do we compare that the opposite of what you're supposed to do, not Reese, but the opposite. So, how does a Christian prepare spiritually when comparing that to pre-hunt hunting season? Okay. That's a question for you.

SPEAKER_01: 7:49

Oh, okay. So, how do we prepare spiritually? Well, we're well, I'm assuming we're preparing for our eternal life. Right? That's what that means. Okay.

SPEAKER_02: 8:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 8:01

So we're preparing for eternity. Um, well, this is a daily thing. Once you become saved, and you are now a child of God, you prepare daily, pick up your cross daily and follow him, basically. So you want to read the word every single day. You want to pray every single day. And what else? Um, those are the two most important things, in my opinion. So we read the word, we pray, but then we also need to be disciples. I think that's one that a lot of people forget. Um, it's easy to do it comfortably, quietly, in the walls of your home or wherever is comfortable and private. That's easy. But going out into the world and being a disciple, that's a whole nother ballgame.

SPEAKER_00: 8:57

So I guess we could say both hunting and faith require slowing down, watching, and waiting on God's timing. Yeah. Because you're watching and your eyes are open and in tune throughout your normal day in civilization to be able to disciple and share God's word. But then you get into the woods and you're slowing down, you're watching for sign. Yeah. You're listening for sign.

SPEAKER_01: 9:29

You're tuned in.

SPEAKER_00: 9:30

You're tuned in.

SPEAKER_01: 9:31

How do we get tuned in to world?

SPEAKER_00: 9:34

Waiting on God's timing.

SPEAKER_01: 9:35

The world, we get tuned in by reading the Bible every day. That is like tuning you up, being prepared, memor scripture memorization. You're tuning yourself.

SPEAKER_00: 9:48

Now, this goes into, you know, what I am not saying, or we are not saying, is once hunting season starts, we switch our minds from in God's word to now we're doing everything for the hunt.

SPEAKER_01: 10:03

Oh no.

SPEAKER_00: 10:04

So God's word, you know, starting each hunt with prayer. Let me ask you this: asking for safety, clarity, gratitude, um, patience, uh, shoot, breath, deep breaths, yeah, slow breaths, um, patience with mosquitoes early season.

SPEAKER_01: 10:21

Let me ask you this. Hunting season. It runs from typically, like our season runs from September, mid-September to like mid-January. So what is that? Four months? September, October, November, December, January. Yeah, four months. Okay. That is deer hunting season in Florida. Not counting other seasons, turkey and other things. But do we say when hunting season isn't here, we completely forget about the hunt, and there's absolutely no preparations, there's no nothing. No, no, there's still like off-season is still a season of preparations and doing.

SPEAKER_00: 11:07

And then it's like you and then when the more you prepare, and the more you put your feet on the ground, the more you dive in, the more you study, the more you focus, the more you put your feet on the ground for the fourth time. It's just like your spiritual life. The more you do those things, the more you're gonna be in tune for when you can actually harvest an animal and when you can actually disciple and be prepared for you know all of the devil's schemes and all of your daily struggles and your life. It's that that preparation. So as a hunter that wants to be the best hunter I can be, I have failed at that because I have been focused on you know, other purposeful, god-given driven mat uh missions and stuff that are going on. So I've kind of put hunting to the side.

SPEAKER_01: 12:07

Um, but well, you've put it to the side in the sense of for yourself.

SPEAKER_00: 12:13

Like, yeah, I don't I used to be crazy about it. I mean, I I there's folks listening right now that are that are crazy about it. And I'm crazy about it, don't get me wrong, I absolutely love hunting, but I've I've turned my priorities around to I'm not gonna go by myself and spend you know five, six days unless I have to, and our life calls me to, but five, six days by myself doing something like I can bring the family with me and we could all do it together, and it can be a family thing. The sacrificing me going away, I mean, unless it's a mission-driven task, yeah, uh there's there's no need for it. So I've prioritized a lot of my life.

SPEAKER_01: 12:56

I've noticed big time because when we first started, well, not when we first started dating and got married, because you weren't really hunting then, but when we first started bearded outdoors and then hunting all of a sudden, you were slowly getting back into it before that, but it really took off for you, and then it was like, holy smokes, this is all he's doing. And I got it, I understood it. I was I I've never I don't think I've complained about it much.

SPEAKER_00: 13:24

You never complained about anything, but you've complained about me obsessing over public land here in Florida that you can't pattern like I've never been a big fan of uh having a piece of private property and constantly having to feed and check cameras and change cards and check batteries, like all that constant upkeep.

SPEAKER_01: 13:47

And and maybe one day I will love it because it does seem fun, but the property was 45-50 minutes away from the house. It was the mosquitoes that got and we couldn't take the kids, like we try to go as a family, and we couldn't even get out of the way.

SPEAKER_00: 14:03

The mosquitoes literally are waiting on your window to pick you up. I would wear full face mask and and run. They were terrible to check the stands and all that. You guys saw the the if you haven't yeah, the last video can find TV on YouTube.

SPEAKER_01: 14:20

He's got a dragonfly on the city.

SPEAKER_00: 14:22

Yeah, it's the dragonfly episode. That was me testing a dragonfly out that works with everything besides the mosquitoes at the hunting garden.

SPEAKER_01: 14:28

It works in the garden.

SPEAKER_00: 14:30

So anyways, so yes, coming back to it. How we prepare spiritually is not how I prepared for hunting season this year. Where are you? We are in the back of the road on a dirt road. What are you golly? I don't know where we're. We're in the middle of Hawthorne or something like that.

SPEAKER_01: 14:58

I'm gonna do a laugh. So sorry guys.

SPEAKER_00: 15:02

Let's bring our spiritual lives. Let's not over-prioritize and put hunting in front of that.

SPEAKER_01: 15:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_00: 15:12

Let's not prioritize, okay, your spiritual life, all we're doing is bringing that into the woods to legally be able to harvest animals. Let's start thinking of hunting as that. Not, you know, oh, sorry, wife, I'm gonna be gone for the next four months. Like, let's not do that as men and as leaders of our household. I got something. Guide and bring our families into that. If they don't like to hunt, cool. Come and stay with me at the cabin. You're only gonna hunt three hours in the morning and three hours in the evening. You don't hunt all day. If you do, and you do that numerous times, you need to go home. Um, maybe during the road. I got to get it. Uh, there's a lady. Okay, this is sketch. So you're dusting her out, girl.

SPEAKER_01: 16:01

I'm sure she's walking. She's used to the colour.

SPEAKER_00: 16:04

We can spend hours preparing for dear season. But let me tell you. We can spend even more preparing our hearts for the presence of God. That's that's wow, we're we're back here. Look at the little house on the prairie house.

SPEAKER_01: 16:16

If only this was the video. Okay, so rewind to what you just said, and it brought up Peter. Peter was a fisherman, like, actually caught fish on a boat. Fisherman. That was his job. And Jesus called Peter from fishing after he gave him his biggest catch of his life. I mean, think about it. You get your biggest harvest of a buck or your biggest fish, or maybe. Jesus was like, you're gonna now fish for men. And Peter was like, okay, I'm gonna follow you.

SPEAKER_00: 16:58

Well, think about it though, wouldn't you?

SPEAKER_01: 17:00

Well, yeah, but I never thought of it until right now. We know who Jesus is spiritually. He did not. He I mean, he did, but he wasn't like, they didn't have a Bible to read, you know? So they Jesus was he was in the moment, like he they were telling the story at the time. So it was all being walked out.

SPEAKER_00: 17:24

Jesus was still kind of, is this guy for real or not? Yeah, like the it wasn't a hundred percent scripture on the resurrection actually being Jesus and being from Nazareth.

SPEAKER_01: 17:34

It hadn't happened yet. So, anyways, what that has to do is Peter was an outdoorsman, fisherman, okay, and he gets called to fish for men. Well, we could say the same thing with hunting. We can hunt for men or hunt for people, and we're hunting for them, like calling them to God's kingdom. That's discipleship. So that's what we're supposed to do. So Jesus isn't asking us to quit hunting, but if he did, you know, we would. But that's not what he's asking us to do. So, how can we use something we love, like hunt hunting or fishing, and use that to disciple two people? And anybody who's listening, if you hunt or fish, you could do the same thing.

SPEAKER_00: 18:21

I mean, God puts us where you know, all everything we do, it should be desired. And God knows our desires, and our desires should align with what God's word says. Proverbs 4.23 says, guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life. So, with that said, guard your heart above all else. So, above everything you do, guard your heart, for it determines the course of your life. Does your heart fill with hunting season over Christ when it comes down to hunting season? Do be I can I can tell you right now, I guarantee it's not aligned the same when hunting season starts versus not. And it's hard, because think about it. I mean, I can tell you right now, I wake up at 5.30, 5.55 every morning, and the first thing I do is read God's word and drink coffee. Well, what happens when now I'm supposed to be getting out, getting in my vehicle and driving to the hunting woods before the sun comes up? It's about the same time that I wake up now. It's just I need to get up and start driving to the hunting woods. So in that situation, do I stop reading God's word? Do I stop going to the gym? Do I stop eating healthy all because I am now driving to the woods? No. You just readjust and align. So during hunting season, I usually wake up and I'll read a little bit of scripture, but then have a podcast segment that I'll start every day. I'll listen to before, you know, on my drive to the woods. Usually it's about 45 minutes to an hour, and that will be my morning scripture, but I still will read something.

SPEAKER_01: 20:13

Yeah. So do you ever read like when you're in the sand?

SPEAKER_00: 20:19

Um I have really gotten good at timing. Timing it to where when I get everything, camera and everything set up, you can actually start seeing a little bit of like the sun is good, it's kind of getting bright.

SPEAKER_01: 20:35

You don't want your phone to be shining when you're in there.

SPEAKER_00: 20:39

Well, yeah, and I used to do the whole uh get there, you know, an hour and a half before sunrise, and I'm sitting there in the dark not being able to look at my phone at scripture or anything like that. Not be so I've gotten too many times. I've I plan it usually by the third or fourth week of deer season. I have it planned out to where I'm just kind of getting getting set up for uh the morning.

SPEAKER_01: 21:03

I have two big questions that I want to ask that could be uh hot topics or controversial. So the first one is we hear this a lot, and you said you say it. Like it's okay, it's not that it's wrong, but my question is, is it enough? And that is when people say that being in the woods when they hunt, that's their time with God. So my question is, is that enough?

SPEAKER_00: 21:35

So you want me to? Is that enough for Do you want this this answer to come? Do you want this answer to be what everybody wants to hear, or do you want it to be real?

SPEAKER_01: 21:51

I want it to be real.

SPEAKER_00: 21:53

Alright. No.

SPEAKER_01: 21:55

So say you're say you you're somebody who believes in God. You may or may not go to church, but when hunting season comes, hunting takes pri priority. Yes, it was. Hunting takes priority when over church, and you say that your time in the woods with God is when you feel closest to God, which there's nothing wrong with that, because I can relate to that too. It's about being in the nature, but is that enough? Or and if it's not enough, what else should be added?

SPEAKER_00: 22:34

That is circumstantial to that person's life and their lifestyle.

SPEAKER_01: 22:39

Yes.

SPEAKER_00: 22:40

For me, all of the studying and all the other things I do outside of the woods, if I didn't get into God's word for those two or three hours in the morning, then that wouldn't make or break my time with Christ. Because that, like, I guess go back to your question. Would it be enough? I think a lot of times it goes by the person without judging somebody and without you know not knowing their walk because it's Christ. So you would hope you would hope that their heart is filled enough outside of the woods that when they say, When I go to the woods, that's the closest I get to Christ, and the closest, you know, that's my talking time with Christ, and all that. Now, if that's supplemental, and that's like an addition to after you get out of the woods and your study time, like I read God's word sometimes three, four times a day. So if I skip it at for two hours, but then I'm still doing all of that, and I also talk to God when I'm in the tree stand and all that, then that's just supplemental. It's adding to what I'm already doing. But if you say I hunt on Sunday, you don't go to church because you hunt on Sunday.

SPEAKER_01: 24:05

That was gonna be my other question.

SPEAKER_00: 24:06

And the only time your wife sees you talking about God or being in God's word is when you say you do it in the woods, then no, it is absolutely not enough. I don't believe. I I I do have friends like that that say, oh, that's you know, the time I'm closest to God, but I think it's unfortunately, I think it's sometimes as an excuse. Like I'm saying that, which kind of covers myself as saying I'm a Christian, so I'm now covering my uh salvation cultural. I would call it cultural cultural hunting ality.

SPEAKER_01: 24:43

Hunting ality, I like that.

SPEAKER_00: 24:44

Okay, so I have a no, it's it's cultural Christians that are hunters, I guess you could say.

SPEAKER_01: 24:49

I have another question.

SPEAKER_00: 24:50

So if a second okay, I am not saying that I am better than anybody or worse or whatever. I wanted a real answer. I wanted people that can relate, and I also do want people to get butthurt on this because if you're that person that is making that, you know, saying those things, but you're so anxious and you're so stressed when you get in that tree stand that literally all and I've done it so many mornings, I realized I did not pray, and there's a buck in front of me, and it's already eight o'clock in the morning. And I I'm I'm so guilty of that, and I don't want you to fall into that trap every day to where when hunting season is over with, you're literally like, I have literally been in less of God's word during hunting season because it's hunting season. I have been the stressed out anxiety, don't even think about God at all, and all I'm thinking about is that buck that keeps showing up on camera that I don't see in person, like it gets it gets bad.

SPEAKER_01: 25:51

So you could say because you've experienced the relationship that you've had and you've grown it, you've been growing that relationship with you and God for years. That when you get a little separated, you feel it because you know what you're lacking. So if you haven't experienced that yet to that extent, and I you don't have to um, I don't know, like read the Bible for hours each day. That is not what he does, and that's not what he's saying, but it's baby steps, like you get a little closer here and a little closer there, and eventually when you kind of slip away, you're feeling that absence. Um, so a question I have now is for somebody who says they they're a believer and they say that that's their time with God, but they're really wanting to increase that relationship, I guess you could say. Um, what would be like a small thing they could implement maybe during hunting season? Uh, since we're coming into that, they can start at hunting season uh because they're gonna be driving to and from their properties and they're gonna be sitting in the tree stand. So, what's something little that they can start adding to that uh this season?

SPEAKER_00: 27:21

Well, right off the bat, I don't think it should start during hunting season. I just think it needs to be intentional now. I mean, there's no other time. Don't wait now.

SPEAKER_02: 27:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 27:31

But I mean, there's some challenges I guess I could come up with, like before hunting season or before opening day, I guess you can say, set aside intentional time for prayer and reflection every day, whether it's the morning about the day before, or in the evening. Um, and this could be dove deeper into this, could be like it could be the that's the least thing you do, but guess what? Before this challenge, you've never done anything.

SPEAKER_01: 27:59

Yeah. Um I mean, even if you were, even if you start a small, like a little five-minute podcast, there are so many podcasts out there that are from five minutes to two hours about re Bible studies and reading scripture and all.

SPEAKER_00: 28:18

You just have to be, you have to be very cautious on who you listen to and who you're being guided by. Because if it's not scriptural and if it's not, you know, the yeah, it could easily turn into now you're listening to motivational speakers. Yeah, we and they're not guiding you to Christ, they're just guiding you to be happy and feel good.

SPEAKER_01: 28:41

So we kind of Reese and I did a lot of that kind of in our beginning.

SPEAKER_00: 28:46

Drive self-motivating, self-help kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_01: 28:49

What helps for you to be able to discern if the is this from God or is this of the world, is you just ask God, you pray to him and to show you, and he will show you. He we don't know what it looks like or how he's gonna show you.

SPEAKER_00: 29:05

Ask and it will be given, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be open.

SPEAKER_01: 29:10

Yep.

SPEAKER_00: 29:11

Matthew 7 7. So that is why seek and find TV is seek and find TV and seek and find podcast.

SPEAKER_01: 29:19

Yes. Um so I have another question, and I don't know if you want to get into it on this podcast where maybe we could do a whole nother podcast.

SPEAKER_00: 29:27

Alright, practical challenge. So I already gave that one challenge before opening day. Set aside intentional time for prayer and reflection. Yes, start that now. Start it before hunting season starts taking over your brain, yes, and that big bug shows up on camera. You probably already had some show up on camera. Um, do a spiritual gear check. So, forgiveness, gratitude, scripture focus, and patience. Get all that in tune and start coming. Up with just that everyday, just that everyday um intentionality, set aside the time and start planning something, and then once hunting season starts, make a commitment to yourself, write it down with this list of things that you're gonna be doing, and maybe write down a commitment like every hunt this season will start with prayer, and even okay, this is something I do a lot, which is set reminders in your phone. Oh, yeah, set an alarm that's silent, of course. Of course, um, to go off at you know, six o'clock. Basically, when you're in your stand before you see deer movement or have deer moving, and to remind you to pray. Once you do that, you'll eventually get to a point where you turn your that reminder off and delete it because it's natural in your life and that's just what you're doing. Being intentional and having your heart in the right place will set you up for spiritual success and a successful you know hunting season. So that's your heart being in check, you know. What every every sit will be a good sit, whether you see deer or not, or harvest something or not. If your heart is aligned with Christ before hunting season even starts, then you're gonna have a great successful year.

SPEAKER_01: 31:27

Amen to that.

SPEAKER_00: 31:29

So, what did you want to get into?

SPEAKER_01: 31:33

Well, we you kind of went over it during the last question, but I was gonna ask how you felt about hunting, like making hunting priority over church. Um so, like when hunting season starts, you basically stop going, stop attending church, or it depends on the weather that day, but if it's good weather, you're gonna choose hunting over church. I you've kind of done a lot of things.

SPEAKER_00: 32:03

There's no right or wrong either.

SPEAKER_01: 32:04

No right or wrong.

SPEAKER_00: 32:05

Because there's folks that don't go to church, but if you look at their life and their serving and what they do uh in God's kingdom knowing that they're saved, but they don't go to church on Sunday or not every Sunday, that's not that's not what gets you to heaven or not. So um I I personally I guess we can say this, it's personal stuff. I hunted on Sundays when that first cold front came and all those things for the past forever until last season. Last season I did not hunt once that had to do with missing church unless sorry, it's okay, unless we were out of state.

SPEAKER_02: 32:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 32:52

If we were out of state, Scott and I, or Amber and Scott and I, we read God's Word every morning, and you know, that Sunday would just happen to be spent in the woods, and but it then comes back to what is our life around that. If your life is only church on Sunday, you don't read God's Word every day, and now you're going from church on Sunday, not doing anything really uh spiritually for the whole week, and now hunting season comes, and now you're not going to church on Sunday. Well, now you don't have anything spiritual in your life. So now you've eliminated God fullheartedly and completely put hunting over priority for that. So it's just what you want really. I don't hunt. I look at it as look at your time in the woods. If two hours on a Sunday morning, I dude, I hunted, I hunted an hour and a half before now they have, you know, some of our churches churches have 11 o'clock service. You can easily hunt an hour and then go to church. You're just getting out, you know, sometimes at prime time. But show up in your camo. If you really need to, I did last year, I did two or three times. Um, but no, I told myself last year that unless I'm out of state, I am not skipping church because uh what what type of a blessing is that you're skipping, you're skipping church and expecting this big buck to come out in front of you and harvest it. And if it's spiritual like it is for me, you know, thanking God for the harvest and and for the time in the woods.

SPEAKER_01: 34:34

I don't think you ever harvested a deer on a Sunday either.

SPEAKER_00: 34:38

Umbe on a Sunday evening, but maybe um I've gone Sunday evening hunting and stuff, but yeah, skipping church for it. I don't know. It's it's uh that's it's all up to you. It's supplemental. And if you're if you're supplementing your time and and getting you know God's word at the forefront, if it's all a heart thing. It's at the end of the day, all of this that we're talking about is heart posture, and you need to you need to check your heart daily. I mean, it's like having a heart rate. It's like you need to check that heart daily. Where's your heart aligned to? Do you have anxiety? What is your anxiety? And figure those things out, and that's where prayer and reading God's word every day why it's crucial. So yeah, that's where we're at. We're getting close to home.

SPEAKER_01: 35:25

Um I want to do an episode soon about or specifically for women who have spouses who hunt more than they would like them to. No, I don't want to start any arguments.

SPEAKER_00: 35:43

What if that wife goes, hey, this podcast, they said uh you hunt too much. That might spark in some guys.

SPEAKER_01: 35:50

I have been in both sides of it where I have felt like you hunt too much, but I guess I'm just not a complainer.

SPEAKER_00: 35:58

Like I I I mean, you tell me to go hunt because you're like hunting content to put episodes again. I'm like, just go. I've purposely formed and excused to hunt Ambery the content to put together. She's like, so in closing, the main recap is preparing your heart is more important than preparing your gear. Preparing your heart is more important than preparing your gear. It is important to prepare your gear. But if you don't, you still get to sit. You still have the privilege to sit in God's God's creation. You still get the privilege, even if no deer gonna come from you because you didn't scout an hour. You still get to do it. And the chances of you still can do things on the point. You can still you know have an estrous land that you walk in. You know, you still can hunt downwind. You still can hunt with good wind. I mean, you can still do those preparations that don't take your life away from your family in the field. So basically share this episode. Tag your hunt buddies in this episode, send it to somebody before opening season starts, um, and remind them, encourage them. I'm gonna text Hunter right now, one of my buddies, and Scott, and uh, you know, hey, get your gear ready, but remember, don't forget your heart. You know, we just talked to Scott earlier, and both of us were like, man, we haven't uh done anything. See, right now, September 1st is today. Normally I'd be in Mississippi and we'd be preparing the the field for dubs and all this stuff, and we're not we're not doing any of those things right now. He's he's getting some work piled in so that uh he can he can you know we can be um going on these missions a lot this year that we have planned and filming and doing a lot of different stuff and I'm I'm in the same boat. We have this banquet coming up on Friday, and you know, I'm trying to pile in some work too so that we can we can take a little bit of time to to focus. But anyways, this was a good one. It was pretty good, and it kind of opened my eyes to some stuff. I need to get some things in check, some gear in check. Uh, but also I think I need to I might prepare like a podcast, find that podcast that I can listen to on the way to the woods for those mornings. Like if you prepare intentionally beforehand, then you'll be you'll be on you'll be in check. You won't be kind of struggling. Oh, I need to get God's word before I get to the woods. That's great, that's awesome. But let's just prepare our hearts and prepare our minds for hunting season. Uh prepare your wife if you have to. If not, start getting them involved, man. Start getting them out in the woods. If your son's five years old, he might be a little annoying. He might be, you know. Talk to a little loud. Yeah, but the thing is, that's what God provided us with this child to raise him up in it in creation, raise him up the way the Bible speaks on, and that comes first with patience.

SPEAKER_01: 39:34

What's that Luke Combs song about it?

SPEAKER_00: 39:36

Oh, the whole album makes me want to cry every time. So I don't know. If we could think of that Luke Combs album, it's about literally father and son album. Uh it's very solid. You guys, you can go look that up. I'm not sponsored by Luke Combs, but um that's a very good album. But, anyways, hope that was encouraging. Um, I hope that I don't think a lot of folks, I mean, really will think about that stuff until I mean it's kind of like us preparing for hunting season. It's like, oh, work, la-di-da, family time, and all of a sudden it's like goo! Yep. Hunting season. Now I'm getting everybody's bows in at the last second and uh cutting arrows and fletching arrows and all that stuff.

SPEAKER_01: 40:20

Drinking your pumpkin spice lattes.

SPEAKER_00: 40:22

Oh, I have that's on check. I just had an iced pecan crunch oat latte with four pumps of pumpkin spice on our way to our job. He's also times two. Also slash white girl. Yeah, it's white girl season coming up. Venison and pumpkin spice lattes.

SPEAKER_01: 40:40

Um we had venison two nights ago.

SPEAKER_00: 40:42

You can hate all you want too. Comment below if you do not like that and I'm a sissy. I don't care. Uh, but yeah, now you can comment below. You can also text. You can send texts. So if you press, if you look in the description below this, if you're on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, you can actually text straight to the phone straight to my phone. So, yep, if you guys have any episode you'd like to hear, uh, any responses, um, comment those responses, leave reviews. We want to hear reviews, even the one-star reviews. If you don't like me, if you don't like our podcasts, we like those reviews too. Because um, I mean, it kind of stinks for everybody to hear our content, but um you also could just block us and just not listen to us. Don't be a Karen. Yeah, don't be a Karen. If you don't like hunting, well, I don't know why you're like um, but anyways, we love you guys. We appreciate you. We appreciate the support. If you guys want to support Operation Freedom Beard and any of the missions we are on this year, a list of the missions are on our website, and there's donation buttons, there's um volunteer buttons, there's all kinds of stuff. We're just kicking off this year in a big way uh with our Operation Freedom Beard fundraiser. We're gonna start doing some silent auctions through our um Operation Freedom Beard also. So any donations we get uh that aren't fund related, if they're product related or whatever, we're gonna be doing some giveaway, I mean, uh some silent auctions and some things like that too, just to raise funds or possibly any donations you guys have, if it's not funds, um, we could bring those to some of these veteran events that we go to and give it to a special person. I mean, and it's all beneficial, guys, and and we're you know, we're the connection hub for things out of state, in state, I mean, all over the U.S. And we're just getting started, so we can't wait for what God has has in store and and planned for us.

SPEAKER_01: 42:50

And if you haven't bought your deer approved beard products yet, yes, hop on and do that.

SPEAKER_00: 42:56

We still sell bearded outdoors beard care products, guys. As much as we give them away, we still sell them on our website. And we have actually started anything on beardedoutdoorsusa.com. Every single thing that we make and sell is going towards Operation Freedom Beard. So if you think you're just supporting a small business by buying our beard care products, you are now supporting way more than that because our life is really starting to dive towards 100% serving and 100%, you know, really discipling to disabled kids and veterans. And also, when we say veterans, we're also we're very, very supportive of active duty. Oh, yeah. So many people are like, well, I'm active duty. Does that count? Active duty becomes veterans. Veterans are, you know, active duty, you guys are you guys are in the thick of it now. Yeah, you just can't grow a beard now.

SPEAKER_01: 43:56

That's the only reason.

SPEAKER_00: 43:57

I mean, some of these special ops guys can.

SPEAKER_01: 44:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 44:00

Um, but alright, enough of my mum mumbo jumbo. Y'all have stuff to do. Get fired up for God, get fired up for his word, start reading it with with intentionality, start reading it, wanting to know it, because everything that's in God's word is was created and spoken and put into this book for our life, for our guidance, not just to be a book, but for us to literally live and read and breathe every single day.

SPEAKER_01: 44:32

It is a living word.

SPEAKER_00: 44:34

So, love you guys. Appreciate you. Thanks for tuning in and um go like and subscribe and and follow our seek and finds TV channel on YouTube. We would appreciate that. That content's been rolling out, but it's gonna get even more uh rolling faster than Flint's gone speed uh here in the next few weeks. Love you guys. See ya.