Prayer, Purpose, and Power: Spiritual Dimensions of Leadership

0:00 Dr. William T Choctaw, MD, JD: Reverend Andrew Collins. Okay, what I want to do, I want to give you a scripture this morning, starting at Mark chapter 9, verse 23. Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. And straightway the father of the child cried out, And said with tears, Lord, I believe, help thou my unbelief, let us go to the Lord in prayer. Father God Almighty, we come to you this morning, my father, knowing my father that you are in control of our lives, my father, knowing that you, you let us sleep last night and then you touched us with the finger of love this morning. You woke us up in closing our right mind, you know, our spiritual, physical, mental capacity is far too involved.

0:40 And we know you did it all because you love us, my father. All because you love grace. And we thank you for that, and we thank you for bringing us to this point in time, my father. As we go through this masterclass today, we pray that you would help us all, my father, to constantly believe in you. Not only that, but believe in the things that you have sent people to tell us. Knowing, my father, that all things are possible with you, my father. We love you, we praise you, we glorify and edify you. Bless my father, our speaker. Fill him with your Holy Spirit, wisdom, and honesty. We speak the words that you've given him to speak. We ask this of you and we thank this of you in your daughter's name, Jesus Christ, Holy Name. Amen. Good morning. Happy to have you all here. Today we're going to talk about wellness.

1:22 Wellness you've heard it in many contexts. But we're going to talk about wellness in terms of your health and in terms of the health of those that you love and those that are around you. So first, Happy New Year. Welcome to 2024. This is the year that's new, and we haven't seen it before, as you can imagine. So welcome to 2024. Happy New Year. I believe life is about being of service to others. I believe knowledge is power.

2:03 I believe leaders can change the world. You are in this room today and on zoom because you're leaders. This is part of our leadership masterclass series and most of this has to do with what I call masterclass medicine. Now you've heard about medicine in different contexts. But this is leaders learning how to do better and how to grow the healthcare delivery system and to help others in in medicine. Much of what we're going to talk about today is going to be based on my, I now can say 76 years of service, of life, and seven and 51 years of medical practice.

2:43 And these are my opinions. I encourage you to use your computer browser liberally, meaning that feel free to look up information that we may talk about, because I think that's how we all learn, and that's how we all grow. And certainly, you'll be able to ask. and answer questions as you need to. I have to know. Well, it's not uncommon, every January, that there's a tradition in this country, and we call it New Year's Resolutions. And if you look at television, you're going to see ads about how to lose weight, how to be healthier, et cetera, et cetera.

3:24 We're going to talk about that, but we're going to do it from a different perspective. We're going to talk about something called wellness. And we'll describe what that is. We're going to talk about, I would say, a good solid three to four resolutions that we recommend that you consider. And included in that is something called radical self help. And we'll describe what that is. And then we'll leave you with some suggestions about what you can do to stay healthy. So, as we talked about the New Year's weather looseness, most of them will involve Eating. And what I'm going to suggest to you, to put it in context, basically, when we talk about being healthier or wellness, we're talking about controlling the controllables.

4:11 What do I mean by controlling the controllables? Basically controlling yourself. You cannot control other people. And I've said it many times, I used to thought, think that I was controlling my children. I was not. I would make suggestions to them, but they basically did what they did. And, and it's sort of like, It's about you controlling yourself, basically. This, this is really what we're talking about. And it's based on the theory that if you get yourself in order, you can then help to help others to get themselves to the level that they should be. And one of the things, one of my favorite prayers that I've learned many, many years ago, I think back when I was in college is the serenity prayer.

4:54 And I've, I've had this on my office wall many times. And basically it's the, and many of you have heard it, it's the God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. The courage to change the things that I can, and the wisdom to know the difference between the two. What's my point? My point is, it is a full time job, 24 7, for you to be in charge of making sure you are doing the right things when they should be done. You don't have time to try to change other people. Because changing yourself and taking care of yourself is, is a 25 24 hour a day a situation. When we talk about change and when we talk about wellness and we talk about self or the individual, I refer to it as the person in the mirror.

5:43 And this is the person I have a conversation with every day in terms of what I should or should not be doing. And I would suggest or recommend that, that you basically do the same. And when we talk about change and we talk about the individual, I'm talking about it on three different levels, mental, physical, and spiritual. So what do we mean by that or why are they connected? Well, our beliefs, what we think, and if we go back to what I call the prefrontal cortex, the right side of the upper part of the brain here. Our belief affects how we think and how we think affects how we feel and how we feel affects how we act.

6:27 My point is, if you're not feeling well mentally, if you're a little down, if things aren't working well for you, go back and look at what your belief system is. What do you believe that may or may not be true? Because what you may find out is that your belief is in error. And just by changing your belief, flipping the switch, I like to say, you can change the way you feel. There's wellness. You've, you've heard this term a lot, wellness. A lot of times when I send an email. I'll say stay safe. Be well. What does being well mean being well means being at your very best mentally, physically and spiritually.

7:14 Yes, we think about ourselves physically all the time. We want to stay healthy. We want to eat right. We want to exercise. We want to lose weight. That's great. But I will submit to you that the two other forms of wellness are just as important as physical, if not even more. And that's the mental part and the spiritual part. The mental part and the spiritual part. Mentally, obviously, is what you think, or how you view other people. Again, your beliefs. Spiritual, many times, is how you think, how you feel in an alignment. with a spiritual belief system, right? As a Christian, you believe certain things.

7:56 And you know when you are or are not in alignment with those beliefs. And so, you want to put all those together, and what I like to say, you want to be balanced. You want to be balanced. You want to have each one of those three areas. So when we talk about wellness and if we were to do a wordle, this is sort of like what we have here, it talks about it in all those different, all those different areas. Happiness, relaxation, enjoyment, science, hygiene, care, mental and physical exercise, et cetera. And again, wellness therapy then is treating ourselves mentally, physically, and spiritually, and thereby being able to help others.

8:41 Because again, remember the beliefs. Life is about being of service to others. So this is not just about This is about us getting ourselves together so that we can then reach out and be helpful to others. So one of the, one of the resolutions that I'm going to suggest to you is something called radical self help. And you may not have heard the phrase before, but radical self help means being serious and, and, and committed to taking care of yourself. Being serious and committed to taking care of yourself. And why, why is this such a big deal? Because many times we are taught, well, you know, it's selfish.

9:25 to think about taking care of yourself. And I'm going to suggest that it is not. Yes, you can be selfish, but radical self care means that if I stay healthy, I can help other people stay healthy, mentally, physically, and spiritually. If I'm balanced, I can help other people be balanced, mentally, physically, and spiritually. It's sort of caring for the caregivers. If I'm a, if, assume that we're all caregivers. as leaders, then if we take care of ourselves, we can help to take care of other people. So what can you do to bring more radical self care to your life?

10:06 You can see this young lady on the screen. She is obviously happy. Because she's involved with the radical self care. So what are some of the elements of self care? Let's just talk about them. And the way, one way to think about it is sort of the conscious and the subconscious. Our bodies, and I, I say this all the time, are like the most sophisticated computer you can ever imagine. It does so many things when we're awake. It does so many things when we're asleep, and all those things cumulatively make us effective as human beings. It's just extraordinary. And those of you young people or, or even not young people who are interested in a career, go into medicine.

10:47 The, the body is just extraordinary. And so the body operates on two levels. It operates on the conscious level and the unconscious or the subconscious level. Think about it being awake and being asleep, right? When we're awake, we're conscious. We, we do things purposefully but when we're asleep we are not conscious. We're not awake, but our body functions remarkably, and studies are now showing that the body is much more active when we're asleep than we ever thought it was. We used to think that everything sort of shut down. Well it doesn't. It doesn't shut down at all. As a matter of fact, some things speed up when, when, when we're asleep. So some, some of the, some of the Elements to look at with self care is getting rest.

11:31 Now, this is obvious, right? You know, if you have any kind of system, you have to rest that system. So again, think of your body as a super duper computer. You've got arrested. You've got to give a chance to repair itself. You've got to do analytics on it. You've got to make sure it's functioning properly, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Fuel, you've got to eat properly. You need food to put into the body, and ideally it should be good food or proper food, and so you've got to nourish the body. It would not help you to go, to not eat for six months or three months. And that's why when I hear the word fasting, I get nervous.

12:12 As a physician being very honest, I hear the word fasting. I get nervous because I'm saying, you know what, my machine is like my car. Now I can say, Okay, I'm going to let that dial get all the way to zero. And I'm not going to put gas in. I'm just gonna, I'm just going to take that risk. That's the way sometimes I sort of view fasting, but that's just me. That's just me. But, but you got to provide fuel for the body. That makes sense, right? Yeah. You gotta move. The body has to be active. The body was not meant to be sedentary 24 7. It is a functioning, active, living being. And that's the way God made us, and so that, that's our job to do.

12:54 And that sometimes we want to be still. All right, sounds a little paradoxical. What does that mean? That means that sometimes you just need to take a break. Sometimes you just need to sit, and you can call it meditation, you can call it prayer, you can call it yoga, you can call it anything you want. But sometimes you just need to sit and be, and be still and be at peace, be at peace. I call it prayer. You know, where I, I just have my, my, my little prayer for whatever I want to talk to God about. But, but, but sometimes you just need to stop, just need to stop and be still. Sometimes you need to speak up. Now this may be difficult for a lot of people who are uncomfortable speaking up particularly in certain situations, but I'm going to encourage you to speak up and you can do it respectfully.

13:42 Speaking up does not mean that you're rude. It does not mean that you're mean. It does not mean that you're a bad person. It means that you believe that there's been a misinterpretation or maybe someone has said something or done something that, that, that bothers you. And it may be helpful to speak up at the time. And number six is extremely important. You gotta enjoy yourself. You gotta enjoy yourself. So, radical self help, one of our New Year resolutions for 2024. is a balanced approach to mental and physical health, conscious and subconscious health. Many times, individuals who have trouble dealing with this or giving themselves permission tend to be what I call responsible people.

14:29 And what I mean by responsible people, they're the person in the family, many times the oldest, not always, but many times the oldest, but they're the ones who take care of everything. You know, they take care of mom and dad, they take care of the other kids, they, they just run things. And so they're the ones that mom and dad go to and says, okay, I need you to get your sister, blah, blah, blah. And I need you to send your brother over here and I need you to pick this up and I need you to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Oh, by the way, I need to go to the doctor. So you need to take me to the doctor. They're the ones who do everything. And if you're not that person, you know, people like that. Right? Many times, they're the individuals who get burned out the most, is my point. They're the ones who are most used because they're very, very good at what they do.

15:11 That's why they do it. But they many times end up getting burned out most or faster than everybody else. And so if you're one of those people, I don't want you to get burned out. You know, we need you. We need you to help all of us to do things that we want to do. Sometimes they may be single parents who feel like that my job is to take care of everybody else. And so I've heard the music term, I take care of myself last. You know, I feed myself last, I blah, blah, blah myself last. I'm going to suggest that, that you, you take a look at radical self care and you don't have to put yourself last. You know, you can just put yourself in the middle, just, just do it at the same time.

15:54 That is okay, is what I'm trying to say, because many of us as children, it's sort of put this guilt on us, on ourselves, because we've always done it, and so that's why we always do it, and it ends up being a problem for us as we get older, as we get into relationships, as we as we have to deal with illnesses on and on and on. So just think about that as a part of radical self help. Or radical self care. So again, the physical, mental, and spiritual, I won't go into every single detail, but again, remember to sort of physically take a walk, again, it's giving yourself permission, and that's the term that I use. I'm going to give myself permission to do nothing today.

16:36 I'm just going to sit, I'm going to watch TV, I'm going to, I don't know, take a walk, go to a movie, whatever. But I'm going to give myself permission. And I use that phraseology. Because only you can do it. No, you don't, you don't get permission from somebody else to do stuff. You have to give yourself permission because you're your own worst enemy. Believe it or not, and maybe enemy is too strong a term, but you're your own, your own worst deterrent or, or, or, or problem. And that's why you need to give yourself permission to eat a little ice cream because it makes me feel good. I'm not a bad person if I eat ice cream. You know, and so my point is, give yourself permission to do things, walk on the beach, climb a mountain.

17:20 I have a good friend who, who likes to ride bikes on mountains, you know, mountain bikes and stuff. And so he frequently posted on, on Facebook, his mountain bike rides. You know, that makes him feel good. So he gives himself permission to do that. He's, he's an attorney, a retired attorney friend of mine, member of St. Stephen's, I might add. So, so, so give yourself permission to do those things. The same thing with mental and the same thing with emotional. So, so my, my point about radical self care, it is not being selfish. Many times we were taught, oh, you're doing this for yourself. Oh, you know, you, you shouldn't be selfish. You can do both. You can do both.

18:01 You can help others, but you can also concomitantly at the same time help yourself, and that's okay. Because we need you to be healthy and wealthy and wise. We need you to be spiritually stable. We need you to be physically and mentally okay, because you're human, and we humans are limited. We're limited. So take care of yourself and be okay with that. Finally, in terms of just dealing with self care, then I'll move on is spending time with other people that make you feel better, that make you feel good. And, and notice, I, what, what I mean by that is one of the things that I do is that I stay away from negative people.

18:45 This is just me. This is just me. My definition of a negative person is, as you might imagine, somebody who's always negative. You know, anytime you ask them a question, so how you doing? Oh, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know, they always have something bad to say about somebody else or whatever. I tend to stay away from folks like that. I, so, and concomitantly, I tend to gravitate toward positive people. You know, because positive people make me feel good. And so what I'm saying is, you can use some intentionality with that, and that's okay. Practice gratitude. Simple, simple, simple, simple, simple. I call it the thank you. Just say thank you. Don't have to make a speech.

19:25 Don't have to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Just say, thank you. I, I've told this story before. One of the things that I learned and my patients taught me is, you know, I'd operate on somebody or treat some, some medical condition and the patients say, Oh, Dr. Choctaw, do you like blah, blah, blah? Do you like tamales, or do you like cornbread, or whatever, I, you know, and I said, sure. And they said, oh, I'm, I'm gonna make you some cornbread. I'm, I'm gonna bring you blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm gonna do whatever. And, and they would do that when I first started praying. I said, oh, no, no, no, that's okay. You don't have to do that. No, please. It's, it's all right. It's all right. You know, that's fine. And what I learned was, that I was denying that person the opportunity to give to me.

20:10 It's a big deal for patients to Dr. William T Choctaw, MD, JD: give to their physician. And I would, I would argue you can plug anything in that blank for physicians, minister, friend, caregiver church member, blah, blah, blah, blah. Giving is a joy. And those of you, and most of us in this room, if not all of us do give, we know that joy. You volunteer for the food bank. You feel good. You're tired at the end of the day. But you feel good. You feel good because, oh, I saw Mrs. So and so, Mrs. So and so, and they were so happy, and you should have seen the kids, and blah, blah, blah. It's a joy. And so my point is, let people give to you. And when they give to you, just say thank you. Just say thank you. Don't need to make a speech.

20:53 Just say thank you. So always practice gratitude because believe it or not, when you give something out that's positive, you really do get that back. You really do get that back. Cut out the toxic stuff. Now that's, that's probably self explanatory. If you practice it or if you're around people who practice it, just sort of stay away from that. And that tends to be negative stuff. tearing people down, ridiculing people, et cetera, et cetera. And have a change of environment, you know, get in your car and take a drive or take a walk. All those things are important. Self care the ability to say no, and I won't go through all of this.

21:33 But one of the things that I would tell my patients who would come in who were very stressed, and sometimes patients would come in and I'd say, what's the problem with Dave? And they would talk for like 30 minutes. And the reason is that they just wanted to talk to someone. And many times, I would say to them, well, you know what? I think you need to develop the ability to say no. As simple as that appears. You just need to say no, because you're the go to person. You're the one that everybody comes to and says, can you do this for me? Can you do that for me? How about this? How should, what should I do about this? I need you to come over here. I need you to have, I need you to be a part of this meeting or this organization or this and this. And sometimes they'll say, you know what? No, thank you.

22:14 I, I appreciate it. Next time, maybe I'll, I'll be able to help you or I'll be able to participate, but I, I just need a little quiet time. I just need to rest or what, whatever the words are, because a lot of times our stress is us trying to please too many people at the same time, and we can't physically and mentally do it. It's not that we don't wanna do it, but it's, but we have limits is what I'm trying to say. That we, humans have limitations and we have to recognize those limitations. And to make things better, sleep, get more sleep. Now, I'm a big believer in sleep, and I certainly have much more respect for sleep than I used to. And I say this parenthetically, we physicians, particularly we surgeons, pride ourselves.

22:58 Pride ourselves in not sleeping. We would brag about, well, how many hours of sleep did you get last night? Well, I just got two and I did a six hour operation and blah, blah, blah. And, you know, that, that was an odd badge of courage. Stupidity! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Stupidity! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Sleep is one of the most important gifts that God gives to us. And, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out That the more rested you are, the better you perform. But anyway, I, I, I digress. I digress. But, but true, true. I, you know, it's certainly true of surgeons. Now, obviously we had the job that where, where many times you, you don't get a lot of sleep, but, but you want to get as much sleep as you can because you can't nearly perform as well.

23:47 And I used to pride myself, my goal was four hours. I said, if I can get four hours, I can do it. I can do any operation. I can, I can drive anywhere. Don't know. If I get less than four hours, now, now I've got problems. Now, I've got problems. So my point is, don't have silly things like that. Just get your 7 to 8 hours of sleep every night, even if you are a surgeon, even if you are a surgeon. Now, I know sometimes you get calls in the middle of the night or whatever, but, but that, that should be your goal. Sleep, by the way, and we continue to learn about sleep, as I mentioned before, two things happen during sleep. One is a process of the day's event. Now you unconscious, right?

24:28 You've cuddled up with your, your teddy bear or, you know, however you go to sleep or whatever. And, but, but your brain is still going. Your brain does not shut down when you sleep. You're unconscious. You don't know what's going on. You're sleeping. Your brain is going through everything you did that day. Organizing what it needs to organize, throwing out stuff you probably need to forget, you know, and setting you up and preparing for the next day. Think about that. Think about the amazing God made computer that does this sort of stuff, right? And the other part of that is restoration energy. Rest, rest, rest. We all need rest, mental, physical, spiritual because once we get that rest, now we're ready when we wake up and the sun is rises to take on that next day and do the best job possible.

25:22 There are many different types of techniques you can practice to go to sleep. You know, some people like to do yoga, meditation some people play music it's suggested not to look at the clock. I must admit, I always look at the clock. I always know what time I go to sleep. I always know what time I wake up. I'm a clock type person. I'm just, I'm just that way. I, you know, I tell people, I've said this before also. You know, if I have to be at a meeting, I'm going to get there early because I hate being late. I'm just one of those time people. And limit caffeine. Now, caffeine is interesting. Some people say, well, you know, I can't drink coffee at night because it keeps me awake. I can drink three cups of coffee a night. If I drink, let me, let me qualify.

26:03 If I drink a watermelon coffee, right? If I drink, if I drink water, if I drink regular coffee, then it's not any good. But if I drink watermelon coffee, I can sleep like a baby. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. And so one of the things that you've heard people say, and I think it does sum up what we're saying today is pray more, worry less. You've heard that, you know, a lot of people say. And I think that's true. I think, I think simplicity many times is the essence of greatness. Pray more worry less. If I'm worrying, then that means I'm not praying enough. And if I'm praying, that means I'm not really worried, right? Because at the end of the day, only you can take care of you.

26:47 Only you can take care of you. Other people can try to help. And they can give you advice, and they can say nice things to you. But it's ultimately your decision about how you feel and how you interreact. My opinion, okay? Be intentional about cell phone use. Be intentional about cell phone use. Now I will admit, I will admit because my wife is in the room, I will admit, I'm one of those people that it took me a while to get to the smartphone. And when I say took me a while, there was a time when my wife and I were with the kids and the grandkids. These are grandkids from San Diego and I brought out my silver flip phone that I adored.

27:32 I adored that phone. But it stopped working. I'd flip it on and I'd push the buttons and it wouldn't work. And my grandkids sing. Grandpa, you know, what, what is it? That was, you know, I said, it's my cell phone. And my son, Preston, just laughed at me. But I couldn't get it fixed because they didn't have any more parts for that. And it was that old. I, I know it's, it's embarrassing, but it was that, but it, it was a gorgeous phone and I, and I loved it. But, but anyway, anyway but so, so I, I, and I then gravitated to the iPhone thing. But my point is, We can get to the point that the machinery controls us and we need, my personal opinion, we need to always be in control, not only of ourselves, but our environment around us.

28:21 And that's where the pray more, worry less comes in. Can't control other people. Don't, don't even waste your time with it. It doesn't mean that you don't give advice. It doesn't mean that you don't help. But you can't control them, is what I'm trying to say. But, but so just, just be intentional about cell phone use. That, that and there are different ways to do that, you know, you can turn it off certain times or whatever. Now, a lot of you have jobs where you are on call 24 7. I did that most of my life, I, I, I get that. But still, just, just be aware of that. It starts with with our young people. And if you think that you are controlled by the cell phone, I guarantee you that the kids are even more controlled by it.

29:04 And maybe control is too strong a word. And I'll admit that. And that may very well be one of my prejudices. But just be aware of it. Just be aware of it. Because when we get into the whole chatbot thing or the artificial intelligence thing, you may want to be able to have some, some distinction between what you do and what the, what, what, what the artificial intelligence does. And a lot of times you ask yourself, well, sort of what, what, what's wrong with this picture? You know, if you have three kids that are out in the, in the sun and beautiful grass, but everybody's got their face buried in a cell phone. I, you know, I'm going to leave it up for you to decide whether that's a good thing or not a good thing, but I'm just saying, be aware, be aware, right?

29:48 Just about done. Matthew 18, 22 takes you in, in, and most of you know this, to a conversation that Jesus was having with his disciples where they were talking about forgiveness. And I have always believed that one of the most important gifts that we're given is the ability to forgive, you know and I think it's probably one of the ones that we use the least. I struggle with it and I think all of us struggle with it, but I think it's important, is my point. That one of the reasons why many times that we are stressed is the inability to forgive. Someone, again, cuts you off on the freeway, or says something to you in a meeting, or says something to you at work, or whatever, I'm just making up stuff let it go.

30:35 Just let it go. Don't try to figure it out. Let it go. Because then you just get more upset. Why did he cut me off? I haven't done anything to him. I don't even know. Don't even go there. Don't even go. Just say, God bless you or whatever you want, but just forgive. Just forgive. That if you were able to do that then that would just be one less thing that you have to be concerned about. So as you look at your new year and as you look at this year being better than last year, because I think every new year should be better than the last. I think we should always grow, and that's what I consider growth to be that, that, that we look at being more well that we look at taking better care of ourselves mentally, physically, and spiritually that we forgive and that we all practice this.

31:20 being well. I always like to end with my basic principles that I've said it before, but that God is in charge. And again, worry more, I mean, worry less and pray more. No bad days. I don't have bad days. I got rid of them about 30 years ago. Cause I figured the days were only good were only bad if I said they were. That I define what my days were, just like you define what your days are. Why in the world would you want to have a bad day? I don't. So get rid of them. Just, just get rid of them. You'll be amazed if you change your life to the extent that you never have another bad day. Think about that. Think about that awesome power that, that, that God has given us to say, you know what? Things, things are good and, and you embrace that.

32:02 Don't sweat the small stuff. Most stuff is small. I've said this before also, the most of the times I've figured out that when I get upset or about to get upset about something, over 90 percent of the time I am wrong. Not 50 50, 65 45, 90 percent of the time. So it's not even worth it, right? So I said, just let that go. I mean, that just didn't make sense. As I mentioned before, forgiveness really is therapy. You want to give a treatment to yourself? Just go around forgiving folks. Forget those folks that irritate you or bother you. And finally, everything is a relationship. Relationships are based on three things. Mutual respect, mutual trust, good communication.

32:45 If you have those three things, you have a good relationship. If you do not, you've got work to do. This Masterclass series is also in podcast form. I would encourage you, if you want to be able to go back and review these series and many others to go to patron. podbean. com forward slash h w w p. And that's the Health and Wealth and Wives podcast with Dr. Choctaw. And we have done over 40 podcasts in the last year or so and you would be able to get more of this information. And finally, be the change you want to see in the world. Are there any questions? Yes, sir.

33:29 Oh, help, help, self help and self care are basically the same. Any other questions? Okay. Yeah, any questions from, from, from the Zoom audience? While we're waiting, I would encourage you to to really listen to us on podcasts. There'll be some very interesting interviews. The distinguished Reverend John Nickens is one of those interviewees, and you'll learn about all of his secrets and why he's the great person that he is, well, try not to fall asleep on that one. Oh, I, oh, Reverend Nickens, are you with us? Always. Thank you so much for joining us. But other people that have been interviewed are Pastor Dockery, Tony Dockery is one of the persons interviewed, Sister Lorena Chalkshaw has been interviewed.

34:18 You really don't want to miss the podcast. So again, go to podbean. com. You can download the app in your app store, the Podbean app, and you can access all the podcasts. If there is nothing else, again, I want to thank you for being with us today and wish you a very, very happy new year. And we'd like to ask Pastor Rivas to come and dismiss us with a word of prayer. It's okay. We're family here. Amen. Thank you, Dr. Jackow, for helping us. Amen. And helping us too.

35:00 Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day. You've given us a lot. We understand that this is the day that you have made. And it is our choice, oh Lord God, to enjoy it, to delight in it, and to have dominion over it. For you even made it for us. Oh God, not us for this day. Therefore, Lord God, to you, we'll give you all the praise. I thank you for the life of Dr. Au, his ministry, Lord God, his family, and for the opportunity you've given us, Lord God, to enjoy him and to be bene beneficiary of his now. Thank you for all the people who participated. Give us that, what we have heard. That power, oh Lord God.

35:41 For even you said that you have given us not a spirit of powerness, but of power, of love, and of a sound mind. In the name of Jesus, let us be that light, being healthy, being well. In your name we pray. Amen. Amen.