Leah Sax:
Hello and welcome to episode 22 of Delight Podcast. My name is Leah Sax and this is Adam Curtis.
Adam Curtis:
Hello, Leah, I cannot believe that we are halfway through season five already.
Leah Sax:
I know, I like that you say I cannot believe all the time. And the other thing that you always say in every episode is let’s just push a bit deeper. Anyway.
Adam Curtis:
I know! And you’re gonna hear that again. And what’s really annoying is I can hear myself say it and I’m like, say something else, Adam. But it’s already come out of my mouth.
Leah Sax:
We have Jodi Whitehouse as our guest this week on the topic of generosity. She is a mom of three boys and she wanted us to say founder of a charity because she is CMN, but she’s actually the CEO and she’s like, Leah, you can’t say CEO. It’ll be too cringey. I’m like, No, Jodi, I’m gonna say CEO. So if you’re a friend of Jodi’s listening. Hello, welcome to Delight Podcast. It’s really funny. We started off with these like four episodes and it turns out we’re now on episode 20 – What did I just say? Adam? 22.
Adam Curtis:
Yeah, let’s say 22.
Leah Sax:
And we’ve got all these wise people around us because last week, who did we have last week?
Adam Curtis:
Oh, we had our friend Simon Dickon talking about contentment. And it’s just such a joyous episode. It’s joyous because Simon really helps us dissect this cultural sort of moment that we’re living in, and why people are so struggling to feel content, even though we’re the wealthiest we’ve ever been. And he just helps us see how true contentment can just be found in wrestling, in Jesus. And it’s just, oh, it’s a tonic to the soul.
Leah Sax:
Further tonic will be provided by Jodi Whitehouse, our guest. So let’s head over to Jodi.
Adam Curtis:
I’d like to welcome to the podcast, Jodi.
Jodi Whitehouse:
Hello. Hello. Good to be here.
Adam Curtis:
Oh, and it’s good to have you here. And before we dive in, Jodi, to find out how you became a Christian, can you first tell us what you do with your your 9 to 5? Yeah, sure.
Jodi Whitehouse:
So I am married to Adam, and I’ve got three boys, young boys who keep me very busy. And alongside that I also have a full time job, and I run a charity that cares for children and adults who are born with a very rare skin condition that I was born with too. So that’s what I do is my day job alongside being a mum and a wife.
Adam Curtis:
That must keep you very busy then.
Jodi Whitehouse:
Yes. Very busy.
Adam Curtis:
Could you tell us how you personally came to know the Lord Jesus for yourself?
Jodi Whitehouse:
Yeah, sure. So I grew up in a Christian home and my parents took me to church every week. I went to a children’s kids club at church, and just through hearing the gospel, I came to understand that I needed Jesus. And at a very young age of six, I heard about the promise that Jesus gives to those who trust in him of eternal life and heaven all of a sudden became very tangible to me. And at a young age I just said, well, I want to be friends with Jesus, and I want the promise of eternal life with him, and I’m going to give my life to the Lord. And so I did. So it was a very baby like faith. But that’s all we need to know who Jesus is, to know the gospel. Anyone can understand it when Jesus opens their eyes. And that’s what happened for me when I was six. But then now, as I’ve grown older and I look back over 43 years, I can very much say that my faith has grown over the years and my love for Jesus has grown and my knowledge of him. And there’s been times in my life where I’ve loosened my grip on Jesus, but thankfully he’s kept his grip very firmly tight around me. My love for him has grown, and my acknowledgement of what he did for me on the cross really impacted me as an early adult. So kind of in my 20s, I really understood the gravity of sin and just the desperate need I have for knowing Christ as my Saviour. So even though I gave my life to Jesus when I was young, I’d say it wasn’t until my early adulthood life did I truly grasp the depth of sin, and just therefore the amazing gift it is to be forgiven of our sin and to have relationship with Jesus and for God now, to see me as redeemed and see me as righteous because of Jesus work on the cross.
Adam Curtis:
And kind of maybe push, push into that. As an adult, you came to grasp the gravity of sin and the amazing grace of God. In what ways did that bring any transformation into your life?
Jodi Whitehouse:
It really was a transformation. I think when God revealed to me the state of my heart and the desperate need for his continual forgiveness each and every day, it made me run to the cross so much faster. So I would run to the cross, and I would be acutely aware of the sin in my life. And as I battled through one type of sin, another one would rear its head. So I’m never sinless. There’s always sin that I’m battling with, and there’s always sin that I’m giving to the Lord. And I think the Holy Spirit is just continually prompted me just to be very aware of the sin that I have in my life. And therefore, I think as my understanding of the gospel and my knowledge of Christ and my knowledge of His Word has grown, I am now sprinting to the cross quicker each and every day, rather than that little jog of when I was a teenager, I think. And I still had my life in control, but I didn’t because Jesus needed to have control of my whole life, not just part of it. And I’d say that’s where there was this transformation of giving all my life to him, and not just part of my life.
Adam Curtis:
Oh, that is absolutely beautiful. I love that imagery of when you’re a teenager. It’s a little jog, and the more you get to know the Lord Jesus, the more you sprint.
Jodi Whitehouse:
Yeah. Truly is.
Adam Curtis:
And what kept you going? What’s kept you sprinting and running and moving forward in your faith?
Jodi Whitehouse:
For me, it’s being connected to a good gospel church. So it’s having a church family around me that I am accountable to and that who can encourage me and support me just in the day to day of running this race. And so I think having good Bible teaching, being plugged in to a loving church community and doing life with like minded believers is what’s really helped me in my faith. You know God’s Word and the church is an absolute gift, and the more we plug into it, the more we get out of it. So it’s not just about going and. Sitting and hearing God’s word, but actively being involved in the church. So true. Serving in ministry. So I run a grace group. We call them like house groups. Every week there’s 14 women who come round to our house. So to open my home up and to sit down and study God’s Word with these women is just an absolute blessing. And actually, it’s a bit of battery life midweek to keep you going. And it’s so important that I have that it helps with my growth of understanding His Word and to love Jesus more.
Adam Curtis:
So, Jodi, you mentioned earlier about the charity which you run and about how you have a skin condition, CMN, how is the Lord Jesus been with you as you’ve come to terms with that, as you’ve dealt with that?
Jodi Whitehouse:
I was born with this rare skin condition that’s a big dark brown birthmark that covers 80% of my body. And so for the first 15 years of my life, I had 30 plus operations here in Liverpool to try and remove this skin condition and missed three years of school. And I very much, throughout my childhood, felt isolated and alone and rejected, and did experience some forms of bullying from other people who weren’t within my community of friends. And so throughout my childhood, I wrestled with the Lord as what I’d say because I believed in God and I knew he was a good God and a faithful God, and he doesn’t make a mistake. Yeah, I was living with this condition that no doctor knew what it was and they’d never seen it before. And I was having all this surgery to try and remove it. And so there was an internal wrestle going on. I probably didn’t realise that at the time, but I certainly looking back, I know that was the case. And I remember at the age of eight, sitting in the bath and looking down at my big birthmark, and I decided to pray to God. And I remember this moment vividly. I prayed, I closed my eyes and said, Lord God, I know you’re good and you’re faithful, and you hear and you answer prayer.
Jodi Whitehouse:
So I’m going to pray that when I open my eyes, my CMN is going to be gone because you’re big enough and powerful enough for that to happen. Amen. And then truly believed that that was going to be the case. And when I opened my eyes and looked down at my skin, I couldn’t believe that God said no. Because when we pray and something doesn’t go our way, we think God hasn’t listened, but he has. And his answer was no. And that’s because he knew what was best for me. And now, again, looking back over my life, I can see it’s because of having a skin condition that actually I’ve clung on to the Lord so much more because I’ve understood that this life is fragile, that we don’t know how long we have to live, that actually, this is a messed up world where there is disease and poverty and sin. And so therefore, I have kept my eyes more firmly fixed on Jesus and what he promises to eternal life, that one day there’s going to be no more big birthmarks. There’s going to be no more disease and war and sin. And so again, like I mentioned before, eternity is so tangible to me because I’ve always kept a looser grip on this life and a much stronger grip on what God promises for eternity.
Leah Sax:
And I guess the founding of your charity was a natural outworking of this relationship with God and your condition.
Jodi Whitehouse:
Yeah, absolutely. So because I had grown up living with this condition that was so rare, I think God instilled in me a desire to support other people who were suffering. And so the age of 17, we discovered that there was another child living in Scotland that had been born with CMN. And that’s quite a long story. So if anyone wants to know more, they can speak to me separately to this podcast. That’s what we discovered, this child in Scotland and we got in touch with them. And that was back in 1997. This was the start of something we didn’t realise, and we began to support this family and this child. And from that moment, more and more families started to discover us and reach out to us as a family. And that’s how the charity was set up and formed. So 27 years on, we are supporting over 700 families in the UK who have had children born with the same condition. And we’re funding research and we’re raising awareness for the right diagnosis is given at birth. And so actually I now know why God said no when I prayed for him to get rid of my CMN in the bath when I was eight. And it’s because he knows what’s best and he has a plan for my life. And now, looking back, I can see that his plan was perfect, far greater than I could ever have imagined.
Leah Sax:
Thank you so much for being a part of the Delight Podcast family. Let us know what you thought of today’s episode by answering the question you can see next to today’s episode. In your app of choice, you know you can find us at Delight Podcast and DelightPodcast.com has a full transcript of today’s episode. Thank you for listening, liking and sharing.
Leah Sax:
Our culture celebrates acts of public generosity, comic relief, bake sale fundraisers, running a marathon for charity. But our culture simultaneously prioritises comfort having the latest bit of tech, multiple streaming services and a sofa you can get lost in. And generosity seems to frequently come out of the leftover budget when we are encouraged by someone else to donate. In 2013, 82% of people gave to charity, and in 2022, that figure sat at 66%. The average monthly giving in the UK is £27. It seems that public generosity is good in our culture, but privately we prioritise comfort. Jodi. Why are we not more generous? Why is it we struggle to do what we know to be right and good?
Jodi Whitehouse:
I think there’s so many answers we could give for this. So I think we may struggle to be generous because of the cost of living to start with. So as costs rise and on the news, we hear how we’re going to struggle to be able to look after ourselves and in the next financial year, that can almost scare us to give generously. So we might say we can give a little bit, but we’ll keep some money back for the rainy days, for the moments when we might not be able to afford, when our boiler breaks or our car fails at MOT and so we can start to hoard money. Or I’ll use the word save money out of a fear of us not having it should something go wrong and there’d be a cost we’re not expecting. And so I think the culture we live in, we’re trying to think of ways we can save money. We have Martin Lewis telling us ways we can like, cut corners and save costs and get the best deals. And because that’s the culture we live in, we try and probably work towards managing our money, which seems sensible and right and good, which I would agree with all those reasonings. But what that can do is I’d say, and for me, I think about personally, it can sow that seed of thinking I need to make sure I’m okay before I think about what I can give. So what can start us is a good motive, can quite quickly flip, where we can then start to be a little bit more self centred. That’s quite hard word, but trying to say it in a sensitive way that we think about ourselves and what we need and what we may need but don’t know about yet. And then beyond that, we will give the leftovers so we can be generous. But I think people have pulled the purse strings in more recent years.
Leah Sax:
That’s so helpful, Jodi. I think all of us can identify with those truths you’ve just spoken. How can we understand the Term generosity?
Jodi Whitehouse:
I think generosity is really when we lovingly give what we own to others. So it’s we want to give. We want to help. We want to support people. And I think for me, when I think of generosity, I almost automatically think of financial giving. So what money have I got left in the pot that I can give? But if we stop and think about it, I think generosity goes beyond that. It’s about giving of ourselves. So not just about the money that’s in our bank accounts, but it’s also giving of our homes, inviting people in. It’s giving of our time, it’s giving of our emotion. So it’s getting alongside people and supporting people and being at where people are at and almost joining their journey in life and figuring out, how can I support someone I know dependent on what they need is it might not be they need finance. It might mean they need your attention, your support, providing resources that you’ve been blessed with, opening up your home, cooking a meal so generosity can outflow in many different forms in life.
Leah Sax:
Why should we be more generous? Is it more than it’s just the good, the right thing to do?
Jodi Whitehouse:
I think we really have to search our own hearts on why we are generous, and it’ll be slightly different for each one of us. I think if I really set my own heart on when I have been generous to other people, it can often come from a place of wanting to feel needed or wanting to be seen to be generous, as in doing good. At times. It can feel like that when I’m giving. Subconsciously it can be in quite a controlling manner, comparing what others have given. And so therefore, what will I give? So it doesn’t come from a place of just generous heart. It comes from a place of comparing and contrasting to what other people do, to make myself feel better, to make myself feel like a good person. And so why should we be generous? We should be generous because everything we well, I believe everything that I’ve been given is being given from God, everything I have. And so therefore, I want to pray that I will. Keep my hands more open than close on the things that I own, because actually I don’t own it. Everything I have is God’s. He has given it to me, and he’s entrusted with me the things that I have for this moment of life that I am in. And so I want to open up my hand to be able to give what’s being given to me, to others.
Leah Sax:
I don’t own it. Everything I have is God’s and I want to give that. That is beautiful. Can you give us any examples of what generosity looks like in the Bible?
Jodi Whitehouse:
In the Bible, we read Jesus life and his example. He shows what true generosity is. As I read about Jesus life, and as I grow my love for him, I become more awestruck by his generosity, not only to people who he walked with and he engaged with while he was here on earth, but also the generosity to me through the salvation that he gives to me free of charge. So all my debt and all my sin, he is being paid for and I have been forgiven. I am debt free because of what Jesus has done for me on the cross. And so, out of the acknowledgement of what Christ has done for me, springs a sense of wanting to be generous to others, because the generosity Jesus has poured and lavished upon me, the outworking is that in my life should be that I want to be generous to others. I want to show people the gospel through the words I speak and through actions. And you see that through Jesus and what he teaches. He teaches us how to be generous in hospitality, through relationships, and through financial giving. And so certain parts of the gospel that we can read, where Jesus really digs deep into these elements of generosity and how we can live that out in our day to day life.
Leah Sax:
How can we live that out in our day to day life? You know, if I’m at home, if I’m about to go and do the shopping, if I’m sat at home, what is an example of some biblical generosity of living that out?
Jodi Whitehouse:
So if you look at, for example, generosity in hospitality. So I said before that when we have a grace group, I open up my home and we have these 14 girls come in. And it’s very much people who I love doing life with and who I naturally connect with in life. But Jesus goes beyond that and he pushes the boundaries and also makes generosity become a little bit uncomfortable and to hurt. So actually, that’s what generosity is it when it hurts us to give. So we’re giving beyond what feels comfortable. And so when I think of generosity, of hospitality, what Jesus teaches in Luke 14, where he talks about who should we invite into our homes when we’re going to give a banquet, we need to be inviting in the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, basically people who nobody else wants to do life with. We need to be looking beyond our friendship groups, beyond the community that we’re comfortable in, and we need to be looking at how can I open up my home? That’s a gift from God to others. Who can I invite in to my home? Who can I invite in to do life with? Who may be shunned from society, may have felt rejection even as I felt growing up, who may not have a circle of friends who can be a support to them.
Jodi Whitehouse:
Who can I invite into my home where I have to give more of myself? And I think that’s the challenge for me. And so on a Sunday morning, me and Adam, my husband, like to invite people around before church because our service is until 11:00, so it’s quite easy to have people over for coffee in the mornings before we go to church. And so we actively try to think like my nature would be, or my natural instinct would be. I’m just going to invite my two sisters around. I’m just going to invite my best friends round. But actually, I want to think beyond that. Who can I invite? Even from my church community who I can develop friendships with, open my home up to, who I can, provide support and care and give my time to? There is a sense in which Jesus pushes us to think of hospitality beyond the immediate, and think of it supporting and caring and serving others outside of our natural community.
Leah Sax:
You talk about generosity and friendships. How can we be generous in all our relationships?
Jodi Whitehouse:
Yeah, I Mean, this is a toughie. Okay? I like this is a challenge for me even as I share this. So again, in all relationships, I’m going to go to part of the Bible and part of the gospel, which people by want to avoid when we think about relationships. So when we look at Matthew 18, we see where Peter asks Jesus, how many times should he forgive? And Jesus blows his mind with. His response not just seven times, 77 times. As in, we should have a heart that wants to forgive and that is tough. So when I think of relationships, I think of the people who I love, who I want to do life with, who I can benefit from, who can serve me and I can serve them. I might not want to do life with. I might not be hospitable in my relationships to people who’ve hurt me, to people who’ve rejected me, has done something that is impacted my life negatively. They’re people that I don’t want to be generous to within my relationships. Yet Jesus gets to the heart and the root of this issue that actually, Jodi, just stop a minute and take a step back. You have rejected me. You have tried to be the king of your own life and not allowed me to be the king of your life. You have decided to go your way and not my way. And so actually, if Jesus can forgive me again and again and again every single day, and be patient with me, and to persevere with me and to still love me unconditionally, then when I acknowledge that, and I’m awestruck by the forgiveness Jesus gives to me, then the outflowing of that should be that I can forgive others, that I can truly forgive, which we may not necessarily feel, but it’s an action that we should undertake and pray that Jesus will just change our hearts, that we can forgive quicker and more easily than maybe we have done yesterday or the day before.
Leah Sax:
That’s quite a call on the heart,
Jodi Whitehouse:
Isn’t it just
Leah Sax:
Let’s go to perhaps what we might perceive to be the most obvious area of generosity. How can we be generous with our money?
Jodi Whitehouse:
Uh, this is a tough one again, isn’t it? I think we’ve said that it’s quite easy to give the leftovers of what we have because it doesn’t, again, impact us directly. And it doesn’t hurt us because what we’re given makes no difference to our lifestyles. But again, I’m going to take you to Luke 21. And here we see when Jesus talks about how this poor widow gives everything she has as an offering to God. So she gives her two small copper coins, all that she had. And then next here, you’ve got these rich dudes who rock up and they give what may seem more generously, but actually it’s not impacting their lives in any way. It is the leftovers. What does Jesus say? Well, this poor widow has put in more than all the others. What she has given has come from her heart. What she has given is sacrificial. What she has given has impacted her day to day life. She has nothing because she’s given it all to the Lord. And so when I think of financial generosity, when I think of financial giving, that challenges me to think about what am I prioritising in my life when I’m looking at my like annual budget spreadsheet? How much am I giving? What am I putting aside for social? For going out, for meals? For having those coffees with friends, buying ridiculous things from Amazon? Like where am I prioritising my spending? I know that I’m being selfish with my money, and so therefore I need to pray that God will loosen the purse strings and he will help me to give, not give out of guilt, but give out a thankfulness that everything I have is being given to me by the Lord. Therefore, I don’t own this money. It is. And so let me give to others in a way that he’s given to me.
Leah Sax:
I’m going to ask you a little bit later on some wisdom calls into how to be generous, but do you have any personal examples of generosity that you’ve seen or that have impacted you?
Jodi Whitehouse:
So I would say when I think back over my life, rather than talking about me and how I’ve given, I have been impacted by the way I’ve seen other people give. You know, the Lord has taught me a lot through examples of people who’ve come across my life, and I’ve been astounded by their generosity. And it may be financial generosity, it may be through time, it may be by people being hospitable. Even last week, right. Here we go. Last week. And I didn’t even think of this until right now. I was asked to go and share my testimony to a group of homeless people in Liverpool. And so on a Sunday night, I met this guy who has faithfully for years. I’m going to say, I don’t know exactly. How many years, but over 20 years has faithfully served the homeless people in Liverpool. He has given his time every Sunday to go and open up a door, go into a warm space and provide food for homeless people in Liverpool. No one knows what he’s doing. It’s not on social media. He doesn’t shout it from the rooftops. He is humbly serving homeless people in Liverpool and it does impact his life. So he gives financially. He’s given his time. He’s spending time with people who he necessarily wouldn’t spend time with. So he is giving of himself every Sunday evening. And that challenged me because when I think of my Sunday evenings, I get the kids to bed, I stick my slippers on and I put the telly on and I’m thinking about my own comfort. I’m not challenged to think about how can I be utilising my time better here. And so the generosity that this guy was pouring out on homeless people in Liverpool like, impacted me, because I saw that actually he was given above and beyond. And where was that coming from? When I spoke to him, his love for Jesus shone. He couldn’t help but talk about what Jesus done in his own life. And the outpouring of that was the way he was serving homeless people in Liverpool.
Leah Sax:
What a beautiful story. I love that he’s not shouting it from the rooftops. He’s just serving his King, by serving these people of Liverpool, I’d love to move on to some practical ways in which we can be more generous. You’ve mentioned so many beautiful things, which I can imagine might feel overwhelming in terms of time and cost and sacrifice. Any practical tips on how we can be generous or more generous? Where would you suggest we start?
Jodi Whitehouse:
Right. We all need to start by examining our own hearts, and we all need to start by praying and asking God to reveal to us where we tend to be selfish, where we tend to hoard. So our like I’ll say how it works out for us. So for me, I would more than likely hoard financially where for my husband he always says let’s batten the hatches down. He likes to be in the comfort of our own home and not invite that many people in, because when he does, it finds it quite exhausting. He needs to recharge his batteries so we know where our weak points are. For me it would be financial giving could hurt. For my husband, it would be opening up, our home could hurt. And so what we have to do is as a couple, we need to be accountable to each other and pull each other up. But also we need to pray together. We need to pray that God’s will enable us to be generous right across our life, not just in one aspect, but we want to give ourselves our whole selves generously to others. So we need to pray the Holy Spirit will prompt us to reveal to us the areas in our life which we can be that little bit more self-centred, and ask him to soften us and change us to become more Christ like. So point one first and foremost, you’re on the starting blocks. You need to pray. And then secondly, I would say start off small because we need to be thinking about how can we serve people in our day to day life.
Jodi Whitehouse:
So think about the people God has put in your life. Think about the people you cross paths with daily, whether that’s work colleagues, whether that’s neighbours, whether that’s mums on the school gate and actively look for ways in which you can serve those people. It might be that a mum at the school gates had a new baby and you say, shall I cook you your dinner tonight? And I’ll bring it round. A simple act of kindness. You’re already cooking a meal. You’re just going to make it bigger and share the portion with this other mum. So look at simple ways you can serve people in your life where you know it will have a huge impact on them, yet it’s only given a small amount for yourself as God starts to soften your heart, to be more generous. As you start to actively look at ways you can be generous, your heart will continue to change, and you’ve got to pray that God’s will can continue to change you where you give more and more of yourself throughout this year. What a good way to start at the beginning of 2024, as we think about generosity and how we can give. Pray that God will soften your heart, that you become more generous in every aspect of your life. Start small and allow God to do the work in your heart.
Leah Sax:
Do you think if we are giving of ourselves and of our heart, can we be too generous? Is there a healthy way or a wisdom call on that?
Jodi Whitehouse:
I think we can, but I think that comes back to what’s causing you to be generous. So I’d say for me, last year I experienced burnout and I’ve never experienced that before I. Didn’t even know it was a thing until it happened to me. But what I realised was I was given so much of my time to others. Actually, what was making me do that? It was almost like I was trying to be the king, the rescuer, the saviour of other people’s lives. It was so that I felt good that I was able to save other people. It made me feel needed. So actually, the reason I was being generous was not from a pure place. It was from a selfish place. And actually what I needed to do was to stop and to bring myself back and to think, Jodi, God has given you time and space and energy, but you aren’t God. There’s a cap on how much time and space and energy you can give. So because of that, I’ve now tried to be wiser in how I serve others. And so I will think in my diary, what am I going to do this week to serve others? But I need to be well, to serve others. I need to have energy to serve others. It needs to come from a place where, out of a joy of knowing Jesus, I can serve others. And so I need to make sure that my relationship with Christ is right first. So my motive for serving others is right. I think you can over serve and be over generous, but often that comes from a place which you need to grapple with and come to the Lord with, and ask him to ensure that your motives in being generous are pure and right and holy.
Leah Sax:
Should we give or how can we give if we are feeling overwhelmed and in a time of need, or a time of needing to receive help?
Jodi Whitehouse:
Often a trait and people who like to give of themselves is they’re not very good at accepting help. So I think at a time when you need to stop and reset, actually, that’s time to accept the generosity of others. And so the gift of church is key because actually, as a church community, we give to one another, we serve one another, we’re accountable to one another. So those moments where you just need to stop and rest and reset, allow others to save you within those moments. And because you allow others to save you, that enables them to save. Well, so I would say yes, stop, reflect, reset, rest, and then ask the Lord to help you to serve well. Ask the Lord to help you to accept people who want to be generous to you.
Leah Sax:
That’s so important that being able to receive generosity well, because I think it can often be a pride thing and a humility thing. Absolutely. Do you have any other further tips on how we can receive generosity? Well, push that pride aside.
Jodi Whitehouse:
I think we Need to pray for our prideful hearts because pride is the root cause of sin. If we pray about the pride that each one of us has in our lives, and often it goes unseen, we don’t recognise it. So we need the Holy Spirit to reveal to us how we are proud and pray that we will come to him with humility. When we humble ourselves, it’ll enable us to accept support and help and generosity from others.
Adam Curtis:
I just wanted to add into the conversation. Sometimes I wonder in our culture, if we sometimes think there’s a vulnerable person and there’s a together person, and it’s the job of the together person to help the vulnerable person and the job of the vulnerable person to be helped. And actually, like, surely as Christians, we can acknowledge that actually all of us are vulnerable and all of us have been given gifts by the Lord God which could go under the together category. And actually, we’re constantly sort of moving in and out of those relationships. We’re constantly going to be needing help and also constantly have an opportunity to show help. So it might be that financially, we’re not in a particularly strong situation, but we can still be a supporting ear. We can still be generous with our time and our energy in other ways. We’re constantly going to be needy and constantly going to be needed, which actually might be a phrase we took from the Friendship podcast.
Leah Sax:
That’s verbatim the Friendship podcast. Brother. Like, that’s literally the title of the friendship episode with Sara Snow.
Adam Curtis:
Well, right Leah, you can edit that bit out.
Jodi Whitehouse:
That’s so that’s so helpful, though, because if you think about like as a church or a church body and where you can all serve each other in different ways. So whether that’s time, finance, opening your home up, if we all are generous together, what impact that would have?
Adam Curtis:
I just want Jodi to be my friend. What a lovely lady.
Leah Sax:
She’s my friend.
Adam Curtis:
Hahahahahahahahahaha.
Leah Sax:
She’s my friend. And as you claimed, Simon Dickon in our last episode on contentment, I am definitely claiming Jodi as my friend on this beautiful episode. Talking of this beautiful episode, talking of it, let’s get back on point brother. I loved it when Jodi was explaining why we are generous because I don’t own it. Everything I have is from God and we give what we have received. It’s as simple as that. And it’s just way more than money, and it’s way more than a cup of tea in the room, and it’s way more than your time. It is a bigger picture of becoming more like Jesus. Yes.
Adam Curtis:
And she had a line in there was like, don’t give out of guilt. Give out of thankfulness. Why can we give out of thankfulness? Because everything we have has been given to us. Because everything that Jesus has won for us on the cross, like we have so much to be thankful for. So many material things to be thankful for, so many gifts and skills and talents and abilities. To be thankful for the very breath in our lungs to be thankful for, and the Spiritual relationship above all we have with the father to be thankful for. So if we have all this, this is our motivation for why we want to give. But also these are the things we’re giving.
Leah Sax:
Our salvation is free of charge, as I think Jodi said to us. And what a motivation to share what we have with others.
Leah Sax:
Jodi, we’ve loved hearing your wisdom on Delight Podcast today. Would you mind telling us as our bonus question this season, which Bible verse is currently bringing joy in your life?
Jodi Whitehouse:
I would naturally usually go to Proverbs 3:5-6. So trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. Thank goodness in all your ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct your path. And when we keep our eyes fixed on the Lord, and we submit to him, he promises to direct our path which gives us so much freedom. That is like kind of my all time favourite Bible verses. So there’s two in there and but then can I just do a bonus one if you don’t mind? Because I would say.
Adam Curtis:
A bonus will accept it. Sorry, sorry. Too much Bible here.
Jodi Whitehouse:
Yeah I could go on and on. 2024 this verse is my prayer. The verse is acts 20:24. However, I consider my life worth nothing to me. My only aim is to finish the race and complete the task. The Lord Jesus has given me the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace. And throughout this year, I really want to pray that I let go. I loosen my grip on this world, and I tighten my grip on the gospel. And therefore I’m living this life, running this race. To finish that, I’m complete the task Jesus has given me, which is what testified the good news of God’s grace.
Leah Sax:
Thank you so much to Jodi Whitehouse for being a guest on episode 22 of Delight Podcast. If you want to learn more about her story, the Carswell book passion for life has a little bit more about her story. We’ll link that in our show notes.
Adam Curtis:
And can I just say, like, sadly, we didn’t manage to get this on recording, but Jodi said that the podcast Delight Podcast was the poshest podcast she’s ever been on, and.
Leah Sax:
Just to be horrifically north south divide, it wasn’t because she’s a northerner and we’re a Southerner because. We were hyper aware. We do sound like some of the poshest English people on the planet. It’s because of the software and how organised we are.
Adam Curtis:
Whoop whoop. There we go. A bit of shameless self-promotion here.
Leah Sax:
Exactly Next week, our guest is Phil Short, and he is talking about discipleship. So please do tune in. This is Leah and Adam delightfully signing off.
Adam Curtis:
Bye bye. Goodbye.
Jodi Whitehouse:
You are the posh podcast I will.
Adam Curtis:
Yes. Come on.
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