A divorce can feel like an ending, but sometimes it’s the first quiet doorway to a different kind of life. I’m sitting down with author Eli Brackenbury, whose newly released book Finding God at Fifty begins with an ordinary morning in an empty house and an unexpected, unmistakable peace. What follows is a raw, grounded conversation about what happens when you stop trying to muscle your way through pain and start practicing daily surrender to God.
We talk about the difference between religion and relationship with Jesus, especially for anyone carrying religion trauma or fatigue from feeling like you have to perform to be loved. Eli shares how chasing recognition, career wins, and even education still left him unfulfilled and how a simple “be still” message became a turning point for spiritual growth, identity in Christ, and a new direction in midlife.
If you’re navigating grief, rebuilding after divorce, questioning your purpose, or stuck in the same patterns, we break down practical steps for daily surrender you can try tomorrow morning. We also get honest about wilderness seasons, storms, and the fear of change, plus how faith can deepen when you stop demanding certainty and start taking the next right step.
Subscribe for more conversations like this, share this with a friend who needs a reset, and leave a review so more people can find Release Doubt, Reveal Purpose. What’s one small “right turn” you can take this week?
If you want to connect with Eli or purchase his book, visit his website at: https://elibrackenbury.com/ or connect with him on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elibrackenbury/
To download a free chapter of host Sylvia Worsham’s bestselling book, In Faith, I Thrive: Finding Joy Through God’s Masterplan, purchase any of her products, or book a call with her, visit her website at www.sylviaworsham.com
Transcript:
So here’s your host, Sylvia Warsham.
Hey, librarian, it’s Sylvia Warshamp. Welcome to Release Doubt, Reveal Purpose. And today’s Eli Brackenberry. And he is an author of his newly released book, Finding God at Fifty. And just as the title suggests, he found God at 50. He had his mother’s death and two divorces and just multiple challenges. It just finally gave him the idea that maybe he should surrender to the Lord daily. And that’s been his purpose for quite some time. That’s the theme of today’s podcast interview. And I’m hoping that whoever’s listening will realize that it’s never too late to find your divine purpose. It’s never too late. Everybody says, Well, if I don’t find it at 20, if I don’t find it at 30, I’m a failure. You’re not a failure. Life is a journey. It’s always been a journey. We’re caught up in what society and the outside world tells us, which is to achieve and to keep going and to not look back. And that’s just not the journey that the Lord has for us. So without further ado, Eli, thank you so much for joining us on Released Out Reveal Purpose.
Oh, absolutely. Sylvia, thank you for having me on. I hope that people can take a little bit about what we talk about today and implement it into their life and actually see what can happen when you do that. I’m looking forward to the talk.
Me too, because daily surrender sounds so flowy on paper.
Sure.
And yet you and I both know that that concept is a lot to unpack in 30 minutes. So would you honor us with that amazing story of transformation that took you from where you once were to the purpose of daily surrender and writing this amazing book?
Well, you mentioned it in the beginning, you know, after after my second divorce, well, I’ll say this. So a lot of times people will see a world event and say, I remember exactly what I was doing when that occurred. And, you know, we’re coming up on the anniversary of 9-11. So people will have those memories and think about where they were when that tragedy occurred. And so for me, you know, my second divorce became final uh January 12th of 2024. And my ex-wife had moved out of the house that morning, and I spent the remainder of the day cleaning it from top to bottom, turning over furniture, vacuuming up dust bunnies, all the things that you would do to give yourself a clean space. And I I was tired at the end of that. So I picked up my phone and believe it or not, went to TikTok, like we all sort of do, to escape from reality. And um, my algorithm had always been the funny things, the jokes, the pranks, the things that can make you giggle and laugh and feel lighthearted. Um, but the first thing that came across my my page was the scripture of Psalm 46, 10, which is be still and know that I’m the Lord your God. And it kind of shocked me a little bit because that wasn’t a natural thing to come across my feed. And so, like an individual that that might react on feeling, I liked the video because I was thinking, yeah, no kidding, I’d probably need to do that. And the next one that came across was Exodus 14, 14, which is very similar in the point where be still and I the Lord, your God will fight your battles for you. And I liked it again, and then I probably put my phone down because it was kind of freaking me out a little bit. And I woke up the next morning, January 13th, and I walked from the bedroom to the kitchen, and then the place was empty, it was echoing, it was a beautiful day out, sun was shining, and so I brewed a cup of coffee. And in a time in my life where I should have felt very stressed out, I should have felt very chaotic, kind of like an everyday life for a lot of your listeners. As the coffee cure cup was hissing at me, I was looking out my window, and the cover of the book is a great represented representation of that moment where I was looking out my kitchen window and I felt this immense amount of peace. Like Jesus was there, uh, his hand on my shoulder, probably drinking a cup of coffee too. I don’t know. But it gave me this level of peace that I can’t explain. And that became the journey of surrender where he says, you know, and I retrospect look back to the night before where I was asked to be still because he will be with me. And I didn’t understand that concept until it gave me that tangible feeling of peace. And so I just said, okay, I said, let’s do this. And so the the cover of the book is the coffee on the windowsill with a silhouette of a man walking down a pathway towards the light to the unknown. But the poll was that we’re gonna do this and it’s gonna probably be very uncomfortable for you, but I got you. You don’t have to take care of these things anymore. And so I I decided at that point that if just a simple ordinary moment in my kitchen was gonna give me that piece, what if I happened to listen to maybe what his purpose was for me or what his identity is for me? Because I’d spent so long not necessarily resisting it, but ignoring the poll that he was probably tugging on me all the time. And so that’s that’s where it started.
I love that. I can’t tell you how much I love that because I can relate as someone who had that pivotal moment, that small moment that gives you a glimpse into what daily surrender with him looks like. And for me it was I had a cup of coffee in my hand as well. And it was Christmas morning. It was December 24th, Christmas Eve actually, of twenty eleven. And I had started dating who had become my second husband. And I asked the Lord very frankly, is this who I’m meant to marry, who I’m meant to love. Because I had prayed for years after my first divorce, and just having gone through a really bad divorce, and I had a little boy and the dating scene where I was at was nothing to really smile about. I was also working in corporate America at the time, and I remember sitting there and the light was coming through the top window of like the door. And I it’s almost like he was in the room with me. And and the the voice I heard inside my heart and in my head was, yes, he’s your gift. He’s the gift I have sent you. And I remember knowing that I was going to marry him, that my life was going to change, and that the Lord was going to be guiding us in this journey. And my husband is part of this mission that I’m on now, in that he’s the breadwinner, kind of financially supporting this mission, because I struggled with that, letting go of that life because that was a type A, very accomplished, like high, high achiever. And to go from that identity to the one I currently hold was not an easy journey. And it was like what you were saying, walking with them. Were you saying, if I show you what’s going to happen, you may not want to walk with me. But because that is something that would scare us as human beings. Like the change that comes with saying yes to him.
Yeah.
Saying yes to stepping in faith, even though we can’t see the path before us. But we know he’s with us. Right. So can you break this down for us, Eli? What happened from that moment to writing the book? How did you start putting one foot in front of the other?
I think it started, you know, I go back to the jobs that I’ve had and the fulfillment that they didn’t provide for me. Yes, they gave me money to take care of bills and things I was responsible for, but they never fulfilled me wholly. I always felt like I needed to do more, to be recognized by the world because of the things I had done. I was raised in the Catholic Church. I was raised in traditional religion. And there’s a Scottish proverb that says, for every mile of path, there’s two miles of ditch. On one side of the ditch, you have religion, and then the other side of the ditch, you have uh rebellion. And so it doesn’t matter how old you are, and and rebellion isn’t picking up your pitchforks and your scythes and and burning a town down. Rebellion is not paying attention or hearing what God wants from you, you know, and so I never understood the Catholic faith as maybe others would. It just similarly to the work, it didn’t resonate in my heart. And so I had to mature as an individual and I had to mature in my faith in order to understand that uh the plan that God has for me is not my own. And to be willing to accept that. And I think in this day and age, a lot of people think if I cannot touch it, if I cannot talk to it, if I cannot manipulate it uh to in my own favor, then it must not be real. And that moment in my kitchen where um I said, I’m gonna trust you. I don’t know why. I don’t know why, because I I’m in a panic. I have to be able to do this. But an analogy I use very often is that if you take four left-hand turns, you end up back where you started. And so that day in my kitchen, I decided to go right, not because I wanted to, because it was very uncomfortable for me to get out of my own lane, but I was being asked to do that. And I had tried everything up to that point, you know, reading self-help books, going to therapy, going to counseling, and trying to figure out what was wrong with me. And those were all somebody else’s opinion. And the thing that I never did in my life was give God an opportunity. Like if you, you know, and he didn’t have to perform. A lot of times people say, If God, if you are real, then do this. Well, he’s not a game show host and he’s not a vending machine where you get to put in the money and pull the lever and your prayers get answered. If that was the case, everybody would be living fantastic lives. But I found that having faith in him on a daily basis allowed me to get out of my way and see what his purpose was for me, to see what my identity built in Christ was, because I had built it on my own. And so that began sort of the book because I had gone through, you know, two divorces. My mother passed away in 2016. So that there was a significant gap between my mother’s death, which is a big deal, to finding God and everything in between. It was almost like when she passed away, and her final words to me before she went up to have surgery was to make your mark. And I said, okay. She always thought education was important. So I went and got a bachelor’s degree and three master’s degrees, and I felt unfulfilled. That wasn’t the mark that she was talking about. And so as I kind of wrote these things and wrote this story, they became not theories on how I got through it. They became lived experience, which I think validates surrendering to something you cannot see because I was that skeptic. I was the guy that said, This doesn’t make any sense to me. I’m not going to do it because I can’t talk to you. But you can. You can. And so that sort of started that process. And I got about eight chapters into the book. And my wife now at the time, she was my fiance, and I said, You’ve been writing this thing, and I’m curious what your opinion is. And, you know, she read it and said, It’s not finished yet, is it? And I said, No. And she goes, You have to keep going because people want to hear a very down-to-earth testimony on how Jesus can change your life. And, you know, the finding God at 50 part was just the beginning. That I mean, that was the first, the square zero in your board game where everybody starts there. And you get to roll the dice and you get to move in the direction that he has for you, and things begin to change. And the best thing that happened to me was my very first girlfriend from 1986 connected with me and we connected together. And we are walking this journey together. And she became my first kiss 40 years ago and will be my last because that was part of God’s plan for me. And had I not surrendered to that idea, had I tried to fill in the holes in my life with something I wanted, I wouldn’t be where I am today, and I wouldn’t be with the love of my life today.
He has a really funny way of bringing us back to he redeems us in the place where we left him at.
That’s right.
I find it so interesting. He uh in my case, when you mentioned you were raised Catholic, so was I, because I’m full-blooded Mexican. And we didn’t really go to church, but I went to Catholic school my whole life. And so I heard it day in and day out. But I didn’t have a relationship with him.
That’s right.
So when I I got married the first go around, I was very young, and I was clearly not meant to marry him. And as I was walking down the aisle, the Holy Spirit himself said, Turn around and walk back, and I didn’t listen. I still did it. And nine years later, he had asked for a divorce, and so I found myself in a very precarious situation. I had turned away from the Lord for ten years while I was married to him. And because we would go to the Catholic Church and he would act one way inside the church and act a completely different way at home. And I saw it with a great deal of people. And I made the mistake of blaming the Lord for it. It’s often that we we have to blame someone for the way we’re feeling. When he asked for the divorce, it was when Hurricane Dolly was making landfall in South Texas. I still remember the day. It was a Wednesday of all days. My niece was being born in New Jersey to give you specifics. And our son was playing in the next room, and he just very quietly asked how long we had been in therapy. And when I said seven months, he goes, Well, I think we should get a divorce. Like, well, matter-of fact. And I remember being afraid, but also feeling relief. And within days of that decision, I heard a voice deep inside my soul that said, You and I need to get to know each other again. And like you, I’m a writer. I’ve published books. And I’ve always been a writer. I’ve had teachers since I was very young tell me, You’re a very good writer, you need to be a writer. And I let that go for so long. Like I told them no forever. And then finally I said yes in 2020. But going back to the original thing, I started journaling and I found them in my pages. And like you said, it’s very easy to talk to him. It’s very easy to pray to him. But as Catholics, we’re we’re not really taught to do that. We’re taught more about religion. I think at the beginning when you were talking, the ditch, that Irish proverb that you were referencing, rebellion on one side and religion on the other. And if we go back to Christ, really go back to his ministry, he was rebellious against religion when he was here on earth. He didn’t like all the rules and regulations because it kept his children from the father. And I find that that is why we have nonbelievers here on earth right now, why there’s such a struggle to speak about our faith because they associate us with people that have used religion to put others down for their own agendas. What is what is your opinion on that, Eli? I’d really love to hear it.
Well, traditional religion that I found for me, uh, and it didn’t work for me, was that you had to perform and there were rules. If you if you want to break down the Bible, you’ve got the Old Testament of 613 laws, and then that all started with the Ten Commandments, but then they were added on to. And then in the New Testament, you’ve got all about relationship. And, you know, Jesus came to this earth to fulfill the law, and he became the law that allows you to reach the father, because there’s no way to the father except through him. And so what sounded foreign at first to me, because of the way that I was raised, I mean, my dad, fantastic, fantastic man. He did the thing that required teaching his children right from wrong. And if you did this, it’s a sin. Sure. But when I was eight years old and my brother was 11, we got drug into confession and didn’t understand, I didn’t anyway, understand why I was there. So I had to go into the booth and talk to the priest and tell a lie, basically sin, so I could get out of there because I didn’t understand what that meant. And so all Jesus ever wanted from anybody was to follow him. And that’s the recruitment of the disciples. It was follow me. Not that you have to give 10% of your income to the church, not that you have to go to confession and be clean. You simply had to follow him. He takes you bruised, battered, and broken. And I was all of those things in that moment in my kitchen. And I was quiet enough and still enough to actually hear God saying to me, follow me. Follow me, follow this path, go right, right? Don’t keep going left because that hasn’t gotten you anywhere. And that’s not what I had for you. I had, I want so much more for you if you could just allow me to write your story or paint your picture with a blank canvas, because I’m a terrible artist. So I had obviously had struggles up to that point. And faith is not about rules, it’s about relationship. Your faith will grow when you no longer have to perform for God, that He will reward you to be if you’re present, if you’re present and you’re and you’re thoughtful and you live intentionally. Um, you don’t have to perform in order to get into the family. You just have to be present and be willing to surrender to the idea that your way is not the way to him.
Yes. Yes, yes, yes, to all of it.
But let’s break it down for the listener, shall we? Sure. On surrender daily. Give me some practical steps to do this for someone that doesn’t currently have a relationship with him, is stuck because of religion trauma and really desires to step into what that pull is leading them to. And I always call that the soul identity. Can you be yeah, can you give us some insight into that?
Yeah. So for me, you know, every morning that my eyes open up, it doesn’t matter what time it is, but if my eyes open up in the morning and I have breath in my lungs, that says to me that God is not finished with me yet, or else He would have taken me. So my day is already blessed. It starts from the beginning. I’m blessed with life. And I don’t know how many times I said, you know, the simple prayer in the morning was, you know, thank you for giving me life. Thank you for giving me opportunity. And whatever your will is, you know, I’m gonna do it because you gave me that gift. I owe you the gift of life. And so now I’m gonna be your steward of this new day. And going back to the job you might hate, you might wake up and go, I gotta go to that job again. But start off with the easy blessings. A lot of times people said, I’ve been praying for the winning lottery ticket for for years, and it’s never happened. Well, that’s not the reward that you’re looking for. The the money goes away. The status goes away. You can’t take it with you when you die. There’s no you-haul behind a hearse. So it’s it’s the thing that begins in the morning that if God is not done with you, he wouldn’t have allowed you to wake up from that coma that you spent six to eight hours in already. So that’s where the blessing started for me. And sometimes I would pray, I don’t even know what you’re doing in my life, but thank you. Every storm has a season, but it also runs out of rain. So we’re we’re right now in hurricane season. There’s hurricanes all over the place. But they won’t last forever. And so we are promised that God will not forsake us or abandon us. So when we’re going through these storms, what is it trying to teach you? Is it trying to pull you towards leaning on him to get through these storms because he will be in the boat with you? Is it trying to pull you towards the identity that he has for you if you’re willing to surrender the idea that you can’t have it? So surrender begins in the morning when you wake up and you’re healthy. And could things be better? Absolutely. Look at the state of the world. Things could definitely be better. But start living intentionally for your own purpose, for your own identity, so that you can start spreading that out. People will begin to notice that you have a peace and calm in an in a world that is meant to tear us apart. How do you do that? And then you become the salt on the earth that Jesus talked about in the Sermon on the Mount. You are the salt of the earth. You are the light on the hill. You don’t have to hide yourself. This is the identity I’ve made for you. Now salt in a vessel means nothing. But when you start to sprinkle how you did it, somebody may say, I would have never thought that was possible. I’ve tried A, I’ve tried B, I’ve tried C. He’s never been there for me. But are you there for him? Are you in his world or are you still in your own? And surrendering the idea simply says, I don’t know what your plan is for me, but I’m going to do it through your will. And it starts every day. And it starts with something very simple. Now, you might wake up on a Monday and wish it was Friday, but we’ll get there. Right. But the fact is, is you woke up, start small. It doesn’t have to be taken off into one thing. And you can’t just surrender your life once and be done, and you can go be on the rebellion side of that path. You have to be able to walk down the center with Jesus, pulling you, kicking, screaming like a child, because we all are all kids. And we’re reluctant to do this because we can’t, we don’t know the outcome. Well, you shouldn’t know the outcome. The outcome is everlasting life and glory in him. And how you get there, start small. Take those steps forward. And it’s uncomfortable. That rebuilding process he’s he has planned for you is very, very hard, very difficult. I didn’t understand what was happening, but I simply went back to those things that came to me through social media of all things. To be still, stop kicking, stop screaming, stop resisting, stop listening to the world. Who lies more to you than you? So it’s very true. I got to where I was because I didn’t do those things. And I am a much better person now because every day I’m looking for some way to glorify God. And, you know, for me, a lot of these times the podcasts are there. I don’t care about the marketplace. I I’m not looking to be a bestseller. I care more about the message that just this average Joe, just like some of your listeners, had some issues, have gone through some things and have relied on one side or the other, but have never really walked the path. And so I just decided to walk the path. At least not in a row. Sometimes I’ll go right, sometimes I’ll go left a couple of times, right again, but the scenery is always different. The perspective that I have is always different because they’re through the goggles of what Jesus wanted for me all along. And he found me when it when I was ready for it. I didn’t find him in a church. I didn’t find him in a brick and mortar building. I found him in my kitchen brewing a cup of coffee. So these ordinary moments that a lot of times we take for granted, if we stop and think about really how blessed are we? How blessed are we? Not what I don’t have, but what I do, what I have been given, opportunity, opportunity to just live a life through him and glorify his name through other people just by existing. I don’t go around and knock on doors. I’m not trying to recruit people to come on the bus to heaven. I’m I don’t do any of that. I just become a different individual that God had intended me all along. And I share that with anybody that wants to talk about it. But it doesn’t involve polos and khakis and got to be perfect, because we are all imperfect and every day we’re gonna fall short. But understand that we’re forgiven for those things already. The blood of Jesus Christ counts for you. Uh, whether you believe it or not, you just have to take that step of faith and realize that it does count for me and I can do so much more with the things God had intended for me.
Such a powerful testimony that you had to share. And I’m really grateful that you did come on the show to share it. I also know that something that was popping up in my awareness to say, I always I have a feeling it might be the Holy Spirit kind of nudging me. But the message is this that regardless of what we have or don’t have, do we love God for who he is and not what we receive from him? And I think that’s a big one because in the wilderness season I just came out of, it was 90 days of being it felt like attacked from all sides. And I did not drown in it as I thought I was going to, although my rumination got pretty bad. I kept hearing the message do you love God for who he is or what you receive from him? And I have a son too that’s uh grappling with that particular question. Do you have any advice for people like us who may find ourselves in a wilderness and the enemy can be coming at us pretty hard? How do we how do we move forward from that and surrender daily?
From a biblical sense, Jesus had just done the Sermon on the Mount, preached to thousands of people, and was tired. And he told the disciples to get in the boat and go over to the other side of the sea. He was gonna stay and pray. And a storm came on the Sea of Galilee. That moment, your 90 days in the wilderness, that storm came, and Jesus palmed the storm by putting his hand up because he was with his disciples. Now his disciples were freaking out, and his disciples were thinking they were gonna die, but he says that’s not true because I’m here with you. And so we go through these seasons where we’re being tested all the time. And the thing that I have used ever since my first day of surrendering was this is just a test of my faith in you, and it’s strong. I’m not concerned about building my home on sand and worried about a storm blowing it over. The material that I’ve built my life on is the rock. And he’s in the boat with me in every storm. And I use that analogy a lot with people that I talk to, is that you know, these things that you’re going through will eventually blow themselves out if you can have the strength to hang on and lean on God because that’s what he wants from us, is faith and belief that he’s there with us. And again, coming from a skeptical mindset growing up the way I did, when I decided just to trust that thought, like it’s not gonna be any worse. It can’t get any worse than it already has been. So I started that walk. And with everything that came up, yes, I got attacked early on in the beginning because I was like a baby Christian. And uh, you know, the devil’s gonna come at you all the time, no matter how long you’ve been walking in faith. He’s gonna try to find a way to get you back on the other side. And I simply said, I don’t want to be on your side. I’m on I’m on God’s side, and Jesus’ blood counted for that, and so be gone with you. And so the storms, you’re never guaranteed a life that is trial-free, that is, doesn’t have any tribulations. You know, John 16, 33 says that very thing that in Christ you have peace. He’s overcome the world. You will always have trials and tribulations. We all do, regardless of what our faith level is. But to get through those storms, I think, in a better way and less scarred about your thoughts on faith, is actually rely on the faith for the first time. Don’t rely on yourself to get through it entirely, that he’s in the boat with you, that he will calm the storm if you rely on him. And so they’re just tests of the strength of your faith. And the more that you go through these things, the more that you begin to realize that with him in your life, with Jesus in your life as the backbone in the center, and you’re putting him first, he’s gonna reward you with that, the proper ship captain during these storms. Because I don’t know how to drive a boat other than turning the wheels, but he knows. And so I give that up to him because that’s what he wants for me. He’s testing my faith. Nope, I don’t have a lack of faith here. You you take care of this for me. And um, you don’t walk away from a burning house thinking he’s gonna come put it out for you. That’s not the same thing. What that means is that uh you have accepted the idea that you can’t do the things in life to control the storms that are coming, that you have to rely on somebody else to do for you what you can’t do for yourself. And it it sounds very simple. And in some ways it is, and in some ways it isn’t. Because if you do that, you’re gonna become somebody that you don’t know. And but because you’ve lived your the six amount of years in a sense of, I got this, I got this, I got this. And then when you realize that you don’t got this, what are you going to do? And and it sounds like, well, if if I do this, people will think I’m crazy or I’m weird or I’m different. But we’re only on this earth for a blip of time. And so the purpose of your life is to to live fully, live intentionally, live with love, compassion. And where does all those feelings come from? They’re coming from that surrender point that you, your heart of stone is replaced with a heart of flesh. And it’s a significant difference because people that, you know, three, four years ago don’t know who I am now on the inside, um, but they’re very well aware of me being a faith forward individual now. And sometimes that makes people feel uncomfortable. And that’s okay because I’m not in it for the approval of man or approval of the world. I’m not in it anymore for that. You know, I’m trying to get the satisfaction and approval of God by the way that I live my life. And that has become my goal. And so every interaction that you have, every step that you take during the day, question who am I doing this for? Am I doing it for me for some temporary glory or some temporary feeling of satisfaction? Or am I looking for something long-term? And that and we approach all relationships that way, especially later in life. How how is this relationship going to satisfy me for more than a day? Well, I can tell you the relationship that has satisfied me since the beginning of this walk has been my faith in Jesus. And it is in and always going towards him is like in my marriage now, we’re both believing and putting Christ first. So, regardless of the issues we may have, we always turn to God and we end up coming together because of that, because we are running to him, maybe separately, maybe differently, but we’re always going towards God first. If you do that on a singular level, if you put God first in your decisions, your thoughts, your processes, you’re gonna get rewarded and you’ll think you did it. But ultimately what he’s doing is gifting you and blessing you because you now understand the power in Christ and what that does for you.
Wow. Wow. And I don’t want to go further from this because what you said needs to be heard and listened to over and over and over again. Any last words of encouragement? And Eli, if I wanted to purchase your book, where can I find it?
If you go to um elibrackenberry.com, uh, elibrackenberry.com, and there there’s you can you can purchase the book there. I do have some other ones in the pipeline that you might be interested in in different walks and different places you you may be in your life. There’s a contact me link on there. I love interacting with people. Sometimes I get the messages that say, I just heard the podcast, you’re crazy. But what it does is it opens up an opportunity to have a conversation. You know, the book is written just like this conversation. It’s very authentic, down-to-earth, not theories, but lived experiences and how I got through them. So you may be experiencing some or all of these things and wondered, well, if this guy was a skeptic like me, I might try to give it a whirl. And the other thing I’d say is that, you know, especially in the midlife, uh, you think your life is kind of finished. You’re done. You’ve raised your kids to functioning adults. That’s the hope. And uh, you know, you don’t have any purpose anymore. You your purpose was apparent, but that’s what you think your purpose is. And so the best advice would be not to give in to the idea that God is done with you or that you are unworthy, that you don’t deserve it, that you have to get your house in order and literally and figuratively, that you have to dress up, you have to go get a tux, but I can’t fit into a tux, so I gotta lose weight now. And once I do that, once I do all of the things, then I will come to God saying, Am I shiny enough for you? And He doesn’t care. He doesn’t care where you are in life, he’ll accept you as you are, whether you’re 30, 40, 50, 20, 60, doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter. Try something different. Don’t keep going left, wondering why you end up back where you are. Go right. Try something different and be willing to the idea that God isn’t done with you no matter where you are in your life.
Love that. Love that. Thank you, Eli, for joining us on Release. And to the rest of the listeners, remember Matthew 5.14 to be the light. Be the light like Eli has been the light. Step into it with faith. Even if you can’t see the path before you. I didn’t see the path before me either. And it does take courage to do that. And even if you don’t have courage, ask him for courage. He’ll give it to you. He’ll give you what you need for your journey. He provides, he loves us, he gives us the next steps when we trust them and surrender to him daily. Have a wonderful and blessed rest of your day. Bye now.
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