David:     I don’t know if you normally have something to write with when you listen to us, but this is one of those times when you should have at least a pencil or a ballpoint, something you could carry if you need to get one.

Karen:     And it might be good to have something to write on, like a piece of paper or a journal, because we want you to remember the things that we’re saying down this podcast.

Intro:      Welcome to the Before We Go Podcast featuring Dr. David Mains and his wife, noted author Karen Mains. Here’s David and Karen Mains.

David:     Here for some people this is going to be old because they know what going on a God-hunt is like.

Karen:     We’ve talked about this a lot in our ministry and our outreach and we’re using these months on the podcast to do exactly that. Leave behind to our listeners the tools of growth, the time-tested ideas so that we are leaving something of value before we go.

David:     You actually wrote a book called The God-Hunt.

Karen:     Right. This began as a spiritual practice in our family. We have four children, and someone taught me that what’s learned with pleasure is learned full measure. And so many of the spiritual practices that we tried to introduce and expose our little tribe to were cloaked within a game-like sort of capacity. So, the God hunt was very definitely the first time I think that we really began to work at what’s learned with pleasure is learned full measure. And so, we put it into kind of a game.

David:     And we’ve kept at it for I don’t know how long and it kind of goes in spurts. There are times when you’re very interested in God hunts and everyone’s excited then it drops off for a while. And you have to have it renewed in terms of your thinking.

Karen:     So, we are renewing our own thinking on the God hunt right now because we have gotten away from this practice. I mean you work on so many things in your life, but we want to share our renewal journey on the spiritual practice of the God hunt with our podcast listeners.

David:     You know the God hunt is seen God at special times and we came up with four categories. Sometimes a God hunt sighting will relate to all four categories at once. And sometimes it’s just one specific one. Sometimes you can’t tell what category it goes into. But let’s name what those four are. And here’s where we want you to start to write down them. Category number one…

Karen:     …is times we have obvious answers to prayer. So, we pray and ask God to work in our lives and lo and behold that prayer is answered. Now we can be very excited at the moment we recognize that God has answered one of our prayers. But being human, we are forgetful. And sometimes we don’t keep a record of the way God has answered our prayers. I’m cleaning out my closet space. I have 40 years of prayer journals. And before I ditched them all I thought I needed to read through them. And the God hunt practice goes way, way back in our lives. So, I have literally, in my prayer journals, a category of how God has worked in our lives over those 40 years. It’s an extraordinary reading experience.

David:     So, you prayed about this and God answered that prayer? That’s very clear.

Karen:     Clear answer to prayer. That’s one of the ways we seek God work in our everyday lives.

David:     Another one unexpected evidence of his care. Let me give a recent one there, Karen. I was here with Joel. Joel is our third born and he has kind of been transitioned because he lost his job. There’s a downscaling and he’s been trying to finish a novel. And so, I said, “Come on live with us,” but the house was kind of quiet because you were away in Texas. And Joel had finished a project and he was kind of just relaxing. We have a hammock in the backyard. It’s kind of the neighborhood hammock because I thought for sure who I’ll find in that hammock.

Karen:     Three little girls are neighbors, and their friends are often in the backyard either jumping on the trampoline or swinging in the hammock. We love to hear their laughter. It’s so adorable.

David:     Now, one into that hammock is in a large tree.

Karen:     Big oak tree.

David:     Yeah. And then the other end used to be in a tree but the top part of that tree got hit in a storm. So, it’s about an eight or nine foot stump. Big stump. And the hammock is stretched between those, and Joel went out. I saw him through the kitchen window. He kind of plopped onto the hammock and boom all of a sudden, the tree stump that the hammocks hooked to came down.

Karen:     Which had been very secure. You know very secure.

David:     Karen it was unbelievable, and it just missed him by a hair. That thing is so heavy you can’t even move it. We’re going to have to get a chainsaw to cut it up because the weight of it is incredible and the normal thing would be to land right on the person who was in the hammock. But it missed him. It missed him by a hair. I asked him, “Are you alright?” And he was kind of stunned. But man, it could have hit him right in the head.

Karen:     Oh, broken his back or something or whatever.

David:     Yeah, it could have killed him.

Karen:     Yeah, it could have killed him.

David:     He got up and he was fine. But you look at it and you say unexpected evidence of God’s care.

Karen:     Yeah, right there. There it was. Right there.

David:     And you can kind of say wow that was something, but it needs to be written down and dated which has been done. And so, not only do you have to have a pencil and pen and a piece of paper to write down these categories, we’ve only said two, so far are the four. But I would also say you should buy, next time you go to Walgreens or one of their drug stores, you would a grocery store that will have little tablets. You know when the guys play golf on television, they are always marking their score.

Karen:     Like the masters.

David:     Yeah, they put it in their back pocket.

Karen:     Also, that’s their little notebook.

David:     Yeah, that’s a big enough notebook to keep track of your dates and your God hunt sightings.

Karen:     Ok.

David:     But you have it there. You have a prayer journal which is a normal thing for you. But you need to record it because, again, what an incredible impact that would have had on our family.

Karen:     Yeah.

David:     Had he been totally either dead or maimed it some way.

Karen:     Yeah.

David:     Okay. So, that was…

Karen:     …unexpected evidence of his care.

David:     Yeah. Here’s another one: Help to do God’s work in the world. You want to give an illustration of that?

Karen:     Well, I think that I really experience this every time I’m writing a book. I feel as though I’m co-laboring because there will be an article that shows up here. Or there will be something someone tells me, a story someone tells me, or see something on television. It’s just crazy. Not because I’m such a great writer, but because I realize I’m not such a great writer. It just feels like the heavenly universe leans in to assist me in getting the work done as well as I possibly can do with my talents. So, I’m very aware of that category in my life. God working to help me do His work in the world.

David:     Obvious answer to prayer. Have that written down friend? Unexpected evidence of His care.

Karen:     Help to do God’s work in the world.

David:     Okay, unusual linkage and or timing.

Karen:     This is a little harder to explain. But generally, what we say when the unusual linkage or timing event occurs in our life is, we start to think, what a coincidence. Isn’t that a coincidence?

Well, I’ve become convinced at age 79 that there is really no such thing in the believer’s life as coincidence. Either we have a host of unseen angels who are helping us experience that “coincidence” or the divine. God is working in our lives in ways that we cannot ostensibly see, but we experience it when these events all come together and things work out in ways, we couldn’t have contrived them on ourselves, planned them by ourselves, or even foreseen. So, we all have this. Next time you say, “Well, what a coincidence” because of something that’s happened in your life. Just remember that you have a God who is ordering your days. And you need to count that as an item on your God hunt.

David:     Karen, do you think that everyone has God hunt sightings if they just start looking for them?

Karen:     Yeah, I think scripture really promises that. “If you seek me, you will find me. If you seek me with your whole heart.” I mean, Jesus says that in the New Testament. There’s plenty of evidence in scripture. And what we’re going to do for the next month of podcasts is begin to show people how much the God hunter, experiencing God, or seeing Him, or finding Him in the everyday is a part of how scripture teaches us to live.

David:     And we’re going to use just recent illustrations.

Karen:     The ones that happened between today and the end of the other podcasts that we’re doing. We’re just going to be very, very current with them.

David:     I would be interested in what other people are experiencing as well. It’s not just us who go on the God hunt. I’d like for many of the people who listen to us regularly to go on the God hunt and hear what God has done in their lives.

Karen:     Well, they can email us. Dean has that address. He’ll give it afterwards. One of the other things I want to say is we have four or five boxes of God Hunt books. They’re not doing anyone any good sitting in those boxes.

So, if you would like to write us or email us and say, “I could use a couple of those God hunt books,” we will mail them to you for a gift of any size, just because we believe in the ministry of this. And we want to get it into the hands of people who want to become practitioners of this spiritual discipline.

David:     We started this years ago with our children and they were really quite young. They were quite good at this.

Karen:     They became better than we were actually.

David:     So, well, I don’t know if they’re better than me. I’m not ready to give up.

Karen:     They were better than I was.

David:     Anyway, the children were very good at it. And we actually put together materials for children as well.

Karen:     So, we have a little booklet. It’s illustrated with children’s illustrations for children, and it’s called I Spy God.

David:     Yes.

Karen:     And it’s a way for parents to help them begin to go on the God hunt and then to write down their God hunt sightings in the I Spy God notebook. So, we can make that available to people as well if they’re interested in giving it to their grandchildren, using it with their children, neighbors, you know. Any kind of environment that you happen to be with children.

David:     You just say somebody asked for it or send a gift if they want. Don’t have to send a gift.

Karen:     Yes. Don’t have to be happy to send it out.

David:     Yeah. Just to put things into perspective, Karen, when we started working on this, I wrote out a sentence: Going on a daily God hunt is a good way to bring excitement back to your spiritual walk. That’s a good sentence.

Karen:     Excellent sentence.

David:     I forgot I wrote that.

Karen:     I wrote a sentence too, so they can take their choice to repeat yours again.

David:     Going on a daily God hunt is a good way to bring excitement back to your spiritual walk.

Karen:     Oh, I think I like yours better than mine. People who create a spiritual discipline of hunting for God in the everyday will find him.

David:     Well, I think that’s pretty good as well. If we went too fast, Karen, one more time, go through those categories. Okay?

Karen:     Ok. Any obvious answer to prayer. Help to do God’s work in the world. Unusual linkage or timing. Unexpected evidence of his care.

David:     Okay. We should have some excited listeners next week.

Outro:     You’ve been listening to the Before We Go Podcast. And if you would like to write to us, please send us an email at the following address, hosts@beforewego.show. That’s all-lower-case letters, hosts@beforewego.show.

If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please remember to rate, review, and share on whatever platform you listen. This podcast is copyright 2022 by Mainstay Ministries, Post Office Box 30, Wheaton, Illinois 60187.