God's Diamonds In The Ruff Podcast
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God's Diamonds In The Ruff Podcast
#163 S5 EP 37: Divine Steps to Rebuild Connections with Guest Branch Isole
Can damaged relationships truly be healed and rejuvenated? Join us as we welcome Branch Isole, a distinguished author and podcast host, to uncover the profound steps towards mending both personal and spiritual connections. We kick off our episode with a heartfelt prayer, inviting the Holy Spirit to guide our conversation and seeking forgiveness for any past missteps. Branch, a devoted child of God, shares his insights on how we are born as electrically charged beings with a spirit from God, emphasizing the importance of nurturing both our physical and spiritual selves to understand our divine purpose.
Guided by Branch's expertise and vast academic knowledge, we explore the essential seven steps to repairing relationships. These steps—recognizing harm, taking responsibility, expressing regret, feeling remorse, making corrections, ensuring no repetition, and embracing repentance—serve as a structured path to reconciliation and growth. Our discussion delves into the universal challenges of relationships, offering a roadmap to prevent returning to damaging patterns and fostering continuity and healing in our relationships.
In our final moments, we emphasize the importance of genuine change and living a truthful life. By reactivating our spiritual connection with God through Christ, we can discern real truth from falsehoods, enhancing our spiritual awareness. A heartfelt prayer for God's continued blessings on ministries worldwide wraps up our episode, expressing gratitude and love. Special thanks to Branch Isole for his invaluable contributions. Remember, we are all diamonds in the rough, capable of immense growth and transformation. Amen.
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Hello, hello and welcome back God's Diamonds in the Rough. Amen, we are so glad to be before you one more time. Amen. If you don't know who we are, I am Catherine.
Speaker 2:And I'm your boy.
Speaker 1:Michael, amen, and we are just ready, always ready, to be a blessing to you and be a light. Today we also have a guest with us, a man, and his name is branch isol. Did I say that right, branch?
Speaker 3:you know I'll answer that. Yeah, we pronounce it isolay, but isol is what everybody says. Isol is what I respond to isolay I like it isol it.
Speaker 1:I like how you say it, how to pronounce it the right way. I can't promise I'll say it again. I weighed up, but that's alright no problem, he is here and will you say hello to everybody?
Speaker 3:good afternoon or good morning. I'm glad you're here with Michael and Catherine and I. I hope we've got some things that you can take and use in your life.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so Branch, he's a author and a podcast host, a man, and he's a child of God, a man of God. We're all children of God and ready to get into the conversation, but y'all know what we got to do first. Yes, we got to pray, so let's get it.
Speaker 2:Let us pray. Dear Heavenly Father, our Lord and our Savior, Jesus Christ, we welcome your Holy Spirit into this conversation. We pray in the name of Jesus. Your Holy Spirit, just have its way. We first also ask that your forgiveness for anything we might have said, done or thought that's not pleasing your sight, that your grace and forgiveness cast it back into the pits of hell where it came from. We also ask that you counsel any assignment of the enemy that will be sent also back into the pits of hell where it came from, for it has no power, no dominion. But your word said that we do. We ask you right now just to have your way In Jesus Christ's you right now, just to have your way in jesus christ, holy and max's name. We say thank you and we say amen, amen and amen amen, amen.
Speaker 1:So, branch, if you would please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about who you are. And um, um, just, um, just. How can you, how you can really answer this answer, the topic of um, the connection between um Christ and relationship.
Speaker 3:Well, that's a good place to start, because that's where it all starts. So we come into this world as an electrical charged unit. That's a scientific fact. We are an electric charged unit and God, as creator, has created a spirit which can live in that electrical charge unit, can live within the body. So we've got come into this world as a combination of mind, body, soul and spirit. And that spirit that we each have within us, because it comes from God, it is grounded in tree.
Speaker 3:So when we're born, we have a spirit within us that comes directly from God and allows us to understand truth in our life. That's the beginning of our relationship, and when we're born, obviously we have a whole lifetime of physical and human relationships ahead of us. So what we're striving for as we grow and mature in the Word is an understanding that to be the best person I can be, I need to be both the best physical person I can be and the most spiritual person I can be. And if I can achieve that, then I understand the things of my world, but I also understand the why behind the things of my world.
Speaker 1:Amen. So you're a graduate of Texas State University and you are a graduate of University of Houston and you hold an Oxford MA Theology degree from Trinity Bible College. So, with all of that said, I see you have seven steps to repair, or seven steps of relationship repair. How does all of that work together in you coming up with these seven steps?
Speaker 3:Good question, and the reason it's a great question, catherine, is because we are all involved in relationships. Today, our whole world revolves in and around relationships that we have at home or outside of the home.
Speaker 3:A lot of times, you know we hit rough spots or issues in our relationships. And as I'm talking about these relationship steps, keep in mind that not only does this apply to our relationships as humans, as people. It also applies to our relationship with the Lord. Okay, so when we're out of sync in our personal or business relationships, like when we're out of sync in our spiritual relationship with the Lord, then our world is out of sync, and so we run into problems and we run into issues that cause, you know, a lot of distress within relationships. Okay, so why is that and how do we correct it? A simple fact that the seven steps are not the way to change the relationship. The seven steps are a guide in how to proceed to get away from the issue that keeps coming up and how to move on. So what happens is we come into the world, we're born, we live, we grow up, we have all these relationships and we hit rough spots. So how do we challenge those or change those rough spots? Rough spots, so how do we challenge those or change those rough spots? Well, here's the normal scenario of people who are experiencing problems in their relationships, in their lives. The reason they're in that place is because they don't know what the next step is after can't we just move on on? Get into an argument or a fight or conflict in one of your relationships and the first thing we want to do is pull away. And then, at some point, especially in a marriage situation or a partnership situation, you know one person does something that offends the other person. The other person you know responds with however they respond to that situation and so it plays itself out and we get to the point okay, well, are we going to split up? Are we going to make up? Right, and most people want to make up.
Speaker 3:So, problem comes, they go. Okay, well, I'm sorry and I accept your apology. Now what, right? The problem is, we all grow up emulating the behavior we saw as children. So, however, our adults in our lives responded to each other in the relationship. That's the cues and that's the example that we know to use in our relationship. Right, and that's why people just can't grow past the issues that they have in their relationship. Once we understand that, I have now some steps that I can actually use in real time and in my real life. You go to that place. Well, what's next? Right? Can't we just move on? So let me give the seven relationship steps, and then I can answer any questions. How's that sound?
Speaker 1:All right, sounds fine, sounds good.
Speaker 3:Okay. Step number one you have to recognize that harm has been done, right. Recognize that harm has been done, right. Pardon me If I have to cough. It's a little deep in the forest and we have pollen just raining down on us this spring. My allergies are kicking in, but I'll try and cough away from the mic, right, okay. Okay, first thing we need to do is recognize harm has been done, okay.
Speaker 3:Okay, first thing we need to do is recognize harm has been done, okay. Once we've done that, second thing we have to do is I, as the transgressor, have to take responsibility for what happened. I can't deny that it happened and I have to take responsibility that it was my thoughts and my words and my actions. Once we've taken responsibility, then we have a step of regret, right, I regret what I did and the harm of the discomfort that it caused you. Next up is remorse. Now that we actually have some regret for what we did, we must fill that regret. We fill it with remorse. Now, the interesting thing about remorse is regret is sorry for what I did to you. Remorse is I feel sorry for myself that I behaved in that way, right, because that's the first step of forgiveness that comes into the process. So we've got recognition, responsibility, regret, remorse.
Speaker 3:The fifth step is redress, or correction. Right, you have to change whatever the inappropriate behavior was. We have to correct that so that it doesn't happen again. Brings us to step number six, which is repetition. We must ensure that that kind of behavior is not repeated again.
Speaker 3:And the seventh and final step, and the most important step, because it leads to forgiveness, is repentance. Right, but a lot of people, you know, think of repentance and they think of it in a religious kind of connotation. Well, in this connotation, repentance means changed future behavior. And not only am I not going to repeat that inappropriate behavior in the future, I'm going to encourage and insist myself to make sure that that action not only is not there, but it's been replaced with a better action.
Speaker 3:So with those seven steps, we can help people on the path of struggle to know okay, we want to correct this, we want to stay together, we want the relationship to continue to grow. The only way we can do that is to not go back to our old pattern of behavior. But in order to not go back there, we have to have someplace else to go. But in order to not go back there. We have to have someplace else to go. So we go to these seven steps, and these seven steps help us on the path of the steps we need to take to reconciliation.
Speaker 2:Wow, you know, and I was just sitting back listening, and one thing that really got my mind rolling is the first thing that you said, and it lines up with the seven steps is the fact that we are all electrical units.
Speaker 2:We are all electrical units and, if you think about it for a moment, in the physical realm as well as the spiritual realm. But the physical realm is, if you code, and that's part of life is the way they resuscitate you or bring you back is they put a defibrillator on you, which is an electrical charge to bring you back and that lets us know that we do have some source of electrical running through our body. And you can relate that even to the spiritual realm, because the electrical or defibrillator that we use as a spiritual is the word of god. We need that charge of the word to get us back on the right track. And you write the repentance. It does not necessarily mean all the time. The religious factor because we had to be understand that we had to operate in the word of God when it comes to repentance is not doing those things again without behavior.
Speaker 3:Right, changed future behavior. That's. That's what repentance is asking for forgiveness, repentance in action is changed future behavior. You know, we all know within ourselves because we have the Spirit of God within us. We know when we are truthful and we know when we are untruthful. Right, and however much we need to massage or manipulate the truth in order to work for me and my desires in this world, the physical world, then the way I see things is my truth, according to what I believe, I think to be true, because the truth is out there.
Speaker 3:In any story that you tell or hear, there's always my truth, your truth, and the truth, the truth, right. And so, as a believer and follower of Jesus Christ, my choice is to know what truth truly is. And how do I do that? Well, I invite Christ into my life and he sends his Holy Spirit to reactivate that original spiritual essence that God created. That is my spirit, housed within my soul, living within my consciousness and my mind, as part of my body, which houses all of those elements of who I am, both physical and spiritual, just like Christ. And because I'm a combination of those four things here in my life, as I grow, those four are always there, right. But most people, because we're caught up in the world, we're caught up in the things of the world, we put our spiritual option on the back burner, right, and maybe we go to church or synagogue or mosque, or maybe we don't, maybe we're believers, you know. Massage it to get what we want and that's not the truth.
Speaker 3:If you truly want to know how to recognize truth in your life, you have to reactivate your spiritual relationship with God through Christ. How do you do that? You ask Jesus to come into your life. He promises when you ask. And you ask Jesus to come into your life, he promises when you ask. You ask Him. It's voluntary, you don't have to, but when you ask Him, he will send His Spirit, which is the same Spirit in God Almighty. Same Spirit. He will send His 100% pure Spirit to reactivate my 20% active but mostly inactive spirit in my body right, and that's what drives my consciousness.
Speaker 3:So if I have the spirit of Christ in me, then all of a sudden I recognize truth for what it really is not my truth, not your truth, but the truth. And that becomes a benchmark for me going forward in my life and my daily decisions and choices of how I'm going to respond? Am I going to respond truthfully? What does that look like? Well, it looks like. How would Christ respond if he was standing here next to me? What would his response be? Because I have his spirit now is in me, activating my inactive spirit to 100. I automatically know what he would do, how he would respond in that situation.
Speaker 3:Now my choice as a christian is okay. How am I going to respond? Am I going to respond knowing the truth, of real truth, or am I going to respond massaging and manipulating the truth to work for me? That's the way of the world. Yeah, it wants us to believe we're being truthful as long as we get what we want.
Speaker 3:That's the challenge of life for everybody alive. But that's the challenge especially for a Christian, because a Christian professor who know and understand and love God enough that they recognize Jesus Christ because he was also a man, he experiences all the things that we do, so he can show us what the options are. Do I want to respond the way he would respond or am I going to respond the way I want to respond, because that's the way of the world and I'm of the world, I want what's mine and I want it right now and see, that's the attitude problem, and when we're in that place we put our spiritual connection on the back burner. We only recognize it or call upon it when we're in need of that strength, but the rest of the time we're just fine being us, you know in our world doing what we have to do, get what we need and get what we want.
Speaker 3:And that's the way of the world. And if you're going to be a spiritual Christian you have to step away from that world. But first you have to be able to recognize the folly of that world. And the folly is the fake, the fabricated of the world. When you have the Spirit of Christ within you, you automatically recognize the truth of the situation. And when you can recognize the truth of the situation, you also recognize all the falsehoods hidden behind the veil. Now you see the truth, the real truth, not your truth, not my truth, but God's truth in action. And my choice is am I going to respond the way he would respond or am I going to continue to embrace the world? And what happens when we embrace the world? We embrace the problems of the world.
Speaker 1:Amen. So, keeping in mind everything that you've already said, what is the missing link?
Speaker 3:Missing link is that activation of your spirit. From that 20%. It's there, but it only responds to right and wrong questions. To reactivate that relationship, you reactivate the power of your spirit and you take it from 20% active and 80% inactive to 100% active, exist and his roles, as you know them, were true and to be. If you know those things, anytime you don't choose that path, you're choosing to work against the world and I can tell you right now the world is going to win. That's the design. It's not supposed to be easy, it's supposed to be a challenge. But the challenge is not for you to you know, be you in the world. The challenge is for you to recognize what truth really looks like.
Speaker 3:Look, if you want to reduce the stress and the struggle and the pressure and the conflict in your daily life, you only do one thing you get the spirit of God in you. Okay, once you do that, you then have the power of recognition of truth. This entire life purpose is for you to recognize truth. Then choose. Is that how you're going to be? Are you going to be that person, or are you going to stay in the place that you've been so, with an inactive spirit not allowing it to have any input into your daily decisions. Well, look where you are in your life. If you've had some issues or problems or troubles in the past, okay, that's what life is about. The key to growth is not going back to that place, okay. Well, how do you do that? Well, if what you've got with you now is giving you what you have, but you want something different, then you have to get something else added. What is it? You already have it in you. You have the Spirit of God living within you, because he was God and he created everything in the universe, including you and me. So he's in there. The love of God and the power of God is so great. He never forces or coerces or convicts anybody or tries to convert anybody to believe in Him. That's not his job. He created us so that we could come to that recognition that he exists. And if he exists, he is the creator and I exist and therefore we should be having a relationship. That's my choice.
Speaker 3:Okay, he already is God. He knows who he is. He's giving us an opportunity to live and experience who he is and then to choose will we be one of his children? Look, catherine, god is like a parent that takes his kids to the park right. Lots of kids in the park. Lots of parents in the park right.
Speaker 3:God concerned about every one of those people in the park. Lots of parents in the park. God is concerned about every one of those people in the park. He's most concerned about his own children, who are with him in the park. Why? Because they have chosen to become his child again, virtually again, again, virtually again, by becoming His children, by making a cognizant decision to embrace His being through His Spirit, in the example of Jesus Christ. As he gave His Spirit to me to reactivate my spirit once again, now I have the opportunity to be all I can be, whatever that looks like, and that's the spirit of god working within you.
Speaker 3:But it has to be a voluntary decision on your choice. How do you do it? You just invite him in. You invite him, he'll respond, you'll know it. Your life that's the missing link. Reconnection to God through Jesus Christ. That's the missing link. It's given to everybody alive, especially today, with media. It touched the entire world. The gospel is being spread worldwide, as prophesied in the last days. It's time to wake up. You know, anything can happen. An aneurysm can strike and we're gone this afternoon, no matter whether you go or don't anytime soon, the deal is be cognizant, right? What is the next breath? After the last breath, you have an opportunity to learn and understand and believe something beyond what you've been told and sold your entire life being in and of the world.
Speaker 3:It's a choice. It's all about choice. That's it, no matter how many decisions in your life, from this moment, this moment on, is all about choice. How are you going to respond? Are you going to respond the same way with our old pattern behaviors and the old pattern responses? Well, look, you already know where that got you. If you want to change, you can change, but you have to be the one to make the change.
Speaker 3:Okay, here's your option Pay the same or consider you know something that will help you and bless you in your life. How do I know that? I'm living it? All christians who really get it. They're living it. They're not giving it lip service, they're living it and, as a result, being a child of god, you will get blessed and protected by god's spiritual power.
Speaker 3:It's that simple. He did it with the israelites and he did it with the hebrews and he did it with the jews and he does it with the world. But you have to be the one to open the door. What does he say? Matthew 7 ask, and you'll be oh, now, and you'll be told Now, speak, and you'll find not, and the door will be open. But he's not a perfect master, so you have free will to make your own choices. All I'm asking you is consider a different option if your life is not what you want it to be. That's where you have to start. But the key is to get spiritually grounded and get the spirit of god active in your life. Your life will change.
Speaker 3:Your life will change and you won't know it until it happens, and it'll happen. We're grounding and you will see your life change so the common denominator is you. It is absolutely you so exactly.
Speaker 3:It's your life. Look, it's your life. We all know and have heard stories of people who've gone from rags to riches and from nothing to you know the top. It's your life. Okay, you've got to be complete and you've got to be balanced. Be the best physical person you can be and be the best spiritual person you can be. Physical person you can be and be the best spiritual person you can be, and then you'll have more input and control of your life because you'll be making good decisions that work in your best interest, not digging yourself that hole deeper and deeper again and yelling for a bigger shovel.
Speaker 1:So Mr Branch, so um mr branch. Can you tell um folks where they can hear your podcast? You have a podcast, correct?
Speaker 3:I do. Thank you for asking. I have a podcast. It's called small changes, big dividends and it's on apple and iheart and all the podcast places. You can get the links through my website. Everything is under my name my website, my podcast, my writings, my YouTube channel. You just put in branchesolecom, google that, and everything that I'm involved with, or written or said or done is in there somewhere, so you can just. And the great thing about mine is I'm not with, or written or said or done is in there somewhere, so you can just. And the great thing about mine is I'm not on page 175. There's only one of me, so I'm on page one man.
Speaker 1:So, um, we are down in the last few minutes of the podcast, and so, michael, did you have a final word?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I did.
Speaker 2:And I was just listening, excuse me, just listen to everything you were saying, branch, and it reflected me back to something that my boss at my job always tell everybody is training somebody and we can take that, that earthly idea and put it to our spiritual idea is, when you train somebody, and what would Jesus train you? It's I do, we do you do. Meaning Jesus is already teaching us of how to live. Now it's up to us to do it with him. Then he leads us to do it by ourselves, to bring other people to him. It's funny how you can take earthly words and turn to a spiritual word.
Speaker 1:Man, so Diamonds you are.
Speaker 3:The two are like a coin. Right, there's two sides, but you have to have both sides. The universe is always in a coin. Right, there's two sides, but you have to have both sides. See, the universe is always in perfect balance. It can't be any other way, and that's how everything starts out. But along the way you know, the balance gets unbalanced. So, welcome to life, amen. You're so right about the thing about your boss.
Speaker 1:Amen To God, be the glory. All right, y'all, we're down in the last few minutes. I'm going to go ahead and pray. Father, we thank you so much for your grace and your mercy. Thank you, God, for just allowing us to come together to have this conversation. We pray that a diamond here heard what they needed to hear. We pray that you would just continue to touch the ministries, our ministries all around the world, god, that are preaching and teaching the gospel for you, whether it's a church or a podcast or an outreach, whatever it is, god. I just pray, god, that we would all do it for your glory. We just love you so much and we're so very grateful and so thankful. We pray that this prayer is pleasing in your sight. Pray it in Jesus Christ's name. We do pray, amen, amen and man. Thank you so much, branch, for being here. We appreciate you and we wish you the best of uh, the blessings of the Lord on everything that you are doing.
Speaker 3:Thanks, michael are doing. Thanks, catherine Michael. Thank you, it's been a real pleasure. If I can ever be of service to you and your listeners in the future, then let's take a reach out Amen.
Speaker 2:Amen and to remember. Till next time, remember you are a diamond in the rough.
Speaker 1:Amen.
