The Puzzle Is Real

Howdy Neighbor

• Matt & Melissa Pisani • Season 1 • Episode 36

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We have an opportunity to bridge relationship with neighbors, co-workers and even strangers! Join Matt & Melissa as they discuss the importance of community and friendships on their latest "Relationship" episode. 

www.mattandmelissapisani.com
@puzzleisreal

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Puzzle is Real podcast where we will be discussing faith, family, and Relationships, hosted by Matt and Melissa Pisani. This is The Puzzle is Real podcast when you know, you know.

Speaker 2:

All right, here we go. Welcome back.

Speaker 1:

How are you guys doing? We are here ready to chat, ready to talk about, let's see, what are we gonna talk about

Speaker 2:

Today? Relationships,

Speaker 1:

Because we are a podcast of faith, family, and relationships. So we are going to dive into relationships.

Speaker 2:

You realize we're relational people as human beings.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. We were born and created to be in community and to have relationships to not be isolated.

Speaker 2:

I'm excited about this because we both had a lot of relationships living in New York and now living in South Carolina. We started from scratch building new relationships. I think it's been really cool being here over a year. Yeah. How many friends and new church family members and just family members in general, that people that we've just really felt connected to, that God has just built up a community for us and we wanted to encourage everyone out there just to continue to pray for your community.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you know, it's interesting when you move to a new place where you don't really know anybody, you don't have connections, and it's literally a clean slate, no pun intended. Um, you don't know where that community's gonna come from or how it's gonna happen, but like Matt said, we just, we've been praying for the right people to come into our life, the right community, the right neighbors, and even for us to put ourselves out there, you know, the, the thing that we have done and we've tried to be intentional wherever we lived, but now it's a brand new neighborhood that we live in, so everyone's kind of coming in on the same page. You know, it's not like the community's been here for 10 years and everyone already has their cliques. So that's been really cool where we've been able to meet our neighbors, engage with them, and create a community, a very tight-knit community, um, from the ground up. And we've seen that time and time again, whether it's us reaching out the first time and then people will reach back out to us. And it's just creating this organic relationship, which I think is really special because we are supposed to reach out to our neighbors. And I know I've talked to so many people that said, I didn't even know my neighbor. I would say hello. But that was basically the extent of it. So I wanna encourage you guys and ask you, do you know your neighbors? Do you know the people who are living across the hall from you? Whether you're a college student or live in an apartment, or if you live in a house, who's to the left of you to the right of you in the front of you? Um, because you don't know, by you reaching out how that's gonna have just a great impact and also an opportunity to build relationships with the people that are right around you. And I think that's been really cool, something that we've done here in Charleston. Um, but I don't know, Matt, do you have anything to, uh,

Speaker 2:

To share? Yeah, I think that, um, what we've done, it's real easy. It's like human nature as you get older to be like, nah, I'm good. I'm, I'm, I'm busy, I've got things going on. And you could easily not try to pursue community. You could easily say, I don't have enough time to get to know new people. What I'm, I'm over 40 years old, I'm over 50 years old, I'm over 30 years old. I'm a creature of habit. I'm not gonna put myself out there. What is this dating? But I think that as a, a follower of Christ as a believer, or if you're a non-believer, if you're just someone that's like, Hey, I'm still on that spiritual journey, trying to figure things out. Whatever phase of life you're in on your walk, it's really important that you do not allow yourself to be in isolation. You don't allow yourself to be in a place of just, um, you know, thinking that you can just do it all on your own, but that you, you need one another. You need support. You need someone to walk through different seasons of life with, whether it's, uh, a brother or a sister, a friend. And we want to encourage everyone that it's never too late to find that. And it's been refreshing for us to kind of swallow our pride and to be humble and say, you know what? This is the time for us to release any insecurities and to really see what God has for us in a new season of community. Now that can be simplistic to the idea that, Hey, I'm just gonna get to know my neighbors. Right? You could be living in an area where like us, you're trying to figure it out. Love your neighbors, you know, get to know them, learn their stories, and, and find a way to encourage and inspire them. And it could be as simple as dropping off some Christmas cookies. And I know we've talked about this in a past episode a while ago about how we used to do that in our old home. We'd bring Christmas cookies and wish everyone to Merry Christmas, our neighbors. And, and we decided to even implement that here in the new neighborhood. And it just, I believe it, it opened up this extension of love to let people know that they're thought of that, that they're cared about, that they're, um, being considered as more than just a neighbor, right? We're called the Love Our Neighbors. So it's really important that as we bridge these relationships, that we just continue to trust that, hey, if, if a relationship is supposed to be from a distance, you know, obviously you'll figure that out too. It doesn't mean you have to be besties with everyone, but man, it's refreshing to be refreshed by others. And it can even be connected to the idea that, you know, sometimes you could literally walk past right in front of you, like a great opportunity to have a relationship with someone that has been put in your path for a reason. So don't keep looking ahead. And I'm talking about friendships right now. Like, whereas someone's right there and you're like, well, I don't know. You know, like, don't overthink it, that there could be a great blessing right in front of you to, to build a, a relationship and a friend today.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. And another cool thing is, you know, I think I never thought I would be where we are today, not only locationally, but also um, with homeschooling, right? Matt and I had kids and so many things have happened in our world and just with the pandemic and so much going on that we really prayed through the decision of homeschooling our children. So when we moved down to South Carolina, we were looking for a community. Um, so we actually found this program called Classical Conversations, which is all faith-based. And we meet one day a week. It's called Community Day. And it's amazing. Like I get to go to school with Mercy and I'm there the whole time with her. I'm learning with her, I'm interacting with everyone. The other moms are there, and obviously dads are welcome as well. But it's just been, it's been really amazing cuz it's built community within a community. So not only are their kids getting little friends, the moms are now interacting with one another. And now we know their children, they know us and you know, we have field trips outside of that day. We have play dates, we have, you know, conversations, people stop over. Um, it's been, it's been really, really amazing just being able to have that sense of community and the, that you know, that someone's in the same season that you were in and being able to connect on so many different levels. And the fact that, um, we all have the same heart behind why we are homeschooling and what kind of education we wanna give to our children is, uh, it's a beautiful thing. And like I said, I never thought we would be the homeschool parents, but here we are. And it's been such a blessing and Matt has even been able to go and be a part of the day with Mercy. So he's got to experience it, which has been really awesome.

Speaker 2:

Homeschools not weird, homeschools not weird.

Speaker 1:

It's not weird. And, you know, it's been, we, we've been entrusted with these little minds and just these little souls and it's just so important to us to be able to just fill that with just godly principles and foundation. Also to be, for them to be surrounded by other godly children and families. So whatever your community is gonna look like, whatever your relationships are gonna look like, um, may look different than what you anticipated. But to be open to what God has for you and the path that he wants to set you on, and also just to reach out. Maybe you need to be the person who makes the phone call. You need to be the person to stop at someone's house and say, Hey, I'm bringing you flowers cuz I'm thinking I was thinking of you. I know you've been having a hard time or whatever that may look like mm-hmm.<affirmative>. So cuz that's happened to us where people have shown up and I'm like, wow, I didn't even know that you thought of me like that. And mm-hmm.<affirmative>, it's just been, it's been great. So although we live in a new place, it feels like we've been here for a while and God has just planted just so many roots already here for us where the flowers are blooming and just things are happening and is all by faith. So this episode not only is about relationships, but also faith, you know, taking that leap and trusting in him that he's gonna guide you exactly where he wants you to be.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. And there's an extension of kindness that I feel like is so interrelational with, with people, right? Strangers, people that we get to know. And kindness is contagious. We're gonna be doing a whole month on kindness, um mm-hmm.<affirmative> with our social media for clean slate living. But even personally, we think about things that we can do to be kind to one another and to love people. And I can't stop by thinking about, man, what if we didn't do these things? So don't let pride or ego get in the way of extending. And even if you try with certain people and you feel like, oh man, I feel like I'm not getting anywhere. I really wanna meet up with this person. I really want a fellowship with them or, or get to know them. And you feel like there's like a, a wall that's sitting there. Like sometimes it's just life and people are busy. So don't take it as an offense or a rejection, obviously don't be the weirdo that's overly pushy, but be intentional to follow up with people if you don't hear from'em in a while. Because everyone can easily fall into isolation. And that's exactly what the enemy wants, is to isolate and then try to kill and destroy you. And that's a, uh, area that we always want to encourage people to find that community. And for those of you that are connected to a church, and maybe you haven't been there in a while, or you haven't been to the building and you haven't connected with the people, I just want to encourage you with Hebrews 10 25. And this is just a, a really important verse to me. And I know I always look at this verse from time to time as a reminder, not forsaking the assembling of others of ourselves together as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another and so much more as you see the day approaching. So, you know, once again, like we don't want to forget about the importance of fellowship and connection and, and there's different ways of, um, thinking of that and looking it up. But, you know, let us not neglect meeting together, right? As some have made a habit, but let us encourage one another and all the more as you see the day approaching. So there's a lot of different interpretations of this verse and translations, but don't stop doing that. Don't stop finding a way to connect with your fellow sisters or brothers in the Lord and be intentional about it. It's refreshing when you can be refreshment to someone else. And it's also really powerful when you see how God's going to use that in your relationships in and out of seasons. And, and we just are really excited to just share with you other things that we see God's doing in Charleston and South Carolina and around the country as our friends are giving us praise reports, but relationships, they take work, but the fruit of them are, are priceless. Great friendships, great relationships to come. And we just pray that over you guys lives.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. And we thank you guys for listening and um, we hope to be more consistent here with our episodes coming out<laugh>. So thanks for being patient, but we love you guys. Yes. Step out in faith, say hello to that person that you have not said hello to that you see maybe every day and do an act of kindness. And you never know where people are at. You know, not everyone's a believer, we all know that. But if we are different and we step out in love, people know that we're different and that's what we're called to be as Christians. We're supposed to not be of this world and we're supposed to be the light of this world. So step out in faith, love on each other. Meet your neighbor if you haven't met your neighbor yet, and say hi to a coworker that you have not engaged with recently or maybe schoolmate or whatever.

Speaker 2:

I just had a weird idea

Speaker 1:

What<laugh>

Speaker 2:

This wasn't, um, planned, but hey, if you get a chance, do some, uh, some Valentine's hunting with people, you know, doesn't have to be like giving them a a strange Valentine's card, but bless people this month of February. Find people that are battling with loneliness. Find people that maybe have lost a loved one recently or, or gone through a tough time and find a way to bless them. Find a way, whether it's just a text, a call, or maybe a tangible surprise, a sweet treat,

Speaker 1:

Or a flower or whatever,<laugh>, yes. But we love you guys. Thanks for listening as always, and we will be back soon. Hey guys, thanks so much for listening to the Puzzle Israel podcast. Please subscribe today and share with the friend. See you soon.