Episode S4E13: A Finalist – Unlocking REAL Success in Life

How does being a Finalist sound to you? Would this role involve significant change for you? If so, are you willing to try it? It may seem challenging, but the ‘win,’ the true success in life – will bring incalculable rewards beyond any of our imaginations. Remember that these podcasts are transcribed should you wish to read the details.

Transcript

Dr Hal Habecker: 0:00

Music. Welcome to the finish and well podcast where we encourage seasoned believers to find meaningful ways to impact their world for the kingdom of God, whether you're 65 and up or not quite there. Yet, our mission is to prepare and encourage every person to finish well. Our prayer is that this podcast will encourage and strengthen you to glorify Christ as we intentionally engage our aging fears. Well, welcome to the finish and well podcast again. My name is Hal habecker with finishing well ministries, and I'm here with a great friend who helped me launch these podcasts almost five years ago. We're in our fifth year.

Dr Randy Hess: 0:48

Randy, how about that? Welcome back. Hi pal. Good to be back. It's

Dr Hal Habecker: 0:52

you're just a valued friend that God has given me in all kinds of ways. Personally, you know, I was pastor at the church when you walked in the back door, you and Julie and we've been friends ever since, and friends in this ministry. You're part of our board, and God has gifted you in thinking, Well, I think about finishing life well and being called to this purpose for this ministry, finishing well ministries.

Dr Randy Hess: 1:19

Hal, you're too kind. I appreciate that. It's good to be back. I've been on a little bit of a sabbatical to take care of some things in my life and how and I talk, and we just said, Let's do another podcast. And so that's what we're doing, folks. So we're glad, you know, we're glad to be be here and doing what we have done many of and just trying to look at ways of things that we have been encouraged about personally we have, and talk about those, and then talk about ways we think others might benefit or be encouraged in their journey of sort of losing ground with one or one or other big purposes in their life, and trying to to re engage it, re redevelop it.

Dr Hal Habecker: 2:08

And that's part of the ministry mission of finishing well ministries Hebrews 1024, and 25 you know, not forsaking the assembling of yourselves as the habit of some, but encouraging, stimulating each other to have these kinds of conversations as we grow older in the body of Christ and is following him, becoming like him, and I envision stimulating, provoking conversations growing out of our podcast. I envision a whole host of people sitting in this room here as we do this, listening in and engaging in the process. I

Dr Randy Hess: 2:44

That would be awesome. How what a blessing if, if that kind of discussion might come out of some of this we do. Yeah. So, so I introduce our

Dr Hal Habecker: 2:54

topic. I will You've

Dr Randy Hess: 2:57

been very kind to let me have a little bit of a run of mental I've gone through my own mental gymnastics on stuff that I comment on about, maybe the journey and the role of finishing well, that it involves certain kinds of discussions and questions and answers, folks. We're not giving you the answer necessarily, but we are trying our best to encourage you to think about things that will help you make a difference. Am I right? How you're right? Randy, let's go well, one of the things we do is we talk about finishing well a lot. That's the name of the ministry. It's a very good name in terms of what we're trying to do with with people in general, help, help everyone finish their life, our life, well, and in so doing, we have not come, probably for very good reasons, to any kind of conclusion about what we should call people who are doing that. Am I right? How we're not we, we've, we've kicked it around quite a bit, but we're not there. So in my sabbatical time where I'm thinking about some stuff for me, it came to me that I have a name that I thought might describe people who are finishing well in sort of a race, if you will, Paul's race, and that is, you may not have won the race, but you're a finalist.

Dr Hal Habecker: 4:50

Does that make sense? It does. It does it captures Paul's image. You know, I have fought the fight, I've completed the course, and you're looking. It. What does it take to finish the course to be a finalist in this category? That's it. Of living for Jesus. That's

Dr Randy Hess: 5:09

it. So the topic I would like to discuss HAL is a finalist unlocking real success in life. And so let me describe how I'm thinking about that. Maybe I really would be interested in your opinion of some of this. A finalist has had some ahas about life and legacy. Maybe quite a few ahas.

Dr Hal Habecker: 5:38

Well, yeah, you you live long enough, you have enough experiences that you may have these all along in life, but you don't have the if you have another 10 years, you haven't had the other 10 years, you think about and there is an aha moment of what the value of life is, what it means, and the legacy of it,

Dr Randy Hess: 6:01

very good that that does describe what I was thinking. A finalist has been engaged on the playing field, participated in the contest, played the game.

Dr Hal Habecker: 6:13

You understand what it what the what the game is all about.

Dr Randy Hess: 6:19

It's not a game in sports, is it? It's not a game of who's better. It's not a game. It's not a contest in the sense of a winner. Everybody that plays the game on the field, tuning into the Holy Spirit, wins.

Dr Hal Habecker: 6:35

They do. You know, we're talking about this the weekend of Augusta in Georgia, and they say the game of golf is played on a five inch span between your ears. I mean, it's about life and how you think and how you live each day, and how you see the whole the course. So it's an example of how we live life every day. I mean, you participate in thinking about the process.

Dr Randy Hess: 7:04

Back to your point. Hal, a finalist has finished the game, the course or the race. Finalist has finished it. They got through. They did tune in to Jesus.

Dr Hal Habecker: 7:19

And I think that's exactly what Paul has in mind. Philippians 121 for me to live is Christ to die is you see everything finished. You look at life as though it's all in the rear view mirror, in a sense. But to die is gain. Yes, it's the best is yet to be. It's the best gain

Dr Randy Hess: 7:39

you're ever going to have, or ever had,

Dr Hal Habecker: 7:42

my boy, is that good?

Dr Randy Hess: 7:46

A finalist has won the biggest game existing on Earth. So we've kind of talked about that a finalist has not beaten you in this game. That's not what it's all about.

Dr Hal Habecker: 8:00

That's important. Let's draw on that one a little bit. It's it's about you. It's not about you comparing yourself to other people. It's not God. There is no comparison that's valid. Ah, God has a plan for you, and he wants to be with you in this process of being a finalist. He cares about you. He doesn't care about your performance level. Is he going to give you a 10 or a 10.5 or a 9.5 he cares about you finishing the process

Dr Randy Hess: 8:31

a finalist wants you, and this is the finalist and everyone to win this game. So we're all in it, hoping that other people will win it as much as I have pulling for each other. We're all pulling for each other. We should be and we we will be happy when we do. A finalist knows what real winning is and looks like, so that's what we're talking about. I think, I think we're getting at it, which is real winning is not beating somebody. Real winning is just finishing the course with the Lord.

Dr Hal Habecker: 9:07

You know, I think of cheering each other on, yeah,

Dr Randy Hess: 9:13

a gigantic team, all of the team we want to finish this game. A finalist has addressed, oh, by the way, on that point how we're praying for the person who has never accepted the Lord right up to the finish,

Dr Hal Habecker: 9:28

boy, we are. I also think of Hebrews 12, where the writer of Hebrews says we're surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses who are all cheering us on in this process of being finalist and finishing the course.

Dr Randy Hess: 9:44

Boy, what a visual. What a visual. Think of that, whether that's just as you and I go across the line with the gigantic cheers from the team,

Dr Hal Habecker: 9:53

yeah, well, it's awesome. Fix that image in your mind as you think about being. Finalist in your life.

Dr Randy Hess: 10:05

A finalist knows what real winning is and looks like, which we have just talked about, a finalist has addressed, accepted and adopted God's plan for his or her life. Randy,

Dr Hal Habecker: 10:18

I have to back up on the previous one. A finalist knows what real winning is and looks like. I have to share an experience that I had with my wife, Vicki and our three kids when they were real little. Vicky had an ambition of running in the turkey trot here in the Dallas turkey trot on Thanksgiving Day, and she trained and was running the course. And when you note I was taking care of all three kids. They were little like four, three and two or whatever. Well, they all had to go to the bathroom at the same time, at the same time, and we missed Vicky coming across the finish line. Oh, but nevertheless, everyone, she was a winner that day, even though we weren't there to

Dr Randy Hess: 11:01

witness, did you see us? Did you see me? Now?

Dr Hal Habecker: 11:05

But real winning is being there, you know, accepting the cheer the that's

Dr Randy Hess: 11:12

it, that's it, right there. So again, a finalist has addressed accepted and adopted God's plan. A finalist knows the need and the way to make critical turns toward God's plan. How does a finalist know that? Well, I think perhaps there's a finalist pause somewhere along the way, where you get the AHA, but you kind of have to pause, because life is one long, busy, busy journey, one long, active Journey for most people, and so they've got other things on their mind, other plans, other needs, other questions, other issues nagging at them that they have to take care of on a day to day basis. So pausing is not something that comes to mind very much.

Dr Hal Habecker: 12:24

Well, I think this is the way God orchestrates life. A biblical example comes to me the patriarch Jacob is a great example of this. You know, at all his stages in life, he had to stop and think about what God was doing in making critical turns back to him. I mean, his marriage is to Leah and Rachel. I think it was, you know, and and the other women a part of that process and his 12 kids, but and God ultimately changes his name to Israel, because he keeps reminding Jacob about what His purpose is, and he keeps stopping and taking critical turns. You know, God kept interrupting him to say, Hey, Jacob, I have a plan for you. I'm going to change your name. I have a purpose for you, and I want you to pay attention. And you know the great wrestling match he had with God, where God said, you know, I want you to understand this, because I care about you and I love you, and I think that's one of the things that makes me think about this term, the finalist knows the need and the way to make critical turns towards God's plan. God helps us in this process. It's not he does. It's not all about my insight. I mean, it's not me making the plan to turn yes, yeah and to realize that. I mean, that's a great aha moment.

Dr Randy Hess: 14:00

Yeah, it's similar to a man's got to recognize his limitations. That wasn't God, that was Clint Eastwood, yeah, but it's so true when we get to a point where we say, You know what, I really can't as much as I thought I could figure it all out,

Dr Hal Habecker: 14:21

and this that the value of the age of years, you realize that God had a plan all along. I mean, you quoted Jeremiah For I know the plans that I have for you, his plans are there all all along for us, yeah,

Dr Randy Hess: 14:35

but we don't really, some of us don't appreciate that, how as the biggest hidden blessing out there for us until later in life.

Dr Hal Habecker: 14:45

I think it's one of the things that aging people can personify and illustrate in the life of a community

Dr Randy Hess: 14:52

that is, as we said earlier, a gift of aging. So

Dr Hal Habecker: 14:55

good, so good. I.

Dr Randy Hess: 15:00

A finalist has made these turns in life. Most were life changing for the finalist, I would argue, and for the people in his or her circle of influence, they all recognize that when this happens, people, they know something's different about you and me. They may not be able to describe it, they may be may not be able to put their finger on it, but it's there, so let's talk about what might have happened to you and to me. Okay, now,

Dr Hal Habecker: 15:35

as we talk about these I want to remind you as our listener that these podcasts are all transcribed. So Randy's going to share a number of things with you, so you don't need to have a paper and pencil to write these down. But I would encourage you to go back and read the transcript of these things, because they're very insightful, not only all the points that we already talked about, but a lot of these transition points on aha moments they

Dr Randy Hess: 16:03

are and how I can kind of recognize in myself that the Lord has got a hold of me and I am making a change. How? So, how will I know this? Some examples. Well, let's start with self, from self to others. What we're talking about there is my outlook and my emphasis.

Dr Hal Habecker: 16:25

Is it all about me, or is it about other people? That's it.

Dr Randy Hess: 16:29

From taker to giver. You know who you are. You know what you're like. You can decide, but I'll bet you recognize that change too, from leaner to lifter.

Dr Hal Habecker: 16:44

Yeah, I like that from

Dr Randy Hess: 16:46

big me to humble me.

Dr Hal Habecker: 16:50

It's huge. I mean, I think that stress of being here for somebody else, as opposed to me, is so critical, important.

Dr Randy Hess: 17:02

I think of it Hal too, as you mentioned, Patriarch. For those of us, you and me, who are patriarchs in a family, you know we can look at that role, and I have unfortunately looked at it in my past as one that deserves honor without any giving. What am I talking about? There is the Patriarch who is big me is a patriarch that says, look, look at my life, look what I've done, look how I've accomplished things. Look at how I've disciplined myself. I don't want any whining. I want you to come and bow down to me with respect, so to speak. Now I know those are harsh words that I just said, they don't sound very pleasant, but too many grandpas and great Grandpas have that attitude. Hal

Dr Hal Habecker: 18:09

too many it's unfortunate,

Dr Randy Hess: 18:12

and the kids and the grandkids and the great grandkids don't find it very interesting or inviting to come and sit on the knee of a Patriarch who has that attitude. Just don't bother me, but honor Me All right. From judgmental to accepting boy that judgmental stuff, it goes with what I just described in an aging patriarch, is I'm too judgmental about how other people are conducting their lives, you know, and

Dr Hal Habecker: 18:49

we're suspect to that, you know, if they would do it the way I did it, they'd be better off.

Dr Randy Hess: 18:55

Of course, I'm smart. I've got my act together. Look what I've done. They don't know anything.

Dr Hal Habecker: 19:04

We tend to think that way about the younger generations. You know, they're not doing it the way we did it.

Dr Randy Hess: 19:12

Well, I don't even have to listen to them, because everything they talk about is crazy. Yeah,

Dr Hal Habecker: 19:17

that's the irony of it. You know, as we age, we ought to become better listeners and seekers to understand our grandkids are adult kids because they're in a different world than we are, and we just assume they should be like us, not stopping to enter their world and listening to them.

Dr Randy Hess: 19:37

We all a bet, people, I bet we all know a grandpa out there like that. We all know it. Maybe it's our own back in the day, but we all know somebody like that. And you know, maybe I'll look in the mirror try to decide if you're one of those boy, it's me from winners or losers. You. You know, you're either a winner or loser to all count,

Dr Hal Habecker: 20:03

every one of them

Dr Randy Hess: 20:07

finalists finishes that line, crosses that line with cheering from everybody.

Dr Hal Habecker: 20:12

You know what? One of the temptations is, you want to judge people before they end. Yeah. You want yeah. And when you finish, you have a different perspective and looking back across the past,

Dr Randy Hess: 20:26

yep, from carefree to caring. You know, gee, I've I'm retired, I've got my act together. We're enjoying life. We've got our hobbies and our whatever we do, our travel schedule. We're good. Thank you very much. We're carefree, so don't worry about us. Well, guess what? That's not finishing Well, folks, great for you. There's another component, and it's called caring for something or some buddy, that is important for you to understand. As

Dr Hal Habecker: 21:09

we as we age, we ought to be known for caring more. That's it. And more and more and more. Let

Dr Randy Hess: 21:18

that also sounds like I'm saying, gee, you can't have any relaxation in your life. Randy, you're taking away my joy. That's not what I mean. I'm sorry if you feel that way. I am saying though that carefree can mean you don't care about anybody, but you

Dr Hal Habecker: 21:39

so insightful

Dr Randy Hess: 21:41

drifting to focus town. I'm drifting before, but now I'm focused. And we've talked about drifting many times, and it's easy to roll back into that drifting process. I could have rolled back into it the last few months myself, in terms of just saying, I've got these, you know, these conditions and medical situations I need to take care of. So in the meantime, I'll just watch TV.

Dr Hal Habecker: 22:14

Nah, don't want we're all, we're all swimming upstream in some way, exactly,

Dr Randy Hess: 22:20

exactly, and if you don't swim, you're going to roll back. We are from fearful to courageous. Boy. I could get on my high horse, I guess, of all the list I could get on my high horse, about this one, not because I'm wanting to put anybody down or blame anybody, or accuse anybody of anything. But I think too much, too many of us, too many of us who are let's talk about a different line we cross, the retirement line. I think too many of us are fearful about ourselves, about how we look, about how we are perceived, about how we come across so fearful and so to use a term out of the you know, the 60s, hung up. So hung up. It has to do with how I want my image to be. I want it to be I want to be cool. I want to be appealing. I want to be enjoyable. I want to be smart. I want to be whatever. My wife has a coffee cup, by the way, not a day over fabulous. She doesn't use that coffee cup. I use it sometimes. I love it. A day over fabulous? Well, that describes a lot of us. I don't want to be a day over fabulous. And what I do is I get a little bit hung up in trying to reach out to somebody, because I might look dumb, I might look stupid, I might look like. I don't know what I'm talking about or what I'm trying to do. Boy, I sure don't want that image. You

Dr Hal Habecker: 24:09

know, I have to stop the courageous people in their 80s in the Bible, Moses leading the children of Israel out of Egypt when he was 80, Joshua, leading the children of Israel into the promised land, you know. And the Lord reminds him that Joshua one four different times be courageous, you know. Are we in our 80s or 70s, or wherever we're at our 90s? Where are we making courageous decisions to be about what God wants us to be.

Dr Randy Hess: 24:40

And you know what I I would argue there a little bit that the thought of reaching out to somebody to be a way, to be a person who might lift them up actually takes courage. You're I think you're right. How do I do that? Oh, I don't want to do that. And that's. Nicely. You know, I'm not blaming, believe me, but if I'm a little more introverted in my older years, because I don't know, I just am, I don't. There's nothing wrong with that, but it makes me reticent to reach out to somebody, or to think I can lift somebody up. I

Dr Hal Habecker: 25:19

think of acts 1038, again, Luke describing Jesus. He went about doing good. I mean, there's simple things we can be about stepping up to the plate. It's our time to encourage others.

Dr Randy Hess: 25:33

So I'll get off my high horse with this one. But it's kind of a big deal because I hope, I hope we can all finish strong, and I hope we can all finish fearless. I do too, so from my fun only to new joy in giving little wordy, but the point is that I'm moving from one position to another. My fun only is about me and my family, my own and probably me and my spouse, or my situation with my personal best love and friend, versus thinking that I can do something that will give me joy by being more of a giver, no time for others to invest in time in others. That's a big deal. How

Dr Hal Habecker: 26:40

so helpful? How are we investing our lives no time

Dr Randy Hess: 26:44

for others? Again, that kind of coincides a little bit with the personal big me, the personal judgmental attitude, the personal drifting, the personal, carefree that all of those kind of lead to me feeling how that I don't have time, I don't have time for others. I've got to just take care of me. You

Dr Hal Habecker: 27:13

know your list here. I want to jump in. It reminds me of Jesus commandment in John 1334, and 35 It's our third essential in the seven essentials, we're to love others as God loved us. We never stop doing that. It seems to me this whole list is a way that Jesus would have us think about loving others and investing in them.

Dr Randy Hess: 27:39

Yeah. And the sad, if you want to call it one sad aspect of not getting it so to speak about what I can do for others and with others is that loss of joy that I'm going to get from that

Dr Hal Habecker: 27:52

you don't have any joy because you're not giving your life away

Dr Randy Hess: 27:57

earned leisure to Real peace. You know we, a lot of us, love our earned leisure, and don't get in my face. I've earned my leisure kind of attitude. Yeah, it's

Dr Hal Habecker: 28:12

interesting to say your leisure come, or your own peace comes from your leisure world, not from the life of Christ. And

Dr Randy Hess: 28:20

I'm you, Well, come on, dude. I've given my whole life to this. I've worked my you know what off to get there, so don't be talking to me about what I need to do with my spare time. But the real peace comes from going beyond that attitude. The real peace will come that you don't have now, the real

Dr Hal Habecker: 28:41

peace comes from resting in Jesus. That's who energizes you to do this well. In resting

Dr Randy Hess: 28:46

in Jesus means you do tune in, yeah, beyond yourself,

Dr Hal Habecker: 28:51

absolutely

Dr Randy Hess: 28:54

and finally, from pointless to purposeful. How that's what we're we're saying kind of a finalist has done and recognized is, it's not pointless. My life is not pointless. God's world is not pointless. Boy,

Dr Hal Habecker: 29:15

so insightful.

Dr Randy Hess: 29:18

So the I guess I'd leave us here with a question, how does being a finalist sound to you? Would this role involve significant change for you? If so, are you willing to even try it? It may seem challenging, but the win, quote, unquote, the true success in life, will bring incalculable rewards far beyond any of our imaginations. In that. In and I know that's that sounds like hyperbole, but I mean that it will from my standpoint,

Dr Hal Habecker: 30:09

so helpful, Randy, I appreciate, I value what you bring to my mindset. I want to summarize this in a way, I had a friend when I was with the Christian Medical Society. His name was David Stewart. He was a psychiatrist in Louisville, Kentucky, for I mean, he took in his senior years, he latched on to me and encouraged me, and one of the ways he did that was in his last years he came down with cancer, but one of his phrases to me always was, he had a mission of encouraging me, and he would always say to me when we met, aren't these great days how and they were? We had great days together. But I'll never forget he called me a week before he went to be with the Lord, and when we got on the phone with each other, the first thing he said with me, how? He said, How, aren't these great days here? He was a week from the last breath that he would take, and probably in a fairly weak position, and he was encouraging me by seeing the purpose that God had in his life and his relationship with others that was encouraging them and sensing God's purpose in his life, even to the very end, yeah,

Dr Randy Hess: 31:32

yep, I'm, you know, I'm praying, how that that's my attitude, right in The end, I saw that in my son, Brad, and I, I mean, it's a very, very encouraging thing to witness, yeah, very and I know it was for you. It's like guys, you know that the Lord has that person, has them, got him just a matter of time he does.

Dr Hal Habecker: 32:02

And that's the legacy they live left with us. They left with our families, yep, and that's the legacy we want to leave, yep,

Dr Randy Hess: 32:11

yep, it is and, and so that's part and parcel, that last step there of being a finalist. So all

Dr Hal Habecker: 32:20

of life is a building up of aha moments. Oh, that's what God meant, and I want to be about that in my life.

Dr Randy Hess: 32:30

You know what? You have to just tune in a little bit how they're there. I

Dr Hal Habecker: 32:35

love it. Randy. Thank you. This is a joy to hang out with you and to process what God's do in our lives, and bring others along with us and learn from them. So tune in and share this message with others, and let's be a finalist in terms of what God's doing in our lives. Amen. Amen. Thanks, God. Bless you, and continue to pray for finishing well ministries and the ministry that God has for you where you are, it makes a difference in the world. May God speed us to that end. Thanks for being with us today. Thank you for listening to this finish and well podcast. We hope you were encouraged by today's conversation and living out your God given purpose. Subscribe to the show. Wherever you get your podcasts, or you can find us at finishing well. Ministries, dot O, R, G, forward, slash podcast. If you have a question, a comment or a suggestion or an idea, send a note to me. How finishing well ministries.org, check out our website and our vision to change the way we think about our aging season of life. Go to finish a well ministries.org, and visit our website. We'll see you next time, and may the Lord bless and encourage

Unknown: 34:02

you.