iRetire4Him Show 128: Find What You Can Do

Jim Brangenberg: Holidays are special and they really give each one of us something to look forward to, especially in our retired years. You've tuned in to iRetire4Him, a special lead up to Christmas edition. iRetire4Him is the voice and resource of the Retirement Reformation, an organization dedicated to you, the retiree who loves Jesus and wants purpose for all of your days, especially the ones ahead of you.

Bruce Bruinsma joins us today as the founder of the Retirement Reformation. He's here to encourage and walk with you through retirement, sharing his own stories along the way. And I'm Jim Brangenberg, please check us out online. So many resources out there. Retirement, reformation. org, retirement, reformation. org.

It's literally three weeks until Christmas and as a retired Christ follower, what's your plan for making a difference this Christmas season? In this new series, we challenge both of us and all of you to the statement - not everyone can do the same thing but everyone can do something. What does that look like for you this Christmas season?

On today's podcast, Bruce and I will talk about Christmas past and present, and how we can serve our neighbors with some Yuletide cheer. We'll make sure and give everyone some ideas on what you could do to make a difference in someone's life leading up to celebrating Jesus's birthday. Bruce, Merry Christmas!

Bruce Bruinsma: Hey, Jim. Merry Christmas to you and to our audience. It's a special time of year. And unfortunately for some it's a, it has some sad memories. And so one of our goals in these and today and the next couple of podcasts will be to see if we can bring some new light into this season for each one of us.

Jim Brangenberg: So we're going to talk today about coming up with ideas, something that everyone can do to demonstrate our faith in action in our retirement during this upcoming Christmas season, but first let's get a little personal. I want to hear, because I've never asked you this question, what's your favorite childhood Christmas memory?

Bruce Bruinsma: My favorite childhood Christmas memory was when I was seven years old and with my mother and father and we were spending a year, was right after World War Two, so it was a long time ago. And we were in the Netherlands. We were in a town called Zeist , and Christmas in Europe is a little bit different than our Christmas here. But the meaning and the purpose is pretty much all the same.

And so experiencing the ways that the Dutch at that point in time, right after the war, in coming from such a terrible set of experiences, how they celebrated it, and I just remember that the biggest thing was a cross with an orange hanging from it. And I said to my mom and dad why an orange? They said, because it is so precious at this time in this country right now, and you should really appreciate it. So I always have, when I think about Christmas, I have that orange in front of me and I go... something to really appreciate that perhaps others don't expect.

Jim Brangenberg: And I picture that orange with a bleak gray background as a just a bright spot because of those tough terrible, tough years that Europe went through during World War Two. All right. So what about your favorite Christmas with Judy so far? The favorite one as a married couple in 63 years this year? 62 years this year?

Bruce Bruinsma: In June, it'll be 63. So 62. And, as I think back over our Christmases together and then primarily with the, as the kids grew and came along and grew together, the ongoing Christmases that we would have, but I think the ones that I remember the most was we were very blessed to have a cabin in Central Oregon. And Central Oregon at this time of year is a little bit like Colorado, in that there's some snow but there's bright sunshine.

As you can tell the sun coming through the window on my face. But there was bright sunshine and there was snow and we would go to our cabin in central Oregon with the kids. And we would play in the snow, get out of the rain of the other parts of Oregon. And it was just a time of, oh, this is really good. And I remember coming into the cabin, stomping our feet, the snow falling off and Judy having some hot apple cider there for us. Us sitting down around the table with Beth and Brent and Judy and me, and having that apple cider together. Those are good memories.

Jim Brangenberg: Yeah. Yeah. It's great. Those kid memories. There's just no, no question. There's so many good memories out there. I love, when we moved to Minnesota, what was cool about Minnesota is that we had white Christmases 90 percent of the 30 years that I lived there. So you always were playing in the snow, that was always great.

What's sad about Christmas is the reality that this is a time of year that everybody thinks about other people and what they could do to help other people. There's always fundraising, there's giving food, there's the Salvation Army ringing a bell, and we get this attitude of serving others at Christmas time. But yet the rest of the year, probably 10 months of the year, we don't do that.

How can we keep this attitude of serving other people and doing something intentionally with our faith all year long? What are the ideas?

Bruce Bruinsma: To me, the key to opening that door, stepping through it and then living it, is in fact, as I, I talk about in our book Living the Fruitful Life, that when I remember that the Holy Spirit in me wants me to reflect those fruits of the spirit, and so whatever the circumstance that I'm in, if I can focus on that, and when I start to get grumpy, when I start to lose that Christmas spirit that you're talking about, and then the Holy Spirit reminds me, remember, look at what it is in front of you and to be able to live and to live out those fruits of the spirit.

So when I'm, when I'm framing the decisions I'm making, the conversations that I'm having, the actions that I'm taking, starting with love and then adding the joy and peace and patience and kindness and gentleness and self control. When I add those pieces in, then I have the opportunity, whether it's in the middle of July or it's the 24th of December, to be able to really live the fruits of the Spirit, which keeps me in that ... what we would call the Christmas spirit, I think. Is the spirit that God designed us for and gives us the opportunity to live out.

Jim Brangenberg: What's amazing, Bruce, is most people don't realize how healthy it is to serve other people. If you're feeling depressed, the best way to get rid of depression is to go serve other people. When you take your mind off yourself and put it on somebody else, it starts to heal. It's the way God meant us to be. Bruce, you made a statement that we're really doing this premise of this whole three part podcast about not everyone could do the same thing, but everyone can do something this Christmas. What are you hinting at?

Bruce Bruinsma: What I'm hinting at is to find the things that you are uniquely capable of doing. Some of them are just general areas. Like for example, the most important thing is your attitude. To keep an attitude of gratitude, looking for the need. So find a need and fill it, find a hurt and heal it, find somebody to love and do it.

And so to keep that attitude and then to realize that there are probably some things that you can do that maybe nobody else in the world can do, or nobody else in your family can do, that you can make a difference for someone. It may be that phone call to your brother in law in Kentucky. It may be wrapping that package and sending that off to your sister in wherever she is.

But something that you can uniquely do and you can uniquely bring to someone else. It may simply be your neighbor. I got a neighbor. His name is Bill Heater. And Bill is the HOA chairman in the area that we live in. So I got a text from Bill the other day and he said, Bruce, I don't know if you noticed, but you had a pretty big limb in your yard that fell down.

And I said, Bill, thank you. I know, frankly, it was a part of the yard that I hadn't seen that. He said, would it be okay if I came over, cut it up and took that away?

Jim Brangenberg: You're like no, I want to climb up the tree and chop it down. (laughter)

Bruce Bruinsma: I want to go do that. And it was a total surprise. It was not, we have no relationship that suggests that kind of activity between us is something that would happen. And what a blessing that was to me. And then, two days later, I'm hearing the chainsaw, and I'm looking out the window down the far end of the property, and there's Bill, man, cutting that sucker up. Hauling it away. What a blessing.

Jim Brangenberg: It's amazing. And we've got to figure out a way for us and our audience to think like that all year long. That being a neighbor is a great way to do this because we're all surrounded by neighbors. Everywhere we are, no matter where we are, we're surrounded by neighbors.

All right. When we come back, we're going to do a catch up, Bruce, on, you had an incredible meeting last week with a whole, excuse me, several weeks ago now, sorry, got on my head wrong, several weeks ago with a whole bunch of different organizational leaders talking about wraparound grandparenting, which is something we've talked about many times in the show.

And then in the next couple of podcasts, we're going to actually talk with some people that were at that meeting. But let's talk in this next segment about what you saw, what you heard, what you saw God do, what we can look forward to in 2025, hearing more about this, because this wraparound grandparenting could be the solution that this country needs to address the issues of the foster system, the adoption system, making it easier for the churches to lead in this.

You're listening to iRetire4Him, we'll be right back.

Jim Brangenberg: Hey, welcome back to iRetire4Him, as we begin a three part series of talking about: not everyone could do the same thing, but everyone could do something this Christmas season. And really, we just talked about the beginning of just, what are some of the ideas, but this next three part series, we're going to talk all about it.

One of the ideas that we're heavily promoting on the Retirement Reformation is this idea called Wraparound grandparenting. And Bruce, on November the 5th and the 6th, I think, you had a bunch of people out to Colorado Springs from a bunch of different organizations talking about wraparound grandparenting.

So what I'd like you to do first is to just give a reminder summary, in case we got a new listener, somebody hasn't heard us talk about this before. What is wraparound grandparenting? And then we'll talk about what you talked about in your meetings.

Bruce Bruinsma: So the purpose and I'm going to read a statement here off of my computer.

So to create a fresh vision for collaboration and a pathway to engagement with Kingdom Impact at the intersection of senior adults and the foster care community. So that was the vision. That was the goal of this group coming together. So we had folks from the Christian Association for Orphans. We had Focus on the Family folks. We had folks from a number of ministries who have experience in the foster care arena, fostering, adoption, dealing with families and vulnerable children. That's really the whole context.

Jim Brangenberg: And the bottom line there though, is both you, your family and my family have a lot of experience in the foster system and adopting, and it's not an easy place to be.

Bruce Bruinsma: It's a really hard place and the need is growing. The need is growing dramatically and the resources are not emerging. And so as we think about how do we deal with that as the church caring for widows, orphans and so on, as Jesus commanded? Then as individuals, what role can we play?

And one of the amazing thing that comes up and that was the reason for bringing all these people together is that one of the resources that is available that can dramatically impact the issues of fostering and adoption and single moms and all the places that need support are those of us that are say 60 and older in doing what we call wrap around grandparenting, coming together, not as necessarily an individual, but coming together as an individual and part of a team to be able to bring support and to be able to bring the dynamic of a wide range of support to a foster family. We'll just deal with that specifically.

And so to understand what does it mean to be fostering? What are the barriers? What are the boundaries? What are the challenges? What are the issues? And then as seniors, how do we need to adapt, adopt, and step into the issues that are there? Some of those issues require change on our part, but all of them require a love and a passion on our part to make a difference in someone else's life.

Jim Brangenberg: What I love about both of us having had experience when you had two kids that you fostered for 10 years, wasn't it? Did you ever have anybody come alongside you for those days where you just needed a break or were they with you all the time?

Bruce Bruinsma: No, we never had anyone that came alongside as a break. We had some friends that when we would do things together as a family, they're very open to we had two kids and we had to foster kids. So the four, four kids they were very open about embracing them and not separating, making a difference there. And that was good, but that was about it. Yeah. And as I think back on it, man, we could have used some help.

Jim Brangenberg: Oh, just a break, just a date night. That's one of the things that, what I see in our own kids, all of our kids, we've got three kids, one of them adopted. But all three of them have been involved in the foster system and involved in considering adopting. Some of them have adopted.

Some of them have opted not to adopt. And it's just, it's brutal. It's not a system that is for the lighthearted, but what is incredible is that when you can give the foster provider a break, they can get a refreshing, but it's, none of it is easy because these are kids that are struggling with identity and the enemy's attacking their identity and their families have been destroyed and they're living with strangers. And it's where the church is meant to be the church because it's a supernatural thing. The enemy loves to attack Identity.

Bruce Bruinsma: If I could just interrupt with that, you have all the issues of the foster parents and the challenges that they have and then you have the issues of the kids. And so for example, I was doing a meeting a month or so ago and I talked about wraparound grandparenting, and a older guy came up and said to me, and he was half angry, and had an angry look on his face, and he said if they just do the right thing, there wouldn't be a problem.

And I said to him, I said, if all of us would do the right thing, there wouldn't be a problem. It's called sin in the world. And the only person who is able to cut through that is the love of God and the sending of his son, Jesus Christ, to forgive us for all the screwy things we do . In order to work with kids who have been abused, have trust issues, have all kinds of issues, we need to change just like we want them to change.

Jim Brangenberg: It's something that the church was designed to do. The church was meant to bring solutions to the planet. The church was not meant to sit back and let the government come to the rescue because frankly now the government established the foster system I don't know how many years ago. I have no idea . In the 70s. So just like fighting poverty for the last 60 years , poverty is worse now than ever. The foster system is now worse than ever. And when, before, the church just stepped up and people in the church took care of kids, everybody said, okay, Bob and Jane are struggling, or Jane dies and Bob can't handle his kids because he's got a job, and people come along and they just helped each other.

You didn't have to give up kids for adoption. But today, it's just, it's a broken system, but there's so much opportunity here. Bruce, when you guys, at the end of your three days of meetings, what did you come away with? The one big thing that you guys as organizations can do together?

Bruce Bruinsma: Number one is that we can collaborate, we can have a mutual understanding of the issues and the language to use to talk about and enter into the solutions. So collaboration together. When God, when Jesus formed the church , it was that in community we have the diversity to have kingdom impact, but if you don't come together in community, then we're limited to the resources or the capacity of one person or one couple. But when we come together in community we can both support each other in that community, and that community can be the supportive piece for the foster family in these particular cases.

The example that we use while we were in discussion with each other on those 2. 5 days together, which were just precious, I learned so much from the others that were there, and hopefully they learned a little bit from me about the role of seniors in this whole piece, but it was the fact that we take that phrase, "not everybody can do the same thing, but everybody can do something". So you put together a team, if you wish, a cadre, a cohort, a group, a support system, that has a 95 year old lady in a wheelchair and a 60 year old guy who's, just switching from tennis to paddle ball or pickleball that in that capacity, those capacities are the resources to be able to be supportive for all the different issues that are going to be faced. And so I was so encouraged by the commitment and the understanding that it is in community that we can have kingdom impact.

Jim Brangenberg: And regardless of the time of year, this is a need that is all year long. So if you know somebody and we're going to talk about this a lot in 2025, but in these last three podcasts of 2024 we're trying to get you to think of not everybody can do the same thing but everybody can do something. If you've got somebody around you, whether they're in church, they sit in the pew behind your pew, in front of you, maybe they're in your neighborhood, maybe they're a son or daughter of one of your best friends, whatever it is, just know if somebody is fostering kids, they need help. If somebody is adopting kids, they need help. Just because the adoption has been completed doesn't mean the work is done.

Bruce Bruinsma: One of the things that came out in our discussion was that exact problem of that in so many places that, you know, there's support perhaps during the adoption process, but when it is over, okay, now the kids are adopted, everybody turns away and says, Oh that's the end of that. No, that's just the beginning of that.

Jim Brangenberg: Yeah. That's when the challenges really happen. Absolutely. Kids with reactive attachment disorder. Once they're actually adopted and settle into a family, that's when the issues really come out. Cause they've been working really hard to stay nice so they can get adopted. Just, there's so many things out there.

If you're listening to this podcast and you care about children. Please look for a family near you to become a Wraparound Grandparent. If you really want to know more, check us out at retirementreformation. org and find out more details. We'll be developing a page on that, on our website, all about this as it grows, organizations you can connect with. But it's an idea that you don't have to have a manual. You just need to have love in your heart and find a family that is in the middle of fostering or adopting.

Bruce Bruinsma: And come to the issues with an open hand and that loving heart.

Jim Brangenberg: Yeah. No agenda because you can't predict how you're going to be needed.

You're listening to iRetire4Him. We'll be right back talking about "not everybody can do the same thing, but everybody can do something" this Christmas season.

Jim Brangenberg: Hey, welcome back to iRetire4Him as we're talking about, everybody can do something, but not everybody can do the same thing during our Christmas season. But how do we take our faith and put it into action this Christmas season and have it carry over through all of 2025?

Bruce, I think it would be a good idea, as we talked about wraparound grandparenting in the last segment, that's something people are going to hear about a lot, because it is a solution the Church, the Body of Christ, can bring this nation and the several hundred thousand - Bruce, did anybody give numbers on how many kids are in the foster system across the nation? Anybody give those numbers? I had heard four or five hundred thousand.

Bruce Bruinsma: The latest number that they're going with is three hundred and sixty nine thousand. That's in the foster system and you add adoption and so on and it just, It gets up to that five hundred thousand number.

Jim Brangenberg: Yeah, okay, so let's go back to the Premise for today's show: "not everyone can do the same thing, but everyone can do something this Christmas season." As we're three weeks away from Christmas, let's get some practical ideas that we can do for Christmas . Let's just say, I'm working but I'm retirement age. What's one thing that comes to your mind, Bruce, something we could do to make an impact, living out our faith . We're still working, but we're retirement age

Bruce Bruinsma: . Yeah, we can, again, like we talked about before, you can find that need and fill it, find that hurt and heal it. And as you look around, not just in your family, but in your neighborhood, and certainly through your church affiliations, there are all kinds of needs that are up. One of the conversations that I would urge you to have, because you have limited time and you've got all kinds of things that are pulling at you, go and talk to your pastor or talk to your youth pastor and say, Hey, who or what is one circumstance that you know about that's going on in your church that I could help with that no one is addressing?

Jim Brangenberg: Are you talking about just giving money, are you giving or giving time? What are you talking about?

Bruce Bruinsma: Could be money, could be time, and typically it's both. Who is here who needs to go shopping that isn't going to have anything for Christmas that I can take to target and have a budget and say, Hey, let's go?

Jim Brangenberg: I'm not a big endorser of target. Can we send him to Walmart or some other great organization like that? Let's go somewhere else other than Target.

Bruce Bruinsma: We can go to Walmart. We can go to Sam's. Wherever it is that, that they can go. And if there's a department store in your town or a general purpose store that is, that has a Christian ownership, start there, but take somebody, have a budget. And help them to experience the joy of identifying, selecting, and owning something.

One of the things that we learned about foster kids is that they don't own anything. Everything is given to them and then it's taken away and then they move from one family to another.

Jim Brangenberg: Usually they have a garbage bag. All they get is a garbage bag. Whatever they can fit in the garbage bag, that's what you get. Let's go.

Bruce Bruinsma: And Focus on the Family's got a great program. We'll talk to one of our guests about that program. It's a bag that they can take their things in and no matter where they are, it is theirs. It is not somebody else's.

And so it's when we say that everyone can do something, what is it that you can uniquely do? And if you're still working, you've got a time constraint. So find something special that you can do that there's a need that's there and ask about it.

Jim Brangenberg: But you don't have financial constraints because you are not on a fixed income. You've got an ongoing decent income. Now, let's just say somebody is newly retired. They decided november 1st of 2024, they were going to retire. And so now they're newly retired. They're living independently . You know, I think we should really turn that conversation to, before you go filling in your stuff, because there's nobody busier than a newly retired person because they just absolutely just go crazy with commitments to new things, and that's great, but first ask the Lord your heavenly father, okay, I've got all these gifts talents and abilities all these skills that I've been honing since I was 15 years old or 13 or 12 or 10, some people started working when they were 8, how do you want me to use them now that I have free time? Before I commit myself to bridge club.

Bruce Bruinsma: Yeah. What they have is time and then their own experiences.

Jim Brangenberg: Yes.

Bruce Bruinsma: So to be able to bring those past experiences into now I have the time and typically the resources to be able to do something special. So ask the Holy Spirit to guide you and to bring to your attention a place where the time can be used. We've all known that there are the different love languages.

One of those love languages is time. Quality time! There is someone that you are associated with, engaged with, it could be somebody from the work that you just stepped away from, the gal who sits at the front desk who has two kids. You're now not working there anymore. If you call her and said, those two kids that you've, that you've got there, they're how old? Eight, nine? Okay. What is it that they might like to do that I could help them with? Not to give them money, but to have time. There's a parade coming up. There's a gift exchange that is happening. There's a party to go to. There's Chuck E. Cheese to go get some pizza. What could I do to help?

And to most of us, when we're, when we transfer into this retirement age, we get hesitant about being aggressively helpful. We are passively, we say if they want something from me, they can ask me and I'm happy to do it. No. That doesn't fit the picture at all.

Jim Brangenberg: What I love about the fact that it doesn't matter no matter what age you are listening to this podcast, the biggest and best thing you can do is to love on your neighbor. You've got neighbors. Whether you're living in an assisted living community or a full scale nursing home, you've got neighbors. Your neighbors may be your caregivers. Your neighbors may be the people who live in the apartment next door. But just love on your neighbors.

Now, sometimes neighbors aren't so lovable, but find a way to love your neighbors. The best way to do this is to start praying for them and ask God to help you to see them the way he does. But in all of this, everybody can do something, we just can't all do the same thing.

But actually Bruce, I just found a way to disagree with you. I think we can all do that one same thing, which is to love our neighbor during this season, and learning to carry that forward all year long. It's one of the best things we can do to make Christmas an awesome place for everybody that we know. Just start loving people. Don't you think?

Bruce Bruinsma: Absolutely. When you're about to say something or react to something or identify something, stop for just a moment and say, how does God's love want to be evidenced in this next statement, this next act, this next whatever it may be? And when you do that, and that becomes a habit, that will change everything for the whole year. Instead of saying let's just not be grumpy at Christmas time, hey, let's not be grumpy at the 4th of July either or May 25, or whatever day it is. And so often when I speak to senior groups, you can look out over the audience and you can see the grumpiness that is pervasive. And if we could change that grumpiness into that unique action that God has prepared you of doing something, what a blessing that will be.

Jim Brangenberg: It's a great conversation. As you look to Christmas three weeks from today, just know there's something you can do and it starts with you just saying hey father, what can I do? But you can do something, it may not be the same thing as somebody else, but start making a difference today. Bruce, great conversation I can't wait to pick this up in a couple of weeks as we get really close to Christmas and we'll start talking about New Years.

You've been listening to iRetire4Him with your host Jim Brangenberg as we talk with Bruce Bruinsma about the fact that everybody can do something, we just can't all do the same things, as we journey from retirement to reformation and prepare for 2025. We're Christ followers journeying from retirement to reformation so we can ultimately say, iRetire4Him!