Messy Advice... | Spiritual Deodorant Required
Description
Today's question: "I'm trying to love people well, but I often feel unsure if I'm doing it right. How do I know if I'm actually helping or just trying hard and hoping?"
Your messy adviser, Johan, takes listeners on a refreshingly honest journey through the awkward hugs, casserole drop-offs, and social faux pas that come with genuinely caring for others. With a dash of humour and a generous dose of grace, Johan explores the uncertainties of loving people well—especially when it feels less like a perfect act of service and more like fumbling forward in the dark. Expect relatable stories, biblical insight, and encouragement for anyone willing to keep showing up, even when caring gets chaotic. Pull up a patio chair, grab your Summer Speedo (the short episode kind), and laugh along as you wrestle with what it really means to journey with care.
CareImpact Podcast Group: https://www.facebook.com/share/g/19rkPGbD7C/
-
Johan Heinrichs [00:00:00]:
This one's for anyone who's ever replayed a conversation in their head 12 times trying to figure out if that awkward hug was love or just weird. Let's be honest, caring isn't always clear. Sometimes it's second guessing what you said, wondering if you should have stayed longer or backed off sooner. Loving people well sounds good on paper, but in real life, it's more like stumbling forward in the dark, hoping grace covers the gaps. Gaps. And half the time, you're not sure if you're planting seeds of love or just stepping on rakes. You try to be present. You try to listen.
Johan Heinrichs [00:00:34]:
You offer help, and it's met with silence or awkwardness or maybe even offense. You think, was that too much, not enough, did I make it worse, or just mildly confusing with good intentions? This is messy advice for people who care, for anyone who's still trying to love well without a clear map, and who's willing to keep showing up anyway. This is Johan on the edge of helpful, fumbling forward with love, second guessing, and enough sweat to ruin your spiritual deodorant. Today's question may as well have been the theme of this whole series. Let's get right into it. I'm trying to love people well, but I often feel unsure if I'm doing it right. How do I know if I'm actually helping or just trying hard and hoping? Which to be fair also describes most of our cooking, parenting, and prayer lives. If you've ever felt more like a well meaning mess than a spiritual rock star, you're not alone.
Johan Heinrichs [00:01:34]:
According to a 2022 Faith in Canada survey, sixty eight percent of practicing Christians say they wanna live out their faith in practical ways, but more than half feel unsure how to do that in a world where care can be complicated. We're trying to bring casseroles to heart problems, and sometimes it works, Sometimes, not so much. We wanna love people well, but the how is often fuzzier than we'd like to admit. So what do we do with all the doubt, the awkwardness, the trying and not always getting it right? Sometimes loving people well feels less like a spiritual gift and more like a series of small social experiments. Some of them go great. Some of them end up in follow-up texts, social anxiety, and a weird feeling you can't quite shake. Picture this. You drop off a meal for someone going through a tough time.
Johan Heinrichs [00:02:32]:
You rehearse what to say on the drive there. You hand it over with a warm smile and, let me know if you need anything, and then spend the rest of the night overthinking every part of that interaction. Was it too much, not enough? Did it land as love or land as awkward? You weren't trying to impress anyone. You were just hoping they'd feel the love that didn't quite fit in the Tupperware. Let's take a look at some scripture. Let's get biblical biblical. There in Luke seven, here's a woman that joined a party that she wasn't invited to, described as a woman of the city who is a sinner, not someone any respected leader would dare be associated with. Everyone else is reclining at the table, calm, composed, respectable, but not her.
Johan Heinrichs [00:03:20]:
Now the way I picture it, she's ugly crying, not a dignified tear sliding down her cheek, but that full body kind of sobbing that takes over your face. Her hair's down, which is already a cultural risk, and she's using it along with her tears to wipe Jesus's feet. This is messy, tangibly, emotionally, socially. It's not inspiring in that sanitized way we usually like our faith stories. It's raw. It's disruptive, visually uncomfortable. And Jesus, he doesn't rush her. He doesn't clean her up.
Johan Heinrichs [00:03:56]:
He doesn't stop her or make it more palatable. He lets her come undone at his feet, and he tells everyone else in the room, she understands what this moment is really about. He honors the emotion, the risk, that cost. It wasn't tidy, but it was true. She didn't check if her love made sense. She just poured it all out, and Jesus didn't flinch. In fact, he called it beautiful. You see, you don't need to get it all right to be walking in love.
Johan Heinrichs [00:04:29]:
If you're still asking questions, still paying attention, still trying to care without turning into a machine, you're doing better than you think. Love is clumsy most of the time, but it's still holy. You don't need to be amazing at this. You just need to stay open to the mess. So if you made it through the series still wrestling, still laughing, still loving, you're exactly who this was for. You're not behind. You're becoming. If you got a story to share, if you wanna be part of a group of like minded individuals trying to care in the messy, join our Care Impact podcast group on Facebook or head over to our website and keep tabs on what we're up to at careimpact.ca.
Johan Heinrichs [00:05:12]:
Until next time, keep loving, keep laughing, and if you made a mess out of loving people well, congrats, that means you're actually loving people and always remember to stay curious.
