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What do you do when the bottom drops out and life breaks in ways you never imagined? Charlie and Jill LeBlanc have walked that road, and through their personal story of loss, they’ve discovered the sustaining power of God's presence. In this podcast, they offer heartfelt conversations, Scripture-based encouragement, and the kind of hope that only comes from experience. Whether you're grieving, struggling, or searching for peace in the middle of chaos, this space is for you.
Hey everyone, thanks for joining us again today.
Charlie LeBlanc:Hi.
Jill LeBlanc:This is the Finding Hope podcast, Getting Through What You Never Asked For.
Charlie LeBlanc:It's a big subject.
Jill LeBlanc:It's a big one.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah, Getting Through What You Never Asked For. So many people are going through difficult times that obviously didn't ask for it, didn't expect it, and we want to help you. We want minister grace and love and understanding to you if you're going through a very tough time.
Jill LeBlanc:Yeah. Before we get really started, I mean, we've already started.
Charlie LeBlanc:Well, that's actually part of the start.
Jill LeBlanc:Yeah. That's true. We have a new resource. It's it's a collection of resources. It's called The God of All Comfort. And, it is a USB flash drive that you can put into your computer Or your smart TV or your later vehicle later late later model vehicle.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah.
Jill LeBlanc:Anything with a USB outlet. And inside, we've got some really great resources there, and they're beautifully designed. There's a PDF that you can download full of scriptures of comfort. There's a a five day devotional. We are going to be writing a thirty day devotional, but this is a little little sneak peek. It's five days of of things that the Lord showed us in our journey.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah. And, you know, one of the things that started this whole thing was we wrote a song called the God of All Comfort. And it's just a beautiful song, if I have to say so myself.
Jill LeBlanc:It really is pretty.
Charlie LeBlanc:Starts with earth has no sorrow that heaven can't heal. It has a verse in it about walking, through the sand, footprints footprints in the sand, that type of thing. And, anyway, it it just emphasizes 2 Corinthians 1:3 that says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort, and how that just jumped out of the page to me. So, we have the song, the video, a nature video of the song on there.
Charlie LeBlanc:I did about a half hour or so teaching on the scriptures concerning the God of All Comfort. Like Jill said, have scripture downloads. We have an MP3 of the song.
Jill LeBlanc:It was a beautiful nature video of that song. Sorry. I was thinking about
Charlie LeBlanc:You were thinking about the God of All Comfort.
Jill LeBlanc:I was thinking about the God of all comfort.
Jill LeBlanc:And yeah. So anyway, this is available now not only for the physical copy like this but we also have it available as just a download. Which you can go to our web website and order it, and it'll go straight to your device just like if you download an album or a song. This will go to your device and you can have full access to everything. So Right. That's there. Also on our website, there's a bundle, price if you buy this USB along with the book. There's a really great price for both.
Charlie LeBlanc:That's right.
Jill LeBlanc:And it's we just we're we're gonna be producing a lot more resources even this year. So we encourage you to connect with us on our email list because they are the first ones to find out about all this. And we just want to keep connected with you. If, if the things that we share are helping you are resonating with you, we just, want to connect with you even closer. So please, probably below this, this video is a link where you can sign up on our email list.
Jill LeBlanc:And I think the link should be below that says sign up on our email list and receive a free download of nine steps for the bereaved and their supporters. And it's it's a beautiful document that just has some some things taken from our book just to help you. Just to to you can put it on your print it out, put it on your fridge or it's just a great reminder. It's a good resource.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah. For sure.
Jill LeBlanc:So please connect with us. And if you like these episodes, share them with people that you feel would benefit from them as well.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah, that would be great.
Jill LeBlanc:And subscribe.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yes, yes, please do. To the podcast. We want to reach a lot of people with this message. We think it's worthy, a message that's not spoken of very much. We get people coming up to us all the time saying, No one's talking about this.
Charlie LeBlanc:So that's the heart that we have, God has spoken to us to talk about it basically. We have a really great opportunity coming up where Joyce Meyer has invited us to be on her podcast, so we're going to St. Louis to do that in September. I don't know when it will be aired, but that's an honor. Andrew Wommack has had us on several times on his GTN network discussing our book.
Charlie LeBlanc:We got an opportunity to minister to the whole student body at Carriage Bible College. We were just in England and just in Holland where we got to share a little bit about it there, ministering a church. So anyway, we're excited about just getting this word out. Now listen, Jill and I have been worship leaders all of our life. We love to lead worship. We love to worship Jesus. We love to write songs about Jesus.
Charlie LeBlanc:But since the loss of our son, this has gotten a hold of us and the Lord has mandated us to speak on this, which we're very happy to do, but I'm just wanting you to understand it's not something that we just kind of decided, let's just talk about No, We have been pulled and gripped, I might say, by the Lord to share about this. Proverbs 30 and here I go, blah, blah, blah, right? You're gonna say,
Jill LeBlanc:No, no.
Charlie LeBlanc:Proverbs 30 says, Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. And that just means so much more to me now than it ever has. Of course we've used that for the unborn, it's very powerful and very deeply touching to me to use it in that realm as well. But there's so many people who can't speak for themselves. There's orphans, there's widows, there's the poor, and there's so many people grieving who can't speak for themselves either.
Charlie LeBlanc:And no one is speaking for them. They're hiding in the church pews. They're afraid to tell their friend that they're still missing and hurting their loved one. Their brother may call them one morning and say, Hey, praise the Lord, let's go out to eat today. This is a beautiful day. Look at the sun.
Charlie LeBlanc:And they don't remember that it's the anniversary of them losing their husband, their son, or their daughter, or maybe their father, or their mother. They don't remember that. And so they're all happy, like, Come on, let's go, let's go play, let's go to the beach, or whatever. But, know, we're trying to speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves.
Charlie LeBlanc:And that's a lot of what this podcast is about, is to try to get this message out to people. And we're in a series right now of, what did you call it?
Jill LeBlanc:It is called Being a Good First Responder.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yes.
Jill LeBlanc:And if you listened last week, I believe I told the story about receiving a phone call from a very close friend, someone that understands our journey and that helped us get our book finished. They had received word the day before that a very close friend of theirs, who I don't know if they are born again, but the friend's 26 year old daughter had died the day before from a pulmonary embolism, which is a blood clot in the lungs. And those we have other friends who've lost at least another couple that we know have lost a daughter, they their former next door neighbors to the same thing. It's just so sudden, there's almost nothing you can do about it. And this happened to this family. So our friend was calling to say, okay, what do I do first? You know, what do I say to them? Do I call? Do I text?
Charlie LeBlanc:Mhmm.
Jill LeBlanc:When should I send them your book?
Charlie LeBlanc:Mhmm.
Jill LeBlanc:All these things because they just didn't know.
Charlie LeBlanc:And we talked all about that on the last podcast.
Jill LeBlanc:Yes.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah. Yeah.
Jill LeBlanc:So when I got off the call, you know, we talked and I just shared things that I felt the Lord was giving me. But when I got off, I just thought we all need to learn how to be a good first responder to these kinds of situations.
Charlie LeBlanc:Right.
Jill LeBlanc:When someone loses someone, a close loved one, whether it's a spouse, like we were saying, whether it's a child or a sibling or a parent. Right. We need to know how to respond to them in a way that is comforting.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yes.
Jill LeBlanc:Healing.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yes.
Jill LeBlanc:You know, just not not just saying...
Charlie LeBlanc:Sorry for your loss.
Jill LeBlanc:Yeah. Well, thank God they're in heaven.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah. Right.
Jill LeBlanc:Or whatever. You know, but but these people's lives had just been turned upside down. Their world has just been completely rocked.
Charlie LeBlanc:Wow.
Jill LeBlanc:And we, as the body of Christ, as Jesus's hands and feet, we and mouthpiece and heart, we need to know how to respond to them in a way that will be helpful and not hurtful.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah, yeah. Be a better first responder. And I think first of all is we need to respond.
Jill LeBlanc:Yes.
Charlie LeBlanc:You know, like when there's an emergency, the first responders are boom, they're called, they're run, they get there. And that's number one important, but number two, we need to be better...
Jill LeBlanc:Yes.
Charlie LeBlanc:Not only at doing that, but when we get there, that we can say the right things. Speaking of that, if you don't mind, I'm gonna read out of Job. You guys know the story of Job, how he got hit with all kinds of difficulties in his life, and over here in the second chapter, in the eleventh verse, it says, Now when Job's three friends heard of all this adversity that had come upon him, each one came from his own place, and it meant as their name Eliphaz, Temanite, Bildad, Shudhai, anyway. Too many.
Jill LeBlanc:Those dudes.
Charlie LeBlanc:Listen to this, I love this. For they had made an appointment together to come and mourn with him and to comfort him. Mean, that's amazing. They made an appointment. They called each other and said, look, we need to go and help him.
Charlie LeBlanc:And I know that when we lost Beau, you know, Rusty and Kim, and I think they called a couple of others, a couple of our close friends, said, We need to go over and help Charlie and Jill. And they showed up, and they helped us they helped us get through this. Then of course we had our house filled with people to come and to comfort us and to minister to us. That's when a good friend of ours, a Jewish believer friend of ours sat on the couch and said, Do you realize what this is? I said, No.
Charlie LeBlanc:He said, This is what we call Sitting Shiva. And that is when we, in a Jewish tradition, is taken from this scripture, I'm going read a little more here in a minute, but it's where he said, We come and we sit with those who have had losses. We don't avoid them. Like we've had some people say, I don't go to funerals. It's just not my thing.
Charlie LeBlanc:Well, no, you don't avoid. You go there for the living. You go there to help to mourn with those who have had a tragic loss. You're a first responder. You run-in there and say, Let me help.
Charlie LeBlanc:A close friend of ours just recently got hit with a very serious kidney situation and was in the hospital. And Jill, you responded right away to his wife. You jumped quickly. Said, Man, we're praying, we're standing with you. We're gonna do anything we can.
Charlie LeBlanc:And another friend of ours lost their mother and you right away ordered from Costco or somewhere a bunch of food to be sent to their house. That's being a good first responder. These are the kind of things we want to talk about in this program next week as well as the week after. But here it says that they had made an appointment, I love that, to come and mourn with him and to comfort him.
Jill LeBlanc:That's huge.
Charlie LeBlanc:And it said, but when they raised their eyes from afar and did not recognize him, they lifted their voices and they wept with Job, and each one tore his robe and sprinkled dust on his head toward heaven. And the verse 13 says, so they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him for they saw that his grief was very great. And the New Living says his grief was too great for words. Sometimes there are no words in situations like this.
Jill LeBlanc:Absolutely.
Charlie LeBlanc:And you when you were talking about being a better or being a good first responder, getting there is the first step, but then being very careful about what you say when you're with them. Not the trivial things like, Well, praise God, they're in heaven. That is just not appropriate. We've done the same thing. We've said, Well, he beat us to heaven, praise the Lord.
Jill LeBlanc:It doesn't happen. Even if you don't feel like you have anything to say that could be helpful, just show up. Because that right there is huge. We must show up even if it's uncomfortable.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah. Yeah, we just had a great man of faith pass a friend of ours that we've known for years and ministered along with him. We just both looked at each other and we looked at our calendar and we said, We need to go. We need to go to the funeral. We need to show our love and support to him and to his family and to his friends, his close friends.
Charlie LeBlanc:Right away we booked tickets for next week. So we're not both tooting our horn, I'm not trying to toot our horn, I'm just trying to say through the pain that we've been through we understand just how hard grief is and so therefore we know the value of being a good first responder. We know how to value it. It may cost us money to get there, it costs us time, and it will, But the value, we just got back from a funeral in St. Louis, and we came back from a two and a half week trip in Europe and England and Netherlands.
Charlie LeBlanc:And we got back home and we just got a, and then all of a sudden the funeral was, we got back on a late Wednesday night, the funeral was Thursday, on Friday rather. So we had one day home Saturday. Saturday, but we left Friday.
Jill LeBlanc:Right, we had one day at home.
Charlie LeBlanc:One day at home and we had to leave Friday. So anyway, it's kinda like, it'll be okay. Oh, they got a lot of support over there. It's alright. No, we we've got to be there.
Charlie LeBlanc:And man, it so important for us to be there. So important for us to be there. We brought some of our books, gave it to the families. When I saw my friend who lost his wife, we hugged each other and he wept. As I hugged him, I wept, we wept together. He knew, and he had texted me before we got there, and I think we said this on an earlier podcast, but he just said, Charlie, I never understood what you guys went through.
Charlie LeBlanc:Now I understand. He lost his wife, I think of fifty years of marriage. He said
Jill LeBlanc:And they were very youthful still.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah, very youthful. Love that he's a worship leader. We mentioned this as well. But yeah, we just wept together, and I really realized I don't care what it cost, I don't care what time it cost us, this was so important for us to be there. Of course, we reconnected with a lot of friends because we used to live in St. Louis.
Charlie LeBlanc:But anyway, yes, we encourage you to be sensitive to people. When someone passes in your world, whether it's a friend of a friend or a close friend, whatever, if you know anybody in that situation, try your best to go to the funeral. Now we're not able to make every funeral. I recently had a cousin pass in Louisiana and we had just seen her just two or three weeks earlier. We had spent time with them. We visited Louisiana.
Jill LeBlanc:And she wasn't ill.
Charlie LeBlanc:And she was great, but she had an instant heart attack and died. We weren't able to make that one. I wanted to, I thought a lot about it, but we weren't able to make it. I wish we would have actually. But it's just, you're not able to do everything, but listen, like Job's comforters, they've talked together, they said, Let's do this, let's go, let's go help and comfort Job in his pain.
Charlie LeBlanc:And like Joe said, even if you don't feel like you have the right words, none of us, listen, none of us feel adequate. I mean, even with our loss and writing a book, sometimes we get in the presence of someone who's had a loss and I'm like, What do I say? I don't wanna say the wrong thing. I don't wanna do So I mean, I just go, even with Kent, and I didn't wanna say the trivial things, but I just hugged him and I wept with him. And he, you've often said this, follow their lead.
Charlie LeBlanc:You know, follow their lead. If they say something about their loved one, you affirm them. If they say something about, Oh, praise the Lord, he's in heaven. I don't I'm I'm happy for He's not suffering anymore. Well then, you know, you go with that.
Jill LeBlanc:That's okay.
Charlie LeBlanc:You go with that. If that's where they're at at the moment, you go with that.
Jill LeBlanc:We rejoice with those who rejoice.
Charlie LeBlanc:Right on.
Jill LeBlanc:And we weep with those who weep.
Charlie LeBlanc:That's right.
Jill LeBlanc:That's what that means.
Charlie LeBlanc:Right. And if they're rejoicing over the fact that their loved one is now in and free from suffering, then we rejoice with them.
Jill LeBlanc:Yes.
Charlie LeBlanc:Praise God. And that is the case in so many situations. But we also know from experience that the weight of grief can come in sneakily, come in after the funeral, after all the accolades, everybody's saying praise God, you know. But the grief when you get alone can hit you. And it's different for everyone.
Jill LeBlanc:Right.
Charlie LeBlanc:But it is important for us to respond and be better at it.
Jill LeBlanc:Yeah. There's a scripture in Galatians. Well, first of all, you know, in Matthew 5:4 Jesus said, blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
Charlie LeBlanc:Mhmm.
Jill LeBlanc:You know, not that mourning is feels like a blessing, but God gives us that to be able to process our grief and our pain. So we have to let ourselves mourn. That's another whole talk.
Jill LeBlanc:But also, the Bible says in Galatians 6:2, it says, bear one another's burdens. And so fulfill the law of Christ. And like we we talked in a previous episode, the law of Christ is the law of love. And love is showing up and being a good first responder.
Charlie LeBlanc:Mhmm.
Jill LeBlanc:In the Amplified, it says in that same path that same scripture, it says carry one another's burdens. And in this way, you will fulfill the requirements of the law of Christ, that is the law of Christian love. But I really love the Passion translation. It says, Love empowers us to fulfill the law of the anointed one as we carry each others troubles.
Charlie LeBlanc:Mhmm. Yep.
Jill LeBlanc:And so we can't overstate it enough to do your best to be involved when someone that you know has experienced a loss, because you might be just the person that they need to see, to be around.
Charlie LeBlanc:Right.
Jill LeBlanc:We shared about our friend who called us with that situation. And, you know, she didn't know if she should call or if she should text or whatever. And you just have to be led by the spirit in those kinds of situations. You know, if you do call and they don't answer, they're probably really busy having to plan a funeral or talk to legal authorities. Because when someone dies in the home and it's not with hospice, the law enforcement gets involved.
Jill LeBlanc:And so, you know, so I'm just saying if you call and they don't answer you, definitely leave a really heartfelt message because they eventually will get to hear your message. But you just have to be led by the spirit. And sometimes they don't answer because they don't want to talk to anyone. But if your name comes up, you might be just the person they do want to talk to. So we just need to be led by the Holy Spirit in how we bear one another's burdens.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah, take the chance. This friend of ours who just lost his wife, I'm very close with him, and he's a worship leader and everything. I texted him yesterday, don't know if I told you that.
Jill LeBlanc:Mm-mm.
Charlie LeBlanc:But I text him because he was on my heart. And I ended the text with saying, Please don't feel like you need to respond. No need to That's huge. I just want you to know that I'm praying for you and I love you and I'm thinking about you.
Jill LeBlanc:That's such a great tip.
Charlie LeBlanc:So, so often we do because we want to be acknowledged. Want people to see that we did it. We want the bereaved one to acknowledge us, but do it unselfishly. Send a text or send something with not expecting anything in return.
Jill LeBlanc:Yes, yeah.
Charlie LeBlanc:That's good. And even say that like I did because they have so much, they're in a whirlwind of so much going on right now.
Jill LeBlanc:So much.
Charlie LeBlanc:So, you know, but if you can be there, support them. And know, people did that for us in a lot of ways.
Jill LeBlanc:Oh my gosh. The day that our son passed away, he was in our home and we had just gotten him signed up with hospice. And that whole situation, it's the last thing I wanted to do I just just didn't wanna go there. I just- Regardless, he passed away and in our home. And and so we didn't call to have his body removed for some time, for several hours.
Jill LeBlanc:But we felt finally because he passed in the night and at like 2am. And so finally, after several hours, we felt, you know, we should call. So we left the house and our friends, we went to my parents just to get away. We didn't want to have to be there to watch all that.
Jill LeBlanc:But we had very dear, dear friends stay there at the house and just, you know, oversee it all. And when we got home, a couple hours later, they had completely reset our entire finished basement, which is where Beau was, and all of the medical equipment, the oxygen, all the stuff that goes with someone that's, you know, having to be treated. And they had it all cleaned up and put away. And they put away all of our Christmas decorations, which they had put out right before we returned home the December, they had gotten all of our because we'd been away for months and they got not all of it, but a lot of our Christmas stuff out, put up our tree, wrapped some of our trees outside with lights. They they just when we got home the December for that, they had done that for us.
Jill LeBlanc:And so here now they had cleaned up all of the medical equipment and put away all the Christmas while we were away at my parents' house. We were just flabbergasted when we came home and it was like our home, you know, we had our home back. We didn't have our son back. We had our home back and I would never have asked them, you know, can you guys help with this? And it probably wouldn't have gotten done for months because I was bad about putting Christmas away anyway. But those are true friends.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah.
Jill LeBlanc:And these are the kind of friends that we need to be. Just find a need and meet it. And be led by the spirit because sometimes we can be a little too aggressive about things.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah, yeah, we've seen that too. People are trying to do too much.
Jill LeBlanc:But we have the Holy Spirit and he will show us, he will help us, He will guide us.
Charlie LeBlanc:Right.
Jill LeBlanc:But we have to give him something to work with.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah, so the bottom line is be a responder and be a good responder.
Jill LeBlanc:Good first responder.
Charlie LeBlanc:And we're all trying to learn how to do that better. So that's what this series is going to be about. We'll go back to you next week with more thoughts concerning this. But we just want you to know that we appreciate you, we love you. If you're grieving or in any pain, we're praying for you, we love you. And we do encourage you to get our book for those who have had losses and for those who haven't had losses but you're trying to be a better first responder.
Jill LeBlanc:Maybe your friend has, or a close relative.
Charlie LeBlanc:Yeah, this has a lot in it about being a good first responder. Then of course, don't forget our USB called the God of All Comfort. This will minister to you. And also, might want to say Jill talked about the mailing list and talked about a lot of things, but I also want to mention that we have a monthly partner program and people, we call them partners of hope, and so people who support us on a regular basis and help us. And everything that we're diving into right now is a new ministry and we need a lot of people to get behind us and help us financially to get all the work done that God has put on our hearts to do.
Charlie LeBlanc:So if you want to be a part of that, please go to our website and you can look at the button. There's also information about partnership there. So God bless all of you, we love and we'll see you again next week. Bye bye now.