Episode 396: I’m Talkin…Beside
I’m Talkin, episode 396 for November 16th, 2025.
This is Joel from the I’m Talkin microcast, where I share my thoughts on a topic that has piqued my interest this past week.
This week, we’re talking beside.
So beside is a…
Here I go starting my sentences with so every time.
I’m going to try to fix that.
I just don’t know when it’s going to happen.
Beside is a pretty simple word.
It’s a word that we use all the time.
I don’t think there’s any weirdness about its meaning.
It’s very clear.
It is what it is, that the word is what it says it is.
It’s beside.
It’s not in front.
It’s not behind.
It’s something that is beside you, on your right, on your left.
It is a word that we use all the time.
One weird way we may use it is when we say we’re beside ourselves, which that could be impossible, I guess.
So, you know, it’s like when we use it, we’re like, don’t walk behind me, walk beside me, or don’t lollygag if we’re talking to our kids or maybe grandkids.
Come up, you know, catch up, walk beside us.
And that’s really the meaning of the word.
It’s we’re beside somebody.
We are by their side.
And therein lies the challenge for those of us who call ourselves Christians.
So today’s word comes from Psalm 23, verse 4.
And it says, even when I walk through the darkest valley, I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me.
Your rod and staff protect and comfort me.
So there it is right there.
You are close beside me.
And why is this a challenge?
Maybe I’m stretching it a little bit, but that word means something different today than it did in the day that it was written.
Nope.
I think I said that wrong.
The word means the same thing.
But when you look at the author of that word, this is a Psalm of David.
At the time, that is where he assumed that God was, and God was there beside him.
God had chosen him to be a king.
God was at his side.
His presence was there, but not always.
And that’s the perspective.
The thing that’s so cool is that now in 2 Corinthians 5, 17, it says, everyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person.
The old life is gone.
A new life has begun.
And what does that new life look like?
It looks like someone who is indwelt.
No longer is God beside us.
God is in us if we have claimed him and claimed his son who died on the cross for us.
God has made his home inside of us.
No longer beside us.
He is with us internally, always, never to leave us.
It is so like God to make a plan that allows us to be his children.
And then he spends all of his time with us.
Every single one of us get all of God, not a single piece.
It’s not like when someone becomes a Christian, God gets a little more thinned out and the Holy Spirit gets a little more thinned out in the dwelling of the Christian person.
No, we get all of him all the time.
And so now that verse means something different.
It says, even in the darkest valley, you are in me.
Your Holy Spirit protects and comforts me.
It’s a whole concept that David didn’t understand at the time, and we get to live with it on the regular.
I’m so glad I serve a God like that.
That is all I have for today.
Until next week, this is Joel from the I’m Talkin Microcast.
A quick shout out this week happens to be my daughter’s birthday.
And it’s a big one.
I don’t know if I’m supposed to say that she’s 30.
Oh, I just did.
And I just want to wish her a happy birthday, and I love you very much.