Intentional Momlife with Jesus

079: Prioritize your day in 4 easy steps

Summary

Do you ever wake up feeling like you’re already on the back foot? You have so much to do that you are only looking forward to crawling back under the covers at the end of the day. Or maybe you have a lot of things on that never ending to do list and it’s a headache trying to prioritize it all?

In this episode Sasha shares 4 easy steps that can be done each morning to prioritize your day in a way that leaves you focusing on your top priorities, giving your first fruits to God, and leaving yourself available to divine appointments.

__________

Want to support our adoption journey by making a tax deductible contribution to our matching grant via Lifesong online at https://give.lifesong.org/lifesong/10121-ff or via mailing a check payable to “Lifesong for Orphans,” with “#10121 Robertson” on the memo line of the check. Please mail to: PO Box 9, Gridley, IL 61744.

Transcription

0:03
Hello sisters and welcome back to another episode of the Intentional Abundant Life Podcast. I’m your host Sasha Star Robertson and I am super excited to bring you this episode today where we are just simply talking about prioritizing your day in four easy steps. And let me tell you, there are only four and they are easy. And we can all do this. We can all do this in a matter of minutes every single day. And we’re going to bring the Lord into it and it’s going to be fabulous. But first I want to do this jingle and then we are going to share some personal bits of information of course.

0:49
Jingle

1:16
All right, so before we jump into today’s episode, I just have to share with you guys how incredibly excited I am because my husband and I have been approved for a matching grant on our adoption journey. So if you’re listening to this in real-time, and you’re just following along in the podcast, as episodes come out, you know that we are in the midst of our second adoption journey to grow our family. And this is huge news. Super, super cool, because it actually has come like the same week that during our first adoption journey we found out that we were adopting twins that were matched with. And my dog just dropped her bone. So sorry if you’re hearing all this background noise.

2:34
But super, super cool news. So it’s a matching grant and what that means is there is a generous donor out there who has said for every dollar we raise up to $7,000. In our adoption journey, they are going to match it dollar for dollar up to $7,000. And so that’s incredibly huge. That’s about 50% of the cost of our adoption through the agency fees and the finalization costs that are expected through our attorney. That’s not counting, you know, other incidentals through the home study and medical stuff and travel, if that ends up being necessary. But again, just a super, super huge blessing.

3:22
So if this podcast has impacted you, if you follow me on social media, if you’re in the community, if you have received value through any of my free workshops or anything like that, and God is putting it on your heart to make a contribution. I don’t make anything for this podcast. I don’t have any sponsors. I don’t have any ads. I don’t get paid anything for the information or value that I put out here. And so if you’ve been impacted by and God is calling you to give in anyway. This is a way that would benefit our family. So incredibly much and again, every dollar is going to be matched. And so your $1 it turns to$2, your $5 turns to $10, your $100 turns to $200, and it would be such an incredible blessing to our family. So I’m gonna drop the information in the show notes where you guys are able to just easily click and give online if that’s something that you want to do.

4:23
I also want to let you know that I am leading another free workshop coming up next Tuesday. This is Tuesday, August 9. And it is a free workshop talking all about 10 powerful hacks for living intentionally as a multi-passionate or busy Christian mom. And this is something that I had actually prepared for a local women-in-business. luncheon networking luncheon here locally that I attended last week and it was such a powerful, powerful talk. I got such high praises in response to it. Even a local House representative was there and he’s your speech both the delivery and the content was absolutely incredible. So many great tools.

5:20
And I know that the women who are listening to this podcast, who are in my community, who are in my circle of influence are just going to be able to gain so many hacks and tools and just real-life application for living intentionally. And so I want to deliver this to guys totally for free. It’s going to be taking place in the community. If you want it on that. Again, the link is in the show notes. I’m not only giving you these powerful hacks, I’m giving you worksheets and time to be able to implement some of them that very day. So that’s going to be taking place at 6 am Alaska time Tuesday, August 9, you do not want to miss out. Okay, now we’re jumping into these four easy steps for prioritizing your day.

6:10
Number one is to begin your day with Jesus. And I think this is so powerful because not only does it go from these faithful foundations that we’re wanting to build everything on that cornerstone right? Not the shifting sand but the cornerstone that is Christ, making sure we’re building everything in our lives and in our being off of that. We’re wanting to give Him the first fruits of our day and we go to Him again. I say this over and over and over again. I love this quote from Tara Lynn St. Aileen. We go to him for his presence, for sitting in his presence, for that relationship with Him. Not for the presents as in the gifts but that is what we get. Right? So I want you to pray over your to-do list and your schedule every single day.

7:04
I love this quote by Martin Luther and I shared it last month on one of the podcast episodes about reasons to get quiet – right – reasons to have quiet time with God daily. And in the quote, he says I have so many things to do today. I cannot afford to not spend three hours of my morning in prayer. I’m paraphrasing, that’s not the quote exactly. There are probably a few words rearranged in there. But it’s so incredibly important because when we let Him guide our steps, there could be something on your to-do list or on your schedule that doesn’t need to be.

7:52
And by praying and giving him those first fruits or allowing him to show us those divine appointments. And if we’re too focused on what we have planned before us, then there’s a good chance that we might be missing those divinely scheduled appointments. And I just want to encourage you in that, that it helps you live in awareness. It helps you live in the gift that is the present moment of our lives. Not constantly looking forward not constantly looking for more, but in current awareness. So number one, begin your day with Jesus.

8:38
Number two is to review your schedule and your to-do list. This is something that I think we can often look over and it kind of stems from that praying over it, right? Praying over your to-do list and your schedule is creating the time for you to review and asking yourself are the things on my to-do list and on my schedule today? Are they the things that are in line with the life I am trying to create? Are they in line with my values? And are they necessary and/or life-giving?

9:19
There have been many times I and my clients have gotten a little wrapped around the axle clinging to something on our schedule that if we take a moment to just slow down and look at it and pray over it, we can see that this is not that big of a deal. This is something that can easily be put off at a later time. It’s something that could be delegated. Or it’s something that perhaps we don’t really even need to be doing it. But sometimes once it’s on the schedule, it’s just like it’s there to stay. Right? And we’re hell-bent on continuing forward sometimes without asking these questions. So really take a few moments. When you pray over your to-do list and your schedule and review it.

10:14
Number three is to state your intentions for the day. And intentions are kind of this like growing off of your intent right your purpose. What are you determined to do? And I love to think about like the overall outcome of the day, right? Like, what’s pressing about this year or the season of life that you’re in? What’s pressing about this month that you’re in, and what’s pressing about this week that makes this something that’s pressing that I am like determined to do today? A good example of this is this adoption season that I just mentioned at the beginning, right? We’ve been on this journey for, goodness, I think we’re coming up on two years, two years in the second adoption journey. And it’s beginning to feel more and more real.

11:13
Like it felt real in January when we were like actually put up on the website and like presenting as a family and our first adoption journey we actually had three different matches with different expectant moms and their babies. And every single one of those took place within 30 days kind of like we’re up or alive on the website. People are looking at our profile book. We’re giving our yes and then we were picked. And then that fell through. We went back. We were giving our yes within 30 days. We were chosen again. And then when that fell through it was actually the first yes, that we put out was returned back and that’s our son.

11:58
So it has been seven months that we’ve been on the website and haven’t been chosen. And not that it’s a bad thing like I we are fully like this is surrender to God. It is in his hands. We know that. We’ve just given our Yes. And when a mother chooses us, when she feels like that is the best decision for her child, and wants to step into that relationship. We’re here for it. But it’s not like it’s not anything like the last time I’ll have to share a whole different podcast episode on adoption and, and all that kind of stuff. Right? But we are updating our home study. We might need to get new photos for the website because it’s been a year since we did that in our profile book. And you know from a two-year-old to a three-year-old massive changes happen, mostly in the hair department for our son, height-wise as well, and his baby face is going away a little bit.

13:02
Anyways, I digress. So we got approved for these adoption grants. And we’re like, oh my goodness, we need to start doing fundraising so that you know, the funds we raised can be matched and updating the home study and just all this other stuff. And I feel like before the end of the year is like this feeling that I’ve been like, I don’t know, I don’t maybe it’s a download right? Maybe it’s God saying that before the end of the year we’re going to be placed with a child but this week we’re updating our home study. Last week we were approved for this adoption grant. It just feels like this is the season right?

13:42
So what is pressing on my values and my family and in my life, right? What has been very real in this season, in this month, in this week, and what things about that are my intentions for today? And one of those things is to email about the adoption grant. I have like three different people in this approval email we found out late Friday. And so one of my responsibilities today, one of my intentions today, is to go through an email back each of the people that I need to in response to that grant to move forward with the steps of reaching out to the fundraising opportunities that this grant organization gives us access to and to take the steps in getting one of our adoption platforms listed. And so all these things have to do with this one adoption grant that’s relevant for this adoption season. Something that’s pressing this week, pressing this season.

14:58
So when you’re thinking of your intentions, stating your intentions for the day, what are the top three things that you need to accomplish today? Right if you can verbally state them out loud, verbally and preferably to an accountability partner. For me right now my accountability partner is my spouse. We do this together four days a week. Every morning, we get up together, we pray together and we state our intentions to each other. And it’s not listing off of these are all the things I need to do today. I’m gonna start with my quiet time and then I’m gonna do this. No, it’s not like reviewing your to-do list, it is stating your intentions. These are the three things I’m going to do today.

15:51
Okay, and then number four is don’t hesitate to shift or pivot your plans. This is not coming from a place of laziness or fear, or lack-mindsets, right? I think sometimes we can say oh, you know I’m going to shift or pivot my plans because I’m just tired today or I just need a mental break today. Or coming from a place of like shiny object syndrome, like, oh, well, I’m just going to ignore this thing on my plate. While I go pursue this other thing. Scope creep, really not important. It’s not coming from a place of that. When I say don’t hesitate to shift or pivot your plans, I’m saying to make yourself available to a friend that might need a shoulder or hand. Make yourself available to those divine appointments that God has in your day. Make yourself available to your spouse and your children. The number-one priorities in your life. And I want to encourage you to focus on remaining present in a state of awareness of your needs, your family’s needs, and God’s pushes and pulls.

17:15
Okay, so in recap, number one, begin your day with Jesus. Number two, review your schedule and your to-do list. Number three, state your intentions for the day. And number four, don’t hesitate to shift or pivot your plans in accordance with what your family or you need or those pushes and pulls from God. Before we jump off. I just have to share with you one last bonus because who is Sasha if she’s not here to overdeliver right? This is something that I’m also going to share, so your workshop has now become not 10 hacks but only nine and if you’ve already got the life goals planner, you’re already familiar with this process, but do a brain dump as needed. This is not something that I do every day, nor encourage my clients to do every day.

18:13
But some of those days where you might be feeling a little overwhelmed or just need a little bit more space to organize like all the things that are floating around in your brain or your to-do list or on your schedule, or whatever else. Do not hesitate to pull out a piece of paper or use an app like workflowy. Again, link in the show notes because it’s probably my favorite app currently. Use workflowy or just a sheet of paper and dump out everything that is on your brain. Everything that is just floating around, creating mind drama and mental Clutter and chaos and overwhelm. And then once it’s all out of your brain, and somewhere else, you can use tools like the four DS, the rubber ball versus glass balls, the peace versus chaos. There are multiple different tools, color coding systems, and things that you can use to then organize that information in whatever way works best for you.

19:12
And all these tools and worksheets are available in the Life & Goals planner. If you don’t have it, grab a copy. And some of these worksheets are also going to be available in the 10 hacks for intentional living. That is coming up next Tuesday. So be sure to be in the community and gain access to all that. Alright, sisters, I pray this blessed you I pray is going to help you live more intentionally and prioritize your day using these four easy steps and the bonus hack.

More about your Podcast Host

Sasha Star Robertson is an Intentional Living & Biblical Mindset Coach for busy Christian moms, wife of 13 years to her best friend, boy mom (blessed by adoption), travel addict, and Jesus freak. She is the founder of The Intentional Abundance Co., curator of the Life & Goals Planner, & host of the Intentional Abundant Life Podcast.

Would you benefit from having a coach helping you live Productively Peaceful days digging into Faithful Foundations, Purposeful Priorities, Mindset Mastery, & Simple Selfcare? This question is rhetorical, everyone would! Schedule a consult with Sasha to learn more about the IAM Coaching Program and to see if you’d be a good it. https://calendly.com/intentionalabundanceco/iamconsult

Desiring Community?

You’re invited to join us in the Productively Peaceful Moms Club over on facebook! It’s a safe space where we can show up vulnerably and encourage each other, where ere share the mission of being the best mommas we can be through the grace and strength of Jesus Christ, where we encourage consistency and are able to hold each other accountable. We share scripture and talk about podcast episodes and pray for each other and set goals and so much more! You’re more than welcome here, you’re wanted here! https://www.facebook.com/groups/IntentionalAbundance

078: Not Hearing from God? Could you be blocking the Holy Spirit? Activate the Holy Spirit through aligning your thoughts to God’s Word with Special Guest Megan Bruiners

Summary

In this episode Sasha shares a powerful conversation… I know, we say that about every episode… but no really, a POWERFUL conversation with special guest Megan Bruiners. Megan is a Kingdom coach, X2 International Bestselling Author, and mom to her little miracle, Joshua.

Intentional Abundant Life Podcast Special Guest Megan Bruiners is a Kingdom coach, X2 International Bestselling Author, and mom on the episode sharing about relationship with God, activating the Holy Spirit through aligning our thoughts to God's word, and our identity as a child of God.

Megan brings with her a Holy Spirit fire into the conversation as she shares a testimony about how she came to know God in relationship with Him over religion and how pursuing God, seeking Him, changed everything for her.

Prior to hitting recording Sasha and Megan we’re speaking on obedience to God and hearing/feeling His call and His will over their lives. It was in that moment they knew that they needed to speak to those who are in a place of not hearing nor feeling His presence.

Do you feel like you’re not hearing from God?
Could you be blocking the Holy Spirit from moving in your life?

In this conversation Megan gives you some powerful questions to ask as you dig into breaking through those barriers to hear God’s voice.

Megan encourages you in your identity as a child of God, as heirs with Christ, as co-creators with our Creator and living in integrity with what God says about who He is and who we are.

No joke, grab your notepad because this singular episode has the power to shift so much for your thoughts and mindset and faith walk.

Want more Megan? Connect with her on social!
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100063563442926
Instagram: www.instagram.com/purposemid_wife
Instagram Author: www.instagram.com/author_meganbruiners

Transcription

Coming Soon

More about your Podcast Host

Would you benefit from having an ally help you sort through some of these very beliefs and thoughts Sue references in this episode? Your podcast host, Sasha Star Robertson is an Intentional Living and Biblical Mindset Coach that helps women just like you to master their mindset and take thoughts captive and obedient to scripture. Schedule a consult with Sasha to learn more about the IAM Coaching Program and to see if you’d be a good it. https://calendly.com/intentionalabundanceco/iamconsult

Desiring Community?

077: Mindset Mastery – How thoughts rooted in being the exception stand in our own way

Summary

In this episode Sasha shares about mindset and how the many thoughts that can come up for us from the root of “I am the exception” and how they can be the very thoughts that are preventing us from creating the results that we desire to create.

“It works for her, but it won’t work for me”
“But she only has one kid I have 5”
“But she has more self-control/discipline than I do”
“But my kids are more stubborn”
“But…… fill in the blank here….

We all make these excuses or shall I say, believe that we are the exception to certain things in life.

Sasha shares about the way our minds work from that deeply rooted thought to the results were creating in life. She shares how we can shift those thoughts and beliefs to the truth that is in scripture and take them captive to the feet of Jesus. Sasha shares about how this exact mindset framework that she uses with her clients, and through self coaching, has helped transform mindsets around motherhood, faith, health, business, and more.

Transcription

0:52
Jingle

0:21
Hey, hey sisters, welcome back to another episode. I am super excited to just dive right into this today. This is probably going to be a short episode because if I’m honest, I kinda have to pee right now. TMI, but that’s okay. But God just really put this message on my heart and was like, No, people need to hear this. So I’m coming to share. And it all has to do with our mindset. And you guys when I talk about mindset, I am not talking about this like Frou Frou New Age, like worldly stuff. I am talking about taking your thoughts captive and making sure they are set on Christ, making sure they are set on Scripture and the truth that we know in Christ. Right? We first I believe have to believe it with our minds. But then we also have to allow it to marinate in our hearts so that we can actually believe it. And I’m talking about a thought today that so many of us can easily get caught up in and it is the thought or even the belief that I am the exception.

2:09
And it doesn’t come necessarily as that thought of as that belief but that is at the root, in the core, of some of these other thoughts. And you guys can fill in your own here. When I say the exception, I’m gonna give you some examples, but I know you all have your own. How do I know? Because I still have them. You know well over a year into using this specific mindset framework for my coaching, after a year of doing all this other stuff in the coaching realm, after years in counseling and therapy. This is the basis of it. This is the core of taking these thoughts captive. And so definitely fill in your own.

2:23
So some of them that come up frequently that I see is that it works for her, but not me. Or the idea that it’s for her, but not for me. And I think for one, yes, it takes wisdom and discernment to come to conclusions and answers to things, right? We have to be willing to take those thoughts captive in the first place, right? To really take in wisdom and discernment to understanding take them to Scripture, take them to our wise advisors, whether that’s friends that we know are plugged into the Lord regularly, or, you know, an elderly woman at your church or a coach or a counselor or whatever, right? Because there truly are things that are not meant for us that are for others and not for us. So it’s definitely a balance of exercising wisdom and discernment there.

4:05
But I’m talking about things where we can instantly count ourselves out. Well yeah creating a schedule for your family and for your life might work for you but not for me. Yeah but maybe that’s for Type A people and I’m not really that kind of a person. I just like to go with the flow. Or I understand what you’re saying about self-control and discipline, but I’m just not a disciplined person. Or, but my kid is special needs, or my kid’s autistic, or my kids are really stubborn. But my kid doesn’t sleep well at night. But I have five kids and she only has one. That’s why it works for her. And there are so many other ways, right? But I live in Alaska and she lives in Florida. I mean, I can come up with so many examples of this, but even just talking about this, I hope that you guys are picking up on this kind of idea of the ways that we can easily count ourselves out by these thoughts and beliefs that we are the exception to what somebody else is saying. Right?

5:15
People show up, and they share things because these are things that they have come to find answers to and find success in, right? And we definitely have to use wisdom and discernment which goes back to these faithful foundations, right, and knowing who God is, knowing who God is to you, knowing what Scripture says, being firmly rooted and deeply planted in seeking His presence and being in His word daily, right? It all starts there, we have to establish that firm foundation on the cornerstone of what is truth first, but then we also have to check our mindset and take these thoughts captive. Because when we are operating from these thoughts and beliefs that we are the exception in any way, shape, or form, what feelings come from that, right? When you’re thinking oh, it works for her but not for me. Because… Or but fill in the blank. Then we are showing up with these feelings of lack, with these feelings Some doubt, with these feelings of inadequacy or getting caught up in the comparison trap, and things of that nature. And it’s just a really, really slippery slope to get into.

6:35
Because then when we show up with these feelings, our actions and behaviors automatically stem from that. They automatically flow from those feelings and those thoughts that I am the exception. It’s not going to work for me because I have all of these doubts and all of these fears and all of these “lack mindsets” holding me back. We show up with the actions and behaviors to not try and not take action. And the result that we create is that it doesn’t work for us. And the biggest reason why it’s not working for us is because we have already decided that it’s not going to work for us. So this is a way that our mindset plays into so much of what we’re doing and how we’re living and how we are existing in life. It’s not just like this simple, one-over type thing, I guess you could say.

7:37
We have to be willing to sit down and check our mindset and check our thoughts and make sure we’re taking them captive to the obedience to Christ, making sure we’re living according to our convictions and what we know as truth because of this is what God says in His Word, therefore, this is truth. My thoughts in this moment and my feelings in this moment are not truth. Okay. Sadie Robertson was at the If Gathering and she had this powerful talk that she shared about your truth. And I encourage you to go look that up, go dig into that and see what God reveals to you in that because it was a very, very powerful speech. And if you really want just like a brief overview of kind-of what she said and the main like key points or key takeaways of that, I did share powerful takeaways from the If Gathering from my notes and what I took away in Episode 41 and 42 right here on the Intentional Abundant Life podcast.

8:57
And so you’re welcome to go listen to those and see what comes up for you. The one about Sadie Robertson is actually in Episode 42. So you can go to that one specifically if you wanted to hear my takeaways about her talk, but honestly, there are snips of it that are on Instagram and whatever. If you have Right Now Media, I think her whole talk is on right now media. They’re housing all of those If Gathering messages. And then in addition to that, if you don’t have right now media, in the Intentional Abundance Community I have shared a link to Right Now Media where you can go and have access to all of the videos and stuff in that powerful platform for completely free.

9:42
In addition to this, this message just continues to go deeper and I feel like what God has been revealing to me in this through The Best Yes… So, one of the ladies in the Intentional Abundance Community, one of my clients, her and I decided to do this. The invite is and was open to all. We’re a little over halfway through this. You’re still welcome to jump in. We just have good conversations. We watch the videos once a week. Come on Zoom. So if you want more information about that, that is in the Intentional Abundance Community as well. But it’s been really cool because The Best Yes has just been so confirming for me because there have been multiple people who have come and been like, oh yeah, I’ve read The Best Yes, whenever I have conversations with them, or if they listen to podcast episodes or whatever else. And I’ve never read the book or done the study before. So it’s just been really really cool. And I love the way that Lysa brings God’s truth into it and brings things together that just put a different word or different language to some of the stuff that I’m trying to say at times.

10:47
But God really showed me this and I didn’t even really put it together before this, but she shares the story about Caleb going with all of these other men to overlook and see and come back and bring a report of, What does it look like at the promised land that God has like promised all of the Israelites? And all of these men go and they report back that they were giants and fortresses and armies and these huge walls and it was very dangerous and like we probably shouldn’t do this because it’s probably not smart. But Caleb brought back the report that it was possible because he knew it was the land that God had promised them. So his report that he brought back was according to the convictions of who God is and what God said, not about his circumstances, his feelings of fear, or what his eyes could see in the moment.

11:45
And Lysa has this quote, in her book. I’m gonna quote it for you. It’s actually her quote, and it says, “It’s not about a matter of gaining more confidence, right? Caleb and these men didn’t go to gain a matter of competence. They went and Caleb reported back according to his convictions. So it’s a matter of being more certain of our convictions. And confidence is being more certain of our own abilities, whereas conviction is being more certain of God’s instruction.” And so I’m constantly reminded of this, right? Whenever I have these thoughts of, I am the exception, or maybe it works for her, or whatever else that comes up in that matter, right? Whenever I have these feelings, or these thoughts, or even these beliefs that are not rooted in truth, rooted in Christ, rooted in Scripture, we have to take them captive. Because if we don’t, we are going on a slippery slope, where it’s like Yoda says, “It’s either do or do not. There is no try.” And if we are going off of this thought that I’m the exception and these feelings of lack and doubt and fear, then our actions are to not even try, to not even take action. And therefore it doesn’t work for us because we already decided that it wasn’t going to

13:09
So sisters, take this thought captive anytime, in any way that you see it showing up in your life, make sure that you are taking it captive to the foot of the cross, taking it captive to the truth that is in Scripture, so that you are allowing Christ to fill that space. We can rewrite these thoughts and we can rewrite these feelings, change our actions and change our results. And this is the mindset work that I get to help my clients do on a regular basis. Every week we meet. And we talk about mindset stuff. There’s a mindset lesson and training on how to go about doing this in the portal, how it is in line with scripture, in my clients’ portal, and it’s one that they get to reach out to me every day if they need to process through some of this mindset stuff. This is the very framework that I have used to take captive, my thoughts about, about my faith, about who I am in Christ, about motherhood, about my relationship with my spouse, about money, about my business, about my health, and so much more.

14:21
So you guys can see this is universal, it works across the board. And actually, it is rooted in cognitive behavioral therapy, something also known as CBT that therapists across the globe use to help patients with their anxiety and depression and things like that, but y’all you don’t have to be in a place of anxiety and depression to use these tools to transform your mindset, to take your thoughts captive in obedience to Christ and to truth, and to literally change your actions and behaviors and the results that you’re seeing in your life.

14:57
So if you want to go deeper on this, please sisters reach out and jump on a consult, I’m not going to pressure you into working with me. Honestly, I’m indifferent whether you work with me or find another coach, my heart and my hope in this is that you will live a life firmly rooted and firmly planted in these faithful foundations, that you will be equipped to master your mindset and all these different things that come up. And that you would be able to live a productively peaceful life in the things that are meant for you, sister, not for her, not for whatever so-and-so’s doing over there, but the things that God has pressed into your heart as your values and the convictions that he’s giving you. So I will see you over in the Intentional Abundance Community as we further discuss this episode, and I hope to see you on a consult. God bless your day sister.

More about your Podcast Host

Desiring Community?

076: Practical Steps to get out of your own way and let God’s Truth become your truth with Sue Corl, director of Crown of Beauty International

Summary

In this episode Sasha shares a powerful conversation with Sue Corl, an international women’s conference speaker, author, mentor, Bible teacher, Cru missionary, founder and director of Crown of Beauty International, teacher, and His Heartbeat Podcast host. Her greatest joy is being a wife and mother of two adult children. She has a passion to see women set free to live in the powerful truths of who they are in Christ and the love of God. She has a Master’s of Education and a Master’s of Christian Counseling. She is the author of several books including Crown of Beauty Twelve Week Bible Study, For Such a Time as This, and Broken but Undefeated.

Sue shares her testimony about coming into this world with doctors considering her life close to over. But through her mothers love and care, and the grace of God, she grew strong enough to endure dozens of surgeries by her teen years. Her story continues as she shares about struggles in teen years and early adulthood and where God met her and challenged her thoughts and beliefs with His word.

Sue doesn’t just share her testimony, she shares practical answers, strategies, and encouragement to help us overcome some of the very thoughts we have that stand in the way of deep relationship with our creator.

Be sure to grab a notebook and your favorite pen as you listen in, because this episode is packed with powerful takeaways!

Want to connect with Sue?
Website: https://suecorl.com/
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Podcast: His Heartbeat with Sue Corl

Sue doesn't just share her testimony, she shares practical answers, strategies, and encouragement to help us overcome some of the very thoughts we have that stand in the way of deep relationship with our creator.

Catch the replay of the Uncomplicated Faith Workshop in the Intentional Abundance Community

Transcription

Sasha Star Robertson 0:12
Hey Hey, friends, I am super excited to welcome you back to another episode of the Intentional Abundant Life Podcast. Today I am sitting with Sue Corll. She is an International Women’s Conference speaker, author, mentor, Bible teacher, and missionary. She is the host of His Heartbeat podcast and The founder and director of Crown of Beauty International, and this is a ministry that she started from her passion to serve women and help set them free from the lies that are passed or life experiences or things that people have spoken over us, etc, can stand in the way of the truth of who we are in Christ and really leaning into that love of God. And so this is going right in line with everything that we’ve been talking about here on the podcast these last few weeks with talking about these faithful foundations and really uncomplicating your faith. She has a powerful testimony that she’s going to share in the beginning but stick around because she has practical tips and tools and strategies that she’s going to share with you guys. So grab a pen, grab a notebook, and make sure you’re able to take notes in some fashion because she gives you some gold in this podcast episode. That’s just gonna help you go deeper and some of the stuff we’ve been talking about here on the intentional abundant life podcast these last few weeks, so we’ll do this jingle and take it away.

Sasha Star Robertson 2:32
Jingle

Sasha Star Robertson 2:46
Hello sisters and welcome back to another episode of the intentional abundant life podcast. I’m your host Sasha Star Robertson and today I am here with another special guest It is Thursday after all, Sue Corl, and she is an international women’s conference speaker, author, mentor, Bible teacher, C.R.U. – or is it CRU? – CRU missionary, founder and director of Crown of Beauty International and His Heartbeat podcast host, and teacher. Her greatest joy is being a wife and mother of two adult children. She has a passion to see women set free to live in the powerful truths of who they are in Christ and the love of God. She served as a missionary for 25 years in Asia. And currently, she travels to minister to women throughout Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and the United States. She has a Master’s of Education and a Master’s in Christian counseling. She is the author of several books, including Crown of Beauty, 12-week Bible study, For Such a Time as This, and Broken But Undefeated. Wow, what an intro. Sue, thank you so much for being here with us today. Is there anything you would like to add to that powerful intro?

Sue Corl 4:07
Yeah, I mean, you know, we’re asked to say what we’ve done or whatever, but really what it’s about is we love Jesus right? Whenever somebody says, Oh, how did you do this? Or that? Or how have you seen multiplying disciples, you know, women go out and serve God. And it’s like, Well, you just love people in the power of Jesus and in His love, you know, and you live it out, you spend time with the Lord. And as He works in your life, you share it with others. So, it’s a lot more simple than that bio was,.

Sasha Star Robertson 4:43
Right! I believe it 100% I actually just read a quote this morning that I feel like it’s really relevant to this. And it’s an Albert Einstein quote, and it says, strive not to be a success, but rather to be a value. And I feel like I just heard that in what you were saying about like, really, we love Jesus because He first loved us. And Now we just want to live a life that’s evidence of that and share that with others share that and like hey look at the value that you have over here in Christ look at the value that comes just from being in a relationship with Him. And so I love that. I know you are just this amazing speaker going all over the place, sharing this message, impacting the lives of women, and one of the things that you mentioned you really love speaking about is about becoming or being a healthy mom. And when I read that I was just thinking about, you know, I know you come from a traumatic background, much like myself, went through a lot of different stuff. Sounds like you you’ve used that even to go on and become a Christian counselor and So much more and share your testimony with others to let them know that there is freedom. And I just see this kind of I don’t say correlation, but I guess impact that our trauma can have on motherhood and how that can show up. So I’m gonna let you take away the floor, speak from your expertise in your experience, maybe share a little bit of your testimony, and how we can move forward to be healthy moms like inside of all of this.

Sue Corl 6:30
Amen. That’s helpful, isn’t it? Yeah, I would like to put my past trauma into a short version. I was born with an extremely severe cleft palate with no nose, no upper lip, no upper palate, all kinds of breathing problems, heart problems, they didn’t know how to close the hole, and they couldn’t get food into me. So they sent me home to die. And my mom being a pediatric nurse, she’s like, No, I’ll take her home not to die, and just began to pray and, and God, you know, let her know that she’s my special gift to you. She’s not gonna die. And He just led her in how to creatively find ways to feed me, build me up my strength enough to take me back to the hospital. And they began surgeries and I had 26 surgeries during the first 15 years of my life. So I spent a lot of time in the hospital. In the old days, they kept you for days and days and days. My normal stay was at least one month. So that went on until I was 15.

Sue Corl 7:41
But the hardest part wasn’t physical. It really was emotional. When I began school and then so much teasing every day, every day from boys, a lot of rejection, a lot of cruel words. And what happens is, you know, Sasha, as we hear those lies throughout the day, we begin to believe them as truth. Now I have a wonderful mom; she’s barely hanging in there. She’s kind of in her last days, I’m afraid, but I’m happy she’s gonna be with Jesus soon. But I love my mom. She’s an amazing woman and was an incredible role model. Unfortunately, my dad was not as much of that and he left us when I was in middle school, and that was not easy either. But mom remarried pretty quickly to a pretty wonderful guy. And my dad continued to be a very loving dad. I will say that just not so good at the providing part.

Sue Corl 8:41
So, through that, I have a lot of positive words being spoken to me from my mom, which I’m not going to say was not helpful. It was. Yet, when we’re bullied every day. As much as we come home to mom, I feel like that gave me a lot of confidence as a person with women because mom’s a woman, but I didn’t really get that affirmation from my dad. A little bit from my brothers. I have two older brothers but primarily with guys, it was just ripped to shreds. So all the time and then when I got into college, I had some sexual abuse issues go on and that kind of thing. And so it left me feeling very fearful of man and a lot of defense mechanisms. A lot of… I would intimidate them. So I became a Christian really in high school. I don’t think I really understood and Mom didn’t really know how to communicate her faith. I more learned through friends and then youth group. In college, I fell away for a short time. And then my brother helped me get back on track and really started walking with the Lord.

Sue Corl 10:03
I joined Campus Crusade for Christ staff when I graduated, became a missionary, -They’re now called CRU that’s that name CRU is it’s a newer name they’ve had – you know, I had to work with men and guys, we were leading a movement. I’m on the opposite end of you Sasha, so I was in Hawaii. We did get your tsunami waves sometimes came all the way down. So I was doing youth work. But again I had this wall up to men where I was, they respected me, right, but they didn’t really feel the love of Christ for me. I just had that wall, but with women, my goodness, I was so loving and caring and the women’s ministry boomed and really grew very large ministry in Hawaii. But after a period of time, like your testimony, I realized, this isn’t okay. You know, I don’t know why I honestly didn’t know why, like you, a lot of these really scary memories were suppressed. I love how you talk about it being like didn’t you say like a box, a little secure box, and that God kept it in. I would agree with that; He knows when you can handle it.

Sue Corl 11:26
But I do know that something’s not right. And even… I did date guys, I always even in that, had an element of fear and protection. And so I did go for counseling with a friend of mine who happened to be a counselor. And that began the work. I think that was helpful, started to surface things. But it was a combination. I’m sure of God meeting with me. You know, partially accounting, but partially the Lord just bringing up things as I would spend time with him. And through his Word really challenging how I thought, and I realized that I’m walking in a lot of lies. You know, I’m sitting here saying, you know, I’m ugly, I’m rejectable, and I’m unlovable to men, but women know they’re okay with me. And God really confronted me in that first through reading Psalm 139:14, that I’m fearfully and wonderfully made. And I’m reading that and going, I don’t believe that. But I got to that point in my relationship with God and realized it’s not okay to just say, Well, I’m going to dismiss that particular verse that doesn’t apply to me at all.

Sue Corl 12:46
It all applies to us. It’s all true. And we can’t dismiss it and we have to stand on it as God’s truth. And to not stand on it as God’s truth is to basically call God a liar. And I knew that wasn’t okay. So I started to ask the Lord, you know, please, through Your Spirit, may I really walk in that truth that I really am fearfully and wonderfully made. And as I looked up, what those passages mean, in Hebrew and the original language, I realized that fearfully means I’m made in the image of God, and God is beautiful. God is intelligent. God is loving God is kind. God is good. God has all these beautiful characteristics and what He’s saying is Sue, so are you because you’re made in my image? Not only that but you’re wonderfully made, which actually Hebrew means unique. I’m unique from anyone. And as Ephesians 2:10 talks about, God has created us, He’s designed us for His master plan, His work. He has a plan for us that He will bring about, and He’s equipped us in everything that we need to do that plan. So all these truths, Sasha, were really setting me free. And my attitude to men, this took a radical change where all of a sudden, I could love them to the point that, I can’t say I realized like, Oh, I’m gonna change. I just did.

Sue Corl 14:21
And the guys in our ministry started coming up to me and would say, Wow, you’re really different. And I go, What? What do you mean I’m different. And he said, i don’t know, you’re like, gentle and you’re really approachable. I didn’t know that I wasn’t, you know? And I’m like, Okay, thank you, I think. But I did begin to rejoice in seeing that God was doing a really awesome work in me and allowing me to not only love sisters but love the brothers, right? And I also realized that you could call it protective behavior. I was protecting myself granted, but when we have a protected behavior, I realized it’s actually sin. It’s a sinful behavior because we’re using our own protective mechanisms, our own self to protect ourselves rather than relying on God. And that’s what Hebrews says, in anything that’s not in faith is sin, right? And I wasn’t having faith that God would protect me in my relationships with men. I was trying to come up with my own ways of protecting and consequently not really loving my brothers in Christ’s love.

Sue Corl 15:39
So bringing freedom into that made all the difference before I got married. And that’s why I went into that because being a mom, you know, shortly not shortly, shortly after I got married. I got married a little late. I was 34, and could not get pregnant right away, so my first baby boy, I was 37 and my girl was 39. But I had really awesome pregnancies very healthy. No problem. I wanted one at 41, but my husband said no, so he gave me a dog. And I love my dog, dogs I should say. I continued that tradition. So I kinda have three kids. But at any rate, I’m so happy that the Lord did that work in me first. So to all our single sisters out there, I really encourage you to do the work so that you can receive God’s healing and you can become healthy and whole so that as you move into your marriage and into motherhood – and maybe you won’t, you know, maybe that’s not God’s calling for you – but if that is calling for you, that you will be a healthy mom. And we can talk about that in a second, but I also want to say that it’s beautiful to be a healthy single, too.

Sue Corl 17:04
So as he made me healthier, it impacted our men’s movement. And suddenly our men’s movement was growing. Now we had a men’s director, he was awesome. But you know, it’s like having, I buy… I love fruit. And I noticed if you buy a bag of fruit, this just happened to me actually with plums, and you leave that bad fruit you don’t notice, right? But they always put the bad one on the bottom, and it begins to rot all the others. And it was almost like that because I wasn’t healthy with the brothers. And I’m not saying I was like, yelling at them or anything like that. But I wasn’t oozing out the love of Jesus to them. You know, I was oozing out self-protective behaviors. That was impacting our Men’s Ministry. Then on the flip side, when God brought that healthy heart to me, where I wasn’t protecting myself where I was able to flood out and over into them that Christ’s love, the Men’s Ministry even began to grow. So whether you’re single, whether you’re married, whether you’re married with a child, you impact the people around you. And having a healthy heart allows you to impact others to have a healthy heart as well.

Sasha Star Robertson 18:31
Yeah, amen. I love this. I just want to mention and point out a few things that you said before we move on. One of the things that I love like I’m huge on living from the stateful foundations and mastering our mindset, too, because I believe that it’s biblical. And one of the things you touched on that is so relevant towards that is like, you’re essentially saying like the Bible says, A, B, and C. But when you read it, you’re like, Yeah, but I believe X, Y, and Z like I don’t really believe, right? And so I feel like especially those of us who do come from backgrounds, with trauma, whether it’s abuse or abandonment, or whatever else, you know, you name it, we do have these beliefs, even things that are spoken over us, to us, things that happened to us, whatever it may be, we can develop these truths and these beliefs in us and then we go read Scripture and we’re like, Yeah, but you know, maybe it’s for her maybe it’s for him or maybe it’s for them or, you know, we can try to justify so easily how it’s not applicable to us. But it is.

Sasha Star Robertson 0:00
So, I think that’s, that’s huge that you pointed that out. And you had mentioned that as soon as you started to stand on these Biblical truths for what they are for truth, then the truth sets you free. And Scripture even says that, and you had declared that. And you had said, you know, at one point, you just you kind of didn’t even, like know how it just did. But that was going to be one of my questions that came up, like, how would you say or advise, like, how do we go from even believing these lies? I have my own framework and whatever else I help walk ladies through but I would love to hear if you have any insight into that. How do we go from believing these lies to believing what Scripture says about us?

Sue Corl 0:53
Yeah, I mean, the most common answer we get, I’ll add something to it is Romans 12:1-2 where it talks about being transformed by the renewing of your mind. And the transformation word actually comes from the root, the Greek metamorphosis. So that’s why we use the butterfly, right, to represent because God really takes us from that icky gooey worm and into that beautiful butterfly, by renewing our mind in Christ. And so it wasn’t like I read Psalm 139:14 and go Oh, okay. All right, yeah, I’ll apply it to me. Okay, thanks, God, I’m good. I wish.

Sue Corl 1:43
However, at the same time, making a choice, I should say, Yes, I’m going to accept this Lord as truth from you. So that’s the obedience part. That’s the part that says, I don’t feel it. But I’m going to trust you. And, you know, the Bible also talks about faith in the unseen, not the seen, right? So at that point that was unseen. To me, really, what I see is scars from my cleft palate, what I see is a nose that was created by a person isn’t exactly what I’d like or whatever, you know, you see these things. But faith in the unseen said that I’m created in the image of God that I’m fearfully and wonderfully made, that I’m beautiful in God’s sight that I’m honored, that I’m valued and loved all these truths. And I’m going to choose, as an act of my will, to believe that. Then the more I continue to renew my mind that meant writing it out on a piece of paper, sticking it on your mirror, putting it on your notebook, putting it on your cell phone, I think I did all of the above, and on my Bible. I put it there, but something you’re seeing all the time, that was renewing my mind.

Sue Corl 3:02
I went into one friend’s bathroom once I had never been to her house. So I went into her house, and went into her bathroom, she literally had scriptures cover her entire bathroom wall. And I’m like, Hey, how’d that happen? Did you just decide to do a wallpaper one day? She said, Oh, no, I do one a week and I’m adding to it each week. So she has so many. And I thought those clever but she was obviously renewing her mind. So a transformation happens. But I’ll add to one thing that we add in our conferences, or conferences are called Beauty for Ashes. But our ministry is called Crown and Beauty International. In our conference, we hold up these cards after we’re giving these messages, then I hold up, you know, 8 1/2 X 11 card, and it says painful event.

Sue Corl 3:57
So I said when you find yourself stuck, or you’re having trouble getting out of depression or anxiety or feeling like you’re a loser, unlovable or worthless or invisible or whatever that lie is about yourself or maybe about God, that He’s left me, that I’m not good enough for Him, He’s let me down, or whatever. So, you think, What’s the painful event going on? Next card: What are the painful emotions I’m feeling right now? And journal them. So, journal all this, and then you can process it with a friend. So journal it out, you and God. And then after you get that down, then you ask yourself, What lies am I actually believing from these painful events and emotions? Are there things going on that are causing me to think, now maybe you don’t feel like they’re lies but you kind of know from what the Bible says.

Sue Corl 5:00
Now, if you’re new to the Bible, do this with a more mature Christian, they’ll help you. And basically, as a counselor, this is what I do. As they’re telling their story. They’re literally saying those lies. I mean, they’ll literally be saying things like, yeah, so I mean, I felt like I was invisible, my parents were so engrossed in their job, they never even saw me, I’m making my own food. But I never felt like I was good enough to be able to feed my little brother and sister, but I had to become the parent. They’re literally saying the lies, you know. So it might help to process it with someone, or maybe you’re self-perceptive, you can hear it. So you’re writing out these lies. And again, they don’t feel like it, it’s okay to say, All right, the lie is I’m invisible. Then you look at the behaviors, that’s the fourth part, What’s the protective behaviors, which, remember, I pointed out the protective behaviors are actually sinful because you’re taking that into your own hands instead of letting God lead you. But we can call them protective or sinful. So what behaviors are coming out of that?

Sue Corl 6:13
And some of those behaviors like mine weren’t noticeably sinful. I wasn’t being a jerk to the guys around me. I just was being ridiculously strong around them and being like, so are you having your quiet time? How’s that going? You know, have you been sharing your faith? Instead of how’re you doing bro? And what you’ve been going through? Can I pray for you? You know, big difference. So what are those behaviors that you’re using? A lot of women I help in the Asian world. You know, they feel this drivenness to be perfect, and they can’t make any mistakes. And they feel a lot of shame when they do. So those are some of the feelings but the behavior is to get straight A’s in school. Be number one and everything they do. And there’s this Thriftiness, so again, getting straight A’s in and of itself is not bad. But what’s driving that? Do you know what I’m saying? So the result is bondage. Then the next step is to go back to and say, we’re going to redo the cards. Was there a time in my life when I felt these feelings before?

Sue Corl 7:27
And 99% of the time there is, or about 95% of the time, there is a correlation to something Well, yeah, I guess I did kind of feel invisible. It wasn’t just when my husband ignores me, but my dad actually did that. Or in school, I was with all these brainy new kids, and they just ignored me, because I wasn’t the brainy one in the class, or whatever it is, right? But you can go back, think about what was it? When was it? What was going on at the time? Okay, and then what lies came out at that time? And it does help to recognize that because it’ll help you go deeper into your heart into the pain into what went on. And God is gracious as your podcast makes very clear. Many of your messages talk about how he won’t just dump the motherload on you like, oh, this happened, and you suddenly have flashbacks to all these horrible things in your life. No, he’s really gentle. And I don’t ask people. I mean, unless you’re getting intensive therapy like you did, and like I have. That’s different, then you do go deep into it. The Holy Spirit will bring back stuff.

Sue Corl 8:52
But if you’re just doing this on your own, you know, or with a friend or processing your life, you don’t have to go back to the fullness of that memory. You know, I can just go to the fact that Yeah, I know that a terrible thing happened with me with a guy and this is what emotions came out of that and the lies that came out of that. Okay, then I want to replace that lie. So what does God’s Word say? Okay, here’s what I wrote out I’m invisible, what Scriptures can I find that are opposites of that? Does God see me as invisible? No. Okay, how do I know? What Scriptures really show me that? And then I begin to write that down again. Again, you might want to get help with that, okay? You know, if somebody knows the word better. And then you look at those behaviors. Say, Well, that’s not really trusting God, like I did, that’s trusting yourself. So I repent. So that’s what the behavior, we put the cards on top of it, the truth going on the lie, the repentance on the behavior, and then On the end instead of bondage, now we’re going to find freedom.

Sue Corl 10:04
Okay, so what’s beautiful in that can go back to my example is as I did that, I could see what it went back to. And I began to replace that with the truth. I repented of the self-protected behaviors the Lord showed me and then went for a walk. And I was walking my dog and I was praying and thanking God for what was true, what he said and again, I didn’t necessarily feel it. And literally, I heard in my head, almost as if a voice, I remember where I was, everything, Sue you’re beautiful to me. And I knew it was Jesus. So sometimes He will even step in and supernaturally comfort you or speak to you? Or, you know, if you feel unloved. I’ve had girls that I’m praying over them, they literally feel they’re being hugged. And they’ll even ask me, Did you see my clothes move? Like, no. Like, He was holding me. Crying. So He’s so wonderful in that way, His Spirit can really comfort as he says, He’s a comforter and Jesus, or you might find yourself you get a picture in your head of sitting in the lap of the Father and him comforting you, or He does beautiful things, even beyond that scripture memory when we take that step of obedience.

Sasha Star Robertson 11:34
Yes, and Amen. I love it, I actually, you just reminded me of this, but walked through a very similar exercise. In a soul care workshop that I did through I think it was Women of Grace Seminary, something like that. And so it was really cool. But at the same time, it just, it walks in line with a lot of the things that, a lot of the tools I use regularly for my own life, and, and get to walk in line with my clients as well. In taking those lies, and rewriting them with truth. That’s really, truly what it comes down to. I love that you pointed out that it’s about obedience, even though I don’t feel it. Lord, I trust you. And I’m choosing to accept this. And just inviting the Holy Spirit in, like helped me to believe this because it is Your truth. And I want to believe it, right? And so I just love everything you’ve had to share about it because I think that’s so practical, and it’s so tangible. And I really do believe that this is how we can become healthier moms and, and not just past hurts, like, you know, that are so big that we would classify them as trauma.

Sasha Star Robertson 13:01
But even these little, almost like these little white lies, right, things that we might not recognize that we’re believing that aren’t actually true. And they’re not actually in line with Scripture. So I love that you pointed that out about Romans 12. And it is the renewing of your mind, and it is making sure what am I choosing to think and feel and believe, and is it in line with God’s truth? Is it in line with taking those thoughts captive, and making them obedient to Christ and obedient to truth. And that can come up in so many different things that can come up in our motherhood and our relationship with Christ, in our own expectations for ourselves with homemaking, and, you know, so many other things. I see it all the time. So I really appreciate you kind of walking us through this way that we can really renew our mind in Christ.

Sue Corl 13:57
It’s an ongoing process, you know, in our conferences, yes. Somebody to leave having, we have small groups and having experienced that, but we really want them to see it as a way of processing any difficult emotion in our life. And so you think about like a mom, right, how we have to make a major shift when we give birth, and we have a kid and maybe we had this job that was really important. Or at least we were out there with adults and people. You know, I’m super extroverted, and suddenly, you’re just home with this baby who is just crying and pooping. You know, cute and we love our kid. I loved having a baby, but obviously, I’m not getting to be around people as much. I’m not doing as much ministry outside of my child in the beginning. So it’s a big shift. And that can be a hard time you can start to start with, do I have any value? Do I have any worth? You know, I’m bored out of my brain. Am I a terrible person? I’m a failure, you can start struggling with that. I can’t even get milk into my kid, or I’m not enjoying being a mother, that can be a big one. Some moms have their babies, and they just don’t enjoy it. And it’s terrifying. It’s like, I’m such a failure.

Sue Corl 15:30
But again, we process it the same way. You know, what does God say? Am I a failure? You know, and you can definitely talk to others and get help with that. But begin to process it, and it does. Motherhood, wow. It’s a refining fire, it brings up stuff like coming from your past. It’s like a form of counseling; it digs down in there. And I remember asking a whole group of moms once in a room, I said, How many of you feel like you’re an angry mother? And about 80 to 90% of the mothers raised their hands. And then I I said, How many of you before you were a mother, felt you were an angry person. And only about 10% lifted their hand. And it was very eye-opening to all of us were like, Whoa, you know, so this is just what happens and being a mom and your in community and you’re going okay, I’m normal, you know, but at the same time, what does that anger look like?

Sue Corl 16:44
How is that coming out? Is it coming out in a destructive way, where we are overreacting to that child, we’re either hitting too hard, or we’re screaming at the child, or we can’t handle it, we walk away and leave that child alone for too long, or whatever it is, or throw the child to a babysitter, we don’t want anything to do it. There are things like that, we can respond, we can feel guilt or we can feel shame. That’s something we need to work through. But what is that coming from? And I think again, taking the time to process that, which can be hard when you got a newborn. So bring your friend and have them sit with you while you’re breastfeeding and say, Hey, will you help me process this? or push them in a stroller? I mean, that was my famous one. Push them out there, they love it. While you’re getting to talk through with God first and then with a sister, you know, or somebody that can kind of help you process what you’re going through.

Sue Corl 17:53
And rather than just, we tend to just take advice or give advice, like, well if you would just get your husband to give you that hour and then you can do your nails. Well, I mean, that’s not bad advice we do… Having those breaks is very important. I think that’s a good thing to do. But that’s not dealing with why you’re erupting in rage with your child, for example. Do you know what I’m saying? So that was our, you know, when we were talking before that I was saying, the number one job of a mother is to be a model of Jesus Christ because their understanding of God, initially is coming for the first 10 years is coming from mom and dad. And depending on what your husband’s like it might only be mom, you know. And so it’s super important that we get ourselves healthy, get our walk strong in the Lord, so that we can model love, peace, joy, patience, kindness, goodness, self-control, because then when I say to my child, oh, God loves you. But when my child is being too rambunctious, I’m screaming bloody murder at them, and sending them to their room for four hours. And so what do they think now? Well, God’s love is very harsh. When I make a mistake, God is so ticked off at me.

Sue Corl 19:41
I help so many women that that is their view of God is that they can’t make a mistake or else but sure enough when I asked them how their parents were to them, it’s usually just one of the parents. But one is super harsh and unfair. Giving the silent treatment. Right, I have a gal I disciple whose mother wouldn’t talk to her for three weeks if she made a mistake. Three-week silent treatment. So guess how her walk with God was, she was so scared of making a mistake, of not praying enough for not sharing the fear or faith, or not having her Bible read? Because if she does, God’s just gonna be silent on me for three weeks. Or when she went through a desert time as we all do, you know, a time where God does seem distant. It’s like, Oh, what did I do you wrong? Right. So you really see how much while our own view actually of God and of a child’s view of God is very parallel to how our parents were towards us and what they modeled?

Sasha Star Robertson 20:55
Yeah, so, so true. And so irrelevant. I think it really goes back to that whole exercise that we walked through is Bible says this, what am I actually believing taking those thoughts captive, and renewing our mind, I agree with you. I think motherhood is very much part of our sanctification process for sure. Because it brings up so many things. But it also makes us so heavily reliant on the Lord. I’ve said multiple times, I don’t understand how people can parent without Jesus, like how do you Mom without Jesus? I don’t know, I’ve never done that. At times, right, and then I’m like, oh, what’s happening?

Sasha Star Robertson 21:40
But I love that you pointed out, too, how much it is us walking that out as an example to our kids. I think that’s so completely relevant. And kind of wrap up what we’re talking about today, I think one of the big points, one of the big takeaways, I have written down here is to create space and do the work to process those lies to process those emotions, to rewrite them with truth and in creating the space for yourself but also the importance and having somebody do that with you, a friend, a mentor, a coach, a counselor, somebody who can be your ally, to help even recognize those lies and point them out to you. So I think that’s so incredibly huge. Sue, do you have any, I guess parting thoughts or takeaways that you would like to leave people with today? And then if you could share with us, where can the listeners find you if they wanted to connect with you more?

Sue Corl 22:47
Yeah, thanks. I’m glad I have a parting thought because I also want to say that we do mess up, we’re not perfect. And, you know, we will act in ways, we all joke and my friends and I, how our kids are all going to need counseling someday, or I even say to my kids, guys, when you have to go for counseling, you know, dad and I’ll help you with the cost. But I just want to say that it’s always important to ask forgiveness, to be humble with our kids, and to say, Hey, Mom messed up. And I’m really sorry, and I’m trying to work on this area in my life. You can pray for me too, depending on their age, you know, will be how much liberty you give them to correct you, so to speak.

Sue Corl 23:41
And also, it’s just so important that we love our kids and that… People debate, you know, you shouldn’t be a friend. It’s different. Well I don’t really agree. You know, my daughter and I are best friends. And we’ve always been that way. And I’m super close to my son, too, dad is my son’s best friend and he’ll say you are, too, mom, but you’re a girl. And they’re older now. They’re adults. And we’ve always had that relationship and that love just goes such a long way. So I just want to say give yourself grace. Sure. As you’re working through things, know that, yeah, we’re not going to be perfect. We are going to lose our temper we are going to run out and ignore our kids or whatever it is, but it’s okay. God’s understanding, you know, you be understanding of yourself too.

Sue Corl 24:39
Yeah, oh, so where you can find me? Yes, that was the second question. Part two. Okay, so we have a wonderful website, crownofbeautyinternational.com And it’s got all kinds of resources on there. Links, it has my testimony, it has a video, other videos we do a weekly devotion on there. I also have a podcast called His Heartbeat. Or if you want to be for sure and get His Heartbeat with Sue Corl. But usually, it comes up with just His Heartbeat. So we talk about all kinds of things but related to walking in truth versus walking in the lies as related to parenting, related to singleness, relating to God, your relationship with God, others, friends, evangelism, and discipleship, all the whole thing we talk about that.

Sasha Star Robertson 25:40
Awesome. Well, thank you so much for sharing that with us. I’m definitely going to include those links in the show notes. So you guys will be able to very quickly and simply click and access her website and the podcast, and all of that fun stuff. I hope you guys…

Sue Corl 25:56
And a Bible study. Yeah, I forgot to say about that Bible study. I love it. It’s called Crown of Beauty. 12-week Bible study, we have it in seven languages. Online, it just went up in Spanish. We have it in English, but if you want, you can email me. You’ll see on our website, a way to contact, if you want Bengali or Arabic or French, Korean, or Chinese. So we can, I’ll just send that digitally to you. But that has been very transformational for people. And there’s also a Leader’s guide if you want to lead it. The Student Book is completely inside that Leader’s Guide. But then all kinds, all the answers are in the Leaders Guide. If you want to start a group so you can get that on Amazon.

Sasha Star Robertson 26:50
Awesome, super helpful. Well, we’ll make sure you have access to all those links. I hope you guys had your notebooks and pens handy today because super wonderful information that we got here from Sue. Thank you again, Sue, for coming on to share with us, and thank you to all the listeners for tuning into another episode here. I hope you all have a wonderful week and God bless you all.

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075: 10 Ways to Find God Time as a Busy Mom

Summary

Are you a busy mom that struggles to find God time in your days? Are you feeling like there’s space between you and God and like you haven’t heard from Him in a while? Do you struggle to get quiet? Is your prayer life feeling like it could be better? Do you remember the last time you opened Gods word for yourself?

In this episode Sasha shares (more than) 10 ways to find God time in your days as a busy mom. Be sure to have a note pad ready because you’re going to want to write some of these down, or better yet, implement them today

Last call to join us in the Uncomplicated Faith Workshop! Register Here: https://intentionalabundance.life/uncomplicatedfaith

Transcription

0:05
Hello sisters and welcome back to another episode of the Intentional Abundant Life podcast. I’m your host Sasha Star Robertson. And if you’ve not been around for a while, if you’re just catching this because of its incredibly punchy title of 10 Ways to Find God time as a Busy Mom, I want you to go back to last Monday’s episode and listen to the 5 Reasons Quiet Time With God is Essential to Everything Else You Could Possibly Be Doing. Okay, that is the foundation. We need to understand why and have reasons of why we want to seek this quiet time in this god time before we look at the action of 10 ways to actually do it. So go back and listen to that. Come back here. Let’s do this jingle and we’ll dive into these 10 plus some bonus ways.

1:02
Jingle

2:00
Okay, okay, let’s dive right in. Like I said, I’m super excited to get into this episode because when I first started my business, this is not what it was about. I love that as I was doing some market research, the number one thing that I kept hearing coming from moms is how to lead a life of faith, lead a life that allows their kids to have faith when they grow up, how to lead their kids to love and serve Jesus to know who Jesus is. And the big thing that God kept directing me to is that we have to do that by example.

2:45
We know, I mean at least I hope you know, that most of what your kids know and do is caught not taught. I have tried to teach my kid to do something hundreds of times. I have told him the same exact thing and he just doesn’t get it, but we could go to the playground one time and also he comes home doing some weird random thing that I had never… I’m like where did you even learn that? But also there are those really, really sweet moments where something happened to me the other day and I like stubbed my toe or I like whacked my arm into something. And my sweet little toddler said Yo tay Mommy and I was like Ow that hurt. And he said me kiss? He wanted to give me a kiss on my booboo because that is what he has caught about what happens when he gets hurt. I say Are you okay? But and then I kiss his boo boo. So he caught this just from my actions in my behaviors. It’s about living as an example.

3:54
I think Scripture really leads us to this conclusion too, is that to be disciples like we have to be disciplined we have to follow the leader and that is Jesus Christ and He lived by example. Therefore, we should be living by example. And so I want to get into these 10 ways to find God time in your days as a busy mom because that’s the number one way that our kids are going to know to love and serve and seek Jesus is by seeing us do it. But also just by us doing it by like living in integrity with that. And so, we’re gonna run through these hopefully fairly quickly, because there’s actually more than 10, giving you some bonus ones here.

4:42
But number one is… Don’t shoot the messenger on this one because this is the one people hate. Moms hate when I say this. And it is number one for a reason. Rise before your family. Set your alarm and get up early. Who wants to do that? Nobody in the flesh. Nobody wants to do that weirdos maybe, my husband is one of those weirdos. He like… the alarm goes off, Bam! You jump up out of the bed in the shower and I’m like, How are you even moving but rise before your family why? It’s quiet. You start your day off on the right foot being filled up with the presence of God. He gives you his gifts when you seek Him when you seek His presence and doing it first thing in the morning is giving Him your first fruits. Like that’s what he truly, truly wants from us is to be in a relationship with Him to seek Him, and to give Him the first fruits of our day. That is why tithing is done the way. It is the first fruits. It’s why the Feast of the First Fruits exists in Scripture.

6:00
And listen, I know that it’s hard. I know that it’s not easy to set an alarm and get up early in the morning, especially at first especially when you’re first starting this routine and this habit. It is not easy. And I know, of all people I know, the fact that I am able to get up at 4:30 in the morning, hours before my son gets up, is a miracle in and of itself. I do on and on and on about this but we don’t have time in today’s episode to do that. But if I can do it, sister, you can do it. You can do hard things. I have a lot of tips, a lot of experience, and a lot of lived wisdom to help in this area. But we’re gonna have to save those for another day. Or maybe if you want to come into a coaching relationship, we can dive into that. But for the sake of this, we’re moving on.

6:54
Number two, encourage your kids to have five minutes of self-play, alone time, and quiet time. And just read a verse of the day or pray in those five minutes. Again, starting out, and this is for the doubters, starting out it’s going to be difficult. Your kids aren’t used to it. They’re going to come back in 60 seconds. They’re going to come back in 90 seconds at first. Yes, it’s going to be difficult because nobody’s used to it. Starting anything new is difficult but it’s so good for your kids to learn to self-play, to learn what five minutes is, to learn to be quiet or to be alone. You’d be surprised though, at how easy this is after just a few weeks of consistency. Sometimes even a few days of consistency. Like our children are sponges; they are wired to be trained. This is why we potty train. This is why we wean them. This is why we teach them to walk and crawl and all these other things, right? This is what you are used to. You have a mountain of evidence to believe that this is possible for you to teach and train your child, and this is just another area that is going to be so good in bringing out so many fruits. So have faith, sister, I believe in you.

8:22
Number three, read scripture, or do a Bible study with your kids? Use a Children’s Bible one with photos, make it fun, and use funny voices or props. Then you’re spending time in a relationship with them. You’re giving them attention you’re reading the books, you’re helping to grow their faith. But also, you’re being reminded of this verse in Scripture, this story in Scripture, this passage this lesson in Scripture. And then you can even take that, encourage the, go back to number two, encourage them, “Okay, we’ve done our little Bible time today. We’ve done time, now I need you to go play for five minutes. And then you go read that story or that verse or that passage in scripture and pray over it. So rich, rich way to get in this time every single day.

9:09
Number four, listen to an audio Bible. The YouVersion app is amazing for this. You can pick your translation, you can push play, and it will read to you entire chapters. Do this while you’re fooling around, driving around running errands, or you’re washing dishes while you’re in the shower, etc. Try to focus on what you’re hearing, right? I know that sometimes when we’re multitasking we can easily allow our minds to wander or focus more heavily on one thing than the other thing. But honestly, if you’re really really struggling to get in Bible time, God time, this is a way that He can allow that even if you’re like passively listening like your brain is picking up and He might be able to take that from Head to Heart. So don’t discredit it, even if it’s not active listening.

10:12
Number five. Write scripture that you would like to memorize or meditate on your windows, your mirrors, your fridge, sticky notes, note cards, or something like that and place them around your home, making a point to read them when you see them. I have a friend who has a gorgeous mountain view at her house and on all windows every time I go over there there are different scripture verses written. She’s a mom of four she’s busy, but you know what she finds time to get quiet and God’s word every day. Her life is a rich account of it. But in addition to that, she’s got these on her mirrors.

10:48
I’ve been to missionaries’ homes that have little note cards with scripture on them taped to light switches. So anytime you enter a room and turn on a light, there’s that scripture verse going back to Deuteronomy 6, God even says, Write His commands on the doorposts of your home, right? Have them on your heart and on your forehead and where you go, and all these things, right? He has all these. How important is it to have scripture in your face and your heart everywhere you’re going and looking and being a living breathing example of that? So this is a really, really great way to do this. I have a magnet in the intentional living store where it’s the 10 commandments, and I have it right on my fridge. And so I try to make a point and I’ll move it around you know if sometimes I get way too used to seeing it right there. I’ll move it so it catches my attention again. And I’ll try to read at least one commandment every time I go to the fridge to open something which is frequent because I’m a snack lady. That’s like my primary life right now.

11:55
Number 6, take your kids to the park, to the playground, have them play outside, or set up something fun for them to do. You keep your Bible in hand. There have been times where I have like a coloring Bible. This is another great thing, wasn’t even in my notes to share with you today. This is another one mamas. But this number like bonus. I have a coloring book Bible a friend gave to me for my birthday and it’s just the Psalms. And so whenever my son wants to color or sometimes I’ll encourage him to color, I’ll get the crayons and colored pencils out and whatever. And I will give him a sheet of paper or coloring book or whatever can sit there and color with me while I’m sitting there reading that little passage of scripture, reading just a Psalm and then coloring the words that are outlined or drawing pictures, coloring pictures about what God is showing me as I’m reading this, right? Psalm 1 has this visual about a tree planted the river, and so I drew a picture of a tree last time I did this. So there’s your bonus. But it has to do with number 6 and in allowing your kids to do something fun while you just have your Bible handy. And you are able to open that up. And this is where the Bible app can come in really handy as well. It’s so you can carry your Bible right in your pocket everywhere you go. There’s no reason to not read scripture when you know that it’s right there.

12:18
Number seven, make a point to read a Bible story or a passage or a chapter or a verse or something before you go to sleep at night. Make it part of your bedtime routine. You brush your teeth, you wash your face, you get your pajamas on, you set your alarm, you lay in bed, you read a passage, and then you roll over and go to sleep. Pray and then go to sleep. Of course.

14:00
Eight make a habit to open your Bible or the Bible app every time you reach for social media. This is something that I did a couple of years back where I just committed to being aware in the present moment. And every time I went to click Facebook or I went to click Instagram or whatever other social media app you’re really fancy and fond of right now. Whenever you notice you’re clicking open Facebook, stop what you’re doing. Go open the Bible app and read a verse and then you can go to Facebook. That’s a way to plug in a lot of little snack size God time in the day. But try not to just like read it and then go back, right? Read it, every single word slowly. What does this mean? Give it at least a minute, at least five minutes of your time before you go through social media.

14:59
Number nine, start nap times or homeschooling times something like that, times of the day you already have this like trigger, where it’s like, Okay, we’re doing this now. Start it with scripture, a verse of the day, a passage, or whatever. So if you are putting your toddler down for a nap and whatever you normally do after you go put them down for a nap, make it a habbit, make it a point to, that is your trigger. You put them down for a nap you go read something in Scripture. Or you’re sitting down to do your homeschooling time for the day. Start your homeschooling time with your kids with a verse, read a verse to them. Okay, our verse of the day is this. Spend a couple minutes on it and then you can move on.

15:45
And then number 10, put on some Coco-Melon or Blippi or frozen or let your toddler play ABC Mouse or something. Do something that keeps them engaged and focused not on your demand for their attention and commit that time to Scripture and praying for 15 minutes. Listen, I know a lot of us as moms want to limit our kids’ screen time for the sake of so many good reasons. Right? So many benefits. But that doesn’t mean screen time is evil period. Right? Especially if we’re going to use that time to grow the fruits in our life and seek the presence of God. My son anytime, he constantly, “Show, Mom, show.” And he wants to watch Blippi or Coco-Melon or frozen or he says mouse, he wants to play his ABC Mouse game. And I want to limit that time but you know what sometimes it’s a really, really good thing for them to be able to learn something. like Coco-Melon is very engaging for that. You know, he learns from it. Blippi he learns from. ABC mouse he learns from. And giving him 15 minutes to do that while I can focus on God’s word or scripture, while I can focus on prayer and seeking His presence, that’s a good thing all the way around, Mama. Let it be.

17:11
And then I have another one. Number 11, Bonus read Scripture out loud while you’re feeding your baby, feeding your toddler, or rocking them to sleep. This is something for the really new mamas out there. Where you find yourself spending several hours a day. Feeding or rocking to sleep or cuddling or holding such a rich time in your life to spend time in Scripture and also worship music. This is another thing where I listen to so much worship music when my son was little because babies, it’s scientifically proven they need that noise, even if it’s like white noise that sound machine or whatever else like in the womb it’s really loud. I’ve heard it compared to an airplane. When you’re on an airplane you know at first you’re like wow, it’s just like constant noise and you’re hardly even able to hear the people in the row behind you talking sometimes because the sound of the engine is just so loud and the sound of traveling that fast through the air is so loud and that’s kind of like the decibel range of the womb. Your heartbeat, your blood flow, your walking, your voice that’s what they’re used to hearing. And so having worship music on, even at a slow decibel while you’re rocking them to sleep or whatever or even singing worship music. Us singing worship music to God is seeking His presence. Lord, I need you was like my go-to when I’m lacking sleep. I’m so tired. I’m running off fumes, maybe like he had colic for the first four months he was alive. It was terrible. For all of us. I don’t think we slept for four months. Lord, I need you was my motto. I can sing the song by heart. I sung it to my son almost every single day when we were putting him to sleep.

19:12
Okay, I have some other bonuses for you. Number 12 and 13, thee are more weekly instead of daily. But they’re ones that God really brought to me that I didn’t want to overlook. Number 12 is to attend or start a moms and Bibles group where your kiddos can be like you and other mamas fellowship together and read God’s Word. I’m so grateful a friend turned client of mine has this moms and Bibles group where we were just reading through Proverbs, and we hope to get through a whole Proverb, like a whole chapter on Proverbs, each week. Sometimes it’s a little more, sometimes we don’t make it all the way through. But we just read a section, discuss, and ask questions, What’s your translation say? Get a more rounded understanding. Talk about life examples. We get to talk about other stuff, our relationships, our friendships, our fears. We pray together. All the kids get to play together and yes, there are going to be distractions. There are going to be toddlers fighting over toys and kids crying and whatever else. That’s part of mom life, right? managing those distractions, but not avoiding going to those fellowships because you know there are going to be distractions. So, if you don’t know of one that you can join, if you weren’t invited to one, start one. Get out and build and grow in community and fellowship in addition to having that Bible time.

20:38
And Number 13 is very similar. Join or start a small group structure book or Bible study. And this can be something like you know, a written book that somebody wrote, reading a few chapters a week and then getting together and discussing it, especially if it’s you know, a Christian memoir or something like that. There are a lot of books that come along with a Bible study and a video study, there are tons of them out there. There are precepts that you can do. There are Bible studies that people just wrote on specific topics or whatever else. Or you can just like I was talking about pick a book of Scripture. There are even structured studies that lead you through a specific book of Scripture where you can just get together and discuss it, but having one of these that is a little more structured is sometimes helpful because it provides homework that you’re encouraged and almost held accountable to do each week while you’re not in the study itself.

21:49
And then schedule the time a few days a week and make it real and present in your life. We actually do lead one of these weekly Bible studies in Zoom each week in the Intentional Abundance Community on Facebook. Right now, we are getting ready to start a new one. So if you’re not already in the community jump in. Share what study would you like to do, and maybe vote for studies that other people have already suggested that we’re trying to decide between. Vote for a day and time that works best for you. If you don’t have one in your local church or local community, or even if you do and want to do another one, this is a really, really great way to do that.

22:40
I have a friend who goes to church every week and she leads a small group marriage study at her home. But still finding this time to be intentional, connecting with the Lord every day is something that she has struggled with. She needs the structure she needs to know every Thursday morning we’re meeting on Zoom to watch the video, to have discussions about what we’ve learned this week and she has the structure of knowing she has these 3 chapters of the book to read, she has these questions to go through and answer throughout the week as homework. And that keeps her intentionally plugged into Scripture and to Christ. And it leads her to fellowship every single week as well.

23:24
And ladies, I could come up with so many more reasons. So many more ways I mean that you can intentionally plug into that God time every single day even as a busy mom. But for the sake of time I’ve gotta leave it here today. But this is one of the things that I love love love doing with my clients is uncomplicating their faith and their Jesus time. I love learning about their specific days, their specific desires, and their specific demands on their life and finding, or shall I say, making a way to Yes. I’m a natural problem solver. And I don’t care what it is that is standing in your way of time with God. Whether it is those demands of your day, whether it is the schedule and structure of your day, or whether it is your mindset that is standing in the way. I’ve helped numerous clients go through and uncomplicate their faith, and love doing it in a very customized approach. So I invite you into a consult if that is something that you’re struggling with. Let’s talk about what it looks like in your life and find a way to Yes.

24:34
In addition to that, I am hosting a face workshop. It is completely free. The link is in the show notes. We are going to be talking about not just reasons why seeking God, His presence, His Word, prayer, and quiet time is so essential to living, but we’re going to be talking about real life, practical ways that we can go about doing this as busy moms. It’s going to be loaded with Scripture,.loaded with encouragement, loaded with real-life examples, and these reasons to seek Him It’s going to be powerful and it’s something I’m really, really passionate about and I feel like God has just consistently been reminding me of is that we can sometimes overcomplicate our faith, and our time with Him, and our relationship with Him when really it is so incredibly simple.

25:35
So click the link in the show notes. Jump in that workshop. It’s completely free. It will be recorded even if you can’t attend live although I strongly encourage you to make the time. Get a babysitter, ask hubby to take the kids, you know, do whatever you need to do to be present at the live workshop, there’ll be time for q&a. And when you attend something live, intentionally plugging into it, you learn and grow so much more than passively catching a replay, you know listening to it while you’re folding laundry or driving or whatever else. Not able to focus and take notes. Totally different outcomes and results happen. But I do want to encourage you, if you can’t attend live, do not allow that to be a reason why you’re not registering, why you’re not plugging into the information that’s going to be shared here to truly uncomplicate your faith. Alright, I will see you in a consult, I will see you at this workshop. I will see you in the Intentional Abundance Community and in between now and then sister have a blessed day.

More about your Podcast Host

Your Host,Sasha Star Robertson is an Intentional Living & Biblical Mindset Coach for busy Christian moms, wife of 14 years to her best friend, boy mom x2 (blessed by adoption), travel addict, and Jesus freak. She is the founder of The Intentional Abundance Co., curator of the Life & Goals Planner, host of the Intentional MomLife with Jesus Podcast & co-host of the Faithful Family Fortress Podcast. Sasha is passionate about the call in Isaiah 61:1-2 and believes that God called her to set mothers free from the stress, overwhelm, and burden associated with modern day motherhood and instead help them live in the freedom of Christ through Biblical mindset & balanced schedules.

Sasha Star Robertson is an Intentional Living & Biblical Mindset Coach for busy Christian moms, wife of 14 years to her best friend, boy mom x2 (blessed by adoption), travel addict, and Jesus freak. She is the founder of The Intentional Abundance Co., curator of the Life & Goals Planner, & host of the Intentional Momlife with Jesus Podcast.

Sasha invites listeners to come and chat about where they’re at, to be seen, heard, and what next steps to take to move forward through the stuck walking with Jesus and others in fellowship. Want to jump on a free discovery consult with Sasha to walk away with wins and learn about next steps towards Intentionally Abundant Motherhood, schedule your call here: https://calendly.com/intentionalabundanceco/iamconsult

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074: Do You Know, Like, & Trust God?

Summary

Do you have a know, like, and trust relationship with God? Or are you struggling to trust Him because you don’t know Him intimately?

In this episode Sasha shares about relationship with God. She shares a testimony about the transition from her living from a backwards space of works without faith, works striving to please God, works to please man, and placing her faith in things of this world… to God’s gentle hand guiding her to knowing Him for who He says He is in His word & Spirit, liking Him (because He first loved us), and trusting Him.

Need some encouragement in knowing, liking, & trusting God? Join us in the Uncomplicated Faith Workshop coming up July 19th. Learn more here: https://intentionalabundance.life/uncomplicatedfaith

Transcription

0:55
Jingle

1:08
Hello sisters and welcome back to another episode of the Intentional Abundant Life podcast. I’m your host Sasha Star Robertson, and today is a little bit of an unconventional podcast episode if you will. I am just hanging out here in my living room. My son is still sleeping. My husband’s at work, the puppy dog is sitting next to me, and I have been enjoying my quiet time and preparing for the upcoming uncomplicated faith workshop. And in this, I just felt like this message was supposed to be shared more than just in the workshop, more than just in the Serenity for Your Soul Challenge that I prepared along with God a few years ago, more than just something that I deliver to my clients because I think it’s something that’s really important for all of us.

2:01
And if you’re a woman in business, which a lot of my clients, perhaps even some of my listeners are, you might be familiar with a marketing term, know like, and trust. It’s very popular terminology and a way of growing and relationship with your audience, with your ideal client, with the people in your circle, right? Well, I guess in marketing, you want them to know you. You want them to like you, and you want them to trust you. So then they will be willing and able to purchase from you. And I think this goes far beyond the relationship with your customers or your ideal client, right? It goes to that of your family as well. Obviously, your family is very close to you, they’re people that you do know quite well or at least you hope that you do. And you would hope that you liked them as well. You know, some of our family I think can be a little bit more difficult to like, and then you would hope that especially in a tight family unit, that you would trust one another.

3:21
I think that’s God’s ideal for our family anyway, although we are human, we are sinful. We can do horrible, horrendous things to each other, which can cause a lack of trust. But this also extends to friendships, right? This applies to business, it applies to friendships as well. But I feel like God really gave me this picture about how it pertains to Him as well And I think back several years ago, actually, where I was in this position in life where I just felt like so many things, so many circumstances, were just not really working out. Long story short, I was going on my second mission trip. I was actually leading the mission trip and it seemed kind of like everything was going wrong. Everyone was fighting against it. I was trying to lead the team in the manner in which the mission organization asked us to prepare, but many of the people on the team, including people who were older than me, and who were leaders at my church at the time, had been on this mission trip with the same organization, to the same community, to the same sister church for several years. And so a lot of them felt like they were exempt from going through the training and following the steps.

5:03
But if you’re somebody who maybe is fairly new to the faith or remembers the time when you were new to the faith, you remember having this childlike faith, or even another way I can put this analogy is sometimes in a working environment, people would rather hire somebody fresh off the street who has no experience in the industry, because if they hire somebody who does have industry experience, they’re having to help them unlearn everything that they had already learned, in order to do it the way that this particular company or wherever else wants to train.

5:43
And so I was facing this a lot. And it ended up resulting in a lot of just hurtful things being said hurtful actions and behaviors. And it caused a major lack of peace in my life. And I remember at this time praying and praying and praying that God would bring me peace about this mission trip. I knew that it wasn’t going to be without stepping out of my comfort zone, not without struggle and without sacrifice. But the very fact that the people I was to be going on this mission trip with were some of the culprits for creating such a lack of peace in my life was where my struggle really was. And the more difficult part about this is these were people that I consider family. I didn’t have a lot of close family nearby and have a lot of close friendships outside of the very people in this community. To make matters worse on top of that they were some of my biggest clients at the time. And my workplace in a sense. So this church community was my family, they were my home, they were my workplace, they were my spiritual community as well, and so I was very deeply connected in this space, but also, it was the place that was causing me such a lack of peace at the time.

7:18
To make matters worse, my husband came home one day during this season, to share some pretty unsettling news in terms of a female coworker of his and her approach towards him. And to make matters worse, I was struggling emotionally, mentally, spiritually, in multiple different ways at this time. The good thing I will say about it is through all of that I was left in a position to just put my head down and seek the Lord. And I remember, I was in His Word, I was kind of going through this almost midlife crisis at the time. And I gathered every Bible study that I had ever done leading up to that point in my walk with Him. And I read every single word that I had ever written down about any Bible study I’d ever done, all the answers to questions, all of the notes that I had taken in notebooks and different spiritual courses or whatever else, and I just really sat down and was like, God, what is going on in my life? Like, please be near to me.

8:37
And I was reading a book at the time. And I remember reading this book, and I believe it was. I Don’t Wait Anymore by Emily Townsend. Sorry if that’s incorrect, kind of winging this episode here. But I remember reading in that book how she was talking about, she would always hold back and live in this almost reserved stance just waiting for some circumstance to happen or some external thing to go on for her to be able to step forward in faith and take action on something. And so hence the title of the book, I Don’t Wait Anymore. She realized that she was almost living in this backward stance. She wasn’t living from a heart posture of faith.

9:26
And I just love how the Book of Romans talks about Abraham. And it was his faith that considered him righteous. This was even before the law was given. Abraham was considered righteous on account of his faith, and I look back and I think of Abraham and I think of his closeness to God. He knew God and he trusted God. And he liked God. Even when God asked him to do some really, really tough stuff that I honestly could not even imagine doing in my life. Abraham trusted the promise that God gave him. And I especially love this section in Romans, it’s actually Romans… Flipping to it bear with me.

10:27
Romans 4 starting at verse 19, he did not weaken in the faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead since he was about 100 years old, or when he considered the bareness of Sarah’s womb. No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God. But he grew strong in his faith, as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what He had promised. See friends He knew God enough to trust God in all things, in all circumstances. He never weakened in his faith and he never wavered. He actually grew stronger in his faith concerning the promise of God. And that only further developed his relationship with God in His likeness of God and liking God, that even later when he was asked to do the unthinkable, and take his son up and sacrifice him, after having received what he thought was this promise, he was able to do so. Because he knew God and he liked God and he trusted God.

11:54
And so going back to wrap up this testimony that I was sharing earlier, I was going through this difficult, very difficult season where I felt like my family and my church body and my work took place and my relationship with my husband and my relationship with the Lord and everything was just struggling. And I shared about how I was reading that book. And when I was reading that book, I said, Okay, God, I can see where my living is backward now, right? Where I was kind of like in this state of perpetual fear of being afraid to take any steps or any action. I was afraid to do any real work On account of what I felt like was resting in my relationship with the Lord. But I was spending a lot of time doing a lot of works to please man in place of my faith and relationship with the Lord. And I realized that a lot of this was that I didn’t know God and I didn’t trust Him. And I couldn’t trust Him without and knowing Him and so I committed that I was going to do that.

13:15
And friends, when I committed to do that, I then did not follow through. I continued going on with this people-pleasing, kind of workspace without faith type relationship but never actually taking any action in who I was being and knowing God and trusting God and liking gods. And this whole situation ended up kind of getting worse. And it came to a point where I actually stepped down from that mission trip. Later I ended up leaving working for the church and went back to my career working for the state. My husband and I had a little bit of a rocky season. But, you know, if you’ve been around here, you know, we’re doing fabulous now. But I can tell you one day, I truly had this like heart like Jonah. And I just wanted to run away from it all. I was so heartbroken and just so confused and struggling with my head down.

14:25
And I went out to my brother’s house who, who lives near the Knik River in Alaska, if you’ve been here, if you’re from here, you know what I’m talking about. But it was springtime. I remember it was March and the snow was melting. And it was like some of those just really sweet nice days where you can go outside with like just a sweater on and you’re finally not freezing for the first time in eight months. And I went out to my brother’s house and they were going to take the truck out towards the glacier and go, you know, off-roading.

14:58
And so I said, okay, yeah, I’ll go with you guys. And I remember him looking at me and saying, last time you did this was like four years ago, and you told me you were never coming out here to do this with me again. And I remember saying to him, “Desperate times call for desperate measures.” Y’all, I was struggling. My mindset was not found on anything foundational at the time. And we went out, and we decided to stop and hang out for a little bit. Somebody got there side by side stuck and it was almost like sinking in the river. And so there was a group of dozens I’m telling you dozens of people out there and they’re kind of just walking around on the river, which was very, very shallow. It was only like a couple of inches deep in most of the spots. There were women and children and men and, and whatever, there were four-wheelers and side-by-sides and trucks and all these people just walking around out there. And I’m walking around out there too, you know, and just this little area, and I was moving my foot around and I shifted my weight from my left foot to my right foot.

16:10
And in that instance, my right foot was sucked into a hole. And I’m telling you, it was the perfect sized circular hole, same exact size as my thigh, and I fell in thigh-deep one, only one leg into this hole, my boot was filled with water. And even still to this day on my job, there were people like I swear, running around in this area right before I was standing there. There were tons of people just within a few feet of me. And there was no ground where one of my feet was standing on. And this was I realized I was standing on ice, not the ground. And it just must have created this perfect circular vortex. I’m sure there’s some kind of physics and logical laws to explain this. Immediately when my foot and my leg were sucked into that hole. It was at that moment that I realized I had been putting my faith and my trust in all of these things of the world. Not God. And it was in that moment I realized no, you cannot put your faith in your spouse or your relationship with your spouse. You cannot put it in your intellectual abilities. You cannot put it in your church congregation you cannot put it in anything else other than God.

17:44
And I remember, leg still in the hole, of course, I had this freakout moment I tried to stand out again there’s no ground like my foot was just floating around in the circular area and finally pulled myself out. I tried to keep my boot in there. So I had to like pull my leg out of my boot, then yank my boot out of this hole soaking wet in this freezing cold like glacier runoff water in March, I just looked up at the sky and laughed and I said, Okay God,. Because it was in that instance, He reminded me of how I proclaimed that I was going to know Him, so that I could like Him, so that I can trust Him, and live in this intimate relationship with Him. And I wasn’t doing that. And He was just holding me to my own convictions holding me to do what I said I would do because He wants nothing more than a relationship for me. He doesn’t want me to serve on a mission trip or serve people in my church congregation or serve in any of these other capacities if it’s not coming from a place of knowing Him and liking Him and trusting Him and serving for His glory for His kingdom for his purposes and the ones that he has called me to. And sisters. It is no different for you.

19:13
And sisters, I’m going to be talking a little bit more about this in the Uncomplicated Faith Workshop coming up. I believe this is a very, very important part in our walk and uncomplicating our faith, truly is to know God and who God is to you. I think God is God. He is unchangeable His Word and His Spirit tell us everything we need to know about his character and who He is.

19:52
But the bottom line is, when circumstances come, that doesn’t change who God is. When people treat us differently or maybe unfavorably, that doesn’t change who God is. And we have to remember the stories in scripture we have to seek God for who He is so that we can know who He is. But know it for ourselves on a very, very intimate level. And so I invite you, ladies, to join us in this Uncomplicated Faith Workshop because this is something I did not plan on doing when I set out to become a coach was sitting in, I guess you could say other people’s faith if that makes sense. But having moms come to me in an overwhelmed state and realizing that a big part of their overwhelm stems from these faithful foundations, stems from this place of them sitting in a very complicated faith where it makes their relationship with Christ very difficult and very complicated, right?

21:13
So, in saying all of that I just think it’s really really beautiful the way that God has shown up and transformed this coaching system to so heavily involve these faithful foundations in the very beginning. And so some of these faithful foundations, I walk my clients through in the IAM is what I am giving you in this Uncomplicated Faith Workshop. And I shared a little bit of my testimony today to let you know that even in those really tough circumstances, even when it might be the very people that are supposed to be helpers in your faith or that you would think would be helpers in your faith are helping to make it complicated. There’s a place that we can go, there’s a foundation that we can stand on, and it doesn’t have to be complicated. So please join us for the uncomplicated workshop coming up this Tuesday. If you’re listening in real-time, the link is in the show notes and I cannot wait to see you there.

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073: Feeling Like You Have a ‘Checklist Relationship with Jesus? Learn how to invest time into knowing and chasing God and living in tune with the Holy Spirit as a busy mom with Angela Pitnikoff

Summary

Feeling Like You Have a ‘Checklist Relationship with Jesus? Learn how to invest time into knowing and chasing God and living in tune with the Holy Spirit as a busy mom.

In this episode Sasha chats with special guest Angela Pitnikoff, a wife, boy mom to 3, and host of the The Kingdom Daughters Podcast.

Intentional Abundant Life Podcast special guest Angela Pitnikoff, a wife, boy mom to 3, and host of the The Kingdom Daughters Podcast.
In this podcast episode Angela gives us practical ways to get intentional with 'Jesus time' as busy moms and how to prevent the 'going through the motions' 'checklist' mentality towards God and instead helps us to live in tune with the Holy Spirit.

Angela shares her testimony about how she went from a check list “making God happy” lifestyle to a deeply connected relationship with Him. She shares about the transformation and how much of it comes from knowing God for who He says He is in His word and chasing after Him, consistently.

Angela gives us practical ways to get intentional with ‘Jesus time’ as busy moms and how to prevent the ‘going through the motions’ ‘checklist’ mentality towards God and instead helps us to live in tune with the Holy Spirit.

Walk away with powerful tips for investing time with Jesus through worship, prayer, scripture, and more.

Want to connect with Angela: www.thekingdomdaughters.com Subscribe to The Kingdom Daughters Podcast

Joining us in the Uncomplicated Faith Workshop?
Register Here: https://intentionalabundance.life/uncomplicatedfaith

Transcription

Sasha Star Robertson 0:13
Jingle

Sasha Star Robertson 1:13
Hello sisters, and welcome back to another episode of the Intentional Abundant Life podcast. I’m here with a special guest today, Angela Pitnikoff. She is a pastor’s wife, boy mom, worship leader, and podcaster. She loves to lead worship and help people know the heart of God, understand the power of the Holy Spirit, and receive the love of their heavenly Father in a deep way. On her podcast, The Kingdom Daughters, she shares her desire to help women understand their true identity in Jesus and walk in true freedom that only comes from Him. Y’all, this is a topic we have been hammering on these last few weeks. So, I’m so excited to hear it from Angela. We will talk a little bit more about where you can find her and her resources later in the episode, but I will tell you now that she lives with her husband and three boys in northern California. Angela, thank you so much for being here. Is there anything else you’d like to add to that bio?

Angela Pitnikoff 2:10
I don’t think so. But thanks for having me. I’m excited to be here.

Sasha Star Robertson 2:15
Awesome. I love it. I think this is going to be a really, really powerful, powerful episode because today we are going to be talking a little bit about finding time as a busy mom to be consistent in your Jesus time and maybe even some practical habits to put in place to help your relationship with God. This has been something we’ve been hammering here on the Intentional Abundant Life podcast. So Angela, if you even want to just start out sharing a little bit of your testimony. How did these become topics that you are super comfortable sharing about and what was your journey to coming to these habits and the space as a busy mom of three boys?

Angela Pitnikoff 3:00
Yeah, I think… So, I grew up in the church. I’m a pastor’s wife; my husband and I have been pastoring for 20 years. And we, you know, I think that being in that place where you feel like, I’m a Christian, I’m good, you know, I got this. I’m a pastor’s wife. I lead worship and I got it all together, you know. And you get in those seasons and you realize you’re not altogether, you know, and you don’t have it. And I think I just for so, so many years, I just chased, chased, chased keeping all these things together, making it look like our family had it together. Even before I was married, it was, you know, having this idea that I had to perform for God and have all these things together and I couldn’t make any mistakes. And so it was more about like, oh, I had to check off these things, make sure I was doing the right things and checking them off and making God happy.

Angela Pitnikoff 4:12
And I came to a point several years ago where I was like, I don’t even know myself very well. I don’t know God very well, I don’t even understand really who he is. I know I remember going to a women’s conference, and I had been dealing with fear all my life, just like different things. It was generational. But she was talking about how we literally have the power to break fear out of our life. We have got, through Jesus, we can break things off like that, and using scripture and using His Word to free ourselves from things. And it literally was like, wait, what? I didn’t know that! All this time, you know, all this time I had been in church or grew up in church and around church and hearing God’s word. And it was like this light bulb went off like, I don’t even know that much. I don’t even really know God, that he’s like… I knew that He was there. I knew I wanted to serve Him. I knew I wanted to live an honoring life, but I didn’t know He loved me. I didn’t know He wanted to free me. I didn’t know that He wanted a relationship with me. And there was just like this breakthrough that happened.

Angela Pitnikoff 5:31
And just since then, I mean, that’s been about, it’s been about seven to eight years, I think that I really been just like chasing after the Lord and saying, Okay, God, what does this look like? And it’s been amazing because I lead worship too. And I was leading worship back then too, but it was more… Again, like just checking off the boxes, learning the song, singing it well, you know, performing and doing all the things you’re supposed to do. And when I started really understanding who God was and really taking the time to spend with Him, I was experiencing Him on a whole new level of just His love and His goodness and His faithfulness, and just being reminded and being able to hear Him more clearly and just walking in different places with Him. So, I don’t know, that went kind of long. Sorry. I get excited.

Sasha Star Robertson 6:28
Oh, absolutely. No need to apologize. I love every bit of it. I love that you talked about going from like this almost checkoff list of (and I’m doing air quotes here for the listeners) making God happy, right, is one of the things that you said. And I’m like, Ah, that is so real and relevant for me because I remember a time in my walk of coming to know Him that it was very similar. And I’m like, I don’t know what to do. I’m reading scripture, and I’m praying and I’m serving in the church in all these different capacities. And I’m doing my Bible study and all this stuff. Why is this happening or whatever else? Not that I was being punished, but it’s just I didn’t feel this closeness with God and I didn’t feel like He was ever present in my life. And so I love that you talked about, you had this epiphany, almost like this revelation, where it was about knowing God. He loves me. He wants a relationship with me. He wants to free me like, what? It’s not just this checkmark Christianity or just saying, Oh yeah, I believe in Jesus and I go to church. It’s so much more than that. But it comes from that place of knowing God.

Sasha Star Robertson 7:46
And I think that was a big question that happened in my walk too, is… I was reading this book, and I forget what it was called. Maybe I’ll think of it later and put it in the show notes. I was reading this book and I was like, okay, yeah, this is so good. This is so true. This is so real. Oh, it’s called I Don’t Wait Anymore by I think it was Emily Townsend is the name. And in there it kind of I don’t want to say I had the same, like transformation or epiphany. But it was one of those things and I was like, Oh yeah, I need to trust God. And then that’s when I realized like, I don’t trust Him because I don’t. Well, I had a really big struggle of just trusting people right and from like past hurts and drama in my life. But I didn’t trust God because I didn’t know God. And so it was still back to that knowing God. So, when I was reading that book I remember I was in Hawaii and I like declared okay God, I’m gonna know You so that I can trust You so that I can be in this relationship with You.

Sasha Star Robertson 8:50
And then I came back from that vacation. I got caught up in the hustle and bustle of life. And then I wasn’t doing that. And like literally, the bottom dropped out of my existence. And He was like… And it was so funny because I remember literally all these things falling away and I’m like, what is happening? Like my whole world was crumbling around me, like literally even the ground I was standing on. That’s a story for another time. But I just like laughed. And I was like, Okay, God, I hear You. Like, I was so clearly able to look back and see, I said that I was going to know You so that I could trust you and be in a relationship with you. And I’m still not doing that. I was still living that’s almost like superficial Christianity. And it wasn’t helping me. I didn’t have any fruit of the Spirit. I wasn’t living in that closeness with Him. I will wasn’t hearing Him. And it was because I wasn’t taking the time to prioritize Him and getting to know him. So, I love that you shared all of that because I think it’s really relevant for a lot of us, especially as busy moms, like, we have to be consistent and seeking Him if we want relationship with Him.

Angela Pitnikoff 10:00
One Yeah, I think it’s definitely about consistency. But like you even said, if we’re not like, you can go through the motions, I think, and kind of, like, get into… Because I’ve done that too, where I’m like, well, I’m doing my devotions, and I’m praying. Like you were saying, I’m doing all the right things, why isn’t this working, you know? And you can get to a point where it just becomes kind of mundane, and you have to be really careful with that. I mean, I always use this example. It’s just like any relationship you have in your life. I mean, if you have a best friend and all you do is go to Starbucks every single day, you always get the same drink, you always talk about the same thing never deter from one specific conversation, and then that’s it. How exciting and deep is that relationship going to be? It’s going To get boring, it’s gonna get mundane, you’re gonna get bored of it, you’re not going to want to be a part of that anymore.

Angela Pitnikoff 11:06
And that is what happens with us in the Lord. It’s the same thing. If you just wake up, it’s good to be in a routine. For me, I feel like I have to do that. I’m like, That’s my morning routine. I spend time with you. But I’m intentional about saying, Holy Spirit, lead me, guide me today. I need to hear from You. I want to hear from You. Open my heart. As opposed to saying, Oh, this is my morning routine. I have to open my Bible. I’m gonna read XYZ, okay, now I’m gonna pray, this my list of prayers that I had all this week, same list, same thing, that then it becomes words. It’s not a relationship anymore. There has to be a routine relationship. It’s like you want to be consistent with what you’re doing so that it becomes a part of your every day, but you don’t want it to become so checkbox. Because that’s when you’re going to start feeling like why am I even doing this? What is the point of this? And God’s like you’re doing this your way and you’re not hearing from Me. You’re not actually building a relationship with Me. You’re not. It doesn’t, you know, and so, I guess my little… that is, knowing God is actually building that relationship with Him and wanting to know who He is. There’s so much goodness in God’s word when you do that. So…

Sasha Star Robertson 12:40
Amen. No, that’s okay. That’s exactly what I was gonna say. I was like, right before you’re talking about that. So I love that you pointed it out because I think it comes to this, You want to do it consistently so it’s a habit, but you don’t want to do it in such a fashion that it becomes ritualistic. So the relationship thing is what I was gonna say, too, like I say this a lot to moms. I actually had a conversation with one of my clients a few weeks ago about this, is like, so this is what your relationship with God looks like. But how would your relationship be with your kids if it looked the same way? Like, if you just never went and talked to them, like in this intimate personal conversation, or even your kids with you. If they never came and talked to you about stuff and they only ever called you when there was a problem, but they didn’t want you to help with the problem. They just want you to like take the problem away, right? Just all these different kinds of analogies, like if you’re not having this relationship with your kids, if you’re not taking the time to be intimate and personal and give them individualized attention and have deep meaningful conversations with them and have this (it’s like a tongue twister word for me) reciprocity in the relationship with them, where it almost is a give and take where you can learn and grow with each other together kind of a thing.

Sasha Star Robertson 14:14
Yeah, it’s so much more than just a morning routine, or just like, check mark off or, or just, yeah, do X, Y, and Z. It’s like we have the Holy Spirit. Just that in itself is such a gift. And we have to be quiet to hear His voice and His push and His call. So, I know that you know some ways as a busy mom to be consistent in your Jesus time. You’d mentioned the morning routine, which I’m a huge fan of. But do you want to share a little bit more about that?

Angela Pitnikoff 14:56
Yeah, I think really, it comes down to finding your best time of the day. being intentional about that, because everybody’s different. Some people are night owls, and that’s the best time for them. Make that your time. You have to be consistent on it. But I’m the same. I’m morning. I’ve gotten myself into a routine every single morning. I do certain things and I do it every morning and it helps. And again, it’s like back to other things, like yes, it’s could be easy to get into those routines and then just kind of make it ritualistic, but when you’re consistent with it and you’re consistently chasing after Jesus like He is faithful. Like he is so faithful!

Angela Pitnikoff 15:44
So, I guess I would say, First, figure out what is the best time of day for you because maybe mornings are terrible for you. Maybe your kids are early risers, and you don’t have any time in the morning. So don’t do that. Do it when it’s nap time maybe, you know, depending on where you’re at in your stage of motherhood, it could be naptime. But that is again about being intentional. Because guess what? Usually, during nap time, you’re like, Oh, I can get to my to-do list. I can do the dishes or the laundry, or I can binge-watch my favorite show while I’m doing the laundry or something. You have to set a time and say, No, when this happens, I am going to sit down with the Lord and I’m going to take this time. And that is where routines are built. Because you’re able to say, No, I’m making this routine. So finding the time for sure. And being intentional about it. I think that “busy” is the badge of honor that moms like to wear.

Sasha Star Robertson 16:48
Right?

Angela Pitnikoff 16:48
I am 100% guilty of that. I’ve said that so many times. I catch myself saying it. And it’s a terrible word. And it’s a terrible thing for moms to just get caught up in because it doesn’t really help us to be busy. It just doesn’t, you know? It makes us tired and it gets our priorities out of whack. I just think we just kind of chase all of these goals and dreams for our kids and our family and all these things. And we’re chasing all those things and we’re not, like you said, widening our heart. We’re not making the number one thing priority. I was actually having a conversation with a friend the other day and I was like I don’t know why we do this but we don’t want to invest our time or energy into the most important things. And instead, we give God the smallest part of our day and expect Him to like help us at all times or that we’re going to be able to hear Him clearly, we’re going to… I know I’m saying this from experience, I was like, I just expected, well, I serve You, Lord, and I’m here and I’m doing this. And it’s like, Well, I haven’t built, you haven’t built a relationship, you know, and you don’t know, I don’t know His voice because I’m only giving Him five minutes a day.

Angela Pitnikoff 18:24
And I’m not saying that you should feel guilted into an hour-long devotional time, or worship time, or anything like that. I understand, especially as a mom. Man, there’s a lot going on, especially in the early years with your kids. There are just constant feedings, diapers, and constant things, I get it. But when we’re intentional about spending time with Him, it is amazing how clear your day gets, how open your day gets, and how not busy your day gets when you prioritize Jesus because your perspective changes on what is important for the day. You have clarity on your day because now you’re walking with Holy Spirit throughout the day, instead of trying to do it on your own. You have a partner, which is amazing. He’s gonna lead and guide you. And when you open it up to Him and say, Lord, I give you this day, even day by day, He’s going to free up so much space for you because you just gave it to Him first. You spent time with Him and you prioritized Him and now He’s helping you throughout the day.

Angela Pitnikoff 19:43
So it’s amazing how unbusy we can be when we… Because we, I think in our mind, and this is the tactic of the enemy. It’s like, I just don’t have time for that. I don’t have time for that and Lord, I’m so sorry. Please forgive me, and I just, I don’t have time today, but I just I give this day to you and that’s it. And that’s okay. God’s like, sure, I love you. I’m gonna take whatever I can get. But when we actually say, No, this is a priority, this is the most important thing, I know that God’s going to help me today when I walk with Him and when I surrender my day to Him, when I’m intentional with Him, there’s a shift. And I’m telling you from experience there’s a shift when we prioritize the Lord, when we give it to Him, He just frees things up. And it just changes. It changes everything. So I don’t know if I answered your question. I’m sorry.

Sasha Star Robertson 20:37
No, I think you did in that last part of what you’re talking about with like changing the perspective and Him just like, I don’t know, like, he clears our schedule and like, aligns our heart with His like when we meet him in the morning. And I remember one morning, this was last summer, like, right about a year ago, I was in my morning, quiet time with him. If I would have looked at you know, one of the things that I do in my morning routine, I call it my daily intentions, I’ll state my daily intentions for the day. And I think so often in the morning, we can look at our schedule, and we can look at our daily intentions and like all the things that we have to do if we’re going out and relying on our own understanding like it’s totally different than when we bring God into that space. And I remember this particular day, like most other days, like if I’m just doing it on my own understanding, like I don’t have time for other requests or for other things like I know what my day needs to look like for me to get done the things that I have on my plate to get done.

Sasha Star Robertson 21:33
And I remember one morning that I was in my prayer time and my quiet time and I was just like, Okay, God, like, Who are you calling me to show up and serve today? And I just felt like he was saying like the people who are close to me like near, local, like in my local community because I do a lot of my business online and a lot of my ministry you know, podcasting and social media and whatever else. And I just felt like local was the thing and it was like not even 20 minutes after I got off my you know, phone call with God. My phone rang and it was a friend of mine locally whose toddler was having seizures and they were in the hospital and they needed somebody to watch their baby. And instantly, I was like yeah absolutely and then it was like, I was looking at my schedule I was able to get like a lot of stuff done before she brought him over and dropped him off.

Sasha Star Robertson 22:34
And like, when I look back on that day, I don’t remember anything that I was so busy and like needed to do on my to-do list that would have prevented me, you know, from saying yes to that need. I remember that God prepared my heart and allowed me to meet that need, and allowed me and my son to have just this sweet time with this little baby in our home. And it was a wonderful day. And I look back and I remember that. And had I said no, I would look back and I would not see, you know, anything super important that I spent my time doing that day. So I love that you brought that up because that’s so very real in my life where that’s just one of the testimonies that I have to share in terms of like God, just changing my schedule and changing my heart about my day, and really preparing me in that quiet time in that space where I met him in the morning to do that.

Sasha Star Robertson 23:33
But I know there was something you had mentioned, I think before we started recording or whatever, where you were talking about kind of just this idea of like worship all day long. And so I’m interested in hearing more about that too. Because I love, I totally believe in like, you know, not just the morning, quiet time like but finding your best time and then being intentional about it, respecting the boundaries of that. I’m 100% Yes and Amen. It’s about chasing after Him. But maybe for some of us who you know, you were saying you’re not expecting people to go and just spend an hour a day like in your devotion or like word study in a day but I think this idea to me of worship all day long is like, but we can have at least an hour away and every day when we’re doing it in this fashion. So will you share a little bit more about that with us?

Angela Pitnikoff 24:25
Yeah, absolutely. It’s funny I actually had to be, when I was thinking about this for myself, I actually started putting in my phone just like reminders like pray, pray, worship, talk to the Lord, you know. And that’s something I encourage women to do because we have that tool. Now that’s like on us all the time. And we’re looking at our phones all the time. And it’s an easy way to just be reminded and get yourself into a routine of praying throughout the day and worshiping throughout the day. I think worship as a whole, like, just worship music brings so much life and connection to the Lord in a deeper way. So for me, it’s not just about the worship, like music-wise, but if you’re filling your home with actual worship throughout the day, and my kids are older, and so 10 years ago, I didn’t have, 10-15 years ago, I did not have access to worship music like we do nowadays. It’s so easy for you to get on YouTube or Spotify, and through your Smart TV and just pour that out and your home.

Angela Pitnikoff 24:28
It wasn’t as accessible when my kids were little. And I actually look and I see people with their kids, you know, people show videos of their kids worshiping and I’m like, Oh, that’s so awesome. Because I didn’t have that I was harder. I had CDs. You know, it was like Hillsong, that was it. But now you have just access to so much and because it’s so accessible, there’s really no excuse for us not to have it, filling our home, filling our car, filling our family because that is our relationship with the Lord. That is life-giving scripture being sung over us and poured into every crevice of our house and home. When we welcome Him into our space like that, and when we allow His presence to move, even if we’re not fully engaged in the worship it’s just being sung over us you know. God sings over us you know. And just allowing that music to fill our spaces like that is just one aspect of how you can worship throughout the day because you’re just, you’re just opening up your space and your heart and your kids’ hearts, to God’s presence, just being able to move freely.

Angela Pitnikoff 25:59
And guess what, the enemy doesn’t like worship, so he’s gone, he’s gonna flee as soon as you open up that, you know, as soon as any of worship is being played. It just, it just frees up your space. So that is worship throughout the day, but also worship as a lifestyle, what we say, what we do, how we pray, how we act, when we’re inviting God to be a part of our every day, there’s less yelling at our kids, you know, there’s less frustration, like I said earlier that our perspective changes on what’s important. And I say that because I again, I, I yelled at my kids, I’ve yelled at my kids before, right? You get to a point where like, ah.

Angela Pitnikoff 28:07
But when you are in tune with the Holy Spirit, and you’re walking with Him, and you’re bringing God along throughout the day, it’s a lot harder for those with that human weakness to come out because you’re connected to Jesus, you’re connected to the vine you know our source, and when you’re connected to that He’s the one moving through you He’s the one working through you. He’s the one teaching and giving you the time like you were saying, to free you up to help people, to bless people, to love people because your perspective is changing. I think if like to be honest, like For me, in certain parts of my motherhood, I would have been like, Heck no, I can’t watch anybody else’s kid my, my blade is all right, you know, but when you’re in those places with the Lord and you’re, you’re in a good place with Him and you’re connected to Him and you spent that time with Him. You’re in a good place to serve. You’re in a good place to give because He’s filled you up. And He’s a part of everything.

Angela Pitnikoff 29:15
And so the lifestyle thing I think put those reminders in your phone to be praying throughout the day, and whatever that looks like. I mean, it could be you have a list of things that you’re going to bring up throughout the day. Even in your notes, you could say, Pray for one of your children. And then the next hour, pray for the other child or pray for my husband or you could be like, just pray and Holy Spirit lead me in this hour. What do you want me to pray for? Who needs prayer? Like who are you going to bring to me today to lift up?

Sasha Star Robertson 0:09
So it could be however you want to do it. That’s the beauty of this relationship with God is, He just wants to spend time with us. He just wants to hear from us. He already knows right? He already knows our needs. He already knows what we need. He already knows what we’re gonna pray for. But it’s about relationships. It’s about building that with Him. And when we start to do that, we begin to hear Him clear we begin to understand what He’s saying to us, begin to build that relationship again, be in community with Him and so yeah, that’s worship all day. It just brings Him into the everyday craziness, you know, where we think we have to just give Him a little bit of time and He’s gonna be with us and you know, that’s fine. But the rest of the day, we have craziness going on. You know, we’re just juggling balls. I was saying as moms we’re always juggling balls, right? We’re always just trying to keep all the things together. When we bring Him into those things it’s just less chaotic because He brings peace. He brings joy like you said earlier the fruit of the Spirit. All those things come out, makes it so much calmer and easier throughout the day.

Sasha Star Robertson 1:38
Yes and Amen. I love that. Like, I feel like worship is so much more than music, but the music I think can really shift our hearts and our mindset toward Him. And I know like, as soon as I start singing the words to a worship song, I’m saying them out loud. So my brain is like processing the language aspect, but then I’m hearing it and it’s to the music and it’s like I don’t know, music just like it. It has a way of like speaking and connecting to my heart so deeply. And like there are songs that like I cannot even sing because instantly like the words just cut me and I am just a puddle of tears. Whether it’s in the car or at church, or if they’re at home. And so like I think it just it brings my heart back to, and my face, back to like the face of Jesus. So I love that. I think it’s amazing that we do have this opportunity to Apple Music Spotify, Amazon music, whatever it is. Pandora, your go-to, just turn the music on your phone, turn the music on your TV. And it’s so easy and then for your kids to like bask in that as well.

Sasha Star Robertson 1:41
I agree when you’re turning down the worship music the enemy flees, and you just reminded me I used to be in this habit every morning where when my son as my son would wake up, I would turn on the worship music and we would listen to worship music while I prepared breakfast and we ate. And I got out of that routine and I’m just like, Man, I want to bring that back. I want to bring that back into our routine because I do remember the really sweet fruits that came out of it. And then I loved your tip for adding prayer reminders to your phone. I’ve never done that before but I think it is incredibly powerful. Just have that pattern interrupt, just to have that thing come across that says hey, stop what you’re doing and recognize that God is with you, like all the time and he is always inclining his ear to listen to you and then even the tip of like, doing what you know, pray for your husband, pray for your kids pray for, you know, like general, you know, pray to God for who He’s going to put on your heart to pray for in that moment.

Sasha Star Robertson 2:58
I think so often, we can get into this habit of like somebody posts on Facebook or a friend reaches out or you know, our church community or whatever else sends a prayer chain and you’re like, Oh yeah, I’ll pray for that. But then making the time to be very intentional about actually praying for those things like those phone reminders are really huge. So thank you for sharing that too because that’s not something that I’m normally in the habit of. So I love that you came on here to add practical tips that that are even things that I’m not doing which is incredible. So thank you, thank you. Thank you for doing that. We’ve talked about so much goodness today. I’m super, super excited for my new habits that I’m implementing as well as all the listeners here. And Angela, I know you’ve got kind of this own ministry and sisterhood and podcast and all of this of your own. So I’ll include all the links in the show notes, but do you want to verbally tell the listeners where they can find you and connect?

Angela Pitnikoff 5:03
Yeah. So I have a podcast called Kingdom Daughters. And it’s all about encouraging women to walk as a daughter of the King, know who they are, and understand their worth. And also just get in really good habits of chasing Jesus consistently and walking with Him, finding freedom in that. So you can go to thekingdomdaughters.com And there’s a couple of links there. I have a free five-day devotional on there. If you want to start from there and then… So that’s pretty much it. I’m just, it’s all new, all new, but it’s amazing. God’s been opening so many awesome doors. And so it’s been really fun. So I appreciate you having me on here. It’s been a really fun and great conversation. I love it.

Sasha Star Robertson 5:53
Awesome. Okay, one last question that I have for you that I did not give you a heads up for, so I apologize. But I love to ask my guests on here, What does intentional abundance mean to you?

Sasha Star Robertson 6:09
Oh gosh, I would say intentionally chasing Jesus. when you’re intentional about chasing Him, He’s gonna give you abundance because it’s like kind of what we were talking about. Like when we chase Him, He frees up our day. That’s abundance man, especially as a mom that’s that is like, praise the Lord for that.

Sasha Star Robertson 6:34
I would say I love it. Yes and Amen. That’s the most concise answer I’ve ever received. But 100% I am with you there. Well, thank you so much, Angela. I appreciate your time. I appreciate all of your tips. And I know that this is gonna bless so many hearts. So thank you, Angela. Thank you to the listeners and I hope you all have an extremely blessed as well as an intentionally abundant day.

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072: 5 Reasons Quiet Time with God is Essential to Life

Summary

In this episode Sasha shares 5 not so obvious reasons quiet time with God is essential to life. Be reminded and encouraged as Sasha digs into the topic with scripture and truth. God is so good and not only does He meet us in this time, but I am confident that He will meet your heart and remind you in this podcast episode as well.

Need some guidance making this time a reality in your day to day as a busy mom? Join us in the Uncomplicated Faith Workshop coming up July 19th. Learn more here: https://intentionalabundance.life/uncomplicatedfaith

Transcription

0:04
Hello, and welcome back to another episode of the intentional abundant life podcast. As usual, I’m super excited to dig into today’s episode because we are talking about five reasons that quiet time with God is essential to everything else you could possibly be doing in life. So let’s do the jingle and dive right in.

1:13
Jingle

1:13
So starting off, I really really love this quote by Martin Luther. “I have so much to do today that I shall spend the first three hours in prayer.” And hearing that quote, and like goodness yes, yes. Right. But then, as a mother, I’m like, There’s no way on earth, I have three hours to spend in prayer. I’ve done almost that much one time. And it was when I was on a little retreat at the end of 2021. And I was like, I’m gonna commit to praying for 30 minutes.

1:36
I think that was the longest time that I’ve ever like, intentionally committed to praying for it, it was over two and a half hours, and I was still praying. It was fabulous. It was incredible. Just the amount of people and different things that I was able to lift up in that prayer time was fabulous. But I love even this idea, right? As busy moms, we can have this just like Martin Luther, I have so much to do today. But what am I going to do? How am I going to start my day with so much to do today? And starting in prayer is the best, best, best thing that we could do.

2:42
Because in that prayer time, when we’re sitting in the presence of the Lord, we’re sitting in the presence of God who is outside of time and His ways are higher than ours and His understanding is above ours and He knows the past, present and the future. So I think of these times where, you know, the kid peed on the floor, and then I got to the house late. And who knows, maybe I missed an accident. Maybe an accident didn’t happen because I wasn’t in that space in that time. We can hear these stories about people who were pilots or people who worked in the World Trade Center on 911. And they were late because they couldn’t find their keys or they hit the snooze on their alarm one too many times or whatever else.

3:33
I’ve read the story about this community of people that were like religiously at church every day or every week at this specific time. And something happened, where every single one of them wasn’t able to make it for some reason or another every single person had their own reason why. But it was so weird for even one of them to not be there for this worship practice, or sermon or whatever it was, if you Google it, you’ll find I’m sure. But the church had a gas leak and the whole church burned to the ground and everyone was like, oh my goodness, all these people are dead. They are always there. And not a single person showed up. And so nobody was harmed.

4:18
And so I just think of those moments too where when I have so much to do today when I want to have this structured schedule, this structure to my life or to my days. If I stop, and I pray, God will reveal things to me. He will give me what I need to sustain me through the day. He will direct my path. He can remove things from my schedule. So let’s get into the nitty-gritty of this episode. Number one is the fact that sitting in his presence, time is never wasted. I know that sometimes in this high-efficient, high-performance, Go, Go, Go, do, do, do, busyness, and hustle are a badge of honor.

5:07
If we’re not equitably producing something or doing something it feels like we’re wasting our time. Time with Him is never, ever, ever wasted. And sometimes it can feel like we’re just sitting there not hearing anything. We’re just sitting there in prayer, and it can sometimes feel like no one’s listening. I promise you, Sister, He listened. He inclines His ear and that time is never wasted. Fruits will always come from that time, even if it doesn’t feel like it right here and right now.

5:49
Number two, He knows what you need. And He gives it. He knows what you need today and He’s happy, elated to provide it when you come to Him and you ask. I think of this when I think of, you know, parents who maybe have older kids who they’re like, Well, I don’t want to… I don’t know if you can hear that in the background. There’s a bird chirping. I’ve got the windows open because it’s a nice, gorgeous, beautiful day.

6:18
So sorry if that’s bugging you, but I think in this one I think of moms who, or just parents in general with older kids, maybe teens, maybe adults, maybe they are grandparents, and they’re watching their kids struggle through something, or whatever else but they sit back and they allow their children to live in the free will that they’ve been given. They’re sitting back patiently waiting to be asked to share their wisdom or their advice or their guidance or their help. And I think it’s a sign of respect, honestly. When people want to come in and, and try and provide advice where it’s not solicited or asked, it can sometimes be taken wrong.

7:00
And I also think of this when I think of or see all these moms that I know are struggling day to day they’re struggling with their schedules. They’re struggling to have time with God. They’re struggling to exercise wisdom and discernment. They’re struggling with their mindset. And they’re not living as this overflowing cup. And I know that this program that God has given me, I know that my coaching can help them. But if they don’t ask, like, it’s not my place to intervene. Very rarely do we ever have somebody come to us, and try and give us something that wasn’t asked for and we appreciate it.

7:48
I actually had an experience the other day with a friend who… She often does this. And I think most of the time, it does kind of like get on my nerves. I love her to death though. Like, I know, her intention is so well-meaning. But she came to me the other day and was like, you know, I was just thinking about something that you said on our walk. And I just wanted to come to you and say, and like all this information that I know and all of this, whatever else. And at first, when I started reading her text, I was like, again? We all have this right? Because it was advice that wasn’t solicited. I wasn’t asking for her help in this area. And I thought what I was doing was a really, really great thing. But I’ll tell you what, after I was to the bottom of her message, I was like, oh my goodness, I am so thankful that she reached out to me about this.

8:41
And it had to do with like, kids reading and whatever else and I was just like wow. I, so well-meaning, am trying to set up my son for success and help him be equipped and exercise his brain and whatever else. And some of the things that I was doing to actually try and help him be able to read are the very things that can cause kids to struggle in their reading later in life. And she knew this from teaching her kids to read, from research and studies that she’s read about it, and from her own lived real-life experience.

9:20
But just to share that kind of testimony, often when people come to us, I think God included, you know, at times, we can sit there and be like, oh my goodness, what are you doing? Like, Lord? Why is this happening to me? And sometimes it’s because we’re not taking the time to sit quietly and seek Him. And there are things that He needs to have happen because he’s taking all of creation into consideration. And sometimes there are things that are truly for our good. And sometimes we would have been more equipped or more prepared or maybe even had a heads up, you know if we had been going to Him and seeking His presence regularly because He knows.

9:20
Which brings us to number three, He directs your path and makes your ways straight. I love how much Scripture talks about He directs your path and He makes your way straight and He lights the path at your feet. He is a lamp, the lamp to your feet and He lights your path. And there’s so much scripture that shares this kind of like analogy in this picture. And it’s a big part of where our wisdom and discernment come in, is by seeking Him by getting quiet and listening back from what He has for us. And sometimes that comes through a push. Sometimes that comes through confirmation. Sometimes that comes through Scripture.

10:54
I was just away on this little weekend retreat and it started off I was doing a little Bible study in this structured prayer kind of devotional that I was doing. And just some of the things in there got me thinking. And so I started taking notes. And then I opened my Bible. And I went to scripture here, and I went to scripture there. And I started cross-referencing scripture that had to do with this word and looking up definitions. And I was just like, Oh, my goodness.

11:20
And it was a way that God showed up and completely changed the trajectory of my path that is then going to change the trajectory of other mamas’ paths. Because he did this to show me how he wants me to lead women in this program. Not that it’s any different than I was before, but it’s giving it more structure, and a more clearly defined path of how He wants me to fulfill this mission that He’s given us.

11:58
I think sometimes we can also go to Him with these heavy-laden hearts or these heavy-laden schedules. And He, knowing what we need, lighting our path, is able to lift those things off of us, giving us wisdom and discernment and direction as to what we might need to lay down. I always love to say that there are good things and then there are God things. And if we are not going to Him, if we are not getting quiet with Him, we might not always be able to see the difference. And I think really that’s discernment, right? The difference between good things and God things. It goes back to the garden when the serpent said to Eve, You will not surely die. And from studies that I’ve done, the word “die” there is from what God said and what the serpent said are two different kinds of Death.

13:06
And so it’s a difference between, right and really, really close to right, is what discernment is. We often don’t struggle with the difference between good and bad, good and evil. Those are more clear, often, right? Like, do I want to eat a tub of ice cream or some carrot sticks? We can easily decide that. Am I going to go out in the rain? With open-toed shoes on in a tank top, even though it’s like 40 degrees out? No, we know that that’s not a good thing. Right? Discernment is close to right and right. It’s close to truth and truth. It’s the difference between good things and God things. And as women, as moms, as children of God, there are so many good things that can come our way.

14:01
I remember, an older wise wise woman at our church, once told me when I first became a Christian, I was just trying to show up and show up and show up and serve. And I couldn’t say no to a need that came across my plate. Because I was doing all of these good things. I was killing myself at the expense of it. I was destroying relationships. I wasn’t seeking God because I was doing too many works. And it was just really putting me in a bad place. And she said Sasha when you’re part of a church, when you are the church, when you’re in this community, there is never going to be a day that a good thing is not going to come across your plate, that another need is not going to be present in our community.

14:50
And I remember last year, this was like one of the things that I did during that time when I was doing all the serving right, our church hosts this Thanksgiving feast every year In one year, they’re like, if we don’t have somebody stand up to direct this and lead this and organize this, we’re not going to have it because we don’t have anybody to, you know, take the lead on this. I was like, I’ll do it. I’m good at organizing, delegating, etc. And I led it. And then the next year, they were looking for somebody to lead it. I don’t remember if I let it a second time or not. I know I came alongside people who volunteered to lead it after that.

15:30
And then last year, somebody came to me and was like, oh, you know, we’re looking for somebody to lead it again. And I had spent so much time in this space of seeking God, I had so many God things on my plate at the time, that I knew fully what He was calling me to do. And so I had to politely decline. But it was an instant, like, I knew that this was a really, really good thing. But this was not the thing that God was calling me to serve in. And by me saying, No, they were able to ask somebody else to show up. And maybe me saying no to doing a thing that wasn’t a God thing for me, allowed somebody else to step into their God thing.

16:20
So, use wisdom and discernment. But we have to be going to Him because He is the one that gives these gifts And that is number four. He is the one that gives the gifts, fruit of His Spirit, His blessings, His wisdom, discernment, understanding faith, His strength, His refuge, and comfort. All of these things are in Him. He is the vine, we are the branches. I encourage you to look at a branch that’s not attached to the vine. What kind of fruit is it bearing? None, because it’s dead, or it’s dying right? If it’s not dead yet, it’s going to die soon. All of these things are in Him and if we are not seeking Him, then we are not going to find them.

17:18
I love this quote from Tarah Lynn Saint Eileen. It’s a complex name. I remember reading it a couple of years ago. It says, “Seek Him for His presence, not His presence.” So, it’s difficult when reading that right because you can’t see the presence v. presents, but seek Him for His presence, sitting with Him and just being with Him in relationship with Him, not his presents as in the gifts He gives. So make sure our heart posture is in the right alignment there. These gifts come from Him, they are the presents that He gives us. But we cannot find them if we are not in a relationship with Him, seeking Him, just to be with Him.

18:11
And then number five, it comes from Hebrews 5:14 says, But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained. Even that it’s just like how powers you have powers of discernment. But they must be trained by this constant practice. And it says to distinguish good from evil. I know I just talked a little bit about that, you know, good and evil are a little bit easier to discern. It’s not like it’s common nature, right?

18:51
Sometimes we do things and we’re like, that was not good. Right? But this constant practice is how those powers of discernment are trained that we’re then able to go out and distinguish these good things from God things. I could go on with like, dozens of other reasons why, right, reasons why God time and quiet time is essential to everything else we could possibly be doing. If it is not built on the foundation, on the cornerstone, if we instead choose to build on the shifting sand, we know what comes from that. And I encourage you to go read that passage in scripture because it is so incredibly powerful.

19:42
And I want to invite you, ladies, into a workshop that I am holding, and it’s called uncomplicated faith where I am going to give you guys scripture and encouragement and real-life examples of how you can uncomplicate your faith and how you can prioritize this time with him and let me give you more reasons as to why this is so incredibly important. And maybe one or maybe several of them are really going to resonate with you, because if you are not taking the time to seek Him daily, to pray unceasingly, to get quiet, to pray, to hear from him to read His Word, to allow it to meditate from your head to your heart. Then let’s do that. Let’s uncomplicate your faith and live out a life that is evident of who it is that is living in you. That is evident by the fruits that you are showing up with and sharing with others. The link is in the show notes to jump into that workshop, and it is completely free.

21:05
So there’s no reason for you not to go click that link. Unless you are like yep, Jesus is like, all over me. My fruits are amazing. I get up before my family and I spend an hour in Scripture every day and I’m doing like All these Bible studies okay, No, even then you should be in this workshop because you’re making your faith really complicated if you are in a different Bible study every day the week. There’s a good indication that you’re not taking the time to allow that to meditate from your head to your heart. If you’re listening to sermons all day every day and you’re not actually allowing it to change your life if you’re in a state of consuming if the fruits showing up in your life aren’t that great? And if you’re struggling to prioritize time with him. Ladies, there are dozens of reasons that I can encourage you to jump into this workshop but you know, you know, if you are living with an even slightly, maybe more complicated faith, then you should click the link in the show notes. Jump into this free workshop. Even if you can’t attend live, I will send you a copy of the recording. Love you ladies have a God-blessed day

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071: How are you responding to God’s promises or call? A message from Luke 1 with Jackie Randall Lentz

Summary

In this episode Sasha shares a powerful conversation with Jackie Randall Lentz over Luke chapter 1.

Jackie is a wife and lover of christ who recently went through a major shift in developing a deep relationship with God after He invited her into more. She shares her testimony through this and how she lives with so much joy, peace, and experiences rest in her relationship with God after coming from a place of anxiety and depression.

Special Guest, Jackie Randall Lentz of Kingdom Boss Academy, host of the Coach with Excellence Podcast, and former counselor is on the podcast sharing her testimony and a powerful word from Luke 1.

Jackie also shares a powerful teaching from Luke 1 in scripture that you’re going to want a notepad ready for because the takeaways are incredibly powerful. She contrasts plans, beliefs, and responses to God’s promises and calls. She asks powerful questions. She shares 2 different ways God’s promises are delivered to us. And she gives us so much to think about and chew on.

This is an episode that will leave you shining and filled up.

Connect with Jackie at www.kingdombossacademy.lpages.co/enroll

Joining us in the Uncomplicated Faith Workshop?
Register Here: https://intentionalabundance.life/uncomplicatedfaith

Transcription

Sasha Star Robertson 0:09
Jingle

Sasha Star Robertson 1:08
Hello, sisters and welcome back to another episode of the Intentional Abundance Life podcast. I’m your host Sasha Star Robertson, and today is Thursday so we have another special guest here today. I am sitting with Jackie Randall Lentz. She is a wife and cat mom from New York. She is here to empower and equip women to be extraordinary Christian life coaches by developing skills, techniques, and a kingdom mindset. Welcome, Jackie. Thank you so much for being here with us. Anything you’d like to add to that bio?

Jackie Randall Lentz 1:42
Yeah, thank you so much. I’m so excited to be here. Just yeah, a little quick background on me. I do have a degree in clinical mental health counseling, and I was a counselor for a few years. I actually worked for a suicide hotline before God called me to coach in 2020. And so I first started out as a self-care coach just really helping women who were struggling with depression and anxiety. And then I made the transition. I joined a team in 2021 to do more business coaching and as I was business coaching, I recognize that a lot of women who were getting the call to step into business and be coaches were signing clients but weren’t really knowing how to work with those clients. So then I made the pivot to build my own business back up and start a certification program where I help women become, extraordinary life coaches, and I love what I do and I love the freedom that comes with it because I love to travel and go camping and yeah… I love just sitting outside and listening to podcasts, especially Sasha’s. So I’m so excited to be here.

Sasha Star Robertson 3:13
Awesome. I didn’t even ask you if you had like listened or if you were a listener, so thank you for adding that. I love that. I love too that you said you kind of started out coaching like in the self-care arena, and that’s one of my pillars as well. And so I didn’t even, we didn’t even talk about this. So let’s just say it’s conversation-based. So I would love to hear more about that because I know my self-care, it’s very much a download from God of what he gave me about this like picture of, I call it simple Biblical self-care. But I would love to know if you could just share a little bit more about like, what that was like for you. Are there any themes that you saw while you were coaching in that capacity, or are any things that you’re like, This is what all women struggle with?

Unknown Speaker 4:00
Yeah, yeah. So it really just started out as that just teaching women how to incorporate self-care into their daily lives and how to kind of manage and cope from any depression or anxiety that was coming up for them. And when I first started, I wanted, I labeled myself as a Christian life coach, but then I soon realized that I didn’t really have that relationship with God. And so as I was coaching other women and teaching them about self-care, I noticed the theme that it all goes back to God. It all goes back to Him, and so through coaching other women and learning more about that. I also started to go deeper in my faith and my relationship with God. I grew up I knew of Him and I knew he… I believed in him, but I never really had that deep intimate connection or relationship with them. So really, when I started building my business and stepping out in coaching, I, it was like a whole going to a whole new level with just God and my spiritual life.

Sasha Star Robertson 5:19
I love that and I completely agree. So I know you have a story which I’m excited to get into about kind of this transition and how you were raised. So I guess let’s just go ahead and get into that. What was it like prior to this relationship? Because you were raised in the church or as a believer, but you kind of had this moment where you’re like, I believe in God, but do I have a relationship with him?

Jackie Randall Lentz 5:48
Yeah, yeah. So I grew up Catholic in the Catholic Church. And so, a lot of it was just kind of getting used to going to church on Sundays. And it was almost like, there are these scripted prayers that we would say, and we would recite, and it wasn’t until I really explored that a little bit more that I realized God doesn’t really care about these scripted prayers. He wants to actually have a conversation with me. Like he actually wants to be with me and be present with me beyond church on Sunday. He really just… He wanted to connect with me on a deeper level. And so that’s what really when I stepped into business, stepped into coaching.

Jackie Randall Lentz 6:42
That’s what really opened that door, as I was helping other women, I was learning more and more and more about God. And I realized it’s relationship first. God wanted to help build my business, but he more wanted to be in relationship with me. And it was through building a relationship with him I was able to just get more comfortable talking to Him, saying prayers that weren’t necessarily scripted, to read His Word, and now I read the Bible every single morning and I never used to do that.

Jackie Randall Lentz 7:30
The joy that comes from that and the peace that comes from that, and just the rest and the energy, everything that comes from that is amazing, and I love what God did because I went from living the life kind of just going through the motions. You know, it’s struggling and experiencing depression and anxiety myself, and then now I’m just experiencing so much joy and I get to help other women experience that joy in their calling to coach and only God could have done that.

Sasha Star Robertson 8:17
I love it so much. So a couple of things that you’re talking about, like the word invite, and this just came up on another podcast episode that I had come out recently. Just the word invite is what God has been speaking to me in that episode and what you were saying and it’s almost like, you know, you had this kind of going through the motions like you said, and God just invited you in. He’s like, actually, I want more of you, Jackie. I want to be in relationship with you. I want you to share your heart with me just randomly throughout the day and this kind of praying unceasingly idea and in just reading the Word for yourself. There’s so much power in that I think.

Sasha Star Robertson 8:57
I was reading this one time where we can get so caught up in the idea of, we love the worship music more than worshiping God, or we love the books about God, you know, or about the Bible or about Scripture more than we love God’s Word itself. And so I think there’s, you know, time and place and everything, but I love that you’re just like, I was just able to like, now I read the Bible for myself every morning and there’s so much joy and peace and rest in that. And I’m just yes and amen over here because I think sometimes we can get in our way. And like make it so much more complicated than it actually is. Or we grew up with these kinds of like, this is how our relationship with God is supposed to look like or this is what prayer is supposed to look like. This is what Bible study is supposed to look like or, you know, whatever else.

Sasha Star Robertson 9:49
Or we can get caught up in all of these thoughts and beliefs from the past that are just… They’re actually just habits that we’re in today that we’ve hung on to but we’ve never taken the time to sit and kind of challenge, is this how it’s supposed to be? Or we’ve not taken the time to just sit and be quiet and listen to God invite us into something different and something more and so I love that because I think we were talking about this before we jumped on and hit record. That’s what I help a lot of women do. And it’s been more than… I would think, almost every one of my clients I feel like we’ve gotten to that quiet time with God. What is the relationship with God?

Sasha Star Robertson 10:28
I serve moms primarily and so they’re like, I don’t have the time or whatever else or they’ve just got their schedule flipped backward or something. Like No, God first because this is where like you’re saying the joy and the peace and the rest come from. I had a podcast episode recently with Sally Burke, who’s the leader of Moms In Prayer International. She’s the president. And that’s what she was talking about, anxiety and depression, there is kind of like an antidote for that. And it is in prayer. It is in thanksgiving and worship and going to God, our Creator, first and allowing Him to fill us with that peace just from being in His presence, just from seeking Him first. Exactly like what you were saying, He wanted to bless your business, but he just wanted to be with you.

Sasha Star Robertson 11:17
And so thank you so much for sharing that because I think it’s just a great reminder to me and I’m sure all the listeners as well. And so, I know in this time of being with Him, He has given you this beautiful picture of the story about Mary and I heard you share like briefly about this topic in another space. And I was just like, Wow, I’ve never thought of it from this perspective or I’ve never like gleaned this for myself. And so I just thought this was a really beautiful thing and so I’m curious to hear you get into this little teaching on Mary today.

Jackie Randall Lentz 12:00
I love Mary! Mary is my home girl. I really… I read Luke chapter one all the time, and every time I read it, I feel like I learn something new about Mary. And so as I was reading it this morning, the first thing that really stuck out to me was in Luke chapter one, it tells the story of Gabriel going to Zechariah who was a priest and he was already married and he kind of he was praying for a baby. He had his ducks all lined up in a row right? And this angel goes to him and it’s just like, you are going to have a son, you’re going to name him John.

Jackie Randall Lentz 12:55
And then we also see later in that same chapter Gabriel going to Mary, and Mary is the complete opposite of Zechariah where she is not married yet. She is a virgin. She was not praying for a baby. She was not expecting a baby. And yet, God gave her this message that she will be pregnant and she will birth Jesus and the story of Mary in that portion. It reminded me a lot of me where sometimes I am coaching the client and then after the session, I’m just like, blown away where I’m just like, wow, like that was absolutely amazing.

Jackie Randall Lentz 13:42
And I reflect on my own testimony and my story, and I’m just like God chose me where I was a lot like Mary. I was not prepared to coach and I know Sasha you, you we were talking about your story, too, where it kind of came out of nowhere, right? Here we have Zechariah who was prepared for the child, praying for the child. He was a priest, he was married, and yet God shows Mary who was not married to have Jesus. And so I just love how the message of God will use you. No matter what season you are in, no matter what state you’re in. Doesn’t matter if you’re going through a tough situation, God still has plans for you. He has a plan for you and He has a promise for you.

Jackie Randall Lentz 14:45
And later in the Scripture, verse 20 literally says, it will come true at that point in time. So sometimes we get… Sometimes God will give us a promise or He will give us a path, but he usually won’t give us both. And this is where faith comes in. Going back to that scripture like it will come true. It will come true at the appointed time. And so whether God gives us the promise or the path, it’s usually not both, usually one or the other. But that is where faith comes in. Knowing that this will happen no matter what promises that the Lord has given you. Whether that’s coached to be a mom, to be in another career.

Jackie Randall Lentz 15:38
No matter what He’s calling you to do no matter what promise He’s given you, we can stand firm and stay grounded in that, in what He says, this will come true at the appointed time. And I might even add to that, lack of belief does not stop God’s will. Because we look at Zechariah. And what happened was he was told, Hey, your prayers, we heard your prayers and your wife is going to have a baby named John. And he responded I am an old man. Like how is this going to happen? I am an old old man, right? He didn’t really have faith in what he was praying for if you recognize that. But when the angel went to Mary and said, Hey, you will have this baby. Call Him Jesus, you will raise Him. Her response was I am the Lord’s servant. How good is that? I am the Lord’s servant.

Jackie Randall Lentz 16:53
And that got me thinking about well how am I responding to the promises that God gives me? How am I responding to the promises that God gives me? Am I responding like Zechariah? Like I’m old I don’t know what you’re talking about, God. I don’t have a degree. I don’t have an education. I don’t have a background in that. I don’t have experience. I’m too young. Or am I responding like Mary not having all the answers, having the question of how is this going to work but responding as I am the LORD’s servant. That’s so good, right?

Sasha Star Robertson 17:48
Yeah, even in what you’ve just shared it has given me so much to think about, and some of the things that I’m just over here, yes and Amen is, God will use you no matter where you’re at. And this is one of the things that I’ve been working with a few of my clients on, is this like, kind of teetering between and finding the balance between like, I’m gonna equipped, I don’t have what it takes, I still have to learn more. You know, this questioning of, Am I too old? How do I do this? What’s the path for me, God? versus like, humbling yourself and knowing you’re not enough on your own.

Sasha Star Robertson 18:29
But then on the flip side is like, knowing I am enough in Christ. I have everything that I need right now because I have God. But not taking it to the extreme of like, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me and just like throwing spaghetti at the wall or whatever. But really holding and finding that really fine line between the two. I love that you said that because I feel like this picture, and this is not even thought getting into this conversation today of just contrasting these two of what you’re saying. One had prayed for it and planned for it, was married, and was ready and was like, Oh man, I was very much in that space.

Sasha Star Robertson 18:29
For ten years my husband and I struggled with infertility, and still do, we don’t have any biological children. But, you know, we had a plan, we were ready, we were praying for this. What’s the deal, God? Where is this? And then there are people all the time who are like, I don’t even want to be a mom. And then they get pregnant and have a kid and they’re like, What? How are you going to respond to that? I love that you contrasted those as well because man, that’s such a powerful question. How am I responding to God’s promises or God’s will? And then this is the mic drop moment. This is going to be in the headliner. What’s gonna be shared, where you said, Lack of belief does not stop God’s will. And I love that. And it is totally painted in this picture, in this story in Scripture, in this event. And I’m just given so much peace about that.

Sasha Star Robertson 20:17
And then the last thing I’ll say before I let you get back to it because I’m over here taking notes right? You said He’ll give you the promise or the path. And I think for myself I’ve most often been shown the picture. He’s given me the vision. He’s given me… And even for my clients, I see this a lot. Like I see this. When you’re talking to me and fleshing out these God-sized dreams, I’m like nope, I can see it. I am sitting in this cafe, the coffee shop that you’re talking about creating. I’m sitting there as your client or I’m sitting there watching you transform the lives of your ideal client in marriages, in families, in the lives of moms, or whatever it is.

Sasha Star Robertson 20:57
But I think He gives us the path one step at a time. Like the Scripture verse in Psalm 119 where He says a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. And I just see this picture of a lamp, but it’s not like the LED flashlights we have today, right? It is literally this old kerosene lantern if kerosene was even a thing by then, right? And it illuminates this little two-foot radius. And you can literally only see the next step. And I know that’s very much of what it was for my path of like coming into coaching just like you had mentioned. God was like, Offer coaching. And I was like, What? Me? I was more of the Zechariah response here. And He just lit the path every step of the way. And I’m like, Okay, God, I’ll take that step. And he shows me the next one. Okay, God, I’ll take that step. And He shows me the next one. And so I guess I just have a question of like, have you seen in your career or coaching or your life Him showing more of a path over a promise like first?

Jackie Randall Lentz 22:13
Oh, yeah. That’s such a good question. Because my spiritual gift is prophecy, so I feel like I get these visions or these dreams of just where I’m going whether that’s in my life, or in my business. I’ve had visions about my future family, about being on stage and speaking. And I’ve had these since I was little. I remember was a little girl and I would line my animals, my stuffed animals, up in a row and preach to them. I was still a Catholic Yeah, I was being a preacher and preaching to them and this is when I was a little girl, lining up the animals and just talking to them about Jesus. And I didn’t even know Jesus at 5, 6, or 7 years old. So yeah, just like even little things like that. I feel if everyone just looks back and reflects on their life, they can see little God winks of who you’re becoming or the plan God has for you.

Sasha Star Robertson 0:03
I love that. Amazing. I love this. Like I always say, that was a God thing. You know, I love that God winks, like, I call them downloads a lot where it’s just like, okay, like we’re writing here, write this down, because that is like a download from God when it’s just not even your own thoughts. But I love how you took that back. And like, even looking back on your life, and so much of my, you know, life story, I guess has been rewritten in the sense, I lived it, and it was one thing, but now I’m in a space where I can look back and Oh, I see what you did there, God. In so many different parts, childhood, my business, adoption, so on and so forth. And it’s just so cool the way he has his hand over our life, like, even when we don’t notice even when we don’t see it.

Jackie Randall Lentz 0:56
Yeah, yeah, that actually leads perfectly into one of my biggest takeaways from when I was reading Luke chapter one this morning. And looking at the story of Mary again, like I haven’t even… I didn’t even recognize this or see this before. But as I was reading that story, it brought up, it showed me that promises come to pass in two ways. The first way is, in verse 13, the angel says to Zechariah, your prayer has been heard. So that’s one way promises come to pass, is our prayers are heard. And then the second way is what the angel says to Mary in verse 30, you have found favor with God. Those are two specific ways that promises come to pass. The first way is that we ask for it, we pray for it, and they’re heard. And then the second way is just being us and just having favor and just being loved by God. And that He just wants to bless us, because we are His children.

Sasha Star Robertson 2:10
Yeah, absolutely. I love that. Because I think about Mary too. And like, you know, just like her response, how you’re like, I’m your servant. And I think like, I don’t know, you know, I can’t quote it because I wasn’t reading Luke 1 this morning. But I feel like, you know, Mary was just somebody who had a heart for God like her, her heart and her face were positioned towards him. And she was in that relationship with Him, even though you know, it was Jewish Times. And, you know, it wasn’t, it wasn’t all about the relationship. She had a heart for Him. And she had a fire in herself for Him and have this, like what you were saying it was about relationship. First, it was on a deeper level, it was, it was a face-to-face kind of interaction, I think.

Jackie Randall Lentz 3:04
The angel does say, when he comes to marry, he says, You are highly favored, he tells her she’s highly favored. And that always makes me think of like, well, what if I show up with the belief that I am also highly favored. And I always tell my clients that too. What if you show up in your business or in life or in your relationships with the belief and grounded in that, that you are also highly favored. I just love that. That term, like the highly favored, I love that.

Sasha Star Robertson 3:42
I want to go now and do like a word study on it, you know, back to like the Greek text and like, Okay, what does this word mean? And just like, where else is it in Scripture and just fully flesh out the idea. And I think this is back to almost the beginning of our conversation. It’s like, I just love allowing God the space in my relationship with Him to do those things, right? I might have a devotion that I’m walking through where I got up and did that this morning, I have another Bible, study that I’m walking through where you read a book, and then you like a couple chapters, and then you go through the workbook, and then you meet together and do the video and discussion. I love going to God’s Word itself. Like I’m meeting with a small group where we just talk about Proverbs, we read a chapter in Proverbs, and we talk about it and maybe it takes us three meetings to get through, you know, one chapter, maybe we go through a whole chapter in one meeting, but then also just allowing Him the space of like, Wow, God, like, Thank you for using Jackie to point this out to me today. And now I want to go and like get a further and deeper understanding of that. And I’m in a season where I feel like he’s telling me to be deeply rooted, almost just like what you had said at the beginning. He was calling you into a deeper level of relationship with Him. And so to me, that’s what it is. I feel like you can’t do enough Bible study, you know, you’re gonna do it every morning, but just allowing Him that space to lead and direct that too. And so I don’t know if that gives freedom to any of the listeners here in terms of like, what does your relationship with God have to look like? Or what is it supposed to look like? It’s supposed to look like you and God doing life together.

Jackie Randall Lentz 5:19
One of the questions too I had this morning was like, okay, so we have these two stories of Zechariah and Mary. Why? Why are they together? Why are they in the one chapter. And it’s because Zechariah and his wife were having John. John, the baby. And John was basically born, his purpose was to prepare the way, prepare people for Jesus. And so going off of what you said too, know that you have value, you have a purpose, and you’re here, whether you know it or not preparing the way for someone, and someone is probably preparing the way for you, right? But just know, like, you’re, you’re preparing the way for others, and you’re preparing the way for future generations. And I really think like that is the big aha of the story here in Luke one is that, yeah, we’re focused on the birth of Jesus, but we can’t forget about John right, and how he prepared the way. So that just came to mind as you were talking about that.

Sasha Star Robertson 6:41
He was such a critical part of the entire story, too. You know, and I feel like that’s, it’s so much of Scripture, it’s even looking back at the law and the Old Testament, and just like how that is even still in Passover, and all these other things there, they are even still, like preparing the way, they’re a foretelling of like, what’s to come and the freedom that we have in Christ, and so much more. And so I love that you said, like, somebody is preparing the way for you, and you’re preparing the way for somebody else. And I can look back and see all of those people that played a critical role in helping me become who I am today. And they were, in a sense, preparing the way but you know, it looks different than the story. I think for a lot of us, it will. But just looking back and seeing all those people that planted seeds, even if they weren’t necessarily seeds of faith at the time or seeds that were like, necessarily, like leading us into a relationship with God are leading us in the Scripture, they were kind of just still those stepping stones of the path that God had for us to bring us to where we are today. So I love that even in knowing that and I feel like God’s really given this back to me and really shown me this picture. Because I feel like sometimes it can take some time to know that the path you’re on and what you’re doing is worthwhile and worthy and like used for good in the kingdom. And so I’m thankful that He has brought that back around. And He has brought me those testimonies from people, like, thank you so much for just showing up. And thank you so much for being you, thank you so much for using your voice and using your testimony, and being a light and planting seeds. And it’s like, you know, for a while, I think we can we can do that, we can show up and we can plant seeds, and we can be obedient to God. And we can show up as our you know, full flavor itself, like our coach Whitney will talk about but I think we all have so much to learn from each other, I think is what I’m trying to say here. And that, you know, I think there are people that will like we’ll go back and forth with on this, like, you know, we’re walking together. And then some of us will take a couple of steps ahead and the next one will take a couple of steps ahead. And so even if you’re, you’re on par at some point in time, I feel like I’m rambling here, but whether somebody is a step behind you or 20 steps behind you, or 20 steps ahead of you or even right beside you. Like we still all have so much to learn from each other. And so…

Sasha Star Robertson 7:36
We’re all sheep. One shepherd.

Sasha Star Robertson 9:25
Yes, exactly. And so that’s what I’m trying to say, showing up with what you have, where you’re at, you know. I guess just going back to that, even what you were saying, God will use you, no matter what, no matter where you’re at, as long as you’re allowing to take on this like, I’m your servant LORD. Like, just show me the way one step at a time and I’ll be there and just having that faith to just keep moving forward. He will usually do too powerful. Power things.

Jackie Randall Lentz 10:02
Yeah. Amen. Amen.

Sasha Star Robertson 10:06
I love it. So have you… Is there anything else about this story about Mary that you had notes about to share with us?

Jackie Randall Lentz 10:18
Let’s see. Yeah, I guess just the last thing that I’ll add to this is God might be asking you to do something that doesn’t necessarily make sense. But it all comes down to the question, are you going to be obedient or not? Will you be obedient or not? Because if you look at the chapter, Zechariah asked how, like, how will this happen? My wife is old. I’m old, like, how is this going to happen? And when we look at Mary, she also asked, well, how is this going to happen? And it’s a fair question, right? And God is not condemning you for asking those questions. He knows your heart. He knows your thoughts. So he knows you have those questions. It didn’t make sense. It didn’t make sense for Zechariah and didn’t make sense for Mary. But the main question was, well, okay, it doesn’t make sense. But are you going to be obedient or not? And for Zecharia, she still lacked faith, which meant that he was silent, and he didn’t get his voice back until John was born. Were married, just having faith and just accepting it and responding as I am the Lord’s servant. Right? It was. Yeah, that was just she accepted. She accepted that it didn’t make sense. But she was going to be obedient. And I think we’re all faced with situations like that, right? Or times where, no matter what we’re going through, it’s just like, oh, man, like, what is going on right now? It doesn’t make sense. But yeah, we are faced with a question like, okay, will I be obedient or not?

Sasha Star Robertson 12:21
I feel like so many times I, in the past, thankfully, I feel like I’ve been getting better at this, we’ll see. But just being stubborn at times, and like, not being willing, and not being obedient to work, like, I’m just gonna have to learn the hard way. And that’s where I was, I spent, like most of my life, I feel like in these coping mechanisms from, like childhood trauma, and all these other things, where it’s like, I had to grip onto this control. And I literally could not let things go. And I just had to walk through this journey of learning the hard way. And I think our adoption journey was really one like infertility adoption, that, that God used to kind of break that in me, because He showed me how His plan and His path and His will, is a far greater thing, and far more beautiful picture and plan and everything that I could ever write myself. And so just that transition, He used the hard way, again, like making, making sacrifices silent, you know, until John was born. I’ve been in those seasons. And I think, you know, maybe just relating to his story, and that sense of, you know, maybe that was the moment for him where he learned, okay, when God sends an angel to speak to you just shut up and listen, or your mouth will be shut, you know.

Jackie Randall Lentz 13:49
I do have one more thing, I guess. When you were talking it was coming to me too, is I say this to my clients all the time, that it’s not enough to just birth a business, you have to nurture it. And so same with any promise that God has placed on you like, it’s not enough to just birth, the promise, you have to nurture it, and I think the story of Mary is the perfect example of that. Jesus went through her womb for nine months. She birthed and she had to nurture Him until he started His ministry when He was 30 years old. So it’s not like God gave her the promise. And then the next day Jesus was born. She had to birth that promise, have faith in that promise, and then, when that promise came to pass, she also had to nurture that and I think patience is key too for a lot of us is that maybe God gave some of us a promise but with that is attached to not just faith and trust, but patience.

Sasha Star Robertson 15:04
It is a fruit of the Spirit after all, yeah. Yeah, faith and patience. And I thank you for saying that. Because I think too so many other times in Scripture like, God does that he gives a promise. Like, who was it he gave? Was it Joseph, he gave this like, promise to or whatever. And then he’s like in prison and all these other things, right? Like, I think it happens time and time like there are multiple stories in scripture where God’s like you will X, Y, and Z. And then there’s a journey, or there’s a period of waiting before God actually reveals that. And so I think it’s so important to just continue to cling to him. And remember, like you said, this God, I haven’t seen it, but I’m still trusting. And I’m actually going to exercise patience and exercise faith, and believe what you have said, and trust that it’ll come to pass at the appointed time. The culmination of the whole story today.

Sasha Star Robertson 16:08
Well, Jackie, I thank you so much for coming on and sharing this because I am just, I’m filled up and I’m encouraged today, I can go out in the world with a light shining on my face out of my soul from this message, and so I know you are primarily a coach that helps Christian women who are setting out to be life coaches, have a more robust understanding of what coaching looks like, and so much more. So do you want to share just briefly like, what is your business? What do you do? And where can people find you if they feel this call and want more of you?

Jackie Randall Lentz 16:49
For sure. So becoming a counselor, it was such a process where I had to get a degree, get a license, have so many hours counseling, and then what I soon learned stepping into coaching is that anyone and everyone could just wake up one day and say, Hey, I’m a life coach, where I truly believe to be an extraordinary coach, it’s time that we hold coaches to the same higher standard that counselors are held to, which means helping coaches know how to coach and become confident coaching and working with clients. And so I created the certification program, Kingdom Boss Academy, it’s three months. And what we do is we just, you learn the skills and techniques to be a confident coach, but you not only learn that information and strategy, but you actually have the space to implement it in this program. So you get paired with a coaching circle of other peers and practice your coaching. You get comfortable and confident working with clients as you build your business. And I also specialize in mindset. So I help my clients as they’re working with clients. And as they’re building a business and learning how to coach. I help them overcome anything that comes up as far as perfectionism, fear of failure, impostor syndrome, you know, all that on that mind drama that tends to come up as a new coach. So that’s a little bit about what that looks like. And yeah,

Sasha Star Robertson 18:39
It comes up for all of us, just for clarity sake, we all need that coaching.

Jackie Randall Lentz 18:46
Yes. Yeah.

Sasha Star Robertson 18:50
Where can people find you or, you know, connect on social find more about this program.

Jackie Randall Lentz 18:56
Yeah, so you can find me on Facebook, Jackie Randall Lentz. I have a private Facebook group too where you can get free coaching from me. So that’s Coach With Excellence. And I’m also on Instagram at Jackie Randall Lentz. And if you are interested in learning more about Kingdom Boss Academy, like hey, my DMs are open, you can shoot me a message on Facebook or Instagram. Or you can go to Kingdom Boss Academy. And I believe Sasha will be putting the link to that right in the description.

Sasha Star Robertson 19:33
Yeah, if you can send me all those, like your Facebook, Instagram Facebook group. I will put all of those in the show notes as well as your website for more information about that. So people can definitely connect with you. And Jackie, one last question before we go. What does intentional abundance mean to you?

Jackie Randall Lentz 19:54
Yeah, that is an amazing question. When I think of abundance, I think of just God having more, more for you, that we were not created or made to live this scarcity or lack. And so intentional abundance, just knowing and embracing that there is more for you. And just like what I said with Mary and how she embraced that she was highly favored, like intentional abundance just knowing that because we are highly favored, there is more in store for us.

Sasha Star Robertson 20:37
Amen. I love that. I love that you tied it to today’s message too so powerful I am going to go out and live intentionally and abundantly in that knowing and believing that I too am highly favored because God loves all of us, of course, he wants that for all of us. Thank you so much, Jackie, for sharing this message and in your testimony here and just giving us so much goodness to meditate and marinate and go launch into Bible studies and word studies on and in new beliefs that we can hold for ourselves too so I know this was a powerful message and I pray all the listeners will just have like you said in the beginning, joy, peace and rest and in their relationship with God moving forward. I thank you all for listening and I pray that you all have a blessed day.

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070: What is Independence Day without Pledging our Allegiance to Our Freedom that comes from Christ Alone

Summary

Freedom is for all! Not just Americans to celebrate on July 4th. In this special Independence Day (American Holiday) episode Sasha talks all about FREEDOM… in Christ!

Sasha covers the definitions of freedom & independence, shares a few different scripture verses that remind us of the freedom that we have in Jesus Christ alone, and shares some stories that further develop this belief that it is Christ that has made us free, not man.

Listen in to be encouraged and reminded of the freedom that you have in Christ and to pledge your allegiance to Christ over all.

Sasha also prepared a special Freedom in Christ playlist for you to sing His praises as you are encouraged through this worship music. Available on both Apple Music & Spotify.
Apple: https://music.apple.com/us/playlist/freedom-in-christ/pl.u-KVXBkP3sZWp4Ma
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0cKcJELmBGg9ri4aFkeSV3?si=c66314610c964973

———
*this episode was recorded LIVE in the Intentional Abundance Community over on Facebook. You’re invited to join us in the Productively Peaceful Moms Club over on facebook! It’s a safe space where we can show up vulnerably and encourage each other, where ere share the mission of being the best mommas we can be through the grace and strength of Jesus Christ, where we encourage consistency and are able to hold each other accountable. We share scripture and talk about podcast episodes and pray for each other and set goals and so much more! You’re more than welcome here, you’re wanted here! https://www.facebook.com/groups/IntentionalAbundance

Transcription

0:04
Hello, Sisters, and welcome back to another episode of the Intentional Abundant Life podcast. I’m your host Sasha Starr Robertson. And today, as any other day, I’m super excited to bring this episode to you because today we are talking about freedom. Today it is the fourth of July, Independence Day here in America, and we are going to be talking all about freedom, but freedom in Christ, y’all. It’s not just something that we celebrate as Americans. On this specific day, but something that we get to celebrate as believers and followers of Christ every single day of our lives. So we’re gonna look into a few scripture verses, and passages, talk about some real-life examples, and I have got a special treat for those of you who stick around to the end. All right, let’s do this jingle and we will dive right in.

1:06
Jingle

2:04
So, I am here today doing this in a totally different way than I normally do. I am also live on Facebook in the Intentional Abundance Community as I am recording this episode, so it feels a little weird, definitely different. For those of you who are in the community, Hello, thank you for joining me. For those of you who are listening to this on the podcast, Hey, it’s still just as amazing here. But if the flow is a little bit different, you might understand why, if I see comments come through, or whatever else. But today, we’re talking all about freedom.

2:40
Freedom is for all because of Jesus Christ, not just Americans on July 4. And so I’m gonna talk about freedom and independence, right, so freedom, there are a couple of definitions about “freedom” that really stood out to me. And one definition of freedom is the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint. And I was like, “ugh” reading that, it feels kind of gross. It’s like the right to or entitlement to or the privilege to act without restraint and that just feels unhinged, that feels out of control to me. That doesn’t speak “freedom” to me. And I think that’s a big difference in a lot of people’s understanding and interpretation of freedom. But another one that I think is really important here and I think this is the one that scripture often comes into alignment with is a state of not being imprisoned or enslaved to be unrestricted and able to move freely.

3:51
And so I think these definitions of freedom are kind of what we’re going to be talking about today, and what Scripture is referencing. And then we also have independence and it’s the fact or state of being independent. Okay. I always love when definitions have these circular definitions. So what is independent? It is free from outside control, not depending on another’s authority or not depending on another for livelihood or subsistence. I’m not so sure if America or Americans necessarily are independent based off of one of those definitions, free from outside control. Maybe… Maybe you could argue that right?

4:42
But I think this story, I was talking to my dad yesterday. And he was just sharing this and it got my mind really thinking about how well it fits into this podcast episode. And it kind of bridges this transition for us. But my father was sharing the story with me about how so many of his co-workers really struggle to follow what the rules are for the workplace. Right? They have an employee guide, handbook, that talks about, you’re not allowed to wear jeans and you’re not allowed to wear excessive jewelry and you’re not allowed to X, Y, and Z right? And he has a lot of co-workers that are just hell-bent on ignoring the employee handbook in doing and wearing essentially whatever they want.

5:35
And so here’s where the issue comes in, is that they think that they’re exercising their freedom, that they don’t have to live under this outside governance, this outside authority that is apart from them, but they get to exercise their freedom and control over doing truly what they want to do in this situation. But this is their employer, right? So, what happens is other people who are following the handbook and maybe step out from time to time, are the ones who are like… that they want to say something to. So, this is also a leadership problem, right? Where the Leadership isn’t cracking down on the people. And honestly, our whole country is in this employment crisis is what it seems like currently, and so it’s definitely a fine line for this leadership.

6:27
But these employees are thinking that they’re exercising their freedom by not following the rules when in reality, they’re expressing their unrestraint, their inability to do what’s truly best for the workplace as a whole, because it’s not good for workplace culture, and it’s not good for workplace relationships, and it’s not good for the dynamic between the supervision and leadership and the staff that works there.

6:56
And I think what I see is I see this evident in the lives of Christians all the time, is that as we grow closer to God and we grow closer to His will and we step into His freedom, He sets us free from this idea that we don’t need to follow any kind of rules. He draws our hearts closer to His will and exercising his 10 commandments and living in that. Why? Because we know that He has given that to us and it’s ultimately good. It’s ultimately for our greater good and the greater good of the whole of society. Right?

7:36
And I just think of these stories, especially in Job where God kind of confronts Job and He’s like, Oh, well, are you taking into consideration like all of creation and the turtles and all these other things when you make decisions? No, you’re not but I, God, am doing that. And so I just think about that and as we step into His will, and really subject ourselves to this other authority is where we truly find freedom and release from so many things. And so starting out today, I want to share Galatians 5:1 and all of these verses I’m sharing from the ESV unless otherwise noted with you guys. So Galatians 5:1, For freedom Christ has set us free, stand firm therefore and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery.

8:31
I’m going to share some other translations with this one because I just really liked the different wording in them. King James Version says, Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ have made us free and be not enslaved again with the yoke of bondage. And then the New Living Translation says, So Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free and do not get tied up again in slavery to the law. And I love that it is Christ who has made us free. We do not make ourselves free. And honestly, nobody else can make us free. Like ultimate freedom.

9:13
Freedom is a gift of Jesus, and it’s given to us and received by faith. When we struggle to free ourselves. We just become more entangled again with the yoke of slavery. And I’ve experienced this recently and it was another coach of mine that brought this to my attention. Whereas I felt like I was struggling with discipline and self-control and consistency and whatever else and she was talking to me about how those things I’ve almost taken back from God. These are Fruit of the Spirit, right? Self-control is a Fruit of the Spirit, but I, on my own, struggled to set myself free from these things that I felt were controlling me, and I just took the self-control and I just tried to grab that so tightly that I was preventing God and Christ from working in my life to allow me to live in that Fruit that is from Him of self-control.

10:19
And I truly believe that Christ has set us free from the power and the penalty of sin, right, the power and the penalty. Sin does not have power over us. We can declare that firmly and lay it at His feet and know that He is ultimately in control. He has given us His Spirit to free us from that power of sin. We know we are free from the penalty of sin because Christ died on the cross for that very reason. And I believe that He also set us free from the presence of sin because we have that power. Right?

10:50
And as we continually grow closer to Him and allow Him to transform our hearts towards God’s the presence of sin doesn’t have to be in our lives. I used to have a really, really strong stronghold and addiction in my life for most of my life. And yesterday that was handed to me and said Here eat this. Almost like the apple in the garden, right, with Adam and Eve here eat this and I was like, No, that sin does not even have a presence in my life anymore. That temptation is not there because God has through His Holy Spirit and through his power freed me from that not just the penalty, but the power and the presence of that sin that stronghold in my life.

11:37
And I love how King James Version says, Stand fast. And that stand fast is meaning stand firm, persevere, persist. It’s meaning to maintain allegiance to that freedom and Christ. We pledge allegiance to the flag often here in America, which I don’t even know if they’re doing in schools anymore. But our allegiance is to Christ in the freedom that he has given us not allowing ourselves to become entangled again to the yoke of bondage. Someone who is legally made free in Jesus can still live in bondage and it’s not showing any type of lack in Jesus or his power. But we’re all often deceived into placing ourselves back into slavery.

12:36
And this honestly happened in the garden where we were as, Adam and Eve, as humans, ultimately free in this Eden in this perfect utopia and perfect relationship with God, but we were deceived into placing ourselves into the slavery that then became the law that was just this example that obviously we are not able to with our own might live up to. And we willingly placed ourselves back into slavery. And I think oftentimes as believers, we can forget our allegiance to that freedom in Christ. We can forget that we have the power over sin, that we have the power over the presence of sin, and we can choose to put ourselves back into slavery.

13:34
And when I say choose, it comes in the act of maybe not taking our thoughts captive. And choosing to seek gossip with a friend or something of that nature over turning to Christ. We’re choosing to stress or grip the wheel or try and fight with our own might over things instead of going to Christ. We try hard, so hard to pull the plow that is God’s and the yoke of bondage leaves us entangled, restricted, and frustrated. But we have the power to declare our independence from the lies and the schemes and the tricks and the deception and the temptation that the enemy places before us. And that power is in Christ. Okay? That power is in Christ.

14:29
So moving on, Galatians 5:13, For You are called to freedom brothers, only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. And I love this part because Galatians 5 continues on to speak of the fruit of the flesh verse, the fruit of the Spirit, and we know that all the goodness there is in that portion of Scripture. And if you’ve been with me for any amount of time, you know my deep love, abundant love, for the fruit of the Spirit. And I want to direct you to go and refresh yourself on all of Galatians 5 because obviously there’s so much goodness and freedom in here.

15:19
But I also want to direct you to this other verse referencing the Spirit of the Lord in this freedom connection. And that is 2 Corinthians 3:17, Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And I know you guys probably know one of the 17 songs that are out there that sing and declare this, where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom. I am free, Amen is one of them. And I just love that because it’s very difficult for me now to read this verse and not sing it, not sing it out with this worship and adoration and reminding me of this allegiance to the freedom that we have in Christ.

16:06
And to summarize both of these verses from the beginning of Galatians and Corinthians to summarize them and going back into Galatians it’s a great reminder of Galatians, 5:16-17, But I say a walk in the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh, for the desires of the flesh are against the spirit and the desires of the spirit are against the flesh. For these are opposed to each other to keep you from doing the things you want to do. And continuing back to freedom. I have a few more verses from John to share. And, John I’m going to talk about John 8:31, 32, and 36. And it says, So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, If you abide in My Word, you are truly My disciples and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. So if the Son sets you free, then you will be free. Indeed.

17:08
And so I just want to remind you friends that we have freedom in Christ, our freedom does not come from a government, our freedom does not come from anything really tangible in this world in this existence. Our freedom comes from Christ, the one who died and hung on the cross for us. And if we abide in His Word, and we are truly His disciples, then we will know the truth and the truth will set us free and this is the truth brothers and sisters, that we are no longer entangled by the yoke of bondage, by the power of the presence nor the penalty of sin. And by walking in the Spirit, the Spirit of the Lord, there is freedom.

17:49
So go remind yourselves about that freedom. I encourage you, obviously to go to Scripture and read these verses for yourself. Read the whole passages read all have Galatians 5 because there’s just so much goodness in there. Visit 2 Corinthians 3:17 and just really bask in this freedom.

18:12
But I am one for music. I love music. I love worship music. I love singing it out to the Lord. And as I had mentioned where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. There are so many songs that reference that scripture verse, but also so many more about being set free. And so I have prepared a playlist right now I have the one on Apple Music. I was thinking I should probably go do this on Spotify for people, as well, who are not Apple users. But I’ve prepared a playlist on Apple Music that I’m going to share the link in the show notes. I’ll even share it here in the community as well. Where you can go and listen to today and even this week and just remind yourself of that allegiance to the freedom we have in Christ. You can bask and rejoice in that freedom in Christ. I think there are about a dozen songs on there. It’s less than an hour of music, but just super powerful stuff. It’s got a little bit of everything in there.

19:07
And then I just want to leave you guys with this little testimony before I jump off today. And that is I have been going through this 21 days of Prayer for Your Business Bible study by Monique McLean. A lot of women in business have heard of this and have gone through it at some point or another and even I think sometimes we as busy moms can often get into the space of beating ourselves up because we have expectations of ourselves or we have expectations like this: 21 days of consistently praying over your business. And then when we’re not consistent with it, we can have a tendency to beat ourselves up over it, right, to put ourselves back in this yoke of bondage because we’re not doing it by any kind of certain expectation or standards. And I say all this to share with you that these 21 days of prayer for your business have not been 21 days consecutive in my reality at all. And there have been times I’m like man, I think I’ve been working on this since May. I started in May. I don’t know if I had a whole 21 days to complete it. I definitely wanted it done by June. But here we are in July and I still have four days left.

20:22
But all that to say, I was never late because today I opened up today’s reading and it was all about being still and she talked about a lady who led a small group at her church about freedom and I just love that she talked about freedom today because that was just a sign from God saying to me, Daughter, you are still on time. There is nothing late about what you are doing. There’s nothing late about sitting in the presence of God and seeking Him and getting quiet. There’s no way we can be late on a Bible study unless we are living to standards set or expectations set by ourselves or someone else because anytime that we go and seek the Lord and seek His presence he is going to be there with us because that is the freedom that we have in Him. He is always going to be there when we turn face to seek Him.

21:26
And it talks about being so desperate to find freedom from different issues in our lives and it talks about the flesh always wanting to call the shots, and how it’s natural for us to want to work out and fix something all on our own. And so I want to leave you with this with this little passage in here that really spoke to me this morning, and she says, When we surrender to God and hand something over to him and become still, we truly find rest for our souls, our minds find rest, our emotions find rest, our feelings find rest. We are telling God that we trust Him when we hand things over to Him. And there’s just so much more goodness in here that I could go on and on and on.

22:10
But today is about that, it’s about the freedom, and sometimes, actually a lot of time, we find that freedom by turning to Him and sometimes even in our busy crazy chaotic days in mom life we can turn to Him and find rest in Him and be a Mary instead of a Martha because that is where our souls and our minds and everything is going to find rest. And I can’t leave this episode without reminding you guys that I am here to walk with you in this journey, to walk with you towards freedom, to re-establish or even establish for the first time these faithful foundations that is in Christ to implement some of these practices to live in this freedom and integrity with what Scripture says and to live this God-first God-focused life. And then from there establish these purposeful priorities so you are pouring first and foremost into what matters most to you.

23:06
Sisters, this is how we can overcome and eliminate a lot of this overwhelm and chaos and burnout and stress in our lives, is to recalibrate and re-align ourselves, not just with truth and God’s word, but what ultimately matters to us in order and focus on them in our purposeful priorities. We work a lot of mindset mastery. So, not just reading God’s word and listening to it like we did today but making sure we believe it in our hearts and that we are taking thoughts captive, that we are not subjecting ourselves again to the yoke of slavery, because we’re being deceived and placing ourselves back into that place. Helping us to declare this independence truly from the lies and schemes and tricks and deceptions and temptations that the enemy places before us because we are all going to be come after, essentially, the enemy is a lion out to devour.

24:07
And I believe that when we work together in relationship, when we have an ally that we are able to better catch these thoughts and catch these beliefs and take them captive. And lay them at the feet of the Lord and that mindset mastery is something that we work heavily on in the IAM Coaching Program. And of course we’re going to implement some simple Biblical self care because what is self care if it’s not Biblical, and honestly, we’re moms, we need self care right? Okay, well, I am just going to leave you ladies at that. You know where to book a consult, link is always in the show notes. And I am just declaring this freedom over you ladies, go click the link in the show notes for this freedom and Christ playlist that I’ve established. Open your Bibles today. It is Independence Day remind yourself of the Independence and the freedom that you have in Christ above all God bless you sisters. And have a wonderful day.