Hi.
I'm Nikki.
And hi.
I'm Hope.
Welcome to equipped Fellowship, where friends become family through Christ.
We're two Jesus loving friends on a mission to share personal stories, resources, and real talk about our triumphs, breakthroughs, struggles, and setbacks.
Why do you ask? Because we believe you are called to live toreously, and we're here to equip you with Holy Spirit led tools and strategies to strengthen your faith, transform your mindset and walk boldly in god's promises.
Because here's the truth.
You have been given great and precious promises by god.
So grab your coffee, lean in, and let's grow together.
It's time to step into everything god has for you.
And I just love that.
Walking walking into stepping into everything god has for you that leads right into our topic today, walking confidently, and your god given identity.
I know.
Like, something I struggled with for years, sometimes I still struggle with, and that is why it's been a big calling on our hearts to have an episode about it.
So in today's episode, we're getting real about one of the most foundational parts of your faith journey, your identity and god.
Let's be honest.
Confidence is a hard walk.
If you're not walking in your god given identity and you're only walking in that worldly identity, you, my friend, were created to be enough.
On purpose for purpose.
And when you root your identity in Jesus, no person, no situation, or lie from the enemy, can move you from your calling.
So in today's episode, we're gonna talk about owning your worth without needing outside approval.
The pitfalls of taking on a worldly identity.
We probably have lots of examples from that.
And receiving self love through the love of Christ.
And boldly saying, here I am, lord, when you're ready, I'm ready.
So good.
I love it.
And just thinking about steps, and, you know, as we share our personal stories and journeys, like, it is a process.
And so I do love to your point.
Like, I love that we say stepping into because it's it's like this almost like continual stepping as you grow in sanctification and all of that.
So I don't know.
I thought that's called a lot of times I think of stepping and just like, whoop, I'm there.
And that's Right.
The definition of stepping into something.
Oh, that's so good.
And out of the out of the gate, I just feel like, um, as we open up the time together of reading the scripture that came to mind.
A lot of times, we wrap up in scripture or prayer and, um, we might closing prayer, but the scripture was just I feel like a good foundational point of going from from here.
So, um, it is Matthew, uh, 22, um, underlined a different one.
I have a lot of notes here.
Matthew twenty two thirty seven through 40.
And it says Jesus said unto him, you shall love the lord your god with all your heart and all your soul in all your mind.
This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like unto it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.
On these two commandments, hang all all the law and the prophets.
And, um, my personal like, when we decided, and we felt like the lord told us to have this conversation today, immediately, I was just telling Nikki before this call, like, This is this is Nikki's wheelhouse.
She, uh, helps other people step into this so incredibly well.
So I expect to hear a lot from her today.
Um, but for my personal, uh, journey and perspective, this scripture, changed everything for me about stepping into my identity and embracing the the victories and the self love as as the world would often call it self love.
Uh, but it is really an identity in Christ.
And that was rooted in the scripture.
Because we often hear in the church to love your neighbor as yourself.
So you go out and you pour and you pour and you pour, but you can only pour as much as you're filled.
And if you're not loving yourself because you don't know who you are in Christ, you can't love other people.
And you can't love yourself and other people unless you understand how to love God and you can't love God if you don't understand his love for you.
And that is all.
It literally ends with saying all things are rooted in this.
And when that clicked for me, that I can't do Jack diddly squat without loving myself and figuring out who I am and him, my world changed.
And I hope that just sharing this in the beginning, because so many people know the scripture, that it just flips something in your mind.
So you can hear all the things that we're gonna share today in a new light and understanding how to love your spouse, your neighbor, your friends, um, your children differently and utmost confidence.
I love that because a lot of times when I'm working with my clients, you know, a lot of things in their life are just falling apart, and they want to, like you said, pour into this, and that, and they they're the yes person, and they wanna do all the things.
And one of my first questions is, what are you doing to nurture and to take good care of yourself? Isn't that selfish? Yeah.
I don't have time.
Like, when would I have time for that? And I'm just, like, If we don't nurture ourself, if we don't love ourself, if we don't respect the the preciousness of how god created us, how can we go around the world whom the whole world.
I just think I can know everybody, like, not just your neighbors, the world.
How can you give to people? How can you teach people to take good care of themselves if you aren't the example? And we were we were so good at that.
We were always pouring into people with our backgrounds and personal training and all of that.
And we did not love ourselves because we didn't have just like you said in the beginning.
We didn't have that rooted identity in what the father says in Christ or what the father says through Christ.
Through the leading of the Holy Spirit.
Gotta gotta include the whole godhead because it all matters.
It matters.
And I just lost my train of thought, but that's good because it means something even better is coming up.
But for me, my when I was walking in my worldly identity.
It was all based on people's expectations of me, what people were saying about me, who I was allowing influence of on upon me, and it was as if, and this download came to me in my run today.
It was if I was walking in the world with a Velcro suit on.
And everything that people were saying to me about me, about themselves, what they were doing was sticking to me.
And it could have been good things.
It could have been bad things.
It could have been.
In between things, it could have been their goals.
It could have been their dreams, but it was all sticking, and I was allowing what these people were saying to become enmeshed into my DNA where I completely abandon who god created to me, and I took all these things what people were saying to heart and made them a part of my identity.
For example, when I was a little girl, my mom said some very not nice things to me on a consistent basis.
And I let those things repeated repeatedly stick to me on my Velcro, and those things that my mom spoke over me became part of my identity.
So when I went out into the world, I allowed more things like that to stick because that was my identity, and those are the things that I deserve.
But as I started walking in my god given identity, aligning myself with a purpose.
God created me to be when I started getting in the word and hearing the truth about not only what he says about me, but each and every one of you listening that Velcro, like we talked about last week, the stones being knocked off, it was like that Velcro was ripped off of me.
That Velcro suit was ripped off of me.
And then that that Velcro sound just became a massive explosion and everything that the worlds that I was was thrown off of me, and god gave me a shield.
To walk around in because I was shielding, shielded by god's protection over me.
And every time now when people try to sling things at me or say things that aren't into alignment with my god given identity instead of sticking, they slide off because I'm shielded by god in his word and what he says about me.
Immediately as you're sharing that, I think, back to the Matthew 22 scripture I shared because it says, love the lord, your god.
And when you we all have things from childhood and things that influence us.
You're young.
You're you're you're like a sponge.
Everything is going to absorb.
And everyone's imperfect.
So that's part of all of our stories to some some degree.
Right? Um, but as you get older, and you don't know the lord fully, you are now the Velcro and all the things thrown at you, is because you're loving the world more than you love god.
So what they say outweighs what he says, and that's where all things think from.
Um, you, you know, people, please.
Right? Fear of man because we don't understand his god's place in our life.
And so it's that it's that twisting of the truth.
And I wanna speak on my behalf.
And Nikki, you can absolutely say if this is true for you or not.
But, um, as we continue talking about this, I've been so guilty about blaming others.
So let's think back childhood, and then Nikki using I love that, the the suit.
Who chose to continue to wear the suit? It's that simple.
As as hard as that is to hear, and it took me a long I mean, literally just recently, I was telling Nikki, like, it took me a long time.
To be like, I chose once I was of age to make my own decisions to allow that to continue happening.
And you just have to remember that.
Um, and it doesn't belittle you.
It doesn't, I'm not saying this to be condemning.
It's just the truth if you want freedom and to really love yourself and accept, accept the father shield so everything can slide off.
You have to first take responsibility of your choices no matter what happened to you in the past.
Yeah.
That's right.
It's so good.
And I love that you talked about the shield because I saw the Velcro not only things coming at you, but allowed you to stick to everything around you too.
But he gave you a new suit.
Um, you know, it's traded the worldly Velcro outfit for the armor of god.
Yeah.
Super slippery.
You can't go stick to anything.
Nothing can stick to you.
I love that.
And hoping I a couple years ago, we talked about the armor of god a lot and getting suited up, like, every day, like, putting every peace on because we knew we were at a vulnerable point in our relationship with god.
We were just realizing and taking accountability for our worldly identity, and we were just beginning to exchange it for our god given identity, and we knew that we couldn't go out into the world without our armor of god on.
A men and people.
Physically, like, put on the motions.
Like, I was putting it on my body.
Like, that's how serious I was about it.
I love that you gave that example because remember hearing one time someone saying I can't tell you where it was and what I was listening to, but, like, you can take it off.
And so just because you read it in the scripture and you've accepted the lord and, you know, through Jesus, like, remember that it doesn't mean that that armor is on by default.
And I think I felt guilty of that.
And so I love that you shared that because if you are not already, I would encourage you to practice that and picture it in your mind's eye or go through the motions.
I mean, you're at home.
I'm sure if you're doing it.
So no one's gonna see you, like, you know.
It's it's okay.
Um, because as you begin to grow, you will not be taking it off.
But in the early stages of all of this, it's a hell have it to take it off.
And you do not wanna keep it off.
I am so glad you mentioned that.
Oh, it's new.
Right? Like, it's a it's a new outfit.
So you're not used to wearing it.
So you're like, oh, get it off me.
And then now let's put it back on.
And you're not used to having the power to have authority to not let those things stick to you.
You have the authority when somebody slings something toward you verbally assaulting you, you have the authority not to let it stick.
My old worldly self, somebody would say something to me or write a comment on something that I wrote and I would take it so personally, like such to heart and just be like, how can I make it better? Like, how can I make this person like me? And now if somebody zings me, says something that I don't agree with or they're they're assault.
I'm just like, They don't know me, like my father knows me.
Like, I rebuke that comment.
I'm not going to let it stick.
I know who I am in Christ.
I know who he created to meet me to be.
And when you know that without any doubt, that's when you walk in his authority, in his power.
And we hear a lot of worldly people like I I step into my own power, and I am I am this, and I am that.
We only have one great I am.
Right.
And it's when you are left vulnerable in that worldly identity, so many things can come and rip the carpet out from underneath you.
And I'm not saying that walking in your god given identity is easy.
And I'm not saying that all things work out all the time because hope knows like I have launched many a program that put my heart and soul and and and worked with god and holy spirit to do and like nobody showed up.
Nobody showed up.
But that's okay because I was obedient to that call that god put on my life right then, and it wasn't for nothing.
And I was able to use it at a later date.
So it's not going to make everything easy per se on a worldly perspective, but it is easier when you know that when you are walking in your god given identity, it's harder for you to hate yourself when things don't work out.
It's harder for you to condemn yourself when things don't work out.
It's like, Right.
And it's because of all your obedient steps through your programs that on this topic today.
I'm like, that's Nikki.
Man, she's got this because that is your baby, and it's because you have a history with the lord of walking this out for yourself and then being obedient and creating those things for other people.
Yes.
It wasn't you.
It it was used.
It wasn't a waste.
And here we are.
And who knows what else he's gonna do with all of that stuff? But, literally, it was my first thought.
It was just like, oh, Nikki's got this.
So I'm trying not to, you know, like, shout the house down and build upon on what you're sharing.
Uh, I want you to speak as much as possible, but this is exciting.
Yeah.
And it, just another Bible verse that I wrote out because this is what I like to anchor on when I'm sometimes faltering in my worldly identity.
It's ephesians to Pen, for we are god's masterpiece.
He created us anew in Christ Jesus so we can do good things.
He planned for us long ago.
Like, he doesn't I say this a lot to my clients.
Like, god doesn't make junk.
So if you are listening to this and thinking that somehow you missed out on god's blessing, you missed out on the good that he that he has for you, that he gave it all to so and so that you compare yourself constantly.
That is a lie from the enemy.
God thought about you long before you even came to this earth.
God's plan for you is always good.
He loves you more than anything that you can imagine.
So if you are struggling and think that I somehow missed out on god's blessing, you didn't.
You didn't.
It's just you are so caught up in your worldly identity.
That you haven't opened the door to see what god has planned for you in your life.
And I also hear if you're listening to this, you're probably saying, but it's too late for me.
It's not.
I didn't start walking into my god given identity to I was 43.
It's never too late and I know that people in their sixties just start walking in their god given identity.
So it's never too late.
You are not junk.
God has a good plan for you.
Okay.
I wanna add one thing to that.
It's making me cry.
I should talk about someone in their sixties and for anyone listening to that, no.
I just lost my dad.
And he didn't find the lord until he was 59.
And we just had a celebration of life on Saturday.
And there's someone that entered his life in the last six months.
And because of my dad, he's not going to church because my dad got him to church with the person that got my dad to church.
And it just shows how god works outside of time and it's never too late.
And and there's so many cool little nuggets like that from my dad's life of only two years.
And that, like, that moved me so much.
And then on top of that, the first thing I was thinking of Nikki when you were speaking was couple years ago.
Nikki and I were involved in, like, this female Kingdom entrepreneurship mentor thing, and I went to one of their live events.
And I will never forget that she stood on the stage.
Her name's Kimberly.
And she said god's plan a is just as good as god's plan z, which means he factors in those missteps, the curly cues you may go down Just because in our mind, we think a is better than z in god's, it's perfect.
And again, my dad's life is that testimony because he lived a really hard life.
And plan a would have been nice because it probably would have been a little more like this, but that's not the reality of being human.
And always remember that.
He has an a through z and probably then more.
And they're all the same because if you see the 26 letters of the alphabet, they might crisscross, but they go to the same endpoint.
Don't forget that.
It's such an important concept to Exchange.
It's not a it's not an important concept.
It's an important exchange of exchanging your worldly identity to your god given identity.
Oh, I'm so glad to use that word because everything's a trade.
Um, when you talk about heaven and, like, the cross, um, you know, it's it's an exchange just like that.
That is so powerful.
Yeah.
Just go over my notes.
Yeah.
No.
No worries.
Um and then another thing Hope and I talked about last Friday.
Was a lot of times when you start making this exchange from your worldly identity to your god given identity.
You ignore all the little wins, all the little things that are going your way.
As you're in that process because you're only fixated on the big thing that you are after.
And so we talked about that we as Christians have to stop ignoring our winds and to to clap for yourself because I wrote this note, celebrating what god is doing in you and through you.
Is a means to celebrate on its own, a big thing, a little thing.
Every step forward with your relationship with god matters.
If you're growing, if you're healing, if you're moving, that deserves a shout of rights.
It doesn't have to be the big thing.
It can be the little thing.
It could be a worship song that you you hear and immediately you feel god's presence around you.
It could be just someone saying, you know, someone who's not been nice to you says hello to you in a friendly way and you're like, like, all those things matter, spending quiet time with god.
That should be celebrated.
Spending time in the word, that should be celebrated, journaling with the Holy Spirit.
All of that stuff matters and needs to be celebrated.
Doesn't mean that we need to go boast about it, but you should celebrate your win with your father because if it was a human earthly relationship, you would be celebrating those things with the people that care about you.
So why don't you celebrate them with god? You should.
Gotta add on to that one.
God's timing's ridiculous.
Um, I want to speak a release on anyone listening.
I literally journal this morning.
I might cry.
Like, this is I didn't forget what we were talking about, but right, like, I kinda separated journaling with what you know, like, they're two different realms, um, in my day.
The lord a couple weeks ago highlighted that I kept trying to prove myself.
And I had no problem celebrating with my father, my heavenly father.
I treasure the reading.
I treasure the journaling.
But when I get asked, Hey, what'd you do today? I feel like I need to prove that I did something outwardly.
And I literally this morning journaled about proving myself.
And this is this morning, just again, the little steps that it's a journey because this was not last week or two years ago.
It was about two hours ago.
And I wanna speak that release that I felt like the Lord gave me and the healing he gave me that you have nothing to prove.
And Nikki's been pretty much saying that.
But I wanna use that language because that's the language god used on me is you've got nothing to prove.
You celebrate those winds of journaling of worshiping, of praying, of reading the Bible.
And if someone says, Maybe you'd spent all day doing it.
You'll be in different seasons of life where it looks different.
I mean, I had seasons where I spent in four hours with the lord, because I was able to, but it also came at a cost.
So, yeah.
I have to remember that too.
Uh, you wanna listen to the lord.
But you want to confidently say I was with god.
And that confidence comes from fully knowing your identity.
And I still was struggling with that until this morning.
So I just speak of release because if the lord did that to me this morning, I feel like it gives me that ability to just speak the ability and the authority to allow what god just did in me this warning to overflow, because we always wanna pour from an overflow, which is why you cannot love others unless you love yourself.
So I wanna speak from the overflow of deliverance of proving yourself to others out to anyone listening.
So good.
I could've I could not orchestrate that if I tried.
Like, that's crazy.
And I really believe that somebody needed to hear that.
Because it gives when somebody hears that, when you're out in the world, like, hey, what did you do today, or what have you been up to? And you're like, oh, I've just been spending time with the lord.
Like, it's really helping me in this season for x y z or whatever.
It gives them permission to do the same or plants the seed for them to do that on their own.
Maybe it's not now, but maybe they get into a tough season and be like, Maybe I just need to spend some dedicated time with the lord.
Like, and when we don't speak our truth of how god's moving in our life, other people don't know about it.
Doesn't plant that seed.
It doesn't inspire them.
Down the road to maybe try that themselves.
Right.
It uh, that's so good.
And even the proving part makes me think about what you shared in the beginning about your own journey and everything of, like, I was only trying to prove myself because What wasn't first? I wasn't loving god first.
I was doing things with god over here, but it didn't translate into my communication with others.
This is layered, guys.
It's an onion.
It's none yet.
And as you're talking, my mind just wrote on this another point that I journaled.
It says stop trying to convince people who don't matter of your worth.
Your worth, everybody listening to this, everybody watching this, your worth isn't up for debate.
If god calls you worthy, if god calls you chosen, if god calls you beloved, That's it.
It's settled.
That's what you are.
You are worthy.
You are chosen.
You are beloved.
You are worthy.
You don't need the approval of people when you have the affirmation of all of heaven.
That's the truth.
And those people are worthy too just like you are, but you gotta let god deal with them while you work on yourself.
I recently was talking to somebody on my own journey.
Yeah.
Again, um, of as I worked on myself and my relationship with the father, it does give that permission, like Nikki was saying, and not always because I'm telling them what I'm doing, but they start to see the fruit and seeing how you spend the time with him, what your worship looks like, what your joy looks like, the fruits of the spirit coming out of you.
And it's beautiful.
And you have to trust that as you do that, God is dealing with the people that maybe you've been worried about because that's good.
It's good.
And by focusing on yourself, it's not removing your love of others.
It's not removing caring.
None of that.
But you have to work on yourself so then he can work on them.
And so I actually had my own revelation.
I can't remember when this was, and I don't know if it's gonna come out right.
But by me focusing on myself, however, the God of this universe does this.
It released them somehow.
It's this ripple effect because at the end of the day, you're only responsible for you.
That's it.
And you have to trust that how he operates breaks things off of them because you're focusing on you.
I don't get it, but I've seen the fruit of it in my own life, be it with family, or friends that have started relying on me.
And I was like, I can't let you rely on me.
You gotta rely on the father.
So I kinda became a vacuum seal, and I watched god move from afar.
And I'm like, god, you did that.
But it's because I Got in here.
I don't get it.
I don't know how he does that.
I don't understand it.
But it really emphasizes the importance of focusing on you and your identity with him.
Yeah.
That's that heavenly exchange.
Exactly.
We can never explain it.
But god knows exactly what he's doing.
And you have to be okay with it.
Right? And then it was just getting back to try to con convince people about our worth.
I know Hopin' I used to do this.
All we used to be overtalkers.
You might think we're overtalkers now.
But we used to over talk with people to try to convince them to either like us or to purchase from us or to like give us affirmation, like we were all about like the kudos and the yeah and uh just trying to convince them like I'm okay.
I'm this.
I'm that and it was just like Now I don't feel that need for outside affirmation.
I don't need to be constantly checking social media to see if somebody com commented on my post.
Like, I just post because I'm obedient to god because when he tells me to post or Holy Spirit puts in me to post, I do it.
So it's I have no attachment to the outcome of that.
And I think for me, that is such freedom walking in that where I'm no longer striving to prove my worth.
I just know that I'm worthy because I am a child god period.
Amen.
It's so good.
And again, this is I keep emphasizing you, Nikki, because it makes me think of your your stuff you've done in your programs.
I also wanna emphasize it trickles from your connection with god from spirit to your emotions, which is your soul, to your body.
Women get caught up in the body realm for multiple reasons.
Um, I'm not even going down that list because you probably have your own reason often to your mind.
Um, but I wanna emphasize that because it makes me think about one of your programs that you've made, but it starts up here.
And you will see the fruit in your body And as someone who has dealt with autoimmune diseases and different kinds of things, I have seen it trickle down.
And that's exactly what, again, Matthew 22 is saying.
You go, god yourself.
Others.
That exchange comes down.
It rains down.
And I just I I feel that because we tend to compare and we've talked about this and I'm sure we'll continue to talk about it.
Um, we want to just emphasize the truth of here, down to the body, down to the relationships.
Um, everything that your eyes physically see will change because of the things that you do not see.
And when you live in bondage to whatever worldly thing that you're in bondage to, it does have a negative effect on your body.
Because your your mind always talk about the three being in alignment.
You always need your mind body and spirit in alignment for optimal health.
And when one of those three things are out of alignment, it pulls the other one with it.
Like Hope was saying, like, it's a trickle down.
So if your your mind's out of alignment, it's gonna pull your spirit and your body out of alignment, or if your spirit's out of alignment, like, the same thing.
And I have seen by getting my relationship with Christ on point, and it's always a process because it's not always perfect.
And feeding my god given identity, more than I'm feeding my worldly identity.
The more my health has improved year after year after year.
Things that I struggled with, all the time, and I'm talking, like, chronically have gone away.
And it wasn't like this.
It wasn't like a blink of an eye.
But slowly, as I release these emotional wounds or things that I've been dealing with or bad behaviors or just not being in alignment with god as as it is that an exchange that we talked about early.
Like, I can't vocalize it.
I can't fully explain it.
But all I know is that it happened to me.
And at 51, I feel better than I felt in my twenties.
I'm not dealing with the same chronic issues that I dealt through twenty five years of my life.
You said it earlier.
You said the the you allowed things to change your DNA from the outside, and now he's changing your DNA from the inside out.
That's what it is.
The dignity changes.
You said it earlier.
And I was like, that's interesting.
She chose the word DNA.
And there it is.
You're getting a new DNA through the blood of Jesus.
The life is in the blood.
So as you connect that way, that's part maybe that's part of the explanation of how this works.
But truly, I was like, wow, it's interesting Nicki used that word.
And as you're speaking now, like, that's part of it.
Yeah.
And if you talk about frequency, you could talk about all kinds of stuff because you're resonating at love and peace and joy and all the fruits of spirit, and your body responds to that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's that like I talked about, like, about the DNA.
Like, I think we made things so, like, worldly things enmeshed inside of us is that that belief system, we made it so strong that, of course, it causes havoc or inflammation or sickness in your body because it was never supposed to be there.
It's false.
Every time you say worldly, false identity comes to mind.
It's a false identity.
It's like a virus inside of your body.
It's not supposed to be there.
And if something's not supposed to be in your body or you eat eat a bad food or something, your body tries to reject it and it creates all this havoc in your body to try to save it.
Which is why symptoms are not I'm not gonna go down this road.
Like, I could talk about this all day.
It's like my super passion.
Um, but yeah, that's why symptoms show up.
You know, we always try to, like, shove the symptoms down.
I know you're pretty passionate about that too, but they show up so they direct us of what to do.
Right? And usually, it does start in the mind or with your relationship with god.
Uh, so anyways.
Blend on that one.
But symptoms are telling, and so many so many ways.
I'm sure one day we'll talk about that because we both have our our own journey of of that.
So good.
You got any other any other notes, Sister? One more.
Maybe more.
But I love this one.
Self love starts with receiving the love.
Of Christ.
And we talked a little bit about that.
But I I journaled on to say, we can't truly love ourselves until we accept the radical unconditional love of Jesus.
He teaches us how to see ourselves the way he does with grace, compassion, and joy.
And how often are we not We don't have grace for ourself or compassion or joy.
We try to strive in our worldly identity through a lens of hate for ourselves instead of god's compassionate love for ourselves.
Absolutely.
The word the word compassion keeps coming up this past, like, week for me.
It's a really powerful word.
That's where a passion of the Christ comes from.
It wasn't that he was just passionate about fulfilling the father as well, is that he had compassion for us to do that.
And this is very elementary in the realm of being a Christian, but, like, You don't earn that.
Right.
As soon as that begins to truly settle in you, it'll change everything.
And it's such a I almost think it's overtaught.
So then our ears shut.
On that.
Um, but view it through.
He died out of compassion for you.
And Nikki and I are going through the Bible this year.
And it's been great going through the gospels and just seeing Jesus' heart towards the different people he healed.
No matter, like, honestly, it didn't even really matter sometimes of what their behavior was leading up up to that.
It it has it quoted in multiple places in scripture that he was moved with compassion.
He's moved with compassion towards you.
And Nikki and I both, I think, can attest to this.
If you allow that to sit in you and I mean, you could set aside two minutes.
Like, set a timer.
Yeah.
We talked about this kinda last week about, I think, last week or three before about him, like, getting washed by his grace.
Set aside two minutes, sit down in a comfy spot, and think about compassion, like, picture that word and picture and embrace.
And then let that embrace just again, mind's eye.
I love the mind's eye because it does start to change things outwardly.
Watch watch it go through your body to the ends of your toes and your fingers.
Because that is the blood of Christ.
Again, it's life.
He made you every part of you.
So you should be able to sit and picture that taking over your body.
And see if if you do not feel different in two minutes.
And then keep doing it.
And you'll start to really feel that constantly.
You get a taste and then it gets bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger until it's what you live out.
It's so true.
It is.
And one of my most broken times of my entire life, I was on the ground in a puddle.
And in my mind's eye, I just pictured Jesus coming on top of me, just hunching over me and embracing me and just letting his love wash over me, it changed my whole perspective of the situation that I was going through because I was in worldly reaction mode.
And then once I was just felt the father's love come upon me, I was like, it's gonna be okay.
It's gonna be tough.
It's gonna be the hardest thing I've ever done in my life.
But it's gonna be okay.
I'm so glad you shared that in similar but different for me in in regards to the compassion part, which that's that's part of it.
But I guess I'm trying to think, you know, again, it's often taught that he's been tempted, how we're tempted and, you know, knows all the trials that we have again, taught all the time, but very similar to Nikki's situation.
I have this thrown out in one of my 2,000 journals.
Um, I was in pain.
And I was I I I I was, like, hunched over and I closed my eyes.
And I saw Jesus in the corner in the same position.
Feeling what I was feeling.
That changed my perspective to then if if you have that kind of wall up of, like, I really don't know if I believe that he is that loving and compassionate.
Then the first step is to to allow him to show you that, whatever that looks like.
But for me, it was I was in so much pain, and I was so overwhelmed with all of my struggles.
And I just saw him.
And it brought me to tears.
Like, he's feeling this pain.
The stress, this angst because it's in me and we're connected.
You were connected to him.
And from that, he convinced I never thought about it.
He can then stand up and come to me and embrace me while I'm still stuck here because I haven't figured out how to get out of that little, you know, shell Even while he's feeling what I'm feeling, he can do exactly what Nikki said.
That's the beauty of it.
Oh, god.
He's so good.
That's how he went to the cross.
You know? Yeah.
K.
Anything else that's come up for you? No.
That your story that you just shared.
I felt it, and then it just reminded me of my own thing and bringing those together wherever someone's at.
Let that mind's eye help you.
He gave us an imagination with the world, or we'll say the false definition of imagination, the false manifestation, the outward appearance of imagination has taken off.
Far, I don't know, hard left her, and I don't know what to call it.
But that's not his original intent for imagination.
Let it run wild with him.
Yeah.
And that's where Nikki and I are one of our first things we did was, um, something called the sixty day challenge.
And that really helped me use my my imagination to picture things and to start the healing.
And and it went up from there.
Um, and that was a a while ago when we did that.
And here we are today.
So I'm still picturing his arm, seeing his love run through me, you know, Um, you never outgrow the tools or the strategies that he teaches you decades ago.
You carry them with you and add them to your tool belt of defining who you are.
It's not true.
I love that Holy Spirit too well.
And you don't forget them.
That's the other cool thing is, like, when it's him, that tells you to do something or it if he's in the imagination you're using, you will not forget it, and he will tell you when to bring it back out.
That's right.
Be it a book, a way you journal, whether it's journaling on the phone or on paper, it changes for me depending on what he's telling me to do.
Um, you'll know what to grab.
Yeah.
So, no, that that just this ending is, like, really blessed me.
Me too.
I've kind I've kind of, like, I don't know, a little bit overwhelmed.
Right.
Because what you when, uh, I like to call it.
I've I've learned from, uh, my biblical counselor, Laurie, about sacred imagination and how to get into that space with god.
And I talk a lot about and we'll do a episode on that, but, like, where that is and how I get there with god and what it looks like and all that.
But when I'm in that space, it is overwhelming by god's presence using my imagination how he originally intended it for.
And you fall in love with them, and that's what everything hangs on.
That's right.
Yeah.
No.
I think that's great.
Trying to think.
Do we wanna end in prayer? I wrote something out.
Perfect.
Go for it, Sister.
And I was debating whether to share it or not because of how our ending was going, but I'm just going to to share it.
Perfect.
It says I didn't wanna stumble in the darkness anymore, consumed by fear.
That I would never measure up.
Trying on different roles, habits, phrases, looks that never seemed to fit.
The cycle of trying to meet worldly expectations nearly broke me as it slowly chipped away at my mind, my body, and my spirit.
My god given identity was lost.
Chip.
I despise who I was.
Chip.
Negative thoughts embedded themselves in my DNA chip.
The frustrations and anger I felt about myself became a weapon to lash out to others.
Chip? Chip chip.
Exhaustion said in.
I was ready to give up, but a holy spirit nudge inside of me said rest and release.
Rest in the presence of god and release all the dysfunction and yuck I was carrying around word far too long.
And a posture of surrender and rest.
I released everything to god.
At first, it was slow, not fully trusting the process.
And then once I let the Holy Spirit guide me.
I could not offload my burdens fast enough.
I felt lighter.
I felt loved.
I felt seen.
I felt forgiven.
I felt whole.
I felt renewed.
It was as if a path opened up before me with two choices.
One was a path I was on, a dark and dysfunctional one, and the other was filled with god's light, love, and guidance.
Right there, I made the conscious choice to stop doing life on my own terms and boldly stepping on god's path that he had prepared for my life.
I gave up my way for his way, my darkness for his light, loneliness for his love, confusion for his comfort.
The identity I crafted for myself.
For my god given identity.
Now it all made sense.
The old I can't read my writing.
Now it all made sense.
Everything that did not align with god's way of life was chipped away on purpose.
And I was fully restored and ready to receive god's download for my life.
I'm so glad you shared that.
It kinda summarizes everything that we talked about.
It really does.
Yeah.
That's so amazing.
And that makes me wanna just say to the listeners, rest and release in Jesus' name.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Thank you all for listening.
I hope this blessed you in big and small ways and I can't wait to see what the Holy Spirit downloads for us next time.
Absolutely.
Take care
