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Hi, I'm Hope. Hi, I'm Nikki. We're two Jesus-loving friends on mission to share personal stories, resources, and real talk about our triumphs, breakthroughs, struggles, and setbacks.
Why? Because we believe you are called to live victoriously, and we are here to equip you with Holy Spirit-led tools, 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. Amen. I love it so much.
And I think last time we were matching unintentionally, and I like to kind of point this out in the beginning because it just shows how cool God is. At this time, we are lively. Look at our attire, if you're watching this on YouTube, like we are full of color, and that was not planned, but super fired up as we wrapped up the last episode about talking about not being wicked and being a child of God.
And like, whew, that's such good news, such joy. And I don't know, I guess we're just super feeling it as we're coming on today, right? We're like, yes, we're children of God. We're gonna shine bright and get going, and rocking and rolling.
I'm so fired up, just. So one thing that you and I discussed at the end of the last episode, and if you're listening and you didn't watch the last episode, definitely go listen to it because I don't wanna call it homework, but I like, we really wanted to encourage you through that episode of going back to the Father and like getting clarity. I'm like, is there any place in my life that I believe I'm wicked, which I learned, cause I went back to the Lord, that holy cannoli, that looks a lot different than I would have thought.
So be sure to go back and listen and do that. And we also pray over you and just like, oh, it was just such a good, good episode. So I felt led to kind of bring that into today's episode to start with about my personal testimony of that when I went back to the Father.
So, man, so good. Okay. So I felt led to dig into the word wicked a little bit deeper.
And I go back to Strong's Concordance a lot of times to do that. And when I quoted the scripture from Proverbs 24, 16, the Strong's Concordance is the wicked, which I thought was very fascinating. And if you know anything about Strong's Concordance, if you don't, don't worry, it doesn't really matter.
I think it's really good to do, but you could also just Google like wherever the spirit leads you. But if you like Strong's Concordance, this is H, because it's Hebrew, 7563. And what stood out to me about this first definition when I looked that up is that the wicked in that scripture is wicked, criminal, guilty one, or one guilty of crime.
And my light bulb went off because I'm like, wait, I know that's not me. The one guilty of crime. Who's that? The enemy.
Right. It ain't us. It ain't us.
So I don't know like, you know, if anyone else that took this back to the father, like if that's your foundation of moving forward with him, like you're free of whatever comes up and you repent and you get free. And that just fired me up. I'm like, Lord, that's not me.
That's not me. So I got super excited. Let me get back on my note.
So if you accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, his death and resurrection declares you are not guilty. That is not your identity. You may make mistakes and I will say, you'll face consequences with that.
That's just the reality. That's how that world works. Okay.
And that's okay. But you're not defined by those actions. We believe we are a lot of times defined by our actions because we start looking at ourselves instead of him.
But he doesn't call us to be a master of our life, which I think is very fascinating. I think that's why we often feel that our actions are our identity because we think we're masters of this life. However, he wants us just to steward this life, not perfectly, just in completion with him and wholeness with him.
So he is the only one that we can call master, the only one that can perfect all things. And so we're just called a steward, that free gift he gave. And we do that by looking up to him.
Now, looking up to him puts us in a posture to receive, but when we turn inward, like I'm talking about when we're like, oh, I got to figure all this out on my actions. I heard this at a conference I was at one time and I've referenced this ministry a couple of times. I just have to shout them out because I realized credit's got to be given.
It's Be In Health, Hope of the Generations Church, highly recommend, just, they are so great at their teaching. So I have brought them up almost every episode. So it's about time they get a shout out.
But it's navel gazing. So you're literally looking so deeply in and that causes you to stumble because your body follows your eyes. So looking up puts us in a getting up posture, which is what we talked about last time as well, which is why it's important to go back to the last episode because it's like, girl, get up.
But how do you get up? You got to be looking up, okay? So that's the intro of, you're not wicked, you're a child of God. So here's my testimony of that. After the last episode, I came out of agreement with believing I was wicked because I wanted to, but I didn't fully understand.
I didn't fully understand what I was doing, right? It's just, we know, dude, get it off me, get it off me, explain it later, Lord, just get it off me. So during my time with God, he revealed that I've been believing I was guilty of, guilty, that's the key word here, I was guilty of never doing enough. And I let that belief steal my peace.
What came to mind were the little projects. Now this is one of many opportunities in which I allowed this to happen, but this is hopefully a relatable one. What came to mind were the little projects around my house that I had to squeeze in in the small timeframes of my day in my life to feel productive, that good old where I think Western culture, we are obsessed with productivity.
So I had been letting other people's lives, even their callings, define what was right or enough for me because I was watching them, what looked like productivity, them fulfilling what they needed to do. And I allowed that to define my life. So I kept pleading guilty and calling myself wicked for not doing what I thought I should.
Amen to that, I should do this, I should do that. That is thinking we are wicked. It blew my mind.
But that evening, so Tuesday, excuse me, no, Monday night, our episode release. No, I'm trying to think them. No, that evening after we recorded the episode, I'm so fired up, I can't think.
I need the spirit's help. So after we recorded that, I went to the Lord and that evening after that episode, I felt released from that constant guilt. No joke, I was released from that guilt.
It broke because I chose to reject the lie and pursue truth. It was yet another layer of my identity as a child of God for me to discover as a layer of healing was addressed with the Father. It was another rise up, get up moment.
I've been asleep, again, going back to the last episode. Only idea that this could ever change. My mind had pulled that not enough, I'm not enough rationale out of my back pocket since I was in high school.
You start very young at that thought process and if you're not mindful, which as a kid, that's extremely difficult to do, it keeps coming up. But God says with a repentant heart and a pursuit of Him, which I believe every person listening to our podcast today longs for deep down, whether you even know it in your mind or not, you have a longing built into you for that. You wake up to the truth when you have that longing in you and you rise again and again and again and it's all based on Him.
We have multiple wake up moments and that blew my mind of how He brought all that together for me and it was rooted in just thinking I was wicked because I felt guilty for not doing enough. God is so good. It blew my mind.
And He put the bow on top by going back to that scripture, like fully back to Proverbs 24, 16. And I was like, wow, that's so neat. And that was just so good and I don't know if you have any feedback or thoughts or testimonies yourself.
I just fired me up, so. I do have a testimony that I wrote out too. Mine came in pieces too.
Just like hope's download came in waves. That's how it usually comes. You get one thing and then you're asking God for like what's next or how do you bring it up or what to do and then that next layer comes and then the process piece, when you actually sit down with the Lord and process these things that you've been thinking about or that have been imparted to you by Holy Spirit.
And then that, oh, I'm getting goosebumps. That gives you a whole nother layer of revelation. So sometimes these things just come instantly, boom, boom, boom, boom.
But sometimes they just come in layers and that's out of God's goodness because these things are heavy. What hope just brought up was heavy on her. And if she were to dig into it all at one time in one setting, it might've been too much for her to process and to fully get the healing and the release God had for her.
Good word, the full healing. We want to expedite because it seems so nice but we'd be missing out on, I like how you said that, the full healing because that night, it's not the first time I've dealt with, I'm dealing, I need to do these things but there was something that broke in that moment because it was time and I slept so good going to bed. And a lot of women understand that busy mind before bed because you've got this massive checklist.
But the full healing came because it was time after all those layers, that's so good. I don't know why I'm just like so like. I know, I got the chill bumps, I'm just fired up.
For me, when thinking about Wicked and I was really trying to process it with the Lord, what was that moment for me or why did I have such a whole body reaction when you brought that up, Hope? Like my whole body told me something that I made an agreement with that. And then Holy Spirit brought up, I always thought that I was a mistake. I always thought that I shouldn't have been born, that my family didn't want me.
Whether that's true or not, but I came into agreement with that thought. Whether it was told to me by my family or whether the enemy planted that seed, that's what I thought. And for years, years, years of my life, I wished that I was never born.
And to me that equals, I must be wicked because I'm a mistake and I wish that I was never born. So there must be something wicked inside of me that I should not be here. And like you said before, that is a thought from the enemy.
And when we broke that off, again, that's why I felt it through my whole body. And I didn't really have time to process that download, but I went to work last Wednesday and I was driving home and I've driven the same route for three years, five days a week. Because even when I wasn't working at the place I was working at, Josephine was going there.
So it was just like constant, every day, every day. And I'm driving and I look up and I see the sign and it says, accepting warranty work. So this is my second layer, number two.
And I knew that I was meant to read that sign because again, three years driving down this road, never saw it, never registered. And it stirred something up in me. I'm like, God, what does accepting warranty work mean? And what it means is like, Nikki, you are under my warranty.
You are under my God-given authority. You are under my God-given warranty. Not just you, Nikki, you just aren't under this warranty.
Everybody in the whole world is under my warranty. The things that people forget to do is to make a warranty claim on my behalf because you are covered. Every sin, every transgression, covered.
Every negative thought, covered. Everything that you did that you wish you didn't, covered. Everything is covered under God's warranty.
We don't make the claim. We don't repent. We don't sit with them.
So probably for 35 years of my life, I was just, I'm a mistake. I should have never been born. I was coming to agreement.
But even though I stopped those thoughts, I never broke it off. I never brought that claim to the Father until Hope brought that up last week. We are just like this because the freedom that you feel from carrying that heaviness is indescribable.
And so after I had that revelation, then I had time a couple days later to sit down with my Father and process this out in a way that maybe brings it all together for not just me, Hope, but everybody listening or watching this. So it's called a note, a love note from the Father. And it says, my child, I saw you today sitting in that waiting room, unsure, worried, and hoping that the damage wouldn't be too much this time.
And when they said it's covered under warranty, you don't owe a thing, I smiled because that's exactly what I want you to know about me, your loving Father God. When your heart is worn down, when life has chipped away your peace, when your soul feels cracked or too far gone, bring it to me. I'm not asking you to fix yourself.
I'm not keeping a record of what went wrong or whose fault it was. I've already made the provision. You are covered under my warranty, by my grace, by my mercy, by my Son.
There is no charge, no shame, no, you shouldn't have known better. Just my arms are wide open, ready to restore what has been broken in you. I don't do quick fixes, I make things new.
I don't patch holes, I heal hearts. I don't just clean up messes, I redeem stories. So bring me your weariness, your regrets, your tangled thoughts, and let me do the work in you.
You are under my divine warranty, written in love, sealed with blood, guaranteed by my Spirit. You don't owe a thing. And then I got the scripture, Corinthians, 1 Corinthians 12, 28.
But in fact, God has placed the parts of my body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. I wasn't a mistake. I was meant to be born.
He created me, and I am here now to walk in his purpose. And you, that like unleashed way more than I could have imagined, but I like to, okay, two things, one that stood out to me is what you just got from the love note from the Lord was that one line that really resonated with me is you shouldn't have known better. What did he just free me of? All the shoulds.
And we're so guilty of thinking we should have known better. We should have known by now. Like that breaks my heart, honestly, because I carried that for so long.
And the rest of that love note was deleting that thought. It's like, it's garbage, get it out of here. Oh man, I felt that.
And then what the listeners don't know, that's just kind of, again, I love sharing God's timing on how you and I communicate and touch bases. You and I chatted last Friday, and you're telling me that you saw this billboard and I'm like, Nikki, I just got off the phone with our car insurance, you know? And I'm like, we're talking about what kind of coverage we need. Do you want comprehensive? Do you want collision? And I literally hung up from that call to talk to you for you to share that revelation.
Like it reminds me of our very first episode, I guess episode zero, where you give the hair analogy. And I'm like, dude, I just caught my hair in a tour just like two days ago. Like God is so cool.
And if that doesn't tell you that no one is exempt from him, I don't know what does. Yeah, we have the best coverage in the world. Like when you think about auto policies or health coverage or like, we got it all.
We got the platinum unlimited system. We just need to claim it for ourselves. I love that.
And I love too in your testimony that you talked about even though your thoughts had changed and maybe your words had changed, you still have to put the claim in. And that's where walking with him is different than some of the teachings that are outside of him is those are like behavior modifications. And he's not a big fan of that.
He wants, like you said, I don't remember your exact words, but he wants to make you new. Behavior modifications don't make you new. Yeah, because even though I didn't believe that thought, I never broke the contract.
Never gave that claim to my father. Man, praise the Lord. And I love how yours was mulch and step.
And I think I have, I will continue to revisit because I gave my one example, but like there were so much more, but that was the one in this moment that needed to be addressed at that time. But there's so many things, especially that concept of should that I think I'm going to now be more aware of. So when it gets popped, like it pops up in my mind, I'm gonna instantly through Holy Spirit's guidance, know, okay, I gotta address this now.
And it's gonna be quick though. I believe that once that first layer starts and you get like a ding, it's very fast and rapid because he's ready, you're ready. It's this beautiful unison.
Wow, okay, this is firing up. Now this leads me to at least something else that stood out to me was Psalm 143, five. And it says, I remember the days of old.
I meditate on all that you have done and I ponder the works of your hands. And Nikki's testimony feeds into that so well and makes me think about the scripture was on a little piece of homework I had from my biblical counselor. But it says people who keep their hearts ablaze continually go back to the sweetness of the moment when they were redeemed.
And us sharing our story just now lit that fire even more, right? But there is a moment where something clicks on a different level. Maybe there's multiple moments, but I just, I felt, and maybe that's why we're so bright we're ablaze today more than ever because you do have to keep feeding the fire. I was curious, Nikki, if you had a moment that you can share with people in your life where it was like, wow, that was the moment where I remember a better understanding of my redemption and his plan.
When I was thinking about this and I told Hope last Friday, my redemption story was not like a one and done. It was a slow drip from the heavenly father. And I think he did it that way because I was so broken that I couldn't take the full unleashing of God and Holy Spirit and Jesus into my life.
I was so broken. It was 2009. I hated myself, let's just be real.
I hated myself. I was so depressed. There was multiple attempts to take myself out of this world.
I thought God hated me and that I was cursed. And I was sitting in the living room of my friend's house, my best friend at the time. And she had to go upstairs to finish getting ready because we were going out, probably doing some not so good things.
But anyway, her husband came in, her husband at the time came in and sat down and he knew something was off. This person by earthly or godly standards at the time was not a good man. Like this is not somebody that you would want to take advice from.
I think though, sometimes God uses an unlikely messenger to you to pause and think like maybe this guy's onto something. So for some reason in 2009, I listened to what this person said to me. And I told him a little bit about what's going on, how I hated myself, how I thought God hated me and that I just really didn't wanna be on this earth anymore.
And he just kept saying to me, Nikki, God loves you. God loves you so much. He wants you here.
He has a purpose for you. Don't give up. Don't give up on what God has for you.
Like your story's not over. And that evening in 2009, it planted the seed for me that what if, what if God didn't hate me? What if God had more for me? What if this depression would go away? Like opened the door for possibilities of building a relationship with God. And that's what I slowly started to do.
I was slowly getting into the word. I was slowly checking out churches. And I remember, because I didn't think I remembered that much about the time, but I remembered the scripture that was downloaded to me at the time.
And it was Psalm 23, five. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil.
My cup overfills. At this time, if you remember for a couple of episodes, I was in constant victim mode. I thought it was like me against everybody.
Everything was a struggle. I had to fight. Everybody was my enemy.
Nobody was on my team. And then I read this and I felt this peace. And this is what I wrote about it.
I remember a time when I felt completely alone, misunderstood, attacked by people I thought would be for me. I felt like I was fighting a battle with no one in my corner. And honestly, it was one of the loneliest, lowest seasons of my life.
And I remember reading that scripture and I remember the tears just welling up in my eyes. And that was the first time that I realized that God saw it all. He wasn't ignoring my pain.
He wasn't distant from my situation. He was there setting a table for me. Not after my battle was over, not when people apologized or reached out, but right there in the middle of my dysfunctional yuck.
When I felt surrounded by oppression, God was preparing a place of honor, blessing and restoration for me. A table, not a battlefield, a feast and not a famine. And when I realized that, it started to change everything for me.
And that's when, like I said, I slowly started building my relationship in God. So it took that moment from 2009, probably later in 2009, when I got into this, found this Psalm 23 to 2018, when I fully gave my life to the Lord. But isn't he good? Yes.
I always say this. I no longer feel depressed. I no longer feel those things.
Like I was so broken and the restoration has just been amazing. And I know it's that process that we're gonna keep healing and growing and building and evolving. It never stops.
We're under his warranty forever, ever. So I have to say this about your story. And we've shared, you know, when you and I met, but like, I don't know that version of Nikki.
And I'm always so shocked at when you share your befores and, you know, you've shared in some detail of your befores and I just, it blows me away. And if God ain't real, you know, and Jesus is love because I cannot imagine that version of you prior to meeting you in 2016. And something, as you were speaking about your trickle, like a faucet and your what ifs.
I just wanna speak over the listeners. You know, the world makes you wanna say, well, what if this happens? And what if that happens in a negative light? And I just wanna speak over you a pure what if. A purification of thinking that way in light of who he is and not of what gonna happen that is bad.
I just wanna light a fire on that. What if things can change? What if I'm a child of God? What if I am loved so deeply? What if there's a table being set before my enemies right here, right now while I'm in the middle and I'm not on the battlefield like you said, I'm here watching the battle. It makes me think of scripture.
I'm really bad at knowing where scriptures are but where they look up and they see all the angels around them. You're not fighting. What if you're not the one meant to fight? You're just here kind of like my testimony I shared earlier to steward what you've been given to steward the warranty that you're under which means just putting claim after claim after claim and turning to him fast, slow whatever speed and rate that it is.
That's what you're responsible for. So I just declare that purity, that pure view of what if, what if the scripture is true? And honestly, I had nothing to lose. You have nothing to lose about seeking God.
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