ENCORE EPISODE: Unlearning and Growing in Our Faith Journey Pt. 2

Unlearning and Growing in Faith

SPEAKER_01 0:05

Hello, everybody. And welcome once again to the Unlearnt Podcast. I am your host, Ruth Abigail, aka R A.

SPEAKER_03 0:14

Hello, friends. It's your girl, Jaquita.

SPEAKER_01 0:17

And this is the podcast that is helping you gain the courage to change your mind so that you and us can experience more freedom. And we are back for part two. Part two. Part two, Quita. Yes, part two. Part two. Part two of us talking about what we've unlearned in our faith journeys. So if you haven't listened to the last episode, we're going to encourage you to do that because we actually didn't get past one point. We didn't have one point. Well, one and a half says quite a half. I say it's one. But we basically didn't get down the list because it was just like we just, we just we just spent it was just worth spending that much time on it. Talking about my God. My lord.

SPEAKER_03 1:03

All right, my Lord, you can get like fire.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

It's like fire.

SPEAKER_03 1:09

Shut up in my bones.

SPEAKER_01 1:12

That's it. There's a lot of fire, and now it's unshut. And the fact that it's unshut, you can go listen to it.

SPEAKER_03 1:18

So unshut is crazy.

SPEAKER_01 1:23

But what we do want to do, just to kind of just so that you're aware of the framework uh that we are uh kind of going through, uh, Quida and I are sharing some things we've unlearned in our faith journey uh from our 20s until now. And so, Quida, what what was the point? What's kind of the point that we unpacked at the last episode?

SPEAKER_03 1:42

So I think that we started unpacking a point, and it really just took us on a journey. Um, the point that we started with um in the last episode was just unlearning the idea that the same fervor that I had in the beginning of my walk with God would continue to fuel um my my my continued path. And and how the answer to unlearning that was learning that discipline determines my direction in my faith walk. Yes. And so if y'all want more than that, you gotta still go check it out, okay? Because me and Ruth was we were hitting the points, okay. We were given the juice, okay, and we done told y'all we didn't learn this stuff the easy way, okay? Through many toils, trials, and tribulations, okay. We came across what we have, and so this little bit that I have, I give to you, and I need y'all to go watch that episode and get it, okay? Because it was good.

SPEAKER_01 2:49

All right, that's right. So go check out the episode. We're gonna keep moving uh into the next point. So we also kind of talked a little bit about our backgrounds. So my background is very different than Quita's background. Quita did not grow up um traditionally in church. She was she exposed to the church, but I like the way she puts this, you know, and I'm totally speaking for you. Not that you don't have a microphone and can't say anything for yourself, but um I uh I like the way she puts this. It's a like grew up on the outskirts of church. I think that's a really great way of putting it. I did not. I grew up in I grew up in church, squarely in church. Drenched in church, drenched in it, right? So I know a lot of y'all have that same story, right? You are a you were part of a church since you can remember. Maybe your parents were um in ministry or very involved in the church. They had you there when the church opens and when it closed, y'all was there all the days a week. Now I will say we wasn't there, we were there twice a week, three times a week on uh once a month when we had what we called um SWAT, Soul Winners Action Team. Look, we would go out, we would go out. Y'all went to the highways and the byways. We went to the highways and the byways to the neighborhoods to the sick and shut in. We knock on the door. Do you know the Lord? You know, we we we did that. So anyway, that was every first Saturday, right? So I was, and then we had church um uh, you know, Sunday morning, Sunday night, Sunday school, you know, Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday church. I mean, we were in it, right? So we had very different experiences, Queen and I. My uh that part of my life uh was very much driven by my parents, as it would be. Um, you know, well, not necessarily for everybody. So for me, it was driven by my parents. Um my father is a pastor, he is still a pastor. Uh my mom grew up in church her whole life, uh, very, very dedicated woman of God. And so um, when they got together, they said, our children are going to be in the church. And that's exactly what happened. Not only that, they uh also put us in Christian uh school, kindergarten through 12th grade. And so we have Bible class every day. I mean, I have Bible class every day from the time I started school to the time I ended it.

SPEAKER_03 5:08

That say a verse right now, off the top of your head. Say a verse. I know you know them.

SPEAKER_01 5:12

John 3 16. Don't test me now. Um now catch me at a sword drill. You're not, you're not gonna, I got you, right? The sword drill is crazy for those of you that don't know what that means, right? The the in the in the Bible, there's a scripture that talks about uh the Bible as a two-edged sword. Two-edged. Ah, no, that's king like I speak, that's me.

SPEAKER_03 5:40

No, no, I was I was completely with it. Keep going. Keep going.

SPEAKER_01 5:43

I got you.

SPEAKER_03 5:43

Yeah, it's a double-edged sword, by the way.

SPEAKER_01 5:45

Double-edged sword, two-edged sword, whatever. Y'all know this is how you know I grew up in church. Nobody says edged. Um, and so uh that so anyway, so we call sometimes the Bible is referred to as a sword. So we call these things sword drills, where you basically you set a verse and the first person to flip to the verse gets a point. We used to do this all the time. These are these are the types of things I grew up doing. I don't know if that was y'all. So I grew up very, very much in that. I was, I was, if if uh if the dictionary had uh if there was a picture next to adopted her parents' faith, it would be my picture. I was very much attached to the faith of my parents uh from uh up until I went to college. So what I what I had to unlearn is that my and I'm I'm kind of thinking through how to phrase this. Uh so I had to unlearn that my faith journey won't necessarily always lead me to where my parents landed.

SPEAKER_04 6:58

My Lord, talk about it.

SPEAKER_01 7:00

My faith journey may not always lead me to where my parents landed. And that it was a very hard lesson for me. And what I mean by that is not, you know, for me, I think mostly but in as far as maybe things that I believe we might disagree in some things, which is totally okay. Christians disagree all the time. And there are some things that I grew up in that I don't necessarily think are totally accurate now that maybe one or both of my parents may be like, I disagree with you, right? And so I had to learn that that was okay. And it was very much tested in college. So I'm gonna tell the story, Quinn has heard this story.

SPEAKER_03 7:44

Um and wait, which story are you about to tell? I got a couple on the I got a couple I could tell.

SPEAKER_00 7:53

I know you do.

SPEAKER_03 7:54

And that I've been telling, actually.

SPEAKER_00 7:56

Well, what's the story you can tell? Go ahead and see what it's like.

SPEAKER_03 7:58

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You're gonna want to lead this conversation.

SPEAKER_00 8:02

No, no, no. I'm curious though. What story are you thinking of?

SPEAKER_03 8:05

That story when you locked in the room.

SPEAKER_00 8:07

Oh, oh, I won't go tell that one.

SPEAKER_01 8:14

I'll tell you that in person. Catch me in person, I'll tell you that one in person.

SPEAKER_03 8:17

Catch her in person and say, Ruth, do you know the Holy Ghost?

SPEAKER_00 8:21

Yeah, tell me, no, catch me in person, catch me in person. I'm not doing that on the air.

SPEAKER_01 8:25

Um, but I did I will tell a story. Um I I was uh and Quita mentioned this um some in her when she shared what she had to unlearn in the last episode, is being really impacted by her friends. Uh I was very much impacted by my friends in college. Uh the first way I was impacted was because I didn't have a car. And so you have to understand, we don't have a car. You are uh forced to go where they go. You know what I'm saying? I have to I, you know, so I grew up in a traditional uh black Baptist church, and then I grew up um uh in a multi-ethnic community, um uh Presbyterian church. So I got all kinds of experiences that's kind of wrapped up in me. But what I did grow up in was a charismatic community. So you know, and for those of you that are that don't know what that is, right? Uh that's essentially when I speak of that, I'm specifically talking about communities that really um had had more emphasis, not not the most emphasis, but just more emphasis than I was used to on uh speaking in tongues and prophetic words and um those types of like um what's the word I'm looking for? Um what's the word I'm looking for?

SPEAKER_03 9:50

Pentecostal, y'all. Yeah, Pentecostal, yeah. That kind of Pentecostal leaning, not the denomination.

SPEAKER_01 9:55

Yeah, Pentecostal leaning. Um anyway, that's what I mean. So hopefully that made sense. I wasn't used to that. When I got to college, I was much more exposed to that than I ever had been. And I was supposed to that in two different churches, and so there were some things that I had to wrestle with theologically around how I grew up versus what I was experiencing there. The biggest rub I had, if I'm honest, wasn't necessarily a theological rub, mostly because I wasn't all that like I wasn't I wasn't at the point where I was like, I'm I wasn't a Bible scholar or anything like that. So I didn't really, I I knew what I read, and I read to understand some things, but the biggest thing that scared me about that was that I didn't think it lined with what my parents lined up. And so I was really nervous about that. And it it had me stuck for a while. Uh, and I I spent a lot of time wrestling with that idea of what happens when the experiences I'm having with God might not land me in the place that I feel like my parents taught me, or that the the places that my parents were um a part of or in leadership of had had taught me. What happens? What do I do with that? And that that had that really wrecked me for a while. Like it wrecked me for a while to the point where I had to, I mean, I had to come just face to face with some things and uh talk to them about how to uh talk to them about like, hey, this is kind of what I think, this is what I believe. Um and that was really hard. Unlearning that your your your journey may not land you where your parents landed. It doesn't mean that God's not walking with you. And that's where I had to really have a deeper trust that just because you have some disagreements with your parents doesn't mean God isn't with you. It is your walk, it is your journey. You've got to wrestle with these things, not you gotta wrestle with these things. It doesn't mean that you also have to wrestle with them. You it's okay. Like it's okay. So anyway, I don't know. That that's one of the things I've had to unlearn. And to this day, there's just some things that I am I don't that I don't embrace to the level my parents do. Uh, that that there are things that they don't they don't embrace the way I do, um, you know, and we make each other better as a result of it. And for some of you, that might be confusing because it's like, okay, and I I will even say beyond parent and child, just the idea of I get this a lot with people who are probably like on the fence of Christianity or you know, like I, you know, I'm kind of a Christian, but not really. And one of the reasons because man, yeah, how are there so many different beliefs as a denomination? Like, shouldn't it all just be one thing? Like, how do you just what why why is there so much uh seeming division? So there's and that that that can be a really difficult thing to understand and of itself, and also at no time in the world did any group of people agree on everything. Like, so Christianity is not um is Christians are no different, right? There are some certain core things and core beliefs that in order to have the name Christian, you have to have, but there are some things that are kind of just exploratory, honestly. You just have to you just have to be willing to go through that process, and different people land at different places, and that's okay. So that so that's that's a that's a difficult, sometimes can be hard to get to grab. Quita said it in in the in the episode before and just repeated it here. The idea of discipline and and and kind of building that skill of discipline will really help with that tension, because part of that discipline is studying and and being willing to understand, being willing to go deeper than just your experience.

SPEAKER_03 14:33

Yeah. Because I think I think what's important is understanding that like it wasn't a fly by night like change, right? Like, and I think that there was an honor for like, you know, like my parents raised me in the church. My parents raised me as a believer, and I am not leaving that. Like you did not leave God to go find God, right? Like you developed your own relationship with God, and in so doing, learned a different side of God, learned what you needed from God to continue moving forward in your journey with God. Um, it was not a I put something down. Um, it was I picked up I picked up more understanding. And I think that you did a beautiful job of carrying that to your parents and saying, hey, this is this is what I've come to know and learn and understand about God. And I and I think even in the disagreement there, that there is a respect. And there's also just the um just the acknowledgement that they are watching you and that they're I think that, you know, I'm not a parent yet, but I mentor a lot of people, but you get to a point where you start learning from them, you know, and I think that there are things that your parents have learned. I can't speak for them, but I love them. Hello. Um, but you know, I think that there are things that you have learned from that they are learning from you through your walk, just as you've learned from them by watching their walk. Sure. You know, it's interesting because I was like, I don't know if I'm gonna have anything to add to this, but I do. Um because I had kind of the uh a very different experience. Um

Changing My Major to Religion

SPEAKER_03 16:26

I was just a fair junior in college. It was the first, it was the day before fall semester junior year began. I was sitting on my bed. Well, no, I went to go visit my advisor. I was a psychology major. I went to go visit my advisor. Uh, yeah, you see where this is going? I I went to go visit my advisor and I was telling her, girl, I'm so excited. I was really cool with my psychology advisor. Shout out to Aaron Hahn. I'm still really cool. Aaron Hahn, Dr. Ponteri, like all of my psych uh people at Furman were the bomb. Right. And so I was sitting in her office and she, I was gonna take this class on autism, and I was super hype about it to learn about all of the different things. And she gave me the book. She was like, You ain't even gotta buy these books. Here go the books. I was like, Thank you, girl, because I ain't want to buy them books. Um, but and I was so excited about being a psych major. I had, you know, at Furman, I was a pretty good student until I got to them psychology classes. Like I have all A's and B's on my uh on my on my transcript, except for psychology. I got a C plus. I took three psychology classes, got a C plus in every single one of them, but that's neither here nor there. And so I'm really hype about, you know, starting my junior year as a psych major. That night, friends, I go to my room, I'm sitting on my bed, and I got like some paper spread out because I'm like, okay, this is my syllabus for this class, and this is where this class is gonna be. And I'm just like setting myself up, and I hear the, I hear the Lord say to me, because by that time in my walk, I really knew the voice of God. And I heard the Lord say to me, You're not gonna be a psychology major. And I was like, cool with me, because I'm about to, I'm close to failing these classes every time I take one. So the Lord is like showing me psychology is not the path for you, daughter. I have another plan. And I'm like, absolutely, Lord. And um, let's let's try something else because this isn't working. And I remember I went to the computer and I pulled up the majors at Fermin, and I'm looking up and down the like computer screen, and I'm like, I could be an English major, I'm a pretty good writer, that could really hit. Um, I could be a sociology major because that's what everybody was doing. They was leaving psychology, which was difficult, and going to sociology. I was like, I could do that, I could do anthropology, you know what I'm saying? And the I just kept feeling a nah, nah. And I would look at religion and I was like, I'm not gonna be no religion major. So, but sociology though, Lord, they say that's easier, and that could still get me through my to my destiny of being a social worker, and I'm looking and I see religion, and I'm like, uh-uh. And then I'm like, and I was stuck on English for a while. I was like, I'm a really good writer, Lord. I write poetry, I can write short stories, I can write long stories, I can write essays, I can write, I can write uh research papers, and then I saw religion, and it's like religion was looking at me, and I was looking at religion. And I literally, because I was very dramatic at the time, I literally got up because I started crying and I got my stuff, and I walked in my car and I just started driving around campus and and crying. Like I was like, Lord, are you trying to make me a pastor? What religion major? Right. And I just remember like that being a turning point in my journey. And I called my mom and I said, Mom, now I just to give a little bit more background. I'm a first generation college student. You know, they like Queen of made it out the hood, you know. So I I didn't come from the hood, but Queida made it out, you know. Come from the country, it's very different. I just wanted to be clear. That's true, that's true. Blackwood, B Wood. Okay, that's enough on Blackwood, not too much, not too much, right? But I I just remember like calling my mom and being like, ah, like mama, I'm changing my major. And I know she was like, oh, good, because maybe she's going to like be a doctor, because everybody in my family wanted me to be a doctor. And I was like, I'm changing my major to religion. And the first thing my mama said was, What you gonna do with that? And I was like, I don't know. The Lord just told me to change my major to religion. And and that's and my mama was like, but what kind of job, what kind of future, like what why would you be a religion major? And I had no explanation, I had no real narrative to give her other than I was following God, and that I had heard the voice of God, which, and again, I went to, you know, family that believes in God, loves God, but they weren't the voice of God told you to do what? No, the voice of God told you to get get a degree that's gonna get you a job. I know that's what the that's what my God would have told you. I don't know who you hearing out here, but you know, it was there was like for me a a fundamental like I felt like I was like, okay, Chquity, you out here on this faith journey by yourself. Yeah. And everybody thought that my life was gonna end. You know, my uncle would tell me, You're gonna be president of the United States. And, you know, I had told everybody in my family I was gonna be a doctor or a counselor. Or something that was gonna make some money. There you go. You know, and you know, when I when I went and said my faith journey has led me to change my career journey, that was when a line was drawn. That's you know, everybody was like, Oh, that's real cute. Yeah, you know, Jaquita knows the Lord. Yeah, she loved the Lord. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, she loved the Lord. Wait a minute, religion major. Hold on, you have now gone too far. And being out there on my own and feeling so misunderstood, you know, and feeling and and it's one thing to feel misunderstood when you have a strong conviction about what you're doing. You know, when you're like, this is my purpose and my destiny, you know. I didn't know until I started the religion classes. I remember my first religion class was uh ancient Israelite prophets. And I went in that class, shut up, Ruth. I went in that class, and the very first day when they said, turn to the book of Jeremiah, and they started reading out of the Bible in the class. I said, it's like everything in me just like fireworks. Like I was like, this is my stuff. Like this is it for me. But I I had to take like that step of faith, I had to take without the backing of my family. Yeah, nobody understood. And I've had to take many a steps that nobody understood, but now they look at me and I think that they have a greater grasp of what I couldn't explain at the time.

SPEAKER_02 23:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 23:41

Like I couldn't, I couldn't get everyone to understand where God had me. But when, but when God started walking me through, like when I went to divinity school, like we didn't even know that was a thing. I had to ask my professors. I was like, hey, what do religion majors do? What what do we do when we graduate from here? And they was like, we go to divinity school or seminary. I said, Oh, okay. I said, um, I said, what school did y'all go to? Because I literally knew nothing. They was like, oh, we went to Vanderbilt. Okay, sign me up. Will you write me a recommendation letter to go to Vanderbilt? Like, I had no idea. Like I was taking it one step at a time. And as God unveiled it to me and made it more clear to me, I was able to make it more clear to my family. You know, and I think that there may be some people like me who, you know, it's not that you had to disagree with your family. It's that you had to make a, you had to take a walk that literally nobody understood. And you, you know, but it, you know, where I am now and who I am now, you know, it is, it has been every bit worthwhile. And I I now see myself as as, you know, I'm taking everybody with me on this journey, you know. But it was um, it was a it was a rough start.

SPEAKER_01 25:01

So that I I think that's such a good um, I think a lot of people, I get a lot of young, younger people who have the the the relationship with faith. And I I just came back from a workshop. I'm in this leadership development uh uh cohort. And we just did a workshop where um one of the topics was discipleship with young people and just kind of like how do you, you know, what is your discipleship with young people look like? And so I uh one of the things we were talking about is just how a lot of young people's faith is shaped because of their experience with their parents in some form or fashion, right? Uh and that that can either be a positive or negative experience. One of the things that I I I I will I will also kind of as a point B that I had to unlearn and I yeah, I had to unlearn about that is that your parents don't own you. And that's a really difficult that's not something we're used to. When we think about ourselves, we think of ourselves as belonging to our parents. You don't, you don't belong to your parents. You were actually not your parents' idea. Uh you were God's idea.

SPEAKER_03 26:24

Preach here, Ruth Abigail.

SPEAKER_01 26:26

Preach. You were got you were God's idea. So God is you're God's not your parents. But your parents are stewards of you. They they are they are here to steward over what God has given them to take care of up until a point. And then you go back, you your relationship with your creator begins at the point um after your parents have stewarded in that after that stewardship season. There is a point where stewardship season of your parents ends. And that's a really difficult thing for us to understand and to even admit, and even parents to to to be okay with, right? There is that tension. And, you know, those of us that, especially those of us that go away, um, you know, after if you if you have if you left your parents' house uh and you've now you're out into the world, you're experiencing all this stuff. And like you said, Quita, you have a an uh epiphany that your family just cannot get behind simply because they cannot understand why you would do that. There's no under there's no understanding of what doesn't make any sense. But in that moment, you decided I'm I'm going to I'm I'm gonna move forward with my creator and not you know not my parents, not because I don't love them, but because they don't own me. I have I began to under you, you know, you begin to understand I belong to God. I don't I don't belong to my parents. They just took care of me up until a certain point. That's something that I I I had to unlearn and it's okay to it is okay to get to that point. And I think the thing that really I see a lot of younger people struggle with when you're starting that journey of your uh kind of adulthood and coming from up under the stewardship of your parents is feeling the responsibility of making of feeling the responsibility of not making them feel insignificant.

Journey to Differentiation and Purpose

SPEAKER_02 28:52

You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 28:52

Like you don't you don't want to make your pay your pam parents, your family feel insignificant. Okay, I'm gone, forget y'all, and nor is that what we're saying. However, it it can be much harder to do that when your family has such a tight grip and hold over you. And I'll be honest, I don't like that's something I'm I'll be I'm grateful for. My my my parents didn't do that, like they didn't they wanted us to go and they let us go. I think they had the same that same understanding. But there are those that have their parents have a really tight grip for whatever reason. And it can be really challenging to separate yourself when you feel like you are moving differently than they did. That's in your faith walk, that could be in your uh your relationships, that could be in in a lot of different things, your work, career choices, all that stuff. So Quino, what would you what would you say from your experience, you know, that what would you say you do with that? Like when it feels like, and I'm not saying this was the case with your with your family, but you had you probably had a different, I mean, I feel like it was closer to that than mine. Like, so when you have, when there's feel like there's this responsibility that and there's this maybe a stronger grip to you and your story that you have to pull away from, how do you do that? Like what did you what did you do?

SPEAKER_03 30:30

Yeah, so one thing you learn about like just like being in like research or like in higher ed is that what they love doing is taking ordinary words and making a big deal of it. Um, and so there's uh it's not necessarily an ordinary word, but the word that I got stuck on when I was at Vanderbilt was differentiation and how it is the process by which you establish yourself as a young adult, right? And there's a process to it, right? There's a surrender to it. There is a, you know, you have to really come to terms with who you were and who you're becoming. And you have to give yourself the space to do that because this is a walk that is building you as an individual and not necessarily you as an appendage to your family, right? This is this is a you and God walk. And I think that even when we look at biblical characters, they had moments when they were with their families, and then they have moments when they were called out for a moment of differentiation. And you have to know when you've come to that point where God is calling me to something. Abraham, Jacob, um um, Joseph, um, Moses, right? There is a moment when your walk will become different from what you may have experienced before. And it is going to require a level of trust. It's going to require a level of surrender. It's going to require um a level of dedication to learning more about who you are and who God is. I remember when I graduated from divinity school, I was 25 and I came back to Greenville because I love my church. Shout out to my church. Um and I came back and I remembered, but I was at a point of differentiation. I was at a point where I felt like no one understood me, where I couldn't explain to people who I was, and I was very afraid, like really just riddled with fear. And I remember I sat on the couch and the Lord told me to write down 10 things that I really liked about myself, and I could only write three, right? Part of the part of the act of differentiation, of really coming into the fullness of who you are, even despite other people not understanding or agreeing, is about you spending time with the with God to be able to write at least 10 things that you know and love about yourself on a piece of paper. At the time, I could only write three. And it it really stressed me out because I had, and they were like really simple. I was like, I'm smart, I'm funny, and I love people. And the Lord was like, that is not all of who you are. How can you really love you if you don't really know you? And so I started praying and I said, Lord, show me who I am. And the Lord started giving me more words about who I am. He said, You are uh an intercessor, you are a prophetic voice, you are a teaching voice, you are the, you know, and he started telling me who I was, and he started telling me what my gifts were and what my strengths were and the purpose behind the process. Because if all I'm presenting to my family is the process, hey guys, I changed my major to religion and I'm going to divinity school, right? If all I can present them with is the process, then they will never be able to buy into my purpose. The reason why I don't get the same questions now that I got back then is because I showed them my purpose. Like here is the here was the profit of the process. Yeah, right. Here is what God was really doing all along. But you have to get to that point where you are are walking that walk for yourself and knowing that you are you are allowing God to give you the understanding that you need so that you can present to somebody, hey, here's the package that God put on the inside of me. I have more words for it now. I have more understanding for it now, right? And and you grow in that, right? I didn't have all the words when I first started, but the more I grew with God and the more God took me on my journey, on the journey to learning and becoming myself, the more I was able to share with others who I was. Um, and again, I was I was able to present them with purpose and not just process, but you can't do that until you go through process.

SPEAKER_01 35:19

That's good. That's that's good, Quito. So, all right, what's the uh what what's what's your um next unlearning journey, faith journey?

SPEAKER_03 35:32

So, you know, one thing that I learned in divinity school, right? Divinity

Unlearning Self-Righteousness and Embracing Love

SPEAKER_03 35:37

school, I always tell people, you know, like they ask me, like, how did you like being in divinity school? And I'm like, when I again, I didn't know nothing. I knew nothing. I was green. I really thought we was about to be in divinity school and we was about to be kumbayaing every night, like uh sitting around a fire pit with Bibles and talking about the goodness of the Lord. This is what I thought divinity school was going to be like. And when I got there, and I remember being in orientation, and somebody we were like going around introducing ourselves and and talking about what our hope for being in divinity school was. And one person said, Well, I am here hoping to find God because I haven't found him yet. And I remember we all looked at each other like, this ain't the place. Like, this do not go to divinity school saying you're going to find God. This ain't it. It ain't it. But I didn't know that yet, you know, and I remember being in that place um and and realizing that what I got from divinity school was number one, it helped me to give voice to my faith, right? It helped me to be able to articulate and share it, but it also really, really started breaking down like some of the some of the uh let's just call it self-righteousness, right? Like let's just call it like this uh this this legalistic version of myself I had created to say I'm holy, right? I'm righteous, I'm saved, right? And and this is what I was presenting to this world. Like, and and the thing that I had to unlearn after my 20s was that the only way to show people God was to present a perfect version of myself. That I had to I had to preach through perfection, right? And I had to unlearn this idea that um that perfection equaled righteousness, or that perfection, which again, self-righteousness, because none of us was perfect, and you trying to put a cover over your imperfections or over your weaknesses does not help to bring people closer to God. And the way that I learned this is because again, in divinity school, uh, I thought I was gonna, I was coming there to be with people who believed like I believed and who knew God like I knew God, and who were just like the Bible is right and everything else is wrong. Like I thought I was going to to people who shared these same sentiments. And that is not, um, I love Vanderbilt. I loved all my professors, I love the friends that I made there, but that is not what I experienced. I got there. I said, Oh Lord, you didn't put me on the battlefield. Like I thought I was coming here to a safe place, but this place is dangerous. It is, it is theologically dangerous. Um, and I remember because I had so much judgment of everyone that was around me because they did not think like I thought, and I kept trying to present like I gotta present this picture of perfection to them. You know, I gotta show them the things that I don't do. I don't listen to this music and I don't drink that and I don't do this and I don't do that. I gotta show them this because they're they're living lives that you know is displeasing to God. But but I remember I was standing on the balcony. I worked at the music library at Vanderbilt. Um, I always had a job at somebody's library. I don't know what was what I was uh going through in that season, but I worked at a music library. I was on my 10-minute break, honey, and I walked to a little balcony and I was standing out on the balcony just looking out over the campus, and I remember the Lord told me, He said, You have to see people the way that I see them. And he was like, You cannot continue to judge them until without being able to see them properly. And I felt so convicted because all I was judging people off of was their behavior, was the things that they said that they did, the things that they said that they believed, everything that in my eyes seemed so wrong. And I was stuck on it. I was just like, these people is wearing me out, Lord. And you know, I was I was really having an Elijah moment. Like I was standing on the mountain, and I was like, Lord, don't nobody know you but me, you know, and I'm the only one, I'm the only one out here.

SPEAKER_01 40:24

I can attest to this version of Jaquita. Whatever. Because me and Quita would talk just about every day while she was at Vanderbilt. And when I tell you, she would go in every day.

SPEAKER_03 40:39

Not too much. They would stress me out. We'd be in it was it was a hard place to be, though, because I mean I learned again, I learned so much, but we would be we'd be in class, and somebody talked about how they don't believe the Bible. I was like, I'm sick of it. I'm sick of it, you know, and so it was, but it was God pulling me back and saying, You see this as the worst of people. But it you want to know what it really did is that it pulled me back into my gifting, because my gifting really is to see the best in people, right? But I was in my own way, right? And so when, and this was my first year there, the Lord, the Lord pulled me all the way together, honey. Like I left there and I was like, let me humble myself, yeah, right. But it was just that idea that like my self-righteousness made me holy, right? My belief in my own righteousness, because that's really what self-righteousness is, right? It's your belief that you are more righteous, more this, more that than the other person. And it was actually what I thought was making me holy was preventing me from actually being able to operate in the in the in the spirit with which God really wanted me to, right? Because you can have what is it, uh, faith, hope, and charity. The greatest of these is is love. Like without love, clanging symbols, right? And you cannot love people if you see yourself as better than them.

SPEAKER_01 42:17

Man.

SPEAKER_03 42:18

If you see yourself as above them. Vanderbilt taught me how to really love people. Um, and not just love them in a ooey-goooey way, but love them in an enduring way, in a way that related to them and and didn't um and didn't um um exile them or are or make them feel abandoned, but in a way that that joined in with them. Um, and that that really was something that I had to learn was that my self-righteousness did not make me holy. And that I needed to, that I did not have to have to present perfection, but that all I had to do was continue to present. You know, it was there that I think that I started talking through what God was teaching me through my mistakes and through like what I was having to work through, versus teaching from a, well, you know, guys, all you have to do is just take that word of God and and apply it. And you know, you'll be better. You'll be better. That's what I did. You know, it was like, hey, no, I really struggled and God caught me and taught me and pushed me, and and and preaching from a place of of surrender versus a place of, you know, I'm already there.

SPEAKER_01 43:45

Yeah. So a couple of thoughts are coming to my mind. Uh I'll still, this is the freshest one. So when I was 23, I think 23 or 24, is when I started doing youth ministry. And um there's something about having to one of the things that we we were at the organization I was with, we had to have a Bible study. And uh this was, you know, with I was had teenage, teenage girls middle school was where I was at that time. And uh I was essentially tasked with explaining um scripture and ultimately, you know, the gospel and what a relationship with Jesus looked like to 12, 13-year-olds who really weren't been around church but not really invested in it and didn't know a whole lot, and you know, not too different than 12 or 13-year-olds that you might know right now. So it this being charged with teaching something is a great way to discover where you are on it.

SPEAKER_04 44:55

My Lord.

SPEAKER_01 44:56

So one of the things that I had to um unlearn in regards to that is I had to, I had a self-righteous problem too. It looked a little different than Quitas, but it was there. I I felt I I know I was arrogant, especially um I if you uh if you go to if you go to 2 Corinthians 12, um there Paul describes how he um saw how he describes the reality of who he was, and then he then diminishes that reality because of who God is. In other words, this is who Paul was like I I am uh you know, and I'm not reading it, so I'm paraphrasing. But I'm the fair, I was a top, top-level Pharisee. I know the word of God, I was a major teacher, I was a leader in the Jewish community, all these things. I'm all these things, and all those things are real, but when I understand who God is, that's way more than who I am, and I need to bring myself down so that I can then uh make him more um make him greater than me. He's greater than me. So anyway, if you if you you want to read that, just second Corinthians 12 is what I'm talking about. And for me, that I resonated with that because I resonate with Paul's understanding of himself. What I had to get to that point, so that's that's where my self-righteousness came from, is like, you know, I got this resume of Christianity that I I just have just because I was born into it, and I got this. Like I'm I'm cool, like I got it. And so I went into that's the mentality I had when I started going into youth ministry. And then I had to begin to break down what this was, and when I started doing that, I realized oh shoot, I how can I how can I try to convince a 12-year-old that they need Jesus what I'm not sure I believe I do. And that began to wreck me. And so one of the things that when I was uh when I was when I was in my 20s, the thing that helped me to get closer to God was to get closer to my sin. I know that sounds weird. When I say closer, I don't mean do more of it. But I mean let me let me I don't mean do more of it. But what I do mean is I had to come to, and let me back up. When I say sin, I mean the things that I I've done that I know were wrong or that I was convicted of that said you really probably shouldn't be doing this, or these are things that you should be doing that you're not doing. That's what I mean when I say that. So instead of focusing on just the things that um, you know, what I was focusing on was the things that I was proud of. When I began to be more in tune with the things that I wasn't proud of, is when I began to get closer to God because I began to understand more of how I needed God because there were actually things I wasn't proud of. One of the things that I wasn't proud of about myself was my lack of vulnerability, my the walls that I had built up, the fear that I had.

SPEAKER_03 48:36

She had them walls, y'all. She had them.

SPEAKER_01 48:38

Chill out, chill out, chill out, chill out, chill out. Chill out. The fear, the fears that I had of people getting to know me because I didn't want people to see certain parts of me, right? The um, you know, the the dis the mistrust I had uh in the fact that other people could love me the way I felt like I needed to be loved. Um there were so that's just one example. I had built up all these walls, I had an image problem. I wanted people to think of me a certain way, and I wanted to present myself a certain way, and so that's what I did. But I didn't do it in an authentic way. It was what is the image I can present that's going to get me the most accolades, that's going to get me the most, you know, likes from other people. Who is that with Abigail? Because that's the one that I want into the world. Um, and I I worked harder on my image than I did understanding my identity.

SPEAKER_03 49:39

And that was on Wait a minute, wait a minute, don't brush past that. That was good. Identity versus image, my Lord.

SPEAKER_01 49:52

So that was that was yeah, and I I mean I that those are and I know that those are things that younger people struggle with today because I hear it. Like it's been said, like you know, and the thing that helped me to understand, and so anyway, when you have to tell it to somebody else, when you're charged with pouring into younger, when you're charged with pouring into other people, it then puts the mirror back on you and what you have to say. And then in my next season of of my vocation, my career, I was then charged with training people how to do what I did. So there's just these levels of teaching. And it was like at every level of teaching, I had to then face what I really what I believed and how it applied to me. Because for too many years, I was I was very good at articulating the what uh of the faith, but I wasn't good at sharing my why of it. And I needed to that, and so I I was challenged with that. So I think if you are, if that's something you struggle with, this self-righteous kind of mentality, then I would challenge you to get more in touch with the things you are not proud of. Stop hiding them from yourself and stop hiding them from God, and stop hiding them from other people because that's where accountability comes in. Don't be afraid to be held accountable because you're being authentic. Um and allow that to happen, allow allow for other people, trusted people to speak into your life to see things that you aren't proud of and then help to speak that into you. When Queen, real talk, Quita, Queen and I are obviously we're different. Y'all can tell that from the cup of the podcast. I feel like we get more like as we get older than um well, we come a little closer, right? We come a little closer. So balance, amen.

Rooting Out Self-Righteousness Through Love

SPEAKER_01 51:57

So um when when we were in college, I was I would say in college for us, we were the furthest apart on some things. And so when Quida would call me when she was at Vanderbilt and would go in about some of the things that she was experiencing at Divinity School, it would rise up in me to basically be like, man, you're being judgmental. There was the I would we would I would say Quida, like you have to like why are you we would we would have these back and forths, did we not? We had these back and forths.

SPEAKER_03 52:33

Yeah, it's where the but what you theme of our friendship you said what you say it's the theme of our friendship.

SPEAKER_01 52:40

It is, it's the theme of our friendship. But one of the things that I I think was so good, this is an example, Queda was not afraid to be honest about where she was, therefore, and even though she may not have wanted to hear it, she opened herself up to a different perspective that may have challenged that part of her, that it was needed to be challenged. And so that's like be don't don't try to cover up the things that might may not be as um attractive about who you are when you're when you're that young. Like don't don't cover it up, allow for God to work work it out through the context of relationship and accountability. Um so yeah, I just that that that just that really yeah, what you said just kind of hit me in that regard. Um I had to really come to grips with who I was, and and you have to get to the point where you really believe that you need God. And and when you're self-righteous, you don't believe you need God. You you think you are enough. And you know, that's that's a very dangerous place to be. And I didn't even realize how dangerous the of the place I was. I didn't realize how how in danger I was when I was thinking that.

SPEAKER_03 53:54

I think something that is important to note is that for me, self-righteousness and for many others was actually a symptom of my insecurity. Right. And so like I was using this idea of being like holy and better and you know, righteous to cover up the things that I didn't like about myself or that I wasn't confident in or that I didn't feel were were good points about myself, you know. And I think a lot of times people do that, like they they they go into they're looking to find something to boost themselves up with. And for me, self-righteousness was that, especially when I first got the Vanderbilt. Um, but when I understood that like really what I was doing was covering up insecurity, I could address what the real issues were, yeah, right? Because I was, I was, I was, you know, a lot of times we deal with the with the fruit, but we don't deal with the root. And you need to spend some time. This is something that I I tell every young adult, young leader, amen, because that's what we said we would call y'all, uh, that I tell every young leader that I mentor is that you need to spend some time with God and really get to the root. Ask God, show me what led to this belief I have. Show me what led I'm Lord, I'm noticing that I have this type of behavior. When I get in these types of situations, I respond like this. Lord, I'm noticing that I'm triggered by this. And a lot of times we have not sat down with God to really like unpack what happened. Where did this begin? Because it didn't begin the moment you noticed it. That's just when you, that's just when you saw it. But God has always known that that thing is there, and you have to go back to the root of it and ask God to start digging up and addressing the roots of of why things were, because for me, self-righteousness was the product of the root of insecurity. And that root of insecurity was something that I had to deal with for years. Um, and that because sometimes the insecurity came out as self-righteousness, other times it came from an overwhelming sense of guilt and shame. Anytime I messed up, I felt like I had disappointed God, disappointed everybody, and that there was no recovering from it. And it took years for me to learn that I had to, I had to deal with me. And I had to, I had to come to I had to come to terms with me. And again, I cannot stress it enough. You you have to go through the through the process of learning to love you.

SPEAKER_01 57:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 57:04

Um flaws and all.

SPEAKER_01 57:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 57:06

Sin and all. Well, you know, we don't love sin. Amen. Um, but you have to, you know, I try to be clear. Try to be clear. You don't want nobody out there. My minister license is right behind me. I don't want nobody going out saying Minister Ross told them to love sin. I did not. But you need to love you. And I think that there that only comes through the realization that God loves you. When I was in college, you know, when I was learning to hear God's voice, all I would hear every single day for two years, literally, I'm not even joking, was the Lord saying, uh, was the Lord basically saying, you know, rest in my love. And I was like, what does that mean? I'm resting, Lord. I love you, Lord. I know you love me. But the Lord was saying, rest in it. Like when we treat God like, like, you know, that He can't overcome our sin, or that like, or that the blood of Jesus isn't enough, that our belief isn't enough, that like, you know, like God is saying, like, literally rest in it so that you can see more. You're so frenzied, you're so anxious, you're so nervous, you're so, you know, high strung that you are missing the opportunity to really experience God because you're trying so hard to be right and to be perfect and to present perfection. But God is saying, Let me love you. Yeah, let me love you. And that was definitely something in my 20s. I promise you, the Lord said that to me every day for two years. And it wasn't until I got probably around 28 to early 30s that I was like, oh, I get it, you know. But um, but it's it's it's it's so important that we that we learn to to trust God and not just trust God to do the big things outside of us. Because I think we trust, like when we think about trusting God, we think about trusting God with purpose and with my finances and with you know this and with that. Trust God with you. Trust God with you. Trust God with you.

SPEAKER_01 59:26

Trust God with the real you. With the real you, not not your representative that you want to be. Not your representative. Like, trust God with the real you. Like that, that's God, God is not afraid of the real you. Like He knows, He already knows. Trust Him with it. Um, and that kind of leads into, I think, my last uh kind of thing I've had to unlearn. But before I say that, I I do want to I want to say this. For those of you that self-righteousness is not something that you struggle with, but you have friends that you know, and the people and there are people in the whether friends or c or colleagues or people that you're around, you know my man, they and it just it bothers you, right? Because you like, and they think they so they so much better, and they always trying to tell me this and tell me they don't understand. Remember and what Quida said, and I will echo that most of that comes from us from insecurity, from pain, from hurt. Have some grace for the self-righteous people in your life. They are struggling.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:36

Hold on, wait, because I feel like I have really pain in myself to be like, no, no, no, no, no. Like I was just like rude or wrong. Like I was just like, you know. But I think sometimes I think it's important that you under also understand that like just because your self-righteousness isn't loud doesn't mean it's not there.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:58

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:59

Like when you talk about dealing with the real you, don't just don't, it's not deal with the you that nobody else knows about. Deal with your self-righteous thoughts, deal with your self-righteous opinions. You know what I'm saying? And not even just self-righteous, whatever it is for you, right, you still have to surrender it on the altar. You still have to ask God to help you to work through it, right? Whether it's um some levels of betrayal of deception, or if you have issues with um a trust, or if you have issues with insecurity, which we've been talking about, or pride. And whatever it is, whatever it is, you still have to surrender it, even if it's quiet, even if no one's called you out on it yet. Let me give y'all a pro tip. Pro tip. If you deal with it with God by yourself, you won't have to get called out on it in public. Okay. If you go to God, be like, God, if you could just, uh, Lord, and I'm not saying that you you're not gonna catch everything. You're not gonna catch everything, but if you keep walking with the Lord and say, Lord, if you show me, I the one scripture I used to pray all the time, I ain't prayed it in a long time, though. I ain't lying to you, was um, I think it's Psalm 130, it might be Psalm 139. I have to look it up, but it says, test the reins of my heart, Lord, and see if there be any wicked way in me. I used to pray that prayer all the time, Lord. Test the reins of my heart, Lord, and you tell me, you tell me, Lord, if there's any wicked way in me, and we can work this out, me and you, Jesus, right? But um I might have unlearned praying that scripture. I need to jaquita.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:53

So that's good because speaking of prayer, and this is kind of where I wanted to uh the my unlearning around prayer is really simple. Uh you have we one thing I've had to unlearn is that God can't handle my honest prayers and brutally honest prayers, like prayers even that implicate that prayers that even may indicate is what the word I'm looking for, that I don't believe things that I've said I've believed, right? Prayers that might indicate that I'm not interested in changing. Uh prayers that might indicate that um I'm angry, I'm upset, prayers that might indicate that I really don't feel like I'm I I genuinely feel like I am uh pretty awesome and I don't really need to change, right? You know what I'm saying? Those are the types of things that God wants to hear.

Overcoming Fear and False Humility

SPEAKER_01 1:04:07

And to to what Queen was saying, you I don't believe that you can get to the point where you're praying that that prayer of psalm without first leveling getting to the level of this is what's really, this is who I really am. If you can't articulate that, praying that prayer of show me, you aren't really open to God showing you. So he might show you and you'll miss it because you you haven't gotten to the point to where you're really, it's one thing to pray it, it's another thing to really like be open to the answer. And you can't be open to the answer of that if you have not already brought to God the honesty that you've been hiding. Because he will reveal other stuff if you ask him to. But if you are hiding what you there are some things you already know, there are some things I already knew that I just I was hiding. And so I could pray that prayer all day long. I'm not really open to hearing an answer until I get to the point where I'm I'm willing to share with God what I already know that I'm hiding from him. And he don't gotta reveal some stuff to you, some stuff, some stuff you know, right? So, you know, like I said earlier, for me, one of those things was like it was fear around being vulnerable, had these walls up. And I had to be, I had to tell God, I don't want these walls down. I want to keep my walls, don't take them down. And here's why I want to keep my walls. I don't, I don't want to do it, right? Like that's those are the types of things that I had to learn how to pray. And that did not come until much later. Like it came like my my later 20s, um, mid 30s is like when that really became real for me. Most of My 20s, I just I just kept them up. Um, but you know, I was there were certain things that I was just afraid of, right? And and and I was afraid of my own success, to be honest with you. I was afraid that I would take that and run with it. That if I was honest about the fact that I might be good at certain things, that I would abandon God. I that's what I believed about me. So I didn't really want to accept. Um I didn't want to accept some of those things that I knew were true. So I I put walls up of false humility to say, no, no, no, no, no. I'm I can't do that. I'm not good at that. Like that's not something that no, I'm not a leader, no, I'm no I'm not good at speaking, no, I'm not good at being in front of people. No, I don't want to do that. Um, you know, and and so I I said those things, which I didn't really believe, but I felt like if I didn't say it, I would go left and abandon God if I had any success in that. I don't know what yours is. That was a big one for me, and God literally um sent people in my life who didn't even know me very well. They were at my house for the first time, and they they said to me, they said, You are a leader. You are a leader, and that I was I was like, I don't even know where that came from. Like, what do you what where does that even come? We weren't talking about it, and they said and they just started going in, and then I that was that was the point where it's like either you take it from them or we're gonna have to go to another level here of exposure because you are just resisting this. And so being honest with God, like in through prayer, like like Quita said, like one of the ways you can do that is uh one of the ways that you can avoid being like out in the public, take care of it in prayer, like really take care of it in prayer, and so I think that was one of the things I had to unlearn is just like that God can't handle my brutal honesty. Um and I know and I and I know at least I know that I feel like I've heard that a lot. I heard that a lot. Like be I just be honest with God, He can handle your stuff, He can handle your stuff. I you can hear it. It's one thing to actually like do it. Um one of the thing, one of the things I'm unlearning even right now is that God can't, God will still be around when I'm inconsistent. Because right now I be inconsistent a lot in my prayer life. And if I'm just being real, it's not as consistent as it used to be. And there are moments sometimes I delay coming back to the presence of God because I'm unsure that he'll be there, because I just have been away for so long. And that is something I've had to unlearn and continue to unlearn. No, no, no, no, no. God is always gonna be there. Don't delay going back because you don't you don't believe that he will. Um, and so that you just have to know like that's an honest moment, it's real. And don't just commit to honesty, commit to honesty um in in your relationship with God. And even if you wouldn't say you had a relationship with God, I think this is the beautiful thing about prayer. It opens that door. Um it opens the door, right? Even if it feels weird, you talking to the wall, you talk into the ceiling, you talk into the air. And I've told some of my young people this before like try it. Just try it. It might it's gonna feel like you talking to yourself, but if there's any small thing in you that believes that something might hear it, just try it. And then, you know, commit yourself, like it opens yourself up to a possibility of of discovering something that you didn't even, you're not even sure is real. But that's it's a great entry point. Um, and so that that's whether you have a relationship with God or you're not entirely sure about it, but something might be something might be out there. I'm just gonna try it. Just try it.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:29

My Lord. Little evangelists. I'm gonna start calling you missionary.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:34

Don't do that, missionary garden.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:36

Don't do that. She wants to talk to y'all about how to find God, how to really come to learn them. That was good.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:46

Nah, that's real. That's I've had to unlearn that. Have you had to unlearn that?

SPEAKER_03 1:10:51

Yeah, I think that um mine was different, you know. I I was just riddled with fear. Like, fear, I think, has been like my arch nemesis. Like, um, and what God recently showed me was that my fear is really tied to like my not wanting to be disappointed and not wanting to be disappointing. Like, and so I have ran from, you know, I tell people I got my Master of Divinity in 2012, right? In 2012, got my degree, came back to Greenville to be at my church. I got licensed in 2019, seven years later, right? And like, I think by that time my pastor was like, so do you, do you not want to be a minister? What are you doing? Like, and I was just like, I don't want to go until I I didn't want to go until I knew I could do it without making mistakes.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:01

And I also was like, I'll go when I hear the voice of the Lord tell me to go. Um, even though he told me to go to divinity school, he told me to come back. Like, girl, you what the come on. But I remember the Lord told me it was time for me to get off the bench. Meaning, you already on the team, you just won't go play. Like we call, we called your number a few times, and you won't come out onto the court. Get off the friggin' bench, you know. And so I, for me, there's always my delay has always been in believing that God would use me.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:43

And in believing that like my gifts and my whatever, whatever fit the moment are fit that that I can be useful. And also, there still be some times I'll be like, do I know what I'm doing? I don't really. But the Lord knows, okay? And trusting that because I like to, I it really is tied to my like need for control. I like feeling like I have control. And and when you are a person that operates in spiritual things, you never have control. Like you never have it, you know, and I've I've had to learn so many lessons that all point back to the same fact that God, it is God, it is God, it is God that holds the reins of your life, of your call, of your gifts. It is God's purpose, it is God's plan. Like even in ministry, it is not because I studied so hard. I didn't preach well because I studied so hard. If y'all only knew, right? I pre. And it's not that I don't be studying when I have to preach, it's that I be waiting for the Lord to talk, and sometimes he just be sitting there like, and I be like, hey Lord, hey, it's me again. Hi, Jaquita. Uh just wanted to just coming back, seeing if you had that word for Sunday. I ain't know what you, I ain't know if you was ready to release it because you ain't really said much, but you know, it's in two days and everything like that. And I've been, I've been on my face. It ain't, you know, it ain't like I ain't been coming to the throne room, but uh, and the Lord moving it entirely how he wants to move, you know, and really surrendering to that. Um, and uh I I have really had to unlearn that God that God needs me, right? Like, like there was just because the idea that God needs me kept me riddled with fear that I would not be able to live up to what God needed. But when I learned that God wants me instead, like it gave me it it gave me a different mindset towards it to saying that like the Lord, I am a willing vessel and that God can fill me and I can pour out, but that it is not, this is not a, you know, I'm sorry, I just watched the movie Harriet. I highly recommend everybody watch that. That woman knew the Lord. Shout out to Harriet Tubman. That woman knew the Lord. I mean, yeah, I knew that, but watching the movie, I was like, yo, shit.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:26

She's a great movie, man.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:27

Yeah. I don't know what took me so long to watch it. I was I was honestly tired of slave movies. Uh we're coming up on Juneteenth, so happy Juneteenth. Y'all are gonna be, you know, y'all might be watching this after Juneteenth, but celebrate again. All right. But you know, I I just I was just so afraid. Like, Harriet would have been, she'd have pulled the gun out on me. She'd have been like, girl, bring your tail. We're going to freedom land. Harriet would not have fooled up with me because I'd have been like, girl, I'm scared. I, you know, I thought I'd be able to do it, but God showing me that like it is always me. Like, I it is always me, and I'm so happy to have you with me, but it is always me.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:16

Yeah. Right.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:17

And and that God's love is not predicated upon my ability to perform. But that God just loves me. And he's not, and you know, like I get so nervous because I want to, again, I want to do it right. Like I want to preach right, I want to pray right, I want to give right. I want to whatever it is that I do, I want to do it right. And the Lord is like, if you want to do it right, back up. If you want to do it right, scoot over and just let me go. Let me have at it. And I'd be like, oh, you know, because I thought, I honestly used to think that me doing it right meant that I spent 12 days in strict prayer and fasting. And yeah, you know, and sometimes it does require that. I'm not even playing, you know, where whatever the Lord leads you to do. But even if you did all of that, that don't make you right. Like that doesn't, that doesn't make, that doesn't like make your gift shine more. It is still the Lord.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:21

It is, it is, it is still God and what God wants, you don't, you don't, you don't have a say in how God wants to love his people. And in uh serving,

Encouraging Faith Journeys and Unlearning

SPEAKER_03 1:17:33

I learned so much more in serving and in growing in God and in like ministry. I've learned so much more because again, the weight of the assignment will cause you to to shift.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:47

Um, so so that you understand and know God more. But yeah, I had to unlearn that. I had to unlearn fear, I had to unlearn control, I had to unlearn thinking I was, you know, top-tier preaching over here. And it's like, all right, nah, girl, just back up. That's what the Lord said. The Lord said, back up, back up. And I said, okay, thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:09

Um, all right. Uh so I think we've sufficiently bared our souls. Um Yeah, that's enough of that. I think it's enough of that. So uh there's just we won't, we won't mention this again. No, I'm just joking.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:23

We we ha we might tell no one what you've heard here today, except tell everyone, actually. Tell everyone. Because what we need you to do, Ruth Abigail, what do we need the people to do?

SPEAKER_01 1:18:34

We need the people to like, to share, to comment, to subscribe, specifically on that share piece. Share this with people. Share think need to be encouraged by understanding that the faith is a journey and not just a moment and a decision. It's a journey. And it's you're gonna go through and you'll come out in different places at different times in your life, and that's okay. Um, so you know, we again we want to engage with you. Let us know. We we would love to know your stories. We would love to know um what uh what your, you know, what your journey has been like. Yeah. And we also want to encourage anyone who's hearing this and and is coming up with like more questions around their faith to seek out um guidance from uh people in your life. Maybe they are uh maybe it's maybe it is a local church. Maybe you're at a church and you've been in a church, but you've never were you've never been brave enough to ask certain questions or to engage in certain conversations. Find someone that you trust. If you don't have a local church, uh then maybe you have a friend who is on this journey too that you can talk about things with. Maybe you have a mentor, maybe it's your parents, maybe it's somebody in your family. But don't don't just like keep it inside. Like don't just wrestle with it in your head. Um find someone to share something with and unpack it because we do realize that some of this is some this could be some heavy stuff. This could be some things that uh can be kind of hard to grasp and can bring up certain things in your life and your past and your present that that you haven't dealt with, need to deal with, um, have kind of avoided. Just don't let it sit there. Like, don't don't let it sit there. Um, I have found that more off more times than not, God works through the people in my life to bring me to certain places in my faith journey. So like just watch out for those moments. So I would just encourage you to find somebody, it could be at the church you're at, if you don't have that, somebody in your life, you know, maybe it's your grandmother who you know love the Lord, you ain't talked to in a while.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:45

Praying, grandmother.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:46

I knew that I was I set you up for that.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:48

Hallelujah. Y'all, I can't wait to be somebody praying, grandma. You kind of bring that baby to me.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:54

Like you're not far from it.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:56

My Lord, I cannot wait.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:58

So anyway, just just just do that. Um, and man, that's it, y'all. We are, I will say, I was this is it. We are actually going to, I want you to be on the lookout for our very for our next series. Um, we've done certain series for it, like interview series where I have a guest on and we'll talk about something. We've done unlearning religion, we've done unlearning uh marriage and marriages, we've done unlearning, shoot, unlearning your personality. Uh, and I'm missing another one, but it's in the archives. Um, and this one we are going to do unlearning entrepreneurship. Why entrepreneurship? Because I don't think I go through a week where somebody doesn't say, I want to start a business or I want to start my own nonprofit. And most of the time I say, I don't know that you do. And so um I think it'd be really interesting to talk to people who have decided to go off and venture on their own and say, I'm gonna take responsibility for something, an idea that God has given me, or an idea that I I feel like has just landed into my head, and I want to build on it. That's a really, really difficult thing. So uh, and I find them to be the most interesting conversations. Like um uh entrepreneurs are pretty special people. And so that I think that's gonna be our next series. Unlearning entrepreneurship. And uh whether you're an entrepreneur or you have an entrepreneurial mind um that is uh maybe within the context of a of a job, this I think this could be really interesting for you to understand what are some things that people who have done it uh have had to unlearn and what are some things that you can unlearn in order to grow in that skill. So uh that'll be our next series. Be on the lookout for it in the next um few weeks. We will drop uh the episodes for that. So that is it. Let's keep unlearning together so that you can experience more freedom. Peace. Thank you once again for listening to the Unlearned Podcast. We would love to hear your comments and your feedback about the episode. Feel free to follow us on Facebook and Instagram and to let us know what you think. We're looking forward to the next time when we are able to unlearn together to move forward towards freedom. See you then.