Girls Gone Bible - Fake Faith (LIVE FROM VOUS CON) | Girls Gone Bible

Episode Date: July 12, 2024

hi ggbbbbb:) GGB LIVE FROM VOUS CONFRENCE! this will be our first live podcast ever! we hope you enjoy this conversation on real faith vs fake faith. we cover how important it is to make sure you are letting the Holy Spirit do a transformative work in your heart that lasts as opposed to just appearing to have a relationship with God and being concerned with how you are being perceived by others. we love you so much. Jesus loves you more. -Ang & Ari we love you guys so much. Jesus loves you more. -Ang & Ari if you’d like to support Girls Gone Bible 🙏🏻🕊️🤍 Paypal- https://www.paypal.me/girlsgonebibleinfo Venmo- https://www.venmo.com/u/girlsgonebible HEY WHILE WE'RE HERE. WOULD YOU BE ABLE TO RATE & LEAVE COMMENTS ON SPOTIFY & APPLE PODS. IT HELPS US. OK BYE NOW LOVE YOU

Come on, can we put our hands together for Angela and Ariel? Y'all are going to do amazing tonight. Thank you, thank you. Guys, is this on? Is mine on? Oh, mine's on too. Okay, guys. Thank you so much for coming.

First of all, thank you, Vu. Thank you, Pastor Rich. Thank you, Pastor DC. We were already going to come to VuCon ourselves, so when they asked us to come and be involved, Ari and I didn't even understand. We were like, why? We're so honored to be here, truly. I'm sitting here looking at all you guys, and I'm just like, this doesn't feel real.

We are so grateful for you guys. Thank you for having us. You know I cry every single podcast. I'll try not to cry tonight. You know me. Bye. Thank you for you know, I cry every single podcast. I'll try not to cry tonight You know me, but thank you guys. Oh man. How are you guys? You guys live here Miami is it I Think we're moving here. I'm not kidding here Should we? We love it here. We feel free free. We're out of the devil's pen in LA

Okay, so this is also gonna go on our channel later, so if you guys don't mind, we're gonna introduce ourselves. Hi guys, I'm Ange. And I'm Ari. And this is Girls Gone Bible. We are live at VUConn in Miami, Florida. We have a room full of the cutest people I've ever seen in my life. And Ari and I have been praying about tonight

for probably two months when we found out we were gonna come and speak. And this is our first time speaking at a church, pretty much, and as most of you know, if you know us at all, we didn't grow up in the church. We are only a year and a half saved, a few years saved. And so Ari and I were wondering, what could we talk to church people

about things that they don't know yet? Like we were running, so we've been praying and we've been praying. And we have come to the idea of today, we're gonna talk about fake faith. Yeah, yeah, we gotta do it. And so Ari and I have a unique perspective, I think, on faith in general, on Christianity, and on Jesus, because we didn't grow up in this. And so I think we have some things to share with you guys on what this has been like kind of coming from the outside looking in.

And yeah, anything else before we read? I think we're... Let's get into it. What story are we reading today? This is so cool. We're doing our podcast with all you guys. This is crazy. This is so crazy.

And I just want you guys to know that when Ari and I are nervous, we lose the ability to read, so good luck to us right now. Oh yeah. We laugh. You already know. You see it. When Ari and I are nervous, we lose the ability to read, so good luck to us right now. Oh yeah, we laugh. You already know, you see it. It's all we do. If we stumble, if we stumble, just, no we didn't. So we're going to read out of Acts chapter 5 today. And it's so funny because we had a friends and family lunch this morning

where Pastor Rich literally brought up the story of these two people, Ananias and Sapphira, and he was talking about how these are two people that you don't wanna be like, and you'll know why in a second, but he also preached a little message this morning on the pressure that we feel from the outside world to do big things, and the pressure that people are like,

it has to be big, it has to be big, what are you doing that's big? And it was so funny that he said that this morning because it spoke to exactly what we're gonna talk about today where God, there is so much impact and so much influence and so much importance in the little moments. And God works in obscurity all the time and so just because something

might not be big doesn't mean it's not impactful and God is way more concerned with the state of our heart our character our integrity than how we look and how we're perceived by the outside world and so and a nice sense of And so Ananias and Sapphira. This is a tough story. Let's jump into it. Why don't you read? But there was a certain man named Ananias who with his wife Sapphira sold some property. He brought part of the money to the apostles claiming that it was the full amount. And with his wife's consent. He kept the rest

Then Peter said Ananias why have you let Satan fill your heart? You lie to the Holy Spirit and you kept some of the money for yourself The property was yours to sell or not to sell as you wished and after selling it the money was also yours to give away How could you do a thing like this? You weren't lying to us, but to God. You wanna go? As soon as Ananias heard these words, he fell to the floor and died.

Everyone who heard about it was terrified. Then some young men got up, wrapped him in a sheet, and looked and took him out and buried him. About three hours later his wife came in not knowing what had happened. Peter asked her, Was this the price you and your husband received for your land? Yes, she replied. That was the price. And Peter said, how could the two of you even think of conspiring to test the Spirit of the Lord like this? The young men who buried your husband are outside the door and they're gonna carry you out too. Instantly she fell to the floor and died. When the young man came in and saw that she was dead,

they carried her out and buried her beside her husband. Great fear gripped the entire church and everyone else who heard and everyone else who heard what had happened. Can I pray really quick? Do you guys mind? Jesus we love you so much. We love you. We love you and we love that you are a God who's in the room with us right now. Jesus I ask that you open our hearts to receive your word. Give us interpretation and understanding of your word. And let these words that we read not just be information, but show us the revelation behind the things that we read, Jesus. I ask that you open the hearts of every single person

in this room and the ones that will be watching later. And that we will not leave here the same God, that you would instill in us a true, authentic, real spirit of faith. And that you would set our hearts on fire for you holy spirit let there be no limit to how much you can move here tonight and above all else do not let ari and i get in your way in jesus name i pray amen so this story of ananias and sephira it's a little intense and you i I know when I first read this I could

not understand why they died. I was like, I've lied. I think everyone's lied and God didn't punish us that way. But the thing about this specific situation is this whole message of dishonesty and greed, especially in the church is a really scary and damaging thing. And Ananias and Sapphira, they weren't punished. Their sin wasn't the fact that they withheld the money. It's that they lied to God and to his people saying that they gave all of the money. And when you lie to God and when you lie to his people and you're lying about your relationship with Jesus, you are doing something more than just lying.

All lying is bad, but when you lie about Jesus, or you lie about how generous you are, or you lie about the integrity just to appear a certain way, you're deceiving the people of the church. And there's more weight to that than just lying to somebody because Jesus is involved at that point. And you're destroying the testimony of Jesus when you lie on his name in any way. And so...

Yeah, no, I agree. I think when you have the ambition to look good and to lie rather than having a pure heart, the enemy has you in a chokehold. I mean, that's just it. It's that simple. And I think that's exactly what happened. Some people read this story and they'll accuse God of being way too harsh on Ananias and Sapphira.

And they'll be like, but God, the wrath was for the Old Testament. God is gracious and He's merciful. And that's true, He is. But I'm afraid that when we put too much emphasis on grace and mercy, we overlook the equally important part that God is holy. He is holy. And he hates sin. He hates sin today.

He hated it then, and he's always going to hate it because he doesn't change. And so that's what we're going to be talking about today, fake faith. So Hebrews 11.1, I think it's good to know what faith even is in biblical terms. Hebrews 11.1 says, now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. And here's the thing about faith, having faith in Jesus radically saved our lives, radically transformed our lives. And I imagine that if we had fake faith, a fake that is only for appearance and how it looks and how other people perceive us, and do we look good to the church, and can we

tell our mentors and our accountability problems that we're absolutely perfect, that brings no transformation. It cannot save you. You have to have real faith. Yeah. And how do you do that? You just draw near to God. I mean, we're close to God because we choose to be every single day.

And it changed us. You don't understand. We're two girls who come from the world, who were literally living in sin. We didn't understand. We didn't know. And we radically changed because we chose to give ourselves to Jesus. We drew near to him.

We had the humility to be like, I can't do this on my own, because truly we couldn't. We didn't understand, we didn't know. And honestly, we didn't have any mentors. We didn't have anyone in the church. We had to figure this thing out just her and I. It was literally just her and I trying to figure it out. But we had Jesus.

And he changed our hearts. We just had Jesus. And I just, I give so many people grace because I was one of those people who just, I grew up in a family who, I was just living of the world, I was in relationships, in my relationship I thought, how could I stay pure? That's where I found my love.

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right you guys, 50%. Here's the thing, Ari and I went from super sinner to super saved. Yeah. Super saved. And like she said, we came from the world. And I think that it's been a really interesting journey for Ari and I because we have come into our relationship with Jesus truly where each other's community. We have more a community now, thank God. But like for a while, we were all each other had in the Bible. We let Jesus do a transformative work in our hearts because it's only the Spirit of God that could bring a transformation in you that is actually sustainable where you don't go back. And I think the reason that we wanted to even talk about this

today is because we came into this world and Ari and I show us for better or for worse authentically ourselves. We don't know how to like, we have to be honest because it will crush us. If we tried coming up here being like, yeah, we're perfect and we have always been good Christians. No, we haven't. No, we haven't. And we're able to like shamelessly be honest about where we're at because we didn't grow up in a culture that forces these things on us. And I think so many people when you grow up in church,

or even when you're heavily involved in the church, which is the most beautiful thing, that we are heavily involved in church and we love it so much, and community is the most important thing, but the issue is when you let your transformation come because the people around you are putting pressure on you. And so we come into this situation where Ari and I have no mentors, like she said. We don't have that much community,

but God is changing us from the inside out and we're laying sin down left and right and never picking it back up again. And then we're watching our friends who have been in this their whole lives, who have 10 accountability partners, who are suffering severely and they're struggling and they don't tell anybody about it. And the reason that they're struggling is because they can't, because they have to look perfect. And it's so damaging for

these people and so we just want to encourage everybody here to be honest about where you're at. And this whole culture of like having to be perfect, it's not realistic. None of us are. Every single person in this room is struggling with something. And honestly, there's nothing more pleasing to God than being like laying it out, being raw. When you are raw and real and you bring it to his feet and you're like, God, I don't know how to do this.

And I was like that when I had to, I just wanna take it back real quick because, so I think I was still in John. I just started reading the Bible. She was teaching me. Two months later, we start this podcast. We didn't even know what a podcast was, but it just happened really fast.

And I'm trying to, I had this longing to be so close to God because he saved my life. I almost didn't make it, guys. And he saved my life. I mean, some of you guys know my story. I was just dead. And he took me out of the pit. And it was almost like I had a second chance again.

And then I'm helping you guys, I'm sitting here and I'm getting the we're getting the questions hey can you guys speak about sin and like that feeling in my heart I was just like I it was like staring at me in the face and I just knew and that's what happens like that godly sorrow when you get close to Jesus and and you just you just can't live wrong and then I'll never forget it it's it was like I we went to we've met some Christian friends and we went to dinner with them and they didn't know what was going on in our hearts because we knew we were we were feeling

we were feeling some type of way and they just looked at us and they said you know you can't really call yourself a Christian and have one foot in and one were feeling some type of way. And they just looked at us and they said, you know, you can't really call yourself a Christian and have one foot in and one foot out. And I look at Angela and my whole body went numb. This is right when we started the podcast. We get in the car and I just break down. And I didn't know whether I wanted to hate that girl or say thank you to that girl Because you know, it's like it's it's a tough thing to face Yeah, you know and then that's when and then I'm sitting there and I'm thinking and I wake up and I said to myself God doesn't need me. He gave me a second chance

He doesn't need me, you know And he's he's he's he's saved's saved my life, and I have one foot in and one foot out, and I'm sitting there, and I'm so close to God, and I'm saturated in prayer every day, and I'm in my Bible, yet I'm still feeling such a lack of peace. I have an immense amount of anxiety every day. I still didn't feel good inside.

Why? Because of the sin, guys, because of the sin. And that was the day I just, I had that godly sorrow and the fear of the Lord hit me. Amen. And if you don't have a healthy fear of God, you cannot be in close relationship with him. We cannot walk around not fearing him.

And the fear of the Lord is being terrified to be away from him. When he found me where I was at and he saved me, I was terrified of being away from him. And so having the fear of the Lord is not running from him, it's running to Him. Yeah. Okay? And that's the day that He, after that, I swear you're talking to two girls that had

trailer mouths, we come from the East Coast, every other word out of my family's mouth is a swear word. So that's how we grew up. And you know, we grew up in sin and it was just one day something broke. We both got on our knees, we said, God one day something broke. We both got on our knees. We said, God, we need you. We need to change our ways. And he did, you guys.

And it changed my life. And I could be in the darkest storm, and I still have that peace that surpasses all understanding. Why? Because I'm walking in the will of God. I walk in holiness now. And there's so many young people that are sitting here that just don't know how to. They're like, oh, well, you know, I don't know if I can.

Yes, you can draw near to him. He will change the desires of your heart. And it's going to change your life. Yeah, yeah. Amen. Amen. Fear of the Lord is everything. You can't do this walk without fearing God. And it wasn't until God gave us something, I almost, because I grew up Catholic, so I loved Jesus my whole life. And it literally didn't change the way that I lived my life at all. There was nothing about me that reflected my love for Jesus,

because I was lacking one very important thing and it was the fear of God. And it wasn't until he put me in a position, he gave me something that I love more than anything in the world and that's Girl's Gone Bible. He gave me this, he put me in this position and we had to go face to face, me and God. And he literally said to me, either you rise

to the occasion or this isn't yours anymore. And it was the first moment where I no longer, I had to lay down the, sometimes when you're walking in this inauthenticity in your relationship with Jesus, you can almost lie to yourself. And I'm sitting here being like, I love Jesus so much and I'm such a good person,

so I can do this, this, and this. And you let yourself get away with all these things because you think that he's so gracious. I'm sorry, but God hates sin and it is the way that it is here. Now in the Old Testament, in the New Testament, he's the same God. And so I was faced with myself to be like, do I actually love Jesus? It says in scripture that God is light and there is no darkness in him at all. So you are lying to yourself if you say you have fellowship with God and you go on continuing

living in spiritual darkness. And so I'm sitting here living in spiritual darkness until he, and God's grace most of the time is so confrontational and sometimes it hurts when he makes us face things. And sometimes he has to bring us to a place of humility in a way that we don't want to get there, but sometimes it's the only way. And I had to face myself and I had to face everything in my life and he literally gave me an ultimatum almost. He said, I'm giving you one chance, either you be the person that I'm calling you to

be or don't but why would you not? And this is our whole issue that we want to talk about today. Is that so many of us are doing things for the perception of others. We're spending all our time looking like we have a great relationship with God, posting Bible verses on the internet, like posting our quiet time with Jesus instead of actually cultivating a relationship with him.

He loves us so much, we're sitting here pretending to have a relationship with the one who died for us. He died so we could have a relationship with him. He loves us so much. We're sitting here pretending to have a relationship with the one who died for us. He died so we could have a relationship with him. And we're lying about it instead of actually having one. It is so backwards. And it hurts me to think about all the people who are suffering because they're people pleasing and they're thinking about others and they're thinking about what other people think Instead of understanding that we live for the applause of one and our reward is not here, but in heaven

I only care about what God thinks actually I don't care at all what anybody thinks about my relationship with Jesus as long as it's pure as long as we're in right standing That's all that matters to me. And so there's, we can talk about sanctification for a second. Sanctification means to be set apart or to be made holy. And there's positional sanctification and then there's lifelong sanctification. Upon being saved, you are positionally sanctified. You are immediately set apart.

You are God's child. You are son or daughter of Jesus Christ. And then the really fun part is the lifelong sanctification where God throughout our whole lives is gonna try and make us holy. And he's gonna prune us and he's gonna sanctify us. And it says in John 15 that he cuts off the branches that don't produce fruit and the ones that do produce fruit, he prunes them to make sure that they bear more fruit.

And if we remain in him, he will remain in us and we will bear fruit only if we are remaining in him. And so our sanctification and pruning process has been so painful. It does. Don't think it's going to be easy. sanctification and pruning process has been so painful. It has been the craziest year of our lives to have lived a certain way our whole life in the world and then to be like there's so much I have to change and it's so funny because you reach a level of holiness and you think you're good and you think you got it all and then God's like, oh, I'm gonna show you all this that you didn't even know was in there. It's so fun. I love you. It's so fun. Yeah. No, I just I just want to say it one more time because I want to get it

through to you. I we literally feel like we crack the code. Finding Jesus is one thing but actually walking in the will of him is another thing. Amen. And I just, I need you guys to hear us when we say this. I just, I didn't understand why I lived my whole life with no peace. You know how I always talk about that feeling in your stomach where it's so unsettled,

where you don't feel good, where you're with your friends, but you're still riddled with anxiety The minute we laid it all down you guys you think it's going to be so hard. It's really not Yeah, it's not you're gonna look back at your old self and you're gonna be like How was I live in that way? you know and I just I want us all to get to this place of purity, of pleasing God, even when it's hard. Is it hard to always be obedient? No, it's not.

Let's be real, it's hard some days, but it's worth it. You will, that's when you're in the light. You're the light you guys want you guys know about the light the bread of life That's it when you're walking in holiness, and I just want us all to get there I want to talk about it every single time we do a podcast because that I we cracked the code The minute we laid it down you guys that's when our lives changed. That's why we're that's when we were in the light down you guys that's when our lives change that's why we're that's when we were in the light amen amen Ari and I have like I've learned we've been learning so much recently God is teaching us so much just about speaking in out of places and being with people in the room and it's a so different

than having a podcast and it's so fun and it's it's it's we're honored to be able to do it but he's been teaching me so much recently by taking me to these small churches. I was in Florida last weekend and we basically went and we spoke at all these little churches. There's like minimum 20 people to 50 people sometimes. Like it's so intimate. And what God really taught me was that

it's so easy to hide behind production. It's so easy to hide behind cameras and lights and music and good lighting and all of these things. Like it really is so easy. It's so easy to evoke an emotion instead of actually cultivating an environment where the Holy Spirit can come dwell and bring transformation. And it was such a grounding experience and so humbling and the best way of being like, I have, like all that matters, you guys, is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, I feel like people don't even talk about

the Holy Spirit enough. Why do we ignore Him? Jesus literally said, it's actually to your benefit if I go because I'm gonna give you the Holy Spirit. I'm gonna give you the helper who's gonna talk to you. He's the spirit of counsel and wisdom. He's gonna talk to you, convict you, comfort you. The Holy Spirit is my world. He's my best friend. I don't do things because the people around me tell me I should. I do it because of the Spirit of God that lives within me that wants this for me that cares and I

It says that the pure and heart will see God. I am so desperate to see God. I need him We have the beautiful thing about not coming from this and then coming and talking on a stage is we know That if we came up here and God wasn't with us It's all done in vain there is no transformation and there is no point in any of it. We are so dependent on God's Spirit and I pray that we never know enough that we think that we don't need Him anymore. We started the podcast because we wanted people to have an accurate view of who God is. We wanted them to know that God is our,

not only our Father, but Jesus is our Savior and the Holy Spirit is our friend. And we wanted them to know about the Holy Spirit empowerment and the healing, the miraculous healing of Jesus, the way that He heals today, just like He did in the Old Testament, in the New Testament, in Bible times. That healing is available to every person in this room.

And I think about how truly from the bottom of my heart, I know that God didn't create all of this, Create Girls Gone Bible because Ari and I are special. And I'm not saying that to be humble, it is the God-honest truth because we're not, we weren't equipped, we weren't qualified, we weren't ready, but I think God knew that we would be honest.

And why are we able to be honest? Because we don't have outside voices telling us that we have to be perfect because we're not. And we never will be, and our past isn't. But you know why we show up honest and we're not ashamed to talk about where we've been, where we're at and everything in between? Because we believe that God is a Redeemer.

And so if you're walking around with all of this shame and all of this guilt and your secret sin and you can't tell anyone and you have 10 mentors, but not a single one of them know what's even going on in your life, you have to ask yourself, do I believe that God is who He says He is? Do I believe He's a Redeemer? Because He either He is or He isn't. Either you're made new in Christ or you're not. Either His grace is sufficient or it's not. You have to ask yourself because the truth is it is, He is and you are made new and your past is not what defines you and you can move on and you can be honest and let me tell you, when you go and be honest and bring people your sin that you think is so bad, they're literally gonna go, oh, I went through the same thing.

Oh, thank God, I'm not the only one. Yeah. Literally. Yeah, I think that's one of the biggest things is we live in shame. I know I did. I looked at Angela when we first started. I said, I can't do this. I have too much of a past. Like, I was really living in. I said I can't do this. I have too much of a past Like I was really living of the world. I can't do this

So as we talk about purity tonight, and we talked to you about all this I don't want you guys to feel like oh man No, no, this is just we're just telling you guys that we were there too And this is how it changed us and I want you guys to to live in the light and feel good and not live in anxiety and fear and feeling shame and guilt all day. That's not how God wants us to live. He loves us so much, you know? And so, yeah.

It's a please, if anything, I hope that this message is encouraging to know that you have freedom in Jesus. You are not, it's, if you're living in this world of shame and secrecy because you think that you can't be open about where you're at or what's going on, Jesus came to set you free. The opposite of what church and church community should be doing is making you feel in bondage to shame. Like this should be the opposite.

Shame is bye-bye on the cross with Jesus. It is bondage to shame. Like this should be the opposite. Shame is bye bye on the cross with Jesus. It is not yours to carry. Let that break off of you right now because we're not carrying that anymore. We have to enter a season of honesty, of being real with ourselves, being real with God. Because you will never have the transformation that you desire, that God desires for you

if you're letting shame hold you back. Shame is the most poisonous, toxic thing. You will never become who God wants you to be if you're in shame. Shame literally doesn't let you propel. It doesn't let you move forward. You're stuck where you are because you're not good enough. I don't feel good enough. My past is too bad. No it's not. No it's not. My life changed when I stopped hiding. Honestly, he was right there like this. And I told him everything all day. And he was right there like this. And he's right there like this for you guys, too.

You have nothing to hide and nothing to be ashamed of. You are not your past. No, you're not. That's my girl. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. Do you tend to compare your life to others? Does social media play a part in that? What do you do when you get caught up in wishing your life looked like someone else's?

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Thank you Better Help for sponsoring this video. I always think about Matthew 721. It says, not everyone who calls out to me, Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my father in heaven will enter. I think about that all the time because at one point I grew up Catholic and so if you know anything about Catholicism you like you know

Jesus you love Jesus but you don't really read the Bible I don't know why so I didn't start reading the Bible until I was 25 and my entire world I wish that people could have been there when I opened a Bible for the first time. Literally my entire world opened up and I fell in love with the scriptures that day and I'm in love with them today. I'm in awe of the scriptures. It's my life. If we could leave you with anything, it's read the Bible every single day of your life. It is the bread and water that we live on. It is the only thing. It is the only thing that matters. And I just think about I loved Jesus my whole life and I would have gotten to heaven and I literally would have

been like, but Lord, Lord, I prophesied in your name. I casted out demons in your name. I told everyone how much I love you in your name, even though I didn't even know the simple gospel. I told everyone how much I loved you and he's literally he would have said to me depart from me I never knew you. I was somebody that Jesus would have said depart from me I never knew you and I thought I knew him. So I just want you guys to know Jesus. I know that sounds simple but know him. He's worthy to be known. He wants to know you. If you're ever lacking purpose, just know that you have one purpose. It is to know Jesus and to make him known.

He created you to have a relationship with him. And when you don't have that intimate relationship, all the people in the world, our hearts are burdened for them. The ones who are depressed and unwell and empty and lost because they have a God-sized hole in their heart that will never be filled by anything except our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ because He's the one who created them to be in relationship with Him. And I, if you guys don't know anything about my story, I came from a really, really dark, dark, Jesus met me at a dark spot. I started suffering severely with my mental health when I got into my twenties. I was experiencing severe panic disorder, anxiety, really bad OCD that I was later diagnosed with, intrusive thoughts.

The scariest place that I could have been was in my own head. It was so scary and I felt in danger being in my own mind. I had no control. I had completely lost control over my mind. And then to make matters worse, the only thing that made me feel better was alcohol. So I then got physically and emotionally dependent on alcohol. I was only 23 years old and my life was over. If Jesus hadn't come through, my life was over. I would not have made it. And so the reason why I experienced my relationship with Jesus so intimately is because I feel the weight of what he did in my life. My intensity of the way that I love him matches the severity of what he saved me from. of what he saved me from. And if it weren't for Jesus, I wouldn't be sitting here right now.

And the greatest gift that he has ever given me is a haunting feeling in my chest every day of my life of what he did, of what he did for me 2,000 years ago on a cross, the cross that killed my Savior, that came as a servant and a king who came down as a baby in the dirt, died on the cross for my sins so I could later be freed and delivered from darkness that I put myself in. I didn't deserve to be saved the way that I was and I wake up every single morning with a fire in my chest because of what he did. The weight, the gravity of the gospel

and the weight of the cross sits on my chest every day of my life. And I pray that he never gives me relief because I never wanna forget what he did in my life. And this is something that every single one of you can experience if you have been in a prolonged season of numbness or dryness. It is time to take a stand against it today and say, I am not settling for this. This is not what he died for.

That's right. I deserve more than this. He wants all of you. He wants all of you. He wants your heart. But like Ari said, it says in Scripture, draw near to me and I will draw near to you. We take initiative. He's standing there waiting for your heart, but you have to give it to him. And whatever is standing in the way of you and Jesus, in the way of your relationship with Jesus,

you tear it down. You get rid of it. Whatever it is, I don't care what it is. And I wanna speak to anyone who's experienced church hurt. Today is the day you drop it right now and you don't take it with you. You can no longer use it as an excuse. I'm not diminishing your pain or what happened to you, but enough is enough. Whoever hurt you is still hurting you today

if you're letting them affect your relationship with Jesus. Let it all go, whatever's standing in between you and him. I love you so much. That was good. I love you guys so much. Yeah, no, I'm just so glad you said that about the Bible. I mean, I looked at her when I first met Angela and I said, do you think I should get on medication? My mental health is so bad. My thoughts are so overpowering. I literally, death would typically scare someone and it felt like a solution for me.

I'm not kidding you. I was so mentally tormented, I couldn't bear another day. And I looked at her and I said, because we had watched The Chosen and I saw Mary Magdalene and it was like watching myself through a screen and watching this woman hold her head on the ground. She's getting tortured by demons

and I truly felt like that was me. And then I see Jesus save her and cast out seven demons and I said to myself, if he could do this with her, why can't he do this with me? I made my mental health, my mental illness, the thoughts, the depression, I made it my identity. I thought, I'm only gonna get worse, this is never gonna get better.

And as I'm watching this woman and how he saved her through the screen, I'm thinking, I think I might have a chance. And you know, we started reading the Bible and she sat there with me every single day and we started with John and let me tell you it renewed my mind. He healed me you guys. I have such a passion for mental health. I know what it's like to feel like you're not going to make it through. I know what depression feels like.

I know what anxiety feels like. I know what heartbreak feels like all too well. Where someone just takes your heart and rips it out of your chest and you are just lost. You have no identity. You think it's only gonna get worse. You guys, it's coming from a girl who literally had the worst depression

and mental health you could ever see. I wish you guys could have seen me a year and a half ago. You wouldn't have recognized me. He changed my life. He saved me. He healed me. He redeemed me without any medication. And I am no different from any one of you guys.

And He will do the same. All you have to do is have a humility to open up your heart to him to say, Jesus, I need you. Help me. And I promise you, you will be different. He will change your life. Change your life. Change your life.

And it's got to be authentic, you guys. It's got to be authentic. Come to him real. Come to him real. God doesn't need some perfect version of you. I wish you guys could hear our prayers. We pray together all the time. It's a mess. Like we literally, I talk to him like he's like actually my friend. And you know if you're struggling with numbness or dryness or you're not connecting to God

or you're not giving him your time the way that you should, ask him, pray that he will help you love him the way that he deserves. When there are moments where I am not loving God properly, I just ask him, I say, God, I need help. I'm not loving you the way that you deserve. Help me, show me, open my heart, soften my heart. He literally can answer all of these questions, everything that is standing between you guys, that's getting in the way of your relationship, bring it to him. Be honest to him. He loves it and he's going to answer those prayers and he's going to honor your honesty

and your authenticity. He loves you guys so much. Don't settle for a surface relationship with God or God forbid just having the appearance of having a relationship with God. We can't do that anymore. We're in the end times, you guys, not to get super crazy, but it's getting serious. It's really intense out there. And not only does God need you, he needs you to go get everybody else.

It's time to get up in your faith, to make your faith powerful, receive Holy Spirit boldness, power, power from the Holy Spirit to not only have a full relationship with God, but then to go teach other people, go make disciples. It's time. And it doesn't need to be on a podcast. We say this all the time. Ministry is in beauty. Ministry is in your workplace.

Ministry is anywhere you are. Everywhere. Ministry is where your feet are. Ministry is where your feet are. Ministry is where your family is. Ministry is literally the random person that is on the side of the road that you can talk to and just ask them questions and talk to them about Jesus. That's another thing I want to talk about with the, well, around fake faith. You know, we can talk the talk talk but we need to walk the walk and it's start and it really we have as Christians a responsibility to care for

others. When we see someone in need it is our responsibility to help them. We are not just to look at someone and say oh I'll be praying for you. No we need to be helping people. There are people suffering and it starts with you you see someone suffering you help them you be a hand for them there's a scripture that says in James 2 verse 14 what good is it my brothers and sisters if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds can such faith save them suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, go in peace, keep warm,

and well fed, but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, it is dead. OK, I'm serious, guys. We have to be helping others. We're suffering. We need to be there for others and another thing, it's so funny, I had a friend the other day who's trying to get into faith but you know what she said to me? She said,

I'm scared. I look at the comments sometimes that people leave under your photos. I don't want, I don't want to be shamed like that. I don't want to be judged like that. That is, we, The gossip and shame and just saying mean things, that is not a person of God. We are not to judge others. None of us are perfect in this room. We all have a past and don't ever forget that. So anytime, I know sometimes we can be talking with friends and whatever, but we need to check ourselves really quick because that's a really big sin. And it doesn't feel good.

And God doesn't like that. He doesn't like gossip. He doesn't like deceit. And He doesn't like judgment. We are as Christians to accept people, to look at them in a place of love and light and say, man, I was once there. Man, I wonder what they went through. Amen. We don't know what people's past are.

Some people have been sexually abused. Some people just didn't grow up in a family where they know better. So we have to give people grace and compassion. Amen. It says in scripture, what does it say? What does it say? We do this all the time.

It says something along the lines of, Jesus said, whatever you do for the least of these is what you do for me. Everyone's like, oh yeah, thank you guys. And so it's so true. It's about the things that you do in private. It's about the moments. You know what the most miraculous things I've ever seen

have been in a room with me and probably one or two other people, the biggest moves of God I've ever seen that weren't televised, that weren't on YouTube, that weren't made into a 30-second reel on Instagram. Those are the most powerful things I've ever seen God do. It's all about the moments in obscurity. These, this is amazing, this is so beautiful, we're so grateful to God, but what you do in private, what you do for the least of us, the people who can do nothing for you, that's what God looks down at least of us, the people who can do nothing for you.

That's what God looks down at and is like, good job, my good and faithful servant. You are making me proud. And so, you know. So yeah. We don't know how to end anything. Are we doing a Q&A? You guys should have seen it. Hang on, hang on.

Are we going to do a Q&A? It's all up to you. I think we have a few minutes left, so if you want to do a few questions, maybe three questions. You guys want to do questions, you want to go home, it's midnight. Hit it. We won't be offended. We can do a few, we can do a few. All righty. I'm going to get some of the ladies in here first, first, first. All right. We'll come right here.

What's your name? Hi, I'm Danielle. Thank you so much for being here, ladies. I would love to hear something that has made you smile that Jesus has done for you lately that's made you smile or something you're looking forward to. It's beautiful. Thank you. Honestly, you know what makes me smile? You guys.

I am not kidding. I look around at you guys and it doesn't feel real. I'm just like, how did we create the most loyal? You guys have given us so much grace, the love you give us. Why do you think we're able to bleed out and feel so safe when we speak on our past? Because you guys accept us exactly for who we are. I don't think you guys understand. You think we're helping you. You help us. Anytime Angela and I have a tough day, we think about you guys. We're

like, well if all else fails, we have them. Literally. No, literally. You guys are the joy of our lives. Really. I mean, we have the most loyal family. You guys are literally, we call you our family. You are. You are. And we just, when I think about what makes me smile, honestly, it's you guys. I swear. Yeah.

All right. We have one more back here. Hi guys. My name is Natalie. So I do have a question for you guys. How do you deal with the passive or aggressive resistance with having a platform and talking about Jesus, having a past, not being the ideal image of God, right?

Because we all have this idea of what it should look like, but that's not the accuracy. So how do you guys handle that criticism and that resistance? Great. Great question. Thank you for your question, and Danielle, you're so cute. Thank you so much. Yeah, you are.

I love your earrings. I think when we first started I used to let it get to me. Ari's really good about, she just doesn't care at all. And she's really good about it. I was a little bit more like, I would let people speak into my faith and my relationship with Jesus. And I did, there were moments where I was so confused because it's something so intimate and vulnerable,

your relationship with God, and that having people speak into it was so hard at first. But then over time, I just leaned into God more. And it was actually one of the greatest learning lessons with God of teaching me and humbling me to the point where I cannot live for the approval of other people because it'll kill me. It'll kill me.

I will never do anything important for God if I'm worried about what people are going to say because there are literally bots that aren't real people that will say something. You know what I mean? Like you can't, you can't. It's between me and Jesus, if I know that we're good, if I know my heart is pure and I'm in right standing with him and my fruit is good and I'm treating people the way that I should, that's all that matters to me. And so it's so easy to overcome that resistance

and it also makes it a lot easier when you understand when you're doing anything for Jesus understand there will be Opposition whether it's physical spiritual no matter what it is It's gonna manifest in some way and so we know that so when we receive opposition, we know we're doing something, right? Amen come on. Let's put our hands together for that Last question of the night it's from a man that's in the room so here you go. Hey Hari, my name is Carlos. First of all I just want to say thank you for what you do and to be honest everything that you said about having like intrusive thoughts and things

just in your mind I went through that. I almost was gonna kill myself the day I gave my life to Jesus but he broke that off and I came to him he gave me a fluttering heart and you know, I I Couldn't be more happier with him. Everything you said was true both for you You have like a pastor type of like care for you, bro Hey the way you talk like yeah, and you too you have this preacher talk to you. Um, I want to ask you, where did the name Girl's Gone Bible come from? And I wanted to ask you, what is the biggest struggle that you had before Jesus and after Jesus?

Yeah, first of all, I am so proud of you. I am so proud. Can we just all give a round of applause for them? Thank you, Charlotte. Thank you, Tanya. Thank you. Thank you. I am so proud of you. Wow, thank you for sharing that. I know that's not, I'm so proud of you.

How Girls Gone Bible, the name, we were in our first session, I could barely even form sentences, I was so nervous. I didn't even know the Bible. Can you imagine? and How and how oh our our producer right we said girls gone we were gonna do girls gone God Yeah, and our producer looked at us and he said oh no no it's gonna be girls gone Bible he said, oh no, no, no, it's gonna be girls gone Bible. We're like, that is genius.

That is genius. Thank you, Morgan. And then something that was my biggest struggle was my unworthiness. I didn't feel good. I didn't feel smart. I didn't feel equipped. I never, I never felt good enough growing up. I didn't, I didn't have Jesus. I didn't have Jesus.

I didn't know Jesus. I grew up in a really difficult household where I didn't have peace. When you don't have peace and you don't have hope, you don't feel good. And I carry that into my adulthood. And my whole life I'm putting my identity into men. I'm putting my identity into my career.

I thought, hey, maybe I'll find love in a man. Maybe I'll find, you know, I'll have that safety in my career in a man. And it only left me feeling empty. And so when I found Jesus, that peace and love and hope and rest that I had been searching for my whole life was right there all along. Amen. Amen. and hope and rest that I had been searching for my whole life was right there all along. Amen. Amen. Yeah.

My biggest struggle before Jesus was I have always struggled now looking back with OCD and a very addictive personality and obsessive compulsive thoughts and activities and habits and that has resulted in you know severe anxiety alcohol abuse disordered eating I mean you name it from this one thing has created so many obstacles in my life. And so that these were the things that were the things that plagued me every single day of my life before Jesus. And now after Jesus, I keep these things under my feet like this because of the blood of Jesus. And luckily, I have God to help me get through it every single day, but there are still things

that I struggle with. If I take one step away from Jesus, if I take one day out of the Bible, I am delivered from these things, but it's up to me to stay delivered. And so every single day I fight. I fight against my genetic predisposition in my mind to have these issues. And so I struggled with them before and I fight every day with Jesus fights for me with a little bit of my help every day to keep these things out of my life and out of my mind. Yeah.

Thank you ladies so much. Can we put our hands together for Ange and Ari? I just think it's fitting before we close if we just take a moment to pray and just praying for the room and then praying for you all. Thank you all for just sharing tonight. I believe that every single one of us were leaving better than the way that we came in and your testimonies and the way that you just broke down God's Word was just truly incredible. Come on. Let's pray heavenly father We just thank you for tonight. I thank you for every single person that is in this room Lord

I pray God that we will continue to seek you God that we will live out true faith God Lord I pray that the things that we do Lord will be only for you Lord that we would do it for the audience of one God I pray for every single person Lord whatever area that they're in Lord that They were realized that's their ministry God where we thank you for ang in Ari God We pray a hedge of protection over them God We pray Lord that as you will continue to enlarge their territory Lord and just allowing them to share their stories Lord their testimony Lord that you would just Continue using them Lord in a special way Lord that will bring you glory God so we just thank you for them God we

pray Lord that you would just continue being with them Lord and so we just give you this night God we seal it in your name in Jesus name we pray amen thank you ladies Thank you guys so much.