WHOA That's Good Podcast - God Loves Us BEFORE We 'Do' Anything! | Sadie Robertson Huff & Alicia Britt Chole

Episode Date: April 5, 2023

Sadie has been waiting for this conversation since she was 18 years old and was given a copy of Dr. Alicia Britt Chole's "Anonymous" — a book which Sadie says is the BEST book on social media. Alicia is a wife, mother, author, and former atheist who had an "unbelievable encounter with God" when she attended her first church service with a friend and says her beginning in Christ came from Him pursuing and finding her. Alicia encourages any singles out there to look for a man much like her own husband who has the fruit of the Spirit in his life, plus why we should value the "unseen" people in our lives just as much as others — don't mistake "unseen" for "unimportant!" Sadie and Alicia discuss what it means to "practice the presence of God" and how the truth that God is near to us is worth repeating to ourselves and others throughout our day. God IS near — He's not behind a curtain, He's not paused somewhere waiting for a certain thing, and He loves us before we "do" anything for Him! Plus, how differently would we live out our faith if we regularly confronted the weight of our sin and how we WILLFULLY sin against the Lord? And why we ALL need a mentor — but if you can find someone you can regularly meet with, that's an incredible blessing, so go after it!  https://nativedeo.com/whoa — Get 20% OFF your first order with code WHOA! https://give.cru.org/whoa or text WHOA to 71326 — Get a free copy of Sadie's book "Live on Purpose" with your gift! Get a 4-week trial, free postage, and a digital scale at https://www.stamps.com/whoa - Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What's up, fam? Welcome back to the world. That's good podcast. Happy Wednesday, everybody. Y'all, I am so excited for today and I know I say that a lot, but today I truly am excited because I read this woman's book when I was 18 years old and it literally changed my life. It was such a pivotal time of my life and I'm telling you it set me on a good trajectory for where I was going. Just reading the wisdom that she wrote. She has so many other books and so many great things to talk about. And I am so excited to have Alicia Britt, Shirley on the podcast today. Welcome to the world that's good podcast.

Oh, thank you so much. I am thrilled to be here. Thanks so much for the opportunity. Gosh, I'm so excited. I have to tell you so my mom is going to be hosting my podcast this summer while I'm on maternity leave and my mom had you as one of her guests that she was going to be interviewing. I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on. I'm like, I don't know. I think I might want to interview her. She's like, she's my friend. I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on. I'm like, I don't know. I think I might want to interview her. She's like, she's my friend. I'm like, but her book changed my life.

And so we had a battle for who was gonna get to interview you. So I'm thankful she let me take it since you and her get to talk all the time. Yes, I love your mom. She has such a beautiful, beautiful heart. So grateful that you spend time with both of you. Yeah, she's sweet Well, I got to ask you the question that everybody gets asked their first time on the Willetska podcast and that is what is the best piece of advice You've ever been given which I know is a very loaded question. You probably have so much advice stored up

I see many books behind you, but give us a good piece of advice stored up. I see many books behind you, but give us a good piece of advice. Yes, well, I'm glad that I had a heads up about this one because my mind would have just reeled. There's so many different things that people have offered to me over the years, but probably one of the most coarse correction type kind of pieces of advice as I ever received was when I was 20. And it was from my mentor. So I've been an atheist, Sadie, and Jesus had interrupted my life Right as I was beginning college and I thought I was there to get a degree But I was really there to be mentored by some extraordinary souls. So there was one amazing woman who met with me every week for four and a half years Wow to teach me the word of God and I think it was my senior year. It may have been my junior year

So I've been walking with Jesus three years maybe four. And she sat me down, she said, Alicia, I'm a little worried about you. And I said, oh my, why? I've been watching a pattern in your life these several years. And I just want to spend some time talking with you about it. So I'm all ears, my heart is racing. And I said, go ahead, whatever you need to say, just about it. So I'm all ears, my heart is racing and I said go ahead, whatever you need to say, just say it. And she said, I'm concerned about

the kind of men you're attracted to. Wow. And I was like, whoa, okay, I didn't that I wasn't on my radar. And I said, I'm listening. And she said, well, you're really attracted to men who are highly, highly gifted. And the center of attention and the ones you first see whenever you walk into a room. And I was like, yeah. You're like, what's wrong with that? I said, what's your concern? And she said, I'm afraid you just might get one.

Wow. And then she said this. She said, look for a man who has the fruit of the spirit in his life. Because if he has the fruit of the spirit in his life, the gifts will come. But when they come, they're gonna glorify God instead of himself. Wow. Game changing for me,

especially not having come from a family of faith. Wow. It really altered what I was looking for in a life partner. And by God's grace, I found one of those kind of men that had the fruit of the spirit tons of gifts but the fruit is even greater and we've been married for 32 years now. Well that is so cool gosh that is such good advice and I know there are a lot of single ladies listening to this podcast right now and maybe you should take that as a personal call out to you

too you know just look at the type of men you men you're looking for and is that really the type of person that you want to spend a life with. And it's so cool that you said that because I always find it so interesting when I ask people that question. And then their advice leads me right into things that I had noted to talk to them about. And I literally had noted your dedication in the book anonymous that you wrote to your husband. And I wanted to note it because I thought, man, that's such a powerful thing to say about your husband. And you

said, my beloved husband, Dearest friend and wise is mentor, a man who in faith treasures the unseen potential of every hidden soul. And I just love that. And then you said in the spirit of Barnabas, you invest in others richly, then would joy set back to watch some shine. And it actually made me think about my husband because I feel like, you know,

a lot of people get to see my life a lot, whether it be on a stage or on a camera, but he's the one that sees all the unseen things about my life. And I think that that is one of the things that makes me feel so wildly loved by him is that he treasures those moments about me just as much as, like actually a lot more than the public moment. And I think, you know, sometimes we start to think getting the striving mentality where I did this message one time on, it's like we desire to be loved, but we get more distracted by being liked, right? Just by being seen, by being, by doing these achievements

that people notice and all these things. But for someone to really see you and know you and love you, like that's where the power comes from. And so in Y'all's life, just speak to that a little bit about how he values his unseen moments and just how you wrote this spirit of Barnabas. I just thought that was a really cool thing to write about your husband. Yes. Well, Barry is a champion. He champions other people. And part of the reason that I was so drawn to him was because of his backstory. We met at a college retreat and we were all supposed to share a little bit of our journeys of faith. And Barry had been married before to a beautiful woman of God. They'd been married about two and a half years when they were driving home from the holidays back down south to go to seminary.

And they had a patch of black eyes. Wow. And very beautiful wife instantly was killed in that car accident. Wow. And so I, you meet someone who's gone through that kind of pain and you learn a whole lot about them. I think most of us might come to a life-size pain point like that and think, oh, right, he got, you know, you, you could have prevented something like that.

I don't know that I can trust you. I definitely know I don't like you and we can turn our backs. But Barry didn't. He faced God with the pain and said, I don't understand you, but I trust you. And he pressed the pain into God's heart and became a man of incredible character. And so when I heard Barry's story, I met him like six years after his wife had passed away.

He was a man who was in touch with the eternal. He was not so earth bound that his energy was being soaked up, counting, and calculating. And I just felt like there was a quality of love in his life that I wanted in my own. And that's been a gift, Barry's been able to give to so many different people. He sees what you're becoming and treats you like you're already there. And champions you on the journey. He is the one Sadie that first handed me the mic. He is the one that started directing people's attention to me when they would invite him to come speak. Wow. Because he has always had this championing in his heart, seeing something

that I didn't see and I didn't even really want. But with him by my side, I think that I could follow Jesus, just wherever Jesus needed us to go. That's so good. I love how you said he had this value of love that I wanted in my life. And it's such a beautiful thing to see in someone and such a gift to receive. And I think that, you know, with Christian,

one thing that a lot of people, my husband, one thing that people would say to Christian that was kind of begin to make him a little insecure at one time in our life right when we got married was they're like, so what do you get to do? Like what's your thing gonna be? What's your minister gonna be? And Christian had never really felt caught or led

to like start his own thing. He actually felt really caught and led to champion what God was doing in my life and to kind of be a solid ground for what we were about to step into because life can be so crazy with all of the travels we do in the ministry that I do that he just felt really called to kind of be a rock and Sam beside me and champion that. And all of a sudden, like that didn't feel like it was enough because of what other people's perceptions were on him.

And it kind of took a while for him to come back to, oh wait, like this is enough. Like this is like, this is a beautiful thing that I get to do and get to do it for our family. And whenever, you know, he got into that and started feeling like he need to start something, it was like hard for both of us to, you know, keep up with all the things. But when he was confident in that, man, it's been the greatest gift to our family. And he really is such a champion of people.

He is such an encourager and such a rock, so steady. And so I just think that really is such a gift in people. And I feel like it's a shame that sometimes the world doesn't see that as much of a value or celebrate that as a value when it really is actually like one of the greatest values to have that in a partnership and in a marriage and it takes a real confident person to be able to stand beside someone and hand the mic. So that's really cool. Yes. Yes. These kind of leaders, they have

tremendous sense of identity in Christ. They have to. They have to get their well done from God and not from the people around or the likes and the hearts. They have to get it straight from God. And it's very, is that kind of man as your husband seems to be's well done over who they are, over how God has created them. Oh my goodness. And they can champion so many things. They don't have to be seen. They don't have to be visible in order to feel valuable. Y'all summer is upon us and I'm so excited but y'all there is nothing like the kind of sunburns that I get especially with all the tennis that I play I get all kinds of weird tans going on and I do not like that I do not like a good sunburn you know it's never

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Use the promo code woe at checkout to get 20% off your first order. That's nativedeo.com slash woe. Use the promo code woe at checkout to get 20% off your first order. That's nativedeo.com slash wo. I use the promo code wo at checkout. nativedeo.com slash wo or use the promo code wo. So that leads me straight into the anonymous book. Why this book changed my life? And you know, people say that like a change my life

and that can be something that's just thrown out. but it really truly was such a huge moment in my life when I read this book because I was 18 years old. I had just moved to Nashville like two months before I got this book handed to me and I had stepped into fully doing ministry at actually still never spoken or preached before publicly or anything like that. I was just actually on this tour called Winter Jam and I was like speaking for like 10 minutes while they moved the set behind me. And this was kind of like my first, you know, step into into what I was going to do. Well, while I was on Winter Jam, Louis and Shelley Gaglio see me out on Winter Jam while

they came to see Crowder and Louis kind of spoke a word over my life. I didn't know him very well at the time and he said you know God's gonna use your voice to really help change his generation. He said I want you to come speak at our church at passion city church on our college night. I just told him I said Louis I am like crazy honored, but I have never done that before. And I don't know if you didn't realize that, but you can totally take back that offer now because I've never spoken before. And I just don't know if that's a great place to start.

And he was like, no, like I really don't want to help, stuard this. I want to help champion this in your life. So we had this cool talk. Well, after that, I just start getting nervous out of my mind, right? And I had kind of was being faced with a lot of stuff from my past during this time of my life too. A lot of what Louis said sounded awesome, but a lot of it was just like, who am I that I

could do that? And if you really knew my life and what I'd just come from, and I don't really know if I'm qualified for that at all in any way, shape or form. First of all, I'm only 18. I've never gone to seminary or anything like that. And second of all, I've just also come from a lot of just not good stuff. I just come out of a bad relationship. I kind of felt like a hypocrite for the relationship I was in and life I was wanting to live and all this stuff. And then also I was kind of being fronted with this idea that I think I put like a lot of pressure on myself to perform.

And I never really noticed that in me until the sudden, I felt like I had to do something for people to love me or do something for people to be proud of me or do something to be worthy of a moment. And I remember someone speaking over me in that time, they said, say, I want you to go read. And John lived 21 where Peter and Jesus are talking. And Jesus said to Peter, you know, I love you. Then he says, Fima, she, but love you. Fima, she even the woman said, you really need to know that God loves you before he asked you to

do anything. So around this time, someone also, who you know, Emily Volga-Tan, randomly reached out to me. We weren't even like close at the time, but she worked at Passion, knew I was gonna be speaking. She says, say, before you come and speak here, I want you to read this book anonymous. And she said, I'm gonna send you my personal coffee. She had literally written all up in this book, Underline Stars.

And now I have two. So this book is just covered with highlights and marks and notes and just really ingested everything that you had to say. And I deleted social media. And this was the first time I had deleted social media in my like career, I guess you could say. And I deleted it for three months, leading up until the message.

And I just read this book and just got hidden with the Lord. And you wrote a quote in the book that you had heard, I think one of your mentors say, and it was talking about this moment when God said, to Jesus, you are my son with whom I'm well pleased. And you talk about just the significance of how he said that to him before he had actually done anything, about done anything as far as what the Savior had come to do.

And it was just like the whole book meant so much to me, but some of that writing in those chapters just really began to change my idea that like God's proud of me actually before I even do anything. He loves me before I even do anything. Which took off this like religious spirit of having to check a box or do whatever, but really just actually walk with the Lord. So what's really cool is that next month ended up speaking at passion and that video to this day is the most viral any of my messages have ever gone and that's what led me into speaking and actually having a public ministry and so I'm just so grateful that

right before I started a public ministry at just about 19 years old I read this book and really got the foundation set and here I am at 25 and I'm just grateful that I read it then. So for the past seven years, I didn't struggle the way that I knew I would have struggled had I not set my heart posture in the right place. And so that's why it really meant so much to me. But I'm curious to know just as the writer of that book, what led you in your life to going on this discovery of the hidden years of Jesus? Yes, well thank you so much for sharing that story and God bless Emily. I love

her. She's a generous person. You know, it actually began just by asking Jesus what he wanted me to study and preparation for a speaking opportunity. So whenever somebody asks me and I fill that yes from God in my heart, I ask him where he'd like me to begin. And I felt like I was supposed to study the temptation of Jesus once again. I had studied it several times before. And each time said, I'd always seen it as a very real window opening into his present. He actually was tempted. I also had seen it as a window that opened into his present. He actually was tempted. I also had seen it as a window that opened into his future. It was foreshadowing some of the temptations to come.

But this time when Jesus had me study it again, my eyes opened and for the very first time, I saw that it was also a window that opened into his past. Wow. Because Jesus makes extraordinary choices in the desert of temptation. He declares it is written, he defeats the enemy, he is tested on all sides.

But Jesus wasn't just plopped down in the middle of the desert at the age of 30. The greatest influence on the choices Jesus made in the temptation and beyond are the choices Jesus had been making before the temptation in those hidden years, in those unseen decades, in those spaces where he wasn't celebrated and applauded where nobody was monitoring everything he said and everything he did. All of a sudden, I realized that the greatness that we study the greatness that we admire the greatness that we worship Of Jesus that we see in his visible years all rested on the hidden foundation of

30 anonymous Years well of three anonymous Decades and my mind was blown. I had never thought about that before. And so I started studying the temptation in detail. And the beginning of Jesus' visible ministry, the baptism by John the Baptist, and then the temptation, and started looking at the strengths Jesus displayed, his first steps into his visible season and then thinking backwards, what must have been growing in him in order for that kind of indestructible strength to already

be present when he began his public ministry. That is so powerful. I love it so much because I think that so many people, it's like you're so constantly focused on wanting to hit that platform or wanting to hit that position or that blue check mark on Instagram that you forget that's actually what God's doing in your life right now is sewarding just, it's actually going to be the thing that's going to help you be able to seward well that platform and that blue check and all the things that God presents in your life because that's what I mean.

But I don't know that if I would have, if I wouldn't have gotten my heart posture right, if I would have been able to kind of, even just like with Stan, all the things that I was about to walk into because, you know, you see the good sides of people's ministry and the success and the fun and all that stuff. But anytime you're walking through something like that, you got to know there's temptation on their side, there's hard things on the other side, there's hardship you're walking through. And thinking about how Jesus prepared for those moments and how He knew scripture so well to be able to speak scripture out in those moments,

I actually just reading back this morning on some of the things I had highlighted and wrote. I wrote these two words. I was like, man, what did I write? Why did I write that? Stop me. I said, anxiety explanation. And I know at that time in my life, I had so much anxiety that there's something that you said that stuck out to me and it was talking about getting the word into your spirit so that you know the word and treasuring the word up. And I remember writing that about anxiety, like it flashbacks me because I was like if I can get the word in my spirit, then I will be able to speak that over my anxiety and I will be able to have clear emotion. And now I'll look at myself and seven years past that. And I actually have done that. I've grown in so much knowledge over the word that I'm able to

speak to the anxiety and it doesn't have authority over me anymore. However, when I read this book, it had a lot of authority over my life. And so I just think about those things that I've done in in those private spaces, in those hidden spaces that weren't public. And there's a quote that you said at the very beginning. And it's like, oh, you say it is critical. We don't mistake unseen for unimportant. And I was like, that is so good because we put so much emphasis on the scene moments of our life and not as much in the unseen as the unseen moments that are going to carry us through the scene.

And so for those listening, I mean, did you write this before social media was what social media is today? Yes, that's crazy. Yeah, in fact, the book almost didn't even make it to us, say to you, it almost went out of print. What? Because it was just, I mean, who goes into a store saying, hey, could I have a book on the sacredness of anonymity? You know, this is really a... The kind of topic people are looking for. So the book really has lived the message that's within it. It's just been as slow as one person put it in the hands of another person who put it in the hands of another person.

The book has been invisible. And I think found by hearts that were wanting to make sure that whatever they built up was resting on a solid foundation. That is so cool. Y'all, we all know that teamwork truly does make the dream work. If I did not have a team, I could not do really anything that I'm doing now. And I'm so thankful for those on my team who do the work that no one's going to see, you know, like shipping the boxes to people to get them the clothing at they order from our website, all the things that they do behind the scenes does not go unnoticed for me.

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the best book on social media. I think that's even better than the one I wrote because it's just so good. And just that line right there, it's critical, it don't make a mistake, the unseen for the unimportant because, you know, actually this year, it's funny that we're having this conversation because since I took those three months off Instagram,

I haven't taken an extended time off of Instagram. And this year I decided, which in most of the time, I take January off, so it took January off and I felt the Lord and I haven't even said this publicly, but I felt the Lord kind of gesturing in me like, hey, I want you to take the whole year off, actually. And I was kind of like, okay, my God. I'm like, am I hearing you right?

Because to me, that felt like a big deal. You know, social media is a huge part of my job and what I do. And I knew my team would run some of the job side of it, but even personally, I was like, that's a big, that's a big year. I mean, I'm having a baby this year. We're moving houses this year. Like it's a fun year to share things with people

and even just the little things. Like I feel like I could give God back the excuse of, well this is how I do ministry and blah, blah. But I felt the Lord say no, like I want you to take the time off and kind of go back into that anonymous time, go back into some hidden time and kind of just restructure some things. And you know it's crazy within about a week of me telling my husband, I was going to do it to my husband and you know it's crazy. Within about a week of me telling my husband, I was going to do it to my husband my best friend for accountability. And I said

I'm going to I feel like the Lord said this and I really want to be obedient to it. I'm going to ask one of my teammates to run things from a work standpoint and things that I have to post. But everything else is just I just need to go back to this within a week. I felt the Lord revealing things to me that I didn't even realize I had let become such a priority in my life that shouldn't be a priority. And here I am a couple months in and I have had people come up to me who are friends of mine say, so do you have such a different joy about you this year? You feel so light. It's like you're handling things so much better and and it's, and I'm like, I see that. And I, and I really know it's because I took this off my plate for this time because the Lord asked me to. And so I'm kind of stepping back into that, um,

hidden time and with my family. And it has just been so fruitful and such a joy. And so anyways, I know you've written so many other books and I wanna talk about that and you have so much content out there and that's why I love interviewing people like you because I get excited from our listeners because I'm like, you're about to go on a journey. Like, you know, Google this name and you're gonna have content for days. Before we go into some of those things that you've written

that I wanna talk about, I wanna talk about your life. You mentioned being an atheist before going to college and I know one thing you said about your husband is he wasn't afraid to kind of lean into the hard things of God. And I've seen you talk about just asking God hard questions. And so what did that time really look like in your life going from being an atheist to actually believing that God is God and how did that happen? Yeah, wow. Well, atheism for me was an intellectual choice. I had been hurt by the church. There wasn't anything that I was disappointed in with a person or a leader.

For me, I've always been a question-asker, Sadie. And I just kept asking a lot of questions. Didn't get too many answers, and so to me it really seemed like faith was some sort of man-made play. And so my dad said, I was nine, mom thought I was 10. But evidently I just came to the one day and said, I think this is a poorly written play, and I don't want to show up as an unpaid actor. Wow. I don't think there's a God to believe in. And my mom was heartbroken because she came from a traditional family of faith.

My dad was a closet atheist. I had no idea that daddy was an atheist until after Jesus interrupted my life. And he knew I always kind of leaned toward a lot of questions, very analytical. And so he assumed that someday I would go ahead and probably walk away from any kind of faith. But I don't think I ever experienced it genuinely. And so departing from it was easy. And atheism just seemed logical. For me, I just thought there's a lot that can't be known, and I would rather live in that kind of mystery, than adopt any kind of fairy tale that would soothe me for a moment. So my atheism started rather benign emotionally,

and then as my life became more and more seasoned by pain, that's when some anger started gathering around the edges of my atheism. That's when I started to be really annoyed with anybody who had the audacity to proclaim the existence of a God that held all power. Thank you. Well, sure didn't seem to be using that to prevent pain. It didn't cause me to question whether there was a God. I was certain.

I mean, I was as certain as certain could be that there was no God. It just caused me to lose more and more trust in people who proclaimed that he existed. So you fast forward and my last two years in high school, I met these two young women who, oh my goodness, say they just loved Jesus. They were the most annoying people I have ever met in my life. They were determined that they were going to be my friend and they've never met an atheist before. And so they just kept trying to talk to me about Jesus, kept giving me all sorts of these little itty bitty bibles and I would debate with them. I wouldn't just argue I would debate and sadly it doesn't take on this side of life. It doesn't take truth to when it debate. It just takes skill and so we were a little unmatched in skill. So they

had truth on their side looking back, no question. But they didn't have a skill. And so it was brutal and bloody. And they would break into tears. And they're like, I don't know, I don't know an answer, which was the smartest thing they ever could have said. You know, as I don't know, it was a really smart answer when it's true. Yeah. We shouldn't be afraid of saying that to people who are asking us questions about our faith. And when they did say something like, I don't know, it actually increased my confidence in them as people. And so they felt like epiquetness fails.

And I thought that for sure, you know, they were just absolutely delusional. But there was something else happening that we couldn't measure in our arguments. Something else was happening that we couldn't measure in all of the disagreements. They were carriers of the presence of Jesus. And so every time they were near me, they were giving me the present of his presence. And that present of his presence was starting to do something. It was like initiating this thought inside of me that I couldn't see or feel and they couldn't perceive but it was still occurring. So a little bit later, friends mom invited me to church

when I was visiting her in Illinois just right before starting college. And I thought, oh my word, these people are everywhere. I was kind of opening there were only in Texas Long as I left the state I would leave the Bible belt or something and This woman was so sweet and it finally occurred to me that she was never gonna stop asking me To go to church like for the rest of my life So I said I'll go once if you never asked me again

Is that a deal and she said sure? And I walked with her into this itty-bitty little simple church. The organ was out of tune. There was nothing of beauty or excellence in the place. Couple dozen people and they were all in their seven days, eighties and nineties. So 70 to 90 and It was one of the last times the church was going to be open because they had just experienced a horrible split. And these beautiful souls stood up and started worshiping, and the atheist in the back row had this absolutely unexpected encounter with the living God, Sadie. Wow.

I was a drunk, I wasn't high, I wasn't the pit of despair. I wasn't trying to rethink my life? Was it open to maybe being wrong? God opened up the heavens above me and it was like this waterfall washed over me for an hour and a half two hours. I was in the presence of Jesus and That changed everything had to wow I had to change everything and so my beginning and Christ began by him pursuing me and finding me. And then I had a choice to make in the middle of it. Do I say yes or do I say no?

But I would have had to have committed intellectual and emotional suicide to say no. So I said yes. Wow. Oh my, we're, what a powerful story. And I, you know, I think I'm so struck by that because it makes me think of what's happening in Asbury College at Asbury University because from everything I've heard

and I didn't get to go, so I'm not sure exactly all the details, but that it was in a little chapel of a Methodist church and the message wasn't something crazy, extraordinary, and the worship wasn't something crazy extraordinary and the worship wasn't something crazy. It was just so simple and it was just so unexpected, you know, and then all of a sudden these 10 students or however many just stayed and heaven opened up. And so I wanted to ask you your thoughts on that because you have something written

that gives an article and I say something about practicing the presence of God. And I wanted to talk about that a little bit and it's crazy that that was your first encounter with God because, I mean, that is essentially, you know, what it seems to look like at Asperger is what it looks like for you, what it looks like for so many people just lingering the presence. And so what does that look like for people to practice the presence of God? When I want to ask you two ways, one that are Christians and then two for people who are atheists who might be listening to this podcast thinking, okay, how do I get into a moment like that?

How do I experience a moment like that if they, you know, have never been open to something like that. I remember whenever I was little hearing the stories of the Bible and just being so amazed and all the stories just coming to life in such a real way. But then actually as an adult rereading the same stories, I knew us a child, but really beginning to understand the power behind the stories. The Bible has had such a big impact in my life, but there are a lot of Christians around the world who don't have access to the Bible. And that is where this partner crew comes in. Handy, I'm so excited. I like this partnership with crew because they have missionaries in almost every country in the world.

But there's one thing missing from many Christians and that is a Bible in their own language, which is obviously a huge part of our faith to get to know the Word of God. So friends, we can help meet that need and I strongly suggest you do helping because this is a huge need that needs to be met. For only $25 a month, you can provide Bibles to three people every month, plus when you sign up to do that, crew will provide meals for 15 people with their humana theory and aid ministry. So that's some serious love, y'all. You're going to be feeding some bellies and some souls.

When you sign up, crew will also show you some love by sending you a free copy of my devotional book, Live on Purpose. I wrote this book because I just started to realize that so many people are so stressed out about what their purpose is, and it doesn't have to be that complicated. God gives us such a great purpose, to love him, to love people.

And so I wrote a book on how to help you discover that in your everyday life. And so I hope that you love the book. There are so many of you who have already signed out to help crew into you. I just want to say that's awesome. And thank you so much for your support. But we still have a lot of work to do.

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So when we think of practicing the presence of God, what that means is attentiveness to the reality that God is near. God isn't waiting behind a curtain somewhere for our emotions to hit a certain pitch. God is not paused somewhere waiting for us to feel a certain thing. God is profoundly with us right now every person who is listening. God is with them. And so practicing the presence of God means that we begin adjusting our thoughts to stop living life like it's a solo and start living life like it's a duet. If he is always with us, that means we are always with him.

It's just that we're not always conscious of it. Practicing the presence of God means that we are willfully aware that I am not alone. God is with me. And so that changes what I think about. It changes what I say. It changes my attitude because now I'm thinking with him. He and I are together in my mind.

He's leading. I'm following. We're together in my heart. He's leading. I'm following. Now, sometimes that is covered with emotional feelings. Sometimes my senses are smart enough to pick up on the always reality that God is near. But our senses don't create God. Our senses don't create God's presence. So whether we feel amazing or we feel nothing, it doesn't change him. Which means our greatest shout doesn't thicken God. And conversely, our greatest doubt doesn't thin God. That's good. Which gives us this incredible freedom to bring our true selves, Sadie, our real selves, and be with the God who is committed to being with us. So as people of faith,

we need to apply. I think it was Frank Labaugh who called it applying a gentle pressure to our mind apply, I think it was Frank Labaugh who called it applying a gentle pressure to our mind, to think with God in our mentoring, that 12 month mentoring that I do, I talk about living in the plural instead of the singular. Jesus and I are doing this podcast with Sadie, not just Alicia. Jesus and I did our hair before we got on. Jesus and I are paying taxes. Jesus and I are cleaning the bathroom. Jesus and I are doing this together. Life is in the plural. It's not in the singular.

So for those who may be listening and you're thinking, I don't know about God. I'm not even sure. I like Jesus. I respect Jesus. He's a great example, but the kind of relationship they're talking about is something that I don't think I've tapped into.

The beautiful thing is anybody who's hearing the sound of my voice right now. God is near you, whether you feel it or not, whether you see it or not, he is near you. And all you need to do is simply apply that gentle pressure of your will, to your mind, to your heart, to say, God, I want you. I want to walk with you. I want to be led by you.

In Esopharmor Atheist, that reality was extraordinary. I mean, the God who designed the universe, the God who designed the minds of the greatest composers and the greatest scientists, the greatest artists, that God was walking with me. That God was walking with me. That God opened my heart to be able to study his voice in his word. And that same God right now is near all who are listening. And so we simply choose to open ourself God word in St. Jesus. You lead. Show me how to follow. Gosh, that's so good. I love that so much. You tackled that answer perfectly.

And I remember that there is a moment in my life where I realized a shift that was like, okay, this needed to happen for me to fully live the life that you're calling me to. And I think for a long time, I said it like this, I would walk into a room and I would be holding God's hand like this, like bringing him into all the moments. You know, it's like, I'm Sadie and I'm a Christian and there's God. But like, there needed to be a shift where he was actually leading and I was following him into the room. And I think whenever I made that shift of, oh no,

I'm not Sadie and God's behind me and I'm a Christian and you know, it's actually like no, like I'm Sadie, I'm a follower of Christ like first, like everything I do is under this umbrella that I've given my life to the Lord, he's the way the truth in the life, no one gets to the Father except through him, like this idea that like this is the direction I'm going and it's following him, not him following in my footsteps, bringing him into all the places that I'm going to ask and for safety or blessing or whatever. It's like that is a false way of looking at it. And so, gosh, I love that you said that. Just following him, letting him lead and having a

this duet of a life. And I think it's really cool coming from someone who wasn't atheist and is so intelligent because I abet to your 15 year old self who if at 10 you said a quote like that, I can't imagine how smart you were at 15 debating these girls. But at 15, you couldn't believe that yourself now would be saying something like that. That's Jesus and I and I that's just like the beauty and the reality of how real it is

to you. Whenever you have an experience with God that's so undeniable, like you said, it doesn't matter if you can feel him in a moment where you can't. The reality is you know he's there. And so I want to ask you a question. This is like kind of an interesting question, but I've just been thinking about this. I feel like you'll be a good person to ask this to just about revival since I mentioned the Azbari University. Do you feel like with revival? Because, you know, we all say we want revival to happen, we want revival to break out,

we pray for revival, we believe for revival to happen. And then here revival happens at this college where it was so unassuming that it was going to happen and people are traveling all over the world to just experience what's happening there. Do you think that it is, and this might be a both kind of question, it might be like, oh, it's both, or one or the other. Do you feel like in a revival moment like that, that it is literally that the heavens do kind of open on a place and God's presence is just so tangible and you get there and you do feel this extra thing of His presence. Or do you feel like it's more of these people are just so hungry and desperate for God's presence and you really could have revival at any place if you had that desperation for the Lord or that practice, that practice of being in his

presence as Christine say would say, you have a discipline of lingering in his presence. Do you think it's more of us being desperate for him enough to linger in his presence? Or it really is a moment of like for whatever unexplained reason, the Holy Spirit just kind of more noticeably there. Does that make sense? I guess I've just been asking myself this question, and I feel like so many people are kind of wrestling with us. Do I go to Asperger to experiences or can this start where I'm at?

Yes, that's a great question. I think a lot of people are asking. So I'm gonna back up just a little bit and then I'll get there. So we have this mystery of finite us interacting with infinite God. Right. So we're finite, he's infinite. And so there is just going to be a ton of the unknown in our relationship by very definition, even if God were to try to download answers to me, because I'm finite, I would only be able to comprehend just a percentage of what he is attempting

to show me. So mystery is a part of faith. It's good. Mystery is a part of the reality of humans walking with God. It's great. But mysteries also uncomfortable and unquantifiable. And so it's very, very easy for us to want to find some kind of formula that we can reproduce, whether it's

for revival, or whether it's for any other area of our life, for blessing, or financial stability, or for a great husband-wife relationship or for the dreams that are in our heart. We keep naturally searching for a formulas. But faith can never be reduced to an equation. The problem with equations is it guts faith of relationship. Its faith of mystery. It's good. And if faith is anything, it's relational and mysterious.

That's good. So I've had some of these exact same questions, Sadie goes through my mind as I've been watching. We almost got to go. We were just so close, we were gonna go with some friends, just to sit and to be and to worship. When we look back over the great revivals, the great awakenings at least in our country, there do seem to be some similarities. They almost

always started with college students, late high school students, that generation has almost always been at the front of the wave. Repentance is another common factor that we can see people having a hunger for holiness. We spend so much time, Sadie, caressing things that Jesus was crucified for. And I think one of the marks of what we look back historically and we go, oh that was a great. Oh, that was a revival. Is it we repent for pressing things Jesus was crucified for? We start realizing that willful sin is really a form of spitting in Jesus' face. When he died on the cross for our sins, I know this is an exaggeration, but I feel like his whole right shoulder must have had Alicia written on it. I had a doctorate in sinning and it wasn't honorary. It was earned.

You know, this died on the cross for my sins. And so for me to willfully sin, it's like seeing him on the cross and spitting on his face. It's like mocking him. And so I do think that each and every awakening there's this realization, a grieving, overwilful sin. And that naturally bears the fruit of salvation, of deliverance, of freedom, of people starting to let Jesus lead in new ways. But we have got to get serious about the things that we know sad in him and not care what we call it, awakening prayer meeting, but we have got to get more serious. Because Satan's gaining ground in us and he's gaining ground in this generation by our apathy and passivity toward the

things in our lives that we know are grieving the heart of God. Yeah, man, that's so true. That's so true. I just preached a message out of college last week and it was about kind of this idea, about not living in the gray area, you know, not living a life of sin and just thinking, oh, it's okay because it's not that bad and then like you weren't called to a life that is, no, it has not that bad, you know. You're a college to so much more than that

and we talked so much about sin and just really went there and it was just so cool because every person was like, you know, I really need to hear that and I was like, I need more than that. And we talked so much about sin and just really went there. And it was just so cool because every person was like, you know, I really need to hear that. And I was like, I need to hear that. Like we all need to hear that. We all need to be reminded of that. And just to gravity and the weight of our sin and the gravity of the weight of what Jesus did for us

on the cross. And I think sometimes you can hear things so much that they become just familiar to you. You forget the power behind them. And you really stop to think about this. I mean, I've been reading first John and just kind of reading over and over again the first two chapters because I'm trying to memorize them

after watching David Platte do that at Passion with Romans. And just reading it so many times really allows the gravity of what is written kind of just, it blows your mind, honestly, because you just start to realize what Jesus actually did, the life God's actually calling you to, and you just start to see your excuses just kind of fade as you begin to read truth over your life.

And so, I mean, that's so kind of, I'm thankful that I would say able to ask you that question. One of the things that saw whenever my team sent me just, I guess, maybe it's something that your team sends a little bit about you. It was like some of her favorite things. And it was like thunder storms, jalapenos, and honest questions. I was like, I don't like those girls. She's awesome.

But I love the honest questions in there. I love honest questions. And I think that that's a that's a great form of just mentorship is being able to ask someone older and why is there like an honest question that you have in your heart. I want to ask you, what do you think the value is of young people asking honest questions to people like yourself are mentors in their life, because I know a lot of people desire for mentorship, but kind of fear that vulnerability of asking some of those hard questions. Yes. Well, I have the gift of a dad who loved

asking questions. And so my daddy, ever since I was little, he would sit me down, he would say, what kind of questions does the daughter have? He always called me the daughter. The daughter. I like that kind of questions. Oh, that's a good question daughter. Oh, wow. You're a good thinker. My dad gave me this gift of not only me knowing that he wanted to hear me, that he wanted to listen to me, but that my questions were valuable. So it took me a while to realize, Sadie, that I don't remember any of the answers. My dad and I came to from any of those questions. What I remember is the safety of being able to ask. It's good.

What I remember is the honor of being heard. What I remember is the closeness I felt when I was honest with him about the things that I was concerned about. And I think that is the same kind of thing that happens in a mentoring relationship. We normally ask a question because we want an answer, but there's something far more powerful happening. When we verbalize our questions,

whether that's to the person next to us, to someone who's a little older, a little further along, or whether that's to God Himself. What we are doing is we are building trust. We're saying, this is real me. In real me has doubts. In real me has uncertainties. In real me has questions.

Can I bring real me to you? And will I be accepted? And God opens his arms and says, absolutely. We're the closest when you're being the most honest. Wow. We are the closest when you are being the most true. We're the closest when you bring your doubts with you instead of trying to stuff them or fluff them or outrun them. And so as we get closer to what is real and what is true about ourselves and about our lives, it expands relationship with God, but also with each other. Now, not everybody that we meet can handle can stewart. I shouldn't say

handle can stewart that kind of honesty. So we need to choose our mentors wisely. But God, he can handle anything at all, any angst, any doubt, any fear, anything, we can bring it all to him. So yes, getting mentors, but there's something more powerful than answers in the questions that we're asking. There's safety and trust being built. That's so good. I love that so much. I am so good. You saw that because one of the reasons I started this podcast is because I felt really blessed that I had so many great mentors in my life. So many people that I could pick up the phone and call and ask hard questions to you or just talk to you. I mean, some mentors would literally just invite me to come stay at their house for the

weekend and ask questions and dive in. And so although I didn't get, you know, schooling as far as seminarians of like that and one day maybe I'll get to do that. I feel like I just gained so much wisdom from people who do have so much knowledge that poured into my life and believed in me enough to listen to me and to let me ask these questions

and give me space for that. And I think that is that built so much trust and My relationship with them, but also just trust in what God was doing in my life And I think that it helped launch me to be confident enough to To actually step on a platform and share a message because like I said I was terrified of that. I felt Hypocritical in a lot of sense because of the life I live But then I actually took the gospel for what it was and realized the old is gone the newest come, but also just that these people who listen to the things I had prepared and helped

beef it up more and brought more truth and all this he says like, okay, I can trust that what I'm saying is sound. It's good, it's on track, and so it helped me so much, but one of the reasons I started this podcast was to help give that to other people, was to help give mentorship and a sense to people, and gosh, I was almost five years ago, four years ago, I've been doing this podcast, and we've been mentored so much, but everyone that's come on this podcast, I personally have just learned so much, and hearing people's comments when I meet them, it's just so powerful but I still do think even if you're mentored by a podcast which I believe you 100% can be or by a YouTube video of your favorite teacher or pastor, I do think that there is such

value and in-person getting together over coffee, over lunch. If you have a relationship where you can go stay the night, you know, for a night and just stay up till midnight, they have the capacity and ask the questions, whatever their capacity is to invite you into their life. I do think that that's such a good and I love how you said it's so much more than just the answers because I can think about mentors in my past where really if you ask me to say that I can't think of a couple things that we came to, you know, but I can just think of the trust that it built and man, it made me feel like I could actually do what God was calling me to do and they believed in me enough to help me do it. And so that's a beautiful thing. I love that so much

and I'm so glad you spoke to that. I was thinking, you know, with those two Christian girls gave me, I talked about the present of presence. And it's what God has given to us. He's given us the present of presence. And that's what is really happening in a mentoring relationship. Just for giving somebody the present of presence we're honoring them, we're valuing them

by giving them our full attention, by giving them our love, our ears, our heart, and mentoring is so powerful. I think that I agree. There's so many different places we can learn, but finding someone you can touch is really, really incredible. They don't have to be the whole enchilada. They don't have to have everything you ever want to learn for the rest of your life, but even if there's one thing in their life that you think, Oh, wow, their relationship with the Bible is unlike anything I have. I need that. Or wow, their way that they interact, you know, with their parents or the way they interact with their siblings.

Ah, I really, really would like to learn more about that. Or the way that they pray points from their heart. So I think if we consider the areas that we want to grow in and then we look for people who seem to have strength in one of those areas and we narrow down on, hey, could I just even have coffee with you? I'd love to ask you some questions about your relationship with the Bible. We don't even have to call them a mentor. They don't have to buy the t-shirt.

That's good. There's so many opportunities to learn face to face, but it takes a little bit of risk and it also takes realizing that only Jesus gets to be Jesus. Everybody else. We're all walking shoulder to shoulder. We're all facing the master mentor, but we all have something we can learn from one another. That's good. Gosh, that's a great practical advice with no pressure

on the mentor or the person to put pressure on the mentor, because it's so important is to see people as human and nothing else. So lastly, I know we're running out of time, but I know that you have a new book around the corner and I cannot wait to hear about it. So tell us a little bit about the new book. I had the advanced copy over here.

Oh, that's so exciting. Yes. That's awesome. Yeah. This is three decades of study, Sadie. Three decades of study. So it's called The Night Is Normal. A guide through spiritual pain.

And it'll be out in a couple of months, so about in July. Oh my gosh. Yeah, it's premise is, you know, when we think about the beginning, in the beginning, the night was one of the original residents of Eden. God designed the night and the day. And so we had the greater light together in the day and the lesser light together in the night and the day. And so we had the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. So what that means is that in the beginning, pre-fall, priests and pre-conflict, pre-death, in the beginning, walking with God required day-faith and night-faith.

Well, that's good. And so this entire book is about night-fa faith. What is it like when the lights go out in faith? And how do we navigate three different types of night faith when we're experiencing disillusionment with God? When he's not who we thought he was. When we're experiencing disillusionment with ourselves, when we're not who we hoped we were. And we're experiencing disillusionment with God's people when they are not who we needed them to be.

So I cannot wait. I feel like this is, I could say I think it's a life offering and I'm so grateful that the publisher granted the opportunity to offer it. Gosh, three decades of study and every one of those topics I know I need. So y'all have better know I'm gonna be pre-ordering that is normal. I'm so excited, I even rereading some of this today. I'm like, okay, this is my next book after I finish, so I wanna reread this again and I just am so grateful for all the offerings

that you put out, all the, like I said, essays and I've had so many more quotes that you have on your website and quotes that you said in essays. And I'm thankful for just how beautifully spoken you are that it led me to just wanting to ask the questions that I actually had on my heart today. And I think that some of those questions are things that a lot of people who are listening are searching for.

So I'm grateful for you just being able to dive in and answer questions that might come at you randomly. But you're a gift to the world. We're so grateful for you. I know my mom loves you. And now I've gotten the privilege to fall in love with you too. And I hope to meet you in person. But thank you so much for taking the time and investing in this podcast and the people

listening. Oh, say, do thank you. And to all your listeners, thank them as well. I'm so grateful for the opportunity. Your questions were incredible, but your heart is beautiful. So it's been a privilege to spend time with you today. Thank you so much! you