Latest / She Speaks Life - Christian Women, Strengthen Your Faith, Bible Study, Grow Spiritually In Christ / How to Trust God's Heart with Alexandra Hoover

Transcript

How to Trust God's Heart with Alexandra Hoover · She Speaks Life - Christian Women, Strengthen Your Faith, Bible Study, Grow Spiritually In Christ

• 0:03
  Hey guys, welcome back to a new season of she speaks life.
• 0:07
  I'm your host, Jamie Elizabeth, and I am so excited to share
• 0:11
  with you. My guest Alexandra Hoover today.
• 0:15
  She has an incredible story on walking through doubt and
• 0:19
  hardship and the struggles and trusting God's heart for her
• 0:23
  life. She has an awesome book out
• 0:26
  called eyes up, how to trust God's heart by tracing.
• 0:30
  In his hand. That is absolutely incredible.
• 0:33
  You guys. So get ready, be encouraged.
• 0:36
  And let's dive into her story. Hi Alexandra.
• 0:41
  Thanks for coming on here. Hey there.
• 0:43
  I'm so excited to be on here. Jamie, thanks for having me, and
• 0:47
  thanks for making room for my words, to be on this podcast and
• 0:50
  to encourage the women who are going to get to listen.
• 0:53
  Oh yeah. Well I've already been
• 0:55
  encouraged girl. I read your book on vacation and
• 1:00
  it was so impactful and so rich with God's truth and really just
• 1:08
  you know, Reminding us that God is faithful and he is with us no
• 1:14
  matter how we feel. Right.
• 1:17
  Absolutely. And yeah.
• 1:19
  And so I'm excited to have you. I met you on Instagram.
• 1:24
  You're so full of inspiration. You seem to give out posts each
• 1:29
  day that really meet me. Right where I'm at.
• 1:32
  I'm like, oh my gosh, how does she do this?
• 1:34
  But we know it's the Holy Spirit.
• 1:36
  It is yeah you God has me. A scrolling at that moment on
• 1:41
  your post. So for sure, that is how I met
• 1:46
  you and then I found out. You had a book coming out and
• 1:50
  I'm like this girl's probably got so much wisdom.
• 1:53
  I know she's got a lot of wisdom, and I need to have her
• 1:56
  on here. So before we go into the book,
• 2:01
  would you just share more about who you are?
• 2:04
  Let's just get to know who Alex. Yeah, absolutely.
• 2:06
  So I am. Alexandra Hoover.
• 2:08
  I'm a wife. 14 years to my incredible husband.
• 2:11
  I've got three, beautiful babies.
• 2:13
  I'm a 10 name is Layla. Kingston is 8, and then Sophia,
• 2:17
  who is six years old? I actually am a second
• 2:22
  generation. Immigrant was born to Immigrant
• 2:23
  parents here in, d.c. born in, d.c. went back to Venezuela as a
• 2:28
  child and told her own, six years old and went back to
• 2:32
  Venezuela every summer up until I was around 17 and got to spend
• 2:37
  a lot of time with my eye. Aunt and uncle, there are sort
• 2:40
  of like a second home to me. And so, initially a lot of what
• 2:45
  I knew about God was sort of through conversation with my
• 2:51
  aunt who was really connected to church and Springfield Virginia
• 2:54
  and I didn't really grow up in the church.
• 2:57
  I was in a church girl, I was in a faith.
• 2:59
  Girl wasn't a God girl. I was a challenger from oh yeah
• 3:03
  life and so Challenger and spent a My time just asking questions
• 3:11
  about who God was. And you know, I always tell
• 3:15
  myself like if God is good, then I just don't think he's good to
• 3:18
  me, or if he's real then he's just not kind.
• 3:22
  And that came really from my experience and hardship through
• 3:26
  life. And so, when I was around 10
• 3:30
  years old ended up moving to Anchorage Alaska, with my mom,
• 3:32
  and my new stepdad, and spent a lot of my time there, just
• 3:37
  walking through really difficult Seasons.
• 3:38
  I mean, I a lot of my life was just really marked for a long
• 3:41
  time by my trauma. And although I've been given,
• 3:47
  you know, a new sense of direction in high school to what
• 3:51
  I thought my life would look. Like, I just really didn't think
• 3:54
  that God was good or real were kind and so fast forward and I
• 3:58
  was 18 years old. I moved to Charlotte North
• 4:01
  Carolina to attend to school down here.
• 4:04
  You know, to give you guys a spark notes, version.
• 4:06
  I ended up not going to the school, I thought Going to go to
• 4:10
  ended up having to Pivot and really take care of my mom at
• 4:13
  that point and Charlotte which is around the time that I gave
• 4:17
  my life to Jesus. And so, when I was eight years
• 4:20
  old, I actually through a series of events of me, not even
• 4:27
  initially looking for God, or for a church, ended up at a
• 4:30
  church, because they were offering my mom, the help that
• 4:33
  she needed. And so, essentially fell in love
• 4:36
  with the local church. When I saw them living out the
• 4:39
  Great Commission, great commandment right in front of me
• 4:42
  as they were the hands and feet to my family.
• 4:44
  And so I gave my life to Jesus when I was 18 and have not
• 4:48
  looked back since, mmm, so guy, reminder of the body of Christ,
• 4:54
  right? Our local church, our community,
• 4:56
  how we need other people in our life.
• 4:59
  I could totally change the trajectory, right?
• 5:02
  Yeah. So if you don't mind, you
• 5:05
  mentioned trauma in your childhood.
• 5:09
  Did you go through what was your mannish girls?
• 5:13
  So many different things. One of the?
• 5:16
  Yeah, yeah. So, you know, one of the things
• 5:19
  that I was really marked by and I talked a little bit about this
• 5:22
  and eyes up and there are different different scenarios
• 5:25
  and different seasons that I use.
• 5:26
  It different stories that I use to invite the reader and the
• 5:29
  woman into God's work in my life.
• 5:33
  But there's a particular season in my life where I endured some
• 5:36
  sexual abuse at the hands of somebody.
• 5:39
  Be who I think. I thought my dad trusted.
• 5:41
  And, you know, in the midst of healing through a lot of that
• 5:45
  particular situation, but also, just a lot of other things we'd
• 5:48
  walked through. I just did not understand where
• 5:52
  God had been in that season. And, you know, I think as
• 5:56
  Believers, that's one of the hardest things to reconcile is.
• 5:59
  Yeah, how do you reconcile a good God?
• 6:02
  Too hard things to put it very plainly, right?
• 6:06
  And so my journey Jamie has A journey of looking back in order
• 6:12
  to really move forward, learning to not just reconcile the hard
• 6:18
  things of life, but learning to see God, even when the darkness
• 6:23
  was all around. And I think this is what I think
• 6:25
  I've learned from writing eyes up.
• 6:27
  I think that there's something really beautiful that happens
• 6:29
  when you're able to take God's character and use that as not
• 6:35
  only the compass, But the lens and the framework from which You
• 6:39
  see life? And here's why.
• 6:40
  Because although I cannot reconcile the difficult things
• 6:45
  that have happened, either to me or have happened to others.
• 6:49
  I can reconcile the character of God to himself, God is faithful.
• 6:53
  God is just God is merciful. And so I gave up this idea of
• 6:59
  always having to make sense of things, because truth is Jamie,
• 7:03
  a lot of things will not make sense.
• 7:04
  There will be some things where we look back and say, man, I
• 7:07
  cannot seem to find And got in that.
• 7:10
  And when we do that, what when we, when we're able to say, you
• 7:13
  know what, I can't seem to find God in that God, that I think
• 7:17
  offers us this invitation to say, I need you to understand
• 7:20
  that. From the very beginning of time,
• 7:22
  God has always been there. And so with you for you
• 7:25
  advocating and comforting. And so, even in that particular
• 7:29
  season as an adult, as I healed, God really said, Alexandra.
• 7:32
  You're going to have to look back to learn to see my heart.
• 7:36
  Even when you can trace my hand. So good.
• 7:40
  Yeah I think that for even unbelievers like Believers or
• 7:45
  unbelievers really you know struggling with that question.
• 7:50
  Like where are you God? Like how how did I go through
• 7:54
  all this hurt and pain? If you're such a good god.
• 7:57
  And I know that you touch on that in your book and it's so
• 8:00
  great. What inspired you to write eyes
• 8:05
  up? I'm sure it's what you went
• 8:07
  through, but I'd love to From you.
• 8:10
  Yes, I kind of joke and say that.
• 8:12
  My spiritual gift is unbelief. Hardly is, which really is a
• 8:18
  thorn in my side. Quite, you know, quite literally
• 8:21
  and you know, a lot of my, a lot of my faith has had this
• 8:26
  undercurrent of unbelief. My life verse is, Mark 924 not
• 8:30
  Romans 8:8 or Philippians 2, 17, it really is Mark and 24, which
• 8:35
  is Lord, I believe, help my unbelief.
• 8:38
  Yeah. When I first started to follow
• 8:41
  Jesus, I kind of came to a Crossroads with him where he
• 8:45
  said, I want to believe that you are, who you say you are.
• 8:49
  I really do. I want to believe that you are
• 8:52
  good. I want to believe that you are
• 8:53
  faithful, but I need you to help me walk through these things.
• 8:57
  And so I began to walk this journey out of him, of learning
• 9:01
  to see his faithfulness of learning, to understand his
• 9:05
  character. And I can when it all began.
• 9:09
  Was when my daughter was about my oldest was a baby.
• 9:12
  She had pretty severe colic. I used to wake up early in the
• 9:17
  morning and we were living in a home that had one of those
• 9:20
  sliding doors like a sliding porch door and I would, I would
• 9:24
  slide my door open and I would literally open up my phone as a
• 9:29
  spiritual Rhythm almost. Now is what I see myself doing
• 9:32
  and I would take videos and pictures of the sky because it
• 9:36
  would reorient me and my heart. And my mind, And quite literally
• 9:40
  on to creation and what God had done for us out of his love and
• 9:45
  grace and mercy. And so this idea of keeping my
• 9:49
  eyes up was because I heard God say to me, Alex, listen there's
• 9:54
  when you keep your eyes down which you know figuratively
• 9:57
  speaking on my circumstances on my contentions on the things
• 10:02
  that have cut me so deep, I'll get lost in those things.
• 10:07
  Like I will get lost in. And we'll begin to worship
• 10:11
  right? Right.
• 10:12
  Things that I'm worrying about and eyes up was really a
• 10:18
  declaration over my heart. And my mind a resolve to say,
• 10:21
  like, in the name of Jesus, I will keep my eyes on things
• 10:24
  above because if I if I don't and when I don't, I do fall and
• 10:30
  that's really where the message of eyes up came from.
• 10:32
  It came from taking a stance on not only seeing God but
• 10:36
  remembering God because I think that Once we see God, it goes
• 10:41
  from seeing God to remembering God and eyes up is all about
• 10:44
  learning to see God and remember him.
• 10:46
  So true just the other day. There's just something about
• 10:50
  looking up at the sky and we so forget we're in, I'm in the car
• 10:56
  and my husband's like, look up, look up, look at the sunset.
• 11:00
  Look at the sky and he's like, it's just like God's artwork up
• 11:04
  there. And when you do that, you look
• 11:06
  up. And you're like yeah, it just
• 11:09
  You have a sovereignty. I mean just reminds you of how
• 11:12
  powerful and beautiful he is to absolutely create something like
• 11:17
  that and it really does make an impact in you and man it's a
• 11:21
  mood lifter for sure. I love that so good.
• 11:24
  Okay, as I was reading, I'm all about journaling.
• 11:28
  So some of the things that I love about journaling is because
• 11:32
  you're right, it's a written record of God's faithfulness,
• 11:37
  right? Yeah.
• 11:37
  My family. I'm writing something.
• 11:39
  Being down that I'm going through and, you know, asking
• 11:45
  the Lord for direction or whatever it is and then God
• 11:49
  comes through. And I'm able to look back and
• 11:51
  just go Lord, you are so faithful.
• 11:54
  And I think that's key of like a who back in your journal and
• 11:57
  looking at all those places where he helped you and he was
• 12:02
  faithful and I forgot that in the Bible that there are the Our
• 12:09
  stones. And so for those that don't know
• 12:12
  what that is in the Old Testament, will you just explain
• 12:16
  briefly what the oven he's our stone is and what are like, some
• 12:22
  of those examples in the Bible? Yeah.
• 12:25
  So one of my very favorite stories is found in first Samuel
• 12:28
  and to do not ever read the book of 1st Samuel.
• 12:32
  I'd encourage you to do. So it's in the Old Testament but
• 12:35
  it's incredibly eye-opening to the overarching story of God.
• 12:39
  And helps you see more clearly just the way that he's moved for
• 12:42
  us. And so all that to say first
• 12:44
  Samuel, I'll give you Sparkles versions and the smartphone
• 12:46
  version. Again, we find that Israelites
• 12:49
  our friends in battle again, like they're always, they're
• 12:52
  always in the middle of something so much like us and
• 12:55
  they've turned away from God. And essentially, God comes about
• 13:00
  brings a loud thunder. Rescues them, defeats the enemy
• 13:03
  and tell Samuel Samuel. I need you to put up a memorial
• 13:07
  for me because my people My sons and my daughters, they're going
• 13:11
  to forget that. Today, that was once a place of
• 13:14
  defeat has become a place of Victory, and I need them to look
• 13:16
  back and remember, and so, Samuel Rex and builds this
• 13:22
  Memorial as a reminder, for the Israelites that not only got had
• 13:27
  been there today, but quite literally Ebenezer means Stone
• 13:30
  of help that God was with them as their help in and through
• 13:35
  their circumstances. Essentially becoming a testimony
• 13:38
  for the A alights that God was he says he is and reminded them
• 13:43
  of his character and faithfulness.
• 13:44
  And so I became obsessed with this idea because I'm like, oh
• 13:47
  my God, how many times have I missed God's activity in my
• 13:51
  life? How many times have I doubted?
• 13:53
  The goodness of God? How many times have I overlooked
• 13:56
  his grace? And so I went on a journey of
• 13:58
  learning to see moments, where I have seen his aunt, where I
• 14:03
  quite literally can say, man, that was, that was God.
• 14:06
  And in through that person, that was God.
• 14:09
  In the situation or circumstance and giving credit to the growth
• 14:13
  of good. There's something that I think
• 14:15
  happens to wear even as Christians we fall into this
• 14:19
  trap of thinking that there's like happenstance or chance.
• 14:23
  No, absolutely not. Absolutely not.
• 14:27
  God is an intentional God. Every good thing that happens.
• 14:31
  Anything that works for our good and God's glory is from God and
• 14:35
  his hand and so don't mistake that.
• 14:37
  Not every good thing is a God thing.
• 14:38
  What? I'm saying is this God quite
• 14:41
  literally will move mountains to make room for you and your
• 14:44
  healing to know him and become more like him.
• 14:47
  And I think we miss giving God the credit for the grace that
• 14:50
  has brought us to where we are today.
• 14:52
  Yeah I agree. And I think we get caught up in
• 14:56
  it has to be something big and I know you shared that in your
• 15:00
  book like it's the small things and I'm like that's exactly
• 15:05
  absolutely a small things. Yeah.
• 15:08
  And it It helps for, you know, other people that are around
• 15:13
  you, you know, having those like-minded friends and, you
• 15:16
  know, or having your spouse just reminds you like that.
• 15:19
  Was God. Do you see that that that was,
• 15:21
  that was God's making, that was his hand in it?
• 15:24
  And then it's like, oh yeah. Like because we'll just forget
• 15:28
  or think it's happenstance, like you're saying or know it's so
• 15:32
  good for us as a community. Remind each other like that was
• 15:36
  not coincidence. That was the Lord.
• 15:38
  So okay, so in your book you shared your own Ebenezer
• 15:42
  moments. You explained that there's this
• 15:46
  one called the starting Stone exactly what that is.
• 15:51
  Yeah. So I love the idea of being able
• 15:56
  to just look back at the very first time.
• 15:59
  You saw God move in your life for the very first time that you
• 16:02
  can actually see his hand of Grace and of love and mercy and
• 16:07
  chapter 1, the starting Stone. Essentially for me, was my
• 16:13
  second grade teacher, mrs. Carpenter.
• 16:14
  And the little notes that I used to write for myself.
• 16:18
  Back when I was 7 or 8 years old, essentially what I what I
• 16:23
  saw in this season of my life was as I kind of walked through
• 16:27
  these different circumstances. God wanted me to look back at
• 16:30
  one of the most tumultuous Seasons to learn to see him.
• 16:33
  And what I found was these two things in these two stories and
• 16:36
  says Carpenter was my second grade teacher.
• 16:39
  And the woman quite literally gave up her what I think life,
• 16:42
  and she would beg to differ. I've talked to her actually,
• 16:44
  since then, but she gave me the not just attention, but she gave
• 16:50
  me the chance of finding a little girl, helping a little
• 16:55
  girl, find her voice and her passion and conviction.
• 16:58
  And so when I was in second grade, I was in something called
• 17:00
  ESL, which is English as a second language, I learned
• 17:03
  English as a second language and so it was choppy and awkward,
• 17:06
  and weird. And my words didn't ever fall,
• 17:08
  right? But mrs.
• 17:10
  Carpenter knew that had I stayed in ESL the chances of me,
• 17:15
  progressing to any type of college, or just the, the, the
• 17:20
  odds were stacked against me. And so, she knew that, if she
• 17:23
  could test me out and get me in to the classes, that would then,
• 17:29
  educate me, move me forward and learn English.
• 17:31
  Essentially, I would do much better for myself, and so this
• 17:34
  woman would literally, I mean, I just, I saw God, so, Clearly.
• 17:39
  And in through her truly and she wasn't a Believer, she was just
• 17:43
  a woman that was willing and able to love well and she for me
• 17:46
  is one of my greatest Ebenezer's where as people we all bear
• 17:50
  witness to the goodness of God, we are image bearers, whether we
• 17:53
  like it or not, it's what we choose to do with it and she
• 17:57
  bear witness to Grace and good for me.
• 18:00
  I also used to write these little notes that I now know,
• 18:03
  are more like prayers and looking back.
• 18:06
  I even see now how the Lord had placed in me this This this
• 18:10
  passion and love not just for words but for not storytelling
• 18:16
  and processing. A lot of what my words do Jamie
• 18:18
  is inviting people to process and to think through things
• 18:21
  together and notes for me although they were like prayers.
• 18:26
  Now that I look back where a place where I could land softly
• 18:30
  with arms open and my words on a paper that were safe and the
• 18:35
  starting stone for me, when I wrote that was learning to see
• 18:38
  God. In that season through my words
• 18:41
  and through people. Yeah, so good.
• 18:43
  I know, there's always our our first, right.
• 18:47
  I mean, I remember going through one of the hardest times back in
• 18:50
  2008 and I just had women around me going.
• 18:55
  Oh, he'll get you through. He's faithful.
• 18:58
  But I've never had that first experience yet, so am I don't
• 19:02
  even know, you know, but he is like he got us through.
• 19:06
  He's faithful. So there's always those First, I
• 19:09
  love that story with your starting Stone there, your book
• 19:13
  explains that there's one stone. That is the Ebenezer of all
• 19:18
  Ebenezer's. Yeah.
• 19:20
  Share with us about that. I think I have a little clue
• 19:23
  what that might be of course. Yeah so all throughout scripture
• 19:29
  like God is totally obsessed with stones and the idea of
• 19:32
  using Stones mountains rocks for us to not just see him, but who
• 19:38
  he is, As our foundation. And so we hear this idea of God
• 19:44
  being our Cornerstone, right? Jesus is our Cornerstone, we
• 19:46
  hear about the Rock of Ages. We have Ebenezer's all
• 19:49
  throughout scripture and one of the things that I love to talk
• 19:53
  about is this. So there are going to be things.
• 19:55
  Like I said earlier, where we just can't reconcile the
• 19:57
  hardships sometimes, you're not going to find that Ebenezer,
• 20:01
  sometimes the season that you want to become and Ebenezer the
• 20:06
  the story that you want to tell doesn't happen.
• 20:09
  Right. And so there is a promise Jamie
• 20:12
  that we miss out on and it's this.
• 20:15
  There is an empty tomb and there is a God who not just died, but
• 20:19
  lived for us and I don't think we make a big fuss and enough of
• 20:22
  a fuss about the resurrection. I don't, I think that we miss
• 20:25
  the fact that there is an empty tomb.
• 20:28
  And that when we can't seem to trace God, we can look back at
• 20:30
  that empty tomb. And that means everything for
• 20:33
  us, the stone is rolled away so that we could now become Living
• 20:37
  Stones, right? The rock of Has given us his
• 20:40
  life so that we could experience life and that for me has been a
• 20:44
  Saving Grace Christ. Jesus is our Stone of help.
• 20:47
  He is our God with us Emmanuel, the savior of the world and I
• 20:53
  went and the hardships and the suffering and the pain in the
• 20:56
  darkness. When I look at that, when I look
• 20:58
  at the empty tomb, I can say the presence of pain is never meant.
• 21:02
  The absence of God, God is here and God is good because he has
• 21:06
  already done enough and that is our greatest event.
• 21:09
  Either right on. Amen.
• 21:11
  So when we read the Bible, the word of God, how does that
• 21:17
  transform our perspective for those that are baby listening?
• 21:23
  And you know they dip into the word here and there they don't
• 21:26
  really engage in it on a daily basis.
• 21:31
  Tell us like your story. How did that just totally
• 21:34
  transform you? Yeah.
• 21:37
  So I absolutely love nothing more than to engage with
• 21:42
  scriptures but not every season is an easy season for that.
• 21:45
  Yeah, right. Like, you know, if you know
• 21:48
  realistically speaking some of my hardest Seasons, what I've
• 21:51
  had to learn to do is to read through the Psalms and for me,
• 21:56
  as I read the scriptures, as I engage with God's word, I have
• 22:00
  loved being able to sit down and remind myself that I am reading
• 22:05
  the scriptures. Not So that I can get something
• 22:07
  from it but so that I can learn more about him and become more
• 22:11
  like him. I think that we get lost in this
• 22:13
  idea that the, the verse is in the scriptures that we find are
• 22:16
  going to somehow fix us, they're not going to fix us are going to
• 22:19
  heal us and we get to read about a God, who loves us?
• 22:23
  We get to read about a greater invitation to the kingdom of God
• 22:27
  and for those who are listening, who are trying to figure out,
• 22:29
  where to start, or how to read, or how to engage, I would start
• 22:33
  with a posture of knowing that when you read the As you're
• 22:36
  engaging a conversation with the Lord you really are, you're
• 22:40
  engaging in communion, you're engaging in conversation and to
• 22:43
  take bite-sized pieces of it and really offer yourself the time
• 22:49
  to process and to think through things and not just chew through
• 22:52
  it too quickly, so good. I know, I was listening.
• 22:56
  Is when Christian speaker author.
• 22:59
  She does Bible studies, I believe, through life way.
• 23:01
  But she talks about the Jewish Culture.
• 23:07
  And she really Taps into the middle eastern way of.
• 23:12
  I don't know, getting to know God and scripture and how they
• 23:17
  do exactly that. They read it to get to know
• 23:20
  God's character. You know how the Western culture
• 23:24
  were like what's it going to do for me?
• 23:27
  And I just loved when I first heard that and I'm like, well
• 23:31
  yeah, because when I'm diving into the word It's very
• 23:37
  impactful to me when I'm having that heart posture of wine is
• 23:42
  seek more of him and myself out of it.
• 23:46
  But I'm really wanting to know, you know, how did God work
• 23:50
  through these Bible stories? How does you know, what do you
• 23:54
  do in this situation? But knowing God and who he is it
• 23:59
  really enlightens? And you know, really gives you a
• 24:04
  better understanding and knowledge Age of how to walk in
• 24:08
  this life thriving, not just surviving and I heard recently,
• 24:14
  you know, there's a there's no risk and trusting God but there
• 24:18
  is a risk and doubting him and that just won't leave my heart.
• 24:24
  I am just walking around just saying, you know, there's no
• 24:27
  risk and trusting God but there is a risk in doubting so, okay,
• 24:33
  I love your reflection questions at the end.
• 24:36
  There were so good, just to slow down and process.
• 24:39
  Yeah. So what made it so important for
• 24:43
  you to make sure that we concluded in that at the end of
• 24:48
  the chapter? Yeah, so I think that one of the
• 24:52
  greatest gifts that we can give ourselves and others is taking
• 24:55
  time, to be introspective, truly to take time to wrestle, and ask
• 25:03
  God to search our hearts and search our, Minds and sit with
• 25:07
  those things. And so at the end of each
• 25:09
  chapter, I offer up at questions, for each chapter, for
• 25:13
  our hearts and our minds. What does it look like for us to
• 25:16
  know? God, was it look like for us in
• 25:18
  this particular chapter to surrender?
• 25:20
  This one idea? And that's important because
• 25:24
  there's this thing that happens when we connect our hearts and
• 25:28
  our minds with our body, like a physical result, engage with
• 25:31
  words, and whether you're a writer or not, or you like to
• 25:34
  journal or not, it really does. Either there's something
• 25:37
  important when you're able to ask yourself those questions and
• 25:40
  really get reflective enough to think about the answer and I
• 25:43
  think God meets us there and it's absolutely beautiful.
• 25:45
  Yeah, so true. There's some about yeah.
• 25:48
  Just writing it down. Like you're saying, you know, we
• 25:51
  are right or journaler but just writing it down that connection,
• 25:55
  that's really awesome. So this whole journey process.
• 25:59
  How has this may be changed your perspective for your future?
• 26:04
  I mean, one thing I just Love about, you know, as we go
• 26:08
  through things with the Lord and we may or may not write a book
• 26:14
  about it, it you're different. I mean, you just are you, you
• 26:20
  know, you wrote this book about who God is and what he did in
• 26:24
  your life. And so how does that just change
• 26:28
  your shift, your perspective for your future?
• 26:32
  Yeah. So actually just experienced a
• 26:35
  really great loss I My brother, about a month ago, a little over
• 26:38
  a month ago, right? After launching the book and I
• 26:42
  do, I truly believe it was in God's foreknowledge that I wrote
• 26:46
  eyes up for myself more than anything, more than anyone and
• 26:51
  in the midst of the season. Right now, here's what I can
• 26:54
  say, most most honestly and most confidently is that I didn't
• 26:59
  shake my fist at God when I found out my brother had
• 27:02
  unexpectedly passed, what I did is I Loud for him to sit with me
• 27:07
  in the midst of my grief, probably, for the first time
• 27:09
  ever in this way. And as I move forward, you know,
• 27:13
  in my future with him, with my family and my assignment, and
• 27:16
  whatever it may look like for those who are listening, the
• 27:19
  perspective I have now is that God does actually exist in all.
• 27:23
  And I don't have to wonder where God is God, is here.
• 27:27
  What I do now is I sit with him enough to see and feel it.
• 27:30
  The extended arms of grace and mercy that he offers us everyday
• 27:34
  and the perspective shift also, Is there's there's something
• 27:38
  really really sweet about knowing that God is always
• 27:41
  working on our behalf that it's never about God's in a built-in
• 27:45
  activity. It's just about our inability to
• 27:47
  see him move and that has been one of the greatest gifts and
• 27:51
  the perspective that I think I'm now living from.
• 27:54
  Yeah, so good. I'm so sorry for your loss.
• 27:58
  Yeah. Oh wow, yeah, I mean, you know,
• 28:00
  especially with something so tragic like that, you know, and
• 28:04
  how your journey your Past has built that faith that to where,
• 28:09
  you know, you said you weren't shaking your fist at the Lord.
• 28:12
  So I know that he gets us through those hardest times and
• 28:17
  he shows up and is there for the Brokenhearted, he promises us
• 28:21
  that gets us through. So I'm gonna end right here.
• 28:25
  I usually do a takeaway for the listeners to ponder on, but I'm
• 28:30
  going to do a little differently because I'm going to just ask
• 28:33
  you like what is the ultimate? Hope that you have for people
• 28:38
  who read your book. Hmm.
• 28:41
  The ultimate hope that I have the friends who are reading the
• 28:44
  book is that they would leave reading eyes up with fresh
• 28:48
  Faith. Truly with Revival in their
• 28:51
  hearts and in their minds to live a life full of Hope,
• 28:57
  because there is hope. And his name is Jesus and that
• 29:00
  same breath, Jamie, something happens.
• 29:02
  When are able to see God in our lives because we leave with a
• 29:05
  test. Te Moni, right?
• 29:07
  We leave understanding our stories and our experiences so
• 29:11
  much better in the hands of God. And so my hope and prayer is
• 29:14
  that they would leave with fresh faith and with new purpose to
• 29:17
  live life on mission on purpose. What right where God has them?
• 29:21
  Thanks Alexandra. Wow.
• 29:24
  I know I highly recommend everyone.
• 29:27
  Get this book eyes up. I'm sure you can get it
• 29:31
  everywhere. Working friends can connect with
• 29:33
  you and yeah. So If my friends are in
• 29:37
  Charlotte would love for you to run to Barnes and Nobles and
• 29:39
  pick up some copies of signed a few in Charlotte North Carolina.
• 29:43
  Also Amazon of course is you know Goliath of all Publishers
• 29:48
  and books right now. So I had to a fun and like he's
• 29:52
  click Prime that thing. It'll be there tomorrow.
• 29:54
  Yeah. Thanks for coming on here and
• 29:57
  sharing your story here on the podcast, thanks.
• 30:00
  Jamie, I'm so glad to be on and I hope and pray.
• 30:03
  These words do exactly what they need to do for this.
• 30:06
  Those who are listening. Thank you so much for listening
• 30:09
  today and I trust that God has encouraged you through this
• 30:13
  story. Did you know this podcast is on
• 30:15
  YouTube, hop on there and subscribe and you can see a live
• 30:20
  recording of each episode and for more information on this
• 30:24
  ministry and to access free downloads, please visit my
• 30:28
  website at Jamie Elizabeth.com that's ja yme Elisabeth.com and
• 30:35
  let's connect Beyond this. By going to my Instagram handle,
• 30:39
  Jamie Elizabeth, she speaks life or Facebook until next time my
• 30:43
  friend. I hope God reveals himself
• 30:46
  through your own life story.