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Kelly Stiles: From Perfection to Grace · Why I Believe

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome back to Why I Believe.
• 0:03
  I'm your host, Michelle Von Ruden, and today I have Kelly Styles joining me.
• 0:07
  Hi Kelly, how are you?
• 0:09
  Hey Michelle, I'm well, it's good to be here.
• 0:12
  so nice to have you here.
• 0:14
  Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
• 0:16
  Sure.
• 0:16
  So I am first and foremost a follower of Jesus.
• 0:21
  My second role that I will claim is wife to Randy.
• 0:24
  And we are a blended family.
• 0:26
  We have four kids.
• 0:27
  Two of them have officially launched and two of them are at home, uh, some high schoolers, if you will.
• 0:32
  And we live in Annapolis, Maryland, but right now I'm coming to you from Dallas, Texas at Dallas Theological Seminary, where we're both students.
• 0:42
  Awesome.
• 0:42
  So are you both there right now then too?
• 0:44
  Yeah, he's over in his doctoral intensive.
• 0:47
  I'm a master's student and I get to sit in when he has his intensives.
• 0:52
  so it's an exciting time.
• 0:53
  Uh before I finish my master's work, uh I'm just kind of playing in the master's pool and then I'll probably jump over into the doctoral work later.
• 1:02
  Awesome.
• 1:02
  So good to hear.
• 1:05
  You have a story when we were talking about how you did not want to be a statistic.
• 1:09
  Can you tell us more about that?
• 1:12
  Yeah, this was a recurring theme in my life as I was growing up.
• 1:16
  there is some uh unstability in my teenage years, and there was abuse, um, some trauma, some things that are really actually difficult to talk about and things that I carry with
• 1:30
  me still today.
• 1:32
  But I remember as a graduating senior, one of my pervasive thoughts was that I did not want to be a statistic.
• 1:40
  I didn't want to be the college dropout, the person that ended up failing because of the trauma that had marked her past.
• 1:48
  And I just was so passionate about pushing through.
• 1:56
  I pushed myself really hard.
• 1:58
  And that story God started weaving when I was 18 and it came full circle a couple months ago.
• 2:08
  And it was just this amazing experience kind of we talk about God weaving our lives together as this red thread through the tapestry.
• 2:17
  And uh I was on a trip to Michigan with um some Dallas students, and it was as if he had flipped the carpet over, and I could see uh this amazing thread line from college all the
• 2:30
  way now in my mid forties, looking at how he had woven all of that together.
• 2:36
  And
• 2:37
  really understanding how it was that he built me and my identity in him and the work um that he's, you know, provisioned for me to do providentially.
• 2:49
  Awesome.
• 2:50
  You say your identity in him.
• 2:51
  Was it always that way, or is that something that you've come full circle with?
• 2:57
  this is definitely something that I've come full circle with.
• 2:59
  During my teenage years, I think I we talked about that trauma, right?
• 3:03
  So my parents are divorced, and my dad was a missionary part time, and I wanted nothing to do with that.
• 3:11
  Um, he offered, you know, to take me to Thailand or to take me to Papua New Guinea, and I just kept saying no.
• 3:19
  So my half siblings went with him and Jesus wasn't my thing.
• 3:24
  I didn't understand it.
• 3:25
  Um
• 3:26
  didn't really want to be a part of it.
• 3:27
  The only part of me that wanted that was because I wanted approval from my father.
• 3:31
  And it was a rough road.
• 3:34
  So going through college, going through my first marriage, um, they weren't God honoring at all.
• 3:40
  And it really took um my divorce, which was my own trauma.
• 3:44
  And sadly, the trauma that I've left my son with, of course, uh, that was the turning point.
• 3:50
  And I remember there being
• 3:53
  it was about 10 years ago, so 2015-ish, where it was really that Christ recaptured my heart.
• 4:01
  And I would hold on to my faith so tightly in those days.
• 4:06
  And again, probably not wanting to be a statistic, right?
• 4:09
  This theme of of how it is that I'm formed or what it is that's going on in my life.
• 4:15
  And I had a white knuckle faith.
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  I was just so fearful to live life without God.
• 4:21
  And then something switched.
• 4:23
  And I I can't tell you what it was other than clearly it was the Holy Spirit just saying, Hey, you know, knocking on my head, Kelly, like relax, like I got you.
• 4:32
  It's okay.
• 4:33
  Um, and somehow this this rope that I was clinging to became this beautiful woven hammock that I could rest in.
• 4:41
  And from there, my faith just grew.
• 4:44
  I mean, obviously we're talking about 10 years ago, and now I'm sitting at Dallas Theological Seminary.
• 4:50
  Like, make that make sense.
• 4:52
  Yeah.
• 4:53
  I know I can't.
• 4:54
  Um, and God's economy doesn't work like our economy.
• 4:58
  Um, and I was never meant to be a statistic.
• 5:02
  I was meant to be a daughter of the king.
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  And really just resting in that, understanding the drive that he had given me, the the fact that he's built in me a way to communicate to others, a way to encourage others.
• 5:18
  um a way to work with others so that they might find their lights um has really just been this it's always been there it's always been a part of my life when I look back and I
• 5:29
  looked at at the giftedness coaching experience that I went through but uh it's never been it was an ember, right?
• 5:39
  And so now I'm in spaces and places where that ember is just being fanned into this like voracious flame.
• 5:48
  that's turned into our ministry.
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  And it's been really cool to see, a little scary.
• 5:52
  Um, even coming here and talking with you, there's, you know, a a little ounce of fear of saying the wrong thing.
• 5:59
  But um, knowing that that God is here in the space, He'll give me the words to say, He'll give you the questions to ask has really been a sweet awakening and also a surrender.
• 6:14
  talk about that surrender a little bit for people that don't understand what you're saying, who maybe haven't listened to previous episodes.
• 6:20
  Yeah, surrender is it sounds like Christianese, right?
• 6:25
  And and to be honest, I'm not fully sure that I understand it myself.
• 6:29
  Um, there is a journey of sanctification that God takes us on.
• 6:33
  Um, and it's this constant idea of of taking something out of God's hands and then giving it back.
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  You know, we've got Carrie Underwood with Jesus Take Wheel, which I think is the quintessential idea of surrender.
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  but
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  It's really a daily routine.
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  Um, and it's more of a posture.
• 6:53
  Um, I certainly am the type of person that wants to control things and wants to control the outcome, right?
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  I want to be on the right side of the statistic.
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  side note, statistics are what they are.
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  You're either on one side or the other.
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  So we're actually all statistics of some nature.
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  And
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  I think that that surrender process is, I might liken it to like peeling an onion, right?
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  Where you've got this this big onion and you're slowly peeling it back.
• 7:26
  And God in his grace, um, sometimes you know, you take off a big chunk and you've got these really hard stories, um, divorce or abuse, or um some of what one of our professors
• 7:39
  calls like the dark night of the soul, right?
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  These these ideas that
• 7:45
  you can feel like you're alone and you're really not.
• 7:48
  Um, and so in those spaces where we're surrendering, I think it's just this.
• 7:55
  Cognitive and behavioral step that we take of saying, like, Jesus, it's yours, it's not mine.
• 8:03
  I know and I've learned enough about you and your word and your character that you are good.
• 8:11
  And even in this moment, if I'm feeling uncomfortable or this is hard, uh, I can trust that you have the end goal in mind and that ultimately.
• 8:22
  This is not my home.
• 8:23
  As much as I love Dallas actually, um, and Annapolis isn't my home either.
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  There is an end to the suffering of this world.
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  And that is when, you know, we will die, we will be reunited in heaven.
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  And at that point, you know, we'll wait, who knows how long?
• 8:40
  Could be a minute, could be a day, and then at some point Christ will come back to this earth and reign and create the new the new heaven here on earth, which is of course, um
• 8:52
  you know, the Lord's Prayer.
• 8:54
  So yeah, there's um there's this idea that ultimately all will be made right and and Christ will be the one to do that.
• 9:02
  So given that, I can surrender.
• 9:06
  I can say, you know, as a mom looking at some of the stories that my children have um created for themselves in their own wilderness seasons, making decisions perhaps that
• 9:18
  aren't
• 9:19
  um aligned with what Christ would have for them and seeing those consequences.
• 9:24
  I think as a mom especially, you walk into those spaces and you're like, don't hurt my baby.
• 9:30
  You know, I know your kids are younger, mine are a little bit older and walking through them, you know, their teenage years and seeing their anxiety or seeing some of their
• 9:39
  friendship decisions, um, sometimes really wrecks my heart.
• 9:43
  But I also know in those seasons where they're in the valley,
• 9:48
  I can't process that for them.
• 9:51
  And my husband has a saying, I don't know where he got it from.
• 9:54
  Maybe he came up with it himself, but um probably not.
• 9:58
  Let's be real.
• 9:59
  Uh, there's no testimony without test, right?
• 10:02
  And so it it's their test and and they have to learn um how to walk through that.
• 10:10
  And, you know, I would love to help them with that, but nine times out of ten, and and Michelle, just get ready for it.
• 10:16
  Um, you know, like.
• 10:17
  When your kids get older, like they don't want your advice.
• 10:21
  They don't want to know.
• 10:22
  And um yeah, so I just uh you know, it's so true though.
• 10:28
  Like, side note, when they get to like seventh or eighth grade and they're starting algebra or goodness knows, when they're in high school and they're doing calculus and
• 10:38
  they're like, Can you help me with this?
• 10:40
  I'm like, No, not at all.
• 10:41
  And that's why they feel they know everything is because they're taking classes that I never took, which is fair.
• 10:47
  Um, but yeah, they they do know a fair amount and the world will help inform them in other ways.
• 10:54
  Yeah.
• 10:55
  I do like that there can be no testimony without the test.
• 10:58
  And I think that's so true.
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  I think
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  A lot of people inherit their faith.
• 11:04
  A lot of my guests have inherited their faith.
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  And then at some point they went through a trial, a tribulation, or just a nice moment.
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  Cause it doesn't always have to be negative, right?
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  I I want to reinforce that.
• 11:13
  We don't always have to have a negative test for us to have a testimony, but at some point we have to say, I choose this for me and not because somebody else wanted me to choose it.
• 11:24
  Yeah, there's there's a definite value sort that happens, right?
• 11:27
  If you're if you have the um God's grace of being raised in a Christian home, you kind of look at your parents and you're like, okay, I see, you know, scripture on the wall and we
• 11:36
  pray before every meal, but like, is this what I really believe?
• 11:40
  Um, and you know, I think God is faithful in those moments, you know, raise them up, train them up in the way, and from that they won't depart.
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  Um, we know we don't know.
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  Um, I also love the saying God doesn't have grandchildren.
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  Right.
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  So like it's it's only a one-to-one faith.
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  It's something that I can tell someone, but I can't pass my salvation on to someone else.
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  and I do have friends.
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  actually this week in class sitting here, um, I met a woman and and she was just so um blessed to know that even though in her growing up stages she felt like her parents were
• 12:16
  maybe a little bit more insulated.
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  Um, but she had a discipler from very early on, older women.
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  you know, that came to her as a teenager and we're like, hey, like let's get coffee.
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  You know, we're we're here talking about um coaching, mentoring, and discipleship actually.
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  But um what a sweet gift that that was to her to have someone in in her community to teach her about Jesus.
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  And I think it's the people that don't have the you know the gut wrenching it hurt down to my toenails experience that often go like, well, is my faith real?
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  And absolutely their faith is real.
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  And and those of us that have had too much trauma are like, gosh, I wish it were a little easier.
• 12:59
  Right.
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  But even even in those stories of trauma, I think God can can definitely use it.
• 13:07
  Um so yeah.
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  Yeah, and I think you brought up a good point is, you know, a lot of times people that maybe aren't growing up in a church-filled home just need the invite, right?
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  Because everybody, especially kids, want to know what they're missing out on, right?
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  Because nobody everyone has FOMO, right?
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  The fear of missing out.
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  And so I think sometimes it's really just that invite.
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  You know, for me, I think we talked about this, Callie.
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  I didn't grow up in a um house that went to church, right?
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  We were raised on Christian values, but we didn't go to church.
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  And it wasn't until high school when my friends invited me to a youth group that I started opening up that door.
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  Right.
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  And so I think that's key as you talk about discipleship is you gotta ask.
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  So many people like just invite them to your youth group, invite them to church.
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  Because what's the worst they're gonna say is no.
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  But they already weren't going.
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  Right.
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  But nobody wants to hear no.
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  I mean, I think this this has been kind of the struggle.
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  Um, my husband and I also have a nonprofit ministry that we run.
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  And um, I'm not good at self-marketing.
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  Like I I don't feel like I feel like it's almost a little bit prideful.
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  But in the back of my head, God is always like, if you don't tell them, how will they know?
• 14:26
  Right.
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  And and that goes along with what you're saying is, you know, if I don't tell my neighbor, Hey, we're going to church for Easter, like have you ever heard about Easter?
• 14:35
  Even if it's just like the, you know, celebration Saturday or whatever it is that you do, um, our church is very active in the community.
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  And actually on Father's Day has a huge car show, which I think is amazing because it's like the number one least attended day of church where like Mother's Day is up there with
• 14:51
  Christmas and Easter.
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  So they figured out how to kind of twist that a little bit.
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  But when it comes to our own ministry stuff, if I want people around the table, guess what I have to do?
• 15:01
  Like I have to invite them.
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  Like, you know, like I have to say, hey, this is what I'm working on.
• 15:07
  No similar, you know, similar to your podcast and and everything else.
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  Like this is what I'm working on.
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  This is what God has created me to do.
• 15:14
  So this is what I'm doing.
• 15:16
  Um, yeah.
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  So it it it all fits together for sure.
• 15:20
  And I think as as women, especially in ministry, there's
• 15:26
  Um, in the environment right now, there's a lot going on about what women can do and what women can't do.
• 15:32
  And ultimately, I think we all need to sit in the fact that we're made in the image of God and He has prepared a way for us to do something for His glory.
• 15:42
  Um and we just have to figure out what that is.
• 15:45
  Mm-hmm.
• 15:46
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 15:48
  I I totally relate though with that self-promotion.
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  It's it's a struggle.
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  I think for a lot of people, I don't think you're alone in that.
• 15:55
  And I think part of it is we have to realize if people don't know about us, they can't work with us, they can't do things with us, they can't share in our faith, they can't
• 16:02
  listen to a podcast, right?
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  All these things, because for me it was just okay, I have to do it because that's being obedient, done, check, okay.
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  But now if my goal in life is to lead people to God, I have to share that faith.
• 16:17
  And we have to unpack it and we have to explain it slowly.
• 16:19
  And we have to say what it is or what it isn't.
• 16:22
  And as as a as a leader in that space too, I'm sure you've encountered this.
• 16:28
  What do you do with the question you can't answer?
• 16:31
  Because we we in our own flesh want to be like, I have all the answers.
• 16:35
  And can I tell you, I'm halfway through seminary, and I feel like I know less now than when I came in, just because there's a volumes and volumes and
• 16:45
  volumes of books.
• 16:47
  The the library is that way.
• 16:49
  It's one of my favorite places to go.
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  And I was telling someone this morning, they said your face lights up when you talk about the library.
• 16:56
  And I was like, well, of course, because it's not about the text that's in there.
• 17:03
  For me, it's about what questions did these people have that are then answered by this research, right?
• 17:12
  And and over time too in in the culture that's changed and if I put up pick up a book from, you know, nineteen twenty, because they have some historical stuff here, how does
• 17:22
  that read differently than the same topic in, you know, nineteen ninety?
• 17:26
  And you can kind of compare the two.
• 17:28
  So yeah, there's there's so much fun stuff to do.
• 17:31
  So especially, you know, the stuff that you're doing here.
• 17:34
  And um, yeah, we need to tell them.
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  We need to tell them.
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  Proclaim the truth.
• 17:40
  Absolutely.
• 17:40
  We're we're we're made to spread the good news, right?
• 17:43
  So, um, so how did you decide, since we've been talking about the seminary, how did you decide to go to school?
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  How did you decide that that was my path?
• 17:52
  Because you went from rejecting to an aha moment that you can't quite pinpoint to I'm gonna go to seminary school.
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  Like that is that is a stretch, right?
• 18:02
  So what made you
• 18:03
  stretch.
• 18:04
  Good question.
• 18:05
  Good question.
• 18:06
  Uh FOMO.
• 18:08
  We can go back to FOMO.
• 18:09
  Um so uh the church that we were at had a biblical leadership program and my husband and I were asked to join it, and so we were students in this leadership program for like a year.
• 18:24
  And I didn't know what was happening.
• 18:26
  And at the end of it, my husband says,
• 18:30
  I've been using this as a test case to see if I could maybe do seminary.
• 18:34
  And I was like, I'm sorry, what?
• 18:35
  What like, like, had you known us when we were dating, like, I think people will be like, What is she even talking about?
• 18:44
  Like, this isn't even happening.
• 18:45
  And so he enrolled in school first and he got a master's in Christian leadership.
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  And I had FOMO.
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  And I did not want to be the
• 18:59
  What word do I want to use?
• 19:00
  I didn't want to be the accessory.
• 19:03
  Right.
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  So I didn't want to get the biblical training and the biblical knowledge that he was getting secondhand.
• 19:09
  Like I wanted to learn from the professors myself.
• 19:12
  And initially I enrolled in Capitol Seminary, which is local there in DC.
• 19:18
  And um, it was another one of those fearful moments where I wasn't trusting God's economy because.
• 19:24
  To have two people in seminary.
• 19:26
  It's expensive, right?
• 19:27
  I mean, there are there are real world costs to this adventure.
• 19:30
  And um, so my work, I work for the federal government, and since it was a leadership degree that I was seeking, they they were willing to pay for some of it.
• 19:40
  And I was sitting in that school and I was studying from professors that studied at Dallas, and we were reading books.
• 19:51
  From Dr.
• 19:52
  Michael Spiegel and Dr.
• 19:55
  George Hellman and Dr.
• 19:57
  Glenn Kreider.
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  So I'm reading their books, but my husband is sitting in their classes.
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  And I was like, okay, this isn't fair.
• 20:07
  Like, I'm not in the right place.
• 20:09
  And so it was it's really this desire of like, I don't want to miss out.
• 20:13
  I don't want to miss out on on what somebody else is doing.
• 20:16
  I don't want to miss out on cheering them on.
• 20:18
  I don't want to miss out on what God has.
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  And
• 20:42
  Go ahead.
• 20:44
  Well, actually, let me let me touch on one thing real quick before you jump into that.
• 20:47
  Um, you said something before you kind of went down this path, but you said if you would have known us when we were dating, you but here's the thing that I've learned and that I
• 20:57
  want to make sure everyone understands that God does not call on the perfect, right?
• 21:02
  He perfects the ones he calls.
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  Right.
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  And so, you know, if you're like, oh, I am not perfect, I can't be this person, I can't do these things for him, that's not true.
• 21:12
  You're probably just the right person.
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  Cause I wasn't perfect either.
• 21:17
  So, but I just want to point that out, right?
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  Like he doesn't call on us, you know, if we're perfect.
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  He perfects the ones that he calls to come and do his will.
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  So, yes.
• 21:25
  us and and he brings us on that journey.
• 21:27
  There's um there's an old Facebook reel or social media thing that's like, do you go to the gym already cut?
• 21:37
  No.
• 21:38
  Do you get in the shower already clean?
• 21:41
  No.
• 21:42
  Well then why would you go to church already sinless?
• 21:45
  And none of us are sinless anyways, which is a whole other theological topic, right?
• 21:49
  Yeah.
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  I can talk about this stuff for hours, obviously.
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  So we're not perfect.
• 21:55
  And you know, when we surrender our faults and and we embrace God's grace, um, He's faithful in helping reshape our hearts and reshape our vision and giving us um bit by bit
• 22:11
  little pieces that we can play with and have tension with and figure out and then move to the next thing and
• 22:18
  And and sometimes there is a next thing and then sometimes you're in a season of, oh, I I don't know what's happening and I'm just waiting, you know?
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  And and so it it's along the same lines.
• 22:27
  I think people have this idea of like once you get saved and you understand the gospel that oh, it's like gold gold and and sunshine and rainbows and it's like no, it's not
• 22:39
  really that either.
• 22:39
  And Jesus says, like, in this life you will have troubles, but you know, don't be afraid because I've overcome the world.
• 22:45
  But yeah, there's
• 22:47
  That's so true.
• 22:48
  And we need to remember that, that God God uses his people to accomplish his mission.
• 22:52
  So um part of yeah, the ministry that that we do, you know, I do women's retreats and um women's events and and different things and it's it's bold, right?
• 23:04
  It's not associated with any church, which apparently is a thing.
• 23:08
  I didn't know it was a thing.
• 23:09
  I was just like, Hey, maybe we could do this and this could be fun.
• 23:13
  like I said, God is a playful God and
• 23:16
  you know, I don't have that fear of failure anymore.
• 23:18
  But the anchor verse that I kind of put on my heart in in this particular space, there's lots of verses, right?
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  And if you've walked with God a long time, if you someone asks you to narrow down your favorite verse, you're like, well, I don't know what season was I in.
• 23:32
  But for now, um, it's first first Corinthians fourteen, one through three.
• 23:38
  And I really like the message version of of this particular text.
• 23:43
  Um
• 23:45
  I don't read there often, but but the way that that this is translated, I think, is beautiful.
• 23:50
  And it says, go after a life of love as if your life depended on it.
• 23:55
  Because it does.
• 23:57
  Give yourself to the gifts God gives you, and most of all, try to proclaim his truth.
• 24:04
  Right?
• 24:05
  So I don't want to miss out on this life that God has for me that's full of love and abundance.
• 24:14
  And I don't want anybody else to miss out on it either.
• 24:16
  So I need to understand how he wired me to be a statistic or to not be a statistic or to have this trauma in my life.
• 24:24
  Um, that I am an unperfect uh believer that is only saved by his grace.
• 24:30
  So that then I can go tell others, and then maybe they won't miss out either.
• 24:35
  So yeah, it's it's just this full circle continual journey.
• 24:42
  Mm, so good.
• 24:43
  Well, this has been great, Callie.
• 24:45
  Thank you so much for jumping on today.
• 24:46
  I totally appreciate your time.
• 24:49
  It's been fun to be here.
• 24:50
  I appreciate it.