Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / March 5, 2024 | Expresso - Rozanna Selley

Transcript

March 5, 2024 | Expresso - Rozanna Selley · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Rosanna.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: I can work an iPhone, iPad, computer, server, network.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: But not not on this show.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Well, this is when I'm asking myself, why do I agree to do this?
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: And appreciating all the strange strange, not strange.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: Strong.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: And and strong and courageous women who have done this before because it's a scary thing to do.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, I'm really, really glad to be here.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: I've attended many.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a lot taller than that.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: I just pointed it.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Look at it.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: Talk to the chest.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: There we go.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: You know how to work that thing.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, indeed.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, there we go.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, I've I've been to quite a few espresso, and I've really enjoyed listening to all of the stories and looking out and seeing some of those folks here tonight and how much they inspired and lifted me up and hearing their struggles and how they were overcomers of those struggles.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: A couple months ago, I was listening to a young lady give her story, and one thing that she said that really impacted me was that she looked around and saw the all the perfect people, you know, that that were around her.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: And that really hit me hard.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, no, not at all.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there are no perfect people, except Jesus.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but you never will, and you you never never have and you never will have a perfect life.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's just not gonna happen.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus tells us that in this world we will have trouble, and but then he says, but whoa, take heart, have courage, you know, have hope, because I have overcome the world.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I believe that we all can be overcomers, and we all struggle with life circumstances and different things in our lives, but um with God's help and power of the Holy Spirit, I think we're all capable of becoming overcomers in that.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: So um that started me thinking, um, maybe I need to share my story because I know you all think I'm perfect.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: I no, no, no, no, no.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh which is absolutely wrong.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but um in Jeremiah 29, 11 it says, for I know the plans I have for you.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: It declares the Lord's plans to prosper you, not to harm you, plans to give you hope in a future.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: And some of us, when we find ourselves in those difficult times, we really wonder where's our hope and future.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: We really question that.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: So um a few weeks after that, I saw Connie in the parking lot, and she walked up to me and she said, Would like to, I'd like to talk at Espresso.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I think I really shocked her when I said yeah, right away.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and I I know some people will say, Well, I gotta think about it.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I I don't know if I'm ready.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not I'm not putting that down at all because most people say that.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: But I had already been thinking about it, and ready or not, you're gonna hear it, okay?
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: So this is my story.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Rosanna Sully, and I'm married to Craig, and um in our lives, we might look happy and smiling, and you'd think we might have a perfect life, but no, it's not it's not true.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: We're dealing with life's ups and downs, just like everyone else.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're not dealing with today, you're probably gonna deal with it tomorrow.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: So um I was glad to tell my story, and we will be celebrating our 50th anniversary this year.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, thank you.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: We have three kids and four grandchildren, unlike your grandmother.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just way short of that.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: But um, but I'm also happy to report that we've sp uh spent another year celebrating Craig's mom's birthday, and she turned 103 in January.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: So that's quite a deal.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: She's independent living, no problems, no medicine.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: She's just um unbelievable.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: So um, in there as we go through our lives, our stories get created after out of all kinds of things.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we our our families, our personal experiences, um, friends, and health issues are a big part of our story.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, some of those things are completely out of our control.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: For example, big one, we can't pick our families.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: And the other things that affect our lives are sometimes due to our own choices and the circumstances of that consequences that come from those choices.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: So there's all kinds of things that build it.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: But I believe that God wants us to have our best life.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: And um and is with us even through those circumstances and troubles.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: And uh with Him uh by our side we can make it through.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, first of all, I didn't pick my family, okay, but they were all ahead.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I was blessed, though, to have a really strong, faithful, um, courageous mother.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: She was um would do anything for anybody, would watch anybody's kids.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: They need clothes, she'd get them clothes.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: They need love, she'd squeeze them, you know.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: So she just loved children.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: And if I'm gonna tell you about me, I'm gonna tell you about her.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: Because my life is built around her influence and her raising me.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: So um, and that really molds it.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: Our families really mold us.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: So she was married at 18 to a man named Boots.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know where that Boots.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: His name was really Oliver, which is my brother's name too.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they had five children, and they were really hardworking people, but very, very poor.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: Very, very little money to go around.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they lived in Kansas City, Kansas, and in a part of the town called Quindero.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if anybody knows Quindero.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I love that.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: Quindero is very interesting people.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I mean that in a good way, Connie.
• 6:19
  unknown: Okay.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um and uh it's kind of like uh a city within a city like Highland Park or Oakland, you know, there it's a very tight community.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: And um they again hardworking people, but not much uh to live on, very, very struggle, a lot of struggle going on.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: Well, one day he decided to help his neighbor uh go to the river and snag some some logs so that he could use them in a building project.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: So they're out on the river in the boat, and they hit something under the water, it flips the boat, and the people on the shore who witnessed this that they both went into the water, they never surfaced, and they never found their bodies.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: So, so here's my mom, you know, a young widow, like 36, 37 years old.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, at that time, there was no way a woman was going to be able to take care of herself and her children.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: There was no way to earn, you know, a living at that time.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: And um, she was in a bad situation, but um she um had five children from age four through 15 at that time.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: So now enters my dad.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: He was a good friend of her her uh dead husband, and um I think I I think about why this happened and how this that she ended up marrying him, and I think part of it was that he she knew him, he was someone she knew, she could cling to that part, you know, of him.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: And then the other I think is a lot of it was desperation.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you you're in that kind of situation.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you're looking for uh a resolution, what's going on?
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: So she married my dad.
• 8:04
  SPEAKER_00: But what might I tell you though, the my the ladies love my dad, okay?
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: He was very pretty nice looking, tanned.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: He was a lifeguard, and and uh he um he was married five times, and my mother being his third wife.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: So uh even when he died in the in the at the funeral, um he's laying in his casket, and some of his old girlfriends walk up and say, Oh my gosh, he's still good looking.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is my dad.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, and he wasn't a bad guy.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: He really wasn't.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: He was just irresponsible, and you couldn't depend on him, save your soul.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: So, um, and it and besides that, you would have he would have been disdiagnosed as an alcoholic in in this day and age.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: Back then, somebody with a little drinking problem, they would never have diagnosed that way.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: But he was um an alcoholic, in my opinion.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: And um, but he was always able to hold down a good job and function, you know.
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh one of the little issues my mom had with him was that he would go to work and come home on payday and stop by the bar and drink a little too much.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_00: And he got real generous when he was drinking.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: And by the time he got home, uh probably half his paycheck was gone because if anybody asked him for anything, he'd give it to him.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: And they knew that, you know.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: So um that that was one of the problems she had.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: And when he um would drink, he was again, not he wasn't not mean or a bad guy, but when he'd drink, he'd get really loud.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: He'd want to discuss and debate very loudly.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, my mom, you know, she was a Baptist, she didn't drink, she did all this.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: This was not the kind of life, home life she was comfortable with, yeah.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: So, and then I came along, and then two years later, she did something that was very unusual for that time.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, she divorced my dad.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: Now in 1953, to be a divorced woman, now you have six children, you're divorced, and uh you have to make it on your own.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so when my dad left, he never looked back.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: He never made any attempt to have contact with me.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, my first memory of my dad was uh sitting in the hall in the courthouse while my mom was trying to get child support.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: And he'd pay for a few weeks and then it'd go away.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: And finally she just gave it up and she knew she was on her own.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: So um she stayed at home.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: The only income she had at that time was uh Social Security benefits for my five brothers and sisters who dad had died.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so she used one of her gifts.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: She was a really good cook, and so she went to work as a cook, and that was what she did for the rest of her life.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: She was a cook.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: And at 40 years old, went to went to work.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: And um, there was a lot of times we struggled with having enough food in the house, having enough money to pay next month's rent, because we always were renting a house.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: We I'm I went to four different grade schools and we moved all those that many times.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: But my mom promised me when I went to junior high that she would stay within the district, so I didn't have to move out of the school.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so um I I just do believe that all during that time um I was being watched over, and um I think that no matter what's going on, that all things work together for good for those who love God and called for his purpose.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: I looking back, I really believe that he was with me.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: My first memory of church was when I was four or five years old, and I was standing on the steps of a little Baptist church, and my mom um loved to go to church, and but when she started working, a lot of times when you're a cook, you're gonna work on Sundays, you know, you're preparing food, you're doing whatever that is.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_00: And um, so she she was real sad about not being able to go, but she encouraged me to go.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: She wanted me to be there, and so I went to whatever church denomination my current best friend was.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: So I was um I was a Presbyterian, a uh Nazarene, a Baptist, and a Catholic.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I really, really enjoyed it all, and I and I did know who God was, but I really didn't develop any um strong faith during that time.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: So it was usually me and my mom as I was growing up, and uh my older brothers and sisters were leaving home.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: They're getting married, leaving.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: So mostly the time just her, except when one of them had a problem, and then they'd come home, and mom would, you know, welcome them in.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: And how long do you need to stay?
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: No problem.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: You just, you know, we just would be, we'd grow, we'd grow and see and go back and forth like this, the number of people in house.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: I was always blessed to have two really great brothers, and um they were my father figures, and they were the ones who kept me from not really having any bad feelings toward men, or you know, that my father abandoned me, basically, right?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: So uh they were good sons, they were good brothers, and they were good husbands, and so they became my my example of what a man is supposed to be, and I knew they cared for me and they'd do anything, anything for me.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: So um I um although all through that time, um it did hurt me, you know, to think that my dad didn't want me.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: Because even during during that time he um uh tried to adopt a little girl that was my age.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: And boy, that really hit hard.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because you start thinking to yourself, what's wrong with me?
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know, am I not smart enough?
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: Am I not um am I not pretty enough?
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: If am I not good enough?
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: You know, all these things that would go through a child's mind.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, but I finally got to the point where I realized that I didn't need him to have my self-worth.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I just I moved on and um didn't really worry about it anymore.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: I got I I had plenty of support around me.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: I had my mom, I had good friends, I had teachers, and um it it it it was what all pulled me through.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so I finally connected with my dad, was about 10 years old, but I really never felt any normal father-daughter relationship or uh um what I want to say, affection, you know, for him.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: I really just didn't trust it, you know.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: So um I I was I did get to the point where I decided I was going to make something of myself.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: I was never going to be in a position where I couldn't take care of my children and myself on my own if I had to.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: And that all came from you know what I experienced as I was growing up.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um I was a good student, graduated from high school.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: My sister, one sister was the only other one who graduated from high school of my siblings.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I wanted to go to college because I felt like that was where I was gonna get a job and have financial security.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_00: And that was gonna be tough because there wasn't much money to go around.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: So, okay, then there was a praise the Lord, hallelujah moment.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: My dad accidentally helped me.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: He retired before I turned 18, and I was a minor child, and so I got Social Security benefits all through college.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: And that was a huge, huge help.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: And between that and some loans and you know, working, I made it through.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I I actually graduated in what they call um the college data processing, okay?
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: And you know that's key punch cards and big, you know, sorting machines and big computers, you know.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um but uh now and I went to where and I grew I retired actually in Bluecross and Blu Shield, Kansas, and I was an IT and network administrator.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: So that that evolved all the way into that.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: But uh I I think that it was again with all that plans going in action, happening behind the scenes.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um I met Craig after college, yeah, and we got married.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: And but right before we got married, I uh told my sister, I said, you know, um I can see getting married, but I just can't imagine staying married a long time.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: Again, again, you know, this is all up here from all my experiences, you know.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm glad to say that that did not, that prediction did not come true.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, and that uh God's plan for me did did include a supportive, loving husband, which I never thought that would happen.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: Now, perfect life, Craig had the perfect life, you know.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure his mother was uh aghast when I came into the picture.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh oh, gee.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't paint my fingernails, you know, I'd done all this stuff anyway.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um but you know, he is my mom and dad, stable family, that you know, they had a good good home, and um he he he he was the one that had the perfect life.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: And he attended church most most of his life.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: Is this is the bell going off yet?
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: Am I going too long?
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: No, okay.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um so but my attendance at um at church was pretty sporadic, and you know, through college, you know, sometimes it's non-existent, kids just don't do it, you know.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um but after we got married, um he was ready to commit again to getting involved in his faith.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: Now, me, I didn't know if I was quite ready yet.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: And he started going to a church and he went a full year without me.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I finally decided to go, and um I went in 200%, okay?
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: Taught Sunday school, joined the worship team, I was on committees, I volunteered, you know, all this stuff.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: I was a good church member, okay.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: I would hear people though talk about something called having a personal relationship with God, but I never quite thought I understood what that had was or that I had it, you know.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um I knew Bible stories, you know.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: I had been to church off and on, but I never really studied the Bible.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you you were looking at Noah's Ark, and um you thought it was like a cartoon story, you know, with illustrations.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's kind of how some people you have a childlike view of the Bible, you know, little stories.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: So um, and I really felt like that church was felt more like a club or a country club, you know.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know think that it was a place where people were going to get closer to God.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: That wasn't coming through to me.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: So um after attending for 40 plus years, um things started to change.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: They started to change for me personally, and my the church started to change.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: And uh that's when I discovered that I didn't think they were interpreting the word of God as my limited knowledge, uh, understood.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_00: And uh the church started picking and choosing uh the scripture that they uh considered to be uh to suit them, and then the things that they discarded were those things that didn't suit them.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so I I thought that that didn't that didn't set well with me.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: And uh after discussing, we decided we had to leave.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: And um making that decision to leave after 40 plus years someplace where you've established relationships, you know, it's like you left your family, you know.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_00: It was it was difficult.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um looking back on that, I think of Joshua 1.9 you be strong and courageous, do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: And um I think we were doing what was right as far as God was concerned, and right as far as we were concerned.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: And um, as we left that church, as sad as it was, um, we never regretted the decision.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: When we walked out, it we had a piece about it, and it was the right thing.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um so we decided, here we go, we're at this time now.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: We decided that we would start looking for a new church, and this is the plan.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to visit three churches and then make a decision.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, this is a decision.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: Our first church we visited was TBC.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, Jim was preaching in a series called There's an App for That.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: I think you guys remember that.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: That was a pretty good one.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um they're all pretty good.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um and after that, uh we left and we had lunch and we're like blown away.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: Blown away that there was somebody up there speaking the word of God very clearly to us.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: We were understanding what God was saying through His His teaching, right?
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um we visited the church during the week just to kind of check it out, see the facilities.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: We wanted a paper saying, What do you believe?
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_00: And they gave us a piece of paper.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's important to do.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: I know you now, I know what you believe, but I didn't know then.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: So the paper told me.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and we really already had decided in our heart this is our new church home.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: So we got here and just it was not right before COVID, and we jumped in with both feet.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I got involved in the the kids' programs club catapult, and and uh we found a Sunday school class we loved.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, they deep dive into the word, and believe me, we have a lot of catching up to do, so we were looking for that kind of environment.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um we just we just really felt like it that's the way you get to into a church and and get uh close to the people there.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: So we had a lot of growth during that time, and we're building, building, building our faith.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: And what one of the biggest blessings during this time is that Craig and I are at the same place.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: We are both so excited about learning about the word of God and and uh growing every day, and that that is a big blessing.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I really do believe that God had always been watching out for me and had a plan for me and was keeping track of me, even when I felt disconnected from him.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and Isaiah 43:1 is one of my favorite verses, and it says, I have redeemed you, I know you by your name, you are mine.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_00: And it was like, I'm not letting you go, it's just not gonna happen.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: So I feel his love and presence every day, and I'm grateful that he never gave up on me.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: So everyone has a story, but have hope, be encouraged.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: We can all be overcomers with God's help and power of the Holy Spirit.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: And and again, I want to thank all the women who've gotten up here and shared their stories because we've all grown and been inspired by them.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I just uh want you to know that you God will accomplish through us everything He intends to accomplish and we can depend on it.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.