Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / September 8, 2020 | Expresso - Abby Holloway

Transcript

September 8, 2020 | Expresso - Abby Holloway · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, thank you to Stacy for talking on that.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm really glad that she mentioned um how uh the most important part is your relationship with God.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: I think like that's that's the only tool you need.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: If you have that, then that's that's all you need if you're growing and um challenging yourself in that.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: As well as like, yeah, the multi-generational.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um I know it can be intimidating to you know interact with some of us younger people, but as a younger person, I know that we want relationships with you guys who are in different generations.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um I want relationships with you.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: So if you, yeah, like she said, don't have grandchildren, if you don't have uh kids in your house, um go out and find some of us who really want to have relationships with you.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: So I want to encourage you in that.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um so for those of you who don't know me, I am Abby Holloway.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um if you don't know me, you probably know someone in my family.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um this is my mom and my little my little brother Caleb.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: So Diana Holloway is my mom, and uh Dan Holloway is my dad.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um and like uh Connie said, I grew up here in Topeka, Kansas.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um I've been here uh my whole life.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm the oldest child, and there are five of us girls, so that was from a little bit of a while ago.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna get some uh some throwback pictures a little bit.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh because my mom is really, really good at taking pictures.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: Like, so good at taking pictures.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Like we have we could have like a whole room of pictures.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I'm not kidding.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: So uh it took a lot to go through all of these and find find some fun ones.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: So there are five of us girls.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh you might maybe not yet, but you might recognize my sister Anna, who she volunteered in the youth ministry this summer, but you might not recognize her because you might just think that she's me, because we look alike.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: And so you might have thought that I was interning for the past two summers, and that's that's not true.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: I did, to set the record straight, I did uh intern with the youth ministry here at Topeka Bible Church for three summers, but my sister is the one who's done it for the last two.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: So um we have uh Swedish heritage, and so we get to do St.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: Lucia, which is really fun.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so I have all these all these sisters, uh we all have A names, Anna, Allie, Adriel, Amy, and then finally my parents got a boy and so there's my little brother Caleb.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm uh 13 years older than him, and uh he's a lot of fun.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: So we have a lot of fun as as siblings.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um I didn't line up my slides very well with my talk, so I'm kind of just gonna go through pictures a little bit.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um we have a huge 15-passenger van, which is uh a fun experience, and that's that's us in the van uh having fun together.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um we are the epitome of the homeschool family with that uh 15-passenger van, so that's fun.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: So these are just some pictures of us.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um and then uh here's uh one of the later pictures.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, this is how hard it is to get all of us to look good in one picture.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: You still can't get it.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: I looked through, there's like 12 of this same picture trying to find one.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: So um this is my family all matching, um, because my grandpa has a fireworks stand and uh we get t-shirts out of that.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: So uh yeah, like I said, this is Anna, so she's the one that you might recognize from interning.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I've grown up in TB, TBC all of my life.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: I've gone here since I was a little kid.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: I think even my dad might even have like the bulletin from the Sunday that I was born, so that's kind of fun.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um but uh it's really growing up here has really brought me to understand how church is much more about what you put into it than it is what you get out of it.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, though you do get benefits out of it.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of like Stacy said, like Sunday is not where the pinnacle of your relationship with God should be.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: The rest of the week is where your relationship with God is.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think a lot of people tend to focus on just that Sunday and kind of see that as their relationship with God.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so I've learned that kind of growing up.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: But as far as stories and testimonies, um, I don't know if any of you are like me, but growing up I always felt like I didn't have much of a story to tell.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um like my sort story isn't like super exciting or profound.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have this like, you know, super uh big moment where God came in and like, you know, changed everything for me and things like that.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so I was kind of always insecure uh about my story a little bit.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: And to give you kind of a picture of that, like I mean, I I trusted Christ when I was four years old, so I don't remember before I was a Christian.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um I got baptized when I was eight, um, so kind of just continuing that progression.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up in a Christian family.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: I was homeschooled.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: There's us with our first day of uh home, my first day of first grade, uh our yeah, picture that my mom liked to take.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um I was homeschooled through high school, so I was definitely in this bubble um where uh kind of like uh Stacy was talking about, like discipleship or being uh saturated with Jesus was something that I really experienced.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so, I mean, what could I possibly have to tell people that they would be listen interested in listening to?
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: Like my life is kind of boring and uh like yeah, it's all all great, kind of.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um at least that's that's how I felt.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe maybe you're like me and maybe you're not, and that's okay.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: But uh if you do feel that way, like I can definitely relate.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I am standing here to tell you that if you get nothing else out of my story, um, I hope you hear this.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: Your story is for God's glory.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, your story is for God's glory, and so it's not about us.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I mean that.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I I want to show you that, and so I hope that you see through my story that it's much more about God than it is about me.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: And like, no matter how unexciting your story is, um I want to tell you like it is important because it shows who God is and what he can do.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um so, like any good story, my story starts out um with everything good, right?
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: At the beginning of the book, you read it and everything's good and happy and going well in life.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I grew up in church, I had great parents who uh did a good job of discipling me and poured into me.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, all my friends uh and I had fun in Sunday school and kids' choir.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: I have a picture of kids' choir.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if any of you have kids or grandkids that might be in that picture, but um I know Alyssa's here.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: There's Alyssa, she's right back there.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um so had fun in kids' choir, um helped with tennis camp, which my mom runs, had had fun doing that, VBS, throwback VBS, um throw back to third and fourth grade Sunday school, all of those, all of those fun things.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it was all like really good until I hit middle school.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Anyone else have a rough time in middle school?
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: No, no one, it's just me?
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: Gosh, man.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: Rough crowd.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: No, I'm just kidding.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: No, uh, I mean, we all know you get hit by hormones, you uh or super like self-consciousness just like drops on you, and all at once you suddenly feel like completely not yourself.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so I started to feel uh outcast from my friends who I had been close to before.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um I felt lonely and out of place, and I couldn't seem to figure out why I felt so much like I didn't fit in.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um I was like, was it was it the way I looked?
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh was it the clothes I wore?
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: Was it you know the way I talked or what I talked about?
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um was it the music I listened to?
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I kept getting so discouraged at being unable to figure out what that problem is.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: Like, why didn't I fit in?
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: Why why couldn't I be a part of you know all of these other people?
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I spent a lot of Sunday mornings um over in the cab basement uh in the bathroom uh crying a lot.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: So that was a lot of my my Sunday mornings.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I kind of I figured like there had to be something wrong with me because you know, like I should I should fit in here.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like I'm homeschooled, I've been in this church my whole life.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: Like I should I should fit in in this place.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: This is the place I'm supposed to fit in.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I couldn't figure it out, so I was like, ugh, must be, must be something wrong with me.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, I tried to then figure out what that was.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: I tried to listen to the right music, you know, whatever was cool, whatever was in.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: I tried to wear the right clothes, I tried to talk about the right things and make sure that I looked the right way, that I, you know, was the right weight and was wearing makeup and you know, different things like that.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I was just stuck in this uh trap of comparison and perfectionism, and it was miserable, awful, awful, terrible, terrible place to be.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like to try to keep fitting in and to not fit in, even though you're trying all of these things, is just a miserable place to be because you can never, never be as good.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: There's always someone you can compare to, and there's always something to show you that it's not enough, it's not perfect enough.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, the whole time I couldn't understand how I could feel, you know, like so out of place, like I said, in this place where I should fit in.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: This is the place I should fit in.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and if I couldn't fit in here, like where else am I gonna fit in?
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: Like homeschool church kid, I'm not gonna fit in anywhere else.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so I continued in that kind of misery, trying so hard to be liked and fit in until I kind of it kind of reached a climax.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: So to give you kind of a picture of where I was at, uh I have this story.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: So at about 16, uh I was struggling with what I realized later uh was probably mild depression.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: And one Sunday morning I woke up and I was like, I didn't want to go to church.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: I don't fit in at church, I don't want to be at church.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um and you know, I felt awful, I was like, I never look good enough, I never fit in, um, and I was just sick of trying to keep it all together and to fit in.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: But my dad, like any good dad, was not going to have that.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: So, like Stacey said, he was gonna make sure that I went to church.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: So because he's a great dad, he refused to let me stay at home.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I did what any self-respecting 16-year-old in my situation would do.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: I threw a temper tantrum, duh.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: Anybody else have a kid or grandkid throw a temper tantrum?
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, yeah, yeah.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, and when I say temper tantrum, I mean like temper tantrum.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Like picture a two-year-old kicking, lying on the ground, kicking and screaming, and that was me.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: Only I was 16.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: Not my proudest moment for sure.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like I said, this is not about me.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I remember crying and screaming, and you know, I my dad was trying to get me to go up the stairs, and I was like bracing myself.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going, you know, like pushing against all of it.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: And he was trying to drag me up the stairs and get me outside, and you know, everything inside of me was pushing against, and I was like, no, I'm not gonna do it, I'm not gonna go to church.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um somehow my dad managed to get me in the car.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: I don't I don't know how.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: He must be a lot stronger than me.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's the only thing I can guess because I don't remember that part.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: But I eventually grumpily climbed, you know, to the back seat so I could be f as far away from him as possible because you know I was so mad at him, and um I just began weeping, you know, like uncontrollably.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: And uh it was definitely pitiful, trust me.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: It was plenty pitiful.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um but when we got to church, I I completely refused.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: I was not gonna get out of the car, of course.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: I was still gonna win this.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: And there was no way I was leaving that car.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: And my dad, he he is a good dad, and he's smart.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: He was like, you know, it's probably not the best idea to make a scene out in the church parking lot.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: That probably would not go over well and would require a lot of explaining.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so he was he tried to pull one of those, you know, like, give us what we want so we can see how foolish our desires are, you know, that thing that God does to us and like the Israelites when he gives us like so much quail that it comes out of our noses, or like uh when he gives us kings and then they turn out all bad, you know.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: So that's what my dad did.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: He was pretty smart about that too.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: He gave me exactly what I wanted.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: So he leaves to go into the sanctuary, and I stubbornly, of course, because I'm right, of course, to not want to go to church, um resolved to not leave that car until the service gets out.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not opening the door, I'm not doing anything, I'm sitting in this car and I'm not moving.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um problem was it was July.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm stuck in the back of this minivan with my tears, my sweat, and my misery because tears and sweat equals misery, um, if you didn't know.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, in the back of this minivan for the entire service in Kansas in July.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: Clearly, I was much more stubborn than smart.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um somehow I survived because you know it was really hot back there.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but you can know I never pulled that stunt again.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: I definitely learned my lesson.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um but it didn't, it didn't really solve my loneliness at all, uh, even if I learned that uh I shouldn't resist my death.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I continued on kind of in this depression and in trying to make uh trying to combat that with making Jesus my best friend.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to be clear here, like that that did help, and that was really, really helpful.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I still really like had this longing for a best friend.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: That was kind of this desire that I had.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I prayed like endlessly for that, that God would give me a best friend until I finally got discouraged and gave up because you know God isn't answering our prayers, and then I'm like, well, God isn't gonna answer it, so I'm just not gonna pray for it anymore.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I even forgot that I had ever asked.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but even though I had forgotten, God didn't, and He sent me a sent me a friend that uh I grew really close to.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: And for the first time in my life, I truly felt like known and loved by someone, you know, who chose me, who's not in my family, because of course I felt loved and choked unknown by my family, but to have someone who doesn't have to do that for you, to choose to do that, um, was uh something that was really impactful for me.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: And uh our friendship really gave me this picture of just how you know unconditional God's love is.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: Like he knows us completely and he still loves us completely.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um and that that really drew me closer to God and gave me this like understanding of you know who he is and what he's like, and it challenged me to know him more intensely.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it it showed just how silly perfectionism and comparison are, because they really are very silly.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um but when that relationship started becoming an idol in my heart, uh God in his mercy took it away and left me with what felt kind of like a nasty breakup.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I had was left kind of having to depend on him through that.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: It was definitely hard to go through that.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: It was a lot of emotional pain.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but again, it drew me back deeper into relationship with him, and I'm actually really thankful for it because it taught me so much about what healthy relationships are supposed to look like, what uh you know having God first is supposed to look like, and just reminded me how just showed me how easy it is for idols to come into our heart and how like um we are supposed to continually be digging those up over and over again because we don't ever get away from them in this broken world.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so just a few years after that, my dad went into the hospital for a month with pancreatitis.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um he ended up having to have a feeding tube because um half of his pancreas actually died and um just his body was kind of working against him.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: So he which I have a picture for this, so hang on.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, there's some other pictures.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: Here's my dad doing what Stacy Stacy said.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, thank you.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um uh reading reading the Bible to us at night.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you saw my picture, sorry I forgot that.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: It was back at the beginning with my dad um when he was in the hospital.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: So he had to have a feeding tube, and that that whole process with him was about two months.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: So two months where my dad is basically um unable to work, unable to do anything of that.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: My mom's in the in the hospital hospital a lot, and so it's just us kids at home.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_00: And that happened over Christmas break, so I didn't get much of a break from school that year, thank you.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and led up to the busiest uh summer uh and semester that I've ever experienced in my life.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um so coming off of that, I already don't have a lot of rest.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: And to kind of give you an idea of what it looked like and how busy I was, I was working part-time.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: I was a double major, like you heard, um, with one of my majors being music, and that's notoriously one of the more busy degrees where they kind of pull you in to do lots of uh performances and things like that, and you have to do a lot of those things.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um I was assistant coaching the cornerstone basketball team because my dad was sick, and so uh he would normally be doing that, but I was doing that uh to kind of help out, and even was head coaching a couple times.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um I was taking 15 hours of classes, I was volunteering with Wildlife, which is a junior high version of young life.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um I was leading a junior high small group here at church.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: I was going to Wednesday night uh oh my gosh, um, sorry.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if it's up here or down here.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: Sorry about that.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: No, that's okay.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: That might be it.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, so I was I was doing Wednesday night programming, helping out with that, uh taking the Perspectives class, which is kind of almost a college-level course, and serving as a leader in the young adults group.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: So I was crazy busy and it was not a good thing.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um and this was all coming off one of those summer summers when I was interning with the youth ministry, which is also crazy busy.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and and then a full semester, and then my dad getting sick.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: So I've been like this whole uh period, probably like at least nine-month period of I haven't had any sort of break.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it was definitely way too much.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: And I fell apart multiple times that semester.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh somehow I survived all of that, but I slipped back into that mild depression.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um at the end of the semester, I uh got smart and dropped a lot of those responsibilities because it was way too much, and jumped right into another full full summer of interning.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: So I did kind of get to get rid of some of those things, but I'm you know catapulted back into a busy summer of helping out with the youth group.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um but I did that, wasn't before I set up an appointment with uh the counseling services on campus.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um it was a really good experience.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: I was properly diagnosed with some mild depression, and I began kind of a journey of learning what rest is and how to cope uh with depression.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: And to kind of tell you what that was like, there were some days that I felt so exhausted, I was afraid I wouldn't be able to like physically get out of bed to go to youth events.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: So I have these youth events that I'm required to be at because it's my summer job essentially, and I was like afraid that I wouldn't actually be able to get out of bed.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it was a very, very present fear because of how how close it felt that I was to actually experiencing that.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um and when I debriefed uh with the people in charge after the summer, I found myself talking a lot about how it felt like my tank was like less than empty.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, you have the E that says empty on your car, and it felt like it was like below that, and that I couldn't even make it high enough to even get to that E.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: And it was just you know so far below that.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because if you're on E, you need more, you need more gas and you need to rest more still, and I couldn't even get to that point.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um But in this in this time and through this struggle struggle, God really taught me, you know, the importance of rest and what that looks like.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_00: Uh taught me like how important it is to be still.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: Like Stacy talked about solitude, but also stillness too is really, really important in our relationship with God and how to find rest in God.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I learned some principles, about five or six principles to combat depression and started like incorporating those into my life to kind of you know move on from that a little bit.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I kept meeting with that counselor to kind of process through some of those things.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_00: And in this time, God really taught me how to embrace my human brokenness, which is really hard for me.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: I don't like being human or broken, but it is what we are, and um it is the whole reason for why we need God.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um and learned how to give myself grace too, because God gives us so much grace, and oftentimes we don't give ourselves enough grace.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, He's He's abundantly wanting to shower with us, but we're holding back and saying, like, no, no, no, you can only give me this much grace.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so I learned how to give grace more to myself.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_00: And this whole this whole time he drew me closer and closer to him.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: Uh when the next summer came around, uh I was start starting to finally feel more like myself again.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: I had decided I had squeezed most of the challenge out of interning with the youth ministry after three years.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: I had great experience doing that, learned a lot of things, it grew me in a lot of ways.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: But I kind of felt like I had, you know, kind of uh done all of the things that it had to give me.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: And so I decided to try something different.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, influenced by the youth ministry's previous mission trip, I decided to travel back to the Czech Republic where we had gone for a week to help with the English camps that local Czech churches uh put on.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: So this is me in Prague, um up at the Prague Castle.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um I so I packed up, I moved to the Czech Republic for two months, uh the longest I've ever been away from home.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: And uh to try to explain how impactful that two months was for me would uh take an entire other session of me talking.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: So I will just have to give you some of the highlights of what God kind of showed me through that.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: So I met uh so many amazing people.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: I met up with Leah Maynard, you might know Leah and uh Jana, who is in, she is currently in Budapest, so I got to see her in Hungary, which was uh really cool.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then I met lots of people, uh worked with youth a lot, and um got to meet a whole bunch of amazing people.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_00: This was one of my my English classes, so this was a group that I had and got to teach.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh these are some of the girls were at the Czech church, um, and I'll stop moving.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: And um it was really fun to get to use my talents uh in both music and English, which lined up perfectly with my degrees, and I got to help lead worship as well as teach English, which was a really cool experience.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um and truth be told, half of my heart now is uh there with those relationships and those people who are there.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um and to have your heart in two different, like completely incompatible places is really, really difficult and painful.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you guys have experienced that, but like to have your heart in places that can't ever actually come together is is really, really hard.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um But it's a good reminder of you know the finite nature of this world that we are in and the hope that we can look forward to and being reunited to reunited with all the people that we care about in heaven.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so it's a good reminder to you know hold those relationships loosely and look forward to the time when we will get to be together all together for the rest of eternity.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it also just taught me too about how God provides relationships.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: So God provides relationships because he knows what we need, and it doesn't matter where we go, um he is wanting to provide those relationships.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: And so you might lose one, but he will provide um one somewhere else.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_00: And that that that's what I really learned from that.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: But it was also in the Czech Republic that I was reminded of how important our stories are.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: So kind of back to what I was talking about, like our stories really are important, and I got to share mine with some of the people there and had really cool experiences about that, and they shared theirs with me, and that was really encouraging and uh uh inspiring to me.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and because it, you know, it can be so encouraging to hear how God is working in other people's lives, because sometimes sometimes we can't see how God is working right now in our life, but to get to hear how God has worked in someone else's life can be really, really encouraging.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_00: And our stories can be a powerful tool to reach the hearts of others and you know show them Jesus as well as encourage them.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, for example, to kind of show you how important stories can be, um, one Czech girl, uh so this is another picture at teen camp, which is a lot of fun, and and really hard, but a lot of fun.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, this is Vercha with me.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh she had a really amazing experience that I got to experience with her kind of.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: And um it it shows how you know we have no idea where our stories are going to go.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: We have no idea what they're gonna look like and what God is gonna pull in and use.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and also like we don't know when it's gonna like cross somebody else's story.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_00: So some some interaction or something that we do might cross and be a part of somebody else's story, and so this is kind of a picture, her story um is kind of a picture of that.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_00: She was in my small group uh for for English, and I had you know spent time getting to know her, and I shared my story with my group, and so she was there and got to hear that.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but she was not a Christian, and she did not come from a Christian family.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um and she would she would talk with us, but she was like adamant that she wasn't you know really interested in the whole Christian thing.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um and you know, we were kind of sad about that, but we definitely we prayed almost every day for her in hopes that her mind would be changed.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um and on the last night at camp, they usually do kind of a gospel presentation after a testimony.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it was it was really, really good.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_00: I thought it was really good.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_00: And we were you know praying that the kids would open their hearts uh to what had been said, and all of a sudden, uh one of my girls from my group comes up to me and she's like, Abby, Abby, um, Virtua's outside crying.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, What?
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_00: What's going on?
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so I rushed over to see if she was okay, and she asked if we could like go around the corner and kind of talk.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_00: And so we walked outside, but it was raining, so we had to find like an umbrella and you know, hide huddle under that.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I asked her what was wrong.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and she told me of this like vision that she had been experiencing.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh she said when Pavel, the pastor, he he had prayed, um, she had put her head down, you know, like everyone else, um, and she saw like this like flashing lights.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: And when he had asked if anyone who wanted to know uh Christ would raise their hands, um, she suddenly felt like everyone around her like raise their hand in her head.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: So she's like picturing this.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_00: She sees you know everyone around her raising her head, even though her her head is down.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_00: The head is down.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um and she felt kind of like left out, like she wanted to be a part of this, you know, everybody else is doing it, and she's like, she wanted to be a part of it, um, but she like didn't didn't couldn't get her hand to do it, or was like wasn't sure if she wanted to do it or not.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um and she couldn't raise her hand and she wanted to just like run out of the room because I mean it was terrifying, and she was terrified.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like, and did she had no idea what had just happened.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, she had seen things that couldn't be explained, and she was like shaking as she's telling me this, like her whole body is sh trembling.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so I'm like, I hugged her, and I could feel like she's shaking so much that now like I'm shaking, and so we're both just shaking.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I asked if I could pray for her, and she agreed to let me, uh, which was really cool because again, like I said, she's not a Christian, and so uh I was glad she agreed to that.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I began praying and I was like, God, like, please, can you calm her spirit?
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: Can you calm her spirit?
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: Like, give her peace, God.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I I'm telling you, the very second that I said the word peace, she's this girl, she's shaking uncontrollably so much that I'm shaking it.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: The very second I said the word peace, she stopped.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: Immediately, completely stopped, not a single tremble.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, both of us are like, what just happened?
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and neither of us are like, What in the world, what just happened?
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: But suddenly she could she said she could feel this like calming peace in her head.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm I'm dumbfounded.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what just happened?
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I I'm and I started like crying tears of joy because I'm like, I didn't do anything in this.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_00: Like this was a hundred percent like God just decided to immediately answer my prayer.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: I've never experienced anything like this.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it was just such uh amazing experience, like really awesome.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it's really cool because it imp it played an important role in her story and her journey to Christ.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, she didn't trust Christ then, she had a lot of questions, was like, I don't know what this is, and was really like weirded out a little bit.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um but just this past week, actually, um I heard that she now has become a follower of Christ, so praise God for that.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: And she's actually been speaking up in school um despite the mocking that she gets.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um the Czech Republic is a very atheistic country, and so she there is like very real persecution that happens from friends um in her in her school, and so that's just so amazing that he she's still you know speaking up about it because community to them is really important, and she's you know risking a lot to to speak up about that.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, as this story shows, like God is really good, and um uh God uses our stories in unexpected ways, and in unexpected ways does it it does grammar.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_00: I should know this, I'm an English major.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um in unexpected ways, you know, it can cross paths with other people's stories.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_00: And like, you know, for me, God has taken me from loneliness to relationship and showing me what healthy relationship looks like, and he's taken me from you know depression to um rest and what rest in him looks like.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um and you know, our stories are a way that he reminds us of just how good he is.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: So just like with virtuous stories, like just to be reminded of how good he is and how he does answer our prayers, whether it's immediately or the one that I completely forgot about.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, your story matters because it shows who God is.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and if you have never shared your story before, um I challenge you to think through your life, like find and remember uh ways that God has been glorified and in what you have experienced.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um and if you can't think of anything, like ask, ask God to give you the eyes to see how he has worked in you and through you.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I hope you then find and pray for uh opportunities to share the story God has written for you, because he is the one that is writing our stories.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um and whether it's up here on stage that you share or if it's out there talking to the people around you and you know, just speaking to uh the people that you know who are in your life and sharing your story with them, whether it's your coworkers or your family or your friends or your children or your grandkids, you know, um just be listening for those opportunities uh that he has to use your story.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I promise, like you will not regret it at all.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_00: It is a very cool experience to see how God can use those stories.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, um my story isn't done, and neither is yours.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um there's still plenty plenty of time left for God to continue to write our stories.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know if it uh my story will take me back to the Czech Republic.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: That's kind of the direction that I I want to go in.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um getting to uh do that again.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um but uh wherever it takes me, um I'm excited to, you know, just go on an adventure with God because to me it really is an adventure because we don't know what's gonna happen.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_00: My goodness.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_00: There's a little bit of my anger coming out.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, no.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe I'll just like hello, hello, hello, hello, hello, hello.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_00: So close, so close to being done.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um anyway, uh so yes, I I'm so encouraged by how God has used him used my struggles, and whenever I get to hear other people's story, how he uses their struggles, um, all for his glory, um, to to not only encourage other people and to point to him, but also to teach us and to, you know, uh show us how we can grow and become more like him.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's definitely such an adventure to see how God uses us and it is so worth it.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_00: And so I hope you can get excited about your story and the journey, the adventure that God is still still taking you on.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I just want to remind you that it is worth it because he is worth it.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so that's kind of all I have for you.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh if you don't mind, I'd like to close and pray really quick.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_00: Is that okay?
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: All right, cool.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: Dear Lord, um I just thank you for uh this time that we have gotten to uh learn about discipleship and learn about the way that you are working and moving and um that you are continuing to work, God, because we know that even if we can't see it, you are working, God, and you are um changing people's hearts and bringing them closer to you, God.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I thank you for the glimpses that we get to see of that.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: Uh God, I just pray for the people here that uh you would remind them of you know how much you are glorified in their story and um just how much uh that can be used to uh build up other people, to disciple other people, to to draw them closer to you, and just even to encourage each other, um, God.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: And so I just pray that you would open their eyes to see how you know you have been working in their life and how uh you have uh been right there with them in every step, God.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um and just ask that you would give them uh opportunities to uh share that with other people and to share how you have been working.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, God, I thank you that uh we have the ability to come together and uh to encourage each other and uh just be in community together.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh people are such a uh gift that you give us, God, and relationships are such a gift, and I just thank you for them and thank you for the way that you uh continue to bring um just the people that we need into our lives, God.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um I just pray that you would be with all of these people here as they go out into this week and that you would uh bless them and uh just reveal yourself to them, God.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and that you would draw all of us uh closer to you, God.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we just ask that you would continue to push back the darkness, and we pray all this in your name.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.