ChristiTutionalist Politics | Christian Perspectives on Constitutional Issues

CTP (S3EFebSpecial9) Purpose Is Grown, Not Held

• Joseph M. Lenard | Christian Activist & Author in Politics • Season 3

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CTP (S3EFebSpecial9) Purpose Is Grown, Not Held
Exploring more of the fascinating intersection of Activism, Community Engagement, Faith / Religion, Human Nature, Politics, Social Issues, and beyond   
We trade career labels for deeper identity as Dawn Stevens shares how losing a dream role led to a life of growing and giving the Fruits of the Spirit. Her vessel stories—Little Pot, Teapot, Oil Lamp, and the cracked jar—turn pressure into purpose and service.
• early life, teaching start, and motherhood tension
• fear of sales and breakthrough at a Christian publisher
• division closure and the shift from holding to growing
• Little Pot metaphor for identity and fruit of the Spirit
• Teapot and pouring gifts into others
• Oil Lamp, burnout, and faithful light
• cracked jar, community, and refueling grace
• jealousy, comparison, and keeping identity in Christ
• practical ways to serve with your shape and season
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A Short Story: A Lasting Legacy? book Trailer

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Opening And Midweek Format

SPEAKER_00

Hello, welcome to another episode of Pristitutionalist Podcast. I am your host, Joseph M. Leonard. That's L-E-N-A-R-D. It looks French. It's not it's wonderful down and oh. Thank you for tuning in. As Graham Norton used to say on his show. Let's get on with the show! Special segment for February and March. Midweek drops. Normally Saturday monologues and normally a guest appearance on a Wednesday, February and March, two a week, Tuesday and Thursdays, in order to get caught up on some interviews that have been stacking up. Enjoy. Going to join me today is Dawn Stevens. It's pronounced that right, not Stephens. It is Stevens, yes. Yeah, it is spelled though S-T-E-P-H-E-N-S, so Dawn Stevens. And as I joked with her, we found each other via the pod match system. And I joked with her reading verbatim. Hey, as long as you could deal with my lame puns, like I will not be able to resist. Better to be a fruit pot than a fruit cake. I think we'll be able to have a great fun conversation. Welcome to the show, Dawn. How are you? Thanks so much. Yeah, well, before we get into the well, why would I say that to her? Let's do let's do the proverbial Christian show. Another pun right proverbs. Proverbial first question. Uh, where were you born and raised? Where are you now? Significant places you may have been in between. How much time did you spend in prison? And for what? That there you go. For the benefit of the transcript, she's laughing. These are jokes, people.

SPEAKER_01

Well, um, born and raised near Cleveland, Ohio. So not far from Detroit. There you go. Cleveland sucks. I mean rocks. Yeah, yeah. Well, left there at 18 and never went back. Um, so lived a long time in Virginia, um, near Virginia Beach area. And then right now I'm living in Raleigh, North Carolina. So that's um my new home. And um, yeah, I love it.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, Virginia Beach. So another pun, of course. Uh life's a beach, right? There you go.

SPEAKER_01

Yes. Well, I love the beach, but I think I like the mountains more. So, you know. In Raleigh, we're right in the middle of both, so it's it's a great place.

Purpose And Identity In Faith

SPEAKER_00

I've I've been to Raleigh, but only once, caught a Carolina hurricane scheme there. Um, yeah, I'm a huge hurricane fan. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I I forget who they played, but yeah, I used to work for Kmart headquarters, an IT guy. So I'd go out all around the country to our various uh uh uh uh warehouse distribution centers is the word I'm looking for, and you know, do work with the computers and whatnot. And uh yeah, you mentioned mountains. Uh one of my favorite opportunities was while out in uh outside of Denver, I forget now because I I haven't uh I've been on disability since 2004, so I haven't worked uh for Kmart for a couple decades now. I so I forget where that distribution center was, but it was close enough to Denver that while there over the weekend drove up into the Rockies. Oh, so nice to be able to do that, and indeed, you know, it was warm weather when I was there, but of course, as I drew closer to the top of the Rockies, it was snowing. Yep, sounds right. Its own eco environment, it depends on what part of the mountain you're on, what weather you get. Yes, yes, very much. Anyway, you're not here to talk geography. Just gonna let you explain the pot, the fruit pot thing, and indeed why you are here. All right, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01

I will happily explain it. So um, Joseph, I am a fruit pot. That's what I tell people when they say, What do you do? or not a teapot. I'm a little teapot. Well, there is a teapot too. I've I've been the teapot, I'll explain all that. But um, basically, I spent my whole life searching for purpose. You know, what why did God make me? I mean, I grew up a Christian.

SPEAKER_00

I knew that this show was about that. Yes.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I I just really and maybe it was partly being a girl growing up in the 70s and 80s, you know, after the women's lib movement. We were we had so much push on us that you can be anything, you know. That was really a lot of pressure.

SPEAKER_00

First wave feminism is way different than like the fifth wave today.

Teaching, Motherhood, And Fulfillment

SPEAKER_01

So much, people don't realize the pressure that we had on us, and so I just had really felt that whatever job I chose or the career path that I chose would define me, would be my identity, and God had to really work through that idea in me, and he used it to show me that you know, my identity is in him. So I went through this process um trying to figure out who I am. I pretty much told God, I'll be anything except this, you know. And the first thing I told him I would never be was a school teacher because I got in a lot of trouble at school. I like to draw pictures, I like to write stories, and I did them in the wrong place, you know. So I would often write on, you know, draw pictures all over test papers. And so I just decided I didn't want to be a school teacher because I didn't like school. You didn't want to put up with kids like you. Well, you're right. Or, you know, but when I graduated from high school and went to visit my sister at a college, still not knowing who I was or what I would be, her roommate came in and laid a poster board down, started to draw pictures on it. And right away I decided whatever your major is, that's what I'm gonna be. Done, decided, I can't figure this out. And of course, she was an elementary ed major. So I went to school and became a school teacher and realized that I was gifted at it, I loved it. I thought this is what I was created to do. God had given me this gift, and I was so happy. Um, I had children of my own at the same time, and then I was really struggling being 100% mom and 100% teacher, and so because I couldn't stop being a mom, I stopped being a teacher, and then I found myself really empty and unfulfilled again. Being a mom has to be part teacher, though, really. It it was, and it should have been enough because moms are wonderful people, but I think partly because of my upbringing and the idea that I would need a career to be someone, I I felt unfulfilled. I felt like there was more that God had for me. And so during that time, I started running an online business. These are the dot-com days, and I began I began doing that, and the only part I was having fun um doing it, taking care of my kids and running a business.

SPEAKER_00

But were you were you one of those who created a dot com? It went to a million-dollar value, then back. You would win zero.

Dot‑Com Tries And Sales Fears

Christian Publishing Breakthrough

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, yeah, if if so, I wouldn't be sitting here today because the one part of the business I was terrible at was selling. Never made didn't make a whole lot of money. So as my children got older, my husband then decided, you know, why don't you really go out and look for another job? Like maybe this isn't it. And so I had then told God, okay, I'll do anything except, of course, be a salesperson because we both know I can't sell. And that's when I met some people from the world's largest Christian publishing company. And man, I was really excited to talk to them. I thought, oh, I'm gonna, you know, write stories, illustrate, draw pictures. This is what I've dreamed of doing my whole life. I told them, I'll take the job that you have, I'll take it. I can't wait to work for you. And so they hired me, and my new position was sales. So once again, I'm doing the one thing I told God, I'll do anything but. And I'm now I'm now tasked to sell their books to schools. And because I was had been a teacher, I knew how to write lesson plans, I knew how to create materials. So I started doing that. And my man, you were I was selling more books than anybody in the company, and I quickly got promoted. I was the head of this whole division that sold books to schools. We ran like a little Christian book fair type thing, they were a Christian publishing company, and um I go ahead, go ahead and name them uh Thomas Nelson. Okay, um doesn't have to be a secret, yeah. This is this is the early 2000s, but um, but at this point, I thought this is what I was created to do, right? Like this is my dream job. I'm making a lot of money, I'm doing everything God has tasked me to do, and I absolutely love you know this job. And about four years in, the company closed the whole division. Um, they fired the 25 reps that worked under me, and they called me up and they said, you know, your position no longer exists. So at that moment, I just got really kind of angry at God. I'm like, I don't know who I am, I have no idea what you've created me to do. I feel like I've everything you've given me to hold, I've done with all my might. And that's when he pretty much said to me, Dawn, you need to stop defining yourself by what you hold and start defining yourself by what you grow. So it was through that whole experience that I wrote this children's book called The Little Pot. And Little Pot goes through this journey where not that pot, like a clay pot.

SPEAKER_00

Not a little bit of pot to smoke. Yeah, I know Little Pot made of pottery, yeah.

Division Closed And Identity Shift

Birth Of The Little Pot Metaphor

SPEAKER_01

Yes, because he's the potter and he's made each of us. So we're on this little clay vessel, and the first thing that the potter does in the story is he puts papers inside little pot, and little pot thinks he's supposed to be smart because he's holding papers, but then the potter makes another vessel and he takes the papers away from him and puts them in that other vessel, and little pot is empty, unfulfilled. The next thing the potter does is fill this little vessel with coins, and now the pot believes I'm supposed to be rich. This is great. Like, who doesn't want to be a coin pot, right? But then the potter makes a vessel that's shaped like a pig, a piggy bank, and he takes all of little pot's coins and he puts them in that vessel. Little pot is empty again, and then the potter fills him with dirt and he does not want to be a dirt pot. But he gets a seed and something starts to grow, and he thinks, oh, I know, because he got ahead of the potter, which I did my whole life. He says, I'm gonna be a flower pot. I'm gonna grow beautiful flowers. And my purpose may not be smart or rich, but at least I look good, right? He's gonna be a flower pot. And so he does. He grows flowers, but then he wakes up one day and his flowers are changing and turning hard and green, and they're not very pretty anymore. And what's happening is they're turning to strawberries because he is a fruit pot. And that's where the potter explains to him you're not a paper pot or a coin pot or a flower pot. You are a fruit pot. And it was at that point in my life after I lost the job from Thomas Nelson that I realized I need to just focus on being a vessel that can produce the fruit of the Holy Spirit, which you know is love, joy, peace, patience. And so that's that's why I tell people I'm a fruit pot. Like it really doesn't matter what happens where I work or what I do as a career, or you know, if I'm a mom, if I'm not a mom, if I'm married, if I'm not married, can I just I just need to be that vessel that the Holy Spirit can grow his fruit through? And so that's that became my focus. Um, once that happened, God called me to be a school principal. I started trying to produce love and joy and peace there.

SPEAKER_00

Um, and that's where we've done that chaos, yeah.

Fruits Of The Spirit As Purpose

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, but you know, it was through those experiences that we actually talked about the teapot. We wrote a second book called The Teapot, where we helped kids understand that the fruit they grow is not for themselves, they need to serve others with it, and so they pour into others, and the teapot helps Little Pot discover to give his fruit away because he has to pour his tea out. And then we went on to write a third book about an oil lamp that helped kids learn to shine and tell their um God stories with others. And my last and um book that I've written is about a small jar with a crack in it that refuels oil lamp because I got through some burnout um with help from other people. So yeah, it's just been a fun journey of you know using what God has been doing in my life um and telling it through stories. And now I share those stories a lot at women's conferences. I go and speak to adults. Um, honestly, you know, we resonate with it, I think, even more than kids do.

Teapot, Oil Lamp, And Jar Series

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, and and hence my better to be a fruit pot than a fruit cake joke. And yeah, I I'm loving this. I I I don't a little behind the scenes, I don't not research my guests because I'm lazy, but I'm a little lazy. But I I purposefully don't want to know a lot about the guest because I discover you just as the audience discovers you, fresh and new, and we go flow with the go, right? Whatever rabbit holds open. So yeah, I all these lessons kids need to learn, and unfortunately, usually don't get. Uh and and this is a great series. I I love this concept, absolutely. Oh, and the other thing is that my OCD brain and the lame puns. Um, you you mentioned patients. I don't have any because I don't have a medical degree. Different kind of patients, yeah. There you go. Wordplay. Anyway, uh I I didn't have anywhere to go with that. It's just I can't resist the line punk. So is there a fifth book on the horizon?

SPEAKER_01

Um, well, yes. Um I actually have it done and it's in the illustration process. I just haven't had time to work on it. But it is um about a black kettle, and it's a black kettle that calls the teapot black. Um and so it plays with that pun. Uh oh, I love that. Yeah, it deals with jealousy and you know, comparisons that we do with other people because I think in our world today, I mean, I even struggle with it. I was on Facebook scrolling just this past week and saw a friend who was getting the accolades that I wanted, and I was like, oh, you know, and then you just go to bed feeling like I'm not doing enough, or I'm not enough. Again, it's it goes back to that identity, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_00

Like everything we do, we define ourselves by, and it's so hard to keep our identity in Christ alone, and um, so yeah, measure measuring up to the standards of above versus our own in this fallen world and the social cultural pressures and economics of needing to earn a living to get by and and all that. Yeah, I mean this world puts a lot of pressures on us that are unfortunate. And indeed, as you said, it's hard to at times I've got a show uh listener feedback one actually with Judy Beerman discussing self-reflection, and indeed it's going into the bathroom and looking in that mirror and determining us as being adequate enough for what we can do, what we could do fitting into this fallen world. I I don't know where I'm going with that either. I'm not always as articulate. If I had a month to write it out for a book, I could get it right. But yeah, sometimes I struggle to articulately say what the hell I'm trying to get across. But I think you know what I mean.

SPEAKER_01

That's why I write children's books. You know, you only get about seven, eight hundred words, and you gotta get it out.

Jealousy, Comparison, And The Kettle

SPEAKER_00

A lot of pictures, right? Yeah, and it's like movies. You have the thematic score, you have the music to help set mood. Exactly. Exactly. Books, you can use less words and the old adage, picture's worth a thousand words, and indeed a lot of times it is. For real. So much, yes. But a picture looks can be deceiving. Back to kind of what you were saying, Martin Luther King Jr., right? Content of character. We need to get past first appearances and first impressions. They can be wrong. We're all entitled to bad days, right? You meet someone on the thing street, they seem like a snarly SOB, but they might be the best fun, loving, great person you would ever meet, but that day, so that's where second chances and grace has to come in. You work that in Danny, uh, into this book.

Grace, Pruning, And Character

SPEAKER_01

You know, that's such an interesting thing you bring up because I recently just have been through a class dealing with grace, which was how has helped me so much in how I look at others and see others. I think they all have a little bit of that element in there, especially the potter's grace on the vessels. One of Teapot's big issues in that book is that he's surrounded by these cute little teacups that all look the same. In fact, when the potter's making him, he makes them in pieces as a pottery, as a potter does. Like there's the spout and the lid and the bowl are all separate, and he's the bowl looking at the spout, going, well, that's ugly, and looking at the lid, going, What's that can't hold anything? What's a stupid ball on top? And then the next day the potter gives it to him and he becomes the thing that he, you know, and then he's constantly looking at the teacups, thinking, I'm so awkward looking. I have this big nose, I have this silly hat. Um, and then throughout the book, when he realizes that he can serve the potter with his spout and his hat or lid keeps him keeps the tea warm, that it has purpose, he's grateful for it and he realizes, you know, but all throughout that you see the potter's grace with him, even with teapot, because teapot gets or little pot gets convinced to keep his strawberries, and you know, the potter prunes him in the story as God prunes us at times. But we see we see God's grace.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, you want to be pruned, not be a prude. Where you go.

SPEAKER_01

Yes. You need to be painful, but it's healthy, it's good. That's right.

SPEAKER_00

Right. Exactly. Yeah, there's great uh analogies here or metaphors, but as I like to joke, and in fact I finally got around it and fed it in uh no, I don't think it was the book of Kennedy. I think it was uh I'm trying to grab it, a short story, a lasting legacy. Uh I'm too clever for metaphors. I use Meta 6s. Huh? But um bum. There you go. Again, at any rate, well, I like to keep my shows kind of short, but I think we've covered a lot of great ground here at a larger 30,000-foot level. Uh what is a website for people to find you, your books, reach out to you, that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_01

So I would love them to come visit me online. I am Dawn Stevens Books, D-A-W-N-S-T-E-P-H-E-N-S B-O-O-K-S dot com. Um, and on that website, you can read about all the different vessels. You can purchase the books, you can um hear a talk that I give and contact me for speaking engagements. Um, I also on the side run a publishing company. So if there's anyone interested in having a book published or learning about self-publishing, um, you can contact me there and I will happily have that.

SPEAKER_00

I also have how to write a book and get it published, it's tips and techniques. So there you go.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, it's it's not easy, it's not an easy process.

SPEAKER_00

No, no, not but those of us, it's ad because those of us who are authors, you would think wouldn't want more competition, but generally we're all the opposite. We want others to write the books we know are in them. Yes, sure.

Writing For Kids And Visual Storytelling

SPEAKER_01

We all do, we all do, and you know what? Publishing it might be a little easier than selling it, right? Because we're back to that sale.

SPEAKER_00

Oh wow, yep. Oh, two different who two different animals sales, and uh, I'm gonna close with one more word play, right? Because we're talking vessels. Uh, we're not talking shipping containers on a boat across the ocean.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, no, grammarly always wants me to substitute my words with the ship, and I'm like, it's not a ship, it's a piece of pottery.

SPEAKER_00

I I had no idea that would lead to something good as authors and publishers. Uh yeah, that that grammarly, absolutely. Yeah, even Microsoft Word word check, spell check in that. Yeah, exactly. It wants to change your vessel to a ship, which would be inappropriate, but if you put T O rather than T-O-O or T W O, oh, it doesn't pay any attention to that. Clearly, grammatically not what you meant there to warn you to change that. Yeah, yeah. Anyway, it was a blast talking to you, Don Stevens. Thank you for stopping by. Take care, God bless. All right, thank you. Bye-bye. Like and subscribe to Christitutionalist Politics Podcast and Care Episodes. We need your help. Thank you for having tuned in to another Christitutionalist podcast show. I really appreciate that you stop by. Again, please like, share, subscribe. We need you to help spread the constitutionalist movement. Thank you again. Take care. God bless. Love you all.

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Joseph M Lenard

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