Lost Everything Then Lost Myself- Tabitha Lopez TRB Episode 54

If you’ve ever felt like God’s love depended on how perfectly you followed the rules, Tabitha Lopez’s story will hit close to home. She grew up in a strict United Pentecostal world where standards, leadership pressure, and fear of “getting it wrong” shaped her identity, even while she genuinely loved God and hungered for the Bible. Then Hurricane Katrina wiped out her home and community overnight, and the faith that felt unshakable suddenly had nothing familiar to stand on. 

We talk through what happens after trauma when you’re grieving, angry, and trying to make sense of why God didn’t prevent the pain. Tabitha shares the slow slide into isolation, social anxiety, depression, self harm, and suicidal thoughts, plus the complicated church dynamics that can deepen shame instead of bringing healing. The most surprising part of her testimony is the detour into Jehovah’s Witnesses, not as a flashy rebellion, but as a desperate attempt to find belonging and rebuild a life without trusting God.

Tune in to hear the rest...

Find Tabitha's book, "No Longer A Prodigal" on Amazon

Transcript

Welcome And Guest Introduction

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the Redeemed Backslider. With your host, Kathy Chastain, Christian-based psychotherapist and redeemed backslider. This podcast is dedicated to those who have wandered but are ready to return to the life-changing power of grace and the freedom found in Jesus.

SPEAKER_01 0:22

Hi, welcome to the Redeemed Backslider. I'm your host, Kathy Chastain. I'm a Christian-based psychotherapist and a redeemed backslider. With me today from the state of Arkansas is Tabitha Lopez. Tabitha wrote a book called No Longer a Prodigal. We will have all of the information for you in the description below, and we'll post a picture of the book. But Tabitha Lopez grew up in St. Bernard, Louisiana. She loves watching football and especially her LSU Tigers. She is a Sunday school teacher at her church as well as part of Ladies' Bible study, which she loves. She would describe herself as the Sour Patch Candy, feisty but ultimately sweet, wanting to treat people with the same kindness and grace that God shows us. So welcome to the podcast, Tabitha. Thanks for being here. Thank you for having me. So for the folks at home, um Tabitha came to me by way of one of our viewers who actually attends church with her. And um Tabitha grew up in a United Pentecostal church in Louisiana, right? Yes, ma'am. And um I I am uh 44 pages into her book, and already I was just like, this is such a needful testimony, and I don't even know the end. Um, but what you started with in your upbringing, I think is what a lot of prodigals out there struggle with, why they have a hard time coming back. And I know of one who never made it back, and um growing up in the very, very strict way that you did um was preventing him from even going to a different kind of church or a different church that would start the process of communicating to God again. So um I'm gonna have you just walk us through your testimony, and I may interrupt a little bit to ask questions or have you elaborate on something. Um, but I I I love how you started your book with the list of the church rules and kind of um because some of the church rules that you grew up with were way, way, way more strict than some of the ones that I grew up with. Um, and so I I just wanted you to give a history of you know what you were like as a child, what church was like for you as a child, your love for God, the way you lived, and and just kind of tell your story, and then I'll try not to interrupt too much, but I probably

Growing Up Under Strict Church Rules

SPEAKER_01 3:20

will.

SPEAKER_03 3:20

Okay, okay. Um, so then yeah, uh, so I grew up super very strict UPC. Um, so my dad was basically when the pastor wasn't there, my dad ran the church. So we were in leadership. I remember as a child, my dad telling us, um, even though we went to a strict church, he was like, There are rules, and then you have to live above the rules we have because you're an example to the church. Um, he's like, you don't just go to church, you're part of people are gonna look to you for got it. Um, and so for me, I always had a great love for God. God has always, from the time I can remember, I went to church, not to hang out with my friends, not to socialize. I went because I wanted to be near God. Um, from the time I can remember, I was always reading the Bible, like always reading the word from a very, very young age, because I just wanted to know God. Um, I had this hunger for God that I couldn't quench. Um, and I remember one time I was we had a visiting evangelist at church, and I was probably like four or five, maybe. Um, and I was right there preaching, right? Like when the crowd said amen, I was jumping up and saying amen and like like just just uh preaching along with the preacher. Um and I remember he pulled me up on stage and uh he had me stand on a chair and he said, I don't know what's gonna happen with this young girl, but there's an anointing on her, God's gonna use her for the kingdom. And even from a young age, that that always stuck with me, and it stuck with my parents. And I always felt that anointed from a very young age, like God was gonna use me to help people. I didn't know how. Um I always just had a very close relationship with God, like his spirit has always been very close within me and a part of my identity. Um, and as long with those identities were the rules, right? The rules shaped my identity. The rules, ma'am.

SPEAKER_01 5:26

It was all you knew.

SPEAKER_03 5:28

It was all I knew, yeah, yeah. And it gave me it, it the rules confirmed to me that God loved me. Not because God loved me for me, but because he loved me because I was following the rules, right? That's that's it was that checklist that I as long as I checked off those those boxes that I knew God loved me.

SPEAKER_01 5:49

Um I actually highlighted that in the book. Um because I think that that is the case for a lot of people even today. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 6:05

Yeah, it's not a it's almost like when you have those those rules, it's it's a security blanket, but it it almost I don't want to say it takes away from God's love God. It it takes away you can have so much more of a love for like you can feel God's love so much better, right? When you don't have those checklists because you know that God loves you for who you are, for who he created you to be, right? The Bible says that he go on, go on. Um the Bible says that he formed us in the womb. So who we are is who God created us to be, right? Um, personality, uh everything that we are. And so we don't need that, or we shouldn't feel the need to have that checklist as to know God loves us. We should have a security within ourselves to know, yes, I am who God created me to be and God loves me.

SPEAKER_01 7:01

Yeah, I feel like without the rules, it requires a lot more faith to believe. And so the rules, like you said, they they help people have a sense of security that if I'm doing all of these things, then I'm okay. I'm gonna make it, I'm gonna go to heaven, right? And so their faith is in this set of rules and not necessarily it faith in God to save them and to walk it out in a personal way with Him. Um, and that, you know, for anybody watching, don't get upset that we're talking about the rules because it's not meant. That's not the heart intention at all. It's just, it's just I do think that people depend on those things um instead of sometimes having a real true relationship with God. And they replace the faith in God because the faith is in the rules. And so as we hear your story, that's what happened to you. But continue on.

SPEAKER_03 8:11

Yes, yes, that's and that's exactly what happened to me. Um, and absolutely like look, at the end of the day, the Bible says we start to have our own salvation. So if if the rules and and for people, I'll just explain what my rules were so that way people know what my rules were. Um, I was I was a female, so I didn't cut my hair. I wasn't allowed to cut my hair, I didn't wear makeup, didn't wear jewelry. Um, my sleeves had to be above below my elbow. My uh skirt had to be right at my knee or below my knee. Um, I wore, I was never allowed to wear pants. Um, we had no TV, no video. Um when even at church, we had separate altars. Female prayed at one altar, and then males played at prayed at another altar. Um, and so that list just governed my life.

SPEAKER_01 9:04

Um, and I there's a longer list in the book. Um, yeah, I'm sure there is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can't think of all of them right now. Yeah, yeah. Well, I think one that one that you said, which definitely existed in my house, was unless uh um unless you're bringing into church, members should not socialize with people who are not Pentecostal. And that that was definitely something that occurred in my house, and I really struggled with that because I went to a high school, public school, where no one from church attended. The only friends that I could make were worldly friends, and they were wonderful people, you know, but it it was that was very difficult. And so, yeah, anyways, I identified a lot with some of the things that you had written about that because it brings about confusion, and as an adult, of course, I can understand. We don't want people to influence our kids and you know, that sort of thing. I can understand, but when you're a child growing up in it, it creates a real sense of judgment of others, which that's how we grew up. Like if if you aren't Pentecostal, you're going to hell and there's no two ways about it, you know? Yes. So continue.

When Rules Become A Security Blanket

SPEAKER_03 10:30

That's exactly how it was for me. Um, and I think yes, I think it's good to make sure your kids are hanging out with good kids, but I also don't think you should just how else can your child witness another child unless you have that relationship, right? Like if they're a good kid, then there's nothing wrong with them. I'm not saying you they're influencing everything they do, right? There's a difference between being a friend and having someone who's an influence in your life, right?

SPEAKER_01 11:03

And I and I think also how do we go into the world and reach people if we're not if we're not in the world to associate with them. Yeah, we have to be able to the you know, we have to interact with others so that our light will shine. And you know, we we have opportunity to even invite them to church that that that separation shouldn't be so much that the only ones coming to church are the people already saved.

SPEAKER_03 11:33

Correct, yeah. Um, and I mean, and there is a scripture in the Bible that says, you know, like you want to make sure when you're going to someone, and I'm paraphrasing, but you you want to make sure when you're going to someone who is struggling, that you yourself don't fall, right? So you do have to make sure that you're in a good spot to go grab coffee with someone or to go do something with someone, and you have to make sure you're in that spot to be that witness. So, yes, you want to use wisdom, but at the same time, Jesus himself always ate, he ate at the tax collector's house, he ate at the houses that the pee that the Pharisees was like, Oh my god, these are sinners, why are you associating with them? Right. But he said in Luke, I came to seek and to save that which is lost, right? Right. And so that's our job is to go out and do that. Right. Uh and it definitely created, I remember in middle school, because I went to public school as well. So elementary, middle school, even into high school until we moved to Arkansas, um, I was in public school. So in in Louisiana, you had to wear uniforms. Like everybody had to, like, uh, even public schools wore uniforms. And so, as this Pentecostal girl, I definitely stuck out, right? Because like my sleeves were always long, my skirts had to be specially made because they had to be the correct length. I couldn't go to the uniform school, into the uniform store and buy the uniform because it wouldn't have been appropriate for me. Um, and so it definitely made me stand out, which isn't necessarily a bad thing because it taught me to stand on my own two feet, right? Like it taught me to stand up for what I believed in. Um, but it also I remember I would always walk around school thinking, man, all these kids are going to hell. Yeah. And I didn't know that, right? But that's what was been taught to me. Because I can instantly look at someone, and if they didn't look like me, then they were going to hell. Right.

SPEAKER_01 13:23

You know, um, and so yeah, that that it just without the relationship with God that comes with all of that, without biblical understanding, when we teach our kids this, it's it's such a delicate balance, right? When we teach our kids this, it just sets us up to judge everybody. And now we have youth in the youth department telling people, you know, if they've been baptized in the Trinity, they're gonna go to hell, instead of using some wisdom and saying, hey, there's more to this, right? Let's let me show you what else the Bible says, and so that we're not condemning, we're bringing in through love and understanding. And yes, it just um I I don't know what the fix is because as I've gotten older and I look back, I'm really grateful for the um guards that kept us safe and protected, you know, and um and grateful how I was raised. But I also didn't understand from a place of love what all of these things meant or even why they were put in place, you know. Hindsight's always 2020. Yeah. So continue.

SPEAKER_03 14:51

Um, yeah, so yeah, no, I totally agree. Um, I think even me looking back on my childhood, I am very thankful for how I was raised because it built a very strong foundation in God for me, right? Um, and honestly, I think it's great I grew up without TV or video um because I had a childhood. I mean, we were outside from the time the streetlight was on, we were outside playing, we played board games, video games, I was always reading a book. So I think that's smart to kind of have that balance, right? But I think it's like you said, you want to come from a place of love. If if you feel like raising your child by certain rules is what's best for you, and you feel like that's how God's leading you, that's great. But teach them from a point of love. Teach them that this is what we do because of these reasons, but someone else may not, but we both still love God and we can both still have a relationship with God. I think that's the delicate situation is finding that balance right on that. Um, but yeah, so uh grew up in church. Um church was at like literally all I knew. I mean, we spent more time at the church than we did at home. Okay. Like uh, so my dad did jail ministry, taught Bible studies to people getting out of jail. So um on I think Mondays he would go do the jail ministry. We would have pray and Bible study at home while he was at jail ministry. Um on Wednesdays, he taught people getting out of jail to kind of help give a foundation for them. So we would always go to church early on Wednesday. We were there probably at like five o'clock. Um, but that was my favorite time because I there was a library right across the street from my church. So I would go there every Wednesday and just get a stack of books. And my mom's like, You're gonna read all those books? I said, Oh yeah, I'm gonna have them read by next Wednesday. I just loved the library. That was my favorite place to be. Um, so Wednesdays were my fake, one of my favorites. Um, and so my dad would teach Bible study to them on Wednesday. Then on Thursday, typically for choir, we had some kind of choir, we had choir practice because we're probably singing somewhere or having some kind of event. Then Friday was youth service. So um at the church I grew up in, every Friday was ran by the youth. Like it was a full-on, and I'm very thankful for that. It was a full-on church service. So youth did music, youth uh sometimes youth taught, or the youth pastor would teach. Um, we would play games, hang out. Then on Saturdays was usually some kind of youth event together. Um, we were either getting going to a house and having a youth party together, or we were going to a youth rally, or there was all then Sunday morning was Sunday school, and then Sunday night was church. And then it was repeat. And so that that was everything I knew. My world was my church. Yeah, my world was my church family, right? Yeah, like I didn't really, I had friends at school, but I wasn't allowed to be friends with them, so I didn't have those connections. My only connections were my church family. Yeah, that's it. You know, same for me. Yeah. Um, and I'm very thankful, but at the same time, when when when my world turned upside down, that like destroyed

Hurricane Katrina And Losing Everything

SPEAKER_03 18:05

me. Um, and so when when I was in 10th grade, uh in August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina was making landfall. Um, I remember we, I want to say, I don't, I feel like we went to church that Sunday morning, the Sunday before it hit. Or Sunday night. I feel like we went to church that night. I could not remember, but I feel like we did. Um, and we went home and we were not gonna evacuate. We weren't gonna leave. We were in St. Fanau Parish. So St. Benoit Parish is right outside the New Orleans area. It's probably about uh Shalmet's probably about 15, 20 minutes. Show me is where my church was. Shalmet's probably about 15 minutes outside New Orleans.

SPEAKER_01 18:47

Um, and then we lived in Poydras, yeah, which was probably so uh go on, I'll let you finish. There's a delay, I know. Um California people don't have hurricanes like this. We have earthquakes. So uh lit going through a hurricane and some of the things that you say in your book about not gonna evacuate, like can you tell us about what that was like in terms of what is you said they were mostly storms, but how often those alarms would sound and that sort of thing?

SPEAKER_03 19:21

Yeah, so we got hurricanes pretty much all the all the time. Like as growing up, we loved hurricanes because it meant we were gonna get out of school for possibly a week. Um, the most a hurricane was for us was just a lot of rain. Um, it would flood the streets, but not really flood them too bad. We would be outside playing in the water. Um, like it'd be like maybe a little above the ankles because the streets flooded. Um, hurricanes were not, we would have hurricane parties. Like when we knew a hurricane was coming, we would go by a friend's house and we would hang out and play games. Like it was just it wasn't anything to us, it wasn't anything major. And we never actually before pre before Katrina, for me, we never got hit by a bad hurricane. It would always end up going to Florida or going somewhere else. So hurricanes were never a big deal for us. Um, and so we were just gonna stay home. We weren't gonna leave. We didn't think it was gonna be that big a deal. And so, well, anyways, my aunt calls my dad, my dad's sister, my aunt calls him at like three or four in the morning, and she's like, Hey, you really need to leave. This is gonna be bad. We're evacuating, leave with us, follow us, we're leaving. And so my mom and dad wake us up, and so me and my brothers are throwing everything into suitcases. We're throwing all our clothes, we're throwing our PlayStations, we're we're throwing everything we own that we could think of into these suitcases. And my mom's like, Oh no, put everything back. You know it's only gonna be a mini vacation. We're gonna be going for three days at the most, just take two days worth of clothes, and that's what but thankfully I took my cat. I took my cat with me. I was like, Well, I'm gonna take my cat anyway. Um, so yeah, we have the clothes on our back, about two days worth of clothes in a suitcase, and we leave. And we go to stay at a Mormel, we go to a day's in in Marmel, and then on Melbourne, and that was in Arkansas, right? More Mel, yes, ma'am. More Mel, Arkansas.

SPEAKER_01 21:15

Okay, yeah. So you're leaving Louisiana to go to Arkansas.

SPEAKER_03 21:19

Yes, we left Louisiana, we evacuated to Arkansas, stayed at a day's in out there. Um, and then we weren't allowed to watch TV, but we ended up watching the news, and I felt guilty about it, but at the same time, this is pretty like major. Um, so we're watching on the news as this hurricane comes through and literally destroys our home, like destroys where we live, everywhere we live, um, just destroys our home, everything. Um, and we're like, oh my word, that's it. Like within 24 hours, we lost everything. Within 24 hours, we had literally the car we drove up in, the two days is worth of clothes in the suitcase and the clothes on our back. And my cat, like that's what we had. Um, and my dad, he worked at Amtrak as an electrician on the trains in New Orleans. He worked at Amtrak. Well, we because the hurricane was so bad, you weren't allowed back into the city for at least a month. Um, could have been longer, but I remember month, month and a half, we weren't allowed back in. No one was allowed back in. So we only had enough uh funds to stay at the days in for so long, right? So then it was like, well, what are we gonna do? We can't stay here. We don't have we can't afford to stay here. Um, so we were gonna have to stay live in our out of our car. That was our only option was to live out of our car. But my dad, he's a licensed minister, and so he had the UPC organization list of ministers. And so my mom just started calling. She called this one church, and they're like, Hey, we really don't have the funds to help you, but we know of this guy in Bryant, Arkansas. Give him a call. I promise he'll help you. So my mom calls him up. Um, and sure enough, he uh he says, Yeah, just come see us, we'll take care of you. And so we go, and I remember being a nervous wreck, right? Because I am not I am not a social person. Like I'm an introvert at heart. I can socialize to an extent, but if I am meeting new people and I don't know anyone, I just shut down. Like I can't communicate, I don't know how to talk to people I don't know, um, especially in the social aspect. Um, and so I just remember walking in and or heading to the church and just like being a nervous wreck. Um, but and we go in and then I see these people who it says it's a UPC church, but they don't look as UPC as what I know, right? Um and but we go in, and sure enough, um, we get greeted by some youth from the church. The pastor greets us, they give us a place that night, they gave us a place to uh someone had a rent house that they weren't, no one had rent at the time, so they let us stay there rent-free for six months, gave us that. They always gave us money for food until my dad was able to get a job. Um, I always look younger than when I am, and so I was 16, but I think they thought I was 12 because I got like 12-year-old clothes. Like they gave me 12-year-old clothes because I always look, I always look younger than I am. Um but but but this one person took me shopping, bought me clothes like for myself, and I remember uh I remember telling her in the store because uh this church didn't have the same rules I had. So I said, Look, I said, Thank you so much, but just so you know, these are my rules. I can't show my elbows, I can't show my knees. Like I gave her my list that I lived by. Um, but sure enough, we bought clothes. Um, and that um as far as like from a uh physical standpoint, that helped us get back on our feet, right? Like it allowed my dad to have time to search for a job out here because then it about so let me backtrack because I'm getting ahead of myself. We're supposed to be living in Arkansas for about a month, month and a half. Then the plan was to always move back to home, back to Louisiana. That was the plan. Well, then my dad makes the executive decision that, well, we're not doing that. We're staying here in Arkansas. We already lost everything. When we move back to Louisiana, we're not gonna be able to move back where we were anyway. I'm gonna, we're gonna have to relocate anyway. So I don't want to start over there to have to eventually deal with another hurricane. So I'm just gonna have us the best decision for us is to stay here in Arkansas. That destroyed me, right? Like that ripped the covers out from under me. Um, and so now my dad is searching for a job here in Arkansas. Um, and he was able to get on with uh a railroad station out here. Um, he's on with um Union Pacific, so he works at Union Pacific Railroad as an electrician now. Um and so we were able to start building our lives back that

Displacement, Isolation, And Identity Collapse

SPEAKER_03 26:12

way. But for me, my life was slowly being destroyed on the inside because now all my friends are gone, my world is gone, my identity is gone. My identity was my church, my pastor was uh what he taught, I believed. I knew the word, but if my taught if my pastor taught it, I believed it. I didn't necessarily have beliefs of my own. Like I knew what the Bible said, but my but I believed what my pastor taught.

SPEAKER_01 26:45

And back back then, um back then we were taught that. I remember that if if the pastor says it, that's the word, you don't question it, you know, you do whatever they say, if they say it, you do it, you know, and so I can understand what that would have felt like because that also was your security blanket, you know, and and you you there really, really wasn't a need. It doesn't seem like there was a huge need to have your own walk with God. Yeah, you know what I'm saying? I mean, I know that people do and people did, but there was a lot of people in that era that didn't have their own walk with God because a lot of times they didn't have to. They were told what to do, they just followed the rules and there was no need, right? Yeah, and I think that's the fallacy of that.

SPEAKER_03 27:48

Yeah, go on, yeah, for sure. Um my I I mean pre-Katrina, I would have told you I was like 100% sold out on God, right? And in my mind I was, but after Katrina, it made me think there's and I talk about it at some point in my book, there's a scripture in the Bible that says that's talking about the church of Laodicea, and he says, you don't realize that you're naked and blind and poor, because that ultimately was my relationship with God, because my core, my core faith was not in God, my core faith was in my pastor, and what he taught was in my list of rules that gave me security, was in my church, yeah. And then God was a part of that, God was a part of all those things, but God wasn't at the center of me, you know. Um, and that's not to say people, ma'am. And you didn't know that until no, no, this was exposed having to lose that until I went through what I went through that really exposed where my foundation really was, right? Like my foundation I was not God, even though I would have told you it was, you know. Um, it makes me think of the other scripture in the Bible that talks about the work will be tried by fire. And if it if the building stands, then it's built on the right foundation, but if it falls, it's not. And so that fire revealed my where my foundation was, and that's not to say I have my my younger brother and his wife go to a UPC church here. It's a great church, and so that's not to say that people who go to UPC churches, they're all the same way as how I was. That's just where I was, right? That's what my foundation was, right? You know, right, right. Um, and so because I was all in on my church, and so that made me all in on God. And so um when that when that got ripped up, when we found out that it made my social anxiety shoot through the roof, right? Because now uh I'm at this church where I don't know anyone and I don't know how to know anyone. I don't know the people I was friends with at my church, I had always been friends with them because we grew up together. I was never forced to make friends with them. We were raised together. I mean, the relationship formed naturally. I didn't have to make friends. Uh, friends were built into my life from the time I was born. Um, and so I've got that aspect of I'm going to this church, I don't know anyone, my social anxiety is out through the roof. And then on top of that, I'm grieving my losses. I'm grieving the loss of my church family, I'm grieving the loss of my identity, right? I'm grieving, I'm grieving my whole childhood, I'm grieving everything. I'm I'm grieving. Then, so I'm I'm grieving and I'm I'm angry. I get angry at God because I feel like God is supposed to protect me and now he's hasn't. He hasn't protected me. He's he's I blame him for everything going wrong in my life, right? I don't see that he's actually providing for us. I don't see that he's brought us to this church, he's he's provided all of this for us, but instead I'm just angry. I'm angry and bitter. And and at this church, it was I didn't fit in. I there's there's no two ways about it, right? Um, and it's what's so funny is the church I go to now, New Beginnings Apostolic, is the same congregation that at the time I I didn't fit in with, right? That I was very angry with and felt like I couldn't break through. I go to church with these same people, but we're both at different places now, you know? Um, because at the time with the youth, I I just couldn't make friends with anyone. It was like hitting a brick wall, right? So I'm very isolated. I don't fit in with the girls, we don't connect, we we they're dealing with their own stuff, I'm dealing with my stuff, and so I never really had any friends. So not only have I lost friends, I'm trying my best in my own awkward way to make friends, but no one accepts me. No one wants to be friends with me, no one's reaching out to me. And so that just creates even more bitterness because now, whereas the church used to be my place of comfort and security, now the church is the source of my bitterness.

SPEAKER_01 32:25

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 32:26

So every time I go to church, I'm hit with anger and isolation and bitterness, and and I don't have any comfort. I'm always just I just feel alone. I feel alone at church, I feel alone at home, and I don't know how to fix it. But I refuse to return to the one who can fix it because now I'm angry and bitter with God. So I refuse to let God help me. So I decide that I'm just gonna do it on my own. Yeah, I'm gonna figure out, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:58

Go ahead. You could always finish a sentence if I have a question. So I I don't want to interrupt you mid-sentence. Um, so you you could always finish. I don't wanna, I don't wanna interrupt, interrupt. Someone wrote in the comments once, please don't interrupt your guests. I don't try to interrupt, but I have had guests that just will talk the whole time. There's no way for me to ask a question. And um, part of the reason I ask questions is because I want to make it the stories, they are so relatable to other people who are watching, right? And and I think what you're describing is the expectations that you had of God, and it was much the reason I fell away when I did at 15, because I believed all of these things about God, that God could do anything that the you know that God provides for us and that God answers

Anger At God And The Problem Of Trials

SPEAKER_01 33:58

our prayer. And so we are not prepared for when things go wrong in our life when we're a kid, because we have such blind faith and innocence. Um, and we just see God as everything wonderful that He is, but we don't understand the testing process, we don't understand, you know, overcoming in life. And so when I hear you talk about the reasons you're angry at him, it's because you you rightly believed all the things about God that the Bible says. It's just that you did not know how to understand that trials come, right? Yeah, and so your yeah, your expectations were you weren't prepared for for that.

SPEAKER_03 34:52

Yeah, and like I think life, look, there's a the the Paul talks about how uh person you're gonna go through persecution and you're gonna go through trials, and that's gonna create character, and then that's gonna create hope, right? Right. So, and the Bible also says it rains on the just and the unjust. God is not manipulating life for his people, he's not making sure that everything just goes perfectly, unicorns and rainbows for his children, because that would require him to manipulate everything on our behalf, right? Oh, sorry, I'm about to sneeze. Okay, it went away. Okay, um, and so um God is not sitting here being a puppet master destroying someone else's life just so our life is good. He's life, he didn't say, Oh, okay, this hurricane's coming, but let me put a bubble around their house and I'm gonna just have all the water grow around it. Now he could have if he wanted to, right? We know he could have, he has the power to, but he doesn't do that because there is life, there is our relationship with him, and then there is the life we live on this earth, and those are two separate things, right? Like, so we cannot expect God to always make sure everything is happy and perfect for us. God, there's a reason why the Bible says he will work all things for your good. If he says he has to work all things for your good, that means all things include bad things, right? Right, right. That means bad things is gonna happen, but he's gonna take those bad things that you're going through, and he's either gonna create character, he's gonna create a testimony, he's gonna allow you, he's gonna use that bad thing to step into something else, right? Like God will take that and use it for your goods, but I refuse to allow God to take this bad thing and use it for my good because I feel like he was the source of the bad thing, right? Like I but like you said, I had this expectation of God to always protect me, period, right? But so when life happened, when this tragic happened, I should have won. I wish I would have, which I mean, it I'm going through a lot, I'm a teenager, etc. I was 16 at the time, but I wish I would have recognized that he did provide throughout. I mean, we had a seamless transition, we lost everything in 24 hours, and then within another 24 hours, we had a place with food and money.

SPEAKER_01 37:19

Yeah. Like, yeah. Tabika, can you can you talk about because I I think um I think it's so important when you said you felt like God was the source of all the bad things that was happening. What caused you to believe that? I know that might be a loaded question, but I I'm asking because I talk to people often through the course of my work or just the course of life who lose a loved one. And they blame God for it because the idea is that God could have and he should have prevented it. So could you talk a little bit about why you blamed him?

SPEAKER_04 38:05

Um I think it's gone.

SPEAKER_03 38:10

Um, I think it's honestly I because uh my whole life, like God was my father. Like God was everything to me. Uh, if I had if I needed comfort, I prayed and God comforted me. If I if I was stressed, I prayed and I had peace. Um, God was my source of refuge and security and comfort. God, in every sense of the word, God was and is today my father. He is my father, right? Um in the sense of that word, he is that for me. Um, he has always been been very close in me. Um, and so I always felt like I could go to God for comfort and that he would always be there. But when this tragedy happened and when I lost I lost everything, I felt like in my 16-year-old mind, God could have allowed us to move back, right? Like he could have allowed us to, I could have been able to go back to my church family, to go back to my life, and I didn't have to be in Arkansas, but I feel like I felt like God allowed us to be moved here to Arkansas, and I didn't understand it, I didn't want it, and so I in my own weird way, I felt like God should have prevented me and protected me from those tragedies, even though that's not realistic, right?

SPEAKER_01 39:46

Right, but it's not what we think, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 39:51

Yeah, like in my 16-year-old grieving mind, that's what I felt like should have happened, yeah, is that he should have protected me from the tragedy, right? And when he didn't, then I put him in a place of someone who would hurt me. Right.

SPEAKER_01 40:10

And I think that calls to mind the scripture, you know, um, to lean not on on your own understanding, but in all things acknowledge him and he'll direct your path. I I think that that happens to a lot of people. We get tripped up when we think it should have been different than what it turned out. And we have to go back to what the word says that God is always good and his ways are perfect. And if we are rationalizing what should have happened, then we're not really trusting him.

SPEAKER_03 40:45

Exactly. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:48

Okay, so go on. Nope, you got I I was just saying, go on. Yeah, I think that's a good point.

SPEAKER_03 40:57

Um, but yeah, so I was just gonna continue on with so now um so I I've I blame God for everything, so I refuse to turn to him for any comfort when that was always my go-to. Um, so now I'm angry, I'm bitter. The church is a source of bitterness for me. Um, I have no friends. Um, I'm angry at my parents for forcing me to move here. Um, I I don't fit in anywhere. I have my social anxieties that are affecting me. So now I'm so isolated and I refuse to let God comfort and help me that now that bitterness takes root. And that scripture in the Bible says if you let bitterness take root, it's gonna destroy everything. When you have that seed of bitterness and you allow it to grow, it will grow and it will destroy. It will destroy you from the inside out. And that's what it did for me. It destroyed my self-worth because my my self-worth was built in God. My self-worth was I had no self-worth. Yeah, my worth was in my church family, and then my church family ensured me that God loved me, so then I had worth. Well, when all of that gets taken away, I'm left with just me, a broken, bitter, angry me. And so I have no self-worth. And now I'm angry and I'm bitter, and I'm hitting a brick wall with everything. So then I'm at this church, I can't fit in, so I try a different church. Then, and it's actually the church that my brother goes to now. And they were great, they were fine, but I didn't fit in because now at this new church, uh, I realized that that's when I was 18, so when I was 16, we moved because of Katrina. When I was 18, I got my first pair of pants. Up until that point, I had never worn a pair of pants. Um, so at 18 years old, I got my first pair of pants. I figured, hey, I'm 18, I can go get me a pair of pants, right? But at that point too, I had realized because when we started going to the church that was last trick, it made me like dig into the scripture and say, okay, what do I actually believe? Do I have to wear a skirt? Is that the only thing I'm allowed to wear? And so I began to search scripture about cutting hair and and clothing, and I realized, okay, no, there's nothing wrong with wearing a pair of pants as long as they're holy, like as long as they're modest, right? And so um I'm like, okay, I'm not wearing boy pants, I'm wearing female pants, and they're modest, so it's fine. So when I'm 18, I go get this, um, I get my pair of pants, etc. So now I'm going, but then I decide I'm gonna go visit this church my brother goes to. Well, they're they're a UPC church. So now I don't fit in there, not because of now. I don't fit in there because I'm not like them now. So I don't fit in at the church I'm going. To now, but I also don't fit in that this new church because I refuse. Once I believe something, that's it. I'm not going to change it. So I refuse to conform to what they believe because I feel like it's not necessary. And so then I don't fit here and there. I'm hitting a brick wall. So then I go, and I just go through years and years of trying to fit in churches. I'm trying to create my own comfort by myself in a church. I'm trying to find a new church that becomes my new identity. And God doesn't allow this to happen because my identity needs to be Him. Right? And so I'm in this isolation for a reason, but instead of allowing that isolation to create in me what God intended, I allow it to stay and to linger and to just make my root of bitterness grow. And it grew and it grew and it grew until I'm hopping around from church to church. Then I end up at this another church. And this church ultimately led to me backsliding.

Depression, Self Harm, And A Toxic Mentor

SPEAKER_03 45:08

So at that point, I would say I was probably about 24, 25. And at this point, because the isolation has stayed so long and the bitterness has stayed so long and it has destroyed me from the inside out, and I'm just fuming and living off of anger, that now I am depressed. I am extremely depressed because we were created for interaction. No matter how much I'm I got social anxiety, no matter how much I like to be a homebody, I also crave human interaction. We all do because that's how we were created. Adam, Adam was in the garden by himself. He wanted a friend. God created the animals to be a friend, was not good enough. So then God created Eve. Because humans require human interaction. So I craved that. I hated myself. I mean, like really depressed to the point I'm self-harming. Um and then it pushes and pushes and pushes to the point I'm suicidal. Like it just grew and grew and grew. So I went from a young from a child on like full of life, loving herself, strong, independent, bold, etc. Bold. To now I'm 25 years old, I can't stand myself. Uh it's hard for me to talk to people. Yeah. Um, I'm just angry and bitter all the time. I won't open up to anyone. I've got this. I figured I said I'd rather have a steel wall around my heart than get hurt. So even though that steel wall protects me from getting hurt, it also didn't allow me love. Right. I refuse to let love come in because love equals hurt. Right. And so um, so I've got the steel wall and I go to this church. And I mean, I'm at this point, I feel like I think I was 25 or 26 when I left. So I think I was probably 20, 21, sometime, somewhere around there. Um, I was living on my own, and I remember, and I talk about it in my book. Um, I was I was living at an apartment here in Arkansas and Bryant, and I was dealing with depression and dealing with like, I mean, like spiritual battles in my mind, like all the time. Like, if I woke up, I was being bombarded with with you're awful, you shouldn't live. Like this from the time I woke up, that's what I was dealing with. Just full-on depression and and darkness. That's I don't know how else to describe it.

SPEAKER_01 48:02

Yeah, what's the spirit? Spirit of heavy.

SPEAKER_03 48:04

Yes, it was very spirit, it was it was the spirit that was attacking me. Um, and so I there was a point, and I'm like, okay, I I come home one night from I don't know where I was, because I would always drive late at night because I had to leave my apartment because I just had to get out of there. And I would go in a parking lot and I would just cry. Like I would just sit in my parking lot, sit in a random parking lot and just in my vehicle and cry. Um, and I came home from I was at home one night and I was folding clothes and I just felt this weight of like, this is it. I'm either gonna, this is it, this is the time. I'm either I'm gonna take these pills, I'm gonna send my note to my brother, my mom, and that's gonna be it. And I didn't want, I didn't want to die, but I didn't want to stay living the way I was living. I couldn't. I couldn't stay living the way I was living. And and I also like none of my family, because I was very good at hot and what I was going through. So I always looked like I had it together. And so like at church, I could talk the best conversation with the best of them about the word. Um, I was worshiping, I was like, it my family had no clue how bad off I was, and I wanted them to know, but I didn't know how to just tell them. And so I felt like if I do this drastic thing, then they'll realize something's really wrong and they'll get help from me. And so um I sent this text message to my brother. I don't know what I said, but he's at work, he ends up leaving work and parenting for whatever reason, but must I don't know what I said, but he leaves work, he's scared, and I end up going out of my apartment. I felt like something was propelling me out of my apartment because I was it was do or die, like I was gonna do it or not. Like I was I either had to leave my apartment or I was gonna do it, and I felt like something was propelling me out of the apartment. So I ran out, so I run out of the apartment and I'm just balling to my parents' house, and I am just I'm in shambles. And they're like, you need to talk to someone. They're like, you've got to talk to someone. So my mom was anti-therapy, like she was like, No, we shouldn't do therapy, therapy is not for you. You need to talk to someone, talk to a pastor's wife, and so um I mean personally at the time, and I talk about it in my book, I wish she would have got me like a Christian therapist or a Christian counselor, someone that could help me both emotionally and from a spiritual standpoint as well. Um, but I also I understand she was she was just doing the best she could for me, and I I get that. Um, and so we're attending this church at this time, um, and there's this pastor's wife that I end up opening up to, but it just was a very toxic relationship. It was toxic on both her part and mine because now I have opened up to someone that I have refused to open up to anyone and be vulnerable with anyone for like 10 years, right? Like I've gone so long without being vulnerable with anyone, right? That when I open up to her, I'm like, okay, this is it. This is it. Like, I'm gonna finally have my identity, I'm gonna have my security. And so she was not who I needed her to be, but I also put too much on her, like it wasn't right to try and make her be my emotional security. That's wrong, right? Um but the way it was handled was not right, like it was not handled from a state of love. She told me one time, and I don't agree, and I talk about it in my book. This person told me one time I break people down to build them back up. But if I'm broken, if I'm broken, yeah, and you break me, you're gonna crumble me. Like you're gonna take my broken and make me crumbs, right? Right? And so that was her no, like that's not the godly love that we're supposed to show, right? And so, like I said, I have my part in what I have my part in that I put too much weight on her, but she also did not show me the godly love that I needed, right? And she did not show me grace in those times, right?

SPEAKER_01 52:23

And so or realize with any discernment whatsoever how vulnerable you already were and what a big risk you were taking, and just you know, confiding in someone for the first time. It that's huge, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 52:40

Yeah, yeah. Um and so that led me when that relationship fell apart, which it needed to, right? I mean, it it just was not healthy, but when that relationship fell apart, that was it. I was that that was my straw that broke the Campbell back, and that led me, which you haven't finished this book, so about to spoiler alert, but okay, okay, um, but that led me to becoming a prodigal, but in a maybe an unexpected way, because I never truly wanted to leave God. Right. So I never when I became a prodigal, I never went, I never did anything quote unquote sinful, right? Like from the outside looking in, uh I was a good girl, good Christian girl. Um but I wasn't my sin, you just couldn't see my sin. My sin was it was an invisible sin. Um, and so I ended up at that time I was working at this bricking company, and I saw working there, and I'm like, I I make friends with this older lady. She was in her 60s at the time. I'm like 25, 26, but we just connected, like we became really good friends. Like we just connected at work. We'll work friends. Um, and it felt like at work, work became an escape from my life. It was a place that I could create an identity that I wanted to create. No one knew me, no one knew my struggles. Uh, so I'm working at this place, I'm friends with this older lady, and uh the relationship at the with the pastor's wife falls apart while I'm working here. And so I'm like, I don't I don't know what to do, but I'm not going to church. I'm not going to church. Church has just done nothing but hurt me for the past um teen years. Church has been nothing but a source of hurt for me. And so, oh, I'm so nervous you would talk about this. Like, it's so crazy. Like, I I talk about this in my book, but talking about it, like what I'm about to say right now is very like it's so vulnerable for me because I I'm it's I'm ashamed of what I did. Okay. And it's easier for me to talk about in the book because I'm writing it. And even like when people read my book and I knew they read it, I was so scared to see them the next day because I knew what they had read. But um the the it was a family-owned brick and company.

Becoming A Jehovah’s Witness For Belonging

SPEAKER_03 55:16

Unbeknownst to me, these people were Jehovah's Witnesses. The company was owned by Jehovah's Witnesses, and so was the older lady that I had become friends with. She was also a Jehovah's Witness. And they had the same rule, which I didn't know this, but they had the same rule that Pentecostal have, and that you can be friends to point, but you don't really be friends unless they're Jehovah's Witnesses, right? Right. And so I made a comment. Uh, I was in her office, and I had made a comment. I was like, Oh, you look very Pentecostal today. Because she did. She had on her hair was up, she had on a long skirt, flowy skirt. She had on, like, she just looked Pentecostal. And she was like, Oh, are you Pentecostal? I was like, Yeah, I am. And then she was like, Oh, well, what do you believe? So we start talking about different beliefs, and then an idea popped in my head, and it was like, This is it, this is your escape. You're not leaving God, but you can create you can create a new path. Now, ultimately, I was leaving God, but in my mind, my messed up mind at the time, I was still living for God in a different way, right? Right, and so it popped up like this is it, this is your chance, and so we end up having these conversations about God in the Bible, and these conversations were like water to a desert because I hadn't had like a meaningful conversation with someone in a long time, and I just craved interaction. Um, anytime I in the it didn't go well with the pastor's wife, and so uh in any kind of interaction didn't go well, and so I just craved this connection, I wanted connection, and I was finally getting connection. I got connection with the older lady, I got connection through these conversations, and so I was like, you know what? This is it, I'm gonna do this. And so we saw talking about different beliefs, and she would bring up points, and I knew what she said wasn't true, but I wanted to create my own security and my own comfort, and so I just went along with the path, and so before I know it, I'm studying with her to become a Jehovah's Witness, and and because it gives me the interaction, like we would start meeting after work at Starbucks and start talking about doing the study. Um, and then I the older lady started inviting me to her house to hang out and have a glass of wine and just have a girls' night because I was studying, and so it created what I was looking for, right? And so I can study I don't I give the right answers, I don't believe what I'm saying, but I give the right answers because I want this, I need this, and so uh I study with her for uh probably a year or so. Um, and then I end up going through you've got in order to become a Jehovah's Witness, you've got to meet with the elders and they ask you questions. You basically got to pass a test, is the way it works. If you pass the test, which I've always been a good test taser, so I was fine. Um, and so I pass the test, and they're like, okay, well, you're gonna be baptized. And so, and I talk about this in my book. Um you don't realize it, but Jehovah's Witnesses is very much humanistic in that it's all about yourself and life on earth. That's all it's about. It's not about living for God. They'll say it's about living for God, but it's not, it's literally just living on earth forever. That's the goal. That's what it is. Um, and and you go witnessing, but it's all about numbers, right? They want you to just always bring in people, bringing in people. It's like sales, right? You basically learn how to sell being a witness. You go through class on, like, they'll have classes on one day of the week. Um, they'll have like witness classes on uh you'll you'll meet in how to talk to people, how to have these conversations. Um, and you're you're talking to them about God, but the only reason you're talking to them about God is to bring them in so that way they're a number within the organization. And um, and you're not allowed to go against what anyone tells you, right? Like what the elders at the church tell you. You can't go against what they're teaching, otherwise, you're gonna get in trouble. Um, once you become a witness, you really need to cut off from everyone else. You know, you you you can kind of associate, but they really don't want you associating with anyone but witnesses, so you become this little bubble within the organization, right? Right, so then you're scared to let go of that bubble because then that's your identity again. Your identity and your friends and everything, right? And so, um, and then for baptism, right? Like, like for church, especially church I I'm in church I grew up in, church I'm in now, baptism isn't like okay, we're gonna schedule a month from now at a conference and we're gonna baptize you. It's oh, you want to be baptized, like Peter said, who can spare water? Let's baptize them. Like, you want to get baptized right now, we're gonna baptize you. Right. Well, with the witnesses, it's not like that, it's very much a show. Everything's a show. And so when they brought me up to baptize, it was at this conference of witnesses with like 400 people, and they do this whole show, and then you get baptized in front of everyone, and then now you're a witness, and it's a whole thing. They literally just say, uh, what did they say? They didn't say I think they I don't think they said anything. I think they just put me underwater because they didn't believe in baptizing in Jesus' name, and they don't believe in baptizing for the Son and Holy Spirit. So I I think they just said nothing when they baptized me.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:08

What was going on in your head? Because um you knew theologically, because you'd been reading your Bible, you'd studied your Bible, you knew what you were taught. How did you rationalize the theology? Was there so but I wanna say what what I want to say is um was there the fear of the Lord there? Or were you able to just Was the fear of the Lord present? Like you weren't afraid to change your belief, or did you did you were you saying to yourself, no, I secretly know what I believe. I'm just playing a game with them. Like, what was happening inside your head?

SPEAKER_03 1:01:54

The second one, the second one, like I knew what I believed, but I was like, I'm just doing this because I need this, and I know that eventually I can go back to God. I know I have a get out of jail free card in repentance.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:05

So you were never you were never really renouncing the faith that you grew up with.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:12

No, I mean I I I told people that what I believed was wrong, right? Like I would tell people, oh, what I grew up with wasn't right, but on my inside, I knew that wasn't true. But I was playing this part and playing this role because uh I wanted to do it on my own without God. I wanted to create my own comfort, my own security, my own love without God. Yeah, to say, hey God, look, I did it on my own without you. It's terrible to say, but that's that's that's what I felt, right? Right, and it's also terrible to say that I felt like I had to get out of jail free card with repentance, but that's what was in my mind. And what's scary about that is yeah, we can't scary, it's scary because you may not find yourself back, you know, like you can go down this road and down this road and down this road to the point, and it happened with me where I'm like, okay, I know I'm right, but am I right? Right? Because I went several years as a witness, I went probably four, four or five years as a Jehovah's Witness. I I witnessed, I spoke at conferences, like I that became part of me, and I was only doing it as a role, like I only did it because I wanted that human interaction. At the end of the day, I never truly believed what they believe, but at some point, when you're living the lie so long, it does make you question what you actually believe.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:39

And I I want to speak to something that you said because that get out of jail free card that you had, I think that's where a lot of backsliders live

The Repentance Trap And Spiritual Warfare

SPEAKER_01 1:03:49

today. And the ones that have not come back, right? They in their mind that's what they're thinking. But there's two things. Number one, we're not promised tomorrow. But number two, you said, which was true for me, is we don't always find ourselves in a place of repentance. I I remember in 2010, I'd prayed back through years ago, and in my mind, in my heart, I was serving the Lord, but I would have a couple drinks, and I would rationalize that with the the thought that um I was only having two drinks. That was all I would ever allow myself to have. And I still prayed every day, and I was still talking to God, and I was still, you know, I was still going to church and walking it out with the Lord, but I would rationalize that. And I remember one night at midnight, the Lord woke me up just wide awake, and I thought my number was getting punched, and I I literally sat up on my bed, and um, I thought that the death angel was in the room with me. I mean, it it was such a wide awake moment, and I was not ready, and up until that time, I thought that I was ready, and even sitting there in that bed, knowing that I was about to die, knowing that I wasn't ready, I could not form one tear. My heart, my actually my mind was crying out to the Lord, and I was saying, Lord, forgive me, I repent, but it was only a fear-based, it was not a true heart based repentance. And that moment forever changed me because I realized the error in my thinking that I I thought that I was right, and also I knew that the one reason I wasn't was because I was drinking. I'm never I never had a drop of alcohol since that night. But I never I never understood that God really cared about that. I never ever understood that. And I could not find a place of repentance there. And um, and you said that a minute ago. You said we may not find a place of repentance because I have since learned that it is God who moves on our heart to bring us to a real true place of repentance. And without God, we can't get there. And so this get out of jail free card that people think they have is an illusion and really I think placed there by the enemy to think that you know you're gonna find that place back again. And I I mean, when you do really have a place of repentance, you need to heed that call in that moment and take it because you may not get it again for years if if you get it again, you know, because the enemy is after our soul to kill us and and eventually he does try to take our life, you know. And you've said it, and I've talked to many backsliders who are suicidal, and it's not that anyone ever sets out to want to die, but that spirit is powerful and I think extremely underestimated because we overestimate our own control when it comes to the spirit realm. We are not in control, we literally are serving God. Or if we are not serving God, then the default is the devil. We are serving the devil, whether we ever realize it or not. So sorry, sorry for the little preach, but I thought the point that you said, I know you said that from a place of revelation and a place of experience, but I I don't think that's also something that we talk about very much, you know.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:03

Yeah, yeah, and um I I agree with what you said because I I talk about this in my book too. How yes, the God is stronger than Satan, right? But we are not. The only reason we can defeat Satan is because we have God. God Satan, Satan is a spirit, yeah, he has powers. Yeah, so without God, he destroys us, it's with God and God's spirit. Satan's no match for God and his spirit, but we are no match for Satan, and a lot of times we like to think of Satan as beneath us, and I'm not giving Satan glory, but uh but he is not a human being, he is a spirit being, and so we have to remember that that when you come against Satan, you come against Satan with God. And like like uh happened in the Bible where he said the spirit said, I know who Paul is, and I know who so and so is, but I don't know who you are when that person tried to cast out the spirit, and that spirit attacked and destroyed them. So um, and when you are backslidden, you cannot fight against Satan on your own. And that's what I tried to do for years and years and years and years, and because I started having conversations with spirits that I never intended to be suicidal, but over years of having conversations, eventually you get led down that path. Being someone doesn't just wake up one day and they're suicidal, right? It's a path that you take, it's steps that you take that eventually lead you to that point. And Satan always had a game plan, right? Yeah, my pastor growing up always said this. This is what my pastor growing up, and it has always stuck with me. He said Satan knows the word in and out. He's also had years and years, hundreds of years of strategy on how to destroy humans, and he's watching and he will create a plan and he will wait for that perfect time to act. Right, and so we have to remember that, and that's why the Bible says, as soon as you feel something coming up against you, you cast it out. It's immediate, it's not having a conversation, it's not talking about it, it's not thinking, it's not giving thought to it. It's as soon as you feel like Satan is coming against you, you immediately in the name of Jesus cast it out, right? Because you don't give place to it.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:39

So when you say having conversations, I think I know what you meant, but for the people at home, can you elaborate on that a little bit? Because uh I would view that as intrusive thoughts. That's the devil speaking to us in our mind.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:52

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:54

Definitely intrusive thoughts. Yeah. And so you're just you were just entertaining that and having conversation back and forth in your thoughts, like within myself. Yeah, within yourself, yeah. Yes, because it is a conversation, it's 100% a conversation, whether we're winning that battle, talking back, rebuking it, or whether it's planting those seeds and it's getting stuck there in our in our thoughts. Yeah, yeah. Okay, very good. Uh, because you weren't speaking out loud with your voice having uh a conversation with the spirit, you just understand.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:31

No, no, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:32

Yeah, it's just in my people do, people do, and people have because spirits manifest. So, okay. So you so you enter the Jehovah's Witness, you become part of that religion, and then what happens after that? What made you leave after five years?

SPEAKER_03 1:11:49

Okay, so um, so I'm there doing the witness thing, and I know it's I know it's wrong, but I'm living, but I'm I'm having the the I'm I'm having the life of like a friend, right? I'm I'm having that friends, but I have created a life of friends and socialization that I created for years, so now I've got it. And um then my my so growing up, my papa, my mom's dad, I was very close with my papa. Like I uh love to go hang out by his house. I would sleep on he would make a pad on the floor, I would sleep next to him. Um, so this is in 2020, the year of COVID.

COVID, Grief, And The Cracks In It All

SPEAKER_03 1:12:33

Um, and so uh I've been a witness for a couple years now. And at this time, my papa is actually going to church with my parents at this time, um, which is crazy because growing up, he was not okay with my mom. Because my mom, my mom was raised Catholic, and my dad wasn't raised anything, and so he was definitely not okay with my mom becoming Pentecostal at all. Um, so full circle movement. Now he's going to church with my mom, which is a big deal. Um and that is something I regret because I never get to I never got to go to church with my mom at our church now. Like I never got to go to church with my papa at our church now. Because at that time I was a witness. So I wasn't able to attend.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:21

Um and did they did they make you disfellowship from your family when you were a Jehovah's Witness? Or did your family struggle with you being Jehovah's Witness?

SPEAKER_03 1:13:31

Or were they My family? My family definitely struggled with it, especially my little brother, um, because I was very much a role model for my little brother. And for me to backslide was a very shocking thing for him. He said, Of all the people, I would never thought you would have, right? Um, and so um he uh it got to the point where growing up, me and my me and my younger brother were always super close. Like we were we're best friends, we would hang out, etc. Um, but when I became a witness, it was just he was so it was just angry, like we would just fight all the time, right? That it just kind of destroyed that relationship. Um, I mean, it's not destroyed today, we're back, we're good, but it it it definitely it changed us completely. Um, and we just couldn't be around each other because he just would be so mad, right? Because he was worried, he was just angry that I had left God and had become a witness, you know. Um, and my mom was just heartbroken. She was just like, she's just heartbroken, right? And um, and so uh the witnesses never told me not to hang out with my family, but whenever I did, they made it a point to make it clear that they didn't really like it, and that they would always put my family down there in front of me. Like they didn't want me really associating with my family. Yeah, they didn't always say it, but they made it known. Yeah, um, so I always felt like I was doing something wrong when I was hanging out with my family. Um, and so 2020 happens, and now the witnesses like literally it's just I go to work and I go home, right? No one's meeting, no one's we're not meeting at the kingdom hall, people aren't meeting for the most part in churches, right? We're not going out witnessing the people, we're not like there is no connection, right? So it's literally working home. We would meet, we would have our meetings through Zoom, um, and we would have our uh writings, like it got some points for witnessing, we would write letters, right? And so we were doing that over Zoom. Well, it literally hit me one day as I'm writing this letter. Um, you know how like in the when you'll get a letter in the mail saying, Hey, you have this such and such vehicle, but you could trade it up for this vehicle for blah blah blah. You'll get those letters in the mail from car dealerships, right? Yeah, that essentially is what we were sending out to people. We were like, Hey, uh, I know that you live in this life on earth, but have you ever thought about having life forever on earth? Let's have a conversation about it, right? Like I'm paraphrasing, but that's essentially what the letter was. Yeah, and it hit me one day as we're going through this, and they're talking about essentially selling selling it to people because it's just about being bringing people in. It's not about God, it's just about bringing people in. You just want the numbers, right? More numbers, more donations, etc. Right. And like uh, and so that hit me, that thought hit me of like, this is this, there's no God here, right? And even the first time I visited a kingdom hall, I knew there was no God there. Like, as I was walking in the building, I felt God telling me, This is not right, you know this is not right. Don't go in there, turn around. But I just refused to listen. And like as I sat there in this kingdom hall surrounded by people, but God wasn't there. Like, you know, when God's somewhere and God was not there, and uh, and then fast forward a couple years, and I'm sitting here and we're going through Zoom, and I just felt like I was like, This is this is empty, it's empty, you know. Um, and but then I just push it away, right? Because I don't want to give up what I've created, because now God's dealing with me, and I know it's wrong, but I'm like, how do I it got to the point where I want to go to church, but I don't want to give up my friends. I want God, but I don't want to give up my social circle that I've created, because that has become my identity, it's become my comfort, and so I've got this tugawood within me. And then within, I want to say August, or I think in August or September, I had went and visited, I went and visited my mom by my uncle, and my papa was living with my uncle, and uh he was coughing, but uh we hung out, and I was like, oh, I was and he would always say, like, I would always kiss him on both sides of the cheek when I would leave. And um, well, this time I didn't. I was like, no, I was like, you might have COVID, so I'm not gonna kiss you. But next time I see you, I'll do it then, right? Well, unbeknownst to me, that was the last time I would ever see him. Because he did have COVID, but within a couple days he was in the hospital. I spoke with him on the phone a couple times, um, and then he ended up passing away from COVID. Um, and that was that I felt some serious grief from that because my my papa taught me how to drive. Like he was like, he if I he would always say, Hey, you want any money? And I'm like, No, I don't need any money, but thank you, you know. Like he was just that person for me. Um, and so when he passed away, that grief just uh struck me hard, like really hard. And I mean, even to this day, I regret one, not kissing him, right? Like not giving him that hug, but I regret most not being able to have been going to church with him at my church now, like yeah, that could have been such a special moment, you know? Yeah, yeah. Um, and so I regret that all the time. Um, sorry, I must cry. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so he passed away, and then I feel this grief and this weight, and I feel like I go several days without being able to go to work, and because I just can't, I can't even get out of bed. Um and eventually I go to work and I'm like, and I know I feel this depression again. I and I have felt this the depression has slowly surely been coming back from all the isolation I'm in now. On top of now, my papa has passed away, and so I'm back to having super depression, to back to having thoughts of self-home that I had thought I'd be beat five or six years ago. I thought I had beat suicide and I thought I had beat self-home. I'm like, I hadn't done it in years, hadn't thought about it, I thought it was done, right? Um, but it was just waiting there for me to get back to that place vulnerable place, vulnerable, yes. And so I'm back there and uh and I'm having these thoughts, I'm not giving in, but I can feel it coming back, and I'm like, no, I'm not going there, I'm not going there again. Um, and so I'm at work one day, and it came to a point where I was like, God, I want you, but I don't know how to get back to you. And it came to a point where God had to force me to give up the life I had created. That was the only way I was gonna get back to God, right? I had to reach a point of walking away from the life I had created. Yeah, and so, and I talk about this in my book, the company I worked for was a family-owned company. So there's some gray areas that come with that, right? But not only was it a family-owned company, but my boss was also my Bible study person for being a Jehovah's Witness. We hung out together all the time, we did stuff together, so the lines were blurred between boss, yeah, between employee and employer. They were blurred, right? Yeah, which is not a good thing. Um, and so uh she was always like like this company is growing fast, growing, growing faster than they could handle, right? So like they're trying to juggle everything. The company's being successful, but they're trying to make everything work. So she was hardly ever that she was always running all over the place, right? Well, there was some, I was an accountant manager at the time, so I was over accounts receivables and accounts payable. Well, there were some checks that she needed to review. Well, it's been a couple weeks. I hadn't had a chance to grab her because she's just been so all over the place. So I go in her office and I give her the checks, and one's like a couple weeks old, and she starts yelling at me because of it. And I mean like full on, like I felt like she was gonna get up and shake me yelling, right? Like she's just full-blown anger at me because this check was a couple weeks old and I hadn't had a chance to to grab her. And in that moment, one, it was it was hitting me. The anger that was coming at me, the frustration, etc. That was coming at me. Um, and I think it wasn't just like about the check. I think it was just she was stressed about everything. I think all the stress she was feeling got let out on me, right? But I also feel like, and I talk about this in my book, I feel like God allowed her to release that on me to get me to the point of walking away. Because I almost passed out in her office from the stress that she was sending at me. Like it was it was intense. Um and so I left her office and I made up my mind. I was like, well, I'm leaving this job. Like I'm done, like I'm walking away. And so I had enough money in my savings that I could pay my bills and live off my savings for a year if I moved back home. And so I called my mom. Well, I actually sent my mom a text. I said, look, I said, I need to talk to you, nothing's wrong. Because this was on like a Monday or a Tuesday. And at this time, my mom and dad was living in Parent with my brother. My brother lives on one side of the property, we live on the other. But at the time we were all living in my brother's house on his acres. Um, and um, so I could text my mom, I said, Hey, I need to talk to you, but it needs to be in person. I'm like, I can't ask to move back home through text message. I need to explain what's going on and talk to her in person. Um, and so at this time I'm like, let's see, I'm 36. So I think I was 32, somewhere around there at that time. Um, and so I sent her the text, and I'm like, but nothing's wrong. I promise nothing's wrong because she would automatically think something was wrong because it's midweek, and I only ever went out to parent on the weekends because it was a long drive. We're about 40 to 50 minutes from anywhere, anywhere we go. Um, and so I only ever went to parent on weekends. Um, but she was like, okay, and so I I leave work and I start driving out to parent, and the whole time I'm driving, I'm like, this

Quitting, Cutting Ties, And Returning To Church

SPEAKER_03 1:24:38

is it. Like, this is the decision I needed to. I already feel like my life's about to change. I already feel even though I haven't done anything, I just have made that first step. Yeah. And so I leave work and I'm driving out to Parent, and I get there and my mom's there, and she walks out and I just start crying because of everything. I was like, mom, I was like, I just start crying, like, is it okay for me to move back home? I was like, I'm mentally exhausted. I want to find God. I don't know how to find God. I need to quit my job. It's not a good place, it's not a good environment, it's not healthy for me. Um, is it okay for me home? And of course she's like, Yeah, of course, yeah, yeah, you can move back home. So, and then she talks to my dad, and I was like, Yeah, of course, she can move back home. It's fine, no big deal. Um, they would they would let me live here forever, you know? Um, and so um they uh they were like, Yeah, it's fine, you can move back home. And so I was like, okay, and this, yeah, this was on like a Monday. I want to say Monday or Tuesday, because that Wednesday was my first day back in church, that Wednesday, because I was like, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go to church with you this Wednesday. I was like, I just I was like, I feel like I need to try and find God. Um, and I feel like this is my first step. But the only way I can find God is to cut off everyone from the life I had created. Um, and my biggest regret is the older lady I had become good friends with because she was a very good friend. And I wish today I could reconnect with her and build that relationship back. But at the time, I needed to cut out those influences. I couldn't have those influences in my life in order to find God. And so um, and so I did. And uh my brother comes home and my mom tells him I'm gonna go to church with him that Wednesday, and he takes off running around the house because he's so excited. And he goes, Oh, but no pressure, no pressure. I was like, I know, it's okay, it's okay. Um, and so, well, then the next that whatever the when Wednesday comes around, I'm like, okay, this is it. And so I did. I ended up quitting my job that day. I ended up sending an email to the CEO and all the managers and thanking them for everything they had done for me. Uh, appreciate everything I had learned, wish them nothing best with the company. But for me and myself, I couldn't handle the environment anymore, and I needed to to quit. Sent that letter, and then of course, um, they're also witnesses, so then, of course, they start sending me text messages, wanting to make sure I'm not leaving the organization. Yeah, you know, um, and it actually got so bad um because then there was a time I ended up having to change my phone number because it got so bad that I started getting harassed by it. To the point I was out with my family. My family had come up in Louisiana. We were staying at a park just having vacation together, and I got to the point where I hadn't answered any of them because I had already told them I was fine and I refused to answer any more text messages. Someone texted me and said, We're gonna report you missing to the police unless you answer us back. And I was like, Yeah, that's not okay. Like, we're not doing this. And so I was like, You do not have a right to report me missing to the police. I'm not missing. Um, you're just trying to force me to have a conversation with you that I'm not having. Um, and so I said, That text message, and then I changed my phone number that way they could have no contact with me. And um, I just felt like that's well, I needed to do that, right? Yeah, um, and so um so that Wednesday we're we're going to church and it's building up, and I am a nervous rat because I haven't stepped foot in a church in four or five years, right? I haven't witnesses, there's no music, like there's no, you literally at a kingdom hall, it's very scheduled. Like you get there, you stand up, you they I think they sing, yeah, they sing a song, you sing a song as a congregation, or they play a song, something like that, and then you sit back down, you go over the lesson, and then you leave. That's it. Like it's very robotic, very structured. That's all it is. And so, um, so I hadn't been at church in four to five years. So I walk in and I'm nervous wreck coming, like I'm nervous wrecked driving. Like my mom's driving and I'm in the car with her, and I'm like, I shouldn't be doing this. Why am I doing this? What am I doing? Right. And it wasn't so much like I knew I was what I was supposed to do, but I felt like I didn't deserve to go back. Like I didn't feel like I just didn't feel like I deserved to go back, right? Like I felt so tainted and so full of sin that who was I to go back to a who was I to step foot in the church, right? Who was I to step into God's presence? And so uh I'm like, I shouldn't be doing this. Why am I doing this? And then we're walking in, I'm like, mom, what am I doing? She's like, come on, it's gonna be okay. And so I walk in and then I get greeted, and I feel like there's just like a label across my forehead that says sinner, right? I just feel like that label of prodigal and sinner is on my forehead that everyone I see that's all they're seeing, right? And that's in my that was in my own mind because that wasn't the case. They welcomed me, they were super loving, super, you know, but I just felt so exposed. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:01

Do you feel that you felt that way that people were judging you because of what you knew growing up? Or do you feel like it was all your own condemnation um because you had been so far away from God?

SPEAKER_03 1:30:16

My own condemnation, yeah, for sure. Yeah, for sure. Um, because this this church that I go to now, like it's nothing like the church I grew up in as far as the judgment, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, um, we uh I let this is how I explain my church. We're non-denominational, but Pentecostal at the core, because we're non-denational in the sense that we don't have the list of rules. You create your own walk with God, but then our core is one God, Jesus name, baptism, gift of the Holy Spirit, right? Like that's what we preach, that's what we preach.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:48

Acts 238.

SPEAKER_03 1:30:49

Acts 238, yeah. So the Acts 238 is our message, but we're not judgmental to anyone who walks in, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:30:57

Yeah, you you let God work it out for them.

SPEAKER_03 1:30:59

We let God work it out, correct, correct. Um, and so I never felt like they were judging me, I was judging myself, like I had that condemnation within myself. Um, and so but I go, and then of course, people stand up and start worshiping, but I'm like a robot because I haven't been around this for four or five years. I'm not accustomed to this, and I don't know what to do. Like I I didn't I was just so uncomfortable with people outwardly worshiping God, it was uncomfortable for me. Um so I just stand up when they stand up, I sit down and then I leave, right? But even just being in God's presence was just even though I had condemnation, it was also such of like a comfort, yeah. From where I had been, you know. Um but then it got to the point I remember so I would go to church. I probably went to church it was probably about a month or two before I even lifted my hands of coming back to church. It was it was several, it was several, several weeks before, um, before I was comfortable even worshiping. One one, I was uncomfortable with it, but two, I didn't feel like I should raise my hands. I didn't feel like I deserve to worship God, you know, like and I remember I remember sitting in a pew, and I say we we're sitting, I was sitting, and I remember thinking, okay, God, I just want your presence, but I just want to feel your presence, I just want you back. Like, I don't need my anointing, I don't need any calling that you had for me, I don't need any of that, I just need you. That's all I want. If all I ever hear for the rest of my life is you, and I get to feel your presence again, I get to have that relationship with you, I'm okay with that. If nothing else ever happens, if if if everything else goes away, and all I ever have is your presence in me, I'm okay with that.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:54

And I was just gonna ask you if you had found your own altar to uh if you'd found your own altar of repentance besides just going back to church, you know, your own place to talk with God and reconnect, besides the building and the services, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:33:14

Yeah, yeah. So initially for those couple weeks, um, it really was as far as like prayer or connecting, it really was just the building, right? I was because I was going through scripture because I I like I said, when you live a lie for so long, it makes you question what you believe. So I was like, let me dig back into scripture, yeah. And so I dig back into scripture and I'm like, yeah, of course, Jesus is God. Like I start reading all the scriptures, I start, and as I'm seeing the scriptures, I'm like, oh my God, they would totally twist it all of these scriptures around. Like this is this is not right, right? And so uh for probably a month or two, I'm reading my Bible at home and then I'm going to church, right? Well, then it got to a point where I felt like God was telling me, okay, kneel down. Just kneel down where you are. Um, and this is this was at church. This was on a Sunday. Um, and if anybody knows me, I don't do that. Like, I don't I don't go to the altar and kneel down. I don't kneel down, like I'm the person that prays for people, right? Like my my altar is usually at home. Like when I'm at church, I'm ministering to people, I'm not being ministered to, right? Right. So it's out of character for me to kneel down, especially where I'm more, especially when no one else, like, especially when it's not no one else is doing it, which at our church, there is no set time of come to the altar. We do at the after the message, we say come to the altar, but anyone can freely come to the altar at any time and we'll pray. There is no set, like we just let God's will happen. But it was just in the middle of a song, no one's like at the altar, no one's kneeling down, etc. And I just feel God telling me to knock down. I'm like, What? No, like, no, this is not, this is not right. Um, he's like, No, you just need to kneel. So I do it. I finally, and that for it was a lot for me, if if anyone knows me, so I submit. I finally submit to God. And I just feel instant, like as soon as I pray down, I felt like the whole congregation coming to pray for me, and I just feel God coming back into my life, right? And it took it took a place of humility, and it took a place of finally saying, Okay, God, I'm yours. No strength, like I'm letting go of everything, and here I am. I'm fully 100 completely yours. Uh, I I let go of all my anger, I let go of all my bitterness. Like, here, you can have all of me. I'm not scared that you're gonna hurt me. I fully trust you. Like, I just let it all go. And then I just feel God coming back. Um, I start speaking in tongues, and it just I just felt God back in my life, right? So, which is great, okay, fantastic. God's, I've got God, great, fantastic.

Humility, Healing Condemnation, And Writing The Book

SPEAKER_03 1:36:09

But the enemy does not give up, and so okay, cool, I'm back at church, so now he hits me with condemnation super hard, right? Like every time I go into the church building, I'm hit with condemnation. So even though I'm sitting on a church pew, now that I have this condemnation, I'm still lawless in the sense, right? Because I haven't let go of this condemnation. God, Paul said there is no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus. But now I haven't forgiven myself. God's forgiven me, but as of right now, I'm basically saying, okay, cool, yeah, you've forgiven me, but your blood's just not enough for me. My guilt's so bad that your blood can't cover my guilt, is essentially what I'm saying, right? And so um I'm sitting there and I just feel this condemnation. And so then I'm I'm having to pray. And but now at this time, I am praying at home. Uh I have this spot that I go find, and I was praying every single day and just seeking God and finding God. So I'm building my own spiritual uh relationship back with God and getting my nourishments I need. And so the condemnation, I'm sure Satan wanted to use it to destroy me, but it really didn't do much against me. I I felt it, but it just as I'm praying and as I'm growing, I was able to reach a point of forgiveness of myself with God through God. Um, and so now now we're in now. I'm back at church and I'm going to small groups because we have small groups from 10 to 11, and then from 11 to whenever we have main church. And so I'm in this Sunday school class with all of these like people who have been in church for 20-something years, you know. It's a it's a seasoned class of Christians, you know. And I've always the word of God has always flowed through me. And so I've always been able, I've always spoken. I feel like I'm broken, I'm not trying to break, but I've always spoken beyond my years when it comes to the word of God. From the time I was joking. Um, scriptures, the it just I've always had a connection to the word of God. Scriptures always come to me, and I'm always able to elaborate, explain, and impart wisdom through scripture. Well, I'm sitting in this classroom with all these seasons questioned Christians, and I feel like I feel God tugging at me to speak up, and I'm like, no, who think about who is she who has walked away to speak? Who is she to speak up in this classroom? You know, how how dare she? And so I would I would don't, I don't, and I don't. Um, and then I go to I felt the need to reach out to actually the the editor, Sean Regan, who's the editor of my book, it's his wife that I reached out to um at the time. And I just felt the need to ask her to go grab dinner. And so we go grab dinner together, and she's like, and we're just and we it's so funny. So she went to the old church with me, right? And now we're at this new church together. Um and we were we had never really connected at the old church. We just didn't cross paths, we didn't connect. Um, and I remember one time me and Sean, because we would always meet at his house to go over my manuscript, and he would um like he would say, Okay, you need to explain this more, et cetera. Like he would give me notes on how to uh and then come back and we would meet again. He'd be like, explain this, add you need to uh enhance this part, speak more on this, etc. But we would also talk Bible inscription stuff, and she's sitting there and we would talk about my book, and she's sitting there on the couch, and she goes, How about the I just remember every time I saw you at that old church, you were just I just remember thinking she's so angry. She's just so angry. And I said, Yeah, I was like, I was like, that's that's exactly that's what she wanted to do. It's like, yeah, she was. It's like, yeah, I was. Um but so I reached out and go to her, I grabbed, we grabbed dinner, but and when we meet, it's like we had been friends for years, even though we never really even had much of a common, we never even knew each other, but we just connected and we start talking uh just life and just everything and connect and then talk and talking scripture. And at some point she goes, Tabitha, you have to speak up in class. I was like, Yeah, but I don't feel like I should. Like, I don't feel like I don't feel like I have the right to. And she's like, Yeah, but what if someone needs to hear what you have to say and you're not doing it, you're not speaking it, you're not speaking what they need to hear. I was like, okay, and so that so then I was able to do that and through everything, I was able to get through that condemnation. I was able to speak up in class, and then it just became easier and easier. Then the pastor of my church wanted me to become a Sunday school teacher at that time, and I was like, I just felt like it wasn't the time for me to do that. I felt like I needed to sit in this class with these seasons Christians and I needed to get nourished myself. Um, and so I told him no. I was like, no, it's not the right time. And I'm very thankful that as a pastor, he was okay with being told no. Like he didn't hold it, he wasn't like, well, I guess she's never gonna be a Sunday school teacher. Because a year later, I felt like I was ready. I texted him, I was like, hey, I'm ready. But then the next Sunday I was teaching Sunday school, you know? Um so I think it's I think it's great that he I and I also think it's we need to know when the answer is no and when the answer is yes. We need to let God lead that. Because if I would have said yes, I wouldn't have got the nourishment I needed. Yeah. To then be able to be teaching Sunday school now, you know?

SPEAKER_01 1:41:37

I think it's the fear of man when I think about that. You know, it's like we have to we have to look to God instead of look to man or like the need that was driving you for so long was connection, wanting to be a part of something, wanting to feel like you had a place. And at a different time in your life, you probably would have said yes for all the wrong reasons, you know. So that's a lot of wisdom and maturity, I would say, in your walk. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:42:09

And then so, yeah, so now I teach Sunday school, we do latest Bible study, and then I felt the need to write this book. Um, I felt like God was telling me you need to write this book. So within it took me, I would say probably from start to finish, probably three and a half, four years between writing, editing, and publishing. Um, it took probably about two, two and a half years to write it. Because I would go to I would go to work and then I would write after work, or I would write on the weekends, or I would write on my PTO days. Um, and so between working full time and writing, it took sometimes, but I just felt like I was like, okay, so there's a scripture in the Bible says comfort others with the same comfort you yourself once received. And so that has been the driving force of my book. Um because someone out there, whether you've gone through the darkness I've gone through or your head in that direction, they need to hear, and like this is this book, yes, this book is for anyone who should, but my core audience is that person sitting on the church pew struggling. Yeah, that that is who my book is for, right? That's at least that's the core of my audience because it has not backslid yet, correct. Um, or someone who has and is wanting to find their way back, yes, right. Absolutely, but my main intent, or like when I was writing this book, I was thinking of that person sitting on the church who's struggling who could end up going the same down the same path I went down. But maybe my book will let them know there is hope. You're not alone. God is there, you do have hope in Christ, and and for the person that has been a prodigal or that is a prodigal, the being a prodigal doesn't define you. We always are able to come back to God, and he's there waiting for us to come back, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:59

And I just want to add to um so many prodigals are afraid of the judgment coming back, partly because they judge themselves and and how they grew up, you know, we know the judgment. Um but I I really like to say on the podcast that I think it's changed a lot. I mean, probably not all churches hasn't changed, um, but I do think that there is a lot more love that exists now in this, maybe this generation, maybe this culture, or maybe just in certain churches. But I do believe there's a lot more love and welcoming um coming back. I know that my pastor, the pastor, pastor of the church I grew up in, he's now our bishop, and um, we have another pastor, but he was always very quiet and he and I never really knew him growing up, even though he pastored for 40 years. I never really knew him. And um he was just always very quiet, but I would see him sometimes out in public, and he was always kind, and he always would just tell me, Kathy, just come back, just come, you know. And I know what he was saying is it doesn't matter what you look like, it doesn't matter how you're dressed, it doesn't matter, just come, just come to church. And um I think about that now, it was myself that prevented me from being able to do that. I had to get desperate, and and actually I found my way back by being at a different kind of church altogether to let God heal some of those places before I did walk back into a UPC church. But um, but I know there's a lot of prodigals out there who who really do love God and they can't imagine themselves going back to a UPC church. There's a lot of them, and so you know, my message to them is just start the conversation with God, let God direct your steps, you know. And there are like the church you go to, it's the apostolic Jesus Name Church. It's just not a united Pentecostal church. Um, but it's all the same spirit of God, same baptism, the same Bible. And um ultimately we're all brothers and sisters in Christ. And I think what you said is something that I always think about is that we have to seek out our own salvation with fear and trembling. And we have to at all times be able to say within ourselves, Am I ready? If my numbers punch today, am I ready to meet God? You know, and we either are or we're not. And so ultimately, this is about heaven and hell, and um, obviously, living for God is the best life, in my opinion. I will, you know, I I my regret is that I didn't know all of this when I, you know, I just didn't know, and I wish that I had, because I wasted a lot of time, you know, but God has used all of it for good in my life now. Um, but I really appreciate your testimony, and I think there are many, Tabitha, who resonate with you. Like you said, they they their sin might not have been the same. And I'm glad that you didn't fall off the deep end and do all the drugs and alcohol and sex and all those things that so many of us did do. But um, but God still took you down a different road to show you ultimately who he is, and I'm glad that you made your way back. And and I'm really glad that you wrote the book.

SPEAKER_03 1:47:55

Yeah, that's what um I told God because when I was writing the book, I was like, I just wanted to if if God put it on my heart to write it, the but we have faith with works, right? So my work was doing what God told me to do, and my faith is that God will get it to the people who need to hear it. Because it's ultimately in God's hands to do that. Um, and so I just I just pray that the book saves a life, saves a soul, you know? That's and that God uses it for his kingdom. He had me write it for a reason, and so I know um he will use it for his kingdom and for his purpose, and it will help the people that it needs to help. And um, I prayed the same thing about this podcast. Um, I found uh I fasted caffeine all week for it, which is a big deal. I was like, okay, God, I just I just want it to be your will. I want to speak what needs to be spoken, and I want it to just not be about me, but let my testimony reach the heart that needs to hear it. Yeah, um, so um I just feel like God was in it. Um, I felt God threw out it, and I know that it will reach the person that needs to hear it. Um, and that's just my hope for both the book and for this.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:14

Yeah. What what would you say? I always end with two questions. What would you say to the backslider, the prodigal, who's still out there?

SPEAKER_04 1:49:28

I mean, I would say that there's hope.

SPEAKER_03 1:49:33

Like, and don't allow guilt or condemnation to keep you from taking that first step. Um the best life is in Christ. And no matter what you've done, no matter no matter what it is, it doesn't matter. Like Christ's blood covers every sin. There's there's no Such thing as, and I talk about this in my book, there's no such thing as um time served in hell. So any sin, no matter what the sin is, which we we like to categorize sin, but in God's eyes, sin is sin. So no matter what the sin is, God loves you and God will forgive you. So if you feel like you, if you feel God, if you know God's tugging at you to come back, just do it.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:27

Yeah. Yeah, start the conversation, pray, talk to him. And what would you say to the parents uh or a loved one, um, a sibling, a husband, a spouse, um, parents who have a prodigal backslider out there. What would you say to them?

SPEAKER_03 1:50:47

I would say one, don't give up hope. Two, no matter how hurt you are, don't let anger drive your conversation. Yeah. Instead fear or fear. Like, don't let anger and fear drive the conversation. Um, you can't force someone back. No, no matter how much you want to, you can't force them back. So when you see them, don't say, Oh, you know better. Yeah, just just show love and just show kindness. The Bible says that a woman that I think it's in Peter, it talks about a woman winning her husband, husband over by her actions, right? Not by anything she said, but just by her actions. So let your actions be led by love, and those actions would lead you back to God.

SPEAKER_01 1:51:35

Yeah, very good.

Final Advice And How To Support

SPEAKER_01 1:51:37

Well, Tabitha, it's a pleasure to meet you. And um, and I appreciate you being here with me. And for everyone at home, this is what the book looks like. It's called No Longer a Prodigal by Tabitha Lopez. It's full of scripture, uh, a lot more detail than what we covered today. And you can find it on Amazon. And um, eventually I'm gonna have a page on my website, hopefully soon, that has all these prodigal books. We have a lot of prodigals, writing books, and um and it's needful, you know. So um, so if you guys could support her, get the book, um, or give it to somebody that you know would really appreciate her story. And um, and with that, thank you again for being here. And to everyone at home, please like the channel, please share it with your friends and follow us on social media. Um, it would really help push our message out further to more people. And um, we'll see you again soon. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:43

We are so glad you joined us. If you have a story of redemption or have worn the label of a backslider, we would love to hear from you. If you'd like to support our ministry, your donation will be tax deductible. Visit our website at the redeemedbackslider.org. We hope you will tune in for our next episode.