Courage Is a Choice - Ann White, Courage for Life Artwork

Entrusting The Faith

How do we equip our families with a biblical worldview? How do we prepare the next generation for life? How do I grow in my walk with the Lord and in my marriage? If you wrestle with these questions, you are in the right place to find answers. This podcast equips families so that future generations may know Christ. Learn Biblical instruction, grow closer to Christ, and apply the tools learned to build a legacy.

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Entrusting The Faith

Courage Is a Choice - Ann White, Courage for Life

April 14, 2026 • Eric Rutherford • Episode 102

0:00 | 47:44

Key Takeaways

Courage is a daily decision, not a personality trait (00:01:07)
Ann explains that courage isn’t something you achieve once—it’s something you choose every single day in response to what you’re facing.
You won’t change until staying the same hurts more (00:10:20)
Real transformation often begins when the pain of your current reality outweighs the fear of change.
Fear and courage are not opposites—they coexist (00:08:44)
You don’t eliminate fear before acting. Courage is choosing to move forward while fear is still present.
True courage: taking a necessary risk and trusting God with the outcome (00:35:34)
This definition reframes courage from boldness into obedience and trust.

Resources & Links

Courage for Life: https://courageforlife.org/
Book: Courage for Life
American Association of Christian Counselors: https://aacc.net/

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Welcome to the Entrusting the Faith podcast. I'm your host, Eric Rutherford,

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and I'm thrilled today because I have with me and white.

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She is an internationally known author speaker, and she is

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a passionate Bible teacher. She founded her global Ministry of Courage for life and of a calling to share with others how God and His Word brought restoration to her life. She is also the author of courage for life,

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where she

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shares transparency and a message of restoration, hope, healing,

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and how to walk in God given courage in the face of fear.

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And welcome to the show. Thank you so much, Erica. It's great to be here.

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I am thrilled that you accepted the invite. Excited to get into,

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into the book and just this this idea and,

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of fear and how it affects us as believers and how we can

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respond in a biblical manner to it.

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So let's just start off with what what was the motivation?

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You know, what was that that kick off point to writing courage for life? And and how is that by especially timely today? Oh my goodness. It's definitely timely today. And it was timely in my life.

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But it's something that we all need to embrace every day. I've often said courage is a daily choice. It's not something that we get and we say, okay, I'm courageous now I'm going to be this way for the rest of my life.

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No, we face something different every single day that God wants us to embrace our God given courage to face. So for me,

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it kind of dates back, and I think this is the way God always works. He's always working on his. We're a work in progress, right? And so I was saved at 19,

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spent 20 years of my Christian life not being discipled, not really knowing.

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Okay. What's next? How do I

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move forward in my relationship with the Lord? I just didn't understand other than to go to church, carry my Bible on Sunday, come back home, put it back on the shelf and pick it back up the next time I went.

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But it took a moment

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about 20 years into my faith where I just was struggling for hope and encouragement.

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I was in the middle of raising teenagers and, you know, marriage and,

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careers and everything. It was just a lot. And I just

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was almost helpless,

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in many areas of my life.

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And so I just dug in and started

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trying to learn God's Word and was led into a really wonderful Bible study,

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actually sitting under the teaching at Kay Arthur for about ten years.

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During that time, I became a an avid Bible teacher, just just loved teaching God's Word. And so I did that for years, went to seminary.

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And then about 14 years ago, I had another crash in my life. And this one kind of went back. And this is what led to me really discovering the word courage and how what I had thought

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was courage in my life was really not God given courage.

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It was just plowing through, you know, just see what what we kind of think.

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So it's that experience,

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I had

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a really dysfunctional childhood and spent my teenage years as a wild child trying to fill all those holes that were void in my family life. And so a lot of that left a lot of just, you know, scars, insecurities, shame, self-condemnation all of those things that when you don't know what to do with them, you just stuff them and try to hide them.

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And I did that for until I was in my,

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late 40s.

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And God allowed me to get to the end of myself because I was wrecking relationships at home. I was, you know, struggling

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at home with in my marriage and,

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with my kids and trying to fix everybody instead of looking at myself to say, what kind of fix about me?

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Because there's obviously something wrong here. So that's really where it all began. Was that

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God began a journey in my life for me to deal with these broken places so that I can embrace his courage and experience the true, abundant life that he wanted me to live.

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Wow, that is

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man.

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I mean, that

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I'm citing it is. But it's it's like that. That's exciting that you have have gotten to that point.

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And we're able to write a book.

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It's but but hard at the same time because of what it took to get there.

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Is that something that you

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I think that's something as believers, we just

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I think we expect.

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Oh, everything's just supposed to be great from here on out. And we forget

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that. No, it's just it's just going to be hard.

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Life is hard. Life is not easy. And when we go through, you know, traumatic experiences, younger as younger kids, teenagers, you know, we kind of compile those scars up. And those scars don't necessarily go away unless we take the time to heal them.

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And, you know, I really watched both of my parents have their own scars and dysfunction and never deal with them.

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And so you really aren't taught

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what you're supposed to do. And so God uses those opportunities to draw us in, to say,

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hey, I'm here.

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You know, if you'll just turn to me, I'll help you get through this, and I will lead you in the direction that you should go.

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We just have to lean into him, or we have to get so desperate like I did, that you don't have another choice.

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That is true. And it's. You know, you talk about it like,

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you know,

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you know, and I'm a parent, and I get that. And but yeah, it's like generation after generation if things aren't addressed. And so when you become aware, it's like, oh, am I going to draw a line in the sand like, this is this is not just me, but this is like

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we're going to change the course of the generations to come, correct?

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In what in what we're doing. And that's scary.

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Can't be 100%, 100%.

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So God, let me get to that point. And it just so happened that at the same time, I was leaving with our church group

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to take my oldest,

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my excuse me, our oldest son, who was in his early 20s at the time

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on a trip to Israel.

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And I was super excited. I had been to Israel before, but I was especially excited to to take our son there.

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He was on the fence about his faith. And, you know, it's like, oh, you know, this is going to solidify it for him, right? You know, I'm trying to fix him, right? And just like it was everything else in my life.

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So I was excited about that.

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But when I got over there, there was such a weight

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in my heart and kind of just on my shoulders about the dysfunction at home and the the brokenness that I was still dealing with, the insecurities and all of the things,

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that I was truly hiding. I was walking into church and walking in to teach two Sunday school classes on Sunday mornings, pretending that I had it all together when I did it.

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And so get to Israel. And I don't know if it was just the it was obviously the Holy Spirit, but being there in the Holy Land,

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I just broke that first night when we were on the Sea of Galilee, and we're in a hotel overlooking,

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the sea.

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I just hit the floor and we get back to our room after a day of touring.

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And I just hit the floor and I literally I laid out and I said, God,

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I don't know what to do next.

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I can't fix this.

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Don't know if I'm supposed to divorce. I know you hate divorce. I don't know what to do. Can you please just tell me what I'm supposed to do next?

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And I felt the spirit tell me to write the reality of my current situation, and really, the reality of my life and the brokenness that I was dealing with

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on a sheet of hotel letterhead.

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And take it to my pastor and his wife,

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who, by the way, had been our best friends. My husband and I are best friends for like 16 years.

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They had no clue.

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And so that's what I did. And that was truly my first step in courage. And that's really how I start the book out. But then I go back and I tell the whole story,

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the whole story of

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getting back to the point of understanding the brokenness,

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going into counseling to heal the brokenness

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and the joy of coming through that journey and experiencing the true freedom that God has given me as a result of me simply saying yes to God.

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That's powerful.

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It has very

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it's powerful. And so let's just talk a little bit about this idea of fear and courage, because I think

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a lot of times

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we we think of those things and we don't think they can exist at the same time in the same place, like you're either courageous or you're scared and but yet there's no middle ground.

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So how do we

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how do we as believers move forward

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when,

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when, when the fear is there and present and sometimes overwhelming?

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It is. Or it can be overwhelming. It is overwhelming oftentimes.

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And you know what? There is no courage if there is no fear for so they absolutely coexist.

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And so it does take a lot of courage to overcome those fears.

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We have so many that I talk about, and I, as going through counseling and thinking about the fear of failure, the fear of rejection, the fear of judgment, the fear of abandonment, the fear of the unknown, not knowing what's going to happen next, which was my case.

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And that fear didn't go away when I took the letter that I wrote to my pastor and his wife.

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I was honest, you know, I wasn't in a trance, but I was just determined, but I so I was a little bit in, just like, I'm not going to even think about this. I'm going to do what I feel like the Lord is telling me to do, and whatever happens, happens. And so I walk down that hall, I get on that elevator, I go to their room, they open the door.

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Janet does, and I handed the note and I said,

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you know, she's welcoming me in,

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she's so bubbly and so, so sweet.

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But I'm like, nope,

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I just need you to read this, and I need you to pray for me.

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My life is on life support. I mean, I literally, as I explained in the book, I felt like I was drowning and that the only thing above the surface of the water was the tip of my nose.

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And it wasn't going to take much more for me to go completely under.

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Wow. And and yet you

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were able to take a step.

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And move forward.

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And take a step of, of faith in spite of,

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in spite of the fear,

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100%

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courage is truly a choice.

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And you know, so often and this was the case for me and not today, but it was at that point

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we don't change.

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And I know you've heard this before,

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until the pain of staying the same becomes greater than the pain of the change.

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I mean, that's truly our human flesh is like, okay, that's going to be too painful. I'm going to put that off. But then when you're in so much pain that it doesn't matter. Okay, you know what? What could be worse than this?

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Then you're going to change. But I have learned

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not to operate and allow Satan to hold me in that, you know, kind of it is what it is situation. And so it's really a choice.

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And as I went through counseling and began to uncover steps that led to my ultimate healing, and there was it was a godly Christian counselor that I worked with.

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And I had been through counseling before, but it's so important

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to find a truly godly Christian counselor because you want someone who's going to be encouraging you in your walk with the Lord, as well as healing the emotional scars or, you know, and walking through those psychological steps that you need to to walk through

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this person,

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was an amazing Christian counselor, and he really worked with my both my husband and I because I was very fortunate,

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my husband wanted to come alongside and also, you know, come into counseling with me so that we all could be healed.

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And

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I'm very fortunate that because not everybody has that privilege of their spouse or family member going with them,

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and working through that healing process.

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So but either way, I was willing to go, whether it was just me

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or both of us, it didn't matter. I was I knew something had to give. And so as I write in the book, there are specific just very practical steps that we can take really every day

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to exercise courage in our life.

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And that's what began to change for me. And they're biblically based steps. That's why, along with the courage for life book, I have written a study guide that is a deep dive into God's Word

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that helps us understand how the men and women of the Bible

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did this. They did these very same things, and they're very practical, very simple.

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But they were profound in my life. And over the last 12 years that I've been in ministry, our ministry works with,

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people that have experienced trauma, people that are incarcerated in addiction clinics and so forth, because that's where God's been opening the doors. But we work with people all over the world with discipleship

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and help them walk through these practical steps in whatever phase of life that they're in.

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Because they're they're just life changing, and they can work for us each and every day.

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I love that, and I want to I want to get into

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courage, the acronym and the steps and just kind of have you go through those before I do, though?

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You you mentioned you were able to find a, you know, a godly,

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biblically led

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counselor.

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Yes. And that

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that made all the difference for for people listening who

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maybe they they've never thought about going to, you know, to a Christian counselor or they don't know what to look for

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or like, maybe they're in you, maybe they're going to a counselor and they're like, man, this doesn't do much for me. Like, what's what? Like, could you just kind of talk through what that can look like or

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does?

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Does fit matter or do they just need to be a believer? I'd love to to hear your thoughts on that. No, absolutely shit matters because you've got to interview these counselors and make sure that,

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you know, number one, you pray about it and you ask God to send you to someone. So.

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So we interviewed several. We did the research behind and everything and the counselors that I recommend today to people, to friends and loved ones and people, you know, that I meet through church or whatever

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are with the American Association of Christian Counselors.

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Now, that doesn't mean there's not a good godly counselor. That's not a part of that association, but it's a great place to start. If you're just looking in your area, you can go online and go to the American Association of Christian Counselors and look for people you know in your area.

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Unknown
But in addition to that, you know, I looked at the background, I looked at the, you know, reviews or, you know, that sort of thing, like, we do everything else today.

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But I also went and met with them. You can have a consultation with a counselor. And

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majority of the time that first consultation does not cost you, you know, so it's kind of a meeting and and then you go from there and then they're going to want an intake form. If they don't get an intake form from you, they're probably not going to really be able to help you because you've really got to fill out.

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Unknown
It took days for me to fill out this book of intake information, because they want to know where are they starting, you know, where, what is your background without them having to take the time and your,

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expensive dollars

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to get that background information. So I would recommend checking with the American Association of Christian Counselors. Definitely looking for a good fit interview.

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Several. And, you know, pray and let God and the Holy Spirit direct you to the person who is right for you.

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Unknown
Excellent. So we will if you're listening, we're going to we'll get a link for that.

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For the American Association of Christian Counselors. We'll drop it in the show notes as well. So if you want to check that out, if you're if you're looking for a counselor,

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as Anne said, it's a, it's a starting point,

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for, for where you're at.

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Unknown
Now let's, let's just kind of jump into into courage, like, what are the, the steps and and what?

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Unknown
Yeah, the, the acronym and kind of the process. I'd love to hear anything you want to share. Oh, absolutely. So as I was, as I felt God telling me to write a book and that was just number one, I wasn't great at English.

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I had never aspired to be an author,

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but I felt God saying, you know, I really want you to write this book. And I said, okay, Lord,

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if I'm going to write a book, I want to write the book that I needed to read because I was I was reading everything I could get my hands on searching up to that point in Israel, searching for answers, going to women's conferences, whatever I could do.

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Unknown
And so I wanted it to be a practical book, but something that people could,

00:16:29:22 - 00:16:34:28
Unknown
you know, really sink their teeth into and take something from and begin taking those steps.

00:16:35:02 - 00:16:52:13
Unknown
And so I prayed about it, you know, as I'm walking one day, I'm saying to the Lord, I said, okay, I want to offer these practical steps of what I went through to go from allowing fear to direct to my life to true faith based decision making.

00:16:52:17 - 00:17:07:12
Unknown
And it it just kind of began to come to me. And then as I wrote them down and I began to pray over them, they just kind of fit into the word courage because I knew I had someone else ask me. As I was beginning to birth the ministry, they said, okay, what was God's

00:17:07:17 - 00:17:09:21
Unknown
one big message that he's given you?

00:17:09:21 - 00:17:11:04
Unknown
The one big thing, right?

00:17:11:08 - 00:17:12:18
Unknown
Well, I knew it was courage

00:17:12:23 - 00:17:17:01
Unknown
because I'd never had the courage to be transparent and to be real with people.

00:17:17:05 - 00:17:19:20
Unknown
And that's what he gave me. And so as these

00:17:19:25 - 00:17:21:18
Unknown
steps came to form,

00:17:21:23 - 00:17:30:15
Unknown
they just fit beautifully in the word courage. So let's go over those steps. That first step is the C step and that is commit to change.

00:17:30:17 - 00:17:44:23
Unknown
That was truly the first thing I had to do that night in Israel. When I was there, I made a commitment. No matter how bad it hurt, no matter what the repercussions were, I was going. I was making a commitment and things were going to change.

00:17:44:27 - 00:17:48:08
Unknown
And so we have to make a commitment and we have to

00:17:48:12 - 00:17:50:06
Unknown
be serious about it.

00:17:50:08 - 00:17:56:02
Unknown
Not like our, you know, New Year's resolutions. We have to make that commitment and stick to it.

00:17:56:07 - 00:18:03:27
Unknown
Then we need to follow it up with other steps. You can't stop there because nothing changes if you just make the commitment right?

00:18:04:02 - 00:18:12:01
Unknown
So I began to say, okay, what was next? God. Well, I had to identify the obstacles. So the first step in courage is overcome obstacles.

00:18:12:06 - 00:18:22:12
Unknown
And I go through and I explain in the book all the obstacles I faced. But we look at the common obstacles that many of us face as we've worked with broken

00:18:22:12 - 00:18:30:20
Unknown
men and women for the last 12 years. Walk through these same steps and, you know, take this journey of seven steps to courage.

00:18:30:25 - 00:18:36:09
Unknown
We've seen them all sorts of obstacles they're facing could be just your own fears.

00:18:36:09 - 00:19:05:29
Unknown
It could be your own perspective or outlook or just negative thinking. Or it could be another person in your life or circumstances, places that you're exposing yourself to. You have to see what the obstacles are that are going to hinder your change, and you've got to figure out how you're going to overcome them. So we spend a lot of time, especially with the people we work with, on identifying the obstacles and overcoming, helping them understand how to overcome them.

00:19:06:04 - 00:19:11:15
Unknown
And then you go to the next step, and that's the you step, uncover your true self.

00:19:11:20 - 00:19:27:17
Unknown
Gosh, you know, I had to just get real with myself, with God and with people around me that were safe. I'd always say, start with safe people. When you're when you're getting, you know, real and when you're beginning to share what's going on in your life,

00:19:27:24 - 00:19:32:08
Unknown
start slow, but make sure you find safe, trustworthy people that are not going,

00:19:32:11 - 00:19:33:08
Unknown
to pass judgment.

00:19:33:08 - 00:19:34:29
Unknown
Right? Because that's what we're afraid of.

00:19:35:04 - 00:19:38:01
Unknown
So uncover your true self is the time that we spend

00:19:38:06 - 00:19:50:17
Unknown
to see ourselves as God sees us, not as the world sees us, not even as we see ourselves. But let's see what what God's Word has to say about who we are, who's we are,

00:19:50:22 - 00:19:55:13
Unknown
and really what our purpose in life and on this earth is.

00:19:55:13 - 00:20:00:02
Unknown
So we uncover our true self with the you step and then we move into the R step,

00:20:00:07 - 00:20:02:12
Unknown
which is a Bible teacher. This is my favorite

00:20:02:16 - 00:20:05:28
Unknown
and it is replace worldly lies with scriptural truth.

00:20:06:03 - 00:20:13:10
Unknown
So as I was going into counseling, my counselor would say to me, and you're a Bible teacher, you know these things? And I said, yeah, I do.

00:20:13:10 - 00:20:16:15
Unknown
But for some reason they can't get past my head. To my heart,

00:20:16:19 - 00:20:18:07
Unknown
I can tell everyone else,

00:20:18:11 - 00:20:25:14
Unknown
but I for some reason can't receive them because there's a block here of me feeling not worthy to receive them.

00:20:25:19 - 00:20:32:25
Unknown
And so as I fought through that, he had me do an exercise which was just this that replace worldly lives with scriptural truth.

00:20:32:25 - 00:20:37:28
Unknown
And I actually have 20 of my top worldly lies that I had to replace.

00:20:38:03 - 00:20:44:13
Unknown
And I would go through an exercise of saying, for example, I'm not good enough, you know,

00:20:44:16 - 00:20:57:12
Unknown
that was my worldly lie. I'm not good enough. Who am I to be a Bible teacher or to to run a ministry? Because that was the lie that Satan kept telling me, you're not good enough, you're not worthy, you're not valuable.

00:20:57:16 - 00:21:06:28
Unknown
And so I had to replace that lie. And so I would I wrote out on a card and I would say, I reject the lie that I'm not good enough. The truth is,

00:21:07:03 - 00:21:13:16
Unknown
I am valuable and equipped for every good work. And then I would recite the scripture that goes with it,

00:21:13:21 - 00:21:22:10
Unknown
and I would do that for 90 days until every time Satan wants to try to convince me I'm not good enough, I'd say, ooh, I reject that lie.

00:21:22:12 - 00:21:34:00
Unknown
You know? It just becomes ingrained. And so that replaced worldly lies with scriptural truth is a very important part of the healing process. Because until we put truth in,

00:21:34:05 - 00:21:37:00
Unknown
we can't combat the lies of the enemy.

00:21:37:04 - 00:21:48:15
Unknown
And then we go on to the a step and was probably my least favorite step because it was accept the things you cannot change. So I was a Type-A personality. Still am, I haven't changed.

00:21:48:20 - 00:21:49:19
Unknown
I was a fixer.

00:21:49:23 - 00:21:52:21
Unknown
I wanted to fix everything and everyone around me,

00:21:52:26 - 00:21:56:02
Unknown
but I had to accept I can't change other people.

00:21:56:07 - 00:21:59:22
Unknown
I don't need only one person I can change and that's me.

00:21:59:27 - 00:22:12:00
Unknown
So that's who I had to change. I had to accept that I couldn't change my past, but I could change how I allow my past impact. My current life and my future.

00:22:12:04 - 00:22:18:02
Unknown
My perspective of my past could change, so I had to identify the things that I could not change and accept them,

00:22:18:06 - 00:22:20:14
Unknown
and yet see the things that I can change

00:22:20:19 - 00:22:22:06
Unknown
and make a commitment to do so.

00:22:22:11 - 00:22:26:18
Unknown
And then after the a step came the g step. Grasp God's love for you.

00:22:26:22 - 00:22:37:14
Unknown
You know a lot of that shame, a lot of that, you know, that stinking thinking keeps us from truly embracing God's just, unconditional, unfathomable,

00:22:37:19 - 00:22:39:02
Unknown
wonderful love for us.

00:22:39:07 - 00:22:46:29
Unknown
I had to accept that nothing, nothing, nothing that I've ever done or could ever do will separate me from the love of God,

00:22:47:04 - 00:22:48:18
Unknown
and it begins to just

00:22:48:23 - 00:22:49:11
Unknown
heal

00:22:49:16 - 00:22:52:19
Unknown
in a beautiful way, the inside of you, and see God

00:22:52:24 - 00:22:56:09
Unknown
as He is just the just the beauty of love.

00:22:56:14 - 00:23:03:19
Unknown
And then came the E step. That was the final step. And this is what we work through with everybody that you know, that goes through any of our classes or

00:23:03:24 - 00:23:05:04
Unknown
utilizes any of our,

00:23:05:07 - 00:23:08:03
Unknown
discipleship and emotional health resources

00:23:08:08 - 00:23:10:12
Unknown
that each step is embrace a life of grace.

00:23:10:17 - 00:23:17:02
Unknown
And so I had to give myself grace. I had to embrace God's grace truly and wholeheartedly.

00:23:17:07 - 00:23:24:18
Unknown
And then I had to embrace grace for the people around me that had wounded me, that hurt me, had left scars in my life.

00:23:24:23 - 00:23:31:13
Unknown
And that was the hardest part. And I think it is for many people. You know, sometimes the hardest part is forgiving ourselves. And I had to do that.

00:23:31:18 - 00:23:37:03
Unknown
But then, you know, you take that next step of having to forgive people who have been ugly or wounded you.

00:23:37:04 - 00:23:39:13
Unknown
Or maybe they're still, you know, kind of

00:23:39:17 - 00:23:41:29
Unknown
a difficult person in your life

00:23:42:03 - 00:23:43:28
Unknown
and you can set healthy boundaries.

00:23:44:02 - 00:23:47:29
Unknown
But in the same token, you have to give them grace.

00:23:48:06 - 00:23:53:00
Unknown
It doesn't mean you expose yourself to being, you know, just mistreated.

00:23:53:05 - 00:23:53:21
Unknown
But

00:23:53:26 - 00:23:59:12
Unknown
you can let go of the the bitterness and the unforgiveness of that person.

00:23:59:16 - 00:24:05:01
Unknown
And I talk about that in the book, you know, in relationship primarily with my father

00:24:05:05 - 00:24:09:18
Unknown
and dealing with the unforgiveness and the anger that had just built up through the years.

00:24:09:18 - 00:24:11:08
Unknown
And I had stuffed and although

00:24:11:13 - 00:24:16:16
Unknown
in his early 60s, before he passed, and by the time I wrote this book,

00:24:16:16 - 00:24:17:13
Unknown
he had already passed.

00:24:17:18 - 00:24:18:03
Unknown
And

00:24:18:08 - 00:24:20:06
Unknown
I talk about how

00:24:20:10 - 00:24:24:24
Unknown
we had a better relationship. He was saved at 61, and

00:24:24:29 - 00:24:29:19
Unknown
a lot of things changed. Everything changed. But he didn't completely heal or change.

00:24:29:22 - 00:24:34:21
Unknown
But you could tell he was different and his heart was different and his motives were different.

00:24:34:24 - 00:24:42:00
Unknown
And I loved that. And so I have that to hang on to. But then, as I'm embracing a life of grace for my dad,

00:24:42:03 - 00:24:44:20
Unknown
I began to talk to one of my,

00:24:44:24 - 00:24:49:29
Unknown
first cousins who my dad was the baby of nine, and he grew up in inner city Charlotte

00:24:50:04 - 00:25:01:25
Unknown
and things that I did not know about him that I learned through a family member or a close family member that I never knew was how severely physically abused my father was when he was a child.

00:25:02:00 - 00:25:03:19
Unknown
And so some of the things that he

00:25:03:24 - 00:25:10:17
Unknown
went through, he never healed from. And now, while that doesn't give him permission to hurt others,

00:25:10:22 - 00:25:12:23
Unknown
it helps to explain

00:25:12:26 - 00:25:22:16
Unknown
why. Because hurt people hurt people, they just do. And so until we deal with the scars, like you mentioned earlier and stop the cycle,

00:25:22:21 - 00:25:26:17
Unknown
we're going to continue to hurt others if we've had those scars in our lives.

00:25:26:22 - 00:25:27:23
Unknown
So those are the steps.

00:25:27:27 - 00:25:34:14
Unknown
I love that, and I love the process and the journey through that is there.

00:25:34:18 - 00:25:37:09
Unknown
Is there one step that is,

00:25:37:14 - 00:25:38:14
Unknown
I don't say most.

00:25:38:18 - 00:25:44:16
Unknown
I'll say most important, but like key to all of it? Or are they all pretty

00:25:44:20 - 00:25:46:25
Unknown
sort of on the same level of necessity?

00:25:47:00 - 00:25:50:01
Unknown
You know, I think they're all on the level of necessity.

00:25:50:01 - 00:25:54:11
Unknown
I think that each step that we just talked about is kind of that closing the loop.

00:25:54:13 - 00:26:01:11
Unknown
You start out with a commitment, you know, but if you don't follow it up with overcoming the obstacles in your way, you're not going to move,

00:26:01:11 - 00:26:05:23
Unknown
if you don't really embrace who you truly are and uncover your true self,

00:26:06:00 - 00:26:11:05
Unknown
you're going to continue to be stuck, you know, in this negative cycle,

00:26:11:05 - 00:26:22:04
Unknown
if we don't deposit God's truth in our life on a regular basis and let it penetrate our minds and our hearts so that we can denounce the lies that Satan wants to tell us.

00:26:22:06 - 00:26:24:15
Unknown
So they really all work hand in hand.

00:26:24:20 - 00:26:25:02
Unknown
And so,

00:26:25:02 - 00:26:31:29
Unknown
my what I tell everyone is this is just I mean, you can use this in any instance whether you are overcoming,

00:26:31:29 - 00:26:33:13
Unknown
addiction, abuse,

00:26:33:16 - 00:26:35:28
Unknown
or whether you just need to make a change,

00:26:36:01 - 00:26:51:27
Unknown
you know, in your job, you know, you can make that commitment, you can look at any obstacles you can uncover who you truly are and what a new position or a new location might mean to a to you and to allowing you to be more,

00:26:51:27 - 00:26:54:04
Unknown
yourself, if that makes any sense.

00:26:54:08 - 00:27:00:24
Unknown
You can accept some of the things you can't change. You may not be able to move, you may not be able to, you know, but there are things you can.

00:27:00:28 - 00:27:03:00
Unknown
So they really are all there.

00:27:03:03 - 00:27:09:20
Unknown
And you're going to need God's love and you're going to need to embrace grace along the way. So they really go hand in hand.

00:27:09:20 - 00:27:23:18
Unknown
And they're so simple. And because they go with the word courage, they're easy to remember and to recite and say, oh, you know what? I'm struggling with this. I need to replace that worldly lie, or I need to replace that lie I'm believing about, you know, well, I couldn't

00:27:23:23 - 00:27:26:19
Unknown
find a new relationship. You know, maybe you're going through,

00:27:26:22 - 00:27:33:15
Unknown
a listener is going through the the loss of a loved one, whether it's by death or by

00:27:33:20 - 00:27:38:00
Unknown
the loss of the relationship, you know, divorce or separation or something.

00:27:38:05 - 00:27:39:11
Unknown
You can still,

00:27:39:15 - 00:27:48:29
Unknown
you know, go through and say, Will I ever be able to love again? Or will I ever be able to heal from this brokenness? The answer is absolutely.

00:27:49:04 - 00:27:53:13
Unknown
You know, God is in the healing business. He's still in the miracle business.

00:27:53:18 - 00:27:58:07
Unknown
And if we just put our yes on the table, which is what I chose to do 14 years ago,

00:27:58:12 - 00:28:03:00
Unknown
our lives can be transformed and changed, and it's amazing what can happen.

00:28:03:05 - 00:28:14:17
Unknown
And he's proven that through. Just like me writing the book, it began as Seven Steps to Courage. And so as I'm writing the book back early on and I was taking from journal notes and so forth and,

00:28:14:20 - 00:28:22:25
Unknown
pulling all of this together, that's now courage for life. We've been working with those seven steps to courage and helping people heal from

00:28:23:00 - 00:28:29:26
Unknown
grand trauma and brokenness and even, you know, just just minor trauma that still,

00:28:29:26 - 00:28:33:09
Unknown
it wreaks havoc in our life if we don't deal with it.

00:28:33:14 - 00:28:36:19
Unknown
It does. And I want to I'm going to

00:28:36:24 - 00:28:38:22
Unknown
ask about sort of the

00:28:38:27 - 00:28:44:20
Unknown
minor trauma, just that everyday courage versus like, major courage.

00:28:44:22 - 00:28:47:10
Unknown
I want to ask that in a second, but but I wanted to

00:28:47:14 - 00:28:48:26
Unknown
first ask about

00:28:49:00 - 00:28:56:11
Unknown
safe people because you in in describing courage and going through the steps, you talked about this idea of

00:28:56:16 - 00:29:00:02
Unknown
opening up to people who were safe.

00:29:00:04 - 00:29:01:17
Unknown
Yes. And so

00:29:01:21 - 00:29:04:19
Unknown
I know that's always been a struggle for me.

00:29:04:19 - 00:29:11:18
Unknown
By God's grace, I found some safe people, you know, the last few years and that that's been, you know, life changing. Yes.

00:29:11:18 - 00:29:11:29
Unknown
But

00:29:12:04 - 00:29:13:05
Unknown
how do we

00:29:13:09 - 00:29:15:16
Unknown
how do we find safe people? Sort of.

00:29:15:21 - 00:29:18:21
Unknown
What do they look like and what

00:29:18:26 - 00:29:20:25
Unknown
are all people safe for?

00:29:20:25 - 00:29:26:13
Unknown
Everything. I know that's like three totally different questions, but but, like,

00:29:26:18 - 00:29:30:03
Unknown
I'd love to hear your thoughts on those. Certainly.

00:29:30:08 - 00:29:33:17
Unknown
So I got an assignment from my counselor at one point.

00:29:33:17 - 00:29:34:14
Unknown
In my journey,

00:29:34:19 - 00:29:38:03
Unknown
my pastor and his wife were the only two people that I had revealed

00:29:38:07 - 00:29:39:09
Unknown
the scars to.

00:29:39:09 - 00:29:41:10
Unknown
I knew they were safe. I knew they loved us.

00:29:41:10 - 00:29:43:05
Unknown
We'd been friends for 16 years,

00:29:43:05 - 00:29:43:14
Unknown
but

00:29:43:19 - 00:29:49:05
Unknown
I didn't know how they'd responded. I hated, you know, to to to do what I did. But

00:29:49:10 - 00:29:51:11
Unknown
I don't hate it. Now, at the time, I did.

00:29:51:16 - 00:29:54:27
Unknown
So your first question, how do we find those people?

00:29:55:01 - 00:29:57:04
Unknown
My assignment from my counselor was,

00:29:57:09 - 00:30:01:04
Unknown
I need you to find ten safe people in your life.

00:30:01:05 - 00:30:01:14
Unknown
I'm like,

00:30:01:19 - 00:30:22:24
Unknown
no, I mean, I have great friends, but I don't have anybody that I want to just fill my junk to. How do I find ten? Right? Like, it was overwhelming to me. And so it's like, okay, let's just start with two. So that's what I recommend. Start there. Start with two. How do you identify them? Well number one I prayed about it.

00:30:22:27 - 00:30:42:07
Unknown
You know I, I had very dear friends but dear friends that did not know the broken side of. And they knew the strong side of. And because as a leader, I'm out there helping and encouraging other people. As a, as a teacher, you know, I'm ministering to people at church. I'm not telling people about what's going on in my life.

00:30:42:10 - 00:30:48:20
Unknown
Well, I do now. I and then they can relate to it and it's a beautiful thing. But I wasn't at the time. So,

00:30:48:20 - 00:31:06:12
Unknown
first, first of all, I prayed about it. So God, just give me wisdom on who I can share with. And so he just brought two people to mind to my mind. And I said, okay, so I just invited them to go to lunch, you know, not together separately at different times.

00:31:06:17 - 00:31:12:08
Unknown
And I revealed very little at first. You know, I just shared a little cat. You kind of test the waters

00:31:12:12 - 00:31:17:22
Unknown
and you don't want to overwhelm them. You know, different people can handle different levels of stuff.

00:31:17:22 - 00:31:21:10
Unknown
And sometimes and I felt like my stuff was pretty deep and pretty yucky.

00:31:21:10 - 00:31:27:18
Unknown
But then you also offer a safe space for them to share with you, and you begin to see

00:31:27:22 - 00:31:29:05
Unknown
if it's going to work or not.

00:31:29:05 - 00:31:48:21
Unknown
And with the first two people that I shared with, it was amazing because honestly, they were needing safe people in their life. I had no clue. And so we became what I call safe sisters. And this is the same thing we find in the prison system. God began opening the door up in the prison systems. And I'll get back to your other question here in just a moment.

00:31:48:21 - 00:31:49:28
Unknown
I promise I'm going to get there.

00:31:50:02 - 00:31:54:03
Unknown
He began, open the door in the prison systems, and one of the things that shocked me the most

00:31:54:08 - 00:32:00:12
Unknown
when I first went in and began teaching, and now we have more volunteers and chaplains teaching our resources.

00:32:00:14 - 00:32:04:04
Unknown
And I don't get to go in nearly as often as I did back in the early years,

00:32:04:09 - 00:32:10:24
Unknown
but I was shocked at the fact that the inmates were not sharing with one another.

00:32:10:24 - 00:32:28:15
Unknown
I'm thinking, you guys are all, you're in here for a reason, right? And so I would think the first thing would be like, well, why, why are you here? If I'm if I'm in there, why are you here? And you begin to share, know they've grown up with trauma and they've grown up not being able to trust anyone.

00:32:28:18 - 00:32:33:13
Unknown
They go in with such a lack of trust that they don't share anything. And so

00:32:33:18 - 00:32:48:11
Unknown
our classes that we have, as we began to have them take inventory of their blessings, their detours, their roadblocks, you know, and all of the things in their life that that are gifts and talents. We look at the good and the struggles.

00:32:48:15 - 00:32:53:07
Unknown
It's amazing as they begin to get safe in this small group of about 15 to 20

00:32:53:12 - 00:32:54:00
Unknown
people,

00:32:54:05 - 00:32:59:13
Unknown
they begin sharing for the first time in their lives with one another.

00:32:59:15 - 00:33:05:11
Unknown
And it's something very powerful happens right there. So it is a powerful moment.

00:33:05:11 - 00:33:09:21
Unknown
If we're in our own prison cell of emotional dysfunction,

00:33:09:21 - 00:33:16:17
Unknown
we have to find those safe people. And so you you begin by prayer asking God,

00:33:16:22 - 00:33:17:28
Unknown
God, bring to mind

00:33:18:03 - 00:33:21:11
Unknown
1 or 2 people that I can begin to share.

00:33:21:15 - 00:33:23:24
Unknown
That helps you get started.

00:33:23:27 - 00:33:32:17
Unknown
But don't stop there, you know, find people that you can rely on, that you can begin to share with, and that you can be a safe person for and

00:33:32:22 - 00:33:42:13
Unknown
and make it a priority in your life. God did not intend for us to walk alone. If he had, he left Adam in the garden with just him, and they'd they'd have been just fine.

00:33:42:18 - 00:33:48:22
Unknown
But God said, it's not good for us to be alone. And that's not just with spouses. We need community.

00:33:48:22 - 00:34:01:25
Unknown
He has all the one another's and the in the New Testament. And I love those passages. We're to pray for one another that we might be healed. And, James, we're to lift one another up, encourage one another. The two are stronger than one, you know.

00:34:02:00 - 00:34:12:18
Unknown
So when one falls down, there's somebody there to lift him up. And so God wants us to work together and be together. We have to get out of the isolation that Satan wants us to get stuck in.

00:34:12:23 - 00:34:13:23
Unknown
so what

00:34:13:27 - 00:34:14:21
Unknown
what does

00:34:14:26 - 00:34:23:11
Unknown
this everyday courage look like? And we'll just say ordinary faithfulness. Because it's one thing when we're, you know, as you described, dealing with

00:34:23:16 - 00:34:30:15
Unknown
what could be pretty extreme trauma when you're dealing with a lot of stuff that's layer upon layer for year on year.

00:34:30:19 - 00:34:31:27
Unknown
But what about just like,

00:34:32:02 - 00:34:39:10
Unknown
I don't know, the everyday courage, whether it's at home, at work, relationships, what what's that look like?

00:34:39:13 - 00:34:43:09
Unknown
You know, it can be just the courage to share your faith in the right

00:34:43:14 - 00:34:47:06
Unknown
or the courage to not say anything of courage to keep your mouth shut.

00:34:47:11 - 00:34:50:06
Unknown
Sometimes that takes a lot of courage for me because I'm a talker.

00:34:50:11 - 00:35:10:15
Unknown
So anyway, there's there's just all sorts of things that we need to do. So back to those steps. In a way, it's that commit to change. It's like, okay, Lord, what do I need to change today? You know, it could be that something small that I need to listen instead of speaking. He may bring that to my mind.

00:35:10:15 - 00:35:20:18
Unknown
Okay. God. What in what circumstances is it here at home? Is it at work? Is it with someone I'm going to run across today? Do I need to be a good listener? You know what?

00:35:20:22 - 00:35:28:03
Unknown
What step in courage do I need to take today? So here's how I define courage. Now I used to define courage is I could ride roller coasters.

00:35:28:03 - 00:35:32:05
Unknown
I could, you know, take on anything in the world I could just plow through right

00:35:32:10 - 00:35:34:00
Unknown
now to me, today,

00:35:34:05 - 00:35:37:11
Unknown
true courage is taking a necessary risk

00:35:37:15 - 00:35:39:16
Unknown
and trusting God with the outcome.

00:35:39:21 - 00:35:46:14
Unknown
So whatever that risk is, you know, is that a risk of being rejected? Is it a risk of,

00:35:46:14 - 00:35:47:06
Unknown
losing,

00:35:47:06 - 00:35:50:17
Unknown
a friendship or something? You know, God's ask you to,

00:35:50:22 - 00:35:52:27
Unknown
you know, speak up, speak out, you know,

00:35:53:01 - 00:35:54:06
Unknown
with truth in love.

00:35:54:10 - 00:35:58:17
Unknown
All right. What are your risking? Okay. God's asked me to do this. I'm going to do it.

00:35:58:17 - 00:36:06:22
Unknown
I have to trust him with the outcome. And that, to me, is true courage. So it can be something small that every day layer, you know,

00:36:06:26 - 00:36:10:09
Unknown
everybody's not going through severe trauma, thank God.

00:36:10:14 - 00:36:15:05
Unknown
And those who have been prayerfully are being healed, many of them.

00:36:15:12 - 00:36:17:07
Unknown
And so they're not going to have

00:36:17:12 - 00:36:20:04
Unknown
the daily wounds to deal with

00:36:20:09 - 00:36:26:07
Unknown
like they have in the past. And so it becomes easier. It's like anything else,

00:36:26:12 - 00:36:33:05
Unknown
like riding a bike. The first time you get on it, you're wobbling, you know, and you're falling over and you're getting set knees and everything else.

00:36:33:10 - 00:36:38:19
Unknown
The first time you take that step that God's calling you to take and you say, okay, I'm committing

00:36:38:24 - 00:36:42:28
Unknown
and I'm going to look at the obstacle and I'm going to find a way to overcome it,

00:36:43:03 - 00:36:43:12
Unknown
okay?

00:36:43:12 - 00:36:46:25
Unknown
And I'm going to take practical action to do so,

00:36:47:00 - 00:37:07:04
Unknown
just like Nehemiah did on the wall. He took he prayed, he sought guidance, he sought information, and then he took action. We've got to take action. And it's those little steps. They get easier and easier. Just like the bike ride. It's not as frightening. It's not as scary. It's like, oh, okay, I can do this.

00:37:07:04 - 00:37:13:07
Unknown
That first time you share your testimony or you share faith, or you ask someone about their faith

00:37:13:12 - 00:37:15:29
Unknown
and their nonbeliever or whatever, and you have that

00:37:16:04 - 00:37:22:03
Unknown
loving conversation of truth and love in a caring way, and you ask God to lead you through that.

00:37:22:03 - 00:37:24:05
Unknown
It's amazing how it's easier the second time.

00:37:24:09 - 00:37:30:18
Unknown
It is. It's all about the reps, right? It's it's the more you do it, the easier it becomes.

00:37:30:22 - 00:37:34:02
Unknown
I love that that definition. True courage

00:37:34:07 - 00:37:41:19
Unknown
is taking a necessary risk and trusting God with the outcome. Yes. Because that's,

00:37:41:19 - 00:37:47:20
Unknown
I mean, that's very applicable that I mean, that's baby step, big step. It like, it just fits.

00:37:47:20 - 00:37:51:26
Unknown
And I think it it gives a better perspective on on what,

00:37:51:29 - 00:37:54:14
Unknown
on what we can do and how to do it.

00:37:54:18 - 00:37:58:08
Unknown
Let me just ask we here, we're going to wrap up in a minute, but I want to ask

00:37:58:13 - 00:38:04:05
Unknown
in terms of stories of transformation, of people who've walked through,

00:38:04:08 - 00:38:05:21
Unknown
seven steps of courage,

00:38:05:25 - 00:38:06:29
Unknown
would you be

00:38:07:03 - 00:38:13:00
Unknown
open like it would love to hear 1 or 2 stories that really stand out

00:38:13:05 - 00:38:17:00
Unknown
and, and, you know, for for people listening who think I had

00:38:17:05 - 00:38:19:09
Unknown
and it sounds good, but but like,

00:38:19:14 - 00:38:23:19
Unknown
you know, we'd love to hear 1 or 2 stories that if you're open to sharing.

00:38:23:21 - 00:38:26:16
Unknown
Oh, absolutely. So we have a lot of stories that,

00:38:26:16 - 00:38:27:26
Unknown
we receive letters

00:38:27:29 - 00:38:31:13
Unknown
weekly. Multiple letters weekly from inmates.

00:38:31:13 - 00:38:49:06
Unknown
We're in the prison system in 39 states with our audio Bible, our print resources, our books, and in many of those states in our in-person classes, they're actually led by chaplains or led by volunteers, and sometimes even by inmates who have gone through the course before.

00:38:49:11 - 00:38:51:10
Unknown
But one in particular, I remember meeting a,

00:38:51:13 - 00:38:56:02
Unknown
with a gal here at a jail not too far from from where we've been living.

00:38:56:07 - 00:38:56:26
Unknown
And

00:38:57:00 - 00:39:00:21
Unknown
she went through the class and she said, you know,

00:39:00:26 - 00:39:03:25
Unknown
she said, I used to think. She said, I used to have courage,

00:39:03:25 - 00:39:11:02
Unknown
to prostitute myself, to take drugs. And I thought that was very courageous because I was taking a risk when a necessary risk.

00:39:11:02 - 00:39:14:23
Unknown
But she was taking risks. And she said, now

00:39:14:28 - 00:39:18:24
Unknown
it's all about having the courage to say no,

00:39:18:29 - 00:39:27:13
Unknown
the courage to stop these things because no is a full sentence. But it's a very hard sentence to say sometimes. And so

00:39:27:18 - 00:39:32:28
Unknown
she talked about that. But then she also shared that when she first was,

00:39:32:28 - 00:39:37:07
Unknown
arrested and put in jail, she felt she was being punished.

00:39:37:10 - 00:39:52:20
Unknown
You know, God hates me. God's punishing me. I deserve this, which we all can. Could relate that that's I'm sure, how I would feel, you know, if if I didn't know the Lord have a good relationship with the Lord and was beating myself up. So

00:39:52:25 - 00:39:55:26
Unknown
in turn, she said, though now I realize

00:39:56:01 - 00:39:57:27
Unknown
God was rescuing me

00:39:58:02 - 00:39:59:11
Unknown
when he arrested me,

00:39:59:16 - 00:40:05:26
Unknown
he gave me the privilege and opportunity to come here where I could be taken out of the environment that I was in,

00:40:06:01 - 00:40:10:15
Unknown
and I put with like minded, broken hearted women

00:40:10:20 - 00:40:17:02
Unknown
that are walking their own courage journey who are willing to lift me up when I'm struggling on a particular day,

00:40:17:07 - 00:40:17:29
Unknown
and who are willing

00:40:17:29 - 00:40:23:05
Unknown
to listen to my hurtful stories where I can get it out and get it behind me,

00:40:23:09 - 00:40:36:08
Unknown
and I can listen to them and relate to the pain and scars that they too have suffered. So that has been just just a beautiful story. But then there's also one other story of someone not in prison that was,

00:40:36:08 - 00:40:45:17
Unknown
and a part of our ministry and has has gone through the courage steps and has actually taught them and is still teaching them to this day to other other women.

00:40:45:22 - 00:40:48:09
Unknown
And she after 30 years of marriage,

00:40:48:15 - 00:40:53:06
Unknown
her husband came to her and divorced her, left and and married a man.

00:40:53:11 - 00:40:59:26
Unknown
And it devastated her. I mean, as you can imagine, number one, divorce is devastating.

00:40:59:26 - 00:41:03:24
Unknown
But then to be devastated in that way and to feel like,

00:41:03:29 - 00:41:09:22
Unknown
ashamed, you know, and embarrassed and you know that. What what did I do wrong?

00:41:09:22 - 00:41:15:18
Unknown
What how did I how did this happen? You know, all of those feelings. And she,

00:41:15:18 - 00:41:26:29
Unknown
has been helped so much by committing to changing that narrative in her head. This is not about her. This is not about her brokenness. It's about another person's brokenness

00:41:27:04 - 00:41:27:20
Unknown
and

00:41:27:25 - 00:41:33:04
Unknown
letting go, embracing that grace for that person instead of the bitterness,

00:41:33:04 - 00:41:34:25
Unknown
the judgment, the hatred.

00:41:35:00 - 00:41:36:03
Unknown
All of those things

00:41:36:08 - 00:41:39:07
Unknown
have been transformational. So much so

00:41:39:12 - 00:41:42:13
Unknown
that she teaches them full time

00:41:42:18 - 00:41:42:28
Unknown
in,

00:41:43:03 - 00:41:44:16
Unknown
in so many places.

00:41:44:19 - 00:41:49:09
Unknown
In, in the area in which she lives, whether it's a church, she's also in another,

00:41:49:09 - 00:41:54:10
Unknown
facility, you know, where there are broken people that she's working with. And

00:41:54:14 - 00:42:01:17
Unknown
God is is just opening the doors. I mean, we need these are practical resources that we offer.

00:42:01:17 - 00:42:04:08
Unknown
They're biblically grounded resources. As a matter of fact,

00:42:04:13 - 00:42:16:20
Unknown
when God told me to birth a ministry, I was going through the counseling and I said, this is not the time, Lord, I know you're not talking to me yet. So I just kind of followed him a little bit until my counselor said, if he's telling you to do it, just do it.

00:42:16:25 - 00:42:35:10
Unknown
Over these last 12 years in ministry at courage for life, God has allowed us to not only produce the book that has become courage for life and the courage for life Study Guide, which is a deep dive into God's Word. And I think I probably said that before where we look at men and women of the Bible and study them in depth

00:42:35:15 - 00:42:43:01
Unknown
as they walked through those same steps, as they committed to change and overcame obstacles and embraced God's Word and so forth.

00:42:43:06 - 00:42:44:05
Unknown
And then

00:42:44:10 - 00:42:51:08
Unknown
we all, God has given us the privilege and opportunity to produce two audio Bibles. As we were working with at risk women,

00:42:51:13 - 00:42:57:14
Unknown
God brought to my heart that they needed an audio Bible to listen to because we were in at that time,

00:42:57:19 - 00:43:02:20
Unknown
homeless shelters, crisis pregnancy centers, and trying to minister to people there. That was the beginning of our ministry.

00:43:02:20 - 00:43:06:24
Unknown
And I was like, okay, these women, number one, they don't read on a great reading level.

00:43:06:24 - 00:43:18:05
Unknown
Number two, they don't have time, and most of them have kids. And so life is hectic. How can we get them an audio Bible without a man's voice? Because that was a trigger for these women.

00:43:18:10 - 00:43:21:23
Unknown
And so I began praying about it and looking and searching and searching.

00:43:21:23 - 00:43:23:14
Unknown
And I couldn't believe there was not

00:43:23:18 - 00:43:31:10
Unknown
a fully female voice starting a Bible. From Genesis to Revelation. I can find a New Testament, you know, that was real dramatized. And I'm like, that's not it.

00:43:31:14 - 00:43:38:15
Unknown
And so I said, okay, Lord. And I prayed and he said, I want you to produce it. And so we did. We got with a company,

00:43:38:15 - 00:43:40:26
Unknown
a production company in Burbank, California,

00:43:41:01 - 00:43:48:16
Unknown
produced the most beautiful rendition with 15 voiceover artists from different walks of life, different

00:43:48:16 - 00:43:49:15
Unknown
ethnic backgrounds.

00:43:49:20 - 00:43:54:19
Unknown
And it has been we have hundreds of thousands of people listening to,

00:43:54:19 - 00:44:00:02
Unknown
this fully female voice audio Bible, and we produced in Spanish as well a couple of years ago.

00:44:00:07 - 00:44:01:10
Unknown
On top of that,

00:44:01:10 - 00:44:06:00
Unknown
I started working with ten Dale and they came to me to have us,

00:44:06:05 - 00:44:11:05
Unknown
and to have me head up the project of writing a courage for life study Bible for women.

00:44:11:10 - 00:44:12:29
Unknown
And they loved it so much.

00:44:13:03 - 00:44:23:23
Unknown
They also published our courage for Life Study Bible for men. And now we're preparing to publish in the next few years of courage for life Study Bible for teens.

00:44:23:28 - 00:44:27:15
Unknown
It is a true discipleship Bible. It's not a commentary Bible.

00:44:27:20 - 00:44:36:15
Unknown
It is a Bible that you can go to. And there is a practical life lesson on every single scripture page, which is 1466 lessons.

00:44:36:18 - 00:44:45:08
Unknown
Throughout God's Word there's courageous women of faith stories, 88 of them in the Women's Bible, 88 in the men's Bible,

00:44:45:11 - 00:44:53:28
Unknown
of men and women of the Bible, men and women of history, men and women today who have walked the courageous faith journey and overcome

00:44:54:03 - 00:44:54:12
Unknown
just

00:44:54:17 - 00:44:55:10
Unknown
amazing

00:44:55:14 - 00:45:06:17
Unknown
issues and circumstances by their faith. And so they encourage us to embrace that faith walk, and that it also contains those seven steps to courage in those life principles.

00:45:06:25 - 00:45:08:24
Unknown
We look at how we can

00:45:08:29 - 00:45:20:27
Unknown
overcome the obstacles, commit to change, accept the things we cannot change, and so forth and so on throughout God's Word, because it all is reinforcing our ability to make courageous choices

00:45:21:02 - 00:45:23:19
Unknown
that transform our life from the inside out.

00:45:23:23 - 00:45:25:28
Unknown
That is that is wonderful. And,

00:45:25:28 - 00:45:27:28
Unknown
not only what you've been able to do,

00:45:27:28 - 00:45:31:13
Unknown
the impact the Lord has made, the resources you've been able to create.

00:45:31:17 - 00:45:55:28
Unknown
And for everybody listening, if they would like to know more about your ministry, more about your materials, where would you like him to go? Well, I'd love for them to come to our app. You can download our app it's courage for Life Bible on an Apple or Android device. And there you'll find the Audio Bible. You'll find access to the print resources, access through our YouTube channel, all of our teachings.

00:45:56:03 - 00:46:00:24
Unknown
And then you can also come to our website, which is courage for life.org

00:46:00:29 - 00:46:01:22
Unknown
org.

00:46:01:27 - 00:46:07:06
Unknown
And we're on we're on YouTube. We're on Facebook, we're on Instagram. At God we have courage.

00:46:07:06 - 00:46:19:15
Unknown
So but the easiest way to connect with all of those links is to either go to our website, courage for life.org or download the app courage for Life Bible and start listening today.

00:46:19:15 - 00:46:22:12
Unknown
We have great resources on there. Great teachers.

00:46:22:12 - 00:46:23:27
Unknown
We want to come alongside you.

00:46:24:02 - 00:46:25:21
Unknown
Let us know how we can pray

00:46:25:21 - 00:46:30:20
Unknown
for you. Just reach out to us and we're we're here to disciple you

00:46:30:25 - 00:46:47:20
Unknown
and help us as well. Get these donor funded resources for free into the hands of inmates and people that are struggling in addiction clinics, because that is what God has called us to do in that realm, as he's open doors throughout the United States and really throughout the world.

00:46:47:25 - 00:46:49:22
Unknown
I love it. So if you're listening,

00:46:49:25 - 00:46:55:22
Unknown
courage for Life Bible App, courage for life.org, we're going to put those links in the show notes, check it out.

00:46:55:24 - 00:47:00:23
Unknown
And really connect with and and her ministry and this has been a blast. I've

00:47:00:28 - 00:47:02:27
Unknown
had a wonderful conversation.

00:47:02:27 - 00:47:07:10
Unknown
Learned a ton from what you've shared. So thank you for joining us today.

00:47:07:13 - 00:47:10:10
Unknown
Thank you so much for having me. Eric is great to be here.