The Proverbs 31 Show
The Proverbs 31 Show, by Leanni Tibbetts, is a faith-based podcast that empowers women around the globe by sharing inspiring stories, actionable insights, and authentic journeys of influential female leaders from diverse fields. The platform will foster a community of support, faith, and courage by highlighting voices that challenge norms and redefine success.
The Proverbs 31 Show
God's Definition of Wealth Might Surprise You | Latoya Francis
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What does it truly mean to live a life of purpose?
In todays episode, Latoya Francis shares her journey from trauma and brokenness to discovering God's calling and building Legacy Academy in Uganda.
Together, we explore what kingdom wealth really means, why stewardship extends beyond finances, and how ordinary acts of obedience can become part of something far greater than ourselves.
If you've been longing to live more intentionally or wondering what God has entrusted to you, we hope this conversation encourages and challenges you in your own walk with Christ.
Host: Leanni Tibbetts
Purpose Parter: Jacques Scott (Food Division)
Produced by: Cayman Style TV
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On the way back in the airport, Scott said to me, Vitali, remember the lady that you was sitting beside? She said to tell you that that day that you were with her, she saw God. My entire world. I remember being in the entire airport just crazy because it made me realize how much it's gone. That was my self-actualization. I felt like in my life. From that point on, I was like whatever you want. I'm on that. If you wanna send me the deep areas of the jungle in Africa, sign me up.
SPEAKER_01Hello everyone, and welcome back to the Proverbs 31 show. Today I am joined by my sister in Christ, a powerful woman of God, Latoya. Thank you for joining us today. Thank you so much for having me. Yeah, I would like you to introduce yourself the way how you feel called to.
SPEAKER_00Um, my name is Latoya Francis. I think if I'm gonna introduce myself, I would say that I'm a dreamer. Um, I love to two-step Jesus. Um, another thing that I like to do, I like to eat mangoes and cucumbers.
SPEAKER_01Oh, tropical girl. Um, one thing I just want to jump right in with this because when I found this out, I literally told Bruce and Shamila, like she did what? And you built a school. Can you tell us about this school, where this school is, and how it came about?
SPEAKER_00Yes. So uh I ran a nonprofit called Let Me Live, and within that nonprofit, we do programs here locally in Cayman, Jamaica, and Uganda. So the school that you're talking about, that's in Mokono District, Nabali 1, um, Uganda. And it's called Legacy Academy. Um, we have about 200 um students. I would say that that is something that I know is the work of the Lord. Um, just the way that the Lord has continuously come through and made it possible. And now in the last two years, just being able to prove the concept that it's not just, you know, donating money, it's actually having impact. We're actually seeing students pass with high um marks for coming from such a rural place. Um, the nonprofit is run by myself, um, one of my best friends, Jirelli, and another one of my best friends, Lalani Roach. Um, so we're the the functioning board right now. Um, but yeah.
SPEAKER_01Wow. And in terms of, you know, you said this is a work of God. How did that happen? Like, did you hear him call you? Like, did you have a dream? Like, how did that happen?
SPEAKER_00Okay, so I would say circa 2007, I had just come back from Jamaica um from going to high school. Long story how I got to Jamaica going to high school, but finished high school in Jamaica, came back home, and I was working at a beauty salon um as a receptionist. And in the lunchroom, reading my Bible, spending time with God, I heard the Lord say two things. He gave me a name first, and then after that, he said, Uganda. At this point, I didn't know where Namath's place was, but I know that he was calling me to missions. So I called my pastor at the time, Pastor Ellen Pegero, and I was like, Pastor Ellen, I think God is calling me to mission trips, and he's saying that I need to go to Uganda. She's like, Well, Latoya, I don't know about in Uganda, but I know Miss Betty Ann Mobley, who goes on mission trips. So it first started with going on mission trips with Miss Betty Ann through Generation 412. So I think we've gone to like Costa Rica, the DR, a couple times. I I think I went to Haiti as well. And then after that, I guess ordaining my or how do I how would I say make this making decisions from then? Because I knew God said Uganda. So even when it came to like looking at school, 2007 got the word, went on mission trips, back to back, then started looking at schools in like 2008, 2009. And at that point, was thinking of, okay, cool, my dad always said I was gonna be a lawyer. So and we come from a family that you know is you go big or you go home.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um, yeah, so it's it's funny how that works because it's a family that grew up with nothing, but they instill these like values in you of anything you're gonna do, go big, or don't bother with it. Wow. So I was like, all right, cool. Uh if I'm gonna do law, it makes sense. I'm gonna probably apply to the Yale. I think you know that was my first kind of choice. Um, but then I don't know, like that's that wasn't what I felt God calling me to do. So in talking to different people, they started telling me about this Who Haw Anderson University, which is in Indiana, and I was like, oh, Church of God school. It's like, okay, I'm I'm Church of God denomination. Uh-huh. So it's like, okay, all right, cool, interesting, but still wasn't sold.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So then I went went on the website and then I saw they had this big program called um on the website, this big banner of a program called the East African Ambassador. So I was like, East Africa? Uganda is in East Africa. I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't even care what we go and study. This is the school I'm going to because this is my ticket to get to um Uganda. Because with the East African um ambassador program, if you want it, so basically what it was, it was like a pageant, but it wasn't your traditional pageant. The whole point of the pageant was you had to pick like this social project.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00And my my project that I picked would ended up being like an at-risk soccer team in um Tanzania. And then the idea was you had to kind of mobilize the campus around this project. You had to say kind of, you know, what one inform them what it was, but get people behind you to kind of um so you're like lobbying then? Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Huh.
SPEAKER_00For for social change. Anyways, my first semester at this university, I was like, okay, you came here, this is what you came here for. You know, no beauty queen like that, but we're gonna do our thing. Um, and so I did the project and I won. And that meant that I got an all expense paid to East Africa. But the issue was I was going to Tanzania. It wasn't Uganda. All right. Details, details, details.
SPEAKER_01I in the vicinity. Right.
SPEAKER_00So I was like, well, listen. So then I started writing back home and I told people about it, like within my community. I was like, okay, cool. I got an all expense paid trip to Tanzania. That's not where I need to get to. But our school also has what we call Tri S. And Tries was like this again, service um project type um program where the school received endowed, like an endowment uh funds that then subsidized students to travel and do mission trips.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00So the same summer, they had a mission trip going to Uganda. And I was like, Well, I go into Africa back to back.
SPEAKER_01Would you look at that?
SPEAKER_00And if you if if you know my background, that was very audacious because who can pay for it? Who can pay for it? But I was like, Yeah, no, no, no, no. This makes perfect sense. I'm going to Africa back to back. I'm gonna go to Tanzania first, then I'll come back to university for a week, and then I'll go to Uganda. It's it's clear. And yeah, I wrote home and said, hey guys, I try and get raised money to go to Uganda. And I had um my church family, my my own personal family helped to kind of pay for the rest of that trip. So yeah, that first summer I was in Tanzania with the Maasai in huts, um, going to bathe with uh Maasai warriors because there might be lions that might attack us, and then right after that I was in Uganda.
SPEAKER_01Wow. And God just provided. Reminds me of the story of Esther. It's like everything kind of lined up in such a particular way, you know, and even though God's fingerprints were all over it, his name wasn't mentioned.
SPEAKER_00Ordained every every single thing. Like from again, when I went to Tanzania, funny story that happened there. Um, so the guy that led the program was his name was called Moose. And I remember um at one point of the trip, Moose was in kind of conversations with one of these um, I guess you call him like a village, the village elder. Yeah. Um, and it it got very heated. Oh, and I saw Moose is a very tall, strapping like white guy. I see Moose almost like turning red. So I was like, what's happening? And he's like, uh after the exchange, Moose comes in, he says, The Toya, he was asking for you as his wife. And not his first wife, you know. Like, this man have multiple wives. And I'm thinking, I was like, at what point in my story, this little girl from Swamp, did I ever think I would be in Africa and someone bartering for me to be his like fifth wife? Um, but nevertheless, that happened. But just to tell you how like I feel like God is such a great storyteller. I could like I couldn't have made that up for myself. And that but then I go to Uganda um like the following month, or so it would have been like two weeks after I came back, I think it was, and I go to Uganda and just had a life-changing experience. I call it, you know, in psychology, Maslow has his hierarchy of needs, and at the very top of the pyramid, you have self-actualization. And I did have one of those situations where um when we went to Uganda, that mission trip and the team that we were with, they were predominantly working with women and children with HIV and AIDS. And I remember we went to this location um in the Acholi quarters. This lady was sleeping on the floor of someone else's hut with her children. She was wrapped in this white sheet. When we went there, immediately I felt like God's saying, You need to pray for this woman. And I was like, I started looking around. Mind you, I was these things matter to me because again, it's just it shows me how God is able to pick you, pick you out and highlight certain things. So one of the things when when he said to pray, I'm gonna be honest, I looked around the room and I was like, Oh God, I don't want a black person on this trip. And I can guarantee you, I don't want a Pentecostal person on this trip. So if you're telling me to pray for this woman, I feel like if I start praying for her, they're gonna look at me sideways. And Holy Spirit just kept on saying, pray. And I was like, okay. At this point, it was like there was no kind of ignoring it because another thing about the lady on the ground was as she was laying there, I could hear her, she was sleeping. And that at this point, like she's suffering with HIV. At this point, she had AIDS, so she's suffering, didn't have any money for ARVs, and you could hear her mourning moaning in her sleep. And Holy Spirit said, Pray for her. And as I reached my hand out to pray for her, everybody else did the same thing. And it made me realize wait, I probably wasn't the only one he was telling this to. Yeah, but you took the first step. And we prayed for this woman. Um, after we prayed, again, I just felt like this righteous indignation came in me, and I was like, okay, cool, what will we do next? We can't leave her here. We prayed for her. Then all I remembered, it was like a movie. Like you watch like these kind of things, these movies of like, you know, people in hospitals or those kind of doctor plots. And I just remember us like picking her up by the sheet, going down a hill, putting her in our bus. They put her to sit beside me. She asked for water in Luganda. I didn't know what she was asking for, so I asked someone to translate. And she said, they said, Oh, she wants water, so they gave me water. I fed this woman, like, fed her the water, and that was different for me because again, at this point in my life, I wouldn't say that I was a very soft person. I was, yeah, on fire for Christ, but I was still, and and I think I am still rough around the edges, but the Lord has, you know, made me a bit more gentle over the years. But at this point in time, for me to be sat next to a woman having my hand around her again. If you if you were in my close circle at that time, my friends knew I didn't like hugs. You had to ask permission to hug me. And but in that moment, it was just like whatever barriers I had up just melted. I had my hand around someone like she was my daughter, um, and she's definitely older than me. Hugging her and just kind of soothing her, humming. I was like, by the way, I didn't even know I could do that, but it happened. Um and humming and feeding her this water, and then we got to the clinic and we dropped her off. And then on the way back in the airport, um, my leader at the time for the trip was Scott, his name was Scott. Um and Scott said to me, The toy, remember the lady that you were sitting beside? And he said to me, You know, um she said to tell you that that day that that that you were with her, she saw God. Mash my entire worldview up. I remember being in the Entabo airport just crying because it made me realize how much we take for granted and how much if we allow how we the how we think we are. Well, I'm I'm not like that, I can't do that. How much we miss God in just giving this woman a drink of water, being treating her like a human being and not or scorning her because I had family members, community members, you go in Africa to work with what HIV and AIDS, you sure? The stigma was sky high, but in that moment, just being able to treat her as a human being and for her to say she saw God, that was my self-actualization moment, I felt like in my life. And from that, I think from that point on, I was like, all right, God, whatever you on, I'm on that. Like if you want me to do that, that's what I want to do. Um, if you want to if you want to send me in the deep rural areas of the jungle in Africa, sign me up.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and that that gave you your boldness, and as you said, your audacity to just do exactly what God was calling you to do. Because I had this friend who always used to say this this phrase, she was like, Sometimes, Leonny, you're the only God that people get to see. Like you're the only glimpse of him that they will ever get to see, and sometimes that's all they need. Yeah, and then the second side of that is that God doesn't call the qualify. No, he qualifies of that literally like all of those things like showed all throughout your your story. So, you know, like that boldness isn't just for Latoya.
SPEAKER_00No, I can hand on heart, I can say that proudly on any loudspeaker. I if we're if we're going based on an individual's own, I don't know, accolades, I don't, I don't qualify. Um if it was up to me, I don't see how or why he would see it fit to use me. And this is why God's love isn't like our love. And this is why I feel like if my my one of my, if you will, core beliefs is no one can come into contact with the love of God and remain the same. Because I really believe that the only reason why I am in these spaces and doing these things is because of the love of God. And also because I know that there's nothing else that the world has to offer. So you're totally right. This has nothing to do with Latoya. It's it's it's about a surrendered life and being willing to be being willing to be surrendered and also knowing that you're not gonna get it right all the time. I think sometimes because we have like this kind of mindset of, well, if I I know God has called me to this, I've tried it, I failed, then I must not be worth it anymore. No, it's not about you, it's about who called you. And if we look at even the Bible and the people that God has called over and over again, he's chose, he showed, he showed us that he doesn't choose as the world chooses. Yeah, he's not gonna take the person, like you said, that is more qualified. He's gonna take the person who's willing and able to go, and then he's gonna do the most because God likes to show off.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and that's beautiful because if if you were in that position, then you could say La Toya did it.
SPEAKER_00Listen, I have over over the course of my life so far, and even this week the Lord reminded me of that. When I went when I went to university in the UK, the school that I went to again, by my own standard, I should not have been at that school. But who takes up this young girl from Swamp and says, Yeah, I can send you to the LSC, the London School of Economics and Political Science, that schools, most of the most prolific leaders in the world have gone to this university.
SPEAKER_01And for those who don't know what Swamp is, can you describe that?
SPEAKER_00I would like to say. I don't think K-Man has a lot of ghettos. Um, but if we if we want it, I in my academic way, I would say it's one of the the low-income parts of K-Man.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um and yes, I think my story in Living with Swamp, and I can proudly say that me and my family, we live in a one-bedroom. That's not your typical one-bedroom apartment. That's a one-bedroom, meaning it's a room, and then you share bathroom and kitchen with like three or four other families. Wow. And that's that's how we we grew up.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So for God then to say, I'm sending you here, but I'm gonna make sure even the funding of this is not very clear. So it's gonna be faith, faith walk. Wow, faith walk, and how how are we gonna fund this? And I I bring that up because I wanted to make the point, and I can go into more details there, but I want to make the point that God from in my life, God has made it very clear that no one else will get the glory. Even even when it comes to the small things, no one should say, I have done this for Liani. No one should say it is because of me why Liani is rich. No, yeah, they must be you in in every situation, you must be able to stand, and and and the echoing thing in the atmosphere in the realms must be God did that. Yes, no one else did that, God did that. Yes, and um, even in thinking about one of the things I know that we want to talk about today was wealth. So even in thinking about that, I always go back to Melchizedek and Abraham, right? So in Genesis 15, um, Abraham comes out of this battle of trying to win back um his cousin, no, his nephew, my bad. So he comes comes from winning him back or um getting that the goods that they have stolen from stolen with him, and he comes to Melchizedek, which is the king priest in the Bible, and that means that he holds a dual role of he was the king of Salem, but he was also the priest of God. And there was a there there's a moment there in chapter, what that is again, chapter 15, no, 14, chapter 14, there's a moment there when Abraham says to him, he's like, in chapter 14, verse 20 to about 24, there's like this exchange happening between Abraham and the king of Salem, Melchizedek. Abraham ends up giving Melchizedek a 10% tithe of everything that he got back from this this encounter, this war.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And then they start to kind of go into this bartering. Now in verse 21, now the king of Sodom said to Abraham, Give me the persons and take the goods for yourselves. And Abraham said to the king of Sodom, I have raised my hand to the Lord God most high, the possessor of heaven and earth, that I will take nothing from from a thread to a sandal strap, that I will not take anything that is yours, lest you should say, I made Abraham rich.
SPEAKER_01Wow.
SPEAKER_00And like that that concept of I think for me, that's one of the blaring things that the Lord has done for me, saying, No, no one can say I did that for La Toya. Oh, yeah, yeah, no, no, no. God did that. God did that, and I take pride in that. That's something that I will I will never bat down from because I would I would rather know that at the end of the day, even the smallest to the biggest thing that I do, my greatest achievement should be that I I please God.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So coming from your background, coming from your family's background, and now coming as a child of God, when you hear kingdom wealth, what what comes to your mind, to your heart, to your soul?
SPEAKER_00Kingdom building. I I'm a I'm a part of something greater than myself. Um things come to mind. Inheritance, kings that things that come to mind is dominion. Um things that come to mind is that God is a good father and he made provisions for his children.
SPEAKER_01Even with that, wealth is not just finances.
SPEAKER_00No, yeah, no, no, no, no, no, no. Wealth is well, wealth is anything that the Lord has given you to steward over. So some people that might be your calling might be your family. You know, your your calling might be if you're a mother, it might be your children. Um it's literally if you're if you're an artist, it's your ability to create. If you are a football player, your ability to play well, uh play wealth. I think anything that the Lord has given you to steward over, that is wealth. But I think the problem is, like you I think were alluding to, a lot of times people only think about wealth in the standpoint of monetary means.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00But when you think about kingdom building, you cannot link limit the kingdom of God only to the wealth that he can give you. Because even if you look at wealth in from a biblical standpoint, um when you look at a man like Abraham, it talks about the land that he has, it talks about his seed, his gen, like his his ability to give birth to a nation that no one can number. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01That's wealth. That's fair. That's fair. If wealth is all of these different things, one thing that I can think of is in terms of a family, because not everyone is doing what you said in terms of stewarding what they have well. They might not be stewarding their family well, they might not be stewarding their craft well. Um, but very much so I see it all the time. People are not stewarding their finances well either, and God will not bless them with more because they're not making well of what they have now. Yeah. So any advice?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so one thing I'll say. Um, my disclaimer is this definitely I don't give financial advice. But and I and I by no means will stand here and say, you know, that yet I have seen the, if you will, the fruits uh of what I believe the Lord has promised me. Yeah, but I know it's coming. Um when it comes to stewarding well, I think it it all points back to the heart, the heart posture.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00So I'm gonna take it from a believer standpoint. Yeah. I feel like in the last few months, the Lord has made um the chapter in Matthew 25 stand out to me a lot. Um we first started by looking at the first part of that chapter talks about the five wise and the five foolish virgins.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I think, you know, while they're talking about lamps and oil, the lesson there is stewardship. Yeah um and understanding what that means, I think is very important. Right after you right after we read about the five wise and the five foolish, we go into another parable now about the five talents. And I think for me, this one is where Holy Spirit has me parked because the crux of this this parable is talking about, you know, this lord, this king going away, this you know, businessman, important person leaving. And when he goes away, he leaves his servant with these things to steward. With one, he leaves five, with the other, he leaves two, with the and then with one, he leaves one.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00When we read that, we might only see, okay, well, talk about talent of goal. We look at the monetary aspect of it, but I think what it's talking about is the posture of our hearts. So for me, and even with my youth group, they know I love Genesis. I love everything leads back to Genesis. I don't care what nobody says, it all goes back to Genesis. In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, we saw that there was, if you will, a pattern that He create that that He gave us, or He was giving, yeah, that He gave us because He did give it to give it to us. Um we just fumbled the bag. Um uh But you know, we see there where He He He creates the earth and He gives us dominion over it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00For me, when it when I think about wealth, now I don't think about wealth in terms of money only anymore.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I now know that God gave me from the beginning. If I look at how the original pattern was. I'm gonna Bible again, sorry. I'll just keep it. Um in the beginning, He He gives us Um in Start at chapter one, in verse 26, then God said, Let us make man in our own image according to our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. If I only think about wealth in terms of money, I'm poor. I broke, and I'm not even a part of the conversation. Um, because this tells me he gave us dominion over this, over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and every creeping thing. So when you dig deeper into that word dominion, we get to find out that it can't just be oh, um, how do I say like just oversight? No. I think um Miles Monroe has an amazing teaching on this where he talks about how because we are made in his image and his and his likeness, two sovereigns can't live in the same land. And the example that he gives is like the the the queen of England. Yeah, what's the name of the king now? Charles Charles Charles. While she's alive, he can he can't be king.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So again, I'm not gonna go a lot deep in that, but there is something there, and those for the Christians that that are listening, I invite you to go and dig deeper into that. The on the understanding here is that when God created us in his image and his likeness, he created us to be on earth because heaven is his his domain. He has domain in heaven, we are supposed to have domain here. But like I said, we in in chapter three, we fumbled the bag. And so now all that is happening right now is almost like this Jesus coming and dying on the cross to bridge that gap is more than just salvation. It is a reinstatement that needs to happen. It's almost as if, and again, and and I'm not trying to step on any theological toes here. I teach youth, and and the way that I understand the Bible, I try to kind of give them in the same way so that they can then go and research it and sit with the Holy Spirit themselves. But what happened was when man fell in chapter 3, it was almost as if the fall into sin wasn't just falling into sin, it's it was giving up your right to dominion of something that belonged to you.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So when we get to Matthew 4 and we see Jesus being tempted, every single thing that the enemy tempted him with, that was truth. Yeah. Because my guy got dominion. And until we know that Jesus has that Jesus died and resurrected, and the Bible says that when he resurrected, he now has the keys, right? Those keys have been given back to you and I. But the problem is a lot of us as Christians, I feel like we we have gone so comfortable with almost going through the mundane that we forget that we were we were put here to reign. Yeah. Um, and I'm not trying to come from a prosperity gospel standpoint, no. I think for me, it's identity, it's understanding. When you said that earlier about being a child of God, that means much more to me than the fact that I'm a part of a denomination or a church that I go to go to and somebody that I worship.
SPEAKER_01No, yeah, it is who I am. Because if God tells you pick up and go, gone.
SPEAKER_00And and it's because I am a child of a king. Yeah. And if I am a child of a king, there is there are certain um, if you will, benefits of that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um, and again, I'm not saying everybody's gonna be filthy rich, and that's not what I'm saying. But I say, but what I am saying is if you understand your identity in God, that Christ came and paid the price for you to get back, you now understand that wealth has nothing to do with money. Yeah, it has to do with dominion.
SPEAKER_01I think just with you saying all of that, let us backtrack significantly to, you know, because there's people like that will not be able to understand that because their foundation isn't even laid yet, right? So they might even be people who are listening that they they're listening to this show, but they're not in a place yet where they have that type of relationship with God. They might still even be on the fence. So how did you get how did you get to here? You know, like how did you where did you come from and how are you here now? What did that process look like?
SPEAKER_00I like that question. Um that process for me has been one of I think the biggest breakthrough was understanding that what the love of God means for me. So I got saved um in 2001. Um no, 2004, sorry. Um 2004, I got baptized December 12th, 2004. And around this time before that, my life was a a wreck. Um, I told you that I had to get I went to Jamaica to go to school. I got shipped to Jamaica to go to school, um, just because I was getting to getting into a lot of fights, a lot of trouble with police, just around the wrong people. And the Lord radically saved me. I feel like if I had stayed in Cayman, um, I would have ended up dead. Maybe multiple children strung on a drug somewhere. I feel like that's kind of the plan that the enemy had for me. Um, I was always a leader, but I the same with the same tenacity that I go hard for the kingdom of God now. Back then I was going hard for the for the devil, didn't even know it, didn't even know it. So that that's it, that's that's that's another thing, right? So went through all of that. Um had a very traumatic childhood as well. Um, when I was growing up, I was molested. And so like a lot of things as when it came to my identity and who I was, um, was very troubled. Um I was suicidal, struggled with depression, um, just really struggled with who I wasn't even even feeling like I belong here. And so over the year over the years, um, and even as a Christian, still battled with a lot of those things, but but knew that there was something else that God was offering me that the world wasn't offering me. So in 2004, around that time, I was in high school in Jamaica, and I encountered the Lord and He saved my life radically. I went through, I would say, a process of I feel like God translated the passion from from the things of the world to down the things of him. So I remember like around that time, like my favorite artist at the time was Lil Wayne. Um, and I could tell you what the favorite song was. It's it was like the poster song for me. And the Lord literally translated me from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light, in that those things didn't have any taste for me anymore. Um, I also at that point I had like a, if you will, amongst my friends, they knew it, but like my family had no idea that I was a budding alcoholic. I could drink, drink, drink. And then I remember one night, um, friends came over, went to the football field, somebody had a trunk full of alcohol. We got lit, and then on the way home, vomiting in the bush, going in the back of the going, going to the side of my house, turning on the pipe, taking something off the line, um, washing my face, drying it, and then just with all my might, my best kind of um, I guess Denzel actor um esque going into this house, straight face, straight to my room, nobody knew like nobody knew. Um and when I got saved, the Lord radically like turned my heart, my my entire body um away from alcohol.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I I guess I'm saying that to say, oh, another thing that I felt I feel like to share here is when I came back saved, went back to my old friends, told them I was saved, they laughed at me. One of them looked me in the face and he said to me, Latoya, if you can get saved, anybody can get saved. And when he said it to me, it hurt me, but it also just showed me like the depths of depravity that I was at. While someone why somebody can look at me and say, if you can get saved, anybody can get saved. Throughout all of that, I think what has brought me to the place of understanding my identity of um in Christ, it wasn't a very like linear, like step one, step two, step three. It went I w I was all over the place. Um I was uh I would say when I got saved in Church of God, preaching, leading worship, got to this place of again still battling with my worth. Am I actually worth anything? Like, given the things that have happened to me, am I truly worthy of love? Um I hear that the Jesus says he loves me, but yeah, I don't even know if that's true because does he really understand who I am? Does he really understand what I've done? And can can he truly forgive me, or is he um forgiving me now and then at some point the shoe will drop and then he'll actually punish me for what I what I've done. So went through this whole thing. Um being in church just to show you how it wasn't linear, because I was in church, but because I my heart wasn't fully healed, I found myself in a place of deep compromise. And compromising because I was looking for love. Compromising because I looked around, I saw everybody's life moving on. I knew that I loved Jesus. I knew that I I loved, you know, being a part of the church, I loved doing the things that he told me to do, but I still felt like, okay, well, I don't, I don't actually think, you know, you actually love me in the way that you love me. Then um that led me to a journey of almost like living a double life. And and I think living the double life almost cost me my life because that's when, even as a Christian, I think I suffered a the most with like suicidal ideation because I couldn't reconcile how I could say that I want to be with God, but then I'm struggling with these other sins, these other secret sins that nobody know knows about. And it was through that struggle with those secret sins that God put people in my life, and these people are some of my best friends to this day that saw me for who I was, but allowed themselves to be God's hands and feet to me. And all they did every single time I messed up and I came and I told the same story over over and over again, they would just especially this one friend, um, she would meet me with the love of God every time. Every single to the point I'm just like, okay, this is I don't know. But then after a while, it shifted my focus from being again, I think, growing up in the way that we grew up, and even within the Caribbean culture, right? We're pushed to do um all these amazing things to aim for aim for the sky. And whenever we fall short, we feel like the world, the world ends. And every time that I would fall short and I would go to her as my accountability partner and say, This happened, whatever, whatever, and she would shower me with the love of God. It made me realize that I was trying to live my life according to the way of the world still. In my mind, I was like, well, no, I'm a Christian, I'm trying to do it God's way. But no, I was living my life by the scorecard of the world and not by God's love. Yeah, and that that for me was kind of the turning point of realizing, okay, no, no, no, no, no, no. You really love me. Because at this point now, I'm growing in my faith, I'm reading my Bible, I'm spending time in prayer, I am learning more about the character of God, I'm knowing that He's with me in everything. So even in those dark moments when I'm thinking, oh yeah, for sure, he's like turned his back on me, like many people have, he's not even He's with me even in those moments, and he's loving me the same. When I talk to my youth, um that's one of the things I always tell them. I was like, listen, my life wasn't changed by rules and regulations. My life was changed because of the love of God. Because when you come into full um knowing that he actually loves you and he means it, all of those other things, a songwriter says the lover's less wild. You realize that, yeah, no, y'all don't even compare. So it doesn't even make sense for me to even now entertain you anymore. Because I know the one who makes my heart glad, and I know the one who knows me fully and loves me um beyond my own understanding, and for me, coming to a place of understanding my identity has been rooted in understanding God's love for me.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you have me just speechless because I I felt that, like I really did. Um, and you know, there's there's so much to glean from that, but I'ma ask you the question that Shamila asked me when I was sitting in your seat, and that is if you could talk to little LaToya, what would you say?
SPEAKER_00I would say, little girl. No, serious, I I I I would seriously, and I've had I have I've had dreams of that. Wow, but I would let her know, keep going because I think the way the enemy works, right? And as I continue to grow in my understanding of spiritual warfare, the enemy is, and I you always use the word litigious, but he's so committed. The enemy is more committed to us than sometimes I believe that we're committed to Jesus, and that's just a fact because he knows everything about you, he makes sure that he understands the patterns that that that that relates to your life, and this matters because and and I would tell her that this matters because at I can see at various stages of my life how the enemy tried to kill me. And looking back now, I'm just like, oh, I get it now. So you read about you know when Moses had to be hidden. Um, and again, at that at this point, is because Thea decided he was killing everybody.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, all Hebrew boys had to die.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. At various points, you find that if if you look at your life, the enemy knows. Hear me well. I'm not saying that the enemy is all-knowing, yeah, but I'm saying that because of his commitment to derailing the plan that God has for your life, yes, he pays attention. So even the things that you and I might not notice, he notices. Yeah. And he tries at every given point in time to derail that. And when I look at my life, I would tell her all of these different roadblocks are gonna happen. But stay the course. I would even tell her I know right now you don't, you don't, you don't feel worthy, you don't feel pretty, you don't feel like you're loved, you're still trying to process a lot of this hurt, a lot of the trauma that you're dealing with. But I'm here to tell you that you do make it to and do some of the big things that you want to do. I'm still working on some of the some of the other things, but we make it through. And at some point, you're going to be introduced to a man called Jesus. At that point of introduction, I'm asking you to do something that I wish I'd had done. Take it and hold on to it, dear life. Look, look to look not to the left or to the right, but at that moment in point and point in time when they when you get introduced to him, hold on to him like your life depends on it, and whatever he says to do, just do it. Even if you don't, even if you don't want to do it, even if you don't understand it, whatever he tells you to do, do it. That's what I would tell her. Because I feel like if I had that, yeah, we'd be we we we floating now, but we we would definitely be flying for sure.
SPEAKER_01And that not just for little La Toya, that's for any any not just young woman, young, yeah, older. It it really doesn't matter. That's for and man, that's for everybody, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that obedience to do whatever he tells you to do, it'll it'll change your life. Yeah, it'll be hard and not gonna be easy, but I can tell you this world has nothing to offer you. So at that moment in time that you've realized I've been introduced to Jesus the king of the world, nothing else matters. Let that be your singular focus and everything else. Like again, we we read Matthew 6 33. We hear in in sermons all the time seek ye first the kingdom of God. Now, sitting sitting here with you, I would be telling any person that's coming to Christ now, and as soon as you get introduced, forget about everything else, focus on that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's a treasure. Wow, wow, okay. Sorry, I really like I have so much to digest right now. It's God is doing a work through you, in you, all around you, and I am beyond grateful that you took the time to be, you know, to sit here and to share your wisdom with everyone watching and. If you have any last words of advice, like anything at all that the Holy Spirit has placed on your heart to share, I would say Jesus is the prize.
SPEAKER_00Um, if you are a believer or um or someone who is interested in understanding, I invite you to look at the book of Colossians. Okay. Reading the book of Colossians, I think in the last year and a half, rewired a lot of things in my brain and understanding who we are in Christ and what access that has for us. Because I think the the the thing, uh especially for being a young Christian, right? We watch on um on YouTube right now. I think sometimes we like to focus more on what like pastors and preachers and everybody else is saying, and one of the things over the last year and a half that I feel like God has said to me is that I long to be in relationship with you. Yes, we we need community around us, but I would encourage um listeners to truly seek out a relationship with knowing the heart of God. When when you get intimate with the heart of God, your your life will change. The way that you the way you view the world will change. Doors that you were struggling to close will be sealed, and the doors that need to be opened to you will be open. Um but it comes back to this mindset that Jesus is the prize, yeah, you know, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. Yeah, he is the prize. Yeah, at the end of the day, you know, it's all about him, and I think if we live our lives focused in on that of at the point of introduction, if you make it all about him, your life will change.
SPEAKER_01Wow, thank you, Latoya. No worries, thank you. You know, your episode um really makes me want to. This is the first time that I'm doing it, but if there's anyone who's watching who doesn't like you don't know Jesus right now and you want to, are you able to lead them into a prayer of asking Jesus into their life? Please let's go.
SPEAKER_00Heaven is rejoicing. Let's pray. So pray after me if you if you have never accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior, or even if you have, but you found yourself wandering um away from him, um, yeah, just repeat after me Jesus, I come before you believing that you are the Son of God. I confess that I am a sinner, that I have sinned, that I have done what is not right um before your eyes, and I repent. I ask, Jesus, that you would forgive me. Lord, I invite you into my heart as my Lord and Savior. And I ask, Lord, that not only will you come into my heart as my Lord and Savior, but that your Holy Spirit will come into my heart as well, Lord. And I will be filled with your Holy Spirit. Lord, from this day forward, I pledge to give my life to you, and I thank you for receiving me into your family. In your name I pray. Amen.
SPEAKER_01Amen. Amen. Thank you, Latoya. Thank you for having me. Proverbs 31, Fom, there is nothing more special than accepting Jesus into your life. And LaToya, thank you so much for leading us in that prayer. I want to encourage each and every one of you all to head over to the Dreamers Guild to learn more from LaToya. And thank you to Jake Scott's Food Division for keeping us refreshed as always on set as we speak about topics that matter most. And as always, please like, subscribe, and follow for more. Yeah, I need to come up for air. Wow. I got very, I'm not even gonna lie to you. I got very overwhelmed at one point in time. It was very hard for me not to cry. Very hard. I was holding them like a G. And a lot of it is so many parallels too, and it shows the enemy has not changed his tactics.
SPEAKER_00It's the same. Our problem is that we are not as committed as he is. They outside. But we won't sleep.
unknownNetflix.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, Netflix, scrolling, like they're willing to do 12 to 1, I willing to do 12 to 12-10. It don't match up, you know, and and and is really saying that if you and then I I've even heard recently pastors say or make a comment about even fasting and stuff like that, and you know, they don't believe in long fast. And I'm just like, bro, you can't you can't not believe in long fast and be a Christian. It doesn't, it don't make sense. Jesus fast for 40 days and 40 nights. Okay, fine. One might say, well, he died, he resurrected, and no, bro, no, and and the scriptures didn't he didn't say if you fast, he says when you fast. So it's like, okay, cool. It's either we want to steward power or we want to just kind of go with the mundane and you know keep going. It's either we want to see people raised from the dead, people set free. When I was kind of preparing for this, and and maybe we can do this at a later time too. Again, the Lord literally led me to Abraham Melchizedek. I was like, okay, why you want why you want me to talk about that? But then I also saw that the first battle that Abraham fought was for family. He didn't fight for land. The first in Genesis, the first war encounter, he went to get back his family. Now one can say lot, and in the in in the in the end is a bit iffy, but I think it's significant. When when I look at what God does first, there's a significance. So I even think about when we see in our families when when deliverance needs to come forth and things need to change, generational curses need to break, we can we can clearly see the patterns, but then we're not willing to take the stand to go and and pick up our, you know, that the song, my mama reminded me of it this weekend. The song about lace up your boots, put on your backpack. We're not ready. And I think because we've gotten into this kind of concept of well, if I call this person and they they're gonna be they're gonna pray for me, man. That that's gonna be no God wants a relationship with you. Yeah, he won't use you, he won't use you to break the chains, he like that's what he wants to do. But you have to understand that for us to do that, that requires great sacrifice. One might say, again, you have people who believe Jesus sacrificed paid it all. Yes, but do you understand what he paid it all for? Yeah so this is why I I mentioned Colossians, because if you go and look at Colossians in chapter one to chapter two, like there's a lot of gems there, and it shows you what he did. Again, I'm not pretending to be like, yo, I don't know biblical scholar, I just a person who loves Jesus and who tries her very best to be obedient sometimes, and all the way obedient me, him fight back, we back, we back and forth sometimes. But I know that there's nothing else in this world for me, so I try my best to kind of tune my ear to that, um, even with my weaknesses. And yeah, I feel like there's a lot more that the Lord wants, especially in the season here. There's a lot more that the Lord wants to release.
SPEAKER_01That was so good.
SPEAKER_00Thank you so much, Diani. Thank you guys for setting it up.
SPEAKER_02I really appreciate it.