S3 | Ep.3 Memorial Stones & Revelationship: Finding Intimacy with God in the Wilderness | Cathy Garland

Cathy Garland shares her journey of deconstructing faith and how she found a personal relationship with Jesus amidst chaos. It's not about throwing everything away but asking the right questions to build a stronger foundation. 

Summary

In this episode of Remember God, host Brenda Savanhu engages in a heartfelt conversation with Cathy Garland, a Bible teacher and author, about the journey of faith, deconstruction, and the importance of remembering God's presence in our lives. Cathy shares her personal experiences of questioning her faith, navigating suffering, and discovering a deeper relationship with God. They discuss the significance of memorial stones in faith, the concept of Eucharist, and how to recognize God's identity in our lives. The episode concludes with a journal prompt encouraging listeners to seek God in their stories.

Guest Bio

Cathy Colver Garland, oldest daughter of Dr. Randy Colver, writes Gracefull Musings, a blog providing women a moment of rest and challenge before those little fingers appear under the bathroom door. A former Vice-President of a software company, she currently consults with institutions and companies on marketing, sales, and strategy. She also mentors women in professional, spiritual, and personal development. Saved and living an “absolutely surrendered” life, her passion is to teach people to hear God's voice and obey, surrender their lives absolutely, and walk in freedom. She is married to Mickey and has two children in elementary school.

Connect with Cathy:

Website | Buy Revelationship | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube

Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Remembering God
02:18 Cathy's Journey of Faith and Deconstruction
13:31 The Role of Memorial Stones in Faith
17:40 Navigating Suffering Through Faith
24:19 God as a Personal Relationship
30:06 The Importance of Remembering God
33:00 Understanding Eucharist and Relationship with God
41:14 Exploring God's Identities
49:06 Journal Prompts and Final Thoughts

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

I had a moment where I saw the bright light that everybody talks about, and the reason they talk about it is because it is extraordinary. And the way I would describe it is the light was like so nourishing that my cells were like, oh, I need this, I need this, I need this. And they were strinking up the light. That's how amazing the light was.

SPEAKER_00 0:22

Welcome to Remember God, a podcast where we practice remembering God in the midst of trials. Hi, I'm Brenda, and I help followers of Jesus recall God's miracles to successfully navigate current challenges. Welcome to Remember God, a podcast to practice remembering God in the midst of trials. If you're a follower of Jesus who's in a difficult season and finds yourself wanting to take control of the situation instead of trusting God, this is the place for you. This is where we will help you remember God in the places where He has shown up in the past, giving you the tools and the strength to navigate through today's challenges. I'm Brenda Savannu, author of Memorial Stones, writer, coach, and your companion on the journey of remembering what God has done. Today I'm excited to welcome our guest on the show, Kathy Garland. Kathy is a Bible teacher, mentor, and author of two books, Revelationship, which is a transformative intimacy with Christ, co-authored with her father, Dr. Randy Colbert, and most recently known, a journey into God's identity and yours. Kathy's heart is to help women move beyond dry religion into living a conversational relationship with Jesus. Through her own suffering, questions, and sacred surrender, she has learned how God meets us in the wilderness and turns places of pain into encounters with his presence. Today, Kathy walks alongside women who feel disillusioned, disconnected, or stuck, inviting them into deeper intimacy with Christ and helping them recognize God's voice and activity in the everyday moments of their stories. Welcome to the show, Kathy. I'm so excited to have you here.

SPEAKER_03 2:18

Thank you. I'm excited. Talking about the wilderness and what God does in it is my very favorite thing. I'm always up for a conversation on it.

SPEAKER_00 2:27

Yeah, I'm so excited. And then, as you know, because you've listened to some of my shows, that this podcast is based on my book Memorial Stones, which is just documenting the places where God has shown up. And for me, looking back at those places has helped me get through difficult, present time, difficult seasons. Um, and obviously it helps me remember his faithfulness. So I I wanted us to just start there in listening to your story. I listened to some podcasts and just a little bit of chatting that we've done. The place that I that I actually wanted to start, and then wherever the Lord takes us, is where you deconstructed your faith at 13 years old and what that journey was with your father's support, and what memorial stone did you pick up there that you look back to as you go through difficult seasons in your life?

SPEAKER_03 3:25

You know, I grew up in a family that deeply loved the church. My dad is a pastor, my mother and father were both um saved and brought to the faith and uh spirit-filled during the Jesus movement. So it was a very authentic home. It wasn't um where we just went to church uh one Sunday a week or even a month, and and and that's all we did. Like there was no tradition about it. It was very much a living, breathing, walking, talking, sitting at the dinner table kind of faith. And um I grew up asking lots of questions. There were uh, you know, times when pastors have to bring that home with them. I mean, sometimes it was a literal person that they brought home and sat down at the table and ate with us. But a lot of times it's these stories of these people, and I had a lot of questions, and none of them were discouraged because they were hippies, I think. You know, it pretty much never open book. And so um I I would ask questions. I remember my neighbor committed suicide, and I was probably about 10. And then a little bit later, I think I was about 13, uh, one of the teenagers, I think 18, 19, committed suicide at the church. And so I'm asking questions. What happens to them? Are they in heaven? Are they in hell? How do you know? Why does it say that? Does the Bible, is it clear? Is that what everybody believes? And so, you know, those kinds of questions are happening in the safety of the table. But what happened was at 13, I saw from sort of the inside scoop, um, where the business began to take over the church. My dad was an associate pastor that was a senior pastor, and he declared that everything was going to change and it was gonna be this way. And there was a lot of uh changes that went from an authentic faith, I believe, to one that was more a word of faith adjacent sort of movement and prosperity driven, but not even just like the prosperity of God, which is sort of like, hey, God, I'll take whatever prosperity you give me, whatever that looks like, but more like looking at specific prosperity markers and saying, this is what I'm supposed to get. And as a child, that's not what we experienced. That wasn't the vibrant faith. And I saw it in my mind disintegrate around me, things around me. And I think as a child, asking those questions, I didn't get a whole lot of answers. And I knew even my father and my mother were asking questions like, why are we going this route? I don't think this is the right way. Why, why suddenly this? You know, and so I'm hearing them ask questions and I'm beginning to deconstruct the version of Christianity that I saw around me. And I told my my dad at the age of 13, I really don't know that this is the way for me. And uh instead of panicking, which I think a lot of parents probably would, um, he took me to the library and we checked out books on pretty much m every religion. Uh, I remember pr every strong, normal, top, mainline religion, and then a bunch of really small ones like Zoroastrianism. I mean, I checked it out on a lot. And and because I was homeschooled, I could make this a part of my homeschool day. And I did. And I studied them. Some of them were very easy to reject. I mean, the Muslim religion was never a contender. I was never gonna let a man tell me what to do, certainly. And I certainly wasn't gonna let them drive me everywhere I was gonna drive. You know, I'm 13, I'm looking forward to driving.

SPEAKER_00 7:11

You know, there were to getting your license.

SPEAKER_03 7:13

Uh-huh. Exactly. So I began to ask questions about those religions. And really, we went to conferences and I was able to ask a lot of people questions that helped me determine. And at the end of the 13th year, I was able to determine that Jesus was who he said he was in the Bible, and that he wanted a relationship specifically and personally with me. And that was a key transition, I think, because you're talking about memorials picked up along the way.

SPEAKER_00 7:48

Right.

SPEAKER_03 7:48

When you grew up in church, you can pick up that God loves the whole world, he has it all in his hands, but would he have done that all just for you? And is that relationship personal with you? And I think that was the main thing I picked up during that time. Yes, he wants a personal relationship, he is pursuing me.

SPEAKER_00 8:14

So as you deconstructed, as you read all of these other books on other religions, the conclusion you came to was that God loves you, wants relationship with you. Um, and and that made it more personal for you with him.

SPEAKER_03 8:34

Yeah. The other religions didn't offer a relationship. Christianity was the only one that did. Um, and not only was it the relationship that was offered, it was the only one that provided proofs, if you will, that Jesus was that he was. Many forensic journalists and scientists have come to the faith because of logic and reason and facts, you know, historical facts. I I kind of did the same thing, but maybe not quite so well. Obviously, at 13, I didn't have all the skills that they had. But it was clear to me that these things did happen, that Jesus was who he said he was, and what is it that he said he was coming for? And the answer to that question is a relationship with me and a relationship with every single individual person, and those who turn to him can have that. Those who reject it, that's fine. But those who turn to him will have that relationship with him, that intimacy.

SPEAKER_00 9:38

I like what you said in one of the other episodes I heard you interviewed on, which was anything that's true should withstand our questions. And so as you deconstructed um your faith, all of the questions that you asked, um, Christianity or just being a follower of Jesus withstood that.

SPEAKER_03 10:01

Right.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 10:03

That's right. Yeah. And and people are afraid of questions because deep down they're not sure that it's going to withstand the questions. And that's a problem. You need to go down that road anyway. Because and people need to learn to ask the right questions. You know, people talk about deconstruction, and what they actually mean is destruction, where you throw a throw a bomb into the whole mist and just blow it up all the smithereens. That's not deconstruction. Deconstruction is asking, is this real? And if so, is it valuable and where does it fit? So when we deconstruct a house, um, you don't get rid of the foundation, you don't get rid of the beams and the support structures, you take it sometimes all the way down to the studs, but you do take it down to where you have to go. And so for me, that was eliminating traditions that were not biblical, or I would call them traditions made of men, or um emphasizing things. This is more on the reconstruction side, adding things back in that Christ did say to do, or Christ did give an example, whether in the Old Testament or the New Testament. And so the deconstruction was basically a year, if you you want to say that, but it continued because I kept encountering more traditions, people saying you ought to do this, you have to think this way. And so I'm always evaluating. I think that's a Christian duty. You have to know what it is you believe and why you believe it. And hopefully the why is because it's true. Okay. And so in a world that doesn't actually believe that truth maybe exists, or that you can have your own truth, or you can come up with multiple truths, and my truth can cancel your truth, and that's not truth. That's something else. And so, um, for me, I've had to continually treat it as a process and ask the questions, and I feel like I'm in good company. The disciples deconstructed Judaism, if you think about it. Martin Luther deconstructed Catholicism. This is a time-honored tradition to ask questions about what is true and what is temporary and just a tradition that's may or may not be useful. Um, sometimes tradition can be useful to some people, but it's not necessarily a truth. And so I had to learn the skill of discernment. So we think of discernment as a gift of the Holy Spirit, right? And it is. But it doesn't just come honed and ready. Discernment is a skill. And knowing and discerning what's true, we can't expect our kids, if we throw them in, say, public education and say, here, now I want you to discern what's real and what's not real. They don't have the skills to do that. We have to equip them to do that. And um, my goal is with my own children is to facilitate the questions so that I can help them hone their discernment. What is the meaning behind this commercial? What is the message behind this show? Or this person just made a statement. What's behind that? And to really discern that.

SPEAKER_00 13:31

Yeah, it sounds like that um that stage in your life as you know, from 13 to 14 in that year that you deconstructed, and as you said, right, you're you're continuing to build on it. It sounds to me like that was like a main memorial stone because it then um has helped you navigate through the rest of your life. Like you go back to that, like I asked these questions, these are the answers that I found in that place. So now this is the direction that I'm going.

SPEAKER_02 14:04

Right.

SPEAKER_00 14:06

Kudos to your dad, because I think a lot of other parents would likely be afraid of their child reading about these other religions because they're afraid they might be influenced by them, even just asking these questions. So, yeah, just that was amazing. When I heard that story, I was like, wow, that's absolutely amazing.

SPEAKER_03 14:28

Encourage parents to respond the same way. Because if you don't answer those questions now and you kick the can down the road, let's say to college, there are, I guarantee it, professors quite willing to help your child completely deconstruct and destroy any and every connection to the faith that they had as a child. That's what they're there for. That's their job. And they they think it's a calling. So, and there are many, many professors who are not that way, and they're good and kind and loving, and even Christian ones, you know, but so they're not all bad. But there are plenty out there who are looking for children who may have been taught the answers in Sunday school to the question, but not necessarily why. And so this year, I think parents have, and Barna Group, and there's others out there that talk about how many percentage of students or parent uh kids are leaving their parents' faith and not carrying it on, how many percent return after they have children or hit a hard time in life, right? And there's these studies out there, and I think they scare parents, but they don't scare you into the direction you gotta go. They scare parents into silence what it needs to be scaring you into having a conversation. And, you know, sometimes my dad would say something like, you know, I used to think this way about this topic. Okay, so an example is women in the ministry. He was raised through the Jesus movement by some more on the traditional side who felt like women couldn't be pastoral or elders or whatever. And whatever your audience believes about that or not, he used to believe that way. But then as he studied the Bible and looked into the Hebrew and the Greek, he felt like that was not what Christ was saying when he presented the upside-down kingdom where there is no difference between male or female, Jew or Gentile, slave or free. So my father said, Well, if that's the overarching concept of the kingdom of heaven, then this other thing must be interpreted differently. We're missing something. So he changed and I watched him evolve. And that's an important part of it too. I'll tell my kids, I don't get everything right. That's not my job. My job is not to be right. My job is to show them the way to Christ and show them who to ask the questions, how to ask questions, how to get answers, and who to trust for those answers. Like, don't go to Chat GPT for every answer in your life. But I mean, that's a common thing today. There are other tools out there, you know, like break out the concordance here. I'm gonna show you how to use a concordance, you know, something like that. We laugh, but it's it's what it is now, you know.

SPEAKER_00 17:23

Yeah, it's true. Technology has made it so, yeah, so much more different. Um, so segueing just a little bit, in one of the interviews I heard you on, you said suffering silences the things that do not matter. So, given this journey that you began in your teen years in deconstructing, and that's now your main memorial stone, how did that help you get through seasons of suffering?

SPEAKER_03 17:50

So, again, that main memorial of Jesus is who he said he is, that's A, and B, he wants and is pursuing a relationship with me. So those became the the touchstones, as you say. I thought, even after that period in time, so from about 13 to 18, 19, that if I did everything right, if I dotted every I and crossed every T, I'd earn the white picket fence, the kids, the chickens, and the husband and the American dream, basically.

SPEAKER_00 18:26

Yeah. And unfortunately, that's a message we get in in our faith.

unknown 18:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:32

I I went down that rabbit hole, but we'll talk about that later. Go on.

SPEAKER_03 18:36

It is a rabbit hole. It's almost like a vending machine, right? If you turn these dials, if you keep yourself pure, if you don't do this, if you do do this, you know, you're gonna get the husband, the picket fence, the kids, the chickens. I'm telling you, that's that is exactly what's presented to you. And um, that's not what I got. I got heartbreak, I got enormous seasons of waiting, long seasons of loss. Uh, my first husband divorced me. Uh, when I lost my first child in miscarriage, when the man I loved broke up with me three times and dated someone else that he thought was his dream woman. We are now married, so evidently that worked out. Um, but when I lost my second child, when I waited years and years for my son to be born, all these sort of seasons, God met me. And it was the revelation of who Christ is, who God is, and who this this God who makes and keeps promises kept hope alive. He gave me a vision of my children years before I had them. I clamped on to that.

SPEAKER_00 19:48

Like was that during your first marriage or before your first marriage?

SPEAKER_03 19:52

It was in between when I wasn't even married, you know. It was sort of a promise that this is still going to happen. And these are your two. And if I hadn't had that, I the circumstances said divorced, childless, maybe never marry again. And in our circles of church, um, divorce was still not very common back then. I mean, this was 30 years ago, and I only knew a couple of people who were divorced, and they were certainly not in ministry. So there's this sort of a decommissioning that happens when you know you have that stigma of divorce, even though I divorced right, and everybody said yes, let him go. He doesn't want to serve God, you have to let him go, Paul says. I followed directions, but that didn't matter. I was still divorced, childless, and looking at a future, unsure of what I was gonna have. But this God who makes promises, keeps promises, this El Roy God who sees me, the God who sees, yeah, the right, and and not only sees the injustice done to me, but does something about it, right? And then even Jehovah Misi, the the God who declares his truth like a banner over me, not what everybody else is declaring, because plenty of people were quite willing and ready to declare whatever they wanted to declare over me, and certainly circumcises did. So for me, knowing God and being known is what held everything together, kept me in the path. I'm not saying I was perfect, but it kept me in the path.

SPEAKER_00 21:34

Yeah. So, Kathy, tell me something. You know, in that place of divorce, how specifically did God show up for you that kept you going?

SPEAKER_03 21:46

Well, first of all, the divorce happened. I did not go to the court. I didn't believe in divorce. I didn't feel like I wanted the divorce. So I said, if you want the divorce, you'll have to handle it all. And that is that is what. Happened. And and during that time I felt like I was in a very safe bubble where nothing could touch me. And they were so that I think it was the Holy Spirit just protecting me from uh the chaos of the the moment. And um, you know, a lot of times during divorce it goes straight to women's identities and it can really cause a lot of problems, a lot of um renaming who we are, you know, rejected, unloved, you know, all those things. He specifically called me away to a a cabin in the woods in the middle of like a snow blizzard, which is crazy. We're about to have that, you know, this weekend. And um, I went to this cabin, not expecting anything, just because he basically drummed it in my head, like, come away with me, come away, come away with me. Until I just went, you know. And uh I plopped open my Bible and I said, All right, Lord, what do you want to say? And he said, Look at Isaiah 54. And I'm I'm sure I'd read it. I've read the Bible many times. I opened it up to Isaiah 54, and suddenly, you know how it is, right? Suddenly everything fell into place. And it's this wonderful chapter about a woman who's rejected by her husband in her youth. I was 18 when I got married. You know, I I was very young, um, who who doesn't have any children, who needs to get her tent expanded because many are her children. Um, and it even had birthstones, my birthstone in there, which is December lapis, and some other different things that were very keenly like popping out on the page to me. And I said, uh-huh, okay, I am taking this as you promising me. And there's even a scripture in there in Isaiah where it says, uh 54, it says, For a moment I turned my face from you. For a moment I was mad at you. And that was like, yeah, I felt that, you know, yeah, I felt that, you know. But then it says, But I am, I the Lord your God, am your maker, I'm your husband, you know. And so it was like, okay, I'm gonna sink my teeth.

SPEAKER_00 24:20

So that was a revelation of God as your husband in that moment. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 24:24

Absolutely. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:27

And so then once you got that revelation that God was your husband, how did that change things for you moving forward?

SPEAKER_03 24:35

So for me, um, regardless of what everybody else said, I knew that some things were going to happen for me. And um I I think some people might say I was even stubbornly um ridiculously sure, confident. And uh people would say, um, well, you need to get on a dating app or something like that, and you need to meet guys or whatever. And I was like, nah, nah, nah. I just need some.

SPEAKER_00 25:03

So you knew that you weren't gonna meet someone that way. God had shown you a different way. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 25:09

Yep. Yeah. So it kind of guided, I could have been pushed one way or another way, but it certainly guided my steps. People tried to fix me up with certain people who were not ministry quality or whatever. And um, like one was like a owner of a club, and I was like, what? No, mm-mm. No, that's not my future. So, you know, and it was just kind of because people want you to not be lonely. And so they're like, Oh, I have a nephew, you know, or whatever. And I'm like, no, I'm not lonely. Uh you don't understand. I'm not dying over here to be married. I know that the Lord Almighty is my husband right now, and when the time comes, I will have my children. And so that implies I have a husband somewhere along the way, too.

SPEAKER_00 25:55

So oh, so when you were in the cabin, you got the vision of your future children?

SPEAKER_03 25:59

It wasn't at the same time, no, but it it was certainly with the expand your tense, many are the children of the woman who was reflected. And so I'm like, okay, so it's gonna happen.

SPEAKER_00 26:12

Yeah. Wow. So some of the so the things you knew were gonna happen coming out of that cabin and discovering that God is your husband were marriage, children. What other things were you certain of?

SPEAKER_03 26:28

It was also talking about re-establishing things. And right after that, um, it was a few more months later of you know, being diligent in the disciplines of devotion and things like that, which I gotta say, there wasn't a lot of life in devotions. I was reading my Bible, I was praying as I was supposed to, but it was more like surviving, not thriving. You know, the the the intimacy at that point in your life is a luxury you can't afford. You're just trying to survive, okay? And so from that point um to um another point later in the summer, um, there was this sort of diligent time. And then in the summer, I went to a youth camp. I was a counselor. I think I had been tapped last minute to be counselor. I was on staff at the church. And so they were like, hey, we'd like you to come and stop my Bailiwick to join a camp. But I was like, okay, whatever. So I went and after worship, um, I felt my heart open a little bit more. And I said, Lord, I'm ready for you to speak. And, you know, I was just turning around to get my Bible off the seat and to plant my butt on the chair. And in that moment of grabbing my stuff and turning around, I hadn't even sat down fully. The speaker said to me, The Lord wants to talk to you. Stand up. And then just spoke all sorts of things, basically rereading to me the promises of Isaiah 54, confirming it.

SPEAKER_00 28:08

Oh, good.

SPEAKER_03 28:09

No, and he didn't say Isaiah 54, but he was saying things like, You do have a husband coming, you do have children coming, you do have a commission, just because you're divorced. I mean, he didn't know all that stuff. And and to, I mean, today, I don't even know if he knew my name. But he said, you know, you feel like you've been decommissioned, but that's not the truth. The truth is God is calling you, you're going to accomplish all the things he set out for you to do. And it was just a recommissioning moment um where God was reaffirming that he's got this. And um there were other hard times that came later, but that may have been one of the hardest. And getting through that, like you talk about, helps me. I I used to talk about stones. I know someone who puts theirs on a wall. I imagine it like pearls on a string, and and I fear them, you know, it's like, or a rosary, you know, like the Catholics have rosary, and and each one is for prayer. For me, each one stands for a time. Oh yeah, that's when God showed up for me here. Oh yeah, that's when God showed himself to be this. Oh, that's when God showed himself to be that. And so when I go through a hard time, I have something to go back to. I just pull that out of my pocket. Oh yeah, that's when you were did this, and oh yeah, this is when you and then I share it with my kids. I mean, age appropriately, but I tell them what I've been through. And that's a part of me remembering God and what he's done to the next generation.

SPEAKER_00 29:48

Yeah, and that and that he instructs us to do that, right, in the book of Joshua, when he says, pick up these memorial stones and tell them to the future generations that this is how God showed up for you. And so that's incredible that you are practicing that with your children.

SPEAKER_03 30:06

Absolutely. And Psalms remind us all the time like remember God and remember to the next generation. And and what is what happens when we forget God? Like there's there's a promise for what happens when we remember God, right? The next generation will stay true to his ways, but there's also promise of what happens when we don't remember God. We have the scripture says they forgot God as God, and then all the hedonistic list of lifestyle, yes.

SPEAKER_00 30:39

All of those things happen. It's the curses, right? Basically, in Deuteronomy 28. Um after verse 14, he says, if you disobey me, like essentially if you don't remember me, these are the things that are gonna happen to you.

SPEAKER_03 30:53

And it's not like he's waiting for you not to remember him, he's just gonna send those things. This is the natural result of not remembering and staying abiding in this vine of the source of life. And if you cut it off, and and and it's funny that today is kind of cut-off culture, you know, it's cancel culture, and they're talking about how uh children are just cutting off their parents and not working through difficult things or or whatever, differences in politics or differences in opinion, and everybody just cuts it off, and that's how they are with God, too. It's like I don't need this source of life cut, and then the next thing you know, they become darkened in their minds and given over to the lust of the flesh.

SPEAKER_00 31:42

To a reprobate mind. Yeah, that's a scary verse right there. If he gave them over to a reprobate mind.

SPEAKER_03 31:48

That's right. A darkened and reprobate mind. And and if you think about it, it's not so much that he's like, I'm done with you. He says, if you do this, this is naturally going to happen. If a vine cut itself off from the vine, let's say a pumpkin vine or a squash vine, it cuts itself off, it will die. It will rock on the inside. There's no other way for anything else to happen.

SPEAKER_00 32:12

Yeah. Yeah. And um, a friend of mine often talks about that we also must remember that the blessings when in thinking about Deuteronomy 28, verses 1 through 14, that those are conditional upon us remembering God and being obedient to his word. Like they don't just come, you know, to your point that when if we're not doing the things, then we'll rot. So wow, I'm enjoying this conversation. So, Revelationship, that is the first book that you and your dad wrote. And um, I was looking on your website, it says, the pathway to an intimate relationship with God who created you, receiving from God all he pours out, then turning it back to him in worship.

SPEAKER_03 33:03

Ah, yes.

SPEAKER_00 33:04

Tell us about that.

SPEAKER_03 33:07

So I think most of your listeners would have heard the word Eucharist or communion, as it's called in certain circles. In my growing up, it would have been called communion. But the word there is Eucharist. And it's when God gives thanks, breaks the bread, drinks the cup, and tells them that this is the new covenant, do this in remembrance of me. And everybody jumps straight to the bread and the cup because it's tangible and we've been doing it for thousands of years. But the word Eucharist is actually a little earlier when he says, and he gave thanks. And we were just talking about those scriptures about the reprobate mind. If people go back and look at the Greek of that, when it says they need they forgot God as God, nor did they give him thanks. Eucharist says it's the same word. So whatever God did, so so there's uh Athanasius wrote about this, and so I'm borrowing a concept from him. It's not my idea, but it's an idea we've kind of lost. And that is that Eucharist is more than bread and body, and why it's this receiving all. So this is what Jesus did. Is it's translated gave thanks, and it's not like our American dash off a thank you note because you've gotten a Christmas present. Like that is not what we're talking about here. Something spectacular is happening that Christ does, and then he also does it before miracles in certain cases. It's the same word. And then also this flip side, if you don't do this, all this bad stuff happens. So, what is this word? Okay, what is this word? So, this word is receiving all that God pours out as a vessel. That's what our job is. We were formed to receive all that God pours out. He didn't need to pour it out, he wanted to pour it out. He made us to receive all that he pours out. So he pours all of himself out into us. We receive it, we return it back to him and worship, but also spill it out to the rest of the world, setting things right. This is what Christ did constantly. And he said, I never do anything I don't see the father doing, I never say anything that the father doesn't say. It's the same thing. I receive from the father, I pour it out, and I return it back to him. So this moment, this perfect thing, Athanasius says, you receive all that God pours out and you return it back to him, and nothing is lost in the exchange somehow. So it's glorious understanding that we're a part of his revelation to the earth. And I know Adam and Eve screwed it in the beginning, right? We we know that, and we would have too, so we can't blame them. But when Christ came and he brings his kingdom, it's it's not like, hey, abide a little while, I'm gonna come back for you, and then we'll go to paradise. That's a Greek understanding. That is uh Plato and Socrates kind of mixed in there. The understanding is stay here for a while, set things right.

SPEAKER_00 36:21

Right, right, because the earth groans for the revelation of the sons of God.

SPEAKER_03 36:26

That's right. Exactly. And that's what Adam and Eve was supposed to be doing, and they kind of messed things up for a very long time. Christ came, he's the better Adam, and through him, we have the power of the Holy Spirit to right what is wrong in this world. And and we'll never get it perfect, but when Christ returns, it will be perfect, right? So, but that's our job. We have this um go and tell the rest of the world the good news that Christ is come and that he's here to bind up their brokenhearted, uh, and to to cast out the oppressive demonic in their life, which worked for the church. The early church was in the middle of Rome, and we think of Rome as you know as the soldiers and the civilization, but what we don't think about is the fact that they worshiped demon gods, and demons were everywhere in the New Testament. That's why they had to deal with them. And the the demonic, I mean, you could go to a stall in the market and purchase a spell because you didn't like your mother-in-law or something like that. That was common. I mean, sometimes the disciples would go to a city after the people got saved, they burned all their magic books. That was a lot of magic books. Okay, so this was a common thing. And so because the church had the love of Christ to bind up the brokenhearted and the power over these demon gods that were running rampant around them, they were able to turn this entire empire upside down and prove this was the proof that their God, our God, is real. And this other stuff, they may be real, but they're not gods. They may be demonic. They could be made-up gods too. They might not even be demon gods. Some of them were probably just clay and stone. Some of them were real and and certainly demonic from from you know the kingdom of darkness. And so they have the power over the kingdom of darkness to say, go in Jesus' name, because Jesus' name conquers all. And that is what we're supposed to be doing. So Eucharist says and revelationship is kind of our word for it, is God revealing himself as he pursues us for relationship, so we can do this thing.

SPEAKER_00 38:42

And the revelation of God to us is so you said giving thanks to him, receiving from him, and then giving thanks to him, which is returning worship to him.

SPEAKER_03 38:54

Yes, and part of that is going out and doing what he commanded. If you love me, you'll keep my commands, right? So going out and doing what he commands, setting things right.

SPEAKER_00 39:04

So when we look at the Eucharist, then part of that too is um taking communion, the revelation of him within us, right?

SPEAKER_03 39:13

Yeah, it's the table of his presence. I think sometimes it becomes just a habit, which is unfortunate, but um, or an afterthought in my circles, you know, you did communion like on the fifth Sunday, you know, you didn't do it all the time. Um now I belong to uh a more Anglican tradition, and we we do the communion every Sunday, and it can become a habit, not a reality. So when I approach communion, I'm approaching the table of his presence, and I am believing that not in some kind of transubstantiation weird way, but in a reality in the spirit that God's nature is being placed within me and is changing me from the inside out so that I can better hold more of his presence and pour out more of his presence. So I approach it with the understanding that it's a part of him working in me. And I'm going to encounter his presence and be changed by his presence.

SPEAKER_00 40:17

Right. And I keep seeing the thread. This all goes back to that deconstruction that you did, that memorial stone of deconstruction, because you keep going back to relationship. I'm seeing that as a constant thread in your life. You keep going back to relationship, and that's that's absolutely amazing.

SPEAKER_02 40:38

You're right.

SPEAKER_00 40:40

So I I bought your other book, the one that just came out known.

SPEAKER_02 40:45

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 40:46

And and I have to admit, I would the cover was so pretty. I was like, oh, I want that book.

SPEAKER_03 40:51

My sister designed it. She's an extraordinary designer. It you're right. It is beautiful. My sister, I have to give props to my sister. She she designed it. It was gorgeous.

SPEAKER_00 40:59

Yeah. Yeah, it's it's so beautiful. I I was so struck by the cover, and then um, and obviously the content. And so I know you're going through the uh God's identities and you start with Abba. Why'd you start with Abba?

SPEAKER_03 41:14

Oh, I you know, people ask me, did you do it? Did you just throw them all together, or did you have a pathway you wanted people to experience? And absolutely I did. So Abba to me is the invitation, uh, the open door through which you walk in order to experience the rest of him. Because if you can't see God as father, and maybe that's because of wounds of an earthly father who failed miserably, and I get that. I understand. When when we do healing prayer and deliverance, the number one thing we have to deal with is forgiveness. The number two thing we have to deal with is father wounds. It's just almost everybody comes to the table bearing some wounds from earthly fathers. And um, if we can get a hold of how much, how great a love this Abba Father has shown us, that we should be called sons and daughters of God, then we can go through the rest of them and they'll begin to make sense. So I start with Abba because that revelation is the one that has to break upon our conscience first. And then after that, we can follow through the rest of them. So in that book, you've got a name of God, like Abba, and what it means for his identity. Then I build the bridge for what it means for your identity. So I just did that. Abba means that we are sons. So he's father, we are sons and daughters. So the bridge is my identity in him, is that I am dark first.

SPEAKER_00 42:57

Right. So going back to your story as a 13-year-old, was that your first revelation? Was God as father? And and how does that relate to your relationship with your father, um, Dr. Culver?

SPEAKER_03 43:13

I don't remember what my first relationship was or revelation was.

SPEAKER_00 43:19

Revelation.

SPEAKER_03 43:20

Yeah, going I I think I was uh accepted Jesus Christ in my heart when I was four. I believe I was baptized when I was five. I was, you know, and and I could answer all the questions, so they let me get baptized and um baptized in the Holy Spirit uh around the same time with the evidence of speaking in tongues. So, you know, I I feel like my first revelation, though I wouldn't have known it, was probably his abiding presence. I have always known his abiding presence. There's never been there's only one In my whole life, when I didn't feel his absolute presence with me. And I know there are people who never feel it. And that that's that's better faith than mine. That's stronger faith than mine. Like uh Mother Teresa, she never felt God's presence. But look at her life. Like, wow, she did all of that without feeling anything. I'm like, wow, that's I, on the other hand, am a senseate, and you know, for me, worship is key. And and and um, though I don't want to be led by emotions and feelings, I do experience him in a feeler, you know. So I think it wasn't something I knew though, probably until it was gone for a short period of time. I broke my neck for a second time. It was nuts.

SPEAKER_00 44:48

Oh goodness. I know you broke your neck twice.

SPEAKER_03 44:51

Yeah, I mean, of all things, I broke my neck skiing one time. So I'm a Georgian, I just I don't do snow. It's bad. I don't do snow ever anymore. It's just like enjoy. I'm staying in the house. Um and the second time was in a car accident, and I I almost passed over to heaven. I had a moment where I saw the bright light that everybody talks about, and the reason they talk about it is because it is extraordinary. And the way I would describe it is the light was like so nourishing that my cells were like, oh, I need this, I need this, I need this. And they were they were drinking up the light. That's how amazing the light was. And there was a fence and a pathway and a tree. And if I was putting my hand to the fence to pass through, and then I drew my hand back. Yeah. And that's when I woke up. I came to and they said, Hey, are you okay? I said, No, I don't think so. And they sent me to the hospital and I broke my neck. So this is a short story, but there's a lot more to it than that. But I'm sitting there laying in the hospital, and they've got a halo screwed into my head, which was um a dear joy. And um they had me under quite a lot of medicine. And you know, they give you that little button that you click, you know, it's got um whatever that really strong medicine is, which which by the way did not take away the pain. It just made me it just made me quiet so that they didn't have to deal with me. That's really what it did. I'm not the best patient in the world. Uh, I figured that out. And so uh I'm sitting there, laying there with all this um flow of everything around me, my eyes are darkened. I really can only see bright white coats and bright people's faces, and you know, it's just it's a lot of pain, and I'm just really underwater, basically. Uh and um I noticed in the three days that I was screwed in and under all those meds that I did not feel his presence. And I did not like that at all.

SPEAKER_00 47:03

How old were you?

SPEAKER_03 47:04

Um 20 something, yeah, 20 early 20. I did not I I was married, young married, like we I think we've been married a year, to my second husband. And um I had no children, but um you know, I was just like very early in the marriage, you know, and um my mother was there, my dad was there. Crazy thing is he'd broken his neck in almost the same spot in in almost the same situation years and years before. So that's fun. And wow. I'm just laying there and I do not feel his presence because the meds have changed how I perceive reality. And somehow it dampened the very thing that I feel him in. You know, the you call it the knower or the the feeler, like you know that you know that you encountered God. If you haven't ever done it, you can't explain it to someone who was never. And um, I said to my husband later, I said, I don't ever want to be under that kind of meds ever again because of how I could not feel his presence. And um I I never have since. And even like with children or whatever, having birthing children, which by the way is nothing compared to having something screwed in your head, um, I haven't. I've just avoided it ever since because I would rather feel suffering and pain and know that my God is near than to have to endure something less and not feel him near. But that's just me.

SPEAKER_00 48:44

Yeah, no, wow, that's amazing. I love that you believed your first revelation of him was an abiding just by how he was moving in your life. That's amazing. It's a beautiful memory. Um, so Kathy, as we start to wrap up today, if you were to leave our listeners with a journal prompt, what would it be?

SPEAKER_03 49:06

The thing I would prompt people with is where in your story is God hidden just enough so that you can have the joy of finding him. So what I mean by that is when uh my kids were little, we would play hide and seek. And I would hide, you know, not so well that they couldn't find me, but just well enough that they had to look. And then they would have the joy, like, you know, in a hamper or something with with my head just barely peeping over, and then they see me, and then they're so excited because they found me, and then they want to get in, right? So it's all it's this chaos, they want to get in, and it's my turn, I'm gonna hide here, and you go find me, you know. That's how it is for God. Sometimes he hides in your story, and he's just not obvious, obvious. It's not a church, he's you know, the the Bible is still there, but it's not he's not showing up necessarily in those places that you've relied upon up till now. And then some people take that to mean he's not interested anymore, but that's not what it is. He's drawing you to find him so that you will have the joy of finding him again. So we see that a lot in scripture, uh, particularly the Psalms. And I ask people, where in your story are you missing him? Look for him, because he's showing up. I guarantee it. But we just need to be trained to find him. Is he showing up in the brokenheartedness? Yes. Is he showing up in the suffering? Absolutely. It says he sticks closer than a brother and he's closest to the brokenhearted, right? So um, is he showing up in nature and you need to get out in nature a little bit more because you're surrounded by the bings and the dings of technology that are making it hard to hear him? But where is he showing up that you need to go and find him and reconnect?

SPEAKER_00 51:08

Yeah, and the joy of searching for him in that place. Yeah. Oh, I love that. So I've got um a few rapid fire questions for you. Out of all the identities that God has revealed of himself to you, what's your favorite?

SPEAKER_03 51:22

Right now, it's the one who is there. So that's Jehobashema. Um, this is important because uh for women in particular, we um experience anxiety because we don't know the future. And sometimes the past is, you know, kind of not the best. We've had a past or whatever. And here we are in the future, and there's angst and chaos, and people at war and rioting, and who knows what's happening. And Jehovah Shema is hey, I am there. So I am there in the past, still redeeming it. I am there in the future, and you're there with me, and we're victorious, only I haven't experienced it yet. You haven't experienced it yet, but Jesus has experienced it, and he's there, he's present with me now. So I think that's the one that stands out to me the most right now.

SPEAKER_00 52:17

Ooh, I love that. That's awesome. Which Bible character would you want to have dinner with?

SPEAKER_03 52:22

Uh, I think Tamar, Judah's Tamar. I know there's a couple of them. Um, I I would take all three Tamars, actually. There's three of them, but definitely Tamar, who um I am becoming admiring of. Here's a young woman who was getting the raw end of a deal, and Judah should have done something. He should have married her, um, or given her to her his youngest son, but he didn't want to do that because he was suspicious that she was gonna be the reason that he was killed, because you know, God killed his first two who are evil. But she finds a way within the loophole of the law to get pregnant by him, which you know, some people don't like, but it was actually within the law, Jewish law. He should have married her. And she he says she is more righteous than I. And so she's this woman who found a way in a culture that pretty much was about ready to relegate her to the side notes of history. She was going to die nameless, childless, futureless. But because of working in that, she not only redeemed Judah's line because she had the children that later birthed David, who later birthed, you know, Jesus. So she's in the line. Uh so for me, I'd like to have some dinner with her. I think she was pretty gutsy.

SPEAKER_00 53:43

Yeah, I just read that story. I think it was yesterday because I'm going through my Bible in a year reading. Yeah, it's fresh in my memory. Do you prefer listening to music or reading a book?

SPEAKER_03 53:53

Depends. Uh now that I'm in paramenopause, reading a book is very difficult to make myself stay focused. So I like to listen to a lot of books. I'm on Substack all the time listening. Um, I do love to read a book, but I have to have no children with demands on me. So it doesn't happen the way that it used to. Um, so I I do love music though. Love music.

SPEAKER_00 54:18

What's your favorite kind of vacation between these two? A beach vacation or cultural vacation?

SPEAKER_03 54:23

Beach. Beach.

SPEAKER_00 54:24

Yeah. I hear that answer a lot. And do you prefer to recharge with people or without?

SPEAKER_03 54:32

Without. I need to read it.

SPEAKER_00 54:35

Yeah, that's my favorite way to recharge as well.

SPEAKER_03 54:37

Yeah, I need a cozy blanket, some tea, and uh maybe a book if I'm lucky, but just some tea will do the trick.

SPEAKER_00 54:46

Right. Oh, I love tea too. Okay, so Kathy, what else would you like to tell our listeners if there's anything else? And how can they connect with you? And then once you've shared that, do you mind closing us out in prayer?

SPEAKER_03 55:01

Sure. Yeah. So if anyone wants to have a conversation, you know, if they're struggling with the hard questions and they never took the time when they were younger to ask the questions, and so now they are. Um, how do you reconcile this thing that God said with this thing that God said, or this revelation of God in the old testament with this revelation of God in the new testament? If they ever want to talk about those things, I would love to talk about them. And I'm and I'm not sure that I always have the answer, but I'd love to talk them through. So um, if they want to get a hold of me, they should go to revelationship.net. It has all my contacts. I'm on Instagram and Facebook and Threads and Substack and I think a bunch of other places, just not TikTok. I'm not on TikTok, uh, but pretty much everywhere else.

SPEAKER_00 55:52

So yeah, and I'll make sure to put all of your contact information in the show notes. Yeah. All right.

SPEAKER_03 55:58

Would you pray for us, please? I would love to. Lord Jesus, we are so grateful that you have revealed yourself to us, that you created us for the purpose of revealing yourself to us and through us and walking with us. And your whole purpose throughout the Bible, you state it over and over again, is that you want to dwell with us. That it's all, everything that happens is not for any reason. It happens for one reason, so that you can dwell with us and we can live. Because dwelling with you is life. And so, Lord, we are so thankful that you made a pathway, that you kept a people, that you um came in uh the form of a smallest little vulnerable child and not some conquering hero king. And we look forward to when you do return as a conquering hero king. But in the meantime, Lord, we just asked for your Holy Spirit to train us into your Christ-likeness, that you would show us that in everything that happens in our life, it is not for any reason, it is for a singular reason that we we will be transformed into Christ-likeness, Christ's image, so that we can dwell with you. Lord, that has always been your purpose, it has always been your plan. Nothing that happened stopped it, nothing that happened was a surprise. Every part of things has been moved into place so that you would win us in the end, that you would win our hearts so that we would be yours. Thank you for that, Lord, and we trust in you to make it so. In Jesus' name, amen.

SPEAKER_00 57:44

Amen. Kathy, thank you so much for joining us on the show today. This has been a fun conversation.

SPEAKER_03 57:51

It's always fun to talk about God, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 57:54

It is. I love it. I cannot get enough of it. Thanks so much, Kathy. If this episode resonated with you, there are two things I'd like you to consider. Number one, rate and review the show. This will help other listeners find the show and get the same inspiration and encouragement you got from it. And number two, I would love for you to share this episode with someone you love and someone you think could benefit from hearing this particular episode. Also, if you would like to connect with me outside of this podcast, you can find everything related to me on my website, brendasavanu.com. There you can find my social media links if you'd like to follow. You can find a link to sign up for an email so that you can get weekly encouragement to your inbox, and you can find information about my book and coaching sessions. So, friends, thank you again so much for listening to this episode and thank you for considering sharing it with your friends. See you next time.