S3 | Ep.14 Reflection Episode: Tracing Kathleen Johnson's Memorial Stones

In this reflection episode, Brenda unpacks one powerful memorial stone from her conversation with speaker, author, and Bible teacher Kathleen Johnson—widely known as Scripture Girl. Kathleen’s story of emerging from fear, an unwanted divorce, and people-pleasing into a deep, scripture-rooted identity in Christ becomes a vivid picture of Memorial Stone 10: Benjamin—Son (Daughter) of the Right Hand. Brenda traces how Kathleen learned to think it, see it, and say it—internalizing God’s Word until it transformed her from the inside out—and invites you to consider where God may be calling you to shift your gaze from the horizontal to the vertical.

Listen to the episode Brenda is reflecting on here.
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About Kathleen Johnson

Kathleen Johnson, widely known as Scripture Girl, is a dynamic Christian speaker, author, and teacher with a passion for helping believers experience the transformative power of God’s Word. After navigating seasons of chronic pain, addiction, and paralyzing fear, Kathleen discovered the life-changing impact of Scripture memory, meditation, fasting, and prayer. These disciplines ignited a chain reaction of freedom, healing, and intimacy with God—and awakened a mission to help others experience the same. She is the author of Scripture Girl, Healed to Heal, Kingdom Authority, Something to Forgive, and Spirit Prayer, and hosts both the Healed to Heal and Scripture Girl podcasts. Kathleen lives in Franklin, Tennessee with her husband and family, joyfully pursuing her calling to help others walk in the fullness of Christ.

Connect with Kathleen:

🌐 Websites: kathleenjohnsonministries.com & scripturegirl.com
📚 Books: Scripture Girl, Healed to Heal, Kingdom Authority, Something to Forgive, Spirit Prayer
🎙️ Podcast: Healed to Heal Podcast
💻  Facebook | Instagram | YouTube
Chapters
00:00 Welcome & Introduction
02:16 Fear vs. Faith: You Can’t Hold Both at Once
04:09 Kathleen’s Mission: Helping Others as She Continues to Receive Help
05:30 The Unwanted Divorce and the Fear That Remained
08:00 The Night It Changed: “Don’t You Know God Doesn’t Want Us to Be Afraid?”
10:00 Horizontal vs. Vertical Validation
12:44 The Practice of Presence: Staying in the Moment
15:02 David, Goliath, and the Power of Psalm 23
17:05 Kingdom Authority: Living from Victory
18:30 Think It, See It, Say It — A Practical Framework for Scripture Application
19:31 Memorial Stone 10: Benjamin—Daughter of the Right Hand
20:30 Season Wrap-Up & Thank You

#RememberGod #brendasavanhu #memorialstones #ScriptureGirl #KathleenJohnson #FearVsFaith #IdentityInChrist #KingdomAuthority #ScriptureMemory #ChristianWomen #BibleMeditation #ThinkItSeeItSayIt #HealedToHeal #FaithOverFear #VerticalValidation

Start documenting your own “Memorial Stones” today.

Transcript

0:02

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 the places where God has shown up in the past, giving you the tools and 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. Friends, today I am so excited to reflect on my conversation with Kathleen Johnson. If you have not heard that episode yet, I encourage you to go back and listen to it. The link is in the show notes. I so enjoyed my conversation with Kathleen, and we now have an ongoing relationship where we touch base at least weekly. Kathleen is a speaker, Bible teacher, and an author who goes by the name Scripture Girl. She is passionate about helping believers actually know, truly know who they are in Christ. What struck me about Kathleen's story is that her journey to becoming Scripture Girl did not start in a place of strength, but it began in a place of fear and disorientation. And then she learned how to apply scripture to her life and come out of that place of fear. And I'm gonna do things a little bit differently today, reflecting on the episode with Kathleen. I normally trace three memorial stones, but I'm actually only going to do one for her simply because I felt like it was the overall theme of what she shared in the experiences she shared about her life. Okay, one of the things that we talked about with Kathleen was fear versus faith. She said you can't be in a state of fear and faith at the same time. And the reason we were talking about that was she said she really liked the idea of my podcast Remembering God, because when you remember God, you automatically remove your gaze from the challenging things. You remove your gaze from the obstacles, and you put your gaze on him. You put your eyes on him. And when you do that, it boosts your faith, right? It just reminds you that no, God is surely for me. And it just takes that focus off of the bad thing or the challenging thing that we're going through. The first place I would like to start in reflecting on my interview with Kathleen was she said her emerging mission statement is to help others as she continues to get help from God. Now, Kathleen has a book called Healed to Heal, and it's all about uh having received healing, right, or help from God, and then now having received victory in those areas, then helping others do that. And what really struck me about talking to Kathleen was her whole monica, right, Scripture Girl, where she teaches people how to memorize scripture and actually and not just memorize it, but actually apply it to their lives. And I was just really, really fascinated with that. And so a lot of my questions were around that, around when she shared some of her life circumstances, just about how she learned how to apply scripture to those places in her life. And one of the major events she uh shared in her life was an unwanted divorce. She was in a marriage where uh she realized that they were unequally yoked and things started happening there. And she said things like fear came up in that marriage, and she ended up divorced. And she realized that in even with the divorce and that spouse going away, she continued to have fear. And she also mentioned that she was holding that marriage up as an idol. One of the things she said was that she realized that she was she wasn't as rooted and grounded in God as she should have been. And Kathleen grew up in a faith-based household. And so after that divorce, she realized that she needed to start seeking God and studying and learning and growing in the word so that she could find deeper intimacy with. And when she did that, she realized that he was always there and he was always looking for her, but she hadn't been looking for him. And then um, that became the foundation for Scripture Girl. And so as we dug a little bit deeper, I asked her about her Scripture Girl testimony that really started right after her divorce. She started dating again, but this fear was still in her. And she said she was talking to a guy and he stopped her in the middle of the conversation they were having and said, Kathleen, don't you know that God doesn't want us to be afraid? And she said that she knew it, right? She knew it in her head. She knew that it was in the Bible 365 times. She had even posted it on Facebook, but she said she had forgotten it. And when he said that, she realized she needed to confront that. And so that night she poured her heart out to God and said, Lord, Father, I don't want to live like this. Help me. And that was the beginning of her surrender. That was the beginning of her starting to internalize the scriptures that she was memorizing, right? And that so resonated with me because for myself, I have memorized scripture. But as I was talking to Kathleen, I was like, have I really internalized it? And so she said she just started practicing, doing that, practicing, meditating on those scriptures, seeing them. And especially this one about not being afraid. She just started thinking about that, meditating on it, seeing it until it had an impact on her. And so that was the beginning of Kathleen becoming scripture girl. And so I started asking her to explain to me what this practically looks like. And she said the first thing would be being aware. So, rewinding a little bit, Kathleen said when she was in this dating season after her divorce, she realized she wanted people to love her and that a lot of what she was doing was based on wanting to be loved, wanting to please people. And God was starting to show that in her, that you're more concerned about how people love you, accept you, than you are about me. And so I asked her, What did that look like practically when you were applying scripture to that? And so she gave some notes. God helped her become aware that you're so concerned with people pleasing. And then the second thing she said was that once you become aware, realizing that God has given us a way to overcome. And so looking at the scriptures that she was referring to, she realized that, okay, Lord, you're showing me this. But as I think about these scriptures, apply these scriptures, seek you, I will be able to overcome this because you've given me a way to overcome this. And it was so interesting because she said she was seeking validation from horizontal sources, right? But when you seek validation from horizontal sources, you're going to get jerked around constantly because people aren't trustworthy. That's literally what she said. Um, but then when you seek validation vertically from God, then you get unconditional love, faithfulness, and he never leaves us nor forsakes us. So as she went through this dating journey, the Lord just started to peel back these layers as she leaned more and more into him, peel back these layers of seeking this horizontal validation versus the vertical validation until she really got it, until she really understood and just knew it, knew it, knew it, knew it, knew it, that it is God who loves her and it is him for whom she needs to be most concerned about rather than everybody else. And, you know, we talked about being present. And one of the things Kathleen said was she learned in that season, she also learned to be present in the moment because there's a part of us that's always looking back, looking forward, but we end up missing our entire lives because we're not focusing on the present. And that really resonated with me because I think it's so true that when we are not focused on what's happening in the present and we're thinking of what's gonna happen in the future, or we miss the character work that God is wanting to do with us in that place. And so when Kathleen went through that season, she started to realize, right, the character work that God was doing in her because she stayed present in the moment and she stopped looking elsewhere. So, friends, if there's something that you can take away, that is that Kathleen also mentioned one of her favorite stories in the Bible is uh David's story, when David goes up to Goliath and takes Goliath down. And a light bulb went off in my head when she said this. She said, David was a man after God's own heart. He was constantly saying, The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want, and that this is who you are, God, and this is who I am, that he was affirming the wonderful things about God and expecting God to be that. So when she said that, a light bulb just went off in my head. And I said to her, I hadn't thought of Psalm 23 in that way. David did say, The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want, but I hadn't thought of it that he was actually visualizing God in that way. Um, and that he was affirming God's character and saying, You are my shepherd, and I shall not want. And so when he went up to Goliath, he knew he had no lap. He knew that the Lord was with him as his shepherd. I don't know if it shifted something for you, but that just shifted something for me in my brain. I've known Psalm 23 since uh childhood. I memorized it as a child, but I hadn't thought of really meditating on it and seeing it in my mind's eye that I have no lack. So I thought that was really powerful. And Kathleen wrote a book called Kingdom Authority, which I read. And it's really just practical application of, you know, we we've we've grown up memorizing scripture, but are we seeing that scripture being applied to our lives and us defeating circumstances, right? And living from a place of victory. And so that was just that was so powerful to me, just listening to that. I think for me, I felt like talking to Kathleen was like a masterclass. It felt like a masterclass in scripture, memorization, application, and kingdom authority, this book that she wrote. It was very impactful for me. And so I asked Kathleen to just give us some practical examples of internalizing scripture. And she gave us three points. She said, think it, see it, say it. Think it is the meditation, meditating on that scripture and seeing it, right? Just seeing it, think about it until you see it in your mind's eye. And an example she gave was that if you see yourself under attack, then think of yourself as strong and think of yourself as overcoming that, as you're meditating on that scripture, speaking it as well, right? So even as you're seeing it in your mind, and then speak it, speak it out aloud and put yourself in it, right? Like there is no condemnation for me in Jesus. And I really enjoyed that. The reason I'm saying I'm only pulling one or picking up one memorial stone for Kathleen's story, it's because I felt like it was just an amalgamation of all of these things, right? And so the memorial stone I picked for her was Memorial Stone in Betan Benjamin, daughter of the right hand. Because as Kathleen shared with me about how she memorizes scripture and how she applies it to her life, to me, it was like, oh, she knows who she is in Christ. She knows who she belongs to, and she knows how to apply the resources and the tools that God has given her. And so that is the memorial stone I traced for Kathleen over everything she shared with me. So, friend, uh maybe this episode with Kathleen was more for me than anyone else, but it really, really resonated with me very deeply. And I'm definitely practicing the things that she shared in that episode. And so, friends, thank you so, so much for listening. I wanted to share some show updates as well. The episode I just did with Kathleen was the last of my interview episodes for the season. And this episode today is the last episode for the season. And so I just want to say thank you for being with me on this journey of remembering God. It hasn't come to an end. We're just taking a break. And if you joined us in the middle of this journey, I started Remember God in uh November of 2025. And the first season was just on the concept of remembering God. What does it mean? And we went through some scriptures over several episodes. And then season two was focused on my book, Memorial Stones, a guided devotional journal of foundational miracles in your life. And so if you just want an if overview of my book, you can go to season two of Remember God. And then season three, which is what I'm concluding right now, was focused on interviews with friends. I had such a blast interviewing the women who came onto my podcast: Tiffany, Kathy, Pat, Jan, Hadassah, Jessica, and Kathleen. And it was such a fantastic time with all of them. And I am excited to continue interviews as I continue this podcast. So, friends, I just wanted to say thank you for that. Thank you for being part of this journey. And we'll talk soon when we resume with season four. Thanks again, friends. 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.