Ep. 14 - Character over Comfort: Becoming Who God Can Trust

Elizabeth Everett delivers a direct and deeply personal message about the tension between calling and character, challenging listeners to examine who they truly are behind closed doors. Drawing from her own journey through pride, pressure, and brokenness, she reveals how a lack of discipline, integrity, and surrender can quietly sabotage the very promises we pray for.

She confronts the reality that not every closed door is spiritual warfare. Some are consequences of unrefined character. Through repentance, accountability, and daily renewal, Elizabeth shares how God strips away what is not aligned in order to prepare us for what is. This episode explores the cost of chasing validation, the weight of striving without surrender, and the hard truth that transformation requires dying to the old self.

Grounded in scripture and real-life conviction, this message calls for a deep heart check. It invites listeners to stop blaming others, confront repeated patterns, and take ownership of their spiritual growth. True healing begins not just with revelation, but with responsibility.

This is not about condemnation. It is about refinement, obedience, and becoming someone who can sustain the blessings they are asking for. God is not withholding from you. He is preparing you.

Learn more about: Advocates for Africa & Happy Horizons Children's Ranch

Grab your copy of Elizabeth’s new book, The Breaking: The Season That Almost Took Me Out and the God Who Didn't, here!

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Transcript

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What if the delay in your life isn't the enemy? What if it's God? Waiting for your character to catch up for your calling. Because God will give you purpose, but He won't sustain it in you without character. Some of us, we're not stuck, we're just being developed. I'm Elizabeth Everett, and this is Grace in the Breaking. Today's episode, it's not going to inspire you. It's the one that's going to confront you. It's going to confront your calling and the character that you're carrying. Because today we're going to examine that character. Not the version that you want everyone else to see. Not the version of the happy go-lucky you are at work. Not the version of the perfect Christian on Sundays. Not the version you post. Not the version that people applaud, or not the version that gets all the validation. But who are you when no one's looking? Who are you behind closed doors? Who are you Monday through Friday? Who are you on the phone with other people? Have you thought to contemplate that? Listen, I am not, I repeat, I am not coming to you from a place of perfection. Yet today I'm coming to you from a place of repentance and from real revelation. I'm going to give you my personal accountability. It's raw. It's real. Because there was once a version of me that was so tied up in validation and so tied up in people's perception of me. Because listen, I wanted the success. I wanted every bit of that promise that went along with it. But you know what I did not have? That was tearing me up inside, just breaking me to pieces all the time. I didn't have the discipline. Do you have the discipline? Are you wanting the promise so badly? I did. I did not have the integrity to sustain it. Because who I was behind closed doors started coming out and showing in my character altogether. Now, listen, if you were to go and talk to an account that I used to call on, I was no nonsense. If I told you I was going to do it, I was going to do it. I had accountability for myself as far as that went. But I was wrapped up full of pride, full of intensity. That scared a lot of people. My character was tied to the validation or what goal I was reaching for and pulling it down. Because of that, I reacted out of emotions all the time. I reacted out of fear. I held on to things that God told me to release forever. Listen, hard-headed right here, the most hard-headed person you will have ever met, but God. When I wouldn't let go of some of those things as he was trying to shape my character, he had to literally bring me to my knees and strip me of everything. My heart was so hardened that had become my character. So no matter how hard I tried in my own strength or no matter what I accomplished, I couldn't sustain that. Because again, the integrity of my character was crushing under the pressure. God wants to give you good things. He wants to give you extraordinary things. You got to think big, you got to think bold, you got to pray bold prayers. But you also have to listen to God. Because if I'm being honest, some of the doors that closed in my life over my career, relationships, et cetera, they weren't spiritual attacks. They were actually consequences of my character. Because I'm going to tell you something. You can pray and pray and pray and pray and pray till the Lord finally says, you know what? Fine. She's not going to shut up. I'm going to give this to her. Be careful what you pray for, because you might just get it all, and then some you don't want. Those are the consequences of the character. Hmm. I want you to think about that. How many times have we thought we had everything in the world all of a sudden for it to slip through our fingers just like that? Well, I know if it's happened to me, it can happen to you. And if it's happened to you, it can happen to me. So it's a daily walk and a discipline in refinement. Refinement hurts. The pruning hurts, but it's worth it. Galatians 6 7 reminds us: do not be deceived. God is not mocked, and a man reaps what he sows. This means we don't just reap blessings, we reap behavior. Man, the last year that I won like 11 awards that year, like I'm gonna tell you what, pinnacle of success, wrapped up in pride, took validation for everything that I had going on, every award. Not the people that I recognize that helped me get there, not my assistant who worked her butt off, not my family for putting up me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me. See the repetitive pattern? That was the type of character that I had. Like again, accountability for people at work seeking validation from the wrong places and striving each and every day to be better than the next, putting the kind of pressure on myself that would crush anyone in their right mind. And guess what? It did. I'm human. Hello. We're not meant to walk with mantles like that continuously. We will implode, and that's just what God let me do. He hit me, let me hit the rock bottom to break my hardened heart into pieces. Because, see, what you saw at work was not what was going on behind closed doors. Remember, the Bible tells us what is happening in the dark will be brought to light. In a moment of revelation, how many times do we rebuke the enemy? When we start feeling an attack or a pressure, we just automatically assume it's the enemy. But we're ignoring the repetitive patterns that we have. We're not taking a self-evaluation or looking at it with eyes of awareness to see how this came about. Did this happen last week? Did this happen last month? What can I do to change this? Lord help me. I mean, we pray for elevation all the time. But then when God starts to bring us into a revelatory moment to open our eyes to go, aha, we resist the correction. What does that say about our character? Every day is a refining practice. Every day is a day to get better and better and better and better versions of ourselves to please our Father above. Because we're flesh. We want to react out of emotion and flesh. We want to react out of fear in our flesh. These are all tied to our character. We want to take on the mindset and be renewed with God daily. So we have to pick up that cross and go. God's not just after our outcome, He's after our formation. The surrender, the refining, what is forged in the fire produces an oil and an anointing that lets you step into the power and authority that lives inside you that you wouldn't have been able to get to without. So I want you to think about this transformation scripture, 2 Corinthians 5.17. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old is passed away, and the new has come. Here's the truth: no one talks about becoming a new creation, coming to God. You got to let go of every old version of you. You have to let it die. You cannot keep resurrecting it. So let me recap. Human flesh. So back when again at that pinnacle, and I was a bulldog. I was intimidating. I wasn't nice to co-workers. I was had one fact focused in on being successful, better than anyone else, and in anything it took to get to the top and stay at the top, I was willing to do. I sacrificed my family. I sacrificed my health. I sacrificed my mental capacity. I did it all. My character, man, it was misshapen. And it cost me almost everything. I was going to take my life due to the pressure. But God. So when I met God and things started changing, it wasn't like a wave of a wand, oh, you're better, Elizabeth. It was a continuous pattern that's still going on today. The conviction I feel in my stomach, the stripping away of small pieces, not to manage it, not to justify my actions, not to rename it, but to kill every part of me that is not of him. Revelation. Conviction. It's all right there. I want you to ask yourself: do you keep repeating the same cycles and blaming different people? This is a deep heart check, friends. I know for a long time I did. Like I still had stuff that was rooted in rejection and I didn't even know it till it was brought to my attention. So thank you, Lord Jesus, for my friends and my family listening today. Because I love them so much, you have given me the wisdom to let them answer this question. Are you letting, are you acting out in fear and calling it discernment? Are you making excuses when he tells you to move? Oh, well, God told me, so I'm not ready to surrender that. Like God's gonna tell me the day and the time. Come on, girl, please. I've been there. Come on, man. Conviction, we feel it, keeps popping up and resonating our head. If it's resonating in our head, he's working on us. Are you gonna die to your flesh? You wanna keep picking up whatever you're picking up at night when you get home? Is that really giving you comfort? Is it helping your sleep? Would you be doing that if Jesus sat down beside you? Look, I have my little Jesus on my desk. He's sitting beside me. So am I going to smoke a joint? Am I going to overindulge in wine and become a drunkard? No, I'm not going to do that with Jesus sitting beside me. So if I'm not going to do that with Jesus sitting beside me, are you really going to wanting to do that when you're sitting alone behind closed doors? No condemnation here, no perfection here, repentance and conviction and revelation is where I'm coming from. Because healing does not begin with your revelation of things, it becomes with your responsibility of picking up that cross and carrying it daily. A refining scripture for me was James 1, 2 through 4. Consider it pure joy that wherever whenever you face trials, because the testing of faith produces perseverance, let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete and lacking nothing. Whoo! I don't know about you, but it is hard sometimes when the waves of life and the waves of opposition, the harder you try to do better, the harder you get hit. That's your flesh. That opposition, stand proudly and go, yes, God, yes, God, I know you are with me. Greater are you than in, greater are you that in is in me than he that is in this world. So I'm going to stand and keep moving forward because I know that the opposition means I'm moving in the right direction. Praise the Lord. Because I'm going to tell you something, friends. You're not being punished in all of this. You're being perfected. So when emotions pop up, thank you, Father. That piece of me seems to be unhealed. Lord, help me to lay it down for you. Help me to lay it down so that we can work on this together so that I may be set free, set free indeed by the Son Himself, because your word says it. So how do we overcome all this? How do we overcome it practically? How do we overcome it spiritually? Number one, we're gonna repent without excuses. This is where we get stuck. Oh, well, I'm gonna do it tomorrow. Um, I'm gonna start on Friday, or I'm gonna start on the weekend, or let me give you an example. How many of you on New Year's Eve, oh, you make all of these New Year's resolutions, right? And they sound great and you're fired up. Then life starts to happen, your flesh starts to take over, and slowly but surely by March, you've like died off the pattern with it all. Character refinement is going to require discipline on your part. We're human, I know it's hard, but you can do it. I believe in you, and we are never alone with the help of the father. It's an all possibilities atmosphere. There's nothing too hard for the father. So when's the last time you asked for his help in this? You want the platform, you want the elevation, you want the promotion, but are you willing to go through the refinement? Are you willing for the correction? Why are you resisting it? Correction, conviction, leads to surrender and forged in the fire. This produces the oil, the oil that no one can take away from you. You can give it away. You can give it away freely if you so choose, but no one's gonna take it from you. Repent without your excuses. Not if I hurt someone. No, honey, own it. You know what? I'm sorry, son, that I yelled at you. I let my emotions take over. I had a bad day and I let that play on you. I'm sorry. I should have been a better example to you than to lose it at all ends. My apologies. Take ownership when you overreact. Take ownership if it's your fault. Take ownership. 1 John 1:9 says, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive. The word literally says it. Why are you staying in a sense of condemnation over yourself? Bring anything that's suppressed in the back of you to the light. Then you know what? The enemy has nowhere to hold on to you. Oh, that happened in the past. Let me go on and tell you about it and put it out there. Because then there's no shame, there's no condemnation. It's out there. What are you gonna do? You can't change the past. But you can show how God changed you from the past, how he molded you, how he shaped you, how you went through the correction and didn't resist it. You are a new creation. Walk in it. Walk into the room like God sent you. Hold your head up high, hold your shoulders back and speak with eloquence. Look people in the eye. Let your light shine outward. It doesn't matter what they say about you. It doesn't matter what you've done in the past. Matters at who you have become through him. Not in your own strength, not by your own mind, but by his spirit. You didn't do, you don't have the power to change, but he has the power to change you. So are you ready? Surrender it today. You have to renew your mind daily to be changed. How do you think that's gonna happen? First of all, you need to look at who you're hanging around with. Do you have the same ambitions or are you stuck in the repetitive cycles? Are there excuses being made all around you? Or you mess up and instead of someone bringing loving correction, are they going, you know what? It's okay, you just try again tomorrow. You want accountability. You want structure. You want love. You want some, you want friends around you that can push you into your destiny that prophetically activate you. You hang around with a drinker, you're gonna be a drinker. Let's just call the spade a spade what it is. You're wanting to change, take an evaluation at everything you're subjecting yourself to, everything that you're compromising in your character, what you're doing behind closed doors, that you wouldn't have a camera out doing a live on social media showing it. Think about that. Can't think about the analogy of having Jesus sit next to you. Would you put that out live on social media where it's out there and you can't take it back? Something to ponder. Reading that Bible daily is going to be a roadmap. You may not notice it right at first, but I can guarantee you, you get 12 weeks consistently reading a Bible, a chapter a day, you start to change. The word actually becomes part of you. You start to have a piece that doesn't even make sense anymore. The old you would have done this, but the character is changing in the middle. It's changing, it's transforming into a child that loves Jesus, that speaks about Jesus. Your character changes. The old is gone, the new springs forth. Do you not perceive it? Isaiah 43, 18 and 19. Forget the former things. Do not look back at your old life. Do not resist the correction. Rise up and walk in it. Romans 12, 2. Do not conform, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Man, you read that Bible, you start to have a problem, you go, I'm gonna, I'm gonna stop, drop, and pray. One, two, three, holy ghosts, one, two, three, holy ghosts, one, two, three, holy ghosts. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Whatever it takes to center yourself right back, get in that word. Mind is renewed. Take back what the enemy stole. Because your transfer mo transformation isn't a moment, it is a discipline. Your character is only built when obedience costs you or me something. I know for me, the breaking, my book came out, and it shows what walking in obedience cost me. What everything that was stripped from me, it wasn't rejection, it was protection. It was the removal and it was the correction to bring me to a place that I could stand before you and help pull you out from what I was attached to, to give you hope, to show that there is redemption and love and no condemnation, no shame through Jesus Christ. So I'm gonna tell you what God is not preparing the blessing for you. He is preparing you for the blessing because he's ready and waiting to give it to you. But he doesn't want to give it to you all at once. You know why? Because it will crush you. You're praying for that husband that loves you. But are you mentally ready? Is your mind expanding? To be able to receive that safe love, to be able to submit and feel calm and peace and let someone lead you. Or if you're the husband, are you ready to step up and lead a family the way God intended for the two of you to chase Jesus together and expand the kingdom? He prepares us before the promise. It's not punishment. Delay is not a denial. It is preparation. It is building our character. Because if your character doesn't change, the very thing you prayed for will be the very thing that breaks you into a million pieces. Do you really want to go through that again? Or do you see where the correction refines you, builds you, and molds you, and that God's timing is perfect? Isaiah 60, 22 says, In its time, I will do it swiftly, says the Lord. And he will. So today I kind of have a closing prayer for us. This is where we're gonna stand strong and we're gonna be surrendered. Lord, put your hands up. Lord, search me. Not the version I show people, but the real me. Expose anything in me that is not aligned with you. Break off my pride. Break off my defensiveness. Break every pattern that keeps me bound. Create me in a clean heart, O Father, and renew a right spirit within me, according to Psalms 51:10. I don't just want your promises, I want your transformation in Jesus' name. In Jesus' mighty name, amen. If this episode hit you, it is not condemnation, it's an invitation. You're not being you're not stuck, you're being shaped. And if you're ready to break what's breaking you, check out graceinthebreaking.com and join our community of accountability. We meet once a week on live Zoom. We have curriculum, we have a daily prayer devotional. Listen, we're family accountability. We leave no one behind. And as always, friends, if you want to do something bigger than yourself, check out Happy Horizons Children's Home. Donations are needed for a transition home for those who have been rescued out of sexual trafficking and exploitation. Are you willing to sacrifice your Starbucks coffee for a month? Do you have$39 to give a child hope? School, clean water, and food? Then check out Advocates for Africa in Rwanda. This is in the bush. Give some hope. And as always, friends, I love you. Till next time. Thank you so much for spending this time with me today on Grace and the Breaking. If this episode spoke to your heart, please remember to follow, download, and share it with someone who might need a little encouragement right now. You can find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and all major podcast platforms. As I close, I want to leave you with this reminder. My grace is sufficient for you. My power is made perfect in weakness. So no matter what season you're walking through, you are not alone. And there is always Grace in the Breaking. For more information, resources, or to connect with me, visit GraceIndheaking.com or email me at info at graceinthebreaking.com. Until next time, friends, stay rooted in faith, hold on to hope, and remember that there's grace in the breaking.