Restored & Rebuilt: Stephen & Tonya George on Faith, Divorce, and Finding Love Again

What happens when two people survive divorce, lean into God, and find each other on a dating app they were both about to delete?

This week, Lou sits down with Stephen and Tanya George — newlyweds with a story that is anything but ordinary. Between them, they have six kids, two painful divorces, and a faith that was tested, broken, and rebuilt from the ground up.

Tanya's 10-year-old son Cole set the ground rules before she even started dating: "Mom, you only need to ask one question — do they believe in Jesus as their Lord and Savior?" That simple standard changed everything.

In this episode, Stephen and Tanya open up about infidelity, the loneliness of single parenting, what it looks like to seek Christ first in a blended family, and how God used a halfway-point church to bring two broken families together into one. They also share how their restoration business — My Water Damage Hero — is a daily reflection of what God did in their own lives.

If you're in a blended family, navigating divorce, or wondering if God still has something good ahead for you — this one's for you.

Topics covered:

• Dating after divorce with faith as the filter
• Navigating blended family dynamics with grace
• Running a Christ-centered business
• How the local church became their lifeline
• Finding hope when you feel like quitting

More Than Conquerors Podcast is hosted by Lou Lepore. New episodes weekly. Email: morethanconquerorspodcast837@gmail.com Website: morethanconquerorspodcast.buzzsprout.com

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Transcript

Lou Lepore: Hello and welcome to the More Than Conquerors podcast. I'm your host, Lou Lepore. We are back for another episode, and we are thrilled to invite Steven and Tanya George on the show today. Steven and Tanya are newlyweds. Very exciting. But most importantly, they are walking with the Lord. Their story is quite unique, and I am very excited to dive in today with them. God is doing great things in their life, so let's roll. Steven and Tanya George, welcome to the More Than Conquerors podcast.

Tonya George: Thank you.

Stephen George: Thank you. Thanks for having us.

Lou Lepore: Delighted to have you, and we're celebrating because you're newlyweds.

Tonya George: Yes. It doesn't feel that way, but sure.

Lou Lepore: And so you are still on the honeymoon. However, you have just planned your honeymoon. Where are you guys going?

Stephen George: We're going to Japan.

Lou Lepore: To Japan. What's in Japan?

Stephen George: Um, for Tanya, it's Disneyland.

Tonya George: DisneySea in particular.

Stephen George: Yeah. And then for me, I just love all the Japanese food and stuff, and Tanya loves it, too, so.

Lou Lepore: How did you all meet?

Stephen George: We met on Match.com, and Tanya will give some more background to it, but I honestly was gonna delete the app, so I was like, you know what? This person seems reasonable. She wrote that she's a Christian. She has kids, and she's divorced just like I was, so I was like, let me just contact her. Gave her my number. I went for everything.

Lou Lepore: Stephen put the full court press on. All right. I see it. Let's flip it now. Tanya, so Match.com, Stephen reaches out. What were you thinking?

Tonya George: I just knew, like, from the start, it was just meant to be.

Lou Lepore: Your kids had some parameters for you — if you were gonna date, they were on it.

Tonya George: So my kids were taking this one hardcore, and my now 12-year-old was 10 at the time, and he, Cole, he said, "I'm sorry, Mom, if you're gonna be dating somebody, you need to date a Christian." And Cole told me, he's like, "Mom, you got one question to ask the guys before you talk to them, and that's do they believe in Jesus as their Lord and Savior?" And if they don't, then he's like, "You need to move on, because that's the only question that really matters."

Lou Lepore: That is some sound advice.

Tonya George: From a 10-year-old.

Lou Lepore: Not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. That's some sound advice from the 10-year-old. Leading from the front, I like it. So you're obviously married now. You got things going good, you got the honeymoon. But as you had shared, you both had previous relationships. So Tanya, about 2006, how did things start for you?

Tonya George: I had met Jay, and we started dating, and then we have four kids together. But as things end up happening, there was some infidelity along the course of the way, and we tried marriage counseling a few different times. But we weren't at a place in which we were happy with our lives or how things were going, and decided it was best to separate, and then eventually get divorced as well.

Lou Lepore: Would you at that time have called yourself a Christian?

Tonya George: So I would say that I had already accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior back when I was 16, but I can't say we were following a Christ-centered life, and definitely not a Christ-centered marriage. We very rarely went to church, even at the holidays. We didn't have a Bible in the house. We didn't talk about God or anything. Or if I did, I was the one that was telling stories to the kids. So it wasn't very well-supported, and it was nowhere a part of our marriage or our lives.

Lou Lepore: That's tough all around, Tanya. I really feel for you in that. And while that was going on, Stephen, you have your own story from 2014. What was going on with you?

Stephen George: So prior to 2014, I moved into Pennsylvania, like around 2011 or so. I was working in a metal company. Ran into Emily's father, who is my ex-wife now, and he introduced me to her. We got along and everything seemed good. We got married in 2014, and we had Sophia in 2015. Closer to the end, in 2016, after the kids came, things just drifted away. There was a lot of infidelity.

Lou Lepore: Brother, that is so tough. Infidelity, that's just a tough situation all around. And both of you, I know that you have handled it so well in leaning into Christ. But Steven, what happened next with your family?

Stephen George: March of 2020, she packed up and left with the kids, and this whole long, drawn out divorce played out, going into 2022 when it was finalized.

Lou Lepore: Did either one of you feel like asking, one, "God, where are you in all this?" And two, did either one of you say to yourselves, "I am never getting married again"?

Tonya George: So it's funny because any of the guys on any of the dating apps who mentioned marriage or more children, I immediately stopped contact with. I was like, "This is not for me." I was okay. I had a career in property management, and I had my kids, and I was able to pay my bills, and I was good. But I would say that through my marriage with Jay, I had felt like God had abandoned me, and I wasn't listening to the trials that were being presented to me. And instead of leaning into Him, I probably leaned more away from Him. Yet, once the divorce happened and after my kids got saved, me and my kids started focusing more on God and what His wishes were. And we said, "Okay, this is what's important to us, and any guy has to be able to come into this picture in order to accept that."

Lou Lepore: Steven, how about you?

Stephen George: I thought I wasn't listening to God. I was like, "God, why did you bring me to Nineveh?" I felt like Jonah. And then once we were at a church that could guide us and give us proper biblical teachings, it just all came together.

Lou Lepore: Divorce is finalized. You have your kids. You're trying to add God into your life and to be a part of that as you see the need. What did you perceive God's role was in your lives during that challenging time?

Stephen George: I was looking for some strength and guidance, honestly. I prayed and asked God, "Is this the right thing to do?"

Lou Lepore: Stephen, did you feel like the prodigal son?

Stephen George: So yes, very much like a prodigal son — not returning back to his father, but returning back to the Heavenly Father. It felt right.

Lou Lepore: And Tanya, you had an interesting story about your children bringing you back to God. There were some medical situations going on with your kids that you felt God used to draw you back?

Tonya George: When Cole was 10 years old, he got diagnosed with two rare brain disorders, and Cole had one question for me, and that was, "Why did God do this to me?" My oldest son was going through active addiction at the time, so it would've been really easy for Cole to just follow in those footsteps. But instead, we didn't even have a Bible in the house, and the kid just starts reading scriptures on his iPad and his computer, and he starts quoting them to me. And I'm like, "Whoa, you're talking from scriptures." That really drove us back to church, and then after I met Stephen, he introduced us to Valley Forge.

Lou Lepore: And you all were recently baptized there as well?

Tonya George: We were, yes. Me, Cole, and Gemma.

Lou Lepore: I hear the story of you guys seeking Christ first and finding each other second. What brought you two together despite all the negativity that you had faced in the past years?

Stephen George: I think it's faith. If you don't have faith, then you wouldn't be trusting in getting married again.

Tonya George: It just all really lined up. It's ironic and not all at the same time that Valley Forge Baptist was directly halfway in between my house and Stephen's house, so it was like a great meeting point. When we started seeing each other more, I took my kids to Awana. His kids were there. We saw each other on Sundays. We started doing more things with the church. We leaned into the church family. We turned to the pastors for counseling, the pastors' wives for assistance. And the church family just wrapped their arms around us and said, "We're here. We're gonna get you through this. We're gonna follow God's plan." And not that we didn't have any rough patches or some additional trials along the way, but it made following those trials much easier to understand and really listen to what God's word and message was.

Lou Lepore: So how did this open up the door for God to say, "Hey, you guys need to be together," and how did it enhance your relationship?

Tonya George: I had never had a man stand next to me in a church before. I knew after my first visit with Stephen to Valley Forge, I was like, "That's it. He's not coming here alone anymore. Me and the kids are gonna be here with him." And then we also took the marriage and the parenting classes offered by Pastor Wendell. And so each step, God had this outline for us, and we just had to follow it and knew that we were growing closer together, taking the words and the advice of the pastor I've heard, and Pastor Wendell especially. Even in our ministries and our ultimate goals, all of it just aligned.

Lou Lepore: I see the Bible coming to life right now as you share this story. Psalm 37:4 says, "Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart." And Matthew 6:33 says, "Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and then all these things will be added unto you." And that's what you were doing. You guys were pursuing Christ with all of your heart, and then God blessed you with this new marriage. So how has life changed since you got married?

Tonya George: There's been a lot of changes. Obviously, Cole, Gemma, and I did move in with Stephen, so we're all living in one house finally. And we also have a business together called My Water Damage Hero. It's fire, smoke, mold, and water restoration. And Cole, Gemma, and I were able to finalize our baptisms, so we did it all together as a family, and Stephen was up on stage with us because he had already been baptized many years before.

Lou Lepore: That's doer of the word stuff right there. That is awesome. And you guys have a really cool story about your business. You're doing restoration. Stephen, why don't you go ahead and tell everybody what makes that so special?

Stephen George: God restored me with family life, so we help restore families.

Lou Lepore: Awesome.

Stephen George: Yeah, it's been a great challenge. But honestly, I think God placed Tanya in my life — 'cause I needed her — more than she needed me, obviously. She's the reason the business is staying afloat and has continued. And she does plenty with the kids, but she does a lot for everyone else. And she doesn't really expect much for herself.

Lou Lepore: I'm thrilled that with the infidelity in your past, you guys didn't throw a holy hissy fit and just quit on marriage. You got back up when you were knocked down, and you put your trust in the Lord, and now He's blessing your moves because you're being doers of the Word. And speaking of, I would imagine with new customers, you have multiple opportunities to share your faith. Does anything like that ever come up?

Stephen George: Absolutely. We do have a lot of opportunities to talk to people. Every house we go to, actually, they will always ask us, "What are you guys doing outside?" We're like, "Well, we actually begin our day with a prayer, and then we go and do our work." And sometimes they'll ask us, "Can you pray for us? We have somebody that's sick or someone that's hurt." So we'll stop right on the spot and do it. It's helped us to tell our customers who our identity is. It's not just a business. It's a Christian-oriented business, and we know how to operate because of it.

Tonya George: And there's times too that we'll tell customers that we don't accept calls on Wednesday evenings or on Sundays because we're at church, and then they're like, "Oh, you go to church?" And it just opens up that door. I think too many people are often worried about speaking about their faith in fear of judgment and what other people might think, or that it might prevent a sale from occurring in their business. Whereas we don't shove it down anybody's throats, but at the same time, we open that conversation whenever we have the opportunity. And sometimes we make the opportunity by saying something just as simple as, "No, sorry, I can't come tonight. How about tomorrow? We're at church."

Stephen George: Yeah, Paul wrote Romans 1:16, "I'm not ashamed of the gospel."

Lou Lepore: And yet, at times, we can get sidetracked and forget to share our faith, and I'm so glad that you are in fact sharing your faith and showing people who you are. I'm fired up, guys. I love talking about sharing my faith and talking about how Jesus will enhance our lives. Look, if you're listening to this today and you don't know Jesus, you better hurry up. We're hogging all the fun. We're walking with the Lord. We're getting blessed. Our lives are changing. This is great. I love this. So as we move forward, let's quickly recap. Your marriage has been restored, and your relationship is strong. But I know from personal experience, blended families do have some challenges. So there are some things to overcome. What are some things that you navigate through that our listeners might be navigating through the same thing?

Stephen George: I will tell you, you gotta put your wife first. That's what a biblical marriage is. And it is hard sometimes. It's challenging.

Lou Lepore: I know from experience you wanna put your kids first because you do love them, and they are younger, and they are more vulnerable than your spouse. However, biblical marriage is your spouse is first, kids are second, and the temptation to just chase the heart of your kid and put your spouse second is always there. It's not that you don't love your children. You certainly, absolutely do. It's just that God said the family was complete with husband and wife, and then he blesses you with additions with children. Tanya, how about you?

Tonya George: Can be a logistic nightmare. I spend a lot of time of my day driving around in circles because that's exactly what it feels like. But luckily, Steven and I have a great relationship with my ex. He comes to visit three times a week, and we take the kids over there, and he's at all of our family functions and everything else. So we're very blessed with having a good co-parent relationship. And Steven's asked me as well as other people, "Well, how can you do this? How can you take a marriage that you were fighting like cats and dogs, and you had to get out of it in order to survive?" And I remember a sermon that Pastor Wendell gave. He said there was a lady who was asked why she forgave all those people who did all these bad things to her, and her answer was, "I chose not to remember."

Tonya George: So when my kids met Steven, initially they were very much, "This is not my dad. I'm not moving in with him. This will never happen." And then a year later, like, they love Steven. Gemma rates him a 10 out of 10 for stepdads. And she said that at a birthday party when a stranger asked her. That wasn't even a mom-prompted question. That makes it a much better situation, at least on our side, to make that juggling happen.

Lou Lepore: If you're a part of a blended family, I know you know what Tanya's talking about. I remember spending a lot of holiday time in the car driving to and from when I wanted to be at a house spending time with family. But praise the Lord for Wawa parking lots. Because many a lunch on Christmas, Easter, you name it, was a Wawa meal in the back of a car. And sometimes that happens. And you have to make it work. And every time that I felt that maybe I was shortchanged or why did this happen to me, my heart would get pricked by the Holy Spirit. And every question I asked God, the answer back was, "That's what Jesus did for you." And so as long as I have a savior who died for me and rose again, and said not only is he gonna guide me through my life, but he's gonna take care of everything in eternity, and I'm gonna be with him in heaven, those trials aren't as tough anymore. And it might not be what I desire, but it's what God has given me. And when Paul writes 2 Corinthians 12:9, and he says, "My grace is sufficient for you," you can rest in that. There's a lot of peace that happens when you think about that. I appreciate your story. And if you're listening out there and you're in this situation, number one, you're not alone, and number two, his grace is sufficient for you. Your job is to put God first, and take the next Jesus Christ-led step in your life. And if you're doing those things, God will bring about what he needs in his will to be brought about, and you can trust him. He is faithful, he is always good, and he's with you in the valley. So how has God grown your relationship with him during your time now as a family?

Stephen George: Well, a lot of the stuff that I didn't even grow up doing, we do now. Talk to each other, communicate, and actually work out some of these feelings and things that people are dealing with every single day. You wouldn't believe it — I learned a lot more from Gemma, the seven-year-old, than I have from anyone else, because she fights her way through a lot of stuff and challenges, but then she'll always come back to, "That's not what Jesus would do." So it's a great thing to learn from somebody that young.

Lou Lepore: Isn't it funny how the Holy Spirit uses kids? Like, all the time. Not sometimes.

Stephen George: All the time. And then also to see Cole, when I asked him about his brain disorders, you know what he says? He's like, "That's not who I am. I just want to be a kid. I just want to be regular. But I want to talk to people about Jesus and have them live a good life. That brain disorder isn't me." That shows me so much mental growth for him. He's 12 years old, and his brain disorder is kind of part of his identity, but he says, "That's not me."

Lou Lepore: It's a little spiritual growth too, I believe. That is putting on the whole armor of God and the fruit of the spirit being peace. That is peace that passes all understanding to know that God's got it, and I don't have to worry — and some great spiritual maturity from that young man as well. So what would you say to the blended family who's struggling to stay faithful to God when they don't see fruit in their life from righteous living?

Stephen George: So I will say this one thing. You have to stick with it. It's like, if you are an athlete, you miss 100 shots, and then you make one — that one might lead you to another 100 that you make. So if you don't give it an actual good try, like faithful — I'm gonna do this until I see something. Or I don't need to see anything right away, but I'm gonna trust that it's gonna be happening. There has to be faith. Without faith, we're not gonna be anything.

Tonya George: In a blended family, we always said it's not a replacement, it's an addition. And to be able to have somebody who is Christian, who loves them so much, be able to help influence them, it's helpful. But we do not — not that we're perfect, because we're far from it — and one thing that Steven taught me was that you don't have to engage in the argument. You can stop the argument. You can pause, and then you can come back to it and say, "Well, wait a second. Why am I acting this way?" And we've been able to ask each other those questions better, but then also with the kids, and then the kids get out their feelings so that they're not so frustrated, and then they feel more peaceful and more safe and more secure, especially having so much turbulence and shakeups and everything else.

Lou Lepore: What advice do you give to someone listening to this thinking their life is over and they can't keep up with the challenges any longer?

Stephen George: I can do all things through Christ that strengtheneth me. There was times when I was just like, "What else is there now? I have kids. I'm divorced. I have nothing else to do. I'm just not gonna do anything. I'm just gonna work on my business and maybe someday retire." But that kept popping up in my head — I need to ask for strength from God to see what else there is left for my life, 'cause there's no way that this is all that God has for me. So that verse really amplified what it is I wanted to do in my life. And believe me, that's the strength that most people need. It's not their own.

Tonya George: I would say that they just need to have patience and understanding, because there's so many moving parts with so many different personalities. By going back to the Bible, by praying, by praying with my kids, that allowed for a man like Steven to enter our lives. And when we continue that — where we read the Bible together, we do pray together, we step back and say, "Well, wait a second. Is that what Jesus would do?" — then the kids start asking those questions. It really helps keep us on our toes. And I really encourage anyone to join a church like Valley Forge Baptist, because not only did we have the marriage classes complemented by the parenting classes, but our ABF that we were paired with was perfect for us. Plus, you're mingling with other Christians who are going through similar things. Everybody was really supportive with us, and that was very helpful.

Lou Lepore: I am so thrilled that you were able to be on the show today and share some of the wisdom that God has given you during this season of life. This is a challenging situation, for sure, but you guys are handling it with grace. You're doing very well together. You're serving one another, and of course, the Lord, your heavenly Father, as well. And we thank you so much for being on the show today.

Stephen George: Thank you. Thank you, Lou. Thanks for having us.

Lou Lepore: There you have it. Steven and Tanya George are on it. They are dialed in, chasing Jesus with all their hearts, and the fruit is proof that they are doing just that. If you have any questions about today's episode or accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you can email us at morethanconquerorspodcast837@gmail.com, or visit our website, morethanconquerorspodcast.buzzsprout.com. Be sure to like and follow our show on social media. And as always, tune in next week for another edition of the More Than Conquerors podcast, where today's test is tomorrow's testimony. I'm your host, Lou Lepore, and we'll catch you next week. God bless.