Revelation Within On the Go!
Finding Peace Through Surrender: Lori Johnson's journey
What if the secret to lasting peace and contentment lies in a deeper spiritual connection rather than diets or external fixes? Join us as Lori Johnson returns to share her profound journey with Revelation Within. From battling weight issues and giving up alcohol after her husband's death to dealing with a difficult boss, caring for parents with Alzheimer's, and navigating grief and retirement, Lori's story highlights the transformative power of faith and surrender. Learn how her commitment to spiritual disciplines, like personalized scripture and prayer, has brought her emotional and spiritual healing, leading to a heart transformation beyond weight loss. Discover how true contentment comes from a deeper spiritual connection, offering hope and encouragement to anyone on a journey of faith and transformation.
Get details about our class starting July 17th at https://www.revelationwithin.org/blueprint
Learn more about our Revelation Within Community: https://www.revelationwithin.org
What if the secret to lasting peace and contentment lies in a deeper spiritual connection rather than diets or external fixes? Join us as Lori Johnson returns to share her profound journey with Revelation Within. From battling weight issues and giving up alcohol after her husband's death to dealing with a difficult boss, caring for parents with Alzheimer's, and navigating grief and retirement, Lori's story highlights the transformative power of faith and surrender. Learn how her commitment to spiritual disciplines, like personalized scripture and prayer, has brought her emotional and spiritual healing, leading to a heart transformation beyond weight loss. Discover how true contentment comes from a deeper spiritual connection, offering hope and encouragement to anyone on a journey of faith and transformation.
Get details about our class starting July 17th at https://www.revelationwithin.org/blueprint
Learn more about our Revelation Within Community: https://www.revelationwithin.org
Hi, welcome to our podcast Revelation Within On the Go. I'm Heidi Biles-Maepperson, one of your hosts and the owner and lead coach of the Revelation Within ministry.
Speaker 2:And I'm Christina Motley, your other host, also a Revelation Within coach, and Heidi's partner in all things Revelation Within. We are so happy to invite you to join us for this episode of Revelation Within on the go. Well, this is one of the special, special ones, because we have Lori Johnson with us today and we are so excited.
Speaker 1:We asked Lori to join us again. She was one of our, if not the very first interview we ever did when we started our podcast a couple of years ago, and her story has continued to develop, so we wanted to have her back to hear more.
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, and we just adore Lori, we adore her and we're just so excited that she's here.
Speaker 3:Well, I adore you too, so both of you have really been such a part of the change in my life.
Speaker 2:Oh well, we're just absolutely over the moon to have you here today. Lori Heidi, do you want to start us off?
Speaker 1:Sure, well, lori, let's start at the beginning and give people who have not yet met you a chance to kind of get acquainted, and then we'll dive more deeply into other parts that we're excited to hear about as well. So, lori, tell the podcast audience, won't you and us remind us how and when did you find thin within, which, of course, is now revelation within?
Speaker 3:we would love to be reminded of that story gosh, it was years ago, um, that I found it, though I don't think it really sunk in until probably two and a half years ago. But years ago, um, I had started with a uh, secular sort of what kind of eating is it called Hunger and fullness, intuitive, thank you Eating, and so I always believed that that was what would work for me. And then I heard of another program I don't know if I should say the name, but and I did that for a while it was Christian but it was the sort of intuitive eating, hunger, fullness kind of thing. And then that became a little difficult. And at the same time I read Judy Halliday's book and thought, oh my gosh, this is exactly what I'm looking for, and found out about thin within through that. So I used to do the studies, but I did them on my own. I would get the workbooks and do them and did that for a long time, and then I would sort of go away from it all and I would try things in between. You know, I've had a weight problem since, or an eating problem. I should say it's that really since puberty, you know, I tried low fat. I would try things. It's that really, since puberty, you know, I tried low fat. I would try things for about a week I'm not one to be deprived it just didn't work, and I knew that there were emotional and spiritual components, that it wasn't really about the food.
Speaker 3:And so, in September of 21, I did a program called Sober Sis and I stopped drinking wine. And I had used it. My husband died 10 and a half years ago and I found that I had always been an occasional wine drinker, but the wine would help me forget my grief and it became a habit and something to turn to and I thought, no, I, this is just. I knew this wasn't what God wanted. So in September of 21, I surrendered that to God and worked through sober sisters for anyone, but it is a Christian, it has a Christian basis and it's run by a Christian woman.
Speaker 3:And so I have not had a drink of alcohol since September of 21. And I don't miss it. But you know what? I did? Replace it a bit with eating more and I thought, oh, I've got to get back to thin within too. And by then surrender had become the thing for me. And so I took a class. I took a couple classes, group classes with you guys, and then in March I think it was of 22. So I don't know. Six months after I had stopped drinking, I decided to coach with Christina because I thought you know what renewing my mind and surrendering this to Jesus are the only things that are going to work, and I need to work with someone to do it. So that's how and when I found it. That long story is how and when I found it.
Speaker 2:No, it's a good story. Thank you so much and congratulations on the alcohol letting that go as a stronghold.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's funny I had a conversation with another Christian woman the other night. We were at dinner struggling to give it up.
Speaker 3:She thought I still drank and she bought me a wine glass for my retirement and I said but it's one of those stemless ones, I love those glasses. I said I don't care if it says something like I can whine all the time now because I'm retired or something, I don't care, I'll bring my skin drift out of it. Who cares? And we have this conversation. And so I told her about surrendering and all of that and I referred her to this. Who knows.
Speaker 2:That's wonderful, lori, that's wonderful. So, when you found us, what were you looking for? What were you hoping for? What were you looking for? What were you hoping for? What were you? Yeah, what were you looking for?
Speaker 3:Always, weight loss was first on my mind, but I knew that I couldn't do it. I knew, of course, I wanted to lose weight, but I knew that it was not about controlling the food. That that was not. I knew because of the wine, and years ago I was 28. So you know, 40 years ago I had quit smoking. I did the same thing with cigarettes that I did with food and alcohol. I knew that it was more about my heart than the actual food. That eating was about my heart. So I was looking to lose weight, but I was also looking. I need to get to the root of this. You know, I can't just control the food. That doesn't work for me, because my heart still longs for something.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, very good point too, lori. I mean our hearts they long. There's what the holidays called years ago silent hunger. There is a silent hunger, constantly stifling, throwing different things at it, whether it's alcohol or food, or shopping or who knows what.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I appreciate you mentioning that we got to get to the heart, right? Yes, we do. We do so describe for us, won't you a little bit about inviting God into that whole process, the food eating and the body image issues, because it sounds like you thought it was going to be about weight. You knew there was another component to it. How did the transition happen where you invited God in wholeheartedly?
Speaker 3:I think it happened. I knew it was about weight. I guess what I mean about more than weight. I would go to God and ask for the strength not to eat, and he does give that. But he wants so much more from us.
Speaker 3:And I think, as I started to renew my mind and you know, having to stop drinking and then realizing that I was turning to food it was like, okay, what's still going on? What is still going on in my heart that I need something, you know. And I kept saying, okay, Lord, show me what it is, Show me what it is I need, Show me what it is I need. And sometimes, actually, I listened to the podcast that you did with Michael two or three weeks ago I guess, and he said something that I remember from. I'm a retired school nurse and I did a lot of teaching on substance abuse and that kind of stuff with my students and they used to talk about getting a dopamine hit and Michael talked about that. And you start so dopamine makes you feel good, we all have it and you start associating dopamine with whatever you choose alcohol, food, cigarettes, sex, whatever you choose as your thing instead of God.
Speaker 3:And so it was coming to the realize that, lord, I need more than just help not to eat. I need help to turn from this. False dopamine hit to you Is false dopamine hit to you. I don't know that God gives us a dopamine hit, but the dopamine gives us peace, I think, and God gives us peace, so maybe he gives us dopamine too. Who knows what happens in our brains? But what you get from God is better than any dopamine hit you get, because you know what. When you get a dopamine hit from a substance, you feel guilty later and you feel lousy. When you get it from God, you feel great because it's true.
Speaker 2:Yes, oh, thank you, thank you. Okay. So when you look at your journey, thin within, revelation within, but especially in this past I don't know year or so what has changed for you? What do you see that's different in your life?
Speaker 3:I've got to tell you more trust, and Christina knows we meet every week. This has been a year. I had a very difficult boss. She started last year in a place where I had been for 26 years and was well-respected and had a really good job and she just wanted to erase me and she did essentially do that as much as she could. And then my parents. My mother is very debilitated with Alzheimer's disease and they lived in Maine. I live in Massachusetts. They were a couple hours awayived in a condo that my husband and I had owned and my brother was building a condo, an apartment, for them. We needed to bring them down. My brother lives two miles from me to help my dad. So there was that. There was what do I do about this job? And then I wanted to sell that condo and pay off my mortgage where I live now.
Speaker 3:So all of these struggles and I kept going to God and going to God and it was so funny, all the things I had learned with food and I'm still learning every day. I don't have this like done. I think it will go for the rest of my life with eating, with all the things that happen in our lives and trusting God. It has taken months for these things to work out, but they have all worked out and I have seen the hand of God as he has met me at all the points. And, believe me, it was stressful. So it was so stressful in December and I'm praying and praying and praying about my job. And I woke up one morning and I just knew sometimes I'm praying and praying, and praying about my job. And I woke up one morning and I just knew sometimes I'm very clear with God in the morning, before the day rushes in that he had released me from the job and that I was probably going to go another year or two and I'm old enough to retire. I've been old enough for a couple of years. But I knew that he had released me and I asked him to confirm it because I thought is this just emotional? So I said I need you to confirm it and I listened to soul space every morning and in soul space, the woman that does it ask. That's a five minute meditation thing that I do in the morning Christian meditation. If you could do anything you wanted and you knew God was in it, what would you do? And right away I said I would retire and then I thought that's my confirmation. So that happened.
Speaker 3:And then from that it was Lord, how do I get my parents down here? And now I need to sell the condo because I need to pay off my mortgage so I can retire. And there were lots of starts and stops, but the end of it all is my parents came down February 2nd. They are two miles from me and I can help a lot. I have a sister-in-law who's just an angel, who does so much with my parents, and then I didn't even have to go to a realtor. I got a call from the woman across the street from my condo it's two blocks from the ocean, so it's a beautiful place. It's a place called Ocean Park in Maine saying my sister would like to buy your place and I said sure.
Speaker 3:So we did everything through text. I met them once and then they did. They bought it on the spot for five thousand more than I wanted and they did all the work. They paid for the lawyer, they did all the work. All I had to do was show up at the closing and I paid off my mortgage and it was just and through all this, god is faithful. So what have I learned? That I can trust him, that he knows best and that I don't always like his timing. I wanted this all set in December. I just wanted okay, I want this all set. I don't learn as quickly when things just happen like that so that God is faithful and turning to him works and that the hunger in my heart to get all these things set wasn't going to be fixed by eating. I might get the immediate dopamine fix. I'd still have all my problems and I'd feel guilty afterwards and like, oh Lord, what have I done again?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so yeah, it doesn't really solve anything. It doesn't.
Speaker 3:And it's like learning to surrender the food starts to end. That that works. Surrendering to God starts teaching you to surrender everything, and it's in bits, but you start surrendering. Okay, what do you want me to do with the job? I'll do what you want, but I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do with my parents. This is up to you, lord, you know, and the condo is yours to do with what you want. I want to sell it to pay off my mortgage, but you know, and he just works it out. So surrender is my big. That's the one word I keep saying.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a good one. That's a good word.
Speaker 2:Surrender is a beautiful theme in your life, lori, absolutely beautiful.
Speaker 3:It is. I actually wrote a list after we heard Michael, and then Christina and I talked about the dopamine hit and I thought, what if I said this to Christina what if surrendering the dopamine hit, surrendering, controlling that hit with a substance allows God in to transform me? I mean, what more motivation do you need to give up that momentary pleasure? And it frees you up so God can get in there and transform you? Because I can get the dopamine hit. But have I opened my heart to God then? No, I've really closed it off with the substance. But if I surrender the dopamine hit in that moment, okay, lord, I won't eat tonight because nighttime eating I took your nighttime eating course is a thing for me. I won't eat tonight. I'm satisfied from dinner I can feel the desire for that dopamine hit. But you know what, lord, I promise you I won't. And what if doing that opens my heart to God and he can get in there and do his transforming work?
Speaker 2:I love that and, Lori, you know when you said this year was stressful for you, that's an understatement. This year was so stressful for you and our coaching calls kind of changed. You know, for a while it was all about food and eating and for a while it was all about, you know, you were really discovering um and drawing in close to the lord and finding that consistency and victory. And then things kind of changed in our calls because you were dealing with all these huge, huge issues.
Speaker 2:So we'll talk about mind renewal to come here, but I'm excited to hear about that, how that wove in as well with your very stressful year where God met you in such beautiful ways.
Speaker 1:So we'll dive into that in a moment, but I know that we want to hear, and those that haven't heard your previous talk podcast interview Would love to hear have you found peace with food and eating and your body?
Speaker 3:I have. I think it's always an ongoing thing. Please don't think that I've arrived.
Speaker 3:I have evenings where I just want that dopamine hit and I just want to eat or something will taste amazing and I just want to stuff it in. But I would say that I have. I'll tell you something I don't weigh myself because I get nuts with the numbers. And after the stressful year I have, I was going for a physical and I thought, oh, I have struggled with those evenings when, with all the stress, some evenings I did eat. I mean, I am not perfect, I have to look and learn all the time and I thought I'm going to go to the doctor. It's been a year and a half. Am I going to have gained weight? I better weigh myself before I go. So I got up one morning. I was so nervous I couldn't even do it. I got up one morning and finally stepped on the scale and I was a pound less than I was a year and a half ago when I weighed.
Speaker 3:So the groove, I guess, with God. I screw up, believe me, and I go back to God every time, but he's faithful and I'm learning so much about food doesn't do it, it just doesn't do it. So, yes, I have found peace. I feel peace with my body and you know what One of the things that has changed is I've come to believe more and more what he says about me, that he thinks I'm beautiful. That not only is my beauty on the inside because it is, he says it is but he made me the way I am. He made me with this color hair and these color eyes and these jowls, the space between my two front teeth, and you know I look at it and think, oh Lord, should I get braces and fix that? You know this is how he made me and he loves it.
Speaker 3:He loves it. So I've come to believe that more and more. It was hard to believe that I grew up in a house where and I love my parents and they were good parents, but I didn't get a lot of I took care of them more than they took care of me. It was kind of all about my mom and I didn't get a lot of feeling that I was good unless I was being a hero to everyone else. So you know, funny, I became a nurse, where you problem solve and you are kind of a medical hero to people.
Speaker 3:I also think that's a gift from God, but I used it as my identity for a long time and it was the thing that gave me value, and I think it was. It was either Christina or a spiritual director that I met with recently saying you know what? It's not my identity, it's not what makes me valuable. It's a gift that God gave me and I can use it and I find great joy in that gift that he gave me. But my value and identity comes from him, from who he made me to be.
Speaker 3:And all those things his love and his care and being able to trust him they grow every day as I walk this journey. It's like it starts with food. That's what led me into it, and it still is about eating sometimes, but it's about so much more. It's all about walking with him and I think he invites us in through wanting to lose weight. Of course we want to lose weight, but that's not what it's about. It's about him and our relationship with him and who we are and our value. I think you added something to revel. It's not about the weight, it's about the worth. It's about what we are worth to.
Speaker 3:God. So in a way, you know, there's that verse that says it was good that I was afflicted. It's somewhere, I think, in Psalms, and I think sometimes as bad as the weight was for all those years. It's what's drawn me into a deeper relationship with Jesus and by the grace of God and his mercy, and how good he is. I've lost some weight too.
Speaker 2:Oh, Lori, you're such a treasure, oh thank you.
Speaker 3:So are you Really? Meeting with Christine has been amazing.
Speaker 2:Oh, we have had an amazing time. We really have. I want to go back to something that you said really quick before we go on. You said kind of in passing, but I grabbed it because it's so important. You said I look and learn every day. Will you tell us what does that look like for you? What do you mean you look and learn every day? Just give us a little bit about that. If you would, I will.
Speaker 3:Every day, and it may not all be about eating every day, but a lot of times it is. And that's where I've learned to look and learn. So I overeat out of stress or boredom or just wanting a dopamine hit, and often it's in the evening. So I may do some look and learn when I get into bed and say, lord, what was going on? And sometimes I don't figure it out and that's where that whole dopamine hit was. You know what, sometimes you just get used to that and you just want it and I may not even know the reason. That doesn't matter so much. As Lord, I'm sorry that I looked for a dopamine hit and not you. What could I do differently next time? Or what? What do you want to teach me about? What do you think about what happened tonight? That kind of thing I've done look and learn in the middle of overeating and stopped.
Speaker 1:And just said you know what Lord?
Speaker 3:I'm done, I am giving this to you and I will not eat again tonight. And then a new thing I'm finding out with look and learn is so let's say it's an evening and I'm still just talking about eating, but it works in other things too. But let's say there's an evening, I've had my parents all week because my dad and my son built my stairs, so I've been with my mom six or eight hours a day and she really can't even communicate anymore. So it's been very difficult and stressful. And I have, for some reason, this week too, I've had a week of zero to five, eating all week.
Speaker 3:I have not the feelings have been there to eat, but I've surrendered them and I've started to think you know what? The surrender is beautiful, but what can I do instead? And I thought you know what? Can I take five minutes, even if I have to go into the bathroom and lock the door and just sit quietly with Jesus? Take it one step more.
Speaker 3:Or quickly look at a lot of times, christina, what you've sent in the morning. Quickly open that up again. Or I have a file of pictures on my phone of verses. I've personalized things, christina, sent things you've posted, heidi, and I take a screenshot and they're in a file still called Thin Within. I should change it to Revelation Within. Pull that up and read something. Just get me back to I'm surrendering. And now I'm letting you put some truth into my heart, lord, because I've opened it up by surrendering.
Speaker 3:But I do it with you know I'll get my son lives with me now because he just he was working full time and getting a master's full time and doing an internship busier than a one arm paper hanger and needed to save money. So he's been home with me for a couple of years. So I'll be sharp with him, or or say something and regret it later and going to God and saying, lord, why did I do that Did? What he say makes me anxious. What do you want me to do? Do you want me to apologize? Do you want me to explain to him? What do you want to teach me through this? Look and learn for those things? Why did I get impatient with my mom? What could I do differently, lord? Or what do you think?
Speaker 3:Oh, people that drive you crazy, you know, at church or something, and your brother says I better learn to live with them. No, because I'm going to be with them in eternity. You know, lord, how can I learn to love that person? What you know? Look what I'm doing. Why do they bother me? Would it help me to know? What can I learn about that? I'll tell you something.
Speaker 3:A woman who drives me a little crazy became my secret sister. We have a secret sister at the church and I laughed. I said you go, god. No, I have to pray for her every day and guess what? You start to love that person. So, looking at what you do to me, you look and learn. You have to think about it. But it's so much better if you take it to God and say okay, what do you think? This is what I think happened. What do you think? And sometimes I'm wrong. Sometimes God has a different take on it. Sometimes he's this is what was going on. And that's when you're like, oh, and you know it's God, because I would never have thought of that on my own, that wasn't on my radar screen anywhere. Yeah, and those things, when God comes to you like that, it's amazing.
Speaker 2:It's amazing, it is. Oh thanks, lori, thank you. Okay. So now let's get into the mind renewal piece a little bit, because, of course, here at Revelation Within, that's all we talk about. And, lori, what you were just describing was mind renewal. So what is mind renewal to you? Is it Bible study? Is it filling in the blanks? Is it prayer? Is it more time with the Lord, or is it something more specific than that? And if you would tell us kind of about that, and what does it look like in your daily life?
Speaker 3:I think it's all those things. It includes prayer, it includes scripture, it includes quiet time with God, it includes things like soul space. But to me, it's my biggest thing with mind renewal is putting the truth in there, because that's how he transforms us. Because that's how he transforms us, and whether you put it in by personalizing a verse, he puts the truth in here in my brain through mind renewal, through looking at his truth, and replaces. Sometimes it'll reveal a lie. Oh my gosh, this is what I'm believing. That's crazy. You know what's the truth here? Or sometimes it's the comfort of you. Know what he loves me? He knew I was going to fail. This is no surprise to him and he's right here with me, those kinds of things. But it's putting the truth in my mind so that it bounces out lies and allows him to change my mind and to change my heart.
Speaker 3:About four or five months ago I did this especially for work. I sat at work in the afternoon when you get home and busy and you're making dinner or you have appointments. So I sat 9, 12, 3, and 6 just on my phone and it just says RMM. When it comes up just to remind me, even if I don't have time. If I'm in the middle of taking care of a kid and it buzzes and I look and I may not have time to pull up my phone or anything, it draws my mind to God and I might just say, lord, give me wisdom with this kid, you know, or I might have time to open up the verse I personalized this morning and read that and remember this week with my mom and we have a family wedding tomorrow, so it's been very busy.
Speaker 3:I had personalized that verse. It's Deuteronomy 33, 12. And it's about the Lord. The one he loves can rest secure in him and he cares for him all day long, and the one the Lord loves rests between his shoulders and I. Just.
Speaker 3:That verse hit me a few years ago when I was saying does God really care for me all day long? Could you tell me if you do? And that verse came up within the hour that verse came up and I thought he cares for me all day long. I mean, could he have answered any more clearly? So I personalized it and that's one I've been looking at a lot this week as things are busy, that and I even just lean back, sometimes in the chair like I'm leaning back in his shoulder, so sometimes it's just something like that. And be still and know that I am God is the verse and the words I picked. You know how some people pick the word for the year. I do that, and be still is what I picked this year in that verse and I can't tell you how many times that will come up in, just, and I know that's God. It'll be on a bumper sticker in front of me at a stoplight when I'm crazed and it brings me right back down and back to him.
Speaker 3:So I think one of my favorite mind renewals and it's one I use a lot is writing a truth list, Like either what is the lie I'm believing? Or sometimes, if I write the truth list, it reveals the lie. Truth lists are big ones for me. That's probably the one I do the most when I'm not doing it on the fly is writing a truth list and some journaling, maybe at first to get you know, telling the Lord what I feel like you know, and then writing the truth about it, and sometimes a phrase from a verse.
Speaker 3:I've been in the church since I was two weeks old. My mother will tell you, so I know a lot of scripture, that kind of thing. A phrase from a verse will come. I'll Google that phrase and the verse will come up because I won't know the reference and that will draw me to that truth. Or a song Do you know? I wake up. I often wake up with a Christian song, one that maybe I haven't heard for years, Maybe I am from when I was little, and I always feel like that's from God, not like a secret message, but just an encouragement. And I don't know you get those earworms. It'll stay with me for days, but that's also a way to renew your mind. Like you know, all my life you have been faithful, and just remembering that and raising my hand in the car and singing that line to him is a way to renew my mind. You are faithful. Food is not faithful. Eating isn't faithful. Wine isn't faithful. Worrying isn't faithful.
Speaker 2:None of those things are faithful Beautiful.
Speaker 2:Laurie, I have in front of me that personalized verse. Can I read that for everybody? It's so beautiful what you sent to me, deuteronomy 33, 12. So yeah, personalizing verses, of course, is something that we share as a mind renewal tool all the time at Revelation Within, and it is one of our favorite tools. And Lori does it so beautifully. So here goes, lori, you are my beloved, you are welcome to rest securely in me in my love for you, my endless grace. I will watch over you, protect you and care for you all, day and night. Remember how much I love you. Lean back and rest against me between my strong shoulders. That's so beautiful, so beautiful. But you can see how she personalized that, put her name in there and, you know, just gave it a little more well, personalization, an invitation from God.
Speaker 2:An invitation from God. Exactly, exactly.
Speaker 3:It is an invitation. Rest between my shoulders. I've got this, lori. This isn't a surprise to me. Another one I love is taking the truth, but making it like Jesus is talking to me. I am the one who will care for you all day long. I am the one that knows you better than any. I am the one that knows a word before it's even on your tongue. It reminded me that God is saying those words to me in the Bible, but to say it to myself, like I am the one, helps me think of Jesus saying it to me, and that always makes it more real to me.
Speaker 2:I think it does, it does. That's beautiful. Thank you, lori.
Speaker 1:Lori, would you tell us a little bit about how your view of yourself and how you believe that God sees you, how that has all shifted over the past year or two?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it has shifted markedly. I am thinner and I love that, but that isn't the main thing that I think of. I like it, I feel better, I have more energy. I ran to an emergency and I ran up two flights of stairs and down the hall and I wasn't breathing hard when I got there.
Speaker 3:Oh, my goodness, so I love that. Believe me, but I am coming to believe and I have come and I continue to come to believe, as I said in that verse, that he truly loves me and cares for me all day long and that I can turn over these things to him. And sometimes he is so gracious that you see it in the moment, you see his answer and he does that, I think, to let us know. I know what you need and I'm here and I will answer you. So, in trusting his love and his care, it allows me to trust myself and my life with him more, but also my view of myself and how God sees me. So my view of myself and how God sees me has changed quite a bit. When I mentioned growing up and I need to be a hero, to be me I am valuable to him, no matter what anybody thinks.
Speaker 3:And I think this year, with a boss who put no value in what I did and really wanted to erase my position and me as a person, I had to really look for okay, wait a minute who am I? And to realize God didn't erase me, god made me who he is and so turning my image and my identity, the way I see myself from a hero, a nurse, all of those things, finding out that those are gifts and they're beautiful and I can take joy in them and God takes joy in them and wants me to. But my identity is the beloved daughter that he made me, the person he died for, because I mean so much to him and every little thing about me he made and he loves, right down to my little toenail. You know those kinds of things. He, he knits every one of us together in his womb and in not his womb, my mother's womb, our mother's womb, and he knows all those details and values them and loves them. So, switching your identity, I mean, I found myself initially trying to prove to this boss how good I was.
Speaker 3:Wait a minute, you don't know how good I am at this job and I was good at the job. I did a good job. I'm a good nurse and I'm usually a leader. That's another gift. And so I'm trying to prove that to her, with up to no avail. She had nothing to do with that and to realize that doesn't matter. God knows who I am. I will not take my identity from her or what she said. She was my boss. I had to do what she asked, as long as it didn't go against nursing law or the things God called me to. I had to do what she asked and I did and I treated her respectfully because God asks me to do that. But I learned to turn my eyes to God for my identity, because she was not going to give it to me, and I've done that with my parents. I've been a hero with my parents since I was little and now that my dad is taking care of my mom, they're 91 and 93. And he's still.
Speaker 3:He's 93 and he's building my cellar stairs with my son and taking care of my mom, doing all those things with my mom, and I always feel like to be valuable. I need to be a hero, I need to take care of them and I do. But it isn't for my value. It's because I love them and God has asked me to honor my parents and I want to honor them. But my value is from God and my identity, who I am, is from him, it's not from when I so if I can't solve a problem, if I'm not the answer or I don't have it, that's okay. That's okay. They belong to God too, and I don't have to only be valuable and good if I can fix things for them.
Speaker 3:So it's a slow thing. I've spent a lot of years taking my value from what I do and caregiving and helping and to start seeing I knew somewhere in my head that my value came from God, but to really have to see it, that my value came from God, but to really have to see it. So that boss has been, she's really been awful this year and yet she's been a gift from God, because he not only used her to get me to retire when he wanted me to retire and I wasn't going to retire this year, but he's used me to learn to look to him for my identity and not to people. Not to people.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Lori. That is an amazing story. I love hearing you talk about that. I just want to ask you, because this is one of my favorite things to hear you talk about. I want to just ask you to share for just a couple minutes about your relationship with the Lord. Will you talk about that a little bit? It is so sweet and so personal and I think that might just really encourage somebody out there who's listening my relationship with the Lord.
Speaker 3:I've probably known Him since I was in my single digits. You know five, six, seven, who knows? But when I was 16, you know, I grew up in a Christian home, in a Christian church, and I needed. When I was in my single digits you know five, six, seven, who knows? But when I was 16, you know, I grew up in a Christian home, in a Christian church, and I needed. When I was 16, I thought I've got to make sure, lord, that this is mine and not my parents. You know, like they say, god has no grandchildren, so that's when that's a date. I know that I said, lord Jesus, I'm a sinner and I know you died for me and I take that gift because it is the only way that I will be righteous and okay in God's sight.
Speaker 3:So from 16 on my relationship, I've always loved God, but I don't think I experienced it. I did the right thing. I'm a first child, you know, the only girl. We do the right things. I've walked with him for years, I've grown over the years, but I'd say the last.
Speaker 3:You know what God gave me a husband that was so different than the family I grew up in. And again, don't get me wrong. I love my family, my parents, but my dad was a bit withholding and not encouraging and I got the polar opposite in my husband and I feel like part of his gift to me beyond loving this man was gave me more of an idea of what God is really like encouraging and loving and understanding and and my relationship really started to turn around at that point. And then Alan died and that was devastating. I felt like the world had disappeared from under me and I was falling and I've always said God caught me and has held me. Ever since it's been 10 and a half years he has given me not the life I dreamed of or expected, but a really good life and my relationship with him is so much more personal and deep I don't know. I talk to him all day long.
Speaker 3:I just talk to him Like I would talk to you, christina, or you, heidi, or my son or the dog. Sometimes I just talk to him and I spend quiet time with him. Christian music just makes me raise my arms and praise him. I truly love him so much and am believing every day more and more in his love and in the fact that I can trust this guy, this God. I can trust this God for everything, even when the worst happened and the worst did happen at the time.
Speaker 3:You know, when Alan died. I didn't expect it and it was devastating. But I can't imagine God has redeemed that and he has been there. That's why all my life you have been faithful. All my life you have been good to me and he has, even in the rough things. He's there and he's good. Even when I want to eat and I want that dopamine hit, if I can surrender to him, he's there and you know what he needs you. I can't tell you that dopamine hit might feel good, but there is nothing like walking up to bed and thinking you were there all evening and I'm going to bed knowing that your piece is better than any piece of chocolate I could have eaten and I do eat a big piece of chocolate here and there when it's out of wanting that hit. God comes through, he does he does.
Speaker 2:Thank you, lori, thank you, thank you so much.
Speaker 1:So, lori, what is one thing you would like to be sure that our listeners walk away with today after they have heard your podcast interview?
Speaker 3:I think the big thing for me, and the thing that worked not only with alcohol and food, but now it's working with everything that I do it with and it draws me so close to God is surrender. He is worth surrendering those things to. You know, we have that urge to drink or to eat or to whatever, to worry, to try and fix things ourselves, and when you say, lord, I am giving this to you and I promise I won't do it as hard as it is. You're going to have to help me, because if you don't help me I will do it. But it's that surrender, and the surrender is what turns you to him. It turns you away from the thing, or the desire for the dopamine hit, or the pleasure or the oblivion. With wine there was oblivion from the feelings and turning to him and even if the feelings are still not good, he is and he's there. He will meet you there and he'll be better than any chocolate, any glass of Chardonnay, anything Honest to goodness.
Speaker 3:When I say that song the Goodness of God, all my Life you have Been Faithful. He will be faithful every time you turn. I promise you that. I promise you that, and it'll be so much better than anything because you get him and then you get all the goodness and all that because you know how they say it isn't about me, it's all about him. Say it isn't about me, it's all about him, but in his eyes it's all about me. So you get back more than you ever given. That's beautiful surrender. That would be my big wow.
Speaker 2:Just surrender it oh lori, we're so glad you've been here today. Thank you so much for sharing your heart and and I know you're so busy this weekend and you've carved out this time for us. Thank you so so much. We hope that you have enjoyed this as much as we have, because I know Heidi and I are just grinning ear to ear and have enjoyed every minute of this interview, and we hope that you will join us for our next podcast episode of Revelation Within. Thanks so much for being here.