Kelly: Welcome to the I Witness Podcast. I’m your host, Kelly Jo Wilson, and this is the show for women who struggle to accept their worth but want to embrace their gifts and share their witness for Jesus. We have a great show today, and it’s actually part two of my interview with Alycia Johnson. Alycia is the CEO at Tirzah Ministries, and she’s also the co-founder of Tirzah Place, which is a home for teenage mothers.
I talk with Alycia about embracing God’s love and calling against all odds. In part one, Alycia initially told us a bit about her family and her backstory, and what guided her to become the CEO at Tirzah. She also shares about Jesus and how her faith was tested through the different churches that she was a part of growing up and the church that she was a part of later in her life.
This is part 2, where Alycia discusses how she has carried out her God-given calling and provides some resources and tips on how you can too.
Kelly: When did you first start the Tirzah Ministries while you were going to school? Is that how you got connected with people and started it?
Alycia: Well, that is a starting point while I was there. Actually, God completely orchestrates my life. People are like, you have to apply for jobs. I have applied for jobs before, but it really is like God just drops things in my lap.
All the professors are like, “You’re crazy. You’re graduating early and moving to Kentucky in the middle of the winter. You’re not even sure you’re accepted to this college and are just going to live there. So you’re taking all your stuff down with you for Christmas.”
I was like, yep, going through.
Kelly: I love it. I love it. That blind obedience is the best.
Obedience to God’s calling can take you to unexpected places
Alycia: It really is. Because you don’t know what’s on the other side of it. It can only be good because you have no clue at this point.
I moved there, got accepted, and found a place right away. The day before I moved in was Christmas, and I was looking for jobs. I was trying to find somewhere, and this place appeared.
I had these rules, but you can’t make rules with God, even so, I always try. They were: I would never work in a residential home and did not think I was strong enough to deal with teenagers. So while I was searching, God was like, apply for this job.
Making rules with God doesn’t work
It just kept popping up on all these sites. It was Christmas day, and I was applying for jobs. They were looking for a third shift worker that’s 23 years old, and I was 21, not 23. They wanted you to work all night in a residential home for teen moms.
I thought it aligned with my passion, but this violates all the rules, and I’m too young. There’s no way this wasn’t going to happen. I applied for the day job that you could be 21 years old.
But when I sent it at 2:00 AM, the man who runs it with his wife messaged me. He said, “Hey, I got your application. Would you like to try out for the third shift position?”
Kelly: Especially because he knows you’re up at 2AM. He’s thinking you’re already up. You might as well do that shift. That is funny.
Alycia: I thought, okay, well, this is it. There was no stopping at that point. So I worked there for two and a half years. It was the greatest experience.
I found out later they opened the year before I was born, right down the road from where my family’s from.
Kelly: Wow. That is so neat.
You find God’s love in other people
Alycia: It was really powerful when I realized that. I see God’s hand in their ministry. Even now, they’re really flourishing and growing. Their heart to minister to people is so genuine. It’s a husband and wife, and their story is amazing.
I’m not going to spend an hour on their story, but I could because there just an amazing couple.
Kelly: You just have to come back. That’s all that means.
Alycia: Yes, for sure. Because they’re incredible people, and they inspired me. I tell people not to discredit a man’s involvement in a women’s ministry in the right way.
Because he told me that I was strong enough to do that job. She could have told me, but in all honesty, she’s actually more the tough one because you gotta be that way with these girls, and he’s a gentle father figure. He said, “You’re young. You’re quiet. But you know what? I think we are going to feed you to the wolves and leave you, and you’ve got this. I will be there.”
When you do the work, you’ll find God’s love alongside you
He was there, even at 2:00 AM. If needed, I could call him. There was a tornado once in the middle of the night, and I was alone with all these girls. I picked up the phone and called him because I wanted someone to talk to that wasn’t a teenager. He was someone I could rely on.
He believed in me, and she also did, but there was a lot of power in him being the first person I interacted with. I left for Wisconsin but kept in touch with them. I still do.
That’s what inspired me to pursue the home for teen moms.
I moved back to where my family lives now in Milwaukee. The first job I had was with someone I connected with years ago. I wasn’t for sure accepted to the job, didn’t have a place to live, had a place picked out, and moved back to Wisconsin.
My first client in Wisconsin was 11 years old.
-Alycia Johnson
God knew the details because my first client in Wisconsin was 11 years old.
I couldn’t even imagine because I was doing home visitation, and there was nowhere for her to stay. So we called foster care, probably about 20 different calls about this pregnant 11-year-old girl, and no one ever took us seriously. Even teachers called. She left her parents’ home because her mom said, if you can’t take care of your younger siblings, I don’t want you here.
She said I’m not the parent of my younger siblings. Her mom said she was out. She stayed with her grandma, and she wasn’t going to school. I had someone try to traffic her, and she called me because I was the person she was closest to. Even though she only saw me every week once a week.
Alycia found herself sharing God’s love through the pro-life movement
I would pick her up and take her in my car, and we did our best to make sure everything was legal since she was 11 and I was driving her around. It was horrible for her. I thought, why are there no resources like this? Why is there no one doing anything about these teenage girls?
I saw it at home back in Kentucky, and I’m like, there’s a solution.
I might have been 23 years old, but why not try to start at home? We’re still fundraising because it was another girl and me, and running those homes is expensive.
It’s still in the fundraising stage, but it’s been so much prayer. I know there’s a need. So I know God will do it, and he’ll make it all happen at the right time.
God works through your unique experiences
But I see God’s hand in bringing me through my family’s story. Through the home in Kentucky and back into Wisconsin.
I saw a huge need for teenage parents, whom I happen to be the daughter of, and have spent these years working with this home. It’s just mind-boggling how God does that. Because he knows your story.
You can’t make that up. That’s when you know it’s God. I can’t take credit for any of that because I don’t get to take credit for who I was born to or where I’m from, so there’s never a point in my life where I can be like, “Well, I did that.” Because it’s so clear I did not do it.
Kelly: Oh yeah, He’s woven such a passion and interwoven you in many different situations to grow your experience. The best way to get you to experience how to do this beautiful ministry is to thrust you into situations where you have to do it.
I’m so grateful for people like you running these ministries in these homes and outreach and providing these resources for people like this 11-year-old girl. Because that’s an easy situation for people to turn their heads to because you people think somebody else will do it.
God knows your heart when He nudges you. You find God’s love within you.
But God knows your heart and knows Alycia will be the one to do it. I know it. I know she’s going to do it.
I’m so grateful to you for being that person for her. Even seeing her once a week, she trusted you enough to confide in and see you.
She obviously really wanted help because it takes a lot to even ask for help. But then to come consistently … It’s just so heartbreaking for somebody to be in a spot like that, especially a child. I love what you’re doing. I think it’s just amazing.
What was the place of your first job? I want to include it in the show notes. What is their ministry?
Kelly: So we’re almost at time, but on this journey you’ve been through, you said you’ve seen a lot of God’s love and grace. You thought about what God said in Genesis about what was meant for evil, but God meant for good.
Was there a verse that stood out to you while you were trying to find your way, experiencing these situations? Especially with your grandmother and your parents. Was there a verse you always remembered that stuck out to you?
Once you find God’s love in your heart, you’ll want to share it with the world
Alycia: The verse for me was Esther 4:14, which I see as a double-edged sword. Depending on the season, it can be bad and good for my life.
It says, “For if you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish. And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this.”
That verse to me is like, how could I be silent about what God’s done. Yes, there were terrible things that happened in childhood. While I talk of the positives of what I enjoyed, growing up in a really traumatic community, there were also many negatives. There were challenges with all of us being a really young family.
God strategically placed me in this job, working in the streets, canvassing, knocking on doors and telling people about the pro-life movement when that law was overturned
Alycia Johnson
Walking through grief with my grandmother and the different challenges we’ve gone through together.
But how could I be silent when a whole generation needs to see that?
God strategically placed me in this job, working in the streets, canvassing, knocking on doors, and telling people about the pro-life movement when that law was overturned.
Being in the streets with these people who have lobbied for years was so powerful for me. Knowing that God knew the timing for this home for teen moms because, before this season, people wouldn’t have been as aware of this issue.
Now, because of the ruling, people are abundantly aware there’s a need, and I truly believe it stops the need for abortion by empowering teenagers.
God uses you to share a powerful message of hope.
This is your first pregnancy, but you can plan the next one. Most of the older women I worked with had their first pregnancy as a teenager. So I might not be opening a hundred centers or homes, but simply sharing my family’s story to say, “You can do it. You can be the one that changes that pattern. You can be the one that starts something new and grow together.”
There’s no condemnation over my grandmother’s story.
We all love and value her, and she’s been such an amazing person in my life. My mom has a degree as a medical assistant now. My dad has a degree as a maintenance technician, and my sister has an early childhood degree. So we actually all have college degrees. We’re still a fairly young family.
You can change those patterns and not let one thing define you.
-Alycia Johnson
You can change those patterns and not let one thing define you.
Don’t let having a child stop you from becoming who you’re supposed to be. It’s an addition, a blessing. It’s not something holding you back from forever.
Kelly: That’s so powerful, Alycia. Thank you so much for what you do and just saying that. I think women really need to hear that, especially young women who have made mistakes in the past, whether it be abortions or just other mistakes.
They need to hear that, especially from a Christian who is just sharing God’s love and grace like you are through this home and these ministries. Your whole family, really. I think that that’s fantastic. Absolutely fantastic.
So if a young person finds herself pregnant and is listening to this today. Or even a woman who maybe has been like your grandma and had gone through an abortion or is really struggling, do you have a takeaway that you would want to share to encourage her?
You are not condemned for your choices but accepted through God’s love and grace
Alycia: I wish that someone had told my parents back in the day about pregnancy centers. What people don’t know is there are actually over a thousand in the nation, and they outnumber Planned Parenthood significantly.
I have worked with them for years, and they’re the most amazing places. I would say go to one, even if you’ve had an abortion. They actually have programs for that. They have healing retreats.
If you’re pregnant, you don’t need to have an unplanned pregnancy.
You can be pregnant, bring your husband, and get a free ultrasound. I sound a bit like a marketing advertisement, but I wish people understood the love in those buildings.
I have never been to a pregnancy center where they said we are here to make money or for a cause.
I’ve met hundreds of women working with pregnancy centers, and everyone says, “I just want to love and support another woman and her story.” I’ve watched them help women move furniture to get into new homes or sit in labor and delivery rooms.
You’ll find people who want to help you because of God’s love within them
They are there for you because they love Jesus. They don’t show condemnation, and the centers are free. You’re not charged anything. They get nothing out of it. It’s simply because they’re there to love you. So call one. There is one in your community.
It’s not very well advertised because they’re not great at marketing, but they’re too busy loving people.
Kelly: I’ll put some links in the show notes for resources. That’s wonderful. Thank you so much for sharing that, Alycia. That is wonderful. And I love hearing about your experience with that because there probably is a lot of fear because there’s fear of the unknown.
If you don’t know these places exist, you don’t even know to reach out and ask. But especially for kids, younger teenagers going through this, they don’t know. They don’t know what they don’t know sometimes, actually all of us really.
Don’t be afraid to reach out for help. You’ll notice God’s love and direction in unlikely places.
I’ll put links to your beautiful Bible verse too.
So is there any final encouragement you would like to give or any final acknowledgments you want to share before we end today?
Alycia: I talked a lot about my journey from the church through the hard things I’ve been through. I prefer not to name the church I’m at right now because I enjoy the anonymity a little bit. But I want to acknowledge that I now have an amazing church that has supported me.
It’s growing, and I’m happy to keep getting put on stages there.
I have to say it’s a testimony of finding God’s love in a humble pastor who’s a bit awkward, actually, and I’m sorry to him in advance for that.
But those qualities in him made him the perfect person for me to have as a pastor after everything I’d been through. So that shaped a new journey for me to feel comfortable and safe in a church again. So there is a right church for you and a right community of God for you.
You have to find what is best for your story and journey now. Don’t let one bad experience keep you from the good ones.
-Alycia Johnson
You have to find what is best for your story and journey now. I’m super grateful for the many pastors and women in ministry who empowered me. So don’t let one bad experience keep you from the good ones.
Kelly: Oh, that’s great. That is so encouraging. I feel like that happens, especially when you put your trust in a church and find out you have a different perspective later.
Sometimes it can really turn you from the church and from God altogether.
So I love your testimony of that. I appreciate you being here, Alycia. I did want to mention that Alycia has a book called Becoming: A 20-Day Devotional.
Why don’t you tell us about the book before we go today?
My story has been more about learning not to be a perfectionist, finding God’s love, and putting my identity solely in him
-Alycia Johnson
Alycia: The book is about those things to guide young adult women because, while people have heard my family’s story, my story has been more about learning not to be a perfectionist, finding God’s love, and putting my identity solely in him.
It’s a 20-day devotional for young adult women to help them find God’s love and what he has called them uniquely to do. I share stories from my journey.
Kelly: That’s wonderful. Thank you so much, Alycia, for being here today.
I appreciate your testimony, and I just appreciate your wonderful, beautiful story and the mission and the ministry that you are doing. Thank you so very much. I am so grateful to you and your whole family for everything you’ve done.
Alycia: Thank you so much. It was a pleasure to be on here and super fun.
Kelly: I hope you enjoyed today’s show. Our show is brought to you today by the Wilson Shop on Etsy. Beautiful designs and encouraging words can change the world. If you’re looking for positive messaging on your favorite apparel, journals, and home decor, visit the wilson shop.com.
If this episode encouraged you, please consider sending it to one friend you think would benefit from what we’ve discussed. I’m so grateful for this time with you, and thank you for listening.
Genesis 50:20, NKJV, “But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is to this day, to save many people alive.”
2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold all things have become new.”
Esther 4:14, “For if you remained completely silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish. Yet who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this?”
Join author Alycia Johnson on a 20-day journey to discover who you are becoming! Using stories from growing up in the inner city and the country, working in ministry, and helping moms/babies across the states, Alycia shows you who she is becoming. This biography is separated into daily devotionals so you can look to your past, see your present, and dream of who God wants you to become in the future!
Kelly: Welcome to the I Witness Podcast. I’m your host. Kelly Jo Wilson and this is the show for women who struggle to accept their worth but want to embrace their gifts and share their witness for Jesus. We have a great show today about embracing God’s love against all odds. Our guest today is Alycia Johnson.
Alycia is currently the CEO at Tirzah Ministries and co-founder of Tirzah Place, a home for teenage mothers. As the daughter of teenage parents, she spends her time advocating for strengthening families and giving young parents the tools to break generational cycles. Her passion is for women to know their value and carry out their God-given calling.
Welcome to the I Witness podcast today, Alycia. I’m so happy you’re here.
Alycia: Thank you for having me, Kelly. I’m excited to be here.
Kelly: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. So, Alycia and I chatted a bit beforehand, and I just wanted to say that it is such a funny way that we came to meet one another. God has a way of putting people in your path and bringing people together that’s amazing. I’m happy that you are here and happy to be talking with you today. I think you have a wonderful story. So why don’t we just get into a little bit of your background, upbringing, parents, and family? You can tell us about your journey to finding Jesus.
Alycia: To make it exciting, I will start with my parents’ story because I like to describe it as a Hallmark movie.
Kelly: Oh, that’s great. I love Hallmark.
Alycia: I feel like someday they could be a Hallmark movie. They were teenagers in the Appalachian Mountains and met at a very young age.
They were in high school from two different counties, and I do mean they were from the mountains. My dad had a motorcycle. He played on the football team. He worked at Walmart, helped with his family, and had his guitar. My mom was one of the cheerleaders, so I always think that’s super cute.
They don’t always like to say that’s super cute or even talk about how they got married, but I’ve always thought it was adorable. They actually eloped in a trailer. The man who married them was the pastor and barber, and he might have been the mayor and the school bus driver, too.
Odds were against Alycia’s parents
This wasn’t that long ago, either. My dad’s friends were the witnesses. During that time, and even today, one of the only ways to leave the mountains is to join the military. My dad was a little bit older than my mom, and he was graduating.
So he joined the military and was actually in South Korea for quite a while when I was young, fighting in the war.
He was over there, and I remember my mom sharing this story, I think she was living with his mom at the time, and she’s 16 with me. She’s barely got her license and realizes her husband has left with the credit card.
She’s like, what do I do? He has the card, and he’s like really going away. So they had to figure that out.
So I have had quite an adventurous childhood. My parents are still together today. I am always blown away. I have heard a lot of statistics growing up and working in the pro-life movement, which I’ve done for several years, about the success rates for teenage parents for marriage.
It’s so funny because when I go to church now, the pastor always says that my parents are couple goals. They grew up together, have known each other through so many seasons, and walked alongside many journeys. They wanted something new for my sister, who’s seven years younger than me, and me.
How Alycia’s parents listened to God’s call for the family
So they really sought to figure out what that new thing was, which was leaving the mountains. We go back frequently, but they asked themselves, what’s best for us?
The first three years were a military journey. I was born on a military base in Missouri. My dad was in South Korea.
I lived in Louisiana, and then my parents ended up in Bible college in Washington State. My parents took us wherever to figure that out, and being a child wasn’t easy. We moved frequently, but I’ve never doubted that my parents loved me.
They were young and were figuring out life. So it’s been a cool journey that ties into my faith journey of my parents. From what I understand of the story, I got saved when I was a baby.
Building a relationship with God
It’s really cool that we got to start a relationship with God together. I try to describe that to people, saying I grew up with my parents taking notes all night for Bible college when I was three. So at the age of ten, I was sitting with pastors until midnight.
I know it’s not the norm for most girls to spend their nights with head pastors and missionaries from around the world just sitting there and talking about scripture.
There were also challenges because of the church. We attended that church from when I was three years old until I was nineteen. That church introduced us to Jesus. But we were navigating the dynamics of figuring out life. My parents were teenagers, and this church really became like a parental figure in their life.
That sounds great, and there were great aspects to it, but there was also a lot of control.
So once they became pastors, there were many things like unnecessary rules controlling what we did. We lived in properties owned by pastors, and they weren’t the best properties to live in.
How listening to God’s call took Alycia to an unexpected destination
We moved from Washington State to St. Louis, Missouri, when I was six. My family went from the Appalachian Mountains into the hood. What surprises many people about me is I grew up in a predominantly African American community. But it wasn’t odd for me at all.
That’s what I knew. That was my norm. We lived there from the time I was six until I was fifteen. My sister was born there. I loved it.
I have so many fond memories, and that really surprises people. But there’s such a sense of community. The neighbors have to protect each other. You really have to watch out.
You know who your neighbors are because you need to know what’s going on. I had so many friends that I loved, and that looked out for me in St. Louis. Let me tell you, that city is amazing because it has so many free things to do.
They just had so many fun things for a family who didn’t have a lot. We could go and explore all these programs, and my parents were really able to learn more about who they are. But unfortunately, in the Appalachian Mountains, there is still a lot of racism today.
Racism is real, but so is God’s grace
That was something I had to navigate growing up. Visiting the mountains every year and having family members ask me what’s it like being around black people. I would say, “Why are you asking me this?”
That wasn’t my norm. My parents were always so loving to everyone. To be honest, nobody ever looked at me as a child and said, you’re white. You’re not black.
I never experienced that when I was in St. Louis. That’s the beauty of the church we attended.
There were so many different races, and you were accepted for your own story, not because of your skin color.
Kelly: That’s fantastic.
Alycia: I feel like my family grew a lot there. It was very challenging. When I was fourteen, I asked Jesus into my heart, but it was more from a place of fear than from wanting a relationship. To be honest. It felt more like, “Well, hell sounds worse, so I don’t want to go there. But I don’t know that heaven sounds that great based on what I’ve been taught.”
Trying to listen to God’s call through fear and unrealistic expectations
Learning through my journey then was like, “I’m going to own this.” But it was all based out of fear and perfection. At that church, my parents were very loved, but I was also seen as one of the perfect children, for lack of a better way to put that, of doing what they were told and following the rules.
I was one of the youngest to be allowed to teach Sunday school alone. That sounds nice, but that is a lot of pressure on a fifteen-year-old girl, for example. If I could go back, I would tell myself, “Don’t take on the responsibility that’s not yours to take on.”
There were grownups in the congregation with their own stories who would look at me and say, “I can’t believe you’re sitting in the back row reading a book right now. Somebody could have got saved while you were reading this book.”
Kelly: That’s tough.
Alycia: The journey of a pastor’s child as well at times. That was hard to hear those things. I’d be like, “Well, am I doing the right thing?” I was constantly questioning. It wasn’t a sense of am I capable of doing something. I’ve always been told I could do many things. But it’s more about, can I not do something? Is there a time when I get to sit and let other people lead? I can go read the book or go to the park. I feel like my family walked through that as well.
The church craved control, but God is the One who provides
Kelly: It’s difficult because it sounds like your family had a lot of faith. They were dependent and active in the church and wanted to do wonderful things.
As you said, they always shared love. They were always loving people. They raised you to see people for who they are.
The initial goals of that church sound like they wanted that too.
But sometimes you get too much control because God takes us through trials and different seasons of our lives to experience how He steps in and is strong for us. Sometimes you don’t always have, especially at fifteen, you don’t always have all that to give out.
Your cup is constantly pouring out, but you have to give yourself some time for Jesus and God to refill your heart with that love. They are so capable through the Holy Spirit, but it’s hard for us in our flesh because you’re trying so hard to help people. Especially when you have all that pressure on you, that’s difficult.
But I love that your parents were very loving and raised you both that way. What a sweet story. That is a very Hallmark-style story.
I love it. God bless them so much.
So you were in that church until you were nineteen. Do you feel like that helped you get closer to God? Do you feel like it helped you search for Him more, or do you think it pulled you away from him?
Listening to God’s call based on a foundation in His word
Alycia: Well, I think that’s what surprises people within that whole journey is there’s this movement now that’s deconstructing your faith. I hear a lot about that, and I disagree with it.
There was a book that came out recently where she talked about disentangling your faith instead of deconstructing. Just because you don’t agree with something doesn’t mean you need to throw out the whole thing.
Sometimes you need to go back and say, “What are the core moments that I can agree with?”
I learned so much from the Bible, which has shaped who I am in ministry. People joke with me because I try to avoid ministry and don’t always want to see that as my calling, but it’s been ingrained in me.
I believe God had a purpose in that to say, “Hey, I’m going to give you a solid biblical foundation. You’re going to hear the word and wrong things about it, but it will be ingrained in you. Then you can reshape that later.”
So my twenties were this unique journey of believing in those morals. I fell into the pro-life movement at nineteen as well, and it was not something I planned on doing or wanted to do.
How Alycia listened to God’s call through the pro-life movement
I was not too fond of the pro-life movement, which would surprise people because I had teenage parents. Every time I saw signs that said, “Adopt your baby,” I was like, well, I love my parents. I don’t want to be adopted by you. I’m happy my parents raised me.
I wanted to speak to those people to tell them not to adopt their babies. They just need your help, and not put pressure on them and make them into leaders. They just need you to love them and show God’s love.
God knew that, so he pushed me into the pro-life movement, which led me on a journey with God. I had to listen to His call.
I knew I wanted to create a different pregnancy center than I had seen, one that was more of a business model, not just helping people. One that protected the staff the way I wish my parents had been protected when I was younger and that also served the people simultaneously.
A different side of Jesus
It was a crazy goal, especially for a 20-year-old, but I thought, let’s see where this goes. I went to a Lutheran College, which taught me not to discredit one church because I disagreed with the doctrine. I’m not Lutheran, but I went to this Lutheran college. They showed so much grace, which I needed to see at that time, extravagant grace, for everyone and themselves.
That showed me a different side of Jesus that I had never seen.
Kelly: Awe, that’s beautiful. I’m so glad you had that because I can already hear that you have this passion and desire that God fostered.
What a wonderful thing. I love that you said not to discredit a church, essentially not judge the book by its cover immediately. Because anybody, say from Catholic or something else, with Lutheran might be like, “Oh no, I can’t go in there.”
But again, probably rooted in your parents, there’s that teaching about accepting and being open to following your heart and listening to your calling from God.
You went in there and experienced just wonderful grace. I feel like grace is such a beautiful thing to see in action. So I’m so happy you had that church to go to, especially if you’ve never experienced that before.
I was going to ask you about when you went to St. Louis, how sometimes in tough communities, or at least rough from the outside, they’re very close-knit people. Like you said, to protect themselves and one another. Which is an interesting thing that you don’t hear much about.
I feel like it’s maybe for protection, so I’m glad that you had that too.
What happened at the church once you went there? How did that transform your journey moving forward with your goals?
How God’s call was persistent, and Alycia listened even without attending church
Alycia: So that was, it was actually the college. I should clarify.
I still hadn’t stepped foot in a church again. So this was the value of Christian education, knowing their core values would align with mine.
While I was there, they just kept seeking me out. I was not going to seek anyone out, especially in leadership, after everything I had been through.
But they kept following me and put me in a pregnancy center. They said, “You are going to love this. You’re going to intern here and not Lutheran, so you can’t counsel.”
I probably shouldn’t disclose this, but she’s retired now, so this is why I can woman in charge who said, “You can’t counsel people because you’re not Lutheran. But what I’m gonna do is give you the keys of the building, and if there’s no one else to counsel people, well, then you have to counsel people.”
So I’m twenty years old in a pretty sketchy neighborhood next to a bus stop in this house where we did pregnancy counseling for people, including teenage parents.
I would go in there by myself. She was the executive director and taught me to run the whole thing top-down.
I fell in love. I thought it was super fun. This is so many of my giftings from childhood, my family’s story. I really wanted to create that new model for what I know pregnancy centers can be.
Listening to God’s call turns desire into an opportunity
So, I applied to grad school. All of my professors and advisors thought I was a bit nuts because I only applied to one grad school. I realized I had enough credits to graduate a semester early, and I thought, I’m pro-life, and I want to do social work.
By the way, for anyone who doesn’t know, social work is not a Christian field.
It’s very limited in the number of Christians involved and is known for being fairly liberal and pro-choice. So I thought I would have to attend a Christian school because I’d be laughed out of any other school.
Only four were in the country then, so I had to pick between Texas, Kentucky, New Jersey, and California.
The one in Kentucky happened to be an hour away from where my parents were from and where my grandparents lived. I always wanted to experience where my parents grew up because my parents may have had challenges, but that wasn’t my story. I have fond memories of the mountains and wanted to live there.
I had started working with pregnancy centers.
An abortion, a suicide attempt, and listening to God’s call for grace
My grandmother had an abortion before it was legal, so a long time ago, she had only disclosed it to one person. She tried to commit suicide when I started working at the pregnancy center.
My grandmother is someone that I’m very close to. She always shows grace no matter where we live. She’s always there. She’s actually in town right now, and I just picked her up two days ago, so we’re very close.
It’s been this constant journey with my family. I ended up going back there and attended grad school, where I experienced another side of God. My professor at that grad school invited me to Bible study at her house.
This community was predominantly white, and I had grown up in St. Louis in a predominantly black community that I was very close to and fond of. The professor that invited me to her house happened to be black, one of the only ones on staff. So that was a special connection I wouldn’t have had with other people. She had us over every week and told us I want you to read the Bible and tell me what you think of the Bible.
I thought, well, this is new. Nobody’s ever asked me what I thought scripture said before.
So that opened a whole new door. It worked with me going to my grandma’s on the weekends, helping her, and getting to watch her. She helped found the Frankfort Memorial for the Unborn, the state capital in Kentucky, with a memorial devoted to aborted and miscarried babies.
Redeeming a life of guilt and shame
She was one of the founding members. So yeah, it’s. It is beautiful to see her life, see God redeem it, and be a part of her walking this journey of faith, redeeming traumatic things for her.
That showed me how God shows grace even in the worst circumstances and how there’s no guilt or condemnation because I watched my grandma walk through a lot of that.
Feeling guilt for her decisions as a teenager when she had that abortion. My mom’s the only other child she has.
God doesn’t condemn you for that. You’re restored, and you’re made whole. He can use testimony to help start a memorial that helps many lives.
That verse in Genesis, I believe, says what you intended for evil, I intended for the good of many.
Kelly: That’s about Joseph. Joseph says that to his brothers, I love that you just said that verse. I feel like that is so true. That is such a powerful statement.
That verse in Genesis, I believe, says you what you intended for evil I intended for the good of many.
It always gets me. That’s why I remembered it. I don’t remember much from Genesis other than God creating, but the story of Joseph, for sure.
Wow. What a powerful thing. Your whole family has made an amazing impact, probably when you didn’t even feel like it was happening.
Everyone makes mistakes, but God calls us anyway
We all make mistakes. We all make choices that we regret. But a lot of people with abortion don’t talk about the aftermath. The aftermath for the mother, too, is horrendous guilt. Horrendous guilt. I mean to the point that she wanted to take her own life because of it.
So I love that she let herself believe that Jesus accepts her even through that so she could listen to God’s call to do amazing things. As the word says, you are a new creation. So, she became the founder of this beautiful memorial. What a wonderful testimony.
I’m so happy that she had you there with her, too. You’re going to school, learning, and then learning about her journey. You guys are just changing lives over there. It’s beautiful.
I hope you enjoyed today’s show. You’ll find links to what we discussed in the blog post version of this episode IWitnessPodcast.com, and our show is brought to you today by The Wilson Shop on Etsy.
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Bible Verses for Encouragement
Genesis 50:20, NKJV, “But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is to this day, to save many people alive.”
2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold all things have become new.”
Join author Alycia Johnson on a 20-day journey to discover who you are becoming! Using stories from growing up in the inner city and the country, working in ministry, and helping moms/babies across the states, Alycia shows you who she is becoming. This biography is separated into daily devotionals so you can look to your past, see your present, and dream of who God wants you to become in the future!
This episode is part 2 of the interview with Lisa Appelo. Lisa unexpectedly lost her husband, and she takes us through how God spoke to her on her grief journey with her seven children. She shares resources and encouragement that helped her along the way and could help other women struggling with the pain of shattering loss.
Lisa Appelo inspires women to deepen faith in life’s storms and is an ECPA bestselling author. A former litigating attorney, Lisa is passionate about rich Bible teaching. Lisa founded a team of writers at HopeinGrief.com and currently serves on the executive team for Compel with Proverbs 31 Ministries. Her work has been featured at Life Today, Insight for Living, and many more. As a single mom of seven, Lisa’s days are filled with parenting ministry and long walks to justify lots of dark chocolate.
Lisa: It is for sure too hard for us. We were not made for death, divorce, disease, or devastation like this. We weren’t made for it. So when these things happen, it does overwhelm us. That old saying that God won’t give you more than you can handle. That’s just not true.
We can absolutely find ourselves in circumstances that are too hard for us.
I remember writing at the top of my journal every day for well over a year,
THIS IS TOO HARD. I CANNOT DO THIS.
All caps, bold, underlined. That was the reality of my heart. I’m sure people looked at me and thought, you’re so strong.
But I knew what was going on inside. I knew the war raging in my thoughts and my emotions and could feel the enemy. I felt like the enemy was trying to get his toe into our family and just pull it apart.
Listen, this was not Lisa who had everything put together and was doing all the right things. This was Lisa who was desperate for the Lord.
Listen to God speaking and nudging you
Sometimes I think we can feel that nudge to meet with the Lord, open the word, meet with him in prayer, maybe read a devotion or read the Bible, and we think it’s guilt. You think God is guilting us like, “You haven’t met with me. You’re so bad.”
But it’s not. It’s wooing us like somebody who loves us, holding out their hands and saying, “I have everything you need. Come to me.”
It makes me weep. Because I remember … I remember those days when I just was desperate. And he says, “Come to me.”
So I think for the woman listening to this right now and saying, “I’ve stayed away from God, and I haven’t opened the word. I am mad,” to just listen to that nudge. Open it and give God a chance to meet you where you are.
It won’t look all tidy, and everything won’t be wrapped up with the bow that first day. God will meet you where you are. He will give you hope and encourage you. He will remind you how much he loves you and remind you of his promises and faithfulness, and that’s how we do life.
We’re not promised that life will be easy. But we’re promised that God will be faithful.
You are not alone, life is messy for all of us
Kelly: Absolutely. Absolutely. Thank you so much for sharing that, Lisa. I think that is so encouraging that it won’t be easy. We know that we’re not promised that. It’s going to be hard, and it’s going to be messy.
A lot of women take comfort in knowing that other women are going through it too, and it’s messy and hard for them too. But there is a way to come through it.
Like you said, listening to that nudge, I’ve had many women reach out to me who don’t think they hear God’s voice. They’re not sure if it’s him.
They question it a lot, but I think a lot of times it is not necessarily questioning him, but more questioning themselves. I love that you said, just listen to that nudge because it is there. It’s like a soft, still voice. Do you feel like it was like that with you? Like he just kept pulling you?
How does God speak to us?
Lisa: God speaks to us in his word, so we can be sure that we can open up the word and see him speaking to us. I mean, not audibly, like how Moses heard or Paul heard, but he speaks to us through scripture.
Somehow a hundred women could read the same passage. God applies it to each of us personally not differently, not in opposition to each other. Still, God will apply it personally to us because scripture’s alive. I would say open up scripture. You don’t even need a devotional. Devotionals are awesome, but start the book of John. Just see who Jesus is and what he has to say to you.
Kelly: What a wonderful book to start in. I read John a lot too. I also really like Matthew. For some reason, I’m so drawn to Matthew when reading about Jesus and I usually read the New King James version. But I like going through different versions to see how he’s speaking to you.
But yes, what a wonderful encouragement. So this happened years ago, but it never fully goes away. Right? You always have this part, and time just kind of moves you past it. You just learn to live with it, I feel like right?
Is that how it is with you? Is that how it feels? The wound is not quite as open, but it’s still there, and you learn to manage it.
But was there anybody that inspired you during that time or your journey that you could look up to or helped guide you? Did anybody walk alongside you?
Does the grief ever get better?
Lisa: Well, a couple things come to mind. One is, yes, grief does lessen and soften if we do the hard work of grief. Time is not a natural healer it’s neutral. It’s what we do with that time. So there are definitely ways that we process grief and loss over and over and over.
It’s never just a one-and-done thing, but it does lessen and soften. Most days I would say I’m very much used to this pace of life and love life.
But we miss Dan at every milestone and at every dinner that we have together. He will always be missed.
I didn’t know any other young widow I could walk with, but I had friends that loved on me. That’s such a lesson to us because sometimes we think, well, I don’t understand what she’s walking through. I’ve never lost a child, or I’ve never been through a divorce, or I’ve never had cancer. So we don’t think that we are capable of really ministering to that person.
God speaks through the love of people, too
But really, it’s just loving that person in it. It’s just loving them and showing up. That’s the big thing. We don’t have to have magic words.
We can’t fix the problem, so we can just let ourselves off the hook of having to fix the problem. But just showing up, being present, reminding, sending a text, having coffee, and listening to their heart. There are so many ways we can love somebody in it, which was huge for me.
There’s somebody who is no longer living but has always been a heroine for me is Elizabeth Elliot. Her writing is just so good. She recently came out with a book after her death, but they put it together, called Suffering is Never for Nothing. She knew suffering more than just her two husbands who passed away. She’s two times a widow, but she had other losses in her life. So, her writing and her steady trust has been a huge encouragement.
We have encouragement in God speaking through other people
Kelly: Wow. That is so amazing that you just said Elizabeth Elliot right now. Because I can’t even tell you. I was just looking up her story. So It’s just funny, to me, those little coincidences.
I love so much that you had friends that loved on you, because that is so important. It’s so encouraging to just sit with somebody, and most times it probably doesn’t even matter what they say. Right? Just to be there to listen, to hug you.
It’s so true. You’re so right. “I don’t have cancer. I don’t know how I’m going to help people. I didn’t, I never lost a child.” Many people say that and I think it it’s very well intended. I think that it’s, “I don’t walk that path. I don’t know it, how can I tell them anything?”
But really, nobody even wants you to tell them anything. They just want your love, your hug, and you to listen to them. So, I am so happy that you had friends like that because, man, it really does make a difference. That’s why fellowship within one another is so important too.
God spoke through testimony
Especially as women, I feel like we get each other. There’s so much pressure in the world, these unrealistic expectations set for us and we don’t even know how that happens. We’re not in competition with each other.
We are here to encourage each other and I love so much that you said that and had that support. Because what a difficult walk.
Elizabeth Elliot, just to share with the listeners, her husband was killed overseas. They were missionaries and they went over to help to minister to people about Jesus. I think they were called the Auca people.
Lisa: I think they’re called a Waudoni is their name now that they use.
Kelly: Yes, yes, yes. Yeah, absolutely. Her husband and four other missionaries were speared by men who did not want them around. They did not accept the word. I was actually just reading something that her husband could have drawn a pistol to defend himself. But he made a promise to them that he wouldn’t. He would not harm any of them, especially if they hadn’t accepted Jesus.
Elizabeth Elliot though, she also lost her second husband after he had passed. But I think it’s so amazing, and it shows such grace that she returned, I wanna say, a year later to minister to those same people who murdered her husband. Only God can give that kind of fierce forgiveness.
Lisa: She would go and live with the very people who had killed her husband and get to know them, understand what they were thinking, and why they killed her husband. Many would come to Christ through her, her witness, and her little girl.
We witness through our character how God transforms our heart
Kelly: Absolutely. And it just speaks volumes to how God can work through us. How we can be the light. Just like he’s working through you. He really is. Even just being here today and sharing a discussion and your story because it isn’t easy to be vulnerable.
Especially about something just so tragic, Lisa. I’m just so grateful to you for being here. I wanted to ask you, was there any verse that really carried you or even carries you now through grief that really speaks to you? I know you said the verse earlier, come to me all weary and heavy laden, and I’ll give you rest.
That’s a fantastic verse. Did that verse help you, or was there another verse that helped you through that?
God’s word is a living encouragement
Lisa: Yeah, there were a lot of verses that meant a lot to me. But I think one early in my grief that I probably never would’ve come across unless I had been reading through the Bible every day chapter by chapter. I found a verse in Deuteronomy 33:27, and it says, “The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms.”
It was such a picture of God that while my world was shaking and imploding, God was steady and eternal. That he held us, and those eternal arms, those everlasting arms were carrying us and holding us when I felt like everything else had fallen apart.
I just clung to that.
I started signing my emails with it and writing it in thank-you notes. I just clung to that verse and that picture of God being our eternal refuge.
When we feel overwhelmed, we have God’s word to comfort us
Kelly: Oh, that is just beautiful. I will also put that in the show notes for the listeners to help them. Because I feel like sometimes when you’re feeling overwhelmed, you’re grasping at straws, and it’s hard to remember even what you did the day before. Especially whenever you have such a hurting heart.
But that is just beautiful. Thank you so much for that.
So I know you are a writer and an executive team member for the Compel team for Proverb 31 Ministries, but you also published a book. So why don’t you tell us a little bit about your book and what your book is about?
Because you really discuss a lot of this in the book, right?
Lisa’s book helps those suffering with shattering loss in many ways
The book is for that woman who finds herself navigating a life she didn’t expect, a life that she doesn’t want.
It can happen in a lot of ways. It can happen through a diagnosis, marriage, or even a business that implodes, and life looks different now. Even a relationship with somebody who’s living but has been cut off causes a lot of pain. Maybe the death of somebody you love.
There are many ways we can find ourselves in that place of shattering loss.
I remember wanting to know one person who was just a few steps ahead of me who could both assure me I would make it through and was flesh and bones. I knew God would be faithful. He’d said he would be faithful in the word, but I wanted to see it on flesh and bones lived out.
Life can be good again, Lisa helps you to walk the journey
Also somebody who could just take my hand and say, “this is the way. Let’s do this.”
So this book does not gloss over the heart. It’s called Life Can Be Good Again, because I remember wanting and worrying that I would never smile again, that I would just make the best of life that it was now, but I would never experience real joy. That kind of organic joy that bubbles up again.
The promise is that life can be good again, but we have to walk through the hard questions and hard emotions. So how do we do that?
Practices that we can do to find our footing and begin taking little steps will help us move forward in this life we didn’t expect.
Kelly: Oh, that’s so wonderful. See, I just, oh my goodness. I just love it so much! Your book is very encouraging. I definitely encourage our listeners to get it, for sure. You said you wanted somebody to help take your hand and see how. So now you are living this wonderful purpose of helping women by taking their hand, being somebody in the flesh.
I love that you’re giving back in that way. It just warms my heart so much. Thank you for doing what you do.
God will never give you second best
Suppose you had one takeaway from your experiences of knowing Jesus and your journey through grief with God through ups and downs. What would your takeaway be to a woman dealing with a similar struggle and pain?
Lisa: Something was impressed on me, probably not early in grief, but probably my second year of grief because I was still really struggling, still in a place of despair.
I mean that second year the fog of grief had lifted, and this hard reality had just settled in. I remember one day in my minivan saying, I don’t even know if I said it out loud, but saying something like, “I don’t like my life. This is not what I ordered.”
On the heels of that came this thought that while this was not what I had expected, it did not surprise God. He allowed it. It was not a Plan B, that it was a chapter two. Because God had allowed it, it had as much abundance, goodness, and joy as the chapter before.
I didn’t immediately feel better or immediately say, “oh, well, I’m all better now. Let me just move on.”
“I still had a lot of missing loneliness and grief to work through.”
But it shifted my perspective and helped me lean on the truth that God does not give us plan B. For so long I thought I was living out the leftovers of the life I wanted, that this was second best and first best was my first plan that was gone.
But God does not give us second best. He does not give us the leftovers. What he allows is chapter two. It’s never a plan B, which can shift our paradigm if we lean on that and say, “well then, by definition, God, if you’ve allowed it, there is goodness here. If you’ve allowed, there is joy and abundant life here, and I’m going to fight for it.”
Lean into God and hear Him speak to your heart
Kelly: That’s just so wonderful. Lisa, thank you so much. I love that you say lean into God because it’s hard. It’s hard, but we start to lean on him. I mean, it’s just a wonderful picture of really leaning on his strength.
He tells us, in our weakness, he is strong. So when we feel most weak, lean into him. I just love how real and raw you are about it. How you do not sugarcoat anything, and you say in my second year of grief. I bet even that statement is helping someone listening because like you said, it’s not a timestamp.
You can’t timestamp it. But yes, what a fantastic takeaway. What a wonderful way to embrace what happened and find that journey back to having hope and joy again. Thank you so much, Lisa.
Do you have any closing encouragements?
Lisa: No, but for the one who’s listening to this, just don’t believe the lie of your circumstances. I think our emotions and our circumstances will lie to us. While our emotions can tell us that we’re dealing with difficulty, they cannot predict our future. Only God can do that, and trust him with that.
Kelly: Yes, absolutely. Just wonderful. Thank you so, so much. I will put Lisa’s book in the show notes, a link to your website where we can find you, and absolutely will share the Bible verses you graciously shared with us today too, Lisa.
Lisa: Thank you for having me, great conversation. I appreciate you making space for this. This is a hard conversation for many, but I really appreciate it.
Kelly: Oh my goodness. Thank you so much for sharing your heart with us today, and I feel so honored to have you here. Thank you.
Lisa: Thank you
Bible Verses for Encouragement
Matthew 11:28, NKJV, “Come to Me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
Deuteronomy 33:27, NKJV, “The eternal God is your refuge, And underneath are the everlasting arms; He will thrust out the enemy from before you, And will say, ‘Destroy!”
Resources for You
Lisa’s book Life Can Be Good Again helps women to put their lives back together after it falls apart.
Lisa Appelo shares how she saw who God is through the shattering loss of her husband. Lisa describes how she was desperate for God in those hard moments, and how her family grieved together but in their own separate ways.
Welcome to the I Witness Podcast. I’m your host, Kelly Jo Wilson, and this is the show for women who struggle to accept their worth but want to embrace their gifts and share their witness for Jesus. We have a great show today about life after shattering loss.
Kelly: Our guest is my friend and fellow author, Lisa Appelo. Lisa inspires women to deepen faith in life’s storms and is an ECPA bestselling author. A former litigating attorney, Lisa is passionate about rich Bible teaching. Lisa founded a team of writers at HopeinGrief.com and currently serves on the executive team for Compel with Proverbs 31 Ministries. Her work has been featured at Life Today, Insight for Living, and many more. As a single mom of seven, Lisa’s days are filled with parenting ministry and long walks to justify lots of dark chocolate. Welcome to the I Witness podcast, Lisa. I’m so happy to have you here.
Lisa: Thank you so much, Kelly Jo. I’m happy to be with you.
Kelly: Yes, yes. Thank you. So, today I just wanted to talk about the wonderful but challenging journey you’ve traveled. Your faith and walk with God over these past few years. So I just wanted to share or wanted our listeners to hear a little bit more about your background and family and then go from there about your faith journey.
You’re really passionate about helping women through shattering loss and grief. I think it’s just so inspiring, and you have such a wonderful story to tell. So why don’t you start by telling us a little bit about your family, background, and even how you came to know Jesus. Like how old you were and just a little bit of what that looks like.
Lisa met God early in her life
Lisa: Sure, when you were asking that question, I was thinking about my story, and I thought, even now, it’s hard to believe this is the story that God has written. This is not what I would’ve expected. And I think so many of us can identify that we are living out a life that we didn’t expect things that have happened or that we wanted to happen that never happened.
I’ll start with when I came to Christ. I was a young girl. I was raised in the church, and I was in Sunday school from the youngest I can remember. In church, you know, things weren’t perfect. Even in my home, there wasn’t much teaching about Jesus.
Most of that was coming to church on Sundays, but I knew I needed a savior at eight. So I count that at eight years old, but we weren’t a family that wrote the date in the Bible or anything like that. So that’s really as best I can remember that I was eight, going forward and pastor, and getting baptized and all that.
But then, in my teen years, I did some teen things as a 15-year-old but rededicated my life. So, from that time on, owned my faith as an adult. You understand what you can as an eight-year-old. Then we grow older and almost have to make those decisions over again as an adult wrestling through some of these issues that seem so simple at eight years old, right?
Kelly: Oh, absolutely. Yes.
God’s unexpected journey for Lisa
Lisa: But, fast forward, I married my college, well, I married my high school sweetheart, so we actually were in Sunday school together. We met in seventh grade, but he was just another boy across the room, and then by high school, we were in a big group of friends. He was a surfer.
We’d go to the beach together, and he was my first date. He was my only date. We went to college together very intentionally because we knew we had a future together. We married sometime in college and ended up with seven children, which is another unexpected thing.
This was not in the plan, but God will tender our hearts and ask us to step out in faith in ways we never thought we could.
So, I have seven children. Five are launched and have their own families, and I am still actively parenting two. My two youngest are at home. My story … I think when we talk about shattering loss and how God really gave me a heart for the woman who’s walking that started 11 years ago.
Shattering loss changed everything
I went to bed happily married and woke up a widow and single mom to my seven children. There were no signs of symptoms, but I woke up in the early morning to my husband’s funny breathing on the pillow next to me and called 911 and started CPR.
The paramedics were there within minutes, and I thought, “okay, he’s in good hands. He’s going to be mad when he wakes up and finds out he has to miss work today.”
But he never recovered.
I went into the ER, and they called me into that room you never wanna go into, and the ER doctor said, “we’ve worked on him for over two hours and have never been able to revive him.”
I went home to tell my kids that was it, that their dad was in heaven. After that, life in every sense fell apart, just shattered into a thousand pieces. It would never be the same again.
Kelly: Wow. That definitely would cause your life to absolutely shatter. Being so young and loving him so much pretty much immediately. You went on a date, and you both were so young and full of life and dedicated your lives to one another. Then you have this family, and like you said, your life took a completely unexpected turn, which is even more of a blessing once you’re walking that path.
But then you wake up in the middle of the night, and oh my goodness, as you put it, you went to bed married and woke up a widow. Happily married and woke up a widow.
Brokenness led her back
But, first, I’m just so sorry you had to deal with that, Lisa. I just can’t imagine, and I’m sure you’ve had many people say that to you.
I will say, though, the encouragement, inspiration, and help just even by being here today as we talk through your story. And knowing you and your passion for writing and reaching women, I’m sure that you’ve provided a lot of comfort to a lot of people, and have really blessed them.
I’m so gracious that you’re here today to talk about this. Going back quickly, whenever you’re young, I just wanna point out one thing, which I think is neat. So you’re eight years old and like, yes, I love Jesus. Your family is going to church and you know about him, but it’s not like writing it in a calendar.
I completely identify with that. I feel like my family had always talked about Jesus, that it was kind of like well-known that you’re Christian, right? That you just know him, say prayers and that’s it. So you can’t really pinpoint the day. But like you said, when you were a teenager, after you come to know him a little bit as you were young, but it never left you just like he tells us it never departs from you.
But once you make some mistakes, dealing with all the hormones and teenage everything, you know? I completely identify with you there. Once you realize, once you see a little bit of the brokenness that you are and then go back, it has a little bit of a different meaning right?
Lisa made a choice
Lisa: Yeah, for sure.
I was doing things I shouldn’t have been doing, and I really felt the before and after, and I didn’t get saved at 15. I was saved at eight but wasn’t living fully for the Lord. I was wandering from him, and was really at a point where I could have kept wandering.
Maybe not come back, or I could say, “no, this is the truth.” So he is my savior, and I desperately need him. It’s interesting because I was actually at a youth camp. It was one of those things where everybody was emotional, and I never went forward. They were like, “come forward or pray.”
I never went forward. I stayed right in my seat.
But I remember praying, “Lord, do not let this be a mountaintop experience.” Just praying that over and over. Then I went home.
Dan and I were not dating. We were really good friends. Then, a few weeks after returning school had started in the fall, he said, “You’re so different. You’re so different.” So isn’t that interesting? Somebody who knew me so well could see the difference.
God puts people together for a purpose
Kelly: Wow. That is interesting. And you weren’t dating him then, he already saw the change in you, though, being your friend. Wow. And especially him too, you know, seeing that change in you maybe sparked a little something extra in him too. You never know. I feel like God really does put people together. It just seems like he really put you together for a wonderful purpose.
It’s just amazing how he can work in our lives. So, I definitely did not want to pass over what happened with Dan in that story. I just wanted to talk a bit about you returning to God when you were a teenager.
That’s so funny that you say that Dan really recognized it. I think that’s great. But you started your life together and had seven children, so that’s completely devastating. So share what you feel comfortable sharing.
Grief was different for each family member
I don’t wanna take you too much through every step of that, but how was the family unit?
How did you guys pray together?
Did your kids embrace Jesus, or was it kind of like they were questioning things?
Or do you feel like you were a very tight unit?
Lisa: When Dan died, my children were four years old, and then my oldest had just finished his freshman year of college. So they were at all different points and after he died, you know, it’s hard enough walking through your own grief, but then trying to navigate and shepherd your children through theirs, it’s really just overwhelming.
People will ask me, “how do I do this?”
I think the only answer I can give you because every family is different and looks different, is to just authentically grieve together.
Whatever that looks like, don’t feel like you have to show up all put together for your children. Don’t feel like that or make them feel like they have to, either.
I remember sitting down with my kids and saying, grief is going to look different for each of us, and we’ll have to have a lot of grace with each other this year. That’s how naive I was. Thinking it would just be a year until we got back on our feet. And it did look different for each of us.
Every day in the car, my four-year-old would randomly start crying and saying, “I miss daddy. I miss daddy.” Sometimes at very ironic times.
Grief struck in both dark and happy moments
I remember a few months after Dan died, my daughter went to a Florida event, it used to be called Junior Miss, but now it’s distinguished young women. It’s a scholarship program (slightly a pageant). She won for Florida. We had never done pageants, but this had streamers coming down and the flowers being handed to her. All the kids are going up on stage, and I’m holding my daughter on my hip.
With all this music and confetti coming down, she is whispering in my ear, saying, “I miss Daddy. I miss Daddy.”
That is such a picture of grief. These events are happening, these milestone events, and then in the midst of that is this gaping, painful loss.
It’s never one or the other. It is both coexisting.
How did my family react to that? I think I just tried to walk them through as best I could. We did a lot of reading aloud together. We were a homeschooling family and had the opportunity and the time to have that Bible time together every morning.
I remember we started reading books on heaven. Everything from picture books, from my little ones to bigger books with my older ones.
I kept an open conversation. I tried to keep a safe place for them to just be able to share and talk however it looked. It looked different for my daughter than for my teen sons and my six-year-old and four-year-old.
Grief still looks different
Kelly: Oh my goodness. I am sure it looks so different and probably still looks different for them in every stage you go through together.
I love that you pointed out that you have to authentically grieve together. Because there is no way that you’re going to have that strength for all of them, right?
You want to make sure that you can because you want to shelter them from all these big feelings and all this pain. But, like you said, the perfect picture of grief … wonderful thing happening, missing her father and whispering it. But I think that’s amazing.
I think that you guided them in such a wonderful way and I bet that a lot of women listening to this are probably thinking the same thing. “I don’t know how I’m going to do this. I’m just going to do it with them, and that’s it.”
That’s just a wonderful guide for somebody who’s kind of lost, because it would be impossible to really carry them through each thing while you’re feeling it yourself.
How did you handle that? How did you handle those really tough moments and maybe even angry at God or frustrated with him?
Totally overwhelmed, Lisa met God every day
Lisa: I was overwhelmed in every sense of the word, and I think when life falls apart, you know, we get to a place of overwhelm where we’re having decisions and massive change, hard emotions, and questions. I would get up every morning and get them settled and started for the day.
Then I would get into my minivan.
I say some people have a prayer closet, but I have a minivan. I would go around the corner to this little park and just park. In that quiet minivan where nobody could slip a note under the door or come into my room, I would just cry out to God. Sometimes I cried out audibly. Sometimes, I would journal. Every day I journaled.
But I would have that time to unburden my heart with everything I had been carrying. All the worries I had, all the fears, the missing, and the loneliness, just all of it. I never went through anger.
Desperate for God
I did go through questioning God, saying, “Why would you take such a good dad?”
Some of the ironies of the situation were that his mom, who was not in very good health at all, the last thing he had been doing was paperwork for her. Not that I wanted anything to happen to her, but just the irony of life. He died suddenly so young, and she was there with us for several more years, which was a grace.
I would get alone in my car. I would cry out to God and pour that out to him then open the Bible.
I happened to be reading through the Bible for a year, but I had not started that year doing that, Dan had actually been doing it.
I was just desperate for the Lord. I was desperate for the word more than I needed my own food.
I wouldn’t look for a passage that would meet or speak to me, but I would just open to that day’s reading. It never ceased to amaze me how God would meet me wherever I was reading, whether it was Leviticus, Psalms, or one of the gospels.
God reminded her of who he is
God would meet me on the words of that page. He would remind me who he is and how he cares for us, and it would give me enough hope to go back into the house and parent for that day. It was not enough for the week. I would have to go back the next day and do it over. It became like that daily manna.
I would go out and pick up my daily manna, which was enough for that day.
When we say God is enough, that’s what it looks like. It’s not like God is enough, and we never have to go through anything hard. It’s that God is enough to get through this moment, to get through this difficulty, get through this day, and it won’t always feel like this.
I kept telling myself that it won’t always feel like this, but I did have to have that hope to get through each day. Until we got our fitting and until my smile came back.
Daily walk through the pain
Kelly: Wow. That is so perfect to say how he’s given it to you for that day in the daily walk with him. Because it’s so unknown. When you say you were overwhelmed in every sense, I think that is an overwhelming piece of it. You think, when is this going to go away? When is it going to lighten up? When is it ever going to get better?
But I think you made a good point that you surrendered every day. You made that time, no matter how busy you were, no matter how intense or overwhelmed you felt. You made that time in the morning or whenever it was and took everything to him. Which I think is a really great thing.
Many women who listen to this podcast struggle with making time and even feeling good enough for God to meet them where they are. A lot of them feel broken and that they don’t deserve it. But also, especially if they’re angry at God for something that has happened.
How can you surrender your pain to God?
What would you say helped you to be able to lay it at his feet whenever you went there? Did it come very easy to you because you had been in the scriptures and walking with God through it? Or was there something or anything extra that you did to maybe help the woman listening now who says, “It’s so hard for me to just surrender?”
Lisa: It is for sure too hard for us. We were not made for death, divorce, disease, or devastation like this. We weren’t made for it. So when these things happen, it does overwhelm us. That old saying that God won’t give you more than you can handle. That’s just not true.
We can absolutely find ourselves in circumstances that are too hard for us.
I remember writing at the top of my journal every day for well over a year,
THIS IS TOO HARD. I CANNOT DO THIS.
All caps, bold, underlined. That was the reality of my heart. I’m sure people looked at me and thought, you’re so strong.
But I knew what was going on inside. I knew the war raging in my thoughts and my emotions.
I could feel the enemy and felt like the enemy was trying to get his toe into our family and just pull it apart.
This was not Lisa, who had everything together and was doing everything right. This was Lisa, who was desperate for the Lord.
Listen to God’s nudge
Sometimes I think we can feel that nudge to meet with the Lord, open the word, meet with him in prayer, maybe read a devotion or read the Bible, and we think it’s guilt. You think God is guilting us like, “You haven’t met with me. You’re so bad.”
But it’s not, it’s wooing us like somebody who loves us, somebody who is holding out their hands and says, “I have everything you need. Come to me.”
It makes me weep. Because I remember … I remember those days when I just was desperate. And he says, “Come to me.”
So I think for the woman listening to this right now and saying, “I’ve stayed away from God, and I haven’t opened the word. I am mad,” to just listen to that nudge. Open it and give God a chance to meet you where you are.
It won’t look all tidy, and everything won’t be wrapped up with the bow that first day. God will meet you where you are.
He will give you hope. He will encourage you and remind you how much he loves you. He will remind you of his promises and his faithfulness, and that’s how we do life.
We’re not promised that life will be easy. But, we’re promised that God will be faithful.
Bible Verses for Encouragement
Matthew 11:28, NKJV, “Come to Me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
Resources for You
Lisa’s book Life Can Be Good Again helps women to put their world back together after it falls apart.
In part 2 of this episode of the I Witness podcast, Jenny Leavitt shares how she coped with the grief after losing her youngest son, Jacob, to a drunk driver. The Leavitt family has been through extreme hardship, and Jenny shares how God’s peace has led them through healing deep wounds. In addition, she discusses how the event impacted her marriage and her older son, Caleb, who almost died in the accident alongside his brother.
I think there are multiple reasons He prepares us. It can be to heal past wounds, past insecurities, and areas where we don’t feel we deserve his love or care. But it can also be for something in the future he knows that’s coming that we don’t know.
Kelly: That’s a wonderful way to look at it and such a good point. I feel like you and your family have really embodied that so much … how he has truly prepared you. I am grateful to him for the peace that he gave to you.
Because as a mother outside looking in, and I’m sure you’ve heard this throughout telling your story, I don’t know if I could do that. I’m sure you’ve heard that, too, “I don’t know if I could handle that.”
But that’s kind of the point. We can’t handle it without Him, and I’m so grateful you had that peace.
Like you said, when he told you they were his, and then again, at that moment because that is tough.
I appreciate you so much for coming on and talking about that because it’s very hard. I love that your husband was trying to protect you even in the midst of it. He’s by your side through cancer, through all of this. That is so great because a tragedy can shake that marriage up big time in families, especially marriages.
But you guys are rooted in Jesus, rooted in faith.
How coping with grief tests a marriage
Do you feel like going through all this has strengthened you both and fueled togetherness in your marriage?
Jenny: Just three months before we lost Jacob, there was a little girl in our church who was seven or eight that died from brain cancer. My husband and I were the children’s leaders, so we walked that road with the parents.
So, just three months before, we had told the parents the stats were not on your side. In marriages that lose a child, the odds are stacked against you that the marriage will not survive.
Then we lost Jacob three months later. We had been in ministry long enough to know what we told them was right. Looking back now, I think we had a solid foundation in our faith, and we had been together a long time, but it still rocked our marriage in certain areas.
What I tell people is if there are cracks in your relationship, miscommunications, and things you don’t handle well … I’ll use myself as an example. I tend to withdraw and shut down.
My husband is the opposite, and that makes him feel like I want to distance myself completely from him and not want to work it out when that’s really not to me. I’m trying to process it. I don’t want to say something that I’m going to really regret.
It’s just a different mindset. Then you have a serious trauma like this hit marriage, and you have to go into it being aware. My husband and I are polar opposites on so many different things. We’re just completely different, night and day. Then you have the fact that we’re also male and female and grieve differently.
What can you do to save the marriage after losing a child?
You have to fight.
You have to fight for the relationships that you want to survive. It will not just be handed to you on a silver platter. We were good solid Christians too. We still had to fight through those human tendencies to revert to what is comfortable and familiar and not want to battle anymore.
You gotta fight through that and be like, “No! You know what? Our marriage is worth fighting for. Our relationship is worth fighting for.”
Not to say that we’ve arrived, because we haven’t, but we have come through a lot of the hardest times.
As you and I were sharing earlier, I read or heard a long time ago that before you share something so close to your heart, make sure that you’re speaking from a place of your scars and not your wounds.
I really feel like my husband and I have … God has brought a lot of healing to those deep wounds. So not to say that we’ve arrived, because we have not, but I do feel like our marriage is more of a place where God has brought some healing salve to those wounded areas, and there’s scarring now.
How long does it take to cope with grief?
It still hurts.
That pastor that I told you about, he’s in his eighties, that they lost their daughter. His wife told me, this actually made me feel better, that it had been 37 years at that point. And she was crying when she was talking to me. I remember thinking, okay, I feel normal.
If she’s 37 years away, and it still gets her thinking about her daughter that she lost. Okay. So, I’m not weird. It’s okay.
She told me, “Jenny, you can think about the what-ifs. Sometimes we’ll sit around and think, ‘I wonder how old she would be and if we’d have grandkids’, but I can’t let my mind stay there. It’s not healthy. We have to just say, you know what, God, thank you for those 15 years that we had, and we’re gonna have all of eternity with her now.”
So, shifting that mindset. And their marriage has survived.
They’ve been a great example to us that a marriage can survive. It’s worth fighting for.
Kelly: I love that you had them … I don’t love that they had to go through that too, but I love that you had them as kind of like a mentor. I mean, it really is so true how God puts people in your path.
Jenny shares how she coped with grief from a healing scar, not an open wound
I love what you said about sharing things from your scars, not your wounds.
It’s so profound. It really is. Because there is a difference. Once you have felt the scarring, the scars start to heal in your soul and heart. Then you can really help a lot of people.
I love that you are reaching out to help and walk alongside people, especially in your church.
Just sharing your story with somebody can make such a huge difference. Especially coming on and talking to me today, sharing how you have gone through it, is amazing.
People go through these things. But, especially once you’re a believer, once you believe in Jesus, and you declare him as your savior.
We are not meant to cope with grief alone
It is not saying you’re never going to have heartache. There will be times it’s almost harder because you know there’s a struggle. But having him, he’s there to walk alongside you.
I love that you’re taking that and your pain and trying to help others.
It even says in the Bible, Paul had said, how we comfort one another with these words. That’s kind of the point because no matter what, there will be suffering. There are going to be difficult times. Like you said before, how you’ve gone through these seasons and how this healing is building on itself.
That’s so true. I think because you had that foundation and, like you said, keep the focus on those small nuggets of wisdom and the peace and understanding that God gives you. Because in those moments, it’s not this big thing, sometimes, it’s that small, still voice that will give you that comfort and reassurance.
I love that you said that because it’s so true because we are human. We’re going to go to the muscle memory of anger and fear.
But those small moments and his small voice inside us will build and help us in our weaknesses. He even says in our weakness, he is strong.
How did Jenny’s oldest son cope with the grief of losing his brother, and what did his journey look like?
So I love that you had that through this journey because it is very difficult, the path you guys have walked, but you, your husband, and your son walked it together. So Caleb is doing well now? Caleb had a lot of healing to go through as well. How old is he now?
Jenny: He is 27 now. Before the accident, he already had his associate’s degree, and it took him about a year after the accident. He had to learn how to walk again like there was so much physical and cognitive therapy. I didn’t even know there were four different types of therapies that he had to do afterward.
So it took about a year for him to be able to rejoin the world. He went back for his bachelor’s degree and is currently an elementary school teacher in the county where we lived in northeast Florida. Some exciting news is he just proposed to his girlfriend on Black Friday …
Kelly: Yes! That’s wonderful!
Jenny: We’re excited.
Kelly: Oh, congratulations!
Jenny: We’re excited. They’ll be getting married next year. We’re super excited. He’s also been praying about and seeking God’s wisdom on if there’s anything that he can do.
He has a heart for people like him who have lost a sibling because he didn’t find many resources to help him. There’s more out there for parents, and when he told me that, I started looking to see if I could find anything to direct him.
There really isn’t a lot out there for people that have lost a sibling, and not just in a tragic way like this, but just on the whole.
There’s not a whole lot out there. So he’s been considering some steps he might be able to take to help other people. He’s got an entire testimony of his own. He had to navigate through anger towards God, the driver, and even himself.
What about coping with grief and survivor’s guilt?
He battled with survivor’s guilt, and he has his own story.
He could also help some people struggling with those issues from losing his sibling.
Kelly: For sure. Especially because they were so young, and it’s so easy when you’re young and don’t have years of experience behind you. But, I don’t know. You guys are pretty awesome. I mean, at 22, you dealt with cancer and everything too.
You were such a good example with that strength, you and your husband together. So I’m so happy that he had you to look up to, but yes, I was going to say that about the survivor’s guilt. I wonder if he struggled with that because it’s his brother.
I’m glad that he’s worked through that.
And he’s a teacher? What an amazing job! Also, at an elementary school, he’s shaping young minds every day, and then to want to reach out and share his story too. I think that that’s just so inspiring.
You guys are good people. It’s wonderful. Honestly, I love that you’re here talking about coping with your grief. I can’t wait to share the episode. I like that you said you always think it will happen to somebody else, and then it doesn’t.
And then when it happens to you, you think, how will I ever handle that?
But I love that God was always with you and all of you. Even in fear and anger, he walked you through that, which is wonderful. So I love you sharing your story.
How to cope with grief using God’s word
I like to ask the guests on the show to share a Bible verse, and I know you’ve already shared a couple of verses with us, so I appreciate that. I love the verses that you shared in Romans, and then also about how God doesn’t leave us or forsake us. I’ll definitely put those in the show notes.
When we go to that muscle memory with all that pain instead of going to what we want to do in our flesh, it’s so good to have a verse, even one verse, to take with us to have that truth.
So thank you so much for sharing those verses. Like I said, I’ll also put links in the show notes for the listeners, so they can always take those verses because God does work all things for good, even if we can’t see it.
Which, most of the time, we really can’t. I mean, God’s very mysterious in his timing and ways.
Jenny: There is one more I’d like to share.
Kelly: Yes, wonderful. Great!
Jenny: So, then after the accident, one of the verses that I felt like God gave me for that season of healing, everybody knows Jeremiah 29:11 “for I know the plans I have for you.” Everybody knows that one.
Many people don’t keep reading, though, and right after that, verses 12 and 13, so Jeremiah 29, all the way through 13.
So yes, he does have plans to give us hope and a future, but right after that, he says, “if you seek me with your whole heart, you will find me.”
And after the accident, that verse was crucial to me more than the most commonly known verse 11. Because there were times when God felt so distant, and I know part of that is the grief.
But there were times when God felt so distant, and I just didn’t understand.
I couldn’t wrap myself around why. But God would bring me back to that verse, that if you seek me and seek me with your whole heart, you’ll find me. And that was crucial in recentering me when I got off course.
What does God do when your grief takes you to a dark place?
I wouldn’t even realize I’m down a rabbit trail in my thinking. But God would remind me of that verse, and it would re-anchor me on hope, truth, and faith. If I just seek him, if I seek him with everything I have within me, I don’t have to understand. I may never understand. I may understand a little tidbit here, but then get the full thing in heaven, I don’t know.
But I do know that if I really seek him with my whole heart, I will find him. He has proven faithful even in that. Sometimes those questions have been answered, and sometimes they’re still questions that I may never know the answer until eternity. When I get to ask him one day, “why, why did it have to happen that way?”
That’s one thing that I would love to leave with your listeners: if you seek him, he will provide answers.
It may not be in the timing you want or even in the way that you think the answers will come, but he will provide those answers if you really seek it.
Kelly: That’s fantastic. I appreciate you sharing that so much because that is so true. Wow. That’s such a good point, too, the future and the hope, but then you seek him. I love that you shared that you were so honest about times of anger and fear and just getting frazzled with emotion because that’s going to come, it’s going to come, it’s inevitable.
The fact that you could go to that verse is great. I think that’ll really help the women listening to this who struggle with a similar challenge. Coping with the grief of losing a son or a child, or struggling in very fearful situations. Cancer. That diagnosis alone, especially metastasized and stage four.
I mean, it’s very scary. The number one thing that you want to say to God is, why? Why, why, why did this happen?
Your finding comfort is very encouraging. It encourages me very much. I’m sure it will encourage people listening to this and I appreciate you sharing.
We all have the same fears, but God is faithful
Jenny: Hey, you’re welcome. I don’t want people to think we’re superhuman or anything. We’re just like you. We have the same fears and same struggles. We’ve just found God to be faithful.
Kelly: That’s it, and we’re not even meant to. One of the things that I’ve shared on my blog and with different people, is that we are not meant to be like “good enough.”
We’re meant to have flaws. We’re meant to be that way, so we can rely on God to really guide us because, in our weaknesses, he’s strong. I love that you shared such a powerful verse. Well, verses is in Jeremiah too. That’s wonderful. I can’t wait to put that in the notes too.
How to learn more about coping with grief and the Leavitt’s journey with God
So where can we find you if somebody wants to learn more about you?
I understand that you actually just released a new book. Do you want to tell the listeners a little bit about that?
Jenny: Sure. Since my husband is a pastor, he kind of jokes that he’s the preacher, so he’s the one who does the speaking in the family. Since the accident, he’s shared our story everywhere, from mock DUIs at high schools to small groups at churches. Wherever they ask him, he shares our story, and he’ll tailor it for the audience.
And inevitably, people would come up to him afterwards and are like, “well, what’s the rest of the story?”
He says no, I’m the preacher. My wife’s the writer, so that’s kind of how it evolved. I just wrote our book, and we strategically released it on November 25th this year, which was Black Friday.
But it also would’ve been our son Jacob’s 25th birthday on the 25th of November.
So we released it on that day. It’s God Prints: Finding evidence of God in the Shattered Pieces of Life. So it tells the rest of our story. It goes into a lot more detail about when I had cancer, even when we lost everything, were homeless, and then the accident and everything.
So folks can check it out there. I have the photo gallery that goes with the book, and that’s open to everybody.
Jenny’s website is a place of hope for others coping with grief
Even if you don’t read or get the book, you can still scroll through it. I have captions so people can get a feel and look at some things. I’ve shared some tips and things that have gotten us through those hard times. I’m going to continue to build on that. I want it to be a place where people can come for practical help.
A place that I wish we had had seven years ago.
A place that I wish we could have gone to and been like, “Am I normal? Where can I go for help? Does anybody understand this? What are some resources? What are some podcasts?”
I want it to be where people can come and get some hope. So I’m hoping to have interviews with others who have overcome adversity and have those kinds of things too. So to be a place of not just help but hope and healing too.
Kelly: That’s fantastic. Thank you so much, Jenny.
God is working things for good through your ministry, reaching out and, like you said, even just helping. Even if you help one person struggling with a similar thing, then it’s powerful. I appreciate you so much for coming here and sharing your story today.
I will put links to your website and the God Prints book in the show notes. And Jenny, thank you so much. I appreciate you so much for talking with us today on the I Witness Podcast.
Jenny: Thank you so much for inviting me.
Listen to Part 1 of this Interview: What happens to a mother’s faith when tragedy strikes?
2 Corinthians 12:9, NKJV “And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”
Jeremiah 29:11-13, NKJV “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.”
Bible Verses from Part 1 of the interview with Jenny:
Hebrews 13:5, NKJV “Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”
Philippians 4:7, NKJV “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”
Romans 8:28, NKJV “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.”
This episode is brought to you by The Wilson Shop. Visit The Wilson Shop on Etsy for beautiful, Christian-inspired designs on your favorite home decor, apparel, and accessories.
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