Let's Riot

God’s dream for you isn’t that you would become unfeeling towards His dreams for you but that you would become unwavering in your trust and His goodness. Ladies and gents, we’re talking alllllllll things dreaming with God on the podcast today- The good, bad, redemptive and down right ugly. Spoiler: Shannon is telling the story of her “dead” dream and how we process putting those things to death and picking up new dreams.

We have forgotten how to disagree with one another. All you need to do to see what I mean is look at the political landscape of our day or better yet…. look at church politics and the state of our denominations. We have slipped into the belief that if you disagree with me you must hate me, or we have to hate you or else we might be infected with your dissent. So how do we disagree well? And how the heck do we actually live out the commandment to “Love our Enemies”.

What are “christian political views” and what is our role in politics as believers? And while we live a life of radical submission modeled from Jesus’ own cross-life we also carry the Spirit of the living God within us, and with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit we have a responsibility— So let’s get into it, shall we?

We can't stop excusing ourselves from the political landscape of our day— that's not how Jesus operated and neither can we. The gospel may not have been a political message but that didn't stop Jesus from going "there". Maybe it's time to re-examine our place in politics and get into scripture to see what the way of Jesus has to say about the church and politics. 

Are we desiring the promise-keeper more than the promise?

That’s the the question I chatted about with my good friend Alyssa York during the final part of our dating series that focused in on singleness, but it ended up being so much more— a conversation on waiting, wrestling with disappointment, how we love sisters in another season,God coming close to the broken hearted, and the value of learning to be alone with God.

Are soulmates a thing? How do we discern who/what God has for us? Does God speak to us about our future spouses? And what are things we should be talking about with our future spouse/what should be deal-breakers? Me and the hubs are getting into PART 2 of our relationship series today on the podcast and answering your questions on how to discern God’s will in our relationships and building a healthy foundation for our relationships!

DATING PART 1: What does it mean to have a Jesus-Centered relationship? *Hint* It has a lot to do with PURITY. But purity is more than just not "going too far". In fact, it is a heart posture we live out of and encompasses ALL parts of life. But how do you cultivate a relationship around purity, then? Do you make a bunch of rules and feel shame because of your sex drive? NO. We seek God's face, together. Me and my husband unpack purity, Christian dating standard, if you should date non-believers and what to do with the question of  "Can I live with my significant other before marriage" on this episode  

SO MANY of you sent in the question “What does the Bible say about Women in Leadership?”  Are women suppose to be silent in church? Were we created to just be helpers to men? Why is this such a touchy subject in the church….. WELL, we are going on journey throughout the entire Bible to get our answer on this one. Spoiler: It seems that Jesus offers a new perspective of harmony between men and women and not hierarchy?

Why is God always portrayed as a man? And for that matter why have we been told that it's even disrespectful to refer to God in the feminine. My gut said it had to do with a deeper lie we are believing. SO. We are getting into scripture to discover the MOTHER heart of God— YES, it's in there., and we are unpacking why we are so afraid to talk about it. 

When I asked our community for the unanswered questions they had in their back pocket about church/life, or just questions they were tired of getting the "Sunday school" answer to, every other one must have been a variation of this: How do we feel God? / Why can't I feel God anymore? So we are unpacking in, getting in the weeds of scripture and keeping this heart check at the forefront: Do we worship God or the way He makes us feel?

So you're waiting for direction from heaven but aren't "hearing" anything... you're stuck. What do you do... like really? No Sunday school answers here. We're getting into the weeds of what our response is as Daughters of the Most High when we feel like we are just getting the dial tone from heaven and need to move forward.

Hey! Do you realize that Jesus wasn't obligated to die for you? That He chose to and wanted to save you? That you aren't some burden on His divine nature, but in His heavenly perspective, it was His JOY to be the sacrifice for your sin? Why? Because He likes you and calls you friend and that changes everything.

It's time we re-learn how to hope in the Lord and kick out the lie that God is holding out on us, or that He owes us something. Sis, it's time to OWN the truth that God isn't just getting our hopes us and live in that power.

Newsflash! We STILL serve the God of miracles! Let's stir up faith in one another and stretch our belief past the status quo! Let's call down heaven to INTERVENE in the Corona pandemic— Even it bows to our God.

In the midst of the entire world being flipped on it's head with the COVID-19 virus, we are getting into the weeds of the limits we put on God's provision and where our emotions and faith meet.

We hear it a lot: Relationship vs. Religion..... but honestly, I don't love the saying, Can I say that? We are in Season 2 of our podcast for the Lent season. We are debunking and stripping away “norms” that don’t line up with God’s word! This week: The idea that discipline is religious and the extremes on the spectrum of relationship and religion. 

Newsflash: Jesus didn't think the Holy Spirit was weird, and as disciples we can't either! We are in Season 2 of our podcast for the Lent season. We are debunking and stripping away “norms” that don’t line up with God’s word! This week: The weird stigma and lies surrounding the Holy Spirit.

FEAR IS FINISHED in Jesus’ name! Because fear does NOT keep us responsible, it keeps us SMALL.  We back! And we’ve just kicked off Season 2 of our podcast for the Lent season. We are debunking and stripping away “norms” that don’t line up with God’s word! First up? The idea that fear makes us responsible and is just a normal part of life.

How do we practically "remember the reason for the season". We're taking a three-week pause from discussing spiritual discipline to prepare our hearts more than our homes this Advent season with 15-minute episodes that lead us through the practice of listening prayer. This week's topic: JOY

How do we practically "remember the reason for the season". We're taking a three-week pause from discussing spiritual discipline to prepare our hearts more than our homes this Advent season with 15-minute episodes that lead us through the practice of listening prayer. This week's topic: PEACE

How do we practically "remember the reason for the season". We're taking a three-week pause from discussing spiritual discipline to prepare our hearts more than our homes this Advent season with 15-minute episodes that lead us through the practice of listening prayer. The first topic of preparation? HOPE.

In this episode, we unpack four of the most common lies the dear of being alone tells us and allow the Bible to point us to what solitude really is.

Why does solitude feel so taboo in our never-quiet culture? Why do our lives feel so uncontrollably noisy? Is community becoming an idol in our lives? We address all of these questions and MORE as we start unpacking the spiritual discipline of solitude.

In this episode, we face the scarcity mindset head-on and distinguish between scarcity and simplicity. What do we find? Simplicity leads to generosity because we can die to ourselves and rely on God as our leader and friend.

We’re diving into a new spiritual discipline and taking on the subject of simplicity. Whether we think the “simple life” is the magic bullet for all of our problems or God asking us to settle for “average” — We’re going straight to the words of Jesus and discovering how simplicity is trust in action.

In this episode we sit down with Phylicia Masonheimer and unpack to nitty gritty of study and call out a few lies surrounding the subject of Bible study. If you’re like us, you’ll be refreshed by Phylicia’s view on study and look up to her as a kind of big sis’— As a public theologian, she teaches Christians how to discern what is true and discuss the deep stuff, so don’t be surprised when this powerhouse woman challenges you to press into Jesus more.

We couldn’t talk about the discipline of study without checking our motives behind study and seeing where we are finding out safety— in right answers or in God. Because here is the thing— We are CALLED TO KNOW TRUTH. Studying to know what God says so that we can hold fast to it is not wrong, but when we are unwilling to lay down the idol of being “right” we miss out on God’s abundance and His invitation to be made more like Him.

Let’s talk about ’study’, shall we? Study is the discipline of UNDERSTANDING and it is this intimate knowledge that transforms us and sets us free to be BOLD in Jesus. But study requires us to believe that God actually wants to give us understanding and to be known by us. Ready to dive into our next discipline?

In this episode, Alyssa Steinhouse joins the conversation on Fasting and chats about breaking the stigma around “weird” Christian practices and how fasting actually does have a place in our everyday.

In this episode, we weed out the idea of “becoming our best self” through the means of our faith and spiritual discipline and surrender again to Jesus. We look at the role of spiritual fruit and sanctification on our lives and fix our eyes on truth rather than “spiritual junk food”.

Fasting is one of those Bible-y things that is familiar to read about in scripture but seems out-of-date in almost every way when it comes to practice. Instead of the kind of fasting we see in Jesus’ life and other Faith-Hall-Of-Famer’s lives we substitute “social media fasts”, but are we missing the heart of fasting? We’d argue, yes…. And maybe it’s feeding into a self-help gospel.

Elisabeth Pierson joins in on re-framing our perspective on prayer and invites us to become more expectant in our prayer life and dare we say it… Have fun with it? If you’ve ever wondered if prayer actually works, felt like its just some stuffy religious thing to do or just want to grow your hunger for prayer, this episode is for you. 

Prayer isn't boring! In this episode, we reframe the discipline of prayer by diving into its TWENTY-ONE forms as outlined by theologian, Richard Foster, and allow ourselves to get uncomfortable and be challenged.

Maybe we need to relearn the Christian narrative on prayer. In this episode we unpack some baggage connected to prayer and call our generation to lay down misconceptions and pick up the power prayer hold.

What are the steps to meditating? How does meditation fit into our everyday? How can you discern what you’re hearing is ACTUALLY from God? How do you reconcile when someone hears something on your behalf from God but you haven’t heard it yourself? We answer ALL these questions and more as we get raw and real about YOUR questions on meditation and hearing from God.

We're not beating around the bush: We know Hearing from God can be a hard subject to talk about. Some of us have been wounded by this topic, others of us are skeptical to say the least. As we talk about meditation (AKA Listening to God) we decided we has to also create space to dive into this subject, though. Let's get uncomfortable, shall we?

Meditation feels foreign in our modern culture, but time and time again we are called to it in the scriptures. In this episode we explore what meditation actually means and dive into hearing from God.

Tune into our no filter discussion on your most asked question about the discipline of Sabbath.

In this episode Alex Hoover shows us God's heart for sabbath from a biblical perspective and frames this spiritual discipline, not as a day of rest but a way to declare we don't just believe in God, but believe Him. 

If you’ve been around the church for any length of time you have probably heard of sabbath before. After all, it’s #4 of the ten commandments and takes up the most real estate by far when God gives Moses these commandments in Exodus. Before we shelve this commandment as just a part of the dusty old testament law, though, let’s examine God’s heart behind “impractical” Sabbath. 

Are you ready to RIOT for the Kingdom? Welcome to episode ONE of Let’s Riot: Where we are giving you a sneak peek of the space we are creating to learn about and practice heavenly rhythms for our every day and get real about hard questions we face as God’s people.