The Secret to Living Well in a Fallen World, with Karen Ellis

With every decision, you have a choice: will you choose the path of wisdom and freedom or the road marked by folly and destruction? In this episode of Grounded, guest Karen Ellis will help you identify what the call of wisdom sounds like and how you can apply it to your own life. You’ll learn what it looks like to build up others as you grow in the grace of God and become a woman who is truly wise.

Connect with Karen

Instagram: @ka_ellis 
Twitter: @K_A_Ellis 
Website: https://karenangelaellis.com/

Episode Notes

• Wisdom’s Call: 100 Meditations for a Life in Christ by K.A. Ellis.
• “You Help Her—in Every Season of Life” video.
• Become a Revive Partner.

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Erin Davis: Today is going to be full of choices, no doubt about that. The question is, “Will you choose wisely?” We're going to show you how in this episode of Grounded. I'm Erin Davis.

Portia Collins: And I'm Portia Collins. We're here to hand out two things that we love: hope and perspective. We're here to talk about a virtue that is one of my favorite things to talk about. By the way, that seems to have gone missing in our post truth world: wisdom.

Erin: Yeah, even the word virtue seems to have gone missing in our post-truth world. And certainly, the pursuit of wisdom seems a little bit AWOL. But of course, it's not for God's people. Specifically, we're going to talk about how to make choices—how to make wise choices and why it matters so much when we don't. So P, you got any choices you need wisdom for today?

Portia: I need wisdom for everything, girl, everything I need it from the smallest of things, like what to cook for dinner tonight, all the way up to the big things, like how to be a good, helping, loving wife and mom. I mean, everything! Wisdom is my thing.

Erin: I didn't know that. 

Portia: Oh girl, wisdom is my thing. 

Erin: Okay. 

Portia: Yes, I cannot wait to be a wise old lady. I want to be a wise young lady. But I can't wait to be a wise old lady. 

Erin: Yeah, I want to be a wise, youngish lady if I'm honest, but I just want to be wise.

Portia: You know, it's my thing. It's my thing, and I'm excited because our guest in this episode is Karen Ellis.

Erin: We love her. 

Portia: She is one of the wisest women I know. God has used her to help me make God-honoring choices. She's here to help us here and heed wisdom’s call. I already know she is going to point us to God's Word. She is a woman who is well steeped in the truth of God's Word. So go ahead, grab those Bibles. I’ve got mine over here. 

And speaking of Bibles, Erin Davis is going to be teaching in this episode. Erin, what are you teaching on?

Erin: Well, I mean, you could probably guess what book I'm going to take us to when our topic is wisdom, but we're gonna be in the book of Proverbs. But I feel like Scripture gives us many litmus tests to know whether we are walking in wisdom or not. I'm going to unpack one of those litmus tests together with you today. So, I expect it to be convicting and encouraging at the same time. 

Hey, share this episode. We count on you. We're here week after week, but we count on you to spread the word that Grounded is on and we're talking about wisdom. Do you know anybody who needs some wisdom today? Of course you do. Send them this episode.

We're gonna save our good news. We like to start with good news, but we're gonna save it for a little later in our episode today because we want to get right into what is going to be, I'm sure, a powerful conversation with Karen. So go ahead, Portia. Get us grounded in wisdom with Karen Ellis.

13:17 - Grounded with God's People (with Karen Ellis)

Portia: I am ready. Karen Ellis is first of all a Grounded favorite. I know y'all love her. She's been here before; she's back again. She is a scholar who has researched Bible theology, ethics, human rights, and global religious freedom. She is the director at Edmiston Center at Reformed Theological Seminary in Atlanta, Georgia. And she is the author of a new book. It's titled Wisdom’s Call. And, she’s my friend. In fact, let me let y’all in on a little secret I love to call her Auntie Karen. Okay, that is my Auntie Karen, welcome back to Grounded, Auntie Karen.

Karen Ellis: Hello my love. It's so good to be with you this morning. You said some very nice words about me. They were very kind. I appreciate that. I'm grateful for this moment that we have that we can grow wise together. 

Portia: Yes. 

Karen: You know, I didn't write Wisdom’s Call because I was wise. I wrote it because I need to grow wise. 

Portia: I got you. 

Karen: I needed to move. Discipleship process is a movement from folly to wisdom from death to life. So we can spend this time growing wise together. 

Portia: Oh, and put a pin in there from folly to wisdom from death to life. We'll circle back to that at the end of our time together, especially in light of Holy Week. So yeah, put a pin in that. 

But let me get started by asking you this, “Can you kick us off with a biblical definition of wisdom?”

Karen: Wisdom is a virtue. Wisdom is most essentially a person. Wisdom is Christ Himself. So, when I go looking for wisdom, when Solomon said, “I want wisdom,” when all the people in the Bible were faced with an ethical choice between wisdom and folly, that's really what it comes down to. The question was not just how you're going to live. But who are you going to follow? Who are you going to allow to tell you how the world works? Are you going to rely on your own autonomy? Or are you going to let the one who by wisdom laid the foundation of this world, who knows the physics of how it was intended to work before it was broken in Genesis 3, and been in Genesis 1 and 2 laying out the foundation of two people who were following wisdom, learning from wisdom, how His world works, and of course, that person is Jesus Christ. 

So, when we seek wisdom, we're actually seeking Him. Tell me how your world works. I can just imagine Adam and the woman in the garden walking around, and they're picking stuff up and like, “What's this do? Oh, yeah. Oh, let me show you that way. Well, why does a platypus look like that?” 

Well, He explains His world, but He also explains not just the inner workings of the physics of the world, sis, but the inner workings of our relationships in this world that He laid out with everything that we needed to flourish before we got broken. 

Portia: Yeah, amen. Already you’ve got me revved up. Erin has mentioned this, this is where she's seated from today. But Proverbs tells us that wisdom calls out to us. I feel like there are a lot of voices calling out to us all the time. Most of them, if we're being honest, are very unwise. And so, what does the call of wisdom sound like?

Karen: There is the call to wisdom to things that build life. The call to folly is the things that destroy the world as it was intended, as we were intended. It destroys God's order. It's the voice that makes us question, “Did God really say wisdom’s voice?” 

Oh, girl. And it's like when Jesus was in the wilderness. It was the reversal of all of the doubt from the garden. The voice of wisdom is, “It is written. I have said to you.” The voice of doubt and folly is, “Did God really say?” 

And so, you know, I think you talk about a world the way that it is now with all these competing voices, to calling us to things that satisfy for a moment. But ultimately, they lead to destruction of relationship, destruction of person, destruction of trust, and all of those things. 

Being able to discern between those two voices is huge for the moment that we're in today, not just in our local communities, not just in our lives, but nationally and globally. It's always for me the question that's on the table, “Am I going to listen to the voice of wisdom? And am I going to hear it.?

So you know, we have the hearing part where we hear. Everybody hears wisdom’s call. But the Holy Spirit quickens those who are God's own, to answer it in our hearts, and to hear it in that deep, life-changing, heart-reorienting way.

Something that's been neat for me since the book was published is my students, and I add the seminary, Reformed Theological Seminary, we've been talking about how perpetual wisdom’s call is. Wisdom’s call isn't just one time. He's continually calling while we're drawing life breath. He's still calling us come back, come back, because that pull towards folly and destruction is strong. 

And it's subtle. Again, sin slithers into the garden. It says, “Hey, did God really say?” And you start doubting before you even know you're doubting. And so, even Cain when he was making his choice how he was going to respond to his brother, God was, wisdom was calling him saying, “Come back to the way of life. It doesn't have to be this. I'm thinking of Genesis 4:6 when he says, “Sin is crouching at the doorway.”

He's basically saying, “It doesn't have to be this way. Come back, come back.” That call is perpetual. It's ongoing for the believer and the unbeliever. It is always calling us to think about the world and submit our hearts to Christ, not to the idols that are just waiting to destroy everything and everyone around us. Satan doesn't love nobody. He doesn't love it. He doesn't even love the people who follow him. Anyway, he treats them mean; he treats you horribly,

Portia: Yes, yes. So let me ask you this, because what I'm hearing you say is basically as wisdom calls out to us, it is a perpetual thing where we are constantly gonna be faced with that decision to choose between wisdom and folly. And of course, we want to choose, everybody would agree and would say, “We want to choose wisdom.” How exactly do we grow and wisdom, in making wise choices?

Karen: You know how the Israelites were always the children of God and were always being asked to build an altar of remembrance? It’s so that they could be able to look back and see God's faithfulness of when they chose to be obedient and follow Him. He's like, “Okay, build this little pile of stones, and we're gonna call it an Ebenezer.” Thus far God has helped us to remember His faithfulness, when they made the obedient choice, when they answered wisdom’s call and followed Him, worshiped Him the way He wanted to be worshiped. 

The more choices that we make, the older we grow in the Lord. And I mean, older, like not chronological age, because there are some old fools around, right? 

Portia: Come on. 

Karen: The older you are, the longer you walk with the Lord. There's no fool like an old fool. But the longer we walk with the Lord, the more we accumulate those places where when we're faced with an ethical choice, we can look back and say, “Okay, I see these places where I've put my trust in You. Even when the right thing to do, even when choosing You looked like I was going to lose, it was good. It was always for His glory and for our good, and so we build those things up. 

It's like going to the gym for me. If I don't go to the gym, the muscles get weak, right? But I go to the gym, I build up those muscles of exercising wisdom, of choosing the house of life, house of wisdom that Proverbs would call it. And seeing all the life that's in there, the life that's promised in the world to come, the more I do that, the more I can trust that making the choice that agrees and comports with how God has set His world up to work will be for my good. 

Now, when I'm not in the gym, when I'm not in the Word, when I'm not around people who say what you were doing is not good . . . When I'm not around those places, my muscles get weak. I start to make choices that fall in folly, and it's going to happen to all of us, even as we're walking, because our sin nature even as God is perfecting us and sanctifying us, folly is still standing in the street. Like Proverbs 7,8, and 9, folly is still standing out there just like wisdom, calling and appealing to the things that we want to worship, appealing to that part of our nature that's so strong. Christ is like, “You have to keep hearing My call.” I see it in my own life. You'll be walking with the Lord, and you're feeling all strong. And then all of a sudden, you look around and you see, I'm in folly's house on a particular given issue. 

You're like, “How did I get here? How did I end up here?” Then there’s wisdom’s call. 

Portia: That’s been memany times, like, “How did I end up here?” And if I'm honest, it's been subtle ways that I've been choosing folly that puts me into the big folly, when I finally recognize, “Wait, I’ve already been making bad decisions to lead to this little small ones that lead to the big one.” 

You know, this week is Holy Week. I love that there's a portion in your book here where you talk about how wisdom and folly meet at the table. The table with Christ. And so, I just want you to share just a little bit of what this looks like. You know, I think in the book you titled this, “Folly’s Betrayal.” What we see at the end, as Jesus approaches the cross.

Karen: Hmm, this is big during Holy Week. I've been thinking about this a lot in a number of different ways. I tend to look at Scripture kind of cinematically, like, there's the scenes where all of a sudden the camera zooms in on a particular moment. And it's the moment where Jesus and Judas dip their hands in the bowl. Because Jesus has already said, “You know, it's he who dips his dips with Me. He's the one who will betray Me.” 

And in that moment, the way if they were a camera, to zoom in on that moment, we would see every ethical decision, every meeting of wisdom and folly, of life and death that started in Genesis with our first parents. You see the serpent, and you see Adam and the woman dipping their hands in that bowl. You see Cain and Abel dipping their hands in that bowl. You see all the brothers throughout Scripture dipping their hands in that bowl. And that moment of history, of life, meaning death. 

In that moment, I've been thinking about that a lot on Holy Week, and how even that moment represents not just the choice between life and death, but the beauty of God, even redeeming the death that Satan introduced in the world in those early, early, early first days. He was redeeming death and saying, “Even this, even this that you brought in for our destruction, is going to be used for their good and for My glory. So you go, and you do what you have to do, quickly.”

And Jesus implicitly is saying, “I'm going to go and do what I have come to do. It's going to be okay for My people. It's going to be okay for those who are called by My name.” 

And so that moment of them dipping, they're there. That's sort of the house of wisdom and the house of folly meeting. There's two sets of guests in those two houses. There's two women, two hostesses in the Proverbs, the house of wisdom, house of folly. There's two meals, there's two invitations to come. 

And they all meet in that bowl. On our way to the invitation, the Spirit and the Bridegroom say, “Come.” We get revelation, where there's also a meal and there's also guests. It's a beautiful meeting in the middle of history for me, that I just wanted to meditate on for the rest of the week. Just trying to think about what this all really means in the big picture. What wisdom and folly and wisdom is conquering and remaking the world, remaking his people, according to how wisdom laid the foundation of the world for it to work, what that really means in the big picture. It's been blowing my mind. 

Portia: Yes, yes, I'm over here really trying to hold my tears back. I think I get emotional anytime as we approach Easter Sunday, just reflecting on what the sacrifice Christ has made, and what He has done. I think that what you just summed up, shows us . . . We see the cross, and we know what Jesus did in that way, but to see that His obedience, and the wisdom that He walks in, is happening all the way from the time He starts all the way up to Him taking His last breath on that on the cross. 

Karen: Yeah.

Portia: It’s just exceptionally profound for me. It just hits me right here. 

And so, thank you so much for sharing that and calling us to go back and to remember and to look at what we see in Jesus, the true wise One.

Karen: Let’s think about that as we share the meal together. 

Portia: Yeah, absolutely.

Before we go, I know that there is a Grounded sister who is listening and making wise decisions, walking in wisdom, heeding the call to wisdom seems very hard for her. I just would love it if you could just close us in prayer and just pray wisdom over our Grounded sisters, over the ones of us who feel like we're struggling and we want to apply wisdom well, but it is a journey. Could you just take a quick minute to pray and call out on our behalf.

Karen: Good morning, Jesus. We thank You that You are wisdom, that You sit at the center of all things. We think about You. You are the center of the universe. You are the center of the world. You are the center of our families. You are the center of our communities. And God, I pray that anyone who is struggling with understanding who You are, that You would would quicken them according to who is called God by wisdom’s voice, wisdom’s call, to answer the depth and the breadth and the height of Your love.

God, I pray that we would remember that You are the keeper, that You keep calling us, because You cause us to return. We thank You for the wisdom that runs down the road with the arms outstretched. The wisdom of the Father for the prodigal coming back every single time. I thank You that the door and the arms are open. Every time we hear wisdom’s call, that You long for us to come back. You've given it to us to come back. So God help us to answer wisdom’s call, even in the hard things, even in the confusing things, even in the smoke and the fog of the war of life. God, let Your voice cut through and let us hear and let us answer. We look forward to sharing that meal with You in glory where all things are made right. We sit at wisdom’s feet. Thank You for keeping us, God, amen.

Portia: Amen, amen. See y’all see why I call her Auntie Karen? You just go ahead and send me your address Auntie Karen. and I think if I start driving right about now, I can see your house by delta time and just sit on your couch.

Karen: I’ll have dinner ready for you. I love you so much, Portia. 

Portia: I love you. Thank you so much for being with us. We're gonna drop a link to your new book Wisdom’s Call. I love you. May God richly bless you, Auntie Karen. 

All right. So now it is time to . . . I'd say get grounded in God's Word but we're already there. We're always there. But Erin is gonna help us to dig in a little bit more. I hear we’re gonna go to the Book of Proverbs. 

34:04 - Grounded in God's Word (with Erin)

Erin: Yeah. Happy to do it. 

Where else could we go? But Portia, you're not allowed to sit on Auntie Karen's couch without me. So, if you make that road trip, I'm going with you.

Portia: Come on. After we get done, you need to come on to Mississippi, and then we'll head on to Georgia.

Erin: Sounds good to me. Yeah, I hope you already are in your Bibles. I hope you already have them open to about the middle where that book of Proverbs is. Proverbs was all over the words that Karen was speaking, in much of what Portia was saying. So, you've already been washed in the Word today. 

But how could we do an episode dedicated to wisdom and not intentionally turn in our Bibles to this book? 

As you already know, I'm sure Proverbs is the wisdom book. We know from1 Kings 3 that the Lord appeared to King Solomon in a dream and the Lord asked King Solomon this question, “What shall I give you?” Can you imagine? And Solomon asked for wisdom. 

So, the book of Proverbs is Solomon recording the wisdom that God granted. That's not new information, but what's been blowing me away recently is that in God's kindness, and because wisdom calls out to us, the Holy Spirit has preserved these nuggets of wisdom for us, to open to, to soak in, and to learn from today. 

So, as Karen said, wisdom is not a thing. It's not a philosophy. It's a person. And wisdom is also not something we drum up. It has a source. It's something that we learn from God's Word. And listen, I know my Grounded sisterhood. Without even looking in the comments, I can guess the kinds of things you're saying. I know that you are women who want to turn from the voice of folly and turn toward the voice of wisdom. That's part of why we gather here together week after week. But how? And how do we know when we're in folly’s house as Proverbs described? Or if we're in wisdom’s house?

I want us to focus together on a single verse in the book of Proverbs. We're going to be in Proverbs chapter 14, verse 1. Let me read it to us, and then we'll unpack it a little bit. Proverbs 14:1 “The wisest of women builds her house, but folly with her own hands, tears it down.” 

Karen actually mentioned this proverb, this wisdom principle, as she was talking and she was giving us a definition of wisdom. She said that wisdom gives life and folly leads to death. 

Unfortunately, you and I, because we're fallen. we're not good judges of our own wisdom. Scripture warns us in places like Proverbs 3 and Isaiah 5, that it's possible for us to be wise in our own eyes and yet be fools in the eyes of God. That makes me want to go or allow you too, probably. 

And you know, if we're honest, this is so much easier to see in other people's lives than our own. We can look at people that we know, and it's as clear as day to us that they are making foolish choices. Why isn't it clear to them? Because our hearts are deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. 

And so, you and I, as much as we love the Lord, as much as we affirm the authority of Scripture in our lives, we need to be humbly aware that it is possible for us to think we're walking in the way of wisdom and actually our feet are set to the house of folly. Eek.

I don't want us to default to fear there. That's not a right response to what we read in God's Word. 

Proverbs 14 shows us one way, one litmus test, not the only way, but one way that we can identify if we are walking in the way of wisdom, the way of God or in the quote unquote “wisdom of the world,” the world has no wisdom to offer only folly. 

And so, let me read it again. Proverbs 14:1, “Man, this verse is loaded. “The wisest of women builds her house, but folly with her own hands tears it down.” 

How do you know if you're a wise woman? Well, are you building up your house today? Are you building up your marriage today? Are you building up your children? Your extended family? Are you building up your family today? Your workplace, are you doing the wise work of building up others in your workplace? Of building up the work that you do together? Your church, are you building up your church? Wise women do and foolish women, they tear it all down with their own hands. 

I'm thinking of a woman I know who is constantly frustrated with her adult children because she hears they did something without her. She'll send these really condemning text messages and shaming text messages. That isn't wise, that's tearing down her own family. 

I think of another woman I know who made her husband choose between her and their children. Well, that's not wise, she tore down her own family. 

I'm thinking of myself, when I am that leaky faucet that Scripture describes, that drip, drip, drip of criticism against the people in my world. You know what that drip, drip, drip, of a faucet will eventually do? It will destroy the sink; it will tear it down. 

I'm thinking I need wisdom just to take care of my body. Karen mentioned this in an analogy. But it has practical implications too. I'm going to make choices today that are either going to build up my body, build up my health, or they're going to tear down my body, tear down my health. It gives us, it turns it into a dichotomy that is rather black and white. I'm not saying our choices are always easy to make. They rarely are. But we can say, “Okay, at the end of the day, if I make this choice this way, is it going to build up? And if I make this choice this way, is it going to tear down? And that's going to help us understand. 

Wisdom, it may start in our minds, it may start in our hearts, but it never stays there. It gets expressed in our words. And the Bible warns us that what's in your heart, it's eventually going to come out of your mouth. If you have cultivated, if you have grown, if you have pursued God's wisdom, that will come out. 

Part of my own approach to Scripture is that I think of it as this aquifer deep beneath the surface of my life, you know where the water lives. I always want that aquifer to be full with what I read in Scripture so that when I drop down my bucket, it's wisdom that comes out. 

So, is it wisdom? What's in your heart, that's what's going to come out. But it's got to be cultivated; it's got to be pursued.

If you've instead meditated on folly, if you've spent your day . . . That hamster wheel is the analogy that comes to me, just running on the tracks of what you deserve, or what somebody else did to you, or what you can control. Those are all folly. We get those are all just silly at the end of the day.

If you've meditated on foolishness, if you've meditated . . . This is gonna hit, and I want it to. If you've spent your day meditating on the fickle ideas of this world that come through this [phone], it's not neutral, this device, it's not.

And if we spent our time meditating on it, that's going to put our feet on the path to foolishness, and we're going to use our limited time or limited influence to tear things down. What's going to come out of our mouths? Wisdom and folly are both an outflow of what's inside of us. They're both contagious. Why is it that women have such a profound effect on the atmosphere around us? And foolish women do too. 

So let me ask you, sister, and you're free to ask me, “Is your family being built up? Or torn down by you? Are you growing in Christ's likeness? Are you growing in grace? Are you trusting the Lord and living for Him? Or are you being torn down? Are you constantly at odds with each other inside your home? Are you struggling to stay out of the ditches of sin? Are you falling apart at the seams?” 

Is it possible you've made those incremental foolish choices Portia mentioned along the way? 

Here's another one. How about your church? Is your church being built up or torn down by you? This one puts a lump in my throat because I've seen far too many churches torn down by a single foolish woman . . . and she thinks she's on the path of wisdom. She thinks she's helping everybody be more godly, but she's tearing down the men that God has put in authority. She's tearing down the elders that God has put in authority. She's tearing down the women leading Bible studies. She's tearing down the other women that are trying to worship there. It's been me. Is it you? 

Growing together, edifying one another, focused on Christ. That's the way of wisdom that builds up, or pecking at each other, consumed by the trivial that tears down our world, our whole world. This sounds like hyperbole, but I really mean it. Our world is either being built up or torn down. Almost nobody feels good about the direction we're heading. Let's be honest, that's valid. I would ask us this, this morning, “Where are the wise women? Where are the wise women who will build up systems to help others instead of tearing them down? Where are the wise women who will build up prayer ministries to plead for revival, instead of just constantly tearing down? Where are the wise women who will champion godly men to step up and lead rather than constantly tearing them down? Is there a path of destruction in your wake? Are there destroyed relationships?” 

Now, I know that some of you have destroyed relationships by somebody else's family. So don't hear me say that if you have messy relationships, you've done that. I'm not here to heap guilt. Guilt is not the voice of wisdom. 

If the Spirit will give us eyes to see, there probably are relationships that are broken because we've made folly our God, temporarily. 

Is there broken trust in your wake? Because you've torn down instead of building up? Is there disunity among believers? J

ust recently, I had to go to someone in my church and confess that I had been tearing them down in my thought life, certainly. And then unfortunately, that came out of my mouth. That was the path of folly. 

It's possible that you've been listening to the voice of folly and tearing down your own life along the way. I'm guilty. I often need to repent, for chasing after ideas and expectations and opportunities that are unwise, and maybe you do too. 

And again, sister, I'm not here to shame you. Shame is the voice of that wicked enemy that as Karen mentioned, doesn't love anybody. But edification of, grow in godliness, that's the voice of wisdom, and I want us to listen to it today. I know Karen already prayed beautifully, but I'm going to pray mostly for my own heart and my own life. And if the Lord has used this to convict you that you've been tearing things down in the name of folly, then I'm going to pray for you too.

Lord, we are unwise on our own. We will run ourselves into the ditch of sin and destruction every time all the while claiming self-righteousness. So, Lord, I pray that You would convict us where our feet are on the path of destruction, turn us today. Help us to be wise women who build up. 

I'll just pray Your Word right back to You. Help us to be the wisest of women, who build up our houses, build up our churches, build up our world, for Your glory, help us not to be women, foolish women, who tear it all down for our own glory. It's in Your name I pray, amen. 

Portia: I don't even have words, because I think that was just what we all needed this morning,

Erin: Me too. 

Portia: As you were teaching, and I was just sitting here thinking and honestly asking the Lord to help to reveal to me areas in my life where I may think that I'm doing the good thing and the wise thing, but it's actually not that. So many times we allow ourselves to become disillusioned about the posture of our hearts and our motives. We really think that we're doing the right thing when in essence what we're doing is tearing down. I don't want to be that woman who is tearing down her church, her family, the people around her. I want to be a wise woman who builds up, so I'm asking God to reveal those blind spots in my life.

Erin: Make it so, Lord. You know, I believe this, Portia. I believe that wise women by God's grace, wise women could turn the tide of everything we're seeing in our world. I don't think it would take many of us, but those who would pursue the way of wisdom, listen to the voice of wisdom, and walk the path of wisdom. I believe it could have such a profound effect because wisdom is fruit, so I'm with you. Let's heed wisdom’s call together.

Portia: Amen, amen. Thank you so much for helping us to stay in God's Word. Love you. 

Erin: My pleasure, love you.

48:49 - Good News (with Portia)

Portia: Well, here it Revive Our Hearts, March is a time of the year that I love. It's a time when we pause to express our genuine gratitude and appreciation to each Revive Partner. Y'all know I love me some Revive Partners. Your dedication in praying for and giving to the ministry plays a crucial role in our mission of calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ. And I know you guys hear me say thank you all the time, and I'm gonna keep saying thank you all the time. But this year, I have a few friends joining me in saying thanks. Check out this video.

Martin Jones: Picture a woman in your life who needs greater freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ. 

Kamie Stowe: Is she a teenagerstruggling to build her identity on the solid rock of God's Word?

Arin Nagy: Is she a young adult in her twenties trying to navigate a new job, a new city, and new relationships?

Hannah Kurtz: Maybe she's a new mom who feels like she's drowning in dishes and dirty diapers.

Monica Vaught: Or she's got an empty nest and she wonders, What's my purpose now?

Tom Mathis: Perhaps she's in the sunset of her life. Her once vibrant passion for the Lord seems to have faded with time.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Here at Revive Our Hearts, we know that God's Word gives purpose and perspective for every season of life. So, every podcast episode, every book, every Bible study, every conference is meant to help women live fruitful, flourishing lives in Christ. But we can't do it alone. As a Revive Partner, you're part of a team of like-minded friends who faithfully pray and give to the ministry. Your gifts are being multiplied to make an eternal difference in the lives of countless women around the world. 

So, on behalf of every woman whose life is being impacted by your generosity, we want to say a great big . . .

Hannah: Thank you. 

Kamie: Thank you. 

Martin: Thank you. 

Arin: Thank you.

Tom: Thank you. 

Monica: Thank you.

Nancy: Thank you.

Portia: Doesn’t that just make you smile? Well, if you haven't guessed it, our Revive Partners are our good news for this episode. Without them, programs like Grounded simply would not be possible. So, to all of our partners, the entire Grounded team, those of us that you can see and even the ones in the back that you can't see, we want to say, “Thank you for your continuous support and dedication. We love you guys. Thank you so much.” 

We also want to open our arms to welcome new Revive Partners into our remarkable family. Many of you have joined just this month, many of you may be still considering joining. It's not too late. When you become a Revive Partner, you are joining a team, a family of like-minded friends whose gifts of $30 or more each month. They are multiplied to make a difference in the lives of women all across the globe, in every season of life. 

So, I want you to think about a woman in your life who desperately needs to hear biblical truth. Maybe she needs to hear an episode like this one today. This ministry exists for her. We're going to drop a link where you can learn more about our Revive Partner family, and prayerfully, you will join us in helping women thrive in Christ.

Erin: Thanks Portia. Yeah, we love our partners. If you're a partner watching or listening, sincerest devotion to you. We know we couldn't be here without you. So, thank you. 

Hey, Portia. Before we say goodbye, I just want to take a minute and let some of our Grounded sisters pull up a chair. They've been engaging. I want to listen to some of that list that says that as she's gotten older, she's had a greater hunger. And that means she has to sit in His Word daily so that you know that's what do we do from here? Go get in the Word to get wisdom. 

Juanita says she's been hearing the voices around her, and she needs to turn down those voices. I mean, that that speaks to me as well. I mean, we can't think that we can constantly be bombarded by foolish voices and that we can navigate it. So, there's definitely some things we need to turn down.

But then, I do want to talk about Jamie. Jamie says she needs wisdom in the area of prodigals. She has a prodigal who's cut her off. And Jamie, that is something that I believe the enemy is doing everywhere right now. He is all over that. And so, I just want you to know that yes, we want to point you to wisdom and point you to God's Word, but we actually have an event coming up in June just for those who are praying for prodigals 

We have Mary Kassian coming; we have Christopher and Angela Yuan we have Dr. Joannie Debrito. And we will really deep dive into this topic in June. 

It may feel like a long time to wait as you're praying for your prodigal if you had to. ReviveOurHearts.com, I wanted to point you to that. I think you'll be able to walk away from that with some real concrete answers. Of course, the Lord gives wisdom. He doesn't have to wait for our timeline, but wanted to make sure you knew you were invited to that. 

Portia anything jumps out at you, specifically from the comments or from this episode. 

Portia: This entire episode is what I needed. I think it was so timely, especially because I got a text message from my sister-in-law right before we started this episode, and she was saying how this week she's going to take a fast of sorts from entertainment, from what she'd been consuming, and taking more time to meditate on just God's Word. Because we need to turn down the noise and the voices and ultimately the thing that we need to be most sensitive to is the voice of God. Wisdom’s call, hearing Him. 

Erin: Lord, make us sensitive to wisdom's call. That's a beautiful, beautiful prayer for today. 

Portia: Yes, absolutely.

So yeah, this was great. We know it's gonna be great next week. Join us next week as we consider what the Bible says about hospitality. 

Erin: Yep. Spoiler: it does not know napkin folding skills, no good eating skills are required. 

Portia: Good. I think we're eating Easter supper on paper plates here. So, I'm looking forward to that episode. We'll be here. We want you to be here. We're gonna celebrate Jesus' resurrection. We're gonna be right back here with a lot of hope next week on Grounded.

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