[00:00:00.880] – Candace Nassar
Welcome, everyone. Today on our Mom Q Mingle, we’re talking about Christian joy and how it’s different from how the world finds joy. We tend to think of being joyful when things are going our way or when we’re doing something we enjoy. But what happens when that’s not the case? Should circumstances rob us of our joy? God calls us to Rejoice in the Lord always. Does he really mean that? How is that even possible? And how can we teach our kids to find joy, especially now that we’re deep into summer. It’s hot, and the I’m bored statements are coming daily. We’re excited for this conversation, and pray that it is filled with some good Aha moments for you. So welcome, Annie. It’s good to see you today. How are things going?
[00:00:49.070] – Annie Mendrala
Good to see you. Well, I’m on a little respite in Northern New Mexico, visiting my parents and my boys. My husband and I are on our way, along with some friends. So we’re going to be playing out here at the Ranch in the mountains. So I’m looking forward to that.
[00:01:11.020] – Candace Nassar
Oh, my goodness. That sounds lovely. Is it nice and is it cooler up there than it is here?
[00:01:16.180] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah, it’s definitely cooler. It gets hot during the day, but it always cools off in the night. But we’ve had a lot of rain, which is strange around here. Things are green in the desert, so it’s fine. Okay.
[00:01:28.130] – Candace Nassar
Well, good. I hope you have a great time. I just came back from a girls’ weekend, which was just the most special time. There’s nothing like that, just to unplug and spend time just being joyful with friends.
[00:01:41.100] – Annie Mendrala
Yes.
[00:01:42.170] – Candace Nassar
All right. Well, let’s start with talking about how the world defines joy and how the culture tells us what we can do to find that happiness. What is that? What would you say?
[00:01:57.430] – Annie Mendrala
So worldly joy, I would say, is happiness based on what happens to me. It’s external, based on things from the outside in. It’s material-based. It’s a little bit self-centered, honestly, because it’s joy that’s focused on me, what makes me happy. And this joy is… Yeah, it’s temporary.
[00:02:21.980] – Candace Nassar
That’s right. Yeah. So I was also thinking about just the whole self-actualization theme that’s in our culture-that we can control our happiness by changing our circumstances. And sometimes we do things that aren’t necessarily good for us to make that happen. I think about alcohol and how we always associate that with having fun and being more relaxed and giving us joy, really, in a way. But that’s so temporary. And we think about possibly getting more stuff or whatever our hearts tell us to do. Sometimes, if we feel, especially as women, if we’re not in a happy place, what do we want to do?
[00:03:10.050] – Annie Mendrala
Go shopping. Retail therapy.
[00:03:11.970] – Candace Nassar
Retail therapy, yes. And so these are all things that we look to to change our circumstances and just change our heart. But really, it’s not going to last. And so it just creates an emotional roller coaster, really, that leads to an emptiness and depression as we’re just looking for the next thing to make us happy. Because happiness is fleeting. It’s a feeling, and we can’t make ourselves happy in that sense. So what else would you say about that? You said it’s temporary.
[00:03:50.610] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. I think the issue is that if we seek happiness, if we try to get happiness, it’s very unpredictable and often disappointing because we think something’s going to make us happy. I was thinking about a toddler in the ocean. They just can’t stand up against those waves. Every wave, life has just waves of unexpected things that knock us down. And if we’re looking for our externals to keep us happy, we’re just going to keep getting knocked down. That’s right. The joy. Yeah. And honestly, that joy and happiness, because it’s so self-centered, can end up being really unloving, I think. We can end up hurting others because we’re seeking to, like you said, through addictions or compulsive behaviors that we think are going to make us happy, actually can destroy our lives and those around us. Very good.
[00:04:45.200] – Candace Nassar
Great point. Yeah. And I think about as we accumulate, thinking that that’s going to make us happy, the Bible says that these things rot and decay. And so there’s just so many points in the Bible that tell us that we’re not going to find our joy in really any of the things of this world.
[00:05:08.600] – Annie Mendrala
I remember a sermon a long time ago. They said, light a match. This phrase. “light a match”- if it burns, it’s not going to last and it’s not going to bring happiness. So as we measure the things that we think will bring us joy, and those things, like you said, will rot, rust, decay, burn. What really will last? I think that’s a great question to ask ourselves.
[00:05:33.830] – Candace Nassar
So good. So let’s now talk about biblical joy. What is biblical joy? What does that look like?
[00:05:41.850] – Annie Mendrala
Well, biblical joy is more of an internal. Again, we said, worldly comes from the outside in. Biblical joy is an internal byproduct of a relationship with Jesus Christ. And I know that sounds like a very churchy answer, but it’s the truth. The relationship we have with God, through the Holy spirit living in us, has a byproduct of joy. There’s so many places in scripture where we’re commanded to consider it joy when we face trials or to rejoice always, to give thanks always in all circumstances. It’s just really clear that if God commands it, that joy, it’s not optional. It’s what’s meant for the Christian life. We’re meant to be joyful, regardless of what’s happening on the outside, because always what’s going on in the inside, the Holy Spirit, will always be with us once we have come to faith in Christ.
[00:06:39.940] – Candace Nassar
That’s so good. I think of Bible Project, which is one of my absolute favorite podcasts that I listen to. They said that joy is an attitude people adopt, not because of their circumstances, but because of their hope in God’s love and promise. It’s a deep contentment that’s in the Lord based on trust in his sovereign care, even in hard times. Isn’t that good?
[00:07:05.580] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah, so true. It’s so true. I love the Bible Project.
[00:07:10.080] – Candace Nassar
Gosh. It’s an attitude, right?
[00:07:11.820] – Annie Mendrala
It’s an attitude.
[00:07:14.100] – Candace Nassar
And I like what you said.
[00:07:15.330] – Annie Mendrala
They say it’s because of the hope. And I think we’re going to talk about this in a minute. But yeah, that hope we have is what leads to the joy, because we can look beyond what we’re in at the moment. It’s what changes our perspective.
[00:07:33.530] – Candace Nassar
Yeah. Another website that I got questions says, It’s a state of trusting in God and in his goodness. So that’s what makes joy constant, is that we know God is always good, and we can rejoice always, like you said in that verse, because we know that God is faithful and that whatever he’s bringing into our life is for our good. And he cares about our joy.
[00:08:02.000] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. The idea of trust, again, feels like a churchy answer, but it’s so true. What am I trusting in? If I’m trusting in God, and He’s my hope, then we know that His promises are true, that He’s not going to fail us, even though everything around us might be chaotic. If we’re holding on to Him, that’s the one thing that’s going to last.
[00:08:26.760] – Candace Nassar
Yeah. So I think about our listeners, some of them, moms that probably have their kids at home or just gotten to that point in the summer already where they’re just like…
[00:08:37.800] – Annie Mendrala
They’re exhausted.
[00:08:38.870] – Candace Nassar
That’s a good way to put it. And it’s hard to find the joy in that every day. So you’ve got a great verse that you talk about that is really the core of joy for you. So why don’t you share that with us? I think it will encourage our listeners.
[00:08:56.590] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. Is this about my favorite verse that you want me to share about joy? Yes. Okay. So my favorite verse about joy is not probably a typical one that people pull out, because honestly, just until recently, I didn’t see the joy in the verse, because it has to do with Jesus dying on the cross. And you would think of an execution, how can you find joy in that scripture? But let me explain. What the Bible says in Hebrews 12:1-2, it says, “Therefore, since we’re surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders us and the sin that entangles us. Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” And now this is the part. It says, “Fix our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfector of our faith. For the joy set before him, he endured the cross, scorning the shame, and he sat down at the right-hand of the throne of God.” Passage of scripture. I like this verse because it’s about the reality that life is hard. He says, run with endurance, right? Throw off those things that hinder us. Fix our eyes on Jesus-for the joy set before him.
[00:10:09.510] – Annie Mendrala
Now, what was that joy that was before him? That’s what we need to grasp. For sure. The joy that was before him was eternity with God, a reunification with the Father and all the saints. This is the place where Shalom, that original design that God had for us in the garden, is restored. And so it’s interesting to me that Jesus, that because of joy, is why he endured the cross. He saw the joy before him. He was willing to go through that suffering. And so I’ve just been thinking a lot about this. How can I be joyful? Life is hard, and there are things that knock us down. But as we get knocked down, just keep looking ahead like Jesus did when he was on the cross. I don’t know. I think it’s a super powerful verse. Yeah. And I’m just… The past several months, I’ve really been thinking about it a lot, that phrase, for the joy set before him.
[00:11:07.930] – Candace Nassar
It’s funny because I’ve been actually… I forget what I’ve been reading because I’m reading so many things at once. But something I’ve been reading was talking about this verse and just the joy of the cross. Like you said, you don’t think of the cross as being… It’s a horrific, horrible thing. But he did it for us, and he knew that the gift that he was giving us and the relationship that he was setting before us, that gave him joy. And so it’s an eternal mindset, right?
[00:11:44.200] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. I love that. I hadn’t thought about that either. It’s joy. It’s eternity with God, but it’s about the relationship. That’s so insightful. The joy is about the restoration of relationships. It’s not about anything else.It’s about what that connection with people and with his creation.
[00:12:07.800] – Candace Nassar
Right. And so we can understand it starts to make God’s love for us so much more plain. And the love for us was the catalyst for the cross. And so if you think about that, it is much more possible for us to have joy going through the things of this life. Life-if we look ahead to our time with God and to eternity. And really, we have the presence of God now. And we’re going to talk some more about that. But yeah, just the restoration of the relationship is just such a joyful thing that we can look at that obviously drove Jesus, the Holy spirit, to the cross.
[00:12:56.420] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. And also it’s a perfect example of what I was saying in the beginning-how worldly happiness is what happens to me. It’s very self-focused. Jesus, when he got on that cross, he was not thinking about himself. He was thinking about you and me and our listeners. He was thinking about others. We’ve talked a lot at different times about codependency and things like that. I’m saying Jesus is the perfect model of just thinking about others in a way that brought joy to himself and to those that he died for. It’s a win-win.
[00:13:31.700] – Candace Nassar
Yes. And it reminds me… I mean, this is an acronym that probably everybody knows that joy stands for Jesus, others, and then you. And that’s what Jesus was modeling for us- that he was looking to the future and what he was doing for us. So his joy was in the sacrifice that he was making on our behalf. And so when we put others first, in that relationship first, then we can find joy. But when we’re looking at ourselves and I keep going back to the beginning, that happiness, the circumstances of joy in the world is focused on me. Actually, Christian joy is the exact opposite.
[00:14:14.460] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. You know what’s interesting? So I’ve heard the joy, Jesus, others, yourself. And honestly, I would say that was Jesus’ acronym, because Jesus first thought about… He chose what he did. Jesus was first in the sense of he said, “I’m doing this. I’m choosing this because this is what I want to do.” And he chose it for others and for the broad well-being of all humanity, and then specifically for you and I. And maybe our acronym should be something similar, like I’m choosing to do what I do for others because that’s what Jesus modeled for me. I think it’s important in that joy that we recognize we’re choosing. Jesus was choosing that.
[00:14:59.340] – Candace Nassar
Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, that is really such a profound thing to understand is that joy is a choice. It is a choice that we have to make. I mean, I said earlier, it’s an attitude. And when we think about motherhood, it’s such a sacrifice. And there are so many days that we can just feel, where am I in this? And I’m not finding happiness in all of the schlepping of the laundry and the cooking and the chores and just dealing with whining kids and all the things. Where is the joy? But if we have that attitude that we are… This is a calling and that God is with us in it, and that we can have joy in the midst as a choice. And we’re going to talk about how we can exercise joy. Actually, why don’t we do that right now? Let’s talk about how we can exercise or develop our joy muscles, if you will. What are some things that we can do when we’re in the midst of, and maybe we’re not, in the trial? We can talk about that, too, but just in the daily grind, how can we find joy?
[00:16:10.760] – Candace Nassar
What are some things we can do?
[00:16:12.840] – Annie Mendrala
Well, yeah. Again, we talked about how Joy is a by-product of a relationship with God through His Word. And so I think the first thing we need to do is get in His Word and talk to Him. We need to start the day in the relationship with Him, because if joy comes from Him, we have to say we got to connect to Him. And so I think that needs to be our first step in the day, because until we are filled with His presence, we’re just going to keep trying to seek external things to fill that hole in the soul, we call it. Without the Holy Spirit, we’re not going to find the joy.
[00:16:53.650] – Candace Nassar
Yeah. Very good. And then for me, something that I’ve learned over the years is when I’m sitting with the Lord in the morning, is just to thank Him for all the good things that He has given me and having that gratitude and practicing gratitude instead of looking at, “Oh, I have to do this today”. Or, “What are all the things that are wrong?” Especially with me being a perfectionist. I can look at so many situations and just think, “Why doesn’t this change and be better, or whatever?” And it starts to frustrate me. Instead, if I can just stop and just look and thank God for the good things, it totally changes my brain pattern. It sets me up for the day as I’m thanking Him and acknowledging all the gifts that He has given me.
[00:17:46.820] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah, I think that’s why I love Mom’s In Prayer. It is a great organization, and they’ve adopted the model of prayer, which is all over. Adoration, confession, thanksgiving, giving and then request. And when we start our day in prayer, thinking about starting with A, who is God? When we just name those things out loud, right, it rewires our brains. And then we move into the confession part of like, “Okay, God, I can’t do it without you. And then that thanks part, that’s huge. I mean, how can we be ungrateful when we’re expressing gratitude? How can we be discontent when we’re recognizing how good God has been to us. Absolutely. But He does want us to cast our cares on Him. He cares about us. The reason He said, “Consider it joy….” is because He knew we would struggle because life is hard, and the enemy is going to try to pull us away from joy. And so we have to choose it. We have to get in that battle of prayer and all of that.
[00:18:55.340] – Candace Nassar
And He helps us do that through his Holy spirit. So true. What are some other ways that we can practice joy?
[00:19:05.760] – Annie Mendrala
Because joy is found in the relationship with God, it’s also found in the body of Christ, like your “Girls’ Weekend”. Spending time. I had a couple of friends over the other day, and we just floated in my pool, and we just talked, and I thought, this is what we’re meant to do, connect, to share, to carry one another’s burdens, to even just sometimes just telling somebody how you’re struggling. It just allows joy to fill that space where you felt hopeless, because the opposite of joy is a sense of hopelessness. So we have things that bring hope.
[00:19:43.410] – Candace Nassar
And we have, speaking of hopelessness, at the very core, we know that we have the hope of Christ’s return, that we are not left in our sin. We’re not left alone. So yes, community. And then I also think of just hoping in that future where God is going to make all things right again. When we look around the world today, we just see so many things that can rob us of our joy. And my goodness, I mean, the politics. I mean, right now it is just hard to even turn on the news or read the paper or whatever. Of course, not the paper, the app. But yeah, there’s so many things that can rob us of our joy. But we know that Christ is returning and that our citizenship is in heaven, that we’re really not of this world.
[00:20:38.810] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. This isn’t our home.
[00:20:40.870] – Candace Nassar
This is not our home. And so if we can get our eyes off of the temporary, again, that whole fleeting happiness thing that’s based on circumstances and just focus on that Christ has died, Christ has risen, and Christ will come again and set all things right. I mean, I just love that, don’t you?
[00:21:01.810] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. When you talk about the political part of it, I think the problem is our expectations. People are expecting things to get better, but the Bible warns us things are going to go from bad to worse. We’re going to… Things are going from bad to worse in this world. Nowhere in scripture does it say it’s going to get better on Earth. I love when Jesus is leaving his disciples and he’s saying, “I’m going to go prepare a place for you. If it wasn’t true, I wouldn’t tell you.” Jesus is like, “I don’t lie to you people.” He has gone before us to prepare a home for us. And if we can stop and go, this is not our home. We can experience wonderful abundant life on Earth, but ultimately it’s always going to miss the mark because we’re going to have that flesh struggle until we die. And so setting our expectations. There’s just a couple of little phrases that go through my head. Lie to match. This isn’t your home. No, this is temporary. It’s going from bad to worse. I know all that sounds a little doom and gloom, but the reality is, it’s true. My expectation is the world will get worse.
[00:22:08.120] – Candace Nassar
And I just love the fact that we were talking about the circumstantial joy of the world versus the constant joy that we can have in God’s eternal presence, the hope that we have in Him. Who doesn’t want to have just everyday, steady joy? Doesn’t that sound amazing?
[00:22:33.600] – Annie Mendrala
Yes, it does. It’s like that waterfall that just keeps flowing, that spring of water that never dries up. That’s just beautiful. It’s there. Yeah, it’s available. I’m not saying it’s not a struggle. I’m sure there are our listeners, and you and I both, we’ve had times of drought in our lives, times where we’re like, “Where is the spring? Why is the water not flowing?” But realizing we’ve got to go to the source to get it sometimes.
[00:23:02.710] – Candace Nassar
Yeah, that brings up a really good point. So does rejoicing mean we can’t feel sad or feel sorry?
[00:23:09.980] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah, I love that question because it goes back to that verse in Hebrews, about Jesus, “for the joy that set before him, he endured the cross.” I guarantee he was not feeling good on that cross. As the nails were going in his hands, as he couldn’t get a breath, as his physical body was giving out, he was feeling pain. Pain and sorrow. Yet, he had joy thinking ahead. And so I would say, in no way does this mean we won’t feel sad or sorrowful. Jesus himself, Isaiah 53:3, talks about how he was a “man of sorrows”. A man of suffering who knew what it was in pain, to be despised, unvalued, it says. It says we didn’t value him. I mean, how many days do we as moms feel like we’re not valued? Does anybody see? Can I get a paycheck or something? Can somebody validate?
[00:24:04.380] – Candace Nassar
Performance review? Yes.
[00:24:08.880] – Annie Mendrala
Who’s going to give me my credit for what I’ve been doing? And it’s hard. So the reality is suffering, that’s sorrow, God uses as a shaping tool in our lives. He uses sorrow and pain to transform our hearts. When we get to those low plays, I love how it’s… Psalm says, “He is near the broken-hearted. He saves those crested spirits.” As crazy as it sounds, some of the best times in my life were the most painful, where I was the most broken, where everyone in the world disappointed me, and God met me, and he comforted me. And there was joy in that. And there’s some days when things are going pretty smoothly and well. And I think, I’m like, huh, I secretly in my brain think, “I wish I had a little bit of struggle because I know how near God comes.” At the same time, I think, “Just kidding.”
[00:25:09.120] – Candace Nassar
For sure.
[00:25:11.140] – Annie Mendrala
We know, yeah, we know, suffering is coming again. Our life is not meant to be comfortable and easy. Jesus warned us, “In this life, you’re going to have trouble, but take heart, I’ve overcome the world.”
[00:25:24.820] – Candace Nassar
Amen. Amen. So what would you say to a mom that doesn’t even have joy on her radar because she’s going through something really hard?
[00:25:35.620] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. First, I just want to say, I am so sorry they are hurting. It’s so hard to be in a pit, and it’s so hard to hear two women talk about, be joyful, consider it joy. You’re like, how? You’re dying inside. You feel lonely. There’s a lot of loneliness in that pit. And hopelessness. So I just want to say, I get it. I’ve been there, and it’s hard. There are days when being a mom is really hard. But second, I do want to say, take heart, like Jesus told us. Take heart. It’s not always going to be this way. Your children will sleep through the night. They will learn to buckle their seatbelts. They will learn to drive cars, and they will learn to live outside your home, most likely. They’re going to grow up. These days are long, but the years definitely are short. It’s a true statement. I’d also say, if you’re struggling in your marriage, don’t give up. Having kids, it wrecks your world in the sense of all of a sudden, it’s not about you. It feels like it’s all about them. And then your husband’s like, “Hey, what about me?”
[00:26:53.680] – Annie Mendrala
Marriage really gets tested when we have kids. And so I would say, just don’t give up on that marriage because God is for you, and he’s for your marriage and for your family. God wants good things for you and your husband and your kids. I would also say it’s so important to have trusted friends that you can share what you’re going through with. And I really mean that, trusted, safe friends. You don’t need to post it on Facebook and Instagram. I think it’s really important to have wise friends who will share the truth with you who will listen in love and support you. Because being a mom and being a wife, they’re hard. It’s hard, but it’s worth it.
[00:27:40.640] – Candace Nassar
Yeah. And they can hold you accountable. When we’re saying, what are some things we can exercise our joy muscles with? Well, the key thing is just that relationship with the Lord and drawing the strength from His presence. And it is really hard to have those times when you have kids at home. Having that accountability with trusted friends and then those that you know are wise and are going to speak the truth into your life. I love that. Really good. So what are some ways that we can help our kids be joyful?
[00:28:15.610] – Annie Mendrala
Yes, I would say, model it. The way to see joy in your home is to model it. I love this idea of mirror neurons. The way our facial expression is, If I’m smiling, that might drive my children to smile. But if they say mom has a sad face, angry face, whatnot, they’re going to pick up on that. It’s really crazy how God designed these mirror neurons. I saw a hilarious Instagram post the other day that popped up. And this mom, her child sitting there, and she starts singing and dancing, and all of a sudden, her kids start singing and dancing. And it’s like, yeah, model joy in your home. My childhood was at times very unpredictable, and that created a lot of fear. I think it’s so important to establish routines and then sprinkle in some good surprises. But I think routine helps build joy because it builds predictability, which feels a secure attachment. So then they feel free to express themselves as they develop, and they feel like it’s a safe place to… When they’re falling apart, they need a safe place to fall apart so you can help them learn how to regulate their emotions. I think playing music and singing is so fun.
[00:29:38.120] – Annie Mendrala
Get in the car and just blare it and put on worship music. I love doing that. I think music in general just brings joy into a space.
[00:29:52.790] – Candace Nassar
I can remember this with my kids. We had a coffee table when they were growing up that was in the middle of this great room. And their big thing (we would put on the music), would be to get up there with hair brushes or whatever and just microphones. I let them just take over. It was like, just have fun. Let’s just have fun and be silly. And then also for me, a lot of what I tried to do was just when we’re saying grace or when we’re in prayer together, for them to hear me thanking God for specific things in our day. And again, just changing that mindset. And even to this day, they do that when we say grace together. We all go around and thank God. So like you said, modeling it, the things that we’re doing.
[00:30:46.320] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. So powerful. Yeah. This is the way we pray with our children will transform the way they pray because they are more “caught than taught” in a sense, the way we model. I do want to say that this doesn’t mean that you can’t be sad around your kids. Things happen, and there will be… That your kids need to see that you… that sadness is a part of the human emotions. Don’t pretend like everything’s a rainbow and butterflies all the time. But I would say in those sad times, to always point back to God, to say, “Mommy, her heart hurts today, but God is with me. God is with us.” Point them to the hope. I can’t say enough how modeling and verbally expressing these things to our kids will help validate because they’re going to feel sad. They’re going to have struggles, and they’re not going to know how to express that if all they think is that we just pretend to be happy all the time. What happens when they have a hard day? I also will say, it’s so important. I know that the reality is, especially in young families, their betrayal happens. Really unexpected, difficult things happen in a marriage.
[00:32:03.260] – Annie Mendrala
And while, yes, you need to get your help and process and all of that and take time out, there are times that it is important for you to get out of bed and go engage with your children when you don’t feel like it. And find ways, if you’re dealing with something like an affair or something like that, or a divorce, or I don’t know. Things happen in marriage, find a way to get away from your children to process that, because all they see is that sadness. The depression. Yeah, the depression, they’re going to have something called secondary trauma. And so I just want to help balance that. There’s age-appropriate ways to process the sorrows that we’re dealing with. Just keep that in balance.
[00:32:55.200] – Candace Nassar
Now, I like that. But again, the joy comes from the presence of the Lord. So if we are feeling that we’re going through something that difficult, again, God tells us that he walks through the fire with us, and he will hold your hand and get you out of those hard times. We talked about our hard times back in May when we did a podcast about mental illness. And so I encourage those who want to explore that a little further to go back and listen to that one. But a good point. So let’s just end this by talking about how God has shown you joy in your life lately. And I’ll share mine as well.
[00:33:38.290] – Annie Mendrala
Yeah. I would say it’s interesting as we even are working on MomQ and we’re recording our videos and excited about just expanding the ministry, just through teaching. And you looked at me one day and you’re like, Annie, slow down. I just want to say, first of all, I so appreciate you looking at me and saying, slow down, because that was like Jesus through you because he’s constantly telling me to slow down, but sometimes I need a physical person to look at me. And I realized, yeah, Annie, slow down. It’s part of the reason we’re out at the ranch. It was a last minute trip. I was like, I need to slow down. I need to set my business aside, the busyness, all the things I got to do because I’m a doer. The other way, honestly, joy has come in my surrender. The past several months, just going through marriage counseling and going through my own individual counseling, slowing down and looking at some really hard things and letting go and just saying, okay, God, I’m going to trust you. I’m going to trust that I can talk about really uncomfortable, painful things, and you’re going to redeem and restore the brokenness.
[00:35:00.100] – Annie Mendrala
And so I found a lot of joy. It’s so strange because we’ll be in a counseling session and we’ll talk about something, and I’ll be thinking, oh, this is not good. He wants to go there. We’ll leave. And Mike’s like, I love you so much. And I’m like, what do you mean? It builds connection as we together, admit what we’ve How we’ve been unhealthy in our marriage, God is bringing healthy restoration. So I found a lot of joy in that, in that surrender.
[00:35:41.560] – Candace Nassar
Yeah. For me, it has been also a slowing because I have the same problem. And as MomQ is growing, delegating to slow down, which has been really… I guess that’s surrender, if you think about it, that I’m giving up a lot of the things that I’ve been doing because I just can’t do it all anymore and just trusting others. And God is bringing those people into my life to take on these things. And what a great source of joy that is just to see God working when I can trust Him and just let it go. Because if we’re stressed out and overcommitted, we can’t find joy. I mean, come on. It’s not the way we’re supposed to be. Yeah, summer is great because things are slower. But maybe we don’t have to get back on the high-speed train come fall. Maybe we can make some changes in our routines and our lifestyle so we can find that joy in God’s presence and just sitting with Him. And Elizabeth Elliot, who is… It’s funny, she’s making such a resurgence. She’s always been great, but I hear her more and more lately. I found this quote that says, “Joy is not in the absence of suffering, but the presence of God.”
[00:37:00.200] – Candace Nassar
We experience suffering because we live in a fallen world. This was not God’s design. He uses those hard times in our life for his good purpose, but He will restore all things one day. Just like a plant that grows deeper roots when it’s pruned and produces more fruit, so it is with God. When He trims and makes cuts sometimes, He prunes us so that we can bear more fruit. And so we can be joyful in the midst of whatever we’re going through, knowing that he is faithful and trustworthy. He’s never going to leave us or forsake us. And we can’t have that joy if we’re not slowing down spending time with Him, and really focusing. I was talking about it earlier, about the joy of the cross, of how much He loves us, and that that is what drove Him to the cross. And that’s something to be so joyful about, just God’s love for us.
[00:38:03.740] – Annie Mendrala
So true. When I came to faith, I was 10 years old, and I was thinking about this the other day. I literally moved from a dark to a light, from hopeless to full of hope. And I was just 10 years old, but I knew something totally happened within me that I began to live out of confidence and a joy and a hope full expectation that I never experienced. Before I knew Jesus. It was like my life was just a chaotic, certain hopeless path. It’s so true that the presence of God is where we find joy. And honestly, if our listeners are like, “I’ve never had joy. I don’t know what you all are talking about.” I really encourage you to just sit down with a friend who is a Christian and ask her, “How do I do this?” Or just sit down with God. “God, how do I do this?” And you know what? He’ll find you and he’ll get people to you.
[00:39:10.990] – Candace Nassar
That’s so true. Absolutely. I love that. Yeah. So I know that you also… We’re talking about a quote from Elizabeth Elliot. So why don’t you… We can close with that. Share that with us.
[00:39:24.380] – Annie Mendrala
Yes. I love that we both had a quote from Elizabeth Elliot. It says, “We are not adrift in chaos.” To me, that is the most fortifying and most stabilizing, the most peace-giving thing that I know about anything in the universe. “Every time that things have seemingly fallen apart in my life.” (This is Elizabeth Elliott talking.) She says, “I have gone back to those things that do not change. Nothing in the universe can ever change those facts. He loves me, and I’m not at the mercy of chance. Our lives are not at the mercy of chance. God has a plan and a purpose, and we’re not adrift in chaos.” I love that.
[00:40:11.190] – Candace Nassar
So good. Love it. Well, this has been a great conversation, Annie, as always, and I have found some joy in it. So I hope that you have. I hope our listeners have. So if you wouldn’t mind closing us in prayer, that would be awesome.
[00:40:27.270] – Annie Mendrala
Sure. Heavenly Father, we’re so grateful for the joy that was set before you, that you, Jesus, endured the cross, and that because of your love, because of your compassion, because of your grace, we can have a relationship with you, that in your presence, we will find joy. God, show us today your presence. Help us to choose joy on those days where we just feel like we can’t. God, we just thank you for your Holy spirit. Thank you for this time. In Jesus’ name, I pray.. Amen.
