Candace Nassar (00:00)
Well, Stephanie, we are so thrilled to have you on the MomQ podcast today. I’ve been looking forward to this conversation because your passion for helping people savor God’s Word fits so beautifully with our heart for equipping moms to grow in their faith. So thank you so much for joining us.
Stephanie (00:17)
It is truly a delight to be here with you, Candice, today.
Candace Nassar (00:20)
I’m so glad and gospel spice and savoring the word. It’s all just I love the name of your ministry. So how about you share a little bit about your journey? I’m sure our listeners have already heard your beautiful French accent and growing up in France and just how you came to faith in Christ.
Stephanie (00:37)
Yeah, thank you for asking that. It really is a story that is to the glory of God. I think all of our stories of coming to faith, right? I grew up in France as a very devout atheist, you could say. So it was my family’s world view, but then it’s something I really adopted for myself when I was a teenager. But lo and behold, it just so happens that when I was 17 years old, I spent my senior year of high school in the US with an American family through a foreign exchange program.
And so it just so happened that it was a Christian family. And it was the first time that I was meeting flesh and blood, true believers in Christ. I had never met a believer in France. France is still, is really completely post-Christian at this point. I hear of hints of revival today, but 30 plus years ago when I was a teenager, it was not the case.
So I had never met a Christian, but I thought I understood Christianity because I had read about it so much through the lens of my atheist authors, my heroes, my mentors, if you will. And I just thought I understood, but I really didn’t. What I had been fed was distortions about what the true Christian faith is. And anyone who’s watching the news, I think, can relate to that. We hear so much noise about what the Christian faith is, and really, it isn’t that at all, right? And so living for a year with these American Christians,
Candace Nassar (01:47)
Sure.
Stephanie (01:55)
Exposed me to the real Christian faith about the love and the truth that Christ calls us to and so long story short It took the entire year But I did give my life to Christ at the end of my year in the States and we could go into the details of that But bottom line I got baptized went back to France still dripping wet from baptism basically
And that’s how it started. So that’s the really, really short version. And ever since that, I have been passionate for scripture because, well, that’s just the way God wired me. I’m a bit of a brainiac, if you will. I like to study things. And so I came to faith because I believed that Jesus had resurrected from the dead and that he had died from my sins. And the only reason why I could know that is because scripture taught me that.
Candace Nassar (02:42)
Right. Right.
Stephanie (02:43)
So that’s kind of the nutshell version.
Candace Nassar (02:47)
I love it. I had a similar experience in just investigating and seeing the truth in scripture and not who I was told Jesus was and then finding out the truth. But I also love that you had this witness in this family that really shined Jesus’ light to you. And that’s just so beautiful and really that’s what we’re all supposed to do. So praise God for that, right?
Stephanie (02:51)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Stephanie (03:11)
absolutely. We need one another. And that is such a thing that anyone who’s lived through 2020 understands. We can’t do faith alone. God has wired us for community and he has called us the body of Christ. We cannot overemphasize the importance of community in our walk with God.
Candace Nassar (03:31)
And just the witness of living it out and how we make disciples by just doing what he’s called us to do. So I love that.
Stephanie (03:39)
Yeah, and it’s relational and it’s not perfect. My American mom and dad weren’t perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but they were faithful, they were loving, they were honest. When they made a mistake, you know, in their marriage, I remember being so shocked when at the time they were younger, they were in their early thirties, they had three kids at home. They had a one year old, a three year old and a five year old. So they probably, lot of your audience can relate to that stage of life. And so their marriage was under a lot of stress.
Candace Nassar (04:02)
okay.
yeah.
Stephanie (04:06)
And I would see that. was a 17 year old living with them. I would see them argue and fight, but I would also see them reconcile and forgive, ask for forgiveness and forgive. And that blew my mind. I had never been exposed to anything like that. So the sincere love and humility that comes from a live relationship with Christ, that is beautifully contagious.
Candace Nassar (04:13)
Uh-huh.
Candace Nassar (04:27)
I love that. That’s so good. And just being real and living it out like that. I love it. Okay, so how did that journey then lead you into teaching the Bible and ultimately starting Gospel Spice Ministries?
Stephanie (04:41)
man, that’s a long story. But basically I spent my entire adult life really aware of the importance of intimacy with God because I’m a first generation believer, right? And actually to this day, you can pray for my family. It’s this day, 30 some years later, I’m still the only believer. My husband, obviously my kids are believers, but not my family of origin. And so this passion for scripture, I think, is born out of humility and desperation. Really? I know I cannot.
Candace Nassar (05:07)
You
Stephanie (05:09)
do anything apart from Christ. I have learned that the hard way. I used to be a very strong, very self-sufficient, maybe one could rightfully say very arrogant person, but Jesus has humbled me in the best possible way to learn to depend on him and trust him. And I mean that not as cliche, not as cute little bumper sticker sort of thing, but as hard earned truth and reality that I’ve lived over the last 30 plus years.
Candace Nassar (05:20)
Hmm.
Stephanie (05:35)
And Gospel Spice really has been born out of that because it is about our experience that meets scripture. We can’t ever have a theology that is higher than our experience. What I mean by that is we can have a lot of head facts about scripture, about God, about Jesus, but if we don’t actually live like we believe them, if they don’t transform our life, then they’re just theory.
Candace Nassar (05:59)
Yes.
Stephanie (05:59)
They’re good theology, but they’re not experienced. And then on the other hand, there’s other people who do the other way around. They value their experience above theology. So they’re gonna say, well, you know, I feel this way, therefore it must be true. No, no, no, that’s really dangerous. Our feelings should always be under the submission of scripture and theology. So then some people have experience that exceeds their theology and that’s wrong.
So for me, it’s how do we match up our theology and our experience? How do we live our life? that is a witness to the truth of scripture, but in a way that is lived out. How do we not live above the theology we’ve actually embodied and learned? So that’s what Gospel Spice is about. It’s about walking alongside people who seek to have a deep theology, a deep understanding of scripture from a place of experience, where we meet experience and theology.
You know, it’s this, it’s what brings out the spice of the gospel. When we taste and see that the Lord is good, like you have, you know, the spice, you have to taste it. Of course it smells good, it probably looks good, but you have to taste it. Otherwise there’s no real point to it. And so in the same way, we have to taste and integrate the gospel so that it transforms us.
Candace Nassar (06:56)
Mm-hmm.
Mmm.
Candace Nassar (07:09)
So true. Could not agree more. And that’s one of the main reasons I have you on today is just I love that passion and I want all of our listeners to really experience that as well. we know that the Bible can feel intimidating to people. So they feel unqualified or overwhelmed by scripture. Why do you think that is?
Stephanie (07:3)
Hmm. I think you have the, you hit the nail on the head. There you go. Well, you know, I wonder if it could be because in our culture right now, we love experts, right? We and we actually have gotten to a place in our culture that’s a consequence of the European Enlightenment where we really only trust experts, which is why we love
Candace Nassar (07:49)
Hmm.
Stephanie (07:50)
you know, to trust people who’ve got a bunch of letters behind their names or who have done all the studies. And if the experts don’t teach us, then we don’t know how to learn for ourselves. Okay, now there’s nothing wrong with experts, but we don’t need to be an expert to understand scripture or to read scripture. All we need to know is to be able to read. If you can read, if you’ve been to first grade and you can read and write, you can read scripture.
So we have this idea that we need someone to help us, that we’re not smart enough or qualified enough to figure it out on our own. No, no, no. We do. We completely do. I mean, the Holy Spirit promises He’s with us. He’s the one who’s going to teach us, interpret for us.
Of course on our own, we can’t. Agreed. But we’re not on our own. You know, and then there’s also this idea that I feel so much sometimes in my own life, like when you’re around people who are what I call Bible acrobats,
Candace Nassar (08:25)
Yes.
Candace Nassar (08:31)
That’s right.
Stephanie (08:41)
They are so good with scripture. Like they have, they understand scripture inside out. They can quote the Greek and the Hebrew and, they’re so good at this. They’re Bible acrobats, but that didn’t just happen overnight. It happened because they spent 20, 30, 40 years studying scripture. So you don’t become a Bible acrobat overnight or a Bible chef, if you will, to keep the food metaphors, but you can become one. It’s just, going to take a lot of
Candace Nassar (08:48)
Yeah.
Candace Nassar (08:59)
Mm-hmm.
Stephanie (09:09)
information and a lot of time. That doesn’t mean like everyone starts as a complete ignorant. It’s okay. I was reading a quote recently. It’s okay to be the most ignorant person in the room because that’s a place of humility from which you’re going to grow. If you want to pretend like you know everything, you’re not going to learn anything and you are actually going to remain the stupidest person or the most ignorant person in the room. The only way to overcome that is to acknowledge that and it’s freedom to say, okay, I don’t know anything, but I want to learn.
Candace Nassar (09:36)
Mm. Mm-hmm.
Stephanie (09:39)
I’m willing to learn. So to become a Bible acrobat, you start by reading scripture today a little bit. And actually, by the way, that’s why I don’t have a seminary degree, because I want to prove that any random person like me can do it. And if I can, then you can too. And if I’ve been able to, you know, become very familiar with scripture in English, which isn’t even my native tongue, then how much more can you too? anyone can do it.
So, and then finally, I’d say you do have access to those Bible teachers, those pastors, those mentors you can trust. So use them, take advantage of them, but I would say be super picky with who you choose as your advisors, your mentors, because they have to be doctrinally sound. And you can only know that because you yourself spend time in scripture. So no one else but yourself is responsible for your time in scripture.
Candace Nassar (10:29)
Yeah, that’s so good. And I know that I hear it all the time that, moms say, I don’t have the time. I don’t have the time. But I like what you said, you know, just start small, just, you know, one step at a time. And I know for me, I just became so hungry, right? Once I start, you know, once I got the Holy Spirit and I could decipher and begin to really
Stephanie (10:40)
Yes.
Candace Nassar (10:51)
be enlightened what the scriptures were saying to me, I could not stop. I could not stop. You know? So I think that’s a big encouragement to moms, is to just take that first step and just five minutes a day and just see what happens from there and just pray for that time. What would you say?
Stephanie (11:10)
Just exactly what you just said. To start where they are, to build that foundation of actually what you just said, telling God, I want to start. How do I do that? Those five minutes I think is great because some people are going to think, I need to spend a whole hour in scripture. Well, I only have five minutes. Well, yes. Well, then you only have five minutes. Great. Start there.
Candace Nassar (11:19)
Mm-hmm.
Stephanie (11:30)
Don’t do what I sometimes do, which is to squander those five precious minutes doing something else. You know, all of a sudden I have this urge to clean the toilets because, well, I have five minutes. I could do that. Or I have, you know, five minutes. All of a sudden I can spend five minutes on social media. No, no, no, no, no. Guard that time. You only have five minutes. Don’t lose three or four of them on something else. No distractions. Phone down. Now is not the time to do anything else. That’s your five minutes.
Candace Nassar (11:36)
Right.
Stephanie (11:59)
And do that, what I would say is do it in one particular spot in your house. It can be a spot that you use for a bunch of other things, but for me, you know, you’ve set aside the time, now set aside the space. Is there a little corner in your house? And I understand if you’ve got a bunch of little kids, there’s probably very precious little space. But find a little place that can become what ancient writers have called a thin place.
A thin place is a place where heaven meets earth in your own experience because you’ve cultivated the habit of meeting with God in that place and so you are mentally, emotionally prepared to meet with God in that particular space. Now that space itself has nothing particularly sacred about it, but you make it sacred by meeting God in that place every day. And so when you do that, it becomes this thin place where you meet with God, this thin veil.
the thin veil between heaven and earth gets thinner in that place. So you set that space aside and that’s where you meet with God. And then if you don’t even have it in you to open your Bible, because you don’t even know what to do with that, that’s okay. Start by spending maybe 30 seconds of those five minutes telling God, okay, God, here I am. Make me aware of your presence. I know you’re here, but can you please make sure I know you’re here?
And then tell him, okay, I’m about to open my Bible, but that’s intimidating. I don’t know what I’m going to get out of it. I want to get something from it. But honestly, God, if you don’t make it happen, it’s not going to happen. I cannot make it happen on my own strength, which is so freeing because then you’re really putting the burden on God and his shoulders are big and have to take that. He delights in you asking him that sort of thing. And then.
Will he give you a big revelation in your five minutes or not? That’s actually not the point. You’re not there for a big revelation. You’re there for a relationship. You show up, you open your Bible, you read the one paragraph, and I would say start in the New Testament. I’m right now reading through numbers. I really do not recommend starting there, right? You don’t.
Don’t start there. It’s terrible to start. Go in John, go in Matthew, the Gospels, and start there. Literally one paragraph. One paragraph. It takes one minute to read that. No more. You don’t need to read your entire Bible in one year if you’ve never done that. That is pointless. Read one paragraph. It takes you 10 years to go through the Bible the first time around. Who cares? That’s awesome. One paragraph. And then ask him, what are you showing me through this?
Candace Nassar (14:07)
you
Candace Nassar (14:11)
Yes.
Candace Nassar (14:31)
Mm-hmm.
Stephanie (14:33)
What are you doing? So for example, if I can give a very practical example, this morning, I was, it just so happens, I’m in the book of Acts right now. I always do an Old Testament and a New Testament at the same time. So I’m in Numbers and I’m in Acts. And in Acts, there’s a moment where Peter and John have been arrested for preaching the gospel and then they get freed and they get back to the early believers and they pray, they pray. They thank God that Peter and John were delivered and
They pray. And their prayer, what struck me is they’re basically saying, God, all we’re asking is that you give us confidence to preach your word. And you’re the one who’s going to heal people. You’re the one who’s going to bring people to faith. You’re the one who’s going to do the miracles. All we ask is for confidence, courage, boldness to preach your word. That’s all we ask.
Candace Nassar (15:10)
Mm-hmm.
Stephanie (15:22)
And then they end their prayer and then I think the text says that the Holy Spirit fell on them and they had a renewed boldness to preach the word. So God answered their prayer. But they’re basically saying, all I want to do is preach your word, is talk about you. You do everything else. And that struck me because again, that’s where I live. I live in teaching God’s word. So for me, it was a reminder. It’s not my job to bring people to faith or even grow anyone’s faith, that’s God’s job. All I have to do is show up. So that spoke to me and that’s what the Holy Spirit does and He’ll do that for you too.
Candace Nassar (15:52)
Mm-hmm.
Candace Nassar (15:58)
That’s so great. Such practical advice, but also just trusting God and releasing that responsibility and giving it to him. It’s very freeing, so that’s so good. Okay, so when we begin to study a little bit more, we get past the five minutes and we’re starting to accumulate some knowledge. You talk about the role of prayer and the Holy Spirit and understanding the historical and cultural context of the word. So how did those elements change the way we study the Bible?
Stephanie (16:31)
that is such a good question because you really basically just said everything. I mean, you talked about prayer. You talked about the Holy Spirit. You talked about scripture. You talked about, you know, the historical cultural context. These are so many different spices that we can mix in our recipe when we spend time with God. Like we’re in the spiritual kitchen and we’re making food and we’re adding all of these spices and we get this absolutely unique dish. So, you know, very briefly, prayer.
And the Holy Spirit, really, it’s kind of what we’ve been talking about. It’s about, I would say, maybe cultivating a remembrance of our dependence. And I call that remembrance because we are completely utterly dependent on God, right? We forget that, but we cannot draw our next breath apart from God. So we are more dependent on God than we realize. So, you know, if we can’t even draw our next breath, we clearly cannot.
pray or study the scriptures without his help, clearly. So what we need to do is remember that dependence, because when I remember I’m completely dependent on you, to understand scripture, then that cultivates surrender, right? And this surrender to know, I really cannot make that happen, Lord. If you don’t show up, nothing’s gonna happen. So I do my part, which is showing up, and then you do your part, which is everything else.
And when we do that, for me, it cultivates freedom because all of a sudden, I’m not the one who’s supposed to make something extraordinary out of my quiet time with God. I don’t have any expectations even. I just show up. It’s kind of like spending time with my husband or with my kids. If I expected something extraordinary with every encounter, I’d be disappointed.
Candace Nassar (18:03)
That’s right.
Stephanie (18:16)
But more often than not, it’s the daily life that builds intimacy and relationship. And once in a while, there’s something extraordinary that happens and that’s wonderful. So when I remember that I am completely surrendered to God, then I’m also free from all sorts of competing allegiances, which are so wanting to get my attention. And it clears the air. It helps me remember what actually matters. And it helps me remember
at the end of the day, who God is and who I am in His sight. In that order, not the other way around. The world would teach us that who we are dictates who God is. We make God in our own image. No, no, no. We as believers know better. God is who He is. Exodus 34 from memory, I am the Lord, the Lord God, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in faithful love and compassion.
Candace Nassar (18:50)
Yeah.
Stephanie (19:14)
That’s who he is. That’s who he declares himself to be. And then who we are, or he’s beloved, in response to that. Actually, one thing my husband and I raised our kids on, and that I think, they’re young adults now, they’re 21 and 23, and they’re both walking with the Lord, which is truly a miracle.
I mean, right, every, we know that, like, we take no credit for that whatsoever. But one thing we raise them on, there’s this saying, there’s nothing you can do for God to love you more, and there’s nothing you can do for God to love you less. There’s nothing you can do for him to love you more because he already loves you to the moon and back, which means for those of us that are, you know, overachievers, there’s nothing we can do to earn his love.
Candace Nassar (19:34)
Yes.
Candace Nassar (19:47)
Right, I love.
Stephanie (19:58)
There’s no good act that’s going to increase how much he loves us. So we can chill a little bit. We can relax. Our days don’t have to be super productive or super efficient. When you’re a young mom, you’re in survival mode with the little ones. That is more than enough. You don’t have to be productive beyond that. That’s already such an intense season of life. There’s nothing you can do for God to love you more through the season. But there’s also nothing you can do for God to love you less through the season. You’re going to mess up.
You are.
And that’s okay. Sometimes, you know, it’s so much harder to forgive ourselves than it is for God to forgive us in Christ. But there’s nothing you can do for God to love you less. And so when you have that, you remember you are His beloved. And He isn’t just like anyone else. He is absolutely matchless in beauty and compassion and forgiveness. And you are His chosen one. That’s pretty special.
Candace Nassar (20:55)
I love that because I can see that picture of coming into my time with the Lord and that posture of humility and just not trying to perform, right? And just resting in Him and how much that can really impact my understanding. And so we’re praying, we’re allowing the Holy Spirit to just overwhelm and guide us. And then what about the historical and cultural context? Let’s talk about that for a minute.
Stephanie (21:23)
thank you. Yes. Yeah, sorry. was, yeah, get me, sorry. I forgot about that. The historical context. It’s like salt. We don’t actually need salt, too much of it. We don’t need too much of it in our dishes, right? Like a soup or a beef dish or any kind of dish or a vegetable dish is going to nourish us just the same with or without salt. But it’s really not going to taste the same. It is so much tastier.
Candace Nassar (21:23)
Yeah. Yeah.
Stephanie (21:46)
with that little pinch of salt. And actually, everything’s sweet, right? Chocolate chip cookies, if you forget the pinch of salt, you know the difference. It doesn’t taste as good. And I think having the historical context is kind of like that pinch of salt. We don’t need it. Scripture stands on its own two feet outside of historical and cultural context. However, tasting scripture without the salt of its historical context is a bit like having chocolate chip cookies without salt.
it’s a little sad, right? One of my favorite combos is actually honey and sea salt. I love honey and sea salt on like everything. It’s like scripture, right? Scripture calls itself honey throughout it, but it’s seasoned by the context and the culture that salt brings. Just one example for me, I remember studying a few years ago, the gospel of Matthew from a first century Jewish perspective. Matthew is the most Jewish of the four gospels. And so he’s the one that packs most of the historical cultural context.
And in the Chosen, the TV series, they do a great job with Matthew, like kind of showing that historical context. So I remember studying and falling in love with Jesus through the eyes of the very Jewish Matthew. And actually that led to one of our best -listen to- courses called Jesus, Rabbi and Lord, because he is our Rabbi, he’s our Jewish teacher, but he’s also our Lord.
And so Jesus, Rabbi and Lord is about remembering that pinch of sea salt that makes you fall in love with scripture all over again. Yeah, truly.
Candace Nassar (23:13)
Right.
Yeah, and the richness, right? Because it just makes it, that’s what I think you’re saying, is that when we understand, like for me, have a study Bible and I like to read when I’m really studying. every single morning, I don’t necessarily read the historical context or whatever, but when I have a question or when something doesn’t make sense and I go back and I look through that,
It’s just like, okay, that’s what they’re trying. That’s what the writer is saying. That’s how the audience would have understood it, right?
Stephanie (23:45)
Yeah, so see, you’re doing exactly what we’re describing. You’re consuming scripture for yourself directly from the text. And once in a while, you bring in an expert, you bring in a Bible teacher, you bring in someone who has that little extra that you don’t have to help you. But the mistake would be to read the notes without reading the text. you know, imagine if we only read the footnotes and the appendixes of our study Bibles, we would actually miss on the text.
So you have it right when you read it that way.
Candace Nassar (24:13)
That’s right.
Mm-hmm. Yeah, I was a precepts study for years and I’m on a break right now, but I just adore inductive Bible study and I can’t recommend it highly enough. I think that that’s key is they, you she talks about, okay, author who started precepts about not getting those commentaries out, you know, until you’ve gone through it and had the chance to do the things that you’ve been talking about. So, yeah.
Absolutely.
Stephanie (24:43)
Because the Holy Spirit does not promise he will speak through the experts and the Bible teachers when you read their footnotes. He promises to speak through his word. Now, does he use experts and Bible teachers to help us? Yes, of course he does. Hopefully those that are really grounded in scripture and in him. But at the end of the day, it’s his word that is alive, not the commentaries we read.
Candace Nassar (25:05)
Yeah, very good. Okay, so is there one tool or habit that’s been especially transformative in your own study?
Stephanie (25:13)
Yeah, I mean, yeah, namely to spend time just enjoying God, delighting in Him, remembering that reading scripture and spending time with God isn’t something you have to do, it’s something you get to do. It’s a privilege, it’s an invitation, it’s something to rejoice about, not something to consider at the same level as
Candace Nassar (25:15)
That might be a one.
Candace Nassar (25:30)
Amen.
Stephanie (25:38)
you know, putting the trash out or emptying the dishwasher. It just isn’t. And sometimes we do that. We put it right alongside that as a checkbox.
Candace Nassar (27:44.814)
Yeah.
Candace Nassar (25:47)
You know, true. So, we talked about Study Bible, we talked about commentaries. Are there some tools that or simple practices that you could recommend to our listeners?
Stephanie (25:55)
Oh, I don’t want to recommend one particular tool because kind of like what you just said, what matters is spending time in scripture itself. And then the tools, the commentaries, the apps, the podcasts, they come later. First, spend time with God. But if you need those tools, you know, I love a good Lectio Divina app, Lectio 365, I really enjoy.
I don’t know if you’re familiar with that one. My kids love it too. My 20 year olds love it. But basically anything that reminds you, that soaks you in scripture. When I was a young mom, podcasts didn’t exist, but I would blast worship music in my car as much as I could. We lived in North Africa at the time, so I had very scarce access to Christian resources. And so now we don’t have that kind of problem. But in your car, listen to a podcast, listen to worship music,
whatever helps you but does not become chains around your neck. know, there isn’t anything you have to do. There’s nothing you can do for God to love you more, nothing you can do for him to love you less. He just wants time with you. So again, would say scripture is the best thing you can do. So listening to this podcast, MomQ, it doesn’t get better than that. Yeah.
Candace Nassar (27:08)
Yeah. Very good. All right. Well, tell us a little bit about some of your current teaching series on Gospel Spice. You’ve got such great resources on your website. Which one are you in right now?
Stephanie (27:21)
So right now on the podcast gospel spice podcast we’re going through a series called identity in the battle and it has to do with our Identity as believers when we go through spiritual battles specifically It’s mostly rooted in it’s written through the book of Ephesians specifically Ephesians 6 So how are we equipped by the Holy Spirit in Christ to face the battles we’re in? So that’s on the podcast right now
Candace Nassar (27:47)
Hey.
Stephanie (27:48)
And we also have courses, video courses, and the one that I’m currently teaching is on prayer. So I live at the intersection of our identity in Christ and prayer right now, and it’s called the Heart Behind Prayer. It’s really transformative. People who are going through it are saying that it’s really helping them fall in love with God through seeing prayer as the privilege of a child as opposed to the duty of a servant.
which again I think is back to our identity. So I highly recommend that. And actually for all of your listeners, if you want, if you want to use the coupon code WELCOME25 on all of our courses, you get 25 % all of our courses between now and Christmas. So it’s a great way to check them out. And actually we offer the first video course, the first session of every single one of course is completely free on our website. So you can get a taste. We’re not, we’re not.
Candace Nassar (28:40)
Fantastic.
Stephanie (28:42)
We’re not after your money, we’re after your intimacy with God. Anything we can do to make that happen is what we want to do.
Candace Nassar (28:48)
I completely agree, align right with that. thank you. That’s fantastic. I appreciate that Stephanie, and I hope that our listeners will take advantage.
Stephanie (28:54)
And I want to offer with your permission a gift to your listeners. So anyone who wants to go and get, I want to offer a link to our identity series. We have an email devotional called Beloved, and it is about who God says we are and God’s perspective on us as his children. And so anyone who wants to receive it for free, I would be very happy to give it. So you just need to go to gospelspice.com slash momQ.
And right there, all you need to do is give your name and email and you will receive that email devotional. I think it’s three days of emails unless I’m mistaken. And because I don’t want gifts to come by themselves, if you also enter, you will automatically be entered for a giveaway which contains Gospel Spice prayer journals. So on video I’m showing them. So we have their leather imitation. There’s a blue one and a brown one. So there’s two leather journals, one for you, one for a friend or family member.
And there will be, there’s some more gospel spy stuff. That’s to encourage you to start the practice of prayer. So there’ll be one winner among the entries and everyone gets the devotional for free. So.
Candace Nassar (30:03)
Wow, okay, I’m excited. I love prayer journals. I’ve been using them for years, so can’t get enough of those, right? And I love that, so.
Stephanie (30:12)
good because you know we go back and we look at how God answered prayer or how we’re still waiting for an answer and I know it reminds me to pray right
Candace Nassar (30:20)
Absolutely, yeah. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve needed encouragement and gone back and looked at my prayer journals, and there it is because God has absolutely… and it wasn’t always the way I thought, but it was always just the right way. And I’m just like, God, you are so faithful. You are so good. You are so sovereign, right?
Stephanie (30:42)
And if you hadn’t written it down, you would probably have forgotten. Now, he would probably have answered the prayer anyway, but you wouldn’t have the blessing of remembering.
Candace Nassar (30:45)
That’s right.
Candace Nassar (30:51)
Yeah, absolutely. Well, you I love your passion for the Lord and His word and being in prayer and just your love for Him. I mean, the fact that you’ve written a devotional, beloved, that, I hope that our listeners will take that, that what you said today. There’s nothing that we can do for Him to love us less and there’s nothing we can do for Him to love us more because He loves us so much that He died for us, right? To set us free.
Your heart for the Lord is beautiful, Stephanie, and I thank you so much for sharing it with us today. If someone feels distant from the Bible right now, what would be the first step you would encourage them to take this week?
Stephanie (31:33)
Yeah. Well, first, thank you for saying that about me. It’s very kind. And I would say, Candice, it takes one to know one. So right back at you, my sister. Your people are in great hands with you. And I would say, OK, so your question was the first step this week. Well, maybe surprisingly, I would say don’t open your Bible right away if that’s what you struggle with. Don’t just randomly open your Bible, because if you do that, you may have really high expectations. And if.
Candace Nassar (31:42)
Thank you.
Stephanie (31:58)
it doesn’t meet your expectations, then you’re gonna be disappointed. Just the fact that you’re aware that you wanna take a step because you are distant from God and from the Bible, that’s huge. So celebrate that. Celebrate the fact that you are now aware that you are distant from God in scripture and you wanna do something about that. That’s huge. Almost throw a party about that. And then talk to God about it. Reacquaint yourself with Him.
Candace Nassar (32:17)
Mm-hmm.
Stephanie (32:23)
If you’re sorry about something, if there’s something you feel stands in the way of your intimacy with him, tell him about it. He already knows. Unburden your heart. You’re not hiding anything from him. You might as well tell him. If you need his help for something, you tell him that. And then once you’ve done that, tell a friend about it. Tell a mentor, tell a girlfriend, tell someone from church, you know, I told God I wanted to start with him again. I wanted to read my Bible again.
You know, and if you don’t have anyone to tell, I’m sure tell Candace, she would love to get an email from you telling her that or tell me, send me an email. I’d love to hear that you’ve done that this week. Do that for a couple of days. Start with that. And I would be surprised if after two or three days of that, you wouldn’t actually desire to open your Bible. So then you open your Bible and I would say to John or to Matthew that I mentioned, and then see what happens.
Candace Nassar (32:54)
Yes.
Candace Nassar (33:02)
Mm.
Candace Nassar (33:10)
Mm-hmm.
Candace Nassar (33:17)
That is so good. Years ago, I had a friend who was praying and praying for her husband’s faith and I was praying with her. He went through a really tough situation and didn’t know where to turn. She said, why don’t you just ask God for peace? Just ask him for peace and see what happens. See if you feel his presence. He did that and almost immediately.
He felt the Lord’s peace when he was really kind of an agnostic. He wasn’t agnostic. I, so I, you know, again, God answers our prayers and just starting there is huge. So I love that. All right. Well, Stephanie, thank you so much for being here and sharing all of that with us. Love your ministry, love what you do. Love you. So thank you so much.
Stephanie (33:52)
Yes.
Stephanie (34:02)
Right back at you Candice, thank you so much.