Ep 1116 ｜ Women Preachers, The Roots of Feminism, & Battling Eating Disorders ｜ Guest： Lisa Bevere
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Summary
Lisa Bevere is a speaker and New York Times bestselling author. Her most recent book, Fight For Female: Reclaiming Our Divine Identity, is a bold and thorough look at the history of feminism, how we got where we did with gender ideology, and why it is so important for us as women to understand both who we are and whose we are.
Transcript
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Lisa Bevere is a speaker and a New York Times bestselling author.
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Her most recent book, Fight for Female, Reclaiming Our Divine Identity, is a bold and a thorough
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look at the history of feminism, how we got where we did with gender ideology, and why
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it is so important for us as women to understand both who we are and whose we are.
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Lisa and I come from different theological camps.
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We will talk about some of our disagreements when it comes to women preaching in church,
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but I am so grateful for Lisa and her very unique courage when it comes to this issue
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that unfortunately many in the church consider too controversial to touch.
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We talk about so much, and she is so encouraging.
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It's brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers.
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Lisa, thanks so much for taking the time to join me.
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I mostly want to talk to you about your newest book.
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You are one of the few Christian female teachers I know who will just be outspoken about gender
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ideology and the reality of male and female, which is sad.
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So tell me a little bit about it just up front, like what this book is, why you wrote it.
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Well, it's called The Fight for Female and Reclaiming Our Divine Identity.
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And when God creates us, He creates us male and female to reflect Him.
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And so when you start to actually mess with male and mess with female, you're undermining
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There's certain things we can be like, okay, I can be quiet on that.
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The sanctity of life and the image of God is not, those are not things I can be quiet about.
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And I started to just read these different things of what is happening.
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If I just even said something about men don't belong in women's sports, people would just
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Well, yeah, that's about the only one I know how to access, my Facebook.
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And why are women not using their voice to fight for their daughters?
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And I started to do a deep dive into, wait, where's the feminists?
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All these advocates for women being willing to say that men can be women.
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And Allie, the deeper I went into it, the darker it became.
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If everybody gets mad at me and cancels me, that's fine.
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A few years ago, you posted the picture of your t-shirt.
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Said the future is male and female, which shouldn't be remotely controversial, but it was considered
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Yeah, so I, yeah, I was in Franklin, Tennessee, which is a little Christian bubble.
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And I went out to this, you know, place with a t-shirt on and the men were like, thank
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And then I had women like, I think I need that t-shirt.
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So Allie, I actually thought everybody liked it.
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But 922 comments within the first 24 hours, people, you saw, people are like, you are
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I mean, people just went crazy on this concept of the future is male and female.
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And what I had put underneath it was the future is male and female because without male and
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And I remember, I was like, what just happened?
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So I type into my laptop, what is the origin of the quote, the future is female?
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A Washington Post article comes up and it was from a lesbian separatist group in 1975 called
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Well, Labris is the two-headed axe carried by Amazons and the Greek and Roman goddesses.
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And they said the future is female was a call to war, an invocation, and a spell to cast.
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And it had been brought back into popularity during Hillary's campaign.
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And how does this, that idea, that ideology connect to, ironically, like the erasure of
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Because it does seem like there are many feminists, some feminists who don't, but many feminists
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who are completely on board with boys and girls sports, men and girls restrooms.
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Well, I, you know, and again, going to the deep dive into feminism, I found out that it
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really isn't so much rooted in the empowerment of women as it is in a Marxist agenda to dismantle
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And so anything that's going to dismantle family, they're going to support.
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Like, I always thought, okay, you know, feminism started really sweet and then it went sideways.
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I discovered that the mother of feminist thought was a woman named Mary Wollsingcraft.
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And she died in childbirth with Mary Shelley, who wrote Frankenstein, who was married to
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Percy Shelley, who believed that the serpent was the wise counselor and God was prohibitive.
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And it was always about a self-will, self-ruled, you know, we, you know, women instead of men
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Like, you and I believe in women who are strong and women who have a voice, but you and I do
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not believe in women using their voice to undermine or undercut men.
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And that whole idea of feminism started to say to women, if you want to be powerful, act
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And I think a lot of people don't know what you just said about first-wave feminism, second-wave
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feminism, third-wave feminism, how they're connected to gender ideology today.
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Because I've heard that over and over again, that really feminism in its foundations is good.
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I've even heard some people try to say, well, you know, Jesus was a feminist in some ways.
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But the feminist agenda is very much a push to go into the man's world and beat him.
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It actually is really interesting to me because the more you—actually, even when I was reading
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about Labras, these are lesbian separatists who look like men.
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I'm like, if you hate men, what are you trying to look like—it didn't even make sense.
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But I have listened to so much of the anger in the feminism and it's like, go into the
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man's world, beat him at what he's game, behave sexually like him, divorce, you know,
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And what I have learned is that I believe feminists are very anti-female because they tell women
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if they want to be powerful, they need to act like men instead of saying there is something
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beautiful and powerful about acting like a woman.
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And so being pro-female is not necessarily equated with being pro-feminist.
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If anything, I feel like feminists are anti-female and anti-male.
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And for those who don't know, the 4B movement, we did an episode on it and it stands for the
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Korean word for nose that started with a B or the four nose.
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It's very small in South Korea, but it's kind of become more pervasive because of social
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And these women who are shaving their heads, they're warding off men.
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They're saying no sex, no men, you know, no reproduction, obviously, and all of that.
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Yeah, in response to Trump's election, saying basically the patriarchy got us here and so
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Okay, does this all go back to the curse after the fall and the curse in which God said, look,
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you're going to struggle for the usurpation of your husband's authority.
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Does all of this enmity that we see between men and women and even the disagreement about
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You know, when we see the fall of mankind in the garden, what you see for the very first
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time is you see order turn into disorder, multiplication turn into division.
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You see all of a sudden a breach between the husband and the wife, between parents and
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I think all of the things that we see now that are broken in our world started with the
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It says that Jesus came to seek and save that which was lost.
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So I believe that when we follow Jesus, he creates a pathway where we do not fight for
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the position with our husband, but that we fight to be one with our husbands.
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That submission means that we are under assignment with our husbands.
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You know, we're not, as a women, we're not under every man.
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Submission means that I'm under my husband because together we are building a marriage.
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He's ultimately the leader, but a leader is somebody who actually exercises something
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I feel like under the fall, we had domination, but dominion says, I'm going to use my authority
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Whereas, you know, and then I get it, the patriarchy, they're like patriarchy, patriarchy.
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You know, I get really nervous when I hear Christian women denouncing the word patriarchy.
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I feel like they have forgotten he's the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
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It doesn't mean that God doesn't honor and value matriarchal, but God is a father.
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And so when we start to say, oh no, he might be female and it could be this, and we are
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And just too many people are running very loose with what God has created.
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And again, we look in Ephesians and Ephesians says, okay, so there's not going to be a struggle
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I know this is a little maybe of an aside from the topic of your book, but it's on what we're
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I saw a post that you put on Instagram a few months ago where you were talking about the
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struggle that you had, the power struggle at the beginning of your marriage.
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Where you were in charge, you were leading, and you felt like, honestly, I can do it better.
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But there was also this tension inside of you that knew this is not how my marriage is
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And I would ask my husband, just drop the baby off at this time.
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I would get in my bathtub, and I would submerge myself where only my nose was above the water.
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I don't know if you've ever been in that season where you're just so you and so not yielded.
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You don't think John's a good head of the household, do you?
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He said, it's a yoke to you, Lisa, but it's a mantle to John.
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And I thought, if I throw it off my shoulders, nothing is ever going to get done.
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And all of a sudden, Allie, all the times that I had been disrespectful and dishonoring
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and I would even say emasculating of my husband came back into my mind.
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And what I thought was so funny in the moment was heartbreaking.
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And I thought, no wonder why we don't feel close anymore.
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No wonder why when we're praying together, I'm thinking, why is he holding my hand so
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And I remember John said, Lisa, you don't have to quit your job.
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But I do think you need to quit thinking you're the source.
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And he said, you can work full time and know God is your source and you'll be at peace.
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Or you can be a stay-home mom and think you're the source and you won't.
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And Allie, I discovered in that moment that all my husband had ever known, well, and I'm
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just going to preface this, he was the only son of an Italian mother.
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And I had to say, instead of using my strengths to say, look how smart I am, I'm going to actually
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And I remember he would say, what do you think we should do?
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And in my head, I was like, he's not going to do the right thing.
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But I had to rebuild a confidence that I had in him.
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And when I was like, God, I don't know if I trust John.
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When we are rightly positioned with God, God watches over us.
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I think it's pretty amazing that God says, if you do not treat your wife right, God won't
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So God watches over not just his sons, but also his daughters.
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And I watched my husband go from being a boy to a man when I stopped being his mother
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So did that look like practically holding your tongue when you wanted to criticize, letting
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Because I imagine that his behavior didn't necessarily change overnight.
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Maybe he still wasn't dropping off the baby at the right time.
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Maybe he still wasn't taking out the trash the way that you wanted him to.
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But I'm guessing the dynamic still changed because of the choices that you were making.
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He said, I feel like I used to supernaturally forget to take out the trash.
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And he said, as soon as you did that, I started to remember, because I remember we had a baby
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I'm going down to the laundromat in our apartment complex.
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And I remember I came home from work and John again was working part time.
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And John's like, hey, hey, can you get something out of the filing cabinet?
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And so, you know, the old me would have said, you get it.
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And I opened up the louvered doors to where we'd kept our filing cabinet.
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And he'd gone out and bought a washer and dryer.
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And it was like he, all of a sudden, his heart turned to me when I turned back to him.
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And I know that, you know, I have a husband who loves God.
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And I know that, you know, there's women out there that have a very different situation.
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And I had parents that were married, divorced, remarried each other, divorced again.
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And I feel like there's an entire generation of young women who've been sent the message,
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The patriarchy is going to stomp you into the ground.
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Jesus actually speaks his life and his fulfillment into me.
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I love how the message, some people call it paraphrase, some call it translation, but it
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talks about how the husband is to love the wife.
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It says, he washes her with the water of the word to evoke her beauty.
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And I feel like that is such a beautiful picture of what Jesus does for us and what my husband
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And now he's got all these girls to take care of.
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But yeah, no, I feel like there's been a whole breakdown of, you know, well, we're equal.
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But that doesn't mean that our roles are exactly the same.
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Speak to that woman who isn't married to a Christian man, because they might be thinking,
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okay, yeah, maybe you didn't have the perfect husband, but he still loved you and loved God.
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Maybe they're married to someone, whether he professes to be a Christian or not, who does
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believe that headship and leadership means micromanaging, means demeaning, you know, doesn't
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actually mean service, as we read in Ephesians 5, but he thinks that it means, you know, tearing
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Well, first of all, I mean, I think she has every right to go to him and say, I love you
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But this is what it feels like when you say and you do those kind of things.
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And I want to know how we can move beyond that.
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And last night I got a text from one of the couples, and they're pastors.
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And John and I said, often when a couple has gone through things like what you're describing
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with his wife, you close your spirit off to the person, you just build these walls and
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And we just had people pray that, God, if there's anything I've closed off my spirit to
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my husband or to my wife, you know, can you open that heart back up?
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But what I had to do, and again, my husband was godly, but that doesn't mean he always had
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And sometimes, Allie, he'd only be home three days a month.
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And I remember when he would come home, we got him at his worst.
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And my teenage son was like, Mom, Dad's never here.
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And John was like, well, I just felt like pressure to him.
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So I remember I called one of my board members.
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And I said, I don't, he's not wrong that he wants this.
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And he asked me, this board member was so wise.
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And he said, does Addison want to get married one day?
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And he said, tell him he's going to be processing his whole life with a woman.
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And it was like, instead of my son seeing it as a loss.
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And all I heard back when I was praying was, tell me I'm enough for you, Lisa.
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It's like, wait, I don't want to tell you you're enough for me because I know what happens.
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It was like, no, Lord, please tell me he's going to change.
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Please tell me he's going to turn his heart more to his kids.
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Please, he's going to turn his heart more towards me.
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And so I started to surrender and say, God, you are more than enough for me.
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And that woman at home who feels this void with her husband, who does not know how to
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And I know it's a scary thing to pray, but there's something that happens in your heart
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where you're not living in a famine, but you're living in an overflow of God's love and his
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And in that place, you're going to find out that even though you're not being poured into
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I, you know, I don't know if this is different in your house.
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I can ask, I can ask John, I can tell God, Hey, I need John to do this.
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And the only person God talks to me about is me.
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And my heart was ready when he, I mean, he came home from a trip and he just said, I have
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I have had the wrong, everything I would have hoped that he would hear from me, he heard
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And, you know, Allie, I don't know if you know this, my oldest son, my youngest son,
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and six of my grandkids live 30 seconds from me.
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And we work with our oldest son and our youngest son.
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So I feel like we lost some time there, but God has given us length of days with our children.
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When it comes to the roles of male and female in marriage, you've laid out really beautifully
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what I think you would describe as complementarianism.
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Like, it's, I mean, I'm kind of like, I don't, I don't buy into egalitarian all the way.
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Um, I kind of sometimes feel like a complementarian and an egalitarian got married and had a baby,
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But yes, I would say roles in a marriage for sure, complementarian.
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And in church, we've talked about this privately, how we probably land in different places,
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although we agree on the principle of the authority of scripture.
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The difference between male and female and the different roles within the church of male
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But there will be some people I've got, you know, a big conservative reformed crowd who
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There may be some people who say false teacher.
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I haven't seen this, but you said that some people have called you prosperity gospel.
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And we can talk about all of those different things just in case there's someone out there who's
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like, wait, I might've heard that, but I don't really know.
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But let's start with, since we're talking about the roles of male and female, what you
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believe the roles of male and female are when it comes to the church, when it comes to preaching.
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And I feel like it, I feel like the house, the household of the church is reflect, I feel like it reflects.
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So I feel like the senior pastor, I'm the most comfortable with senior pastors being men.
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And I don't believe that women have no voice, but I believe they have the voice of a mother in, in the church.
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I, if I get invited to speak at a church, I don't see that as exercising authority because
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And I'm under the authority of the pastor who asked me to come and maybe speak on marriage
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or speak on gender identity or, you know, and so I'm not there going, listen, I'm the
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And I guess that to me, there's a big difference between preaching and pastoring.
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So there's a difference between fivefold ministry and ministering as a believer and making disciples
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So I, but I know that reform was a lot more hard line on those things.
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I would not say it's an issue of salvation either.
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I think when we were at dinner, when you look at first Timothy 2, 12, I do not permit a woman
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Obviously this is in context of the local church.
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I think he was very focused on not just that moment.
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He was like, here's the culture and the women are uneducated.
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There's the Roman culture and again, teaching and talking.
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Like if we're going to be legalistic about it, women need to stop talking the second they
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Like they need to be passing notes if they have to remain silent in the church.
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So it's, to me, the pulpit didn't even start till a thousand years ago.
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But again, you know, Allie, I respect other people's sensitivity to the things of the spirit.
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But, you know, the first time I ever did a Sunday morning service, I was a nervous wreck.
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And I had to really wrestle with that because I always just said no.
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I'm, you know, thank you for asking me, but I'm going to take my own kids to church on
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But I also feel like we're at an Acts 2.17 moment.
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In the last days, God says, I'll pour up my spirit on all flesh and your sons and your
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And not, I don't believe prophesy is like, get up and, you know, you're going to have a
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I believe it's to speak under divine inspiration.
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And so I believe in the last days, it looks a little different than it does in the first
00:32:48.520
And just to clarify where I stand, because there might not, there might be people who
00:32:53.860
One, of course, I consider Lisa a sister in Christ and I wouldn't have her on if I didn't
00:33:00.140
believe in her wisdom and appreciate her so much.
00:33:04.300
I do not read the scripture as permitting a woman to preach before men in church.
00:33:10.920
Now, there are people who would expand that even more who would say that I should not even
00:33:22.440
I would say that it is not just an individual preference from Paul because it is in the word
00:33:30.460
And so I wouldn't see the use of the pronoun I as discounting this as God's authority.
00:33:36.260
But I certainly don't see it as a salvation issue.
00:33:40.900
I don't believe in women preaching, even if I do really agree with that.
00:33:45.240
That appreciate the content of what is being said.
00:34:10.720
John practicing me just going to confession before I got on airplanes.
00:34:15.800
So I had never heard the gospel, got born again through Campus Crusade.
00:34:21.720
And then, yes, we believe in the infilling of the Holy Spirit, but we believe that anybody
00:34:33.840
We are too evangelical for the Pentecostal world, which would be kind of the charismatic
00:34:41.500
And what makes you too evangelical for the Pentecostal world?
00:34:44.240
Because we're very much about Scripture and not about experientials.
00:34:47.480
So there's kind of that, like, John has a tendency to preach on the fear of the Lord.
00:34:58.280
He has a tendency to preach, I would say, the hard truths.
00:35:02.040
And so there's, they'll kind of think, oh, you guys are legalistic.
00:35:08.800
And then you come over here to reform and they'll say we're, no, you guys are too charismatic.
00:35:14.540
So I, you know, I've always preferred to be non-denominational or say I'm spirit-filled,
00:35:20.160
but that's, I see you as spirit-filled, you know?
00:35:23.360
So I don't feel like whether you speak in tongues or not should be divisive.
00:35:31.260
Yeah, there's like a little bit of a difference in language and maybe even agreement too when
00:35:39.160
Now, I would not say, oh, I heard the Lord say, or I heard the Lord audibly because there's
00:35:49.560
But that's not, that's not to say that I don't believe that the Lord can convict someone
00:35:54.980
a certain way that they don't explicitly read those words in the Bible, as long as it is
00:36:02.060
And I have heard you say, and many of my Christian friends say, I heard God say this to me.
00:36:07.840
And I just said that about, you know, you don't think John's a good head of the household.
00:36:11.540
So I would actually love you to tell me, how do I position that where it's non-offensive?
00:36:16.760
Oh, I don't think that you should worry about that.
00:36:19.320
I wouldn't worry about positioning it in a way that is not necessarily, that is not offensive.
00:36:24.020
I think that I do always, I'm always going to be a little bit, if someone says, God told
00:36:31.940
me, I'm going to, like, my ears are going to perk up.
00:36:36.620
And I'm not saying that this was you, but my ears are always going to perk up to make
00:36:40.960
sure that whatever that person says God told them is in complete alignment with Scripture.
00:36:47.280
Because obviously, if God says, well, God told me to sleep with my boyfriend, or God told
00:36:51.980
me that it was okay for me to do this, even though his Bible says otherwise, then obviously
00:36:59.660
And so, yeah, there is, there is a difference there, but I've had a lot of charismatics on
00:37:03.380
that have talked about different things like speaking in tongues and deliverance.
00:37:06.200
And I was raised Southern Baptist, not charismatic at all.
00:37:10.620
If I saw someone raise their hand in church to worship, my mom would be like, mom, get
00:37:17.120
Um, so like very different backgrounds, but I charismatics and I would say reformed people.
00:37:23.460
We do agree on like some really important things.
00:37:36.020
It is all American meat, craft beef, better than organic chicken.
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00:38:00.640
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00:38:27.400
I would say one criticism that reformed has is that charismatic people are more health and
00:38:31.840
And you were very surprised that people have labeled you as that.
00:38:34.820
I think they just, I think they just put you over there.
00:38:37.320
Whether you, whether they ever heard you say anything that said that, um, matter of fact,
00:38:44.840
I got, and again, going back to like, how do you get into, I, you know, when the whole
00:38:49.760
craziness that we talked about, the tragic baby dying, I had said, Hey, God is always a
00:38:59.580
And they said, Oh, you're talking about, in case people don't know, Bethel, Olive, we
00:39:04.620
talked about that a few years ago, like probably five years ago.
00:39:13.240
Well, 2020 is almost five years ago, which is crazy.
00:39:15.580
Which is, but I remember I, I said, he, he can heal through doctors.
00:39:24.540
He can heal through natural stuff and he can heal by taking us home.
00:39:30.480
And I said, what, do you think that when we go to heaven, that is the first time we're
00:39:36.860
And so they're like, no, he always heals supernaturally.
00:39:40.240
And I'm like, no, he doesn't always heal supernaturally, but he can.
00:39:45.220
But, and, and that's, I think where like John and I would be considered, oh no, you
00:39:49.340
guys aren't like, and I've, and I've had pretty strong conversations with, um, what
00:39:58.700
I'd tell you guys, you're, you're adding, you're not, there's, I don't believe they're
00:40:05.020
And so John and I, if it is not in agreement with the word of God or the spirit of the word
00:40:10.200
of God, cause you know, there's sometimes there's things like it, you know, you can't
00:40:13.500
find in the Bible, uh, certain things, but you can find the spirit of that.
00:40:19.340
And so, and even when I said about Paul saying, I, you know, Paul was like, don't get married.
00:40:26.680
So like, I'm just saying there's things that sometimes you say, now, was this God talking
00:40:32.980
or him saying, I'm very concerned that women are going to be, uh, arrested and beaten, or
00:40:39.000
they don't know what they're talking about, or they're bringing in crazy Greek goddess things
00:40:45.100
Like we don't think we, and again, I, I am with you on, I have seen all sorts of abuse
00:40:57.500
I've been in meetings where there's not even been one single scripture shared and it was
00:41:05.300
And the scripture that talks about, you know, Eve was deceived first and then Adam, like
00:41:12.980
some of the prohibition against women exercising authority, being in that position of shepherd
00:41:20.040
of a flock in a church has to do with what we see in creation, what we see through the
00:41:27.840
How do you see that reality manifesting itself today?
00:41:32.440
That it does seem like women in some ways, at least are more susceptible to this kind
00:41:38.780
of deception, even the deception of gender ideology.
00:41:41.580
Well, it even says that these are the foolish, the women that are taken captive.
00:41:50.540
First of all, if we are not in the word of God, we're going to all be subject to deception,
00:42:00.760
And so many Christians have gotten so lazy with reading the word.
00:42:08.960
And you and I know that you need to read the word of God and it rightly divides.
00:42:14.020
It comes in and it separates soul from, you know, thought and intent, joint and marrow.
00:42:20.920
And we live in a time period where there's a lot of things that sound right, but feel
00:42:27.800
And the word of God comes in and tells you, oh, Ali, why you're uncomfortable with that
00:42:33.620
And you heard, like, you know, we've seen this.
00:42:36.500
And so if women are led by their emotions, then they are going to be taken captive.
00:42:43.560
But if women are led by the Holy Spirit, and to me, there's this beautiful thing here where
00:42:49.920
you see, yes, Eve was deceived, but Adam knew what he was doing.
00:42:58.200
But then we see in the New Testament that God overshadows an old woman, Elizabeth and Mary.
00:43:07.960
And you see this older woman and this younger woman, and they're just prophesying to one
00:43:12.680
another about Jesus, about Emmanuel, about the prophet, John the Baptist, and about the
00:43:20.100
And there's this beautiful symphony of God's redemption on godly women.
00:43:25.200
And so I feel like God is like, hey, I'm bringing back what was lost in the garden.
00:43:33.780
And it's not that, you know, he's like, oh, we don't need male or female.
00:43:37.980
But I do feel like if women can be led just by their feelings, I also will say this is funny.
00:43:45.640
But I went through menopause when I was probably 57.
00:43:49.900
And I'm going to tell you, when you were going through menopause, there is a crazy person
00:43:55.160
in your head saying things like, you need to start yelling on this airplane right now
00:44:06.540
So it's even worse than like PMS or like when you're a teenager.
00:44:15.760
Like I had to be like, you crazy woman, I shut you down.
00:44:18.900
I will read the word of God and I cannot react emotionally.
00:44:23.600
I need to be, I need to have the guardrails of God's word and the Holy Spirit.
00:44:32.060
I even notice in myself when I go a period of time without reading the Bible as much,
00:44:37.420
that I find myself more susceptible to lies, not only personal lies, of course,
00:44:44.040
like my own personal temptation towards like anger or jealousy or bitterness or pride or
00:44:49.940
But even like worldly lies that I should definitely know better.
00:44:58.040
And then I kind of have to realize, oh, it's because I have been slacking in this area.
00:45:03.560
It's not like you lose the Holy Spirit or anything.
00:45:08.280
Well, your mind is no longer, it's not being renewed day by day by the word of God.
00:45:15.440
And so if you're filling your mind with garbage, you're going to be controlled by garbage and
00:45:24.440
And people just, they got used to being entertained during COVID.
00:45:29.300
And one thing I wanted to make sure that we talked about and you've talked about before
00:45:33.480
is body image and your dad and your relationship with your body and how your dad affected that
00:45:43.080
Because that does have to do with everything we're talking about with being a woman and
00:45:47.240
either embracing or repudiating our identity, all of that.
00:45:51.740
So I was 15 years of age and I swam competitively from the time I was 5 to 18.
00:45:57.040
But I tore my Achilles tendon and I had to sit down, sit out one year.
00:46:03.340
And I guess I chubbed up and didn't even know it.
00:46:10.440
My mom and my brother were out and my big, gruff, Sicilian dad sitting there in a chair
00:46:25.640
And I turn around and he's like, oh my gosh, your butt is huge.
00:46:31.140
And I was like, I said, well, at camp I weighed.
00:46:34.160
And I told him what I had weighed at camp that summer.
00:46:43.840
And so I walked the hall of shame back to my parents' bathroom and I climbed up on the
00:46:56.680
And so I came back and I told my dad what I weighed and he just sat me down and he said,
00:47:15.520
I stripped off all my clothes, stood in my bra and my underwear.
00:47:21.300
So all I could see was like a headless reflection on myself.
00:47:28.520
It was for the first time I thought, that is my enemy.
00:47:39.900
And so that night, immediately started cutting back on food, started running in the snow
00:47:45.180
drifts in Indiana in my swim team, sweats, trying to lose the weight.
00:47:49.940
And as soon as I lost weight, I started to get positive affirmation.
00:48:01.500
I started, people started to say, oh, you look good.
00:48:03.820
And at 15, I started to think, oh, if I'm thin, I deserve love.
00:48:17.060
So what started at 15, though, started to accelerate.
00:48:25.200
And then I went out to the University of Arizona.
00:48:28.800
And University of Arizona has California girls.
00:48:31.680
And so now, all of a sudden, I was like, I'm not thin anymore.
00:48:34.760
And in my sorority, we all just would start to throw up after we ate, take diuretics, take
00:48:42.880
And I watched myself become captive to my own body.
00:48:51.100
And I know now, looking back at 15, when my father said those things to me, it was like
00:49:08.860
I don't want her to live with the constant comparison of social media that is always saying
00:49:17.520
you're not thin enough, smart enough, pretty enough, filtered enough, whatever that not
00:49:23.560
And I love that you're like, you're not enough.
00:49:29.400
You know, but so yeah, so that became this thing.
00:49:32.420
And then I was hospitalized because I had just so abused my body.
00:49:42.860
And I was like, I probably need to stop getting drunk.
00:49:46.400
So I transferred all my excessive drinking into excessive eating.
00:49:54.720
I bought a, I think it was like a size 10 wedding gown in the hope that I could get down into
00:50:15.080
And this is so crazy, because I had never heard any of this terminology.
00:50:20.940
I sensed the spirit saying, your weight and food is an idol to you.
00:50:34.240
And he said, I want you to go on a three-day fast.
00:50:49.720
And he said, you need to find out I am your source.
00:50:56.780
But you, when you're sad or happy, you come to me instead of to that.
00:51:02.720
And I remember, I said, I don't even know what's a healthy weight anymore.
00:51:10.220
And I wanted to weigh 103 when I was at my worst.
00:51:13.520
And then I now, you know, was, I can't remember what I weighed at that time.
00:51:16.860
And I remember, I've sensed that God is the one who made me.
00:51:25.340
And I was like, God, what do you want me to weigh?
00:51:27.740
What do you, I don't know how to be healthy anymore.
00:51:29.820
And I wrote a number on a little piece of paper and I put it in my Bible.
00:51:34.760
And then I just walked and worshipped and I stopped being abusive to my body.
00:51:45.060
You know, Romans 12, 1 and 2 says, present your body a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God.
00:51:52.660
But it's really hard to present something to God if you think it's wholly unacceptable, if you think it's less than.
00:52:12.860
It's really hard to glorify God with something you hate.
00:52:22.080
I was like, no, God, you wove me in my mother's womb fearfully and wonderfully.
00:52:40.840
And he just said, you know, I was reading my Bible and I realized, oh, Sarah wasn't beautiful because she ran aerobics in the desert.
00:52:47.980
He said because she refused to give way to fear.
00:52:50.660
And when we yield to fear as women, our whole body metabolism changes.
00:52:56.900
And when we thank God and when we honor God and when we eat until we're satisfied and not until we're in pain.
00:53:07.800
When we can take those things to God, it just rebalanced everything.
00:53:18.000
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And this really does go with also the theme of your book.
00:54:22.200
I know that's not what your book is about, but you've said multiple-
00:54:27.100
And because this is, you know, it is pretty unique to women.
00:54:30.960
And it is all about realizing who our source is, who our satisfaction is, who the identity giver is.
00:54:38.900
Because just as he made our body in the womb, he designated our sex at the moment of conception.
00:54:48.880
And so knowing whose we are changes not only how we eat, how we see our bodies, but also how we see being women.
00:54:58.920
And I do, I really encourage people to go out and get your book to really have a theological understanding of what it means to be a woman.
00:55:07.440
Yeah, you do kind of talk about a topic that is political, but for the Christian, this is pre-political.
00:55:14.640
It's pre-civilizational because it goes back to the first chapter of the first book of the Bible.
00:55:19.840
And so thank you for being one of the only Christian women teachers who is willing to take on this subject.
00:55:27.140
Your boldness is an example for us, and I'm just grateful for it.