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For over 25 years Proverbs 31 Ministries' mission has been to intersect God's Word in the real, hard places we all struggle with. That's why we started this podcast. Every episode will feature a variety of teachings from president Lysa TerKeurst, staff members or friends of the ministry who can teach you something valuable from their vantage point. We hope that regardless of your age, background or stage of life, it's something you look forward to listening to each month!
Kaley:
Well, hello everyone. Thanks for tuning in to The Proverbs 31 Ministries Podcast where we share a biblical Truth for any girl in any season. I'm your host, Kaley Olson, and I'm here with my co-host for today, my friend Melissa Taylor.
Melissa:
Hello.
Kaley:
Hey.
Melissa:
Happy to be here.
Kaley:
Hey, Melissa. We just wrapped up a really incredible teaching with our guest for today, Dr. Naomi Cramer Overton, who first of all was such a delight.
Melissa:
She was.
Kaley:
And a wealth of wisdom and has a lot of really cool background in biblical studies and leads companies. She's amazing, but she today is going to share about what it means to want more for our lives and how God leads us practically through steps to become more, through things like our identity and belonging and things like that. It's really, really an amazing teaching.
Melissa:
It was great.
Kaley:
And one of the things you'll hear us talk about at the very end is Every Woman's Bible, and, Kaley, what I loved learning about this Bible is that it was developed with contributions from over 100 women. It's written for women, and it speaks to so many questions that we're asking, like How can the Bible guide me in daily challenges? How do I reconcile the cultural context of the Bible with its relevance today? And she had the other one. What was it?
Melissa:
It was —
Kaley:
The scriptures women love to hate?
Melissa:
Yeah, we love to hate and address the ones that disturb us the most. Like Why would God want this in the Bible? What does that mean for me today?
Kaley:
They talk about everything, so it's really, really great.
Melissa:
Proverbs 31 ... we're all about helping you know the Truth and live the Truth, and that starts with digging into God's Word for yourself. So we linked the Every Woman's Bible in the show notes to make it easy for you to purchase for yourself or for a friend.
Kaley:
Yeah, absolutely. I definitely want to grab a copy. And, Melissa, we have to talk about our new Circle 31 Book Club, which is brand-new to Proverbs. So excited about it. But, guys, today, whenever you listen to the episode and hear Naomi talk, you will be challenged to get into community and to get into a place of belonging. At Proverbs 31, we have that for you. Through the Circle 31 Book Club, here you'll engage with a community of women that will help you resist the temptation to be complacent in your walk with the Lord, which is exactly what we talk about today, and make real progress on the challenges you're facing. Oh my goodness, Melissa, what book are we reading first?
Melissa:
We're reading Untangle Your Emotions by Jennie Allen.
Kaley:
So excited.
Melissa:
Yes. And it starts May 1.
Kaley:
May 1. That's amazing. If you're listening to this in retrospect, and it's September, we're reading a book basically every other month in the Circle 31 Book Club. So, if you're listening to this and you're like, "Well, I missed Entangling your emotions," don't worry, we've got another book for you, so just go to the link in the show notes and you'll find out what we're reading now in the future. All right, lastly, it is free, so there is no reason you can't be part of our circle. Melissa, we've talked enough. Let's get into Naomi's teaching.
Melissa:
OK.
Kaley:
All right, friends, I'm excited to welcome our guest for today's episode, Dr. Naomi Cramer Overton. We are so excited that you're here. Welcome to the show.
Naomi Overton:
Thank you; I'm glad to be here.
Kaley:
Well, I know we talked about this before we started recording today, but you are a doctor, but a doctor, not like a medical doctor. You have a degree in theology, specifically in missions, and it took you 10 years to complete, which is a lot of studying. And so first of all, I just have to say congratulations and thank you for all of the hard work that you've put into learning what you've learned. And I can't wait to hear what you have to share with us today.
But before we get into your teaching and all the great content you're going to share with us, I want to give you an opportunity to tell our audience a little bit about who you are.
Naomi Overton:
I am so unlikely a leader. I think that would be one of the things I'd say. I'm the youngest of eight children, and yet God has tapped me at various times to serve as the CEO of two of the largest women's ministries in the United States. One was MOPS ... now called the MomCo by MOPS, and the other is where I currently serve, which is Stonecroft Ministries, which has been around for 86 years.
How God chooses the youngest child to lead enormous organizations, don't know. I'm unlikely.
Kaley:
That's amazing.
Well, we also talked about this before, and you prayed about it actually before we got started recording, and you said, "God, I'm so thankful for how you created women," and I think that what you said is such a testament to how God uses not only women but uses anybody to put in any position that He desires to be able to influence where they are with the giftedness that He has given them.
The work you've done is amazing, and I know the message you're going to give us today is going to really equip our listeners, because we invited you on the show today to talk about how God really does work through all of us, even when life may seem nothing but ordinary. And, Naomi, I'm thinking of our audience listening to this who are in the thick of it with life.
Me and Melissa are right there. I'm sure you're right there too. We're juggling all the things, and sometimes we lose sight of what purpose means, because it's been a while since I've even had a chance to come up for air and remember that God is using me and has a major plan for my life.
Melissa, do you feel that way sometimes?
Melissa:
Absolutely, yes.
Kaley:
All the time. And I think everybody listening does. And so, Naomi, we cannot wait to hear your message and how you're going to speak to not only our hearts but the hearts of those who are listening, so why don't you take it away?
Naomi Overton:
Sounds great. Thanks. When I first spotted her, and I'm going to call her Michelle, she had chosen a seat at the back of maybe a 200-foot-long conference room in a hotel where I was speaking about living into our God-given purpose. At first I wondered, Why is that lady sitting in the back in the uncomfortable seats that are pushed up against the wall when there are comfy chairs right here up close with all the people? And then I noticed there was a man who was standing up near her, and he was rocking back and forth holding a baby, probably trying to get that baby to go to sleep, and there was a stroller right nearby. And I thought, Ah, that's why. But you know what? I want more for her. I want more for Michelle and more for you and honestly more for me.
I want ... in every season of our lives in and with our most important relationships, I want us to be able to sit and stand and step right into the middle of the room, right into the center of God's extraordinary purpose in the midst of our really quite ordinary lives.
There's a Michelle, I believe, who lives in each one of us, whether we're moms or not. And a lot of days we do, I do, put ourselves in the back of the room. We're just sure that our lives are too full so we can't have much influence. Maybe we won't have it now. Maybe we're not sure we'll have it ever, but a lot of us, like Michelle, in part because of putting ourselves in the back of the room, can feel isolated and anxiously insecure.
We ask questions like, Am I a good-enough ... (whatever)? Am I a good-enough wife? Am I good enough at my job? Am I a good-enough mom? Am I ... You get the idea. And How do I keep up with what work needs from me and what my family needs from me, and my goodness will I ever find time to take care of myself?
OK, true statement here, friends, Kaley and Melissa, I'm wearing slippers right now as I'm talking with you, in part because I wanted to remember that this is what it's like. I'm a Michelle as well, and will I ever find time? Will you ever find time to take care of yourself and maybe also lean more deeply into what you think God has made you for?
We sometimes wonder if we're failing. Honestly, that's a horrible word, but we wonder, Are we failing at what we care about most? Caring about our people and trying to live out what we're here for. Work takes too much from us a lot of the time, and the dream of living our purpose and growing closer to God, that dream just slips out of reach. For today.
And those are some of the reasons that women in particular are leaving the church. Leaving, attending, and being part of a regular church community at three times the rate of men. The guests, what you and Michelle and I, can realize that with God, with God, living our extraordinary purpose is actually ordinary. And we can do it not just for the people God has put in front of us but with the people God has put into our lives, and from not who we wish we were or aspire to be someday when we get the degree or whatever, but we can do that purpose from who God has already made us to be today.
So, Michelle didn't know that yet when I met her, but God's Word shows it, and we're going to dive deeply into God's Word and some women who God used [and] worked through for extraordinary purpose.
When we look at God's Word and we think about His extraordinary in the midst of our ordinary, we first can see that we have reason to believe. We have reason to believe that God is enough and God can make us enough.
I was raised by a mom who's like Michelle and yet a mom who somehow found her way to the middle of the room, and even though she had every reason to sit at the back, she grew up hearing her parents fight, but she purposed to build a great marriage. Her own mom told her things like, "I wish we'd done what people do with kittens," like "that we drowned you at birth." Can you imagine? Imagine ever hearing that from a parent?
And yet my mom aspired to be the best mom she could be, and she birthed eight children. And let me tell you, as the youngest of her children, every one of us knew we were so, so wanted.
My mom found that education helped her get distance from her turbulent family, and after she trained as a teacher, she returned the favor by teaching women in prisons how to read.
My Michelle, my mom Michelle, had every reason to sit at the back of the room, but she did not do that.
And when I became the CEO of a motherly ministry that's known as MOPS, or the MomCo by MOPS now, and whose slogan was "Better moms make a better world," I wanted to know how there could be more moms like that, and I searched the Bible to see who are the women who God works through greatly in spite of their circumstances and in the middle of their relationships?
And so I looked from the beginning in the book of Genesis, and I looked all the way through to the end, the book of Revelation, and what I found surprised me. These were the women who usually put themselves at the back of the room and if they didn't put themselves there, someone else asked them to sit there.
There were women like Hagar, who was used and then bragged about how she could become pregnant when her mistress Sarah couldn't. There were women like Esther, who had been orphaned and then let's face it, friends, she was abducted by the king for his own pleasure. There were women like Mary, who was a young teenager who God chose and then she risked stoning. She risked shame when she said, "Yeah, I'll be Jesus' mom."
What I found about these women in this pattern in the Bible is that God takes women like these, and women like you and women like me, and He takes us by the hand, and He walks us into the center of His purpose, And He does this first by establishing who He is and who we are and, because of that, what we can do. He establishes our identity and our authority.
In Genesis 1:27 and 28, in the New Living Translation, we see these words, and I'm going to compress them a little bit, but please go read them for yourself.
“So God created human beings in his own image ... male and female he created them. Then God blessed them and said, ‘Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth and govern it. Reign ...’” (Genesis 1:27-28, NLT).
Dr. Carmen Joy Imes, an associate professor at a leading Christian university and an author and podcaster and all that, wrote the study notes for Genesis in Tyndale's Every Woman's Bible, that by the way introduces probably the day that this podcast goes live, and Dr. Imes wrote, "Humans fill the role of representing God. This mission to represent God requires every one of us in a wide variety of ways in every corner of the globe. Both men and women are essential workers in this task. Humans are not divine, but we are the only creatures made in God's image."
And Dr. Imes adds that we can live out our identity, we can live this identity, because God gives us authority.
Psalm 8:3-6 says, "When I look at the night sky and see the work of your fingers—the moon and the stars you set in place—what are mere mortals that you should think about them, human beings that you should care for them? Yet you made them only a little lower than God and crowned them with glory and honor. You gave them charge of everything you made, putting all things under their authority" (NLT).
And that's what I saw in the extraordinary ordinary women in the Bible. In their relationship with God, they came to believe that God is enough and makes them enough.
Hagar. We look at Hagar in Genesis 16:13. She believed that God cared about her even after she'd been mistreated by people. She said, "You are the God who sees me" (Genesis 16:13, NLT).
Esther believed. In Chapter 4 ... Excuse me, in Esther 4:14, she believed that God could save the Jewish people and she could be empowered at least to do her part. She said, "If I perish, I perish" (Esther 4:16, ESV).
And Mary believed. We see in Luke 1:38, God favored her to be the Messiah's mom.
So, you and I, we, can live extraordinary purpose in ordinary life as we believe that God is enough and that God makes us enough, giving us the identity and the authority.
What else? What else did I see in these amazing women? Well, really, they were regular women honestly in the Bible, but God showed them something else that He invited them to do.
The second thing that amazingly purposeful, extraordinary, purposeful women did was they belonged, and we can belong. Often God started their breakthrough stories by talking directly to them and yes, they believed. But He continued those stories by inviting these women to belong.
We belong to and can serve God, not just through our family and our friends and our communities, but with our family and our friends, with the people in our neighborhoods, our workplaces, our schools and our churches.
God helped women of the Bible live with extraordinary purpose as they served with their people, just like my friend did for me last night. She and I walk together on Sundays and at the end of our time talking... We actually live lots of miles apart, 1,200 miles apart, but we walk on most Sunday mornings together and we talk and at the end we pray together and last night I told her that I'd be joining you on this podcast, Kaley and Melissa, and I said, "Can you believe it? I mean, what a privilege, right?" And she said, "Yes, Naomi, yes, I can believe it. God shows up."
This friend encouraged me to keep living who God has called me to be. And we see how women who God worked through greatly also belonged and found a way to live extraordinary purpose.
We see Hagar in Genesis 21:17. She returned to Abraham and Sarah's household after she'd run away. And later when she was forced to leave with her son, God showed her He was still with her, so Hagar lived her purpose as she was in relationship with God and as she cared for her son, Ishmael.
Esther, Esther 4:15 and 16, Esther listened to her family member, to her cousin Mordecai, and she fasted and she prayed with her handmaidens, people who were near her and with the Jewish people of Sousa, people who were far from her. Esther belonged as she lived her extraordinary purpose with her family and her community trusting God. And then Mary in Luke 1:43 and 46, she sought out Elizabeth and together these two women found joy. Oh my goodness, did they find joy in their incredible callings.
Mary had extraordinary influence as she belonged to God and served her family and also served with her family.
These patterns in the Bible of women who God worked through extraordinarily ... what else I saw after they believed and they belonged was these women became more of who God made them to be. Becoming only happens as we step forward in faith. Often these steps involved huge sacrifice and high risk for these women. Usually, the people who took them, they weren't ready, they weren't prepared, [and] they weren't qualified by human standards.
In another place, in the Every Woman's Bible, I wrote a devotional about how I discovered my purpose, and at the end of it, I wrote, "I follow God, the God who says, ‘I am your purpose.’" So, I follow I AM. I don't follow my Enneagram type, which by the way is four wing three. I don't follow my Myers-Briggs type, INFJ. And I don't follow any of the labels I could choose to put on me, like that I'm a wife, which I love being; a mom, which I also love being; a leader, which God has called me to be surprisingly; or that I'm good at this, and I'm really bad at that. Nope.
Knowing my calling comes from God, not from me, and really has very little to do with my qualifications, that gives me confidence to become and to press on.
We become and we glorify God, not by being qualified or by being fit but by stepping out in faith, just as Hagar and Esther and Mary did.
Hagar, Genesis 21:18, became. She was a woman without a husband, but she became the mother of a nation. She knew God saw her even when others had not.
Esther in Esther 4:16, she had been an orphan who was abducted, and yet through her, God saved the Jews in Sousa from genocide. She dared to go against her husband's orders, King Xerxes, when King Xerxes had thrown out his last wife for doing that: for disobeying and dishonoring him.
Mary in Luke 1:48, she heard God's angels speak. And think about this. This really caught me. As Jesus was in Mary's womb, was Mary's voice the first voice He ever heard? As she caressed her pregnant belly, was that the first touch Jesus ever felt? And as Mary gave birth to Jesus, she was the first person to shed blood for Him.
That's how women, who God works through greatly, lived extraordinary purpose in ordinary relationships in the midst of ordinary messes; in many of their cases, women who had been put to the back of the room because they were too unseen, like Hagar, they just belonged to somebody or who [were] put in the back of the room, like Esther. I know she was queen, but my goodness, her position was shaky. Queen Vashti had been deposed pretty easily right before her.
And then, also like Mary, who, when we think about it ... Oh my goodness, I'm the mother of three daughters, one who's in heaven and two are living. I cannot imagine a 13 or 14 year-, 15-year-old girl, one of my daughters, being ready to say “yes” to God like that. I'd say she's too young.
What about you? And what about me? This is what I want to come to. I care about you, and I care about me. Understanding that in the thick of all the people and all the pressures that we are in this moment — as you hear this, this moment, those pressures, those wonderful people who need you — in the thick of this, it's ordinary for us to live God's extraordinary purpose.
And we do that as we believe, believe that God is enough and makes us enough, that we are image bearers who have authority. When we believe, we are no longer insecure.
What in your past or maybe in this moment has given you a glimpse that God is enough? It makes you enough, sister.
We belong. We can ask family members or our pastors to pray with us or other women in ministry to pray with us about where is God leading, and how do I overcome this obstacle, or how do I engage these people so that I'm going together with my people, not alone?
Now, I work for a ministry that has incredible praying women, and it's called Stonecroft, and there's a way you can seek prayer right now at this moment. If you go to Stonecroft.org/pray: stone, like a little rock, croft, C-R-O-F-T, .org/pray.
And I know we're going to hear Kaley and Melissa at the end of this time about some other ways people can connect through Proverbs 31 to find sisters who will seek with them what is God doing and how do we find strength together to follow Him.
And as I think about pastors, you can ask your pastors to pray. Right now, literally right now, my pastors are praying for me. That's a great example of we live out that extraordinary ordinary purpose as we belong.
And then finally, we become, but we don't become by thinking our way to becoming. I wish we did. Or by journaling our way to becoming, although journaling is great. I've got shelffuls of journals right near where I'm sitting as I'm talking to you right now. We only become by actually stepping out in faith. And so, maybe that step for you is a baby step right now.
One of the hardest things I ever did was leave a really, really visible position, but I knew God was calling me to do it, and I couldn't imagine how to do it, and so the first step I took was I started fasting. Every Friday, I started fasting until dinner time, which was our pizza night, and maybe that's a step for you. Or maybe it looks bigger and it looks bigger. What is the step that God's Word and prayer and wise people in your life are all agreeing aligns with the step that God would ask you to take?
Let's get back to Michelle, the real Michelle. The gal at the back of the room with the husband rocking back and forth holding the baby, hoping the baby would sleep and not make noise in the middle of this presentation I was making, that was on a very similar topic to what we're talking about right now, you and I together.
At the beginning, you met Michelle, and Michelle, like you, like me, can often feel insecure, but God can make her secure. She can often feel isolated, but God has ways for her to take a tiny next step and belong. She often doubts her influence in the midst of all the things. In the midst of the dishes, and, oh my gosh, the latest thing. For me, I just came home and found that there were just ... The bugs had all decided to die in my house all at once. That was super fun. Vacuuming up all the bugs on the windowsills; that's like, ugh, that's not how I want to live influence, but it is where I am today.
But like God says to Hagar in her mess and to Esther in her lack of control and tenuous position and to Mary in her potential shame and danger, God says to you, and God says to me, "You can do what I call you to do. You can do my extraordinary purpose in the midst, in the thick of your ordinary, because I made you for this."
At the end of the talk where I met Michelle, I was shuffling my papers and packing up my laptop, and I looked up, and I was surprised to see there was a man, a stroller, and Michelle standing in front of me. It was a 200-foot conference room, like I said, and they had to walk a long ways up to the front, and he said, "I want to thank you." And then he turned his head toward his wife.
Michelle continued. She said, "Until today, I thought that to do what I'm here for, to do something really meaningful for God, I'd have to wait until my kids were grown, that I'd have to do it without them. I thought I'd have to leave my family to do something that matters." And her eyes sparkled, and she went on. "Now I know that I am here for my family, yes, but it goes beyond that. I am here to serve God with my family. I don't need to wait, and we're going to start living that way. Thank you."
So, you. Hey, you. Your name's probably not Michelle; some of you, it is Michelle. Hey, Michelle. Whatever your name is, you are important, and what God has called you to do is important, and the relationships God has put you in are important, but your purpose does not end there. With your people, with God, this day, it can be your ordinary to live God's extraordinary purpose.
I want to pray for you. The words of Genesis 1:27 and 28, the very first words in the Bible about why we are all here and what God empowers us to do. Let me pray.
Father God, we thank You for these words that were written down. “So God created human beings in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27, NLT). You created us. Then, God, You blessed us and said, "Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth and govern it. Reign ..." (Genesis 1:28, NLT). How amazing, God, that You would call ordinary me in my slippers, each person who is listening right now, maybe she's washing the dishes or driving somewhere but still able to hear the traffic noise. I have no idea, God. You called each of us to reign. That's an extraordinary purpose. And yet You know our ordinary, You love our ordinary, [and] You gave it to us. You called us not only to live it for the people who are directly around us but also with them. And we praise You.
Jesus, I pray for each person who is hearing this, that today in this moment and each day, God, she will return to Your voice, in Your Word, in prayer and with Your people to remember who she is and to step forward in faith, to become who You have made her to be.
Jesus in Your beloved and powerful name I pray, amen.
Kaley:
Amen. Amen.
Melissa:
Yes.
Kaley:
Naomi, thank you so much for a practical but such a well-thought-out message for everybody who is in the trenches, who has forgotten that she's here for a reason and that God is writing her story specifically, just like He wrote Hagar and Mary and Esther's story like you mentioned.
I don't know, I just kept thinking, Melissa, there's a reason that the Bible only includes a few people as examples.
Melissa:
Right.
Kaley:
It doesn't mean that there are only a few people who are special, ordinary people that God uses. He uses everybody, but there's only so much space and so many examples that He can give, and I think it's so easy to get discouraged whenever we see people in the Bible that are mentioned and we think, "Oh, well, my story's never going to be written down." Or we see modern-day people who are living really big and bold lives.
Melissa:
Exactly.
Kaley:
And for like, "Well, I'm not that important" but everything that you do is important, and thank you for that reminder for us today, Naomi. I have a question for you that I want to ask you because you've got a lot of experience in schooling and as a CEO. I know as a CEO, you're thinking business and strategy and there's a lot of research that even goes into that ... that way you can run a company really well. At the beginning of your teaching, you mentioned that women are leaving the church at an astronomical rate. Do you mind going back and sharing that specific stat with us? I think it was close to your introduction.
Naomi Overton:
Yes. That specific statistic was found in a study of churches, and it was also found by Barna Research and then also was published about in Relevant Magazine. Women are leaving the church at three times the rate of men, and they've asked why, and some of the reasons why are the reasons I mentioned in that part of my talk.
Kaley:
Yeah, and I was going to ask you to dive deeper into that. It's wild to me that that is happening, because what's so interesting about being a woman is that we really carry so much influence in the home. If we're a wife and a mother, we are the people who are working with all the schedules and making those everyday mental load types of decisions, and I wanted to ask you more specifically — I know you covered it in your teaching; you answered through speaking on identity and belonging and becoming more — but how does the rate of them leaving so fast, the body of Christ that we are called to be a part of, how does that correlate with living on purpose? What do you think they're missing?
Naomi Overton:
Yeah, that is such a great question, and Barna found that, first of all, a lot of women at some point in their lives, most women at some point in their lives will be single. So, if you take women who are single or whose marriages have ended or who are widowed, that's a whole lot. In some cases in places, it's a majority of women in a church. And one of the reasons that Barna found in their research was that, rightly so, churches and pastors care about families and marriages; they're super important. And a lot of practical teaching, a lot of the small groups, a lot of Sunday school classes are geared around families and marriage, and if you're a single woman who's no longer married for whatever reason, where do you find yourself? Where do you belong?
If the teaching from the front takes the scriptures and then it applies it to here's how you live it out with your kids or here's how you live it out with your spouse, and you don't have either of those, your kids are grown, and they're no longer in the house, and you try to go to work Monday morning, and you have a lot of things in the workplace where you're like, "Oh my goodness, I wish I knew how to live this out in my work." That was some of the disconnect that Barna found was going on.
And then Relevant Magazine really talked about a lot around single women feeling that they didn't see their place in the church. And also, if they work career forward, they didn't see that reflected in the women who were in influential roles in the church. And so it was just that sense, like Mary sought out Elizabeth. They're both pregnant with unexpected pregnancies, and they needed each other. Well, these women who were career forward, and we know that women are ... The current women in the United States are the highest educated group of women our nation's ever had. They weren't finding people that were visible, at least to them, that were sharing the commitment and the calling God had given them to use their skills in the workplace.
So, those were some of the reasons. And then a really, really important reason for men and women who were leaving the church is they were not finding connection. They were not finding that belonging.
Kaley: It's wild. Isn't it so crazy that in a world that is so connected — well, I guess on the surface — that we're missing that actual connection, and what a reminder, or the importance even, that connection plays in reinforcing the purpose in our life, because I think the Christian life and following the Lord is a really lonely and hard thing to bear alone —
Melissa:
Right.
Kaley:
— And that's why it's so easy to lose sight of who we are and what we're doing.
Melissa:
That's exactly what I was thinking, Kaley, because I know I can sit well in the Word and learn more about who God is and who He made me and how I can live out and I need to believe that He's enough. I can sit with that really well. I can sit really well with reading about how I belong, how I'm important to the Lord.
I think when it's hard is when you get to that become, that's when I need my people, because even though I know what God's Word says, and that is the most important thing, sometimes I need you beside me to say, "Yes, you can do this. I'm praying for you. Don't be afraid to take that first step," because I can say, "I'm going to fall flat on my face," or "They're going to think this is stupid," or "Nobody's going to come along with me," or ... I can have all the reasons, and if I'm in isolation, that doubt is going to fester in my mind. I need God talking to me, but I need people as well.
Kaley:
Yeah. Yeah, that's so true, Melissa. And, Naomi, I love ... And just wrapping up our discussion here, one of the things that you said at the very beginning of your teaching was alluding to this wanting more for life, and I thought that was such an interesting statement, because sometimes wanting more for your life seems really anti-Christian and anti-humble. I don't know a great word for anti-humble, so I'm just saying ... prideful, I guess. But it seems so countercultural to the Christian life to want more, because there's verses in the Bible that talk about living a meek life. Look at the Beatitudes or look at the life that Jesus lived, and I think as Christians, we have to look at it through the lens of not acquiring more or keeping up, but you explained it so well.
I want more of a deeper understanding of my identity and what my authority is as a woman called by God. I want more belonging. You can never have enough, and that's not a bad thing to want. And the idea of becoming more and stepping forward, really putting it back on us to take that step and not wait for God to drop something in our lap all the time.
Melissa:
He equipped us to move.
Kaley:
Yeah, He did. So, I thought it was so practical, Naomi. Honestly, you're a doctor who I could listen to and talk with for a long time, so thank you for really helping break this down simply for us. And to wrap us up, there are a few action steps I believe that we can keep taking after listening to this teaching. First, and most importantly, we need to get into God's Word. We can't know what God is directing us to do without knowing Him and knowing His voice, and sometimes ... I don't know about you, Melissa, or you, Naomi, if you feel this way, but a fresh Bible can make all the difference, because sometimes I get a fresh Bible, and my goal is to make the leather soft as fast as I can. I want the Word to be worn out in a good way.
So, we recommend getting into the Every Woman's Bible, and, Naomi, you were actually the general editor of the Every Woman's Bible, so I would love to give you an opportunity to share what makes this edition so special.
Naomi Overton:
Oh, thanks. I appreciate that. And yes, I love your ambition to make it soft. That's so cool, Kaley. I think first of all, we really listened to women. We listened to women who are not regularly in the Bible and to women who are, and we asked them, "When you think about opening the book of the Bible, this big book of 66 books, why? What is it you are trying to find in there?" And what we found is that women are going to the Bible because they want to know the answer to: What am I here for? What's my purpose in early seasons of life or in the middle of life or toward the end of life? What am I here for? And so we really zeroed in on that. We really zeroed in on God's mission, what God says we're here for.
And we looked at that in our relationships with God, with our family and friends, with our communities, schools, workplaces, neighborhoods and churches. And then finally, what are you here for in the unique ways that God has called you? That's a big focus.
But a second thing is, let's be honest, sometimes it is hard to ask the questions of the Bible itself or of the people who were around in Bible study or at churches when teaching that are really disturbing about things that are in the Bible, specifically things about women. And so what we did was we took a list of ... It was called “Passages that Women Love to Hate.” It actually had been published in U.S. News and World Report, and we took every single one of those Bible passages and gave them to a Bible scholar, a female Bible scholar, and we said, "Unpack this for us. Don't give us the easy answer. We want to know what was going on when this woman in Judges 21, this concubine is chopped up into a hundred — not a hundred but a whole lot of pieces. What is going on? Does God OK that? What is going on when there are concubines or a man has many wives? Is that God's normal, or is that just what people are doing?
Kaley:
That's awesome.
Naomi Overton:
You get the idea. We asked really hard questions. And then the final thing, if I had to say one more, Every Woman's Bible, how do you live into that? We invited over a hundred women from every continent in the world in many different walks of life to use their voices and tell their story, and we asked the readers to tell their stories as well.
Kaley:
That's awesome. I just have to say something really quick. The whole questions women ... What was it? Scriptures Women Love to Hate.
Naomi Overton:
Hate. Yeah.
Kaley:
Is that what you said Naomi?
I would buy a copy of the Bible right now just to be able to get the answers to those questions. That's amazing. I love that you guys went there, because that addresses a stereotype specifically that I think women walk into is that our Bible study and time in God's Word is always supposed to be happy-go-lucky, and we're supposed to smile every single time we read something and never question it. And that's not true. Sometimes the Bible makes us scratch our head, and I think it's OK to recognize that. I love that you guys made a Bible that addresses the really sticky and hard things. That's amazing.
Melissa:
Because I'm always tempted to skip over those.
Kaley:
I know.
Melissa:
I [inaudible] to think about that another time. I'm so glad you address that. And it really is Every Woman's Bible, not just a specific woman who fits in a certain —
Kaley:
That's great.
Melissa:
— Stereotype like you said.
Naomi Overton:
I have to credit my associate editor, Misty Arterburn. She was the one who had that as a burden for her. It's like, "We got to do this."
Melissa:
Great job, Misty.
Naomi Overton:
Yes.
Kaley:
Yay, Misty.
Melissa:
Well everyone, you can get your Every Woman's Bible using the link in our show notes. And, Kaley, you mentioned taking two action steps, and the first one we covered was getting into God's Word, but the second one was getting into community. I'm so excited to talk about this again. At Proverbs 31 Ministries, we have the perfect community for you to be a part of: our brand-new Circle 31 Book Club.
Kaley:
Yes.
Melissa:
It's absolutely free to join, and when you do, we're going to read books together that challenge our thinking and we're going to make progress together. One of the things I love most about what you'll experience through the Circle 31 Book Club is how we're making community accessible through discussion groups where you can join to read and learn along with like-minded ladies. We'd love for you to join our Circle today for free. Just use the link in the show notes to get started.
Kaley:
I love that, Melissa. I'm so excited for the Circle 31 Book Club, and it really fits in with the last point Naomi made about “becoming” is an action word, and you have to take a step in order to keep becoming and getting into God's Word and then taking the step to get into community —
Melissa:
Yes.
Kaley:
— Are two really great things that you can do. Lastly, Naomi's team has shared a few free scripture downloads that are designed and pulled from Every Woman's Bible that you guys can download using the link in our show notes. We've linked those for you as well. And, friends, that is all for today. Naomi, thank you so much for joining us and for sharing your wisdom with us. It was truly a treat to have you on the show today. Friends, at Proverbs 31 Ministries, we help you know the Truth and live the Truth, because it changes everything. See you next time.