transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:00] Hi, I'm Susie Larson. Thank you for listening to Susie Larson Live. Faith Radio podcasts are only possible because of your support. So thanks for giving, and thanks for sharing with a friend. Welcome to Susie Larson Live. Always so honored to get to spend this time with you. In fact, I look forward to bringing you conversations every single day that hopefully inspire you in your faith walk, that deepen your understanding of God's Word, and that heightens your awareness of His very real presence in your life. Over a month ago, I had the privilege of flying to Dallas, Fort Worth to film a handful of shows for the Better Together TV show. I remember this like it was yesterday. The driver picked me up at my hotel, and I waited in the backseat for another guest who was also going to be on the show. In a whirl of a moment, this adorable, firecracker, vibrant young woman hops in the car and said she was stuck in Canada and didn't have any clothes except for the one she was wearing. And I think she bought a shirt at the store. I loved her instantly. She was so is, so vibrant, so beautiful, so full of life. And it's just so funny to me. I was stuck in Canada, but right from there, we were off and running, just talking deeply and honestly, and we just became fast friends. And then I got to share the set with her all day long as we filmed five shows and did all kinds of other recording. And I'm telling you to learn about her backstory, to learn about what this woman has overcome, and all the wisdom God has imparted to her in her young life is amazing. I call her a little spark plug. Alexandra Hoover joins me today to talk about letting go, breaking free from offense, and moving forward with God. You're going to love her, I absolutely know this. Before I introduce her, I want to ask you just to chime in, if you would. Tell me right now, without thinking too much about it, what's one thing God's saying to let go of? What do you need to let go of? Why don't you text me, 877-933-2484. Tell me what's one thing. You just know it. You know it. Let me know. Alexandra's book is You Can Let Go, Make Peace with Your Past, Break Free from Offense, and Move Forward with God. Got five copies to give away. If you want in on the drawing, if you need this kind of message to help you move to your next place of freedom that God has for you, in a separate text, you just text the word book. In a separate text, and there's no emojis, no exclamation point, just the word book. The way you know if you did it right is if it kicks back a link for you. Okay? So just text the word book to 877-933-2484. And one last thing is our spring fundraiser is just around the bend. And you know this. We're listener supported. And this is such a powerful time to talk about what God has done, where we've been, and to cast a vision for where we believe He's taking us. So I pray you prayerfully consider your role in our spring fundraiser. It's always a powerful time. All right. Let me tell you about my guest. We'll get her on the show. Alexandra Hoover is a compassionate writer, a sought after speaker, and an author. A proud Latina, she's pursuing a masters of arts and women in theology at Northern Seminary. As a wife and mother of three, she treasures balancing family life with ministry, finding joy in serving and inspiring others. My friend, welcome to the show.

Speaker 2:
[03:24] Oh my gosh. I'm so glad to be here.

Speaker 1:
[03:26] Hi. Hi. I can't wait for our friends to get to know you. And I'd love to start here. You're a busy young mom. You got a lot going on, but I know just because I got to spend time with you, that first and foremost, your walk with God is about most important. So I'm wondering, as you've been just sitting with Him, and I know you're kind of in a new season of life right now, as you've been sitting with Him and bending an ear towards heaven and opening up the Word of God in your lap, like what is the Lord impressing upon your heart that you feel like we need to hear today?

Speaker 2:
[03:57] Faithfulness. Oh my goodness. He has been talking to me about stewarding what is right in front of me. The last few weeks, you know how the Lord will just highlight certain things to you, right? And different messages and as you read his word. And so for me, it's been faithfulness. He's been asking me to pay attention to the ways that he's moving in my life. And I think he's doing two things, reminding me to stay faithful, but to enjoy the things that I get to tend to, to notice them, to like savor his goodness in the midst of them, both hard and good. And I've loved it. I've seen it in a lot of different ways the last few weeks. But faithfulness, my friend, how do I remain faithful and steward what he's given me?

Speaker 1:
[04:41] That reminds me of Psalm 145, where it charges us to think about and give specific examples of God's power, to think about, to remember, to rehearse specific examples of how he's come through for us. And we can judge the Israelites as perpetual forgetters, but so are we. We have air amnesia all the time. And I think the only way that we can stand in and walk in the fullness of God is to remember, is to reflect and rehearse, my goodness, I've got a history with God. And friend, even if you're listening, maybe you're new to the faith and you're like, I don't have a history with God. I've only turned my life over to him a week ago. You still have a history because he knew you before you were born. And he was guarding and guiding you before you even knew what he was about. Maybe say a word, if you would, Alexandra, to the person listening today who maybe doesn't really feel like they have a history with God or really hasn't thought much about his faithfulness to them.

Speaker 2:
[05:36] Sure. I love that question. It's one I wrestled with personally. And I think I would love to tell you that we were sitting over a cup of coffee or maybe your favorite tea. I would say, my friend, all of your life are moments of grace. And in the seasons where you thought you weren't going to make it, what got you through was God's grace and His goodness over your own life. And so even in this moment, I'd ask you to look back in the moments where you thought, man, that was the end. And to know that in that moment, it was the Lord's grace and His strength. Even in our moments of weakness, when we were like, man, I have no idea how I got through where that season almost took me out. That is God's grace. The fact that you are listening today and you're here and you have the ability to hear and you're breathing, there's air in your lungs, you are growing. That's God's grace. So look back, notice the moments where you thought that was it. And then know that the reason you're here today is because of God's faithfulness. That is it.

Speaker 1:
[06:30] Amen. Amen. When you're broke is You Can Let Go. And I need people to know that this is not theory for you. I mean, you know, some people have trauma in their backstory that they could point to and even make an idolot as a reason to stay stuck. So when you're talking about letting go, this again is not theory. It's something you've had to live through. And I would, if as much as you feel comfortable, give us some insight into your backstory and some of the things that have happened to you that really bore this message in you.

Speaker 2:
[07:03] Yeah, you know, no one wakes up and says, I want to teach on offense and letting go and letting go of the trap that has been. Yeah, I like to say that I came face to face with offense, with pain at an early age. It was my first kind of companion. And I was raised in a pretty chaotic home. My dad and my mom were never married, and my dad is a high-functioning alcoholic. My mom has always struggled with since I can remember some sort of brain health challenge and was severely depressed for most of my life. And I saw the way that life went for my mom. I saw the pain and the betrayal she walked through. I experienced it with her. I actually say that her offense became my own. And the betrayal that she walked through with my dad and his infidelity and alcoholism. And we went through just a ton of difficulty. I have a very specific story that I always go back to, but it was a core memory of mine where I remember saying, oh man, I do not think there is any good here. I was, my mom and I were out. We were, I was maybe about eight years old. We were on the way back home. And I was in the back seat, could barely see over the dashboard of the car. And we were pulling into the driveway of our home. And I remember seeing two things, our clothes out in the yard and a car that I didn't recognize. And so I immediately, I tense up, I can feel the temperature of the car change. And I look at my mom and she's processing, she's pulling into the driveway and she knew who it was. And I remember just freezing in the back seat and thinking to myself, who is that woman standing at the door? And who was that little boy? So my mom gets out of the car and she's walking towards the door of, you know, our front door. And immediately it just, I begin to hear screaming and my dad is standing next to this other woman. And I get out of the car, a brave little girl ready to defend my mom and take on whatever was happening. I was both incredibly afraid and also very angry for her and for me. I'm walking towards the front door, to the left of me is our yard and our clothes are there. I see all of my clothes thrown out. And my mom stops talking to the other woman and my dad, and she looks at me and says, this is your brother, this is Levy. And that was the first I had met my brother. He was only about a year older than me. And my mom tells me to get back in the car. And I do. And she ends up picking up some of our clothes. She puts them in the back seat and we drive off. And all she did was cry. She wept all the way to a friend's house where we ended up staying. We were living in our friend's basement for about the next six months or so. So we were displaced, homeless for a little while. And I remember just being completely broken by that, you know, as an eight-year-old little girl. And that wasn't the first time that I had experienced this level of pain. I had other moments in my life where I looked at my mom and said, oh, there's nothing here other than just pain and struggle, even though she fought so hard to give me moments of joy. And I'm very careful, Susie, with how I show my story because I don't ever want to come off as someone who didn't experience, my mom did her best, you know, she gave me what she could. And yet there's so much pain and offense that came with us. And so, you know, there are moments where I look at and say, that's where it happened for me. That's where I think I became engulfed by pain and also offense became the filter of my life. It became the lens from which I saw my whole world.

Speaker 1:
[11:02] First of all, I so appreciate the way that you honor her while at the same time being honest about how it impacted you so you could heal, you know, because we'll never heal from a pain that we don't acknowledge. And yet there's such a massive trend these days of young people walking away and just cutting off, you know, their parents. It's a massive trend right now where they're not sorting through. They're not seeing a bigger picture and the possibility and the importance of legacy. And so I just really appreciate that because this is, that's a taste of what you walk through. And imagine as a little girl being homeless, of staying in someone's basement, of not having a mom and dad, a loving mom and dad together. I mean, there's so many things you didn't have. So what were the lies that you picked up when life let you down like that?

Speaker 2:
[11:52] Yeah, that's so funny. I was just talking to a friend about a particular lie that I'm still wrestling with. These lies become strongholds. And I do want to say that the lies that we pick up from our pain do end up becoming the way that we live. And so I always like to remind myself and my kids, right? So like what we think becomes what we believe when we don't audit that. And then what we believe becomes how we behave. And there were several.

Speaker 1:
[12:18] Say that again. What we think becomes what we believe if we don't audit it. And then what we believe becomes what we behave. Wow.

Speaker 2:
[12:25] What we behave, absolutely. And which, you know, Scripture is so clear on, you know, taking our thoughts captive and thinking on things above. And there's an intentional invitation from our Jesus to, you know, where he's saying, I need you to pay attention to what you are thinking because what you think does become the narrative from which you live from. So I had to do the work of understanding what my lies were, what I was not just thinking, but what I believed from that to be true. Even if I wasn't admitting it, right? I allowed that narrative to become the landscape of my life. And so a few, number one, that God was good just not to me. That became a core belief in my life, quite literally, that if there was a God, because I think for most of my teenage years and even into young adulthood, I would say that I was agnostic. And I didn't have language for that, Susie, up until maybe 15 years ago or so, 36 now. And I would always say like, yeah, I had proximity to Jesus, but I just didn't know him. And there's a difference between having proximity to God and having intimacy with God. And I had family and even some friends in proximity to us who knew Jesus and would tell us that I just did not believe that he was good. So I'd always say like, yeah, if God is good, it's definitely not to me or my mom. And so I had so much resentment against the idea and the character of who God was as father, as sovereign, right? Holy, faithful, none of that was treated me. So yeah, God was, if there was a God, if he was good, it certainly was not to me. And so from that came a whirlwind of lies. I would always be left out, this perpetual sense of feeling rejected, consistently rejected, consistently left out, which I think you and I had a little bit of this conversation of, there's this lie, this looming belief of like, man, I'm always going to be left out as an outsider. So that was one of them.

Speaker 1:
[14:24] Okay, pause here, pause here. We got to take a break. We don't want to miss one thing you're saying. So friends, if you're relating, which I know that you are, we've talked about this before. I mentioned this on the show plenty of times, but my friend Marie years ago said to me, there's a pattern of theft in everyone's life. And that the enemy starts when we're talking about children, and he conditions us to believe his lies, so that he can keep lying to us. And so, friend, I want you to think about that pattern of theft. I want you to think about the lies and how often it is the enemy saying, you know what, you'll never be enough. You'll always be on the outside of the circle. You are rejectible. You're easily rejectible. You're dispensable. We can toss you aside. That is the enemy talking. When we come back, I want to hear more from my friend Alexandra Hoover about the lies that she picked up on Life Let Her Down, because now she is someone who has flipped the script and helps many, many women get free. Her book is titled You Can Let Go. Make Peace with Your Past. Break Free from Offense. And Move Forward with God. We'll be back in a minute. Faith Radio podcasts are produced by the listener-supported ministry of Faith Radio. If you're interested in becoming a team member, a donor to this ministry, you can support the podcast anytime and donate at myfaithradio.com. Hope you're having a really great day. Thanks for tuning in to Susie Larson Live, talking to my friend Alexandra Hoover. I love this girl. Her book, As You Can Let Go, Make Peace with Your Past, Break Free from Offense, and Move Forward with God. And before the break, Alexandra, you talk about when you're a little girl, and parents were never married, you're eight years old, your mom and you pull up to your home, and your dad is there with his another gal and has a child with her, and your clothes are on the lawn, and you're eight years old, and you're displaced and living in a friend's basement, and there were multiple other things that happened in your life to just sort of set up a narrative that if God is good, he's definitely not good to you, and that you are rejectible. You started to talk about some of the other lies that you believed because of these things you endured. Say more about that.

Speaker 2:
[16:44] Yeah, gosh, as I continued to work through what I believed and what became these behaviors in my life, I also recognized that I consistently thought that I was not only rejectible but that I was just not loved, like not lovable. And with that came this intense belief and looming consistent feeling of self-doubt, like I'm just, I'm not, I'm dumb, I'm not good enough, which speaks into that rejection piece. But it's a little different, right? Because it's more identity based. It's like who the very fiber of who I am is, it's not good enough. And I think we hear that as women and you know, men too, quite often. And I think we move past it too quickly. But I had to take time to do what I like to call identity work. Like, who am I? How has God created me? Like, what is the outside of just being, you know, the Imago Day of God and like, man, this this beautiful creation that the Lord loves and cares about and thinks about, I needed to also understand the good things that God had given me because I had become obsessed with looking at the lack. And so believing that I was who God said I was, became this challenge, this beautiful invitation. God was like, you will know who I created you to be and you will know that you are loved, you have good things to offer the world, that your life was not a waste. I think those for me and a few others became some of the greatest lies, but I would say those two mainly, this idea of rejection that I was never good enough and left out, abandoned, missing opportunity, missing God's good for me and identity, who I was in general.

Speaker 1:
[18:32] And as we both know, healing is not a once and done typically. It comes in layers because we have to disentangle from the lies and heal from the trauma and replace the lies with the truth. But I would love to know, what are some kind of moments, remarkable moments with the Lord where He started to disentangle you from these lies and show you that actually the opposite is true? You know, the enemy, his native tongue is the lie. And even, you know, hearing you talk about those lies, knowing you, even the bit that I know, it's like, it just once again reaffirms what a liar he is, because you are so beautiful inside and out, and you are firepower in the way that you help people find out who they are. It is no wonder the enemy attacked you when you were young. But I'd still love to know, how did you come upon the truth?

Speaker 2:
[19:20] Oh, my gosh. Thank you for those encouraging words and just exhorting me all the time. I have one specific memory where I want to say this first. That is so true, that the Lord heals in season and in layer, because it is this untangling. And so I think even it is God's grace, even in how he heals us, because I think we oftentimes think we are more ready to heal from things that we are actually positioned to heal from. Right? There are moments where God says, I'm ready to reveal this thing to you. You have a better awareness and knowledge of who I am. Let's walk you through, because sometimes it is so painful to look back, to come face to face with the depth of brokenness. I was probably about 25 years old. It was one of my first experiences going to see a Christian counselor. She was phenomenal. I still talk to her till this day. She actually had gone through a, she became a coach first through Grace Life, and then became a Christian therapist. And so she'd become kind of a coach for me. And then I walked through therapy with her. And one of my very first sessions with her, she had said to me, we had untangled a lot of these lies. And she had me journal these three questions. And she said, I want you to tell me, I want you to answer this for me, Alexandra. And I was like, great, let's go. I'm ready. I was ready to go. I'm like, I can do this. She said, number one, I want you to write down what you believe about yourself. Like, what do you believe about yourself? And I wrote down, I was like, well, I know the writing. I know what to say. I'm a child of God. I'm a loved daughter. I'm beloved. I'm righteous in his eyes, blah, blah, blah. And she said, okay, well, write it down. She said, what do you think people think about you? And I was like, oh, okay. So then I began to write that down. I wrote down, I think people think I'm dumb. I think people think I'm not good enough. I think I'm, you know, I'm the last bit of what good is. And if they choose me, it's because they didn't have anybody else. And then the third thing she had me write down is, well, what do you think God thinks about you? And immediately, I was like, right, I know Christianese, I know what to say. God loves me. And she said, no, try again. What do you think God actually thinks about you? And I sat there in this just overwhelming wave of shame and guilt just flooded me and I began to weep. And I said, I think God gives me the scraps of his grace. I think he looks at me and says, I'm so annoyed by you. You're so needy. Here, just take this. And that day was the day that I began to unravel what I was believing. And it was in that moment where she said, now I want you to reverse that. And now I want you to look up eight-year-old you and speak to yourself as if God would. What do you know the truth to be about you? And what do you know the truth to be about God and how he sees you and knows you? And that was the day that I always like to say, I began this work of not only healing, but truthfully allowing God to give me a new lens. I love this, the visual of a lens has been such an important picture that God's given me, this lens of how I see him, how I see life, how I see my world. And that day I began to allow him to paint that in for me again. Like he began to color it in with new colors and he began to color it in with his perspective and his truth. And I was more aware, right? Not completely healed, because healing is a life long journey with him as he pieces his back together. But I remember that day being the day it all changed for me.

Speaker 1:
[23:05] Wow. Another part of your story that's amazing, one of the lies you believed, because you had no reason to believe otherwise, was that you had no Christian heritage. You know, you were from a broken heritage. And talk about how God proved that one wrong.

Speaker 2:
[23:24] Oh, gosh, I'm so glad you brought that up. Yes, I was. That used to be such a point of contention for me. I would envy, I would envy people and women who would come from these homes. I'm like, man, you are so blessed to have parents who loved you. You grew up in the church. I imagine had I had like 10 plus years of like equipping and discipleship, I'd be completely different today. So that was, I became jealous. Like I would covet it. It was so strange. But not surprising, right? Because I, in my mind, I would always try to find, I'm like, right, that is why I am struggling today. Because I, my family couldn't give me that. Again, another lie. And so a few years back, maybe I was around 29 years old. We had traveled up to Virginia. I've got some of my family there. And my cousin was a lot older than me. I was doing my best to try to show my kids, we do have family, right? We are not alone. There is this part of me that longed for connection and belonging. And I knew a part of that was also to just do my part in showing my kids like, hey, look at mom. We are doing what we can to bridge these relationships and mend them. And so I'd gone to visit some family. I wasn't super close to them, but this particular cousin who's a lot older, he and his wife would take care of me when I was younger. And there was a sense of connection and belonging there. And so I brought my family, I brought Mario. And our kids were there and it was really beautiful. And I began to tell him about my life. And he was like, I see what you're doing, you're writing and you're speaking. And we're so proud of you. And I was like, yeah, you know, I'm so thankful that the Lord has done this in my life. And he said to me, he said, well, you know, your grandmother wrote you letters. Like she's written you, she'd write you letters and she'd been praying for your whole life. Now, mind you, my dad is a pastor's kid, which I did not know.

Speaker 1:
[25:18] Wow.

Speaker 2:
[25:19] My grandmother was an evangelist and a missionary, and my grandfather was a pastor. There were local church pastors in Venezuela. And so there's a side of me, gosh, I'll cry, that I did not know existed.

Speaker 1:
[25:30] Wow.

Speaker 2:
[25:31] So there was this moment where he said, well, give me a second. He went back in the house and he brought out these like composition notebooks and these letters that he had put in there from my grandmother and my great grandmother, who was also an evangelist and very well known in the Presbyterian Church in South America. And he began to show me these letters and these prayers that my grandmother had written to me. And he said, I don't think you know that you've had, you've had people praying for you before you were even born. Your grandmother and your great grandmother had been praying for you and contending for you. And so where you are today is the legacy and the answered prayer of your grandmother's and your grandfather praying for you. Even though I never got to meet them. And I remember sitting and we were in the yard in front of his house, just all sitting together and I just remember becoming so undone by God's faithfulness and saying, wow, for every moment in my life that I believed, I had been abandoned and overlooked, you had been contending and sowing seeds in my life since forever ago.

Speaker 1:
[26:36] Come on.

Speaker 2:
[26:37] And I was so, I was, you know, bolstered up in my faith, but there was just this sense of God. I just felt his comfort say his a hug and a hug and a gentle nudge from him saying, do you see how I work? Which of course encouraged me and I think gave me new perspective even about the work that we have before us, that the sowing of seeds, right? Like we, we plant and others will water, and we may never see the fruitfulness of what we're called to do. And I believe that I am that for my grandmother and my great grandmother. I believe that they're with the Lord right now, and they're watching the fruit of their faithfulness and saying, wow, but that's the life that they lived. They were prayers and they would sow seeds, and they understood how the economy of the kingdom works, which now has given me so much perspective for my faithfulness today. I may not see the fruit that I want, but I know that God will do something with it.

Speaker 1:
[27:36] Wow. I knew part of that story. I didn't know the full part. Wow. Wow. Wow. God is so good. He always has a remnant. And friend, listening today, there's someone praying for you that you're not even aware of. God will make sure of it. And we have a cloud of witnesses cheering us on. Jesus is interceding for us day and night. You're so not alone. You're so not a have not. You're not the outside of the circle. Someone may treat you as dispensable and rejectable. They can toss you aside, but God never ever will. Alexandra's my guest today, Alexandra Hoover. Her book is You Can Let Go. Earlier in the show, I asked you to text me just right off the top of your head, what's something you know you can let go of? I'm not saying throw it into the universe. As they say in the New Age world, I'm saying entrust it, let go, let God. What do you need to let go and give to God? Right now, top of your head, text me, 877-933-2484. Title of the book is You Can Let Go. Make peace with your past, break free from offense, and move forward with God. Before we start talking about making peace and breaking free from offense, when we come back, I want you to talk about the way that our pain shapes us if we don't audit. And then how do you redirect and flip the script so you can be on the path of healing? More with Alexandra Hoover in a minute. Thanks so much for tuning in to Susie Larson Live, talking to my friend Alexandra Hoover about her book, You Can Let Go, Make Peace with Your Past, Break Free from Offense, and Move Forward with God. And if you just tuned in, once the live show is over, within an hour, it will be up on podcast. You got to go back and listen to the front half of the show, because you got to hear Alexandra's backstory. It's gripping, it will remind you that you're not alone. God is with you. He'll always put people where they need to be in your story to point you to Him. He is so for you, He's so with you. And whether you've walked with God for a long time or just a short time, you have God in your history. You're fearfully and wonderfully made. You bear His image. And He has put people in your path. He's assigned angels to your care. You don't even know what God has prevented in your life. Yes, you've walked through some things, but there's a lot you haven't endured because God's hand has been upon you, whether you realize it or not. Alexandra, take a minute, if you would, to talk about how our pain shapes us if we're not careful.

Speaker 2:
[30:11] Yeah. Man, pain is so interesting, right? Because I wanna be clear and gentle, even with how I talk about this, because it's important that we recognize that pain and hurt, they happen to us. And so let's establish that, right? Like pain is gonna happen. There is hurt and loss that has either already happened or it's coming our way. People are people and that's a part of it. That's a part of what we get to experience as we live out our lives. However, hurt happens to us. It's not something that we have to allow to become us. And I think that it is easy to allow our pain to become, even our lens, right, through life and we begin to live into that. And so a great example is, right, this having a victim mentality, that because something has happened to us, it becomes our identity. And we begin to live into that and it becomes not only our identity, but it becomes how we behave. And so we walk with defeat. We live from a posture of defeat, posture of defensiveness, right? So we become critical towards ourselves and others. I'm not good enough. I'm not loved. And so now I am treating my neighbor, my brother and my sister in Christ in the same way. You're not good enough. You will hurt me. And now I'm defensive and living with this posture of just a broken heart towards God's people, even though we know that they're imperfect, right? It's important that we recognize that although we are going to experience pain and walk through pain, it does not have to become us. As we audit the things that happen to us, as we go back and look at our trauma, you know, little trauma and big T trauma, we get to take it to God and say, Lord, help us sort this out correctly. Help me identify the pain. And I'm really big on this too, right? Self-awareness is not enough. We are obsessed in this culture and the season of where we are with self-awareness, self-help. And we're really good at saying, okay, these things have happened to me, but we are not great at having action after that.

Speaker 1:
[32:23] That's right.

Speaker 2:
[32:24] As believers, there is action that He calls us to. There is forward movement to allow God to redeem these places, whether it is through counseling or sorting it out with the person who has wounded you. There are several ways that we are called to tend to our pain, but most importantly, it's taking it to God. And I think I asked the question pretty often in my life is, you know, or it was, do I trust God with my pain? And that was one of the first things I had to come face-to-face with. Do I trust God with my pain or would I rather take care of it on my own? And I think when I began to identify how I was taking care of my pain, I began to see some of the behaviors and beliefs that I had allowed to become this narrative. And so I was living trapped in my fence and in my pain. I was living stuck. God said, no, I need you to surrender, release control and allow me to bring justice to your life in the way in which I see is best. And I think a lot of the time, and I know we're all friends here, so a lot of the time, we think it is better off in our hands. We know what to do with our pain. We think we know what to do with the people that have caused this pain. But we don't. God does. And so taking it to him and allowing him to give us peace in the places that we feel like we would in our experience piece is the first point of action, is going to him and saying, I trust you, even though I don't know how you're going to do this, because it feels unimaginable to heal from this particular thing. I trust you to breathe new life over me, God. And I trust you to do what only you can.

Speaker 1:
[34:02] So good. I mean, one of the ways you know that you're trusting yourself is you're in a scarcity mindset, not an abundant mindset. You're trying to be in control. You refuse to trust God. And there's wreckage all around you. And there's no peace. There's no joy in that. I mean, if left to yourself, you're not enough. I mean, that is just the truth, to handle that pain. That's why Jesus took it on the cross. But it is amazing when people turn over that pain and they trust God. I mean, you can be someone like Alexandra or someone, every woman around that circle on Better Together had experienced sexual trauma, I think, if I remember right. And our powerhouse is in the kingdom. It is amazing what we can overcome, as you say, is we trust God with the pain. That is so powerful. One of the questions you ask in your book is, has, where has offense led you? And friends, I just want you to think about that. Where has your offense led you? To be resentful, impatient, critical, harsh, callous, emotionally reactive, envious? Well, say a word, if you would. Let me look at my time here. Say a word, if you would, about the process and the power of forgiving and letting go. How God brought you there and what you can say to the person who's having a hard time with that today.

Speaker 2:
[35:11] Well, you know, it was super easy. I just did it overnight.

Speaker 1:
[35:13] It was, you know, flip of the switch.

Speaker 2:
[35:17] It was really easy. I just, you know, I said, God was doing and he was like, bam, it was done. No, it was a process. It was a process of learning to identify and surrender. You know, I will say this to our friends who are listening. Offense is a trap.

Speaker 1:
[35:35] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[35:36] And we see it all throughout scripture. Jesus talks about offense being a snare. And a snare is quite literally a trap. And if you think about a snare, you think about walking into a trap, it immediately does what it snaps. And you have to have somebody come help you get out of that. If there's an animal trapped in a snare, it cannot get out on its own. And so once you are trapped in the snare of offense, there's only one person that can come and his name is Jesus to help you walk out of that trap. And we do that by being incredibly honest with where we are and incredibly vulnerable with him and asking him to release us from the things that we have held ourselves captive to. And I'll say that very gently to my friends listening. You know, there is a moment that is going to come where you have to decide that you truly want to move forward with God, that your pain is actually not the life you want to live into. And allowing him to walk you out of that and truly move you in freedom. And now, what does freedom feel like? How does that look? I think we hear that and it's pretty flippant. Freedom, walking in freedom with God and moving forward with freedom, is knowing that God can heal your pain better than you can. And so it's a posture of trust. It's a posture of surrender. We are surrendered to God in our offense. We say, Lord, you do what you want with not only the person, but with me, because guess what? We also offend others. Guess what? In the midst of our own pain, we become offenders as well. And so there's a reckoning that happens to walk in freedom where we become incredibly humble and we go to our knees and say, God, I am a sinner who you have now saved. I am just as broken as the person who has hurt me, and yet you have saved me and have given. There's like this new empathy and compassion that we begin to walk in where we say, wow, it is only by God's grace that I am here and I can now walk in forgiveness. And that is where when we are able to extend the same forgiveness to others, when we have accepted the level of and the depth and the whiteness of God's grace and forgiveness towards us. And once we begin to walk in that, friends, something happens. There is a true sense of freedom that you begin to experience with God and with others around you.

Speaker 1:
[37:57] I think you can probably hear the power in Alexandra's words. You can hear the power in the ministry God has given her, because she, like I said, this is not theory. She has wrestled this thing to the ground. And in your book, You Can Let Go, you talk about, there's a way to honor your experience without allowing the experience to victimize you. And like you said, that's where so many get stuck. It's like their identity is their offense, their identity is their pain. And when you get stuck in that, it's like there's all these people you're anointed and appointed to touch. And yet, while you're trying to live on an island all by yourself controlling outcomes, you really are not only depriving yourself of a testimony, depriving God of glory that's supposed to be gleaned from your life, but depriving all of these people that you're appointed to touch. Speak a word if you want about that.

Speaker 2:
[38:45] Absolutely. I'm really careful with this idea of pain to purpose, because I don't want us to think that God is only allowing pain to bring purpose. And so I want to speak to that a little bit. God will walk us through our pain, and when He does, He brings purpose from it. Meaning, we get to experience and see and witness His redemption, and we have this access to be able to tell those around us, let me tell you about God, let me tell you about what He has done, let me share with you how I am walking in freedom, even in the midst of my betrayal and my abuse and the disappointment that's happened. There is such an honest truth that comes from that, and people can sense it when you have truly walked through it, and like you said, wrestled it down with God, because people will be able to hear and see Jesus, and they'll be able to sense His kindness and compassion. I do think that, man, our whole lives, friends, we can either allow God to take the rubble and build something from it, or we can just allow ourselves to sit in the rubble and miss all that He wants to build, even while we follow Jesus, right? So as you follow God, I always talk about this idea of we can be in relationship with God and not be walking in full abundance with Him. Like there is a difference. You can be a follower of Jesus and not fully experience the abundance of Jesus, and I want us to experience the abundance of God. And more than anything, Jesus wants you to experience everything He has, and that will come when we're able to say, OK, God, what do you want to do with this? There's something beautiful, and it'll come in season. It may not be right away. But as soon as you're able to identify the people that He's put in your life for you to speak into and say, hey, I'd love to share what God's done for me. You'll begin to see how God's redeeming even the parts of your life that you thought, man, this was a waste.

Speaker 1:
[40:40] I love Alexandra. Alexandra Hoover is my guest today. When we come back, just a few minutes left, I want to talk about the idea of grace. You talk about when we're so focused on our pain, we can't love others well, and that's just true. I mean, think of a drowning person, they're going to pull everybody else down with them. And I think it's been proven over and over again, self-focus, especially ruminating on your pain and the things that have happened to you, only poison you. But there's something about letting the grace in, about looking up, letting God bring some healing to you. So you can see that you're in a much bigger story than yourself. Your story is just never just about you. It's always a bigger story because you're part of God's story. Alexandra Hoover is my guest today. We'll talk more about this in a minute. If you're a new listener, we want to officially welcome you with a free welcome pack gift. Request yours today at myfaithradio.com.

Speaker 3:
[41:55] Oh yeah.

Speaker 1:
[41:57] Hope you're having a really great day. Thanks for tuning in to Susie Larson Live. Having a super important conversation about breaking free, walking free, not making an eye out of your pain or the hardships you've endured, but really trusting God to, you know, inviting him, inviting his involvement, his healing power, where you participate in the healing process. My friend Alexandra Hoover joins me today in her book is You Can Let Go, Make Peace with Your Past, Break Free from Offense, and Move Forward with God. We've got a handful of copies to give away today. Text the word book to 877-933-2484. So talk about the idea, you know, we've kind of made the case that if you live self-focused, if you're kind of nurturing, protecting your pain, you're a very self-focused person. So what does it mean to like let the grace in so that you not only are you receiving healing, but you start to see other people who need healing and help too.

Speaker 2:
[42:50] Yeah. Oh my gosh. I want to establish first, what is God's grace? Like what does that mean? So God's grace is His free, unmerited favor, right? And love that is extended to us, humanity. And it's offered through Jesus. And so when we're talking about grace and what it means to allow that grace to come in, I want you to picture this. This is how the Lord showed me. Imagine yourself walking into a dark room. And you are trying to find the light switch. And you've, you know, it's a room you've not walked in before. You're trying to, to feel, you know, your way around. And all of a sudden you, you know, you bump into this wall and you figure out, oh, there's a light switch. And then you turn it on. You recognize that you've actually been in this room before. You had just forgotten that this was the room that you had walked in before. And now all of a sudden you are recognizing, oh, this is actually familiar for me. You begin to see furniture and pieces that you'd seen before. I liken this picture that the Lord gave me to how our experience with turning the light on in our lives, the grace of God being turned on, this switch that all of a sudden we're in this room, it feels unfamiliar, it feels disorienting. When we turn God's light on, this grace that comes in, you're able to see more clearly. You're like, oh, wait a second, I've been in this room before. I know where the light switch is. I know how to walk through this, this sweet reminder and almost this affirming sense that the Lord is not just with us, but He's for us. And oftentimes we live our lives that we're walking in a dark room and we don't know where we are. And God's like, no, I'm with you. There is this grace that is for you. Turn the light on, walk with me, turn that switch on, allow my grace and my favor and my love that I've extended to you to be the compass. I love this idea of a compass to God's grace being our compass. So allowing the grace and turning that light switch on. I want to give you that visual because it really is as simple as saying, let me turn this on. Let me remember that the light of God, the grace of God walks with me. He's the light into my feet and the lamp into my life. When we allow that grace to guide us and to walk with us, again, we begin to see even the people around us through that lens. Oh, right, they have this favor and love extended to them as I have to myself. And we are called to what? The disciple makers, fishers of men, the great commission, to go with the authority of Jesus and tell others about His goodness. And all of a sudden, we have this purpose that we've been given to not only tell people about the goodness of Jesus, but use the experience of our lives to help them turn the light on too, to let this grace back in and say, Oh, I know I'm oriented again. I have direction. I know how to walk with God and it will set you free to love people and be women and men who do have a purpose because we do. One of the lies is, oh man, we don't have a calling, we don't have a purpose. No, in Jesus name, you have been given a sphere of influence, your family, your coworkers, your community to help them turn that light on and seek God's grace so that they can orient themselves back to the very purpose God's given us, which is to love God and love his people. And we will feel a sense of freedom even in that, as we walk in the grace that God's given us to.

Speaker 1:
[46:08] Amen. Somebody text me an amen. And something that as I'm kind of watching your story unfold visually in my mind as you're sharing it, is this host from heaven, the promises, the people, the provisions, everything God's put in place, the more that you're willing to step into it, the more you're given privilege to see the hosts that are in your favor, right? I think if you're determined to be a victim in your pain, because it's the pure in heart that see God. I mean, Alex, you determined to trust God, and so He gave you revelation. He allowed you to see all that's been put in place for you. And I got one other picture I want to share. I got this picture of this cute little Latino girl, eight years old, standing behind these big boulders that are taller than she is, and it's the enemy, all these obstacles he put in your way to say, no, there's no hope, there's no future, this is who you are. And you dare to walk around those, and now you're facing rolling hills, this pasture, this promised land, these spaces that God has invited you to occupy, to inherit, to steward, because you dared to walk around the lies and to put them behind you. We just got about a minute and a half, but when you think of that girl, and you think of who you are now, what has most surprised you about God and about what he's done in and through you?

Speaker 2:
[47:25] I, you know, a few weeks ago I was in my bathroom, and I was, I love to wrestle things out with God, you guys. I'll be honest, it's how I got here. And so I was in my bathroom wrestling it out with God as I do. And I was, I just got out of the shower, I was brushing my teeth, and I said to God, I said, Lord, I am exhausted of being resilient. I am tired of being strong. I am tired of, of always having to walk up, you know, these hills are around these boulders. I mean, I'm going through an interesting season right now where there's a lot of change in my life. And I was just angry and annoyed with not God, but our circumstances. And really that I was envious of others who I had perceived to have it easier than me. One of the lies. And the Lord said to me, would you have rathered me, given you strength to keep going, or would you have rather me allowed you to fall apart? And it changed my perspective so much about my resilience and my strength. And allowed me to see that the gift, one of the very gifts that I have today, is that the Lord has kept me. I have been kept. There has been this supernatural strength from God where in the moments that I thought, man, look at her, she is so weak, she wants to give up, there's nothing left with me. God has provided. And so I don't know if that answers your question, but I just think I have a new perspective of even what I've walked through. Instead of looking back and being like, oh, there's this narrative of a broken girl. And so much from that moment, just from a few weeks ago, now I look and say, man, God has kept me. The resilience I have is not even of my own. And even that perspective switch that day in the bathroom, I'm like, right, God, even what I have today, the resilience, the strength, the power that I am experiencing is because of you. And it has allowed me to see myself in a new light again, right through the father's eyes. And it's beautiful.

Speaker 1:
[49:18] Thank you, Lord. Well, Alex, thank you for this time today. It's been absolutely powerful. And friend, thank you for tuning in today. I pray you found some encouragement here. Don't get stuck. You can let go. You can make peace with your past. You can break free from offense and you can move forward with God. You must. People are counting on your obedience and your trust. We love you, friend, and we will meet you back here next time. Thank you for listening to this conversation from Susie Larson Live. These conversations are available because of your support. You can become a supporter now at myfaithradio.com. Please subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss any episodes, and then share it with friends so together we can all have a deeper life in Christ.

Speaker 3:
[50:05] Everyone's story, including yours, has a chapter you didn't expect. The unfolding podcast reminds us that with God, each one can be rewritten.

Speaker 2:
[50:15] To break the cycle of crime and incarceration in my family.

Speaker 3:
[50:20] We're reminded that even when your past feels heavy, I knew I was breaking God's heart, that I would beg Him to help me. God's kindness draws us in.

Speaker 2:
[50:29] I felt clean and whole.

Speaker 3:
[50:31] That even when all hope seems lost, I did a lot of crying out to God.

Speaker 2:
[50:36] I would go into the bathroom and I would just lay on the floor.

Speaker 3:
[50:39] Even when redemption feels impossible.

Speaker 2:
[50:42] I've struggled with pornography for the first 10 years of our marriage. I've lied to you about it.

Speaker 3:
[50:46] We see that God is inviting us into something better. It's not my plans, it's your plans.

Speaker 2:
[50:51] I was rescued to rescue.

Speaker 3:
[50:53] God is writing a new story on each episode of the Unfolding Podcast and reminding you that your story is a part of His. Find The Unfolding today wherever you listen to podcasts.