Spiritual Growth Amidst Chaos: Jackie Hill Perry

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Spiritual Growth Amidst Chaos

Guest:Jackie Hill Perry

From the series:Upon Waking (Day 2 of 2)

Air date:November 22, 2024

Shelby: Hey, Shelby Abbott here. Are you tired of the tension and the division that exists in things like your family gatherings and your friend groups, and certainly on social media? I know I am. Well, Psalm 133 tells us that it’s good for believers to live in unity with one another, but in today’s kind of easily angered and often offended world, that just feels impossible, doesn’t it? It feels like wishful thinking.

Well, that’s why I’m excited to invite you to join us here at FamilyLife® for a five-week video series from our friend, author, and comedian Amberly Neese. It’s called “Moving Toward Each Other in the Middle of a Divisive World.” And in it, Amberly just guides us through how to build peace in our natural circles of influence when differing thoughts and opinions and beliefs threaten to create division. So you can download this five-week video series at FamilyLife.com/FindingCommonGround.

Alright, let’s get into the program.

Jackie: I think God knowing us isn’t a knowledge of us where He’s disappointed. It’s not a knowledge of us where He has wrath stored up for us. It’s a knowledge of us as a father, and I got you, so I’m even curating circumstances sovereignly to make sure that you look more and more and more and more like my son.

Shelby: Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I’m Shelby Abbott, and your hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson. You can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com.

Ann: This is FamilyLife Today.

Dave:So it’s a good day today. We’ve got Jackie Hill Perry back in the studio with us talking about her book Upon Waking. And yesterday we were talking about falling on our face. Again, I’m not a mom, so I don’t know what it’s like for you two as moms, but I don’t think that’s easy to do in the middle of mom day.

Ann: Well, I loved it because she talked about how Moses would come into all these difficult circumstances and what did he do? He would just fall on his face before God. And we were talking about how difficult that is with kids because we used to have time to be in the Bible and to contemplate and to read and to pray. And now we’re just in the middle of chaos. And so as I look back on those days of when our kids were little and things were chaotic, you know what I wish? I wish I would’ve been on my face more. I do. I think about that. The kids are all yelling, things are crazy. The dog just pooped in the house. Just get on your face just like Moses.

Jackie: Your kids will think you’re crazy.

Ann: Yes!

Jackie: They’ll think you’re nuts.

Ann: And they probably thought Moses was nuts.

Jackie: Yeah, absolutely. “Why is he on his face? We were talking about how we’re hungry. We want quail and manna.” I had a situation and I’m sharing it because I think it’s meaningful. This weekend I was at a service to speak, and I was just feeling emotionally odd and weird, which happens to me a lot before I preach, is that I have this, I don’t know, something affects me where it’s like it will affect my freedom in the pulpit. And I had an attitude, and I was worshiping like, “Lord, help me, help me, help me, dah, dah, dah.” And I felt like the Spirit of God was saying, “Get on your face.” I was like, “Nah, that’s crazy. Why I got to do all that? I just asked you to help me.” And it is like, “Nah, get on your face.”

Dave:And this would be in front of people.

Jackie: I’m in the front row, so that’s a part of it. It is like, “Nah, people going to step on my hands and ain’t nobody else on their face. Why you want me?” It was like four songs of me debating with the Lord about getting on my face. And it felt as if the Lord was saying, “How in the world,” I’m paraphrasing, “are you going to preach a message about reverence and you don’t want to get on your face?” And so I got on my face, and I immediately felt free.

Dave: Really?

Jackie: All of the irritation, the anger, the pride I just felt, and I was like, “Oh, this is what you’re requiring of us is surrender.” So if that means you got to look crazy, then that’s what you do. If that means you got to look weak, then that’s what you do. It’s costly to be a Christian at all times. And I think for me, I learned a big lesson where it’s like, “Oh, you want more from me than what I’m willing to give and I have to give it If I want honor you.”

Ann: I remember we were on staff with Cru for 15 years and every other year we would go all be together as a staff. Where would we go? Moby Gym at CSU,

Dave:Fort Collins, Colorado.

Ann: And so we’d have speakers come from around the country. We’d have worship and all of us were together. It was pretty magnificent in terms of praise and worship. But there was a young woman that was going to speak, and I was sitting just a few rows back from her. I mean this is a huge gymnasium. At the time I thought she must be a lot older than me. I think I was 22, 23, 24. And this woman’s name was Nancy Leigh Demoss, now Wolgemuth. And the whole time we’re worshiping, she is the only one on her face—

Jackie: Wow.

Ann: —praying before God. And I thought, “Man, she’s the only one doing that. What’s she doing? Is she going to speak?” And you know what happened? She got up and spoke and it was great. I don’t really remember, but what happened was revival started happening because people started coming up to the microphone and confessing sin.

Dave: —for three days, 24/7 all night.

Ann: But now what I was thinking, “Oh, that woman there, she’s proud. She’s got to be in her—I’m 22—she’s got to be in her 30s. She’s close to my age. She was in her 20s. Here she is on her face. She gets up there and preaches her face off. And then there’s revival that breaks out. Three days people are repenting.

Dave:We went back to our dorm, we came back 2:00 AM 3:00 AM It went on for days. It was one of these remarkable moments. I didn’t even know that part.

Jackie: That does something to my heart.

Ann: You didn’t?

Dave: I never heard you share that before.

Ann: Well, that’s what I thought. Nancy has really impacted you.

Jackie: Oh yeah.

Ann: And so for you to be on your face, that’s what I pictured of her in her 20s on her face before God.

Jackie: Yeah. When you read the Psalms, you see a lot of body language. I think maybe depending on the tradition we come from, we might shy away from bodily expressions in worship. But I think it’s meaningful because there’s something about the position of the body that can also shape the position of the heart. Especially if you sense the spirit calling you, like what happens to a person when you hug them versus when you shake their hand? That does something to your heart and so I think even in worship, it’s a thing. It’s a thing. It’s a scary thing. It’s a humbling thing, but it’s a worthwhile thing.

Dave:I mean, what is it that locks us up in worship. On an NFL game I’m on the sideline, I turn around and look at these fans and they are chest buddying each other on a touchdown.

Ann: They don’t even know each other.

Dave:They’re so exuberant. And that same guy in church, if you raise your hand to worship, he’d be like, “What are you doing, dude? I’m uncomfortable with that.” I’m like, “You’re worshiping a touchdown and you’re showing it with,” like you said, “body language.” Do you think something shifts? I mean even the fact that you would hesitate to fall on your face. You probably wouldn’t hesitate if you’re in your prayer closet.

Ann: Would you hesitate?

Jackie: No, I wouldn’t.

Ann: Would you hesitate?

Dave: Oh yeah, I would because I’m thinking, “I don’t know. Are you really calling me to do that here? How about tonight?”

Ann: Why I think “And then will they feel like they need to. Do they think I’m just showing off?” There’re so many things that would go through your head.

Jackie: For me it was pride. Why am I fighting so hard? Why is it easier? I was teaching Isaiah 6. Why is it easier for you to get up there and talk about God being holy, holy, holy and you won’t get on your face? You don’t need to be teaching if you can’t do that.

Dave: Wow.

Jackie: You don’t need to be leading anybody if you can’t do that. It showed me the degree to which I want to preserve an image. That’s what it showed me. I am more committed to my image than I am to authentic and sincere worship. Worship that cost me. It doesn’t cost me as much to preach to you because you’re going to applaud. It costs me to get on my face and be embarrassed.

Ann: That’s good.

Dave:And I think the same thing happens in our marriage when God’s calling us to a humble move, and we fight it.

Jackie: Oh, with mind, body, soul and strength.

Ann: It’s easier—

Jackie: You just got to say sorry. No, I’m not saying sorry.

Jackie: They need to say sorry. I’m not doing that.

Ann: It’s easier to do it with our kids than our spouse.

Jackie: Oh yeah. Why do you think that is?

Ann: I think it’s because I’m willing to allow them to see my vulnerability and my brokenness, but with Dave, I didn’t think I had much pride. I have so much more than he does.

Dave:I mean maybe it’s that your spouse has hurt you and your kids haven’t or don’t as much.

Jackie: Not the same way.

Dave: It’s like there’s a history here. I’m not going to soften toward you.

Ann:It shows a vulnerability and a weakness. Not a weakness. There’s a strength in it, but it feels weak and vulnerable to apologize and to go to you and be, to admit to it. And I’m realizing the older I get, the more prideful I see myself as being. It’s so sad.

Jackie: Yeah. I think we have these categories of power. I think people who I have power over feel safer. So a child; a child, even though I love them, they love me, there is a sense in which I still have power. I can send you to your room, to get out, stuff like— My husband, the power differential is not the same because we’re equals and yet God has called me to honor you in a very privileged, important position so it feels like you have more power to hurt me. And so it’s harder for me to be weak in front of you than it is to be weak in front of somebody. I can just, yeah—

Ann: It leaves you vulnerable.

Jackie: Yeah, that’s scary.

Ann: It is scary.

Dave:I mean, are there any devotionals in there that you just love? I mean I’m sure you love them all.

Ann: —a favorite.

Dave:Any you want to read a bit and talk about?

Jackie: Day 19, the text says, “And the Lord sent Nathan to David.”

“Everybody needs a Nathan. Someone sent with a courageous love and a wise set of words for the benefit of our faith. How else would David have seen himself?”

“We know the story in 2 Samuel 12, don’t we? David walked his roof; looking below it and seeing Bathsheba, he summoned her to himself. When he learned about the seed he planted, he schemed to cover the sin. A false atonement. He settled on murdering her husband Uriah and succeeded. Bathsheba carried and birthed the child and not once did David confess. Between the summoning and the birth, almost a year had passed. Blindness ages with us unless God sends someone to help us see again. Like Peter who denied Jesus three times and didn’t grieve until a rooster crowed.”

“Nathan comes and tells David a story about a rich man with many flocks and a poor man with only one lamb. A guest of the rich man comes, and instead of practicing hospitality out of his own abundance, the man takes the only lamb the poor man has. David hears the story and rage rises within. Such emotion could be perceived as righteous anger. If he were a preacher, you might be led to believe his passion was symbolic of his purity, but somewhere in a room was the woman he stole. Somewhere in a grave was the poor man he stole her from.”

“His sins were real and obvious, and yet David’s convictions were angled at imaginary wickedness. In response to the story, David says: ‘As the Lord lives, the man who has done this deserves to die.’ (2 Samuel 12:5) David discerned what should be done to the man, but he failed to see himself as the one it should be done to. ‘Nathan said to David, “You are the man.”’ (v. 7)”

And then I go on to say that “Everybody needs a Nathan.”

It’s kind of this idea that we cannot see ourselves without community and how the longevity of their blindness should be considered in how we read those stories. Because we’re reading a book and so it feels like kills Uriah, has sex with Bathsheba, dah, dah, dah. Nathan comes. The pace feels fast until you consider the fact, no, she was pregnant for 10 months. So that’s a long time before this man confesses. You got Peter. He denies Jesus three times. He had to wait ‘til the rooster crowed to be convicted.

Sometimes we can be stuck in a rut of blindness for a considerable amount of time until God sends somebody to wake us up to the reality of where we are in our lives. And I think that is to bring it back to marriage and family. I think that’s the beauty of marriage, is that God will use your spouse to reveal parts of your heart that you would not have seen otherwise. That’s a gift. That’s a kindness. That’s a mercy. It’s irritating, but it’s a gift.

Ann: Have you been in a rut before where Preston has brought it to your attention?

Jackie: Yes. What’s funny is Preston will often have—he’s already seen the thing. He’s just been praying and patient about when to bring it to me. Where it’s like, “Oh yeah, I was praying about that three weeks ago.” I’m like, “Why you ain’t say nothing?” but I know he knows if I’m not ready, I’ll even fight what he sees. Like, “Oh, you just making stuff up.” Just a little gaslighting, stuff like that, just a little bit. He knows me enough to know that he wants to present things to me in a way where I can receive it.

Ann: That right there is a great lesson for marriage. Pray before you go; let God soften the heart. Because you don’t often bring things to me. You’re way more gracious to me than I am to you. You’re very patient, but when you have brought things, they’ve been a gift. I don’t like it, and it makes me mad, but it’s a gift.

Dave:And we, years ago, Ann did the same thing. She had a women’s group. I had a men’s group. I mean we are doing life together for decades. And I don’t know, one year I said to these guys, “Hey, I think what we should do this year is give each other gifts.” And they’re like, “What do you mean?” I said, “I think one of us should leave the room and the rest of us talk about the blind spots of that guy. And then when he comes back in, let’s tell him because he doesn’t see their blind spots. So we’ve all got them.” And they’re like, “Yeah, let’s do that.”

Oh man. It was tough. And we only met once a month at that time for the evening, did dinner, the whole thing. And so I remember when it came to my night, you go out in the kitchen and they’re in there and you’re like, “This has been going on a long time.”

Jackie: “How many blind spots have I got?”

Dave:“Am I really that bad?” And then you come back in and sit down, and it was really an interesting conversation. It was sort of like a Nathan moment and we always started this way, “Dude, let tell you, you’ve got this gift, and we affirm you for this.” And it never started with the negative.

Jackie: —compliment sandwich—

Dave:It was the positive. There are great things, but here’s two things we identified. And the thing is you got four or five people agreeing so you know it’s true. I’ll never forget it. It was hard but it was the Nathan moment. “Thank you. That is a gift.” It was actually wrapped in a way that “You guys were kind the way you did it, but I know this is something I need to work on.” But man, it was hard because you want to hear it and you’re right. That’s what sort of marriage is and that’s what Nathan was for David. We read that story and go “Good for him.” And then we’re like we don’t want Nathan to do that for us, but we need it.

Jackie: But the kindness of God is that what He reveals, He covers, He sanctifies, and He then uses. Because it’s after Peter did what he did, God says, okay, when you turn, strengthen your brothers. It’s after the situation with Uriah that we get Psalm 51 where God has, he canonized his repentance. That’s something special. And so I think even knowing that God is so kind to us that He’s not revealing things to break us per se, but He is revealing it so we can know Him and out of that knowing, use us to equip other people who are where we were.

Ann: I think you’re right. I think when people become a Nathan where they’ll speak truth in love, it takes us into a repentance that’s very needed.

I think too, our kids can do that to us. I remember asking our kids, they were a little bit older, probably all elementary age, and I asked them, “What do you think the values are of our family?”

Dave:This is not a good moment.

Ann:And kids are honest.

Dave:It was an honest moment.

Ann: It was honest. And they said, here’s what they said. Dave’s a pastor; we’re both in ministry. They said, “Well, we know what the answer should be. This should be God is our greatest value.” I’m like, “Okay, okay, but what are you saying?” And they all said, I think one person probably Austin was being nice. I think he said, “Jesus.”

Jackie: That sounds like Austin.

Ann: But everybody else said sports; sports. We value sports in our family. I went to bed that night—

Jackie: You cried.

Ann: I got on my knees in repentance, “Of all the things we’re passing on to our kids, it’s sports are the most important,” but they’re so honest.

Dave:I think they are pretty important. No, I’m kidding.

Ann: Honestly, they were way too important. That caused us to talk. It made us review our schedule and what we talk about and where our hours are spent because that becomes an idol so quickly in our world.

Dave:Oh, for families.

Ann: Yeah. But I think it’s a good question.

Jackie: Yeah, that’s a great question.

Dave:Hey, day 23, you remember what you even wrote on day 23?

Jackie: I have no idea.

Dave: It’s a good one. So read a little bit of it then.

Jackie: This thing was supposed to be 90 days.

Ann: What happened?

Dave:Oh really?

Jackie: I text Austin, I said, “Austin, I don’t got 90 days in me. I don’t have that much wisdom. I haven’t lived that long.” Because a devotional is deceptively difficult. You need to have 60 different ideas.

Ann: Ideas.

Dave: Right.

Jackie: I said “We got to cut it to two months. We got to.” People ask for another one. I said, “Let me live another 10 years and then you’ll get another devotional.”

Day 23, the text is Psalm 139:1-4, which says, “Oh Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.”

The text says, “Depending on who you are, or should I say, depending on how you live, the saying “God knows my heart” may land a particular way. There are those who use the sentence as justification for lawless behavior, supposing God sees their pure intentions even when the behavior is obviously unclean. It’s a way to numb the conscience and harden the heart. Which is most ironic, for Christ offers His blood to cleanse the conscience and soften the heart.”

“There are others for whom that statement gives rise to a spirit of fear. Simply because they know their heart too. If it were a house, they know the design of each room and how it looks nothing like heaven. Interrogating your own self has its benefits, but along with it is the temptation of self-deprecation. Seeing sin in yourself can elicit much shame, so imagine reckoning with the Holy One seeing you and your heart with transcendent clarity. You’ll either hide from His glare in self-condemnation or through self-deceit.”

I think God knowing us is both comforting and scary depending on your view of the God who knows us. How we see him, I think can influence the way we understand him seeing us. I think if you’re not in Christ, it should concern you. It should scare you that the judge knows all of your deeds and the verdict will be guilty, but I think in Christ, we know that Christ has taken that guilty verdict for us. And so we’ve been made clean by His blood, our consciousness, our clean and all the things.

And so His knowledge of us isn’t a knowledge of us where He’s disappointed. It’s not a knowledge of us where He has wrath stored up for us. It’s a knowledge of us as a Father. Like “Girl, I know you crazy, but that’s why you need me, and I got you. So I’m even curating circumstances sovereignly to make sure that you look more and more and more and more like my Son.” I think that’s encouraging to know.

Ann: Me too.

Dave:Yeah. How do we take that view of God and not condemn ourselves? Because we know He sees, like you just said in that Psalm. He sees and we know He sees. Nobody else sees so it’s our own little private sin or secret sin but we know God sees us. And so it’s easy to self-condemn us when we should be going, “I understand what the gospel means. I shouldn’t condemn myself, but I do.”

Jackie: Something that I’ve been saying or processing within myself and saying out loud, which is that I think as Christians, we have a very strong sense that some thoughts shouldn’t be entertained. I think we know envy shouldn’t be entertained, so we put that to death or try to. We know lustful thoughts shouldn’t be entertained. We put that to death. But I think shame is something we think is actually normal. So when we have thoughts enter our minds that accuse us, “You’re not this,” “You’re still guilty,” “You’re not worthy,” “You’re not loved,” “You’re not valuable,” “You’re not seen,” that’s not true either. It’s the accuser of the brethren speaking to you in your own voice.

And I think if we start to see that self-condemnation or shame in all the things that should be died to too, then we would experience the freedom of what God says about us. You have Paul saying there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. You have the New Testament calling you saints, calling you his beloved, calling you his child.

I remember I kept telling myself that I was trash, and it was because that was how I was trying to be humble. So when I would feel my ego coming, it’s like, “No, you’re trash. You’re this.” And I remember I felt like the Lord was like, “Is there anything anywhere in the Bible where I’ve called you that? Have I ever called you trash? I haven’t even called you guilty because you’re in my son.” So you even need to speak over yourself what God speaks about you in the scripture. That’s how you fight self-condemnation. What did he say? How does he speak?

Dave: Truth.

Jackie: It’s also going to come out in how we minister to people.

Ann: Yes.

Jackie: I think people who try to take up this fake prophetic mantle of speaking negatively over people, trying to shame people into holiness. That’s how they minister to themselves.

Ann: Me too.

Dave:Yeah, it’s the voice they’re hearing inside.

Jackie: So it’s even going to come through in how we parent. It’s going to come through in how we encourage. And so I think it’s something that we need to deal with for ourselves, but also, we don’t want to spill that poison into our ministries.

Ann: I’ve done that where I’ve spoken to some women and I took sticky notes and I put on those sticky notes, all the words I spoke over myself every day. You’re right, I thought, it’s almost humble, “I’m nobody.” In Christ I felt that same thing, like, “I never called you that. I died. You’re my daughter.” And I thought, “Would I ever call my sons any of these names?” And if they continually called themselves that, “I died for you so that you could be my son and daughter.” And I think that we’re flippant with our thoughts in the identity and the words that we speak over ourselves when He died for us. We’re the sons and the daughters of the King.

So I think that’s important even as a listener, what are the words you’re saying over yourselves? It became a mantra of mine. “It’s because I’m stupid. It’s because I’m fat. It’s because I’m dumb. It’s because I’m ugly. It’s because I’m not worthy.” Yeah, we are. And so I think that some of those words become words that the enemy weaponizes.

Jackie: Oh yeah.

Ann: And I think we need to be, as the scripture says, we need to take those thoughts captive and then bury them where sins should be buried. He died for those. They are buried in Christ.

Jackie: Yeah. We don’t have to overcorrect and become narcissists. So you overcorrect by, “Well, let me write all these affirmations on my wall. You’re great, you’re amazing. You’re this, you’re that.” It’s like, “No, you’re still a jar of clay.” So there is a sense in which you are inadequate, but that positions you to discover and experience the adequate one. And so you don’t fix self-condemnation by self-aggrandizing.

Ann: Yeah, that’s good.

Jackie: You fix it with worship. What did God say about himself? What does he say about me? What does he say about the church? That is what I then say to myself. That’s how you fix it.

Ann: That’s good.

Dave:Yeah. I think one of the beauties and agonies of marriage is you get to do that to your spouse. You can be the voice of God when they’re condemning themselves or they’re beating themselves up. You get to live the gospel out and say, “I love you. I accept you. I don’t think less of you.”

Jackie: That’s good.

Dave:“This is who you are, and I get to be the voice of God to remind you of that.” And it comes back hopefully. That’s what we’re called to do in marriage. I think that’s what’s attractive to the world. They see that kind of acceptance and grace to one another who don’t deserve it. They’re like, I want that. Where’s that come from? Well, actually it comes from—

Jackie: —the Holy Ghost.

Dave: Yeah, exactly.

Ann: But I think too, you’re right; but when you say that to me, I think sometimes, especially with women, we can cover it up like, “No girl, you’re great. You’re amazing.” That doesn’t help me. That part I don’t, like I’m glad that they think I’m great or whatever, but it’s a reminder of who I am in Christ. That ministers to my soul.

And that’s what you do, Dave, because you see all of my sin, but you’ll still love me in it and remind me, “Aren’t you glad that we’re His and He died for that?” Like, “Yes, that’s sobering, and I need to be reminded of that.”

Dave:And I would say we lose that thought every day. And that’s why for the next 60 days, you got to get Jackie’s book Upon Waking. Wake up at 5:00 AM—like I do every day. Nope, I don’t—and start your day in the Word. And literally you can go to FamilyLifeToday.com and get the book. We’ll send it to you and change your life.

Jackie: Beautiful.

Shelby: I’m Shelby Abbott, and you’ve been listening to Dave and Ann Wilson with Jackie Hill Perry on FamilyLife Today. Jackie has written a book called Upon Waking: 60 Daily Reflections to Discover Ourselves and the God We Were Made For. You can get your copy right now by going online to FamilyLifeToday.com or click on the link in the show notes. Or feel free to give us a call at 800-358-6329 to request your copy of Jackie’s book. Again, that number is 800-“F” as in family, “L” as in life, and then the word “TODAY.”

Do you follow us on social media? Well, if you’re on Instagram, head over to FamilyLife Insta, or if you’re on Facebook, just look for FamilyLife for more regular encouragement about marriage and parenting.

Well, happy Friday. I hope you get the opportunity to worship this weekend in your local church, enjoy the time together as a family, and we’ll see you back next week.

On behalf of Dave and Ann Wilson, I’m Shelby Abbott. We’ll see you back next time for another edition of FamilyLife Today.

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