When Idols Fall

We've frequently discussed the issue of idolatry on our program. What happens when our idols fall? Why does God allow such to happen? Join Dr. Lee Ann Marino and guest Julie Harvey from Encouragement for Today (Adelaide, Australia) for a conversation what we do when idols fall...and what we are supposed to learn from such situations. (Intro and Conclusion Track "Fire ball" by Yvgeniy Sorokin, https://pixabay.com/users/eugenemyers-40510887/. Righteous Pen Publications Track "Inspirational Background" by AudioCoffee, https://pixabay.com/music/corporate-inspirational-background-112290/.)

Episode Transcript

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(02:27):
We've talked a lot about idolatry over the years on the Kingdom Now podcast.
But what do we do when the idols that we openly admit that we've had fall?
What do we do when we stand and we look out and we all of a sudden realize that the very
things that we've idolized aren't God, that they don't hold up to maybe whatever we might
have hoped that they were?

(02:48):
Well that's what we're going to talk about today.
And my guest on the podcast today is returning Julie Harvey from Adelaide, Australia, who is
not just ordinary.
And is the moderator of encouragement for today on Facebook
And so Julie, take a minute and introduce yourself to everyone.
No, it's me again.
I'm back again and I am just that person that's on encouragement for today.

(03:12):
Okay, I try and encourage myself.
See?
I'm going to get you for that later, but yeah.
So, and talking about this, I had said before we came on the air that I had something we
could open with and we can kind of go from.

(03:34):
Yeah.
So, you and I both kind of got saved.
I think you got saved before I did, but we both got saved in the 90s.
And at the time when we got saved, a lot of people that would later become very, very prominent
in Christian circles were on the rise.
So, televangelists were on the rise, the kind of the art of that programming was starting

(03:57):
to really become a real tailored polished thing.
And much like everybody else, I can vouch for myself.
I pretty much looked to them.
I looked to a few in particular that if I'm going to be really honest, very much particularly
in the early years of my ministry kind of shaped where I was and what I thought I wanted

(04:18):
to be and who I wanted to become.
And the longer that time went by and the longer I was in ministry and I was having a totally
different experience than they were.
I started to kind of change how I felt about them.
And I remember when, like we say, our idols fall.

(04:41):
I remember when they started to look differently to me, how that kind of made me feel and what
kind of happened with that.
And saying that today, we're going to kind of talk about idolatry, I guess, in a different
way than we've often talked about it.
What is your experience with idols falling?

(05:02):
Yeah, that's right.
Yeah, the same as you really.
I'm trying to, I've been sitting here trying to think.
And early on in the piece, I sort of went with this thing.
Like when I first became a Christian, I had these two friends that came to church with
me and sort of got saved around the same time as them.

(05:25):
And it was the same sort of thing.
It was all the teleavangilists, the, yeah, we won't mention any names, but everybody knows
who they are.
You know, the big healing ministries, the big evangelist meetings, you know, the big crusaders
and the big crusades and all that sort of thing.
You know, it was like in the late 90s, especially, we're really starting to come into, like you

(05:51):
say, come into their own.
So the girls that I started going to church, we were all sort of in the same boat, you
know, we were all really enjoying and enjoying their shows.
And the thing was like, I would just record these shows on VHS.

(06:13):
I had always VHS.
Same.
I had at least VHS recordings of these shows, you know, and honestly, I would, the opportunity
that I had, I would just watch them.
And some of them I'd watch them over and over and over again.
And I, and I, yeah, and I would try, like you say, I would try to model my life against

(06:37):
them.
But like the funny thing was, I've got to also say this, I don't know how to approach this
really.
But what sort of happened to is, do also during that time with me and my two friends,
we, there was this other, because I, like, we were attending at a large church, just the
biggest church in Adelaide, biggest Pentecostal church in Adelaide.

(07:00):
And there were a few things that went on within that church where, where people, and probably
just a couple of years before we got saved.
So, so we came into the fold and we didn't really know what was going on with the church
leadership.
But like a couple of years later, there was this one pastor in particular that was on
the rise, also in Adelaide.

(07:23):
And like he had been kicked out of our church.
And, and this one Sunday, so we met these new people at the church and there was this one
guy in particular that, like, really encouraged me, my friend, one of my friends and her, and
one of her friends, who was a guy.
And so there were the three of us.
We went up to this church in the hills to, to hear this guy speak.

(07:48):
But when we got to this church, it wasn't, the guy wasn't speaking.
It was just us sitting there watching this DVD or video or whatever it was at the time,
can't remember.
But all they did was bash our church leadership.
And so, and, and what they did was they kept, they, they turned around and they said, all

(08:10):
these meetings that you're seeing with all these people getting, getting saved.
And especially the meetings where not so much getting saved, but the prayer meetings, because
it was at that time where the revival was breaking out and people were laying hands on people
and, you know, the meetings where you'd go to the meetings, they lay hands on you and
you'd fall in the spirit and you'd fall in the spirit and things like that.

(08:32):
Well, what's the, can you remember the word for that?
Slain.
Slain is true.
That's right.
Yeah.
That's, that's the phrase that were being used at the time.
And so this guy was bagging the church saying that all of that was demonic.
It was all wrong.
It was all, and like, and he, and he came against some of the, in his speeches, he was coming
against these big preachers and he was attacking our church and he was attacking.

(08:55):
And so that really scared my friend and her friend away from the church.
And at that time, I realized and it was got, and I don't know, it was God saying to me,
don't listen to it, you know?
So I had to step back from my friends.
I had to separate from them and the way I did it, maybe it was a little bit mean and nasty.

(09:18):
I don't know, but I sort of had to do that at that time.
Otherwise, you know, for my own well-being.
But what I'm trying to say is, so I, you know, I mean, I didn't leave the church.
They left the church.
We split with, I split with my friends.
I was friends with them still for a little while, but I realized the path that they

(09:39):
were going down.
I mean, it was just, it wasn't right.
It was, though, it was a lot of, there was a lot of slander going on.
So in other words, there was a lot of, maybe there was some truth to it, but there was a lot
of lies that were being fed to them.
Do you know what I mean?

(09:59):
And because there were still only a couple of years old in their walk with God, it was
very damaging to their faith as young Christians that weren't babies, but I don't know, only
a couple of years.
Not strong.
I mean, we were only, we've been Christians for about a little, like three or four years

(10:20):
or something, not really strong in our own faith, you know.
And so that's how I felt God was saying that to me.
That, "Oh, I'm so anyway, I had this big thing where I separated from my friends and I was
still going to church."
And so that was where I needed to be at that time.
And so I was still with these people that I looked up to, these preachers that I looked

(10:44):
up to.
I was still very much into their teaching.
I was still very much, you know, and it did help me and it helped me grow.
But there was a point that I got to in my experience with God and with things that were being
opened up to me, there were things that I could no longer, how do you say when there's no longer

(11:11):
like a yardstick, a guiding post, that it was shit.
What I started to go through in my walk with God was so far out of the, out of the park,
that nothing, no teaching, no preaching.

(11:32):
There was no measure.
There was no measure.
There was nothing for me to refer it to.
And so that started me on my, really, my own journey.
And that was around 2001, 2002.
I was in leadership in the church at the time.
Oh, okay.
But I was in, like, I had a group, a group at my house.

(11:56):
I had, like, a Bible study group at my house.
And the leadership was changing the way they were doing things was changing.
A lot of the people weren't happy with it because what they did is they went, they were becoming
more, I don't know, free air or whatever you want to call it.
They weren't so structured.

(12:17):
They became more like their groups would have like coffee mornings and things like that.
So it wasn't so Bible based, like you wouldn't just come in.
Yes.
You wouldn't, so it was a bit less traditional, I guess you could say.
But at that time, that was what the church were doing.
They were trying to make themselves more user-friendly.

(12:38):
And so, you know, it was all about getting together with people that weren't Christian.
So they could see that you were normal.
Well, we're not normal, you know.
I know.
But I guess they were finding their feet in that area and all the rest of it.
So there were a lot of changes going on.

(12:58):
And it was all, it was round about that time.
It was just not long after my dad died and I was in leadership.
And it was about maybe 12 months into that.
My group sort of, I had a lot of older people in my group and some of them passed away and
some of them didn't.
They no longer wanted to, they weren't interested anymore.

(13:20):
And so my group dwindled away to only a couple of people.
And in the end, it wasn't worth, you know, so the group just sort of like folded them.
And that was it.
I was still in the leadership, but I didn't have a group.
And so in the end, I was still attending a night group.
And I felt like God speaking to me about moving onto another church, one that was more local.

(13:46):
And it was all round about that time that I, like I said, I had no precedent.
I had no, there was nothing there to help me with what I started to experience in my work
with God.
And there were only, the only thing that helped me was at the time I was working in the library.

(14:07):
I was volunteering in the library at the church.
I had a couple of days a week or maybe one day a week I would go up there and because
I didn't have a group anymore.
So I was sort of within, with another one of the ladies in leadership that I was going
to her group at night time, she invited me.
So I sort of got involved with the church a little bit during the day and so I was working

(14:30):
in the library.
And so I started to look in the library, which had a lot of really old books in there and
for what I was going through.
And I found one book with one passage in it.
Don't you love God.
That's a show that showed me.

(14:53):
I've still got the photo copy somewhere in this house because I photocopied them and kept
them.
And what it did was show me that I wasn't losing my mind because I'm not going to go into
what started happening, but I thought I was going nuts to begin with, I'm thinking, I'm
going crazy, this is not real, this cannot be real.

(15:15):
Where are all the books on this?
Where's all the preaching on this?
Where's all the stuff on this stuff?
You know, and so that's basically, so when certain idols started falling apart for me was
when I realised there was no one coming to, I mean I know this is a little bit cliché

(15:37):
and I know Jesus is, I mean you'd get religious people arguing with what I'm about to say,
but no one was coming to save me if that makes sense.
I'm not saying God's not there to save me.
No, you're a person.
I'm talking about people.
People, ministry, leadership, books, all of that.

(16:01):
TAPES, VHS.
VHS, nothing could help me with what I was going through.
Except for maybe like I said, one paragraph in a book that proved to me that I wasn't
losing my mind and that was the only thing I had for years and years, I mean literally years

(16:23):
until 2018 and that's no word of a lie, but I grew within myself at that time and I learnt
it was just me and God for a long time, it's what I'm trying to say.
I had one friend, Linda, I had one friend that I could talk to about what I was going through

(16:47):
now.
She wasn't going through what I was going through, but she was non-judgmental and she was
an ear for what I was, for some of the stuff that was happening to me and I could talk to
her about it, but I would see her maybe once every six months and apart from that I had
to carry it myself, what I was going through, there was no one to help me and so what's coming

(17:14):
to me right now is your idols, they're not going to be able, when it all boils down to
it at the base they are not going to be able to help you.
If you're putting them in a position that they were never meant to have, then you're in
for a rude awakening really I think because they're not going to come and save you and sometimes

(17:43):
to rely on God that's what he does.
He puts us out there in that wilderness by ourselves, because he teaches us to rely on
him.
We're all these preachers when you need to talk to someone about something that you can't

(18:03):
just talk to anyone about.
We hear that a lot in church and I was hearing at the same time I was going through this stuff,
I was still attending church in the beginning and every time they would say things like, we
hear, we hear for you to come and talk to me any time and in my head I was hearing, no,

(18:26):
they are not ready for what you have got to say and I knew they would not accept what
I'm telling them.
I just knew they would label me as crazy, needing psychiatric health and also the fact

(18:50):
that you need the devil cast out of you.
I just thought, no, I can't tell you, I can't tell you and even to this day, very few people
know what's really happening with me in some areas because I just can't talk to anyone
about it.
It is not mainstream and even after 21 years, because that's how long it's been, 21 years,

(19:18):
the church still ain't ready for this stuff.
Interesting, even though we've gone on for 21 years, they're still right there.
No, isn't that interesting.
I wonder sometimes if we've gone backwards.
I mean, that's just about, oh, no, no, no, honestly, I was just about to say that.

(19:39):
You look at where the church is today and some of the beliefs that have come in now with
certain people who we were talking about before we come on here that we're not allowed to
talk about.
They've been put on this pedestal and you are being led to believe that they're all powerful
and that they are basically in God and they're saying things like that themselves.

(20:02):
It's coming out of them else.
And the church is all in.
The church is all in and that is so scary to think that Christians are all in.
I have seen talking about the fall of our idols.
That's why we came on today to talk about it in their own about way.

(20:22):
That's it really.
I've seen Christian leadership involved and I think, are you for real?
Are you kidding?
Are you kidding?
But we don't need to.
We've got so much material, really, I guess, on idolatry and things like that.

(20:47):
You know what I'm saying?
I think some of these leaders that I looked up to, I'm glad that God took me off into my
own wilderness.
I guess it's a little bit like Paul.
The church went one way and his call was so different to that.
I mean, at the time being called to the Gentiles was like, "Whoa, no, we're Jews.

(21:15):
We're called to the Jews, you see?"
Because we look back now, the thousands of years later, and think, "Oh, yeah, Paul was
called to the Gentiles so well, but back then, that was a big deal."
It was a big deal.
It was a very big thing.
So God took Paul off into the wilderness for 14 years or whatever it was.

(21:35):
And then when he bought him back, I mean, can you imagine the shop?
And he's...
No.
He said himself some of the leadership are scared of me because they remember the old
Paul.
And the rumours that they hear were a... he got saved were only really rumours.
And it's like, "He comes this guy that was such a threat to us back in those days."

(22:01):
And he sort of had to prove himself a little bit, didn't he?
Because...
Oh, yeah.
You know, the things that God made him go through, like being put into prison and all the rest
of it, really in a way, I suppose a lot of it was to prove to the leadership that this
guy is legit because I've never really thought about it that way before, but I guess that was

(22:26):
part of it, you know?
So yeah, he had to be... to be seen as a cop.
I mean, and look what God put him through.
And yet, and yet now in the church we have these people, these leaders coming up and they're
being allowed to... because, oh, but they're a Christian.

(22:49):
And I... and I'll... but they're... and get this.
So many years later, they're still saying, "But they're a baby Christian."
And I'm thinking, "Well, it's been nearly a decade if they're still a baby Christian,
there is something wrong with you."
Yes, something's not right in the development.
No, something is definitely wrong.

(23:12):
Okay.
You know.
But the idolatry relates to that.
But the idolatry does relate to that.
Nobody is disciplining that particular individual that you're talking about.
Nobody is a Nathan.
Nobody is a Gad.
Nobody is some of those other prophets, the Samuel.
Nobody is in there in that individual's face.

(23:35):
No, that's wrong.
And if you don't have somebody there to speak power, then you're going to have power run
a muck.
And as you were talking, I had a couple thoughts.
The first one I do want to mention is what you were saying about Paul.
And I never thought about Paul in this context before.
But Paul's ministry was idolatry in its literal incarnation.

(23:59):
And the reason I say that is because the Jews didn't feel they were idolaters.
Not.
Idolatry was something that people would statutes did.
And does that sound like a lot of Christians today?
Oh, well, you know, we might point at Catholics, or we might point at Orthodox, or we might
point at somebody else.
But we don't at the very core of ourselves get at the idolatry that we all have as people.

(24:23):
Yep.
And idolatry is a human problem.
I do not think it's specifically a Christian thing or Jewish thing.
I think it's an everybody thing.
Because we all like to chase what we think we like.
And listening to your story made me think a lot of my own because much like you, I had

(24:44):
the VHS tapes.
There were preachers that I followed.
You know, in those days, there were not a lot of women.
It seems like to me, there's even less than there were them now.
Yeah.
And I can say that now, like you said, we've gone backwards.
But there were preachers that we watched that I watched religiously that I wanted to be

(25:05):
like.
And maybe I didn't necessarily want to be like them in every single sense, but I guess
you could say I wanted what they had.
I wanted to have the ministries that they had.
And the first thing that happened that kind of started to challenge that because I had
a much deeper point of contact with maybe televangelist than somebody else in the vein

(25:31):
that I never fit it in my local church.
I was never somebody that they said, hey, let's put you in charge of a small group.
I might have led youth leadership when I was a teenager.
I might have done an occasional thing where I spoke for a couple of minutes, but some
of that had to do with my age.

(25:52):
Some of that had to do with my standing because as I've talked about another podcast, I wasn't
a part of churches.
I was really only a member at one or two of them or to have membership standing.
Most of them for the most part, I was kind of in and out of and I was kind of on the fringes.

(26:14):
And that was for a lot of reasons.
There were a lot of reasons for that, which we're not really going to get into, but nobody
really had a place for me.
So my hopes and dreams were to be like these people on TV because I'm not connecting that
they went through their own period of wilderness and their own period of order and their own

(26:36):
period of having to submit to some semblance of order.
I'm kind of seeing them as the exception to the rule and that they made it.
And that I now know is not necessarily the case, but I liked the idea of being able to go
in and out of places and not really having to stay anywhere.

(26:58):
And the first thing that happened that really changed was plastic surgery became a really
big thing and all of a sudden the preachers were all getting it.
And the major female minister I followed had facelift.
In fact, from what I know, she's had more than one now.
And first of all, we have to consider that I was 20 something years old and didn't have

(27:22):
a line on my face.
And I'm saying that because it's very easy to look at that kind of vanity and look down
on it when you don't have any lines on your face, right?
And it was kind of easy to look at it from a very specific perspective instead of saying,

(27:44):
you know, you've got issues and you still have them, which is what I kind of see now.
And that maybe you're not quite as healed as you've claimed to be.
At the time, it just kind of seemed like a judgment point that it was something I could
kind of point to in judge.
And that particular minister just kind of kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger.
I would say it's kind of peaked at probably as big as they're going to get now.

(28:09):
And then you started to go through that.
And so that was very disheartening.
And then kind of like you, I was connected to churches that were very, very negative on
fame.
They saw this as vanity.
So I kind of went through a phase where I didn't believe in all these big ministries.

(28:30):
And I don't really think I had a problem with the bigness.
I had a problem with the fact that I didn't know how to achieve it.
And so I was connected to a lot of ministries.
And actually that's how you and I met about 18 years ago, which I know it's been that long
that's kind of scary.
We're like a whole person old enough to drink now, but you know, how long we've known each other.

(28:55):
I had just married for the first time.
And when I met you, I'd like only been married two or three months.
And I was 25.
And like you talk about, we were in a totally different place than we are.
And I connected with a few ministers that I met, and particularly women.

(29:16):
And I served, like we say, I sat down and I served and I did what we say I was supposed
to do.
And that blew up.
That blew up with all sorts of accusations and different things.
And that kind of went that way.
It went sideways.
It went sideways.

(29:36):
It went belly up.
And I mean, I will level with you that much like you're talking about.
I went through a series of different leaders.
I went through about three in a few years.
I guess, you know, my limit was typically about three years.
And so in about eight years, I had been through three different leaders.
And what kept happening is I kept leading my leaders.

(30:00):
I kept wound up being my leaders' leaders.
It's difficult when you're an apostle, when you're positioned and you keep, I'm not saying
this to make us seem, well, not me anyway, but you in particular, not saying this to anyone
that's listening to make you sound like, oh, yeah, you're the greatest.
But the problem is you keep growing further than what your leaders are all the time.

(30:28):
And you end up in this position of, well, what am I supposed to do?
It's just me and God, I don't have any of it.
You feel like because the church is telling you, you need accountability.
You can't get told.
Right.
Right.
And that's why I kept trying to do it.
That's right.
Trying to set that up and...
But you're making yourself smaller when you do that.
And that's...

(30:49):
And that's exactly what I did.
Yeah.
That is exactly what I did is that I kept making myself less than I did.
I was.
And I kept trying and I just couldn't find anyone.
And much like you're talking about, the last leader was definitely, we would say, be

(31:09):
beneath the level I was on.
He was absolutely beneath the level I was on.
I just wanted somebody on paper and things kind of wound up being in a whole thing.
So to make the long story excrucially short, much like you and it was later than yours, I
would say this is somewhere around 2013, 2014.

(31:30):
I started going through my own process to try and kind of find my own ministry voice.
And it meant that I really wasn't connected to anybody like I had been because I couldn't
find anybody that was really suitable to lead.
And there are people out there who would judge that.

(31:50):
I felt like that for years though.
You know, I'm out here in this wilderness.
I don't even go to church and there's a confession for anyone listening.
I mean, there are religious people will be screaming at this one.
I don't go to church.
Well, and I mean, I didn't go for many years.
In fact, not that I don't want to.
It's not that I do not want to.
It's that there is nowhere for you to go.

(32:12):
That's right.
And that I had that period, I confessed that in another episode we recorded recently.
Oh, you've already done that.
All I wanted to do was go to church.
All I wanted to do was go somewhere and lay it on the altar.
And find God and and feel like I could be there and I knew that I couldn't because everywhere

(32:33):
that I went, it was going to be I needed to be in their ministry.
I needed to go off the road because at the time I was on the road, I was in a very difficult
marriage.
I really didn't have any friends.
And it's like you talk about it was very much a wilderness period of time.
And what happened is the wilderness got greater and the other stuff got less.

(32:53):
You would often think, you know, people talk about with this kind of thing that you would
think, oh, I would see God more and things would get better and all the other stuff would
increase in the desert wouldn't.
The desert period actually increased until I reached a point in 2016 it was, I had had
the church in Raleigh and that just didn't work.

(33:15):
And we had had a lot of schism in the ministry that I led not really because I was doing anything
but I am going to be really honest in saying that I just really kind of think that the people
I was connected to really weren't for me and they weren't helping and I needed to really
kind of focus on where I was.

(33:37):
And I went to a service and there was nothing wrong with the service I tell people except
that I was there.
And I preached it and it really wasn't message it wasn't bad but it wasn't me and I got
in a car and I drove home from Danville, Virginia and I was living outside of Raleigh at the
time and I told God if I never preached again then I would never preach again but I couldn't
do this anymore.

(33:58):
And I literally did not preach again for another year and that event didn't go real well.
And then it would be another period of time before I would really do much again.
And after that it was not until my husband died until Shawn died that I came into the place
where I moved and God connected me with different people and I started church but what I will

(34:27):
tell you is that that is still ongoing but it is definitely not the concept that a lot
of us have of church or it's home church we rotate between houses it's typically would
be considered a small group.
We had a schism a few years ago that now we've pretty much replaced the people who left but
it took a long time it took almost three years.

(34:49):
And God has really been doing a work and is really doing an incredible thing but when it
comes down to it that desert experience really was the result of idols falling and it did
start with an image of people but it also then extended to different concepts.

(35:12):
And it went to a whole view of church and a whole experience with it and a whole encounter
with it.
And you and I connected even though we had known each other for a lot of years in late 2018
when I found out Shawn was sick.
And much like you're talking about I had nobody else I could talk to.

(35:41):
Nobody understood what was going on especially with the way that things kind of ended, the
complication of the relationship and then you have that he's sick and then he's suddenly
dying and then he suddenly dies.
And I don't even have my footing and we've spun around all these different times and
had all these different things and then there was the aftermath.

(36:03):
And much like you say I couldn't go to somebody who was 25 and never married at the point
in time and talk to them or I couldn't go to even a lot of the people I knew who were older
because they just weren't going to understand where we were at and what was going on.

(36:23):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And you know that in your heart.
You know that you just I cannot tell these people this stuff they will not understand.
You just know it.
You just know it.
And it was like that for me for years and years and years and years.
And it still is like that.

(36:46):
But I've grown within myself to the point where I don't let that phase me anymore.
Yeah.
And I guess God's opened.
So what I'm going to say to do with the idols is it doesn't shock me anymore.
Does that make sense?

(37:08):
Even though that makes perfect sense.
Even though I saw leadership and I've seen and I've heard and especially on the airwaves
today and in the news feeds on Facebook, people that I once respected and looked up to
backing certain people and they are not godly.

(37:33):
I'm sorry the Bible tells us quite clearly you will know them by their fruit.
That's it.
And if you are this leader, there is a multimillionaire and you're right up there and you're in this
little bubble, that is your problem.
You are in a little bubble and you are not you are sorry but you are out of touch.

(37:55):
If you are going to try and tell me that what certain people are doing is godly and is
the will of God, I am sorry but I cannot.
I cannot.
I cannot even.
What's the scripture that says how can two walk together unless they are.

(38:16):
Unless they be agreed.
It's Amos 3:3.
Yeah.
I'm sorry but I can't.
I can't even sit under their teaching anymore because I can't sort of trust them I guess.
I don't know.
And I've been going through that for a little while, you know, going back to church and well

(38:41):
I did.
I went back just before Christmas and I really enjoyed it actually and not enough of, I mean
enough spoken to you about it.
And that God really showed me, I mean it was God, there was no two ways that it wasn't but
now I'm still thinking well I was going to visit a few more churches but at the moment
the way since then all this other stuff has happened.

(39:05):
Now I really don't know where to.
I'm at that point again it's like I've come around in a circle and now I'm still feeling
the same way.
I'm like where do I go because and it's horrible thing to sort of say I don't know who I
can trust but I mean I don't know maybe I'm maybe I'm being too, I don't know, pedantic
about that and maybe I just got to step out and find out and you know.

(39:30):
But it's just made me very uneasy all the things that are going on now.
I just, I have to sort of, well I can't really say that I have to separate myself from them
because I've been through that.
I'm already there, I'm not.
I am separated already.

(39:52):
So sometimes now I'm sort of thinking well maybe God took me out all those years ago
because I'm where I need to be now because I couldn't have stayed there any longer.
You know what I mean?
Maybe I wouldn't have grown.
Maybe I wouldn't have grown to the point that I have now in God and be able to see the

(40:12):
things that I see if I had a state.
Well like you were saying everything you tried to do, you were trapped, it wasn't working.
And you couldn't, how can you come under, a lot they always use that phrase don't they?
It covers, a covering.
You come under someone else's ministry straight away that's putting you under them, it's

(40:35):
trapping you.
You know and God sort of doesn't want that for you but like I was saying all your
idols that you, I saw them there standing around this person and I thought I can't, I'm sorry
but I can't be a part of that.

(40:55):
But I'm strong enough within my own faith to know I'm not going to fall apart because
of that, because of the path they're choosing to take.
And that's between them and God.
I'm not judgein them, you know, that's between them and God but I can't align myself with

(41:15):
them if that makes sense.
They've got to, yeah, that's their thing.
And if that's their thing, that's their thing fine but it's not mine and really it's, I
just think that you shouldn't be saying the things that you're saying because you're not
anyway.
Anyway, I'm sort of having trouble explaining what I mean without coming out and saying who

(41:44):
I'm talking about.
Right.
Well, what I would say is maybe it's an issue being led because what I will tell you is
that when you're supposed to be somewhere God will lead you to it and you'll know it's
right.
And the reason I say that is because that's what's happened with sanctuary.
You know, basically we could say I've got a minority church.

(42:06):
My church is queer, it's female, it's non-binary, well it's something else.
Well, it's something that, it's something that all those preachers, there's no way they'd
understand your church and your ministry.
There is just no way they would understand that.

(42:28):
Right.
I'll throw you under the bus as soon as even.
Exactly.
But somehow people find us.
Yeah.
And they think that we've all kind of connected.
One of the things I prayed after we had the schism a few years ago was I asked God to bring
people to sanctuary who would be here because they loved sanctuary for sanctuary, not because

(42:49):
they wanted a world stage, not because they thought this was their opportunity to move
up, not because they wanted to be somebody, but we're really going to love what we were
doing because they loved what it was about.
And God has done that.
And what I would say is that with the gifts that we have, I feel that they're also very

(43:10):
misunderstood because whether we like it or not, the systems that we have in place are
built on idols and that's church as much as it's anything.
And we're not supposed to say that, it's a dirty thing, we're not supposed to say that,
but I think that there's a very fine line.
I understand the idea of covering in a couple of different senses.

(43:31):
I don't necessarily agree with it the way I originally learned it.
I can understand the concept of it to a certain extent about protection and spiritual stuff
and all that.
Yada, yada, yada.
But I also feel that we can make idols out of our leaders.
Yeah.
And we can make idols out of our leaders because we aspire to be like them.

(43:54):
Instead of like Paul said, follow me as I follow Christ.
The goal is that we're following Christ.
The goal is not that we're following our leaders unto our leaders being rich, unto our
leaders being successful, unto making our leaders a name.
I think that there's definitely something to learn there.

(44:15):
But we have to find a balancing act with it.
And I think that everybody wants to connect to somebody else to be somebody.
The whole way that we had things networked in the mid-2000s, early 2000s, in the 20, I
guess, the 20 teens is what we would call it.

(44:36):
And you remember how things were set up?
Everybody was setting up network after network after network.
And everybody was just trying to throng to be with everybody else.
And that's not how this should be.
We should be where we are because we know God has called us to be there.
We should be there because we know that us being there makes a difference.

(44:57):
We should be there because we're getting something from it.
And if we don't meet that criteria, we need to really think about what we're doing and
why we're there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Not just there for the big names, not just there because that's what they're doing.
I mean, see, this is the problem.
And now all these people that were there, disciples are going to believe that certain people are

(45:22):
right simply because their leaders are following them.
Their leaders are siding with them, their leaders.
And if there are anybody that sticks their hand up and says, "Excuse me, but that's not
right."
I mean, shock horror.
You must be, you're not of God because you're saying that it's wrong.
Do you know?
And so it's like cult worship, really, isn't it?
That's like, yeah.

(45:44):
Yeah.
Exactly what it is.
But I think God keeps saying to me, it's because, well, this is what I feel is coming out for
me with all of this stuff is it's because it's all being laid bare.
It's in exposure.
It's really what it is.
It's like God is just exposing everyone and everything now.

(46:06):
Like everything, all the rock, you know, how you pick up a rock and all the bugs underneath,
scuttle away.
Yeah.
Because the light hits them.
That's what's happening.
And we're seeing it in all its ugliness, really.
What we're seeing is ugly.
It's ugly.
And God is saying, "Well, good.

(46:28):
People need to see what's there.
We've been covering all this stuff up for too long."
And isn't it funny though that the people that are doing the accusing, like we were
doing something, there's only two things that they're really honing in on.
Well, there are other things, but as far as the Christians are concerned, there's really

(46:53):
only two things.
I don't know if we can mention them.
Can we?
Sure.
Can we mention that?
Well, we say it's abortion.
It's abortion and queer people in some facet and now they're focusing on trans.
But it's, what we call single issue focus.
And whatever the single issue is does tend to change and I think that that's kind of important

(47:15):
to mention here.
But for a while, it was gay marriage.
Well, they lost on that.
So now they're focused on something else.
And the reason why I think that it's even important to state that is those issues are idols
to these people.
And you can send me your nasty emails.

(47:36):
You can send me whatever you want that I said that is the truth.
Because if you're thinking more about unborn fetuses than you think about God or about what
bathroom trans people are in, which is really kind of weird when you think about it anyway.
I mean, you know, that you're worried about what bathroom somebody's in.

(47:58):
You know, and what I will say as far as that goes, if there were incidents or there was
a real threat with that, we would know about it by now because they've been in the bathroom
all this time.
It would make you so.
And it was, if it was a thing, we would know by now.
So it's conjecture, it's hype, it's bullshit.

(48:20):
We're just going to call it that.
But you know, when your focus is on all that, you are spending all your time focusing on that,
you are not focused on God and you are not focused on what God has to say to you.
And idols can exist for a lot of reasons.
But I think one of the deepest reasons why they exist is so that we don't have to deal
with ourselves.

(48:41):
And I'm thinking of the verse you were talking about earlier because you were talking about
exposure.
And you know, Jesus said that the time would come when the word would be, what was said
in secret would be heard from the rooftops.
And every secret would be laid bare.
And people think that there's going to be an angel descending from heaven and a trumpet

(49:02):
last but though we're going to uncover all the cover things, it doesn't, it doesn't
work like that.
But what I will say is Satan conceals God reveals.
Yeah.
And even though maybe some of this stuff we don't want to deal with, we don't want to look
at.
And there are people and you know this as well as I do, they are digging their heels in
even more to their idols.

(49:23):
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
So that they don't have to deal with it because this is the fact when you die and you stand
before Jesus one day, Jesus is not going to ask you about all the aborted babies that
you saved.
He is not going to ask you about how many trans people you kept from going to the bathroom.
He's going to ask you about you.

(49:43):
Yeah.
He's going to ask you about what you didn't do right.
And you know, ask you about all your stuff.
But you know what, what, what, always what I'm seeing in, in the media at the moment with
this person that's taken over, we're trying to take over the world.
Let's face it.
And the Christians in particular, that bugs me.

(50:03):
They call themselves Christians, but they're labeling themselves that, but they're not really
not in, not in practice.
They're not.
And the scripture that keeps coming back to me is the one with the sheep and the goats.
And they are in the separation and in the separation and they stood before God.
And when he was, when he was rebuking them, but what about the miracles that we did?

(50:30):
What, but what about all the, all the, all the awesome things that we did in your name?
And what did he say?
Depart from me.
I don't know you.
I don't know you.
I don't know you.
And that is what they're doing now.
All these miracles of God.
All these things that it's, it's God, God is doing this.
God's doing that.

(50:50):
But is he?
Is he?
Really?
Is he?
Because the other scriptures pertaining to that, he said, the poor were among you.
You didn't feed them.
You know, and he looks at how they were treating people.
Right.
And if we want to look at how people are being treated.
Well, it doesn't take much for you to look on the news and see how people are being treated

(51:19):
at the moment.
Right.
Really?
Right.
If you want to open your eyes, it's there.
Mm-hmm.
I saw a meme recently that what you just said hits on, and I don't know who said it.
It was a quote from somebody.
But the guy who said it basically said, you know, you've got all these Christians waiting
for the second coming.

(51:40):
And they don't realize that Jesus stood before them in a kid who was hungry or in somebody
who needed medical care or in somebody who was a foreigner.
And they turned them away.
Yeah.
How?
You know, Jesus said when you do it onto the least of these you do it to me.
Yeah.

(52:00):
And like you say, if we're not treating people right, and that's what Jesus was talking about
is he was talking about not being partial.
He was talking about making sure that people had what they needed in meeting needs.
Obviously, we can't meet every need that exists.
I can say this straight up.

(52:21):
My ministry cannot fund every single African ministry that shows up in my inbox that I can't
verify.
Okay?
We cannot do that.
But I can tell you that when we are in Charlotte, we make little bags full of stuff for hygiene
products and we hand them out to the homeless.
We can do that.
Yeah.

(52:42):
It's about doing what we can do.
It's about being who God calls us to be.
And it's not about the earthly power.
It's not about attaching ourselves to names.
It's not about being better than anybody else.
It is sincerely about doing and being who Christ would ask us to be.

(53:05):
And that doesn't make you court on quote, quote, quote, although I will say Jesus did say
to watch and pray.
It's not to stay awake.
It's not about being court on quote, liberal or conservative or political or anything.
It's about being a Christian.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And that's got to do with treating people with respect.

(53:27):
Whether they're gay or whether they're a single mother or whether they've just had an abortion
and they don't feel very well.
I mean, it's all of those things.
You're a human being.
Right.
You know, I mean.
And what we're seeing at the moment is just the, I just think the dregs of humanity.

(53:51):
We're just seeing some, like I said, it's, it's, it's being exposed because God wants people
to see it.
And it's being exposed on a large scale like, you know, and people that we, we admired and
once looked up to just, and, and I'm glad that I went.

(54:16):
I went through what I went through 25, 30 years ago to put me in a position that I'm in now
where if a so called, I, so called idle like that fails, then I, I might be disappointed
in a, in a bit upset and dwell on it a little bit, but it's not going to destroy me if you know

(54:41):
what I'm saying.
I mean, like you said, a certain group of people went up into space, didn't they?
And, you know, you know what I mean?
And expected the whole world to cheer them on and think that it was great and think that
it was awesome.

(55:01):
And so did not.
But all in the world did not.
Yeah, because they didn't have the ability, and that's what I saw.
And I totally agree with it.
They didn't have the ability to read the room.
Right.
Right.
Because of all the, I mean, if it had it, if this had, if they had have done that 12 months

(55:22):
ago, probably wouldn't have been so bad.
They might have copped a little bit of like for it, but wouldn't have been the issue that
it is now because of the timing.
Right.
And because you're showing us your privilege at the moment when other people, and your
total ignorance to, yes, when other people are suffering and someone else was stuck in

(55:49):
space for eight months, not being able to get back and they, and they, and they thought,
maybe they thought they were going to die up there.
And then you go up there for 11 minutes and you see God up there and now you've had
this awesome experience.
Excuse me.
You're being quite rude, really.

(56:12):
Right.
You're, you're not thinking straight.
Are you?
No.
And so now everybody can see what's going down, down on earth at the moment is in your country
is not really a pretty sight.
And you're totally ignoring that and you're going on some space joyride.

(56:35):
Well, hello, yeah.
Good for you.
Lucky you.
Yeah.
So you are going to cop flat and I'm sorry, but you've only got yourself to blame now.
But maybe, but maybe you will wake up, maybe, maybe it was a good thing because hello.

(56:56):
Read the room.
Well, this actually has been an awesome episode.
This has really been great and I will say in advance it's going to be a little bit before
it airs officially.
This is the first recorded episode for season seven.
It's not going to be the first episode that airs, but it, it's really, really important.

(57:18):
And you know the drill.
I typically turn it over to the guest and ask what's something you would like to leave
our listeners with?
Just don't, it always comes up to me.
The same thing comes, tries to come up out of my spirit every time.
I've finished one of these and it really is the same thing.
It's like don't give up, I suppose.

(57:38):
It seems to be one of my catch phrases, but like because we can get very disheartened when
our bubble, when, when our bubble is burst, you know, when we see our idols as, if they're
human ones, because at the moment, today we sort of spoke a little bit about other things

(57:58):
that can put themselves before, but like ministry and everything.
Well, when it's human, human idols, we can sort of be very disappointed in them, you
know, when our bubble is burst and we've got to come back down to earth.
Literally, yeah.
And so don't, don't give up, you know, you'll get through it, you know, you'll get over

(58:25):
the fact that yes, my idols are human and you may have to say goodbye to them, well, you're
will if they're right, if they're standing, if they're in the place of God, you will.
But, you know, I'm saying, God is separating you from leadership or anything like that,
then it's necessary and you will, you will get through it, you know, you know what I'm saying?

(58:51):
You'll come out the other side stronger and with more wisdom than what you did when you,
because really, I think they block our growth, our idols block our own growth.
If we're always depending on them to lift us up and no, no, no, go to church and I'll

(59:12):
listen to that preacher and they'll, and they'll encourage me instead of learning to encourage
ourselves in the Lord, you know, like David did.
And that's basically what God's trying to teach us is that he has to come first in our
lives.
And most of our walk is going to be just us and God, really, in reality.

(59:36):
There's not always going to be somewhere, someone there to hold your hand.
You know, except God.
So that's it, really?
Amen.
To that.
That was very, very well said.
Well, I thank you for being on here and I'm excited about what God is going to say through

(59:56):
us in this new season for the podcast and how can everybody get in contact with you if
they would like to?
Well, usually I am on Facebook.
I've actually, and because I listened to our other podcast the other day and I noticed

(01:00:17):
that I'd said that I'd unlocked my profile on there.
Well, I sort of, I had to lock it again because of, because some of the arguments that I've
been getting into online, I thought, I'm better off, I'm better off locking.
Yes, I, isn't that terrible?
I'm just, I'm just confused.
No, it's protection.
Some things we need to not see.

(01:00:38):
Yeah, so I've had to lock my profile, but I'm still available to for mess through messenger,
you know, that messenger is available or encouragement for today, which is my page, as I said
at the beginning and I sort of scooted around that a little bit and I got out of that one
and going into too much.
And really through sanctuary, through your website, and just probably the other place that

(01:01:01):
I can just take to.
Absolutely through our discord.
And so if you're interested in sanctuary's discord, you can go to our website at welcomeinthisplace.org
and click on, I think it's the resources link and there is a link to join our discord and
you are welcome to join with us and we would love to have you in there.
Well, I thank you for being on Julie and I thank all of you for listening and let's talk

(01:01:23):
about a resource that might help you with some of this stuff.
I'm going to recommend my book, A Heart God Can Use, The Journey to the Center of His
Will.
That's a heart God can use.
The Journey to the Center of his Will.
It is new updated and revised.
Look me up, Dr. Lee Ann B. Marino on Amazon.com or wherever books are sold and all my titles
will come up.
Definitely check that out.

(01:01:43):
There is something out there for everyone.
Also, if you are a leader interested in leadership, want to learn more about it, check out my
pathos column at patheos.com/blogs/leadershiponfire.
That's patheos.com/blogs/leadershiponfire.
Leadership on Fire column is about all things related to leadership.

(01:02:06):
So go and check that out today.
Also, if you are interested in connecting with me across social media, I'm
@kingdompowernow
That's @kingdompowernow on Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, for however much longer.
We have that Instagram, Blue Sky, anything you're interested in, I'm most likely on there
@kingdompowernow.
Let's have that conversation.

(01:02:28):
Let's learn what you want to hear, what you want more of.
Let's make that connection today.
Also, if you'd like to learn more about the World of Counterculture Christianity, feel free
to visit my website at KingdomPowerNow.org.
That's at KingdomPowerNow.org.
If you are interested in seminary that is entirely affordable, can be done from home,
even on your own time, and is something you will use for ministry in this day-in-age check

(01:02:50):
out, Apostolic Covenant Theological Seminary, acts176.org.
That's acts176.org.
And if you are in the Charlotte, North Carolina area and would like to connect like we talked
about with a group that we were discussing earlier where we really are doing this faith
thing together, check out the work of Sanctuary International Fellowship Tabernacle at
welcomeinthisplace.org.

(01:03:11):
That's welcomeinthisplace.org.
And if you have any questions that are not answered on site, feel free to reach out.
We will get back to you.
And this is Apostolic Dr. Lee Ann Marino reminding you and closing that Idols Fall, but God
stands.
And Idols Fall so that we can stand with God.
Until next time, be blessed.
Thank you for joining us on Kingdom Now.

(01:03:34):
I pray that it is proven to be a blessing in your life, offering an on time word for you.
To learn more about this work, ask a question, submit feedback, advertise with us, order
suggested items, be a guest, or donate to support this work.
As our podcast is supported by people like you, visit my website which contains essential

(01:03:57):
information, projects, and other points of contact around the web.
at kingdompowernow.org.
Also if you'd like to visit Sanctuary International Fellowship Tabernacle, visit one of our North
Carolina or South Carolina locations, check out welcomeinthisplace.org.
Until next time, this is Dr. Lee Ann Marino reminding you that the Kingdom of God is within

(01:04:23):
and that means the Kingdom is now.
(dramatic music)