Priscilla Shirer: You Will Overcome This | Women of Faith on TBN

Women of Faith on TBN brings you the best of TBN’s women’s Christian teaching. Here you’ll find content from your favorite women’s Bible teachers, speakers, pastors, and authors, featuring teachings from Priscilla Shirer, CeCe Winans, Christine Caine, Joyce Meyer, Jackie Hill Perry, Lisa Harper, Lisa Bevere, Sarah Jakes Roberts, and more!

have not allowed myself to question the

character of god once i find myself

stepping into that category of

questioning whether or not god is good

or whether or not he loves me or whether

or not he’s sovereign and overseeing all

of this that’s when i stop myself and go

uh that’s not what we do we know who god

is in my life and my family’s life and

we’re gonna stand firm in that because

that’s the hope of our salvation

[Music]

you’ve talked a lot about the armor of

god and i think that’d be really

pertinent right now to understand how

does the armor of god actually help us

have a perspective where we can walk

into this thing boldly with courage

you know what

you said a key phrase that i was going

to use that was rolling around in my

mind and that is opportunity

we could see this pandemic or any

personal dilemmas that we face in our

lives or in our ministries or our

churches or what have you we could see

any of them as something that is a

hiccup in our plan or we can see

everything even the difficult things as

an opportunity an opportunity for what

an opportunity for god to be glorified

in a unique way that through our life he

might not otherwise have the opportunity

to be glorified an opportunity for us to

be strengthened our character built our

spiritual backbone fortified in a way it

would not otherwise have the opportunity

to a way for our perspective to be

shifted so that now i have the lens of

compassion and empathy towards others

that i wouldn’t otherwise have because i

didn’t know that pain i didn’t know what

that isolation maybe felt like but now i

can relate to my congregants differently

if you’re a pastor or the people that i

serve in ministry differently um and

it’s an opportunity for us to do what’s

on what ephesians chapter 6 says

stand firm against the schemes of the

enemy how will we know

what it is

to feel like a victor unless we’ve had

these circumstances in our life where

there was clear obvious demonic

opposition and we saw righteousness

become a breastplate for us we saw that

integrity of character form of

breastplate that staved off the most

serious advances of the enemy we saw our

salvation which is our identity being

not just a ticket to eternity but now it

became a helmet over our minds and it

sort of flipped off all the fiery darts

of the enemy trying to convince us that

fear and anxiety is our birthright how

will we ever know what it’s like for the

word of god to become the dagger of the

spirit so that the enemy doesn’t stand a

chance when he’s trying to come against

us and our families how will we know the

power of prayer oh my gosh i think about

this all the time

as a mom of these teenage boys how will

i ever know the power of prayer unless

in my struggle sometimes with my anxiety

i worry because i watch my boys struggle

with issues of morality or thought

processes or attitude issues and i go oh

man um i don’t want the enemy to take

advantage of their weaknesses or their

frailties well this is the time that i

get to show up in prayer and stand in

the gateway of my home and say not today

say not on my watch not while i’m here

i’m going to be someone who’s positioned

in prayer because now i’ll get to see

what it is to stand firm against the

schemes of the devil in prayer

for my family what a testimony we have

when we we literally

physically practically put on the armor

of god by being righteous believers who

guard our minds in the word of god who

are found on our knees in prayer who are

in the scriptures so that it becomes a

dagger against the schemes of the enemy

when we do that

this is going to be our testimony this

is going to be a decade from now what

the folks coming up after us gave this

is going to be what we tell them we’re

going to tell them practically what we

did to stave off the schemes of the

enemy and they’ll be able to emulate our

lives not because they heard about it

but because we told them

straight from our mouths that we’ve seen

it work in our own experiences

so it’s so encouraging and i i think i

think as we’re all listening we’re

hearing this theme develop of how much

we just have to take advantage of this

moment of what god’s trying to do um

i also think we will look back and take

account for how we spend this time and

so it’s an important word

you’ve gone through a lot of loss on a

very personal level lately a lot of

grief lost your mother lost an aunt lost

one of your best friends

this has not been a season for you i

know that’s been without pain

a lot of people are walking through that

now maybe this was children or parents

and the grief of loss

i’m just wondering from what you’ve

walked through and lost how would you

encourage people today that might be

walking through that right now

sure um

yeah you’re you are right gabe there’s

been a lot of loss seven

people in our family have passed away in

the past 18 months or so seven people

and um and then on the heels of my

mother passing away this past december

the last day of december or december

30th rather a couple weeks later i had

to have a surgery to remove the upper

lobe of my left lung

because of something they found there so

it was this

huge um

sort of

a hurricane of events

so there’s emotional recovery happening

right now for us slowly but surely and

physical recovery in in my case and what

i’ve really felt has been a bedrock for

our family and by the way we’re

stumbling through this like anybody

would in this situation so i’m certainly

no expert on this

but i felt such a freedom to ask god my

questions

without questioning god

does that make sense

like to go ahead and be job and be like

habakkuk and say i kind of don’t get it

i kind of don’t get lord how in the

world not healing my mother is going to

bring you more glory than what we were

praying which was that you would heal

her on this side of heaven i kind of

don’t get why my best friend and cousin

winter you would allow her you know one

day we’re playing with the movie we’re

going to go to the theater to see that

was our thing that’s what we did go eat

hot buttery popcorn and have a nice

coca-cola and see a chick flick

why we could be planning that one day

and then her heart stopped beating the

next day i don’t get how that’s gonna

bring you more glory than if you would

have responded to us the way we prefer

so i can ask those questions

the freedom in being able to voice my

disappointment to cry the tears to just

straight up grieve

i think ministers need to be told and

leaders need to be told like it’s okay

you know see the therapist

have the conversations cry the tears

stay in bed for a while take the

sabbatical

do what you have to do let your mind low

just stop being so productive it’s okay

the world can go on without us ministry

continues without us we can ask our

questions and bring to him our frailty

and humanity

and we can do all that without

questioning the character of god and

that’s what’s carried me i still believe

god is good

i still believe he has a plan and a

purpose for my life and for my family

everything i believe before we lost

these seven loved ones about god is the

same thing i know to be true about him

now he hasn’t changed just because i’m

in the valley

in fact i get to experience all of those

characteristics more now

than i ever had before and i’m extremely

grateful for that so has it been

difficult yes am i asking questions of

god yep because i don’t get it probably

won’t

but i have not allowed myself to

question the character of god once i

find myself stepping into that category

of questioning whether or not god is

good or whether or not he loves me or

whether or not he’s sovereign and

overseeing all of this that’s when i

stop myself and go uh that’s not what we

do we know who god is in in my life and

my family’s life and we’re going to

stand firm in that because that’s the

hope of our salvation

that’s so good so helpful i think for

all of us to hear because we all have

those moments where we’re questioning

we’re not quite sure

what god’s doing and we want to know we

seek those answers but we don’t always

know it’s not always clear

thank you for being so personal even

walking through that journey you’ve

walked through with us and just what

that’s been like for those who might be

walking through the same thing

one of the subjects you’ve talked a lot

about you wrote a movie about this is

the subject of overcoming and i know in

my reading of revelation so much this is

what god wants he says i want to reward

you as overcomers that’s a big idea and

a big principle what does it mean for us

as christians to be overcomers i think

the world looks on and maybe they don’t

know what it means for christians to try

to overcome how how can we do that how

can we be

overcomers how can we learn from that

idea

that’s right

um there’s a friend of mine named

catherine catherine um wolf you may

actually know jay and catherine wolf

that katherine suffered a stroke when

she’s 26 years old and she’s it’s a

decade later now

but the message of hope that this girl

brings i have not heard anything like it

it’s unparalleled in my experience

because she discusses this idea of

overcoming but she discusses it through

the lens of suffering because she’s now

living with all the effects of having

had this massive stroke that really did

wipe out a lot of her ability to

function normally and she says that it’s

interesting how western christianity um

in particular whenever we meet up with

suffering we’re immediately praying that

god will resolve the suffering that he

will take that issue out of our life

that is causing us to basically have to

overcome so we pray it away as opposed

to first praying

lord find me faithful while i suffer

that is the definition of overcoming

the definition is that i am in the midst

of the struggle i’m in the midst of the

pain the tears are falling from my eyes

but because i know who i belong to and

because i know that this is not the end

of the story and because i know that

this is not my home that this isn’t a

period for me on the end of the sentence

of my life that there is an eternal

destiny waiting for me that i can still

live with my chin held high with a peace

that passes all understanding i know

death is real but death has lost its

sting it doesn’t control me it doesn’t

make me anxious it doesn’t make me

fearful but i trust god with my life and

that i know my life and the life of my

loved ones is in the palm of his hand so

it doesn’t mean i don’t suffer it just

means that while i’m going through the

suffering i’m praying lord find me

faithful help me to overcome lord

because i know what you’ve put in me and

the strength that you’ve given me access

to by your spirit