Join Dr. Tony Evans and his four adult children—Chrystal Evans Hurst, Priscilla Shirer, Anthony Evans, and Jonathan Evans—for an insightful conversation on what it means to hold on to faith when life breaks your heart. In Divine Disruption, Dr. Tony Evans and his children pull back the curtain on their faith-shaking experiences, in order to provide biblical wisdom and practical encouragement for how to deal with the hard, unexpected things we all inevitably face.

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[Music]

well hello everybody this is dr tony

evans with the urban alternative

and i am

so excited about

today’s program

i’m excited to have you with us

because this is the first

this is the first time

i have had all four of my children with

me

to share with you our friends

i have my oldest daughter crystal my

second priscilla

my third anthony junior and the baby of

the family

jonathan

and uh we are here for a very special

reason because we’ve been collaborating

on a very special and very personal

project

it’s called divine disruption

when god intervenes in your affairs or

life intervenes in your affairs and you

need god at a whole another level and i

know many of you even coming through

this season we’ve been through

have uh had to go through your share of

those kinds of trials

and so we’re inviting you in through

divine disruption not only the book but

this program

into our thoughts and struggles that

we’ve gone through as we worked on this

project because we’ve gone through it so

this is not

theory and nor is it theoretical

this was the reality of life that

we we faced and that you faced and that

we all need to face together so

i’m just glad to have all of you here

and i guess a great opening question is

just before we get into some of the

specifics as you look at the overall

journey we’ve been through what are some

of y’all’s reactions some of your just

just wrote feelings and thoughts about

the pain of the problem uh that we have

gone through and some perspectives that

you have

well i think for me it’s just um

it’s a lot of hurt and disappointment

yeah because i just felt i felt

disappointed

in god specifically with with mommy but

everything that has been going on but

obviously mommy the closest for me

losing my mom and all of the all of the

prayer all of the you know quoting god’s

word back in his face you know going

back to your sermons and saying okay

this is what dad said let’s do it this

way this is what the word says and you

feel like you’re trying to do everything

right you’re trying to to run the race

as hard as you can

um for my mom but also because you know

wanting to see god display himself in a

mighty way for a testimony

you know a lot of people just say that

are afraid to admit that

that they can get emotionally

disappointed with god

or confused by god i mean you know what

did rebecca say well how long

god we got to do this and why are we

doing this and

and there are many of questions in the

bible about how god is doing what he’s

doing why he’s doing it how it got done

and was it fair and all is there justice

with god and those questions and

sometimes you can’t just wish them away

because they just come to your mind due

to your circumstances and that’s why you

have to have a faith deeper than your

feelings because when your feelings take

over they can make your faith fly out of

the window that’s right my perspective

was the same as jonathan’s i i

um being the most emotional of the kids

i tell everybody that just right off the

bat i’m the one who feels the most i had

to

uh really

learn how to hold on to my faith in a

moment like that where you’re believing

what you’ve read you’re knowing that god

can come through and he’s deciding not

to

through all this what i’ve experienced

is god holding on to me in a way that i

would have never experienced otherwise

and i don’t want to go through this ever

again i want all of our family members

back but if you read the instruction

manual in your car and you hear about

the safety features and how the seat

belts work and how the airbags work

that’s one thing but skidding or

slamming on the brakes or getting into a

wreck and the seat belt holding you back

and airbags coming out and you realize

you still went through the wreck but you

realizing that that manual actually

performed the way that it said it was

going to and that’s the way i feel yes i

felt

the seat belt of his word holding me in

my seat when i could have gone flying

through the windshield i needed to feel

that where did you learn to illustrate

like that

okay

girls anything that you want to say well

i would echo um exactly what jonathan

and anthony just said those were the two

things that were coming to my mind the

first thing was that you can ask your

questions and dad you taught this at

church you can ask questions without

questioning the character of god and so

i appreciate that job or habakkuk we can

look at them and see that god allowed

them to to ponder and to wonder and to

be and to express discouragement and you

don’t find a god who condemns them for

those questions but rather he meets them

where they are and he reminds them i’m

still who i said i am i’m still going to

do what i said i was going to do so i’m

i felt through all of this very grateful

for a god who lets us

be human

he knows we’re human the flip side of

that is like anthony said i have never

seen such tangible proof of the holy

spirit’s presence as i have in the past

couple of years so for those who don’t

know we’ve literally lost including my

mother-in-law who passed away six months

after mom

we’ve lost eight family members eight

and it was like back to back stuff that

just kept happening and so of course

what you expressed john john is true

like

of course we’re going to say god what

what is this but then the flip side is

you look back and go

how are we able to still have moments of

levity in that or get a good night’s

sleep or hold food down in our stomachs

you know or preach a day after or dad

still preaching on sundays or us still

parenting our kids you know getting up

out of bed and putting clothes on there

are some people who don’t know the hope

that jesus offers and the strengthening

power of the holy spirit that one of the

things that hit our family could hit

them and they can’t they can’t function

so apart from the holy spirit of god

strengthening us that’s what that

reminded me of that we can get up put

clothes on sleep at night eat food

during the day parent our children and

still put one foot in front of the other

that to me was proof that the holy

spirit is who he says

and that’s the thing is that i

i had moments where i was discounting

that because you don’t

you just know how you feel

and what you’re going through but you’re

not thinking about

even in that the spirit of god is

holding you from drowning but you don’t

think about it yeah because all you’re

thinking about is the moment what you’re

going through who’s hurt the pain

like people say the one set of

footprints in the sand is god carrying

you yeah uh through this moment it’s

crazy

you know you made a great uh statement

because a lot of people

don’t know the difference between

asking god

a question and questioning god yeah

those are not the same thing and if you

can if you conflate them to be the same

thing then you wind up feeling guilty

about a legitimate question

it’s okay to ask god why it’s not okay

to challenge god okay with the why and

so learning that distinction is is very

important because that frees you up to

be honest with god and not trying to

hide

what’s really going on inside which he

already knows anyway yeah

i think definitely one of the ways that

i had to learn how to experience god’s

mercy is to look for his mercy in

unexpected places because a lot of times

the byline of this book is holding on

faith when life breaks your heart and i

was trying to figure out what’s a new

way i can try to learn how to hold on to

my faith because my grip was getting

getting a little loose one of the things

i haven’t really voiced that much

because it doesn’t really really even

sound right to voice is me

asking god for mercy we went on that

trip in august to uh we just went to

mckinney texas and got a little place

together and i prayed we prayed and had

communion together and i prayed god show

us mercy i literally felt like somebody

was like the game you played when little

he was bending my wrist back and

breaking my knuckles and i was like

mercy mercy you remember that game yeah

i felt like that’s what god was allowing

to happen

now in hindsight

as much as i want our mother here if he

was going to choose to take her home

which he did

i found in under in a crevice i found

mercy in the fact that he took her

before the pandemic hit oh no yeah

that’s finding mercy in a crevice like

if you have to look that hard for it

that’s finding it under a rock those

moments

um and and the peace that he gave me

because i’m the one who’ll give up on

hope real quick those his mercy i found

it in in very unique places and i think

a lot of times when you’re trying to

hold on to faith through disruptions

that’s what you have to do dad i feel

like your audience just because we’re

here with with with everyone i feel like

i want to ask you as your son and as

your kids how are you doing like we we

know tony evans the preacher can pull it

together and give a sermon at any time

but how are you doing i say on a scale

from one to ten i ask him this all the

time he does

on a scale from one to ten how are you

doing

depends on when you ask me yeah because

some days are good and strong and other

days are weak and dragging you know when

you’re in those quiet moments when the

house is quiet

nobody’s there to greet you nobody’s in

the you know in the space that you’re

used to

you can get you can get a little down

you can get yeah well when you’re

flooded with memories so people remind

you even when they give condolences

they’re triggers that can take you from

what you’re focusing on then

to the things that bring you memories or

hurts or or losses all of that affects

the number that i can i can give you

know but there’s a roller coaster ride

right

you know and you keep plowing forward

but

there are challenges and then there are

times of

great memories and celebrations as well

yeah i i think what made that time

remarkably difficult on top of the fact

that we lost mommy and on top of the

fact

that there were multiple people in our

family who passed away was that all of

those people were connected to you

did you personally feel like even though

it’s life

and losing your loved ones is a part of

life

did you feel ever or do you even feel

now that the way god allowed things to

to play out was slightly unfair

you know i did have the question

why

why this

why now why this much

but i never questioned god

my

biblical beliefs had to kick in

particularly isaiah 40 when they were

asking you know this is not fair in

isaiah 40. where’s the justice do me

and then god says okay you got to look

at me because if you look at your

circumstances i’m the everlasting god

i’m the creator and i you’re gonna have

to look to me for new strength because

the problem with the question why

is it often doesn’t get an answer yeah

in your case are you saying that that

the question is yeah yeah so yeah

i can’t answer the question

why this why this now why there wasn’t

uh supernatural healing when there were

things that indicated

i mean we had some yeah we had some

killer indicators yeah things that yeah

that’s right when we talk about the

doctor we met at the right time when we

talk about

this new medication that had come out

and medicinal treatment when we when we

talk about all of these details the

it’s staggering to think that it wasn’t

going to be reversed

i had to appeal to what i knew to be

true about god while still asking

questions along the way that’s what

chapter five is all about between

expectancy and reality like that that

space between what you’re expecting and

the reality and we watched you

i i know i could speak on all four on

behalf of all four of us and the church

we watched you handle that space

in a in an amazing way really to to look

back on that and i i think that

in fact i know this to be true

that the members of your church

and the broader christian community that

have respected you so much as a scholar

a theologian a pastor in all these

different capacities

there’s a deeper appreciation now

having seen

your humanity in a way they’ve never

seen that before the tenderness

with which you spoke and preached and

ministered

as you yourself were struggling and the

vulnerability you had to tell your

church here’s how i feel today and

here’s how i’m hurting today and here’s

the struggle they saw tears fall from

your eyes and the vast majority of

people in your local church had never

seen that side of tony evans and i think

for people in leadership sometimes

you know pastors teachers preachers

whatever that you can stand on the

platform and folks see that but there is

a depth of ministry that happens in dad

you have exemplified that so powerfully

and beautifully to so many people

well you know it’s uh

it’s one thing

to preach it

and to believe it when you’re not

experiencing it yeah it’s a whole nother

ballgame

to preach it and believe it in the midst

of experiencing it

is the window between my father passing

and my wife passing was about a month

a gap between those so i was flying to

baltimore to care for my father flying

back here with of course

you all helping me to care for

your mom

but two things help me

uh within that

my father’s strong faith

and your mom’s strong faith yes

so i did have

faith helping

faith when faith was weak

by those

who we were trying to have faith for

yeah who in that moment should have the

least amount of faith they were the ones

with the most yeah absolutely so it

definitely was was the most trying time

and still repercussions of that time

continue

but i’m bolstered i mean your mom’s

challenged me to keep preaching the word

in spite of the illness that she was

going through

it was a it was a very spiritual time

in a very painful situation

one of the very unique things about this

this project in this book is that for

the first time

and i’ve never had a i’ve never owned a

book where you’ve had five different

points of view and five different

perspectives from a nuclear family so

since we’re here i would love to hear

um how you the byline of this book is

holding on to faith when life has broken

your heart what are the ways specific to

you jonathan because we’re all four so

different that you have held on to faith

in spite of all the loss and i’d love to

just go around in here it’s the faith of

my family

that i that i come from having daddy and

mommy teaching my whole life and then

having you my siblings being able to

share how you feel but your faith and

hope through it all

has really helped gird me up because i

didn’t have to go through it and do it

by myself

i think um

mommy’s funeral

was

a big deal yeah her

celebration um the celebration of her

life

in her going home to be with the lord

was done well and it was well attended

in person and online

and i say that because

as beautiful as mommy

was and as much pride as she took in her

appearance and how she showed up

anywhere she showed up looking like a

million dollars that’s true um

she

made it her business

to do a lot of

foundational work in a lot of places

to not

get the applause to not be on the stage

to not go first

and she was very intentional in

supporting daddy in ministry and then

also

supporting us i think about the fact

that across the mantle

in our home it was a big deal to her to

have something from each one of us up on

the mantel

as her trophies

and so to have the opportunity to

celebrate her life well to me matched

how well she lived her life and i say

all that because

holding on to faith

is the idea that

this is not all there is

and then after we’re gone

there is more celebration there is more

to be celebrated

there are ripple effects that will go on

from generation to generation

because of what we choose to do and i

know

as we all do

hearing mommy talk that there were

multiple moments in her life where she

wondered

so even now

when you have to wonder

god what were you doing even now if you

have to wonder why here why now

in light of the celebration that comes

later

the questions the struggles

the doubts that you have right now are

no match for that celebration

so her example

makes me remember

that the feeling of right now is no

match

for the celebration of the decisions

that you make and the outcome the ripple

effects of those decisions over the

lifetime i think for me holding on to

faith has meant that even when i can’t

see what the ripple effect is what the

celebration is what the outcome is what

the trophies are that the faithfulness

when you can’t see is what counts

that’s great

um i think for me holding on to hope

what encouraged me most in that is my

children probably i

realize as a child of mom and dad

that the way i’ve watched them walk

through our whole lives with a

commitment and a consistency and an

integrity they weren’t different people

at church than they were at home

i want to have that same impact on my

kids i want them to know that the same

god i’ve been telling them about and

teaching them about and rearing them to

honor that if i trusted him when

everything was good i want them to be

able to say and let me tell you

grandchildren of priscilla shire that

your grandmother still honored god even

when stuff was really hard

wow yeah

um for me

i had to come to a pivotal point in my

life and in my faith where i had to ask

myself do you believe

what you say you believe or not

that i got that’s the bottom line i got

that far yeah because it um

it

on many levels what being on a stage and

singing is one thought but just in

general i had to ask myself do you

believe what you’re singing or not and

when i made that decision and said yes i

do believe this and i believe that god

can hold me through this

then i had to start acting like i

believe what i’m saying so

if she’s fine and she’s enjoying it

enjoying the presence of jesus and and

and uh and we’re not far from her i

really look

this is uh i don’t want to talk too much

because i know people want to hear you

talk daddy

but um you have my name that’s true

and i’m the only one

no i i

really do believe our experience like a

baby in a mom’s womb has no idea that

it’s it’s comfortable and cozy and has

no idea that it’s two inches away from

another reality that’s so much bigger

than what it’s currently experiencing

mommy has gone on to that new reality

and i feel like yeah our world this

world we’re in is comfortable and cozy

but we’re two inches away from

experiencing a whole

other thing that is so much bigger than

where we are right now

and when i think about

us being in the womb of earth and being

cozy and but what god’s intention for us

is is to be on this other side where he

has so much more for us and it’s just

two inches away like right through this

is this whole other experience and

mommy’s there and it’s that close i feel

like

when i decided to believe what i believe

i’d know that my mom is close yeah i

know and i feel and i experience her

close and that

has how i’ve held on to hope and that’s

god’s mercy because i was the one to be

like i am done yeah yeah yeah but this

experience in faith has has

taken a load off in so many different

areas because i just decided i believe

fully and not just when it’s easy

there there’s this moment

actually a really private moment with

our family

but it’s the morning that mom passed

away and i just want to describe it

because

i see in dad’s

actions in that moment exactly what you

just described

so

we were all around mom we were in their

bedroom

it was clear that these were going to be

her last couple of hours

and there we were just the six of us mom

was laying in my lap anthony’s on one

side crystal’s on one side and dad’s

laying right next to her and we’re all

around her like a cocoon

and i looked over at dad and dad you

were rubbing mommy’s hand she wasn’t

conscious at this point you’re rubbing

your hand we were playing worship music

and you were reading psalm 91

you were just reading it you weren’t

talking you weren’t

trying to help everybody you weren’t

angry

you were just

reading psalm 91

and anthony you just described

not knowing what to do sometimes you

just go

i’m going to honor god in this moment i

don’t know what that looks like i don’t

know why this is happening

but what can i do in this moment to just

release it to god and then trust him and

i watched our superman dad because you

know we kind of think you’re superman

um i just watched you

you literally at that point realized i

cannot do anything else

and so all you did

was open up the bible and start reading

psalm 91. that’s interesting i didn’t

remember that yeah until you just

brought it back up that that’s

was the response um

the toughest statement i had to make in

that moment

was to say you know not my will but thy

will be done that’s that’s a hard thing

to say yeah yeah when the will is not

what you want you know

you know and i i talked to myself and us

and the church

you know about god’s

conditional will and his unconditional

will

certain things god is going to do

because god’s going to do it there are

no conditions tied to it it’s

unconditional

but then there’s certain things that are

conditional he will only do it when

we’ve done our part prayer obedience

whatever it is

god took this out of our hands yeah he

did

we had prayed we’ve been to the doctor

we tried every new medication we’ve gone

to md anderson in houston

holistic effort we

there was no stone to our knowledge

unturned

and she had to be the most prayed for

woman

in america

because we’d ask all of our radio

listeners and everybody who knew the

ministry to pray

so everything

that could be done to our knowledge was

done

so i had to resolve to the fact

that this was god’s

unconditional will because if it was

conditional we met the condition we met

the conditions we went

we went extra credit okay

so this was his unconditional will and

we had to resolve ourselves

to that and still pray and praise

and trust god

in spite of it i i really

believe bottom line is that you do what

you can and god will do what you can’t

like you said daddy exhaust what you can

do and then just trust that god’s gonna

do the rest you know crystal in chapter

15 of this book you talk a lot about the

doing the right thing along the way what

are some of the right things that you

would encourage those who are joining us

today to do along the way as they faced

their disruption

it’s kind of what you said about

doing what you can and god will do what

you can’t

it’s this idea

that

you work with the knowledge that you

have mama used to say

you go with the light that god has given

you

until he gives you more light and until

he gives you more light you do what he

told you to do last

often in the bible what god is looking

for are people who are willing to work

with the little information they have

he’s looking for people who are willing

to say yes

to say yes quickly and to do what they

know the best that they can do with all

of their might

and what we have what god has allowed us

to have is enough until he gives us more

that’s a part of the trust factor that

if what i have isn’t enough

that god is big enough to fill in the

gap well this is uh

this is great it’s great being together

uh as a family we’ve stayed close as a

family it’s great doing this special

project thanks for letting us on your

radio program today

yeah we well you deserve one shot

so

so radio and television but i’m glad for

this project because your mom wanted us

to do something together so anthony put

together this uh

this work this book uh divine disruption

and um and keeping hope alive when you

know things are breaking in your heart

and in your life

and so we’re we’re

we’re glad to

have the process of doing this together

because we all shared in the pain of it

together

and we’re all growing from the purposes

together and i

i want god to touch

touch the folks who

who hear and see this

that when when your heart breaks

and your hope is shattered

that that is a fresh opportunity to

experience god in a new way

[Music]

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