Living the Reclaimed Life

You Have Value ~ Valerie Mc Mahon Ep. 96

March 06, 2023 Denisha Season 3 Episode 96
Living the Reclaimed Life
You Have Value ~ Valerie Mc Mahon Ep. 96
Show Notes Transcript

If someone asked you, who are you? What would you say? What defines you? Or better yet, who defines you? Is it your job title, family, yourself, the world, or God? Join us throughout March as we explore four foundational truths that truly define who you are in Christ.

Here are two Ebooks just for you!
1. NEW Ebook! 10 steps to shattering shame in your life. You can grab that HERE.
2.
CLICK HERE to receive a FREE E-book to help you combat those lies and hear the truth of what God's heart has to say to you.

Did you know we have a jewelry line that speaks to your identity in Jesus? CLICK HERE to shop inspiring jewelry that encourages you to live out of the truth of who you are in Jesus. Every purchase helps support our mission to provide healing and hope to women worldwide.

For more encouragement, check out some of our offerings
HERE

If this podcast encourages you, would you partner with us to spread the message of hope and healing? You can DONATE HERE.  Living the Reclaimed Life is a Reclaimed Story, Inc. podcast, An Arizona non-profit corporation.

If you would like to connect with a safe group of women doing real-life together, join our private Facebook page,
“Living the Reclaimed Life” Join us! 

Check out more at our website www.reclaimedstory.com 

Connect with us!
Facebook
Instagram 

Here are two FREE Ebooks for you!
1. Shame Off You: 10 steps to shattering shame in your life,
HERE.
2. ABC's:
CLICK HERE for a FREE E-book to help you combat lies and replace them with God's truth. For more encouragement, check out some of our offerings at www.reclaimedstory.com

Did you know we have a jewelry line that speaks to your identity in Jesus?
CLICK HERE to shop. Every purchase helps support our mission to provide healing and hope to women worldwide.

Would you partner with us to spread the message of hope and healing? You can
DONATE HERE. Living the Reclaimed Life is a Reclaimed Story, Inc. podcast, An Arizona non-profit corporation.

If you would like to connect with a safe group of women doing real-life together, join our private Facebook page,
“Living the Reclaimed Life” or on Facebook or Instagram

Transcript is auto-generated

[00:00:00] Denisha: If someone asked you, who are you, what would you say? What defines you or better yet, who defines you? Is it your job title, your family, yourself, the world, or God, join us throughout the month of March as we explore four foundational truths that. Define who you are in Christ. Welcome to Living the Reclaim Life Podcast.

[00:00:29] Denisha: I'm Danisha. We're glad you're here for conversations that revive hope, inspire healing, and encourage you to live a vibrant life with Christ. So grab a cup of coffee as we chat with today's guest. So before Valerie and I pushed to record this morning, we were talking about the good. We were talking about the nineties.

[00:00:50] Denisha: The nineties, yes. Yes. And I realize that on this podcast, I often say I am so excited. And that is genuinely how I feel. [00:01:00] However, I think I need some new adjectives. Yes. So as stoked, I am stoked. . So Valerie goes, you're stoked. And I said we have to just start out and talk about what we've been doing here.

[00:01:09] Valeria: Yes. Before we hit record, we're totally stoked about this topic. I think 

[00:01:13] Denisha: this is gonna be radical . Okay. For all of you listening, I think 

[00:01:17] Valeria: that's more. But 

[00:01:18] Denisha: is it? Probably, probably. Okay. We're done with the nineties . You can keep listening. Uh, so this month, you know, we were thinking about what to talk about in March, what to share, and kind of what God put on our heart.

[00:01:31] Denisha: And one of the biggest themes, I think for the whole month is identity. Yes. Who am I and who are. because of who God 

[00:01:41] Valeria: is. Yeah. And we're kind of, we're modeling it after one of my favorite pieces of our jewelry, the identity bar, necklace. And so we're gonna over the next few weeks, break down each of those.

[00:01:53] Valeria: Um, awesome statements. See there. Ego back to the nineties, . We're having fun here. One of those [00:02:00] each. Side of the necklace says a statement about who we are in in Christ. And you know, Danisha, I think one of the most predictable things. right here. I'm about to drop a bomb. See, that's nineties too. . One of the most predictable things about us as humans is that we will mess up.

[00:02:20] Valeria: Um, we'll make mistakes, right, and we will fail. And likewise, we're gonna be hurt by people. and their mistakes. And I know that seems like a downer to start a podcast, but, but it's true. And what we're gonna be talking about, what we wanna encourage you guys with today is that we wanna dedicate our time today to talking about knowing the truth of who we are.

[00:02:44] Valeria: Because of the truth of who God says we are. No matter what we've done, no matter what has been done to you, we want you to know that you are valued. So we're gonna jump into that today, but I, I wanna share, since we're kind of on a [00:03:00] roll about being a little lighthearted today, I wanna share a funny story about a mistake I made.

[00:03:04] Valeria: So my last year of college I met my, um, who now is my husband. And, uh, we were friends for a long time. At the time I had another friend who was getting married and she was marrying a man with the last name, McMillan, and my husband's last name was McMahon. And I remember the first time I introduced my, you know, I don't even think maybe we were boyfriend girlfriend, I'm not sure yet.

[00:03:30] Valeria: But I was introducing my husband to my parents and I introduced him with , the last name McMillan instead of McMahon. And he's looking at me. Uh, is there somebody I should know about ? So anyway, I, I just wanted to share that because obviously that's a silly mistake, right? It didn't have really that much consequences.

[00:03:53] Valeria: My husband still married me even though I butchered his name at first. But you know, the thing is, you guys, we can [00:04:00] laugh right at some of our mess up, but then how quickly. We can become so greatly ashamed for other mistakes. And, you know, Danisha, you know, I love connecting our themes to a Bible story. And one of my favorite stories that I like to share about is a true story of a woman in the Bible who was not only defined by what she did.

[00:04:24] Valeria: But also what was done to her and it's, it's the woman at the well, and maybe you're familiar with it. Her story is found in the book of John chapter four and. Maybe you can relate to her story because she had spent a good part of her life searching for her worth and value in relationships, where maybe at times that thirst for being loved, valued, and enough was quenched for a little bit.

[00:04:50] Valeria: But it was never fully satisfied and most likely, her worth and value was minimized and even stolen through being used and [00:05:00] abused by men. And so you guys, this woman, she's ashamed, she's isolated, but sh and she encounters Jesus. at a place where she was hoping to remain anonymous. I don't know about you Danisha, but I've been there, right?

[00:05:14] Valeria: Yeah. I've been there when I've made mistakes and we feel ashamed. And what do we wanna do, right? We just wanna hide. We don't wanna be seen by people that may know us, but she comes to draw water from a well, and she meets Jesus, and she's so depleted. She's depleted a value from the effects of public ridicule and judgment for her indiscretions.

[00:05:37] Valeria: Coupled with the cultural bias for being a woman and a Samaritan, all of this was stacked up against her. So she wanted to come and draw water. She had to draw water. She had to be, you know, she was, she had to fill that physical need every day, but she was hoping to come at a time that. She wouldn't be seen.

[00:05:58] Valeria: She wouldn't be questioned. She [00:06:00] wouldn't be ridiculed. She was hoping you guys to have a break from that steadfast stream of feeling worthless. But here's what changes for her. Jesus asks her for a drink, but he begins to gently expose. Those deep needs of a thirsty soul. And you guys, we all have thirsty souls, you know, because of sin, right?

[00:06:28] Valeria: Because sin entered the world. We all have an emptiness to be filled, right? Tanisha, we all have that emptiness. We all have a value that needs to be verified. We all have that need to be seen, to be known, to be loved. We all want to know our. So what do we do when we don't feel wanted? When we don't feel worthy, valued, or.

[00:06:52] Valeria: Why do we go off often? Go searching in places and in people that will never bring true [00:07:00] satisfaction. All right, Danisha, this woman, that's, that's what we gleam for her from her story is that she. and, we'll, we'll read more about it in a little bit, but she, she went from relationship to relationship, hoping to find that value, hoping to find that, to fill that emptiness.

[00:07:18] Valeria: When, when have you experienced that Danisha or maybe, um, just in with the women we worked with where, you know, people are searching. For value, and they come. They're like, I just, I feel empty. I don't know what to do. Why? Why do we go everywhere else , but where we should go? 

[00:07:37] Denisha: I think there are so many things in our lives that try to fill that spot that only the Lord can fill.

[00:07:47] Denisha: There are so many things. We wanna be validated from, right? Mm-hmm. , we want our boss to tell us, yes, you did a good job. I see you right? Yeah. We want our friends to want time with us and to be, you know, [00:08:00] giving time to us validates us. Yeah. In, in a lot of ways. Um, we want. Are, let's talk about social media for a second.

[00:08:08] Denisha: Right? That really sets us up for external validation. Yeah, that's not the Lord. How many likes did I get? Well, I poured out my heart. Did I get, you know, did anybody comment? Like the whole social media thing? Mm-hmm. , I think really. Pushes an external validation in a really unhealthy way. Yeah. And that's something that will never satisfy.

[00:08:28] Denisha: You know, it's actually a great example of how we search after those things one day. I mean, I know I've been in jobs, you know, I was in sales for 20 years. Mm-hmm. , and you could go from, I'm gonna say hero to zero. . You know, one day everybody, you're on the email list, everybody's talking about your store, how, how great you did.

[00:08:46] Denisha: And then two weeks later there's no mention because you know, your sales weren't as great and somebody else kind of took that spotlight. Yeah. And so it really did. Um, for me that was a season where I. in many seasons, but that was one particular [00:09:00] season where I remember you could go from hero to zero so fast.

[00:09:03] Denisha: Yeah. So I had to find ways to keep myself and my team motivated and validated, even when we weren't the number one salespeople. Yeah. And so I think there's a lot of ways that we look for that from external sources, but as you mentioned, that never satisfies. Mm-hmm. that never satisfies us. 

[00:09:21] Valeria: Well, and just even think about social media, right?

[00:09:23] Valeria: Are we. ever fully known. Mm-hmm. on social media, and we're gonna talk about that throughout this podcast today. I mean, we're, we're really only putting part of ourself. Yeah. There. And so what are we really seeking to be validated for? You know, are we really seeking to be known as we truly are, or we're just.

[00:09:42] Valeria: Putting on a, a facade and hoping to get valid. You know, it's, it's never really gonna fully satisfy, like you said, as that picture 

[00:09:50] Denisha: of the clean kitchen, let me tell you, six inches away from the end of that frame is 47 piles of dishes or, you know, piles of, of dog hair Yeah. [00:10:00] Or whatever. Like, that's real, right?

[00:10:01] Denisha: Yeah, that's real. And that's, I know that's one thing that, um, you know, we really try to do too is, is let people into the real sides of life because it lets us know that we're not. , how can we be certain of our value no matter what happens in our lives? Mm-hmm. . And today we wanna share three truths with you.

[00:10:19] Denisha: Um, number one is we remember who God says we are. No matter what people say. Um, and you know, to us about us behind our backs, we remember who God says we are. We read the truth of who God says we are in His word. And I think you have an example of that. 

[00:10:37] Valeria: Yeah. I mean, we have, that's. Where the ultimate truth lies.

[00:10:41] Valeria: And, and so maybe, I mean, maybe reading the Bible is, is not a habit for your, or maybe it's not something you've really, um, have done. And, and that's okay. But we encourage you, even if you don't have a Bible, you can get free Bibles, right? You can walk into a church and get a free Bible, but just opening God's word [00:11:00] and reading the truth of who you are.

[00:11:01] Valeria: And I love Ephesians one, one through seven, and I'm not gonna read it verbatim, but. I'm just gonna pull out for you guys the things that God says of who we are, the blessings we have in Christ. We are chosen. I love that we are chosen. Ephesians says, before the foundation of the world, before the world was created, God knew he was going to create.

[00:11:25] Valeria: As we are chosen, we are blameless. Danisha, you know, we just talked about mistakes, right? That we're human, we're going to make mistakes. But in Christ, because of his salvation that he freely offers to us, we are blameless. We. Adopted. I love that. I love that we are adopted into his family. Maybe, maybe you're adopted or maybe, um, you never really felt wanted in your family, but know that you are adopted and wanted by God.

[00:11:55] Valeria: We are loved. We are loved and we are forgiven. And also [00:12:00] in Genesis speaking about the beginning of the world, in Genesis 2 27, it says, God created man in his image. I don't know what else says value beyond that, that we are created in the likeness of God, that our value. And never will be determined by what we do, deniesha by what we do right, what we've done wrong, how much we do, how little we do.

[00:12:27] Valeria: Our value is determined by who's we are. Hear that? Hear that today, you guys. Our value is determined by who's we are. We are daughters of God. We are sons and daughters of God, and that's why we wanna so clearly encourage you that your mistake. Your mistakes. Our mistakes are not a measure of our value.

[00:12:50] Valeria: We've, we've talked about shame, um, in this ministry and on this podcast we have an ebook all about shame and how shame doesn't belong on us. And that's [00:13:00] when we begin to question our value, you guys is when shame enters our story because shame. , we are our mistakes, right Tanisha? It's not so much like, oh, I made a mistake.

[00:13:11] Valeria: Shame tells us we are bad. We are dirty, we are defective. We're worth, we're worthless. And. Um, I, I've shared a little bit on other podcasts of one of my favorite books, the Cure, and I'm walking, um, through the Cure with a group of Reclaimers right now, and it's been so awesome. It's actually my fifth time reading the book, Tanisha.

[00:13:34] Valeria: So, so either that tells you how good it is or that I still need to learn, right? Just like the Bible. All the about, all the about. Um, but I love what The Cure says. It says shame whispers, and. That no matter what you do, you will always be defined by what you did or what was done to you. When our sin and shame is defining us, then it's hard to know [00:14:00] our worth.

[00:14:01] Valeria: Right. Tanisha? It's hard. And this I'll just briefly, and I would encourage you, you can get the book off Amazon and we'll. Will list it in the show notes, but it's such a powerful book because the Cure talks about these two roads, these two paths, and it's kind of written in an allegorical kind of way. And one path leads us to the Room of good intentions, Danisha, which is all about, um, what can I do to appear, like, talk about social media, what can I do to appear that I have it all together, that I have it all together, that, um, I, you know, nothing's wrong.

[00:14:31] Valeria: I'm not experiencing any pain. Sitting and what happens is you get to the room with good intentions and at the door of that room, they hand you a mask, right? We put on that mask, we put on that mask, that hides our shame. We put on that mask that hides our, our sense of worthlessness. And in this room, you guys, it's all about managing our own sin, right?

[00:14:55] Valeria: We've made mistakes. Okay, I made this mistake. I gotta do something [00:15:00]to make myself better, to make myself good enough that God will be pleased with me. And I can raise my hand right now and say, that was me. I grew up, I grew up in a Christian home. I, I know the truth, but, but somewhere along the way, I started adopting that.

[00:15:17] Valeria: Really that lie that I had to perform for God, that I had to do. I had to be the good Christian girl, do all the right things so that God would be pleased with me. And that really ultimately comes to, I felt more valuable. I felt more worthy if I did all the right things. But what happened when I didn't do the right things?

[00:15:38] Valeria: And that's why there's this other path that leads you to the room of grace, and that's when we believe. Who God says we are, that we accept that we can never , we can never resolve our own sin, you guys by quote unquote working on it. We know that sin is not just between, it's, it's never between me and God.

[00:15:59] Valeria: Like [00:16:00] they give this image in the book Danisha, I love this, where it's like, just imagine that you have this pile of sin, right? This pile of sin, which we all often have this pile of sin and, and sometimes we imagine. God. Jesus was like on the other side, like waving at us. Hey, how you doing? Yeah, I see that.

[00:16:18] Valeria: When are you gonna clean that up, ? And I'm like, but no. Like that's not where God is. You. You know where God is. You guys, God is right next to you with his arms wrapped around you and saying, I. I love you and we are going to work on this together. And that's what, that's, that's that value that God wants to communicate you guys, that we can live carefree because we realize that God is crazy about us, that he sees you as valuable even on your worst day.

[00:16:50] Valeria: And you know, Danisha, I don't know about you, but when I'm in that mode of performing and pretending, I just get tired. [00:17:00] like, don't you get tired? Like, you know, like wearing a mask is tiring. Yeah. Because you're not being who you really are and, and what God is saying, you guys, what God is saying by saying you are valuable.

[00:17:12] Valeria: Come home to grace. He said, that's home. He's saying home is where grace is. That is where you are seen, valued, loved, and known. . And there's other, there's other scriptures. Danisha, do you wanna read a couple of the other scriptures that I, I just love these scriptures because it tells us, again, of who we are in Christ and what do we do when we feel less than.

[00:17:39] Denisha: You know, one of the things that comes to my mind, Valerie, as you said that mm-hmm. , is um, Kurt Thompson talks a lot about knowing and being known. Mm-hmm. , how important it is for us to know other people, not know all the sequence on their mask Yeah. But know them and to allow ourselves. To be known. And Psalm 34, 5, I think [00:18:00] speaks to this a little bit as well.

[00:18:02] Denisha: Those who look to him are radiant. Their faces are never covered with shame. That's knowing God. Yeah. When we know who he is Yeah. It changes who we are. Yeah. Right. And so, um, I really like that, uh, their faces are never covered 

[00:18:17] Valeria: with shame. . Yeah. And then second Corinthians three 16 through 18 Danisha. This is actually what my ministry unveiled and free is, um, founded on, but whenever anyone turns to the Lord, The veil is taken away.

[00:18:33] Valeria: Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom and we all who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord's glory are being transformed into his image with. Ever increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the spirit. That's, that's where God in 2020 took me. He said, you know, valor, you've been hiding behind the mask of [00:19:00] ministry.

[00:19:00] Valeria: And I remember being like, what? What? I thought ministry was a good thing, but we sometimes can, can be so busy helping everybody else in order to protect ourselves from feeling, protect ourselves, from dealing with our own stuff, right? Our own stuff. God says, come to me. You are made in my image. In my image.

[00:19:21] Valeria: You have freedom. You have freedom. Take off the veil, take off the mask, and find freedom. And you know, that's what leads us to our second truth, right? We talked about knowing who God says you are. Well, secondly, we remember. That our sin is not our signature. I love that. Right? Right. You sign your name, right.

[00:19:41] Valeria: That when you sign your name on a document that that proves who you are. But so often, right, we let our sin and our shame define us. And again, in the cure. I love what it says. It says, if we see God through a veil of shame, we'll think the goal is to fix the behavior, right? Shame wants us to [00:20:00] constantly trying to prove we're not as bad as we imagine, but in the room of grace, however, we're learning to believe we are no longer identified.

[00:20:10] Valeria: By shame. Hear this today, you guys, our God doesn't see us that way. He doesn't need us. I love this. He doesn't need us to see ourselves that way. Romans eight, one, another one of my favorite verses. It says There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. We are free. We are free to trust God's delight and love.

[00:20:34] Valeria: even in the midst of our crazy, you know, trying to grow up in Christ, trying to mature right. He loves us. He knows that we're maturing. Um, even in the cure. I love the illustration. It talks about, um, a butterfly and how we know that caterpillars turn into butterflies and that what scientists have discovered.

[00:20:54] Valeria: Is that a a, the, the caterpillar? Yeah. The Caterpillar's DNA is [00:21:00] like the same as the butter. So like they've, they've seen that what you know when it's in the form of a caterpillar, it has a butterflies dna. N and I love that because that's such a picture of that God already knows who we are. He's waiting for us to know who we are.

[00:21:15] Valeria: We're maturing into who we already are. I love that. So Galatians two 20, another awesome scripture. I am crucified with Christ and it is no longer I who live. But it's Christ who lives in me. Talk about value right there and the life which I now live in, the flesh I live in. Faith, the faith of the son of God who loved me and gave himself up for me.

[00:21:44] Valeria: Again, this is one of my, probably my most favorite quotes from Cure. It says, the reality of the sin we're capable of tells us we are who our shame has declared us to be. And I'm kind of parenthetically putting in in grace. [00:22:00] Sin has no such power. I am Christ in me. Hear that you are Christ in you on your worst day, in your worst thought during your worst temptation.

[00:22:13] Valeria: So when you. Believe and receive Christ. You guys, you are clothed with Christ, like Christ is in you. You, it's like your I idea. You can say, hi Danisha. I'm Christ in me . You know? I mean, wouldn't that be amazing if we, we just live that truth, knowing that on our worst day, Christ hasn't left. He doesn't like, oh, sorry.

[00:22:33] Valeria: You messed up again. Like he is with you. His righteousness is within you. He has clothed you with righteousness, with grace and mercy. And that leads us to our third truth. What's our third truth? Danisha, we 

[00:22:47] Denisha: remember we are worth dying for. Oh 

[00:22:50] Valeria: yeah. we were worth dying for. I, I know that God says we're supposed to lay down our life for our friends, Danisha, but I don't know, like [00:23:00] I, I don't think there's anyone, anyone in this world, Eric, eat.

[00:23:04] Valeria: In the span of time that would maybe die for me, I don't know. But Christ died for me and I love it. In Romans five eight it says, God demonstrated his love for us. Or you could even say that God showed how valuable we were to him that while we were still sinners, you guys, while we were still in the muck, in the mess.

[00:23:25] Valeria: Christ died for us. And, and that's what I love about that scripture, is that it defines who we are by saying that we were worth dying for and that Christ. So I'm gonna go a little deeper here. Here's like a free Bible study right here, is that we can measure you guys, we can measure the value. Of our souls being released from the penalty of sin because of the shed blood of Jesus Christ.

[00:23:53] Valeria: His sacrifice life was the ransom paid for the wages of our sin. The [00:24:00]Bible says the wages of our sin is death, and here's our word, right, reclaimed story. We were reclaimed at his as his children. He paid the price, he reclaimed us. And so the value of a. That has been redeemed, can be measured by this. You guys can be measured by the richness of God's grace lavished on us because of his incomparable love for us.

[00:24:26] Valeria: So hear this encouragement when you are struggling with an identity crisis through the re, through the riches of redemption, our identity is. And secured when there are days, right, that you feel exposed and ashamed, just like Adam and Eve, right after the fall, they hid because they were ashamed through the riches of redemption.

[00:24:51] Valeria: You are clothed in the righteousness of Jesus Christ when the ugliness of sin. And of your [00:25:00] shame has left too many stains, right through the richest of redemption. We are washed clean. You are washed clean by the blood of the lamb, and when weighed down with guilt through the riches of redemption. Your guilt.

[00:25:15] Valeria: My guilt is gone. It's gone because of the extravagant gift of grace given to us in the name of God's beloved son. So I wanna go back quickly to our story of that woman of the well. Who was already feeling pretty depleted, pretty worthless. And here, Jesus asked her for a drink. And you guys gotta understand how significant that is because Jesus was a Jew.

[00:25:42] Valeria: He was a man, and she was a woman and a Samaritan. The Samaritans didn't get along with the Jews. And here, Jesus, ask her for a drink and, and this is what she does. And don't we do this? Danisha so often it's so easy to just de dismiss our value so quickly. She says, you are a [00:26:00] Jew. I'm a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?

[00:26:03] Valeria: And Jesus replied, if you knew the gift of God and who it is that asked you for a drink, you would've asked him and he would've given you living water. So Jesus is beginning to reveal. Who he is, right? We talked about who God is, changes how we see ourselves, but he's beginning to reveal to her who he is and who she is in his eyes.

[00:26:28] Valeria: He has something for her that will fully satisfy her thirsty soul and end her weary search for value. Here is a woman, right, Tanisha. Here's a woman who comes day after day, day after day to fill her water jar, right? And it's gonna be empty again. That's why they had to come day after day. They filled up their jar, they took it home, they came back.

[00:26:50] Valeria: But here is a woman who also. Has gone from man to man, husband to husband, desperately hoping to be valued and loved, [00:27:00] only to be left empty again. But here's why that I, what I love, she now encounters a man, hear this and maybe you can relate. She encounters a man, she encounters, um, a person now that who, who doesn't wanna take anything from her.

[00:27:17] Valeria: He wants to give her something. I. , but because the song of her life has told her she is worthless, she doesn't even recognize it's a different tune. It's a different tune. Jesus is inviting her to receive living water, the living water, salvation, the gift of eternal life, but it doesn't register with, it doesn't register with her.

[00:27:41] Valeria: She mistakenly thinks Jesus is talking about some kind of source of water that will forever quench her physical. and therefore save her from the public humiliation and cultural condemnation of her life choices. You know, I can relate to this Danisha Wright. I am, [00:28:00] and I've been talking to the ladies that I've been walking through the cure with about this.

[00:28:03] Valeria: It's like, I, I wear the mask of like, what's the next new thing, right? Mm-hmm. , what's the next new thing that can help me feel better, look better? You know, sometimes we do, we, we want that, almost like that. Salvation that will save us from the hard work, right? of doing what we need to do to be whole. And so that's what this lady, she's this woman, she's like, okay, what you're talking about a water that's everlasting?

[00:28:30] Valeria: Like I don't have to come out here and and, and be ridiculed. And be judged. Like, give me that, give me that, you know, sir, give me this water. So I won. Thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water. Right. We talked about weariness, right? She's weary. You guys, she's tired. She's tired of coming in the heat of the day to draw water at a time where she, she can hide, she can avoid the sneers and tears and the, of all of her condemners, right?

[00:28:59] Valeria: [00:29:00] I've been there. Tanisha, maybe you have two. I know some of you have been there. You know, we're feeling ashamed. We're we, we, we have sin that we need to deal with and honestly, we just don't wanna deal with it. And we wanna just bandaid it, patch it up instead of really deal with it. And we're, we're tired and she's weary.

[00:29:19] Valeria: But this is when Jesus gently exposes her spiritual emptiness that needs to be addressed. He says, go get your husband and come. and she says, I don't have a husband. And Jesus says, you're right. You've had five, and the man you're living with is not your husband. And she's like, okay, all right. Um, you've asked me for water and now you've told me everything I've ever done.

[00:29:43] Valeria: Okay, you're a prophet . She's like, you're a prophet. You, you know every detail in my life. But it's so beautiful and I encourage you guys to read the whole story in John chapter four, but God, Jesus starts to reveal who He. and he reveals to her that [00:30:00] he is the Messiah. And you know, Danisha, I've often said that I'm gonna write a Bible study all about this next verse because it's, it's so overlooked.

[00:30:08] Valeria: Sometimes we just read verses write. But in verse 28, I love this. It says, then leaving her water jar, she goes into the village, she goes into the town that she's been avoiding for years, right? and she leaves her water jar. She leaves the vessel that she has been trying to fill, you know, kind of again, metaphorically, that she's been trying to search for her value.

[00:30:36] Valeria: Fill it with relationships, man, after man, and here she meets the Messiah. The Messiah who has living water for her, the answer to her emptiness and she leaves her water jar. I love that. The Samaritan woman who first encountered Jesus filling void of value, she runs into town and and here she's all these people that she's been avoiding because of [00:31:00] shame.

[00:31:01] Valeria: She now tells them that she has met a man that knew her whole broken. And I get emotional about that because that's what Jesus does. He says, I don't need you to be put all together. I don't need you to be perfect. Like I know your whole broken story and I say that you are still valuable. That you are enough, that you are worth receiving the greatest gift that you will ever receive.

[00:31:31] Valeria: That's what drew me to Jesus, was that he knew everything I ever did and he still loves me. He still sees me, and this is what's so neat. Her thirst for worth, you guys was satisfied. Her value was now found in being fully known by Jesus. 

[00:31:53] Denisha: There's so much peace in that, that we can be fully known by him and that that's a [00:32:00] positive thing.

[00:32:01] Denisha: Yes. And sometimes when we're fully known by people, we've been let down. Yeah. We've been discouraged, we've been abandoned. . And so ladies, we want you to be encouraged with this truth today. You are valued. No matter what you've done or has been done to you, you are valued that God delights in you. Shame no longer needs to be your signature.

[00:32:25] Denisha: Mm-hmm , you are beloved. You are worth dying for. And you are still worthy today. Even when we mess. So may you drink from the well that will never run dry, that your thirsty soul can be satisfied by Jesus, the living water. Thanks for joining us today, and we'll see you next week as we talk about who we are because he is love.

[00:32:54] Denisha: Thanks for listening. I pray you found hope in today's conversation and maybe [00:33:00] even feel a little less alone in your story. Stay connected with us on Facebook and Instagram at Reclaimed Story. Wanna learn more about living a reclaimed life and how you can be a part of our growing community of reclaimers?

[00:33:13] Denisha: Check out our website at reclaimed story dot. All of those links and more will be in the show notes. And if you enjoy this inspirational podcast, be sure to subscribe, rate and review. Not only will you be the first one to know when new content comes out, but it is also a huge help in helping us reach more people to live the reclaimed life.[00:34:00]