S3 | Ep.10 Reflection Episode: Tracing Jessica DeYoung's Memorial Stones

In this reflection episode, Brenda unpacks three memorial stones from her conversation with speaker and founder of Made Whole, Jessica DeYoung — the deafening quiet of a wilderness season where God seemed silent, the profound grace of receiving forgiveness and walking in true freedom, and the fruit that comes from choosing obedience even after delay — then offers encouragement to help you recognize where God has shown up in your own story.

Listen to the episode Brenda is reflecting on here.

About Jessica DeYoung Jessica DeYoung is a Christian speaker and founder of Made Whole, helping women grow in faith and walk with God in real life. She shares honest stories and practical encouragement that move listeners from inspiration into action.

Connect with Jessica: Website | Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | YouTube | TikTok | Pinterest | LinkedIn

Jessica also shares the fuller story of her testimony on the Just Talkin' About Jesus podcast — listen here.

Chapters
01:20 Reflecting on Jessica DeYoung's Story
01:58 The Wilderness Season of Silence
05:39 Testimony of Grace and Forgiveness
09:36 The Call to Obedience
12:23 The Importance of Obedience and Love
13:30 The Value of Reflection in Our Journey

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome to Remember God, a podcast where we practice remembering God in the midst of trials. Hi, I'm Brenda, and I help followers of Jesus recall God's miracles to successfully navigate current challenges. Welcome to Remember God, a podcast where we practice remembering God in the midst of trials. If you're a follower of Jesus who's in a difficult season, finds yourself wanting to take control of the situation, instead of trusting God, this is the place for you. This is where we will help you remember the places where God has shown up in the past, giving you the tools and strength to navigate through today's challenges. I'm Brenda Savannu, author of Memorial Stones, Writer Coach, and your companion on the journey of remembering what God has done. Friends, today I am reflecting on the conversation I had with Jessica DeYoung. If you haven't had a chance to listen to that episode yet, I'd encourage you to go and listen to it. It was really moving. There was just something in her story about her honesty, her vulnerability. And she was just really open about sharing the things that she has gone through. So today I want to go back to that episode and just trace Jessica's memorial stones, trace the places where God has shown up in her life. Jessica is a podcaster, a new friend of mine, and runs a ministry. And so if you'd like to connect with her, make sure you check out my show notes so that you can connect with her. She's also always open to receiving guests on her podcast. So if that's something you would like to do as well, make sure you connect with Jessica. Right. So today, like I said, I would like to trace Jessica's memorial stones. The first one I'd like to trace is what she described as the quiet season she went through, the wilderness season. She literally said that she wasn't hearing from God. And she said she closed her eyes, and what came to mind was Jesus on the cross crying out, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And that she felt that way. She felt forsaken by God because she was going through the season where she wasn't hearing anything from him. She continued to do what she knew to do, which was opening her Bible. She was praying. She was continuing to teach and minister to other women. She was consistent, but all she heard was a deafening silence. She even shared that as she opened the Bible to read, they weren't even words anymore on her Bible pages, but just letters on a page. And she just wasn't getting anything from it. But she did continue to keep going back. She kept going back. She kept crying out to God. She kept showing up, right? Even though she wasn't, she couldn't hear him. And it had been quite some time of that happening, but she just kept going back. That season that God had gone quiet in Jessica's life reminded me of Memorial Stone 2 in my book Simeon. He has heard that I am unloved. The reason Jessica's season reminded me of that isn't that God didn't love her, but it's that she felt abandoned by God. She felt forsaken. She felt like she was all alone. And she kept going back and crying out. And very similar to Leah, when she conceived and birthed Simeon, Leah was in this deep place of longing, and she wanted to be loved by her husband. And she wanted to be known as someone who is loved. And instead she felt forgotten. But having Simeon, she felt that oh, God has heard my prayers, he's heard my cries that I am unloved. So now he has given me the son. And it's similar to what Jessica experienced in that season, where she felt like God had just gone quiet, not felt like she just wasn't hearing anything from him. She even said she asked for friends to pray for her and they weren't getting anything either. I mean, they prayed for her, but they weren't hearing anything specific for her. But what she learned coming out of that season, and when God did eventually speak to her, he was showing her that there are other women who also go through the same thing where they're not hearing from him, where they feel forsaken by him. And he wanted her to know that so that she can share her experience with other women, so that those other women wouldn't feel alone and wouldn't feel like this thing is only happening to them. But it has happened to some of his other daughters, where they experience this nothingness, numbness, emptiness. But they would have a place to go to share because Jessica has also shared her story. And so that was pretty powerful. And I went through a similar season, so I could completely resonate where I just wasn't hearing anything and I didn't know what else to do other than just continue to cry out to God. The second memorial stone I want to trace in Jessica's life is the one she shared about the testimony of grace from the Lord. Jessica shared that in college. She went through a great deal of trauma. And one of the decisions she made was to have an abortion. And sometime later, she asked God to forgive her. And she continued to ask him over and over and over again: God forgive me, God forgive me, God forgive me, God forgive me. And she said, then one day while she was lying on her bed, God said, I don't know what you're talking about. You are forgiven. And so this shame had been put on her, even though she had already asked for forgiveness and God had already granted her forgiveness. The enemy was still piling shame on her, where she thought she wasn't forgiven and she thought she had to continue to beg for forgiveness from the Lord. But he had already thrown that sin into the sea of forgetfulness. And I think that's indicative of a lot of our lives when we do something that brings up shame in us and God has forgiven, we've asked for forgiveness, we've repented of it, God has forgiven us, but we continue to think that no, he's still, I still need to ask for forgiveness. I still haven't been cleansed of this, forgetting that Jesus died for us and cleansed all of our sins. If we come to that true place of repentance and asking for forgiveness, that thing is gone. That sin has been thrown into the sea of forgetfulness. And that reminded me of Memorial Stone One in my book, Reuben. Um, he has seen my affliction because Leah in that story was deeply wounded. She wasn't seen, right? Jacob loved her sister, but he didn't love her. And so she was just so afflicted. And never mind that, right, her father put her in this position to marry this guy who didn't love her. So I can't imagine all of the things that Leah was going through. And so Jessica carrying the weight of this thing that she did, she was she was wise enough to come to God and in his mercy and in his gentleness, he forgave her. He said, I see your affliction and I'm removing your guilt and I am forgiving you. And so she ended up turning that freedom into ministry. And she's built her work on helping women move from fear of outcomes to choosing obedience. And that's an amazing thing. Jessica didn't share the full story of the abortion that she had, and it sounds weird to say, but the fruit that came from it, because God turns everything together for the good of those that love him and are called according to his purpose. So if you would like to hear that story, the fullness of that story, she actually shares it on my friend Jan's podcast, just talking about Jesus. Um, she shares what happened there and the fruit of that situation. And so I would encourage you to listen to it. I am going to also link that in the show notes. So the third Memorial Stone that I traced with Jessica, uh, it was a little bit funny because I also recognize myself in this, and I'm sure a lot of us do too. Um Jessica was talking about starting her podcast, that God had asked her to start this podcast, and she kept saying no. She was she would say, No, but Lord, um I can do this instead. And he would say, No, I want you to do the podcast. And she would say, No, but I won't do this instead. So she was just talking about obedience, that it's so important for us to be obedient to the Lord. And she shared a story of a woman who was given a word for another woman, but she delayed in sharing that word. And by the time she gave it to the woman that God had pointed out to her, that situation had already passed. And it was hard. That woman didn't understand why she was being given that word at that time. Uh so Jessica was sharing her experience of being disobedient and delaying obedience, which really is disobedience. I'm sure all of us can relate to that, right? Where we're told to do something by the Lord, and then we're like, no, I don't want to do that. What if I do this instead? And one of my friends uh says quite often, we're always seeking the Lord for new instruction, but we haven't done the last thing that he's told us to do. And so perhaps we need to do the last thing he told us to do before we go seeking him for something else. When Jessica finally was obedient about starting her podcast, things came together. And now she's over 58 episodes into her podcast. She is planning a retreat that's coming up. She's gathering a community of women to learn that God is there with them in the wilderness, that God is there with them, even when he's quiet and silent and they're not hearing from him. And so it's just amazing the work that Jessica is doing. This experience that she shared reminded me of Memorial Stone 3 in my book, Judah I Will Praise, because even in her disobedience and then eventually obeying, what the Lord is doing with Jessica is cause for praise because she's speaking encouragement into other women's lives and she's shoring up the areas where other women are discouraged and just having a difficult time in life. And so I absolutely love that for Jessica. And so, friends, the moral of the story is if God's asking you to do something, do it. But even if you do disobey, you know, repent, ask for forgiveness, um, and then go ahead and do the thing anyway, because we never know what he's going to do out of that thing that he's asking us to do. But it shouldn't also be because of what he might do out of that situation. We really should just obey God out of the overflow of love from our hearts because he loved us first. So if we're able to receive his love, then we can pour out our love to him and our obedience to him can come from a place of love, which is more powerful than anything else. Friends, thank you so much for spending time with me again as I reflected on Jessica's episode. If you're in a quiet season right now, I just encourage you reach out to Jessica. You can reach out to me as well if you'd like me to pray with you. Just know that there are others with you in this place, and there are others with you who have gone through exactly what you're currently going through. So you are absolutely not alone. You know, the other thing I wanted to say was you might be wondering, why on earth does Brenda do these reflection episodes? I like to go back and look and ponder about things. And so as I'm looking at these interviews that I've done and each reflection episode I'm doing, I'm reflecting on what the guest has shared. I'm reflecting on the places where God has shown up, and I'm reflecting on what God is doing. And I think that's so important for us as we move through life to continuously reflect and to just slow down and take a moment to think about what happened in this place, why did it happen? What can I learn from this? And how does it apply to what I'm going through today? So I hope that speaks to you as well. Thanks again for joining me on today's episode of Remember God. And if this episode has spoken to you, blessed you, I would love for you to share it with a friend who needs to hear it. And if you haven't picked up my book, make sure you click in the show notes and pick up a copy of my book. Until next time, friends, let us keep remembering where God has shown up.

SPEAKER_01 14:58

At a certain point, it became completely clear to me, so really very clear that I was blaming him, and that as long as I'm taking offense in him, as also Jesus is saying, uh, blessed is the one who is not taking offense in me, because many people actually took offense in him, including believers. As long as I'm taking offense in him, because I don't understand his ways, because all come from this, I'm not understanding what's happening. That uh I will not have a progress in my healing, that I will not have um I will not be able to move forward in my grief journey.

SPEAKER_00 15:36

If this episode resonated with you, there are two things I'd like you to consider. Number one, rate and review the show. This will help other listeners find the show and get the same inspiration and encouragement you got from it. And number two, I would love for you to share this episode with someone you love and someone you think could benefit from hearing this particular episode. Also, if you would like to connect with me outside of this podcast, you can find everything related to me on my website, brendasavanu.com. There you can find my social media links if you'd like to follow. You can find a link to sign up for an email so that you can get weekly encouragement to your inbox, and you can find information about my book and coaching sessions. So, friends, thank you again so much for listening to this episode and thank you for considering sharing it with your friends. See you next time.