Where is God in Crisis?

Where is God in crisis? In this episode Gina has a conversation with her friend Nancy Joy Dozier. From Nancy’s upbringing as a pastor’s kid and her husband’s battle with a life threatening illness to the power of God’s word and the power of our words, Gina & Nancy cover a lot of ground. You will be encouraged, challenged and inspired!

Nancy Joy Dozier is a certified life coach, author, speaker, personal pastor, and mentor.

Meet Nancy Dozier

Gina:

Nancy Joy, you’re here! I’m so excited! It’s been a long time coming. You and I actually met on Instagram, which is the most cheesy thing ever.

Nancy:

But shout out to Instagram though.

Gina:

Right? My husband’s a bass player. Your husband’s a musician as well. Your husband was following my husband and then you stumbled on my podcast and then you guys started listening. You reached out and then we connected. The rest is history! But it’s been such a joy getting to know you. We got to talk on the phone and it felt like you were a friend from high school, and that we’d known each other for a super long time.

We’ve only seen each other once in person, in Nashville. You were so kind and so generous to drive from Georgia to Nashville when I was out there, back in May. You invited me for your “I’m a Miracle Conference” that was online. I was very honored to do a couple of Dwell sessions for your conference. Dwell is the guided Scripture meditation project that I have, and you asked me to do a couple of those. So I did that, and then you were so sweet and sent me a copy of your book.

I have to say that, that season in my life was just insane. The whole world is dealing with a pandemic, so everybody’s world was insane, but on top of that, my dad’s journey with Alzheimer’s had accelerated the few years before that and he was placed in memory care. My stepmom was losing her eyesight and going blind, living by herself an hour away. My step-brother lived on Maui, so he wasn’t able to do much. I’m trying to take care of my stepmom long distance, plus take care of my kids in our family and things that are going on here, and really taking way too much on.

I was also doing ministry and the different work that I did. When I was flying to Nashville, I was as close to burnout as I think a person could be. I had your book on the plane with me. I have to tell you, it was such a cup of cool water for me. It was such a sweet affirmation, and encouragement. It was a huge nudge of “Lean in, trust what God’s doing” and it was just such a gift.

First of all, thank you for that. I know I told you that in person, but I want to say it publicly. Thank you for that. And it’s funny because we didn’t know each other, and I’ll be super real, so the title of your book is “Decree a Thing, Creating Your World With Your Words.” And at first I was a little like, “Oh, is this going to be a little prosperity gospel? Like name it and claim it?”

But you were super sweet, and we had a great conversation, and we were bonding, but I was like, “huh, I’m curious what this will be about.” But I want to just say you are a gifted writer. It’s very simple, but profound, Biblical, encouraging, but challenging. It’s just a gift. Thank you so much.

Nancy:

It’s such an honor. Thank you. That means a lot.

Gina:

We could talk about a lot of things. First of all, just share a little bit about yourself, who you are what you do. Then, I’ve written all over the book. There’s a couple of things in here I would love to touch on. I would love for people to hear a bit of your story, your journey with your husband’s health and how God healed him.

Nancy:

Let me just say, you are an absolute joy. I call you my sweet friend. I’ve just enjoyed getting to know you and meeting you. It’s so funny, you were telling the story about how my husband was following your husband on Instagram, then found you, and then I found you. What’s so funny was, whenever you and I had our first initial phone call and we had the best time I immediately called my husband, “I spoke to Gina today. And it was just the best conversation. We were laughing and connecting.”

And there’s utter silence from him. I said, “Hello? Hello?Hello?” My husband is the musician type. It’s the type that has a vibe. He’s like completely quiet. I kept asking, “Eric, Eric, what is it?” He goes, “She was my friend first.” My husband is a little bit in his feelings, because you and Norm were his friends first and I somehow stole y’all from him. We’re just believing God for inner-healing for him and he’ll be good. It’s been such a beautiful experience.

What drew me to you was listening to your podcast and listening to some of your Dwell guided prayers. I thought to myself “Where was she, when the whole world imploded on itself with this whole pandemic?” At the beginning, I felt like I needed you and I didn’t even know I needed you until I heard your voice. I looked at my husband and told him that there is something resting on your voice and it’s the Peace of God.

There’s just this anointing. I was like, “I need her, I need her.” I just kept listening. I would just listen and listen and it was feeding my spirit. Because there was so much chaos. Even when you are grounded in the Lord and you got this vibrant relationship with God, it doesn’t make you impervious to feeling, or the reality of what’s happening around you. You’re not impervious to that pressure, the mental pressure, the emotional pressure of the whole pandemic and the whole world going crazy.

There’s so much collective trauma. You’re trying so hard to stay anchored in the Word and to remind yourself of what God has spoken. I felt like finding you was just such an on time, blessing. I’m grateful to be here with you today.

A little bit about myself. Originally my dad is from Haiti. My mom is from the Congo, which is actually where I was born. For those who don’t know, Africa is a continent, not a country. Congo is literally like the entire central Africa. It takes up the whole middle. It’s rather large, beautiful people, incredible worshipers, amazing music. A heritage of prayer and worship. That’s at my core, that’s who I am. I love to worship God. I love to pray. I love to wait on the Lord. That’s really who I am. I grew up in Boston, Massachusetts, and had a great childhood in ministry with my parents. Did all kinds of great things, YWAM, mission trips, church camp. The church girl life.

A Call to Ministry in Crisis

Nancy:

But God really began to get ahold of my heart, as I went into my teens. The Bible talks about us having these treasures and earth and vessels. He began to introduce me to the treasures that he had hidden in my heart. I really started a journey of pursuing Him. Pursuing His presence, pursuing Him in this secret place really became the anchor of my journey. God began to allow me to begin to discover the prophetic gifts, the gifts of healing, miracles, signs and wonders, gift of even speaking and preaching.

All of this that He had placed on the inside of me, I wasn’t looking for it for lack of a better term. I wasn’t looking to be prophetic. I wasn’t looking to even be a leader, to be viewed as a leader. Or have people begin to say, “Hey, what are you doing? Are you having a Bible study?” All this crazy stuff just began to happen. Even in college, on 9/11, God wrecked my life in the best possible way. There was so much chaos happening all around us. Those of you guys that can remember that day, there was this blanket of despair.

You could feel it in the atmosphere no matter where you were. It was as if our whole world was torn apart. That was the very first day of school that semester. We’re in an eight o’clock class when we started hearing announcements that everyone was being called to one of the main buildings on campus. I went to Berkeley College of Music. We’re all sitting there going, “This is a prank. Whoever is doing this. They’re getting sent home. This is a terrible prank.” But it wasn’t. It just kept going and we realized that something’s happening.

We walk out of the building that we were in and there’s FBI, bomb squad, Boston police, like every kind of agency you could possibly think of in our streets. They’re telling us to crawl. We’re crawling across the street to get back to this main building. What we didn’t realize and didn’t know at the time, the bombers who blew the buildings up actually had stayed the night before in the hotel that’s connected to our campus. It’s right behind our campus. We didn’t know that, we were just told to get across the street, get safe. We’re crawling across in the city. But that day changed my life because we didn’t know if we were about to get blown up next. We didn’t know what was going on.

I remember my heart began to pound, because I’d come to this place, Gina, where I was saying, “God, I don’t want to be a ministry. I don’t want to live that life. I’ve seen my parents. This is 3, 4 generations in, at this point. Let me just go be a lawyer. I’m going to be amazing. I’ll still serve at some children’s church somewhere, it’s gonna be great.” But I didn’t have a desire. I didn’t want to lead people. I didn’t want to do any of that.

I thought I was going to get my little degree and keep it moving. And that day I’ve never felt my heartbeat like that. And it was this feeling, “Open your mouth now and tell them about Jesus.” It was this feeling that I could not shake. And before I knew it, I’m on a table in this main room and I’m screaming at the top of my lungs, I’m crying and telling students or whoever else was in there, “I don’t know what’s about to happen guys, but eternity is real and you need to know Jesus and you need to know that He loves you. You need to know that He has a plan for your life. This does not have to be the end of your story.”

It was almost like an outer-body experience. From that moment, God launched my life into what I’m experiencing and what I’m living. We saw hundreds of kids come to the Lord, hundreds of students that day. Over 300 students came to the Lord that day. Within a week, we had baptized probably about 500 students in bathtubs, our campus didn’t have a pool. We were in dorm rooms, just dunking. They’re getting filled with the Holy Spirit, getting healed from trauma, getting healed from emotional baggage.

Then we started hosting these meetings and sometimes we would have 700 students that would show up. God launched my life into this whole trajectory that was not my idea. I really wanted to work on my singing, mind my business and go to grad school, but He had other plans. My journey has been one about surrendering to God ideas because mine never seemed to be His.

It just never seems to be the same, what I want to do and what He wants to do in me and through me. It’s really been about surrendering to Jesus. My husband and I got married and moved to Atlanta where we’ve been now.

Gina:

You just alluded to, you’re a pastor’s kid, fourth generation ministry, which in and of itself brings so much expectation and weight and burden. In your book, you share a little bit about that. That fear of, “Am I going to say the wrong thing? Am I going to do the wrong thing? I need to look a certain way. I need to dress a certain way. I need to act a certain way.”

There’s that reality where you know Jesus, but your identity and everything is within proximity of your place in this orbit. That time in high school, when the Lord started speaking to you, “You are My girl!” Not just you’re their daughter or you’re a pastor’s kid, but that journey of discovery. Then that seminal moment on 9/11, when the Lord’s then calling you out. Not calling you to be the preacher’s daughter that now is going to carry the torch. But, “You are My girl who I’ve gifted, who I’ve called. Now, stand up and open your mouth.”

There’s just something very sweet and powerful about that journey. It’s significant that you were able to respond to the Lord in that. Sometimes those expectations and those weights and those burdens can really drive you away. I would love it if you want to unpack that a little bit. The other thing I love is that you were saying that you didn’t have aspirations to be a pastor, to be a leader.

There’s a lot of times that I can decide what I want to be and strive and manipulate to try to position myself. But there’s something about being in that place of God calling you up and God calling you out and then it’s up to you to say yes.

Nancy:

It’s an interesting journey growing up as a kingdom kid, a PK or, pastor’s kid, a preacher’s kid. The pressure is insane. When you’re a girl, because I think the boys kind of get away with stuff, but when you’re a girl, “What is she wearing?” There’s all of this criticism. People don’t realize how that impacts this kid who’s no different than any other child.

They’re going through the same stuff that your child is going through. And yet we place this extra like layer of burden on those PKs. A point of difference was in my parents. I could name drop all kinds of big time ministers and their kids and their families. And I know their kids and I knew what was going on in their homes. For us to be years down the line and to see some of those families, some of their kids. The choices that they made to walk away from Jesus, to walk away from the house of God, to walk away from calling and ministry and assignment.

And just be like, “I don’t want to have anything to do with it at all. I’m going to run as far away as I possibly can from all of this and live a life that is as opposite to this as possible.” But I think for me, what really made a significant difference in my journey with the Lord and understanding God as Father and understanding the importance of being authentic in your relationship with God, whether you are in a building, whether you’re in a pulpit, whether you’re at Walmart, whether you’re at Starbucks. I saw my parents demonstrate that.

Nobody’s perfect. They’re not perfect, but they created this environment where, who they were at my recital, at the theater production of “Midsummer Night’s Dream”, which by the way, I had a solo. Who they were sitting in that auditorium or who they were in our backyard or who they were on a random Tuesday night at home, is who they were in the pulpit on the Sunday. I didn’t see a variance. I didn’t see a difference.

What they would preach and tell people was what we were being told. But even more, it was what they were modeling. It’s what I saw. That marked my life in a way that was indelible. To this day, I carry that with me. That really kept me from going off the deep end. And unfortunately, there are so many other young people who grew up like I did, who didn’t have that balance, that sameness at home and in front of people.

They were taught to put on a show in front of people. You get tired of that. You get tired of pretending to be something that you’re not. Here’s the thing, whatever God anoints is never your representative. God will never anoint your representative. He will only anoint your true self. That’s why David was like, “I’m not about to put this armor on, this is not who I am. The anointing is not going to come on me pretending to be Saul. It comes on me being David.” There’s so much power in authenticity that makes the difference in how we raise our families.