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Hello, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Christ with Coffee on Ice. I am your host, Allie Yost, and I am feeling so grateful and excited to be here with you guys. I'm excited for this word today, y'all. I am excited for this word because...
First and foremost, wait a minute, before we get into anything, I hope that you guys are having a great Friday. Happy Friday, TGIF. Do people say that anymore? I don't know. That was something we said a lot in like middle school and high school. I don't think that's a thing anymore. Kind of like hags, like have a great summer.
Anyway, we have our iced coffee here today. Pumpkin spice per usual. Actually, it's just like my normal... Okay, so this is what I've been doing. I've been going back and forth between getting like the actual like flavored ready-to-go coffee Starbucks that you can get from Target or wherever else. And then just getting like your regular like cold brew, but then putting a pumpkin creamer in it. I don't really know which one I prefer better. I think I like the creamer method better actually.
That is what we did today. But anyway, we have our iced coffee. We got our Christ and we got our coffee on ice today, y'all. But anyway, feeling very grateful and excited for this word today because this is a big word. This is a word that came and smacked me in the face while I was doing my hair and makeup today. And it's funny because so I have been curating as God pops little messages into my brain or things just come to me.
from the Holy Spirit, I will make sure to write down like keywords of whatever that is, right? So I'm like, ooh, that's a good topic for a podcast episode for Christ with Coffee on Ice, you know? So I do have a list of topics and things that I would like to cover here on the podcast, right? This one was not one that was even, it didn't even make it to the list. I was so excited to start talking about this. I was like, no, no, no, we're just going to sit down and we're just going to like dissect this because this is
Such an incredible word that I think a lot of us, if not all of us, can relate to. So I want to talk about identity and what defines our identity in life. Oh, this is so good. This is so good. Because I think a lot of us can find, you know, our identity in things that truly do not have the right meaning.
To give us identity. Because too many times in life, I feel like we fall into this lie that the enemy tells us that we are supposed to be finding identity in anything else other than God.
So I got on Instagram and TikTok today, and I did talk about this for a minute, but I was like, this can go so much further. We need a whole episode about this. I'm going to read you the exact word that God gave me as I was standing in front of my mirror doing my hair and makeup. I was just trying to curl my hair and put my lip gloss on, and it just smacked me in the face. It was so good. I had to write it down and immediately put my phone up and record this because it was just...
You know how the Holy Spirit just be giving you words, the Holy Spirit be giving you words. And I'm going to say one thing too, is like with starting this podcast, I feel like I still kind of put this pressure on myself where I'm like, Oh God, how am I going to get the words? Like, how am I going to think of another thing to talk about? You know? And I even look at other people who, you know, get online and do some type of ministry or, um,
Even certain pastors that I like really look up to and I'm like, they've been doing it for years. And a part of me goes, how in the world do they still find things to talk about? And it is God. It is all God. Like for me to think that I'm supposed to sit here and find all the words myself because I don't like, I don't have to find them myself. Even today's message alone is an example of how I didn't have to do a thing other than listen to him.
So in case you guys missed the post that I made on Instagram or you don't follow me, whatever, I'm not offended. So this is what the Holy Spirit said to me while I was curling my hair. Okay.
Have you ever had somebody tell you who your God is or what your walk of faith is or looks like? They'll tell you that it's either not real, it's fake, your relationship isn't good enough with God, you're not close enough to him, okay, right? There's so many different ways that it could be said. But they try to tell you who your God is or what your walk of faith is. That is like someone trying to tell you where you come from or what your ethnicity is or what your lineage is.
I know my identity because I know I'm a child of God and I know my story because I have seen him and I have heard him in my life. Nobody has the right to tell you where your identity lies. And if your identity is in God, you better believe that that is the truth. Not what other people say you are. God is your definer and provider of identity, not people.
Another thing that spoke to me after I already posted it was who is someone else to tell you what runs through your veins other than God himself?
No one has the right. And I loved this because to me, I do find all of my identity is in God. And he is the only thing that will ever tell me who I am. He is the only opinion. He is the only provider in my identity because the blood that runs through my veins is Jesus Christ. The blood that runs through my veins is God. The blood that runs through my veins is the Holy Spirit. The blood that runs through my veins is the kingdom. Who are you?
Who are you to tell me what kind of blood type I got? You're not about to tell me that I'm the blood type
A.B. when I got the blood type O. I actually don't even know my blood type, but you know what I mean? Do you get what I'm saying? Somebody telling you what your ethnicity is. You're looking yourself in the mirror and you know exactly what you are and somebody's trying to tell you where your family's come from, what your ethnicity is, your lineage. Nobody has the right to tell you where you come from. Nobody has the right to tell you who you are. Nobody has the right to tell you what runs through your veins other than God.
I could end the episode right there. I literally was blown away this morning. And what really sparked this conversation in my head, I think, was because I have had people commenting on my social media saying, "Oh honey, you know, this whole Jesus thing is, I'm really happy for you, but have you ever tried this?"
Have you ever tried believing in a goddess? Have you ever tried to believe in this or that or the next? Or even more drastic, they'll just tell me that God isn't real or they'll tell me that Jesus isn't real or they will tell me that I am worshiping my sky daddy that isn't a real thing, okay? People in my comment section telling me what I am and who my God is...
And so I think that is where this kind of sparked this conversation in my head, because it really is like trying to tell somebody else where they come from.
Especially when it's like a total stranger online that you don't know personally. Actually, even if somebody did know me personally and they tried to tell me who my God was, I'd say, I don't know who you're talking about. I know exactly who my God is because I have seen the miracles that he's made in my life. I have seen the way that he has absolutely transformed my heart, me and my life.
know what you're seeing, but I know what I'm seeing, and I'm gonna stick to that. I'm sticking to the guns of God. That's what I'm sticking to. My guns are with my God. Is that too violent? God would never condone that, but you get what I'm saying, okay? I'm sticking to my guns. I'm sticking to my roots. I'm sticking to my grounds. That's probably a lot better and less violent.
But you know what I mean? Don't let anybody question you and your purpose and your identity. Don't let anybody question that. So that's just one example, right, of how people can try to tell you what your identity is or where you should get your identity from. But the more I sat with this topic, the more that I realized that this can really go so much further.
I have my little notepad out. And granted, we are not necessarily breaking down scripture, but I have scripture to back up what we're talking about today. So one piece of scripture I want to read right now is 1 Corinthians 12, 27, which reads, All of you together are Christ's body, and each of you is a part of it.
This is very short and sweet, and I love it because it tells us that all of us have such a clear identity in God, a clear path, and a clear purpose. Not only just for ourselves, actually, but for other people. We all together are Christ's body, and each of you is a part of it. We are all a part of a greater plan, and we hold so much purpose in God that
To the point where our minds probably can't even wrap around how each and every one of us intertwine so purposefully that all of you together are Christ's body and each of you is a part of it. So obviously we've just covered the topic of people trying to tell you who your God is, who
who Jesus is, what your faith looks like, okay? There are definitely a lot of other aspects in our life that people try to tell us who we are or things that we can allow to define us like other people. Too many times in our lives do we not only look for identity through other people, we look for validation from other people, we look for approval from other people, and I think that it just comes naturally to us as humans
as wanting to make sure that everyone else is comfortable with who we are.
A lot of us like to say that that is a people-pleasing mentality, which it can be, but it's hard to not let other people's opinions of us affect us. Unless you have the thickest skin on planet Earth, you cannot tell me that there wasn't at least one moment in your life where you allowed somebody's opinion to kind of get to you and get under your skin and affect you in your day and maybe possibly even alter the way that you see yourself.
From a young age, we were always told who we were. This is something we have been told since we were little children in school. Personally, I'll just talk from my own experiences. From a very young age, we are told by adults everywhere who we're supposed to be, what our future is going to look like, what we are capable of, like our limits, etc.
to the maximum success we will have based on our grades or our performance in school, we are told who we're going to be and what our life will look like from a very young age.
and what our potential is. Literally. I mean, teachers would tell us what our potential is. And most times it was very positive, obviously, where, you know, teachers are there to encourage kids and tell them that the possibilities are endless. And, you know, you have all the potential in the world as long as you, you know, apply yourself. But,
You weren't always lucky like that. Like there were definitely some adults growing up and teachers growing up that were not as encouraging. And now looking back on this, that all seems so limiting. Like allowing people to tell you what your potential is from such a young age, asking them to basically be psychics.
of what your life is going to look like based on who you are in that moment at the age of what, like 15? That's insane to me. That's crazy to me because I don't even think a version of me last year could have predicted who I was going to be this year. So how in the world is somebody 50
15 years ago going to tell me who I'm going to be when I'm an adult. Bless. But we'll move on. The other thing, too, is when you're a kid, like you look at adults like they don't do anything wrong and they can't make mistakes and that they know everything. So when you hear these things from adults, you're like, yeah, they're probably right. Yeah.
My potential is pretty limited, isn't it? They think I'm only going to get to this type of level in life. I'm giving, okay, let me give you an example. So I don't remember what age we were at. We couldn't have even been in high school yet. We were like in middle school, like end of middle school, getting into high school. This is when they're trying to tell you like, you got to start planning on knowing what you want to be when you're older. And you got to start knowing what you want to major in college. And I'm like, I'm in the eighth grade or even honestly ninth grade. I'm like, I am a freshman in high school right now. I don't even know what I'm going to eat for breakfast tomorrow.
To think that we were brainwashed to believe that we were supposed to know what we were going to be for the rest of our lives at the age of like 14 is beyond me. But when you're at that age, obviously we're very influenced. We don't have many opinions yet. We're very underdeveloped. We're just little beans, okay? But you look at adults like they can't do anything wrong. Like you look at them and you're like, you guys know everything. Like you're much older than me.
And, you know, you can't make mistakes. You guys know everything, right? So you have these types of people telling you who you're going to be when you grow up. But now that I am an adult, I do see the world for what it is. And I
I see it a bit clearer now knowing for a fact that adults are just as imperfect as the rest, you know, like now that I've grown to become an adult myself, I'm sure there's a lot of little kids that look at me like I know everything and I'm like this big old person. They probably think I'm like 43 years old. You would look at like a high school senior and you'd be like, wow, you've got to be like 28. And it's like, it's still a kid, you know what I mean? But anyway, now that I am an adult,
I see how imperfect and flawful, not falafel, flawful, full of flaws we are as adults, okay? We don't ever grow out of that. So an example, I almost got to it and then I got sidetracked, but an example is we took this test, right? Where if we didn't know what we wanted to be when we grew up, it was a questionnaire. I can't remember how long it was. It was quite long. I feel like there had to have been like 40 questions, right?
We took it on the computer and it was basically like a yes or no situation. And they were giving us all sorts of questions. And at the end of the test, it would tell you what you will most likely be when you grow up. So it could have been a doctor. You could be a firefighter. You could be a teacher. You could be a paramedic, whatever. OK, you could be a vet.
So one of the honest to God results, I don't know if I can't even remember what I got y'all. I wouldn't be surprised if this was my result. Honest to God, one of the results was a bus driver. You are going to tell a child that all they could ever live up to be in life is a bus driver. Now I am saying this with the most love in my heart. There is nothing wrong with being a bus driver.
There is nothing wrong. Actually, I have to say some of my bus drivers growing up in school were one of the most impactful people in my childhood. We have bus drivers that we are still in touch with. My family and I, especially my mom, are still in touch with to this day because of how great they were. I'm not saying that being a bus driver is not impactful or like you can't do good with a career like that.
But imagine a child at the age of 13 or 14 being told that whatever dreams they may have had in their mind, maybe they did want to become a brain surgeon. But because of the way that those test results came and they were told that they were only good for driving a bus, imagine how...
how defeating that could kind of feel a little bit. Again, I'm not saying one is better than the other, but I just can't believe that as young children, we were told who we were going to be for the rest of our lives. And you're teaching children to decide who they're going to be for the rest of their life, which in my opinion, I didn't mean to make this a big thing, but it's very culture of us because God is constantly navigating us through our lives and
and showing us the people that we're going to be probably till the end of our lives. You have parents, teachers, peers, friends who are telling you who you're going to be. And especially when you don't have the knowledge of God, you don't have his wisdom, you don't know his word,
If you don't know any better, you will let other people identify you and tell you your worth and tell you all you're good for. The important thing about staying in the word of God is
is that he reminds us so many times that the only person who can define us, our strength, our fate, our future, our impact is him. And when the Bible says that we are capable with all things as long as we do it with God, that is the biggest truth we could ever take in our everyday lives.
If you have things that you want to achieve in life, or let's say if you have even gone a majority of your life without achieving the things that you always wondered about or wanted to do with your life, it still isn't too late. You can achieve literally anything with the strength of God. One of the coolest POVs that I've ever adopted into like my mentality is that when
We all talk about how our God is like supernatural, okay? He is so powerful, so capable. He can achieve anything. Like I say, our brains cannot even comprehend the things that God is capable of. Like the fact that he knows every little hair on your head. He knows exactly how many hairs...
are on your head and my head and your neighbor's head. His wisdom, his knowledge, his capability is so far past our understanding. So we understand that, right? Let's take it to the next level so that the next time that you are doubting your capability, you're doubting your identity, you're doubting your purpose, you're doubting your worth because of what other people are saying about you. Just remember that that creator that we're talking about right now, God, the supernatural one, the one that can make anything happen also lives inside of you.
excuse me, lives inside of you. We are made in the image of God. He is in you, which means as long as he is inside of you, as long as you are a believer, as long as you are a follower, you can do all things through Christ. Like, yeah, you're probably right. You can't do it. You can't do it. But you know what you can do? It with Christ. You
You can do it with Christ. You can't do it alone, but you can absolutely achieve it with him because he is inside of you and he is the guy, the big guy that can do anything. If that's not like the, if the next time somebody asks me what's, if you were to have a superpower, what would it be? I would be like, I already got it. I already got my superpower. My superpower is the Lord. My superpower is Jesus Christ living in me. That is the biggest, that,
That is the superpower. That is the superpower you could ever, ever ask for. That is the superpower you could quite literally ever ask for.
The same guy that created the universe, the stars, the galaxies that go beyond our understanding. Yeah, that guy. In you. In you, babe. You can do anything. Okay, so we're not going to let anybody define us and tell us who we're going to be, who we are. Okay, next thing that we are victim of falling to when it comes to our identity or who we are is our past, right?
Don't even get me started. Don't even get me started. If I were to bet what could be the heaviest chain to have around our ankles in our lives is the burden and the guilt of our past, of the decisions that we have made, of the mistakes that we have made. We all have held guilt or even could be actively holding guilt in
in our lives and that has to be one of the biggest things that a lot of us are slaves to. If you are a slave of your past, I just want to tell you something. First off, you are not defined by your past. You might be shaped and molded by your past, but your past is not who you are.
Our past is something that holds most of us in a chokehold, and it might even be one of the hardest things to break free from. Knowing we were capable of doing certain things or making certain mistakes in our past makes it hard to not identify ourselves in them. Our past may shape us and help us,
with the product that we are today, but it does not define us. God tells us over and over again to let go of our past and forgive ourselves the same way that he has forgiven us.
If God can forgive us of our sins, we should be able to do the same. Guilt is a chain around our feet put there by the devil. He knows our weaknesses. And if he knows that guilt is one of your weaknesses and it is something that can hold you back, oh, he's going to use it. Oh, he is going to use it. He is going to use it to keep you from God.
He's going to use it to keep you guilty so that you don't want to face God or grow your relationship with him or strengthen your relationship with him. He is going to keep you from a clear mind by using your guilt against you. Never living in peace. Always thinking about what you've done wrong, what you've messed up in, the mistakes that you've made. He will always make sure that your mind is busy on what you did.
to keep you from being in the present right now. He will make sure that you stay guilty in your mind and unforgiving to yourself because he wants to keep you from happiness. He wants to keep you self-sabotaging. He wants to keep you from doubting. He wants to keep you doubting if you are worthy to be in this healthy relationship or this person is treating you well. He wants to keep you from all of that happiness. He wants to keep you from growing. He
He wants to keep you from growing and moving forward in your life. Because as long as we are living in the past, we are never going to be able to move forward in our life. It's like you are staying still.
staying still in the guilt and the decisions that you made in your past, you are staying completely still while the rest of our lives are passing you by. Everything else is in motion and you are just staying there and you're not able to move forward in your life. Once you realize that that is just another tactic from the enemy himself, you can hear God clearer telling you to let it go. If you realize that
that all the guilt that you feel is just the enemy trying to hold you back, you will be able to hear God so much clearer telling you to give it to him. Ask God for forgiveness and he will give you that and you can move on. Don't ask him for forgiveness. Receive his forgiveness and then don't forgive yourself. If God can forgive you, which he has, you can forgive yourself.
So we are not letting other people and we are not letting our past define us. And sometimes people will try to define you because they know what you've done in your past. They know what you've been capable of doing and they try to hold you at a place where your past defines you.
That is literally the same tactic sent by the enemy, just in a different font, just in a different font. If he can't convince you to have your own guilt in your own head and hold yourself hostage, he'll use someone else to hold that over your head. He will use other people in your life or around you to remind you what you did in your past and hold you captive that way.
First John 119 reads, when we confess our sins, he forgives us and purifies us. This means we do not need to let shame and guilt control us. Rather, we can embrace forgiveness and our identity and worth in Christ.
our identity and worth in Christ alone. God does not want you to carry the burdens of your past. So what defines us, y'all? What defines us? Not our past, not other people, not what people say about us, not what they think of us, not what we say about ourselves, but God himself. God is the one that we find our identity in, our worth in. Jesus Christ is
is our identity. And anybody who tries to tell you otherwise, you can tell them to take it up with the big man. You can tell them to take that up with the big man himself because we are staying unbothered. We know who we are. God knows who we are. So we know who we are. He knows exactly what your plan is. He knows exactly what your potential is, which is great. By the way, your potential, it is so good. You don't even realize what God has in store for you and your life.
Do not let the enemy win. Do not let the devil try to use all these distractions to tell you who you are when you are a child of God. You know, another thing that I heard the other day, and this is so true, and I'm going to say this a few times on the podcast though, is that even the enemy is a believer. Even the enemy believes in your potential. He believes in your potential so much that he tries so hard to distract you with your past, to
to distract you with your past. He tries so hard to distract you with the opinions of what other people say about you, what they think you're going to be, who they think you are, what they say your walk of faith is, who they say your God is. The enemy believes exactly what your plan is. He knows your plan like God knows your plan. And that is why he works so hard to defeat you and doubt yourself and put your worth and identity in other things.
So anyway, I loved that message today. I loved it. And I think that it really can relate to multiple different aspects of our lives. It could be as simple as someone trying to tell you what your character is, who you are as a person.
Everybody is going to walk around with their opinions, but other people's opinions of you is nothing compared to what God's opinion is of you. So if you believe in your heart that you are being called to do something, if you believe in your heart that he is using you in a way, or if you believe in your heart that you are capable of something and everything in the world is telling you you're not,
Or you can't. Just remember who created the world. And it's almost silly to think that we would find identity in anything other than him when he is the one that's created everything at the end of the day.
I loved this episode. I loved this episode so much. Thank you, Holy Spirit. Thank you, God. I just hope and pray that this speaks to someone, if not all of us, but someone. It was something I needed to hear. Well, I love y'all. The sun is setting right now and I'm losing daylight and I feel like our work is done here today. This was a really good message.
And I just appreciate you guys so much for being here and for listening and for supporting the podcast. It means so much to me. This has turned into the literal highlight of my week and days.
And one more thing too, can y'all just go show somebody how cool Jesus is today? I want all of us to go show someone why Jesus is so cool. Walk like him, act like him, talk like him. Let's be a little bit more like Jesus today and show somebody why he is so cool. Let's be compassionate like Jesus. Let's be forgiving like Jesus. Let's be kind like Jesus. Let's be loving like Jesus.
I love you guys so much. I hope you have the best week and I will see you next Friday. Bye.
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