Run to the Word of God: An Interview with Kay Arthur

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Would you please welcome my dear friend—and yours—Kay Arthur! (applause)

Kay Arthur: We are dear friends. We don’t get to spend that much time together, but her heart and my heart beat the same for the Lord! I love you, and I thank you. It’s such a privilege to be here at my age.

Nancy: Well, thank you, sweet friend. We’ll tell that age in just a minute, but let’s sit down, because we’re all old here! Right?

Kay: Oh, we are.

Nancy: Kay’s traveling companion, Linda Cathy, is with us tonight from Precept ministry. Let me just ask, how many of you (because I just may not need to introduce Kay) have been through a Precept study or heard Kay teach or have been in some way impacted through her life and ministry? I want you to stand up so she can see you. (cheers)

Kay: Whoo! Look at all them over there!

Nancy: To God be the glory! You may be seated. 

And that’s all Kay has ever wanted, for God to get the glory. We contacted Kay and said, “We’re going to be talking about Heaven rules—that’s our theme.”

That’s been Kay’s theme for as long as I’ve known her, which is pretty much most of my life. Our hearts beat alike when it comes to the providence of God, the sovereignty of God, that you can trust God to write your story.

So I just knew she was a fit for what we were talking about this weekend. We asked her office if she could come, and she said she wanted to. She’s been here all weekend! I just expected her to show up tonight, but she loves sitting under the Word! 

We’ve been so thrilled to have you, Kay. How old are you?

Kay: I am eighty-eight, and I will be eighty-nine November the 11 [2022], Lord willing. I just want to say one thing, because it means so much to me. One of my favorite truths about God is the fact that He rules over all, that He is the Sovereign Ruler of all the universe! 

When I got saved . . . I’d been married; I’d been divorced; I’d been immoral. I’d shaken my fist in the face of God and said, “To [expletive] with you. I’ll see you around town. I’m going to find someone to love me!”

So I went out and looked for love in all the wrong places. And then, God gloriously saved me! I was talking to one of the young men (God knew that I liked men better than women at that time), and he said to me, “Kay . . .” He took his ring off of his finger, and he said, “Now that you belong to God, God has you in his hand, and no one can touch you. No one can say anything to you or do anything to you without His permission.” 

I thought about the hands of Jesus. They’d been nailed. Blessed, blessed are we who belong to the Lord and know and realize that we are daughters of the Living God and that God does according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay his hand, and none can say unto him, “What doest thou?” (Dan. 4:35) What He does is good and perfect and acceptable! (applause)

Nancy: And that verse comes from Daniel. You’ll find it there.

Kay: Yes it does. Yes, I love Daniel!

Nancy: I know you do, and you’ve helped me to love it more. So as you think about God’s providences and His sovereignty in your life, that doesn’t mean it’s been an easy life. 

Kay: That’s right.

Nancy: So, as you’ve experienced testing—the dementia and departure of your precious Jack and now you’re dealing with Parkinson’s . . .

Kay: Yes. See my foot shaking? Camera, get the foot shaking. (laughter) I thought I might as well just let everybody know what it’s like to go through Parkinson’s and share it with them so that they can know, they can pray, and they can help others.

Nancy: Tell us how God’s rule in your life in this season, and in the hard seasons, how does God’s rule make a difference?

Kay: Why fight against God when He is God? Why not allow Him to put His arms around you and encircle you and be your Strength, your Life, your Redeemer? So in any given situation . . . bBecause I’ve been in the Word of God so much, it’s really neat, because God often will just give me a Scripture, give me a truth. 

You have to forgive me, but in Alzheimer’s . . . No, in what is this disease that I have? (I have to keep Nancy on the ball!) In Parkinson’s, there is a shaking, but there is also a memory problem.

And so sometimes while I’m talking, I’m thinking, Lord, now what is her name? And the Lord has to bring it to mind. So, I’ve decided that what I will do is that I’ll just stop and be honest, “You know, I can’t remember what I was saying. Help me say it.” But it’s always good if what we say is honoring to Him. Now, did I answer your question?

Nancy: I don’t even remember my question! (laughter) Robert and I listened to a message on the way here that Kay gave five years ago to a group of seminary students at Dallas, and it was so powerful! We looked at each other and we said, “That’s the kind of heart and faith that we want to have!”

The two things you come back to again and again and again—you’re like a broken record (for those who remember records!)—the character of God and the Word of God. You talk about “they who know their God.” Tell us why it’s so important to know your God.

Kay: It’s vital that you know God, because you and I are living in a time when truth has stumbled in the streets. (Isa. 59:14) What we are being fed is a colossal lie about our gender and our morals. We’ve got to know the Word. We’ve got to hold it forth in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. (Phil. 2:15)

In Isaiah—this is another book that I would think that it would be good for you to start reading—it says, “To the [law] and to the testimony! If they will not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn.” (Isa. 8:20 ESV) In other words, they’re walking in darkness.

We are living in a time when they are speaking against the Word of God. It goes on to say what is going to happen. It’s in the passage. This just came to me and I felt like I was to share it, and that is in chapter 9, we have that wonderful verse. 

It says: “A child will be born for us, a son will be given to us, and the government will [rest] on his shoulders. [His name shall be called] Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace” (Isa. 9:6 CSB)

The passage says there will be no end of the increase of his government or peace on the throne of David, and over His kingdom to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. (Isa. 9:7)

It’s been said that everything depends on our response to His Word, everything! In any given situation you can either respond and live as God says and count it all joy and press on in all the Scriptures, or you can turn your back. (James 1:2) But the minute that you turn your back, you’re going to be in trouble!

No individual, no society, can recover except by returning to His Word. That’s why I love Revive Our Hearts, because it holds forth the Word of God in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. We’ve got to live; we’ve got to let His Word be heard; we have to remember that it’s truth.

Isaiah 59:14 says it, “Justice is turned back [and we see the lawlessness right now] and righteousness stands far away. For truth has stumbled in the streets, and uprightness cannot enter.” We’ve got to hold forth the Word of God! Thank you for what you’re doing, to do that.

I’m right beside you, and I’m going to run well. I want to finish up that goal of that baseline, and I want to hear Him say, “Well done, my good and faithful servant! Enter into the joy of the Lord!” (Matt. 25:23). 

Nancy: So, Kay, for women who maybe are newer to the faith or haven’t had a disciplined study and devotional life in the Word, help us get started. Help encourage us to know how we can make the Word . . . You’ve lived in the Word. You’ve pointed people through the Word through Precept studies.

You want to mention one Linda’s got right there, that they may want to use as a tool. How to get started in having a life in the Word of God?

Kay: Well, this is a good way to start. I’m not trying to sell my book, but this is a good way to start. It’s called Lord, Teach Me to Study the Bible in 28 Days. I heard once that one woman said to the other, “Oh, don’t do Precept. Don’t do what Precept does. It’s too hard, you don’t have time for that.” 

That was not from God! (laughter) You’ve got to know God’s Word for yourself! [From] Daniel 11:32, “. . . but the people who know His Word will be able to stand firm and take action.” So you need to know God’s Word, and there are basics.

Anytime you study it, you want to ask the five “W’s” and an “H”—who, what, when, where, why, and how?” It takes time, but this Book is the Book that is absolute, pure, unadulterated truth! So you want to answer the questions, like I said.

You want to mark the text. The very action of marking the text and coloring the text . . . We’re known for being “the colored pencil people.” But marking the text, seeing key repeated words, finding out what the text says.

So, everything that we are doing is designed not to show you what we believe, but to show you how to get truth for yourself. Now, some of the people were saying, “Oh, you can’t do Precept! It takes too long!” That kind of makes me mad, but anyway, you can’t be in the Word of God enough! 

So, I wrote the 40-Minute Bible Studies—no homework. You go through the Word of God. And this one is, The Power of Knowing God. This is where it would fit in really well with what you’re doing. You’re talking to us about knowing God and that Heaven rules and what He is like. So this one will really help.

Another one is Breaking Free from Fear. The first one I ever wrote (and I didn’t mean to do all this, but anyway) was Lord, I Want to Know You. It’s a study on the Names of God. The name of God is a high tower, and the righteous run into it and are safe. (Prov. 18:10)

“Man does not live by [what?] bread alone, but by [what?] every word that comes from [where?] the mouth of God.” (Matt 4:4) So those books are designed to help you discover truth for yourself and know what God has to say, and not to turn to the right and not to turn to the left. (Deut. 5:32) 

I love the verse, “He sent His word and healed them, and he delivered them from all their distresses.” (Psalm 107:20) He will keep us in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee, because He trusts in Thee. (Isa. 26:3) You cannot spend too much time in the Word of God! Of course, you wouldn’t neglect your family . . . But you’ve got to know it for yourself; you’ve got to know it!

Nancy: Kay, I’ve heard you talk about the importance of knowing all the Word of God, sixty-six books. Talk to us about that.

Kay: Yes, the whole counsel of God. There are sixty-six books in the Bible. How many of them do you know? He gave us this Book in its entirety. This is what we are to live by and this is why you want to spend time—not legalistically—but you want to spend time in the Word of God.

He says (and I’ll remind you again), “If anyone does not speak according to this word it’s because they have no dawn.” (Isa. 8:20) In other words, they’re sitting in the darkness. Did I answer your question?

Nancy: If we’re not in the Word, we’re going to be in darkness. And that’s what we see all around us. Some of you have sons and daughters and parents and mates that you’re praying for who are sitting in darkness because they don’t have the Word of God.

Well, you can’t make them love God’s Word, but you can love God’s Word! Our lives can create a hunger. I get around Kay, and I want to know God better. I want to know His Word better. But you and I can be that kind of woman too, in the places where God has put us.

Kay, has there been a season of your life you look back to . . . I know the homegoing of your husband, the diagnosis of Parkinson’s, I know in your family there have been challenges. How in times of trouble has the Word of God and the character of God kept you steady?

Kay: When my first husband committed suicide, when he hung himself . . . When we were told that Jack [her second husband] had Alzheimer’s . . . 

Nancy: In those times of trouble, how have the Word of God and the character of God kept you stable, kept you going, kept you encouraged? 

Kay: Yes. His Word is a strong tower, so anytime that I have a need, I run to the Word of God. I ask God, “God, show me what I need to know. Show me what I need to do.” And then I wait upon the Lord. But the more you’ve studied the Word of God, the easier it is.

You know, I’ve been in the Word of God for all these years, and so it’s ready for me. It’s not necessarily that you know where to run, but we teach you how to go to the Word of God and how to discover the answers. 

There’s “everything that pertains to life and godliness.” (2 Peter 1:3) Everything is in this Book! This is like the balm of Gilead. I’ve said it to you already this evening, that He sent His Word and what? He healed them and he delivered them from all their distresses. (Psalm 107:6)

So, depending on what you’re going through, if you know the books of the Bible . . . My goal was, before I quit or before I was taken home to be with the Lord, that we would have a Precept course on every book of the Bible.

And we now have sixty-six Precept courses. (applause) I was looking for a Scripture in here that I wanted to share with you, Hosea 4:6, where God says, “My people are [being] destroyed for lack of knowledge.” So, you’ve got to know the Book!

Scripture interprets Scripture. If you will start and just make this—not a legalistic rule—but every day you get up, you eat food, eat the Word of God! Go through the Bible book by book. Mark the text. It will soon become your friend.

I have been here [a spot in her Bible] about when God called Jack home, and different things and events that happened just in answer to prayer. They’re next to Scripture that has to do with the situation. 

And so, the more you know God, the more you know His Word, the stronger you will be so that whatever comes your way, you can stand firm and take action and walk righteously.

Nancy: I know you’ve been through some circumstances in life and in your ministry where it didn’t seem like God was in control. There were hard things, things you would not have chosen. How do you counsel your heart to trust that Heaven rules?

Kay: If He’s God, and if He is the One that spoke and brought the world into existence and said, “Let there be . . . and it was so . . . let there be . . . and it was so.” (Gen. 1) If He is God, He cannot fail! If He is God, He knows what’s coming. He’s omniscient. He’s omnipresent. He’s omnipotent. He is eternal. You go through the attributes of God.

And, honestly, it’s just plain stupidity and absolutely ridiculous for you not to believe Him and cling to Him as a waistband clings to the waist of man! (Jeremiah 13:11) We don’t always understand the horrific situations that people go through.

Precepts is working in all the countries of the world. We have it in their language, and this is the thing that heals them and gives them direction and gives them comfort and gives them assurance.

We just have to know that God will not give you anything you cannot bear, but in any given situation He will make a way of escape so that you can handle it whether it’s temptation or whether it is testing, God is the answer. (1 Cor. 10:13)

I brought my business cards (you can get them at the table) because I just wanted you to see, to know this: “Know God Deeply. Live Differently.” And you cannot know God deeply apart from the Word of God.

The problem today is that a lot of people are twisting it and distorting it, and they are not being challenged by those who know what God says. In Isaiah He says, “If they don’t speak according to this word, it’s because they have no dawn.” (Isa. 8:20) They’re sitting in darkness, and you and I will spot that darkness if we understand the truth of God and what God has to say.

He says in Isaiah that justice is turned back, righteousness stands far away. (Isa. 59:14) And if you know what God says prophetically, difficult, difficult times are on the way. He says that truth has stumbled in the streets, uprightness cannot enter. (Isa. 59:14)

Now, this is what I just wanted to give you so you’re prepared: yes, truth is lacking. He who turns aside from evil makes himself a prey. (Isa. 59:15) In other words, there’s going to be a warfare. You and I have to know that our warfare is not against flesh and blood. It’s against principalities and powers and spiritual wickedness in high places. (Eph. 6:12)

That’s what we are seeing, and we’re just seeing what lawlessness is like when there’s no fear of God before their eyes. (Rom. 3:18) You’ve got to know it! You want to get Hosea chapter 4. Read it tonight before you go to bed, and look at what’s happening.

People are being destroyed for a lack of knowledge.And children are suffering because we have not been in the Word of God. (Hosea 4:6) We have not lived according to every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. (Deut. 8:3) We’ve got to start living it! Live it, live it, live it! 

Someday you and I, precious one, are going to stand at the judgment seat of Christ (this is for Christians), and we’re going to give an answer for the deeds done in our body, whether they be good or evil. (2 Cor. 5:10)

God is honest and fair and just. You and I have to know this. He cannot reward sin. He has to deal with it. He cannot honor you—or even has to answer to you—if you have not respected Him as God.

May the fear of God fall on the United States of America! May it fall on the church of Jesus Christ! May we put away and turn off and get free from a lot of this garbage and this talk and the way they’re doing things. May we go back to the Word of God, and may we be cleansed by the washing of the water of God’s Word (Eph. 5:26) so that we might be a vessel unto praise and honor and glory unto His appearing. (1 Peter 1:7)

You know what I’m going to do tonight (so you can pray for me)? I’m going to go home and kick myself (I have a bad habit of that) because I didn’t do it the way I really desired to do it. 

We just had our partners in for the weekend, just before I came down here, and I got to tell them that I was honored to be speaking here, and all that. I was with them, and I hadn’t seen some of them in a long time.

I came out and said, “I’m going to be eighty-nine years old, and that’s going to happen very, very soon.” I saw some of you and I thought, Boy, you’re looking at me and you’re saying, “The ol’ gray mare, she ain’t what she used to be . . . many long years ago!” (laughter)

May we, may you and I, stay on target. May we not turn to the right, may we not turn to the left, may we observe to do according to all that He has commanded us, and may we hear, “Well done my good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of the Lord!”

So get the card. It says, “Know God Deeply. Live Differently.” The people who know their God are what? “But the people who know their God are able to stand firm.” (Dan. 11:32) But not just stand firm, to take action.

May the results and the fruit of this time together and this ministry, and our ministry, and Joni’s, and others, may it be used mightily of God so that when we see Him, He’ll look at us and He’ll say, “Well done my good and faithful servant. Enter into (what?) the joy of the Lord.”

I love you, and I thank you so very much! (applause) Thank you.

I have one more thing to tell you. I’ve done it when I’ve spoken to large crowds, so you meet the qualifications. What I’ve prayed (I don’t think He’ll do it tonight) but I’ve prayed, “Lord, I pray that when I die, I’ll die on the platform!” 

I pray that I will be standing there, have taught the Word of God, and get a grand and glorious heart attack and that someone will come to the platform and tell them to repent and how to be saved.” That would be a good way to go, wouldn’t it? (applause)

Absent from the body, present with the Lord. (2 Cor. 5:8) and wanting to hear, “Well done, my good and faithful servant.”

Nancy: I believe Kay’s going to hear that, “Well done.” But there’s a challenge for us. Don’t miss the Word of God through His servant to us. “Remember your leaders who have spoken God’s Word to you. As you carefully observe the outcome of their lives, imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.” (Hebrews 13:7–8 CSB)

And oh, that God would raise up a host of younger “Kay Arthurs,” who love God’s Word, who know their God, who stand firm, and who take action.

Lord, thank You for this precious servant, for those who serve with her. Thank You for Precept ministry. Thank You for the many studies and resources they have taken around the world. Thank You for Kay’s faithfulness to You and Your faithfulness to her—because that’s where it all starts—over these many years. 

Lord, we don’t know how many days or months or years you may give her, but we know, for all of us, Heaven’s closer than it was yesterday. And so help us, and help her, with each day to be found faithful, knowing You, knowing Your Word, and telling others the wonders of the gospel of Jesus Christ!

So bless this servant, and in this season of trial and testing with the Parkinson’s and the weakness, may she find You to be her strength! Would you strengthen her, would You sustain her, would You continue to sanctify her, and would You satisfy her deeply with Your steadfast love? We love her, and we thank You for the gift that she is to us and to the body of Christ. In Jesus’ name, amen.

All Scripture mentioned are paraphrases from NIV and NKJV unless otherwise noted.