Saying “Yes, Lord” Over the Long Haul

Dannah Gresh: Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth says she never wants to be offensive to others for the wrong reasons.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: But when the truth is off-putting, what am I to do? Stay the course. Be faithful. Proclaim the Word . . . and do it for as long as God gives you breath.

Dannah: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast, with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of Lies Women Believe and the Truth That Sets Them Free, for September 2, 2021. I’m Dannah Gresh.

As Christians, we try not to become a stench in the nostrils of the world around us. While we have to stand up for what’s right without compromising, we don’t want to be obnoxious or unnecessarily abrasive in how we go about representing Jesus. Right?

Let me tell you, that's something people who are “out front” or have a more public ministry have to think about quite a bit. And it is getting more difficult than ever. At True Girl, the ministry I lead for tween girls, we have a monthly subscription program. We provide discipleship tools like daily devotions and mom/daughter conversation plans. 

We like to include some fun things in those boxes, too—like daisy crowns, candy apple kits, and the world’s cutest little panda magnets—they’re kind of like object lessons. They help the girls remember the biblical truths they’ve been studying. And we buy these little gifts by the thousands! What that means is that we are good customers! 

And in the past few months we have had vendors who were so incredibly excited about the sale they were about to make suddenly in our correspondence say, “We cannot sell our product to you.” My team would ask, “Why?” And they would respond, “After seeing your website, we cannot support an organization like yours.” 

Like mine? Like what? Like one who loves Jesus and takes a stand for and embraces being a girl and all that the Bible says about that? You see, these were vendors who were offended that we were reinforcing the biblical and practical and physical distinctives of being female. And I wish I could say it’s only happened once, but it’s happened three times this year!

The world considers anything associated with two distinct genders to be offensive. But God’s Word not only affirms those two genders but also instructs us how to live like godly women. Today we’ll hear from our host, Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, as she tells us candidly about some of the ways she’s had to wrestle through thorny, controversial issues over the years.

This week, we’re pausing to thank the Lord for twenty years tomorrow of Revive Our Hearts being on the air. What a blessing! We can’t do this apart from His strength, His grace, nor can we do it without friends and listeners like you!

If you’ve ever prayed for Revive Our Hearts, if you’ve ever made a donation to the ministry of Revive Our Hearts, if you’ve ever told a friend to listen to a program or read a book in our store, if you’ve ever dropped us an email or called to say thank you, can I say thank you to you?

It’s been good to hear from some of you how God has been using this ministry in your lives! Annette took some time out of her day to call and leave us this word of encouragement. She lives in Arizona and listens to K-WAVE online.

Annette: I just wanted to call. I'm so glad I have this opportunity, because Revive Our Hearts is really really changing my life—especially the power, wisdom and reward of a gentle word podcast.Proverbs 15:1–4 is not something I'm struggling with right now, but it's how I used to be. And God has changed my life. 

I've been listening to Revive Our Hearts for the last year since I'm working from home because of the pandemic. Thank you, Nancy; thank you, Dannah for everything that you do! I know it’s a lot of work. Thank you for being such a great inspiration!

Dannah: And thank you, Annette. That’s so encouraging for me to hear. Believe me, I needed those reminders from Proverbs 15, too! 

In commemoration of our upcoming twentieth anniversary, Nancy sat down behind the microphone with radio veteran and dear friend Bob Lepine. They spent some time looking back on the early years of this program, Revive Our Hearts, and what has grown into a national and international conference ministry. Let’s listen.

Bob Lepine: I remember the phrase came up; we were asking ourselves, “Who is discipling women in the United States? Who’s the primary discipler of women?”

Nancy: Are we actually going to say this?

Bob: Yes, I think we should. We think most American women were being discipled—and many of them still are today-—by Oprah. 

Nancy: Yes. I remember thinking that in many Christian women’s lives—women who were sitting in church Sunday after Sunday—they were being more discipled by what they were getting from Oprah and that kind of teaching than they were from their pastor.

Bob: Yes, worldly wisdom was what they were getting, and they were building their lives on that. And our vision, our hope, our prayer was that God would use Revive Our Hearts to be a part of transferring women’s thinking from worldly wisdom to biblical wisdom and that that would build a new foundation under their lives as they began to soak in the truth of God’s Word rather than in the speculation of a psychologist or the latest author of a book or whatever the fad of the moment was. 

We got to a point where I remember saying, “I think we need to look at some kind of an event for women, a national event for women.” You had spoken regionally in churches and locations. You had gone for a weekend and done a conference where you would speak three or four times. 

But our Advisory Board, as we got together, I just sensed it was a moment for getting women together from all around the country.

Nancy: Yes, do you remember how big my eyes got?! (laughter)

Bob: I do remember! Yes, this was another one of those vision ideas that you thought, Could we really pull this off?! The first True Woman event happened in Schaumburg, Illinois in 2008. 

Nancy: And you recall that, 1) That conference sold out—6300 women—ten weeks before the event. We haven’t done that since. It was unheard of, and it was like there was this pent-up hunger.

But, 2) Just days or a week before that conference, the bottom fell out of our economy! And so that was all the talk and the news. There was a lot of fear and anxiety about that. So we were looking at each other like, “How is this going to affect everything?”

But you were there, Bob, I was there, and many of our listeners were there. We remember when those doors opened on Thursday night. I want to say October 9, 2008, there was this like gush, this flood of women—including over a hundred women from the Dominican Republic. 

Bob: Right.

Nancy: We didn’t know who they were at the time, but they made their presence known, and they added a lot to that particular weekend. They were so eager! Here’s what I sensed: I felt like many of these women had felt for years that they were kind of alone in believing a biblical perspective on womanhood and their calling and design as women. 

And they looked around and found out there were six-thousand other women who had a similar DNA and sense of mission. And there was this awareness. Women came from many different countries and were looking around and were saying, “We’re not alone!” 

You know, Elijah had said, “I alone am left who worships the Lord.” And God says, “No, there are seven thousand who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” (see Rom. 11:3–4) And there was that sense, “There are others! We have support!” There was encouragement. 

We saw the Lord move bringing women, providing the resources financially, the speakers . . . Moments in that event that were what we always ask Him for—“God-moments”—where you can’t explain what happens apart from God. 

And really from that day there was a greater sense of movement. That is where we released the first True Woman Manifesto. 

Women reading parts of The True Woman Manifesto:

We believe that God is the sovereign Lord of the universe and the Creator of life, and that He created all things. . .

We believe that sin has separated every human being from God and made us incapable of reflecting His image as we were created to do. . . 

We realize that we live in a culture that does not recog­nize God’s right to rule, does not accept Scripture as the pattern for life, and is experiencing the consequences . . .

We believe that Christ is redeeming this sinful world and making all things new, and that His follow­ers are called to share in His redemptive purposes . . .

As Christian women, we desire to honor God by living counter-cultural lives that reflect the beauty of Christ and the gospel to our world.

We believe that Scripture is God’s authoritative means of instructing us in His ways and it reveals His holy pattern for our womanhood, our character, our priorities, and our various roles, responsi­bilities, and relationships.

We glorify God and experience His blessing when we ac­cept and joyfully embrace His created design, function, and order for our lives.

As redeemed sinners, we cannot live out the beauty of biblical womanhood apart from the sanctifying work of the gospel and the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit.

Men and women are both created in the image of God and are equal in value and dignity, but they have distinct roles and functions in the home and in the church.

Marriage, as created by God, is a sacred, binding, lifelong covenant between one man and one woman. (applause)

Nancy: Dr. John Piper spoke at that conference, and he talked about how Christian women are not to be wimpy women.

Bob: Right.

Dr. John Piper (from True Woman ’08): Wimpy theology makes wimpy women. Wimpy theology does not give a woman a God big enough, strong enough, wise enough, good enough to handle the realities of life in a way that enables her to magnify Him and His Son all the time. He’s not big enough. 

Wimpy theology is plagued by woman-centeredness, or as we usually call it, man-centeredness. Wimpy theology doesn’t have a granite foundation of God’s sovereignty underneath. It doesn’t have the steel structure of a great God-centered purpose for all of human existence, including the worst of it.

God’s ultimate purpose for the universe and all of history and your life is to display the glory of Christ in its highest expression, in His dying to make a rebellious people His bride. That's the reason the universe exists. That's not wimpy, and it doesn’t produce wimpy women.

True womanhood is a distinctive calling to display the glory of the Son in ways that would not be displayed if there were no womanhood. Married womanhood has ways to magnify Christ that single womanhood cannot. Single womanhood has ways to magnify Christ that married womanhood cannot. 

So whether you are married or single, do not settle for wimpy theology! It's beneath you. God is too great. Christ is too glorious. Womanhood is too strategic. Don't waste it. Your womanhood, your true womanhood, was made for the glory of Christ.

Nancy: Mary Kassian talked about the history of the feminist movement . . .

Mary (from True Woman ’08): By the late 1960s, the image of June Cleaver being happy at home in her role as wife and mother had fallen by the wayside. She was replaced by the 1970s Mary Tyler Moore, the image of a pretty, single woman in her thirties pursuing a career at a television station.

Nancy: . . . and the ideology and how that had influenced everything—the air we breathe was filled with this.

Mary: And whether or not you would admit it, whether or not you know it, all of us in this room have been profoundly affected by feminist thought!

Dannah: So many powerful memories from that first True Woman Conference in 2008. Nancy spoke, too.

Nancy: About how God was raising up women who were willing to swim upstream, like salmon, and to be counter-cultural. We knew this was going to be a remnant movement, that it was never going to be the “in” thing. But we realized we had sisters. We had others who were in the battle with us!

Nancy (from True Woman ’08): She lives intentionally. She’s not just drifting, letting the circumstances of life pull her along. She’s willing to be a salmon, swimming upstream to live a counter-cultural, godly life in an unholy world. 

Nancy: And we got our marching orders, we got our calling. We left that place affirming that True Woman Manifesto, and saying, “We will, by God’s grace, be women of God submitted and surrendered to His Kingdom purposes.”

Women left that conference and went back to almost every state in the Union and different countries, hundreds of different churches, to take the message, to take the change that God was bringing about in their lives, and to reproduce and make what was the beginnings of a grassroots movement that we’re still believing God for.

Bob: Yes, and it was catalytic. Each one of the subsequent True Woman events has been catalytic. We sow a seed there, not even knowing the ground it’s going into, and we watch a harvest come up.

Dannah: We’re still enjoying some of the fruits of that 2008 harvest, and that’s because our Spanish language outreach, Aviva Nuestros Corazones, was conceived in that conference. We’ll hear more about the international reach of Revive Our Hearts tomorrow. 

We’re listening to Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth in conversation with Bob Lepine, as they reflect back on twenty years, tomorrow, since the first Revive Our Hearts program was broadcast. 

Nancy: You know, the message of revival and biblical womanhood . . . That term is even really out of vogue today, and it conjures images in people’s heads of things that we don’t mean and we’re not saying. It carries some baggage with it today.

And certainly, even the biblical understanding of manhood and womanhood and gender and sex and what it means to live a sacrificial life, these things are not popular messages. Sometimes when we’re talking about these issues . . .

Have you ever sat back, whether it’s listening to me or listening to the True Woman Conference and thought, Oooh! I don’t know how that’s going to be received! Maybe kind of wincing or saying, “Boy, prepare for fireworks!” As you’ve watched us proclaiming a counter-cultural message, what’s gone through your head and heart?

Bob: For the most part I’ve been cheering it on, because I resonate so much with that counter-cultural message. There were times when, I think, you would take a stand on an issue, and I would think, Yes, that will be off-putting for some.

I think we had conversations about, “What’s the best way to say this in advance?” or “Do we edit that out so that it’s not a stumbling block for people?” But we’ve always been committed, you’ve always been committed, and I’ve resonated with that, to not being intimidated by what’s going on in the culture and pulling back.

You proclaim hopefully winsomely, and I think you’ve done that (we want to be winsome in our proclamation). As Ephesians 6:13 says, “Stand firm,” even with that winsome approach. I think you’ve modeled that.

I think all of us would look back and say there are ways we said things twenty years ago that we could not say today in the same way, because it would be heard differently in 2021 than it was heard in 2001. 

Nancy: This is why I went back and revised Lies Women Believe, not because the truth changes to fit the culture, but how the culture hears some truths changes. And I think by God’s grace, and with help from friends like you and others, I’ve tried to temper it.

You’ve asked me at times, “Okay, when you take a stand on this, do you believe this is absolute for everyone, or is this something you’re just saying is a wisdom issue?” You’ve helped me to try and process, “Is this something that women when they hear you say you recommend this, do they think they should all do it this way? Or are you just giving an example that they may want to consider for their lives?” So, trying to be winsome, to realize that the truth is not only right but it’s also good and beautiful.

Bob: Well, a classic example of that is when you wrote on the subject of contraception in Lies Women Believe, and counter-culturally said, “I think maybe it’s wise to reconsider the unquestioning acceptance of contraception, which has become the norm among Christian women.”

What I heard you saying is, “This is something that should be approached prayerfully.” You were not saying no one should ever practice any kind of contraception or birth control. Again, you said it differently when you revised Lies Women Believe.

I knew in saying it the first time . . .

Nancy: Yes, I know; you told me! “This will get some . . .” Just even raising the question was counter-cultural.

Bob: Because it’s so counter-cultural, people are going to go, “This is just a throwback. This is a person who is just not even up to date with the times.” Well, we’ve never been guided by the spirit of the age.

Nancy: And to make clear, for those who haven’t read the book and don’t know what it says . . . we / I didn’t say contraception was wrong. What I said in that book was, “If Christ is Lord of every area of your life (and He is, and we say He is and should be), then this is an area where He needs to be Lord as well.”

So for us, in this or any other area, to just be making our own decisions and going with the flow of the culture without stopping to critically think, “Why am I doing this? Why am I thinking this way? What is influencing my thinking? Do I have a biblical perspective and worldview on children, on family?” Even raising those questions is hard!

Bob: Yes, and I have always appreciated the fact that when you’ve come to an issue like that, it is not something that you have just rushed in with a quick opinion on. You have kept silent until you have had time to process and pray and study and consider. 

You may come to a counter-cultural conclusion, but you do not come to it lightly. And even in proclaiming it, you want to proclaim it boldly, and yet at the same time carefully.

Nancy: And humbly, to realize that I don’t have the corner on truth. I’m not God, and I’m not trying to point people to my opinions. It does help when you have to answer emails and letters and deal with calls from people who either misunderstood what you said or vociferously disagree with what you said.

But I’ve often said that even our critics—and there have been those, there are those—actually help you clarify your message, shape it, and say it in a way that doesn’t put unnecessary roadblocks in people’s paths.

Bob: And those of us who do this cannot imagine the context into which we are speaking when we speak. There are tens of thousands of contexts. They’re hearing what you say with all kinds of different, “Well, what about my situation?” And in your situation we might shape the message a little differently.

But if we’re anchored in what the Word says, we can say, “We think biblical wisdom would point us here.” You’ve always been careful to do this, to say, “The people who can help you best with the issue you’re dealing with are not people on the other end of the radio. They’re people in your church, people in your community, people who know your life and your context.” 

That’s where we want to point people for the ultimate answers and for the ultimate wisdom in these kinds of situations: people who are anchored in the Scriptures, know your context, and can apply that well.

Our hope is just to provoke you to bring every area of life under the Lordship of Christ. A friend of mine says, “Most of us are more catechized by the world than we are by the church or by the Scriptures.” It’s time for us to think biblically and not worldly, and that’s the mission of Revive Our Hearts, that you have been faithful to.

So, to your question, I’ve known there were things that you were saying that were not going to be popular. Most of the time I have said, “That’s a good thing.” There are times for a prophet to speak knowing that his or her words will not be liked.

I was having a conversation last night with some friends about the ministry of Charles Simeon. For more than fifty years, he was the pastor of a church in Cambridge, in England. There was a ten-year period in his ministry where . . .

Nancy: He was not well received. 

Bob: People wouldn’t show up! In those days you paid for your pew, and you had a lock on the door to the little cage that you sat in. People would lock their cages so nobody else could sit in their seats and wouldn’t show up. He was preaching to a nearly empty church for ten years!

Nancy: Faithfully! Yes.

Bob: And it was his faithfulness in ministry, even when people weren’t showing up, that the Lord honored. It’s one of the reasons why we remember his name today. So, the popularity of what you’re saying . . . All of us want to be liked, but that’s not what ultimately guides what we say, whether it’s going to be well-received, or whether it’s going to be liked.

And so, when you’ve said things that I knew were counter-cultural, for the most part I have said, “I’m glad you’re saying these things, and I hope people have ears to hear.”

Nancy: I’m so glad I’ve had friends like you, pastors, others that I’ve been able to use as a lifeline and say, “I’m wanting to address this, but I want to do it in a way that’s careful and wise and biblical.” I’ve had friends like you who have helped me think through those things, have helped me to articulate them.

You know, “in the multitude of counselors there is safety” (Prov. 11:14), so I thank the Lord so for a team of people who have not only helped me to be more faithful to the Word and deliver the message, but who also have encouraged and supported when those attacks came, and said, “Be faithful! Stay the course.”

In fact, I can remember there was a season in this ministry where the kind of teaching we were doing was falling out of vogue in the broadcast world. It seemed for a time, would programs like this even still be around? 

Now, that’s been weathered. I think the ship has been more or less righted on that. But we didn’t know. I remember the Lord taking me to 2 Timothy 4:2–6, which was written to pastors, but I think the application was helpful to me in my setting. Paul charged Timothy, 

Preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; rebuke, reprove, exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when men will not endure sound teaching; but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions. 

He says, “This is what the world is doing: They’re wanting something that is going to make them feel better about themselves.” But Paul says, 

As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. (ESV)

And God used that passage in that season to just remind that the measure of success was not how well the message is received. Now, I don’t want to be the obstacle. I don’t want my personality or my being rough or unloving or lacking meekness . . . I don’t want that to be what is off-putting to people. But when the truth is off-putting, what am I to do? Stay the course. Be faithful. Proclaim the Word. And do it for as long as God gives me breath.

Bob: And you have.

Dannah: Yes, Nancy, you have! And we’ve all been the beneficiaries of that tenacity and that commitment to God’s Word. So thank you, Nancy!

We’ve been listening as Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth and Bob Lepine look back on some of the bigger moments in the history of Revive Our Hearts. It hasn’t always been easy, but God has been faithful!

The first True Woman Conference was held in 2008. Then we had True Woman ’10, ’12, ’14, ’16, ’18, but True Woman ’20had to be cancelled because of the pandemic. On odd-numbered years we held Revive ’11, ’13, ’15, ’17, ’19, and now, coming up on October 8–9 in Indianapolis: Revive ’21! I can hardly wait. I am so excited! 

Nancy, Mary Kassian, Kim Cash Tate, Pastor Chris Brooks, Susan Hunt, and I are all going to be talking about how we can stay grounded, standing firm in a shaking world. I hope you’ve already registered, but if you haven’t, there’s still some room! 

You can sign up for Revive '21by going to ReviveOurHearts.com or by calling 1–800–569–5959. If you can’t make it in person, you can join us online, but you do need to register for that, too. Again, all the details can be found at ReviveOurHearts.com. 

While you’re there, check out our gift pack for the month of September. For your donation of any amount, we’ll say “thank you” by sending you the study by Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth and Mary Kassian True Woman 101: Divine Design. We’ll also sendalong a frameable art print that says “Yes, Lord!” Find out more at ReviveOurHearts.com or by calling us at 1–800–569–5959.

Tomorrow is our actual twentieth anniversary, and it’s Nancy’s birthday, too, so you won’t want to miss the culmination of our celebration week. I’m Dannah Gresh, saying, “Please join us tomorrow for Revive Our Hearts!”

Encouraging you to swim against the current, Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is calling you to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

*Offers available only during the broadcast of the podcast season.