S 2 Episode 11: Priscilla Shirer: Knowing Your Identity

You all, hi, I'm here with the Priscilla Shire.

I'm her younger sister.

Yeah, no, no, no, no, we're just sisters. You could just say we're sisters.

Younger.

Why is she trying to set that up like that? Anyway, we are here with all of my accoutrements, even though we could have just done this over the phone in pajamas, but I loaded up all my stuff and brought it over to see you in person, like we don't see each other in person.

I know.

All the time.

But we don't—

Her children are currently eating dinner with my children because this is how it, that's how we have to make it work. But I'm interviewing you. You've been on my podcast 2 times already.

And you have a very good podcast.

Thank you.

You have a really great podcast. The topics and the guests you have on.

Listen, and the fact that I've done it for almost 5 years, that's the thing.

Has it been 5 years?

I started it, well, yeah, 4 and a half. I'm, I'm, I'm, yeah.

What?

I know.

That's amazing.

Girl, listen, I'm just trying to, trying to be out here. Just, I don't even know. But you've only been on the video show with other people, right?

I'm helping you host other guests.

Yeah. I haven't had, just had you on to talk to you. And you're such a good interviewee. Am I? An interviewer?

Interviewee. Like when I'm asking other people questions.

No, no, no. I'm the interviewer.

Oh, that's right.

You're that too. But now you're the interviewee.

That's true.

Okay. And y'all probably don't know this, but back in the day, Priscilla actually went to school for communications because she wanted to be like a news news person.

Yeah, that was my goal for my life, was broadcast journalism.

Yes. So this is fun for me to interview her, even though she's trained to be the interviewer. I don't know what I'm saying right now.

Whatever.

But anyway, um, first time to be just by yourself on the Sister Circle Show. This will be a Sister Circle Show episode, and we're doing this because, um, she has more stuff coming out that is going to bless you, and more movies. Because you keep telling people that you only did it and God only opened the door that one movie. And you just— I mean, like, your answer— you have an answer, which is, you know, God just— it was another venue, another avenue for doing ministry. And it was just an opportunity that you weren't looking for. Right. And so you kind of talked about it like a one-off. But then you were in a second movie. I was like, when they called me, I was like, you want me to do that again? Yes. And then now we're in number 3. So this movie that's coming out August the 23rd, Yay! Overcomer.

Overcomer.

Okay, so are you the lead role in this movie?

No.

You're a supporting role?

I'm a supporting role.

Okay.

Yes.

That's fun. And so your role, what's your name in the movie?

Olivia Brooks. She is the principal of the school where the main character attends school. She's a 15-year-old girl.

Okay. Yeah. So I'm curious, you've been a lead in a movie and now you've been supporting.

Yes.

And a couple of movies, which do you prefer?

Oh, that is actually a good question.

Listen, I gotta come with it. I gotta come with the good questions.

Yeah, that's a good question. I will say that it's hard to answer that question because I prefer— there's some things I like about being a lead, there's some things I like about being a supporting character.

Okay, give us both.

So being a lead means you get to be on set the entire time. They need— you have so many lines and so many scenes and you got to be there all Summer, for example, with War Room, we literally— my whole family packed up and moved. You came for a little while on set.

I did.

I even got to sneak in. That's right.

I got to walk through.

If you watch the scene where me and Miss Clara are about to walk into the parking garage where we're accosted by the guy that's going to rob us, right as we're walking in, there is a woman in white clothes that walks behind us in the scene.

Listen, 5 minutes, y'all. I only needed 5 minutes of fame.

It's 5 seconds. It was like 5 good seconds.

I really needed 5 minutes. 5 minutes, but they only gave me 5 seconds. Okay, so you were leading that role and you were part of it.

I liked being on set all summer. I mean, it's like you really become a family because you are filming 13 hours a day. And with the Kendrick Brothers films and with the Irwin Brothers, they're the guys that did I Can Only Imagine, they have devotions every morning. We stop and pray over certain scenes that we want really God to be glorified in theaters through. It's just like being at summer camp, but you're working real hard all day, all day long for an entire summer. But having my sons around that, in that environment with all these creative people behind cameras and hanging lights and doing art direction and all that, I just loved being totally immersed in the entire experience. So that's what you get when you're a lead. But the flip side of that is you gotta learn all them lines.

Listen, you gotta cry on cue.

So there are some days when other actors, they have off because they don't need to be in that particular scene. But when you're the lead, you are always filming every single day, all day long. So there is, there is a lot of load to it. And you don't have that when you're supporting. You're like, for I Can Only Imagine, I just went in for 2 or 3 days. They filmed every single scene that I was going to be in, in the movie, the 2 days that I was there, then I was done. Yeah. And then with this film, 2 or 3 weeks or so. We were in and then we were out. And so we didn't get to just be the full summer like everybody else, which I missed that. I really did.

So, I mean, I think that's interesting too, just to talk movie talk for just a second. You said, you know, that in some of these movies, especially where you're not the lead, you get— you come and you do your little part, which means that you don't really see the whole movie. Even when you're the lead, you don't see the whole movie, but especially when you're doing a supporting role. Yeah, you've just been a part of the scenes that you're a part of, and then you get to watch it.

And can I tell you a spiritual lesson that I got from that?

Because She's the prophetess.

But anyway, they tease me and say that all the time. Listen, let me tell you the spiritual principle I got out of that. Because you're in this scene, yeah, and you're doing it with the other actor, and the director might say to you, okay, when you finish that line, I need you to look off to the left. And you're like, what? Ain't nothing over there. Or they'll say, I need you to kind of do a laugh-cry where you're kind of laughing but it turns into emotion, cry. And you're kind of like, but why? So you don't get it, and you've got to choose whether or not— I can't tell you how many times I just had to trust what the director was I was like, why am I looking to the left? It doesn't make sense. But the director or the writer is the only one that knows all the ways the scenes are going to be edited together. So it wasn't until you see the final edited movie, not just if you know all the scenes, but you see the edited film altogether, you sit there as someone that was in the project, you sit there and go, oh, that's why I needed to look to the left. If I hadn't looked to the left, it wouldn't have transitioned well to the scene that the director knew was coming next. So of course that's true of life. Like, God sees the full spectrum of the edited version of all the parts of your story. The season of singleness and the season of marriage and the single season of childlessness where you were asking God to give you a baby and it didn't work out in the right timing and all of that stuff. It's when you see the edited version that you go, "I got it." Which means you have to trust while you're in the middle of it. You gotta trust the director.

Woo!

I'm gonna write. I'm gonna write.

Do it, do it, do it. Do you still put out your monthly Jewelry Box articles?

Yes, and I've gotten a little un-monthly lately because I've had a lot going on, so I've been a little un-monthly, but can you believe that's almost been probably 17 or 18 years that I have done these Jewelry Box articles every month.

Consistency matters. If people are interested in getting that email from you, they can just go to goingbeyond.com.

Yeah.

Right on the homepage, there's a place where they can sign up.

I don't know if it's right on the homepage, but underneath Connect, then you'll see the Jewelry Box.

Jewelry Box.

If you read the Jewelry Box article, there's a place there if you want to just get them in your mailbox every month.

So you guys have been reading her books, you've been doing the Bible studies, you've now been watching her do lives about all kinds of things including hair.

But also I discovered Insta Live. I'm not a very technologically advanced person, so when I discover something I'm like, what is it called?

Insta Live?

I don't know, what is it called? Instagram Live?

I just think it's Insta story. It's just a live Insta story.

Oh, is it? I've been saying Insta live. Okay. A live Insta story.

A live Insta story.

Okay. That's what I'll say from now. Thank you for helping me.

Yeah, that's what I do. I'm the geeky person in our family.

She knows all things technology and I'm so—

Oh boy, man. So, okay. So all the things, but you've also been watching Priscilla in two movies. I can say movies because there are two that are out. So now it's about to be 3, thrice now she has been in movies and Overcomer comes out August the 23rd.

It does.

Okay, why should we go see it? I mean, apart from good film, like why this movie?

Yeah, several reasons. Number 1, you need a night where you go get some hot buttery salty popcorn and a soda with a friend.

And she salts her popcorn.

I mean, yes.

It's a situation.

It's a situation. And I will, this is what I did the other night, 'cause me and Shandria snuck off to the movies.

Wait a minute.

Yep, my friend Shandria. Our friend Shandria.

What's the problem with this statement though?

I know, we snuck, but this is the thing. She didn't call me. No, I didn't call you. You know why? You know why? Shandria was over here laying on the sofa while I was doing interviews all day, and then an interview got canceled, and we looked at our watch, and in 10 minutes Toy Story 4 was going to start, and Jude was here, so we just jumped in the car with Jude, and in 10 minutes we went to the theater and saw the movie. We couldn't have called you.

She's still explaining it because we couldn't have called you.

The movie started in 10 minutes.

You wanted to find out while we're on camera. You left me out.

I, I didn't leave you out. That's not the— that's not the point. Anyway, hot buttery popcorn. You need a night, right? You need an excuse. There are not enough films that you can just go and relax in a theater. Like, there's no— nobody's gonna blow anybody up or anything like that. That has its place. It's not superhero kind of thing. It's just a good sort of family-friendly movie. You can bring your family if you want to, or you go with a girlfriend or your sister, and you can go in. There's a reason now for you to go to the theater, um, on the weekend of August 23rd. So that's one of the reasons why, because you need a good movie every now and then.

Yeah, with good popcorn.

With good— listen, I will wait till they pop new popcorn. It's a thing for me. It's my favorite snack.

Yeah, she, she used to also get popcorn from Target on her way to the theater because that particular theater didn't have good hot buttery popcorn.

So she had to go— Have y'all had Target's popcorn?

Do you know that they're getting rid of all the concession stands?

Yes, I know. And I'm very upset about it, but there's still one, the one that's down the street from me, the Super Target. They're gonna keep it? I think they said they're gonna keep it.

Cause it's popcorn. I raised my kids on popcorn and Slurpees going to Target.

Going to Target. You walk around Target with popcorn in your hand.

But there are reasons besides popcorn to go see the movie.

So Overcomer, First of all, 20 years ago, even 10 years ago, saying I'm gonna go see a faith-based film made you cringe a little bit.

Yeah, 'cause they were kinda corny.

They were for real corny. They were corny, we certainly wouldn't take an unsaved friend because it was like—

An indictment against Christianity being all things fun and enjoyable.

Granted, the technical excellence almost couldn't be there because there weren't the dollars, there weren't the support.

Takes money.

Yeah, so we live in a, we happen to live in this resurgence of what it means to be a faith-based film. It's a beautiful time because we've got these films that are unapologetic gospel films. I mean, they're not watering down the name of Jesus. In Overcomer, you'll see my character lead somebody to the Lord. I'm talking the whole, the whole gospel, the whole gospel that Jesus is the only way. That right there. Yes, that happens in this film. And you've got a production company like Sony that has thrown— I think they— I think this one was $3 million or $4 million to make. So you've got all these dollars, which means you're going to see a movie that's technically excellent. That looks good, that you don't mind taking your friends to. And then as a believer, you're gonna be grateful for the fact that it's not a sugar-coated gospel. And then the story's just good. You're gonna cry, you're gonna laugh, just like in War Room. Like, people just enjoyed War Room. They enjoyed Miss Clara, you know what I'm saying? So you'll enjoy this film, and then you really will come away with— come away like with War Room— you'll come away asking yourself questions about your life and the way you're navigating the theme of this movie, which is identity. Is your identity, your value, wrapped up in something that can be taken away from you? So you see these characters, their stories converge in a beautiful kind of surprising way that really does not only draw you into the story of the movie, but it's got you thinking, you know what, is my significance wrapped up and tied up to something temporal? Because that stuff, man, success is up one day, gone tomorrow. If you want the approval of people on Instagram and you're depending on whether or not you get this many likes, man, you will live in a constant state of like a hamster on a wheel, never arriving to this place of settledness. So this question will make you ask, where does your identity lie? Who have you allowed, or what have you allowed to define you? And rooting it back firmly in something that doesn't change, and that's Ephesians 1 and 2. You are who God says you are. And going back there, discovering what he says about you and then beginning to live in light of that, not based in the fear and insecurity and all those things that, you know, cripple us.

So, I mean, you were kind of talking about the question I wanted to ask you, which is, you said it will, it will cause you to ask, where is my identity rooted?

Yeah.

So what has been your answer to that question, maybe in seasons where it hasn't been as firmly rooted, or has it been? Have you had seasons where It wasn't rooted.

You know me.

I mean, maybe I do.

You're just trying not to answer the question.

Maybe I do. Um, and what do those look like for you?

Yes. Well, I look back particularly, I can talk about things right now actually in my life this week, still growing and struggling. Yeah. Always.

Yeah.

In this, but I can look back to my early 20s in particular and there were relationships I allowed. And when I look back on why I allowed them, it was because my significance was tied to my approval in this group of people right here or this guy right here. So I made choices, man. I, the whole reason I was in the relationship was because I was wound up in feeling significant because you liked me. Now looking back on it, I realized that if I would have known I'm already accepted, I'm accepted, period. I'm valuable. I'm chosen. I've been adopted into the family of God. Then it literally makes you stop choosing things that say something different. Yeah, that say something different. And if you stop choosing things to validate you, because I don't actually need your validation, it means I can actually choose things that I want, that I really actually want, and that really are healthy for me because I'm choosing them from a place of significance and not a place of insignificance.

But you say, you say, well, I didn't know, or when you know, but we've been raised to know, right? So how do you explain the disconnect that happened for you, that happens for many of us that either were raised in Christian homes, raised in church, or maybe we weren't, but we've done enough Bible studies to understand it. But it's not, it's not flowing. It's not filtering through to decisions.

All I can say is we live in the world.

What does that mean?

I mean, we live in a place that is constantly tugging us in the opposite direction. That, that's all I can say. It's like now it's even worse with social media that our teenagers now, we're telling them all the time, you and I, we tell our boys all the time, right, proactively we speak God's affirmations over them. We tell them who they are, they're men of integrity and character and all this stuff, but then they live in the world.

They're at school constantly telling them they're not enough.

So when the clique goes like this and away from them and makes fun of them for being integrous in some area or choosing not to look at that or whatever—

integrous—

When the clique goes away and they feel that pain of not being in that clique, well then that tugs on something in them and they may falter for a little while trying to gain the approval of that particular clique or that girl that, God forbid, you know, our boys lay their heart out on the line for some girl and she's disinterested in our boys. I wish she would.

I wish she would. I wish that little hussy would come up in here and just lay her hands somewhere on my husband. On my husband. That hussey too, or bus. Listen, it's a thing. Moms and boys with these little girls, it's a thing. But anyway, that's—

they're a little forward.

They are a lot forward.

So when one of them might break my son's heart, yeah, that makes a son who was secure all of a sudden feel a sense of, wait a minute, wait a minute. So I think it's just we live in the world. Yeah, we live in the world, and so we get caught up sometimes. I have, you know, we get caught up. Um, I mean, even recently— you're gonna laugh at me even bringing this up— but even recently, well, last year this time, something I said from 3 years ago was completely misunderstood. Yeah, I'm gonna say what it is. Um, but 3 years ago, I was giving a message on the armor of God. One little smidgen of it was about how as believers we have to have our We have to be anchored in the truth of God, 'cause that's the first piece of armor, the truth. And so, as believers, we can't, like, mold the truth to suit our demographic and what makes us comfortable. So as a point of illustration, I said I do not define myself as a black woman. I define myself as a Christian woman who is black, meaning that Christianity needs to be the major adjective that defines my life. Christianity as seen in his word, not morphed to suit a demographic. I did not intend to say I'm not a Black woman. Listen, I didn't intend to say that. What I intended to say in the moment is that we can't define ourselves as Black Christians or white Christians or Hispanic Christians or Republican or Democratic Christians. I could have said anything, but I misspoke and said Black woman. This is 3 years ago. So someone—

that she said it, yeah, but I said it right.

So the people that were at that local church that day, they had a misunderstanding because they, they, number one, they know me at that church. We've had these conversations. But number 2, they heard the whole album. The greater context. So somebody took that 90 seconds out of context, kind of posted it and said, "Priscilla Shire says she's not a Black woman." So listen. Oh, they came for me.

And it messed with you.

Oh, that's my point that I'm getting to.

It messed with—

so the Black community, I mean, I was posted across major urban news media, big picture, "War Room actress says she's not a Black woman." And in this age when we're affirming each other in our culture. Man, people came for me mercilessly.

And she was looking just like that. I don't know.

I didn't even know what they were talking about. I had to go back and look at this little 90 seconds out of an hour-long message where admittedly I could have been more articulate. But the point is, I believe that the Lord allowed that to happen. There could be many layers of reasons that I don't even know., but the one reason I know for me is because it allowed me to see how deeply I was hurt at the rejection of this group of people that I belong to, that I didn't even realize that my significance was too tightly wound up in whether or not I was approved of by that community.

And accepted by.

And accepted by. I didn't know it. I didn't even know it. And see, I think sometimes it's until something's stripped away, the job is gone, the health is gone, the relationship is gone, that you realize your reaction shows you where you're really—

where there's a hole.

And so there's nothing wrong with me being accepted by any community. Great. I'm so grateful. But when it's taken away, am I okay?

Listen, because she was walking around for weeks talking about, y'all, I'm Black. I am Black.

I'm a Black woman.

We were like, it's okay, Zilla.

I know.

You're Black.

And it's okay. You know, the thing is, I had several older, I was about to say women, but a man as well, in the faith, leaders who called me. I was so grateful. They called me and they said, "We want you to know, we know who you are." We know who you are. I mean, it can make me cry thinking about it, that the phone would ring and someone would call and just say, "I want you to know, we know you. We see you." One woman went, Susie Owens, Pastor Susie Owens, went on and on. She said, We see you in your melanin skin. We see you with your natural hair. We see you as you have faithfully for 20 years spoken identity and significance to women of all demographics and backgrounds, telling them to appreciate the skin God put them in. We see you. We know who you are. Don't let the naysayers of a 90-second clip disrupt the past 20 years of what God has done in your heart.

That hurts too.

Absolutely. And so stuff like that, when you have people that come alongside of you and go, Girl, don't even worry about it.

Right, right.

Because when you're in the midst of controversy like that, because I'm not in the media like that. That's not something that's normal for me.

You don't have a publicist?

No, I don't have a publicist. I'm not in that.

You don't have an everyday stylist?

No, no, no everyday stylist.

I mean, just, you know, let's just break the— No, none of that.

So when you're in that kind of thing like that, it feels like it's the whole world.

Yeah.

But it's not.

It's not the whole world. But it feels that way.

It feels that way.

Just like it would feel that way if a young woman broke our son's heart.—

That's right. It feels like a whole world, but it's not.— It's the same thing.

Well, you're Black. We know you're Black.—

I know I'm Black.—

And you have wonderful, natural, thick, juicy hair that everybody's always wanting to talk about. But I always have to tell her, when you talk about your hair, just make sure you tell people, and she does, that whatever you had when you were a little girl, that's what you're going for.

That's what you— because we, we, I do it too. We look at other people's hair on Instagram and go, oh, when I go natural, it's going to look like that.

Or when I use that product, or when I go to that hairdresser or when I take this vitamin. And you just need to look at your pictures.

Whatever your pigtails looked like when you were 6, it's gonna be a redo of that. It's gonna be a redo of that.

It's gonna be a redo of that.

There are different ways to style it, but the texture you had then, you know, it might have shifted a little bit with age and stuff, but generally speaking, it's the texture you're gonna have now.

Yeah, yeah, that's so good. And I love your honesty about that. And I think what you said, which is we all have holes and we are not aware of them until something is stripped away. We don't realize that we're naked in that area until it's uncovered.

That's right.

We just don't even know.

And I think that's partly why the Lord allowed that for me. Here I was, it was right after I had finished filming a movie on identity and I was just crafting a book and a Bible study on identity. That's right. He needed studying and thinking and writing about that. And the Lord allowed this blowup to show me in my own life Yeah. Where my significance was not firmly rooted.

Well, one thing too, you said that, you know, people called you and said, "We know who you are." And when you talked about the Bible, Ephesians 1 and 2, God always knows who we are. So I can hear somebody saying, "Well, I wish I had people to speak into my life like that." I wish somebody would call me and tell me that they knew who I am or to encourage me when I'm struggling. Yeah. But that's why it's so important to read God's word for yourself and to wash your mind and renew your mind, Romans 12 says, in the word. Because ultimately, God knows who you are. He knows who you are now, and he knows who he intended for you to be. So even beyond loving people who speak into your life, read God's word and keep washing yourself with the word until you believe what he says about you.

And I can tell you, honestly, a great place to start, because Olivia Brooks, Chris in the movie tells Hannah, little 15-year-old Hannah, she says, I want you to do me a favor. I want you to open up your Bible to Ephesians 1 and 2. Just read it and write down everything it says you are.

Yes, it's listed, it's listed, it's listed.

He goes, he's like, you're adopted, you are chosen, you are holy, you are blameless. I mean, just all, all on throughout. And then you post it somewhere like where you're going to see it. Maybe you make photocopies and post it a lot of somewheres, and then you keep seeing it over and over. And you start making choices that line up with this. Like, you might not feel chosen, but you start making decisions like someone who is. If I was your feelings line up, yeah. So that means before I tweet this, is this a person that's secure and significant, or am I trying to insert myself into a conversation that's not even my conversation just so I could be a part of something? Yeah, I can't tell you how many times I've paused and—

talk to me.

Sometimes you texted me, girl, girl, girl, is this okay?

Because, because we do need a check. We need a check and we need a reminder first from God's word, from family, from friends who love us, um, to say, is this, is this who I am?

Is this who I am? Or am I, is this insecurity poking its head up or fear poking its head up or ego poking its head up? You know, um, one of my love languages is that I'm a gift giver. Chrystal Hurst will tell you this.

I love the best gifts.

I love giving gifts even more than getting them. I just like to come up with a good monogrammed, I thought of you, personal, and I'm so glad about it. Yeah, so I give gifts. You're a good gift giver too, though, by the way.

You've been real. You can do it like on tap. Like, I have to— it has to come to me.

I can't— yeah, but I had to start— there were several times where the Holy Spirit pinged my heart And when I tried to figure out what was the ping about, why was I giving the gift?

Why were you giving the gift?

Um, to impress. It wasn't just a pure, I want to bless that person. There was something wrapped up in it that was impure. It was my desire in some way to impress you or to receive your approval in some way. So then what I had to do then when I recognized that was resist the urge to give the gift.

So how— so don't— that doesn't apply to me. No, I mean, I guess what I'm— how do you know the difference then between the urge to give the gift out of a need for approval?

Because I can give it to you without— I don't need anything from you. I don't want anything back. I'm not giving it in hopes of—

so you just pause to see what your—

yeah, yeah. When I felt that ping with those particular gifts, with those particular people. Why, Lord, why is there even a ping here?

Mm. That's the Holy Spirit. Yeah.

Just pausing long enough to go, what was that about? And then just sitting with the Lord long enough for him to just say, just to feel that I'm doing this because I hope they like me. You know?

Yeah.

And that's not— I'm liked. I'm already liked. I'm already loved. So I'm not going to feed this part of my flesh by giving the gift here. That doesn't mean I don't give the gift to other places. It means not here, because here I'm only doing it because I hope you'll like me.

So you wrote a whole book about identity. One of the things that— because we did a quick live before we jumped on and did our recording— is a lot of women were like, so is this book really for young women? Because, you know, everybody's like, Chrystal Hurst has a book out, so who is— listen, our Bible study is waiting for the next— so who is this book for? Okay, and who is the Bible— what is the book Who is it for, and is there a Bible study that goes with it?

Okay, so this one right here, this is the first copy I just got my hands on.

It's like Felix.

Yeah, it's like having a baby. When you, you just have a baby and you kind of look at it and you think, oh, how pretty, and then you have like postpartum, like, is this it?

And you're like, did I, did I say that? Did I not say that? Did I say it like that?

What, what's happening? Um, and you automatically see mistakes and things like that. But anyway, I'm, I'm very excited about about this book. So the main character in the film is a young woman. So our goal was to write something hopefully that young women would be attracted to.

Let's define young women if you're going to say who this is for.

Can I be honest with you and say this was a struggle with me and the publishers? Because they wanted to write teen girls on here, which they have, for teen girls. But when my 17-year-old friends hear teen girl, No, that's not them. Yeah, that's their 12-year-old sister.

Right, right, right.

So I had to talk to them about that. They are already seeing themselves as young women by the time they get to 17 and 18 years old.

Yeah.

So in the Bible study that we also did, we had people at the table that were 8th grade in the conversation with us for the video recording, but also some 22-year-olds that graduated from college and that lent their wisdom, but also the struggles they're currently having with identity. So that being said, I will I wanted us to write for the subtitle, for young women and the young at heart, because what I wrote here applies to me, right? I'm 45, and I was like, I needed to hear this from the scriptures. So I will tell you what separates— okay, so to answer your question, yes, somebody who's 15, who is 17, I think they can handle— I think they can handle it. I wrote it with short chapters so that someone who's younger won't feel overwhelmed. I thought about those sorts of things. I also wrote it peppered with personal stories from my teen years and early 20s so that it's not just like hit you in the face with a bunch of scripture without sort of just drawing you in with story. So it's real friendly and it's personal, and I did that intentional so that a young reader will feel connected to it. But at the same time, I think women that are well into their 30s and 40s are just going to enjoy the read and that there are going to be—

yeah, and this is doable. It's this right here. Yeah. This is doable, short chapters, and I feel like I can actually finish it.

Yeah, the font's not real small, there's space on the page. So in that way, it's for a teenager, but the content is for all of us.

I just flipped open to page 45, it says, "Why not just be your God-honoring self now?

Why wait?

For what? Seriously, what are you waiting for?" What are you waiting for?

Listen, I wrote, I'm real excited about this one chapter in the book. Let me show you, Chrystal, in the table of contents.

No, it's for winter.

It's dedicated to winter. Look at chapter 3.

Ah, it's called A Hair Story.

A Hair Story. And then in parenthesis, what's your story? And the point of chapter 3 is I'm talking about our physical uniqueness and how sometimes we just don't like the way God created us. So I was in high school and, you know, I, as all of us did in the 1990s, if you were a Black girl, your hair was relaxed, your hair was straightened chemically.. And I wanted that because I wanted my hair to be long and straight, like that, just like that, yes. I wanted it to be like that because I was a cheerleader and most of the cheerleaders, actually I was the only black cheerleader for a while. I wanted my hair to do like their hair. And I wanted my hips to be more narrow like theirs and my nose to be more narrow like theirs. I didn't like my appearance because it was different than, you know, sameness is celebrated. If you're not the same, then you're a little oddball out and I didn't want that. But I spent, you know, a decade damaging my hair with the chemicals. It might not damage everybody's hair, but it did mine. So I got to 24, cut it off, and it's one of the best decisions that I ever made to just accept the way my own hair grew out of my own head. So that was my story, but like I said, I titled this chapter with parentheses, "What's your story?" Because everybody's got something about their body that they prefer to be different. But here's the thing, these movies came along. And these directors and writers and producers needed someone that looked like me. If I had been created to look differently, I wouldn't have been able to be used at least in this way, in this unique way, to do what God is asking me to do. So I've been so grateful because I realize now that every part of our uniqueness, the color of the skin we're in, the texture of the hair we have, the weight, the width of our hips, the narrowness of all that stuff God had in mind something that he could only reflect of himself through the uniqueness of the way he created you. You are, you are a complete opportunity, a complete package to reflect the creative genius of God in a spectacular way if you just relax and go on and be you. Just go on and relax and have your hair and have your height and celebrate your skin color and all of that stuff, and God will reflect his greatness through you in a way you cannot even imagine.

See, right there on YouTube, right there, you need to just take your, take your little mouse and just zip back about 25, 30 seconds and listen to that again, because you were like in flow mode. Oh, like the words were coming out. You went into speaker mode. It was really good. So I mean, I want to come back to this, but kind of what you're talking about, you just said, you know, God has created you to be you, and people ask us all the time, so do y'all compare yourselves close to each other. And I don't— I think that for a long time, well, I think we did in certain ways, but I think it was a lot less because while we were both mothering and while we both— there was a lot of differences in what we were doing.

Yeah.

I think it's probably increased more, um, in the last 10 years just because life— we're doing a lot of more things similarly.

That's not my story.

That's what— what is your story?

My story is I've spent most most of my life, particularly up through, I would say, 25, 30, wanting to compare myself to my older sister. She's my older sister, so she's—

I was mean too.

She was a little mean. But Chrystal was, you know, named Chrystal, meaning she's the light in everyone's eyes. Everyone's eyes lit up because Chrystal was there. But she's smart. She's— without trying, she's smart. Like, she made A's and didn't really study. But she liked to study. Who likes to study? She was a reader. She was the one that always sort of was the good one, did things the way they were supposed to be done. You have to get that script.

Get away, go ahead.

But it was Chrystal. Chrystal had this hair that cascaded in curls. She never, still to this day, I mean maybe once a year she gets one little pimple somewhere random. I was the opposite of all of that. So I had acne all all over my face. My hair struggled the whole time that I was growing up. I was a little bit of a rebellious person, so I had that streak through me. I had to study really hard to try to make a B. So I have spent most of my upbringing going, why can't I just be like my sister?

And then, and then I spent most of my— no, because here's the thing with Priscilla and I, There are a lot of things that have come easy to me, but easy is not how you get things done. Priscilla, to this day, is a doer. If she decides to do something, like, if you're thinking about it, you better tell her that because it'll be done in 5 minutes. She's— she gets things done. And when she started out in her life, everything that she set out to do, she did it, and she did it with flying colors. Like, you remember being in high school, you were on that gymnastics team. Yeah. And I remember you struggling with being the only Black girl and not being invited to some things because of that. But because of you and our mother—

Yeah, Mommy would not let me—

Who was like, oh no, no, no, you will not not be invited. We are going to the party. But I mean, you just kind of were like, I'm supposed to be here. And you've shown up to your life that way over and over again. You're like, you know what? If I want to do it, if God has given me a passion to do it, If God has opened the door for me to do it, you know what? I'm going to do it. And I sit back and think about it and stress about it and calculate it and get prepared. And then I look up and Priscilla's already— it's been 5 years. She did it 5 years ago. So I mean, there's a lot of things. And then she's very, very— because she was a gymnast and because she was a dancer and all these different things— were you a high-hatter?

No, I wasn't a dancer.

I was a cheerleader. Cheerleader. Okay. All that. Look, just stretch your arm out like this. This, just, just, I mean, can they get— yes, it's still, it's still there. She can still do a back handspring.

Me on the other hand, but I don't do it because my back.

So she's beautiful. She's a wonderful gift giver and high hospitality. You come to my house, you get paper plates. You come to her house, you get china. I mean, so there's a lot of things as adults, I'm like, man, look how far and fast she's going. Like I was telling— really? Yes. And then I was telling somebody else, I was like, in fact, I said it to Daddy. Just yesterday. I said, I feel like Priscilla has had 20 years to build this ministry and build a message, and she doesn't really stress or strive. And life circumstances have allowed me to do— I always wanted to write, but later. And I feel like I have to, I have to war against feeling like I have to play catch-up, not just to you, just in general in life. But my own sister is very far ahead. So I'd be lying if I said that every now and then I don't flip over to your Instagram and go, okay, at least I'm keeping 10% of the followers she has.

Crystal Hurst!

Oh no! No, but I'm just saying, like, that's just real. So I have to, like, present day, real time, say to myself, like, this is what matters about me. Like, I have to say, you know what? And we do that for each other. Yeah. She says to me all the time, Chrystal, but you're so practical. Like you're so practical.

Seriously, there is a style of teaching that I— it's harder for me to get to. I try to get to it because scripture has to be application, otherwise we've wasted a whole hour if we're not going to talk about what I'm supposed to do as a listener. That's very easy for you. You're able to talk about theologically sound doctrine from scripture, and then you're able to say, girl, let me tell you how this works in your real life. You are so good at one-on-one discipleship and practicality and the nuances of digging into your business and making sure that the truth of God comes to bear in your regular business. That right there is, to me, I don't want to say more important than an hour-long message. I don't want to say either is more important. I'm just saying that's necessary.

And it's different and it meets different needs at different places in different seasons of life. Totally. So we as sisters have the opportunity and the gift that you have with your sisters, your real sisters, your play sisters, your friends, uh, your sisters in Christ, to tell them what you see in them, to call out what you see that is blessed and chosen and wonderful and delightful to God about the person that's sitting next to you, even if it's a person you don't know very well. We have to do that as women to call out Even though we gotta look at what God says about us, it's good for us to call out the good in our sisters because sometimes we don't see it. You know, we don't, we don't see it. We don't see it. So is this a Bible study? No, Radiant, a Bible study?

So Radiant is not a Bible study. This is a chapter book, one chapter after the other, short chapters.

But I saw you do videos.

And then we have a Bible study. Oh, Bible study is called Defined. I don't even have a copy of the Bible.

Is that for young women and teens too, or is that for anybody?

But I say young women are the young at heart because here's why. Defined is really Ephesians chapter 1 and 2. What does it say you are and what does it say you have as a believer so that you can start living in light of that truth. So anybody that wants to really have a reframing of their perspective or a reorientation, an introduction to your identity in Christ, I think that it'll be a valuable tool no matter your age or really.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, and we— if you've never just read through Ephesians 1 and chapter 2, let this be your opportunity to do that with, you know, with a buffer, with story, and with encouragement to fill in some of the blanks. But literally, if you read it, it's there. God says, "Here's what I think about you." And this is a great tool for doing this if you're young at heart, if you're a young woman, or if you even have teen daughters. So many people say with their children, teen girls or boys, that they just want a tool. They just want a tool. Something. This is a tool. And I used to take Charis when she was a teenager, anything that I wanted her to do with me that she didn't want to do, we'd have a date. We'd go to Starbucks.

I remember that.

Uh, we'd go to—

She used to feel very left out. You used to go to Barnes Noble.

We used to go to Barnes Noble. We used to go to, uh, Red Robin. We'd go to Red Robin and get a shake. And then she was like putty in my hands. Yeah. So take your teen out on a date. And say, hey, let's read this together. And again, it's an easy, it's an easy read. Yeah. If there was one thought that you would leave with women who have been watching this, or men who have been watching this, a lot of people watch this, um, about identity in Christ.

Yeah.

And how it changes the game.

I would say this: you are not the way you feel. You are not your past behavior or your current behavior. You are not what other people have said about you, what your mama called you, your daddy called you. You're not even what you call yourself.

Mm-mm-mm.

You are not your inclinations, like you're bent that way, you have a tendency toward that lifestyle or that habit or that addiction or that sin. You are not your struggle. Just because you have a struggle doesn't make you less than. Those things might be a part of your being and and a part of your life and a part of your story, and you may have to work through them, and I'm not minimizing the pain of some of the hurt that you may have experienced, but you are not what you have done, nor are you what has been done to you.

Mm.

You are who God says you are. Point blank, period. So you have to separate all of those nuances of your reality from the truth. You do not have to live like this. You don't have to live from this place. You have to work through it,. But you can make decisions, choose relationships, choose your reactions, your responses, chart your future based on the truth of who God says you are and what you have in him without letting all of this ruin the entirety of your life.

Why the title Radiant?

You know, Radiant because there was this beautiful portion of scripture. I have it right here at the top of the book. It is Psalm 34:5, those who look to him are radiant. Their faces are never covered with shame. And there is an illustration in this book of 2Daddy's church where they've got these stained glass windows that line the side of his church. It's a real old school, little teeny narrow church. And I'm sitting in, in the church one day we were visiting, and the sunlight's spilling through this stained glass window, and you know it makes this design, and as the sun moves, the design shifts and changes across our laps as we're sitting there. On the wooden pew in Two Daddies Church. And I thought, that's what we are. We are each these unique stained glass windows. All the nuances of them were intended. The nuances of our physicality, of our personality, even the cracks. So even the weaknesses, they still reflect that light a certain beautiful way that I wouldn't see the light that way unless it was filtered through that particular stained glass. So it's just saying that you are a radiant reflection and expression of the light of God to the world.

Yeah, let his light shine through you, whoever he's created you— the real you. Yeah, whoever he's created you to be, uniquely as you've been created, let him shine through you. No reason to hide. I love this, and I can't wait to see Overcomer.

I can't wait for you to see it too.

See you in the movies again. I didn't get to walk through this one, but that's okay. I'll get hot popcorn with you.

Oh, I will get hot popcorn.

Salty, hot salty popcorn.

And opening weekend, we need to go show up at theaters. Remember we did that with War Room?

Yes.

We went to one theater first, right? We did it for a little while just to see what people's reactions were. Then we left that theater, drove to another theater, and we waited until it was over. Me and Alina. Alina's our— she's our niece-ish, and she's our biological family. And, um, we stood there and waited for people people to come out of the theater and they kind of looked at them like, is that it?

Is that them? Is that—

and we got to greet a bunch of people. So we're going to do that again because that was— that is really fun to kind of just see what people's reactions are about the movie. But I'll say this in closing really quickly: you got to go opening weekend if you can, okay? Um, production companies, they decide how long a movie is going to be in the theater, and they also decide whether or not to open it up in more theaters. They decide that based off of The opening weekend numbers, that's all that matters. And so I do encourage you to see that because these Jesus-honoring, Christ-centered films, they need to continue. And the dollars will be there, the distribution will be there, as long as we show up.

So show up, show up for your life, show up to your life.

I got— I just got— I just got the book in the mail, by the way.

Oh yeah, it's a beautiful book.

I know, I love it.

I'm excited about that too. So show up for your life at the movie theaters.

How about it?

On August the 23rd to see Overcomers and get your friends and family to go with you. Let's show up and make sure that Hollywood knows these are the kinds of films that we want. And let's make sure Priscilla Shire knows that we want her to keep making movies.

Thanks!

This is so fun.

Thanks for joining me! You're welcome.

Love you, Scylla! Love you too, Chrystal Hurst! Hey, y'all.

I hope you enjoyed that video.

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