Losing Control Changed Everything!

0:00Speaker 1:What's off in Granger.

0:01Speaker 2:I'm being it, ma'am.

0:02Speaker 3:I'm Amber.

0:03Speaker 4:It's not known for one podcast. And we have Amber sitting in for Parker. We do, and we have and Wilson sitting in for Tyler.

0:11Speaker 5:Yes, welcome, Thank you.

0:13Speaker 4:First, you're the first guest we've had, so you must be really special. You're in town and Tyler is in Nashville for a wedding and you play a concert at two step in in Georgetown, Texas yesterday. Yes, and we somehow worked it out or you were able to come. Yeah, welcome, thank you.

0:34Speaker 5:I'm so excited to be here.

0:35Speaker 2:Saturday was nasty weather, you got you.

0:38Speaker 5:It was beautiful yesterday, gorgeous, perfect weather.

0:43Speaker 4:You have You've been to Texas at least three times, I know in the last few just a few months.

0:49Speaker 5:Yeah, yeah, yeah. We travel here often, which we love because we love Texas so much and it's always so good to be here.

0:57Speaker 1:Where are you from.

0:58Speaker 5:I'm from Lexington, Kentucky, but I've lived in Nashville for six years, so I feel like it's starting to really feel like home.

1:04Speaker 1:How old are you twenty four? Yeah, moved at eighteen.

1:08Speaker 5:Yes, all of myself out of high school. I don't know how. Looking back, I don't know how I did that. But yeah, I was only eighteen and moved all of myself and started my career and had no friends, knew no one, had no church community, like no one. It was. It was a crazy season. Wow, Yeah, it was a lot.

1:26Speaker 1:I did that at twenty sounds like you. Yeah, yeah, nobody. I knew nobody.

1:32Speaker 4:There was a there was one friend of a friend of somebody that went to Baylor and I had I had her number and on the fourth of July I texted her in twenty two thousand, two thousand.

1:46Speaker 1:Two thousand. I think it's two thousand.

1:48Speaker 4:Yeah, it's it's says it does something to your soul, and it says something about you. It defines a part of you in that way, doing that, especially.

1:59Speaker 5:At eight Yeah for sure.

2:02Speaker 1:Yeah, and so how did the Lord save you?

2:07Speaker 5:I grew up in a Christian church or a Christian home, you know, the church, like just always knew about God, knew about Jesus, but it always felt like religion to me, like something I was supposed to just check off of a list, you know, or pleasing my parents because they wanted me to have faith. So when I was in seventh grade. It was my first day of that year. Of that school year, we had like this new Bible teacher come to our school. And I grew up in a very small private Christian school, like ten kids in my graduating class, tiny school, so when we got new teachers and new staff, it was always a big deal.

2:44Speaker 5:But it was also like very rare that we got, like we would have the same teacher from like, you know, middle school all the way through high school. So I remember meeting this guy. His name was Pastor Cameron, and he could not say the name of Jesus without crying. And I remember having this moment like just hitting me like, Okay, if this grown man is crying over the name of Jesus, that it must be something really, really powerful. And then he ended up playing some worship music, which I had never heard worship music before because I grew up in a church where we only sang hymns, and he had played a clip of Sephnie Gratt, singer at Bethel Music worship, and I just felt the Holy Spirit for the first time ever, an unexplainable feeling, and accepted Jesus into my heart.

3:25Speaker 5:When I got home that day from school and I was twelve, Yeah, and it was so real for me, and I remember that whole school year. I mean it was like the most powerful, one of the most powerful years of my life because that teacher was so influential in my walk with Christ. But he would we would go out and pray for the homeless on the streets and we would go pray healing over people. It was just an incredible experience to get to truly live out what it means to walk with Jesus and to go be a follower of him. And so that whole year really changed my life.

3:54Speaker 1:Okay, and then where does music come to play in this?

3:57Speaker 5:So music came about three years after this. Grew up playing piano. My parents forced us to take piano lessons. Had no choice.

4:08Speaker 6:So you always tell people, I don't know, if they want a Lott guitar, You're like, start with piano.

4:12Speaker 5:I mean, it's definitely like a good bass instrument. But we hated it. I mean we were miserable taking those lessons, and we'd have to practice like an hour a day, you know, all the things that my parents would tell me to do, and me and my sister and my brother took lessons, and so I always loved music. I loved listening to Christian music, country music. We grew up on Christian radio. But then there came a moment right around that age of fourteen fifteen where I started loving worship music and I was listening to it all the time and growing in my faith. And then a tragedy took place in my life when I was fifteen that really changed its directory of where I was heading. But my brother was killed in a car accident when he was twenty three, and when Jacob passed away, my whole life completely changed. I know that all of walk through this in another way, but you know, when you go through something like that, your whole world changes and your whole life changes. And for me, I remember having this perspective shift on what truly matters in life, that it's all about Jesus. It's all about telling people about Him

5:20Speaker 5:and living your life for him. And that's really when I remember praying throughout those days after my brother passed away, just for the Lord to reveal to me, like what he wants to do with my life, how he wants to use me. And a couple of days after my brother passed I was downstairs worshiping at the piano and I was playing this song by Hill Song called What a Beautiful Name, and my mom overheard me singing it, and at this point I had never sang in front of anyone in my lifetime, including my own parents. And so she comes into the living room and she's crying and she's like, man, I had no idea you could sing.

5:56Speaker 5:I'm like, well, I don't sing, I'm just worshiping. And I was really from because I didn't know she was listening to me and I didn't wander hearing me. And then so long story short, she asks me to sing at the funeral, and I eventually decided I would, and so the first time I sang in front of anyone was at my brother's funeral, which led to like one thing out of the next. But basically I was discovered on YouTube and then signed a record deal at seventeen, so it was all birthed out of the place of loss and tragedy, which has given me such a perspective on why do what I do and has helped me not get caught in the weeds of the industry and the pressure of all of it. Because I remind myself every day. I'm doing this for the Lord, but I'm also doing this in honor of my brother. And to watch what God has done in my life has been like the coolest thing, just to witness it all.

6:45Speaker 1:And then what were you doing when you found out about Jacob?

6:50Speaker 5:So, I mean I remember like career wise or like what I was passionate about.

6:54Speaker 1:Arth No, walk me through what we were doing that day.

7:01Speaker 5:Well, it was a beautiful sunny day in June, and it was June seventh of twenty seventeen, and we had actually spent the entire day with my really good friends and my mom and their mom and kind of a girl's day. And my brother was supposed to go golfing with my dad that night, but instead went out with his girlfriend for dinner to celebrate her she had passed her nursing board exam. And so we had talked to like the last night I talked to him was the night before, and then we go through the whole day and go to bed that night, and he passed away at like eleven fifty eight pm that night in a car accident, and we found out at three thirty in the morning police came to our door knocked on the front door. You woke up, Yeah, was woken up by my sister. She was like, go look outside and see what's going on because she can't see without our contacts and she's literally almost legally blind without contacts, and so she could see some light flashing, but she had no idea what it was. So I ran down the stage to see and immediately could tell why my parents' reaction and you know, facial expressions what had happened. And that

8:07Speaker 5:was probably one of the hardest parts was watching my parents go through that, because as a little girl, you don't you don't ever, I mean, you're not meant to see your parents grieving the loss of their own child. But watching them carry that, that grief and wait was really was really sad.

8:27Speaker 4:At what point did they did you see strength from them?

8:31Speaker 5:Who? I felt like that took a while, maybe a year or two in where I felt like they were finally kind of coming back a little bit. But it was dark for a while for them. I think they they really obviously struggled so much, but then just like the basic daily things, it was like getting through one day at a time. It's like how we lived in that season, Like for a while, couldn't even eat food. You know, they were in such a state of gres that it was like all they could do to just drink water and survive. And then as we continued on, it was like life would come back to them and it was a slow process. But God was so good, like He truly gave us exactly what we needed to get through each day, Like little by little.

9:16Speaker 1:Where was the church in this? Were you guys?

9:20Speaker 5:Honestly, we were out at church for a long time and it was beautiful and they were really supportive when my brother passed away. But the whole season of that and then my career starting kind of pulled us out into We spent a lot of time in Nashville because I was writing a lot, and started kind of switching churches around and watching online. Honestly for the first few months, but I do remember the community we had in that season was so powerful, and I don't I mean, I know we wouldn't have gotten through that without the community and the people that surrounded us. It was a beautiful, a beautiful season of life to watch how they just came around us, supported us, got us through, gave us all that we needed, and it was it was so sweet looking back on that now, Like anytime I've lost others, you know, since then, or I'll know a friend that loses someone, that's always the first thing I tell them is like, when someone experience is lost, the best thing you can do for them is just to be there for them and to show up for them and to support them in whatever way that looks like. And so that that was a beautiful season for us.

10:24Speaker 1:Just start a job too.

10:26Speaker 2:Today.

10:27Speaker 1:When the friends arrive, they're gonna sit with them for a while.

10:30Speaker 3:Seven days. They don't say anything.

10:32Speaker 6:I say that often because people say, you know, how can I be there for somebody? And when somebody's in a state of shock or grief, it's like I think we always we want to fix it and say the right thing, and I think the best thing sometimes is just to be there and be present and cry with them and not try to fix it, because you.

10:47Speaker 3:Can't fix something like that.

10:50Speaker 6:Yeah, your story sounds so similar in different ways. Sunny day in June, you know, just seems just sounds very similar forth to Yeah.

11:01Speaker 1:Wow, So now how are your parents.

11:05Speaker 5:They're good. They're good. It's been it'll be nine years in June. So we feel healed in the sense of like we can talk about him and not cry our eyes out, and like we can talk about him with joy and look on back on memories and there's so much joy there. But they'll definitely have their days and moments anniversaries, birthdays, holidays, holidays are really hard for us still, So there's definitely those moments for them. But for the most part, they're they're doing really well, and they're at the point where they're just like they can see so clearly that God had a plan and all of it, and so they live in that confidence.

11:39Speaker 4:There's one thing you said earlier about that you want to play music for Jesus and to honor Jacob through that, and you do have to be careful because if you weren't playing music anymore, would you not be honoring him. And that's something you want to wrestle with now and not then, because you're going to honor Jacob by making Christ look awesome in your life. And and to do that, you don't need to do anything that for for your you know, through your talents you don't need to. You just need to be you and follow Christ. So I say that because if one day you got laryngitis and lost your voice. Yeah, you wouldn't want to go. Oh no, now, how am I going to honor my brother? But that that wouldn't be true, you know. And you have a sister.

12:39Speaker 5:Yeah, she's four years older. Her name's Elizabeth. She's amazing. She's a clothing designer. She's in the fashion like world. She's super creative and she styles me for all my shows and it's really fun. She's awesome.

12:52Speaker 2:So you don't have to worry about shopping, No, not at all.

12:56Speaker 1:Yeah. And how's her eyes? She didn't?

13:01Speaker 7:Yes, Yeah, the two old men ask that wear glasses so we can see the iPads.

13:07Speaker 1:Yes, your eyes, we must with the same thing. So how is she now? Where does she live? Did you say?

13:14Speaker 5:Did you say she's in Kentucky?

13:15Speaker 1:She's in Kentucky too.

13:16Speaker 5:Yeah, she's she's really good. She you know. I think for her it was harder in different ways because they were closer in age, so she that was her best, best, best friend. And I think for her it's been hard just just honestly sometimes still wrap her head around it all. But watching the way that she's grown in her faith over the years has been so beautiful and through the loss of Jacob, Like she's just she's really come fully into like who God is making her to be and creating her to be. So yeah, she's doing really well and we're all we're all very close as a family.

13:51Speaker 5:They used to my parents used to travel with me and on the road, and they do still a little bit now, but it's just at the beginning, it was just such a family thing because I was seventeen, eighteen years old and watching I think for them to like and my sister, watching what God has done has been so special for them because they get to connect with people too at shows and like my parents get to pray over other parents that have gone through loss, and my sister gets to talk to siblings that have lost siblings.

14:16Speaker 5:So it's really cool.

14:18Speaker 6:I will say, yesterday London was at your set because she went to the show yesterday and she said she was just crying because you had told your story little pieces of your story, and she just said, I just feel like I relate to her so much because I lost my little brother too, and you said, you know that that's when you truly found the Lord, and so she just felt really close to you in that moment.

14:36Speaker 3:So yeah, it was really sweet, even if it's just for for the one.

14:39Speaker 6:You know, it's like you think you're going out to honor the Lord and honor your brother in a huge sea of people, and it's like sometimes I think we focus on the whole crowd, and sometimes it's just for that one little girl in the crowd.

14:52Speaker 3:Who hears it.

14:53Speaker 6:Our boy absolutely just doing that special thing.

14:56Speaker 4:Yeah, we had, we had an answered prayer amber and I did. We did this weekend because there's this big festival, you know, coming to town and I don't know, they have a lot of people that go out there and London. You know, now she's fourteen. She grew up on tour buses and just grew up around it. Always backstage, always, you know, the always, like in the county fairs before they opened.

15:26Speaker 1:That was just her life as a little girl then.

15:29Speaker 4:And then when I left touring in twenty three, she would she would have been eleven, right, sorry, math so if so, she didn't really care about like concerts and artists and music at eleven, But then twelve thirteen, fourteen, she gets really into it and she's and so she's dying to go to this concert this weekend and she's like picking out her outfits. And it's a little bit hard for me because I'm like, Lord, don't Lord, may she not fall in love with things of this world and get so caught up with these things. And I can't necessarily tell her these things straight up because it just sounds like a worried father. And so at some level, at fourteen, I have to let her experience it.

16:22Speaker 1:And she was so excited. And then she goes.

16:25Speaker 3:And it was the rainy day she went the first day.

16:27Speaker 4:Yeah, and she saw for herself, like a lot of people pushing each other around, and they're in the rain and it's cold, and her friends got split up.

16:37Speaker 1:And then well she was.

16:37Speaker 6:In the middle of like the pit watching somebody, and there's people pouring spilling beer all over her and pushing her. And oh, she accidentally stepped on their blanket. She you know this, lady, she said, yelled at her, like watch your feet. And so she's for she's been in kind of like a little bubble of her Christian school and her church and her her believer friends, and so when you get out into the world, people aren't as kind and nice because they're doing worldly things. And so she was just she was like, I don't I don't know that this is for me, but she really wanted to see you. So the next day she's like, I really want to go because I want to see Anne.

17:08Speaker 1:So she did and that was the highlight of her every day.

17:11Speaker 4:And she left shortly after your set, yeah, because it was just it was too much, and Amber and I were so happy. She was like, London felt horrible because we bought the tickets. Yeah, and she didn't want to feel like we wasted money, but inside him like no, no, no, but.

17:29Speaker 6:There's just something this is great that every other word is a curse word. And so she just said she we were so joyful that she she felt conviction about it, you know that she felt like, oh, I just it made me uncomfortable certain certain people's sets, and so Grangeer and I were just laying to.

17:43Speaker 3:Be like, thank you Lord, thank you Jesus that the Holy Spirit like convicted her about certain things.

17:49Speaker 8:And you have you've told this story from the stage, but now you're telling it in a book called Rebel with June ninth.

17:56Speaker 2:That wouldn't come up.

17:57Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, you might not even know that it.

18:02Speaker 7:Before we had cameras and audio rolling. She's like, oh, this is what it looks like and saw the book.

18:07Speaker 5:Had never seen the book, which is crazy. I'm like, how did how did? Why haven't we gotten a coffee? We need to go get a coffee.

18:15Speaker 2:What made you want to write a book?

18:17Speaker 5:So this is my third book. First book was My Jesus and then I did like a hay Girl devotional and then this is my third book.

18:27Speaker 2:I see why I missed the second one.

18:29Speaker 5:Yes, she did, your daughter have one of those. We need to get there, so we need to get one. She just came out in September.

18:37Speaker 6:Yeah.

18:39Speaker 5:Honestly, like, I love getting to write books because I can expand so much on what God is teaching me or what I feel like I'm experiencing in my life. Because you know, for an artist, you can only write so much in a three minute song or talk about so much on a stage. So this was a chance for me to really get to expand on the message of Rebel and what I had experienced when I was writing my record Rebel, which was honestly, I really just like a huge moment in my life of things shifting and me being bold for Jesus and standing for what I believe in. So we wrote the record Rebel in twenty twenty three, put it out intween twenty four, and then throughout a whole season. Was just a lot of moments of me really standing my ground and the things I was believing in in Jesus specifically. But I had just signed a deal with Universal Nashville, which is a country label, and then still was at Capital Christian. So I had this moment to put out some songs on country radio. And before that I was very much like, I'm in Christian music, this is the path I'm on.

19:42Speaker 5:Got an opportunity to do this, and I remember telling Matthew lest my manager, I was like, I'm not signing this deal unless I know that I can be authentically who I am and still sing about Jesus. And so, long story short, obviously they were like, no, we want you to do what you're doing. But it was a moment for me to really think about what am I doing. You know, how am I going to write this record? How am I going to put out a country record and still make sure the focus is on Jesus. And that's when Rebel came about of what it means to like authentically be who I am, which is I love country music, but I love Jesus, and my songs are going to be faith based. They're going to be faith forward.

20:21Speaker 5:They're going to they can sound like country, but they're going to have Jesus at the front of them. And so that really led the whole movement of rebel. What does it mean to be a Christian in the world we're living in today? When you follow Jesus, it makes you an outsider, It makes you an outcast, It makes you go against the grain and go against the world. And that just let a fire in me to write this book and to continue writing about what God was teaching me during that time. So I'm so excited that it's now finally coming out because it's we wrote it so long ago, and it's like, I'm so excited about it.

20:52Speaker 5:So I think it's going to be I think it's gonna be really special also for my generation in the movement that's going on in my generation of people following Jesus and having this hunger for Him, and I hope and pray that it just helps my generation continue to be bold in their faith for Jesus.

21:10Speaker 8:I was skimming through it and I stopped on chapter two. The title of it is Dust of My Rabbi, and it talks about those who followed the Rabbi so close that they're covered in the dust of the Rabbi. Whose dust are you covered it? Who's discipling you?

21:31Speaker 1:Oh?

21:31Speaker 5:I mean I have two people back home in Lexington that are so vital in my walk with Jesus. But it's Pastor Cameron, who I shared led me to Jesus when I was twelve, and he and his wife have been my mentors and pastoral influences for so long. Always people I know I can call that they'll pray for me and really walk with me through everything. So they've been huge in my life and cannot be We're grateful for them. Pastor Cameron and.

22:01Speaker 4:Erica your band we got we got one of them here.

22:05Speaker 1:I'll try to talk to him. All believers, some of them believers, all of them, all of them. Yeah, even the crew.

22:14Speaker 5:Uh, we're you know, we.

22:16Speaker 1:Don't have to call anybody.

22:16Speaker 3:I'm not sure.

22:17Speaker 5:We're working on some of that, which you know, we want names on the we need to pray for them. Yeah, has been one of the coolest parts for me. I think I was on a tour last year, and there was one guy that has really like wrestled with his faith and shared some things that like he felt like God was really like calling him, and uh, I remember having this moment of realizing, like, what we do on stage is important, but what we do backstage is probably almost more important. And how we're loving on the people and our crew and team and watching some of my people that work on my team fall in love with Jesus and follow Jesus has been the coolest thing ever. Like, I think those moments to me stick out more than any moment on stage.

23:01Speaker 1:Chess. Yeah, that's a blessing and rare.

23:05Speaker 6:Yeah.

23:05Speaker 5:Yeah. But I love my band so much. They know I'm like, they're they're obviously all older than me, but I like my kids like they're just they mean so much to me and it's such a fun season of life having them on the road.

23:21Speaker 4:Everyone starts in almost everything, everyone starts as the youngest person of the group, and then you end up being like the same age as everyone in the group, and then you end up being.

23:31Speaker 1:The oldest one.

23:32Speaker 3:And that's what happened.

23:33Speaker 5:That's crazy.

23:33Speaker 4:It always happens that way. When I first started, I got some of my guys areut twenty years older.

23:39Speaker 3:Yeah, we were just talking about your older gus.

23:43Speaker 4:So all right, now now I get it gets interesting. It has to get interesting here. You're what's your home church in.

23:50Speaker 5:Nashville, Church of the City in Franklin. Yeah, yeah, that's your Darren Whitehead.

23:55Speaker 4:So why is Darren? Why why do you not claim Darren as the got this discipling you?

24:01Speaker 5:Oh, great question. Uh, I haven't. I've only spent a little bit of time with him one on one.

24:07Speaker 4:The only reason I say that is because that word pastor, derived from shepherd, would mean the one in the in the fold, in the flock with the sheep, and so like a Christian mentor or in that in that aspect, wonderful. But when it comes to pastor shepherd, you would you would expect someone to be there for sure.

24:31Speaker 5:Well, it's Church of the City as his church, It's like not, it's a massive So it's not the kind of church where he goes and I guess does that You know, he doesn't go one on one with a lot of people. But I think the overall community of that church has truly taken me in and loved on me and prayed for me and really supported me. But I would say, like, yeah, who's pastoring me? Honestly, would would literally be the people back at home that I stay in contact with all the time and have really spiritually been there to pray and lead me in that way.

25:09Speaker 5:But yeah, Darren's amazing, and that church has been amazing for me. It's a very massive church, and it's been growing like crazy, and so I think it's like, I don't know how they even really go about that from like from their perspective, but it's been It's been a really sweet community to be a part of.

25:28Speaker 1:Do you get together with them?

25:30Speaker 5:Yeah?

25:30Speaker 1:Often?

25:31Speaker 5:Yeah, So we a lot of the times when I'm headlining my own tour, we structure the weekends so that we're home on Sundays, which was something I implemented a couple of years ago. I was so exhausted from just missing church and not being in community at a home church, and so we switched everything around, and as much as we can help it, we are home on Sundays.

25:52Speaker 4:So yeah, I mean, Hebrews ten, do not neglect to gather this summer or in the habit of doing, and for it would be so wise of you to do that when you're headlining and whenever you can.

26:05Speaker 1:We got management sitting in.

26:06Speaker 4:Here, but you make that happen, especially like you mentioned earlier, but a crew member that's coming to know Christ and you're modeling that. You're you're saying, this is what it looks like to follow Christ as he's coming into faith, as he's a baby Christian, and you're saying, this is what it looks like to follow Christ. And then for you to say and what we do is we gather with the body, with the Bride of Christ on Sunday. We gather and not just to receive or to to you know, consume, but we're there too with our own gifts to you know, work alongside the brothers and sisters in our church. To model that to the baby Christian is huge, and I feel like you know that, and it's it's there is a constant tension of we want to be we want to be out, we want to be evangelizing, we want to be preaching the word, we want people to know Christ. And the same time, as as much as we pour out, we have to be poured into, yeah, or we go empty, right, yep? Absolutely, And I think I know that you believe that. And it's apart from that, that's something that really was probably the hardest thing for me and touring was that I

27:29Speaker 4:was just always gone and couldn't couldn't be there to leave my family on a Sunday morning.

27:39Speaker 6:Yeah I would, I would when the Lord started drawing me to himself, I would take the kids alone because a lot of times you weren't home on Sundays.

27:48Speaker 4:Yeah, I mean Saturday, because Saturday nights are the nights we make money. And so to say to say to a book an agent like I can't play Saturday nights, this is right. Yeah, then they're probably gonna need to get somebody else because that's the time we really need you, and especially around album releases or book releases, so you you won't look back on your on your in your twenties and go I wish I had played a little bit more.

28:20Speaker 5:Oh yeah, I know, I'm already feeling it.

28:25Speaker 1:Yeah.

28:25Speaker 4:Yeah, this is a this is a time in your life between twenty four and thirty four, this decade that you're stepping into right now, you'll never get back. And and so that means two things. It means, on one hand, you'll never get it back. So so preach Jesus boldly, you know, to step out with it what they with a gospel like you're doing right now. That is uncompromising and bold like you're doing right now. And on the the other side of that same coin is be in the body, be poured into you know, have maybe maybe the pastor Darren.

29:09Speaker 5:Church of the City.

29:10Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, maybe he's not the guy because he's he can't handle all of it. But there's somebody there at Church of the City. Yeah, they could take you in because the day, because there will be more dark days for all of us, there will be suffering coming. Yeah, Jesus promises it, you know, John sixteen.

29:33Speaker 3:Yeah, what's your favorite chapter of the book?

29:36Speaker 5:Ooh, I don't know. I feel like each of them are so you want to say it again? Yeah, I'm like, I can't even remember the names of the chapters.

29:46Speaker 4:But what is the rebel following Jesus? A rebel stands for truth, a rebel identity, a rebel strength, giving God all the glory, weapons and warfare.

29:56Speaker 1:That's a cool donald. The RESTful heart of a.

29:57Speaker 4:Rebel, relentless pursuit, a rebel's heart to please God.

30:04Speaker 5:Honestly, It's so hard to choose, but I feel like each of them are very We packed this book full as as much as we could. Each of them are really packed full of truth and a lot that the Lord was teaching me. The Weapons and Warfare chapter was really big for me because I was dealing with so much spiritual warfare during that time of taking a stand for Jesus and being bold, like to the labels and to all the people around me that were, you know, suggesting one way and I wanted to go the other.

30:36Speaker 5:Felt like God was calling me the other. So that was a huge chapter for me to write, and honestly a really like meaningful chapter because me and the girl that wrote the book together, we were praying through this chapter and this title, and even she was experiencing crazy spiritual warfare as we were writing that chapter, and so it was like one of those moments where I was like, we're going to look back and remember that this that the enemy was after us. But then we wrote it, and then I feel like this chapter is going to impact a lot of people. And I feel like that's always how it is, you know, when you're chasing after Jesus and you're walking with him the enemy goes after you harder, and that's what we really experienced during the writing of this honestly, of this entire book, but yeah, that chapter during that time of my life, like it just felt like the enemy was all around us, encompassing us.

31:27Speaker 5:And it was a daily reminder for me. I had to remind myself every single day when I would wake up, to fight the enemy with Jesus and to be aware of all of the lies he was going to speak over me, in all the ways he was going to try and attack me and my team. And I lost my voice six times that year when we were putting out this record and writing that book, and it was crazy. I lost my voice on the Today Show. I woke up the morning of the Today Show. Is my dream to get to play this Today Show? I mean it was like my dream. They were like what TV performance would you dream of? And I never really dreamed of any of them, but I was like, well, the Today Show if I'm pick, you know, if I get to pick, And I woke up with laryngitis that morning and it was just like one, Yeah, it was. It was crazy, and so I felt like that was evidence for me during that time that God was really working and I needed to be prepared spiritually and have a community around me that we're going to pray on my behalf. So you what'd you do doing for the Today Show? So I called my vocal coach and it was like four am, because you know, you have to get up so early,

32:37Speaker 5:and I started, well, I texted my prayer chain and I was like, guys, pray. We need a miracle, like a straight miracle. We need this voice to come back. And so we went to the Today Show and first question we asked was like, well, first question I asked was can I use tracks, which you know a lot of people won't talk about that publicly, but I was like and they were like no, because if you do the way that like the sound was whatever. They were like, we can't. So the second question was Okay, should we reschedule this, you know, for another day, and it was no, we have to do it. So when I got into sound check at four am, five am whatever, I could not speak, and the audio guy came up to me and he's like, okay, I need you to test your mic and I was like, I can't, like I have no voice. He's like I need you and he was like being super mean. It's like I need you to test your mic and I'm like I can't test my I literally have no voice. So I looked at Matthews and we're like okay. So we get to the hotel and he walks me up to my room and I just start crying, like just having a full bloom breakdown,

33:34Speaker 5:and he's like kind of looks at me like I don't know what to do. Like I'm like, Matthew, can you guys sing for me? Like what am I gonna do? Matthew doesn't know what to do. I don't know what to do, and so I get into my room, close the door. I call Pastor Cameron in Erica, and I had a whole team of people praying and I was like, guys, I don't know what to do, and they just start praying over me and get into hair and makeup. Call my vocal coach. We start working and he's like, I think we can get it back to maybe thirty percent, you know, vocal range or whatever. So I was able to get through the song, but it was so bad, Like I look back at that and I'm like, I don't know how I even got through that. Moment alone but also just vocally. But the Lord gave me enough of a voice to get through, and that's all I can Like looking back, I'm like, God gave me what I needed to get through that, and I knew he would.

34:32Speaker 5:He always does anytime I've lost my voice, But that year I lost it six times, which I haven't lost it since that, since twenty twenty four, which to me was like so much of a sign of what God was doing.

34:44Speaker 6:So I can't have a couple of questions. Hopefully I don't forget when so I look back on a lot of things now with you know, having fresh eyes and an eternal perspective, do you feel like like we believe in the sovereignty of God and he controls all things. Whether or not he allows the enemy to do something like attack your voice, it's still under the hand of God. So and I talk about I wrote a book, and we talk about idols, and so it's like you wonder in that in that moment, if the Lord was just like reminding you not that you're not that the Today Today Show was an idol for you, but like reminding you not to seek those things over him, and he gave you that moment of taking your voice and you say, you know, you know, you don't know how you got through it, but you got through it with him, and you had many people praying brought you to your knees again, had you know, so many people praying for that moment to remind you that He is everything that you need.

35:33Speaker 6:So anyway, I just wondered if you had that perspective like of thinking, because I think sometimes we blame everything on the enemy, and sometimes it's like just another reminder from the Lord, like I brought you to this place to remind you of who I am, and I am all you need, you know. Yeah, I just wonder if you kind of ever thought about that.

35:49Speaker 5:Oh. Actually I have a lot of those moments. And it's interesting because growing up I never wanted to do music and so I've never been the kind of artist that's like I didn't grow up, you know, wanting to be famous and be a singer, and so my story is different. But there happened moments where God has like allowed something to happen that has truly taught me, Okay, you need to keep your eyes fixed on Jesus. And that was one of those moments where it was also like a moment never being greater. Then I'm trying to like word this the right way, but a moment ever being greater than like what living with Jesus is, if that makes sense, or like the sweetness of his presence or the sweetness of a moment with him. And every big moment in my career has always had something around that connected to it, whether that's like having a really hard day emotionally and mentally and struggling with a lot of depression and anxiety, or that's a moment of sickness where I have to fully rely on God to get through a show. Even the first day of our tour that we're on right now, I was sick, Like the day before I got sick, and I told Matthew I

36:55Speaker 5:was laughing about it, and I was like, I told Matthew, I'm like, I feel like this is the Lord like reminding me to rely on him, Because when I'm not sick and everything's going great, I'm not going to rely on him as much for getting through a show. But when I need the Lord to literally carry me through a show, those are always the most powerful moments for me, and the most powerful shows of vulnerability and performances, and so that was definitely a moment where I was like, Okay, God is God is showing me that the highest of highs in our humanly like perspective or opinion is nothing in comparison to his and so relying I mean, I relied on God so much that day to get through and He showed up in the most incredible way, so awesome that.

37:41Speaker 1:I was going there too.

37:42Speaker 4:Okay, because especially since we started this podcast talking about Jacob and talking about your desire, which is a good desire to honor Jacob through your music, and that is a godly is a good desire. But if that's what we start relying on, not that you are, but we have a tendency as humans to rely on get the gifts above the giver. And God doesn't need you to share the gospel. He doesn't need me to share the gospel. God doesn't need us, He doesn't need anything from us because He's already perfect and complete. Someone that is perfect doesn't need anything else to make it more perfect.

38:25Speaker 1:But God's after your heart. And so when we.

38:30Speaker 4:Do I don't want to sound like we're adding, we're adding things to the story, but when we are in front of something like the Today Show. We do have a tendency to put it on a pedestal like it's the only thing right now in our world, and it technically is. And I do think about that sometimes, like with the Today Show, for instance, they're doing something right now with people that to them, that's their whole world right now, and tomorrow they'll set up again and they'll do it completely again, and it'll feel like the biggest thing for those people in that moment. And it's not unlike God, who loves you, to say, oh, did you think you're going to sing today? You're not gonna sing today.

39:10Speaker 4:I'm taking it all away. And what did you do? You went to your prayer team, you got on your knees. Lord, what would I do? What would I do without you? I rely on you for breath, for a voice, for I rely on you for every heart beat. And he goes, now, you're back to me. Now your position is right to go back to the Today Show.

39:30Speaker 1:Yeah, And he does that. He brings us to our knees because he doesn't need you.

39:35Speaker 4:To go on the Today Show and say the perfect gospel with the perfect articulated voice that's just like an angel.

39:40Speaker 1:He doesn't need that.

39:42Speaker 4:He wants your heart, which is very different. And then he'll use your broken laryngitis raspy voice for his glory in his way to someone else or maybe to share the story right.

39:58Speaker 1:Now for something.

39:58Speaker 5:Yeah, yeah, so true.

40:00Speaker 6:Did you talk about that about having Larenroitis in that moment, because you know, you're in the public eye and there's lots of critics. So after that performance, if you were like at thirty percent, did you see or hear people say negative things about that performance or do you even look or care or.

40:14Speaker 5:I don't look. Yeah, I don't have social media, Yeah, but I do. Yeah, Oh I got rid of it three yes, yo, but I do know that. No, I don't think so. I mean, my team said they couldn't even tell okay, good, like we couldn't even tell me you have Laren Rnis And like y'all.

40:29Speaker 6:I think I say the same thing about him, Like you guys know your voice, and y'all know y'll have really good ears and most of the time, ninety nine percent of the time, the audience would never know.

40:37Speaker 3:But you know, yeah, you know, yeah, yeah.

40:39Speaker 1:Double click on the social media thing.

40:41Speaker 5:Yeah you got it. Three years ago I got off of it.

40:44Speaker 3:Oh, go off of it.

40:45Speaker 4:Okay.

40:45Speaker 6:I was about to say, okay, London, you can get it when you're like twenty one.

40:48Speaker 5:No, my biggest like, I wish, okay, I wish so badly that my parents knew about social media back then, because if I can go back and change anything about my childhood, it would be that I got my first phone when I was nine. We had a flip phone, me and my sister shared because I was I was a dancer, so I was in ballet every day, so we needed a phone to tell our parents to come pick us up, you know, and all that. But then when I was ten, the iPhone three came out and there was like a buy one and get one free deal at eighteen. So my mom gets fun, yeah exactly, and she know she's being so sweet. We get in the car from school. I'll never forget this day, and me and my sister are there and she goes, hey, girls, I got an iPhone three and you all can share it.

41:34Speaker 5:So we get it. We share it, and I mean I got Instagram the next day. Who was ten years old? We had My parents had no idea what back then that was in I don't remember fourteen years i'd have been yeah, yeah, time. So they had no idea the damage, you know, there was no studies back then about like the damage it would do. And so I got Instagram, same account I still have now. I just changed the username to Annilson Music, but that was my same account, and I remember it's shaping so much of my life in a negative way, with like comparison to other girls and feeling like I wasn't good enough or pretty enough, and all the things that came along with it, and my parents like monitored our phone and everything. But it was still like back then, they just had no idea what it was going to do. So I go throughout high school, get into my music career, and then Pastor Darren at Church of the City in twenty twenty three did a digital fast and he was one of the first pastors to really talk about this, and we go through a I think it was like a forty day digital fast. He ended up writing a book on it that you can get on Amazon, and I've done the

42:40Speaker 5:book twice now, but it's a forty day book basically devotional if you write down things each day. And but he was he would go into the first option was like getting a light phone, which at the time was one of the only phones that was kind of doing this. But I bought a light phone. I did it for a year. And then the other option was making your smart phone dumb, as you would say, so like going black and white on your phone, so taking off color which makes you want to look up and not down at your phone, getting rid of all social media Safari, Gmail, the only thing on your phone is text, call, a maps, and camera, I think. And I did that for a year and a half two years, and it changed my life forever. And I still don't have any social media on my phone, and I mean it was like it was the best thing ever for me. So now I'll check it on my laptop and then my team will post for me, which is great, so I don't have to get on it, which I love. So yeah, it's so good.

43:34Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm with you in the same way.

43:36Speaker 4:I don't have it on a phone either. Yeah. Now I moved it to my laptop. And then also what I found was I don't really go to my laptop to look at social media. Yeah I thought I did the last September, And you were like, I wonder if you'll just find something else to replace it.

43:50Speaker 2:Yeah, no you haven't.

43:52Speaker 1:No, it's it's life changing.

43:54Speaker 6:And as a parents, like you said that, we didn't know when Instagram started. It was just photos. It wasn't like the scrolling, the shorts, the reels, yes for you pages and stuff. So yeah, we're trying to make changes in our digital family as well.

44:11Speaker 5:I can't imagine when I have kids one day. I can't even imagine like how hard that will be. But also like, that's so good that you guys are doing that, because it's true. I feel like all your kids will look back and thank you one day. I've looked back and think to my mom on so many things that she did that at the time I rolled my eyes about and I was so mad about. But then I can look back now and say thank you Mom, thank you Dad for having the standard for us, and for fighting for this for us and for protecting us in these ways. Because now this world that we're living in today is so dark and social media is such a slippery slope for kids, especially that age, being a teenager, there's already so much that we're dealing with in our identities, and then to add that on as a layer on top.

44:52Speaker 5:It's just awful.

44:53Speaker 4:Yeah, can you take a clip of what she just said? And so I could send it to London over and over and over.

44:59Speaker 6:And she didn't have social media, but all her friends do and she wants it.

45:02Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean your parents.

45:05Speaker 6:Well, yeah, I tell her that all the time, Like, I know you don't understand. You're going to thank us someday, I promise.

45:09Speaker 7:Just throw it on YouTube and have it loop on your yes on her TV and thank you so much for coming so fun, Parker, thank you for sleeping in and Hamber you did so much better than Parker ever could. Just to show that you know, his ways are not our ways, his thoughts are not our thoughts. Is that my thought would be Yes, Matthew West, you go seeing hey girl on.

45:33Speaker 2:The Today Show.

45:33Speaker 5:I would have loved that.

45:37Speaker 3:He would have done it too.

45:40Speaker 4:Album out Rebel and then your book coming out with the same title June June Night, June Night.

45:48Speaker 2:Real quickly album is Stars though yes, album Stars.

45:52Speaker 1:The new album and and.

45:54Speaker 5:Rebel is the Rebel was my second record. Second record out Stars in October.

46:00Speaker 1:There's a new record called.

46:01Speaker 2:Stars, but that comes out June ninth, is what it says on.

46:04Speaker 5:That Yeah, June night, can't wait.

46:08Speaker 4:Yeah, it's almost close to your angel day. Yeah yeah, that's what my kids call it.

46:14Speaker 1:Anyway, love it girl. Thank you so much. This is really fun. Hope to see you again.

46:18Speaker 4:So you're our first guest on this this rendition of the podcast.

46:22Speaker 5:Yeah, oh, I'm so honoring thanks for having me. It's awesome.