PODCAST TRANSCRIPT | EPISODE 212: THE LAND OF MOTHERHOOD, PT 23
LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell
EPISODE 212: THE LAND OF MOTHERHOOD, Part 23
Another revolutionary podcast today with my daughter, Evangeline. She shares her story of mothering her young children in a small one room "hut" with no running water and cooking outside. Eventually, they had two rooms where she and her husband slept in the kitchen. No room for children's beds, so they all slept on the floor in the main room.
She tells how she learned to embrace her situation with joy and make it fun, and how she has learned to CHOOSE JOY in every situation. Be ready for a challenge when Vange gets going! Evangeline is a mother of 10 and grandmother of six and three more on the way.
Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, Life to The Full, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.
Nancy Campbell: Hello, ladies! Well, can you believe it? I now have Evangeline, my daughter, with us today. You’ve heard from Pearl. You’ve heard from Serene. And now I have Evangeline. It is so great to have them with me, and for you to hear from their lives, how they have learned to walk in joy. For those of you who are just coming onto this podcast, we’re talking about the land of motherhood, and how that it is a land of joy. God wants us to have homes of joy.
Jeremiah 30:18-19: “Thus saith the LORD; Behold, I will bring again the captivity of Jacob's tents,” talking about their homes, “and have mercy on his dwelling places. . . And out of them shall proceed thanksgiving and the voice of them that make merry: and I will multiply them, and they shall not be few; I will also glorify them, and they shall not be small.” Do you notice, ladies, what comes out of the homes? “Out of them will come thanksgiving, and the voice of them that make merry.”
In Isaiah 51:3, we see another description of the home. It’s talking about Zion, but it relates to our homes. “For the LORD shall comfort Zion . . . joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving, and the voice of melody.”
We actually see two sets of twins in that Scripture. “Joy and gladness,” they go together right through the Word. We see joy and gladness, and God wants them to be in our homes. The other set of twins are “thanksgiving and the voice of melody.” God wants them in our homes, too.
When God was blessing the tribes of Israel through Issachar, He told them, the tribe of Issachar, that they were to rejoice in their homes; Deuteronomy 33:18. The word for “homes” is ohel, and it means, “a covering, a dwelling place.” It can be used to talk about a hut, or about a mansion, or a palace.
Some of you may be thinking, “Well, I live in this little, cramped space. It’s just like a hut! Goodness me! How can I have joy in my home? If only I had more space and a bigger home! Well, I could feel a lot happier.” But Vange, that’s how you started your motherhood.
Evangeline: Well, you know, I love that you said that because I was thinking as you were speaking, “Oh, I’d better tell these stories!”
Nancy: Yes, I want you to start.
Evangeline: A lot of you don’t know, and I want to say a lot to you, because this is my passion, speaking about the joyful mother. So many of you rely on your circumstances. Literally, Mum, I have so many mothers come up to me. “Well, you know, you’ve got your mother, and you don’t know my mother. You don’t know my life.”
Or “You haven’t had cancer,” and “You haven’t had this,” and “You don’t live in my house.” Everybody’s got something to whine about, or to cry over, or some spilled milk. We live in a fallen earth. But that’s not where we leave our brains! Especially when, Mum, you were saying all those verses about where the joy comes out of our dwelling place.
We live in one percent, the west, of the richest people in the world. I’ve had a fun adventurous life. Even with my children, we, in one weekend, we moved out of a city, and we had some land. We didn’t have enough money to build. My husband found some stuff in a dumpster. In one weekend, he put up, I think it was 9’ x 14’, one room. We moved all out there. This was when I had, I think I had six children, pregnant with my seventh.
I know I had five, and I was pregnant with my sixth child. I had my sixth child out there, Mum. It’s true. We moved into this one room with no water. It was literally one room. No bathroom, no taps (faucets), there were no holes in the wall. It happened to be the coldest winter Tennessee has ever had on record.
We were cooking outside. Everything got frozen. I’ve got so many adventurous stories. You can’t even believe it.
I had people coming up to me, “Oh, you poor thing! This is just . . .” Look, I’ll tell you what! It was all in the mind. I literally had the most adventurous, adventurous life! If I followed their thinking, man alive! I would have been down in the pits like you couldn’t believe! Like the poorest, like the worst woman! I know I felt like I was the millionaire most days, because I chose it! I chose how my brain was going to go and think about my circumstances.
Many years went by, and it took a long time to get water, because we had to hire machinery, everything. It’s a long story, but eventually we got water. But you know what? I felt like I was living in Africa, in these beautiful woods. You’ve got to look at the fine, at the wonderful things around you. You’ve always got to choose joy. It’s all about choosing.
Can I say something more, Mum?
Nancy: Yes!
Evangeline: The other day, Zadok said, “Oh, somebody was asking what your mother is like,” because my children are very out there, and full of personality. I thought, “Wow, wonder what their mother is like?”
He said that verse: “She laughs at the days to come” (Proverbs 31:25). I’ll tell you what. When things do go wrong, you have to laugh. I remember my husband, well, he had hired all this machinery for, I think it was about the tenth time, to try and get water. We had to go down a cliff to get water. Then ice and snow. It just filled up the whole trench again. I think I had hemorrhaged. I was pregnant. We came in, and all we could do was laugh, because what else are you going to do? You have to laugh at some things. There’s no other choice, because otherwise you’re going to cry, and then you’re going to die early. Because joy literally makes you live longer. You have normal blood pressure. Joy heals you.
Nancy: I wonder if you are imagining it. Vange was saying how she came out with these children. They have ten children now. Of course, she is a grandmother today. Where did they sleep? The children grew up with no beds. They never had beds. There was no room for beds. So, they had their sleeping bags in the corner which they put down and slept in this little one room in the evening.
Nancy: And then your bedroom . . . Well, in the end, you got, you had the one room. Then you had one more room. Wow, hallelujah! But the little kitchen was where you and Howard slept, in the kitchen! And then the children all just laid down their sleeping bags on the floor in the other room. But they’re all here to tell the tale and they loved it!
Evangeline: Oh, yes! My boys thought beds were for girls. In fact, they hate sleeping on beds to this day! Because they grew up on the floor and they moved out. So many fun, fun stories.
But I want to tell you guys, you cannot laugh at the days to come when you’re full of anxiety. You cannot laugh when you’re full of yourself and woe is me! You cannot laugh when you’re fretful. You cannot laugh and have joy when you’re fearful, when you have no hope, when you have no purpose.
Let me tell you, mothers, this is your season. Own it. You cannot laugh and be joyful when you have no purpose. I think I just said that. You’ve got to choose it. Jesus said to the Israelites when they had feasts and there will be joy. He said, “You will be joyful.” Joyful is not just a state of the heart that willy-nilly comes.
“Well, I’m not joyful.” Well, jolly well choose it for crying out loud. Tell yourself to smile! Laugh out loud. Choose it! There is a choosing. Instead of choosing how you feel.
The other day, a story that just happened. I saw it again. I was over at Serene’s house, and Pearl came in. We’re just all talking away of what’s happening. I mentioned a little story, and I was in great spirits. I hadn’t even though anything about it. And then Serene said, “What? What?”
I said, “Yeah, yeah, yeah.”
She said, “Where were you?”
I said, “Oh no, I was here.”
She said, “Well, I’m not having it. No! Oh, my goodness! No, you should have to deal with this. I could really work you up in a tizz. But it wasn’t fair Vange. That wasn’t fair for you.” I’m like, “Well, I’m good, I’m good, Serene. I haven’t even thought about that. Didn’t even think about that.”
And then Pearl was there. She was like, “Oh, Vange, we could really work you up in a tizz.” They were joking, of course. Well, when I got home, I saw the situation again, and all of a sudden, I thought, “Oh, yes, that is just not right.”
It shows you, when people start to hear your story, I’m like, “Oh, poor you.” No, no, no. Do you know what? I went home and got myself in such a tizz. It was so stupid! I thought to myself, “This is the dumbest thing in the world. My brain was perfectly whole, and perfectly happy, until I took up somebody else’s offense, even though they were joking.
Stop taking up other people’s offense, and other people’s offense on where you are, on how you live. When I lived in that one room, when they were all little, the whole world was offended at how I lived. But do you know that every child that came in, and some of them were millionaires that came in and said, “Oh, I wish my mom and dad lived like this. This is so adventurous. This is so fun!”
See? It’s all about how your brain goes. We must be proactive at choosing joy.
It’s not having joy. It’s CHOOSING joy.
As the mother goes, so the family goes. You have to mother your own mind. Just as you mother your children and you teach them, you have to mother your own mind and teach yourself. Teach it. Encourage it every day.
King David did it. He said: “Oh my soul, live, and my soul lived!” Mother, tell yourself, “Oh my soul, be joyful!” And you will be joyful. Tell yourself, “No moods. Stop feeling sorry for yourself.” Life is always full of points down. If you haven’t, go back to the beginning, and write.
Stop and see where your subconscious is. What are your top thoughts? And by that, what I mean is, what do you think about when you’re in the shower? Just not really, it’s calm, the hot water is falling all over you. If it’s not conducive to life, then change your thoughts for joy and life because you’re wasting your thoughts.
As your thoughts are, so are you.
You can be wasting 70,000 thoughts a day.
It takes practice. It takes practice. Don’t allow your external state to determine your joy. If you try to control your environment, then let it go, and look up, because, in Jesus, when you’re in the spirit with Jesus, there are always blue skies. I don’t know or care what circumstance you are in, there are always blue skies with Jesus.
Do not own “the terribles”? Don’t take on other people’s problems. Do not be weighted down. Even in Ezekiel 37, and I’ve not talked to you ladies before, the people of God, it’s actually the people of God, and you women listening, you might be a person of God. They cried out, and they said, “Lord, we have no hope.” Ezekiel 37, it’s really fantastic. It says because they had no hope, they were not in joy.
Then, here he comes. In the Spirit of the Lord, he prophesies. You mothers have to stop prophesying to yourself every day. In the Spirit of the Lord, say, “Hear the words of the Lord to those old, dry, negative bones that have not had joy in a long time. Say, oh bones, oh mind, live in joy!”
Hezekiah, in the Bible, said, “The Lord delivered my soul.” He said the Lord didn’t deliver his circumstances. Maybe later on. But first, He delivered his soul. You cannot be joyful when you whine. I have never met a group of people who whine so much as mothers in this modern-day culture.
And yet, how does the Bible, throughout all of history, describe mothers? As the “happy mother of children” (Psalm 113:9). And yet we have forfeited our actual title over our lives because of whinehood.
It’s not whinehood, it’s motherhood.
Happy mothers who don’t ever whine.
Forgive, because you cannot have joy when you’re holding something against your husband, your children, or somebody else.
Nancy: It’s like this verse in Deuteronomy 28. It’s very challenging here, where it says: “Because you serve not the Lord your God with joyfulness, and with gladness of heart, for the abundance of all things, therefore shall thou serve thine enemies.” And it goes on.
The Lord sees this as something very serious. When we don’t serve Him with joyfulness in the ministry . . . The service God has given us to do as mothers, is to serve our families, serve our husband, to build our homes. Our serving unto the Lord is in our homes. He wants us to do it with joyfulness, with gladness of heart.
When we don’t, and when we don’t, sadly this is in the section on curses. We start off this chapter with all the wonderful blessings. That’s where we want to be, in the blessing part. But don’t be in the cursing part, dear ladies, where we are not serving with joyfulness. We’re serving with groaning and grind, whining and griping.
No, let’s serve with joyfulness! Serve our husbands, serve our children, with gladness of heart and joyfulness. It makes all the difference to your life, and it makes all the difference to your husband, and all the difference to your children!
Evangeline: Another huge point is that the way you view God is the way you will be. A lot of you have the wrong image of God. You have Him as this person who’s always unhappy and about to beat you up.
Jesus said: “As you see me, so you see the Father.” The Father is the most loving person on earth, because out of the whole of history, Jesus, there was no one who set foot on the earth who was so full of love, so full of mercy, so full of life, so full of joy. Jesus was the most joyful Person that ever has lived. That’s who God is, and you’ve got to start seeing God as the most joyful person. Then you can be like that.
You can’t be joyful when you’re going around without a smile. It’s true. I actually do this. I practice this throughout the day. I just smile, by myself. I do the biggest grin I could ever have. It really alters and elevates, and I think it gives you endorphins. Smiling shows the world. When somebody’s smiling at you, it’s very hard not to smile back.
I think when you’re smiling, it’s very hard for your heart not to smile with your actual external expression. Change your countenance always. Stop going around as the grump in your house. Tell your children too. Smile! I tell my children, “Hey! Smile!” “Oh, nothing’s wrong.” No smiles. Just smile. Smile! Force yourself to smile throughout the day, all day.
If somebody’s done you wrong, if it’s not evil, evil, evil, immoral, if it’s just something that annoys you, smile! Smile, smile, smile, smile, smile, smile. Mum, do you mind, before we leave off, if I read this? It’s something that I wrote, and my Mum actually got me to write it. I don’t know if you posted it or what. But I found it the other day and it’s so good, so I’m just going to read it to you ladies out there,
It's titled “LOOK UP,” because as you look up to Jesus, as your thoughts look up, you’re going to change.
“There is so much life to be lived, even under the grayest of skies and the bluest of skies. The skies of our brain are made up of 60,000 to 70,000 thoughts a day. Can you imagine seeing 70,000 stars, twinkling and pulsing with life, through an inky black sky? It would literally pulse our breath into sheer wonder and glory.
That’s how I feel most times. My stars are my thoughts. I have chosen them. I don’t let the inky black displace the light of 70,000 twinkling life choices, even though the dark night is always going to be there in the background. No, it’s a very war cry against the empty black that has my soul breathing the words of Light Himself.
Shine. Shine. Shine like stars in this universe. ‘See, I have set you as a light to shine, to shine in your family.’ And how? How are you going to do that, when your supposed circumstances don’t match up? The epic revelation that shining begins in your own brain, in your own dark sky. My own mind.
Will I light my own backdrop to see light, and goodness, and glory, and beauty of the everyday? Will I realize the mystical music of living each day as doing the little things that need doing with a smile? The things that no one gives a nod to play the music of life more beautifully than Beethoven’s greatest symphony.
Why should we live for those fleeting high moments when it is the thrill of enjoying a million mundane, everyday moments of time that makes one love life and have joy? These moments, these notes, each one supporting the best music ever played. Don’t live for the thrills. To live another note is thrilling.
Imagine sneering at the sound of a new heartbeat! Impossible! That sound brings triumphant celebrations. Yet, what does it do? It brings a job, day in and day out. Year in and year out, never changing. When it starts, we give parties, we give parties, and when it stops, we cry.
Then why should we sneer at the day-in and day-out heartbeats of our season? The very reason we celebrated in the first place. Why should we cry over the mundane rituals that accompany our season? When we are changing diapers, and they say they are changing the world, you just beam your smile wider. While they are standing and receiving accolades and you are falling on your knees from a stray Lego, still smile.
Yes, feed the children. Get them to bed. Wake up. And do it again. And what for? Because it is beautiful. Because this is what makes life—our everyday moments, the ritual of the everyday, the business of breathing, bathing, work, and the hours people call mundane in order to live, and in fact, find our treasure.
The secret of loving a joyful life is not in pursuit of life but of loving every moment in the rituals of the everyday. If the joyful heartbeat of daily living dies, and you’re whining, you will live for yourself, and lose your soul trying to find purpose for life. Nothing is as dead as not realizing your season and the ritual of it.
To escape the mundane is to escape the very beautiful whole of life. The sheer goodness of having a work before us that is enduring, made up of scars and healing, laughter after pain, dancing after mourning. It’s beautiful, utterly beautiful.
To look for anything else outside of that is to look for something that doesn’t exist, it’s fleeting. It is a fast-paced fleeting fame and burned-out world, offering you false highs, empty escapes, and thousands of new toys to try and make you happy.
But you, ladies, yes you. You now have the market on life. Your mind can choose its skies where the insignificant and daily duties are quite literally the light bulbs of blazing life in all. Look up, my friend. Look up. Because there are 70,000 twinkling stars for your choosing. I love you.”
Nancy: Wow, that’s really amazing, Vange. Where did you get that?
Evangeline: I wrote it!
Nancy: You wrote that?
Evangeline: Yes. I wrote it to somebody who was complaining.
Nancy: Whoo!
Evangeline: I wrote it to somebody who was whining. I just believe it. It’s what changed my life. It’s what changes all our lives. It’s true. It’s true, Mum.
Nancy: That is so powerful! You hadn’t given that to me before.
Evangeline: Oh. I thought I had.
Nancy: No. That is absolutely powerful.
Evangeline: I thought I gave it to you.
Nancy: I know. I’m always waiting for them. Thank you! That is so great. It reminds me of David, and how he constantly affirmed that he would praise the Lord.
Psalm 9:1-2: “I WILL,” he doesn’t say, “Well, I should praise the Lord, but you know . . .” No, “I WILL praise thee, O LORD, with my whole heart; I WILL shew forth all thy marvelous works. I WILL be glad and rejoice in thee: I WILL sing praise to thy name, O thou most High.”
We keep going through the Psalms, and he keeps saying: “I WILL,” “I WILL praise the Lord,” “I WILL rejoice in Him.” That also has to be our affirmation, our confession. “I WILL, I WILL.”
Evangeline: I wanted to find the Scripture that I was in the other day, and I can’t find it for you ladies. But the whole chapter was, choose joy. It was Paul and Timothy, and they were nearly dying. They were in jail, and it was so funny. It was so great. The whole chapter was, OK, be happy! Choose joy! Be excited about life! Over-excited about life! The whole thing was like, oh man!
I must have read it before, but I never read it like this. I’m underlining all the things, and there were about twelve of them in just one chapter. All of choosing your state. It was incredible!
Nancy: Absolutely! Yes.
Evangeline: Yeah. Like King David. “I will. I will. I will.”
Nancy: Exactly. It’s all a choice, isn’t it? We’re going to choose joy.
Evangeline: Will you? Today?
Nancy: Absolutely! I love Psalm 46:4: “There is a river, the streams of which make glad the city of God, the sanctuary of the tents,” that means “the homes,” “of the most High.” God wants the homes, His homes, He wants His river, the river of the Holy Spirit, to flow through our homes, to make them glad. To make them glad.
We can’t do it on our own. We need the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, which is the joy of the Holy Spirit. It’s only through the river. And, of course, this river has many, many streams. The Holy Spirit wants to flow out in streams, in streams of joy and gladness, streams of love, and forgiveness, and sweetness, and healing, and encouragement, and building up. Streams of compassion and kindness, and tender-heartedness, humility, meekness, long-suffering, patience, peace-making. We just go on and on.
There’s a stream for every need that we have as we’re raising our children and building our homes. They may not all flow at once, but they will flow as we need them. It’s all through the power of the Holy Spirit that makes glad the homes the homes of our God, Amen?
Evangeline: Amen. Can I just say one thing, Mum?
Nancy: Yes!
Evangeline: I’m sorry, but the thought came to me that, really, what Mum was saying then is absolutely the truth, because it’s out of the homes that all those things that you were talking about, being kind, and all those lovely, wonderful things.
Anyone can be kind when everything’s going right, when everything’s going your way, and everybody likes you. It’s really a load of junk to only be kind when situations arise. Life doesn’t always go our way. Really being joyful is in the moment where things don’t go right.
You’re not in the right situation. Things are going everywhere, especially as a mother. You’ve got things out of control from morning till night. There are certain things that you can control, but you don’t know if you step on a Lego, or this one’s going to split his lip open. But it’s choosing joy in all the crazy situations.
When you want to scream, you smile! You laugh. When you want to lash out, you don’t. You claw your skin instead, and you laugh, until it becomes one great big fun game. Life does! You have to practice. You have to practice it. Once you practice, it becomes your lifestyle.
There’s not one joyful person that I have known that hasn’t chosen joy (and they don’t live in a normal circumstance . . . you know, multi-billionaires . . . in fact, some of those are sad, and some are happy. But it’s not having your circumstances, joy is not having your circumstances right. Uh-uh. Nope. Not at all. It’s actually practicing when your circumstances aren’t met and aren’t right.
Nancy: That’s right. Oh, yes! Thank you, Vange, for coming and sharing.
Evangeline: You’re welcome, because this is one of my most passionate, passionate things to tell people. I want to kick it in the face.
Nancy: I do think that joy, this is the greatest need in the homes of God today, is His joy. His joy to be filling the home. So, dear mothers . . .
“I pray, Lord Jesus, that You will bless every mother listening today. I pray that You will fill them with Your joy. Lord, we thank You for Your Word that says that the kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.
“Lord, this is Your kingdom life. We thank You Lord, that You’ve given us Your joy. Lord, I pray that You will bless everyone listening today. Just pour Your joy out upon them. Teach them how to put it on, Lord God, because You have already given it to them.”
“I pray that You will fill their homes with joy, and fill their homes with laughter, and fill their homes with, Lord, gladness, and thanksgiving, and the voice of melody. Oh, God, that You will be praised and thanked and glorified in every home, Lord.
“We thank You, Lord, that singing unto You, Lord, is part of joy. You want us to do this, Lord. Bless them, bless them abundantly, Father. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.”
Blessings from Nancy Campbell
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