CNLP 789 | Beth Moore on Knowing When It's Time to Leave and Proof-Texting Scripture to Keep the Pulpit and Power

Summary

The Carey Nieuwhof Leadership Podcast

Episode 789 | Beth Moore on Knowing When It's Time to Leave and Proof-Texting Scripture to Keep the Pulpit and Power

Release Date: March 3, 2026
Host: Carey Nieuwhof (Art of Leadership Network)
Guest: Beth Moore
Main Theme: Navigating pivotal transitions in ministry; the dynamics of women in church leadership; the dangers of proof-texting scripture for control; and why so many women are leaving the church.

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Episode Overview

This episode features a wide-ranging and vulnerable conversation with best-selling author, Bible teacher, and speaker Beth Moore. Moore reflects on her deeply personal and professional journey—from decades in ministry to her painful departure from her denomination (the SBC), the burden of public scrutiny, and her continued resilience. She explores the challenges faced by women in church leadership, the misuse of scripture to consolidate power, the mass exodus of women from the church, and her approach to knowing when it’s truly time to leave a ministry context.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Transparency and Privacy in Leadership (01:22–11:35)

• Balancing Transparency and Privacy:
  Beth Moore discusses the tension between sharing her life experiences for the benefit of others—especially women—while protecting the privacy of her family and loved ones.

  • “What do you need that I can give you? ...I can’t give you what I don’t have, but whatever I have is yours.” (03:02, Beth)
  • On the increased exposure of family life through social media, she expresses caution:
    • “How in the world are you ever going to take that down?...I have opened up my home to a whole different kind of...not always criticism, but that there's always going to be opinions about it.” (05:45, Beth)

• Regretting Oversharing on Social Media:
  She and Carey swap stories about learning—sometimes the hard way—what should remain private.

  • “It only takes one big regret to just hearken to you constantly with putting out something that is deeply personal to the family.” (07:28, Beth)
  • “The unintended consequences [of social media] sort of entered the field maybe in the mid-2010s...we didn't understand.” (09:21, Carey)

• Forgiveness and Grace for Social Media Missteps:

  • “I think there is a big part of me that thinks in some ways that we have to...forgive one another for being caught in a maelstrom of social media upheaval.” (10:17, Beth)

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2. Knowing When It’s Time to Leave—From the SBC and Beyond (16:57–36:38)

• What Is Worth Fighting For?
  Beth reflects on fighting for positive change versus simply fighting against things or people, and the emotional toll of the latter.

  • “Are we fighting against or fighting for? ...When we are fighting for something and not just against something—that is a huge difference.” (17:16, Beth)
  • “I think anger is a huge, huge energy drink.” (18:19, Beth)

• The Experience of Leaving the Southern Baptist Convention:

  • The loss felt like losing “home.” Her church had always been a place of refuge, unlike her family of origin.
  • “When that brokenness came, it was a sense of losing family, losing home. No, losing home. That was my place of belonging.” (23:45, Beth)
  • She realized she had become “more of a cautionary tale” and a “negative” within the denomination, and thus felt release to move on.

• Healing and Reconciliation:
  Some restoration has occurred—not officially or institutionally, but through pastors and former colleagues reaching out.

  • “Not from the top...but invitations from Southern Baptist churches...just because time goes by.” (25:56, Beth)

• Life’s Non-Negotiable Tests in Leadership:
  Beth identifies two inevitable tests in long-term ministry:

  1. Choosing between the approval of one’s mentors/peers vs. obedience to God’s will.
  2. Facing the consequences—on platform/finances/numbers—for acting according to conviction.
  • “He [God] will test us to prove that we really do have it in us... we really are people of faith, and we will choose him.” (33:41, Beth)

Notable Quote:

“When you realize you are not a positive, that you have become a negative...that's when you think, okay, I've overstayed my welcome...that's the best way I know to put it.” (24:55, Beth)

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3. How to Discern When to Leave a Ministry (36:38–41:29)

• The “Unsettling” Promptings of the Holy Spirit:
  Sometimes there is no scandal—just a persistent, holy restlessness.

  • “There are times that we go because God just goes, 'I have another thing I need you to do.' ...Sometimes it's very costly.” (37:50, Beth)

• The Warning About Waiting for a Crisis:
  Leaders often linger in a place until conflict arises to avoid the sadness of a goodbye, but this delays obedience.

  • “We can leave better mad than sad...we wait until there's a crisis.” (40:09, Beth)

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4. Personal Story: Childhood Trauma, Redemption, and Ministry (41:29–61:31)

• Childhood Trauma and Its Imprint:
  Moore shares honestly about surviving abuse at home, her gratitude for a church that provided safety, and the complex journey to healing.

  • “When your protector has become your perpetrator, you're now in a...zone. You need Jesus and good, good support...” (46:41, Beth)
  • She only publicly named her father as her abuser later in life, wanting to give hope to victims of similar family trauma.

• The Outworking of Trauma in Leadership:
  Made poor relational choices, lacked boundaries, and struggled with self-destructive patterns and chronic regret.

  • “I would not hunt out people that would treat me any differently than I would treat myself, which was not well.” (58:09, Beth)
  • “You've got to deal with that chronic regret. It will eat you alive.” (58:51, Beth)

• Redemption as a Lived Reality:
  “He buys it back...It's not an abstract theological concept. It's tangible. It is in real life.” (55:03, Beth & Carey)

  • Beth: “God is faithful not to waste anything...He gave me such a heart for women...such a heart to encourage them in the dignity that they have in Christ.” (49:30, Beth)

Notable Quote:

“If you want what I have, you sure don’t want how I got it.” (46:18, Beth)

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5. Why Are Women Leaving the Church? Abuse, Dignity & a Fading Sense of Belonging (61:31–70:26)

• Accelerated Exodus:
  Beth affirms new Barna and Stetzer data: “I could have told you this before you ever did the data...” (62:10, Beth)

• Church Sending the Message Women Are Expendable:
  “You are giving them the message that you do not care about them—or that to the degree that you do, they are expendable the moment you care about something more.” (64:14, Beth)

• Cut-off from Using Gifts or Serving:
  Especially in hyper-fundamentalist settings, women increasingly have nowhere to serve, diminishing their sense of purpose and safety.

  • “They didn't want them upfront in any way, in any shape or form...” (68:07, Beth)

Notable Quote:

“You cannot take the dignity from women that Christ gave them. You can't. They're not expendable. We're not expendable.” (67:19, Beth)

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6. Proof-Texting Scripture to Maintain Power (70:26–75:05, see also [00:01])

• Scripture as a Tool for Retaining Control:
  Beth and Carey discuss how selective reading of scripture ("proof-texting") creates justifications for exclusion and the centralization of power.
  • “You can proof text it to get what you want. ...Using scripture to protect power and to make sure all the power sits right here.” (71:17 & 71:29, Beth)
  • Beth encourages studying the whole counsel of scripture, especially the prominence of women in Luke, Acts, and elsewhere.
  • Rebukes those who are harsh:
    • “When someone's really, I mean, I'm talking like hateful and brutal with their speech...your heart so disconnected from the scriptures, you are a living corpse.” (74:27, Beth)

Notable Quote:

“They had to protect the pulpit more than they needed to protect the people. ...That's proof texting—using scripture to protect power and to make sure all the power sits right here.” (00:01 & 71:29, Beth)

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7. Hope, Resilience, and Avoiding Cynicism (80:08–84:47)

• Why Not Walk Away?:
  Despite immense hardship, Beth never considered walking away from Jesus or from ministry.

  • “I’m in too long and too deep with Jesus by the time so much of this happened that I'm just not going anywhere.” (80:17, Beth)
  • “I don't have him [Jesus] confused with people.” (81:06, Beth)
  • “...He has never undermined my dignity in any way...until He says, 'you're out,' I'm in. Because I'm in with Him.” (82:28, Beth)

• The Gift of Resilience:
  “I told Russell Moore one time, I said, you know, I'm like Tigger...I just bounce. I just bounce back after. I'm pretty resilient. And I do think that is because of history. I think I had to be.” (83:44, Beth)

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Notable Quotes

• On Social Media:
  • “I think anger is a huge, huge energy drink.” (18:19, Beth)
  • “There is a big part of me that thinks in some ways that we have to...forgive one another for being caught in a maelstrom of social media upheaval.” (10:17, Beth)
• On Women Leaving the Church:
  • “You think they're going to have your same priorities and think, well, there are certain decisions we have to make. … The church has a responsibility to be the reflection of Christ.” (64:24, Beth)
• On Scripture and Power:
  • “You can proof text it and you can proof text it to get what you want... using scripture to protect power and to make sure all the power sits right here.” (71:17–71:29, Beth)
• On Cynicism & Faithfulness:
  • “I just don't have [Jesus] confused with people... until he says, ‘you're out,’ I'm in. Because I'm in with him.” (81:06; 82:28, Beth)

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Key Timestamps

• 01:22 — Navigating privacy and transparency in leadership
• 07:28 — Regrets and lessons from oversharing online
• 16:57 — Deciding what is worth fighting for in ministry
• 23:45 — Leaving the SBC: losing "home"
• 36:38 — Sensing when it’s time to go (the role of the Spirit, dangers of overstaying)
• 41:29 — Beth’s childhood trauma and its life-long impacts
• 55:03 — The tangible reality of redemption
• 61:31 — The church as a safe/unsafe place for women, and the exodus of women
• 70:26 — Proof-texting and the protection of power in church
• 80:08 — Why Beth is not cynical; resilience in the face of loss

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Concluding Thoughts

Beth's candor—about pain, perseverance, calling, and hope—is moving and instructive. She challenges church leaders to honor the dignity of every person, to avoid weaponizing scripture for power, and to recognize the unique risks and burdens women in ministry shoulder. She testifies to the faithfulness of God in seasons of deep loss and transition, and models a resilience rooted not in institutional loyalty, but in Christ alone.

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Follow Beth Moore: [@BethMooreLPM on Instagram/X]
Her new memoir: “All My Knotted Up Life”

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Useful for leaders wrestling with transitions, gender equity in church, spiritual trauma, and the complexities of public ministry in the digital age.

Transcript

[A]

The Art of Leadership Network, that mindset, I think that it's proof texting, using scripture to protect power and to make sure all the power sits right here.

[B]

Welcome to the Carrie Newhoff Leadership Podcast. Hey, I'm so glad you joined us today. For all of you who are new to listening, we're really glad you're here. Today on the show we have got Beth Moore and we talk about how do you know when it's time to leave. She left the denomination 10 years ago. We talk about what's really going on around the issue of women in leadership. While there are different views, some people just like to proof text to keep the pulpit in power. She talks about that. We also talk about why so many people, and especially women, are leaving the church and a whole lot more here on the podcast. Really glad that you've joined us. We got a lot to talk about. Beth Moore is an author, she is a speaker, she is a Bible teacher whose conferences has attracted millions around the world. She has written numerous books. We talk in particular about her memoir, which is extremely well written. It's called All My Knotted Up Life. And now, without further ado, my conversation with Beth Moore. Well, Beth, I've been looking forward to this conversation for a long time. Thanks for coming on.

[A]

I am so pleased to be here. Carrie, thank you for having me.

[B]

So I love what you say. I think it's on the back cover of your book All My Knotted Up Life, but it's like familiar to many, but known by few. I thought that is a really good description of just pretty much everybody who's listening to this podcast because they're church leaders. They have a platform that is a phenomena I find really interesting. How has that shown up in your life and ministry? Familiar to many, known by few.

[A]

I think that for a lot of us who have been out there a while. So think in terms of perhaps my peer age or even 10 years younger than me, but out there long enough to learn some things the hard way. And some of those things are that you say too much and then wish you could back up and retract some of it. And so you learn along the way and then the tendency is to swing the other direction. Carrie and I bet you can relate to this where, okay, I learned my lesson saying too much. Now I'm going to err on the other side and I'm going to keep my cards really, really close. And you know, it's just a matter of growing up in ministry long enough to figure out the balance of the two. And what I really want to share as something that I'm convinced is a benefit. That's the question I have to ask myself. I like to just put my life out there. What do you need that I can give you? And I say especially to women because that's the primary area of my ministry. I say to them constantly, I can't give you what I don't have, but whatever I have is yours. And so I like that transparency, to be able to share life experience and that kind of thing. But there is that crossover into then what is not secrecy, but just some amount of privacy. And I also, I want to say this and I think this is a really strange dynamic for the time we're living in for our younger ministry families. Now you can put your kids all over Instagram, TikTok, whatever it may be. This is a whole different ballgame now because how in the world are you ever going to take that down? But there's the question of. I've also dragged my family into this. So I have to think lots of times most of what I have kept private has been because it was like, this is my story to tell, not theirs. And with my siblings I feel that way. It's like, you know, they didn't ask for all of this. So trying to navigate, particularly when you were talking about the back of that book, particularly in a memoir, trying my hardest to stay with, okay, this is what my story is without getting into what might be private to them. So I think it's a constant navigation, but I think it comes down to what, what is beneficial and what still protects the people that don't want to go to a microphone with me.

[B]

Yeah, they didn't sign up to have a, quote, famous sister, a famous mother, a famous, whatever.

[A]

Daughter.

[B]

Daughter. Uh huh. I think that's, I think that's a really good point. You know, when social media started, I was a little more free in sharing family moments and I've kind of really dialed back. I'm like, there's stuff that's for me, not because it's inappropriate or anything like that, but just because I think the richness of life is not everything has to be shared online.

[A]

I wonder, I don't know what age you are, Carrie. I know you're a good bit younger than I am.

[B]

I just turned 60.

[A]

Okay, all right, so I am almost a decade older. But I wonder if you, you have curbed some of that for the same reason I have. Which is. Or that you're more sensitive to it, let me put it that way, that you're watching what you think with some of our younger ministry friends might not be the best idea. I will think to myself over and over. I don't know if you're going to end up glad that you put all of that out there and made your life basically a reality show, because I'm all for sharing family moments and things like that that are fun. But if my whole life is out there, that I have now, I have opened up my home to a whole different kind of, what can I say? Just not always criticism, but that there's always going to be opinions about it. Now I have invited them into a private place. So that is a really big part of it is that I sort of find myself now pulling back. Cause the more I see society going in, the more I'm beginning to pull back.

[B]

Yeah, it's funny, I see the same thing. And I was thinking about that, ironically, not prepping for this interview, but just over the weekend. Some people I follow, you know, and they have three or four kids and they're all very young, maybe under the age of five or whatever. And it almost is like a reality TV show that's showing up on Instagram or TikTok. And I just wonder what that's doing. I mean, you now have, you know, I think there have been lawsuits and cease and desists and you know, kids who have grown up because social media is 20 years old going, why did you do this to me?

[A]

Yes.

[B]

But it's a really good question. Everybody loves to look at every someone else's life and make comments.

[A]

I can remember only takes one big regret to just hearken to you constantly with putting out something that is deeply personal to the family. But I. We had a broken engagement. This was many, many years ago in our family.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And we had made it all like, oh, they're engaged. And all of this kind of thing

[B]

kind of chronicled the whole thing on social.

[A]

It was blogging days. And so I don't know how to explain this exactly because this might have been something that was more the inclination of women and women bloggers and women audiences. There was quite a lot of bonding in those days. Now there's some of that on Instagram and some of that is the reason why I've even stayed on X is because I have friends there that I don't want to leave. And they're the only place I have them. But in those days, Carrie, I mean, we just put out so many personal things and wrote long articles about it. All the pictures chronicling the whole thing. And then that Engagement was rightly not because of any. There was no sin on either part. There was no. Nothing terrible to say. It just wasn't the right thing for them to follow through with. They just broke the engagement. And then we had to go back and track through every single bit of that and navigate that. And the. The pain it added to that daughter, I never want to be in that situation again. Never.

[B]

Wow. It's a really good point. And, you know, I think, to be fair, because I'm thinking of it, you know, social media is 20 years old, but I think if that was, let's say, even 10 years ago, 15 years ago, whatever it was, Beth, we didn't. We were figuring out social media as it went along, and we didn't understand. It was really only. I'm trying to do a timeline. I'm working on a new book on AI and blah, blah, blah. But I'm trying to figure out, I think the unintended consequences sort of entered the field maybe in the mid 2010s. That's the first time they were kind of like, oh, this isn't all good. And if you're young listening to this, looking back on it was like, duh. But we didn't know at the time we were figuring it out 100%.

[A]

I want to throw this in because there I would even put it exactly where you're putting it on the calendar. I haven't researched it just from my particular observation. And I'm a big people person, so I happen to like the whole social aspect. I'm intrigued by social media, all of these things, and watching cultural trends. This is all up my alley. So I really like that. But there is a big part of me that thinks in some ways that we have to go back and glance at, say, 10 years ago and to some extent forgive one another for being caught in a maelstrom of social media upheaval. I mean, I'm talking about when this was like the trash bin was on fire. I mean, it was like. And all of us saying everything that came to our minds. And I still speak my mind, Carrie, but I'm careful about it. You know, I will give it thought first. When in those days I was just willing to fight. You know what I'm saying?

[B]

I do.

[A]

You start asking, you look back and go, what? What? And who did it change? Exactly what I'm saying. I'm willing to fight for change, but are we going to fight for no change at all? And in fact, are we going to fight only for what we were fighting for, to be doubled down on in the opposite direction. And it's not, Terry. It's not that I would go back and change the things I said or did online. It's that I would not be as inclined to do them today. Like I haven't. I can't think of many things I've changed my mind about except the effectiveness, how effective it is to take on a big fight in public. That is something that I would would say is a colossal waste of time.

[B]

And the answer is it is not effective to have a big public fight.

[A]

But my daughter will say we still call it Twitter, so forgive me. Cause I'll I. Most people do. But I have a good friend that calls it Zitter. And you know, I get that because he just puts it together. But my youngest daughter puts it this way, and I think about it so often. Yesterday morning, Carrie, I deleted something that I was just about to post. I read it and I thought, do I want to take this on today? And then my answer to myself was no. But she says it this way. She says, I don't hate myself enough to get on Twitter. Just. I think there's a certain part where that is legit to just say so. You know, in a way, I do think that there should be some grace over a time period that we were caught so off guard we did not understand bots. I would have thought every single thing that was being said to me was being said personally in those days, Carrie. Because I wouldn't have known any different. You know, I think.

[B]

I still think it's all people, not bots. Yes, well, I know that's not true.

[A]

But no, you find out ways to track it to see. And if you begin to look, there are certain giveaways for an account that is not. That's fake. Not necessarily a bot, but it's fake. It's been someone arguing with you that doesn't even know you, that's just trying to keep you on that particular platform. But it's. It's just all so intriguing. And I think back and I sort of want to be forgiven for not being able to keep a. A good control on my tongue. And I also have forgiven some people that haven't asked for it. But I thought, you know what? I think your mouth got away from you. And so did Min.

[B]

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[A]

Yes.

[B]

You know, because I think a lot of leaders are asking this question, what is worth fighting for? Because if it was a dumpster on fire 10 years ago, it's a toxic sinkhole today for the most part on social media. Is there anything in your view worth arguing about on the Internet?

[A]

Oh, absolutely. I want to take that in a little more general.

[B]

Sure, yeah.

[A]

Sphere. If you'll let me carry it. One of the things I try to do, I think this through in my marriage. I think this through in extended family crises or personal dynamics, whatever it is. And I certainly think this with social media, to be able to think through, if not actually pray through, which is really what it needs. Am I fighting against or fighting for? And I do think I'm thinking of Paul talking about the Corinthians, for example, and when he said, I'm jealous for you, that you have a sincere, wholehearted love for Christ, you know, he was jealous for them, not of them. I think when we are fighting for something and not just against something. And one of the things that I think characterizes our current climate socially is that we have become addicted to fighting against. I'm not sure half of us know what we're even fighting for. We just know what we don't like. We're fighting against it. We're fighting against. Against the other side, because there's something emotionally to be gained by that. I think anger is a huge, huge energy drink. I really do. It's that internal iv, and it's giving all sorts of fuel to just energy. I think we're exhausted. I think we like to be energized. And so we're gonna get mad, and so we're mad at people instead of wishing, longing for something for them. And so let's go back to the SBC a little bit, because I wouldn't even need to tell you how much I loved my denomination. And I'm trying to think what would even be comparable to it as far as something that I suffered in the last years that would feel like that loss. And I would tell you right before the memoir came out, my brother that I talk about very fondly, my dear big brother who was just my. Well, my best friend. My best friend, he died suddenly of a heart attack. And, I mean, just like dropped dead. No warning, nothing. Just. That's when you get a phone call and it's already over before you have the chance to even respond or run to a hospital or get to anything. And the loss of my lifelong denomination was not sudden like that, but it was that radical a loss. Absolutely not. Just the loss of some of what it would feel like to lose a friend much dearer than that. And perhaps the way to put it, if anyone who's familiar with my story, and certainly the memoir, knows that my home was not my safe place. Carrie. Growing up, my church was so that. I mean, I just. A lot of people have been hurt by the Church. I didn't by God's grace, and maybe because I was so hurt in my own home. I don't know. A lot of people are hurt both places, these things. We can't sort all of this out. But I was not hurt by the church. It was a safe place. It always was. I can't think there were churches that are more dear to me in my history than others, but all were a blessing. And I didn't even have all that many, probably five in my lifetime. And those were because of. Primarily over moves. But when it. So when it. When that brokenness came, it was a sense of losing family, losing home. No, losing home. Losing home. And not a home, but home. That. That was my place of belonging. So what finally brought that decision to pass was that I came to a place where I realized I had fought so hard for something. Going back to what the point that I was making a few minutes ago. I was fighting so hard for it, for my denomination, for us not to pull so far into what I'll call and somebody else won't, what I would just call ultra fundamentalism. I was just like, oh, please, please, please, please, let's stay. A bigger tent than that. This is unrecognizable to me. Just fighting for. Fighting for women to just, you know, have. Have a place to serve. Not asking for a certain platform. I'm asking, do they get to use their gifts? These were things worth fighting for. And then certainly for the protection of people from abuse. These were. Oh, fighting for. But when you realize that two things, that it's only causing the pull in the opposite direction and that you've become. I've become a. What can I. A cautionary tale where I knew that I was part of what scared other women that were leaders that say, for instance, were in their 30s, 40s and 50s, were very much seeing what was happening and that some of their responses would be, I don't want that to happen to me. So I'm going to. Now I'm going to retreat. I'm going to pull back. I'm going to. I'm not even going to try. These were. These were things that became a concern to me. And the other one was that I realized that I was causing more trouble in my denomination. I was no longer a blessing and I can't. I truly, to this day, this was a lump in my throat. I'll never get to where this is an easy thing for me to get out of my mouth. I had served it since I was 12. I have never. I had Never known any other place, any other denomination. And I began literally serving at the same. At the time that I would have graduated out of VBS Vacation Bible School, so 12. Then I started helping with VBS and then started helping with Sunday school and then started helping with, with, with young adolescent girls and all youth and, and then on from there. And, you know, I, I, I loved them and had served so hard and served those women and, and having to come to grips with the fact that, that you are not a blessing to them anymore. And that was, that's time to go. When you have now caused what you feel like are so many problems that people just want to see you go. And I'm not being pitiful about that and not being, there's no, no, no martyr syndrome in that. Nothing. I'm not, I don't want to talk like a victim in any stretch. It's just when you realize that you are not a positive, that you have become a negative. And that is when you think, okay, I've overstayed my welcome. I'm no longer, I'm no longer welcome here. That's the best way I know to put it. And I'm so happy to tell you, Carrie, you know, it's been a while since I've talked about it, so I can really feel the lump in my throat. I'm so happy to tell you that some healing has come to pass.

[B]

Yeah. How so?

[A]

Yes. And not from the top. I would not say from. Not officially and formally, nor even maturity, but as far as a number of pastors I've heard from along the way, invitations that I've gotten to come and speak at Southern Baptist churches. And I think just because time goes by, I honestly think if I could be so bold that somehow the thought got across and then my multiplied, this, this was a hard, hard thing to watch because you're watching yourself characterized as someone leaving the sound doctrines of the faith when you know, you know that's not true. And you, you, but there's nothing you could do about it. And I. So time goes by. And I think that some people were fair enough to just go, well, you know, she didn't, she didn't actually leave the face like you expected her to. So that's a good, that's a gift of time, isn't it?

[B]

So some of us, yeah, that you're not quite the heretic.

[A]

Not quite the heretic? Not quite. Just sort of, you know, the old way where, no, the ones that are most conservative, they were not the ones that threw open the doors to me in the first place. So it would have been more the ones that I. Where I more prolifically served before. So those have sort of come back around to some extent and decided, well, and they may have moved on to other Bible studies, but they may have decided at that point maybe she's not the heretic we thought she was.

[B]

It is funny. I left the denomination almost 20 years ago and I got a call Presbyterian. And I love Presbyterianism. There's so much of it. To me, Tim Keller was the embodiment of what Presbyterianism could be and should be.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Really admire him. And it was one of those things. It was my call to go. I just saw a couple things I don't want to get into right now that I wasn't comfortable sitting with. Just a change, a drift. And so I left. And I mean, it was a bit of a story in our country. But anyway, long story short, I got a call two years ago and it was from somebody high up in the denomination. And he just said, hey, you were saying things 20 years ago I don't think we were ready to hear. Would you come back and share those ideas with us? And I'm like, you bet I will. I'll be there in a heartbeat. And it was just so healing to come back to share it.

[A]

It's so healing. Carrie, I did not know that. Do not think we wouldn't have gotten in a conversation a long time ago about this. And I don't. I have this desire to sit around a round table someday which is just, you know, just a pipe dream. But with people that have sort of had similar journeys, that have some miles on their docket with ministry, that have been full on in it. And I'm not talking about that just, you know, maybe attended church. No, I'm talking about that full on in ministry and then decades later look back over some of it and talk about it. I just think that would be the most fascinating conversation. But Terry, I find this intriguing because would you say that this is true? That by the time it does start coming back around, God has accomplished what was purposeful in you. He let it take that much time. I say that because God has done so much in these 10 years and I look back and I think how would I have learned those things and experienced those things and let him do the deep work apart from that? And since we're talking to leaders, let me say this. We will get tested. We will. It's not that we might. If you live long enough and you serve long enough and you're in it, you've given your heart to it. You will not escape. A couple of tests that God is determined for us to pass. And one of them is will we choose to keep the approval of our mentors and those to whom we owe things like, oh, respect, like, they did invest so much in us, they did have a lot of favor on us. All these things that will, we choose them. When we come to some decisions and we come to, this is what I believe the will of God to be. And this is where these that I really want to please, this is where they are. Are we going to go with God or are we going to say, listen, God's more merciful than people. I'm going with them and he's going to forgive me, you know, and this is a temptation. It sounds comical, but, boy, does this happen. We're going to get that test. We are. We're going to be tested on whose approval? When it comes down to it, there are people who we don't. We don't care if they approve or not. I'm talking about the people, your community, your circle, the people that have raised you up in ministry or have been your compadres or your partners. When their will departs the will of God for you, what you going to do? The other one is we will be tested on numbers. We will. We will. And sometimes this will be numbers of, be it followers, the size church, the size ministry, but numbers may also be money, finances, paycheck, whatever it is. Will we accept that once we make a particular stand or make a particular decision that we believe is in the will of God, will we be willing for it to have really powerful effects on all of those things?

[B]

Are we willing negative consequences? Yes.

[A]

Are we willing to let God use it as the pruning of our lives? I mean, Terry, when I say the size of our ministry, try to think how many years this was. When I tell you that we went from enormous groups to, I mean, downsizing almost overnight, and to be at peace with that and be able to say, come what may, this is. This is how it's going to have to be. Because I've got to go with what I believe, the will of the Lord.

[B]

Because your convictions. Yeah. Your convictions cost you audience. They cost you dollars. They cost you a lot.

[A]

It's not a joke. I mean, some of this stuff say, well, you know, surely that he'll just bless you. Yes, he will. Yes, he will. And yes, he has. I had a. And have enjoyed a fellowship with the Lord through all of that, that I wouldn't trade anything for. But will he allow these kinds of things to have an enormous impact so that we can, according to 1 Peter, chapter 1, prove genuine? And that Carey, he's going to be after that. No one's going to escape that. He will. He will test us to prove that we really do have it in us. We really are people of faith, and we will choose him. When it comes down to it, we're going to choose him over and over. And you know, it's going to be painful, but it's going to be peace.

[B]

Hey, this episode is brought to you by the Art of Leadership Academy. So, you know, in today's conversation, we're talking about something that's both heartbreaking and urgent. The growing number of women who are leaving the church and the deeper reasons behind it. So I want to share a couple of resources with you that can really help you and your team respond with wisdom, clarity and trust. So first of all, I explore this trend in depth in my 2026 Church Trends Report. One of the most disruptive shifts happening right now is that while young men are showing up in record numbers, which is awesome, women are quietly walking away. And the reasons go far beyond headlines. And if you haven't downloaded the report yet, you'll want to get the latest data, my insights and discussion questions that you can actually work through with your staff or leadership team in your context. And then secondly, if you want to go deeper and actually build a healthier culture in your church, one marked by trust, integrity and strong leadership, I want to invite you to join the Art of Leadership Academy. So inside that, you're going to find practical courses, coaching and a community of church leaders who are committed to leading. Well, in a complicated moment, you don't have to navigate the challenges your church is facing all by yourself. You can start with an all access membership to get the clarity and the guidance you need to lead a thriving ministry. So two resources to help grow your leadership. Number one, the Church Trends Report. And secondly, an all access membership in the Art of Leadership Academy. Get both by visiting the link in the description of this episode. Wherever you're listening, YouTube, Spotify, Apple. Just scroll down, click the link, soon you'll be on your way. Or simply visit theartofleadershipacademy.com what is your advice when people come up to you and say, I'm thinking of leaving my denomination, I'm thinking of leaving my church, that kind of thing. But let's keep it at the macro level, at the highest level? I get that question from Time to time, probably because I'd done it. What's your advice to them?

[A]

Well, one thing I'm going to ask immediately if I'm in the position where I can, but I'm going to assume that someone's given me that open door. If they've asked me, I'm going to ask why? What is it that you're.

[B]

Yeah. What are some valid reasons in your absolute.

[A]

Oh, oh, absolutely, absolutely. But also all the way down to. This is why we, Carrie, we as the people of God, have to learn to walk with God. We've got. And I say this because even if we are unsettled, sometimes we don't know why God has told us to move. We don't know. We're just like. And I'm not talking about. I've been moving from an entire denomination, but I'm talking about in anything, we can just be like, I'm unsettled. I don't know what it is here. I've always been so plugged into this church or this community, and I just feel like God has put the word go on me. I mean, that word go. It is characteristic of both eras of time, with Abraham in Genesis 12 and with Matthew in the close with the Great Commission, go, go. So go means by. It just does. There's no going without leaving. And so it can be a legitimate reason to leave just because you cannot get settled, that the Lord has told you to stay, that for some reason you are supposed to leave that group, and it's not because of any wrongdoing. You're just. So there's that I want to go in and say that there are times that we go because God just goes. I have another thing I need you to do. Sometimes he'll call us to leave when we've never loved that environment more, but he's looking for us to obey him. And sometimes it's very costly, but other times. Here's what. I didn't say it well earlier in our conversation, so I'm going to say it better now. Perhaps when I would tell you to go is when you flat out can no longer stay.

[B]

That's fair.

[A]

I am a stayer. I don't think that's a real word, but it's the only word I have known to use in conversations like this along the way. You can look at my marriage of almost 47 years and through lots of ups and downs and my friendships, I have lots and lots of long friendships and long relationships. And even with publishers, I don't jump around much. I like the Relational aspect of it. So my inclination is going to be what I have to believe in, what I would say to others that are in ministry or in some kind of leadership. What you're praying for is, lord, you make your ways, make me where I'm sensitive to the leadership of your spirit, and that when you've got. When you want me to leave, that it will be impossible to stay. And one of the things that, like, you're just, like, about to jump out of your skin. It may not even be anything negative. But what I will say, Carrie, if we would leave when the Lord says, when he first begins, if we'll look back, all of us who've been around as long as you and I have, and I'm older, but I'm just saying we have put in miles with the Lord. If we'll look back on our life experience in ministry, we will see numerous times when the Holy Spirit was already saying, I'm detaching you from this group or this community or this circle of people or this workplace or this part, whatever it may be. I have someplace else I want you to go. We're already knowing we need to go. We need to go. We need to go. We don't want to. We have relationships there. So what will happen is because we don't want to be sad, we wait until there's a crisis because we can leave. Better mad than sad. It happens over and over. So a conflict is forced. Now, I'm happy to tell you that that's not. Was not the case with the sbc. I did not. I wasn't feeling that desire to, you know, To. To leave long before. So that wasn't the case there. But I can think of. I can think of half a dozen that if I'm looking over 40 solid years, really a little more than that, over 40 years of ministry, I can think of several times I overstayed the will of God. And what would have just been sad had to turn into something where I got to whatever degree, maybe they never even knew, but I had to get mad and conflict happened.

[B]

Interesting. I want to go back to something you said. You know, your childhood, and you wrote about it in your book, difficult at times. Do you want to talk about what happened and how that shows up later in life for you?

[A]

Oh, dear Lord Jesus. I think difficult at times is the. Is such a gracious way for you to put that, Carrie? Yes, I was raised. I thank God to be able to say in a church, going home, and the debt that I owe my parents for that is Inestimable. So let me say that because again, that was my place of safety. It was a place where I felt accepted. It's a place where I learned about Jesus in Sunday school. And you also have to understand when you. Okay, so you put me at just shy of 70. I'm in a different time generation than some of our listeners. So in my parents day, a lot of my peers would tell you that their parents didn't talk a lot about God at home, that it was mostly, we're going to take you to church. That's where that happens. It's not that there isn't a blessing set over the meal, but as far as. Were my parents raising us up in the things of the Lord, no, there wasn't any discussion really about Bible reading or anything like that. I mean, we knew where our Bibles were on Sundays when we got the car to go to church and that kind of thing. But it was a bit of a different day. And I have some friends that are Ray Orland's parents very much raised him and his family in the Lord. That was not our case, but we did go to church. And so I'm very thankful for that. But our home, under the roof of our own home, our lives were so, so unstable. My father was an unfaithful man to the Lord. And I say that not as a judgment of his heart or motive, but because of events that happen, things from outward actions that certainly conveyed that there was a darkness in that life. So he was not faithful to my mother, nor was he. I'm going to keep this singular to myself because here is where I don't want to tell the stories of my siblings, but they would have their stories to tell. I will simply say that what I told for a really long time early on. So, Gary, now this is more than you asked, but I was counseled as a very young speaker that I finally told an older woman who was a speaker that had mentored me some. I finally told her that I'd been abused as a kid. And she said, and I understand why she said it. She said, I would counsel you not to tell that publicly. She said, I don't think people can handle that. And I. You know what? I should. You would think that I would have been young enough to, because I was young to take her counsel and go with it. But I couldn't do it. I couldn't. You see it in the very first thing I ever wrote, I made reference to it because, Carrie, I felt like I couldn't even be understood. I Don't know another way to put it. It's not that I want people to think, oh, Beth, in the first descriptions they'd have of me, oh, yes, she was victimized as a child. No, I wouldn't even want that in the first paragraph. But it's part of my journey with Jesus. If you asked me. Okay, perfect example. People, young women will say to me all the time, I want what you have. I cannot tell you. And I understand what they mean, because I knew people that I thought, I want what you have. I want what you have. And it really has something beautiful at the root of it that you have to go down into and realize it's not the person, but it's that yearning for Jesus. But one thing that I always say back to him is, well, if you want what I have, you sure don't want how I got it.

[B]

No. And that's a thing, right? You sign up for someone's whole life, everything that shaped them, and they don't

[A]

want my whole life. So life goes on. And so it becomes very much a part of my. That's open. Then the Bible studies, many of them all. I would make some kind of reference to it. Any. Any woman that had been with me for years in Bible study would have known that I had a background of abuse, but I just never told who. But when I went to write the memoir, so I was almost, you know, I was creeping in on 65, and I had wanted for a couple of years. I was beginning to be inclined to wish I could tell it that it was my own father and it was within my own home and nuclear family. Because, Perry, that's a big one. That's a big one. And I was just. I had come to a place where I wished those people who have my kind of background, they need hope so badly when it is that personal. When your protector has become your perpetrator, you're now in a. You're in. In a zone. You need Jesus and you need good, good support and help so desperately. And good professional help. And good this is. Now this will mess you up. And so I got so stirred in my heart to share it, so I did in the memoir, I shared it. And so I can't. I don't know who I would have been. We say, what impact has that had on your ministry? Well, I can't think who I would have been. I don't want anyone to misunderstand that. I'm saying it was worth it to me. I'm not saying God let it happen. So I would Be more deeply inclined in misery. I'm not saying any of that. I'm saying God is faithful not to waste anything. And what he did, he gave me such a heart for women, such a heart to encourage them in the dignity that they have in Christ and who they are in Christ. And it gave me so much compassion and empathy and I'm not scared to use that word. I can look at a group of women that maybe the group has been pulled together because it's women who are hurting. And I can go into that zone, I can touch that place in my heart and I can, I can feel so much of what they're feeling. And so I just, it was part of what shaped me and I, I just, I would not be the same person. It shaped how I applied the word. Okay, okay, caring. I had to apply the scriptures. I didn't get the luxury of just studying to study. I wasn't going to make it. And I mean this all through. So I don't mean that this was true when I was 16, 18, 21. I'm saying full grown adult, 30s, 40s and so forth. I just don't have that option. I had too many things stacked against me. It's too challenging. It caused consequences that I still deal with today. Now the healing, the emotional healing of it, I'm so thankful to say is advanced so that I praise God for. But oh, it's a huge thing and important to me. It's important to me that whatever the Lord allowed in my path, to me redemption is that he turns around. This is going to sound corny and makes the devil sorry he messed with me.

[B]

You know, almost 800 interviews, Anne. And I'm really sorry for what happened to you, Beth, as a child, I really am. But what I hear over and over again from the people that I interview is whatever their story is, whether it was abuse or it could be being raised in poverty or with single parents or as an orphan after their parents were killed or something like that. Because you hear variations of so many stories in a lot of these leaders. They become, I wouldn't say grateful for, but reconciled to the fact that yeah, that is the childhood that's part of my DNA. In the same way that you could have been raised in a wealthy home or non abusive home or that kind of thing and it propelled them on to create a drive in them or something in them that propelled them to where they are today.

[A]

It's true.

[B]

Do you see that pattern in your life, Beth?

[A]

100%. That's why you look back and Think I'm so glad I can't do it all over and get to choose what's in it and what's not in my story. Because this is what God put together. That all blended. You know, we're a blend of our. Our DNA, our. All the things that were poured into us through whatever education, lack of formal education, whatever it may be. All of these things, our skills are, our spiritual gifting, whatever it is, all of this. All of this comes together, all of these forces come together and make this person. And to just be able to trust him with the healthiest version. Let me say that. The healthiest version of that person that you can possibly be. But it's been precious to me to look back over it and be able to say, okay, the Lord was faithful with every strand of that story. And I'll tell you, Carrie, at the end. So I don't know how you write and I don't know how others write that may be tuned in to us. But I Usually, when I'm writing a book, I'm sending in parts of it. Like, I've talked it through with the publisher and editor, and we've got it kind of shaped where I want to go with it. And I've gotten in the first couple of chapters, but after that point, I sort of write it as I go. And so I don't turn it in as one finished work. And other people may, but. But that's just not the way I've done it. And so the first time I read it from beginning to end, I mean, Carrie, I mean, I just. I just sat and wept, and I did not weep with a single thread of sorrow. It was like, dear God in heaven, you have taken care of me. I just thought the upheaval, the things he had brought me through, this ride, this roller coaster ride that we had been on together, and I have been Jesus in me, that we had been on together, I was overwhelmed by the grace. And so it is. It's redemption. I think that's what redemption is. He buys it back.

[B]

It's not an abstract theological concept. It's tangible. It is in real life.

[A]

And there's just. There's accepting it, just coming to accept it and to know that you were. Here's the thing, Carrie, that we have not talked about, and it's not necessarily where we. It might be a rabbit trail to us, but it wasn't just the abuse. Like many abuse victims, there are repercussions of those things and ways of acting out of those things before you're able to ever get on some kind of road to healing. So the decisions I made out of it, the disastrous decisions, the self destruction and the just. The sin, you know, that I would cycle in and out of, that is a tough part of the story. I look back over my life and it's part of why I got to the end of that memoir and really wept when I read the whole thing was because I thought how gracious the Lord had been to me. Because if you asked me, Beth, what would you say had been the biggest cause of damage to your. Who's done you the most wrong of anyone? I would say me. I did.

[B]

So what did that damage look like in your life? The pattern of self destruction, the quote sin that you mentioned, Beth, what was that? How did that manifest in your life?

[A]

Well, I had, without being graphic anyway, zero boundaries, which is very common. So with. I have said so many times to people, one reason why it is so important that we have our communities certainly are churches where they are as protected as is possible from predators and abusers is not only because of the pain of the abuse and what that has caused a person, but the kinds of decisions, the repercussions of it, the kinds of decisions that we will tend to make. And with every abuse victim, it would be different. So their story is not going to be my story. But there will be many who would say the same thing as me in that we went on to build relationships. If you knew, I was so young. I do not remember life prior to being mishandled and unstable and having an unstable home. So I don't have. I don't have any memory of that. I certainly have a memory of when I would tell you I was assaulted by that family member. But I was already showing signs of things going very awry by early childhood. So I'm making decisions out of that then. Every relational decision, everyone I dated, all of the things, the people that I was drawn to, the kinds of relationships I was drawn to, the ways I would set myself up to be hurt and the ways I would set myself up to be. Because I had so little esteem for myself, I would not hunt out people that would treat me any differently than I would treat myself, which was not well, it was not well. So it was a mess. And then you have. You have all the fruit, the poor fruit of that, of just bad decisions and attracting. I've said so many times, I'm sure this is not always true. This is not everybody's story. But baggage attracts baggage. I mean, it just does. And so that's What I attracted in my relationships, in my dating life, sometimes it looked bad. It always looked cute. It always looked cute because I was drawn to cute, but unhealthy. And then that has all sorts of, you know, it has a contagion effect. So tough and so regret to not. I'm so glad I get to say this to some, someone in leadership. You've got to deal with that chronic regret. You've got to because it will eat you alive and it will come back to bite you over and over again and send you back into the same cycle. So there's got to be this distinguishing the difference between deep heart repentance and then this chronic self destructive regret where you just can't get over long after the Lord had forgiven me for my sins, Carrie. And that I had changed. I mean that pattern, I no longer had the pattern. I had repented. I still would ask him forgiveness over and over again. I'd still go back to it and go, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I feel like according to his word, because he throws those things in the depths of the sea. I feel like probably the Lord was going, what things are you talking about? You know what I'm saying? But no, I was going to repeat them to him over and over again because I couldn' with my regret.

[B]

Guilt.

[A]

Regret and guilt, misplaced false guilt. Because those things, they had not been swept under a carpet. They had been pursued deeply and repented of. And my decisions changed and come into conformity with the will of Christ in that area. So it was, I mean, not only guilt, but misplaced guilt. It was not having enough faith in the Lord. It was like, I can do my part, I can repent, but you can't do your part and actually forgive me like you said you would. So it's unbelief, Beth.

[B]

Home was not a safe place for you. But you mentioned the church was. But then the church has not been a safe place for a lot of women. Hasn't been a safe place for a lot of people. And I know you've been very vocal on that. Do you want to talk about that phenomena? You're probably familiar with some of the new data from Barna. And I hope 2026 will be a year where we go deeper into the data, get some fresh insight. But like women are leaving the church very, very quickly. You probably see that in your own audience. You know, that they're like, I'm just done with this.

[A]

I told my friend Ed Stetzer, I said, I could have told you this before you ever did the data. And I'm not being as smart. He's our good friend, so we can.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. I don't need a study. I don't need a study. Right.

[A]

But I was very intrigued to see that it could be documented.

[B]

Yeah. And it's apparently accelerating, which is, you know, alarming. It's great that young men are returning to church, but the women are going in the opposite direction. And I just would love your thoughts on that. I mean, we ultimately pay for our sins. The church has not been a safe place for everybody. It's been a safe place for a lot of people, but not a safe place for enough people. What are your thoughts on that in the state of the church as it sits today?

[A]

Again, I don't want to be. I don't want to come across as thinking that I know it all, because when I tell you I don't, that is an understatement.

[B]

But you saw this. For years, women didn't feel safe.

[A]

Okay? So what I can say is that I have had 40 years of deep and wide experience with women. So this is my whole adult life, interacting with women, speaking with groups, all the communication that goes forth, all that. This is so. It is the world that I know the best is the church. The church world of women. So I do feel like I can speak with some amount. Not of expertise, experience. And so I want to distinguish between those two things. And so what I think I knew it. What. I was fighting so hard for it. I thought, you are giving them the message that you do not care about them or that to the degree that you do, they are expendable the moment you care about something more.

[B]

So you being the church is giving women the message that they're expendable.

[A]

And I mean this. Ten years ago, I was so alarmed because I thought if you keep this up and you continue to convey this message, what you don't realize is that these women are going to go, okay, you don't care about me. You think they're going to have your same priorities and think, well, there are certain decisions we have to make. Because, I mean, this is our nation. This is our. Carrie. The church. Now I'm sitting down now. I'm starting to stand up. So you can tell when I start feeling very strong, I'm about to get up. The church, to me, has a greater responsibility to the family of God even than the home. I say that because the church is representing Christ, representing him. You can't do that with Holmes. You can't go. You have to represent Christ. I mean, we teach that, we hope that the church. It is a responsibility of the church to be the reflection of Christ and his ways and his words. And so, man, when we start departing from that, there is a verse in Galatians 2, would you believe? Because I memorized Galatians when I was writing a Bible study curriculum with my daughter over it, over the book of Galatians. And I was doing some of my memory work on it this morning and my walk and I said it just this morning. So I know. I feel like the Lord wanted it to be fresh on my mind. This is going to connect. Carrie. It says it's Paul talking, of course, and he's talking about his argument with Peter, who is called Cephas in the book of Galatians. And he talks about how he opposed him to his face and how he called him out in front of all of them. And it says something. I'm going to say it out of the esv, because I'm. This is a CSV, but in the esv, he says, but when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in front of them all, da, da, da, da. It says earlier talks about that when. That how he would not yield to them because he could see this was someone earlier in that same chapter too, because he wanted to preserve the truth of the gospel. This is what I. That is as well that scripture says it as well as anyone. I know that what I was seeing, I was going like, this is not in step.

[B]

This is not the child.

[A]

It's not. It's not. It's not. And you cannot take the dignity from women that Christ gave them. You can't. They're not expendable. We're not expendable. For whether it is power, whether it is political gain, again, I'm not saying that some of those decisions aren't important. They are. I'm talking about they don't get to be made at the expense of the gospel or the ways of Christ. No, not by the church, individuals outside the church. That's. I mean, the church. No, we have a responsibility to walk in step with the gospel of Christ. And I absolutely think that the message that came across, and I think this is the other message, Carrie. And that's. I'm not gonna have a place to even serve. And what I saw, because there are people that say, and I don't know how you feel about this, and this is where there are going to be people on both sides that are not going to agree with me about what I'm about to say. But I'm talking about my own convictions. I was never ever looking ever for one minute to take over a pulpit. Never. I would not. When I said, what were you looking for? I saw just a few days ago somebody talk about women. Women pastors of churches. And they had people's pictures up there. My picture was up there. The only thing I've ever been paid to do by a church was teach aerobics back in the gym, in my church gym when I was in my 20s. I've never been a pastor of a church, but I'm a big believer in women getting to exercise their gifts. And what I was seeing, I was seeing such a pull that women were not even getting to teach. Sunday school classes, community groups had replaced Sunday school. Where were they? Where were they even going to teach? They didn't want them upfront in any way, in any shape or form. They didn't feel like any. I'm talking about the hyper, hyper fundamentalists. It just was like. And I think that's what's come across is there's no place for me. I'm not. My safety is not important. But not only is my safety not important, my gifts are of no importance to you. And yeah, I think that's. When you think about how women have served and you begin to cut them out, it's going to have a cataclysmic ultimate effect. The fruit of that will not be good.

[B]

What do you think churches that would pursue that line of thinking, what are they getting? What are they accomplishing? What are they in their mind? What is their justification? Because you've heard everything from misogyny to no, that's just the way the Bible says it. Right? That kind of thing. You see a variety of things, but there's a certain, like, what are you really seeing? What's really going on?

[A]

I think that there is. Anyone can do it. Anyone can do it. Anyone that's been in scripture even a little bit.

[B]

Well, I can take the scripture and make it say many different things.

[A]

You can proof text it and you can proof text it to get what you want. And what I think many, not all, yes. By any stretch of the imagination. I'm saying that this message that got across about it didn't, you know, we had to protect the pulpit more than we needed to protect the people. That mindset. I think that it's proof texting. Using scripture to protect power and to make sure all the power sits right here and the Reason why I say that is because. Carrie, here's what I got asked this question in the Q and A just last week. What would you tell a woman who's trying to figure this out, is trying to figure out how the New Testament feels about women? I said, well, first thing I would do, first thing I would do is I would send them to Luke's gospel and then go on with his writing in the Book of Acts. Take a marker and Mark every single time it says either women, woman, or speaks of a woman or a girl. And it's astounding. It is astounding. The place that they had the activity among the Gospel accounts, God seeming to very much make a point through Christ of including. And not only including, but at times going, I'm going to turn this upside down with the women are going to be the one to announce that I have risen, that that tomb is empty. And then you go through Acts and see Lydia, you see the church gathering at. You see Nympha, you see the church gathering at John Mark's mother's home. All of the things that. All the times that women are active in the New Testament church. That. And what kills me, I said this. I was able to articulate this years ago, before any of this ever happened. It was like, I'm not trying to take away or erase First Timothy 2. I'm not saying it doesn't say that. I'm saying that's not all it says. And when it is preached as if that is all it says. If we have no, we're not even going to mention Acts 2 that he pours out his spirit on his sons and his daughters and that they will prophesy when we just take certain scriptures. And we're going to use that to be the rule over the church. When we're going, like, okay, but didn't we have to do the work studying it all together? Did we? Were we not called to you? When I. When someone throws at me you're disobedient to the scriptures, I'm like, okay, which scripture are you talking about? Because when you speak to me with total disrespect in that statement, that's not what I'm talking about. But when someone's really, I mean, I'm talking like hateful and brutal with their speech. And then they're going to throw at me or someone else that they're you know, that they're disobedient scripture going like, dude, your heart so disconnected from the scriptures, you are a living corpse.

[B]

So you asked me a question That I didn't answer. Oh, dude, I should answer it. We have listeners here who have differing views. And I understand, as you do, Beth, that people have different views on egalitarianism versus complementarianism, et cetera, et cetera. And it's a bit of a theme right now on the podcast. We're having different interviews about it in light of the data that women are leaving the church. But what I think is inexcusable. I totally understand different views on key issues. Me too. And I know you do, and I know Katie Cole does, and other women leaders do. And I've had most of the generational leaders of your generation, other generations, my generation, all on this podcast. And they're all very deferential. They're not there to say, I've got the one thing that you need that is not the spirit. But what I don't think has any room is being demeaning or degrading to women or to disregard or to be spiteful. Now, now I'm learning that in the context of a 35 year marriage where I have been dismissive sometimes and I have been. And you know what I'm learning as I get. And you talk about your marriage to Keith, right? Like, what am I learning as a husband? I am learning to treat my wife with honor and respect and kindness and grace in a way that as a man doesn't come always naturally to me.

[A]

You want to hear something intriguing, Carrie? My husband was dealing with. We were, you know, in marriage, it's not just one person, it's both of you. He had a health crisis that caused him to have a couple of years that are almost a blur to him. Almost a blur. And it was. I've tried to explain it in computer terms every, every now and then so that somebody could understand. It is like his. Not just the software, but the literal hard drive just failed and then had to be jump started. So there are years in there. And it just so happens that they were the years that I was going through. The aftermath of 16 of 2016 is what I'm talking about. And then the stuff with the sbc. So he was, of course I was talking about it. The girls and I were talking about it. I was in the same house with him, but he was unable to really process it, what was happening. Well, so time goes by, so much healing takes place. He begins to really. Then he's himself again. He starts then looking back at all of it, going like, dad blessed it. And so I say that because it would be. He'd call the Girls, our daughters, and go, you're not going to believe what so and so said about your mother. And they go, dad, would you look on the date of that. But you know, it was kind of. We would sort of laugh about it because it was like, you're, you're a little bit late. You're a little bit late reacting to this. This is a whole lot better now. But it was, it was an interesting thing because Keith will tell you, Carrie, that watching the way women were treated in particular for him, because he's not a big social media person, his wife. So in our situation, it was that he was watching how people had treated his wife. It changed him. It was like, I think when you see it, something that we have, all of us do, all of us have these tendencies, these ways that we've been sort of trained up by culture to act that are so much a part of us, we don't even realize that they're, you know, against the way of Christ. And then we see it like burgeoning out in a, you know, nine foot Goliath. And suddenly we become more hopefully, hopefully if we've got any self awareness at all, we become aware of the seed in us. And that happened with him where he was alarmed by it and began to

[B]

think, I gotta pull all this stuff.

[A]

I got you. Yes.

[B]

Everything by the root. I'm in a very similar place and, you know, culture's moved on. I've had a long marriage, you've had a long marriage. Attitudes are different than they were at the beginning of the marriage. But I just realized I've gotta change. So I know we're almost at time. I gotta ask you one more question. I didn't get to any of my questions. Beth, congratulations. Great job, great interview. Why aren't you just so cynical? Why didn't you just quit?

[A]

Oh, my goodness, Carrie, I've said this before and I know it must be hard to believe. It just never flat out never occurred to me. And there's a reason for that. It's not just there's. I like to tease about being a little bit blonde at times, but this is not because of that. It's because I had. I'm in too long and too deep with Jesus by the time so much of this happened that I'm just not going anywhere. Please forgive me if this sounds hyper spiritual because I don't want it to be. And I wish there was a different way to say it so that. And it didn't sound like that, but I mean, he's my whole life by the time I was tested on so much of it, and that I would have been most tempted. Now, I've been tempted many times to be less public, to be out of the public eye so much. But as far as ministry, I knew. Maybe because I just never had it easy from the beginning. Maybe because I was always running against the wind just in my home and stuff, and had to take responsibility for my own spiritual life and my own faith. But I don't have him confused with people. I really don't. And there are a lot of ways that I mistake and misread, but that. That wasn't the case here. I just. He's. Jesus is Jesus, and we're us. And even though it's very painful, they did not call me to ministry. The Lord did. And he has never done me wrong. He has never undermined my dignity in any way. He has never said, you're out. He has never told me to quit, that I did not have value. And so, you know, until he says, you're out, I'm in. Because I'm. I'm in with him. I'm in with him, and. It's my calling. So. And so that. Okay, you got to give me another minute here, because that doesn't ask the question why I'm not cynical. That answers the question why I'm still in the cynicism has been protected because I. Again, this is going to sound right. I still enjoy him. You know, I still have a lot of joy in him. And somehow, you know, I told Russell Moore one time, I said, you know, I'm like, Tigger. I just. I think it's what some of my detractors hate about me is that I just keep coming back because I do get down. But Tigger, I just bounce. I just bounce back after. I'm pretty resilient. And I do think that is because of history. I think I had to be. I think I had to learn as a child.

[B]

You had to learn resilience, how to

[A]

get back up or where would I be, Carrie? So. But I have. Even this morning in my prayer time, in my Bible reading, I just. I still love him and I still enjoy. I just enjoy the Scriptures. I enjoy fellowship in the faith. I've enjoyed the conversation we've just gotten to have. I love to talk about the things of Jesus. I'm just still in it. And he's just sustained me. I've said to him so many times, you've kept me. I've told other leaders, servant leaders that were struggling. The Lord is our keeper. As Psalm 121 says. And he's not going to let us go. And no matter who throws us out or has no more use for us or room for us, he's not going to let us go. And I'm not going to let him go either.

[B]

Got to tell you, you're a great writer too. That is a fascinating read. The book is called All My Knotted Up Life. Yeah, it almost reads like I'm like this actually happened. But it reads like great fiction. Even though it's nonfiction. You know, sometimes it's very pedantic.

[A]

Thank you for saying that.

[B]

Nonfiction Y biographies.

[A]

I'm so glad.

[B]

Really beautifully written. So it's called All My Knotted Up Life for leaders who want to track with you online. You can be caught in fights on X. I'm sure. Where else can people find you these days? Online?

[A]

Maybe they'll be glad to know that most of the fights they can catch me in now are over bags. Basketball over basketball, rabbit fan. And listen, some of my bros, they don't expect me to be able to talk it with them. And it's like, oh, I know what you're talking about. We'll trash talk with them. But my name online is the same in both Instagram and Twitter X and that's Beth Moore. Lpm. Living Priest Ministries is the name of the ministry. So we go by lpm. And so that's how you know. That's how you know it's me and Carrie. I've enjoyed this so much. I hope I have not over talked.

[B]

No, you didn't over talk at all. This was great. I just love for leaders to tell their own story in their words. So thanks for helping our audience think through some very difficult issues. I'm sure your story is resonating with a lot of women and men and you've given me pause to think so. Thank you.

[A]

You. I'm so thankful for you, Carrie. Thank you. And keep doing the work you're doing. It's so important to serve servants.

[B]

Well, I hope you found that conversation enlightening. I certainly enjoyed it. If you want show notes to talk about some of the things that we talked about on the show, you can find them in the Art of Leadership Academy absolutely free. Just set up an account, join well over 15,000 leaders and well, you can do that by going to theartofleadershipacademy.com you can find everything there. Coming up next, I am going to talk, well, solo about some things that I'm thinking about. What about revival on the church? What happens to our motivation. You know that post that makes the room look a little bit fuller than maybe you think? Well, we're going to talk about motivations. We're going to talk about doing an internal heart check as a leader. That's coming up. Also coming up on the podcast, Carl Lentz, Katie Cole, JJ And Kate Tomlin, Chelsea Smith, Jenny Allen, and a whole lot more. And if you don't want to miss any of that, give us a follow, a subscribe, maybe drop a comment and you can follow us wherever you want. Also, I've talked about this a few times and I will give it a rest at some point. But one of the debates is do you watch podcasts? Do you listen to them? Traditionally I'm a listener because I like to take it on the go. But Spotify, if you're following us on Spotify now, you can seamlessly switch between audio and video. So when you're driving, you know, you just listen and then you can pop over if you're sitting down one night and finish it watching on video. It's a simple tap. That's it. Super easy. Thanks so much for listening. If this conversation was helpful, leave a review or comment wherever you're watching. And I hope our time together today helped you break a barrier that you're facing.