Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Well, well, well.
[00:00:02] Hey, welcome back.
[00:00:05] This is the Grace and Grit Mindset podcast. And this is Shanna Williams. I'm your host. And it is April 3, 2026, and it's technically Good Friday.
[00:00:18] So I pray that today is a special day for you. It definitely is for me. I'm hoping that when my husband gets home today, we can celebrate a little bit with. I don't know, we'll probably just do a small little communion and maybe watch the chosen a little bit, watch a couple episodes of that and just pray and do a little worship.
[00:00:39] So, so, so thankful for Jesus and his sacrifice and how amazing he is. Can I get an amen on that?
[00:00:48] So looking forward to this weekend and Resurrection Sunday and just beautiful service and then spending some time with my family and watching my little kids do their fun little activities this weekend. And I hope that you are, too. I hope that you are just enjoying God's blessings right now. And I know the world's crazy. I know we're all kind of just seeing all kinds of uncertainty and lots of fear in the world right now, but I know that our God is with us and he is our refuge.
[00:01:23] And we don't have to be afraid. And no matter what's going on around us, we are secure in. In the palm of his hand. I know that for sure.
[00:01:32] So thank you for coming back here. It's been a couple weeks and I've been super busy. So before we dive in, just want to tell you real quick a couple of announcements here.
[00:01:43] Number one, we have about, oh, about a week and a half left for you to sign up. If you are a woman.
[00:01:52] That is the stipulation.
[00:01:54] We are my friends, and I recall the spiritually well woman. And we are putting together a retreat May 1st through the 3rd in Mena, Arkansas. And it is for women who are really just needing to get away with the Lord and needing to hear his voice, needing to reset. But our topic this year, our theme is crossing over or crossing over the Jordan. And we've never been this way before. And that is coming from Deuteronomy, where the children of Israel are finally crossing over after wandering for four years. And pretty much everyone has died off except for the children that were born after the ones that didn't believe God. So you have Caleb and Joshua who are leading the new, the next generation. And one of the things they said is, or the angel, the Lord said to them, you know, I'll go before you, because you've never been this way before, as he's leading them across The Jordan. And, you know, what was in our hearts was that we are. We are entering into a new season. And it's a. It's a. It's a place we've never been before.
[00:03:03] And so a lot of us feel like, hey, God's leading me into something new. And I have no idea, you know, what I'm supposed to do or how I'm supposed to do it. I just can feel like something is different.
[00:03:15] And along with that, there's a time of preparation and there's a moment of what I would say consecration before the Lord. And before they even crossed over, they had Passover.
[00:03:29] And there was this moment where they consecrated themselves before the Lord.
[00:03:35] And I think that's very symbolic of needing to let go of things that, that we need to say goodbye to.
[00:03:47] And, and even before that, at the beginning of Deuteronomy, God speaks to Moses and he says, you know, it's time to stop circling this mountain. Turn north it you, like, you've circled this mountain long enough.
[00:04:02] And that's what we feel like. It's time to stop circling the things that we keep circling.
[00:04:09] The fear that we keep going back to, the insecurities, the anxiety, the. The unforgiveness, the constant battle of, you know, whatever it might be in your life, feeling overwhelmed, feeling not good enough, feeling maybe people pleasing what. Whatever this mountain is. Maybe it's several. It was for me, several things that you keep going back to that you just can't seem to overcome.
[00:04:40] I feel like. And my friends and I feel like, hey, this is like God is calling us into our promised lands, and we just can't keep going back to these same things over and over.
[00:04:52] It calls for a renewed mind. It really does.
[00:04:56] And we want to step into that with you. We want to say, hey, it is time to advance the kingdom of God. It is time to stop going back to these old mindsets. It is time to truly step into that metamorphosis of change.
[00:05:12] And. And that comes from Romans 12:1 and 2, that renewed mind, that true renew mind.
[00:05:19] And so we're so excited about this. We only have room for 12 women and those spots are filling up. So we have some, some spots left. But if you went one in on that, I'm going to drop that link in the show notes so that you can check out.
[00:05:34] Check out the link and see if that's for you and see if you want to sign up for that.
[00:05:40] That is the first announcement I have. The second announcement I have right on the heels of that. And very In, I would say, connection with it is as we were talking about this retreat a couple months back, we were preparing the Lord. Just really, you know, I didn't realize it was all connected at the time. But I came home and I started writing and didn't really even put together that the book that I was writing was connected to our retreat. And so I was able to write this book, the Lord. And I should say I wrote this book in about 10 days because I was able to pull from a lot of the podcasts and a lot of blogs I had written over the years. And I did write new material as well. Well, I was able to, to edit all of that, put it together in, in about 10 days.
[00:06:34] So that was an adventure for sure. I never done that before. I've always had people help me edit.
[00:06:40] But it's done. It is submitted to Amazon kdp.
[00:06:47] It is available in pre order right now for the Kindle side.
[00:06:53] The paperback version will be available to order April 10th. So next Friday you can actually order. So I'll have the link up soon for the, the Kindle version, I can't. I don't have the link yet for the paperback, but it's coming. So just know that if that's something you're interested in, it'll be on all my social media channels. But honestly, if you get on my email list, go to shannawilliams.com if you get on my email list, you won't miss anything because I'll definitely be throwing that out there soon.
[00:07:21] So I'm so excited about all of this. So if, if you come to our retreat, you're definitely going to be hearing about that because I'll be talking about some of the, some of the material in the book when I have the chance to talk and teach from it. I'll be pulling from some of that. The other women that'll be with me, Caroline and Lisa, they'll be talking about their own whatever God gives them as well. But when I have the chance, I'll be pulling from some of the struggles I've had mentally, you know, with, with circling these mountains. Because the book is called Choosing Better Leaving the Mountains. We were never meant to circle.
[00:08:04] And so today, kind of on the heels of that, I just want a little bit talk about in particular leaving the mountain of unbelief.
[00:08:15] Because really, I believe Unbelief. That's kind of funny. I believe unbelief is a sin.
[00:08:24] And I believe it's kind of the root of a lot of the other mountains that we Circle.
[00:08:30] And. And I think that when you look at.
[00:08:36] Because a lot of what I'm pulling from is. Is from the journey that the Israelites took in the. The 40 years of wandering that they had. And. And I think sometimes we journey and we just really throw them under the bus and we just act like they were so horrible.
[00:08:54] And, oh, my gosh, how could they not see what was going on? How could they do that? And we act like we're so much better. We have to remember they did not have the Holy Spirit the way we do.
[00:09:04] They did not have the cross behind them. They did not have Jesus intervening as their high priest the way that we do. They didn't have the story behind them.
[00:09:15] They really didn't know God. They had been.
[00:09:19] 400 years had passed. They didn't know God anymore. They had been slaves in bondage for 400 years.
[00:09:26] There was kind of this silence that had happened, that they had been in bondage between Joseph arising to kind of save the entire nation.
[00:09:37] And then they go into bondage and they're in this slavery. And for a long time it was good, right? Because the Pharaoh that was there loved them well. Then he passes away, and then the generations go on, and then it becomes this bad thing, and they forget who their God is. They don't know him anymore the way that Joseph knew him. And.
[00:09:57] And the father, the patriarch, Abraham, I think Jacob, the way he knew him and his sons. And so every generation loses a little bit more of this heritage and this knowledge. And. And of course, when you. When you become a slave, think.
[00:10:16] I think a little bit of you dies, you know, because your humanity is crushed.
[00:10:22] You know, you lose hope. You become humiliated every day. And you just. As you live this out, walk it out, you become more and more hopeless every single day.
[00:10:33] So they had never known freedom. And so all of the sudden, they go from being a slave and God comes in and they watch. God miraculously set them free. They watch these 10 plagues happen, and then they watch God kill their firstborn of all the Egyptians, and then God sets them free. And then they go out into the wilderness and they have no way to cross, and they think they're going to die. And all of a sudden, this God they don't know shows up and parts the Red Sea and they cross over, and they're just in the wilderness, and they don't have any idea who this God is. They just know he's very powerful and they're terrified of him. And if you read Exodus, you read how they're terrified of him. And they tell Moses that they don't want to go near him. They tell him, you go up there, they're scared of him. And when you see. It talks about when the. When God does descend, how it's this loud sound and there's thunder and lightning and everybody is terrified and there's fire everywhere. And so, I mean, this is terrifying. And I don't think we can understand that. So this is a God that you and I. We've never encountered him that way.
[00:12:01] We have seen or felt more. More. So we've never seen him like this, right? We've felt him. We have felt him through a different way. More of a love, more of an agape presence of the Holy Spirit, who we can feel. His love is deep. This warmth, this embrace, this inclusion, this.
[00:12:27] This connection reconciling. Reconciling us back to the Father through Jesus and the Holy Spirit pulling us in and forgiveness and restoration. We've not known a God who seems like he's full of wrath, who seems like he's.
[00:12:45] Like. We don't know if he loves us or hates us or who he is. So that's. That's what they were dealing with. So they're. They're scared of him. They don't know who he is. They just know that he's very powerful and he might kill them if they don't. If they don't exactly do what he says.
[00:13:00] So I think, you know, as they're in. In the wilderness, wandering around, they're terrified, they're scared.
[00:13:09] And. And they just want. And I think they just want an easy way to appease him.
[00:13:14] And. And they don't realize how holy he is, that he's not like the other gods that Egypt had, where they could just like, burn incense or they could just do something real easy, like offer some. Something. Something silly and keep the. Or, you know, or even kill something.
[00:13:33] And that would make it happy with. With our God. He requires a lot more than just some kind of physical sacrifice. It is also a heart thing. It is also a morality thing with our God. And I think that they just couldn't wrap their head around that. And they certainly didn't know him as Father.
[00:13:55] So pulling that all back around into a circle is. There was this level of unbelief in their heart of.
[00:14:06] Well, I don't really believe that he's.
[00:14:11] You know, I mean, I believe he's powerful. I believe he's a God, and I believe he must be the God of. Of the whole universe and like the ultimate God. But I don't really believe that he, let's put it in a more personal way. I don't really believe that he loves us.
[00:14:32] I don't really believe that he is going to necessarily do what's best for us.
[00:14:39] I think that that was the heart of where they were coming from, was. I don't know if I can trust him. I think that's really where it was coming from. It was more of a, of an orphan approach.
[00:14:52] And I see a lot of that today in the church. And I, I dealt with that too. Is an orphan spirit, like, where you, you don't know him like, as your father, you just know him, that he's very powerful and you feel like if you don't do the right thing, he might get you or he might punish you. He might, he might withhold from you and he, he may not be good all the time. There's a lot of Christians who behave that way because they don't know him, you know, as, as being a good father, a kind, loving, who is who he wants to be. That is his heart. That is who he really is at his core, who he wants to be.
[00:15:39] Sin caused. I believe him to have to be a God of justice, a God who required sacrifice.
[00:15:53] Because we were so sinful, we made that choice and it required him to have to respond that way, if that makes sense. And so we're talking about, okay, how do we stop circling a mountain of unbelief? Because certainly the Israelites didn't get that right. Right. Because they weren't allowed. That generation died away. God said, you will not. And even Moses didn't get to go. God said, I will let you see it, but you're going to die here. And, and I was even reading the other day that God didn't even let them bury Moses. It says that God buried Moses himself, which I think is very sweet.
[00:16:34] God thought so much of him that he buried himself and.
[00:16:41] But, you know, only Caleb and Joshua were, Joshua were allowed to go and to lead that next generation.
[00:16:48] And so the thing that I want to really say to you, and this is going to sound really, I don't want, I don't want to say harsh, but maybe like step on your toes. Because I really wish somebody would have just stepped on my toes about 20 years ago and called me out on this because I think it could have really, like, it would have maybe ticked me off, but it maybe would have like, set me on a new path. You know, when somebody like says something to you and it ticks you off but it really makes you stop and go, you know what?
[00:17:16] Okay, you know what? Maybe you're right. And it's this, because this is so scriptural. But unbelief is a sin is a sin.
[00:17:25] It's not a.
[00:17:30] I don't know, an emotion. It's not like something you can just pretend that, hey, I'm just gonna, you know, act like this is not a big deal.
[00:17:42] It's actually a sin. And I believe it's a really, really big sin because I think that at the core of a lot of what we struggle with, unbelief is really at the very core of it.
[00:17:58] Okay? So I'm going to back this up with Scripture.
[00:18:02] And because I believe that unbelief, it can lead to spiritual consequences and a separation from God.
[00:18:10] And that was evidenced by what you see in the Israelites and what their consequences were, because they did not believe God. And let's be clear about this. God gave them chance after chance after chance to repent, and they would not. The hardness of their heart and the unbelief at the. At the bottom of all this, their lack of humility, is what sealed it. So Hebrews 3:12 says, See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God.
[00:18:50] And so you can see in that, that they were not able to enter because of their unbelief, because he says in this Scripture that it's a sinful, unbelieving heart that causes us to turn away from the living God.
[00:19:08] And that passage, it emphasizes that unbelief can thereby lead into turning away from God and prevent someone from entering into his rest. And if you go back and look, well, if you keep reading in that scripture, that's what it says, that they were not allowed to enter into God's rest because of their unbelieving hearts.
[00:19:31] Ouch.
[00:19:34] And I want to look at mark 9:24. This is just kind of another illustration about unbelief.
[00:19:40] This is the boy with his son was sick, I think. Immediately the boy's father exclaimed, I do believe. Help me overcome my unbelief. Well, you know, you got to give the guy something because at least he admitted his unbelief. I appreciate that right there, because that's huge. This verse illustrates the struggle between faith and doubt, acknowledging that unbelief can hinder one's relationship with God.
[00:20:12] Now my question is, do you believe that that unbelief can actually hinder your relationship with God? And are you willing to even acknowledge that Maybe in your life, that unbelief could potentially be hindering your relationship with God. Because let me tell you what it does.
[00:20:30] If you let it. If you let it play out, it will create distance.
[00:20:34] It'll create.
[00:20:36] You'll find yourself being sarcastic, you'll find yourself being cold.
[00:20:40] You'll find yourself kind of being petty, or petty's the right word.
[00:20:47] You'll kind of assign.
[00:20:53] You'll say things about God that are not true because you're hurt.
[00:20:57] You'll be like, yeah, well, you know, that's what he does.
[00:21:01] Must be an art. If somebody else is blessed or they got something you didn't want. You'd be like, well, it must be nice. Must be nice to be God's favorite. You'll say things like that. And basically what you're doing is you're attributing and you're saying, oh, must be nice that God's so nice to you. He's not that way to me. I guess he has his favorites.
[00:21:22] Because basically what you're saying is, I don't believe that God loves me the way he loves you.
[00:21:28] He must have his favorites. He must not be a good God. That's basically what you're saying at the core of that.
[00:21:38] Okay, I love this one. Matthew 13:58, because this really illustrates what I'm saying. And he did not do. This is Jesus. He did not do many miracles there because of their, what, lack of faith. So their unbelief.
[00:21:51] And so that verse shows that unbelief can what, limit God's work in our lives is terrifying to me.
[00:21:58] Unbelief can limit God's work in our lives, indicating that faith is essential.
[00:22:06] Essential for experiencing his power.
[00:22:09] His power makes you wonder, like, how much more could you and I be experiencing in our lives or communities? Think about entire communities. Think about entire cities. Think about the entire state you live in. Think about the nation you live in. How much more could you, in your community, your state, your nation, be experiencing if the faith was operating there? The expectation. I was just reading Today Psalm chapter 5, where David was coming before the Lord with an expectancy in his heart.
[00:22:45] How ridiculous would it be if we come to God and we pray without any expectancy? What a slap in God's face. Why even pray? Like, why even pray if there is no expectancy? If we don't believe he hears us when we pray?
[00:23:03] One of the things I love about Jesus when he prays is he does it. He says something like, father, I know you hear me when I pray.
[00:23:14] You got to know that when you say that, that God loves it.
[00:23:18] He loves that kind of, that kind of belief, that kind of trust, that kind of, yeah, I love it that you know that. I hear you, man. You know, you know somebody when you can say something like that. And that's what he wants. He wants you to know him that way. There has to be this absolute trust and faith, faith in him that when you pray, he hears you. That when you lift up your voice and you ask him for things, even if he says no to it, at least you know that he heard you.
[00:23:54] And that's okay. Even in this Psalm 5, the way that David phrased it was even if you say no, that's okay with me.
[00:24:03] I, I just, I know that you hear me like I, I, I release the answer to you because you know best, like you know better than me. But I do have an expectation of whatever I say, whatever I pray whenever I speak to you, you hear me because you love me.
[00:24:21] And that's the way that God wants us to approach him. There has to be a belief that he cares when we talk to him.
[00:24:29] See, people who don't really believe God loves them, they have that orphan spirit of, well, it doesn't really matter if I pray because, you know, I'm worthless and God doesn't really love me anyway. And that was the difference, I believe, between Saul and David was Saul.
[00:24:48] I think Saul in his heart never really thought he was good enough. And he kept trying harder and harder and harder and harder.
[00:24:54] Whereas David in his heart knew who he was.
[00:24:59] Yes, he was only a little shepherd when God called him. He was the youngest of all of Jesse's sons. But in his heart he knew he was God's son, and that was enough for him. If God had never called him out of that little field of sheep, he still would have been God's son. But with Saul, it was never enough.
[00:25:21] Like, you know, Saul had everything. He was the king of Israel. And it's still didn't satisfy that insatiable need that he had inside of him to be someone like he could never feel that void in his heart because he, he would not accept that God loved him, that he was God's son too. And I think that's, that's the problem with people who have kind of an unbelieving heart towards God. They don't believe that God really loves them. They don't believe that God's really their father. So they circle this mountain of unbelief all of their life.
[00:26:01] And that, that results in things like Insecurity that results in kind of a poverty mindset. I used to have that really bad and insecurity.
[00:26:13] Sometimes still it tries to come up and I have to. I have to go, you know. No, I know who I am. I'm yours. I'm yours, Lord.
[00:26:21] It can come up in just fear.
[00:26:25] I mean, this unbelief mountain. And ironically, I don't even think I wrote a chapter in the book about unbelief. I did write a chapter in a book called Faith Over Fear, which is very similar.
[00:26:37] But I really believe unbelief is the.
[00:26:40] Is kind of the underlying problem that a lot of people have is they don't really, like, know who God is in a real personal way of, okay, he's my father, not He's a God in the sky who is waiting to judge me and all the bad things I've done.
[00:27:10] And, you know, like, he's the God of my parents.
[00:27:15] And a lot of people grew up in church, and they've kind of got that Bible belt mentality, you know, because I live here in Texas with the Bible Belt and a lot of people grew up in church, but, man, they don't know Him. He's the God of their parents, and they have a lot of fear of God. It's a lot of religion, but they don't know Him. And they think. And they think they're saved because they grew up in church.
[00:27:41] They live like hell, you know, outside of church. And they come to church on Sunday. And I'm not. I hope to God these people are saying, maybe I'm wrong. But there's. There's not a real, like, close intimacy with God. There's not a real true knowledge of who he is. Because here's the thing. When you really know him, you don't want to sin anymore. The struggle just kind of just goes away. To be, like a bad person, you don't really have to struggle anymore.
[00:28:14] It's like, oh, I don't really want to do that anymore.
[00:28:18] I just. I don't have that desire.
[00:28:21] I just want to be with Him.
[00:28:23] So it loses its luster. It loses its luster to want to go out and party or to want to go out and just, I don't know, see what mischief I can get into. I don't want to do that anymore, really. I. I just want to be with him. I want to do what makes him happy. I. I find wanting to watch things like the chosen or things that are fun to me is, oh, I want to do a Bible study. I want to go hang out with my friends and talk about Jesus. I want to go the night of worship, or my husband and I want to go watch a Christian movie. Or maybe I want to go.
[00:28:56] I don't know. I mean, it's not always something necessarily Christian like that, but it's just wholesome things. They make me happy.
[00:29:04] It is advancing his kingdom too. And I think that it's just, it's all about knowing him.
[00:29:13] It's about knowing him.
[00:29:15] But if we can get to this root of unbelief and realize that an unbelieving heart is really what's causing and driving and that it is sinful too, it's very sinful. And calling it what it really is and not glossing over it and acting like, ah, you know, whatever, but it's a sin. And anything that's sinful truly does create distance in our heart between us and God, like in calling it what it is, you know, I mean, we really do have to.
[00:29:49] Anytime there's sin in our life, we really do have to confess that before him.
[00:29:54] And Scripture says, hey, confess your faults one to another, that you might be healed.
[00:30:00] And I think that that's such a good practice is to say, hey, you know, like confessing to another believer. I struggle with an unbelieving heart and I'm tired of it and I don't want to live like this anymore.
[00:30:13] And they probably already know that. They probably already know that you say things that are very callous towards God or you have an unbelieving heart and it's sinful. They probably already know that. And they're probably like, oh, I'm so glad you said that, because I really want you to get freedom in this area too.
[00:30:32] And I think that, like, if you could learn this and, and, and start to walk in this freedom, a lot of your other problems that you, that you keep trying to fix, like you keep trying to fix, oh, I'm tired of being insecure. Oh, I'm tired of being afraid. Oh, I'm tired of feeling anxiety.
[00:30:52] Well, perhaps it's the mountain of unbelief that needs to be dealt with.
[00:30:59] Because if you can, if you can stop circling this unbelief in your heart and get to really know God as your Father, that stuff is going to fix itself. And you don't have to keep trying to fix it. That's what, that's our problem is we try to. We see the problem. Let me fix the problem. Fix the problem, Fix the problem. We don't fix the problem. We go to our Father Our healer Jesus, who is the great physician, we go to him, we just hang out with him and he fixes stuff. Like, that's just who he is. Like people who, in the Bible who were sick, they didn't heal themselves, they just showed up around him and he just healed people. That's just who he is. And that's never going to change. That's, that is who he is.
[00:31:44] He, he is a healer.
[00:31:46] He loves it. And I, I don't think that that was a, you know, one time moment in history where he just did it for like, you know, a few years and he was done. I think that's who he is. Jehovah Rapha. He loves to heal.
[00:32:03] And he loves to heal not just physically, but because he does do that too. I still believe that. But he loves to heal emotionally, he loves to heal spiritually, he loves to heal mentally.
[00:32:13] I've had God heal my mind too many times to know that he still loves to take someone's fractured mind. Which, by the way, when you look at anxiety, when you look at the way that Paul talks about when he says be anxious for nothing, that word anxious, and I wrote about this in the book, actually means a mind that's fractured and pulled in many directions.
[00:32:40] That's what that word is talking about. When the anxiety that Satan tries to pull into our lives, it's actually pulling our minds apart. But if you keep looking at that scripture, it says be anxious for nothing. And then he goes into, but let the peace of God.
[00:32:57] He talks about this peace of God.
[00:32:59] It's a peace that puts things back together and brings wholeness.
[00:33:05] So it's the exact opposite of what this anxiety does. It fractures. But the peace of God brings everything back together.
[00:33:14] That's what our God does. That's what Jesus does. That's what our Holy Spirit, our very best friend, our helper, comes alongside of us and says, you know what? I know your mind's fractured. I know you're pulled into a thousand different directions. I'm going to put your mind back together. So if people tell you that he doesn't still heal their lying, he absolutely heals. That's, that's that sin of unbelief to believe that God doesn't want to heal your body or your mind or your spirit or your emotions. He absolutely does.
[00:33:50] He wants to come along beside you and heal those parts of you that are broken.
[00:33:57] He. He does. I hope that you believe that and I hope that this message brings you some comfort and encouragement today.
[00:34:06] And I mean, I'm so excited about this. I'm so excited about this book and I'm super excited about this retreat coming up. And I don't know what I'm going to talk about next week. I just let the Lord lead me week by week by week.
[00:34:21] But be on the lookout for the book. I hope that you will pre order it or that you'll jump on there next week and order it.
[00:34:28] I hope that you'll think about signing up for the retreat. It's going to be amazing.
[00:34:33] And yeah, until then, until next week. I hope that you guys are blessed, have a beautiful Easter and I will see you next week.
