Devotions with Dre Episode 36: Inner Healing: When Childhood Trauma Meets Spiritual Warfare, with Kay Robinson (Part 1)
Hello, it's Dre. You are about to hear an incredible interview. It's another two-part inner healing conversation with a dear friend. This is Kay Robinson. Last week, we wrapped up a conversation with Marcus Robinson, who is her husband. They're both pastors of a church plant. It's called Dream and Imagine, and they are longtime friends of mine.
I've known Kay since 2019, the year that she married Marcus, and I've known Marcus for a heck of a long time, way longer than that, through the college I went to, Azusa Pacific University. He has been in ministry ever since then, all over Southern California, and doing some international ministry as well.
And Kay has now joined him in a lot of that, and she shares her own story of growing up knowing about God, but not having ever experienced the inner healing power of God until she was in her 30s. [00:01:00] And she has been healed from a lot of stuff. And so I know that this conversation with her is gonna be so encouraging, and it's so filled with hope, and it's so filled with the beauty of the love of God!
So let's jump in.
We're back with another inner healing story, and this is my dear friend, Kay Robinson. She is the best. And every time that I get to talk with her, I leave so encouraged. I feel closer to God. Her faith is so real, and it's been, like, tested by fire several fires. She's just such a genuine person, honest person, and I love hanging out with her so much, and I haven't seen her in a while.
Kay: That's the nicest thing to say about somebody. Thank you.
Dre: You're welcome! So my first question is tell us a little about yourself. I know that's a hard question ... because you've lived a whole life, but maybe a little bit of background. Where did you grow up?
Kay: Um, okay, I guess the [00:02:00] gist of... 'Cause we're talking about inner healing, so let me not skip over some of the better details of what I would need inner healing from. So, I grew up a child of immigrants, and, ours is a little bit more of a interesting situation because, I can't even identify with a lot of other immigrant families, 'cause my family was so unique.
So, my father was a gangster back in Korea. A nd they have, uh, a term called yangachi, and they're the ones that carry knives. So they're, mm, guns aren't allowed in Korea, so like, uh, it, knives are as violent as it gets. But it gets pretty violent, because the man looked like he was covered in zippers.
And there's always like, just coming from that kind of background, him being an alcoholic and just struggling for a really long time with a lot of his own violent history, uh, and [00:03:00] childhood, uh, there's just was a lot of room for error as he was parenting. And we kinda grew up in with that, but then also, um, just very, very poor because as soon as he got to America, he had stroke the very next day.
Dre: Oh my gosh.
Kay: Yeah. So then all of a sudden my mom had to be the breadwinner, and she was, like, in her 20s with two young children and a handicapped husband, and, um, in a brand new country without knowing the language. So yeah, that wa- uh, it was just a lot, uh, growing up. But yeah, that was my childhood.
Otherwise, pretty normal.
Dre: And this was in LA, right?
Kay: Yeah, LA County.
Dre: So your family background is your parents didn't know the Lord, correct?
Kay: My father didn't know the Lord. My mom did. And I think that's how he became saved [00:04:00] a couple of years before he passed away, actually.
Dre: Whoa. So they stayed together all these years? And she led him to the Lord later in life.
Kay: Yeah, um, in, in a very interesting way. And I think, because he was so anti-Christian for a long time, all she could do was just show love, and that was the one thing that he was lacking in his life.
And I think over 30-some-plus years of just being shown love, he finally opened up to Christ.
Dre: That's amazing.
Kay: Yeah.
Dre: You don't see that all the time, unfortunately.
Kay: You don't, 'cause I think it's easier to nag than to love. And my dad was such a difficult man, but my mom adored him.
And I don't know how much of that was just being in obedience to Christ and how much of that … 'cause I do believe that she genuinely loved him. But she does tell me that she had to [00:05:00] really work at being faithful to God's word and just to live out whatever it is that God says.
So if God says to be joyful and to be prayerful and to be thankful, then that's what she did.
Dre: So you kinda, did you absorb some of this stuff from her?
Kay: I got a bunch of stuff from my dad, actually. And then after, after I became a Christian and, um, God was starting to do a sanctifying work, I think I started to, to bear the fruit that I saw my mom have.
Dre: Yeah, it's funny 'cause I would say the same thing. My natural inclination and temperament is more like my dad. Yeah. But, um- I don't know. I even feel like I had some weird thing in my head where I, like, rejected some of my mom's traits or didn't want them. Like, maybe she was perceived as more weak or something.
Now, in my, in my late 30s, I'm like, "I am exactly like my mom," "And that is amazing." So intuitive, so empathetic. Like, I- [00:06:00] I've grown into these things that I got from her, from God... from her, you know, and I, I'm very glad and grateful that I'm a mix of both of them and, and how God designed them, how God designed me.
Like, you see it more clearly when you're older, I think.
Kay: I think the thing that occurred to me very recently was, uh, I always struggled with who I was. I've always struggled with, um, "Why did I do that?" Or like, "Why am I like this?" And just kind of like kicking at the goads and trying to be better and trying to be, you know, like all these different things that I aspire to be.
But once I came to Christ, and I came to Christ very late, once I came to Christ and I started to live in my purpose, I think there's a distinct difference 'cause when you first come to Christ, you're not necessarily living in your purpose, 'cause you've so misaligned your life, it takes a while just to get you back on track.
But once I got on this path to being in God's purpose, all of my traits started making [00:07:00] sense. Like, oh my gosh, like this is actually a good thing. Like I used to really crave attention, right? Like, so, you know, I'm, I'm like more loud, I'm more outgoing and stuff like that. And, and I would crave more attention.
I would demand more attention, and a lot of my life I was like, "Why do I even... Like, why do I struggle with this?" and different things like that. But what I found is that as I've grown older -that personality trait actually works really well for me, 'cause I'm constantly seeking God's attention. You know?
Like, as long as it's directed towards God, it's like, oh, I love that about myself. You know? Like, this is a good thing about me.
Dre: That capacity for close relationship- and attentiveness and intimacy.These are things God wired in you. Yeah. But when they're not met in Him, that's where we go south and, yeah.
[00:08:00] Yeah. That's cool. I like that. So when did you become a Christian?
Kay: I became a Christian at, uh, 2013, so I must have been in my mid-30s. Cool. Yeah. Um, I grew up a Christian, though, but, like, I grew up, like, a Bible banging, like, very, like, religious, like, speaking in tongues and casting out de- Like, our church was very, very charismatic, but I think the thing that was lacking was a lot of, um, biblical truth teaching.
So, a lot of it was more, like, topical teaching and, you know, you hear the same verses and different things like that, but then everything was over-spiritualized, so everything was the Holy Spirit, and everything was demons, and everything without-
Dre: So hyper-charismatic, would you say?
Kay: Yeah. You know, to the point where other people were like, "Oh, your church is kind of cultish," you know? Mm-hmm. Um, and as I grew older, I was like, how could God be saying all these things to everybody, and then they're all [00:09:00] contradicting each other? I was like, "That doesn't make sense to me."
So I was like, "Somebody's either lying, or somebody's e- like, wrong. Like, there's something going on here." And then as I started, like, digging deeper, I realized, "Oh my gosh, nobody's read the Bible." And even, like, the leadership, right? 'Cause I was in the leadership for a long time, and I, I, I liked the, to read the Bible - I didn't know that other people didn't.
And then, because I struggled with so many different things growing up in the background that I did, I struggled with depression, I struggled with, like, identity. Like, am I gay? Like that kind of stuff. I, I struggled with, uh, a lot of fornication, and even like being a good Christian girl, I had like tremendous inclination towards lust.
And, um, you know, and all of that gets rooted in, you know, that's, that's birthed from like a lot of abuse and different things. But when you're a [00:10:00] kid, you just loathe yourself. And when you're being taught at church to be a certain way, and you can't fit that mold because everything in you is just struggling against you, and then the peace that they promise in the Bible, you just don't get.
I served more, I read more of the Bible, I did more praying, I did all these things, and I didn't have any freedom, I didn't have any peace. I didn't have any... Like, there was nothing changing in my life, and I was like, "This religion has no power. It doesn't have the power to save me, so I'ma just do what I feel like I wanna do all the time," which is I constantly sin.
So that just kind of like went on
Dre: So you kind of went more that direction in your 20s?
Kay: Yeah. So in my 20s, I totally left the church, and then I left the church until, you know, my mid-30s when I got saved, and I think that's the, that's the thing about sin and leaving the church. When [00:11:00] you first leave, you don't get, again, it's not like- Hell is burning around you, you know?
Like, the way that you think. It's just so insidious. Like, sin is so insidious, you know? It just, like, lures you in and then seven years later I was like, "Oh my gosh, I'm dying." Like, I'm literally, I think I was physically dying because I couldn't stop drinking.
Dre: Now, when people hear your story, some of them might think, "Oh, she mentioned her dad's an alcoholic, now she's talking about how she's drinking too much. Is there something there? Is there something generational?" What would you say to someone like that?
Kay: Oh, absolutely. I think I'm inclined towards, like, different addictions generally. And I loathe that he drank, but when I first started drinking just out of rebellion, I really enjoyed it.
And I think the problem for me, though, [00:12:00] was that it got coupled with a couple of other traumas and then, because I, I tend to be more of, like, an action-oriented person, I needed to keep going with my life and then try to deal with that any way that I know how. So then I would just drink to suppress and then, you know, like, live my life.
So then, seven years later, I ended up being a workaholic and an alcoholic.
Dre: I think that's somewhat common. Especially when there's a history of trauma, people will do what they can to not f- have those feelings surface- Yeah ... so that they can keep their job and their life going.
But i- it's still there. Yeah. It's just waiting there.
Kay: You know, it's kind of interesting because I've realized that I, I used alcohol as a way to allow myself to cry. 'Cause in my waking hours, I couldn't afford to cry. I couldn't afford to, like, take the time to do any of that. You know? Like, I didn't have a silver [00:13:00] spoon in my mouth.
I had to hustle. I had to figure things out for myself, and so I didn't have the opportunity to feel sorry for myself. But at the same time, I didn't even realize that I was, like, really deeply ingrained in this idea that I was a victim, you know? And that's why I needed to be different and better, whatever.
But then the foundational understanding of who I was, was a victim. And that was a big issue.
Dre: Yeah. And are we talking about abuse? Like-
Kay: Yeah ... a, an abuse victim. Sexual abuse victim. And when you're a sexual abuse victim, I think you're prone to more sexual abuses. So then, like, you know, in childhood, and then, like, in the teens, and then in the 20s, and different things like that.
And when those things accumulate, um, it breaks you, but then you don't want to deal with it right then. I think when you're younger, you have the energy to try to, like, suppress it, and then you hit, like, your 30s and I'm like, "I'm tired," and all the crazies come out.
Dre: [00:14:00] So what happened when you hit that point where you couldn't really suppress it in the same way anymore, or where you realized...
Whatever you realized. Tell us about that.
Kay: Well, I, I would love to say that I came to the conclusion that I needed Jesus, but I did not. I really tried to stop drinking. I got to this place where... And I think your audience is a little bit more understanding of spiritual things, right? So, um, I have, as a child, and, you know, on and off throughout my adulthood, had the ability to see spirits from time to time.
I think it's just generationally in my line, and I could use it for God or not, because there were actually shaman in my bloodline too. But- As I got, you know, when I left the church, I just cut off all of that stuff, but it was weird because I would still [00:15:00] encounter things here and there. So, you know, like, my, my best friend, her mom was a shaman, and she wanted me to be a part of something, and then I actually saw the spirit she was dealing with, and I was like, "Mm-mm."
You know? But the biggest problem ended up happening when, uh, I became a alcoholic, like a serious one where I couldn't stop drinking, and every ti- time I would drink, I would be able to see spirits. And initially it was more like, you know, I'm just, like, observing and different things like that.
But as time went on, and, and mind you, I wasn't a Christian at this point, so, as time went on, like, it would get a little bit more intense, so then I started doing automatic writing, and I would, when I was drunk, I'd write in my journal and, like, it would just be insanely violent or you know, very, like, vengeful towards, like, somebody or whatever it was, and it would scare me.
So I tried to quit drinking, and I could not do it. So, you [00:16:00] know, instead of being like, "Oh, I need God," or anything like that, I just like, I just like, "I guess I'm just built to drink, so I'ma, I'ma keep doing that." And what ended up happening was that God had to literally step in and save me. It wasn't people.
It wasn't me. It was nobody else but Christ just intervening on my behalf.
Dre: Like, what, what did that look like when, how did Christ intervene?
Kay: So there was a girl that worked with me, and she invited me out for drinks, and I always, I'm al- I was always down for, like, free drinks, right?
So I went with her, and as the night went on, I started noticing a spirit following her. And I was thinking, "Oh, I'm not gonna say anything 'cause I just wanna have a good night. I don't wanna have to deal with anybody." You know, it's been occurring that I've, I've been seeing things. [00:17:00] So I got drunker, and obviously, your lips get looser.
So I asked her about it, and she flipped out because she knew. She had a feeling, and she knew. And I think for her, it was at the level of, like, kind of poltergeist-ish, where things were falling and things were getting messed up or whatever. So she's, like, freaking out 'cause she's like, "I knew it, I knew it, I knew it."
I'm like, "Ah, I shouldn't have said anything." But she was so persistent on me engaging with it and talking to it, and I've never done that before. And for the first time in my life, I engaged with it, and this thing started talking back to me. It started giving me all kinds of really very descriptive details.
Like, "You were here with your friends. Um, you were d- you were..." I think they were, like, playing with a Ouija board in, like, abandoned something, right? And doing something-
Dre: Of course, of course ...
Kay: super foolish. Yeah. And then that's where she picked it up from. And, and it was talking about, like, it was describing itself and [00:18:00] why it was present, and the whole time I was listening to it, 'cause it was saying, "Oh, I've been following you, trying to help you."
And it went on all these details, and the whole time I'm hearing it, I just saw flashing lights going, "Liar, liar, liar, liar." But I didn't, you know, like, I don't wanna freak her out. I have no solutions for her. I'm not a Christian, right?
Dre: Right. At that time, you don't, uh, have any-
Kay: Yeah, and I just wanna go home.
Like, I don't wanna, like, I just don't wanna deal with this anymore. So, you know, I, I told her what it said, and then I just went home. And I was thinking, "Oh, you know, I'm not gonna hang out with her again. She's got some freaky things going on." And I fell asleep, and I was drunk until 6:00 AM 'cause in, I was in Korea at the time, and there's no, there's no last call there.
And around 9:00 AM, I hear almost like an audible voice just banging in my head saying "Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop." And when I finally woke up, I had a vision of [00:19:00] hell, but I know people have see like fire and all that kind of stuff. For me, it was just darkness, but this darkness was so profound that it like liquified me from the inside.
I was terrified. For three days, I couldn't sleep, I couldn't eat. I was just-- I didn't know what to do. And I think the conclusion that I got to where the Holy Spirit was leading me at the time was, remember, in your childhood, who was the only person that was light? And all I remember is that Jesus was a light.
That's what they taught me. Not that I understood it, but I felt it from time to time, and I was like, "This place that I saw, I can tell that that's where I was going." And it had a complete absence of light. And I might have been depressed out of my mind, but there are moments when you're on Earth where you still [00:20:00] experience happiness and delight and maybe a laugh or something like that, no matter how depressed you are, right?
But this place had zero light, no goodness, nothing. And I decided three days later that I needed light, and solicited somebody to do the Sinner's Prayer with me, essentially.
Dre: Like a Christian friend, or...?
Kay: Well, I was so adamantly against Christianity that... This guy's name was Phil, and he was a Christian, and I hated him.
He was, like, my arch enemy at work. But he was the only Christian I knew. So I asked him, and of course, like, for him, being the Christian guy, he just wanted to talk about Jesus with me. And he led me to Christ, yeah.
Dre: Whoo. So that was 2013, you said?
Kay: 2013, yeah.
Dre: So he leads you in basically a prayer [00:21:00] that says, in essence, "Jesus, I wanna follow you now."
Kay: Yeah.
Dre: And you mean it.
Kay: Yes.
Dre: So what happens after that?
Kay: Um, I'll tell you what happened right before that. So everything in me, and it was so funny because I didn't realize it until later, that I had so many demons that I had collected, but I thought it was all just me. Everything in me was screaming, "Don't do it.
Don't do it. Don't do it." Like, it makes no sense. Like, it literally felt like screaming inside of my being. "Don't, don't, don't. Don't do it. Don't do it. It's crazy. Why Jesus? It doesn't make any sense." And then I was, and I just had to be like, "I'ma do it," you know? And when I finally, uh, went against everything else to be like, "I'm still going to try to accept this Jesus and believe that He is really King," you [00:22:00] know, and not just...
'Cause I said the Sinner's Prayer a million times when I was a kid, right? But this time it was like life or death. And the moment I said, "Amen," it felt like, like just total and complete and pure love just came over me like I've never believed could exist. And then I thought, "Oh- That's who Jesus is.
That's it. I, I missed it this whole time. I would question, why can't I get to God in, any other way? Why do I have to go through Jesus? It's because Jesus is His love. You reject Jesus, you reject His love. [00:23:00]
Dre: Yeah. You can't be in relat- that's what He's saying. "You can't be in a relationship with the Father except through me."
That's why, because God is love, and Jesus is, is- Is the embodiment of His love ... this is, it is who He is, and no one else is this. So that's what He's saying, "I'm the way." It, I, He's not trying to be a jerk. He's just explaining how it works and who He is. Like, it's not... I, I think people, you know, they hate when they, they hate when they hear that Jesus taught that He's the only way to heaven and to the Father.
Kay: Well, you know, to, to... I'm not gonna give them credit, but, you know, to, to that point, it's impossible to understand this truth without the Holy Spirit. You just can't without the grace. Like, even, even understanding that Jesus is love is a grace.
Dre: Oh, 100%. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He, he gives us the faith to believe.
He's giving us this whole thing. You didn't, like, even come to him, really.
Kay: Yeah, no. It just was more- Well, there's nothing in my story [00:24:00] that said that I was even ta- trying to take a step. Yeah. So, like, I can't give anybody else glory but God. Yeah. Um- That's so true ... yeah. Yeah. It's absolutely true.
And, and he gave me the grace to, to understand who Jesus was, and there's like, I can't go back.
Dre: So it's, it's kinda cool because it's like, it's 100% him, he did all the work, he made the sacrifice, he rose from the grave. He is God. He is calling you, welcoming you. He's eager to start this relationship with you.
He's made the way for this to happen. And of course, that's like, on one hand. And then on the other hand, everybody has free will. And we get to choose, 'cause he's not gonna force us to do something - that's not love, that's not a relationship, that's not good, that's not friendship. Like, I don't know what that is, slavery or something-
but that's not how he rolls. So even while everything was, like, screaming not to do it, you still exercised your free will- to be like, "I'm doing this." And I think, I, I mean, I see that in a lot of [00:25:00] people's story, especially people who've had a story of inner healing and/or deliverance, that there's this part where your, your human free will kicks in and it makes a choice.
So that's important too. So it's a cool, like, balance of like, He did it all. We just have to make the choice.
Kay: Yeah. Um, just that the, the choice to believe, there's a choice to love, there's cho- but, but it's like, ultimately, the choice to follow, to, to be completely submitted, 'cause I don't think you can encounter a love like that and, um, start giving him, like, stipulations on- Mm ... like, "This is what I'm gonna accept, and this is what I'm gonna do," and you know.
Like, when you encounter a love like that, you can't help but be like, "Wow, God is huge. He is big. He is so powerful. He can end my life [00:26:00] right now." I was looking at a darkness that I was heading into, and he could send me there.
Dre: He'd have every right to send all of us there. All of us. And that, and it's within his power to send us there.
Kay: But the fact that he chose to, to love me and to, to save me, like, you can't do anything but completely surrender and submit to God like that. God like that, yeah. So a little after I got saved I started getting very sick. Um, I got really, really like just had this chronic fatigue and it started compounding over the years and I had changed my diet.
I did- I went like raw vegan. I, I started working out. I changed, you know, like I cut out like meats and dairy and I did so many different things to try to help myself. Year after year, it just [00:27:00] kept getting worse and I was thinking like, "This is just not even a normal level of fatigue," because I would get one of those 32 ounces of iced coffee from Coffee Bean and then add-
extra shots to that. So it like, it would have six shots in this 32 ounce or whatever it is, and I would just be like sipping on that like it was IV. And by noon, I was in tears because I was still so tired. Like there was something very, very wrong with me. I got to the, the place where I was like, "Do you know what?
I think I might have a very, very serious illness at this point," 'cause I can't, I can't even function as a human being. Like I would have to wake up two or three hours earlier just to be able to shower and wash my face and get my hair done and because I was so slow and so tired and everything just took so much out of me.
But the night that, this is the night that I [00:28:00] had like a divine intervention. I was so tired that I felt like I couldn't, I couldn't pray, I couldn't worship, but I told God, I was like, "God, I'm gonna write down everything that you have ever done for me. I'm just gonna say thank you because I don't have the energy for anything else."
So I started writing down like since I got saved, like the things that He was doing for me, and then my pen paused at one point, and it's kind of like this random thought dropped into my head, and it said, "What if it was spiritual and not physical?" And I was like, "I never, I never thought about that.
It never occurred to me that it could be spiritual and not physical." So I texted Marcus, who's my husband now, and I was like, "What if my fatigue is spiritual and not physical?" And he, and he's such a practical guy. I love it because he believes in the power of the Holy Spirit.
He believes in the authority of God, but he's not a wackadoodle.
Dre: So you've met Marcus at this point?
Kay: Yes, and we're [00:29:00] dating, and he is like, he is so biblically sound, and he believes in the power of the Holy Spirit because God literally saved him out, uh, of the ghetto, the, the hood. And he was like, "The only way that you can do that is by the power of the Holy Spirit."
So he believes in all that. And so I talked to him and I asked him like, "What if it's spiritual and not physical?" And he just gave me very, very, you know, just sent one text that said, "Okay, these are your next steps. You need to ask the Holy Spirit what might be causing this, you know, spiritually. What are the things that you need to repent of?
And then repent of all of those things, and then you need to cast them out in the name of Jesus." And I was like, "Okay, well that's simple enough." So I started praying and asking God about what it could have been, like what the cause could have been, and then He started reminding me of, I took a year off of work.
I quit my job to go farming, because I wanted to be [00:30:00] like a homesteader or something like that, right? And then I realized-
Dre: Was this before you met Marcus?
Kay: This was way before I met Marcus. Marcus would not be down for that. But I wanted to be like this homesteader like in Costa Rica or something like that.
So, uh, I quit my job to do this, and I went with more extreme farms that are more like off-grid. And when you go that way, you meet a lot of like green witches and people who wanna be shaman, and a lot of people who are very spiritual about things. Um, and then at this time, I, I was a new Christian.
I unwittingly participated in things that opened me up spiritually. So for example, like, one of the girls were like, "Oh, I can see, um, people's spirit animals. Do you want me to tell you yours?" And I was like, "Sure." You know, I didn't think that... I thought that was so harmless. And so, like, little things like that, just like, "Sure," like, "What's my spirit animal?"
Or, you know, like, somebody had, like, a birthday [00:31:00] book that tells you, you know, astrologically what you are like and different things. And I had come into so many agreements, like spiritually, like bound with witchcraft. And so I started writing everything down that I could possibly remember. And when I was, like, working in Korea, like, shamanism and fortune-telling is so common that my boss would even ask me to go to her fortune-teller to see if we're compatible to work.
You know what I mean? It was a part of, like, me getting to work. I had to go to a fortune-teller and stuff. So like, I was writing all those things down, and then I just got, like, real excited because as I was writing things down and as I was repenting of them, it was like 11:00 PM at night, and I started feeling more energy.
And I was like, "What is happening to me?" Like, "This is amazing." So, so then I started going buck wild, and like, "I repent of all the Harry Potters," you know? ha All the, all the Twilight books. They were terribly written, but they [00:32:00] were like- ... my secret shame, you know?
Like, I was just like, "Oh." And I, I, I wrote down everything possible. I had a Harry Potter shirt, tossed it. Harry Potter, like, you know, like game, tossed it. All those things, just got rid of every possible thing that I could possibly have dabbled in with witchcraft. And then I repented of them, and then I said, "In Jesus' name, you know, I cast them out," and I felt better, but it was so not dramatic.
Dre: Right, you didn't, like- Manifest- froth at the mouth.. hear something leave and then the door slam…
Kay: I didn't; nothing like that happened. I just felt a little bit better, and so I was like, "Okay, in faith, I'm gonna stop drinking coffee as of today." So the next day was the first time I hadn't had coffee, and I haven't had coffee since.
Dre: Wow. And your energy's normal?
Kay: Yeah. Well, it would be impossible at this point in my life, and I think God needed to s- to, to heal me in order for me to do the things that I [00:33:00] do now, because I'm a mom of two little boys. They have so much energy.
Dre: I feel so bad for people who deal with that when they have young kids. We pray for them.
Kay: Yeah. So it left. So it left, and then- And it was spiritual. It had nothing to do-
Dre: Do you know exactly which one thing on that list, or multiple, which ones?
Kay: No, it was a purge, and I think that's what you need to do though, 'cause that's what repentance is. Repentance is ultimately, like the absolute purge and saying that, "I'll never go back." So I think that's what... 'Cause with, with demons and different things like that, they don't go until you repent.
Dre: Some things are hard. I mean, if it, if it was a special interest for someone who got super into- Yeah ... you know, particular stories or movies or whatever, and then, and it wasn't like they were trying to be like that. But it's just like they [00:34:00] got attached to- Yeah ... a story at a time in their life or something, and then now you're asking them to like let that go.
It's hard, but that's what the enemy, that's why the enemy's trying to do this with media. Like, 'cause so people will hang on to stuff like that. I mean- Which is so- It's insidious ...
Kay: just, yeah, it's insidious, yeah.
Dre: Telling you, you're right. So you didn't even know exactly what, which one of those things had potentially tied you into this, like, energy issue, this spiritual chronic fatigue?
Kay: I think it was less, uh, it was less about the detail and more about the general witchcraft. That I had interest and participation in witchcraft. And my repentance had to be for the interest and participation in witchcraft. And so now I try to not even engage in any kind of interest. Like, I used to love reading fantasy, right?
And now I'm stuck to sci-fi because like if it- Yeah ... it's related to witch- witchcraft This is so pervasive.
Dre: It's so pervasive.
It's so frustrating [00:35:00] to try to find stuff without it in there- Yeah ... in this day and age. It's like, ugh. Yeah.
Kay: And now I'm just like, lots of, like, space war books. It's really...
Dre: Did you feel called into ministry?
Was there a point in time where-
Kay: Oh, no. I was like, "Mr. Pastor, um, you can't handle me." Like, I didn't think that I would, I, I, I didn't think Marcus and I would make it because it's like he's, how are you gonna, I'm just not material. I'm like, I'm not a pastor's wife material.
Dre: So you thought, "Pastor's wife and me, those don't go together."
Kay: No, yeah, absolutely not. Absolutely not. When I first got saved, my, the pastor's wife that, you know, that I was being discipled under, she was like, "Kay," "I've been praying for your husband," 'cause I got divorced twice. I had a, a wreck of a love life. S- right? So said, "I've been praying for your husband. I've been praying for, um, him to be a pastor."
And I straight, I, I told this dear, precious woman, "Why the F would you do that?" Like, why would you do that? Um, it just didn't make sense. But [00:36:00] I think I take not the role of pastor's wife as significant, but the command to make disciples of all nations - that serious to me, and that's for everybody.
So is that ministry? Yeah. That, is that what I do? That's what I do. I don't know. People call me Pastor Kay, and it's very weird sometimes, but I think the, the essence of whatever it is that I do pastorally is just being obedient to God's call to make disciples.
Dre: So did you become an official pastor?
Kay: Marcus walked you through that or whatever?
Kay: Yeah. He's so funny 'cause he's like my biggest fan, and so he's just like, "You'd be a great pastor." And I was like, "I'm the worst. I hate people."
Dre: No, you are a great pa- no, you're a great pastor.
Kay: But do you know what he said?
Okay, so I was like, "Marcus, I can't be a pastor. I hate people." He's like, "That's good." [00:37:00] You know Paul like killed folks Like Peter chopped off an ear. Like it's the people that think that they're loving that's dangerous. Mm. He was like, "It's dangerous when you go into ministry thinking that you can love people to Christ, but if you know you can't love, then you depend on Jesus, you'd be a perfect pastor."
Dre: Yeah, it's the people who are like, first of all, I'm so not qualified. That's, that's humility. I mean, that's like, you know?
Kay: Or truth, yeah.
Dre: I, I can't do this. Mm. You know? I, and I have like a more, I don't know, I would call my temperament a little more like bold and harsh and
and then, you know, you, you look at the typical stereotype that we get shoved into our heads at some point growing up in church of like a woman in ministry, and it's always like the most mousiest, sweetest like- Yeah ... and I'm like, I can't, I'm not-
Kay: Sensible shoes, cardigan, you know?
Dre: Cardigan. Yeah. It's, I'm like, I can't...[00:38:00]
Y- so I think that- Is, it did give me a certain... Like, when God called me into ministry, like, I had clarity that I never wanted this- Yeah ... and I'm not gonna be good at this. Yeah. It, it's gonna have to be God. Like- I'm like s-
Kay: Yeah ... I'm totally resonating with you. Yeah. Yes, yes, yes.
Dre: It's gonna have to be
the Lord because- Yeah. But, I mean, that's like Isaiah, and that's anyone when you really start to... Like, when Isaiah in, in chapter six- Mm-hmm ... when he's like, goes in there and he's like, "Woe is me," like, I, I'm a man of unclean lips. Like, I'm in the throne room of the holiest of holies- Yeah ... in heaven and with God.
Like, I, I'm, I'm gonna die. Yeah. I, I'm gonna die. And then instead, the Lord just has, like, a angel minister to Isaiah and, like, put coal on his lips and make him clean. I mean, and then he's like, "Uh, I need someone to go for me," and Isaiah's like, "I mean, what I'm even more scared of is saying no, so here I am.
Send me."
Kay: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Dre: So that's the type [00:39:00] of humbling encounter that I think the genuine call into ministry is and should be in a way, you know? Like-
Kay: Oh, interesting.
Dre: ... we know that we can't, and we're not, and, and it's so... It makes, like you said, no sense, and it's so, like, I almost have like a, a little bit of trepidation.
Like, I don't wanna do this in my own strength. I don't wanna-.. I'm sure you're the same way. Like, I don't wanna mess this up. I don't wanna mess somebody up. I, I don't wanna misrepresent my Jesus. So I, I gotta h- I gotta, I gotta have the Lord- I gotta be real ... every step of the way.
Yeah. So there wasn't, like, a moment where you audibly heard God say, "You are called into ministry officially now"?
Kay: Oh, no. I always knew that, um, that I just wanted to tell everybody about Jesus. That was just, you know, but, uh, I just figured I'd do that as a layperson. Um, it, it was interesting because [00:40:00] it's not like Marcus ever pressured me into getting into ministry.
It just happened where he would constantly get the stage, and then he'd pull me on stage, and then we would end up, you know, doing Q&As and different things like that. And the women would hear, particularly the women would hear me giving such different answers than a lot of the other women, you know, that they would hear, like Christians.
And then they would just seek me out for discipleship, and then that's how it just kind of ended up happening as- Yeah ... a ministry.
Dre: I think you carry a lot of strengths because you're, like, uncompromised in your heart for God. Like, there, it's not like you're compartmentalized. we can all fall into this, but, like, our hearts can be compartmentalized.
Like, certain areas are yielded to the leadership of God in your life, and then other areas not so much. I mean, I used to be that way for sure. He had to really integrate me to be more holistically.. [00:41:00] with him, you know? I think that's everybody's process to a degree, but I think you carry a sense of, uh, your dedication to God as, like, a whole.
It's the, it's whole. It's complete. Like, it's like, "No, all of me, I'm all in," you know?
Kay: I think, um, I think I worked, because I wasn't a Christian for so long, I worked it backwards, so instead of, like, un- like unloading things from within, like, I was like, "This is who I am. I, I'm a whole, I'm a total mess. You can just see the whole thing, and then take it or leave it," type of thing, and then he would just take different aspects of me and just, you know, smooth out those rough edges that other people can see.
And over time, I became more of this, showing more the fruit of the spirit- and different things like that. But my worry was that I was too forward about stuff, you know? Like, too, like, it's like, eh, sometimes I drop a F-bomb here and there, you know? And I, [00:42:00] I did that for several years until God told me literally, "Stop it."
Dre: I've been a Christian for so long. It's just this y- past year that he's been like- 'Cause I've always been like, "I don't care about that. That's not-He's like, "Stop it." It's not necessary.
You know? The, out of the same mouth. You're like literally worshiping the Lord, you're like, "Okay." No, it makes sense to me now. Like, it, there was a heart change I think. It was cool because, like, I mean, I'm glad I don't have a propensity to, to be legalistic and- and care about things like language, which evolves and changes and is different in different contexts, and who's to even say what is a quote, unquote bad word, blah, you know? Like, I'm so, like, right-brained about stuff like rules. And that was where I was coming from, but it was also just, like, I just didn't want to stop. Yeah. 'Cause it's hard.
Kay: And it's funny sometimes.
Dre: Yeah. And it's the vernacular of just- Yeah ... like, everybody just, it's more common now, and I don't know, it's not, it's not as offensive as it used to be in a lot of circles. But anyway, yeah, I felt like it hit me in a different. And, and I was in my devotion time with the Lord, and I was just like, "Wait a second.
No, yeah." I, I lost my taste for it. And I literally am like- I like that ... like it's still slipped a few times since then. But I'm like- Yeah ... "Eh, no. I don't- Yeah ... I think I'm done with that." So anyway, I don't know why I keep talking about me. This is about you.
Kay: No, no, that's good though, because it's not that He's delayed.
For me, it didn't feel like he delayed dealing with that because it was minor. It's more like God deals with one thing at a time. He doesn't dump everything on you and tell you to, like, shape up, you know? And I had more pressing matters for a long time.
Dre: Yeah. Yeah. Oh, same pro- that was probably...
And I just think it's important to let him [00:44:00] decide what to bring up next. That's the sanctification process.
Kay: Yeah. It's like, it's gonna happen anyway, so just let him, let him -Jesus take the wheel. 'Cause sanctification is painful.
Dre: It's like life-saving surgery. Yeah.
Kay: Yeah. Without anesthesia.
Dre: Yep.
Thank you for listening to part one of my conversation with Kay. Come back next Friday, and we will hear the conclusion of her testimony. See you there.