Yolonda Troupe Smith

David W Ebel: Okay. Welcome to the God Says Yes podcast. You are welcome here. Hello, welcome to God Says Yes. I'm your host, David Ebel, and after fifty plus years of ministry, mostly focused on helping people where they are through what they're going through, to give hope, to give encouragement, to meet people where they're at. ⁓ our focus is finding people who are struggling. I don't care what you're struggling from, whether it's people or places or things, if you've been betrayed, belittled, whatever, that does that that's that's how you got here. If you've been cheated, that's how you got here. If you've been betrayed, same thing. And sometimes it's just you you've been in church and someone there misbehaved and church hurt is real. And on behalf of the rest of the body of Christ, I apologize. That is not what we want for you or anyone else. But sometimes when you go take look at the emergency room, which the church is the emergency room of the body of Christ, people come into the emergency room kicking and screaming. They're not happy to be there. And sometimes spiritually people aren't happy to be in church because they're not comfortable yet. As a result, they splash over the ugly, and we're the ones who get it. And it's not right. And we ask that God will bless you and help you to see past that. Remember, we serve God, not the the people. And the people don't get in God's way unless we let them. So we hope that you can look beyond whatever stopped you. And today we start some hope. We start some beginning. Some open door to to good things. So we welcome you. And ⁓ I have with me my friend Yul Yolanda Troop Smith. She is a dynamic woman who mentors people and invests in people all all through her life. And we have the privilege of having her with us today. Welcome, Yolanda. ⁓ hello. excited about being here today, excited about sharing. ⁓ the nuggets that God has given me over my life on how to be able to overcome all the different challenges that we go through in life and how to take everything that he's deposited in me and share it with his children. Amen. So tell us a little bit about about you. Well, I am a native of Columbus, Mississippi, small town girl, ⁓ grew up there and then went to college and graduate school. And then ended up going through a hard phase in my life with disobeying God and ending up uniting in marriage with the person that God said not to marry. And it kind of took me on a path that really showed me the importance of talking to God, listening to God, obeying God, and being able to rise up out of anything with God. And after that, I was able to spring up and move on to the next phase of my life and moved to Atlanta, Georgia when I remarried. And now I'm enjoying the life that God has for me after a series of trouble. Well, and it's it's it's good that you recognize that because when you make a mistake and you confess and ask God to forgive, not only he forgives, but he washes it away with Jesus' blood. So when he looks at you, he doesn't even see where where where you goofed up. It's over. You're living in today, not in history. And that that gives us all hope. Because I don't know about every anybody else viewing, but I know that I've needed his forgiveness on multiple occasions because I thought I was doing what God wanted until I find I finally stopped and asked him. By that time I'd made some s some foolish, stupid mistakes. But he forgave me and he he's kept me going. He kept opening doors and life has been beautiful. In spite of me, not because of me. So Yolanda, I I I would like to invite you to tell us your story, who you were, who who you when you met Jesus, who you became, and what happened next? Well, nine years old is when I had my first encounter with hey, I'm ready to tell the world that I want to be a Christian. what happened on my block, the friends that I played with, their church Had revival ⁓ earlier than my church had revival. So all of my friends are telling me, we are going to get baptized. We're becoming a part of God's family. And I'm like, what? I want to become a part of God's family. I've been, I go to Sunday school, I go to church, I love God, I want to do it too. But my parents were like, Well, your church is not ⁓ having revival ⁓ at this time, so you gotta wait. You gotta wait until. Our church is doing it. And I'm telling you, it was like fire inside of me that I wanted to become a part of God's family. I worried my parents sick about wanting to go to that church and be a part of revival. So they finally gave in and said, okay, we're going to take you over and we're going to see what God is doing with you at nine years old, making you want to just drive us crazy about going to church. I went to the church. They talked to the pastor. He said it was okay for me to come on board. Back then they call it the mourner's bench, where you actually go on the first row in the church and you sit there and listen to the different preacher, ⁓ the preacher for that revival preach each night. And until you feel that God is saying it's time to move forward and receive him as your savior and join his family. And now we get baptized on that particular day. End of the week and I went forward and I became baptized and joined the family of God on my own, not at my church, but when I felt the move to do so. Now I didn't understand everything, but I understood that I wanted to become a part of God's family. So that was my first move. Then I went right on back to my church and was there, started singing in the choir, and then I had this encounter when I was in middle school. I actually had the opportunity to go to a choir day at a Pentecostal church. And our little choir had gotten really, really good at singing gospel music. And so we would go into the church, all the choirs are seated in the different sections of the church with their beautiful colored robes, and we're all going to worship the Lord in song. And we began to see some things we had never seen before. We saw people get excited and shout and run and dance and give God some extra stuff that we had never seen before. So we were terrified. We said, what is going on? It's the devil. And we gotta run. So that was our first experience. So we sat there. We were like, I don't understand. I don't want to come back. I'm scared. But everyone else that did understand, they praised God. They enjoyed the fellowship. We got up and sang, and the Lord used us in a mighty way, and we left there confused. So we go back saying, Y'all, what happened at this place? What is going on here? I don't understand. But we would go back every year for that same choir day. And I began to watch how their music was different from our music. How something was happening. in that place how the musicians their music sounded more look the it's the the beat of the drum sounded different from everybody else's beat of the drum ⁓ the the the the the keyboards the the guitars and i didn't understand then it was the move of god the anointing of god on them and then later on in life i found out that every one of those people that played in the choir When they were children, everybody in church stretched hands to them and prayed for them to be used by God to the utmost to glorify him through singing, through praying, through whatever service they wanted to give. I said something different is going on here. Amen. And so I was excited and I I began to go from afraid to wanting to inquire what's happening. But I left school, my high school, went on to college, and at that point I began to see difference in people in college. You know, like some of the people were wild and crazy, you know, and glad to be away from home. But then I found some that even though they were not at home, they still were interested in going to church. They still were interested in making sure that on Sunday, They went to service. So I began to meet all these different people. And so I introduced myself to a crew of them that loved to sing. We were all in a choir. It was a choir in our college. We were actually able to sing all over the world in the Rust College a cappella choir. But some of them knew the Lord in a better way. Some of them had personal relationships with God. So I ended up going to church with them. And while in church, This particular Church of God in Christ Church minister preached, and it seemed as if the words of the Bible came off the pages and came to life. And for the first time, I was not just ignited by singing. I got ignited by the word. And I found myself going every Sunday, I want to go, I want to go, I want to learn. I'm excited. What's happening? And I began to be touched by the word. I begin to say, okay, now how do we take this and how do we apply it to what we're doing? But while I was there, I began to just get a little bit too much intrigued in the party life. Has anybody ever been at that point in your life where you might have been raised going to church all the time, but you're seeing some things that are different? And you want to experience it, you want to explore it. Well, I had a problem when I was back home in my earlier years. I was an only child. My parents were very strict. So whatever I did, it was always controlled. It was always given the rules. It was always told how you're going to do it, when you're going to do it, what time you're coming home, what time you're getting up, what you're going to do. It's going to be structure. It's going to be organization. It's going to be chaperone. So that was the way I grew up. They even let me do some things, but it still had to be chaperoned. So inside of me, there was always this yearning to be able to do what I wanted to do when I wanted to do it, without my parents giving me any instructions, okay, or any rules. So now I get to go to college and I'm able to have the opportunity to not receive instructions and not receive rules. And what I did was I did not handle it well. So my first college that I went to, I did not study like I should have. I did not get my homework. I didn't go to class like I should have. And so I remember my mom telling me when I came home for Christmas, pack your bags. You're not coming back here after the holidays. You're going to go and we're gonna find you somewhere else to go because you've lost your mind. I don't understand what you're doing over here. Your grades don't look right, but I have a solution. In coming home with us. So I was very sad, very down, a little bit depressed about the fact that I had to be ushered out of that school into going home for Christmas. I was a little down, sad the entire Christmas time. And so she said, We found a place for you to go. You're going to go to my alma mater. You're going to go to a Methodist school. And I had fun at that school. It was amazing, is what my mama was telling me. I said, okay, okay, I'm going to try it out. I have no other choice. You took me from where I'm going. And so when I get there, I find out it's a place that's kind of secluded. A lot of people don't have cars, they can't get anywhere. So you kind of sit in an environment where you're pretty much gonna live that structured college life. And I was sad as I could be because I did not want to do that. Okay. But you know you can take a person away from the area, but you got and and and the wrongdoing or that mindset to do wrong. But if you take them to a new place and they still have that mindset, they're gonna find things to do that are out of order. And you bet your bottom dollar idea. So I get there and I meet a girl in my classroom and we just hit it off. She said, Come home with me for the weekend. We're gonna have amazing time. We're gonna party, party, party. And I was like, ⁓ yeah, I found the right connection that, you know, I can be able to still do what I used to do. I get there with her, guys. I begin to smoke marijuana and I wasn't even doing that at the other place. So I kind of escalated because it was nothing to do, nowhere to go, pretty much. So I began to smoke marijuana with her in a car during the day. And so then this weekend I ended up going home with her. Now I know I was not raised like this. My parents told me not to do any of this stuff. So how did I get here? It was that yearning inside of me, that desire inside of me that always wanted to be free and do what everybody else did. Because I wasn't able to do what everybody else did, but now I can. And now I will. So I go home with this young lady for the weekend. And she has sisters and all of them were talking about how we're gonna party. They're all older than she is. And her mother seemed like an amazing mother, just as sweet and calm and talking with me. And then they all say, We can ready to go party. And we go party every day you're here until you leave you. On Sunday evening, and I felt like I had hit the jackpot. So I'm excited. We're all talking about what we're gonna do, where we're gonna go, all of these things. And so we begin to go visit her sisters. So all the other sisters seem fine. But finally we get to the last sister, the older sister, and we go into her apartment and we walk in the door, and it's pitch black in there during daylight. And I was like, wow, why is it so dark in here? It's just pitch black. Is everything all right? You know, and so I see just a little ray of sunlight coming through the curtains that were not closed completely. And it kind of with that little bit of light, you could see just a little. She was sitting in a chair, and her eyes were just black. And her skin was a little bit fairer than mine. So the black eyes showed really strong. She's sitting in the chair, she says, We go pa. Hey, what it gonna be like? We're gonna do this, we're gonna do that, we're gonna do the other. And as she continued to keep opening her mouth, all of her teeth were decayed. She looked horrible. And I heard the Lord speak to me. He said, Take a look, Yolanda. Take a long look. Because this is what you're going to be like if you continue on this path, on this road that you're on. Because you were not raised like this. And this is slow death. Getting attached to drugs and alcohol, partying. Your parents are, you know, putting you here for college to get an education, and you're getting an education in partying, and not an education in computer science, which is the degree that they've given you. You got to get on the right road. It scared me straight. Now, some people it might have taken something more. To wake them up, but that woke me up. I went along with the rest of the weekend, but when I got back to school, I saw everything on the campus in a different life. I saw where you were was on the wrong path. Now, what are you gonna do to get on the right path? What are you gonna do to get yourself out of this situation? What are you gonna do to get away from the girl that you see in class all the time? How are you gonna handle this? So I go to class, and what God puts on my mind was, hey, just tell her I'm gonna do things a little different. I kind of got on the wrong path, but I'll see you later. So every time I saw her in class, I moved in a different direction. This is a time that God began to talk to me about things that I was doing that was out of order. There were a couple of other times that he had spoken to me, and I took it for granted like it wasn't a real serious thing. When I said I started my misbehavior in the other college, I did. I started running there with people that were partying a lot, but I just didn't go to the To the area of beginning to smoke marijuana. I would drink a little, but most of my drinks, they tasted like Kool-Aid and it had a little bit of the alcohol in it, but you really couldn't taste it. But before I left that campus, God did something to me that showed me that I needed to listen to him. And that was why my ears were open for the situation with the lady with the teeth out of her mouth. God wants me to go back and share this story with you because there are a lot of young ladies that may have done. Or may be tempted to do what I did at that first college before my parents took me out. God did that because he knew I was going too far. So a gentleman calls me on the phone in the dormitory and says, Hey, Yolanda, how you doing? Let's go out to dinner. I'll treat you. So I was like, Yes, free dinner. Who won't go? I'm excited about this. I go downstairs and when I see the gentleman, I look at him and I say, He's a very handsome young man. I've never seen him before. How can I forget anybody that looks like this? He's very handsome, but he's saying he knows me and he says he wants to take me out. So I say, ⁓ yeah, free meal, I'm going. So I go to the car and there's another gentleman in the car. I get in the car with both of them, like a stupid young girl, and I did not know them. I get in a car with both of them. We go and have dinner. I'm sitting there, we're laughing and talking, and he invites me to their dormitory. And I had friends, gentlemen, that went to that school. And that dormitory did not have visitation. And I knew that. So now I'm saying, How do I get out of this? I shouldn't have ever come with them. Lord, I'm scared. And so the Lord speaks to me and says, Tell him, can he take you back to the dorm and let you freshen up? And he took it as, ⁓ my, she's really excited about us. She wants to go back and freshen up. So we're going to take her back. Let her freshen up. And then she's going to go with us. And the Lord said, The minute you get out of that car. And you get in that dorm, you go up to your room, and you better not come back down. You call at that front desk and you tell them that something's come up and you're not gonna go back with them. I did that. I stayed in my room, and a few days later, the newspaper came out that he was the rapist that had been raping a lot of girls on the campus. And I would have been next if I had not heard him say to me. You better not go back with him. You better say, I'm gonna go freshen up. He gave me that thought, he gave me that idea, and I'm so glad I listened because it could have been a totally different way. So that night I began to say, Lord, I thank you for what you did for me. I thank you. I I thank you for taking care of me. You could you saved my life. I could have been killed. I could have been raped. I could have been all of these things. And you took care of me. And I'm so glad I had sense enough. To listen to you. And so now I got my mind open to hear him when he talks to me. Now listen, I didn't talk to him 24-7. I I didn't talk every day what you want me to do, how you want me to do it, which way you want me to go. I didn't do that. I still had, as as the older people would say, I was a lukewarm Christian. I, you know, I still was doing some things, but I was aware now that God was real and that he talks to his children. And that you better listen because he's doing things to help you and take care of you. And that was a life-changing moment for me. So I did go on to the other college, but I wasn't all straight. But that second example, where he said, you better look, you better take a long look. Because if you don't start changing things, you're headed down the wrong direction. I took care of you once before at the other college. Now here you go again. You know, coming in the different college, but still going down the wrong road. Going home with somebody that you just met that you didn't know anything about her. My parents would have had a fit to know that I had gone with someone I met at school and they didn't know them. That was the way I was raised. But now my heart is open, my eyes are open, my mind is open, that God is real. And now I'm ready to listen. I wasn't sold out, as we were called, but I sure was open. And so now I'm listening a little more to him on things where I feel that I sure don't know what in the world is going on, but I do know that God talks to me. And so that was two examples of where he had begun to tell me how I talked to you. And that's what he wants to do with all of us. All of his children. He wants to talk to us. He loves us because surely you all know that I was not one of those that was had it all together and that was on the right road and listening to God and saying the things that were in order and doing the things that were in order. So I was an example of someone that wasn't on the right road, but he cared enough about me that he talked to me and he pursued me when I wasn't pursuing him. And I want to let everyone know that he's that kind of God. And so as the years went on, he actually began to talk to me more. And then I began to long to want to talk to him. I began to want to see. What he had to say about things. So another example is where I actually ⁓ went shopping, guys, to get a bed in the bag. I don't know if any of you all have heard of that. ⁓ it's kind of a little older thing. I don't know if younger people have heard of a bed in the bag, but it is where you get the spread, you get the sheets. You get the pillowcases, you get all those parts together for a bed. And so now when you buy everything that's in that bag, your bed looks amazing. It is beautiful. And everything came in the bag. So I'm in the store. I get my bag. It has everything in it. And I leave the store. I purchase all of it. And I go home and I fix it up. And when I get home, guys, there are Extra pillow shams in the bag. And I'm like, whoa, my blessed lucky day. I got all these pillow shams in here. And now my bed looks just full across the top with all of these extra pillows. There were some extra pillow shams. So now I got, you know, six, seven, eight, ten of those things. And it looked beautiful. And I was excited about it. And I just stood there, looked at it, and said, God, how amazing this looks. And so the next thing I hear him say to me is, you gotta take the extra pillow shams back, Yolanda. You can't keep them. I'm like, wait a minute now, God. Why can't I keep the extra pillow shams? They look good. They were in the bag. Why can't I have them? He said, because somebody else is missing two pillow shams. Because they're in your bed in the bag. He said, take them back. Then I was like, okay, God, okay, daddy, why I gotta take him back. I don't wanna take him back. So I don't know if anybody's ever had a conversation with God because he's asking you to do something that you weren't quite ready to do. But that's what I was doing. I was going back and forth, talking to him, saying that why can't I keep him? He's saying you gotta obey, you gotta learn to do what I tell you. And so it probably took me about two to three days, guys. Every time I would go do something, this is what I hear in my ear. Pill of sham, Yolanda. Pill of sham. I'm like, okay, God, come on, let me have them. So after two or three days, I said, okay, I'm gonna take it back. You're not gonna give me any peace until I take the pill of shams back to the store. So I go into the store and I meet the lady. And she says, I can't believe you brought these back. She said, I don't believe you did that. She said, People don't do things like that. Why did you bring these pillows of shams back? I said, because God told me I had to bring them back. And and and I and He wouldn't leave me alone until I promised. It wouldn't give me peace. She said, Girl, you can have those pillow shams. If you went out of your way to bring them back, God bless you and you keep them. And when I got in my car, God said, This is what I'm trying to show you. If you obey me, great things happen. Blessings will overflow and overtake you in your life. If you talk to me, listen to me, and obey me. I'm going to give you exceeding abundantly above all you could ever ask or think, according to the power that works within you. And I am the power that you connect to. And if you connect to me, your life is going to be amazing because we are going to do this life together. I talk to you, you listen to me, you obey me, and blessings will overtake you. That was the first experience of how he told me how important it is to. Talk to him, get his instructions, and obey. And what an amazing life he has set for his children when we do that. And he wants me to spread it all over the world: that our God is an awesome God. And he's waiting to connect with you to give you the most amazing life that you could ever have. Thank you for sharing all that. That's that's powerful. I'm gr I'm grateful for your transparency and letting us know who who you are and what you've been through. Now, now that he's done that for you, what do you do with your life? So there are a few little things in there I'm I didn't talk about. And during all of this time, I loved singing. From six years old to now I'll be 65 in September. I love singing. He added on to the singing with songwriting, and then he started me to record it. So I've done two full CDs and a Christmas song that he's had me to write. And I love singing. I mean, I love it. And so God, I thought that was all I was gonna do was sing and write songs, and that was it. And then he began to start working with me, saying, Hey, why do you think I'm talking to you like this? Why do you think I'm, you know, communicating with you? Because I have more work for you than just singing. I have some things that I have just for you. And it's your assignment. So I just kept getting closer and closer and talking to him. And then that marriage, you know, broke up because I'm like, okay, God, I'm talking to you and I'm, you know, working with you and you working with me and you working on me. So what's happening? He said, Well, first of all, I told you not to marry him. And so you did. And so now you're dealing with all the things that he was raised were okay. And you were raised that they weren't okay because I had a path for you. You're on a different path. And he said, He's okay, you're okay, but you're not okay together. And he said, What I don't want you to do is discredit him because this thing is not about him. This is about me and you and what I told you. And he said, I am your father, and you did not obey me. I told you not to do that. He said, So now I'm giving him, he's gone on with the things that he wants to do. Let him do what he's doing because I got for you what you're supposed to do. So I ended up, I don't know if anybody knows anything about broken and hurt, disappointed, you know, mad at yourself because I disobeyed God and went into that union. And so 17 years later, God pulls me from the union and a size two was too big for me. You can see the bones in my face, the bones on my shoulders. I came back home to my parents like that. I was horrible. I words can't express the shape that I was in spiritually, mentally, physically, and financially. I was broke in ⁓ all areas. And I came back to my parents, and I'm an only child, and I had two children. So I came back with two children. My parents said, Come on home. We will help you raise the children. Whatever God is telling you to do, you come back. I don't know if anybody's ever been just so down. I felt like mud on the ground that you had to scoop up and that God had to try to put me back together. Because I was just a wreck. But I was even more of a wreck because I was ashamed, because I just obeyed God. I was mad at myself, and I felt price was no worthless. I felt worthless. I felt like God, you can you even use me? You know, I I didn't do what you said. You know, I'm so h hurt. I'm I'm so down. And he and he told me, he said, go back to your parents. He said, so I can show you how I can take care of you. Let me take care of you. Let me show you what I can do for you at this broken point. And see, when we get broken, that's when he really can't work with us. Because we don't have a desire to do anything of our own anymore. But we don't have anything. We are down to nothing. So all that I needed was to just drown myself in him. And that's what I began to do. I began to read the word like never before. I began to study the word. I began to watch all the ministers on television. My favorite was Frederick Casey, Price, Joyce Myers. Creflow dollar. I had my favorites and I watched it all the time. And I was getting filled with the word from every direction. I was going to church all the time. I was singing in the choir. I was writing my music and I was talking to God. And he was talking to me. And I was sold out to want to do what he says in my life. I was ready. I had, I look, I came back with nothing. So I had Jesus and my family, and I was ready. To allow him to work with me. And this is when I'm sitting in Sunday school at my church, and they be, I don't know if you know anything about ⁓ Baptist Sunday school books, but those books always had a topic for that Sunday with all the scriptures that go with it. And then they had ⁓ little stories about different parts of the scripture and life application with those particular scriptures and the thing. And this particular day, it was the Holy Spirit. And I know nothing about the Holy Spirit, nothing but the word and what I saw, you know, back in the Pentecostal time and some of the things I had seen through the years and chatted with people, but I had never really applied him in my life. I didn't understand his role to a believer. So I'm in Sunday school, they're talking about it, and I say, God, what are they talking about? without moving. My lips might have been moving a little bit there, David, since you saw that today. But I was talking to him, saying, What are they talking about? And are they making any sense? And what is this? And people would begin to make a comment as we were going through the study. And God says, Hey, Elon, why you ain't got nothing to say? I said, 'cause I don't know what they're talking about. I have no clue. I don't know what this is. He said, Precisely. That's why you need to go study and find out about it. And he said, instead of crying, From the day the children leave to go off to be with their dad in another city, stop crying and start getting over here and reading about the Holy Spirit and let me teach this to you. He said, Do that instead of falling out and not eating and all this foolishness for days when they leave. I was like, okay, dad, all right. So I started studying. And at first I was more confused than I was at first. I said, Okay, now God, I'm I'm I've it's worse now than it was at first. I need your help. I need your help. Talk to me, show me what's going on. And I spent weeks studying that and praying. And he was talking to me. And I wrote everything he said in a pamphlet. And I said, okay, God, I think I understand now. And I put it off to the side. And I got a phone call from a friend that said, Hey, all that Holy Spirit stuff you've been doing up there in your house. I'm having a women's conference. I want you to come and share that in one of the breakout sessions. I said, What? They said, Yeah, go talk to God. He'll tell you how to get it together. Well, my profession. when I from graduate school, I got a master's in teaching. I was a college professor. I taught computer science. So I was like, okay, God, I guess I'm going ⁓ like I do in the classroom and be, you know, teaching whatever you got me putting in this little pamphlet here. That's what I'll do. So he had me to put it together and he said, run extra companies and just let people get them and give you a little donation for them if they want them. I let the Lord lead me. They took all my my pamphlets and gave me donations for it. And I was like, okay, God, well right then what get what you said, I'm gone. Then a minister calls me and says, Hey, I need you to come over here on one of my noonday talks with my members. And I want you to share that Holy Spirit stuff I've been hearing you talk about around time. I said, For real? I said, Well, okay, then you know. So I go over and I share it with them. Then he says, I need you to come back on Bible study night. And I need you to share that with the whole church. I need you to do that. And bring those papers, bring what you're doing. And I was like, okay, I don't understand now. You know, what what what what's going on with with this here, God? And so I would just pray, and then he gave me the song, the Holy Spirit. I went over, I did the teaching, and I sang the song, and it was amazing. I mean, God moved in a mighty way. And then I ended up dating this gentleman that I had known since I was four, and he was five. Our pre-parents had been best friends all our lives. Both of our marriages had broken up. We both were divorced. And we had been best friends. And so we started chatting and praying with each other and doing the daily bread on ⁓ when he was away, ⁓ because he didn't live in Columbus, he lived in Colorado and I was back in Columbus, and we would chat. He'd come home, visit his parents, well, his mother, because his dad was deceased. We chat and just pray, and that was it. And so one day he said, Hey, you think we could date? I said, No, no, no, no, friends shouldn't date. No, no, no. And so he later told me he had told God, she was crazy because you told me to tell her this. And she's not, she's not listening to me. She told me she don't want to do nothing. She she, you know, she was married. It was crazy. She don't want to date. She don't want to be bothering anybody. He says, So how can I do that? So I actually stayed home eight years and we dated a l a little bit in the latter end of that, probably like two years. We finally started dating. And then God ended up bringing us together. we were so close. I was in his wedding back in the day, and then he was in mine. And that's how close we were. And God, you know, put that together. But during those eight years, God moved me into ministry, becoming a minister, or ⁓ licensed minister, and then five years later, an ordained elder. He put that thing together and fashioned me. I ended up getting closer and closer and closer to God. Reading the word, studying, and I had that pamphlet, and I moved to Atlanta, Georgia. When I married him. When we got to Atlanta, we joined the church and we just kind of worked by sitting on the pew. If anybody knows about that, we were sitting on the pew. We weren't working, but we had both been working really hard in our churches. But we didn't work in that church. We sat back and relaxed and enjoyed going to church and letting God just fill us with the word. And I wasn't working in the choir. I had been choir director. I was praise and worship leader, all that. I did none of that there. Absolutely nothing. So we sat there until the Lord said, okay, it's time for you to move to the next level. Join the church. Tell them all about what you've been doing in the church and move forward as an elder. And so that's what I did. And I met the elders there and we began a relationship. And one of the ladies came over to my house, and I had that Holy Spirit book on the counter because God had told me to bring it upstairs from the basement. She saw that book and she said, May I look at this? And I said, Yes. And she said, ⁓ my God, this needs to be published. And I said, Really? And that began the journey. Of me starting to have a ministry that was concerning the Holy Spirit. And now it's turned to five books. The first book was The Holy Spirit, the person, the works, don't live without him. The second book was the blueprint, how the Holy Spirit Connection can change your life. The third book was the work book to that book, which is the blueprint. How the Holy Spirit connection can change your life? This book is 265 pages of diagrams, multiple choice, fill in the blank, all types of activities that flow with the book so that now you will get the opportunity to connect with the Holy Spirit. And now he can change your life like he did mine. So now you got application to everything that he had me to put together. He said, Do you think? That I allowed you to get a degree in teaching, a master's in teaching. And now you don't teach and use that degree for me. You did it for the world for 17 years. Now you're gonna do it for me. So now that's what I'm doing. I'm bringing and sharing the word to God's people and teaching. So I have that book, I have that workbook, and then God says, Hey, I want people to have the answers. sample answers to this 265 pages. Because I had a lot of people say, well, you know, I hope I got the answers right. I I I hope I'm on the right road. ⁓ you know, can you help me a little bit with that? And so I've created the teacher's edition to the workbook. Red letter answers to the 265 pages. And it has been a blessing. I've had people to say they love it. And then after that workbook, he had me to do a daily journal. So now that you've learned all the information, now you want to apply it daily by sitting down with your journal, going through the four pages that we share in each day, taking your scriptures, playing music, writing the answers to those prompts in that journal, and getting what God gave me is called the Holy Spirit hookup. That's what I'm doing daily. I'm going from church to church. I'm doing podcasts. I'm teaching. I'm doing on online book clubs. I'm doing ⁓ using the ⁓ social media to share a 60-second word from God called Motivational Monday. And I'm sharing the music. I'm actually gearing up now to do ⁓ write some more songs and get out there and record again. I just want everybody to know that Jesus loves you. He has an amazing life for you. And if you get to know the Holy Spirit and hook up with him, he will teach you how to connect with him and get that amazing life that he has for you. Nothing can beat the Holy Spirit Christmas. Amen. That's that that's you've just you've hit all the all the bases, one after after another. I'm I'm thoroughly blessed. Now Do you have a website that you'd like to tell us about so that we could post it in the in the video? Yes. The title of the website is yolanda troopsmith.com. So y-o-l-o-n-d-a. T-R-O-U-P-E S-M-I-T-H dot com. Okay. Now, whenever we do these recordings, at the end, we invite our guest to give us a nugget, a golden nugget, something that people can maul over. They can they can can they can consider, they can meditate over, whatever way that they they and God s you know, concentrate and learn. What would you share with us that people can take with them in the weeks to come? One of them. Strong scriptures for me because I know life, as there's a saying out there, people say this thing called life is be life and meaning all these different things are gonna happen to you. Nobody's life is perfect, nobody's life is trouble-free. So I remember this scripture and it helps me. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not to your own understanding. In all of your ways, acknowledge him. And he will direct your path. So no matter what's going on, marriages, you know, breaking up, divorce, children out of order, jobs not doing the way we think they should do, not getting promotions that we thought we should have gotten, people saying they're gonna do this, that, and the other, and they don't do any of it. All of these things are happening. People lying, people cheating, people stealing, you know, all sorts of things happening. But if we trust in the Lord, To realize that God is in control. There's nothing happening to me or you that God is not allowing. He's not walking around saying, ⁓ my God, that happened to you, London. What went wrong? Whatever goes on, God knows it. And if he lets it happen, he's allowing it. And it's going to be for your good. So trust him. Lean not to your own understanding. All of your ways acknowledge him as the King of Kings, the great I am, the good shepherd. ⁓ an amazing God that loves you and is right there with you because He said He'd never leave you nor forsake you. And He's going to give you an expect it in if you talk to Him, if you listen, if you obey, you will have an amazing life in Jesus. Amen. That's what I want to tell you. Amen. Well, thank you for everything you've shared. And ⁓ it is time for us to close in prayer. And ⁓ once. Once we're we're done recording, ⁓ Yolanda's gonna hang on with me for a chat after that, but for right now let's just close in prayer. Lord Jesus, we're grateful for your love and your mercy and how you've you've worked in your Yolanda's life. You Yulon Yolanda's g ⁓ a perfect example of who we really are as people. We we we do we know what we do and we do what we do until we learn about you and then you show us better. You lead us and guide us into all truth through your Holy Spirit. Lord, anoint her in all of her ministry ways. Bless the viewers and the listeners, and draw them closer to you so that they can get a a a dose of the Holy Spirit working in their life as she has shared today. Anoint this podcast and use it for your glory so that people can fall in love with you all over again. Bless this in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. There's always a challenge, and that is seek after God. He will be found. Want to know him better? Seek Jesus. Jesus is the way to God. And Jesus' Holy Spirit is with the one who works in your life. Seek after God. He is there waiting for you. Thank you. This has been the God Says Yes Podcast with David Ebel. To connect with David, email him at GodsaysYespodcast at gmail.com. You can get his latest book, When the Doctors Say No, God Says Yes, at Amazon.com.