Leanna Ellington grew up what she calls a “couch potato kid.” From a young age she was overweight, even attending her first Weight Watchers meeting at just 8 years old. As a young adult, after years under the control of diet mentality and chronic shame, her whole life revolved around how she looked and what she ate. 

Can’t all of us identify with this toxic struggle to enjoy food but also stay thing and look how our inner critics tell us we should look??

Well, near the end of her college years, Leanne hit a breaking point. She did a drastic diet and lifestyle overhaul and lost nearly 1/3 body weight (about 100 pounds) in her early 20s. From there forth, she operated under a “results rollercoaster," leaving her more fit than she’d ever been but also victim to a self-rejecting relationship with her body and habits of disordered eating.

 After several years of nutritional and biological education, teaching, and even starting her own “Not your average bootcamp” business at home in Orlando, Leanne found the body she’d always wanted and a career she’d never dreamed of! She was a huge success, drawing thousands of women to her teaching, studio, and platform under the “fat girl to fit girl” narrative. She even launched a corporate fitness business which afforded her regular spots on CNN and Fitness Rx.

Even still, her whole life felt plagued with imposter syndrome. Externally, she was healthy and killing it. Internally, she was still stuck.

“I felt like a fraud. I had paid the ‘cost of skinny.’ I majorly hurt myself [and my body] and was so focused on being skinny and lean and fit, that I didn’t listen to my body and ended up needing major spin surgery.”

She still didn’t like who she was. “I looked in the mirror and had the body I’d always wanted. My arms were toned; my stomach was flat, but inside, I just knew nothing had really changed.” From here, Leanne started a deep dive into the concept of “self-image” and spent several years studying psychology, behavior science, and neuroscience to better understand how they contribute to body image. Her true crisis wasn’t just with food; it was how her relationship with food was marring her identity.

Now, Leanne’s business and podcast, Stressless Eating, combines philosophies from all of her studies as well as her decade long, personal journey to 3-dimensional health (physical, mental, social-emotional). Her work is a systematic approach, enabling and shepherding women toward the multifaceted health freedom she’s found and guiding them into a new paradigm through which to relate to food.

Leanne reminds us that the eating problem is really "a thinking problem!” Our mindset shifts are everything, and the keys to stressless eating start here!

Free webinar @ www.stresslesseating.com & Stressless Eating Podcast

In our third “behind the scenes” look at NaSHEville’s three missions, this week we hear all about Brooke’s personal adoption story of her daughter, Louie. Her, at times heartbreaking, but ultimately overwhelmingly joyous journey to and through adoption gives us insight into all the “birth pains” that this process demands. And while data estimates around 60% of Americans have had some sort of experience related to adoption, many of us still know all too little about the process.

Here are some basic stats:

• In the United States alone, 135,000 children are adopted every year.
• Each day there are around 430,000 children in foster care.
• A typical agency Home Study can take roughly about 6-8 weeks to complete.
• The full adoption process can take from 12 months to many years.
• The costs for all facets of adoption services can range from $5,000-$50,000+ depending on a number of circumstances.

With all these variables and uncertainties, many families are left wondering: can we really do this? Even if we feel called toward adoption, is it possible and is it worth the heartache and financial strain that seems to often mark the process?

Brooke admits that “this was the first time in my life I truly had to give up control; it truly was in God’s hands.”

But in spite of the legitimate fears that her adoption could fall through, when asked was this the right decision, the answer continues to stand a resounding, “yes!” She says, “We could have over-thought the decision to death, but when God tells you to move, just move.” And as he does when we follow, he showed up in countless crazy, divine ways, leading them to a successfully finalized adoption.

Brooke gives us insight into their consideration of international vs. domestic adoption, the initial anxiety of meeting and getting to know their birth mom, and how they intentionally included their biological son throughout the entire process.

Despite significant legal setbacks at several points in their fight to finalize Louie’s adoption, Brooke says nothing has laid the foundation for greater faith and discipline in all aspects of her life than the adoption process. It’s an arduous walk that demands faith and endurance and selflessness, but as Brooke so beautifully reminds us, adoption in and of itself is a living “picture of the gospel.”

Though many of you have followed NaSHEville and She’s in the City for a while now, for both our long-term friends and our new ones, we want to spend some time taking a deeper look at the missions closest to our heart: trafficking victims, widows, and orphans and vulnerable children. This week the host becomes the guest, and Mattie shares her story of growing up in the spotlight and how her family’s platform enabled her to speak publicly about the tragic loss of her husband, Ben.

From the first days of building NaSHEville, widows have been on our hearts, because Scriptures reveals over and over again how close they are to God’s hearts:

1. “Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.” Isaiah 1:17
2. “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” James 1:27

What many don’t know is that Mattie’s husband accident happened after NaSHEville was already in the works. All of the sudden she found herself widowed at 28 with an organization already committed to serving women across the country who were now just like her.

Mattie shares about the twelve day battle of praying and hoping for her husband’s healing, and how ultimately, she didn’t get the miracle from God she and countless others had been praying for. Since then she has walked out nearly three years of grieving for the world to witness, hoping above all else to point anyone suffering back to Jesus, the only One able to heal our deepest wounds.

“Ben was the love of my life. I lost my best friend, my marriage, and a lot of myself on the day he died. And while I’ve since questioned and bargained with and gotten angry at God for letting Ben go, I have also never known him or trusted him or relied on him more deeply than I do today. The valley of the shadow of death is a real place we will all face if not once, many times, in our lives. But God is just as gracious in the valley as he is on mountaintops, if not more! And hear me: Christ is more than enough to endure anything you may face.”

Though many of you have followed NaSHEville and She’s in the City for a while now, for both our long-term friends and our new ones, we want to spend some time taking a deeper look at the missions closest to our heart: trafficking victims, widows, and orphans and vulnerable children. This week we sit down with Leslie Eiler Thompson, who works with End Slavery Tennessee and hosts their podcast, Someone Like Me.

As our primary partner for human trafficking, End Slavery has been a pivotal pioneer in not just the local, but also the national, fight against trafficking, a term in and of itself that wasn’t even used or recognized until the last decade. Because of their work alongside many other advocate groups, sex trafficking is now legally defined as:  

any commercial sex act that involves force, fraud, or coercion or the exchange of value; and ALL commercial sex acts involving minors

End Slavery not only fights for victims’ rights by way of national policy and legislation reform, but they are also the first point of contact for trafficking victims in Middle Tennessee. They bring a full circle approach to the fight, offering everything from education and public advocacy, to prevention, training, and holistic, trauma informed treatment and rehabilitation for victims in their care and their programs.

If you’ve seen social media campaigns on trafficking or have it on your heart to learn more, don’t miss this episode where we get an inside look at what it’s really like. We explore questions like:

What demographics are being trafficked? What are the red flags? What is the survivor’s journey to healing like once they are rescued? How crucial is community for their recovery? How does the average person help?

Much like poverty and world hunger, the only approach to fighting this evil and serving its victims is to start locally, right here at home. Thanks to organizations like End Slavery, we can!

For the third and final week of our mini-series on Christian sexuality, we get the inside scoop from Hayley Thoen on her “backwards” journey to find faithful sexuality. We know Hayley from her role in the recent Netflix series, Marriage or Mortgage (episode 7), where she and her then fiancé, Andrew, are vocal about their choice to live separately in order to keep from having sex until they’re married. So, to be on a show where you either get to choose a dream home or dream wedding, you’d think the choice to hurry up and get married would be pretty easy, right? 

Well, no spoilers here, so go watch the show or listen to this episode to see what they picked.

What you won’t find on the show though is the crazy and courageous journey Hayley and Andrew took to arrive at their choice for abstinence until marriage. While the show suggests they had been waiting for marriage from the start of their relationship, Hayley tells us quite a different story.  

Their timeline goes like this:

February 2016 – they meet
August 2016 – they move in together
October 2018 – they get engaged
August 2019 - they come to faith, are baptized, stop having sex, and Andrew moves out
Fall 2019 – they film the show 

So, what sparked their hard turn away from casual sex in their relationship and their tough decision to stop sleeping and living together? When the couple got engaged, they sat down and picked a wedding date. But it was the next question they asked that day changed their lives forever.

“We had no idea who we could ask to marry us.” With neither of them being part of a church, they began visiting different ones around Nashville in hopes of finding a church home and someone to officiate the wedding. What they found was an entirely new understanding of faith, of God’s design for sex and marriage, and deep, life-changing relationships with Jesus that neither of them had experienced before.

I couldn’t love Hayley and her story more. She is honest about wanting to choose what was logistically easiest, and honestly “logical,” over what she knew the Bible says about sex. She encourages women who might be feeling like they want to hold off from sex with a partner but are afraid having that conversation could compromise the relationship. And she’s so real with us about how sexual temptation is a struggle too big for any of us to handle on our own without the grace of God and without community.

When I asked Hayley if, today, she’d say their choice to hit pause physically and start, what she called, “actually dating again” during their engagement was the right choice, she gave a quick “absolutely!” Not only did their decision strengthen their faith as individuals and as a couple, she also attributes the emotional depth and trust and communication they gained over their year and a half of celibacy to taking sex off the table.

“I think we were using sex to cover up [all our other issues],” she said. “Once that was off the table, that’s when we really began to grow.”

This girl is honest, courageous, and so generous to share her story and encourage anyone in a place of sexual struggle or guilt or questions. And she’s emphatic – she’s here for you if you need her:

DM Hayley @hayleythoen !

Join her at Zeal Church in Nashville

Kat Harris is a podcaster, author, and full-time photographer in New York City. Ten years ago, she launched her account, The Refined Woman, which began as a style blog for those seeking fashion advice by way of her work in the NYC fashion world. But with time, Refined Woman turned into a much more personal platform, where she began sharing the ups and downs of her dating life as a Christian woman, saving sex for marriage, in a world of hook-up culture.

From there she has gained a tremendous following, with women all over the world coming to her for dating advice, encouragement, and a safe place to break the shame and isolation that we often experience as Christian women surrounding sex and sexuality. Her first book, Sexless in the City: A Sometimes Sassy, Sometimes Painful, Always Honest Look at Dating, Desire, and Sex, released April of this year, addresses everything you can imagine about what God and Scripture have to say about sex and how she found her ultimate “why” to stay committed to a sexless life in New York City.

Phase 1 – The Deconstruction

When Kat suffered a tough breakup in her late twenties, she asked herself: “Why am I really holding off on sex when everyone around me (Christian and non) seems to be fine with having it?” She realized she just didn’t know what she believed anymore or why. Her break up and subsequent deep dive into what the Bible has to say about sex led her down a five-year journey of deconstructing what she had for so long assumed to be true and seeking out what God really says about sex and sexuality.

“I grew up in purity culture, being taught [without question] to save sex for marriage and that my body is inherently bad, so I should cover it up.”

Kat wondered, is all of this still true? I can’t really be the only one asking these questions, right? So, she took a leap. She decided to trade in legalism and strategic rule-bending and self-righteousness for the risk of asking hard questions. And her book invites us to do so right along with her.

Phase 2 – The Reconstruction

What she found when she began to break down the truths about biblical sex and sexuality is that there’s actually more freedom in God’s design for sex than she ever imaged. She studied everything from scripture to science, sought out both biblical and secular perspectives on sex, and talked with thousands of people, both who believe and who don’t, who are abstinent and regularly sexually active, to find out what they believed and why. 

She discovered that much of the science surrounding sexual pleasure actually backs up what scripture teaches on the power and beauty of monogamy and marriage. She reminds us that though we often associate sexuality as sinful and something to be kept apart from the spiritual, they both are fundamentally designed to point us to God and the deep connection we all desire to have with him. She gives a fresh and completely scripture-based assurance that God designed sex and sexuality with intention. She encourages us to invite God into our sexual lives, both into the good parts and to the areas where we struggle, because he created it.

“God doesn’t make bad things. He created the body [and all its parts] before the fall.” 

Ultimately, she offers a liberating perspective on sexuality for those of us who aren’t married because sexuality means so much more than physical sex. “If sexuality was a book,” Kat tells us, “sex would just be one chapter.” 

Part 3 - The Practical

So, this is all great in terms of reworking our biblical understanding of sex and sexuality, but as Christians pursuing biblical sexual ethics, how can we live that out obediently without feeling awkwardness or shame?

Or as she puts it, “what does it mean [practically] for a single woman in her sexual prime who is seeking God, striving to abstain from sex outside of marriage, and feeling all the feels?”

It means an invitation to ask why. For every belief you hold or boundary you choose to set for yourself and your sexual ethic, ask the hard questions. What do you believe God intends sex to be? Does the Bible back that up? Do you want or not want to live out these ideas? Who do you want to be sexually? Does whatever you’re participating in sexually help you move toward that?

But ultimately, God is more concerned with our hearts than our behavior modification. 🙌🏻 He absolutely wants us to value and pursue the boundaries he calls us to regard sexual behavior, and he is faithful to empower us to live obediently. But he is also unendingly faithful to forgive and redeem us the times when we fall short. Scripture gives us a clear picture and invitation for what God’s purpose for sex and sexual flourishing looks like. But above all, our purity and salvation always come from Jesus, and Jesus alone.

Where has this left us?

For Kat, it means “shifting my approach from sexual purity to sexual integrity.” We can’t earn Jesus’s love or salvation through anything, including through sexual purity. That is a works-based salvation, and that’s not the gospel. So, she had to answer her own why questions: what’s my boundary? What’s my why behind that boundary? And how do I set myself up for success to be true to that boundary?

“I do want to continue saving sex for marriage. But I will no longer worship sex and virginity as something contributing to my salvation.” 

Your questions aren’t too big for God. Your mistakes aren’t too shameful to be covered in full by the blood of Jesus. And sex and sexuality are far from embarrassing to the Creator who created these things. Why not bring your why’s to him and see where he leads you?

Follow Kat:

• @therefinedwoman
• The Refined Collective Podcast
• Sexless in the City: A Sometimes Sassy, Sometimes Painful, Always Honest Look at Dating, Desire, and Sex

This week we are about to get crazy, y’all. We’re diving into a quick mini-series on the ultimate taboo yet most universally human topic – sex. No, not the mechanics of it or politicized issues surrounding sex and sexuality, but we want to take a fresh look at what God intends for sex and sexuality. Why? Because we love God, and sexuality and sexual desire is something that every single human being experiences on the reg!  

In her book, Talking Back to Purity Culture: Rediscovering Faithful Christian Sexuality, Rachel Joy Welcher steps up to the plate and does a beautiful job tackling what is biblically true about sex. She also dives into ideas and messages, that though well-intended and based on scripture, were mistaught, misapplied, and ultimate mislead millions of youth over the past several decades of Christian “purity culture.”

 What led her on this daunting public journey to rediscover true Christian sexual ethics? She herself was a product of the “true love waits” movement of the 90s and early 2000s, obeying the teaching’s rules and saving herself for marriage. But when after five years, her husband renounced his faith and divorced her, it left here without any idea how to live out faithful sexuality outside the bounds of marriage. She was in her late twenties, no longer a virgin, what she’d been taught made her “pure,” and felt that “there wasn’t really a category for what [she] was going through.” 

So many of us can relate to feeling alone and in this position.

Whether single, widowed, or divorced, what does faithful sexuality look like when we’re no longer teenagers and when marriage feels less and less like an option?

Or what about when sexual expectations within a marriage don’t measure up, leaving us disappointed and in pain?

After her divorce, Rachel went on a quest to find these answers, and many more. Not only did she re-read the purity culture books from her youth to see where they fell short of the truth of the gospel, but she also wrote her entire doctoral dissertation on the topic!

In Talking Back to Purity Culture, Rachel addresses so many of the shaming, fear-based messages that the movement taught young Christians and she gives us a fresh, grace-filled perspective on the daily struggle it is to be a sexual human being who loves God.

A few of the many topics she covers include:

1. The dangers of idolizing virginity.
2. Sex is a gift, but it is not a reward for good behavior or a guaranteed human right.
3. Sexuality isn’t sinful!
4. How to talk to our kids about sex and help them to expect their sexuality, not suppress it. 

No matter what stage of life or where we find ourselves relationally, Rachel addresses so many of the white-elephant issues that we shy away from as a Church. She reminds us that her ultimate goal is to address what we got wrong about true Christian sexuality, not in order to shame or blame, but so that we can do better moving forward.

“I would love to see us be more honest in our community and to realize that sexuality is common to all of us. It was part of what it means to be human.”

And ultimately, that our purity and worth come from Jesus, and Jesus alone.

Follow Rachel:
@racheljwelcher
https://www.racheljwelcher.com/

“MY WHOLE LIFE I’VE ALWAYS BEEN A RISK TAKER. WHICH MEANS, WITHIN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE, IT’S NOT REALLY THAT RISKY. IF GOD’S LEADING YOU, THERE’S ADVENTURE ON THE OTHER END OF THOSE LEAPS OF FAITH.”

BE THE VESSEL

For Beth Guckenberger and her husband, much of that adventure began in Mexico, where they lived and raised a family for 15 years.

“WHAT WE KNEW FOR SURE IS THAT WE WANTED AN UNCONVENTIONAL LIFE.”

When the couple felt what Beth described as “a magnetic force toward something they couldn’t see but couldn’t deny” – the pull of the Holy Spirit – they pulled all of their savings and went to Mexico with the goal of serving orphans and vulnerable children. Did they have a plan? Sure. Though it was anything but complete blueprint. Did they have funds? Sure. But only to last them one year.

Since their move over 25 years ago, Beth and her husband have launched Back2Back Ministries, which has grown into an international non-profit serving orphans, vulnerable children, and the communities in which they live. Today it is in over nine countries around the world, operating with millions of dollars in budgets each year. Looking back, Beth reminds us:

If we follow these prompts in spirit, “God is there to do work far broader and deeper than we could do ourselves. He’s just looking for a ready vessel who will stand in the right place, at the right time. And twenty-five years later, that’s still my story.”

SUPER-MOM

On top of serving countless children around the globe, Beth is also a biological, adoptive, and foster mom to 11 kids – 7 girls, 4 boys – from 17-34 years of age. Because of their experience as foster and adoptive parents, Back2Back has since developed a curriculum, Trauma Free World, for parents fostering or adopting kids with informed trauma.

RECKLESS FAITH

First and foremost, Beth talks about how the call to “wait on the Lord” doesn’t mean stagnancy. It’s not a stillness, like inactivity. It’s a stillness rooted in trusting the faithfulness and power of God to empower us as we take bold steps. As well as his power to re-direct us if and when we do move into the wrong directions.

Beth’s 40-day devotion, Reckless Faith: A 40 Day Journey to Saying Yes, is a practical supplement to her original memoir, Reckless Faith: Let Go and Be Lead, and offers not just insights into how Jesus has brought adventure in her own life, but also applicable ways to say yes to reckless faith in our own every day walk with Christ.

“BIG STORIES GET TOLD THROUGH A BUNCH OF SMALL YES.”

She also reminds us that reckless faith doesn’t always mean “high volume.” It doesn’t always look bold and loud. Your adventure is the exact, perfect one God has tailored for you. But get excited! Because where your reckless faith takes you is somewhere no one else has been before. As Beth says, “Sister, if I can do it, you can do it.”

Just as so many of you are, Courtney Burg is a season of life that often feels, as she has coined it, like “mombo jombo.” As a writer, PhD student, and mom of four, her days are filled with all the beautiful, exhausting, messy blessings that mom-life has to offer. But over the past several years, her work and her message has gone far beyond just the mom-blog sphere.

Courtney shares with us how at five months into marriage, she finally addressed an alcohol and pill addiction she’d been battling for years, and with kind help from her husband, went to rehab. Writing and journaling quickly became a crucial part of her sobriety journey, and the tender words she originally wrote to heal herself are now actively helping to heal others – not just from substance addiction, but from the addictions of busyness, achievement, and a consuming desire to feel needed by others.

Even in her sobriety, Courtney still felt burdened by deep shame, and as she started unpacking that shame with others (personally and on Mombo Jombo blog/social media), she began to find some freedom.

Much of the work she does now via Mombo Jombo and in her online workshops centers around boundaries, a concept we hear about a lot but often don’t take the time to address honestly in our own relationships.

“Boundaries is not just pushing people [out of our lives],” Courtney explains. “Setting boundaries is God’s work. It’s loving. It’s how I can help you without hurting both of us. It’s how I can be the best steward of the time, talents, and treasures that God has given me. It helps me know what’s mine and not mine to fix.”

Because we are finite, flawed humans, no relationship will ever be perfect. We know this. But where is the line between sacrificial love that the Bible calls us to, and the kind of self-sabotaging love that leaves us over-extended and resentful? What do healthy boundaries look like, and is setting them really the way we best care for ourselves and love our people well?

Courtney walks us through these tough questions and many more! There is hope and encouragement for any woman, in any season in this week’s episode, whether struggling to set boundaries with others or to understand “who am I when I’m not _________?” – fill in the blank!

 Where to find Courtney?
www.mombojombo.org
@courtneyjburg  

A few of Courtney’s favs:
Boundaries, Henry Cloud
Atomic Habits, James Clear

If there’s ever been a year to turn our understanding of work, of faith, and in many ways, of life in general upside down, it’s been this past one. Many are out of employment, furloughed, or working hours on end at home. For some of us, we’ve jumped more fully into the arms of the Lord, but for some, we’re doubting his goodness more than ever.

As women, as a nation, and as a world, we have found ourselves in an uncomfortable, prolonged IN-BETWEEN PLACE. 

So, what better She’s in the City guest this week than two-time author, Bible teachers, speaker, and entrepreneur/businesswoman, Kat Armstrong, whose latest book, released January 2021, explores just that. It’s entitled The In-Between Place: Where Jesus Changes Your Story. She brings just the prayer and the perspective and the encouragement we need as continue headlong into this next year. 

In the book Kat dives right into the in-between places we all face – places of doubt, pain, uncertainty, waiting, shame, you name it! She walks us through the story of a woman in scripture who felt a lot like we do in our own tough seasons – depleted and stuck. And she reminds us in powerful, biblically rooted ways that we are not doomed to relive the same cycles of disappointment and worry, because God is a powerful and creative God. And more times than not, right in the middle of our in-between places is where Jesus shows up in radical ways. Sometimes to change our circumstances, but always to change us if we’re willing to let him.

We talk about why waiting, though we don’t love doing, it is such a crucial part of establishing our faith and that, when surrendering our uncertain seasons to the Lord, we can:

1. Make peace with our past

2. Find hope in our present

3. Step confidently into our future 

Whether you’re in an in-between moment in your life right now or not, this episode is a much-needed encouragement as we all continue to face uncertainties of the pandemic. Thank you, Kat, for your powerful and timely message! 

Follow Kat @katarmstrong1 and get a free signed copy of The In-Between Place: Where Jesus changes Your Story @ https://www.polishedonline.org/join-the-network.