 Radiant Church presents Radiant Stories, a collection of stories that showcase God's faithfulness to take our hopeless situations and craft them into beautiful testimonies of His power, provision, and love. We are here today with Kendra Zondervan. We are so excited to have her on. She is the wonderful other half of John Zondervan, who is the Richland campus pastor here at Radiant Church. She also is on staff, and she plays a huge role in our day-to-day here at the campus. So we are really excited to have her, and she's got a really powerful message. I've heard her testimony before, and the growing up portion of it is really intense, and then encountering the Lord as well, and Pastor John works, he's woven into that as well. But today I think she's going to talk about primarily the love of the Father and how it's affected our life. Yeah, thank you so much for having me, and this is a really cool opportunity because I don't typically get to talk about my story, and I love interviews so much. So it's just something that John has the ability to be out front, and I love that about him. So this is a cool moment for me. So I actually grew up with a single mom, and I've never met my birth father. He was not in my life at all because of just a lot of circumstances revolving around abuse, and he actually was in prison, and he just was never in my life. My mom kind of escaped from him really more than anything. So she grew up with a mom and a dad. They came from the Netherlands, actually migrated to this country, and so growing up I kind of was off and on. I would stay with them. They were really a place of safety for me. It was really a god thing growing up because my mom just entered into another relationship that was basically very abusive when I was about three years old. So she moved in with this guy who later became my stepdad, and it was off and on, we'd be there, we'd move out. We'd be there, we'd move out. So it was just, I grew up very early, I guess. I had to depend on myself. I probably started doing things that you wouldn't even do until your college years, basically before I was like 12 years old. So just had an interesting kind of life, but you don't understand that you're really in dysfunction until you grow up and you grow out of that dysfunction, and then you realize, wow, okay, I would never want that for my kids. So that was kind of my history. I met John and we met in a restaurant. Neither of us were saved. I really hadn't had any experience even going to church at all. I would occasionally go with my grandpa to this community church that was in our town, and I just remember going and being like, oh, I kind of like the music here. I had this kind of acknowledgement of God, and I always just remember thinking even, oh, well, I'm a pretty good person. I mean, really, that was what I thought, and it was really never went beyond that. I never felt conviction of sin. There was an emptiness and there was definitely a brokenness and just so much shame that I carried and I just had no understanding or idea how I could ever get rid of that. I mean, as a very young child crying and thinking a lot, like why am I alive? Why am I here? Because I did have a brother that was born before me with my real dad. My mom lost him in the hospital. He was born with some birth defects, and I remember crying myself to sleep like, God, why am I the one that's alive and just never really understanding that. So it kind of went through my life being very independent. I moved out when I was 16. I would just live with friends because it was just so chaotic within the environment, just constant, just screaming, fighting, yelling, police. It just was never ending. So I learned how to be on my own and John and I actually came to radiant when it was not radiant for a birthday party and literally went to service and encountered the presence of God and for the very first time and he came forward and I had this fear for whatever reason. I knew that God was real. I knew Jesus forgave my sins. I believed, but I didn't go forward then. But from that moment on, it was the change in my life and John and I were able to really walk through those steps of maturing as Christians together because I had kind of lost my friend relationships that I had prior to that. I mean, my life was literally turned upside down in a great way. So super thankful that we had each other during that time. And so it was kind of like really early on, I think I was just so liberated from the sin and the shame that I carried that I really pressed in in the sense of being made new in Christ and the life that he gave me for paying for my sin. But it was just very natural and easy for me not to go deeper with the Father because all my life I had lived not really understanding what that relationship means. I had no context for it. So it was just very easy for me to pray to Jesus and to Father God. But it was very methodical, if you will. There wasn't a relationship context. And so I just remember even like the image I had of the Father was distant. He was just distant to me. And when I prayed, I always pictured Jesus as the mediator, like literally the line in the telephone, like, okay, I can get close to the Father through this cord, but it was just never a closeness that I felt like, I don't know, he wanted to have with me because I didn't understand. And I believed that because of the blood of Jesus, I had access to the Father. I mean, the Word of God talks about us being grafted in as children of God and we're co-heirs with Jesus. But instead of something that kind of broke down barriers, it became an invisible wall almost for me. And then there was an awakening that happened when I went on this heart quest. I don't know if you've ever heard of that. It was just an intense, like, one-week time where you went through just a lot of your past, a lot of things that, a lot of times you don't even understand, have kind of shaped and formed your ideas about yourself, your identity about the Lord. And it was just very, very in-depth. So I spent that week and, you know, I just did incredible things, spoke to me in personal ways that I hadn't experienced before. And I just remember at the end, we were at this dinner and we were supposed to kind of ask God a question about, like, what he wanted to ultimately do for, like, in the future, kind of what was beyond this. Like, we were going home. And I clearly, in a way that probably apart from certain dreams, that I've had, it was almost as if I heard the audible voice of God, but it was so strong in my spirit. And he just said, Kendra, you know Jesus, but you don't know me. And so it was just like this awakening moment where I realized I don't really understand the love of the Father. And I want to, I really want to. And so I just think that was the time when the journey really began for me to sink into the depth of his love. And I think he wants that for all of us. It's not about being just saved by grace. And it's incredible what Jesus has done for us and what we can, you know, have because of what he did. But it's ultimately, we were created to have relationship with the Father. And it was just for whatever reason, that was the moment when that became something that I was not going to let go of. I was going to be on a mission in order to encounter that more and more. So I just love radiant so much because it's, you know, just, it's not going through the motions. It's not just, you know, hearing, you know, a few messages and you're, you know, just kind of living life. It's always a challenge to go deeper, to grow in ways that I never could have imagined, you know, in the years that I've been here. So I just am so thankful for obviously Pastor Lee and Jane and their leadership and sacrifice and just the way that Pastor Lee does not compromise when it comes to the presence and the Holy Spirit and the Word of God and just I, it's changed me. It's changed my life. No, I feel like that is such a profound realization that you obviously didn't have on your own. It was, it was an encounter moment. What are the things that you have done? Like what has changed practically in your prayer life and even in your relationship with the Lord and the friend Jesus, the brother Jesus and the Father God from that point on when you really heard His voice, what changed practically day to day? How did you start seeking that relationship? I honestly think that there was something that came alive in me as really embracing and believing that I was a daughter of God. I think that that helped me to actually communicate and want to like really enter into intimacy like with the Father. I talked to Him differently. You know what I mean? It was more like it wasn't a ritualistic type thing where it was, I've got to come pray to Jesus to be like this mediator for me to actually get close to the Father. It just literally those walls were just broken down and it was almost as if I really felt like I was able to sit on His lap, like be fully embraced if that makes any sense. So it just changed the way that I had conversations with Him. It was just really turned into, I talked to the Father all the time like I would somebody who's standing right here next to me. It wasn't like, okay, I'm gonna, again, I get you carve out time, you have a set of side time to read the Word of God, but it just became a presence that I knew was always there with me. And I think that definitely was something that changed and surely it's changed over time. But I think that that was the difference. As a new Christian and as a new believer, it was almost like I had these kind of traditions that I don't even know where they came from, but this idea that, okay, I've got to do my devotions every morning or every night and that was the time that I really had to spend with the Lord and to talk to Him and when He would hear me and it just slowly changed to, I know He's always with me. I'm always talking to Him. I'm always getting new revelation about how He feels about me, about my identity, about things that He's putting on my heart to do. And so that just became more of a reality. And I think ultimately what it did was it allowed me to understand how He speaks to me because I do think that the Lord speaks to us in different ways. Some people will see an image and they will see a picture or they will just get this, a scripture will literally just jump off the page and it will mean something to them that they could have never had a pastor or someone explain. It's the Holy Spirit. So just really learning how to understand His voice and how He speaks to me and when He's speaking and that has changed my life really even over the past, I would say less than five years. That's become very strong because I had always been a, I don't know, dreamer, if you will. I think I dream every single night and I remember, no, they don't always make sense, but the Lord has kind of escalated, I think the way that He speaks to me and it happens a lot in dreams. And then I've developed like this thing where I just, I really want to understand. I'm definitely like very analytical. I want to know and I want to research and I want to understand. Some of the ways that He has really downloaded just His love in a profound, like supernatural, miraculous way is through dreams and Him helping me not interpret other people's dreams but help me interpret my own dreams. I can just share like, this was probably about eight or nine months ago, I was like at a conference, I was with a coworker at the conference. I'm sleeping in the night and I have this just horrible, horrible, horrible dream and I have a son, Eric, who is six and so in the dream it was like some, I don't know what was going to happen but it horribly terrible, like apocalyptic type thing was going to happen. Like Eric was going to suffer and he was going to, like something was coming after him and I don't know, maybe I've watched too many walking deads or something, I have no idea but John and I had to give him poison in this dream and my heart is, I mean in total, total anguish. I can't imagine, but I know I have to do it so I'm in the dream and I'm just like, I have to do this and it was, I can't even verbally tell you like how real it felt in that moment and how it was beyond anything I could ever imagine that I would ever do, but I had to do it so I'm giving it to him and I'm just holding him and I am just broken, I'm broken and I'm feeling him fade away and I wake up and I'm sobbing when I wake up from the dream and I'm just, I, it again just felt so real and I just knew in that dream I can't go on how can I do this, I don't know how I'm going to get through this I don't know how I'm going to go on and I woke up and I was just, instead of kind of being like oh my gosh, I can't believe that, I'd never do that I can't believe I would dream that I, in that moment just asked the Lord I asked the Father, I was like, why would I dream this? Lord, I could never do that, how could I do that how could I even dream about doing that? Why would I even have this dream? And I immediately, it was the tangible presence of the Father in a physical way came on me and he said, I did that and it literally was something that was a revelation to me about the depth of his love he gave and sacrificed his son that he loved so much more than I could ever love my own son that it just gave me like this revelation of oh my god, you love me I mean so much, I can't even comprehend the heartbreak and the brokenness that the Father had to go through to literally put the sins of the world on the son that he loved, turn his back and again, Jesus chose he chose to make that sacrifice for us but the Father had to have just the heartbreak that that is, I can't even imagine it and I just, it was something that I don't know it changed me, it changed my view in an even more profound way about the love of the Father and it was like this horrible, horrible nightmare became a like, just a catalyst for the Father to actually even pour out more of his love on me and so I, it's just been things like that time and time again that he has done and revealed to me in just random, crazy ways so you've had revelations as kind of an individual you've had revelations because of being a parent what do you feel like he has revealed to you through the years since you know being saved and encountering him in that way about being a daughter, like an earthly daughter yeah, I think it's that he would go through any lengths to honestly just be there for me to provide for me to be like with me and it just, I don't know when you don't have like an earthly Father, it's just so interesting because you just don't understand what it would be like to have like this unconditional like presence, love reliance on somebody and my mom you know did the best that she could again when you have, when you're parenting out of pain in her and brokenness it's very difficult for you to to honestly do the things that I'm sure she wanted to do for me and so being so independent I think that obviously has changed because I am able to press into like the unconditional love of God it's crazy like I know that there's nothing that no mistake that I could make nothing that I could do to separate him from loving me, from encountering me it's just amazing because God continues to like reveal things like that even I mean honestly like I was saying like in the last few years being able to kind of surrender those things that did give me this false stability and gave me this idea of okay I'm like I'm okay like just so thankful for the love of God and how he speaks to all of us it's like insane blows my mind it is I mean I've been personally impacted by your testimony and I've been personally impacted by the courage that I've seen you display in sharing what the Lord has put on your heart because I know you as a person you do not like talking in front of people I know I feel like there's more of a power more of an edge and the Lord uses it in a very specific sharp way when he uses people that are typically quote on quote behind the scenes or they prefer to be a little bit more behind the scenes upfront or you know something like that I feel like there's an edge to it there's a specific thing that cuts right to people's heart and I have personally experienced that from you and it's been absolutely incredible just to end I want to ask you a really simple question and it doesn't have to be a long answer but Kendra before encountering the Lord how would she define a father and now how would you define a father wow that's I have to like literally sit and like really just do on that it's so hard to even like say because I really had no idea I had no idea if that makes any sense like it was just distant there was really no concrete like feeling of what that was prior to my relationship with the Lord and sure like it's developed because I was able to really kind of get close to John's dad who was an incredible father so just even early on in my Christian walk it was kind of like I had these representations of incredible fathers which gave me a glimpse into the heart of the father but I mean now the father to me I mean he's everything he unconditionally knows me he created me his thoughts are always positioned towards me he is my life line I guess that's what I would say like I could never do anything that would separate me from how much he loves me that's what's changed like there's just no conditions and maybe before it was there was a distance or because you know I could only see that in kind of earthly terms and even probably with some of the things that I went through with my mom even love seemed conditional and now I know it's not just unconditional it's literally God he did not spare anything in order to be close to me to really know me and it's not that's not just me that's all of us it's kind of an abstract thing to grasp onto especially daughters that do not have close relationships or any relationship at all with their earthly father you do have a father you can experience that especially as a woman or a girl when you don't have a father I think there's definitely differences between fatherless sons fatherless daughters you go through you know different things and I think there was always this like overwhelming need for validation for me that I just couldn't get I couldn't I couldn't attain it I knew that it was like this hunger but I didn't understand how to get it and of course in you know the I guess process of trying to get that validation I went to many other things whether it was you know like the wrong friendships drugs alcohol guys I mean just so many different things I can try to fill or bring this false validation that never satisfies it literally leaves you more and more empty and broken I love you thank you I can't listen to this this has been radiant stories click subscribe to get a brand new story delivered to you every Monday