Ask Jennie Anything - Part 1

January 07, 2020

Jennie Allen

Bible teacher, founder of IF:Gathering

We are heading into another awesome year, and Chloe and I are so excited about YOU. So let's go in. Chloe has all these questions for me because this is the kind of thing she does. She goes out into the world, she posted on my Instagram, and she asked all of you to send in your questions.

Chloe: This is straight from you guys. I have a good list for you today, and we don't even know what these questions are. Let's start with, how has God surprised you this past year?

Jennie: Ooh, that's fun. You know, He has surprised me. He keeps surprising me. I mean, this is a big surprise. How much I enjoy this, and how fun it's been to have this community of people with a podcast. I think this year too, I've been surprised that there's been a little bit of a slower pace even though there's a lot happening, and it looks like there's a lot happening. I don't know, it's just felt more manageable to me. IF:Gathering is in a healthier place. Really, because of you and having teammates, all of my ministries are in a healthier place. 

And so I think what I've learned this year and been surprised by is how, in the quiet and in a little bit slower pace that isn't "strive-y" because I haven't been releasing anything this year, it's just felt quieter and calmer. And I think what I've liked in that is that there hasn't been something in my soul rise up that says, "Hey you need to stay in the hustle and you need to stay in the grind." 

We tried this Mexican place last night that was this hole in the wall. We live in Dallas, and we're just determined to find hole-in-the-wall places, and there aren't many. And so we found one, and it brought me so much joy. All my kids were home and there's just something about the normal, small, everyday things this year that have brought me so much joy--that just keep delighting me more and more. And I think part of that, for those of you that maybe have young kids, is because my kids are in good places. They're a joy right now and they're not as demanding and I think I'm just savoring everything. Used to, I always had to try to make the mundane matter and now I'm not confused. I'm like, the mundane is the best part. It's the very best part. 

Well, that leads us to our next question: So if you could go back in time to young-mom Jennie, what advice would you give her?

Good question. Well, I mean it's advice I got a lot, which is-it's going to go fast and it's true. I think I would tell her it's okay. You're okay. Like you're doing a good job. You really are. 

I wrote a post recently on Instagram that got a lot of engagement, and I think the reason it got a lot of engagement was because everybody's dying to hear this, but it basically spoke to that girl. I mean, I had a picture 10-years Halloween ago of my three kids at the time in their costumes. We were on the front steps. We just hosted a hayride and had hot dogs in our front yard. And I wrote about how looking back at that girl before IF:Gathering, before writing, before speaking--just leading a Bible study of seven girls in her home, like she was winning. And I think everybody related to that, and they can see that looking back at my life on Instagram, you know, everybody's like, "yeah, you were winning". But we don't see that in our own lives. And I definitely didn't see it in my own life at the time. I definitely felt like, "am I doing what God wants me to do? Am I doing enough? Am I messing up my kids? Am I making the right decisions when it comes to the way we live?" We were neck deep in church planning, and we had people in our house almost every night. And I thought, I'm screwing up my kids. We're sacrificing our kids for the church. Well, my kids are now grown, and they look back at those years as the glory days. Like they are like, "gosh, why don't we have more people in our house like we used to?" All the things I thought was messing them up were actually the things that were making them who they are. 

And so I think I would tell myself, you're not. You're obeying God. There are times that I'm sure that you can have too many people in your life. You know, there are times to pull back and times to run forward. But as much as we could at the time, we were obeying God, whatever that meant for that day, for that year. And so we were winning because of that, and God was taking care of our kids in that. And I think that's what you need to hear is that if you're obeying God, you know it's that single-mindedness we talk a lot about here. A.W. Tozer, I quote him all the time about this, "Put God in his rightful place, and a thousand problems are solved all at once" and that's how it's supposed to go. And I look back at that couple, that cute young couple with those cute kids, and I want to just say--you're winning because you're obeying God, and your kids are winning because you're obeying God, and they're going to be okay.

Kind of make me want to cry a little bit. That was good.  I will speak to that. Everything you say is true because I think I'm in that season right now, and a lot of the encouragement that I get from you is exactly that. It's going to be okay. And nine out of nine times it's okay. It's always going to be okay. Okay. This is kind of fun. What was the best gift someone ever gave you?

I got it. It's so easy. So my husband Zac never was into gifts. He wasn't into holidays, he wasn't into birthdays, he wasn't into Christmas. To be fair to his family, they're a football family. And so most of the holidays, even several of their birthdays, are in the football season, and there was nothing but football during football season. And so to give them some credit fairly, they were preoccupied with other things. And so my husband just grew up not caring about it. And I grew up, as y'all that listen to the podcast know, in Winter Wonderland, Christmas Land. My parents do holidays.  I mean, when it's your birthday, from the moment your eyes opened, you had a tray in bed and never could lift a finger of work. I mean, they spoiled us. Just on holidays. We definitely were child labor other days, but on holidays they were like, you are the queen of the house. And so then I get married, and not only does he barely remember it's our anniversary or my birthday, but he never got me a gift. I mean, he didn't even get me anything. I would have to say, okay, I'd love this, and maybe he would get that--maybe. I mean, it was pretty bad looking back. And some of you are like, that's my husband. Sorry.

But fast forward, we went to counseling. That was just part of it. Y'all know why we went to counseling, and it changed our marriage. There were so many parts of it, but that definitely was one of them. Just saying, you know what, I feel a little bit neglected. He's going to be like, Jennie, I got you gifts. I don't remember a gift prior to this one. So this is going to end in a great way. This is why I believe in counseling--mainly because everything changed, and he is a great gift giver now. He really realized this is part of my love language. This is part of what makes me feel valued and loved. And it doesn't matter that he doesn't feel the same way, and he's so good at it now.

But the first: so we're in the middle of counseling, and it's hard. Our marriage has been through a lot. This is probably year five, and we were in our first home that we ever owned. So little and cute and so many good memories there even though it was hard years. And it's Christmas morning, and he brings out this big, big thing covered up. He had gotten me a piece of art, like a real piece of art. He had gone to a gallery, and he had picked out a piece of art. I never owned a real piece of art, and at that point in our life, we could not afford it. We were so poor. He was a youth minister, and I didn't work. We had two young kids. And I still don't even know how he paid for it because it was probably hundreds of dollars. And he had never gotten me a gift that nice--barely ever gotten me a gift. And it was such a picture of God's redemption in our lives for him to do that. I know it's no big deal. It's just a Christmas gift, but it was a huge deal and it was such a picture. It still is. It's over our bed right now. I still love it. He picked it out without me.  I think it was God's gift to me through him. I think it was just God's saying, I see you and I'm going to heal this marriage. And yeah, I hadn't ever told that story. That's a good question.

And you are the best gift giver. I remember when I had my second baby, and people give you meals, which is lifesaving and necessary, but then I got a box. I opened it up, and it was a bathrobe. And I just remember feeling like it was like a hug--like you'd sent me a hug. And so now I send that robe to my friends who've had babies. You just think outside the box, and I love that about you.

Ok, if you had $1 million, what would you do with it?

Oh, $1 million. I mean, so many different things are coming to mind. I mean, and this is so random. I would love for IF:Gathering to be in a better place financially. Ever since we launched, IF:Gathering has been right at--we're making enough money but not. We're never far into the black, and I want to be far into the black because I'm such a dreamer. I want to see translations, I want to see it go everywhere. And so I think what I'd give the money to, we've never had anybody really focused on donor development. And so I would invest some money and say you can only spend this on a donor development person so that it could multiply and multiply and multiply. 

So my dream is that in the next few years there will be an extra million dollars at IF:Gathering because I really believe our greatest years are yet to come. Our slogan is, "We've reached a million, help us reach the next million". I think it's been more people than that. I mean it's unbelievable how far IF:Gathering has reached. My hope is that we'll reach to the ends of the earth, that we'll be able to translate, we'll be able to take tools to the ends of the earth, That's the first thing that comes to mind.

The next thing that comes to mind, as my kids get older, experiences become more important to me than anything else. And so building experiences with them and time with them. That's what I always tell Zach. I'm like, I don't care if we have a big house. I don't care if we have nice cars, I don't care about any of that. What I care about is enough money to be able to bring my family back together as they start to go to college, as they start to have families, as they start to move on per se. I just want to make sure we can stay close as a family. It just feels so, so valuable and important to me.

So where would you go if you could go anywhere with them?

Honestly, I don't care where we go. I mean, we have fun. Even going to that hole-in-the-wall Mexican food restaurant last night, the whole time--we just laughed together. We have so much fun, especially with Connor home. We literally laughed all through dinner and all the way home. And I don't even remember what we were laughing about. I literally think we'll have fun anywhere we go. It's just building time. And actually I think the bigger value, too, is just pulling them away. Because even in Dallas already, even though we didn't live here long while Connor was in high school, he has 8 million friends here from Texas A&M, and he went to SMU first semester. So even being home, he's got plans, he's busy. So I think just pulling them away far enough so that we can actually get time together.

Okay. You actually posted about this on Instagram this week, but how do you get out of a rut?

Yeah, I did post, it was a silly post. You want me to read it? I'm gonna read it to you. Oh, it was so simple. Sometimes the stuff that people need to hear and that you think, Oh, this is too basic, but we need to be bossed around a little. 

This was at like nine o'clock and I said, "Set your clock. Meet with Jesus. Move your body. You will not regret this."

And I mean, it's ridiculous how many times it got shared. And so what I would say about that is it's so basic, right? That's just grown up, adult stuff that we know we need to do. Like set an alarm clock, wake up a little bit earlier, work out, be with Jesus. But I think we can get out of habits without even meaning to. 

These last two weeks I've just been really busy, traveled some, and we've had family in. And so those two things just didn't happen as much in the last two weeks. And I felt it. Like, I felt crabby, I felt just short with everybody. And so since I posted that, I think I've worked out and spent time with Jesus every single day, and I still had a hard week with work. But I definitely feel more like myself and happy again to be working and grateful. I just think these basic patterns and rhythms and disciplines in our lives, they're so important, and we neglect them. I mean, to me, that's enemy stuff. You know, that's really truly enemy stuff. And it's a big thing about what we're going to talk about this semester. You know, we're talking about Get Out Of Your Head. We're talking about our thought lives, and a lot of our thought lives are driven by our lack of discipline or our discipline. Our thought lives don't stay in our heads. Our thought lives bleed into our relationships, our behaviors, our emotions, right? So the way we stop that spiral, the way we interrupt it, is by taking thoughts captive. Scripture tells us. It's harder to behavior-modify if our minds are out of control. So we've got to start at the source. It's harder to just say, quit being sad, quit being depressed. And the way we can sometimes arrest our thinking is to move our body and to meet with Jesus. I think those two things help. We're physically made to move. God built us that way. And our souls are emotionally and spiritually dependent upon Jesus. So when we neglect things that he says that we need, things start breaking down.