#403 How to Overcome Temptation with Kirby Kelly

Kirby, thank you so much for being here. Welcome to the show. Thanks for having me, I'm so excited to be here. I am so excited to have you. This has been a date I've had circled on my calendar and then we had to reschedule it because we were both sick. But now we are here together. And by the time this airs, your book will be out in the world. And so congratulations. Thank you! I can't believe it.

It's honestly so surreal, even at this point in time when we're recording it, just like the date being so close and now knowing that it's available. That's crazy. It's crazy. I know. I'm so excited to dive in to just learn more about you. So give us the Kirby Kelly 101 to tell us who you are, what you do and how you got to where you are today. Absolutely. Well, to all the listeners and the viewers, hi, hello. My name's Kirby Kelly and I am now an author.

But I know which is so crazy to say to be able to like tag that onto everything now. But I'm an author now, first time author of my new book, You Can Be Free, Overcoming Temptation and Habitual Sin by the Power and Promises of the Gospel. Very long tagline with that one, but it's very true. But I also create content on social media. I have my master's in theology. Big brain for Jesus. We love it. I'm a wife. I live in Dallas, Texas with my amazing husband Richard.

And I'm just really passionate about making Jesus's name known. But not only that, taking theological concepts, like actually taking the truth and the meat of scripture and just chewing it up and making it digestible and available for anyone. whether they are a new Christian or whether they are a seasoned believer who can handle the tough stuff.

I really just love to walk alongside people and help them understand and know God's word and apply it to their life so that they can enjoy the fullness of life that Christ has promised us and the fullness of that relationship. So literally everything I do is for that. I also have a podcast, it's called Bot and Beloved, where I do exactly that.

I take either questions that people submit or, just whatever's off the dome, whatever God puts on my mind and my heart for that week, just recording episodes to really equip people with God's word.

And yeah, that's what I love to do. Amazing, amazing. Okay, but I like to go back in time. So let's tell me about young, not that you are not young, because you are young, younger child, Kirby Kelly, like, did you grow up in a Christian home? Was this what you knew you were called to do? Walk us through your, because I love hearing people's testimonies in general. And So I'd love for you to kind of share what your road was to really walking this path. I mean, getting your masters in theology.

Like these are all decisions clearly that were made at a young age. And so I'm just, I think especially as a mom of young kids, you know, these are things that I'm thinking about. Like I didn't grow up in the church. And so for me, like I'm always really inspired by people who did and who... maybe had a call at an early age to do something like this, but I'd love for you to share your own journey. Definitely. So I did not grow up in a Christian household.

I initially grew up in a Catholic household and it was very much like you say your prayers and you go to mass whenever it's convenient or if it's a holiday. And that was kind of my introduction to any sort of faith really. I knew that there was a God out there. I knew that Jesus died for my sins, but that was pretty much it. It was like, okay, well I was baptized as a baby. So we're all good here, right? Mm -hmm.

understand like the Christian faith and theology and the real depths of who Jesus was and what he did for me that was never truly presented and ingrained in my mind, in my heart, anything like that. So growing up, I wouldn't even classify it as lukewarm.

I had a faith, but it was just, it was so small because I was only introduced to so many like tiny little bites of who Jesus was. And it wasn't until I was about How old was I, like eight years old that I actually heard the gospel for the first time.

But what led to that moment was I grew up in like the perfect household, quote unquote perfect, like American dream household where it's like the white picket fence, like mom is at home with the two kids and dad's working in finance in New York City. Like you would see it and be like, wow, like this family literally has it all and they have it all together. But if you peeled back the layers, you would realize, no. Nothing is going perfect in this household, this family.

My father struggled with addiction. I don't know about his whole life, but my whole life, from as young as I can remember, he was an addict to alcohol. And eventually when I was 10 years old, it took his life. So he passed away from his alcoholism. And even at eight years old, like coming to know the faith, my parents got divorced when I was seven.

We moved down to Texas, my mom, my brother and I. And she was like, what am I going to do with my kids this summer as we're like transitioning from living in New Jersey, you know, their dad being an alcoholic and us getting a divorce. Let me, let me send them to a Christian summer camp because it sounds like it'll be a fun thing for them to go do. There's water slides there. Like they'll have a good time. But more fun, literally, right.

But more fun than the water slides was me hearing the gospel, honestly, like hearing about who Jesus was and what he did. And. and how life was truly available in him. Like this was all new for me. And although I didn't give my life to Jesus right then and right there when I was eight years old, the seed was planted and I went to that camp every single year, like reoccurring every single year.

And it was, it truly was like the seed was just watered and nurtured and tended to every single year to the point that when I was 14 years old, I made that decision to give my life to Jesus. I had a radical encounter with Jesus. But like I said, backing up when I was 10 years old, my dad died from his alcoholism. And there was just, I mean, so much trauma, so much pain, so many unanswered questions that I had at that young of an age to lose a parent to addiction. I mean, it was really hard.

And I never necessarily blamed God. I did have some anger towards him and some frustration toward him because it's like, well, you can do anything. So like, why didn't you stop this? I didn't understand truly at that point in age, like accountability and free will and a person making their own decisions. But the enemy really used that as a foothold in my life to get me to kind of adopt this savior complex.

Like, well, I have to be everything for everyone around me and be their savior, which was funny because, I was pursuing this way of living, of trying to save everyone around me. Meanwhile, I was drowning. Not only was I drowning in my own depression and my own anxiety and even at that point, suicidal thoughts and tendencies, because I was being bullied all throughout middle school, but I was even dealing with my own fair share of addiction.

And I talk about it in the book, that when I was four years old, when I was seven years old, and when I was 10 years old, I was continuously exposed by other people.

to pornography and so this was something that I was struggling with as well like my own habitual sin my own form of addiction as a child as a little young human and it wasn't until this like big culminating moment of giving my life to Jesus at 14 that I truly saw God for who he was like as my perfect father who was always present who loves me after not having a father for so many years. knowing he still loved me, but he was human nonetheless.

And even realizing the weight of my sin of like, wait, this is destructive towards me. Even the self -hatred of not wanting to be alive, like realizing, wait, I do wanna be alive. I do wanna live. Like I know I have a purpose and I know that life with you, God, is so much more abundant than life without you. And so it was like this big culminating moment, like my cornerstone, like my Ebenezer moment of like, wow, God's here and God did this in my life.

but I still was dealing with my habitual sin even after that moment, hence why I wrote this book, You Can Be Free. But I was on fire for Jesus at 14, like preaching the gospel any chance I could, anywhere I could, any way that I could, whether it was talking one -on -one with my peers or just creating content online. And that's kind of what kickstarted what I do today, which is making content all about Jesus online.

My real heart and my calling is to just tell people about Jesus in any way I could, but media was like on the rise at that point. So I just jumped on that. I was making YouTube videos about Jesus, vines about Jesus, like tweets about Jesus, literally anything and everything. And as social media has developed, you know, podcasting about Jesus, making TikToks about Jesus, YouTube about Jesus, all that stuff. But it was my senior year that I really felt like I need to be, I really need to be.

make everything that I do be about Jesus. And so going into college, I majored in communications and minored in biblical studies. But it was like a few months after I graduated with my undergrad that God told me, you need to go back to school. And I was like, okay, God, if you're calling me back to school, you're gonna have to pay for it. Because like, prices these days, like I am Gen Z millennial, I ain't got no money.

And he opened the door and he made a way for me to go get my master's degree with. a bunch of scholarships, praise God. And yeah, I last year graduated with my master's in theology and I'm just applying everything that I've learned, all the study methods, like all the scholarship, you know, knowledge that I've gained into everything that I'm doing because we need to love the Lord with everything, with our heart, soul, mind and strength.

And so, yeah, that's kind of like a blurb of everything, but. love it. And I think that I specifically asked that question because I knew obviously bits and pieces of your story. And I really wanted you to share them because I think that that helps people see another example of how our journeys to faith are not linear. More often than not, they're not these like just. stick straight lines from like birth to death.

And a lot of times there's different, you know, aspects of the messiness of life that come into play. And I also wanted you to share that because what you have written in this book, In You Can Be Free, is coming from a place of experience. Like you're... It's funny how I kind of have to remind myself. Like as I'm talking to you and as I'm listening to him, like, cause you're, are you still 27 or are you 28 yet?

Yeah. Like I have to remind myself that you're 27 and like, because you have such wisdom and it's really funny. because my, we have a, a, a couple in our church that, my husband and I are really good friends with, and they are also young, like husband's 27, wife is 26 and. they're the kind of people that every time we're hanging out with them, like my husband and I both regularly have to remind ourselves, I'm like, they are 26 and 27.

Like, so much wisdom and I just feel like it's such a great example of because you know, a lot of times, not like I'm that much older than you, like I'm only 12 years older than you. But like, a lot of times the generations you find this like, those millennials, like they're just the worst. And then like, you know, like boomers were doing it to Gen Xers and Gen Xers did it to millennials and millennials of doing it to Gen Z and Gen Z is doing it to Gen Alpha.

And it's like the generation that's right before you always tends to just be like, ma, you know. And when the reality is, it's like, no, we can learn so much from each other. And, and, and that is something that was told to me for so long. It was like when I was a young millennial and I'm kind of an elder millennial, I actually think, I don't know. But it's like this, just an attitude of like, well, you don't know what you're talking about. And like, you're too young.

It's just like, no, get out of my face. Because when you live a lot of life and you've had a lot of life happen to you, that brings wisdom. Experience brings wisdom. Time brings wisdom. Trauma brings wisdom. I mean, there's so many things that happen to you. what I was thinking. I'm like, girl, it's the trauma. the trauma. Because I mean, that's, that's my story is also just like, crippled and riddled with trauma, and how much that has played into my own faith and like that.

And so, so I think that that, like I said, your story gives a great frame of reference for this book and and, and obviously the journey, but I would love to know, like, when did you know that this was going to be your first book like that? That? Mm -hmm. I, at 27 years old, am going to tackle the really super light and fluffy topic of temptation and habitual sin. Just keeping it easy breezy over here, Kirby. But here's the thing is I love this topic so much. I love talking about it.

And so, yeah, I guess my first question is, Where in the journey of the last few years, where did you realize this is the book I've got to write? This is the book that I have to write for such a time as this. Yeah, well, just a little newsflash for everyone. I am free from my habitual sin. I forgot to say that when I was giving my little life story.

But yeah, the whole purpose of this book is to equip people with the knowledge and the tools to be able to live a life of freedom with whatever they're struggling

with. And for me, like I said, I was exposed to the sin that I was stuck in from a very young age and I went from exposure and kind of just this curiosity and confusion to like really being crippled and corrupted and riddled with this sin that I couldn't shake off. And especially when I gave my life to Jesus when I was 14 years old and started radically like living for Him, I just, it was so hard for me to make sense of God, I'm doing what I don't want to do.

I keep doing what I don't want to do. I keep returning to this thing like. I'll be good for a few weeks and then I fall back for a few weeks. Like I'm good for a few months and then I have like a time where I just go back and I binge this and it's like, why can't I shake this off? And I think just even living in so much secrecy with my sin and silence with my sin, the enemy just like saw that as a playground for shame and for self -hatred and for. self -condemnation and all these things.

Because remember, like, I was a Christian at this point in my life. I gave my life to Jesus and I was just wrestling with so many lies about myself, so many lies about God, even even lies about the enemy and like how much power he had in this situation over my life, right? And so going into college my freshman year at DBU, I was like, enough is enough.

Like I am genuinely, like I finally got to this point in my life where I was like, I'm genuinely sick and tired of being sick and tired of struggling with this thing, of going back to this thing. And as silly as it sounds, I think one of the biggest things that also was a motivator besides my own motivation of really, really wanting to stop was the fact that at my Christian university, they're like, no, like we have web lockers on everything. So like y 'all don't have access to this.

So even just this sense of deprivation, which really was a sobering thing for me to realize of like, wow, I'm like, I'm actually addicted to this if this is, if I'm just like, wait, like I won't have access to this. Well, what happened? Like that just like soberly hit me in the face of like, I have a problem. Like I actually have a problem and I need to stop this thing and figure out how to quit this, how to stop this habit, like how to get free.

And during my freshman year, I was able to begin to take steps of freedom. eventually to the point where I was just running in freedom, like with no chains, with no more bondage, with no more weight on me, weighing me down. Like I wasn't, I didn't feel the need to say yes to temptation, to even give time to temptation, to entertain it. And it took lots of years, lots of tears, lots of lessons, lots of reading scripture and understanding the truth, like really understanding the truth.

But what made me want to write this book is because as I was going through my freedom journey of Overcoming that specific sin I was in I mean there's tons of sins out there that people are struggling with it's not just pornography There's so many things that people are struggling with But as I was opening up about that specific sin it surprised me how many women in particular were struggling with this sin in secret and The more and more that I was getting free the more and more I felt like I had

the ability to share it openly without any shame, like giving God the glory for what he's done in my life. And it was like all these people were coming out of the woodwork, like coming out of, I don't know, just like their own closets of shame and being like, yeah, I have these skeletons too. And it's like, my gosh, like I didn't realize that all of us were struggling here, whether it was with that sin or just any other type of sin, like being transparent about where I was.

what God was delivering me through and what God had delivered me from. It was just, I just, I knew that that was something that needed to be talked about because there were no books like that when I was growing up. Like when I gave my life to Jesus, I was reading books. Like I was like, I need to learn everything and anything about Jesus. And whether it was scripture or whether it was just like any of the books that I have behind me, I wanted to know everything.

But when it came to sin that I was stuck in and the shame that comes with it and temptation and. you know, humanity's free will and sanctification, like all these big churchy words that we hear that we don't know what they mean. It's like, there was not a book like that out there where I even felt like I could pick it up and approach it. And so I was like, I just felt like God was telling me a few years ago, like maybe three or four years ago, okay, now's the time to start writing.

And I was like, okay, like I always had a feeling I'd write a book. But this topic, I was like, what? Like, As I was just sitting with God and thinking about what I wanted to write about, I knew that I wanted to write about freedom and I wanted to write about sin and overcoming sin that people were stuck in because that was such a vital thing that I walked through that I never shared publicly online with my ministry online.

And so of course God was like, you're gonna write a book about it and this is how people are gonna find out and get their freedom. was by actually leading with my story first. And initially I did not want to, but as I was writing the book, it was like, I can't help but share this to literally everyone and anyone who's gonna pick it up. But it's a story of hope because the reality is, is that in Christ, there's no condemnation.

In Christ, there's no longer shame for the things that he has freed us from and delivered us from. And I just really wanted to provide a practical and biblical strategy for anybody wherever they're at in life and faith and sin. to be able to look at it and understand that in partnership with Jesus, we can be free. And so, yeah, this book came to be, I literally blinked my eyes and now it's here. I can't believe it.

Well, I just, as you were talking, it's just so funny how literally right before we started recording, before we got on here, I was finishing up just my own daily, like, reading. And it was on the difference between conviction and condemnation and how we know the difference. I know, like, just literally five minutes before we got on here. This is what I was reading.

And... So I actually wanted to read Romans 7, because this is like exactly what you were talking about, is Romans 7, 15 through 20, when Paul is talking about how he says, I do not understand what I do for what I want to do. I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that good itself does not dwell in me. That is in my sinful nature.

For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.

For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do. This I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it." That verse also always cracks me up because I feel like it's the Austin Powers, like, no, I've gone cross -eyed. So you're like, what are you saying, Paul? But the...

But yes, and so like talking about the difference between conviction and condemnation, whereas conviction is of the Holy Spirit, is of God, whereas condemnation is not. And, but yet, like, our human natures, our sinful natures within us, like we are going to do stuff. And then we're gonna, sometimes immediately, sometimes later be like, why did I do that? Like, why am I making these choices? Or, whatever thing that you struggle with.

And if anybody says, I don't struggle with anything like it can be as simple as you're addicted to Instagram and or you're addicted to your phone. And you don't want to be on your phone all the time. But you just for some reason you keep picking it up. Or whether it's pornography, or if it's alcohol abuse or drug addiction or lying, like whatever the thing is that you're just like, you're continuously struggling with this.

But it's you have to understand and discern the difference between are you feeling conviction over this thing or are you feeling condemnation? And that can be one of the hardest pieces because sometimes the lines can be a little blurry on, well, am I feeling condemnation over this or am I feeling conviction?

And so I would love, like, do you have a good explanation of kind of the difference in a practical sense of how somebody who maybe is new to this or is like listening and they're like, I struggle with X, Y, Z. How do I know if I'm feeling conviction over it or condemnation? Definitely. I literally write about this in the book, so I'm glad that you're bringing it up because that's exactly where I was struggling. I felt like I was just living in this condemnation.

But the reality is, is that even when we look at John 3, 16 and 17 and 18, like when we actually read not just that one verse where it talks about God so loved the world that he sent his only and beloved son, you know, to die for our sins, right? But when we keep reading, he didn't send Christ to condemn us. Like we were already condemned in our sins.

So it's like, like if we're just looking at a blank slate of humanity, because we have a sinful nature, we have already condemned ourselves in our sinful nature. But here's the good news, Christ did not come to condemn us. He came so that he could by professing our faith in him, by submitting to his Lordship over our lives. That doesn't mean that we're perfect.

but that we're surrendering to a perfect God who can guide us, who can help us, who has a perfect will that's way better than the will that we have for our own lives. When we submit to him and choose to follow him and declare that God, you are going to Lord over my life and I believe in you, who you are, what you did. He, and this is how one of my counselors described it for me because I was really stuck in this condemnation mentality as a Christian is that.

It's as if God with his righteous right hand, when we make that decision, that declaration, there's that shift that happens. It's like he scoops us out of the condemnation bucket that we were once stuck in that we could not crawl out of, and he moves us into a completely new bucket, like a completely new category of saved, salvation. And it's within salvation that we feel this conviction. And that's not a bad thing to feel conviction.

A lot of us think conviction is a bad thing, but, It's the Holy Spirit, kind of like when we think of Jiminy Cricket being the conscience of Pinocchio kind of being like, that's not a good idea, and don't do it. It's different though, because this is God speaking. This is a holy God speaking. And conviction isn't always a bad thing either in the sense of don't do this. Sometimes we're convicted, I need to do this thing. I need to make this right decision.

So conviction is the Holy Spirit guiding us, sending warning bells to us. like with the best intention to not lead us astray, but to lead us towards life. Condemnation has us sitting in death. Conviction leads us towards life. And so I think when we reframe it that way of, this is God stepping in intervening to help me because he has my best interest in mind, I think that totally even reframes how we approach God in our sin, how we approach God.

when we are struggling, that we can actually go to him and not hide in shame or hide in secrecy or just give into it and then not feel worthy and then stay stuck in it. No, like conviction is meant to propel us towards the loving arms of a father, of a savior whose job is to do the saving, to help us to actually be able to navigate this thing called life, the newness of life in a way that... that is new to us now that we are living life the way he's calling us to live it.

So conviction is not a bad thing, period. absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, conviction is and I love that you also included the distinction that sometimes there are things that are like conviction is can be positive and can move you in a in a in the right direction. When you're convicted to make a particular decision or convicted to to maybe have a conversation with somebody, I mean, whatever it is or forgive somebody. Yeah. Yeah. it when we're living in sin or temptation. Yeah, exactly.

Okay, so one of the things that you talk about in your book is identifying these green and red light zones as you're actually beginning to walk through this. And I like to talk a little bit more practically for people because one of the things that I think maybe just as my own personal frustration in the world sometimes is when you'll listen to a podcast and it's like, they'll talk about an issue, but then it's all like very like up here. And it's like, you never like get down.

I'm like, I'm like, can we just like get down to the nitty gritty? And so I like to get down to the nitty gritty. And one of the things I love so much about what you write in this book is some of the nitty gritty. And so can you talk about the green and the red light zones? And how exactly you use that in your own life and you help other people set those boundaries for themselves? Definitely. So, I mean, you summed it up pretty well.

Whenever I'm whenever I talk about in the book green light and red light zones, it's boundaries. And I know that boundaries can sometimes have this connotation to it in the Christian faith as only being when you're dating someone. And it's like, no, like we all need boundaries in every area of our life, especially sin. And that's one of the many strategies that I talk about in the book, but I think that's one of the most important ones that I talk about in the book.

And it comes later on after kind of like actually giving us the right perspective of sin and ourselves and all that stuff. But when it comes to green light and red light zones, we need to be honest with ourselves. Like we really need to be honest with ourselves and take a step back and realize, what am I struggling with? And what does that look like?

Like what leads to that moment of, Crossing the line because I think for a lot of us when it comes to the boundaries that we're setting we're setting it like right at the line That we're crossing when it's like no We actually need to back it up like a couple of feet a couple of yards a couple of meters a couple of miles like We need to really back it up. But so so we aren't so if we were to give in to temptation We wouldn't be in the worst place ever.

We wouldn't be completely so far gone that it's like well where? Am I a hopeless case now and falling back into this cycle, right? But when I talk about green light and red light zones, to put it simply with what I mean by that is like what is permissible and what is absolutely just not up for consideration, like up for grabs.

And that's something that each and every single one of us has to do individually because I don't know what your life looks like when you're away from everybody and it's just you and God and the enemy. And it's like, OK, what's going on here? Say that. it's like what's going on here. It's that perfect picture of the devil on your shoulder and the angel on your shoulder telling you what to do. That's not what it looks like, but that's a good image of what it can feel like at times.

And if we can soberly understand our weak points, where we often make allowances for, and we can say, okay, no, I'm gonna define what's in my red light zone. I cannot pass go on this, I cannot run this red light. It's not just a stop sign, but it is an end of road here sign. Like I cannot pass this thing. We have to actually sit down and define what that looks like. For me, I'll give a few examples.

When I was in college overcoming my porn addiction, some of my red light zones wasn't just, okay, I'm not gonna visit this website or Google this phrase or whatever. Like that wasn't my red light zones. Obviously that was in the red light zones, but even taking it back a few feet, inches, miles, whatever. It was, I'm not gonna have my phone on me past 10 p I'm gonna download certain apps or have certain software, so I literally can't look it up. I am not going to have my electronics in my room.

It even got to a point where I was like, I'm only going to use a university computer and not my own computer. And I had things in the green light zones, eventually. There are some things that perpetually have stayed in red light zones where it's like. No, I'm not going to compromise. Those things are going to stay there forever.

But as I developed discipline and as I developed an understanding for this sin and how badly it was affecting me and just even realizing in the eyes of God how destructive this thing is for the world, it's like, I don't want to do that. But as I developed more of a discipline for certain things and a desire, for God and for other things, it was like, okay, eventually having my electronics in my room or using my laptop moved to the green light zone. Like it eventually moved over there.

But we have to define like, okay, soberly, like what am I struggling with? And what are the steps that I'm taking? What direction, like what's the gateway? What's the thing that starts it and kicks it all off that eventually leads to this area where I've crossed the boundary. And it's like, my gosh, like I can't believe I did that. We need to define what we will not compromise on and take it a few steps back and set the boundary there.

And then eventually as you develop your discipline and grow in your desire for the things of God, have accountability and feel confident enough in yourself and being able to like shut the enemy down and deny temptation and flee from temptation to be able to see what is permissible to move into the green light zone. Again, some things perpetually live there. in the red light zone, but there are other things that eventually we can become permissible and move to the green light zone.

that's so good. So good and so practical. And then I love how you talk about like, this isn't something that's not like the stone tablets of the Ten Commandments. Like, it's this is written in pencil and it's meant to. Yes. day. And it sounds simple even explaining it, but like sometimes when you have been stuck in sin for so long, it's like, wait, I just need the simple truth. I need the simple gospel. I need simple strategy and start from there.

Because if you're trying to like overcome everything in one day, it's like, that's way too much. That's way too, it's exactly, it's unsustainable and it's just unapproachable. as well, it's like, well, I can't get free if I have to do this, this, this, this, this, and this. It's like, no, just start by humbly, humbly assessing what you struggle with and what you, what you have like a lean towards and begin to analyze. Well, let me take it a few steps back.

What always leads me to making this decision to being put in this scenario, to, to being in this place, whatever, to being vulnerable. So then I make this decision. Like take a few steps back and define what that is and share it with somebody, share it with someone. I talk a lot in the book, the importance of confession and community and all these things and how to find it and why we should confess and who to confide in.

But like even having accountability in that, I had roommates that understood, you know, where my green light and red light zones were and they were checking in on me not to condemn me. but to keep me in check so that I could live a life of abundance because that's what I wanted for myself even when I quote unquote didn't want it in that moment of the battle of the flesh and the spirit going on within me. yeah. Man, that is so good.

And I think, yeah, the accountability piece is also so important and involving others in whatever it is that you're battling. God didn't create us to fight these battles alone. Yes, we have him that, you know, he fights our battles for us. However, like we also need people around us. Mm -hmm. to help keep us in check.

And sometimes, depending on what the thing is, maybe it's a spouse, maybe it's a roommate, maybe it's a best friend, maybe it's a group of friends, maybe it's a pastor, maybe it's a counselor. It can be a variety of people, but you also need to make sure that the person that you're involving or the people that you're involving are on your level. You know what I mean? Because you don't want to be involving... people that are just gonna like enable or be like, it's fine.

Cause there are those people that'll just be like, it's not that bad. It's not, it's fine. It's not doing anything. You need someone who is compassionate but is willing to correct you. You need both. in a compassionate way. That's right. So good. So good. Okay, Kirby, as we are wrapping up here, I would obviously love for you to share where people can connect with you and, you know, where if they want to follow more and all that stuff. And obviously, for everybody, please go get the book.

You can be free. It is available now by the time this airs. And so wherever books are sold, please go get the book. And so Kirby, are there any just kind of last final thoughts, like what your hope

and prayer is for the people who pick up this book? Yes, genuinely my hope and prayer is that when people pick up this book, they can believe in the title that it's not just like some good sounding book title. You can be free, but it truly is a promise to every single person out there. Like I have I have I'm a living testament of this that I am free because of Jesus. I am free because of literally everything I write about in this book. I don't just write about my story, but I even write about.

you know, other people that I've seen struggle with habitual sin who struggled their whole life with habitual sin and how maybe the areas or the mentalities that they struggled with that they seemingly couldn't break free from when the truth is, is that we just need to simply believe the truth of the gospel that this is real, that Jesus does love us, that he did die for our sins, that he has power over everything, that he can equip you and show you the way out.

Like these aren't just good sounding truths that apply to every single person but you because that's exactly how I felt. But no, this is true for you. Like he died once and for all and he died once and for all like and he rose once and for all for all who believe in him like we we get to live in freedom and fullness from our sin from our shame from every single thing that is plaguing you today.

This book is for you like And it might be for someone that you know, and whether you want to get it for yourself or get it for another person, I hope that you do, because the tone in this book is not condemnation. The tone in this book is not, well, you just need to try better, like do heart, do more work, like pray a little harder, have a little bit more faith. No, it's not just that. It's so much more than that.

It really, my heart is that we would understand exactly who God is, that he is so compassionate, so loving, so forgiving. and willing and able and desires to see us live free. So I hope that you get the book and I hope that it is just maybe even a new narrative, a new tone of voice that you're hearing in this space of conversation that it's, there's no shame here. There's no condemnation here. Truly there is victory here and it's in Christ. We fight for victory from victory because of Jesus.

So if you do want to get the book again, like Molly said, it's available everywhere right now. It's called You Can Be Free. My name is Kirby Kelly. If you want to follow me on any of my social media, my Instagram, my YouTube, my TikTok, it's Kirby is a Boss. Please don't judge me. I made it when I was 13. And so we're keeping it. We're keeping it. We're keeping it. At this point, I'm like, okay, it's just too much to keep up with. But then I have a podcast. It's called Bot and Beloved.

New episodes every single Tuesday where kind of like Molly, we just sit, we talk. We talk about Jesus, we talk about real life and how to make sense of both of them so that we can do life with Jesus. So y 'all can check that out, yeah. good, Kirby. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for this book that you're putting out in the world. And I know it is a labor of love. And so congratulations and just you're amazing.