Today’s guests are two young women who have faced the typical challenges that girls deal with in our culture today– self-confidence, peer pressure, criticism, and authenticity. Chelsea Crockett started making videos as a teenager just for fun, which eventually morphed into her highly popular YouTube channel Beautylicious Insider. Chelsea’s mission is to show girls how to be authentically beautiful–mirroring the love of Christ to encourage their self-worth. Kaylee Rutland is an upcoming country music singer/songwriter who, before performing and singing, battled shyness. Her songs have a message for young women everywhere, including a very special song she wrote for her 13-year old sister who was dealing with self-confidence issues.

 

Jesus Defines Our Worth: Chelsea Crockett & Kaylee Rutland – Jesus Calling Episode #96

Narrator: Welcome to the Jesus Calling podcast as we continue our series on country music and faith—counting down to Country Music Week in Nashville, Tennessee. Today’s guests are two young women who have faced the typical challenges that girls deal with in today’s culture, and have chosen to let God guide them to the next chapters of their lives–YouTube sensation Chelsea Crockett and rising country artist Kaylee Rutland. Chelsea Crockett is one of the biggest names in social media today, known for her popular YouTube channel Beautylicious Insider. Chelsea gives her fans insight into her life, faith and how to be authentically beautiful. She has written a new book that brings this all together called “Your Own Beautiful.”

Chelsea Gives Advice & Encouragement On YouTube

Chelsea: My name is Chelsea Crockett. I started YouTubing whenever I was 13 years old and I’ve enjoyed it ever since. My passions have changed from makeup, beauty, and fashion to real-life advice, faith videos, and just blogs–lifestyle content.

So, I ’m from Troy, Illinois, and you guys probably have no clue where that’s at because it’s a small town of 10,000 people. I lived in that town ever since this past year–when I moved to Atlanta, Georgia–and I enjoyed it a lot.

I just had like three or four close friends we hung out pretty much weekly.

Growing up, I had a family of five total, including me. I’m the oldest; I’m 20 years old. My sister is a year younger than I am, and my brothers are three years younger than I am. My family is currently out in Colorado because my dad just got a new job out there.

He was unemployed for like a year because his previous company had a really big cut back, which was really, really hard on our family, but we ended up growing quite a lot through that. My dad was a great example of faith throughout the entire situation and time of testing, in a way. So, it was a hard time, but also just steered the direction for all of us in such an interesting and different way than we ever expected.

Growing up with my family–we had our issues, of course, just like any other family–but my family was always just supportive of the decisions that I made; as long as they were moral. You know, I’m not going out and doing reckless things every night.

But throughout the years, just with having all the experiences that I did, I really wanted to emphasize how family and at least have people who are like family in your life that can encourage you; who can be your support system.

So, I encourage a lot of people on my videos and in my book to do that.

God-Sent Conversations

I wanted to start my own YouTube channel because I just saw so many different funny and creative videos. In 2011, I started making videos all about makeup, all about fashion.

I never expected the channel to have success in general. I just wanted to have a place where I could upload my videos and watch myself and show my friends. At first, I was kind of shy to just expose myself in that way, because the first couple opinions that I got from my family and friends were like “what are you doing?”

This is weird, but I was one of the very few that were making videos at this time. I’m really glad that over the years I’ve been able to form a connection with people who are my age older or younger. It’s amazing how many people from around the world watch; and I have like amazing, just God-sent conversations with these people.

Showing Her Heart For Jesus

I enjoy just seeing the process over the years as to where I was and how I am now. I think the biggest change that I saw in myself and in my videos happened in high school. I think that’s a big year, or big 4 years of realization in terms of like who we are, and what we want to do with our lives, and at least start to get the idea.

God just kind of took a hold of my heart and really spoke to me in a lot of just extraordinary ways. I knew I wanted to live for Him wholeheartedly.

“God just kind of took a hold of my heart and really spoke to me in a lot of just extraordinary ways.” – Chelsea Crockett

I had accepted Jesus into my heart whenever I was 10 years old,  but you know, I think when we’re 10 years old we really don’t know entirely what we’re doing. So, in this moment, it was like huge for me.

I knew that this is like what I wanted to live for, and I wanted to portray it in my videos. I want to portray it in my family life, friends’ life, and I hope that they saw a change in me, because it definitely was a big change for myself.

Your Own Beautiful

So, I recently wrote a book called Your Own Beautiful.

I wrote it simply because I got so many different messages over the years talking about anxiety, depression, identity,  friendship issues, just communication with other people that you don’t know how to necessarily communicate with.

I think another important thing to address is the fact that if we don’t know who we are, then we’re going to believe all the other lies other people tell us about who we are.  I really learned that a couple years ago because I really didn’t know who I was in Christ.

“If we don’t know who we are, then we’re going to believe all the other lies other people tell us about who we are.” – Chelsea Crockett

I didn’t know who God really is because I didn’t care enough to look into it. The biggest part of us, and the biggest thing that we should strive to receive, and to just look for every single day is just the beauty in Christ because we have that within ourselves. I just love being able talk about the fact that God sees you and He sees me and He just is working within the little things in life and the big things in life.

“I just love being able talk about the fact that God sees you and He sees me and He just is working within the little things in life and the big things in life.” – Chelsea Crockett

I just wanted to put it all in one place where all those people who had questions can go to, and it’s just a resource that’s Bible-based. Backed up with Scripture.

I love just being able to spread positivity. Any time that I can encourage my friends, encourage people online, it just creates joy in my heart. It also just creates joy in other people’s hearts– it’s contagious, honestly!

Daily Time With God

On my YouTube channel. I’m going to be talking a little bit about how I spend my daily devotional time with God,

Since you have to spend time with God to know who He is and to know who you are, I like to spend time in God’s word using the help of different devotionals like Jesus Calling. I used that quite a lot last year and a little bit now to just see how God sees me, and also to know more about who God is.

Jesus Calling – it’s like a day-to-day devotional that you sit down and you do every day, and you can be quick, or it can be more extensive because there’s a two to three different verses along the bottom that you could go more in depth with, and just read on your own. Or, if you’re like, “you know, I just need my daily dose of God, I’ve only got five minutes, let’s read this.” I can look it up my phone. It really just works with your schedule and just reading in general, sometimes it can get hard to manage your time with life. For me, with running a YouTube channel, different social media platforms, and just trying to spend time with my friends and family, every single day can get a little overwhelming to try to balance life. But I just try to focus on the day to day and go with the flow.

The Four R’s – Read, Record, Respond and Reflect

So, I use a tactic called “The Four R’s” and it’s about “Read, Record, Respond and Reflect.”

It’s just really taking in the word of God, like reading it for what it is–whether you’re reading one passage or just a short little blurb in and breaking it down–and then I like to respond by writing notes, or just reading it maybe even more, and then responding and highlighting things that stand out to me like, “Why did God say this? What was the context of this?”

Then, I like to reflect by again just taking the word and figuring out what the context was– what it was like back then whenever this was written–who was writing it; all that sort of stuff, because it really plays into the fact of how you take this person, or how you take this passage in the book, or whatever.

Then, after I reflect a little, I like to respond and we all are going to do this differently, but pretty much it just involves prayer. It doesn’t have to be a big, huge, gigantic prayer. “Lord forgive me for my sins, and just like this passage in Psalms says; You are the shelter that I rest in” like, it’s honest– I’ve never been very structured and just “this this and this is what a prayer is.”  

I just like to get honest with God and say “this is what the Scripture says and this is what I’m not doing right now. I just need you to invade my heart and allow this to be actual living Word with inside me.”

Narrator: To find out more about Chelsea’s book “Your Own Beautiful” visit ChelseaCrockett.com. And if you’re planning on being in Nashville for CMA Fest, come and meet Chelsea in person at the Jesus Calling Booth #106 at Fan Fair X on June 9 from 1:00-1:30 or check her out on facebook live on the Jesus Calling facebook page.

 

Narrator: We’ll return to meet our second guest after this message about a free offer from Jesus Calling.

 

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May Family Prayer Calendar

Daily prayer calendar which works with your Jesus Calling devotional. Each day begins with a guided reflection followed by space of prayers of thanksgiving and special requests.

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Kaylee Rutland Overcomes Shyness to Pursue Her Dreams

Narrator: Our next guest is up and coming country music singer/songwriter Kaylee Rutland. Kaylee’s music makes an unmistakable connection with listeners as evidenced by her tremendous social media following and their response to her music and her message. She visits with us today about how she developed a love for music. at an early age,  about overcoming shyness to pursue her country music dreams, and about her new EP, which includes a song that was inspired by her sister.

Kaylee: I’m Kaylee Rutland and I was born and raised in Flower Mound, Texas. I moved to Nashville in 2013 to attend college at Belmont University. I just graduated with my degree in music business a couple of months ago. Now, I finally get to do music full time. Country music is what I’ve been doing my entire life, and it’s so nice now that it’s like my full-time official job.

The first time I ever really sang was in a Christmas musical at my church when I was 8 or 9, and I was like a really, really shy kid. So, it’s kind of crazy in hindsight, because I was never one to really want to jump on stage in the spotlight. But one day our musical director–such a sweet woman–just asked us to raise our hands if we wanted to solo and in the one spontaneous thing I’ve ever done, I threw my hand up and afterwards I kind of thought to myself like, “What was I thinking? Why would I do that?”

When all the kids came on stage and we were finally performing in school for our parents and the whole church, I got behind the microphone and I was super crazy nervous, and then the minute the music started playing and I started singing, all of the nerves completely melted away. I’m like “Oh my gosh, this is the best feeling, like I want to do this all the time.”

Ever since that Christmas musical, I kind of realized that that’s what I wanted to do forever–was continue singing. As I got older, I would perform at little school plays, and talent shows, and again I was singing with the church on the worship team all the time.

I played piano for a while, then I picked up guitar. I always had voice lessons, so as I got older and went through middle school and high school, I definitely realized this is something I want to do and kind of honed in on it. “I want to be a recording artist. I want to perform onstage. I want it to be country music.”

It kind of started to clarify the picture, having conversations and praying with my parents about it, and realizing that I wanted to go to Nashville, and then finding Belmont once I went to Nashville, and it kind of grew through there. 

A Prayer To Melt Anxiety

Overcoming shyness is kind of an ongoing process because it’s always something like–even right now when I come in and chat with people and I’m on camera, or again, anytime I’m on stage, I’lI always have like that nervous tingle before I go on, and like the butterflies, and your breath catches a little, and you’re like “OK it’s going to be fine.”

So, every time I get that feeling, but once I am doing what I love–I think what I’m called to do–like all of the nerves kind of melt away.  Especially with my band that I play with in Texas–we kind of have a tradition before every show. We’ll gather up in a circle and pray before we go on stage. It always just kind of helps root us and remind Who the glory is for when we’re on stage. It reminds us that this is all going to be great, it’s all going to be fine, and just kind of gets rid of that nervousness 

It kind of helps you see that anxiety is just kind of like unnecessary, or just like a very small thing that you can work past, because that’s when you remember: “Oh right, God’s on my side.That guy who created the universe–it’s going to be fine.”

You Can’t Doubt God’s Purpose for You

There’s been countless instances where I’ve doubted myself, doubted my own talent, or even my own drive, and I’m like “is this really what I’m meant to be doing, God?”  Not even asking myself, “is this what I want to do, but like am I good enough to make it?” Especially with doing school at the same time–it was such a balancing and a juggling act; trying to figure out how to take 17 hours of classes at the same time as I’m trying to be out there performing and recording music and writing songs. 

“There’s been countless instances where I’ve doubted myself, doubted my own talent, or even my own drive, and I’m like “is this really what I’m meant to be doing, God?” – Kaylee Rutland

I think every time that I’ve had an instance– that something has happened–almost immediately that kind of puts it into perspective. I’ll have a cool opportunity come up or things would suddenly get easier–like the waters would calm–and it would just kind of be like a reminding presence from God–”you’re doubting yourself, but if this is what I’ve called you to do, l’m gonna get you through it.” It reminded me that I’m not in control of it,  and I don’t have to be in control of it. Because if this is the career that God has mapped out for me, I could kind of relax a little bit and be setting my doubts aside because God’s going to make it happen. 

Being a role model and an example for other young women is really something that I kind of hope to do in this platform, and with my music. Getting a big head hasn’t been an issue too much because there’s always something that keeps me humble there’s always something that reminds me like “all right, you’re not too much, hotshot.” So, that’s been easy.

And again, like God has called all of us to serve the people around us, so that’s definitely something that has kind of been a grounding factor throughout my life, is remembering my main purpose here on Earth. With social media and kind of having stuff out there for the world to see–not just my close friends and family–but really anybody who owns a computer or a phone–anything they could find. It kind of helps me take a second look at anything that I do or say or sing or post before I put it out there. I have to remember: does this reflect who I am as a person? Does this reflect the kind of person that God has created me to be? Is this something that can positively impact people who I’m trying to reach out to?

Slow Down and Take In God’s Gifts

Connecting with God and keeping that kind of as a part of my day to day routine is a part of something I do every morning. And Jesus Calling is actually a great example of that. On a personal level, that’s what I do.  I start every morning in prayer, and I pull out my devotional and read it for the day, and then I go to my bible app on my phone and I always read a little bit of a passage, and it just kind of starts the whole day off on the right foot. It’s something that I can kind of go back to in my mind, if I come across any hurdle or difficulty throughout the day and kind of just remember “all right, like stay grounded, like God’s got you in his hands, this is your goal for the day.” It’s just something I think that everybody could use to sort of keep us rooted as we go throughout our day to day life.

When we do take a minute to just kind of slow down and look at the world around us, it’s so much more obvious to see all of the gifts from God and all of the opportunities and doors that he’s opened, and every gift he’s given. Really, I think a lot of times–even personally–when I’ve gotten too caught up in music, or in the past–my schoolwork– or wor– just something that’s going on socially with my friends, we can kind of tend to focus on the negative. But when we do slow down and actively look for those moments, I think God really reveals the giving-ness in His nature to us.

“When we do take a minute to just kind of slow down and look at the world around us, it’s so much more obvious to see all of the gifts from God.” Kaylee Rutland

Kaylee’s Song For Her Sister

Narrator: Kaylee’s new EP, includes a song she wrote about a young girls struggle with self-confidence. She talks about how her sister inspired the song and why this is a topic that is near and dear to her heart.

Kaylee: So, “Do You” is about my younger sister Mattie. Gosh, she would have been about 13 at the time I wrote it. Out of all my siblings, I probably see the most of myself in Mattie.I just love her. She’s so sweet and so hilariously sassy, but I often see her struggling with self-confidence and kind of trying to figure out what her identity was, as any teenage girl would do and that’s really where when I look at her I kind of see a little 13-year-old Caylee and I got together with Jamie O’Neal and Manny Murphy and I was telling them about this and I told them that I wanted to write a song for her. And that’s kind of “how do you start?” it was a conversation about my little sister and something that I would like to say to her as well as to my younger self and to all young women out there who are really trying to navigate who they’re supposed to be in this world, where I think we so often compare the worst of ourselves to the best of other people. That’s really kind of where “Do You” came from.

That’s always scary when you write a song about someone and play it for them. I think it had the effect that I hoped it did, which is that she can kind of try to see more of the good on herself as opposed to only the good and other people.

It’s all about who God made you to be–not just trying to be like the people we see around us.

 I think one of the biggest issues that the current generation is dealing with kind of stems from social media. I don’t mean that social media is that issue, because so much good can come from that. But because of the ways that we can connect with each other through the Internet, and again, like how we always see the best in one another’s lives along with the worst in ourselves–we kind of miss out on that fellowship.

So, I guess that’s really what I would say. The issue is a lack of truly meaningful fellowship and so often again, especially with me, when I’m scrolling through Instagram or Twitter and I see amazing things that other people are doing—their beauty, their success, or anything,  I can really kind of start to get down on myself.

“The issue is a lack of truly meaningful fellowship…when I’m scrolling through Instagram or Twitter and I see amazing things that other people are doing—their beauty, their success, or anything,  I can really kind of start to get down on myself.” – Kaylee Rutland

Whereas, if I can have a moment to talk with my girlfriends who are all going through the same thing whose successes and beauty that I can see, we can kind of build each other up and remind one another of the good things that we see, and the amazing gifts that God has given to one another as well. I think that that’s something that we don’t often get to do with social media. But when you have those moments of honesty and fellowship with other women, you can really kind of remind yourself not everybody is perfect and you’re not alone in that. 

“When you have those moments of honesty and fellowship with other women, you can really kind of remind yourself not everybody is perfect and you’re not alone in that.” – Kaylee Rutland

It also is a good reminder, hearing from other people, what’s beautiful in you.

Narrator: To find out more about Kaylee’s EP entitled “That Side of Me,” visit KayleeRutland.com. Kaylee will also be appearing at the Jesus Calling booth on June 8th at 11:00 am during the Country Music Association’s CMA Fest. If you’re in Nashville that week, come by and say hello to Kaylee at the Jesus Calling booth on June 8th at 11:00 am.

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Narrator: Next time on the Jesus Calling podcast, we visit with the members of legendary country music group Shenandoah. Lead singer Marty Raybon shares about his faith and how gratefulness to God keeps him going.

Marty Raybon: When I get up in the morning, when I open my eyes, I just say, Lord thank you. I praise your name Lord God, somehow or another some way today, Lord God use me.  Do something that You could do through me today, just use me Lord.

 

Narrator: Today’s featured passage comes from the November 8th entry of the Jesus Calling audiobook:

“Learn to appreciate difficult days. Be stimulated by the challenges you encounter along your way. As you journey through rough terrain with Me, gain confidence from your knowledge that together we can handle anything. This knowledge is comprised of three parts: your relationship with Me, promises in the Bible and past experiences of coping successfully during hard times.
     

Look back on your life, and see how I have helped you through difficult days. If you are tempted to think, “Yes, but that was then, and this is now,” remember who I AM! Although you and your circumstances may change dramatically, I remain the same throughout time and eternity. This is the basis of your confidence. In My Presence you live and move and have your being.”

– Jesus Calling