SEASONS OF WAITING
DOE (a.k.a Dominique Jones) is an inspirational singer and songwriter who is a refreshing presence in the music industry, today.
Her roots are music; beneath her individual ministry lies the foundation of her family, foreverJONES. DOE, her parents, and her four brothers and sisters all traveled together and ministered as a family band. To date, foreverJONES has been nominated for 3 Grammys, 6 Stellars, and 4 Dove Awards.
In 2014, DOE took a leap of faith and explored her solo carer. Since then, she has worked with multiple recording artists, written a number of amazing songs and released a self-titled EP, which is available now and features the hit single “Brighter”.
DOE is a multi-layered artist who is ready to bless the world with her authenticity, incredible talent, and an undeniable musical gift will allow her to have a lasting impact on all who hear her sound.
We love to start off with a little question, so tell us one fun fact about yourself?
I am a HUGE foodie, and I love to cook. So I am currently in this season where I am learning to be a healthy foodie.. for the sake of living long. I am constantly finding new recipes and posting that online.
Obviously, you are such an incredible and successful singer/songwriter, but I am sure there were times to this lead up of success which required you to wait on God… wait on His timing to fulfill these giftings.. can you explain a little more about this whole journey you have been on?
Absolutely, I mean that is my story…. the fullness of my story is waiting on God… waiting on God’s timing.
Often we think that promises are just delayed or that people are refusing to see us or celebrate us for who we are called to be in the kingdom, but really it’s just that he has hidden you for his perfecting timing, and when that moment comes, everything changes. It is just all about the timing of God.
When you get on the other side of waiting, and the promise begins to manifest, you realise that if you had gotten everything you wanted in the moment when you felt like you were supposed to get it, you would not have had the capacity to carry the weight of the call, or the maturity to maintain or protect the moment that you are going to be given.
That is what I see when I look back because there was maturity and a level of depth that I gained in the waiting, there was ambition that I had to shed in those moments of waiting.
People can decide that they are not going to wait in those moments and that instead they are going to strive, and kick down doors. They might be able to conjure something up so they don’t have to be still and wait, but it may not be God’s idea of what he planned for you in this season. There are so many valuable lessons that I gained in the ‘waiting’ and don’t want to toot my own horn because it was a very painful process, it wasn’t easy.. but it was so well worth it.
It is not about getting everything you want, it’s about you stepping into the promises of God and not losing your soul. That is what it is about.
I personally struggle to just “wait”…. I often get frustrated and wonder ‘why is this happening? why is it taking so long?’, So why does God want us to go through these seasons of waiting?
I would not shine a light on “why does God want me to go through this”… I would just live through it because you are not going to understand “why” until you get to the other side.
That is where the clarity is, it is not in the waiting season… it is not before the waiting seasons… it is after the waiting season.
If you spend your time in seasons of waiting and obsessing over the ‘why”, you are going to miss the growth that is going to take place in that season.. you are going to miss the lessons.
We say over here in the states, “I am living my best life right now” and if you are in your twenties I want every young girl, every young person who is “waiting”… to live their best life.. because you might get to the next seasons of life and realise that maybe it was not a season of waiting, maybe it was a season of rest and you wasted it trying to figure out what the heck God was going.
YOU ARE NOT PAYING RENT TO LIVE IN THE FUTURE, YOU ARE PAYING RENT TO LIVE IN THE PRESENT… SO GET YOUR MONEY’S WORTH.
I want every girl to get the best out of this season that you can get. I want you to enjoy every relationship, I want you to date in a healthy and Godly way, and meet guys and get to know yourself and what you want. Do not get distracted but do all the things that are permitted to you in a holy and wholesome way, and grow, so that when you get to that next season you have all these lessons that you will learn to take with you. Rather than obsessing over the next season, take advantage of the one you are in.
Spend time with the Lord.
Spend time with people.
Learn how to communicate.
Learn your enneagram
Learn what things make you tick, why are you the way that you are
Understand your heart
Learn to hear the voice of God
Learn how to be consistent
Get discipled
Read as much as you can
Learn the language for this present season
There is so much you can do right now in this season and what I don’t want you to do is miss it because you were obsessed with the next season that you’re not even in.
You can not live in that next season, God can live in there, but you do not live in there yet.
You have just given us the advice to get through the ‘waiting’ season’… how well did you follow that same advice?
I think I floated in and out of that, I went to school in my twenties and went through a lot of heartbreak, I learned so much about my heart, I learned about hearing the voice of God, I traveled, I was a youth pastor, I was in youth ministry, I had a lot of relational changes and that’s not just romantic, that was platonic as well.
One of the things I wish that I had done, was doing more without fear. A lot of what you girls may be dealing with is this fear of missing God or a FOMO, or a fear of missing out. A lot of times we are scared that we missed out somewhere, and wonder is that why things are going so slow.
We often obsess over this the most, because we feel like we may have missed God or that we are somehow going to miss out on something that is in the future, so we begin to obsess over the details of how I am going to get there. That is not God’s will, God wants us to live in the present, he wants us to be fully present.
I was definitely one of those girls that tried to listen to the older people because you are always going to hear older people say these things that I am saying to you today. But I would say that 80% of young people your age don’t listen, and do obsess over their future, and don’t have fun, don’t just live their lives. If you think about it, the majority of you guys are not going to take this advice and you are going to spend most of your time trying to figure out “did I miss God”.
I am telling you, you didn’t… you did not miss God and you are not going to miss him. You are going to run smack dab into the promises of God. You are going to have a great life, and for those girls that are listening to this and they’re obsessed over their future relationships with their spouse, I want you to know that you are not going to die alone.
If you choose to invest in the beautiful relationships you have around you, you are going to have so many beautiful experiences relationally in your life, you are going to have a lot of people at your funeral that said that you were a loving, and present individual… and that is what you want.
You want to get to the next season and say “I handled that last one with care, and now I have so many lessons that I can walk into this one with”
The mistakes that you make right now, count them as valuable lessons. You are going to have moments where you wonder “why is God allowing me to walk through this pain” but those moments are adding to you.
I am passionate about you getting the most out of this season that you have. You are not going to miss out, you’re not.
God loves you so much, he has so many great things for you, he is a good dad, he is an incredible dad, and he loves watching you get the desires of your heart.
What are some of the specific bible verses that have helped you through the seasons of waiting?
My whole chapter was Psalm 16.
My favorite part in this chapter is verse 11… ”You make known to me the path of life, and you will fill me with joy in your presence and with eternal pleasures at your right hand”
I would just repeat that over and over and over and over again.
This scripture is ministering to me even right now because if I am being transparent, I am currently in a moment where I feel a little discouraged… nothing bad is happening, but I am just in it… I am ministering, I am traveling a lot and at times I am like “God, can I do this?”. So revisiting this scripture is just new life for me and you need to have some scripture in your pocket to line up with all the advice, and so Psalm 16 was my scripture.
Do you have any general life advice for our readers?
For me because of how I am wired, I always felt like I was so different or that I didn’t fit in, and once I got to a place where I accepted myself, then God was really able to use me at full capacity. We hear a lot of positive people that talk about accepting yourself and loving yourself but for selfish gain.. and when we change our perspective on that and make it for God’s glory, it becomes really powerful.
Loving yourself, getting to know yourself, and understanding yourself, really becomes powerful because then you are able to offer more of yourself to God- God can only use who you are, not who you are pretending to be.
Ask the Lord to help you love yourself, and to help you fully surrender your whole self so that you can be used by God at full capacity.
Be all of who you are, I want to talk to the quirky individuals, I am telling you that there is a subgroup of people that need to hear the gospel the way that only you can express it. So you need to discover that and understand how you express in life and how God is going to use you because you are needed in the world.
Upcoming projects?
I have been leading worship a lot lately, and I have a full project coming out around October so I am really excited about it.
It’s finished, all the songs are written, we just have one more song getting mixed and I can wait to give this music to you guys because I feel like it’s all about me shedding layers and really coming into who i am called to be.
Thank you Doe
xx
FOR MORE:
- @doejonesmusic
- www.doejonesmusic.com