What's Your Story?

As a kid I would always hear these incredible stories. I would go to believe and hear stories from men who had fallen away from Christ and did "bad" things. As I got older the stories got more intense and more detailed. I heard stories of just crazy things and people who were never Christians in the first place or people who fell away. In the human eye it didn't look like they would ever come back. I heard stories of how God captured the hearts of His lost children and how they were now doing amazing things to further His kingdom. These people that would speak were now amazing Christians and I had a desire to have a faith like theirs. I used to think to myself how can I impact people for Christ without a story? How will I get their attention without walking up there and starting out with, "In high school I was a heavy drinker", "I was addicted to porn", "I'm a crack baby", "I was an atheist for 25 years", "I had never heard about Jesus until I flipped on the TV and some guy was talking about Him". I could go on but you get the picture. I just wasn't sure how God was going to use me without this awesome testimony. I was raised in the church. Parents are Christians and still together. Brothers and sister are all still alive and they are Christians as well. Never really fell away. Pretty involved in church. Sing in the youth band and elected student leader twice. The way I saw it my story sucked because I sounded like a goody goody. Little did I know being a "goody goody" was a HUGE part of my storey. This girl who was a leader in her youth group and had a decent life fell away and she fell fast. She started hanging out with the wrong friends and got involved in some things that she shouldn't have and at the same time kept her christian family thinking all was well. Her relationship with God died and the bible was shoved under the bed. Prayer life, what prayer life? That disappeared. She found her self looking for an escape so she turned to self injury and stopped eating. She was sick of not having control over anything in her life so she took control. She has now been battling self injury for a year and over time God has broken her stony heart. He has placed people in her life who have held her accountable and encouraged her. People who loved her and have shown her Christ love. God has began to capture her heart again and her broken life is being put back together. This girl grew up thinking she couldn't be used and now she has a story she cant wait to share. It is a story of pain, a story of brokenness, a story of running, a story of healing, a story of hope, a story of love, it is a story of an old life made new. She will never be the same. Her story is beautiful and she loves it.