Church Refugees: Your Journey is meant to Help Others

I believe they whatever sins, depravity, or epic fails that we encounter in our lives are meant to strengthen us and then allow us to use our stories to help others.  The idea is for you to endure trials, temptations, and other pitfalls. Due to your faith in God, the intercessory work of Jesus and others in your life, combined with the power of the Holy Spirit you receive victory and have a testimony.

Unfortunately MOST people don't get to the victory part because they give up  so they don't get to share their testimonies. They say that faith comes from hearing the right kinds of stories. I agree with that. When I first took up with the charismatics I was shocked at all the miraculous stories I heard from people. It affirmed my faith because I hadn’t heard of God doing anything for anyone before like this.  I started thinking, “Well maybe there's something to this God thing!”  I had seen miracles in my life but didn’t even realize that’s what it was!  Hearing other people tell their stories helped me to realize that miracles happen..they still happen.  I was PRIMED to look out for them in my own life even more.

One of the reasons that I'm so adamant about chronicling my own story is because I want people to see  the God miracle factor in my story. I want women to be able to Go Get it and let it come because they were encouraged by my stand and certain belief of provision and faithfulness of God.

In church we miss this because we're trying to be perfect and keep up appearances. We miss so much in the community when we can't be authentic with each other for fear of judgment.  I am honest and I say that I complained, I grumbled, I tried to manipulate circumstances, I ran ahead, I was bitter, I melted down in a Polynesian restaurant,  I was angry, I was frustrated, I was ready to give up, and I’ve lost faith a bunch of times.  I’m definitely not perfect and will never pretend to be so.  I want people to see how a less than perfect person believed in her outrageous dream that God Gave her and saw it through.  I know it will help so many people. 

Even my journey about the whole dieting and body image thing has impacted people so I know that when I share even more of my experiences that I will impact even more women.  I think the story is so much more than what I’m that even I am not ready for how much IMPACT this will have.

How you build community is by sharing experiences. You can't build a true community without sharing true life experiences. This could contribute to why church has been described as shallow and superficial by congregants in nearly all of the books I've read about Leaving Church  When I think of some of the church groups I've been apart of, I can't see some of the leaders being able to handle discussing real life experiences. It is said that you can only take people as far as you've taken yourself so a church leader who hasn’t gone very deep isn’t going to be able to lead anyone past the surface level.