It’s a cliché, yet it is very true and I used to be frustrated with the story I’ve had. Back in my early teenage years I observed, that the girls with lots of problems were the ones to get attention. I got really fired up about it, because I honestly had such an easy life, but the longing to be special and noticed was still a big part of who I was.
I remember how I used to make up scenarios in my head of how I would get cancer and then everyone I looked up to would come see me in the hospital and I would be.. something, someone. Insane and gross, I know.
This last September, when I came to DTS, everyone had to share their stories and I hated it. I was so nervous. Not because I was afraid to be exposed, but because I felt like my story had nothing to offer. No drugs, no abuse, no broken families, no crazy redemption, no nothing. I felt like I had no right to dream big dreams or think that I could offer help to anyone, because how could I, when I had never really been through rough times?
This feeling only grew stronger when I was reading a book, and the author said, that people who hadn’t gone through hardships were boring, because it probably meant, that they had never taken a risk. That just stuck with me. One of my biggest dreams is to be a risktaker whose trust in the Lord in unlimitted and I don’t want to be boring, so I stopped reading that book. It made me feel like my life had absolutely nothing to offer.
I did tell my story though. And I told my story again this week first of SOMD, as we tried to get to know each other. I told my story in the middle of other stories of deep, deep pain and even deeper love, and I didn’t enjoy it. But, this second time I noticed a change. Not because my story has changed, but because my view of God has changed. I was asking Jesus, why he had blessed and proteced me to the extend he has. He send me to Psalms 139 which says
“All the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be”
This hit me. Who am I to want another story? It is written in God’s book! That is honestly so mind blowing. I say that I trust in God, and I have to trust Him with everything, even with the fact that I had a beautiful life. It’s absurd, right? I want my life to be a reflection of God’s greatness, and as I write this I realize that His greatness is shown through more than crazy rescue and redemption. It’s shown through His continual goodness and faithfullness and that is what my story consists of. How lucky am I?
As I tried to process through these thoughts with a friend he reminded me, that it’s not hardships that qualifies you to live out your dreams. I can help victims of trafficking even though I have never been sold. I can speak life to a self harming teenager even though I never cut myself, because helping should never be in my own strenght but in Jesus’. I might not be able to relate, but I can piont to my best friend who carried all the pain of this world on a cross, and He is what everyone needs at the end of the day. HE can relate.
I’ve learned to trust in God’s goodness. His faithfulness in my own life is actually beyond my own understanding. He’s intervention in my new friends’ life has left my eyes open to another aspect of His love, and I’ve had my mind blown just a bit.
Even though I weren’t the teenage girl to get the most attention, I guess I just don’t really care anymore. God pays attention to every second of my life and He cares deeply about every little thing on my mind. So whatever my story holds from this day on, I want it to be a story of my Father’s goodness and that goodness is without limits, so I guess this story of mine is the same.