What's In A Story?

I have several posts it "edit" mode. I think I may be feeling a little less than certain of my writing abilities these days. I'm not sure why, but I am just having a hard time letting go of my words. So right now, I am promising myself that I am going to complete this post and publish it...even if I don't think the words made their way onto the notepad in the perfect order!

I mentioned quite some time ago that I felt God was prodding me to spend some time preparing my testimony. I have had this sense of urgency on needing to have an account ready of how my relationship with God started and has developed. I think it is important for all of us. But this was something that I felt I needed to spend some time really focusing on and seeking how to put it all in order and getting comfortable telling people about. I think that was a big part of it! I need to feel comfortable - unashamed, humble, honest!

These are qualities that are important to me. The thing is, my "story" is full of places of shame - things that I generally feel safer hiding (or hiding from) and when I start sharing my testimony I get very uncomfortable sharing a lot of these places. A lot of it is that I am afraid of what people will think. I've said before that I don't think the point of telling a testimony is to unload every event in one's life, but rather to point to Jesus in that individual; to answer the question of who He is to that person, how that relationship came into existence, and how the individual has been impacted by that relationship. I think something people often struggle with in delivering a testimony is how to answer these questions without providing all of the details of their life. I also think that some of the most powerful testimonies I have heard are those where the person speaking is honest about the places God has redeemed or is in the process of redeeming in them. This is what I want to be able to do - without leaving people thinking I am screwed up!

So, I decided a few months ago that this was important and I needed to work on it. Then, in September my small group leaders said that around January they would like to have everyone give their testimony so that we could get to know each other a little better and see some of what God has done and is doing in the lives of our group members. We all agreed this would be a good thing, but didn't talk much more about it until recently. I worked on preparing my story, but figured it would be a while before I really shared it with anyone.

A couple of weeks ago I was on a ladies retreat with my church and it was amazing - throughout the weekend, I had many opportunities to speak with women and very naturally deliver pieces of who I am. I realized after the weekend was over, as I was reflecting back, that in the duration of one weekend and about 10 conversations I had almost completely delivered my testimony. It was SO awesome to me to see how God had prepared me for that time!

Not everything came out as perfect as I would like it, but then again we are talking about me...very little ever measures up to my expectations! It is one of my great flaws - I am a perfectionist! The fact is, it came out. And it happened in unexpected and natural ways. Now I have to put it all together and figure out what to keep in and take out for delivering it to my small group. We actually started sharing this week, but I am not sharing for a while. I think it will be in February. What would be really cool is if it ended up being March and it could be right around my 10 year anniversary of when I gave my life over to Christ! Wouldn't that be cool!?