Day 7: Write your Story. When I was in high school, I remember being challenged to write my testimony and I had no clue where to start. I had grown up in a Christian home, and while my parents were divorced, my mother had made it a point that I have the opportunity to know Christ. I remember looking back at my life and wishing that something bad had happened to me so that I would have something to share with other people. I just didn’t feel like I had a story worth sharing. Don’t get me wrong, I loved to talk with people and I have always been sort of an open book, I just didn’t really feel that I had anything that really showed the power of Christ in my life. So, I never really shared what I felt like was a “testimony.” What I did do though, was talk to people. I loved getting to know other people and getting to know their stories. As I would talk with them, we could usually find something that we related with each other on. And then I could tell them some of my experiences. It was just natural. But I wasn’t sharing a “testimony,” I was just talking to them. It took me a long time to realize that what I was doing was sharing my testimony. I didn’t recognize it because I thought it had to be some big, thought out speech that I made that ended with “and you should know Christ too. What are you doing Sunday because I know a pool of water that is just calling your name to be baptized in.” I thought that unless I had some big thing to share like being healed from cancer or turning around a life devoted to the use of drugs that I didn’t have anything worth sharing. But the reality is that people relate to all sorts of different experiences.
Writing my story tonight, I realized just how much God has done in my life. He has changed the way I view the world and how I view myself. Because of Him I no longer feel empty, envious, and like I have no purpose (at least not most of the time. This is not to say that I am perfect and that the devil doesn’t sometimes pull me down). Because of Him I now feel fulfilled, that I can make a difference, and that there is a purpose for my life.
God has given me a story and He wants me to use it to reach people. God has also given YOU a story that He wants to use. We all have stories and they are all different. God can use them to reach different people in different stages of life. Our experiences help us to relate to other people. It helps us to feel compassion and to long for their salvation. Our stories connect us. They help us make relationships, and out of relationships, discipleship is born. Sharing your testimony doesn’t have to mean standing up in front of your church and spilling your guts about every single thing that has happened in your life. It can mean chatting with a student in the youth group who’s parents are going through a divorce and you can relate to that. You can share about how God helped you get through that time and how you learned to lean on Him and learned how to forgive through that experience. The important thing is that you take opportunities to share your story (or parts of it) and use it to point other people to Christ.
Nicole, thanks for sharing your life with us!