Have you ever noticed that people give testimonies after everything is resolved?
I think we should start a movement to do them BEFORE everything is resolved.
Because that’s when testimonies really count.
I just did a podcast on Boundless- Focus on the family’s ministry to singles, http://www.boundless.org/podcast-section/2015/what-men-want-episode-385 and I talked about the season of my life when everything fell apart. (If you scroll down, it’s under “The 49 year stretch”)
I had a speaking ministry at the time, and my engagement had just ended. At 43 and single– with a wedding dress tucked away in my mother’s closet, and shower gifts stacked in my ex fiance’s garage– I wondered if I should sit a few speaking gigs out.
I found it hard to get out of bed, let alone get on stage to speak.
I can remember thinking “If I share my story, people will walk away from God, not toward Him.”
I better hide out for a while till I get it together.
And at that moment, God spoke to me. It wasn’t an audible voice (if that happens to you, I’d be interested to hear about it), but more of a surge in my heart.
DO YOU THINK I DON’T KNOW WHAT IS HAPPENING IN YOUR LIFE? Am I not big enough to handle this?
Meekly I decided I better just tell my story the way it really was. But I was pretty sure my speaking career would fizzle in it’s wake.
However something miraculous happened as I began to share this soundbite of my life.
I ended my testimony with these words:
“I have no idea what God is doing right now, but one thing I do know is that He’s not through.”
You could have heard a pin drop.
And then, a funny thing happened. Instead of walking away, people leaned in. Because the middle of the story is where people live.
And God whispered to me “See?” I don’t need you to “clean up” your story. What people need is to see someone holding on to faith. Even when the bottom falls through. Even when life has fallen apart.
Because I am the God of the resurrection.
And because
Share your story. The good AND the bad. It’s what people need to hear.
And let God be the one to end it. Because if you are still breathing, He isn’t through.
love this…so true. xo
This post on Testimony brought to my mind something I always share with those who feel God is not answering their prayers; I speak from the experience of the healing of my special needs son and daughter – both have equally serios but very different special needs. The healing is not complete by any means, yet it commemced the moment they were born and is ongoing; both have reached milestones that my wife and I would never have envisaged. God’s timings are very different from ours and while a healing can of course be instant, it doesn’t have to be -it can be gradual and there is Biblical authority on this. So my testimony is that if we don’t get answers to our prayers on demand, it doesn’t mean we are not getting anmswers.
Thank you for writing this. I needed this.