Telling Stories

I see my little one struggling under the weight of this season. Dark clouds loom overhead. And it’s hard for this Mama to watch the rain.

How do I tell her that there will be more days like this? Hard seasons. Happy ones too. How do you give a daughter what she needs for the road ahead?

A few friends and I are meeting once a month with several younger women to tell our stories and share our faith. My friend Dianna said she wished someone would have been honest with her about this life with Christ, all those years ago. So we gathered, Friday night on Dianna’s back porch, and went around the room telling our stories.

The words spoken were pure poetry.

As I anticipated taking my turn to speak, I felt my face grow hot. I could have melted in the chair and faded away for fear. I looked at Dianna, who knows me inside and out, and hoped for a reprieve – maybe a “you-can-wait-‘til-next-time”.

Didn’t happen.

Instead, she prompted me to start at the beginning, “Lynnie, why don’t you start when you were a little girl and your parents divorced.” I swallowed hard and began my story when I was seven years old – the place when I became keenly aware of my need of a Savior.

The tears welled up as I poured out my heart and dark, red splotches covered my neck and chest. Raw emotion tumbled out in what felt like root ball clumps.

There it was. The “me” that’s underneath the mascara and hairspray. Exposed.

For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And He died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for Him who died for them and was raised again.

2 Corinthians 5:14-15 NIV

It took several days to recover from all the uncovering.

Why put myself through the whole nervous ordeal? The love of Christ compels me. Stretches me. It takes me out of my comfort zone of religious platitudes and shallow conversation.

Love is the overflow and expansion of joy in God, which gladly meets the needs of others. Love is not merely the passive overflow, but the aggressive extension and expansion and completion of joy in God.

John Piper, The Dangerous Duty of Delight

Christ’s love compels me to share my story in order to spill His love on to someone else – maybe someone sitting on a back porch on a Friday night…or a daughter.

 

I’m a wife, mother, lover of Jesus and yes, a former beauty queen. I write about life, messy faith and real good food over here. You can also visit me on Facebook.