Had I not dealt with this in the world, where would I be today?
Everyone has a story or a past but every story is different. Our stories shape the way we view ourselves and others, greatly impacting our belief system. People often say, “you don’t know what I’ve been through” and this is relatively true. I don’t know unless I was a fulltime witness, or it was shared with me by the person who experienced the going through. While it is easy to cast doubt on others, we must recognize our stories shape us and how we choose to proceed from those experiences are up to us. Our stories could be used for a greater purpose in the world, or we can keep it ourselves and never share it to help someone else. On the other hand, our stories can destroy us by our inability to never achieve a good ending.
Destroy? Yes, destroy. I was recently watching a movie based on the life story of a famous singer. As I watched I grasped the early dysfunctions that started in her childhood home between her parents. A disapproving mother, a dishonest cheating father and drug user brother, which led her down a path of attracting the same behavior in her adult personal life, a cheating, alcohol and drug user husband, having to dealing with the tabloids who were never keen of labeling her as a drug addict. Surrounded by the dysfunction, all I thought to myself was all she ever wanted to do was sing, and this she did. However, the singer tragically passed away from the effects of long-term drug use and drowning.
This singer holds a special place in my heart, and I am always saddened when I think of her. Why? To think of the incredible talent she had, only to have it slowly taken away from her year after year surrounded by the wrong people, including her own family. The singer’s voice was incredibly captivating and underneath the addiction, I saw a woman who loved God and needed freedom. Our stories can either build us or destroy us if we don’t break away from the antagonist.
The enemy’s job is to take us away from our story as quickly as possible by whatever means necessary. Sometimes he uses distractions cunningly to whisk us away, whether through lust for something we desire or desire more of, or someone we desire or marries which was not God’s plan, other times wounds we experienced that have not been healed and have created confusion in our lives, or our own blatant denial that we need help.
The question is, where would you be without your story? It is not a trick question but a question of recognizing how important your story is to your destiny, where you are in your story and have you allowed a chapter to drag on for too long creating repetitions or simply put, going in a circle. Have you gotten to a place where you are able to share volume 1 of your story? Recognizing your story is to recognize your testimony, a time to share wisdom and knowledge necessary to power the next individual who is facing the same story you have walked through to victory. This is where purpose comes in.
What did you learn from your story or is your story in control of who you are? Think of it this way, is your story still impacting your life in a negative way or has your story given you purpose? Are you embarrassed or angry with the past or have you accepted the past to be so and seen why God allowed you to go through everything you have been through? Are you currently going through and have given up hope or are you going through and holding on to hope that God will bring you through? Are you celebrating the rewards of you making it through and keeping it to yourself while others suffer a different fate? Here is the reality, your story is never just for you. Christ’s story was told to point us to Him – yes but also to show us how to live like He (Christ) does which gives us direction on how to reunite with Him.
Coming to terms with the things you have dealt with will bring out your greatest strength and testimony. When you get stuck on anger and hatred rooted in forgiveness, it steals your breakthrough it steals your story. You must come to terms with your past, the things you have gone through and come into your present with a story, a testimony that created change in you and will bring about change in others around you.