Testimony

God put it on my heart to give my testimony in chapel to the students at school. I thought I would post it here. I haven't made any changes, so it might be confusing at some points, but remember that I graduated from the school at which I now teach, and that I was speaking to high school students.

Dear Lord, I pray that you open ears and hearts. Speak into each and every student here today. I pray that you would show each person here today your love.

God never meant for us to learn by experience. He meant for us to learn by faith. We are supposed to hear a word from him, and believe and trust in Him that it is true. Take for instance the original sin. God told Adam & Eve not to eat the fruit. He wanted them to trust Him. But they had to learn from experience, and it had some pretty dire consequences. Here’s an example from our time. When your parents tell you to not run out into the middle of the street, they want you to learn through faith—believing what they tell you—instead of having to learn first-hand. Why do we think that matters of our heart are any different than learning with our physical bodies? That’s my heart for you today. I want you to learn through faith. Don’t shut this message out and think you have it all figured out, or that this message doesn’t apply to you. That’s a lie of the enemy who comes to kill, steal, and destroy you. I don’t want you to have to experience the pain that I have in order for it to bring you the joy of the Lord.

I am one of you. I have sat in your seat. I come from a great family. Many of you know my parents. They have attended church here since 1983, and my dad is a deacon. My mom taught here for years—she still comes around for Youth & Government, and she’s on the school board. To know my parents is to love my parents. Both of them are mighty in their faith. They are both pillars of this church, this school, and the kingdom of God.

My upbringing was probably similar to a lot of yours. I was in church every time those doors were open. Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, potluck dinners, home fellowship groups, prayer meetings, you name it. I started Kindergarten right down the hall in the very classrooms some of you learned in with Cindy Lindstrom and Barbra Storie. My parents valued Christian education, and I never knew anything different. One day, someone brought a “Good News” tract and talked about it in chapel. It used a multi-colored glove to tell about God and how much He loves us. Each finger on the glove was a different color, and represented a different aspect of salvation. I took home this little tract, and I told my mom I wanted Jesus in my heart. My mom prayed with me, and that was that. A couple years later, in the baptistery right above me, my dad and Jesse McElreath baptized me.

When I was in elementary school, I would doodle things like, “I love Jesus,” “I hate the devil,” and “God is good” next to crosses, flowers, and kittens. I read my Bible when I was supposed to, and I always knew I was a Christian. The older I got, the more scriptures I memorized for Bible class. I could tell you any Bible story. I could answer the trivia, and I would beat anyone in a sword drill. I had a long list of “I will nevers”. I will never drink alcohol. I will never do drugs. I will never smoke cigarettes. I will never have sex before marriage. I was the “good kid” I was supposed to be.

Growing up in church, I heard message after message about God, about living right, about making right choices, about doing the right thing. I heard how important all these things were, and if I didn’t do all of these things, I felt somehow that I was less of a Christian. I looked at all of the Christians around me, and I would place each of them on a totem pole according to their “goodness.” Jennifer was a good Christian because she goes to youth group on Wednesday night. Tyler must be a good Christian because he raises his hands in chapel. Katie is a bad Christian because she made out with her boyfriend. I learned through my experiences that Christianity was about appearances. If you acted right on the outside, then for one, you could fool people into believing you were a good person. For two, you obviously didn’t care that you were being two-faced, so I guessed most Christians were probably like that. Every Christian I knew never really talked about their day-to-day struggles. They never talked about how they had to bring their hurt and brokenness before the Lord daily – or even if they did. They didn’t even talk about the fact they WERE broken. It affected me in a way that I’m not sure I was aware of at the time, and I would have never been able to put into words.

And the older I got, the more serious chapels became. There would be several people each year who would come and share their “testimony”. These were people who had been alcoholics, drug addicts, people addicted to pornography, the worst of the worst, and God had redeemed them. These were powerful stories that would really move the audience. But yet, there was an aspect with them that I couldn’t identify with. I’d always say, “That’s not me.” Of course God would redeem these horrible people who had done horrible things. But I wasn’t a horrible person. I was a good person. I didn’t drink; I didn’t smoke; I didn’t have sex; I didn’t do anything that bad. “That’s not me.”

The problem was that none of those stories were even remotely close to who I was in high school. My struggles weren’t about extremes. My struggles were about who I was. I wanted to be accepted. I wanted people to like me. I wanted boys to like me. I wanted my parents to understand me. I didn’t want to be controlled. I felt everyone was trying to control me and my behavior. My parents tried to control me by taking the car or other privileges from me if I didn’t conform to their rules. My teachers were trying to control me by giving me bad grades if I didn’t do my homework the way they wanted. My coaches were trying to control me by making me run suicides if I didn’t perform in practices or games to their standard. God was trying to control me by sending me to hell if I didn’t conform to what the Bible says. I felt I lived my life for everyone else, and if I didn’t, I would suffer the consequences. I saw no one else truly struggling like I was, so I figured I was the only one. God didn’t work for me. He didn’t come rescue me, and He wasn’t showing me grace. I thought, “Well, I guess God isn’t what everyone says He really is.”

By the time I went to college, God still had never been real to me—despite all of the head-knowledge I had. I decided in my heart that I wasn’t going to live for anyone else any more, and I wasn't going to let anyone control me. If no one was going to control me, that meant I could do whatever I wanted. So I drank for the first time. Nothing bad happened. My life had been a lie! All those people telling me that alcohol was bad were lying! It was fun! I liked it, and I wanted to do it again! So, I started drinking—a lot. It eventually came to me partying just about every night, and I figured out how to get the boys’ attention.

It was all in an attempt to assert my individuality and how no one could control me. I made horrible decisions for myself, my body, and my life. All the while, I was attending a Christian university, and completed my degrees. On the outside, I still looked like the same Lindsey to friends and family, but on the inside, I was dying.

My junior year, I wanted to quit it all. I wanted to quit college; I wanted to get away from my “friends” who would influence me to drink and party. I started to go to church, and I prayed a lot. It lasted for a while, but old habits die hard. I eventually started drinking again and hanging out with the same friends.

In my senior year of college, I had a boyfriend named Matt. We dated for about two years, and we talked about marriage quite a bit. After college, I moved in with my best friend Courtney in Arlington. We had a large group of friends who all lived in the same area, and we hung out all the time. I thought I was in love with Matt, and that I would marry him. I was the perfect situation. We had the same circle of friends, and he came from a good family. God was not at the center of our lives, but he was raised in a Christian home, and he was a Christian, so in my mind, we were all good. I started getting this strange feeling though. We were watching a movie one night, and in the movie, a bride-to-be stood in the mirror and had second thoughts. I thought to myself, “That can’t be me.” I told Matt that I thought we needed a break. He left my apartment, and I broke down in tears. I thought I had made the biggest mistake of my life. I went to tell my roommate Courtney about it, but instead of comforting me, her response was, “We need to talk.” She proceeded to tell me that Matt had cheated on me—with her! My entire world crashed down on me. I not only lost my boyfriend, but now I lost my best friend! How was this possible? I ran to the only place I knew for comfort—God. After lots of prayer and healing, I was ok. I was able to function again. It wasn’t easy, but I did it. I realized then that it could have saved me a lot of heartache had I done it His way instead of my own. After a while, though, I started slipping back into old habits. God didn’t answer my prayers how I wanted him to. My trust in God faded a little. He didn’t move as quickly as I thought he should, so I “helped him along.” I started making decisions for myself again. I started doing what I wanted to do.

Then came Adam. Again, I knew what I was doing. God was taking too long to bring me a husband, so I was going to find him myself. He came from a good family, he was a Christian. Neither of us were really living what most people would call a “Christian lifestyle.” Then one day, I didn’t feel right. Something was going on with me that I couldn’t explain. Later that day, a positive pregnancy test explained it. And there I was. 26 years old. Pregnant and not married. How in the world was I going to ever going to tell my parents? What would all my friends think about me? I was ashamed. I was embarrassed. I was mortified. I would literally be carrying my sin in my belly around for nine months.

Adam and I quickly got married, because I was terrified to be a single mom. Our marriage was not built on God’s Word—we didn’t even pray together. I knew that I always planned on going back to church and getting back to God, and I was confident that we could come back to God together. As soon as Mikayla was born, I knew I had to get to church. I knew I had to renew my relationship with God. The closer I got to God, the further I got from my husband. To make a long story short, Adam decided he didn’t want to be married any more, and he definitely didn’t want to be married to a Christian. He made a lot of bad choices that hurt me very deeply. I’m not going to go into all of those, because you might meet him one day. Once again, my world came crashing down. This time, it was my family. It was my future – my kids.

When Adam left, I was devastated. The only place I knew to turn was up. God used this horrible, awful, heartbreaking experience to nudge me back to His plan for my life. So many times, we think that God’s plan for our life is scripted out. That we have to make all of the “right decisions.” I don’t believe that at all. I believe that God’s plan for our lives is to have an intimate relationship with Him. Everything else is just details.

God’s perfect plan for me was never for me to go through a divorce. His perfect plan for my life was to have an intimate relationship with Him. His perfect plan was for me to follow Him, put Him first in my life, and to never allow anything to come between our relationship.

Through my divorce, God revealed Himself to me in such a real and tangible way. He scooped me up and held me in His arms. He healed my heart beyond anything I ever thought possible. He taught me that my true love story has nothing to do with a man here on earth. He showed me that my true love story is written in the Bible. My love story is Jesus.

My whole life had been a series of ups and downs. I wanted to follow God, but I just couldn’t keep going after a couple months. As Jesus tells Peter in Matthew 26:41, “The spirit is willing, but my flesh is weak.”

But this time it was different. I finally “got it.” And here it is—I surrendered my soul to God.

Galatians 2:20 says “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

All those other times that I was trying to get my life straight, I was still holding on. I still refused to give over complete control to God. I wanted the relationship. I wanted God to be in the car with me, but I wanted to drive. What I failed to see was that’s not how God works. If you invite him into your car, you either allow Him to drive, or He will get out at the next stop sign. He doesn’t work that way. He’ll be waiting there to get back in, but He wants to drive. He HAS to drive. Allowing God that control in my life was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, because it’s scary. And remember, I vowed years ago that I would never let anyone control me, and now I have to give God control of my life? Plus, I didn’t even really know *how* to give God control.

It started with Luke 9:23: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.”

That means I have to decide—every day—decide to follow Jesus every day. It means that I have to choose to deny myself and what I want to do in order to do what God wants me to do. That’s hard. But it gets easier the more you do it. But when you love God, it gets really easy.

Mark 12:30 says, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”

Except that I didn’t even know *how* to love God. All my Christian upbringing and schooling, and here I was: I don’t know how to love God. Because here’s the question: how can I love God when I don’t always feel it? It’s because love is a choice. Love is an action. You choose to love. You choose to be thankful and rejoice.

I Thessalonians 5: 16-18 says, “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”

It doesn’t tell us to do it just when we *feel* like it. Action always comes before the feeling. You choose to love, obey, honor, and glorify God. The feeling comes afterward. The feeling follows after your attitude. If we wait until we *feel* like it to praise and honor God, we’ll be waiting a long time.

Not only did I have to learn how to love God, I had to learn how to be loved *by* God. If I was going to give God control of my life, I sure needed to make sure He was going to love me through it.

I John 4:8 tells us that “God is love.”

It's what He is. It's His state of being. How awesome is it that I am loved by Love Itself?

When God looks at me, His heart smiles. I make him exceedingly joyful. He beams with pride when He looks upon my face. He melts from the inside when he thinks about my name. ME! He feels this for ME! When I think about how much He loves me, how can I not help but fall in love with Him?

When we look at God this way, it makes it much easier to rest in Him and trust in Him that He is in control of my life. It makes it easier to believe that the things He tells me to give up - that I really want - aren't always what He wants for me.

Now say it to yourself:

When God looks at me, His heart smiles.

I make him exceedingly joyful.

He beams with pride when He looks upon my face.

He melts from the inside when he thinks about my name.

ME! He feels this for ME!

If that doesn’t make you smile, I don’t know what will.

If you are a Christian, then you have to believe the Bible—all of it—not just parts of it. That’s what the Word of God says about every one of you. Don’t you dare believe the lie of the devil who is whispering to you, “That’s not me.” The king of lies and the king of darkness will tell you that right now. Which one are you going to believe? The Word of God, or the word of Satan? It’s your choice right now.

Dear Lord, I pray for each one of these students right now. I pray that you would rest upon each person right now. Allow your Spirit to speak to them, and let them know that you love them more than they could ever imagine. I pray that those who are struggling with giving up control to you would be empowered to do so right now. “I give you control of my life, Lord.” Say it right now. You don’t have to say it out loud—just in your heart. If you mean it, say it. “I give you control of my life, Lord.” Lord, speak to your children. Let them know how precious they are in your sight. Let them know that they are safe and secure in your arms. Let them learn by faith and not by experience. I pray that you would pour out your spirit upon these students like you never have before.