Share Your Story

“Your story is the key that can unlock someone else’s prison. Share your story.”

This quote is hauntingly bittersweet to me.

To tell my story, I’d have to bear my soul. To bears one’s soul is to break down the walls so carefully erected for sanity and self-preservation.

To tell my story is to rip open all of my wounds and scars exposing every hurt, shame, and humiliation… as well as the years of assaults on my heart and mind while telling the world, “Would ya take a look at that?!”    

I can barely process the things I’ve seen, the places I’ve been, the deeds I’ve done, and the events that have happened to me much less put them into words for all the world to see.

How can my story unlock anyone else’s prison?

In Luke 22:31-32, Jesus is sharing the Passover meal with His disciples when Jesus turns to Peter and says,

^“Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.”

Peter was about to take a beating.

Sifted wheat was first beaten and crushed in order to separate the outer shell, the inedible chaff from the edible seed. It was then sifted or shaken in a sieve with jagged-edges that literally tore and pealed the chaff away from the seed, then discarded it though the sieve to blow away in the wind.

Satan wants nothing more than to beat, crush, and then sift us over jagged-edges until we are so torn, exhausted, and desperate that we let go of our faith and watch it fall through the sieve to blow away in the wind.

But God…

God allows the beating and crushing in the trials of our lives, the struggles we face, and the hardships we endure for the sake of strengthening us, building us up, making us stronger and stronger until all the chaff in our lives, the things that don’t look anything like Jesus, falls through the sieve to blow away in the wind.

Notice this … Jesus said,

 “…but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.”

We are going to find ourselves in the deep, dark prison cells of trials, struggles, and hardships…but Jesus is praying for our faith! If we will exercise our faith in the darkness, His light will break open the prison doors and we will walk out strengthened, built up, and stronger.

Then GO!

Tell your story…strengthen those who are in those same prison cells that you have been set free from.

Rip open the wounds and scars and let the light of Jesus shine into all of the dark places you have been sifted and say, “Would ya take a look at that?! Look at what God brought me through! Look what HE did in my life! He is faithful! Don’t lose hope…keep the faith!”

Each blogger at the Waterfall of Grace has a story to tell… Some stories are heartwarming, some are tear-jerking; but all share the hope we have in Jesus. 

We pray that by sharing our stories we can present the key of hope so that you can be encouraged and strengthened in faith as you trust God to bring you out of the prisons of your life and tell your story.

 “Your story is the key that can unlock someone else’s prison. Share your story. “

Soli Deo Gloria

Have you shared your story?  We would love to hear them in the comments below!!!

Meet the Blogger – Read Laura Robinson’s Bio