I was born in a small town in the valleys of Colombia to a single mom, My dad was absent from my story since before I was born. When I was six, my mom married a kind Christian man who seemed to have reached us by God’s grace and rescued us from the hardships of poverty. My new dad taught me about Christ, and both he and my mom loved me with all their hearts. 

We moved to the U.S. where I had to learn to speak English and adapt to an entirely new world. I felt so different from everyone around me. I looked different. I was rounder with darker skin. I never truly fit in and felt so out of place in the world. From a young age, I wondered if anyone truly loved me, truly saw me.  

After some time, my dad took a job overseas, and we spent time living in the Middle East and China. My time in the Middle East exacerbated my already bitter and insecure heart and my rebellion. I was distant from my family and started to fall in love with the culture and religion around me. 

Shortly after, my dad moved us to China where we were part of a small Christian community in the city of Qingdao. Here I had Bible classes every day, I was taught by only Christian teachers, and I got to experience mission trips around China. I knew the story of the gospel and could write you essays about the Old Testament heroes, but it had not reached the inner parts of my heart. I was so blind and deaf to the love being poured out to me.  I had a heart of stone. I still longed for acceptance, attention, and assurance from anything other than the Lord Jesus. 

We moved back to the US when I was a sophomore in high school. I was more sheltered in China, but now I had access to all the things the flesh could want. For the next five years, I spent my days worshiping the god of my stomach and the culture (Philippians 3:19). I severely damaged the precious relationship with my family, and I missed the sweetest years of my little sister’s life.

This part of my story is so difficult to remember because I ran so deeply into the pit and made destruction my friend. I was covered in shame, I felt worthless, and because of my knowledge of the Law (1 Timothy 1:9), I knew I was far from the God I had heard of all my life.

But God in His glorious mercy for me, Stef, called me out of death and into His light. I found myself at The Porch after overhearing my classmate in college mention it (you never know who is listening). I heard Jonathon Pokluda proclaim the Gospel boldly -  about a life free from sin, shame, and condemnation. He talked about  how Jesus offered eternal life and peace with God and how I had been wasting my life and wasting away with it (Romans 6:23). It was like an avalanche of God’s love and grace hit me from there.

The Lord began to remove friendships and relationships from my life. He stripped me of everything that I had found identity in. He even moved our family from Plano to Little Elm, physically separating me from the influences around me. I was so thirsty for life because I had been a slave to sin and held by it so tightly. I started to attend re:generation in Dallas and found Watermark Frisco after meeting Destinee Valadez. She faithfully shared about the Body with me during an Unashamed event. I was given the courage to ask Karen Bundren to be my re:gen mentor, knowing very little of who she was, except the warmest smile on Sunday mornings. I confessed to her my darkest and most regretful actions at Kona Café (great coffee). She looked at me with tears in her eyes and told me about a God who loved me enough to die for each one of those actions (Ephesians 2), and that He would trade His place in heaven and suffer an unjust death to have me at His dinner table (Isaiah 43:1-7). Also, Jesus was the only one who could fill the God-sized hole in my heart, and He was eager to heal my wounds and call me His. 

I was placed into the most beautifully orchestrated community group and have found the sweetest friends who encourage me and point me back to Christ on a daily basis. Over the past five years, the Lord has been restoring all that the locust had eaten, sanctifying me, and maturing my devotion and fear of the Lord (Philippians 1:6). 

I will be the first to say I am the least of all. I don’t have any qualifications that could place me in this devotional except the extreme and majestic grace and mercy of a loving God Who would love a broken girl like me. He is so faithful to redeem what appears to be so beyond help. Today, I am still trying to understand (with all of you) just how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ for me. But now I can say I walk with Jesus. He is my Savior and my Lord. To know Him is to live, breathe, and see the fullness of life…

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

1. Whether your story sounds like mine or you’ve grown up in the church, what can you say God has saved you from? Give Him praise for that today. 

2. What is keeping you from living a life unashamed to share the gospel? 

3. Remember the years of the past. Can you trace how the Lord’s hand has always been guiding you to Him? Are you ready to fully follow Him, now?