I remember that day. I was struggling. For some reason my pain, my past, my broken parts were all coming to the surface in a wave. I was still in recovery mode from divorce. I’d been in a pretty traumatic car accident that should have killed me. I had started writing again and my rape at 19 years old had risen to the top of the page. It was not pretty. And I was, as I said, struggling. I had some good friends around me but I was struggling to overcome all of the voices in my head that seemed to be louder than theirs. I was struggling to find any purpose.
I was sitting in church and I honestly don’t even remember what the preacher was saying. It was like I was under water and I couldn’t breathe. In that moment with tears flowing and covering the page, I wrote, “Why didn’t you let me die? You had so many opportunities and yet you always brought me back from death’s gate. Why didn’t you just let me die?”
As I sat there trying to hold myself together, I heard God’s voice whisper in my ear, “Because I knew you’d live to tell about it.”
Psalm 118:17 (NIV) I will not die, but live, and will proclaim what the Lord has done.
I went home from church that day and began sweeping out the cobwebs and dusting off the shelves of my broken life. I figured if God was going to repair what was broken, I wanted to prepare the way. My whole world began to turn upside down. As I became more open to God stepping into the broken places, I began to heal.
Now I share my story freely. I think vulnerability creates safe space for others to share their story.
Psalm 118:7 (MSG) I didn’t die. I lived! And now I’m letting the world know what God did.
Sunpohari.
[written by Becky Thurman]