Posts with the category “sanctification-stories”

As I share this part of my story, I can’t help but feel like I am a little behind for my age! Yet, when I look back and think about how I arrived at this point in my story, I realize that I am exactly where God had planned for me to be. I am a lifelong Christian that has had many opportunities to grow in my faith. Some good, some very trying.  I have experienced a lot of spiritual growth in the pa...  Read More

I grew up going to church. But not this kind of church. I did all the things—the things you were "supposed" to do. From Sunday school to sitting near the front row, I did it and thought it was the right way. It was a church of obligation, that box you check. Even doing "all the things" and being in church, I couldn't tell you a thing about Jesus or the Bible. In fact, I can't even remember opening...  Read More

I grew up in a small town in the heart of Illinois called Chicago. I grew up in a Christian home with my mother and five siblings, in a two bedroom apartment on the city's south side. We, for the most part, were happy and we had Jesus in our lives. Mom was the daughter of a southern pastor and we came from a long line of God fearing down-home southern Christians who knew and spoke the word of God ...  Read More

As the oldest daughter in my family, I was the first in many things. Perhaps the hardest was being the first to leave my father. He was not an agreeable man, unless, of course, you were agreeing with him.I was twenty-three, ready to leave for my first year of college. It was time for me to say good-bye. I went out into the backyard, looking for him. I found him, his face set like stone, staring ha...  Read More

The plane landed and my mask was completely drenched with tears and snot.  Before I boarded the two and a half hour flight from Charlotte to Madison I had called the CCU to check on my husband to see if he was still stable and if the CT showed anything new. The call had gotten disconnected, I was an absolute wreck.  My parents were there at the curb just as I walked outside.  Mom gave me a big hug...  Read More

My story is not one I particularly want to tell. It’s not one I like. Rife with drama, heartache and stupid decisions. Such is life I suppose.I grew up in a Christian home. Did the church-ey things like Sunday school and Awana. I accepted Christ young and got baptized in middle school. It didn’t become my own until high school when I made it my own. I was able to be in a small group that dove into...  Read More

It was as if I had heard “The Story I’ll Tell” message series 18 years before it was preached at North Ridge.  Three years before that I had been an unchurched, depressed teenager that was radically transformed by God’s grace during my senior year of high school.  Now as a college sophomore my faith had grown by leaps and bounds but there were parts of my sinful nature that needed to be addressed....  Read More

The book of Leviticus reveals the strict laws for people who have a disease/condition called leprosy. This disease causes one to be unclean and unworthy of living and worshiping God in the community. Instead, they were banished to live among other lepers outside of the city. They were required to live in shame by tearing their clothes, uncovering their head and expose their upper lip. They must in...  Read More

One of four amazing miracles our God has so graciously performed in my personal body and life played out on Interstate 694 in Minnesota. Having just flown into Minneapolis from Oklahoma on a flight that had been delayed one hour due to foggy conditions, a friend, Maxine, and I were intent on driving to Eau Claire with no additional delay in order to be on time for an appointment there.As I drove o...  Read More

You’d never guess that this was a day for an epic miracle merely by looking at the water.I’m staring. Staring at the subtle current, if you could call it that. It’s moving, but not even enough to be an official ripple. The liquid dances and somehow seems to return to where it was, but on a microscopic scale. I did what was asked… walked to the edge, laughed in the face of fear and doubt, followed ...  Read More

It was the summer of 2014, I was almost 21. That winter before my mom and six younger siblings finally left my dad, Paul. His cover was blown and his sins lay rotting and ugly in the light of truth. Accepting the cold, hard reality of the life I had lived this far, the abuse I and my family endured and my deep grief was suffocating.  My sister worked at a Christian summer camp and I had a lot to r...  Read More