I Am . . .

Underneath my skin and buried somewhere deep in my soul, I knew I was a good and decent person, but for the life of me, I could not figure out why I was here or why I had to endure so much in my life. I had no purpose, felt no value, and saw little worth in myself.

With each failure, I felt defeated, and as the failures mounted up, they took me to deeper and deeper levels of despair. I would end up in great darkness, yet always sensing in my spirit that there had to be more than this in the world. Waves would crash around me, sometimes throwing me against the rocks. Life’s curve balls would hit me and almost take me out. By the time I was a teenager, I already wore the labels that said “Hello, my name is Failure, Mistake, Unwanted, Worthless, Unloved, and Rejected.” And I wore them for most of my life.

In spite of my best efforts and within my own strength, energy, and power, I tried to shake these labels and prove to someone, to anyone, that I was not these things; that I had value, worth, and purpose. But then the waves would crash me into the rocks again.

There isn’t much that hasn’t happened to me, whether by my poor choices or by others, things that no one should have to go through or endure, particularly as a woman. And when I would read Romans 8:28, which says that God works all things together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose, I would wonder how on earth He could tie all my messes and mistakes into anything good.

I think we often see God as this mean, controlling, vengeful being who just allows all this bad stuff to happen (in the world and to us personally) and does nothing about it. Especially for those who grew up with any amount of religion, we tend to see the God of the Old Testament, who sends floods to wipe people out or locusts to destroy crops and has already banished us all to hell. For a lot of years, hell is pretty much where I lived (or at least decided to visit for a very long time).

When I started to see things through the lens of the cross, the cross of Jesus, I saw a completely different God. I saw a Father Who loves all His creation—including myself. And when I stopped blaming Him for everything I had ever endured or done, and started embracing His vision of me, it was (and still is) a very powerful perspective.

Looking at life and myself through the lens of the cross, discovering how God saw me, even in all my mess, I started speaking His word over myself, and my life started changing—and changing in extremely positive ways.

Now, when I look back on it all, I see God’s hand all over my life, even when I was so far away from Him, but also when I hadn’t even come to Him yet.

God’s word is powerful. Discovering who you really are in and through Christ, and who you really are to God, is a powerful journey: a journey of forgiveness, redemption, freedom, and joy; a journey that leads to heaven and escapes the hells we can experience in our everyday lives; a journey that leads to a brand—new perspective of you. So my hope, my prayer, my dream, and my purpose with this book is to reach people who have experienced trials, defeats, and losses; who feel less than they really are; who are perhaps lost and don’t know the way out … because that’s where I was.