Authors Note: This year I have invited a few guests to share part of their story for my audience. I will be posting at least one guest post a month through the end of the year. To begin it all is my brother, Christopher. He is a regular contributor to the Rebelution Blog and has recently launched a YouTube channel for young men called Wild:Life. In today’s post he shares about the power our stories have to influence others for Christ.
“He moved through the days in peace and wonder, for his whole story had been told for the first time, and he found that he was still loved.” – Podo Helmer from Andrew Peterson’s North! Or Be Eaten
The idea just popped into my head one day, kind of out of the blue. I was tired of people cowering in their shame, hiding their stories, and belittling their redemption. But what could I do? I was just a pipsqueak, barely seventeen at the time, with little talent and little experience. But I had a blog and a story.
Stories wield incredible power.
They can produce shame or expel it, promote failure or win victories, draw close or push away.
Remember that verse in Revelation which says we overcome the devil by the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony (Rev. 12:11)? That’s all? Blood combined with words overcomes the devil! In other words, Testimonies of Redemption are powerful things.
It is not an incidental that Scripture is composed primarily of stories and that Jesus taught primarily through parables? It is intentional.
I believe if we want to positively impact the world, we must start telling stories—good stories—historical, biographical, and fictional.
Let me explain why I think this way.
Although I have blogged since I was thirteen, I never had a passion for it until 2012 after my Mom was killed in a car accident. It was during this time (when I was seventeen with little experience) that I felt a deep drive to share everything on my heart, even if it was raw and rough around the edges. I blogged about my struggles with God, grief, and spirituality.
Around this time, I heard several stories involving some sort of sexual failure, all with one theme: nobody wanted to talk about them. Nobody wanted to talk about their failure. Even when there was reconciliation and victory, people were still ashamed of their stories.
This upset me for several reasons.
One reason is because the vast majority of men I talk to and know personally have failed sexually at some point in their lives. And a vast majority of young people who’s sexual stories I have heard or read about, both guys and girls, have viewed pornography at least once.
Therefore, it should surprise no one in the twenty-first century when someone confesses either past or current sexual failure. This is not an excuse, but it is nonetheless true.
The second and even more important reason I was upset that people hid their stories was because, as a Christian, I believe God’s grace is sufficient to redeem even the vilest of stories and His love covers a multitude of sins (2 Corinthians 12:9; 1 Peter 4:8; Proverbs 10:12). Again, this is not an excuse to sin, but it is nonetheless true!
If God has indeed forgiven us and no one in Heaven or on Earth can condemn us, then tell me: Who are we afraid of? Why are we shaming ourselves when Jesus took our shame to the cross? Why are we shaming those who fail when God the righteous Judge Himself refuses to use shame to bring people to repentance (Rom. 8:34; Is. 53:1-7; 1 Pet. 2:24; Jn. 3:17;12:47)?
It was with these thoughts stirring within me, that the Holy Spirit gave me a dangerous and frightening idea: Why don’t I tell my story?
And I did: I told my story of three devastating years trapped in pornography.
I had no idea what would happen. I feared the shame of people’s “surprise”; I feared rejection from from potential girlfriends or father-in-laws; I feared rejection from the few readers I had; but I knew deep inside that I had to tell this story. You see, it was a story that originally gave me the freedom and courage to confess to my parents, and I wanted to do the same for others.
I had to tell my story because it was no longer my story: Jesus had entered in, embraced the shame, brought redemption, and made it our story. It was a Jesus Story—not a Sinner’s Story, not a Shameful Story, not a Reputation Story: a Jesus Story. I was no longer exposing my shame, I was proclaiming my redemption! I was no longer protecting my reputation, but magnifying the name and wonderful reputation of Jesus Christ. This is why I am here! This is why I was saved in the first place: to glorify Christ!
As a result, I have lost track of how many guys and girls have told me they were spurred toward victory after reading what Jesus did in my story.
Satan doesn’t want Christians telling their stories.
As I said before, stories wield incredible power. Satan knows this. He hates our stories, he hates us, and he most definitely hates redemption. Thus, he uses his only weapon, Deception, to plant shame and fear in our hearts and minds. If he can keep us shackled by shame and fear, he can control us and keep us from freedom and freeing others.
The moment his lies are dispelled—shame broken and fear defeated—satan has lost not only our stories but potentially everyone we share with. No wonder he works so hard at filling Christians and their churches with shame and fear of man: he does not want us sharing our stories!
The Church is supposed to be the one safe group in the world free from shame and filled with grace and forgiveness. It should be the setting where people can freely share their faults and messy lives because everyone around them not only understands human nature but also the immeasurable grace and love of God.
The Church is where people call their brothers and sisters to repentance motivated by God’s love and kindness rather than shame. It is where people confess their sins openly, not to gain “eternal insurance,” but because they have felt Jesus and known His love. They have tasted and know that the Lord is good (Psalm 34:8).
So what is your story?
Why don’t you tell someone about it? It doesn’t have to be online or even public—it can be to a neighbor or a friend. And maybe, just maybe, you’ll find like old Podo Helmer that “his whole story had been told for the first time, and he found that he was still loved.”
