Faith Over FearExemplo

Fear of exposure kept me in hiding for nearly two decades, but this only led to loneliness and isolation. I didn’t share my story—my mess of a past—with anyone, except a handful of close friends, until about eight years ago. That means from 1994, the year God pulled me off of the streets of Tacoma, to 2011, I lived in hiding. I presented an image to my friends, our neighbors, and our church family of who I wanted them to see, terrified that somehow they’d discover who I really was—who I believed I was. Though I belonged to Christ, had been redeemed and transformed, my fears of exposure revealed I hadn’t learned to rest in grace.

I was living as if I was still a child of darkness, one flashlight beam from discovery, when God had reformed me into a child of light. My fear of exposure kept me in isolation, but God’s love patiently, gently drew me out. 

The more I understood His grace, the more I learned how to rest deeply in it, the more I realized I had no reason for shame and nothing to fear. He knew my worst regrets, the ugliest things I said and the most hurtful things I’d done, yet He loved me anyway. He was there watching every moment when I committed my most shameful sins, but not once did my moral failures turn Him away. Instead, they stirred Him to come close. They drove Him to the cross. 

Today, I share many of those stories I once kept so deeply hidden and I do so with courage, with both feet firmly planted in grace, because I know I’m forgiven. I know I’m made new. The person I once was doesn’t exist anymore. I am now, and forever will be, a child of God. 

~Jennifer Slattery