Love.
Freedom and love. Freedom and love. Freedom and love!
That’s what you have in Christ.
No condemnation. No punishment.
Only freedom and love.
And that freedom and that love are redeeming. They make you new. Literally.
That was the gist of my word for Johnjo.
And I was well equipped to give Johnjo this message, because it’s been the essence of my Race. My Race has been a walk of freedom. A walk of love. A walk of redemption.
When I showed up at World Race training camp last July I was a broken woman. A woman held captive and bound by the chains of my past. The thing was, I’d been wearing those chains so long I didn’t even realize they were there anymore. I thought I was fine.
After having my heart broken and my future plans & hopes crushed in college, I was empty. Everything I’d put my identity in had been stripped from me. I had no idea who I was. So I turned to substances to fill the void. I used men to make me feel validated, affirmed and loved. Not many people, if anyone, knew what I was really going through. Those that knew what I was doing assumed it was just my wild college phase. I was just having fun. That’s what I told myself too. But it was deeper than that. It wasn’t what I was doing that was as damaging as why I was doing it. I was broken and I was searching for band-aids.
The Lord was good to me. He brought me through the desert. He changed my heart. He healed me.
And once I was on the other side, I knew that I was forgiven. But I couldn’t forgive myself. And so I wasn’t free of my past. Everywhere I went , I carried my old self, my old burdens and my shame around on my back, always believing I wasn’t really worthy of being loved – by the Lord or even by a future husband. It was exhausting. But I thought I was free. Because it had been so long since I was free, I couldn’t remember what real freedom felt like.
And then at training camp the Holy Spirit collided with my life. And in a period of twenty four hours, the chains were broken. The truth of God’s word settled in my heart.
There is no condemnation in Christ!
It is for freedom that Christ set us free!
And I was free. And I started walking in that freedom.
Through launching for the World Race and my first month on the field, the Lord continued to speak to me about my freedom and what it means. He used the people around me to encourage me and show me new things about myself and my heart and my past. He whispered to me:
In freedom there is redemption. In redemption there is freedom.
You’re free. And that means you’re redeemed. And that means you can talk about your past.
You’re free. You’re redeemed. And that means you’re new.
And so for the very first time, I began to tell people about my past. But more than that, I started believing some things about myself:
I’m not defined by my past.
The Lord loves me no less because I chose to fill my broken heart with the world instead of Him.
He loves me, because He loves me. Because He loves me, because He loves me.
Because of His love, because of His redemption, I am new.
My body and my heart and my mind and my spirit are new.
And so I can walk with confidence and in freedom. Because of who He is. Because He loves me.
Believing those things has changed me radically.
The shame has fallen away.
And so as I finally got Johnjo to look me in the eye, I spoke with confidence. Because I wasn’t speaking to him about hypothetical situations. Or hypothetical forgiveness . I was just telling the truth of my own story. And I was speaking as a woman set free.
He listened. He smiled. He nodded. And when I was finally finished telling him my story and how much freedom and love and redemption he had waiting for him in a relationship with Jesus, I exhaled, waiting as Ernest exchanged a few lines with him in Swahili, certain Johnjo would ask us to come back later.
But he didn’t.
He asked us to come inside.
And he asked us to pray with him for a relationship with Christ.
Freedom. Love. Redemption.
They are mine.
They are Johnjo’s.
And they are yours.
