Lydia S

I was saved at the age of four. I remember how I wanted to pray the same prayer over and over again because of how good it felt to ask Jesus into my heart. My Dad is a pastor and has been my whole life and my Mom is the worship leader at my church. I never had a “messed up” childhood and I always wanted to serve in the church. But I had always felt a certain pressure to be perfect and as I got older it got worse. People were looking at me different because of who my dad was. I started succumbing to the pressure.

At 13 I started cutting myself. I covered it up like it was nothing and acted like everything was just fine. I continued to serve in my church and was there practically every day, but I never read my Bible on my own and in my mind I didn’t need God to fix me. As my friends started caving into drugs, sex, alcohol, and other sins I felt like my “little” problem wasn’t comparable and that what I was doing was just my own way of coping. I didn’t realize how bad I had gotten till one day I couldn’t stop the bleeding. I sat on the floor and cried asking God where he was and where his love for me was. I was ignoring the fact that he was right there and that I had left him.

About a year after I had started cutting we held a youth conference at my church. During one of the studies the youth pastor teaching posed a question. He asked: when we are in a war against another country do the soldiers fight each other during the day but hang at each others houses during the night? Obviously not! They are in a battle against each other just like we are in a battle against the devil. So why do we act like we hate him but then in secret we hang out with him? That hit me like nothing else. I instantly started crying. I was so ashamed that I had called myself a Christian, a “little Christ” but then ignored him! I had left my first love.

As soon as the study was done I went up to the pastor and prayed with him. I felt completely renewed. My life has been changed ever since. God showed me I don’t have to be perfect. He died because I’m not. But even after this I harbored bitterness against people for years. But thankfully God used some incredible people in my life to help me let it go. I love Jesus more than anything, but now it’s for real! My name is Lydia and I have been ransomed from cutting, hate, bitterness, and fear.