Still Rising - The Beginning

This is not the end of the story.

I survived, but survival was never the destination.

Victory is not pretending life never hurt. It is learning how to rise when it did.

It is not about never falling down. It is learning how to wipe your feet and keep walking. Learning.

Growing. Becoming mature. Returning again and again to who God created me to be before life marked me.

Still Rising is not denial of struggle.

Some seasons hurt deeply. Some pits feel impossible to climb out of.

But there is a peculiar glory found in those places. A nearness to Jesus. A dying to old things that once felt familiar and comforting.

I carried things I was never meant to carry.

Yet somehow, through every hard season, the grace of God kept carrying me.

There were moments I barely had breath left in my lungs, yet the Lord breathed life back into me.

Moments peace walked into the room because I finally learned where my hope comes from. Where my help comes from. Who I can trust.

I am strong because God sustained me. I am resilient because I kept getting back up.

Never by my own strength.

I have fought battles silently. I have wrestled through dark places. I have had moments where I did not know how I would keep going.

But death did not win.

Jesus rescued me.

The grace of God carried me. The Holy Spirit helped me. Jesus never stopped holding me together when I felt like I was falling apart.

I have not arrived. But I know the direction I am walking.

The valleys. The breaking places. The hidden places. The places where grace held me together.

The story is unfolding.

I am living it.

I am telling it as I go.

What was meant to destroy me became the very place God taught me how to rise.

This has been a journey of discovery. Of healing. Of surrender. Of becoming who God created me to be.

If you knew me yesterday, you may not know me today.

Because God is not finished with me yet.

The story is not over.

He still holds me.

It is being written.

And because Jesus rose, I am still rising.