No matter how many years pass, the Word of God stands firm and His character remains true. 

Speaking of the passing years, week 15’s devotional takes us way back to being a child.

In fact, think back to being 5 years old again. 

I think of dancing, singing to Sing-Along videos (anyone else remember those?), playing outside and loving my army of stuffed animals and dolls that surrounded me.

Yet, I also remember that time as being when I started to notice others and care about their opinions. What I share this week may seem wildly far-fetched since it’s been decades but I promise it is what I experienced and why I feel so strongly about teaching our youth the Truth EARLY on.

I started feeling anxious and having body image issues at this age. I remember it as clearly as 35 years will paint you.

It was at that age of five when I noticed that I was taller than other girls. In fact, at dance class, I often thought to myself, “I want to be small like them.” Then, my recital dress ripped at practice & I had an accident because of nerves. That is when I felt feelings that I didn’t know much about. I just knew I didn’t like them.

I started to hear lies inside like, “If only I was shorter…” “If only I was smaller…” “If only I was prettier…” And we know where “If onlys” often take us…

It is when I started to be conscious about eating and my body. However, it was not cultivating healthy habits. Instead, it would lead me to an eating disorder unit at the age of 15 and decades of distorted body image/eating issues.

Yet so different from the journey that “if onlys” can take us on, God was with me and working. He was taking me through this journey of healing that I could never have drafted, to a freedom I hoped for but never knew truly existed #freedominchrist

It was one where I learned first-hand how faithful God is and that His promises are true.

You see when I was 15, I was told I would become a statistic but God promised me that I would NOT!

And that is the story that this week’s Truth Seeking Right Here and Right Now devotional shares. I pray it encourages you and gives God all the glory. Read the story here…

Have you ever prayed for something that never came to be? There are so many unanswered prayers that chances are, I will never understand. In those times, I pray and cry out to Jesus, putting them in the “compartment” of “I do not understand Lord.” However, today, I am reflecting on those requests that I am thankful God did not answer. #godswaysovermine

I think back to many prayers and even pleas I made to the Lord when I was in my teens & twenties.

All the opportunities I prayed would come, the doors I prayed to open, the friendships I prayed would stay, the relationships I prayed would turn into the one that lasted…

I often prayed for my Prince Charming aka the one that the movies told me would save me from my pain, loneliness, deep sadness and anxieties (Or so I thought). I drafted all the stories in my head of how it would happen, especially on long car rides with my family where my dad would play 106.7 and I’d envision the fairytale.

But that was flawed: a prince, boyfriend, nor husband would not save me.

Only Jesus could.

Still, I didn’t understand that yet and sought the fairytale in places I was not meant to stay, in chapters that would turn before I was ready for them to do so and in people that would be written out of my life’s script.

Take for instance, the relationship I prayed would work out in high school. I prayed, prayed and prayed. I wrote endless entries in my diary that sounded like this…

Dear God, Why not me? What have I done wrong? Please make him love me for me. Why not me? What can I change or do? Help me Lord. As always, thank You. ~ Jen

I had it (thankfully) wrong.

Yet, again, there was a moment that changed everything for me, a moment that I did not draft and one no one around me believed.

It was a moment where I had a taste of freedom and even more importantly started to learn an important lesson to carry through all ages and times.

It involved this Truth:

GOD HAS THE WILL.

AND HE IS THE WAY.

Here is the full story that brings us back to the late 1990s for Week 14 of the Truth Seeking Right Here Right Now devotional series.