I've been musing for the past few days on the nature of my testimony, this "story about God" I'm presenting.
Is the idea to share as much information as possible? To convey only the core facts?
What perspective should I be focused on? Mine or God's?
How does my personal story relate to others' around me? What role does it play in God's grand narrative of redemption of humanity?
When I write, should I err on the side of total transparency or keep it clean for the general audience?
And what writing style should I use and do I have to adhere to it the entire time?
I trust these questions that I'm wrestling with will give you greater insight into how my brain works and processes situations. I was just reflecting back over the first three parts of my "testimony" and realized that each one was written in a different literary style. The first one was largely me telling the story of my life up to my very first love encounter with God. The second was more informational as I presented the various truths I was being challenged with during lecture phase in YWAM. And the latest entry consisted largely of analogies and word pictures.
I guess part of me wonders which approach is most effective so that I can hone in my direction and purpose for sharing. Right now, I'm obediently committed to finish sharing my full "testimony" with the rest of the online Christian SSA community. I do believe that once I'm done with this task it will signify the transition into the next chapter of my life. Hopefully it won't come as a huge surprise to too many of you here but I'm still actively working towards living in an offline state. And that's what makes this next chapter somewhat bittersweet. I'm super excited about the prospects of no longer retreating to the internet to process my life and instead do that with tangible people in real life as well as my own personal journaling with God. But I'm sad to give up some of the great friendships I've made here online as well. So many people were here for me when I felt like I was all alone with nowhere to turn.
Ultimately, it's my hope that everyone eventually embarks on a similar transitions to reality. In my mind, I feel like I'm dutifully leaving behind a complete set of instructions for anyone who might follow behind me and stumble upon this ol' blog of mine. The online community certainly facilitated a specific role in my life, it met some legitimate needs for a period of time, but it was only meant to serve as a season. I plan on sharing a more complete picture of what deintegration has looked like for me over the course of this last year and a half. I'll also outline what steps towards authentic Christian community look like as well. On the flip side, if anyone is interested in working through these steps and looking for a more direct form of communication then I would be more than happy to oblige. I believe very strongly in one-on-one discipleship and would love to share with anyone willing to invest the time and effort.
Until then, I'll continue to work on hashing out my full YWAM testimony and beyond so that I can share it in its entirety soon. Thanks for following along guys!
