That’s Me!

A young woman came to see me for the first time today. She shared that she is 17 and just graduated from high school. She has never been in trouble before and will never do anything like this again.

She has already been accepted to a prestigious university and hopes to be an attorney. However, she is so fearful because of what she has done that she will not be able to start school. If that happens she will lose her spot and they will not allow her to re-apply. She is in a special program and it is very restrictive.

This young woman shared that she believes in God, but He feels silent at times. She started reading from Doing Time with God, which is written by youth in lockup. The title from this excerpt is called Afraid to Succeed. The young person who wrote this explained how she was doing so well, her mom was proud of her, but fear set in. You see she wasn’t use to doing so well, so the pressure mounted and eventually she fell back into her old ways. She was ashamed to go talk to the chaplain because she messed up again. However, she was so glad she did. She came to realize that she needs to understand who she is in Christ and stop replaying the negative self talk. Instead she needed to hear the truth of who she is in Christ to drowned out the lies she and others tell herself.

After she was done reading this story, this precious young woman looked at me and said, “That’s me!

That’s me!” “God just did something there, didn’t He Beth.” Yes, yes, yes He did!!!!

We went onto discuss how she can trust in what God says about her and that she needs to throw away the lies that she and others tell her. I shared this verse with her…

“Let us now live up to what we have already attained…I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.” Philippians 3:16, 4:13

For many of us we fight those same battles and often times aren’t willing to be this transparent. I am thankful for each of these incredible young women who are willing to be transparent and openly deal with their struggles. Then in a moment God reveals Himself to them in a way they have never experienced. I feel privileged to be part of those moments.

Click here to invest financially in the lives of high-risk youth living in Winnebago Co. Contact us for more about opportunities to invest in these lives through prayer. Is God calling you to iInvest your time through serving the least of these? Contact us to learn more about new opportunities to volunteer with JJM.
Stateline Youth for Christ – Juvenile Justice Ministry – bfontana@statelineyfc.org or jrogers@statelineyfc.org