The Journey so far....

 

            There’s a story I once heard that never left me. Nearly a decade ago, I was in church listening to a couple share their testimony. A journey from years of barrenness to adoption. After seasons of prayer, heartbreak, and hope, they finally brought home a three year old boy.

            The new mother had poured her heart into preparing his room. She painted the walls, chose toys, decorated the crib and the bed with love. Every morning, she’d wake up early, her heart full of joy and anticipation, and tiptoe to her son’s room to check on him. But every time, she’d find him sitting quietly, already awake, never calling out.

It broke her heart.

            After waiting so long to be a mother, after longing to be needed, she couldn’t understand why her son never cried for her, never called out for anyone. Eventually, she asked the social worker, “Why doesn’t he cry?”

The answer was devastating in its quiet truth.

            The social worker explained that in many orphanages, the babies and children quickly learn that crying does not bring anyone. No one comes when they cry. So they stop. Not because their needs go away, but because they adapt to abandonment. They swallow their pain in silence. That little boy had survived by learning not to cry, and even in a loving home, it would take time to unlearn that lesson.

I think, in some way, that boy lived inside me too.

            I didn’t grow up in an orphanage. I came from a Christian home where everything looked fine from the outside. We were taught to hold ourselves together, to behave well, to not make a scene. I learnt young how to strive, how to be the best version of myself. But underneath the image was a quiet fear. That if I failed, I’d be unloved. Unseen. Left alone.

            At eighteen, I met Jesus through a student ministry on my university campus. I finally found someone who saw all of me and still chose to love me. Someone who didn’t demand perfection, but offered grace. I gave Him my heart. But deep down, I still clung to the belief that I had to earn that love. I couldn’t help it. Old habits die hard. And shame… shame is a powerful stronghold.

            Years passed. I moved countries, had children, faced all the ups and downs that life brings. But when things got hard, I didn’t cry out. I did what I always knew how to do: carry the burden quietly. I didn’t want to be a bother, even to God. I kept the pain neatly tucked away.

Just like that little boy.

        Then, in December 2020, something shifted. I began to experience prayer not as one-way pleading, but as conversation. I opened my Bible and, for the first time, it opened me. The Word didn’t just speak but I could feel it working inside me, teaching, comforting, confronting. A part of me began to thaw.

           But I still struggled to trust Jesus with the hidden parts. I couldn’t quite bring myself to let Him into the rooms where fear and failure sat in silence.

And then something happened.

            One evening, my ten-year-old son broke his hand in three places. I stood in the hospital, helpless, as the doctors pushed the broken bones back into place. He was heavily sedated, screaming in confused, drugged pain. And I couldn’t do anything. No mother wants to see her child like that. I wanted to take the pain from him. I would have done anything.

            That scream, that raw, unbearable scream, it cut through something in me. It reached the orphaned part I had long buried. It opened the places I had sealed shut. The helplessness, the ache, the longing… it all surfaced at once.

            Weeks later, I was listening to the song “You Unravel Me” when I felt the Lord whisper something to my soul:

“My body was broken too. The pain was real. The shame was real. The humiliation was real. I bore all of it. For you. Won’t you let Me understand your pain? Won’t you let Me carry what you’ve tried to carry alone?”

And I wept.

            After years of holding it together, I finally let go. I cried. Not in despair, but in release. I wasn’t strong. I didn’t need to be. I just needed to be honest. And Someone came.

“You number my wanderings; Put my tears into Your bottle; Are they not in Your book?”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭56‬:‭8‬ ‭

            Jesus didn’t just love the perfect version of me. He loved the frightened, hiding, exhausted version. He always had. I just hadn’t known how to be found.

            That’s why, after twenty four years of knowing Him, I chose to get baptized.  Not as a checkbox or tradition, but as a public declaration. I’m not an orphan anymore. I don’t need to keep proving myself. I’m not a slave to fear. I’m a child of God.

He split the sea so I could walk through it.

He unraveled me with melody.

And I stood and sang, because I was finally free.

“You unravel me with a melody

You surround me with a song

Of deliverance from my enemies

Till all my fears are gone

I’m no longer a slave to fear

I am a child of God.” ( Bethel Music Lyrics)

And if you, like that little boy, have forgotten how to cry because the people around you couldn’t hear, take heart. Your silence is not the end of your story. There is One who hears the cry you stopped making. Even when your voice fails, your tears are not lost on Him. He has counted every one of them. And when you are ready, He will come. Not because you were loud enough, or strong enough, but because you are loved enough.

You are not alone. Not forgotten. Not abandoned.

You are seen. You are heard.

You are a child of God.

“Though my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me.” Psalm 27:10

“For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.””

‭‭Romans‬ ‭8‬:‭15‬