Cristi Emery, who attends Green Bay Community Church, shared her story of God’s redemption in her life. She wasn’t a believer growing up, got married at 19 and experienced the tragic death of her husband just months later, but then discovered God’s transformative power. Pastor Bobby Coverston used Cristi’s story as a springboard in his message at GBCC services on Sunday, August 31, to discuss how God uses both good and bad circumstances in our lives. Here are some talking points:
*How much time do we spend trying to rise above our pain, or pretend it doesn’t happen? Trying to deny the reality of our own pain, we can start to remove ourselves from our own story. We need to be honest about real life and what’s going on inside of us.
*Some of us long to be known yet we go on living a hollow existence. If the story of your soul is never told, if the secrets of your heart are never shared, if the struggles of your life are never heard, you will miss out on great opportunities to point toward God and minister to others.
*Bethany P. Haley said, “When your greatest heartache becomes your greatest ministry, grace comes full circle.” Why do we share our stories, which include pain and victory, joy and sorrow, and everything in between? It’s because we get to experience the fullness of grace. All along God was doing something in Cristi Emery’s life, even when she wasn’t proclaiming faith. He’s also working in all of us.
*Music provides a beautiful, powerful image about life. Ups and downs get woven into the symphony of our lives that God has created. In music, major chords sound happy and minor chords sound sad. As you advance in music theory, there are in-between chords that create dissonance and sound wrong and create tension – they don’t feel right and need resolution. A musical piece is a collection of major and minor chords, just like our lives are made up of happy and sad times. We all have a story that is filled with ups and downs. We are a symphony still being written. Our stories aren’t done.
*The thing that gives us hope is that the underlying theme God is writing into the song of our life is redemption. We are being redeemed. To know the sweetness of redemption, we have to know what we’re being redeemed from.
*Everyone has a story and needs to tell how God’s redemption has been written in their lives. Otherwise, you will experience the tragedy of an unobserved life. You are encouraged to plot the highs and lows that make up the music score of your life. What are the unique moments that changed the direction of your story? Get in touch with how redemption is happening in your own story.
