Ryan's Story

Ryan Truax from ZOE Church in Los Angeles, CA shares his story about moving from pain to purpose in this video.

The Worth of a Soul

Hannah Clarkson from Huddersfield, England, Rahil Patel from London, England and Ross Mcintyre from Livingston, Scotland share their stories about how they went from pain to purpose in life. 

Motherhood, Pain and Perfection

DawnCheré Wilkerson sits down with Julia Veach to talk about motherhood, pain, and perfection.

Drugs, Prison & Second Chances

Michael Carroll talks about how from a young age he was carrying around a lot of guilt and shame in life. The trauma that he and his sister went through as children caused Michael to become a very angry young man. He started smoking weed as a teenager and was looking for different ways to numb the pain in his life. At age 16 he became very rebellious, moved away from home and started selling drugs with his friends. Michael eventually got sent to prison which became a turning point in his life, in prison he surrendered his life completely to the Lord and started reading a Bible and getting to know God. Today Michael is serving in ministry and is passionate about sharing a message of hope and deliverance to other people who come from different broken situations.

Through the Eyes of a Lion

Four years ago pastor Levi Lusko and his wife Jennie went through their most painful experience in life so far when their daughter Lenya died. When we are faced with pain and hardship in life what comes next will depend on what lens we choose to view our circumstances through. Levi Lusko preaches a powerful sermon at Life Church about perspective and the pain in our lives.

Marky's Story

Tears were streaming down my face as I listened to Marky's story for the first time at Elevation Church on Sunday. Each one of us will experience a lot of pain during this life on Earth, in one way or another. We can't change that, but what we can do is decide how we will approach this life. We can decide to be fighters facing our fears and the pain in this life with great faith and courage. We don't have to give in to despair and become depressed, we have a great hope in God and we know that although this life is painful it is temporary. Eternity awaits us just around the corner and we don't know how many more days we will get on this Earth, but while we are here we can choose to either live in fear or by faith.


Jesus could endure the pain of the cross because he was focused on the joy set before him. We too can either focus on everything that is wrong right in this moment or we can choose to look ahead. No matter what difficulty we face in this life it's only temporary, eternity is what comes next after this life and that is forever.


When my soul is secure in Christ I can hold on through all the storms of life and know that one day soon there will be no more tears, no more pain, no more death and I will be with God forever. I can keep running this difficult race called life with courage and hope because I know it will soon be over. Once this life is over the only thing that will remain is what I did for Christ. Did I spend my life on complaining and arguing with others or did I take every opportunity I got to serve God through loving Him and loving people? I want to be a fighter like Marky and not waste my time on Earth on complaining about what I can not change, but rather focus my energy on loving God and loving the people God brings into my life.

Annie's Story

Annie Lobert's life story gives me tears in my eyes as I listen to it. Annie grew up feeling unlovable and was desperate for love and attention. She graduated high school heartbroken and with a resentment towards men that made her long for revenge. As a young adult Annie became convinced that money was the answer to all her problems and she was willing to cross many of her own boundaries to get it. After years of pain and sorrow Annie ended up having a near death experience, she nearly died of a cocaine overdose, this experience became the turning point in her life. Today Annie has found the peace, freedom, acceptance and love she always longed for in her life.

It's Friday!

All dressed up for Date Night with the man in my life on Monday.

Good coffee + a good book = Self-care

The week started on a good note with a fun Date Night with my hubby on Monday evening, then the rest of the week was mostly difficult, painful and included a lot of sadness. This is life, sometimes it’s wonderful and sometimes it hurts. My main goal for this weekend will be self-care. After a hard week I won’t make any big plans for Saturday and Sunday, I just want to rest and be kind to myself. I plan to spend some time at a coffee shop somewhere in the city this weekend, enjoying a latte and taking the time to read “Find Your Brave” by Holly Wagner. I’ve only read half a chapter in the book so far and I already love it! I wish you all a fun and relaxing weekend!

How we view our problems matters

When we are in a season of confusion and pain in life our perspective becomes very important. God's perspective and my own perspective will be very different. Most of the time I aim for an easy and trouble-free life so it's not surprising that I get frustrated when I hit a roadblock in life. When I find myself in a painful season in life it's always tempting to blame somebody else for my pain, but I can make the choice to let the circumstance make me better rather than bitter. What looks like a problem to me might just be God's provision for my life. What may look like a failure to me might just be what God brought into my life as the training ground where he will make me stronger and better than before.


Pastor Charlotte Gambill from Life Church in England teaches us what we can do when we find ourselves in a confusing and painful season in life. The thing that can save us during a difficult season is the people we surround ourselves with. When we are going through a painful season we are always tempted to isolate ourselves, but in isolation we will only get more angry, more frustrated and more sad. We need to surround ourselves with people who won't only tell us what we would like to hear, but the things we need to hear. It's also important to not let certain people speak into our lives during a painful and confusing season in life. There will always be people who will be quick to tell us why we don't have what it takes to overcome the challenge we are faced with. We need to make the choice to surround ourselves with people who can encourage us during the difficult seasons of life, not people who add discouragement and help us stay stuck in life.


It's important to remember that although the problems we face in life can be really frustrating God's perspective is much bigger than ours.What we view as our life's biggest mistake might just be what God will use to shape us into someone who can help others more than someone who hasn't made that particular mistake in life. What we view as a threat to our plan for the future might just be God redirecting us toward a direction that will bring more good things to our lives than we could ever imagine.


Josef's story in the Bible is one filled with roadblocks but God used all the hard stuff in Josef's life to build incredible character in him. Josef was quite arrogant as a young man but after years of struggle he had become a man of great character and integrity and that's when God gave him a very influential role in the land. Josef's older brothers viewed Josef as a problem and decided to get rid of him, little did they know that the same person they viewed as a problem was going to one day save their lives. Perspective changes everything. If we keep staring at our problems all we will ever see is pain and hardship. We can choose to lift our eyes and trust that God is working in all things for the good of those who love Him. What the enemy sent our way to try to destroy us God can turn around and use it for good.

A Response to National Pain

We live in tumultuous times and if we only look at what we see in the news this world can seem hopeless and scary. We face many different problems in our world; political problems, climate change, human trafficking, racism, natural disasters, war, terrorism etc. It’s easy to become so over-whelmed by these problems that we become fearful, worried, angry and start blaming and hating on each other. We look for quick explanations and someone to blame for all the disasters that we together as a human society have created. Finding someone to blame might make us feel better for a little while, but it won’t make the problems we face any smaller. Each one of us get to choose if we will be a part of the problem or a part of the solution. As Christ-followers we are called to be carriers of the answer, not carriers of anger, carriers of hate, carriers of prejudice or carriers of “I told you so.”

We all have very different opinions on the situation and the tremendous problems we face but in the end the only thing that matters is what God thinks. What does God ask us to do in times of trouble and despair? Judah Smith teaches a sermon about the racial injustice in America but this message can be applied to any problem we face because it all comes down to how we choose to live.

The first thing we need to know is that our pain matters to God, God is grieved by our pain, but God is not worried or fearful. God is the answer to our pain and He is totally and fully in control. The second thing we need to know is that how we choose to live our lives matters. When we look at our problems in the world it can be tempting to say: “God, how could you allow this to happen?” The answer is simple; from the beginning of time we have been given free will by God. We are where we are today, both in our personal lives and as a society, because of our choices. We all have free will and over history we have (and we continue) to put ourselves in these painful situations because we don’t choose God and His ways, we choose our own way. The Bible calls this pride.

Judah Smith talks about how although our political systems and experts are important in our societies we will end up in despair if we put our hope in them. God doesn’t call us to believe in people, because humans can not save this world. God calls us to put our hope in Him. If we look to our experts and politicians to save this world we will constantly be disappointed and let down because we are placing a burden on them that was never meant for them to carry. It's a burden too heavy for any human to carry. God sent Jesus to carry this burden for us, so that we wouldn’t have to carry it. Jesus didn’t come to Earth just to save us from the grip of evil, he came to save us from ourselves. We tend to be quite self-destructive in our ways sometimes. It’s not surprising that we continue to end up in trouble and despair when we insist on living our lives apart from God. Outside of God’s will the enemy is waiting and he will be quick to use our free will to steal, kill and destroy everything that is good in our lives and in our societies.

Every human-being, whether expert, politician or regular person is flawed, but God is flawless. As Christ-followers we put our hope in God, not in people. Humans don’t have what it takes to save the world. We need God. There is no hope for humanity without God because the enemy won’t stop fighting to have our souls. This truth is often one of the hardest truths for humans to accept because our pride is strong within us. We want to be able to say: “We’ve got this! We don’t need God.” I’ve been in situations like this many times, where I have been insisting on overcoming a struggle on my own without asking God for help or guidance. When we act like we don’t need God it feels like swimming upstream, you work hard but you get nowhere. Children can’t make it in this world alone, every child needs his/her parents, and in the same way we were created to need God. Our pride pushes God away and we don’t want him, but that doesn’t change the fact that we need him.

We all carry a responsibility on our shoulders to take good care of the world we live in, but if we exclude God and think that we will be able to save this world on our own we will become exhausted, hopeless and fearful. We were never meant to face these gigantic problems on our own, we have a God who loves us dearly and who is fighting for us every minute of our lives. Why do we fight against a God who loves us and wants good things for us? Pride is the answer. How many times have we experienced the same situation with our own children? We know what’s best for our children and we try to help them but they don’t want to listen to us.

For some of us, the first thing we need to do in the battle for a better world is to come to God on our knees and let him carry our troubles, to cast our cares on him. We were never meant to carry these burdens alone. When we seek God’s help in our troubles He will give us His peace, joy and strength. When we take on our battles in life with the protection, provision and guidance that God offers us the journey will look very different. It won’t be an easy life but we will no longer have to live weighed down by fear, worry and anxiety. God will make a way through every storm for those who seek Him and His will for their lives. I know these things to be true not just because I’ve read about them in The Bible but because I’ve seen God do amazing things in my own life. I get tears in my eyes as I write this because I am so humbled as I think about how great God’s love is for me. I don’t deserve this great love in any way but He keeps giving it to me anyway and I will make sure I’m always ready to receive it.

“Cast your burden upon the LORD and He will sustain you; He will never allow the righteous to be shaken.”

Psalm 55:22

“Commit your works to the LORD and your plans will be established.”

Proverbs 16:3

Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that He may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.”

1 Peter 5:6-7

“Keep your guard up. You’re not the only ones plunged into these hard times. It’s the same with Christians all over the world. So keep a firm grip on the faith. The suffering won’t last forever. It won’t be long before this generous God who has great plans for us in Christ – eternal and glorious plans they are! – will have you put together and on your feet for good. He gets the last word; yes, he does.”

1 Peter 5: 9-11

Lost and Found: Finding Hope in the Detours of Life

Sarah Jakes had big dreams and hopes for her future but after a series of bad choices she found herself in a place in life where nobody wants to be. When Sarah's marriage ended after a lot of hurt and rejection she could have let her pain dictate her future, but instead she chose to use her story to help others find healing and redemption in life. Sarah Jakes shares her story in a very honest and vulnerable way in her book "Lost and Found: Finding Hope in the Detours of Life". Sarah's story offers hope and encouragement and reminds us that no matter how lost we feel in life we can be found again.

Adopting siblings

I love listening to people's adoption stories because it's so nice to get to see the happy ending to every journey. Every adoption journey is a great love story. Every adoption includes pain and hardship, sometimes it's from an unplanned pregnancy, or parents who are addicted to drugs, have mental problems or are financially not able to take care of a child. Every child that needs a new home has gone through hardship. The adoptive parents have also gone through their struggles, many times they have struggled with infertility for years. Every time a new family is created through adoption it brings hope and healing and something beautiful can come out of all the pain in the end. Love has conquered over darkness.


This video tells the story of how three boys who had lived in many foster care homes finally got their forever family and a place to call home. Veronica became the adoptive mom of three boys and her biological son Styles was finally able to have brothers, which he had always dreamt about.

Diego's Story

Diego Martinez experimented with different types of drugs and was part of gang culture in high school. After Diego's girlfriend died from breast cancer he experienced a deep loss and pain that no drug could take away. One of Diego's friends at the gym recommended that he would try out Oasis Church in LA. God's love gave Diego a new chance at life that changed everything.

What's my purpose?

Personal development are one of my biggest interests, as you can probably tell if you have been reading this blog for awhile. It excites me to hear stories about people who have overcome great obstacles in their lives and found healing from a very painful past. Every life on this Earth will include both joy and pain so I find it very encouraging to learn from people who have been through both.

One of the most encouraging things about being human is that we can choose what kind of life we want to live. We don't have to stay the way we are, we can grow and develop every year if we are willing, and live to see change we never even thought was possible. There are many different ways we can grow ourselves every year, one of my personal favorites is reading books. I seldom read fiction these days, I love reading Christian books and psychology books because they help me grow the most as a person.

Every year I read 1-2 books that end up changing my life forever and that alters the way I see the whole world. A couple of years ago I read "Drunk tank pink" by Adam Alter, a psychology book about how our environment shapes our thoughts and actions. This book totally changed how I view the world around me. This year one of the books that has changed my life the most is "Restless" by Jennie Allen.

 "Restless" is a book about figuring out the purpose of your life and seeing how your gifts, passions, places and relationships aren't random but deliberate and meaningful. Even the suffering we have experienced in life plays a part in our life purpose. Jennie Allen explains that where we have experienced the greatest suffering in our lives might just be the place where we are the most passionate to create a positive change in this world. If you have gotten tired of living a life without a clear direction this book will help you see your whole life from a new angle and figure out what you were placed here on Earth to do.

One year in a few pictures

I like taking a moment to think about the year that has passed and feel thankful for all the wonderful things I got to enjoy during the past twelve months.

The winter of 2015 was cold and we had a lot of snow in Toronto that I could enjoy.

In February my parents came to visit us in Toronto and we decided to take a trip to Collingwood together.

We visited the Scandinavian Spa in Collingwood which was an awesome experience, I dream of going back there again in 2016.

Spending a lot of quality time with my family during the winter was wonderful, we had a lot of fun!

In March my husband and I celebrated our 3rd wedding anniversary. We celebrated with a mini version of the same kind of cake that we had for our wedding three years ago. I love being married and I love the taste of wedding cake!

During the spring of 2015 I enjoyed looking at all the beautiful flowers in the suburbs.

I love tulips, and the park is so beautiful during the spring!

We decided to take a road trip down south during the spring, we spent a few days at Myrtle Beach, SC and a couple of days at Virginia Beach, VA.

Vacation time, my husband and the beach, what else can a girl ask for?

I enjoyed getting back to hiking again as the weather was getting warmer.

In June it was time to celebrate the Scandinavian holiday Midsummer's Eve with wild flowers, a barbeque and strawberry shortcake.

The Pan Am Games came to Toronto during the summer of 2015 and the city was filled with people from all over the world.

We took a trip to New York City during the summer to celebrate my 30th birthday.

I love being able to sit outside all night long during the summer when it never gets cold.

One of my favorite things that we did during the summer was take many trips to Wasaga Beach,ON to go swimming in Lake Huron.

During the fall of 2015 I enjoyed hanging out by the lakefront and the marina.

I decided fall was the perfect time to get back to healthy eating again after a summer of eating a lot of burgers and ice cream.

My favorite workout during the fall was taking long bike rides along the lakefront.

It was great to be back to the city life after spending a lot of time relaxing in the country during the summer.

On a sunny fall day we took the ferryboat out to the Toronto Islands and spent the day relaxing in the park and enjoying the beautiful views of the city.

Then came December and it was time to start celebrating Christmas and look forward to a new year. As I look back at all the fun things I got to enjoy during 2015 I feel very blessed and thankful. The year also brought some sad news into our lives, like when we found out that a close friend of the family had passed away very suddenly. The adoption process we started during year 2015 also ended up taking a lot longer than we had expected.

Every new year tend to come with both great moments of joy and sad seasons of mourning. Life is a journey with both ups and downs along the road, but I find it helps to remind ourselves of all the good times to be able to hang in there during the harder times in life. No matter how hard the season of life we are in is it will pass eventually.

All the hard things we are going through in life also become easier to carry when we share our pain and suffering with other people. We are not meant to do this life alone. Let's make year 2016 a year when we choose to mourn with those who mourn and rejoice with those who rejoice, let's do this journey together!

Hold It Down

It's an awesome feeling you get once you have finally figured out your purpose in life. You now live life with a whole new passion and energy, but what happens when you run into some really big obstacles on your journey? It's one thing to find the purpose for your life and it's another to actually finish what you've started. How do you manage to keep your faith when you run into disappointment after disappointment or failure after failure?


Pastor Nick Nilson from Lakewood Church teaches us how to "hold it down". Nick knows what we need to be able to stay strong in the midst of the struggles in life and how we can stay on track even when everyone around us is waiting for us to give up already. I like what Nick Nilson says closer to the end of the sermon: "Oftentimes just after our greatest setback in life we experience our greatest miracle in life."


If we would have decided to give up that moment when everything seemed so hopeless we would never had gotten to see the miracle. The reality is that life on earth will include some really hard struggles and pain, but when we find the hope and strength to "hold it down" even when things look bad we will get to see the miracle at the end.

What Causes Pain and Suffering?

Pain and suffering, if we could just get rid off those things our world would be so wonderful.We all know that this world is full of suffering, that it isn't really possible to live on this earth without experiencing pain to some degree. Today many of us are blessed to live in countries where there a lot less pain and suffering than there used to be a few hundred years ago, but that doesn't mean that it hurts any less when pain enters our lives. It's so devastating. We all wonder why these things happen, what's the source of all this pain?


If there really is a God then how can he allow all this suffering in the world. The Bible makes it clear that there are two different forces in the world, there is God, and then there is evil. We can call evil the devil or darkness or whatever we like, but we can't fight the fact that evil is real. Wherever there is lack of love evil flourishes. Children who grow up in homes without love doesn't become very nice people to be around. Countries with political systems that aren't based in love aren't very nice places to live. In places and people where there is absence of love there is great darkness.


Although we try to protect ourselves from evil with laws, alarm systems on our homes etc. we are never fully removed from the presence of evil. We live in a world with both good and evil and the only real way to get rid off evil is to "kill it" with love. When we fight evil with more evil it only grows, but when we choose to fight evil with love there will be a little less evil in the world every time.


For as long as we live on this earth we won't be able to escape having to live in the presence of both good and evil, but we can choose in what direction we want to walk. Do we want to spend our lives spreading more love into this world or do we want to practice revenge and other behaviors that only create more evil? It's a hard reality we live in, but we all have to choose what side we want to be on. We can choose to love or we can choose to hate. When we choose to follow God we choose love, because God is love.

"Where there is love, there is God."
Mother Teresa

Do Something

You often hear people say I don’t believe in God because if there was a good God up there in heaven looking down on us he wouldn’t allow so much pain. This way of thinking makes sense in a way, but when I think of God as our Father in heaven it helps me understand God’s plan better. God created the earth and everything was good, then he created us and the trouble started. This scenario makes me think of how most couples have a pretty nice life together, until they have kids, then the troubles start. Just kidding! J

Although, it does help to think about how we relate to our own kids when they misbehave to better understand how God relates to us. When our kids get themselves in trouble what do we do? Do we clean up all their messes for them and let them get away with bad behavior? No we do not, or at least if we are good parents we don’t clean up all our children’s messes. We tell them to clean up their own messes, under our guidance and supervision of course. We don’t abandon them in their troubles, but we don’t do the work for them either, because we know that they need to deal with the mess themselves to be able to learn from their mistakes.

I believe God relates to us in the same way, when we get ourselves in trouble he wants us to figure things out, but he will never leave us alone in our struggles. God will always be by our side to strengthen us when we are weak and to guide us when we are lost. If we come to Him with our problems he will always offer us help, but he won’t do the work for us, because he too wants us to learn something from our mistakes and grow into better people than we were before.

It’s tempting to blame God for everything that is wrong in our world but when we think about the fact that God has created seven billion solutions for the problems in this world (us) then can we really put the blame on him? God has done his part, he has created each one of us with one or many gifts and skills. We are all equipped to “do something” in this world, but we choose if we are going to put these gifts to use or not.

 

I can choose to sit back and complain about everything that is wrong or I can turn my focus towards the particular task that God has created me for.  Each one of us is the solution for some particular problem in this world, but as long as we choose to stand still and do nothing not much will change will it? It’s time for us to do something! J