This past January, I had the privilege of serving at a youth camp, and it became one of the clearest reminders I've ever experienced that God truly wastes nothing.
During the week, I met two girls who were carrying incredibly heavy burdens. Both struggled with severe anxiety rooted in deep personal trauma. One battled body image issues, identity struggles, and depression, while the other wrestled with depression and the lasting effects of childhood trauma that had made it difficult for her to trust others.
As the week unfolded, I felt God continually drawing me toward them—not because I had all the answers, but because He simply wanted someone to be present with them.
One evening during worship, I noticed one of the girls sitting alone. I asked if I could pray for her, even though I had no idea what I was going to say. I simply felt God asking for my obedience.
What I expected to be a short prayer became nearly 25 minutes as words I hadn't planned began to flow. When we finished, she looked at me and asked why I had stayed with her for so long. She told me no one had ever sat with her like that before.
I was able to tell her that God had simply asked me to stay, and I wanted her to know she was worthy of being loved, seen, and cared for.
She later shared that she had never experienced God speaking to her so personally through someone else.
Throughout the week, I also spent time with her best friend. We talked, prayed together, and slowly she began opening up about the pain she had carried for years.
On the final day, I prayed over her one last time. As I prayed, I sensed God bringing specific things to mind that she had never shared with me. Afterward, she told me she felt lighter, as though a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. For the first time in a long time, she felt like she could breathe again.
Then she said something I'll never forget.
Before coming to camp, she had been questioning whether God even existed.
By the end of the week, she believed.
As incredible as those moments were, what God was doing in my own heart was just as significant.
Five years ago, I found myself in one of the darkest seasons of my life. I struggled with many of the same battles these girls were facing. I knew what it felt like to carry anxiety, to question my worth, and to feel alone in my pain.
I remember praying one night, "God, I don't understand why I'm walking through this. But if You can use my story one day to help another young girl who feels as alone as I do right now, then it will all be worth it."
Sitting across from those girls, I realized God had answered that prayer.
The pain I once begged Him to take away had become the very place from which He was able to bring hope to someone else.
Looking back, I can see that God never abandoned me in my suffering. He was preparing me to comfort others with the comfort He had first given me.
If there's one thing I've learned, it's that God is a Redeemer.
He takes our deepest wounds and transforms them into places of healing. He takes what feels like ashes and breathes new life into them. The seasons that once seemed meaningless can become the very testimony that points others to Jesus.
Our stories aren't defined by our pain, but instead by God's faithfulness.
I'm living proof that He can bring beauty from brokenness, purpose from pain, and hope where there once seemed to be none.
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