By Heather Martin
This article was originally published in PCJH’s Winter 2025 Pinnacle, “Testimonies of Faith”
John 16:33 says, “I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.”
God gave people a love of reading a good story, something that draws you in, pulls at the heartstrings, something you can connect to emotionally. The Bible is a wonderful example of Him using stories as a platform to help us learn more about Him while relating to people who existed so long ago.
Entering college, I sadly fell into a mindset that there were good and bad testimonies. A “good” testimony was extremely captivating, sometimes involving a near death experience or overcoming an addiction. People met God through these circumstances and ended up having a huge transformation overnight that led to being on fire for the Lord. I don’t want to minimize these kinds of testimonies because I truly believe they are amazing and God can work in amazing ways. I simply felt like I had a “bad” testimony.
I grew up in the church and learned about God from a very young age. He has always been present in my life and my faith solidified as I grew older by going to youth groups in middle school and high school, before moving on to a Christian college. I recall at a very young age (maybe four or five) having my mom’s friend sit me on her lap and recite a prayer repeating after her for Jesus to come into my heart and that I claimed Him as my Savior. It was very anticlimactic and not a remarkable story to keep people on the edge of their seats. Obviously, I was very young and at the time didn’t fully understand the importance of that prayer or what it truly meant, but I fully believe that I was saved then and I know with certainty that God has been a constant in my life ever since. He has placed amazing people in my life who have allowed me to learn more about Him and draw nearer to Him.
All of this to say, I have faced my own trials as a follower of Jesus Christ. In John 16:33 Jesus says we WILL face them: no ifs, buts, or maybes. One of the biggest challenges for me has been living with a deeply rooted belief of unworthiness, of never feeling good enough, of putting others above myself because I truly feel I am undeserving of love. It’s like having a pair of glasses that you use to see the world more clearly, or in this case, to see Jesus more clearly. Everyone has a different prescription because they grew up in a different home environment. Events in their life cause their eyes to focus differently, to need a different prescription from your own. Well, my glasses are filthy. There is this thick filmy residue of unworthiness that I have tried to scrub off, but it’s really stuck on there. By the grace of God, I’ll be able to wipe it off for a minute here or there and get glimpses of what I’m supposed to see, glorious glimpses, but then the residue comes back. I’ve been through a long journey of trying to discover my worth as a child of God and to clear the residue of unworthiness off of my glasses in order to see God more clearly. This is a lifelong journey, but God is holding my hand the whole way through.
It brings me so much joy that along this journey I have also been able to come full circle and work with children in this very church through Little Lambs, JOY Summer Camp and Youth Ministries by teaching them about Jesus and His love for them and by helping to form a small foundation of coming to know the Lord for themselves. Because that is precisely what allowed me to really come to know God growing up within the church. I am now capable of pouring into them and helping them see their value as a child of God.
Since taking on that mindset in college, I have learned that there are no “good” or “bad” testimonies: it’s all God’s handiwork in our lives and that is always GOOD. Just having a testimony and giving your life up to God is a beautiful, wonderful thing. That is all God wants. It is enough.