The Gift Hiding in Your Faith

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2 Timothy 1:6 – “For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands.”

The day I discovered I could decorate cookies was the kind of day that you press your forehead to the window glass. Cold. Wet. Rainy.

I was little, and let me tell you, growing up, I didn’t spend much time in the kitchen. Baking, cooking, anything involving an apron? That just wasn’t my scene. I was the girl with scraped knees and a dirt-smudged ball cap, more interested in climbing trees than learning how to simmer or sauté.

But that dreary day, stuck inside and restless, I found myself asking, “What can I do today?”

A few weeks before, I had met a woman who was an artist—but not the gallery kind. Her canvas was soft-baked sugar, and her paint was glossy royal icing. I remember her saying, “You don’t have to be Leonardo da Vinci to make something beautiful. You just need to enjoy the process.”

She must’ve seen the doubt in my eyes, because she followed it up with, “Come over sometime. I’ll show you.”

So that rainy afternoon, I took her up on it.

She set out the piping bags and cookies. I followed her lead, awkward at first, like I was writing with my left hand. But hour by hour, the icing began to turn into art. The cookies started to look like something someone might actually buy.

And more importantly, I felt… creative.

Turns out, God had tucked something inside me that I never knew was there. I had always assumed creativity was reserved for the artsy kids with glitter pens and sketchbooks. But here was me, the tomboy, squeezing swirls of color onto little edible canvases and loving it.

Now, I decorate and sell custom cookies through my little online business: Taste of Tallulah. It still amazes me to say it out loud. What started as a rainy day experiment was the start of a God given talent I never knew I had.

And I wonder—what might He have in store for you? Don’t talk yourself out of it.

You don’t need permission from the world to try something new. You don’t even need good weather. Just a little curiosity, a little courage—and maybe some powdered sugar.

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What Do You Know, Joe

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Psalms 34:18 — The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.

Joe came from a well-off family. They weren’t uber-rich, mind you. But they were comfortable. He grew up going to decent schools. He wore high-end clothes. He may or may not have worn monogrammed underwear.

When he turned 18, he was going to join the military like his dad, the officer, wanted. But there is a well known saying in the military, “You can’t make chicken salad out of chicken excrement.” We are who we are.

Joe just wasn’t the military type. He was creative, he wrote poetry, for crying out loud. So he went to college instead.

Turns out, the poet was a great student. And he realized something important during college: He liked teaching.

So he got a job as a private tutor. It was a fun gig. He taught the children of a good family, and life was shaping up nicely.

Things got even better when he met a girl. She was lovely. Charming. They became obsessed with each other, constantly annoying all those around them with PDA.

It wasn’t long before they were engaged. Joe was probably happier than he’d ever been. They started planning the wedding.

Only days before the big event, there was an accident. It all happened so fast. His bride-to-be drowned. The accident happened right in front of Joe. His was the last face she saw.

Joe was catatonic. He had PTSD. Night terrors. He couldn’t stop seeing her face. His friends and family didn’t know whether he would ever get over her.

The worst part of it all, he often said, was the loneliness. Loneliness is the worst sensation in the human experience.

He finally left home for a fresh start. He took a job in a rural town with a tiny population. A town so small they the city-limits signs were nailed to the same post.

He lived in the sticks. He joined a church. Mostly, Joe kept to himself. He was a quiet guy. He spent a lot of time alone in nature.

Also, they say he helped people. He was a handy guy, so he was always at someone’s house fixing something. He was usually helping the disabled folks in town, and the shut-ins.

He earned a reputation for being a hard worker. Locals tried to hire him, but he had a personal rule he followed. Joe would only work for those who couldn’t afford to pay. He accepted no money.

You know. Just a really good guy.

Then he met Catherine. They had an instant connection. It was one of those relationships that just worked. They started hanging out a lot. He loved her so deeply it hurt. And just like that, the loneliness was gone.

They got engaged. It was the happy ending of a very long grief process. A ray of sunlight. But shortly before their wedding, Catherine developed pneumonia. He was at her bedside when she died.

After that, Joe was a wreck. They say he threw himself into the work of helping others, if for no other reason, than to combat loneliness.

He wrote poetry, too. Lots of it. Late one night, while writing a letter, he wrote one such poem.

The page was dotted with drops of saltwater, smearing the ink in little puddles. The beginning verse of that poem went:

What a friend we have in Jesus,
All our sins and grief to bear
What a privilege to carry
Everything to God in prayer!

And anyway, now you know the rest of the story.

— Sean Dietrich

 

 

Lyrics:

What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear!
What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer!
O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear,
All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer!

Have we trials and temptations? Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged; take it to the Lord in prayer!
Can we find a friend so faithful who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness; take it to the Lord in prayer!

Are we weak and heavy laden, cumbered with a load of care?
Precious Savior, still our refuge—take it to the Lord in prayer!
Do thy friends despise, forsake thee? Take it to the Lord in prayer!
In his arms he’ll take and shield thee; Thou wilt find a solace there.

-Joseph M. Scriven, 1855
(Tune by Charles C. Converse, 1868)

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Jesus Calls Us Back to Life

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John 11:25 — “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live.”

Have you ever thought about the fact that the primary way that God chose to reveal Himself to us is through story? I think God chose to do this because He knows us best.

One of my favorite stories comes from the dramatic scene in John where Jesus finds Himself at the tomb of His best friend, Lazarus. By the time Jesus got there, Lazarus had been dead for four days.

In Jewish tradition, the soul would hover over the body for three days, but on the fourth, there would be no more hope for any reversal of the loss. This little cultural detail sets up the story to show Jesus faced with an impossible situation.

Surrounded by weeping family and friends, Jesus calls out…'”Lazarus, come out! Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”

This is our story! Apart from Jesus, you and I are without hope, without life, and without promise. No matter how far gone we think we are, we can all still hear the powerful and authoritative voice of Jesus calling out to us.

“(insert your name here), come out! Take off the grave clothes and be free!”

Because, just like Lazarus, He has called us back to life!

— Phil Wickham

 

LYRICS

How great the chasm that lay between us
How high the mountain I could not climb
In desperation, I turned to heaven
And spoke Your name into the night
Then through the darkness, Your loving kindness
Tore through the shadows of my soul
The work is finished, the end is written
Jesus Christ, my living hope

Who could imagine so great a mercy?
What heart could fathom such boundless grace?
The God of ages stepped down from glory
To wear my sin and bear my shame
The cross has spoken, I am forgiven
The King of kings calls me His own
Beautiful Savior, I’m Yours forever
Jesus Christ, my living hope

Hallelujah, praise the One who set me free
Hallelujah, death has lost its grip on me
You have broken every chain
There’s salvation in Your name
Jesus Christ, my living hope
Hallelujah, praise the One who set me free
Hallelujah, death has lost its grip on me
You have broken every chain
There’s salvation in Your name
Jesus Christ, my living hope

Then came the morning that sealed the promise
Your buried body began to breathe
Out of the silence, the Roaring Lion
Declared the grave has no claim on me
Then came the morning that sealed the promise
Your buried body began to breathe
Out of the silence, the Roaring Lion
Declared the grave has no claim on me
Jesus, Yours is the victory, whoa!

Hallelujah, praise the One who set me free
Hallelujah, death has lost its grip on me
You have broken every chain
There’s salvation in Your name
Jesus Christ, my living hope
Hallelujah, praise the One who set me free
Hallelujah, death has lost its grip on me
You have broken every chain
There’s salvation in Your name
Jesus Christ, my living hope

Jesus Christ, my living hope
Oh God, You are my living hope

Songwriters: Brian Johnson / Phil Wickham

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Chain Breaking Honesty

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James 5:16 — “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.”

I kept checking the boxes.

Read my Bible? Check.

Said my prayers? Check.

And still I felt weighed down. I’d lie in bed at night and wonder, “What is wrong with me?”

I didn’t want to admit it, not even to myself, but the truth was, I was struggling with a sin pattern. It was one that kept cycling back up in my life, and it came with this private shame I could not shake.

And I had gotten good at covering it with “good Christian things.” I thought if I could stay busy enough with God’s stuff maybe it would go away.

But the guilt only grew heavier.

One Thursday, I went to my weekly Celebrate Recovery group really discouraged.

That night, someone read this verse out loud:

James 5:16 “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed.”

I had heard that verse before, but I never noticed that last part.

Not just forgiven. Healed.

I knew how to ask God for forgiveness. I believed grace covered me when I failed.

But healing? Until that night, I did not realized that confessing my sin out loud to another human being could bring healing.

After the meeting, I pulled someone aside—someone I trust—and I told her the truth. The real, honest, ugly version of it. I confessed what I had kept buried and asked if they would pray with me.

She didn’t flinch at what I said. She just listened and then prayed.

I can’t explain it in any logical way, but the heaviness lifted. Something unknotted deep inside. I didn’t feel exposed—I felt safe. And free. It was like God used her voice and her prayer to reach a part of my heart that had stayed locked for years.

That’s the power of confession. It’s not a religious ritual. It’s not about earning grace or checking off a spiritual box. It’s about real, biblical healing.

James wasn’t writing theory—he was giving us a map out of the stuck places. Confess to each other. Pray for each other. Be healed.

If you’re exhausted from trying to fix yourself, maybe it’s time to stop hiding and start healing. Tell the truth to someone safe. Invite Jesus into the places you’ve been managing on your own.

You’re already forgiven, but you were made for more than that. You were made to be healed.

And it starts in the light.

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Make Today Count

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Hebrews 12:11 – For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

I was not the kind of kid who begged to be outdoors in the summer. I liked comfort, routine, and air conditioning. So, when my mother announced I would be attending back-to-back camps all summer long, I assumed she was joking.

She was not.

There was no negotiation. One week it was tennis. The next, basketball. Then came YMCA camp followed closely by dance camp. I remember thinking she must have mistaken me for someone else—someone coordinated, competitive, and social.

She had not.

She just loved me enough to be firm.

Her tough love was not up for debate, and though I wanted to resist, something slowly began to shift—not in her tough love, but in me.

There was this one camp—a Christian camp—where the rhythm of the days caught up with me in a different way. The mornings began with quiet time. It was the kind of quiet that made you think about things you usually avoided.

I learned to listen, not just to the camp leaders, but to my own choices. I noticed how much easier life became when I got enough sleep, ate what my body actually needed, and spent time with people who made me feel safe, not small.

At the end of the summer, I left with a small pin on my shirt that said, “Honor Camper.” It was just a pin, but it felt good because what I really achieved was a new mindset.

Looking back, that summer was not about sports or schedules. It was about learning how to show up for myself, for others, and for the Lord. And it turns out, showing up takes practice. It takes daily choices, honest reflection, and uncomfortable effort.

Maybe life is not all that different from summer camp. Every day, you get a fresh start. You can opt in or out. You can show up or shrink back. You can waste the time God gave you or let it change you.

What if you stopped waiting for a “big moment” and just lived today like it mattered? Try something new. Build honest friendships. Sweat a little. Laugh a lot. Choose the kind of effort that builds you from the inside out.

And remember—God did not give you this life so you could sit on the sidelines.

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Out of the Box Answers from a Great God

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 Psalms 37:4 – “Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.”

Adoption has always been part of our family’s heartbeat. We had two children already—both adopted, both deeply loved. I would go to the ends of the earth for them, but tucked beneath all that joy was a desire I never spoke out loud.

I had always wanted to adopt a newborn, a baby from the very beginning. Though I didn’t really talk about it, I still whispered it to the Lord in passing.

My husband and I were both fifty-three. We were well past what most people would call “baby years.” Life was full. Our routines were finally starting to settle, but then the phone rang.

It was our Christian consultants. A baby had just been born, and they said the birth mother had asked for us.

I sat still. I think I forgot how to breathe.

She knew our age. She did not care. She said we were the ones she wanted.

And just like that, the thing I had quietly hoped for—the thing I thought might never happen—became real.

That birth mom’s trust became something more. It turned into a friendship. And that friendship has continued to grow.

That newborn is now six-years-old. His name is Chambers, and he still gets to see his birth mom every now and then. When he does, I just stand there watching him laugh, remembering how close I came to never knowing him.

I see a promise kept. I see a prayer answered. No it was not on my timeline, and it was not the way I expected. But it was answered in a way that proved God was listening the entire time.

Dear One, if you have a longing that feels too small to name or too impossible to see fulfilled—do not bury it. Hold it open. Offer it to the One who sees you clearly. He may not answer in the way you expect, but He is not bound by what makes sense.

He works outside the box, and sometimes, the answer comes wrapped in more love than you knew to ask for.

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How Do You Go from Liked to Loved?

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Ephesians 2:4-5 — “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved.”

When my husband Christian and I first became boyfriend and girlfriend, I took on another role: FBI Investigator Sadie Rob.

I’d seen his Instagram so many times. But when I became Investigator Sadie, I started noticing stuff that I’d never really cared about before, including the girl he went to a party with.

All of a sudden, I noticed her in a different way. I spiraled as I thought about how much fun they must have had and how beautiful she was, with her blonde hair and blue eyes.

After my investigation I walked away concluding I was no longer good enough for the relationship. I figured I should do everybody a favor and exit. I’d save Christian the hassle.

Years earlier I’d been dating a guy, and somebody said my looks were not up to par compared to another girl he had previously dated. That really stuck with me.

It got in the way of me getting close to people. It wasn’t that others weren’t willing to love me; it was that I didn’t feel very lovable. It wasn’t that they weren’t willing to date me; it was that I didn’t feel good enough.

That little lie had been planted in my heart for years, and I almost let that affect my relationship with the person I would later marry. He was standing there pursuing me with love and respect.

I went to Christian and started telling him how I was feeling. He shared with me something very powerful that day. He said, “Yeah, those girls were attractive. However, I am captivated by you.”

At first it felt pretty odd to hear those words coming out of my boyfriend’s mouth, but then he said, “You can notice something is attractive, because the fact is, it’s attractive. But to be captivated means that you hold all my attention.”

That day I stopped investigating and rested in the security that he was captivated by me.

So many times we do this with God. He is loving us, pursuing us, and asking us to be in a relationship with Him. He has written a couple-thousand-page love letter to us, but we have to allow ourselves to be loved and captivated by Him.

We must begin to take God at His word. When we refuse to allow ourselves to feel loved, we stop a relationship from being able to grow. Be captivated by your Creator, and don’t lose sight of His gaze.

— Sadie Robertson Huff

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God Never Skips Over You

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Colossians 3:23–24 – Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward.

Sunflower seeds, red dirt, and Gatorade. That was the theme of my childhood summers.

I can still smell the nacho cheese from the concession stand and see the red lips of other kids eating snowballs by the bleachers. Everything about those days stuck—on my cleats, in my memory, in who I was becoming.

Those days playing softball was where I learned how to work with others, how to win well, and how to lose without falling apart.

That is, I thought I had learned it until the all-star list went up.

We were all crowded around the bulletin board. I was bouncing on the balls of my feet, pretending not to care as much as I did. One by one, the names were called out. I leaned in.

And then it was over.

My name was not there.

I blinked, waited, and checked again. Maybe they skipped a line. Maybe someone forgot something. But they had not. They just… did not choose me.

I stood still. My face burned. I could feel my throat get tight. Everyone else was laughing and hugging. I just stared at the list offended. I had been one of the best on the team. At least, I thought I was.

By the time we got back to the car, I was quiet in that heavy way you are when you feel hurt. My arms were crossed, eyes out the window. I hoped no one would say anything.

But later on, my dad came to me, handed me my glove, and said, “Let’s get to work.” There was no lecture, no pity, just steady love.

So, I kept going.

That year I worked harder, not to prove them wrong, but to become someone who did not give up so easily. The next season, I was the starting pitcher.

Looking back now, I think God used that moment to teach me the kind of lesson you can’t learn when everyone is clapping for you. He used it to show me that being overlooked by people does not mean being unseen by Him.

If you are walking through something similar—feeling forgotten, wondering if any of it matters—please hear this. It does matter. You matter. You matter even when no one calls your name.

The invitation is not to quit or to prove them wrong. It is to put in the work, to trust who God says you are, and to grow like it is true.

Because it is.

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From Forgiveness to Family

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Matthew 6:12 – “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.”

Over the past few years, I’ve been on this journey of writing songs inspired by the real life stories that people send to me.

This one story in particular has had a profound impact on me. It hit me kind of hard. It’s about a woman who did the impossible, and it made me ask myself if I could do the same.

Renee had four kids. Two of her daughters were twins. Megan was coming home from the beach one night with her best friend when their car was struck by a drunk driver named Eric, a 24-year-old kid.

Megan lost her life. Eric killed both girls that were in the car. Renee lost her daughter in an instant. Next thing she knows, she finds herself in a courtroom watching this young man, this 24-year-old man, get sentenced to 22 years in prison.

Renee wrote to me and said, “I now have a mission that I never would have chosen.”

What she meant by that is that in the years that followed, she began to travel around to schools and churches and different functions, and she would speak about the dangers of drunk driving.

But as the years progressed, she felt like something was missing from her presentation, and that’s when God put it on her heart that she had not forgiven this man who took the life of her daughter. And so she reached out and did the impossible.

She reached out to Eric in prison and said, “I forgive you.”

The ripple effects of that act of forgiveness are still being felt today. That young man’s life was absolutely changed because this woman forgave him.

He said, “I can’t even forgive myself, and she forgave me.” Eric said he found his eternal salvation as a result of this act.

One by one, all of Rene’s family members followed her lead, and they reached out and expressed forgiveness to Eric. So much so that now they describe Eric as part of their family, like a son to Renee.

The story doesn’t stop there though. Renee went to the courts along with her family, and she was able to have Eric’s sentence cut in half from 22 years to 11 years.

This blew me away.

The reason she did it is so that Eric could have a second chance at life, and so that he could join her in their presentations. She told me that now she shares not only about the dangers of drunk driving, but also about the power of forgiveness.

— Matthew West

 

LYRICS

It’s the hardest thing to give away
And the last thing on your mind today
It always goes to those that don’t deserve

It’s the opposite of how you feel
When the pain they caused is just to real
It takes everything you have just to say the word…

Forgiveness
Forgiveness

It flies in the face of all your pride
It moves away the mad inside
It’s always anger’s own worst enemy
Even when the jury and the judge
Say you gotta right to hold a grudge
It’s the whisper in your ear saying “Set It Free”

Forgiveness
Forgiveness
Forgiveness
Forgiveness

Show me how to love the unlovable
Show me how to reach the unreachable
Help me now to do the impossible

Forgiveness, Forgiveness

Help me now to do the impossible
Forgiveness

It’ll clear the bitterness away
It can even set a prisoner free
There is no end to what it’s power can do
So, let it go and be amazed
By what you see through eyes of grace
The prisoner that it really frees is you

Forgiveness
Forgiveness
Forgiveness
Forgiveness

Show me how to love the unlovable
Show me how to reach the unreachable
Help me now to do the impossible
Forgiveness

I want to finally set it free
So show me how to see what Your mercy sees
Help me now to give what You gave to me

Forgiveness
Forgiveness
Forgiveness
Forgiveness

Songwriters: Matthew West

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Say Goodbye to Yesterday

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2 Corinthians 5:17 — “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”

There was always one.

One student always showed up to youth group and sat in the back. Hoodie up. Eyes down. Never sang. Never responded.

And I could not stop thinking about him.

We did not start Elevation Rhythm for big stages. We started in rooms like that—small, loud, and imperfect— with students like that who were not yet sure what they believed about God but still came.

We began by remixing worship songs, just trying to help them connect. Eventually, we started writing our own. Not to sound cool. Not to go viral. But because we knew not every kid listens to the same thing, and if God speaks every language, then maybe He could speak through every genre, too.

Our hope was that in all the noise of the world, they would hear one song that felt personal like God was saying, “This one is for you.”

During one of those writing days, it was just me, Gracie Binion, and Mitch Wong. We were talking through what God had done in our lives and how hard it can be to stop believing the lies about who we used to be.

Then Gracie said, almost in passing, “I think I finally said goodbye to who I used to be.”

And that was it. We knew our students needed to hear that.

That was the beginning of our song “Goodbye Yesterday.”

We already had the name of the album, Victory Lap, but the meaning sank in deeper that day.

A victory lap is what you take after the race is finished—Not to win but to celebrate what has already been won. That is what life in Jesus is. Freedom. Not striving.

And maybe today, you are the one sitting in the back, not literally but in your heart. You are still unsure if God sees you and still dragging around the shame of a life He already paid for.

If that is you, hear this: you do not have to be weighed down by a version of yourself Jesus already set free.

The cross is before you. The past does not have to define you because He has already won. So, say the words even in a whisper.

“Goodbye, yesterday.”

And the rest of your life? It is your Victory Lap.

— Josh Holiday

 

Lyrics:

Goodbye yesterday
I’m living in the light of a new day
I won’t waste another minute in my old ways
Praise the Lord I’ve been born again

Goodbye yesterday
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me
I’ve got resurrection in my veins
Praise the Lord, I’ve been born again

Again and again and again and again
You rescued me out of the mess I was in
Traded my sorrow for something to sing
I’m dancing on the grave that I once lived in

I have decided
To follow Jesus
The world behind
The cross before
I won’t turn back

Written by Joshua Holiday, Gracie Binion, Mitch Wong, Steven Furtick

GOODBYE YESTERDAY – LEARN MORE HERE

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