Grace: How a Recovering Legalist Moves Forward in Faith

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A few weeks ago a fellow faith blogger asked me to write a guest blog for her some time about my faith journey. “I’m particularly interested in your journey to finding Jesus…how grace has changed your life…or something of that nature.” I readily agreed. That was a month ago and I haven’t written a word…until now.

I haven’t really talked about faith – at least not explicitly – in this space in quite a while. I think that my faith story has been coloring a lot of posts. It’s always been there. But I haven’t really written a blog post specifically about where I am right now.

Mostly, it’s been because I’m not always really sure about where I am.

I think that when I wrote my blog series about legalism and grace I was a girl who had a lot of answers. As time has passed since then (can you believe it’s been four years?), I think I’ve gone through several phases.

I went from a place of surety…to a place of anger…to a place of rest…to a place of extreme doubt…to a place of healing and renewal…to a place of settling into my spiritual identity. These phases, much like the five phases of grief, haven’t had definite beginning and ending points. In some ways, I’m still dealing with all of these phases all at once. Moment to moment my emotions can change, and I’m back feeling angry, overwhelmed, or overjoyed.

I haven’t really allowed myself to write about it in detail because I felt like I had to have more things “figured out.” But, I’m also one of those people who sometimes doesn’t know what I’m thinking until I write about it.

So, before I write a post for my fellow-blogger Christy, I think I need to “flesh out” and work through some stuff in this space. Maybe then I’ll be able to string together some coherent thoughts for a guest post.

I’ve laid in bed over the last few nights, unable to sleep – trying to write a post in my head, as I always do. I’ve ended up thinking about all of the things I need to write about, disclose, and work through. It’s like “Wow, I need to talk about this…oh…and that…and I really can’t talk about that without talking about that…and this…and…”

…and thirty minutes later I’m up folding laundry at 11:30PM because my head is in a tizzy.

So, for the next {undetermined amount of time} I am going to be writing several posts about grace, our church, and where I am in my faith right now.

This page will serve as the landing page for this series. I will be sharing all posts here. If you want to receive these posts to your inbox so you don’t miss any, click on the “Messy Faith” option in the sidebar. (If you are already on my mailing list, you can click “subscribe” and it will take you through the process to update your preferences so you can receive the posts in this category.) You can also “Like” my faith-based Facebook page, Beautiful Messy Faith.

If you are new to my blog and would like to know more of my faith story in preparation for the posts to come, I would recommend the following posts to read to “catch up,” so to speak:

Legalism and Grace: How I Left the IFB Movement and Chose Grace – read this 31-post blog series here!

#whitespace: one word for 2014

A letter to my former self on her high school graduation

Guilt-inducing hymns, the try-hard life, and recovery

Dangly pink earrings and a million regenerations {a lesson in identity from Doctor Who}

Hope: One Word for 2015

Broken faith: more of my testimony and what God has done (and is doing) for me

Love songs for the girl who needs to remember that God loves her

No Matter What, I Believe: On Broken Faith and Healing Birth

A thrill of hope {my #oneword365 recap, end of the year highlights, and top posts of 2015}

Grow – my #oneword365 for 2016 {#growingrace2016}

Bible Journaling: Art Therapy for my Bible Scars