If you’re new here—hi! This post is a part of a series I’m doing on labels. It is all about the names, categories, and expectations we carry—whether in faith, motherhood, creativity, or life—and what happens when we break free from them. This piece is about how a label changed for me. I have guest writer posts included in this series as well. I hope you’ll join us!
When I started blogging I knew I was in the “Christian blogger” world. I wrote lots of devotional styled pieces. My first published print project was in a study Bible. I freelanced for Christian outlets. Gradually, I took on more freelance work that wasn’t just “Christian” but my corner of the internet always was. My personal brand was heavy on Jesus.
But then my faith didn’t feel the way it used to.
I watched the story my family, my Christian community, my mentors, and my friends all pray and believe for change into something none of us hoped for. Some of my friends timidly asked me what I thought about it all after the fact—remembering how we had prayed before. Some brushed it aside, saying God would redeem eventually, we just didn’t know how yet.
For me, it was personal.
I couldn’t ignore the way my faith changed when I was asking myself how a good God, who loved me personally, could allow this to happen to me. I felt myself cry out and question him again and again. And a few months later—I was out of my maternity leave and ready to return to writing. But how could I write if I didn’t believe?
My identity felt foreign to me. I was trying to make sense of something that felt senseless. I was desperately hoping to put all the pieces back together while simultaneously knowing—I don’t think I can. (The truth I found later was that God can—it was never up to me anyway.)
Lots of creatives experience imposter syndrome. But this felt next level.
How can I be a Christian author, a Christian blogger, when I am living in a Psalm of lament?
I knew I still believed in God. I just couldn’t help but wonder what went wrong. I wanted to know where my prayers took a turn and didn’t make it, or why people who didn’t pray got the very thing I prayed for. I wanted to be able to trace all the memories with clear explanations but I had to release that I could not.
I continued in therapy, I hesitantly approached God, and I showed up to write anyway. Doubt and struggles had never disqualified anyone in God’s eyes anyways, so why would they disqualify me now?
I’ve always loved Jesus’ gentle invitation to Thomas when he doubted the resurrection—come touch my hands. He didn’t shame him for wanting him to see for himself. He said, come look, let me show you.
My daydreams are full of Jesus with scars.
I have a scar now, too. I wonder what mine will look like one day. We’re promised new bodies, but truthfully, I hope I can keep this one. Because this body is the one that was broken and scarred and the Holy Spirit decided it was a worthy home to take up residence in. Even when I wasn’t sure what to believe.
I have gotten emails since I’ve began writing through this season. All positive. (I will admit that people probably wouldn’t email me if they hated my posts. But I will say my email list has grown more in the last year than ever before.)
Some people have said they loved seeing a bit of my darkness. Others said they noticed a change. The writing feels different, deeper, fuller.
I always reply thank you. But what I think has been echoing in my spirit lately is this: It’s not just the writing that has changed, it’s also the faith.
In the middle of it, it can feel like things are falling apart. I wondered where we would go from here. Was I deconstructing? (That felt too scary.) Was I losing my faith? (That felt even scarier.)
But maybe faith isn’t something we lose.
Maybe it’s something that shifts and takes on new depth when we walk through the fire. Maybe what felt like unraveling was actually a slow, steady rebuilding—one that required me to let go of the labels I once clung to so I could grasp something truer—God himself.
I don’t think I fit neatly into “Christian blogger” anymore, at least not in the way I once did. But I do know this: I’m still here. Still writing. Still seeking. Still believing. And maybe that’s what faith actually is—not certainty, but persistence.
So if you’re in the middle of a season where your labels no longer fit, where your faith feels different than it once did, I hope you know you’re not alone. There’s space here for the questions, the doubts, and the messy, unfinished stories.
And I hope you’ll keep showing up too.
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