Faith Over Chaos

Let me peel back the curtain a little more. I was a pregnant teenager—16 years old, 1990. Back when families didn’t have a roadmap for this kind of thing, just a whole lot of fear and a hope that someone else might know what to do.

So my parents did what they thought was best. They found a ministry called Jesus Cares Ministries and made the hard decision to send me there. I’m sure it felt like handing me off to strangers—but those strangers? They became my spiritual parents.

It was there, in the middle of confusion and quiet heartbreak, that I met God—not the Sunday School version, but the One who sees the scared, the shamed, and the stubborn… and still calls them His.

I didn’t walk into Jesus Cares Ministries with deep theological hunger. I walked in with teenage sass, a know-it-all attitude, and just enough stubbornness to make things interesting. I wasn’t ready for revival—I was just trying to survive maternity jeans and figure out how to act like I had it all together.

But God met me there. Not with thunder or fire, but with quiet love through people who saw past my sarcasm and uncertainty. They planted seeds—truth, grace, identity. Not all of them sprouted right away. Some had to fight through hard soil. Some cracked open years later, pushing through spiritual concrete just to reach the light.

There’s a wall in that ministry home with pictures of all us girls. Back then, I jokingly called it the “Wall of Shame”—because let’s be honest, many of us had wandered. Some of us ran. But Doreen, my spiritual mom, didn’t laugh. She saw something deeper.

Now I call it the Wall of Grace.

Because even if those girls walked away, we’re still waiting for the seeds to sprout. And they will. Because God is merciful. Because He doesn’t forget what He plants. Because He’s the kind of Gardener who never gives up on His garden.

“I will give her back her vineyards, and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope.” — Hosea 2:15 NIV

That verse reminds me that even when it looks like nothing is happening—when the soil feels dry and the silence feels heavy—God is still working. Restoration doesn’t always come with fireworks. Sometimes it comes slowly, quietly, beneath the surface.

This post is a reminder:

He is faithful. He is worthy.

Keep praying. Keep walking.

Keep choosing Eden Thinking—even when it feels like He’s not there.

Because He is. And He’s still gardening.

Helping you find peace in the garden again—even when the weeds feel louder than the Word.

Feeling like you’ve got a few folks still hanging on your personal Wall of Shame? Might be time to check if God already moved their frame to the Wall of Grace.

• Who have I quietly labeled as “too far gone,” while God is still gently gardening their story?
• What seeds might be sprouting in someone’s life that I’ve stopped praying for?
• Have I mistaken spiritual concrete for a closed case, when it might just be a slow bloom?
• Is there someone I need to reframe—not as a failure, but as a future testimony?
• What would change in me if I believed God’s mercy was bigger than my memory of someone’s mess?