Stories

I got a lot more out of the weekly meetings, the book, and the retreat than I even thought I would because the topics we covered were so comprehensive. It wasn’t just a matter of “do we sin sexually or not”. We looked at what where our hearts were at, what are we withholding from God, what are we hiding from in relationships, where do we not trust God’s best design, where do our thoughts or emotions need to be filtered through the spirit of truth.

And then on our retreat we got to learn more about the design of our sexuality, outside of even having/not having sex, where it is being lived out rightly and where it can go wrong. And then break off ties we’ve made or that have been made for us over the years. It was hard work but good work! And we got to do it alongside women that we get to have greater intimacy with. We were looking to our right and our left thinking “oh it’s you guys that I sort this out with. It’s you guys I stop hiding from. It’s you I get vulnerable and walk out this love with”. The price was already paid for all of our freedom, we just needed to learn how to fight for that better and reclaim what is already ours. It was amazing to have a time dedicated to doing just that. It was an automatic invitation to leave it all out on the table and in the light!

- Jadie

I once had a conversation with a young woman who told me she was very frustrated with the role masturbation played in her life. She shared that she had been doing it habitually for several years. After a long conversation about it, she was more frustrated. She said to me, “I honestly do not lust when I masturbate. If anything I am celebrating how cool it is and how creative God is while I am doing it.” She admitted there are times when there is lustful “stuff” going on, but for the most part, her habit is strictly physical. She felt hopeless because she wanted to fight spiritually as the thoughts came and take care of the emotions that were fueling it. The problem was she couldn’t see the lust and emotions clearly and was convinced they weren’t even there.

We finally got to the bottom of it. She had been introduced to physical stimulus at a very young age by a family member. It was a very brief encounter, but it was the first time she was made aware of this part of her body. Naturally, as a child, she became very curious and began to innocently explore. I wasn’t long after that she had childlike questions that went unanswered or silenced because they were “dirty.” The emotions she had following that were humiliation, fear, confusion, loneliness, and the list went on. As she and I continued to talk, we both quickly realized that the reason she masturbated up to that day was because Satan had gotten a foothold into her life and spoken lies to her that said this part of her was dirty, out of control, and something to hide. Once we saw that, we replaced those lies with God’s truth and celebrating how she was created. The power behind the years of habit was gone.

What she was convinced was just a physical habit that she felt hopeless about ended up being much deeper. Through much prayer, confession and worshiping of God’s truth, masturbation began to take on a whole different role in her life. In times when she would normally be tempted to masturbate, she was able to journal out praises for how God created her and choose to believe the truth about who she is in Him. Now the physical desire quickly dwindles each time she does this, and it not longer controls her. This is just one story, but I hope it helps those of you who might have some of the same thoughts or feelings.

The truth is that for us as women, almost everything that goes on with us physically can be tied back to a thought that triggered an emotion. Because we have so many different emotions stemming from our thoughts, we can be sure that many of those thoughts are not based on God’s truth about us. So as we come full circle, we find ourselves once again confronting our thoughts. It’s time to stop giving in and “feeling” everything so much. We need to start praying, fighting and allowing our mind and emotions to be refined and used by God. We as women are so complex, intricate, beautiful, and COOL! We don’t have to live bound to our emotions. We can take our thoughts captive and live free in the truth.

- Jamie Book

Unveil provided a space for conversations that previously felt like they either couldn’t be talked about or were not ones that left you wallowing in your own bondage and brokenness. Being able to have weekly meetings going through the book not only shed light on God's design for us in our sexuality as women, but allowed me to see the same grace and freedom exemplified and extended through in the women around me.

The Unveil retreat left me with so much more understanding of Gods designed for sexuality and womanhood derived straight from the Bible. This partnered with practical understanding of our minds and bodies left me with the ability to walk out my freedom from soul ties and lies in my everyday life.

- Kaela

Growing up, I was the kind of girl people would call a “church kid.” My best friends were almost always from my youth group. I loved going to church, and I always tried to live like a Christian, as I knew it. I did my best to follow all the rules and stayed away from what I learned was “bad.”

Looking back, I’d say I was a pretty good kid. However, I have absolutely no idea how much power I had through the Holy Spirit until I went through Unveil with my roommate in college. Even though I sat through hundreds of sermons and Bible studies, I never once learned how to really deal with sin or temptation. I was totally blind to the constant spiritual battle occurring around and within me. I bet Satan was pretty happy with where I was at. Even though he knew I had a relationship with Jesus, I was powerless when it came to sexual or emotional temptation. I simply had no idea how to fight spiritually, so when Satan would accuse me of lies like “you aren’t as pretty or thin or smart as her” or “he would never be attracted to you,” I would just believe the lie every time, weakening my self confidence with each lie.

Consequently, when I started dating my boyfriend in college, I gave into plenty of lies and compromised in my physical relationship with him. Over and over, we would cross the physical boundaries we had created, because all we knew how to do was try really hard not to break a rule, and then beg Jesus to forgive us when we failed. Believe Satan’s accusations became so exhausting, and I never felt complete freedom. It turns out trying to follow rules without the power Jesus gives us through the Holy Spirit doesn’t work very well.

Luckily, after finally agreeing that I actually did struggle with lust and temptation, my roommate and I started to through the unveil book and be accountable to one another with the temptations we were facing. The chapter on Spiritual Warfare was especially life changing for me. The concept of using the power that I have through the Holy Spirit to actively fight against Satan’s accusation was profound. At first praying against lies out loud seemed worthless because I didn’t believe it would work.

But the more I prayed with confidence, the more power I gained to be able to deal with Satan’s lies. It was silly for me to fear Satan because I knew since I have the Holy Spirit, the battle was already won. Even now, Satan will tempt me to believe the same lie over and over, but I know with the Holy Spirit I have the power to reject the lie before it turns into a stronghold.

I know experiencing freedom in Christ is a process, not something you feel once and then always have. I still hear Satan’s lies daily, but I’m so thankful for the knowledge I now have to actively fight spiritually against them, instead of just believing Satan’s accusations over and over again.

- Becky

We do not often hear from this world that we are secure, accepted, or significant. I began the unveil study in a deep struggle with my identity. I knew that God thought more of me than I thought of myself, but as far as what that was, I was at a loss. My entire life I had thought of myself as nothing more or less than what the world thought of me. If I got an A on a test I was smart. If I had a boyfriend I was pretty. If I went to Bible study I was a “good Christian.” God used the unveil study to show me that not only was my thinking misguided, it was altogether wrong. I am an intelligent, beautiful, SAINT not because of what I have done but because of who Jesus is and what he has done for me!

Those words–secure, accepted and significant–describe desires that reside deep in my heart. I realized that I had spent a great deal of my life striving for those three things, and I had found them and did not even know it. After learning more about my identity through this chapter, I spent some time going through the verses described and reading them in context in my Bible. The Scripture really came alive to me during that time. My view of myself changed to look a little more like Christ’s view, and it was freeing.

I also discovered that my identity struggle is not something I can learn about and check off on my “to do” list as being completed. I have to surrender my misguided view of myself to the Lord every day. I review His word and reprogram my thoughts to be more like His all the time. I have discovered the more I do this the more freedom I experience to be the woman God mad e me to be to love myself and love others more completely.

- Nikki