By Katie Viesselman

My Faith Growing Up: Nicole Miller

My faith growing up was a lot of what other people viewed me as and not what my individual relationship with Christ looked like. I was always striving to reach that goal or reach that fulfillment and satisfaction that I thought I would get from the recognition of being a Miller kid or making the top sports team. In reality, that never brought me satisfaction. I mean, yeah, I’d come home and be in a varsity sport and have all these points and in the moment it felt great, but when the doors were closed, I was super empty. Honestly, I was just lonely and just, like, unsatisfied and an angry person because I thought I could do it on my own and do it without Christ, but still throw in the “Christ” word once in awhile. I’d be like, “doing it all for God,” but in reality, I was doing it for myself.

My Faith Growing Up: Willy Issa

It’s weird – I’d say I had faith, but it wasn’t really like my own or something that I simply gave God fully. Trusting Him.

Growing up, it was a lot of comparing myself to other people and other Christians. It was this thing of looking at other people and how God had gifted them and made me be like, “Why God? Why don’t I have that gift?” Or “Why haven’t you given me the ability to do something like that?” And the devil really used those as lies. It was because I wasn’t gifted there – like, what’s the point of even trying to to strive after God if you’re not good enough?

I’d say with me now, my relationship with God is a lot about, like, intimacy and the intimacy I have with him. In that time, there wasn’t that intimacy because it was all about me comparing myself and I would see other people doing things and it would always be so discouraging.