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In this episode of ‘From Surviving to Living,’ it’s the beginning of 2016, and I discuss the challenge of special occasions like birthdays behind bars, and my journey towards spiritual awakening through reading the Bible. I touch on the difficulties of sharing my newfound faith with my family and the rejection I faced from them. In this episode I also dive deep into how scripture challenged my existing beliefs and led me to understand the concept of being chosen and loved by God. I encourages listeners to seek a real relationship with Jesus, and share how questioning and seeking answers from God led me to a profound sense of His Presence and understanding.

Holly’s story is a testament to the belief that transformation is possible for everyone through a relationship with Jesus and highlights the alive and active nature of God’s word.

00:00 Welcome to From Surviving to Living
00:53 The Power of Transformation and Faith
02:17 Breaking Free: A Journey of Faith Behind Bars
03:15 Discovering the Bible: A New Perspective
08:05 The Challenge of Sharing New Beliefs
13:09 A Deep Dive into Spiritual Understanding
15:02 Experiencing God’s Presence and Lessons
21:08 Closing Thoughts: Your Story is Never Over

TRANSCRIPT

Do you seek solace through spiritual beliefs? Does this method of comfort leave you resistant to questioning those beliefs?

Early in 2016 God would begin to change everything in me. Despite these positive changes my family would soon reject and abandon me, offended by my new beliefs. Through it all, I would discover the secret to solace, which transcends mere belief, finding peace in an actual relationship with Jesus.

We’ll explore the experience of knowing Jesus and uncover the secret to real relationship with Him. Listen until the end, you don’t want to miss a word! This is Breaking Bias.

February 2016 and another birthday in prison for me. When I first arrived at prison it had been the month of March. Since my birthday is in February, I’d had an entire year before my first birthday there; I had watched other women celebrate birthdays all year, trying to make them special.

Holidays, anniversaries, and birthdays, the hardest times in prison. They are typically spent with family and friends, happy, but can be stark reminders of loss when one is away from loved ones. Most women tried to make the best of it in prison. I saw this was not easy for them. I vowed to make my birthday special but just like them, it never turned out the way I wished.

Is there a time of year that’s very special for you? How do you observe it? Have you experienced loss that makes holidays more difficult to enjoy?

For the past month I had been reading the Bible constantly, everywhere. I didn’t jump in at the beginning. Instead, I began towards the end, hesitant and unsure. As I came to a teaching in the book of I Peter, I read a verse I remembered hearing when I was young:

²⁰ knowing this first: that no prophecy of the Scripture is of any private interpretation. ²¹ For the prophecy came not in olden times by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. II Peter 1:20-21

I didn’t completely understand this but it did make sense that if God wanted to write a book, He could. We think of authors like Stephen King as having a good editor and publisher. We take for granted their books are as they, the author, intended. Why think human authors have abilities superior to God? Either God can do god-like things or He is not a god, not worth worshiping.

I also found something in the book of Hebrews I’d heard before at church but had never felt was explained well:

For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Hebrews 4:12

Now however I wondered, ‘How is the word of God alive? How can it be active? It’s a book! It’s been the same for thousands of years.’ Soon, however, God would explain this concept to me. I was about to be surprised and delighted.

I quit reading when I got to the last book, the book of Revelation. While I was engaged from the start, I didn’t feel confident reading that unusual book. Secretly I worried whatever new enthusiasm to read the Bible I’d been granted wouldn’t get me through it.

God had given me a supernatural desire to read His Word, that was more than obvious to me. I was used to experiencing my own instability and unreliability, however. All my life I rarely completed anything I started. I suppose I feared this experience would be no different, so I was cautious about doing anything I feared might ruin it.

My parents had taken me to church. I’d listened to many pastors. Maybe I believed I’d been told everything necessary, and whatever I didn’t know I’d be fed by some pastor or teacher eventually, so I’d felt no urgency for God or the Bible.

I didn’t enjoy church, the people there. What I had enjoyed was being a know-it-all. My church upbringing gave me knowledge, but I wasn’t eager for more back then. Now I thrilled to just to read the Bible!

I know my situation was not unique. In years since I have heard many similar stories from others. Like them, I had heard of a personal relationship with God, with Jesus, but I’d never understood the mechanics of it. My “relationship” with Jesus until this point had been an infrequent monologue – me talking at God as well as hearing about Him from others. Similar to writing a Hollywood star and following their life in the news, I was a fan, not an actual friend, of God. I urge you to evaluate your own situation today!

A.W. Tozer says in his book Voice of a Prophet, “You have a right to be consciously aware of meeting God…

“I charge that in the modern evangelical church we are not consciously aware of a Presence. We are not consciously aware of God. We do not hear His voice; we hear only a recording of His voice. We do not see God’s face; we see only a painting of His face. We hear not the sound of His voice; we hear but an echo of that sound. We are always once removed from God. When we stop looking at a picture of God and begin looking at God; when we stop hearing the echo and hear God’s voice itself; when instead of having God in history we have Him in experience, we will begin to know what Abram knew when he fell on his face before God.”

By early 2016 I had been incarcerated almost 5 years. My parents, who lived nearby, visited me weekly. Retired, they had turned into snowbirds. Deciding Minnesota was no place to be when it’s cold, they had chosen Florida as their new winter home the previous year.

Reluctant to leave me without company, they asked church friends to visit me in their absence. Two wonderful women agreed. I enjoyed getting to know them. My new reading left me excited to share what I was learning! It would not go as I expected. In fact, I would experience many unusual responses to my growing excitement about Jesus soon.

By the end of January I had read much of the New Testament. I was so encouraged by my reading that I started over again. I came to this verse a second time:

¹⁴ The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.” I Corinthians 2:14

I thought nothing of it right away. I believed I did understand spiritual things because other people had shared THEIR understanding. It never occurred to me I had not been personally taught by the Spirit – only men had taught me. I also had no way of knowing if what I had been taught by these men was really from God. It never occurred to me that there was a way to know the difference. I was about to discover many new exciting things!

As I read this verse in I Corinthians 2 now, I thought verse 14 must describe an unsaved person, which was certainly not me. Confirmation bias – an unconscious behavior where a person pays attention to information that confirms their existing beliefs and ignores evidence that points to a different belief, probably prevented me from seeing the truth. I would come to read many things now that would challenge my existing beliefs.

A few weeks later in February I got to the book of I John again. I read for the second time:

“As for you, the anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things and as that anointing is real, not counterfeit—just as it has taught you, remain in him.” I John 2:27

 I sat and thought. It began to dawn on me that I could ask God Himself to teach me, in fact I should. I began to ask Him direct questions often while I read. I also began taking notes as I read.

Growing up I had often heard about “the will of God” and “God’s will for your life.” God’s will had seemed to me to be like fortune telling, which is also elusive and ha