Greetings,
It’s not too often that I meet people and instantly become connected to them. But since I have taken on this journey of pageantry, I have met two amazing women that I connected with instantly. Although our stories are different, there are several similarities within our journey which is why I dedicate this blog to them.
This past weekend I had the opportunity to travel and spend time with these amazing women. When we are together, I love how our conversations are full of laughter, tears, and more laughter. We go from tripping out, to motivating each other, to deep spiritual conversations. Well Friday night, while on the road, we were just sharing our stories about different issues that we have been battling and our future goals. The conversation got so deep that it was still on my heart when I woke up this morning.
Often times, when life is not going the way we want it to go, we become so easily broken and weak in our faith. We began to lose hope, doubt ourselves, or even feel unworthy of God’s promises. But, I’m here to tell you, that there is no need to doubt yourself or your abilities because you are still reaping the harvest in the midst of. The Bible says in 1 Peter 5:10 (AMP) that, “And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace [Who imparts all blessing and favor], Who has called you to His [own] eternal glory in Christ Jesus, will Himself complete and make you what you ought to be, establish and ground you securely, and strengthen, and settle you.” Therefore, you have to go through to get to.
To be transparent, when I started my journey of pageantry my life was great and things were going as I planned. I had returned home from the military, bought a house, graduated college, and started my own business. After becoming Miss Montgomery Plus America 2015, I got a promotion and started working in my desired career field. As it got closer to pageant day, I witnessed my aunt transition from this earthly realm of life; I was administratively withdrawn from grad school; and things just kept going downhill from there. But, in the midst of those downfalls, I became the state titleholder and went on to nationals but yet again I was faced with more tragedies.
Although I felt like a failure at the time, and after listening to my sisters’ stories, I realized that we are not failures. Because things did not go the way that we wanted them to go or because our stories does not sound like the next person’s story, does not mean that we have failed. We as human get so caught up in living to please and impress others that we forget that our purpose to please God and not man. Therefore, God has to take us off our own course to put us back on His course so that we may reach and fulfill our destiny. So, don’t look at suffering as a form of punishment because it’s all apart of His promises.
"Just when the caterpillar thought the world was over, it became a butterfly." -proverb
Remain Faithful and Be Blessed,