Is My Story Too Messy for God to Redeem?

Sign up for the Graced Cohort

Listen in for:
• Why I'm leading this cohort now
• Who this is for (and why your story isn’t too messy)
• What I’m asking of you
• All the details about how to join
• How to sign up (and scholarship information)

Click here for show notes.

Watch this episode on YouTube.

Chapters

• 0:00 Grounding With Box Breathing
• 2:33 Welcome And Show Theme
• 3:20 Invitation To The Graced Cohort
• 4:50 Teresa’s Story And The Six Women
• 7:30 Naming Shame And Belonging
• 10:45 Who The Cohort Is For
• 13:20 Study Structure And Weekly Flow

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:00

Well, welcome friends. I am excited for this episode of Beauty in the Brokenness. I know it's the holiday season and things are a bit crazy right now. So before we jump into this episode, I would love to do a quick grounding exercise with you. If you're anything like me, these last few weeks and the next few weeks are going to feel a little bit crazy. And so one of the practices I love to do on a regular basis is box breathing. That's where we we breathe in for four seconds, we hold it for four seconds, and then we have a long, slow exhale. And my hope is that this few moments in your day would just be a little bit grounding, a little bit centering, and will bring a little bit of calm amidst your chaos. So let's go ahead and start with that exercise, shall we? So go ahead and inhale.

SPEAKER_00: 0:59

Hold it and give a long slow exhale.

SPEAKER_01: 1:10

We'll do that three more times. Inhale.

SPEAKER_00: 1:16

Hold it. And exhale. Let's do that again. Inhale. Hold it. Exhale. Last time. Inhale. Hold it. And a long slow exhale.

SPEAKER_01: 1:58

For me, usually by about that third breath, I'm starting to feel my shoulders relax. I'm feel starting to feel a little bit of the tension move out of my body. And I hope that that was just a moment of pause for you during this crazy hectic season. Hey friend, if you've ever wondered how God's word connects with the messy, broken parts of your story, you're in the right place. Welcome to Beauty in the Brokenness, where we have honest conversations about the Bible, our real life struggles, and the hope God brings for healing. I'm your host, Teresa Whiting. And today I am excited to tell you about an opportunity you have to join me this next year as we study Grace together. Today's episode is gonna be a little bit different than usual. I typically have a guest on, or I'm doing a teaching, but this episode is actually an invitation. I'm addressing you, the listener, and inviting you to join me on a journey in 2026. A journey of grace, of restoration, of redemption, a journey of getting to know God's heart in a deeper way. I'm not sure if you're familiar with my story. If you're new here, welcome. Um, you can always go back to episode one where I share my story. But as you may know, I am the author of Graced, How God Redeems and Restores the Broken. And it's a Bible study that, if I'm really honest, I didn't want to write because it's about six women in scripture and how God restored, redeemed, and rescued them from sexual brokenness. And you guys, I didn't want to be the sexual brokenness lady. I didn't want to be talking about this kind of stuff. But as I studied their stories, as I got to know these women like Tamar and Rahab and Bathsheba and the woman at the well and the woman caught in adultery, I kept seeing, like, oh my goodness, their story is not that far off from mine. The heart of God towards these women, his compassion, his grace, his drawing of them and inviting them into his story and inviting them into his family, it amazed me. See, for so long I lived my life with a story of sexual brokenness that I kept silent, that I didn't want anyone to know, that I carried shame over. I remember having thoughts regularly like, if they only knew, I really don't belong. I'm still not good enough. Even though I was a pastor's wife and I was serving in ministry, I felt like I had to keep this certain part of my life a secret. And I have met so many women who feel the same. Women who come up to me maybe after a speaking engagement and they tell me something about their life and they say, you know what? I've never told anyone this. And these are women from 17 to 77 that say these kinds of things. Women that carry stories of brokenness and shame, and because of our culture, or because of what they learned in church, they feel like they have to stay silenced and hidden. And you know, yours might not be a story of sexual brokenness. Maybe your brokenness came in a different way. Maybe it's because of an abortion or because of a divorce, or maybe you've walked through a health crisis or a financial crisis, or your marriage is terrible. I don't know. I do know this. We all live in a broken world, and everybody has something in their life that isn't as it should be because we live after the fall. And so, whatever your form of brokenness may be, there's a space for you at the table. There is a space for you as we study God's word together, as we get to know his heart, we realize this is why Jesus came. It's who he came for, and believe it or not, it's even who he came through. And so I am so excited to announce to you and tell you about an opportunity, an invitation for you to join me in going through grace in 2026. I have partnered with an organization called the Church Hub, and we are going to bring you what we're calling the Graced Cohort. And so for 13 weeks, we're going to meet together. And rather than you just getting the Bible study and doing it on your own, you're going to have an opportunity to be a part of a safe community, of a community of women who will point you to Jesus while holding your hard story. It will be a place of confidentiality, of compassion, of grace. Who is the graced cohort for? Well, it's for you if you have ever had thoughts like I have. Like if they only knew, I'm not good enough. I don't belong. But let me tell you, oh friend, you belong here. This is a place where you will find acceptance, belonging, and compassion. I will say it's not for you if you're looking for just like a kind of a fluffy Bible study and you really don't like digging into scripture, but you just kind of want to read a little thing and say what say your piece. Um, this is more of an in-depth study. It's more of a time for us to dig into God's word together. It's for you if you love Jesus. But you wonder if he really loves you. If you're feeling stuck in your faith, if you're thinking, you know, I know that the Bible says God loves me, but I just wonder like if he really loves me, why did he allow this? If he really loves me, why don't I feel it? It's for you if you've got questions, more questions than answers. And listen, I'm not promising that I'm here to give you answers. Together, we're gonna bring our questions to Jesus, we're gonna bring our questions to Scripture. And we may or may not get answers, but my prayer is that what we do get is a deeper insight into God's heart. It's for you if you've ever felt like I'm not quite sure that God can redeem or restore this. You know, the stories in Scripture are so powerful. I love the verse that says, I am the Lord. Is anything too difficult for me? And of course, that's a rhetorical question. The answer is no. No, there's nothing too difficult for him to redeem and restore. Maybe you have had similar thoughts to mine of if they only knew I don't belong, I'm not good enough. All of those things that really that's just shame, shame that has been spoken over us, maybe, maybe by the enemy of our souls, maybe by people in our lives, often by our own self-talk. If that's you, this study is for you. I want you to know that we are not here to fix one another. We are here to fix our eyes on Jesus and to point one another to Jesus. We're here to hold one another's sacred stories with confidence, with compassion, and with a heart of tenderness toward one another. This study is designed to bring you closer to the heart of God. That's why we study grace. It's not so we can fill our heads with more Bible knowledge, it's so that we can see God's heart and get to know him better. It's to deepen that relationship that we have with him. If you're hungry to dig deep into God's word and to study and to get to know him better, this cohort is for you because together we will dig into the scripture just to tell you a little bit of how grace is set up. Each week begins with a creative retelling of the woman's story. So day one, we kind of dive under her skin. We say, what is it like to be Tamar? What was it like to be Rahab or Bathsheba or the woman at the well? Day two, we kind of dig deep into the themes that she is, um, that this woman's story is bringing out. Day three, there's a little bit of a shift, and we say, okay, we've looked at her story and we've looked at some of these themes. And so, how do those themes show up in my life? Like, where in my life do I see these themes reflected? Day four is always a psalm. And so many women who have gone through grace have told me that they love day four because the psalms reveal the heart of God, they reveal his tenderness, his compassion. They put words to our feelings, whether those are words of pain or words of praise, they give voice to the things that are going on inside us, our emotions and our thoughts. And then day five always ends with a deep dive into the heart of God. See, God is the hero of every story. Your story, my story, the stories of the women in scripture. God is the hero. And so what do we learn about God? In every story, we see different facets of his heart, different aspects of his character. And you might be thinking, oh, Teresa, I don't know. My story's a little too much. You know, I thought that for so long. But the fact is, no story is too much. No one is too far gone for Jesus to redeem and restore. This is why he came to this earth and walked this earth. This is why he went to the cross was for all of our broken stories. And you might be thinking, well, this is a lot. What if I don't keep up? You know, I've not really done a Bible study before. This is the place for you, my friend, because uh, we're gonna take two full weeks to go through each lesson. You might be feeling uncomfortable, like, oh, I'm not ready to share my story. Well, the good news is you don't have to. This study is not so much about my story or your story, it's about the heart of God. It's about the stories of these women in scripture and how they reveal God's power to redeem and restore. The study allows us to dig deep into God's word and to get to know him better. My heart is that this would be a healing community for you. See, it's fine and good to study scripture on your loan, but when you join a community of other women, you have the opportunity to be seen and known and loved and encouraged and empowered and strengthened in your walk with God, not just because of who you are and what you've learned, but as you walk alongside others. If your heart is longing, if you are looking for a Bible study for 2026, I want to encourage you. I want to invite you to join me and a group of other women. We're keeping these cohorts small, we're capping them at 12 women. We're gonna meet on Tuesdays. You can choose morning or evening. We're gonna meet for two hours, and together we're gonna share what God is showing us about Himself. We're gonna share what we're learning about these women in Scripture and how God is meeting us in his word. There is a cost to join the cohort, but please know that if cost is prohibitive for you, just shoot me an email. I have a 100% scholarship that we will offer to any woman. We do not want cost to be the reason that anyone stays out. So I hope you will join me. If this sounds good to you, maybe God is stirring in your heart. Maybe you're thinking this might be something for me. I would love for you to join the cohort. As always, I will have links in the show notes. I uh if you're part of my Beauty in the Brokenness community on Substack, I would have sent you an email with links for you to join the cohort. But whether or not you decide to join the Graced Cohort, I just want to thank you for being here, for listening, for being the kind of person who shows up for these conversations. We don't have the easiest conversations on this podcast. Sometimes they're tricky, sometimes they're deep. Um and so the fact that you show up week after week means so much to me. I am so thankful for you. I'm grateful that you're here. And I'm gonna be signing off for the rest of the year. Um, I know we only have a couple weeks left, but I'm gonna be spending the next few weeks with my family. And I hope that you are doing the same that you have, that over these next couple weeks you find or you make time to be refreshed and restored, to celebrate Jesus coming to the earth as Emmanuel, God with us. The heart of God on display, walking the earth. I pray that during this season you sense his nearness, you feel his grace, you know his presence in ways that are deeper than you have before. So thanks for hanging out with me today on Beauty and the Brokennest. To find everything I mentioned on the episode, go to TeresaWhiting.com slash listen to find all the show notes. In closing, I want to leave you with this prayer from number six, 24 to 26. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you. The Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.