The Marked Life Blog

So, I recently did a thing…

I released my first eBook, “Through the Turbulence (Prayers from the Diary of a Broken Heart)“.

Though it’s an eBook, it really is more of a raw honest prayer diary.

I never drafted these prayers with the intent to publish them – some of them were far too personal and written in such depths of pain. It was truly my heart’s cry.

After a dramatic deliverance at the end of 2018, my life began turning around completely. I was previously saved, however, the Lord was setting me free from mounds and mounds of subtle deception, depression, anger, hopelessness, religion, and a lot of other unrighteous and oppressive mindsets, heart-sets, and practices.

These prayers were written prior to that deliverance, and over the course of a few years. In the summer of 2019, as I was going through some documents, I came across those prayers. I was overtaken with the heaviness and desperation that laced each page. I barely recognized the writing and it seemed like I almost didn’t recognize that woman.

I knew that my life had changed.

There was freedom, peace, and joy. The drama certainly didn’t take a break, but my focus was on Jesus. I was spending time soaking in prayer and the Word, and I felt Him carrying the weight of my burdens through the new turbulence I faced in 2019. Something I had never really experienced before.

I read prayer by prayer and I felt the Lord showing me CLEARLY the depths of the miry clay that He picked me up out of. I had come to such a point in those prayers, that I was clinging to life spiritually, and at times physically. The enemy had me completely strangled – more strangled than I believed or even realized or understood. There were several things hindering God from having full reign over my life. I list some reasons why God may not move in our lives here.

As I wiped the tears of joy from my eyes, I felt prompted to share. I resisted this a bit – it was far too personal. I sat on it for months and the Holy Spirit showed me which prayers to include and which ones to leave between Him and I.

And so, it began.

In July 2020, I officially published, Through the Turbulence. Pride would have suggested I keep this private part of my life, well, private. And some of our lives are meant to be private indeed. Pride would have lead me to only continue on showcasing the “best” parts of myself – my beauty, success, exquisite entrees, ventures and adventures, etc. Things that would highlight and showcase ME. Things that would point women toward inspiration but would never point them toward the Cross.

God wanted me to reveal the muck.

In doing so, He would resume His rightful place in my life and those around me could only look toward Him…and Him alone.

I believe He also wanted me to stop wishing that all my circumstances would somehow divinely disappear. This type of thinking left me crippled and hopeless – two conditions He never called me to.

The Lord graciously allowed (and still allows) me to travel through the turbulence to:

1. Recognize my weakness and need for Him.
2. Recognize that even as a Believer, I am not exempt from the brokenness of the world.
3. Recognize the power and authority I have been given as an heir with Christ to stand and to persevere and to fight against (and through) spiritual warfare.
4. Become one with Christ in both His victory AND His suffering.

Exposed. Desperate. Gut-Honest vulnerability.

Has pain become your portion? Are you stuck in a dark place? Overwhelmed? Discouraged?

We can reach God exactly where we are at. This book is for every woman who finds herself in a desperate battle to hold on to her faith in God through her trials, concerns, and deep emotional pain.

It is for every Christian woman, who is pressured to hold it together when she really feels like letting it all loose. For every person who feels limited in the scope of their relationship with God, or struggles with giving their darkest burdens to God, envisioning prayer as awkward.

It is for the indifferent person, conditioned to believe that prayer only consists of religious jargon and repetition.

It is for the Believer who feels their relationship with God is mechanical and impersonal.

It is for the person who is crying out on the inside, but may not know how to vocalize it in prayer.

It is for the weary mom, the overworked business woman, the Christian who wants to severe the relationship with the flesh. The uncertain and desperate young woman, the brokenhearted and betrayed.

This common ground, is for you.

Don’t go through the suffering of life to stay the same

Seek God’s transformation through the turbulence. Recognize that there is a refinery in the tribulation. The Lord is so good and so limitless, that even though the fire may shake us, it never shakes Him. He will use that fire to shape and mold you still. I’m so thankful that His strength is made perfect in our weakness!

Here’s to a new journey,

Hannah