The Grace Awakening

A Story of Faith and Building Bridges Written by Lenee Fuelling

As a child, I had a recurring dream. Floating horizontally midair, I could see my limbs hovering in segments nearby, away from my body. My arms and legs were slowly returning to my torso, my feet and hands following. This strange but gentle process repeated every dream, always ending with a peaceful sense of anticipating completion. 

Decades later, I’d realize that this dream foreshadowed a longing of my heart for us —all of us—to know communion with God and each other through Christ. Connected to this passion, I co-write Bible studies for Multiply Goodness, an organization that aims to empower women to love God’s word and to foster intentional friendships among people who hold different faith beliefs. In Utah, where I live, this primarily translates into relationships between members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and traditional Christians. Engaging in the Multiply Goodness community has been a wonderful experience, though my journey to this point includes overcoming much shame and religious judgment from my past.

I can trace shame back to when I was a little girl running wild and free, collecting burrs in my hair while picking raspberries, and catching sunfish from our dock. I had exuberant confidence and an ambitious imagination. Late one afternoon, I spontaneously composed a song and, self-accompanied by my colorful xylophone, sang the passionate lyrics at the top of my lungs. From another room, my father bellowed, “Lenee, be quiet!” I now recognize that a parent should be able to have some peace in their own house, but back then, it was unintentionally crushing. I felt embarrassed—and shame slyly introduced itself to my soul. 

Around that time, I’d often sit by my grandma in a church that highly valued the spiritual gift of speaking in tongues, which they perceived as a sign of eternal salvation. Surrounded by a sea of uplifted, foreign-sounding voices, I would softly pray aloud from my heart. But only English ever came out. Religious judgment chided me, “It’s so obvious you aren’t saved.” Then shame chimed in, “Yeah, you certainly don’t have enough faith—just be quiet!” 

Later, in my teens and twenties, I palpably experienced God’s love through serving and loving people around me. Even so, much of what I believed about God and others was shaped by a judgmental paradigm of my religious culture. Fear that someone was “going to hell” unless they converted to Christianity in my religion’s specific way often commingled with the gospel message. An “us versus them” or “team” mentality naturally arose around people of different faith traditions. In it all, I unwittingly adopted self-righteousness, a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Still, God pursued my heart. Sensing an inner calling from God, my husband and I moved with our infant son from Michigan to Utah in 2007 to help plant a nondenominational Christian church. For us, this was a huge leap of faith and a growing experience. Our Utah congregation’s heart sought to welcome people with open arms and to foster a culture of seeking Christ together. At the same time, an actively reinforced defensive religious wall seemed to exist between Utah’s Latter-day Saint and traditional Christian communities. Honoring this cultural wall, I continued my fervent faith walk, content within my own faith community. 

I may have stayed this way forever had it not been for a further awakening to God’s voice in prayer through the turmoil of experiencing infertility issues. The painful cycle of hope crushed by disappointment—on repeat for 84 months, and punctuated by three miscarriages—devoured my soul. I struggled with bitterness against God, others, and myself. I was tormented by thoughts of being cursed, punished for my past, not enough, rejected, unloved, unseen, unfit, and barren. So much shame.

I had tried to have enough faith, to love well, and to live righteously. Exhausted, I stopped striving to be a “good Christian.” I didn’t trust God’s goodness and couldn’t feel God’s love.

During my final miscarriage, I was a wreck. Once again, I was a carrier of death. As I sat sobbing in my shower, an image emerged in my mind’s eye. I saw grief squeezing my soul dry like a twisted sponge, wringing out the last ounces of my rebellion against God’s goodness. I sensed God’s presence deep within like a bubbling spring, pushing death and despair up and out. As the sponge untwisted, absorbing fresh Holy Spirit water, I sensed God saying, “I’m redeeming every cell of your body and soul. Feel my new life—soak it in. I’m redeeming your suffering. My heart aches to redeem—I endured all types of pain and suffering for you as my prize, Lenee. And I am your prize, my child—press on! I am teaching you this truth!”

That awful miscarriage was a turning point. It was like a veil lifted to reveal more fully what Jesus believed about me and life. The Holy Spirit worked through my painful wrestling process to shine light in a deep soul wound I didn’t know existed, to heal my broken trust. Fragmented parts of myself reintegrated as I received God’s heart for me as truly beloved, disarming shame’s power. I could finally believe that God is good in all circumstances. 

Ten years later, God continues to use my wrestling to activate Christ’s grace in and through me. I love that spiritual formation is a lifelong process. Mine includes a growing fascination with how the mystery of Christ’s grace comes alive in community. My heart soars in cross-denominational Christian worship gatherings and in Multiply Goodness events, as we experience God’s presence communally. Developing deeper spiritual friendships with Latter-day Saints has been a balm to my soul and is helping heal my residual religious judgment.

For example, last year my Multiply Goodness small group was talking about the relatively recent shift of openness between Latter-day Saints and traditional Christians, in contrast to the religious mistrust we had all historically encountered. Tears welling, a friend wondered if this mistrust was a multi-generational effect of the tremendous maltreatment faced by the first Latter-day Saints, with violence perpetrated even against women and children. Survival necessitated self-protection. Defenseless, we sat silent and vulnerable in the Spirit’s presence.

Throughout the whole next day I prayed and wrestled. The idea of religious intergenerational trauma was new to me. I’d never considered religious division as a spiritual seminal wound before. I thought about the cruel responses by some traditional Christians, in the name of God, during the establishment of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. My heart filled my throat as God’s compassion in me grew. 

Simultaneously, the Spirit started highlighting my own self-righteous judgment. Initially I resisted, “God, I didn’t personally persecute anyone. Other Christians generations ago passively witnessed or did those atrocious things!” And I sensed the response, “That’s technically true, but what about the spiritually defensive posture you’ve maintained toward Latter-day Saints until, by grace, just recently?” Oh . . . ugh. 

And then gently, with laser-beam precision, there was more. “You know, Lenee, my body of Christ spans all generations, so you are actually an integral part of the same body that responded in such non-loving ways, and that often still defends a judgmental attitude.” Whoa . . . another veil over the eyes of my heart lifted. I dropped to my knees. “Oh Lord, have mercy on me! And on all of us!” God’s forgiveness, mercy’s womb, reunited my heart with the relationship of Love that invites all nations from all generations to engage. 

I began to see how Jesus Christ as the “door” of John 10 was not exclusive; but instead He embodied and revealed the gracious way through all our defensive walls, fractures, and trauma—into radical love. Through Christ, we all belong in God’s diverse spiritual family and release  the love and light of God’s kingdom. Our collective participation in Christ’s lineage by faith grows our unity of experiential “knowledge of the Son of God” (Ephesians 4:13 KJV), who meets us wherever we are, to walk with us into truth and healing. 

The Holy Spirit is doing a profound work of reconciliation right now. Like notes of a supernaturally resplendent xylophone, we can lift a new sound of worship with our lives as we intentionally love each other. In this harmony, Christ will restore what shame, self-righteousness, and religious judgment have stolen from our faith communities for so long. 

As I reflect back to my childhood dream, I believe that grace summoned and empowered the separated parts of myself that had agreed with shame and judgment to return to my beloved wholeness, renewing my vision and voice. I now sing a new song of faith about discovering the “incomparable riches of [God’s] grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:7 NIV) as our diverse faith communities come to behold Christ and transform together. And I’m filled with a peaceful sense as I anticipate continuing completion, this time as part of a healing body of Christ that spans all time and space. Maturing, as whole and beloved.