Kelly Lester grew up in a Christian home, but having experienced abuse, she chose a rebellious path. Her family did not give up on her though, and eventually God delivered her from her wrong choices in life.
A pastor’s daughter
People expected a lot from Kelly as a daughter of a pastor. She had always walked straight and narrow, and she somehow lived up to the expectation. She was a budding tennis star, top in the class and was bound for college. Her goal was to not disappoint her parents, which led her to feel the same way towards God. So, naturally she grew up having this fear of disappointing God.
However, her efforts of keeping the image failed as a result of an incident that she had no control over. At 3 years old, she was molested, and though she has little memory of it, it robbed her of her innocence. Then in freshman year, she did the unthinkable. She snuck out of the house to go to a party. There, she started making out with an older boy who forced her to have sex. Kelly refused and tried to fight back, but she ended up being raped. Too scared to tell her parents about it, she confided in their youth pastor. Instead of being met with sympathy, she was blamed for sneaking out. That’s when Kelly got angry and decided to walk away from God.
The rebellious path
At 15, she got pregnant, but she decided to have an abortion in an effort to save face and not disappoint her parents. She thought that once she got rid of the baby, that would be all there was to it. She didn’t think about the anger, guilt, and shame that would come after. The abortion dramatically changed her from being a rebel to completely going off the deep end.
She began partying and all the other things in her life like tennis and college plans were set aside. After graduation, she got addicted to drugs and alcohol and had three more abortions. On top of that, she lived with violent men who would beat her up. She was equally violent and with all that had happened to her, she truly felt like she deserved it.
The turning point
Things started to change for Kelly when she was around 27 years old. She called her father to come pick her up after having another violent fight with her boyfriend. Apparently, two days before she came home, she was almost killed by her boyfriend who tried to hit her in the head with a two by four, but her life was spared when he suddenly stopped.
Kelly tried to lie about what happened to her, but her father looked at her and said, “Kelly, two nights ago, I was asleep, and I was woken up in the middle of the night by the Lord. And I had a vision of you laying dead on the floor with your head split wide open. And so I began to pray.”
It was at that moment that Kelly realized her life was spared because of her father’s prayers. She later on started going back to church while living with her parents, and in one of the sermons that she attended, she heard God say, “If you follow me, I will make beauty from ashes.”
She tried to question God how it could be possible with everything that she did in the past. God just kept repeating what He said to her. Out of desperation, she ran to the altar, broke down and asked for forgiveness, begging God to save her.
Redemption and healing
God delivered her from her old life and through prayers, reading the bible, and support from family and friends, she started to find healing. God replaced all the lies she believed in with the truth from the Bible. Today, she is happily married and is a mother of six. She has forgiven herself for the abortions and has been sharing her story all over the nation, hoping to impart God’s love to those who are going through the same thing that she went through.
