Dusting Off Faith

I never really thought I’d find myself back in church: alone, emotional, and clutching a tissue like it was the last shred of composure I had. But there I was, sitting in the back pew, trying not to cry too loudly during the second hymn.

Over the last few years, I’ve experienced more loss than most people expect to in their twenties. Friends. Family. People I loved and assumed I’d have for decades. Grief like that changes something in you. It strips back the surface-level distractions and makes you look around, wondering what’s actually holding you together.

For a while, I tried to hold it together on my own. I kept busy. I distracted myself. I told myself I was “fine.” But underneath it all, there was a deep ache. Not just sadness, but this sense that I was completely untethered. Like I’d drifted too far from something I hadn’t realised I needed.

And that something was God.

I’d grown up with church in the background, family services, Catholic all-girls school, youth group talks about “purity” that mainly just made everyone squirm, but it had been a long time since I’d really thought about faith on a personal level. Life took over. Uni, work, relationships, trying to figure out who I was and what I believed. God got pushed to the side, quietly and politely, like He’d understand.

It wasn’t a dramatic moment that brought me back. Just a quiet Sunday morning where I felt a pull to go to church. So I went. Alone. No expectations, no friends to hide behind. Just me, God, and a lot of feelings I hadn’t properly processed.

I won’t pretend it wasn’t uncomfortable. I didn’t know any of the songs. I forgot when to stand up. I got emotional, because for the first time in years, I felt something that resembled peace. Something sacred. And it caught me completely off guard.

That service was the beginning of a slow, steady return. I went home, dug out my Bible (which had accumulated a thick layer of dust), and just started reading again. Not from a place of obligation, but curiosity. I wanted to understand who God really is, not the version I’d been handed in childhood, but the real, living God who walks with us through pain, confusion, doubt, and yes, even through grief.

And what I’ve been relearning is this: God’s love is not like ours. It’s not transactional. It’s not performance-based. He doesn’t need us to have it all together before we come to Him. I used to think I had to clean myself up before I could reconnect with God. Now I know He’s the one who does the cleaning. All He asks is that we show up.

Being a Christian woman today comes with its own set of expectations,some cultural, some spiritual, many completely unrealistic. But a high-value woman, in the truest sense, is one who knows her worth isn’t determined by trends, achievements, or how many Bible verses she can quote from memory. It’s found in knowing who she belongs to.

There’s strength in returning to God,not because you’ve got something to prove, but because you’ve got nothing left to carry on your own. There’s beauty in relearning how to pray. In getting it wrong. In asking questions. In realising that faith isn’t about perfection,it’s about relationship.

And let’s be honest, life doesn’t hand us many quiet moments. But those stolen bits of time, whether it’s a ten-minute scroll break or a walk in the cold with a podcast in your ears, can be a nudge. A reminder to reconnect. To come back. To breathe.

If you’re reading this and it’s hitting a nerve, if you’ve been feeling distant from God, or unsure if you’re even allowed to come back, know that you are. There’s no perfect script or right time. Just a choice. One quiet, honest decision to look back in His direction.

He’s not keeping score. He’s not rolling His eyes. He’s been waiting.

And if you’re anything like me: grieving, healing, learning to walk with faith again, you’re not alone. There’s room in the back pew for you too. Just come as you are.