Faith Stories with Naomi Reed

“In 1950, I attended a Methodist youth group as a teenager, and I remember being told by the youth group leader that God destroys the wisdom of the wise. I was stunned and I didn’t understand it. The youth group leader was quoting from 1 Corinthians 1:19 and she showed me that verse, but I […]

Warning: This Faith Story contains references to a sexual assault and a subsequent pregnancy. “I grew up in a sheltered, Christian home. My parents took me to church every Sunday. They sent me to a Christian school. We had Christian family friends who we met regularly for meals. I heard a lot about being a […]

“I grew up thinking that I was always in trouble with God. My image of God was that he was a bit scary … and that I wasn’t good enough. It distorted my view of God as ‘Father’.” “I wasn’t actually a naughty child. I was pretty good. But in the early ’70s when I […]

“I was born in Villanuova, in northern Italy. It’s a mountainous area near Lake Garda. I didn’t stay long at school. I got work at the railway, digging. I was really good at digging … and since then, I’ve had 155 jobs. I’ve never been married or driven a car. I came to Australia when […]

“In Tonga, 99 per cent of the people go to church and have a Christian faith. My family was like that. We always went to church.” “In 1960, my grandfather gave the land for the church, right next door to our own house. He gave it for free. He wanted his children and grandchildren and […]

“I’ve had severe, chronic pain for the last 13 years. It’s caused by a combination of health conditions and it affects my whole body. It’s relentless … and impossible to escape – every day and every night the pain is there.” “Sometimes I can’t leave the house, or even leave my bed. I can’t even […]

“For most of my life I was adamant that I would never have anything to do with Christians, or the church.” “My parents were atheists and they didn’t like Christians. They said that church was rubbish and a money-making thing. In our house, it was almost like my father was the god. He had to […]

“I live in Florence, Italy. In 1989, I was doing my final exams at high school. I didn’t know anything about Jesus, back then. But on the last day of my high school exams, I took the bus home from school and it was a really hot day. So I decided to get off the […]

“One day, my husband said to me, ‘I think we’re being called to serve in the Muslim world.’ It was completely out of the blue for me.” “I said, ‘I haven’t had that same revelation.’ I needed to think and pray. We had three small children and we were living ‘the dream’ – renovating our […]

“About 15 years ago, a friend invited me to join a Bible study. I said, ‘No, thanks, that sounds pretty boring. If I was going to read the Bible, I would read the Bible by myself.’ Back then, I wasn’t regularly going to church or reading the Bible. My wife went to church, but I […]

“I was the eldest of five children, and we grew up on a dairy farm. My parents didn’t go to church, but they were happy for us to go along to Sunday school, with a neighbour. I loved it. I loved the Bible stories and I learned the Bible verses … but I don’t think […]

“I can’t pin point a time when I became a Christian. I think I just grew into it. I was born into a dysfunctional family. Dad was an apiarist who later became an alcoholic, and my mother worked two jobs to keep us going. I heard of Jesus mainly as a swear word.” “I had […]

“My sister and I both grew up with a belief in God. We went to church. We believed in Jesus. And from when we were both young, we would talk about prayer. What is prayer? How can we understand it? How does God work through our prayers?” “I remember reading the words of Jesus and […]

“I came from a Hindu family, so after I accepted Christ, I was rejected from my family and my village. Because of that, I couldn’t study… and for a time, I had no work.” “I often wanted to know why. If I had sought God’s will for my life, and if I had responded to […]

“I grew up in Phillip Creek [Northern Territory], in an Aboriginal settlement run by the government. I used to drink milk from the goats and eat bush tucker. And my father, he drove the truck. His country was out west – Jipiranpa, out Willowra way. I went to preschool and Grade One there. But there […]

“When our second son was 15 months old, he started getting bruises. I should have known what it was. With my medical background, I probably did know, but I didn’t want to admit it. He went for tests and the doctor said that he had acute lymphoblastic leukaemia. I was in a state of shock. […]