Growing Up a Preacher’s Daughter: Finding God Outside the Church

I grew up a preacher’s daughter.

Which means I saw it all. Not just the sermons. Not just the altar calls. I saw the back rooms. The drama. The politics. The gossip whispered between hymns. I saw the way Christians could be some of the meanest people to each other the judging, cutting, tearing down in the name of “truth.”

I saw the racism. The classism. The abuse of power. And then Sunday morning would come. Families would file in, faces polished, shoes shined, cars parked neatly outside. And we’d all sit together, singing Oceans, or Amazing Grace, or The Goodness of God , knowing full well the pain, the secrets, the weight each home carried back into the pews.

That shaped me. It made me allergic to inauthenticity. It’s probably why I refuse to be fake now. I live with this black-and-white rule: I’d rather be raw, even disruptive, than polished and false.

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Wrestling with Faith

Here’s my tension: I love Christ. I know Him. I talk to Him. I depend on Him.

And yet, I struggle to talk openly about my faith because I’m not perfect. Because I cuss - honestly, I use the F-word like a comma. Because I wrestle with my own humanity every single day.

And sometimes I’m afraid people will point and say, “She doesn’t look like Christ. I don’t see the fruit in her.” Perhaps on some days, they’d be right. But fruit isn’t instant. It has grown over time, through pruning and struggle.

If I waited until my life looked picture-perfect to talk about God, my voice and my story would never be told.

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Why David Changed My Mind

When I was younger, I couldn’t stand David.

The man was a murderer. An adulterer. A failed father. He didn’t even defend his own daughter. And yet, in Acts 13:22, God calls him “a man after My own heart, who will do all My will.”

How could that be?

It wasn’t perfection. It was pursuit.

At his weakest moment , broken, exposed, ashamed - David sought God. And at his highest moment, crowned in the palace - David sought God. Whether he was tearing his clothes in grief, pouring ashes on his head, or writing psalms in the quiet, David turned toward God again and again.

Romans 11:29 says, “The gifts and the calling of God are without repentance.” When God puts something in you: His anointing, His purpose, His gift, He doesn’t take it back when you fail.

David failed spectacularly. But he repented fully. And he never stopped searching for God. That’s why God loved him so deeply. That’s why he was chosen. Not because he got it right, but because when he got it wrong, he came back.

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My Truth

That’s where I see myself.

I am not perfect. I don’t always look like “church.” I don’t fit the mold of what a preacher’s daughter is “supposed” to be. I am messy. I am flawed. I battle my own reality: my humanness, my profanity, the parts of me that make me feel like I can’t speak about God.

But like David, I keep coming back. I keep pursuing. I keep showing up, raw and unfiltered. And I believe that’s what God is looking for.

And here’s something we as Christians need to stop doing: making people feel like their sin separates them from God. That’s not even biblical.

Romans 8:38–39 says: “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Nothing. Not your sin. Not your past. Not your profanity. Not your humanity. Nothing can separate you from the love of God.

So if someone told you you’re too broken, too messy, too far gone - they lied. God isn’t asking you to be flawless. He’s asking you to be faithful. To keep coming back. To keep turning your face toward Him.

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Hypocrisy vs. Humanity

It’s not hypocrisy to love God and still fail. That’s just being human.

Hypocrisy is pretending you don’t fail. Acting like you’ve got it all together when you don’t. And I refuse to live like that.

When I lived on the street, I found more comfort in the broken honesty of people who had nothing than I ever did in the polished faces of church folk.

Because on the street, people lived their truth out loud. No masks. No Sunday costumes. Just real.

And strangely, I met Christ there. In the rawness. In the truth-telling. In the humility of people who had nothing to hide.

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Stepping Out

So this is me, stepping out of my comfort zone, speaking about my faith openly. Not because I’ve arrived. Not because I’m spotless. But because I know Christ meets me in my mess.

Like David, I am after God’s heart. Not because I’m perfect, but because I keep coming back.

And maybe that’s what I’m supposed to say to you: stop waiting until you’re polished to show up before God. Stop waiting until you feel worthy. Stop hiding because you cussed too much, or fell too hard, or doubted too long.

If you wait for perfection, your story may never be told.

Show up messy. Show up broken. Show up with the ashes still on your head.

Because God doesn’t want the performance, he wants your heart.

Listen to the, Faith, Failure, and Being Real podcast episode, here.