Lacey’s Story

“Because of my personality when I was small, I hated church. I am an introvert. My parents and my elder sister, they are extrovert and they have many roles in church. People in my family kept comparing me to my sister and my parents. They always asked me, “Lacey, why are you so quiet and so shy?” They just think I am weird.

The people in church were kind but sometimes their mindset cannot accept shy people.

When I was small, I began to wonder if God made an error when he created me. I was having these kinds of thoughts. But that didn't make me hate God. I started to suffer from depression when I was in high school. Our education system in Hong Kong is pressurised, and I was supposed to have already figured out what I wanted to be and what I wanted to study at university. I kept trying to live up to my parents' expectations because I wanted to be accepted. However, when I realised that they had no expectations of me, I felt lost.

I don't know why it happened but one day I felt quite depressed, and I was asking God why so many bad things happen. Why should children be killed? Why are there wars? I have not done anything wrong, but people are not accepting me. I have not hurt other people, so why are other people hurting me? Why do no people hear my inner voice? I was quite angry, and I just said to God, “I will not believe in you anymore.”

I went to a camp with other people from university to do some star gazing. I wanted to be an astronomer. We were lying on the grass looking up into the starry sky. I was looking at the star that was really bright and then a voice was coming to my mind, “Look Lacey, there’s a bright star. There are many beautiful beings in the universe, in space, but only on earth has God created humans like me with emotions. Have you ever thought, why?” I thought, “Right, OK, that’s an interesting question. If God created humans, he knew they’d do bad things yet he still created us.” Then I felt perhaps I was being arrogant, that I just didn't understand God's view or God's plan and I am just using my human perspective to see the problem of suffering. God knew I loved stars and he used a star to speak to me. I was around 13 or 14 years old then.

At this point my belief in God became my own belief, not my parents’.  

I was interested in astronomy starting from primary school but developed a rare visual impairment causing double vision in high school. This condition caused me to miss whole lines in multiple-choice questions during multiple science exams for university, resulting in low scores. Also, inspired by my experience that night looking at the stars, I changed to study psychology. And that was quite amazing because studying psychology was like studying my whole life - my true self, my inner voice and who I am. It taught me how to accept myself as an introvert who may not be popular among people.

But there were many religious questions I was not able to resolve, so I decided to study theology as my Masters.  And this also influenced me a lot. It taught me to accept myself. I still struggled with the thought of God making me with many errors, but when I was studying theology I thought, “If God can accept even a murderer, then how come, if I have not hurt any people, why would I not be accepted?”

So, during my study of theology I began to be honest with myself and accept my strengths, and also my weaknesses. Until then I always wanted to hide my weaknesses. Studying theology change me a lot. It made me relax about my weaknesses. I still hate church, but God accepts that. It doesn't mean you have a bad relationship with God. I want to be a person who aligns my thoughts and my behaviour, not somebody who lives in an ivory tower.

At this stage I'm still exploring what my calling is. I've discovered I have strengths in research. Even if I live with depression, I can live a good life. I'm still struggling with the problem of suffering, but in my research I would like to integrate psychology with theology. I now realise that when I didn't embrace my true self, I wasn't truly believing in God who created me. I'm learning to be more patient now, and that if I don't believe in myself then I don't believe in God. Now it's about following my research interests and God's call.

Theology and psychology are very knowledge-based, but you must make that become your own experience that can make you grow, rather than just be stuck in your brain. I want to deal with other people in an honest and sincere way, but I also want to deal with myself like that. I am one of those people who keeps criticising myself but it's like being a two-sided person. I used to think that people in church were two-sided, but now I realise that I can also be two-sided! It makes me be humble.

But I still think many people's belief comes as secondary belief. I mean, for example, belief in what your pastor says, or meeting other people's expectations, rather than fully encountering God yourself. When that happens everything becomes more systematic, more like a business. Just because we gather together doesn't mean that we have closeness to each other or to God. We can be living a lie that we don't realise because there is a good intention. We gather with other people, we study the Bible together, we talk about our lives and how we are in our daily lives, but it can become just like an assignment, you know, like, OK, this week I brought five people to church, so I mark that down. So, people become a task, an object, rather than a human. It can become just a habit. A habit is not a bad thing, but if you lose the human connection then it is.”

As a Christian how do you nurture your own relationship with God and your spirituality?

“Every day I keep having conversations with God. I take a little time to read some Bible verses, and I will keep reading it until I see if I have some questions about it. I will bring up my pressures and what I am facing currently and tell God about it. Some people think I'm crazy, that I'm just talking to the air. But when I am in a depressive mode, I think that emotions can really influence your thoughts and behaviours. But I don’t want my emotions to influence me that much, so I want my thoughts and my behaviour to deceive my mind about my emotions. And so, I talk with God for a while every day. It is accumulatively beneficial. It's like sending out my C.V. for different jobs. I don't get a reply to every one, but every one I send is progress.”