09/21/2026
Have you ever wondered if you would ever truly belong?
Martina Keast landed in Canada in 1975. Sixteen years old. A home that never felt steady behind her, a language she barely spoke ahead of her. She translated for her own parents while she was still learning the words herself.
She moved again and again. She never quite fit in anywhere.
Belonging became something to earn. She earned it with silence. She earned it by being useful. She earned it by performing for whoever might let her stay a little longer. That pattern followed her straight into adulthood. She lived in survival mode so long she stopped asking if it was healthy.
Then she hit the choice everyone eventually hits. Keep white-knuckling it, holding everyone and everything as tight as she could. Or let go, and trust God with what she could not control.
She let go. One relationship at a time. One unanswered question at a time. No plan. Just showing up.
Forty years after she landed in Canada, Martina stood at a women's conference in the Northwest Territories. A stranger she had never met placed a coffee cup and a yellow scarf in her hands and welcomed her onto that land. Surrounded by prayer, she believed something she had never let herself believe before.
She belonged.
Romans 5:3-5 says suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope. Martina lived that verse for fifty years before she ever read it.
It takes courage to hand people a story like this one.
If you've ever wondered whether you'd truly belong anywhere, this one's for you.
You can read the rest of Martina's story in Brave Faith, a collection of true stories about trusting God through life's hardest transitions.
https://us.amazon.com/Brave-Faith-Trusting-Through-Transitions/dp/B0HC1FTGNH
