A ‘tiny’ Christian rebellion in college: How one prodigal daughter returned home

By Keela Dee 

I was born and raised in the church, and growing up I always thought that church would be a part of my life. I accepted Jesus into my heart when I was eight. I was a leader in my youth group, and I was never out past midnight, except when the high school band attended an out-of-town football game.

I grew up in Lubbock, a West Texas college town. I had a strong support system of family and friends, I knew all the best places to eat, and I was comfortable. But the year I graduated high school, a lot of things changed. 

With Texas Tech University right there at home, I decided to stay for college, but my parents ended up moving five hours away to be closer to my two older siblings. Then my high school flame of two years broke up with me. 

I was devastated and for the first time, I felt truly alone in my hometown. 

During all the relationship changes, I started the identity-changing, soul-crushing, peer-pressuring madness that is college.

For the first semester of my freshman year, I hardly left my dorm room. I was swirling in a cloud of depression and dealing with all the post-breakup stages of grief: Hoping he would come back, burning all his photos and letters, trying to stay “just friends,” and crying myself to sleep. 

A ‘tiny’ Christian rebellion

Once I entered into the acceptance phase with my ex, I tried looking for other things to satisfy me, and here’s a hint: Jesus wasn’t one of them. 

The church I grew up in didn’t have a college group, so I eventually stopped going. I figured it was about time for me to have a rebellious phase. Just a tiny Christian rebellion to check off my college bucket list. 

So I went dancing and drinking and dating and just put God on the shelf for a while. 

I attended church just a handful of times during college and even got suckered into a Christian college retreat once. I only allowed a minimal amount of opportunities for God to speak to me, but when I did, I heard sermons on Luke 15. 

The first time I heard it, I probably rolled my eyes and barely paid attention. The second time, I waved it off as a coincidence. The fifth time? I started wondering if God was trying to tell me something through the story of the prodigal son.

The more I heard about the father meeting his son on the road after he was estranged for years, the more I realized God wanted me to come back to Him. 

My issue was, I didn’t want God to see who I had become. I didn’t want to face my decision to reject Him for worldly pleasures. 

I was afraid He would be mad or disappointed with me. I was ashamed and thought I had to clean up my act before I could run back into His arms.

Celebrating a daughter’s return home

It wasn’t until I started a relationship with my now-husband that I decided to better myself. Colton and I had been friends since high school, and he had a similar story to mine: growing up a “good kid” and then putting faith to the side during college. 

We were on and off for a while because we each still had some maturing to do. But during the final semester of my undergrad, we decided that if we got together again, we were not going to break up. 

We needed to work on our friendship and get “right with God” to essentially prepare ourselves for marriage. I obviously stopped dating around, we stopped going to parties, we started getting back into the Word, and we found a church home together. 

I finally felt the arms of God wrap around me just like the father and son in Luke 15.

But as I started to grow closer to my Father, it suddenly hit me: I did not need to clean up my act in order to run back to Him. 

In the parable that I heard so many times, the prodigal son did not realize his sinful ways, repent, and then run back home a clean, valued member of society. He came back because he was hungry. He still smelled like pigs.

But once he neared home, his father ran to him and wrapped him in a hug. He celebrated with a fattened calf. 

I’m sure after that party, the father sat his son down and had a loving but firm conversation with him about his actions.

But first, he celebrated. 

That’s what I have to keep in mind, no matter where I am in my walk: God wants me just as I am. He will open His arms and greet me with love even as I continue to struggle with sin. 

God never needed me to “get right” with Him; in fact, I may never be “right” with Him. But I can run toward Him, mess and all, and receive His warm embrace.

Keela Dee is a Christ-follower, wife, writer, Texan, minimalist, and lover of all things nerdy or brewed. Her hope is to love God and others through her “subcreations,” which is a term she got from Tolkien meaning the creations she makes as a subset within God’s primary world. You can find Keela on Instagram and Twitter, and read her blog at kdsubcreations.wordpress.com.