If someone were to ask me for one word to describe my high school church experience, I would say,
“T-shirt.”
Let me explain.
My small group is somewhat infamous for having wildly chaotic group times. We laugh together, cry together, yell at each other, and stare at each other. Were we ever really on topic? Rarely. I think it would take the hands and toes of every girl in my group to count the times my leaders have pulled a hood over their head or begged us to “lock in.”
I think it all started with our leaders, Elexa and Lauren, who were definitely tired of us not paying attention. As adults with much more life experience, they always had significant takeaways from the night’s message and used every opportunity to guide us in our baby faiths. When one of them would drop a “Jesus bar,” which we define as a significant statement about the character of God phrased poetically like a line in a song, we started calling them out as “T-shirts,” meaning that the phrases deserved to be printed on a T-shirt. This morphed over time, and eventually every stupid thing that fell out of our mouths made it onto our never-ending T-shirt list.
This list has been growing over the past four years. As we have grown into women, it has grown into an iPhone storage nightmare. We often take the time to go back through the list and acknowledge our favorite quotes. Nothing makes me laugh quite like my friends’ best and worst moments.
Looking back, these moments were doing something deeper than just making us laugh. They were slowly chipping away at the walls we built around ourselves. Growing up seeing these girls every Wednesday night, I always viewed them as “church friends.” While I don’t think it is the worst label, it definitely impacted how I communicated with them. I thought that they were all perfect. That they didn’t think like I did. They didn’t feel like I did. They didn’t sin like I did. Over time, I started to believe that no one would like me if I were honest. I could never come clean.
Big surprise: I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. We all thought that the rest of the group was being honest, but no one ever really said what they were going through.
Until this July. We got to attend CIY Move together one last time. And the walls finally came down. Circled up in an empty parking lot, we aired out the things we had kept hidden. We confessed the secret struggles, the doubts, and the sins we thought would make others walk away. But instead of pushing each other away, we pulled in closer.
I think one of Satan’s favorite tricks is to convince us that we are alone. He whispers lies in our ears, warps our identities into ones rooted in deeds instead of grace, and isolates us. He forces us into an echo chamber of our own sin until our eardrums feel like they are gonna explode. Until we believe that we are truly unlovable, unforgivable, and untouchable.
But, God.
God loves us even in our sin. God forgives us over and over. God always pursues us.
Satan says that confession is condemnation; God says confession is freedom.
Satan says we are isolated and alone; God says we are known and loved.
So, as my friends and I head in separate directions, as we are isolated in new towns and schools, we can rest in the fact that we are never truly alone. God is always with us, and we carry a piece of each other with us, too. And on the days when the isolation feels a little too loud, I know exactly what to do. I’ll open my notes app, scroll through a never-ending list of “T-shirts,” and remember exactly who I am.
Top 5 “T-shirt” Quotes
Metaphorically, I’m a horse.
All the other girls have asthma, and they still beat me running laps.
Journal, I’ll write tomorrow.
When Mark speaks, it makes me patriotic. USA! USA!
NASA is turning off gravity?
Sadie Dodson
Sadie grew up here at Christ’s Church and after graduating this May, she will be attending Ozark Christian College to study Worship Ministry.
Sadie is pictured here with her D•group at CIY MOVE 2026.
