The Roar That Raised Me vs. The Lion Who Redeemed Me

There are certain sounds your body never forgets.

For me, fear didn’t start as an abstract concept. It had a voice. It had footsteps. It lived in the walls of a home that was supposed to be safe after my mom passed, but instead became the place where fear learned my name. Living under my aunt and uncle, I didn’t just experience discipline or correction. I experienced intimidation. The kind that makes you small. The kind that teaches you to brace yourself before anything even happens. The kind that rewires how you hear everything.

So when I read 1 Peter 5:8–9, it doesn’t feel distant or symbolic to me. It says to be sober minded and watchful, because the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. That word roaring does something to me. Because I know what it feels like to hear something loud and threatening and feel like you are the target.

But what I’ve been sitting with lately is this tension in Scripture.

Peter describes the enemy as a roaring lion.

John describes Jesus as the Lion of the tribe of Judah.

Two lions. Two roars. Two very different realities.

And if I am being honest, for a long time I responded to every roar the same way. With fear. With shrinking. With silence. Because when you grow up in an environment where intimidation is constant, you don’t stop to ask where the sound is coming from. You just react.

But the enemy has always used what is loud to feel powerful.

A roar does not mean authority. It means intimidation.

And intimidation has been one of his oldest tactics.

When I read Nehemiah 4, I see it so clearly. The people of God are rebuilding something that had been broken, and the opposition doesn’t just attack physically. They speak. They mock. They release words meant to weaken resolve. In verse 3, they say that even if a fox climbed on what they were building, it would break it down. That is not just commentary. That is a word curse. That is an attempt to plant doubt, to make them question the strength of what God told them to rebuild.

I know what that feels like too.

To have words spoken over you that make you question your worth. Your stability. Your ability to stand. Words that don’t leave bruises you can see, but settle deep into how you see yourself.

And if we are not careful, those voices don’t stay external. They become internal. The roar outside becomes an echo inside.

That is how intimidation works. It does not just try to scare you in the moment. It tries to shape your identity over time.

But Peter does not just warn us about the roaring lion. He tells us how to respond. He says to resist him, firm in your faith. Not react. Not run. Resist.

That is a completely different posture.

Because resistance requires recognition.

It requires you to pause and say, this sounds loud, but where is it coming from?

Is this the enemy trying to intimidate me into shrinking back?

Or is this the Lion of Judah, whose voice does not produce fear but authority, not chaos but clarity, not intimidation but identity?

Jesus does not need to intimidate to prove His power.

His voice calls things out of you, not fear into you.

And I am learning, slowly and honestly, that healing has looked like retraining my ears.

Not every loud voice gets my agreement anymore.

Not every threatening tone gets my obedience.

Not every word spoken over me gets to take root.

Because I survived an environment where intimidation was normal, but I refuse to let it remain familiar.

And this is where 1 Peter 5:10 has become deeply personal to me.

It says that after you have suffered a little while, God Himself will restore you, confirm you, strengthen you, and establish you.

For me, that “little while” felt like three long years.

Three years of learning fear.

Three years of surviving what I did not have the power to change.

Three years of hearing roars that made me feel small and unsafe.

But that was not the end of my story.

Because God did exactly what He promised.

He restored me.

He placed me in a home where I was not just tolerated but chosen. Adopted. Covered in a way that felt completely different than what I had known before. He did not just remove me from something. He redeemed what those years tried to take from me. He began to rebuild what intimidation tried to tear down.

And even now, I can see how He has been strengthening me and establishing me, piece by piece.

Not overnight. Not all at once. But faithfully.

The same God who told me to resist is the same God who promised to restore.

So now when I hear the roar, I don’t just think about what I came from.

I remember what I’ve been brought into.

The enemy may still try to sound loud.

He may still try to intimidate.

He may still try to use words to weaken what God is building in me.

But I am not who I was in those years.

I am not trapped in that environment anymore.

And more than that, I am not without covering.

Because there is another Lion.

And His voice does not echo fear.

It establishes me.

So I stay watchful. Not anxious, but aware.

And when the roar comes, I do not shrink like I used to.

I stand.

Not because the sound is gone.

But because I finally know which voice is worth listening to.