Ilonka Deaton's inspiring message of hope in Keeping Secrets is
one of victorious life for any wounded heart.
She didn't think she mattered to anyone, much less to God. Life was
little more than a nightmare, a dark narrative that included seduction
and child rape, emotional brutality, and all the countless injustices
that flow in its wake. It began when Ilonka was twelve and didn't end
until she was seventeen. And though the horror was repeated over and
over again, she could tell no one what was happening to her. However
dark our secrets might be, they are never truly idle. They lie to us.
They tell us awful things about ourselves. They shape our thought life
and make us afraid.
It wasn't until Ilonka told the person who would later become her
husband the whole story did liberation come. And it is still coming. In
the hands of a loving God, a God who not only sees but cares and
responds, our nightmares become redemptive tales. Our darkest secrets
show themselves for what they are (and what they are not). Keeping
Secrets is a true story about survival and recovery from the madness of
childhood sexual abuse. And, happily, it is about redemption.
