My Childhood Was Very Distressing

I felt abandoned. I moved out at at the age of 16. My life was filled with drinking, smoking, rebellion, and pride… Growing up, my childhood was very distressing. My Mother was in and out of hospitals and had all kinds of problems. My role was to help raise my siblings. My father commissioned me in my late teens to rescue my brother who was living in his car. My father, although gone a lot, gave us memories of summers with grandparents and horses to ride which made things bearable. I still felt somewhat abandoned with home life the way it was and remember having to crawl through the bedroom window to make SOS calls to my Father for being locked in our rooms or problems needing attention. I don’t remember much about my childhood, except the fights in the middle of the night and the time the Sheriff came and locked all four of us kids in the garage and straight jacketed my mother and took her away. I moved out at the age of 16 to run away, living on the streets for three days. I got married to my high school sweetheart very young with baby responsibilities soon after. My life was very much without God. I was miraculously spared from three close calls in car accidents and mishap. Once, I pulled off from the interstate on an exit ramp to put the convertible top up from the rain. I rushed to get quickly back on the highway, only to realize I would have been instantly smashed from an oncoming, fast speeding, semi-truck that was blinded from view by the rain.

I was seeking God, but I still didn’t know why I was here in life and for what purpose. In college, I went to chapel three times a week and drove with a fellow student who exemplified Christ in every way. That was when I decided to give my life to Jesus. The Lord had begun a work, but the seed planted by my friend in college took time to show up. I was living a life of worldliness, unfaithfulness, drinking, smoking, running up debt, and living ‘my’ life. Yet God pursued me. I

really got serious about God after a close call car accident. When my family could not get the answers we had questions to of where we would have ended up that day, we changed churches where they carried Bibles to church and started attending a Bible Study. The difference this time was that we let the Bible get into us, and we began to know all about a Holy God whom we must give an account to.

My life from then until now has displayed so many miraculous ways of deliverance. There is no other meaning on earth why I’m still here. Once, I was so sick, I got down to 88 lbs, was bedridden for three years, almost died twice but then was totally revived. Another time, our family was caught in a burning home, where we all were able to make it out instead of falling through the basement where the fire started despite the couch already being halfway through the floor. On another occasion, we started to go over a railroad track, the windows iced up, and a train horn blared a warning. We did not see it. Then we tried at the last second to stop but slid on the icy road, only to stop inches away from the speeding train. God’s hand was surely upon us.

A person has to ask themselves, ‘At what point do I become radicalized for Jesus, where He is all that matters and the status quo is no longer acceptable?’ For me it was accidentally coming on to a Bible teaching church where the Pastor happened to be preaching a series on how we were in the ‘last of the last of the last days.’ It got my attention, and I stopped to count the cost of where I was at in my life. I had to renounce the new age holistic practices I had gotten myself into so that I could submit myself to a living God and correct the crooked path I was on. This cost me my job, income, and retirement. Even after being gloriously saved, I had very badly fallen from grace. I was looking for something to satisfy, comfort and console but had no idea that it would or could be God and that my life would someday be accountable to Him. I vowed to live for my family but nevertheless there were two divorces, one because of adultery on my part and the other because of ‘mistakes’ in judgement wanting to go the ways of the world. There were twists and turns in my life, to the point I wondered why I was kept alive except to be there for my family. If it were not for the grace, mercy, and love of God I would see my life with nothing but regrets and failure if not covered over with His Mercy.

Now, I see God working mightily through my three children, five grandchildren, and one great grandchild. In looking back, I’m amazed at how badly a sheep (me) can lose its way. Every twist and turn in my life was tainted by pride, selfishness, immorality, wanting my own way, worldliness and sin, even when I purposed to live a ‘good life.’ He truly does leave the 99 to go looking for even one. Jesus is in the business of redemption, restoration, and reconciliation to bring someone back to Him. Only God has that kind of transforming, persevering love. Because of this incredible debt I owe to a never ending Savior who runs after me, I now center my days and moments around the Word of God, worship, and prayer. I have to have Him. My life is simply lived out in a small home with minimal work, social or other activities so as to attend to my disabled adult son. I want more than anything to be pleasing in God’s sight. Who is this Savior and Master and King who loves so unconditionally and unreservedly? I have to know this great love that pulls me towards a Holy yet merciful God. He is my only survival.

Where would I be if not for His great forgiveness of all my sins? My eyes, heart, and spirit have been opened up in a way that I am now willing to follow Him with a fervent hope and longing for the soon return of my Savior which permeates and governs all that I do. I can think of nothing else but have my life so ordered, in everything I do, as to worship Him and be around His Family and His Word 24/7. Nothing else matters. Nothing else satisfies. The Lord will write the last chapter of my life for His Glory.